Hyoga scenic base

A bit of a special thingy I have gotten my hands on recently, namely a special, unofficial, scenic base for the bronze Cygbus saint, Hyoga.

Hard to find and bloody expensive, I managed to snatch one of eBay for less then 50 dollars because it had a snapped off wing.  No problem for a wargamer, as the material of the statuette is the go around polystone material, which is easily superglued, especcially with a `clean` break like this one, and a bit of skull white later the crack is barely visible.

Only reason that it can be seen on the picture is because, well, the camera intensifies and contrasts it all a bit, but it looks awesome in my cabinet.

You also don`t want to drop this thing on your foot, it weighs about 4 kilo`s...

Al`eeha, Hashut's Chosen - Brush Slave League round 5

So, another month of the painting contest gone by, and a second victory claimed, as seen here.  This round was a bonus round, and the theme was `Commander and Attendants`.

I turned to the models mostly from the heritage I posted about a few months earlier, the collection of Hashut`s Chosen, and picked her conversion of a female sorcerer, patched it up with some green stuff and a new weapon, and a fresh paintjob.  As ger attendants, the first was her Bull Centaur hero conversion made from Archaon`s horse and a Minotaur, detailed with some 40k pieces like a door for a shield and such.
The second, the musician, was a Zonk-cast.  This is a very special set of models that I posess, as it seemed the caster is a scammer picking on forums as a modus operandi to supply to moderators and `famous` collectors, then takes orders and payment to never deliver, so be aware if you see this person on forums!!!  The whole discussion is still to be found somewhere on the CDO forum, just do a quick search for it but don`t be taken aghast... it seemed to be pretty ugly and I kiss my hands I`m apparently considered a `famous collector`.

So here are some more pictures of the models:

Al`eeha, Hashut`s Chosen

Minotaur Hero / Bodyguard

`Zonk-cast` Musician

 

Is this art?

Something completely different for once.  One of the things that relaxes my mind incredibly is a trip to the local Zoo in Antwerp.  Normally, as a membership holder, I hop in there for half an hour when it`s busy at work, as my office is located 500 meters or so from the zoo to clear my mind during lunch.

Today I went there with the lad and my girlfriend, her parents, her sister and the two (and a half, as it`s still in the tummy) kids.  Rainy weather but heck, the peace and quiet is great to load up the batteries and I took some snapshots with my cellphone:

Yes, I love owls, they have always been my favourite animal.

When it rains, whatever spot is great to hide from it, even when your a duck...

Hobgoblin Kharash Unit

When I first downloaded the unofficial Warhammer Armies: Hobgoblins army book, one of the units I definitly wanted to include in the budding force was a large block of Kharash, or slave units.  Planned for the 500 point tournament last week, I failed to complete the army in time, but that doesn`t mean I`m not going to keep building one.

There are better fates in life then being caught in a slave raid by a Hobgoblin tribe.  Tens of thousands of slaves are labored to death in the fields of the Eastern Steppes, and they are the lucky ones.  Many are traded off to the Dawi Zharr to toil in the forges of Zharr Nagrund and end up as sacrifices to Hashut very soonish. 
But when the tribes go to war, they gather all their slaves together in large blocks and herd them onto the enemy lines, to soak up the enemies missile fire and confuse their ranks, in an utter disregard of life.  Think a bit of `Operation Follow the blackie` from the South Park movie...

But these human shields are also great opportunities for doing something with excess models in your collection.  When I first tried to decide what to use, I was looking at a bag of 75+ Foundry Dark Age models and a heap of Curtsey`s chinese troops I still have lying around.  However, considering their `value` I soon decided against that and keep those models aside to trade off left or right.
Then I found some old 4th edition metal zombies (8 or so) and saw an idea... if I `camouflage painted` those models, in which the wounds and all where painted over as normal flesh, one would see ot zombies, but very scruffy, unhealthy looking humans.

And I can keep my hordes of greenskins to make the still traditional Ravening Hordes list `slave troops` of Orcs and Goblins.

I also had a set of 30 Mantic zombies from the not to be planned Superhero campaign, which left with Creepy Corridor Andy to places unknown, and the bulk of the force was decided upon.  It was about to be numbering 50 models strong, knocking me only back 100 points and not causing Panic in Hobgoblin units when they fled, ideal sacrificial blocks in other words.

Filling up the unit with some unit fillers, the first of two 50 man units as such was created.  For the second one I`m slow and steadily adding models to it, as I build that one using a model each time of the opponent beaten by my Chaos Dwarfs (in whatever game I field them, being it WFB, BB, HOTT or something else) since 2012, so currently it numbers 7 models (out of 6 WFB and 6 BB games).

For the unit fillers, I in the end placed three in them, namely an Ogre they caught on a raid somewhere, an old Shadow Lands `Spirit of Man` and a certain yellow rodent that farts electricity... and I so wanted to include Pikachu in my forces one way or another for sheer annoyance factor for my opponents hehehe.

15mm K`daai and Destroyer

One of the project I`m still wanting to complete this year is a 24 points force for use in Hordes of the Things, in scale 15mm.  The iniatial wood elf plan was exchanged for a force of my one true love, the Chaos Dwarfs, and since then I`ve been scouring and ordering from various manufacturers for suitable models in (evil) dwarven ranges.

Not a simple task, and the force will also host a substantial part of greenskin slaves to bulk out and because those models are far more frequent to find then suitable dwai zharr, but the first models I painted up and based today are the K`daai and their Destroyer equivalent, which will be used as a Behemoth and a set of monsters (the large troll etc entry in the HOTT book).

The K`daai, of which I based two on a single base, are fire genies from the Magister Militum range, while the Destroyer is a fire elemental from 15mm.co.uk, both aquired at past Salute.

The Great Tournament for Small Armies

And so the first of July is upon us, and the Great Tournament for Small Armies at the Tin Soldiers of Antwerp has taken place.


Organised by Patrick of Nelson`s Revenge, the set up was to have a relaxed afternoon and battling it out with small forces of 500 points.  As told in the posts of earlier this week, I entered with a Chaos Dwarf force from the Ravening Hordes list, and you know what they say about old foxes...

Victory conditions where simple, with 3 / 1 / 0 points for win / draw / loss, and VPs for tie-breakers.  No additional points where awarded for massacres and all, as in those small scale fast paced battles one break test decides as good as the whole game with no retaliation possible.

In the end, 12 participants turned up, as with the start of the holidays and the first decent weather in months in Belgium, half a dozen had family matters to attend.

Round 1: Hannes - Orcs and Goblins

Facing me in the first round are the goblin horde of Hannes, numbering over 100 models consisting of a unit of goblin archers, two large hordes of night goblins, a level 1 shaman, a goblin hero and a battle standard bearer.  No problem, if I tackle this tactically, me tremble will keep the army from charging before turn 4 and hopefully the blunderbusses will decimate the units below fighting ability.

The plan worked perfectly, losing only the cannon after a redirected charge.  The warriors broke one of the large blocks, and the busses decimated the one with the characters in, but not breaking them unfortunatly in the end or it would be an even bigger win.

Result: 120 - 110 victory


Round 2: Kenneth - Chaos Dwarfs

Intresting here, as it would mean a battle between the Legion list vs the Ravening list.  We played to a gentlemen`s agreement, as Chaos Dwarfs are about the only race in the Warhammer world out to dominate the rest of the Old World instead of scheming and backstabbing each other, and in this spirit the battle was fought.
The special scenario meant this was the round where lots of VPs could be gained as a slain general meant another additional 100 VPs and units yielded an extra +50%, and result near the 1000 VPs rolled in.
He fielded a small block of 10 warriors, a block of 10 Fireglaives, a Demonsmith and the Helshrieker Missile Launcher.

Not so in the bid for Dawi Zharr domination.  We both lost exactly 5 models, each losing 2 missile troops due to firing at each other (his Fireglaives being neutralised most of the battle by the tremble).  He lost a further 3 due to moving into the Venemous Ticket, I due to the magic that caused his smith to lose a level and forget his only spell, Fireball.

Nothing died, no points where scored, and the two Chaos Dwarf forces where ex aquo at 4 points and +10 VPs total both.  Only two forces at that point still had the full score, and as those had to face each other to decide the winner, if we both won the podium would be filled by... the rarest army in the history of Warhammer tournaments!

Result: 0 - 0 draw

Round 3: Kristof - High Elves

The clubs top player as my final opponent, this would be hard... he fielded a small unit of 5 Swordmasters, a unit of Phoenix guard with hero and a unit of Sea Guard.  But no wizard, so this battle would be a feast of Fireballs I hoped

The initial stage saw the Swordmasters all wiped out bar one and the fire of Earthshaker and Blunderbusses reduce to Phoenix Guard to a single rank.  Then I was charged by both these units, and managed to lose the combat by one, even with my ranks... and broke!  Luckily the Phoenix Guard didn`t catch me or it would all have been over, even though I had killed the last Swordsmaster so he only had a single pursuer unit!

I rallied and a 3d6 Irresistible Fireball and a Blunderbuss volley reduced my sorcerer to a level 0 powerless mage, but his more importantly his Phoenix Guard to just the hero and the standard bearer.  I decided NOT to try and kill the last Guard, as that way they could only rally on double one and as such the hero was dragged of the field. 

The last unit hasn`t been a thread as they only managed to losen one volley while not trembling by the `shaker, and had been reduced to only 5 models.  Unfortunatly the scenario special rule of capturing a frog (the red base) eluded me by 1 inch for a further 150 VPs.

Result: 456 - 0 victory

Unit of the Tournament: no doubt my Earthshaker.  The mighty gun might have only killed 5 models over the whole tournament, the good old earthquake effect made sure I wasn`t charged early on, was virtually free of opposing missile fire and the one war machine I did face only fired 3 out of 6 turns when not caught in the aftershake.

I learned the plan worked, the other Chaos Dwarf player had also won his game, and even though he beat me on amount of VP`s, this meant Hashut claimed spots 2 AND 3 of the tournament.

Allow me now to present the full results of the day

Prices where there for the first three finishers, the painting competitition best painted army (not included in the grand total) and a red lantern for the player managing to end last.

First off, the artistic side of things, the Painting competition, inwhich a maximum of 110 points could have been earned

1. Jo - Dwarves: 100 points

2. Tomsche - Chaos Dwarfs: 93 points

3. Kristof - High Elves: 86 points

4. Kenneth - Dark Elves: 85 points

5. David - Halflings: 84 points

5. Yannis - Orcs and Goblins: 84 points

7. Mike - Skaven: 80 points

8. Hannes - Orcs and Goblins: 79 points

9. Lily - Night Goblins: 75 points

10. Sven - Norse: 68 points

11. Patrick - Demons of Chaos: 68 points

12. Kenneth - Chaos Dwarfs: 30 points

And then, the final results of the tournament itself:

1. Sven - Norse: 3w, 0d, 0l: 9 pts, 2250 VPs

2. Kenneth - Chaos Dwarfs: 2w, 1d, 0l: 7pts, 730 VPs

3. Tomsche - Chaos Dwarfs: 2w, 1d, 0l: 7pts, 576 VPs

4. Mike - Skaven: 2w, 0d, 1l: 6pts, 1388 VPs
5. David - Halflings: 2w, 0d, 1l: 6pts, 630 VPs
6. Hannes - Orcs and Goblins: 1w, 0d, 2l: 3pts, 1228 VPs
7. Patrick - Demons of Chaos: 1w, 0d, 2l: 3pts, 661 VPs
8. Kenneth - Dark Elves: 1w, 0d, 2l: 3pts, 626 VPs
9. Kristof - High Elves: 1w, 0d, 2l: 3pts, 521 VPs
10. Yannis - Orcs and Goblins: 1w, 0d, 2l: 3pts, 410 VPs
11. Jo - Dwarves: 1w, 0d, 2l: 3pts, 396 VPs

12. Lily - Night Goblins: 0w, 0d, 3l: 0pts, 221 VPs

And so a nice and succesful tournament drew to a close, and it really was a joy to play in.  Great work Pat, and a nice plume for your hat with this one!