It begins... again...

After a marathon spray session last weekend (I plowed through 3 cans of Chaos Black and a can of Corax White), all the goblins & squigs are undercoated. A colour scheme for the Gobbos in decided upon, and the first 20 are complete.... It's my curse that my painting technique is not really suited to horde armies, as much as I love them (although saying that, I never manage to play them that well anyway - Winter War Wooden Spoon, you will be mine...).

Anyway, there's a couple of fun conversions in this army that I'm looking forward to painting up, but for now - here's some goblins!

A break from the traditional Night Goblin black, but I think they pull it off with panache - and in an homage to the 90s, I've got the traditional red spear and yellow moon iconography updated in a muted style.

That's just 20, there's another 150 or so to, including squigs, snots, and spiders... wish me luck!

Mali-Guild-faux-ball...

While I reached a decision on my army for Winter War (Night Goblins), I'm lacking in motivation to paint the Great Green Horde just yet... so here's a few pics of what's on the workbench right now!

Dr. Grimwell and his motley crew, so very close to being finished

The not-so-mighty Fishermen - 3 games, not even a goal yet... Hopefully they'll play better with a finished paint job and a bit more practice!

A quick update...

So it's been a wee while since my last update - the Neverborn are finished & the Guild are all but the finishing details done (pics to follow soon as I remember!). While no Malifaux has been played, there are 2 crews to be built as I got a little carried away with buying up stuff. Mei Feng & Seamus's crews are in various stages of building & painting.

On the selling front, I've successfully cleared out the Dark Eldar as well, only a handful of Eldar remain as a painting project, along side the Guard (who may see action in an strictly non-competitive way if there's ever a casual game at the club!).

In my quest to win a 3rd Best Army award of the year, I've foolishly decided to build a 3rd army - Skarsnik's Night Goblins are on the table - about half built and some awful old paint jobs to be re-done in the next 2 months before DWARF's Winter War - wish me luck dear readers!

....oh, amd do hassle me for photos of the Malifaux bits before I drown in a see of goblin green!

Neverborn progress...

Malifaux progress - been meaning to post these for a while but life has a tendency to get in the way!

In other news, I  am in the midst of selling off the bulk of my 40K collection. The Eldar are mostly gone, a few painting projects being kept, CSMs are all gone, Dark Eldar are in the maybe pile... only the Guard remain as they were my first 40k army and will always be a special project.

Anyway, just a short post tonight as I am actually working on my WFB Chaos for DWARF's Cry Havoc tournament in a week and a half! Here are Angel Eyes and her crew in progress- getting doing to the last details now...

A nice change of pace from Warhammer

Through the Breach

A wee change of pace on the hobby front recently, a start on my Malifaux starter set. While I've been gaming with my Chaos Warriors  (and to my usual standard - 3 losses in the last 3 outings: Ogres, Orcs, & Empire) on the painting table I've been trying to get some basic colours down on the Neverborn & Guild models.

A wee bit of Malifaux 

The eagle-eyed among you might notice some new paints too - Malifaux has given me the chance to play with some lovely new Scale75 paints, and I'm impressed. Lovely pigment, great coverage and beautiful matt finish, I might even give them a wee review later...

Return of the Drak...

Guess who's back... back again... 

After an astounding run of 12 games (1 draw, 11 losses...), Lady Genevieve is going to take a short break. The Daemon Prince of Slaanesh, Drak'nyah the Ascendent returns from the Chaos Wastes at the head of a mixed raiding party. 

With his former Lieutenant, Hirad Bonehelm having shifted allegiances to Khorne at the collapse of Archaon's force, Drak'nyah embraced his ascent to daemonhood and has been biding his time before getting ready to re-enter the Old World.

The hooves of his raiding party rumble like thunder and the peoples of the civilized world bolt their doors and cower in dark corners....

I should have kept more of a note of my Chaos results, but before the Vamps stepped in I think I had run 6 or 7 games, with 3 wins or so - we'll see how we fare tonight...

Chaos Kiiiniggits

 

Resting in Peace....

Last week I got in my first game post-Storm. Stephen's Ogres met my VC on the field having avoided each other at 2 tournaments. Where Liddle's Ogres had munched their way through me in relatively quick fashion, Stephen and I had a more relaxed, but still competitive game - he's trying to teach me to think more like a tournament as the scene round here is more competitive than I'm used to (as I've mentioned before). I rejigged my list slightly, dropping my L1 Vamp to boost both Genevieve and Kruger, and came out with a 7-13 loss. Turns out that I can put the hurt on Ogres when I hit them with the Ethereals (and when there's no magical shooting to nail said ghostly units!).

I'll be taking him on again tomorrow with a further tweaked list: Genevieve on the Abyssal is resting for the night, and her sister Marie will take control, alongside Kruger and Vorash as I try out a mini-scream list for size.

Thursday has another game lined up, and I think I'm resting the VC altogether for this one. Cry Havoc 16 looms on the horizon, and I feel the call of Chaos once more - time for the Slaaneshi Warriors to boot up and march to war...

The end of the summer looks like it might bring another 1-dayer in September, I think that's the perfect chance to push another 2500-3000pt army and make it 2 completed armies for the year, but Empire or Dark Elves, that is the question?! My VC project has been a lot of fun, but time to shelf it for a bit (still over 1500pts of bits to build and paint, and I'll be honest, I'm a bit burned out on bones!)

Coming off the back burner in the next few weeks will also be Malifaux, thanks to the arrival of both my M2E Starter set, and some lovely resin bases - time to get painting!

A Storm receding...

So, it's been a couple of days since Storm Over Stirling 2016, and what to report? 

Lady Genevieve put in an award-winning performance, well, winning might not be quite right... After missing out on the Wooden Spoon at Fall of the Old World 2 by a point, the sheer un-competitiveness of my army was somewhat brutally exposed in the larger field of SOS. I scraped 14 points from 3 games (10 of those for getting my list in on time & voting for best army!), if I want to be competitive, I either need to drop the Abyssal, put in another Terrorgheist, or go full blender-lord, but none of these appeal to me, so I'll stick to my guns and run my list the way I like to - after all, it's about having fun!

Lined up for Best Army voting once more

My opponents on the day were John's Undead (another Vamp on Abyssal, and dual Terrorgheist set up, lost 20-1), Chris M's Dwarfs (Anvil of Doooooooom, lost 18-2 but it felt closer), and lastly Graham's Dark Elves (Mallus blender bus, another 20-1 drubbing). While I killed more this time than I did at Fall, I was crippled by the tourney bonuses (each game I lost 400pts on fortitude for Blood & Glory, and at least 300pts for table quarters), should have brought more banners! I do think I'm getting better with the Vamps, but my list is hamstrung in too many places by my own desire to run certain models.

It's not all 'bad' news though...

Cue the trumpets.... bum, parrarumpum-pum, puuuuuuummmm... I won the Best Army vote in only my 2nd competitive outing...

Boom first competitive awards...

I'm not going to lie, I'm pretty chuffed with this. While I like to game, painting and converting is the big draw for me - so to have my army voted top in a field of nearly 30 is some pretty good validation. I know I'm not a hard gamer, and when I started the VC project, I just wanted to get a few votes for my painting and have a bit of fun playing guys I'd not met before. Massive thanks to Kromlech EU for sponsoring, and to all the guys that voted for my army - made for a fine end to the day!

My VC will probably go on the back burner for a wee while now - summer is on the horizon and I feel like painting something lighter (also I need to stop buying up things for them on ebay!). I've still got about 2000pts to build and paint for them, but that's for picking up again nearer Hallowe'en. For the summer, I'm thinking Empire, and some Malifaux or Zombicide for gaming with Ash and a change of painting style... 

Vampire Counts: Core units

Continuing the story of the Du Sang family's undead army...

The Du Sang Household Guard
Once the proud guardians of the Du Sang family's lands, now doomed to forever serve their mistress in undeath. There is no rest for these faithful retainers, as Genevieve's armies wage war on the living.

The Shambles

Blood-soaked, rotten corpses of former enemies and townspeople who displeased the necromancy, Kriersdorf. The Shambles are mere arrow-fodder, raised quickly and disposed of without a second thought.

The Slavering Hunt
Lady Genevieve's father was a renowned huntsman. There was a time that his annual beast hunt brought the greatest of Bretonnian chivalry to the castle. Since her dark ascension, Genevieve has maintained the tradition, only now she prefers to hunt more heavily armed prey.

The Blackblood Brood
Ghouls had long lingered in the dead places of the Old World, often small family groups gathered in the crypts and graveyards of the towns surrounding the Du Sang family's ancestral home. Since the arrival of the Strigoi, however, their numbers have grown unchecked. The armies of Genevieve are often accompanied by hordes of ghouls, throwing themselves on the enemy in a mindless feeding frenzy.

Fall of the Old World 2 - My review

So, time has flown in since I played the Undead Legions at FotOW2, and what did we learn from the 3 games?

First up, tournament play is hard. As a guy who's used to playing 1 2000pt game of an evening or afternoon (and maybe watch a 2nd game while talking over the best moments of the last), concentrating for 3 games in 1 day (at 3000pts), starting at 9am is exhausting! but it was fun, and I even got a few photos to prove my army was there!

Might not be that competitive, but damn we look pretty! 

I went with a classic Vampire Counts line-up. Maybe not playing to my strengths, but it looked pretty (well, as pretty as mouldy undead can look). Neferata (thoughts on her later). Neferata, Necromancer, Strigoi Ghoul King, Ghouls, Skeletons, Zombies, Hexwraiths, Dead Dogs, Ghosts, Terrorgheist, Morghasts, a Banshee, and a Cairn Wraith.

 

Look, the Hexwraiths killed a thing... Just not this thing, it killed them... 

Game 1 was against High Elves, and my opponent was a good lad, we were both playing relatively new armies but managed to keep each other right. A thoroughly fun, fast paced game so me lose 14-6 eventually, as Neferata and the Terrorgheist went down and his big cavalry blocks were left pretty much untouched. Neferata did spawn her freebie vamp, and munched through a couple of units, but she's a points-sink and too easily killed. I did knock out his chariots, fast cavalry, and bolt throwers with relative ease, but it didn't add up to enough points in the end. So far so good.

 

The observant among you may notice that Nefereta isn't dead yet... 

Game 2 and I was up against the other Undead Legions army. Only he had come to play hard, and had Nagash, a Casket of Souls, his own Terrorgheist... It was fun, another good opponent, but ouch was it hard - Nagash summoning piles of Hexwraiths and armoured snake-riding tomb kings behind my army meant I was effectively fighting 3000pts vs 4000pts, and it showed. Again, Neferata spawned her freebie vamp (which helped me take down the Casket of Souls), but she wasn't nearly survivable enough. Eventually I went down 15-5, but again I didn't do enough damage to move off the bottom table. 2 more kills and I would have wiped out his ghouls, and we'd have seen a very different scoreline, but you (un)live and learn.

And again, Neferata hasn't been eaten by a Carmine Dragon yet... 

Game 3 against the Dark Elves was the stinger. Final game of the day, and I crumbled. It looked alright early on, but then the Carmine Dragon hit Neferata and it was a slow descent to a near-tabling from there. While it was fun, Dale ran a very hard list for me to beat, and although it was a small field, I doubt he'd really thought that he be on the bottom table at the death. I killed a few things, but the loss of Neferata so early on made for an uphill struggle, and his Dreadlord on dragon blitzed through whatever the Carmine Dragon didn't. In the end, all I had left was a Spirit Host which had spent most of the game tying up some Shades on the flank.

So what did I learn? Tournaments are fun, a nice way to get a few games in, but too competitive for me. I much prefer a narrative game, and some character development over a small campaign. Secondly, I can't roll magic dice for sh*t... or maybe I need to buy new dice, 3 games (plus practice games) of dismal Winds of Magic rolls really makes the Vamps suffer (can't raise your guys back if you keep rolling 4-6 dice a phase while giving your opponent 4-5! My insistence on fielding units that I liked painting, and sub-optimal choices, makes it hard to pull out a win in an environment where everyone is running hard lists, and I have struggled with the Vamps. I love the models, the painting mission was a joy, but out of 8 games I've had 7 loses and a draw. Chaos Warriors they are not... I miss the raw damage output, but I'll stick with them, even hamstringing myself with the dread abyssal (how can a model look so good, but be so easy to kill?!). Also, she's much more survivable as a generic Vampire Lord than as Queen Neferata - only 6+ armour, no ward, and -1 to hit means she gets whittled away by shooting before any of her benefits kick in.

There's been 2 practice games since the tourney, and another lined up this week before Storm on Sunday. The list evolved a little as I was tabled by Ogres and ran Dwarfs close-ish (i.e. not that close, not the 19-1 loss against the Ogres, but not a draw either). For better or worse, the list is submitted, and the theme is ghouls and ethereal - go ghostly or go home!

Update...

The Army: Vampire Counts

Run as Undead Legions at Fall of the Old World 2 

Lined up for some painting votes... 

My run down of how the army ran in its first tournament will follow, along with better pics of the completed units, but put briefly I lost 3 for 3. It was fun, but I didn't do enough damage to my opponents, and was slaughtered in my last game against Dale's vicious DE/Carmine Dragon list.

--

3000pts chosen from below (Blue = Painted, Orange = Assembled, Red = unbuilt):
Neferata Mortarch of Blood

2 Necromancers

3 loose Vamps (1 Strigoi, 1 foot (sub for Nefereta on foot), 1 Strigoi)

Mounted Wight BSB (conversion required)

Krell/Wight King

Mounted Vampire 

Kemmler 

Coven Throne/Mortis Engine (if I get it built)

30 Skeletons - Swords
35 Skeletons - Spears
45 Zombies
16 Dire wolves (11 ready, 5 undercoated)
60 Ghouls (45 ready, 15 built)

Corpse cart
3 Spirit hosts
5 Hexwraiths
7 Crypt Horrors (3 ready, 4 unbuilt)
3 Vargheists
9 Black Knights
4 Fell Bats

Mourngul/Varghulf 

2 Morghast Archai

2 Cairn Wraiths & Banshee (+2 assembled)

Vampire Counts: Characters

This first of my more detailed pics, and some short biographies of the key dramatis personae....

Genevieve du Sang (Neferata)

Matriarch of the du Sang Family, Genevieve was responsible for the corruption of this once-proud House of Bretonnia. She is also behind the insidious rise of Deiter Kriersdorf from hedge wizard to Master Necromancer.

Erasmus Gruber, Marie du Sang (Isabella von Carstein), & Deiter Kriersdorf

Marie soon followed her sister into the blood curse, proving to be an adept student of both combat and magicks. She formed a close bond with Kriersdorf and his apprentice, Gruber, raising countless dead warriors to the family's cause.

Vorash &Vorysh, the Brothers in Blood

No-one remembers the arrival of the Strigoi princes, but the horde of ghouls that followed would not be forgotten. Little more than savage beasts, the Du Sang family keeps their blood cousins as a powerful pair of weapons to be unleashed on their foes - either together or individually.

And we're ready for war...

It's taken just over 3 months off and on, painting nothing else besides, but we're there (a minor injury to Skin Wolf 3 asides - that's setting with a pin right now)...

 

The Family du Sang lines up for battle... 

Neferata, Isabella, 2 Strigoi, 2 Necromancers, 1 Corpse Cart, 50 Zombies, 30 Skeletons, 45 Ghouls, 3 Skin Wolves (counts as Crypt Horrors), 11 Dire Wolves, 3 Spirit Hosts, 5 Hexwraiths, 2 Cairn Wraiths, 1 Banshee, 2 Morghast Archai, and a Terrorgheist... somewhere in the region of 150 models in the time it normally takes me to paint 20 then lose interest!

Individual unit profiles to follow when I get the chance.

Update...

A productive night saw me finish off 15 ghouls, 25 zombies, and the 2 morghasts. All that remains is to glue a wee bit of static grass to everything and we're done! That's a wee bit of static grass to over 100 models of course...


30 skeletons
50 zombies
5 hexwraiths
1 Strigoi
2 morghasts
1 necromancer
6 dire wolves
15 ghouls...

Urg! Still awaiting my Malifaux starter set - looking forward to a change of painting style!

Death comes on swift wings...

4 painting days to go....

With Fall of the Old World 2 on Saturday, it's a race to get things finished, will our hero make it? Will the Old World fall? Stay tuned for our next thrilling instalment...

 

Growing the ghoul horde, raising some more zombies, and summoning the Morghasts 

My, what a big halberd you have... 

Raising reinforcements...

In a bid to get some heavy hitters into the VC before Fall of the Old World 2 on the 26th, on the painting table this week we have...

A couple of Morghast Archai and another Strigoi....

Some more ghouls, some nice alternative Fell bats and another half a dozen wolves

Really it's just a break from piles of zombies and building skeletons - I think after I get it to 3000pts, I'll need a change of scene for a wee while, all this necrotic flesh is warping my world view!

An expanded world?

In its randomly updated state, this blog has really just been about GW models, but I think I might explore a bit more in my ramblings.

Admittedly, there are few folks reading this, but it might be fun to see how long I can keep this going this time around - after all, I tend to lose motivation on the blog after a few entries, so expanding its remit might help...

On the horizon:

Zombicide, the one mini game that my significant other & partner in crime actually likes, and encourages us to play - we've just got Season 1 and a couple of expansion packs, but we had a fun Christmas/New Year period playing lots of this...

Finally, a game that my girlfriend enjoys...

Malifaux M2E, an impulse purchase after repeatedly seeing my girlfriend looking at the minis in the local gaming store - we'll see if this takes off or not...Got a Starter Set coming and my eyes on a Mei Feng box - kick-ass girl with a bunch of augmented labourers for back-up? Yes please...

Ok, no minis yet, but we bought a book...

All we are is dust in the wind... Dust... Wind...

First "real" tournament style practice last night against High Elves with my Vamps.

In short, brutal. When I arrived, my opponent had already laid out his army, I knew I was in for a tough night as soon as I looked across at a Lord on Star Dragon, 2 Frostheart Pheonixes, an L4 Mage in a Silverhelm bunker and pain in the backside Eagles & Reavers making up the numbers.

Oh, and a small archer bunker with his 2nd mage.

Hmm, Lady Genevieve is going to hurt...

I was rocking a similar list to the Skaven encounter - with a few tweaks, dropped the dogs and a spirit host to get my L1s up to L2 wizards, other than that I was ethereal plus ghouls, skellies, and a small zombie pile.

It went wrong from the vanguard phase... Foolishly left my Hexwraiths exposed to the first Pheonix, with my single spirit host behind - he had first turn, lost my ethereal flank by the end of my first turn (ouch). I got lucky as my opponent fluffed not 1 but 2 Purple Suns, almost destroying his Silverhelms in 2 turns - my Terrorgheist took out the rest.

Turn 2 I lost Genevieve to a combi-charge from the dragon and the first Pheonix, followed in close order by my 'gheist, from there I survived 3 turns of crumble as he slowly waded through my army.

In the end it was a thumping 20-1 on tourney scoring (I would have broken him back if only I could have taken the last wound off his Lord, that would have got me about 600 more points for a bit more respectability).

Highlights: 

• Watching the 2nd Purple Sun miscast drop his L4 to L1, forgetting all his offensive spells.
• 3 zombies tying combat with an eagle
• A single corpse cart holding up the 2nd pheonix for 2 combat phases
• Surviving 3 turns of crumble for the loss of 7 models

Lowlights: 

• Magic, I got a single Invocation off in the whole game, and 1 hellish vigour... that was it
• Sacrificing Genevieve to save the 'gheist for one turn
• Vanguarding the Hexwraiths straight into trouble
• Having to remove the Hexwraiths in turn 1 again

Lessons learned:

• Don't throw Genevieve against characters, she's a unit killer
• Don't vangaurd the hexwraiths, use the move to redeploy them
• Need to try a few dirty tournament tricks - move the general to Kriersdorf rather Genevieve by running her on Death or Shadow
• Get those morghasts built and field the wraiths as heroes

Next up, not sure, a week or 2 of painting before Fall of the Old World 2, if it's happening...

Armies of the Iain-perium

A quick rundown of my armies and their status:

Fantasy 
(Armies saved for posterity after the death of the Old World)

• Warriors of Chaos 10500pts mostly built/painted
• Skaven 1500-2000pts built, plenty still to go
• Dwarfs  6000pts ish, about half built
• Empire/Men  4400pts ish, mostly unbuilt
• Dark Elves  3700pts ish, mostly unbuilt
• Orcs and Goblins  3700pts ish, mostly unbuilt
• Vampire Counts  5400pts ish built - mostly built/painted
• Daemons of Chaos  2100pts ish, mainly Slaanesh, to be built/rebased from 40K

40K 
(More collected than played)

• Imperial Guard Praetorians & Steel Legion in progress
• Inquisitor & Retenue built
• Dark Eldar  mostly built/painted (thanks to Matt) built, likely to be sold
• Eldar Mostly unbuilt, likely to be sold
• Chaos Marines  Mostly unbuilt, likely to be sold

Scenery sets  

•  Some random bits built - loads in the wardrobe of sprue...

The Dead march on...

Last night I rolled out the VC at 2400pts for a first run out. With a month or so until Fall of the old World 2 and 5-6wks until Storm Over Stirling and no experience of running Vamps, I thought it was time to get some practice in.

Lined up for battle:

Lady Genevieve, her Cursed Sister, & Drippy the Terrorgheist

The Shambling Masses next to a graveyard

The Vanguard didn't last long...

My opponent ran a blocky Skaven army with a penchant for weapons teams (which almost did me in by the end of Turn 1!), the usual tricks to prevent flying were a royal pain in my a**e, and Skaven magical shooting tore big chunks out of my army - the Hexwraiths, Cairn Wraiths, Dire Wolves and a Spirit Host were all hammered in turns 1 and 2, luckily my opponents fear of Hexwraiths let the Terrorgheist survive most of the game.

It was a bloody encounter, I took a pasting in the first couple of turns, but once the Vamp got into combat and the 'gheist got in behind his lines, I made my come-back.

In the end it was a draw (I shaded it by around 200pts, not enough for a minor victory).

Highlights: 

• Skaven Slaves passing every terror test and even wounding the 'gheist.
• 3 Rat ogres bouncing off my skeletons and getting run down
• Wrecking a massive Stormvermin unit inc. Grey Seer & BSB with only 3 Crypt Horrors and the Vamp Lord
• Wind of Death - that spell is brutal
• Terrorgheist screaming a Warp Lightning Cannon to death

Lowlights: 

• Misreading the rules on Invocation and failing to raise anything like enough casualties back
• Seeing my L1 vamp turned into a toad by the hex scroll
• Not rolling up Vanhels
• Having to remove the Hexwraiths before they even moved

Lessons learned:

• Read the spells properly
• Don't split deployment
• Try and take fewer, larger units - need to go first in the face of weapons teams.

Next up, High Elves, the same HE that I tabled last week with Hirad's Warrior of Chaos.... I suspect not so easy with Vamps, especially as he's bringing his SOS list...

Dead Rising...

The Mission: Assemble and paint 2400pt fun list for my first ever Tournament
The "Dead"-line: End of March 2016
The Army: Vampire Counts (maybe run as Undead Legions)
--
Roughly the list will be picked from (Blue = Painted, Orange = Assembled, Red = unbuilt):

Neferata Mortarch (model, fielded as Vamp Lord on Abyssal)
3-4 Necromancers (b)
2-3 loose Vamps (1 Strigoi, 1 Mounted, 1 foot (sub for Nefereta on foot), 1 Strigoi)
Mounted Wight BSB (conversion required)
Krell/Wight King
Coven Throne/Mortis Engine (if I get it built)

30 Skeletons - Swords
35 Skeletons - Spears
50ish Zombies (25 ready, 25 undercoated)
16 Dire wolves (5 ready, 11 undercoated) 
30 Ghouls 
30 Ghouls

Corpse cart
3 Spirit hosts
Hexwraiths
Crypt Horrors (the gorgeous Forgeworld Skinwolves)
Vargheists
Black Knights
Fell Bats

Cairn Wraiths & Banshee (+ 2 assembled)
Corpse cart 

--

Some initial progress shots below:
 

Lady Genevieve du Sang, Necro, Wraiths and Spirit Hosts

Ghouls

Dogs and in-progress Cart

New year, new army... kind of...

Ok, the events of last year threw us all - who'd have thought GW would actually can the Old World in its entirety and follow through on it's End Times premise?! But so much for that, luckily for me, the guys I play with decided to continue the Old World timeline into the Age of Rebuilding. In this timeline Hirad & the now-daemonic Drak'Nyah rule the Wastes alongside Dave (maybe now Matt's) Nurgle lord....

What did this mean? Well clearly the old model ranges aren't going to last. Despite GW releasing Warscrolls and telling us that every model would have a home in the new realms of Age of Sigmar, we've already seen the death of the Tomb Kings, and much of the old Warriors of Chaos range. So what was my response? Somewhat foolishly perhaps, I panic-bought and stockpiled plastic sprues like they were canned food in a zombie apocalypse... At the last count, I can now build and eventually field: Warrior of Chaos (as if I needed more), Empire/Bretonnia/Kislev survivors, Dark Elves, Skaven, Dwarfs, Night Goblins, and Vampire Counts. Add that to my brother's High Elves, Tomb Kings, and Bretonnians, and I think we've saved a fair chunk of the Old World for posterity. I couldn't stretch to Wood Elves (a shame), Savage Orcs (not so fussed really), but after some heavy investment, I've armies to last a lifetime.

In between all this, I moved north of the wall - a return home of sorts, but that put a spanner in the regular gaming until I came across Stirling Wargamers. The local club has become a tough proving ground for Hirad's forces - 3 defeats from 4 games, although the one victory was a glorious affair... Hobby-wise, I lost my Chaos-mojo and found it pretty hard to get any painting or building done but that doesn't mean no hobbying... dun-dun-duuuuunnnnn (Big Reveal)

That's right, 2016 begins the Vampire Counts proper - and I've agreed to go into 2 tournaments in the next month or 2, forcing me to get 2400pts (plus summoning units) completed in the next month (I've worked solidly on this since around Christmas)... Pics to follow