Book Review: I Am Slaughter

Games Workshop and Black Library announced at the end of 2015 that there would be a year long event exploring the post Heresy era called "The Beast Arises". As this was an era in 40k lore that hadn't been explored to any great detail, it piqued my interest and bought into it with the first release in December.

A large slice of humble pie

Hi guys Craig here.

Happy new year and all that jazz. Hope it was a good one.

Today I have been eating a huge portion of humble pie. Today I tried Age of Sigmar (AOS) for the first time. After 6 months of point blank refusal I gave it a go. With all the new models coming out and the new books and the core rules being free I kept on looking and thinking  WHAT IF????

What if it is actually a good game?
What if I actually like it and have been putting it off for 6 months?
Or something that has never come up. What if i'm good at it.


Well I can honestly say I was excited for the game all week. Was excited to see how it would out pan out and if it would give me any memento to carry on playing AOS.  And....... It has. I can not wait to play my next game of AOS.

The base rules are only 4 pages long and its really easy to get into them. The main and interesting part of the game is using the base rules alongside the battle-scrolls for each individual unit. Before I played the game it looked like a game for kids to get them into GW as a kinda stop gap before 40k how wrong was I. In the 1 game I have had I could see how my army depended on situation attacking and spell casting from my wizard to either buff a unit of cut down the amount of attacks a unit took.

Playing AOS has completely energized my fantasy playing armies. Seeing that I can use my  previous fantasy armies and if anything there actually a little better than before. Just taking my armies of the shelf or out of my case and knowing that I don't have to rebase them and knowing that they have a new lease of life actually makes me genuinely happy.

I can see a lot of potential in the new system from GW and look forward to seeing what they can bring to the table and how they will relate the old world with the new.

Below is my first AOS kill. He got killed in the 2nd turn and if I am honest I jigged like I was in river dance.

However after this kill it went down hill for me pretty quick. I lost two blocks of Skaven clan rats. One unit to a unit of Questing Knights and one to a unit of Pegasus Knights.

but at this point i was not down trodden and didn't feel like the game was over. I still had my Warlord, Warlock Engineer, Doomwheel and my proxy Hellpit.

My Doomwheel in the last turn took out 2 remaining Pegasus Knights and my Hellpit (Thundertusk/Stonehorn Proxy) took out another two Pegasus Knights which shocked my opponent  deeply as we laughed for about 10 minutes after in pure shock. 

Overall I lost narrowly but i thoroughly enjoyed the game and can safety say i will be eating humble pie for some time. At this point I will be trying new armies and new units to get to grips with the rules and the game.

All I can say is if your unsure on the game go out and give it a go. Worse case you spend 2 hours of your life trying something and at the end of it at least you know its not for you. However for me I just wish I got on board all them months ago,

Thanks for reading guys and will catch you on the other side.

One Last Huzzah

Craig here.

I know its been a long time since we have posted. It's safe to say that grown up life has caught up with us all, but hopefully all should be better in 2016.

However me and Alun managed to sneak to a Games Workshop event The Battle of Dimmamar Campaign day. 750pts Imperial against Chaos 4 games using the Maelstrom of war objectives . I took necrons which  was pleasantly surprising what I could get in for 750pts.

I took  Lord (staff of light)
          15 Necron Warriors 
          15 Necron Warriors
          3 Scarab swarms
          5 Deathmarks

I must admit it worked quite well. I had things to take out most things apart from nasty Death Company. Whilst I was thinking about my list I was thinking of different directions to take it. How to deal with close combat and high toughness gribblies. Then Alun gave me a brilliant piece of advice. He told me to focus my army on one aspect. (Shooting, Close Combat or maneuverability). So I focused on shooting (maybe minus the scarabs) and it worked brilliantly. 

Age of Sigmar: Week One Observations.

Age of Sigmar has divided the community. With that statement I will probably be in contention for the stating the obvious award 2015. But, I think it is a good step forward for a stagnant Fantasy gaming system, put it this way, I have played 5 games of Age of Sigmar, I doubt I have ever played 5 games of Fantasy. With that, I feel I have discovered a few hidden depths of the game either by myself or by proxy that I am going to go through now.

Angels Looking for Redemption

I think it comes as a surprise to no one that I am mainly an Eldar player. So when it came to a cityfight event in the local store this weekend, I thought I would go completely at odds to the norm and try out the new Blood Angels. I don't have a huge force, but it would give me a chance to break the seal on the new book and look at the game from a different perspective.

A WAAAAGGGHHHH TO FAR!

Hey guys Craig here.

Today's post is all about how my Orks and Matt's Dark Angels faced off against each other.

As I don't have a huge force fro my Orks (as of yet) a small 600pts game was on the cards. I knew that at this points cost Matt couldn't get a lot. Mine wasn't a huge amount but I still felt confident going into this small but no doubt bloody battle.

Matt's List was (roughly)

Command Squad all with bolters. 1x Apothecary, 1x Librarian 3 x normal guys plus the banner of devastation (Salvo 2/4 Bolters)

1 x 10 man tact squad, all with bolters
1x 5 man tact squad 1 with plasma
3 Black knights with plasma and grenade launcher
5 Vets tooled with meltas and combi wepons.

My List

Grukk Face Rippa
Weird Boy level 2

1 x 12 boys, Boss nob, Eavy armour, Big Shoota
1 x 11 boys, Boss nob, Eavy armour, Big Shoota and Trukk (Trukk had Red paint job, Boarding Planks + Big Shoota)
1 x Deff Copta, twin linked Rocket Launcha
1 x killa Kan, Big Shotta, Clan claw.

We were using the objective cards second time using these bad boys. I was like a kid at Christmas using his new toys.

Turn one I charged my Trukk straight up the right flank, Moved my Deffcopta out of the way of his black knights and the Killa can clanked forward towards. the banner of infinite shooting. To say Ork shooting is appalling is an understatement. I hit with a massive NOTHING. However I did manage to turbo boots my trukk a bit more. At least i did something in my shooting phase.

Matt's turn one. was just the beginning of the end. He took out my trukk and half of the unit with it. Making them flee and left Grukk all on his own to face the 5 man tact squad. He also managed to take a hull point of my Kila Kann and a wound of my Deffcopta.

My Turn two shooting was still underwhelming. however I did manage to take out a black knight. with my deffcopta. Then I thought my luck was going to change Grukk was in charge range of the 5 man tact squad. The beast of Sanctus Reach was going to get in a make a small mess of these imperial suck ups. O how I was wrong. in over watch he took two wounds. (Double 6 on the plasma to hit) got into combat I killed two Dark Angels and the unit finished me off. considering his is suppose to be a beast in combat I was a little disappointed. Maybe the dice gods were testing my patients.

Matt's Turn two. My unit of boys were murdered with bolter fire including the Weirdboy. Matt's veterans finished off the Killa kan with ease. The deffcopta died. All I had left was 4 boys from the trukk that had blown up. I think as a mercy killing Matt left his black knights within charge range to see how his knights would fare. After two round of combat the orks had finally been curb stomped.

We tallied up the victory points and I had 1 point. Matt had somewhere into double figures. Safe to say Matt cleaned up big time.

What I have learnt from this battle is to buy either another trukk to get both units of boys up top quick. or buy a looted wagon 7pts more and cannot be killed by bolter fire. I am looking forward to playing Matt again and this time Grukk will have his revenge.

Untill next time guys.

Tale of Many Gamers: Like a Shooting Star(weaver)

I know it's not the end of the month, but I got a head of steam and a chock load of motivation and piled it into this here Starweaver. It was what I was working on over the Bank Holiday weekend, and the last weekend saw me finish up the crew, gun and base to put this one to bed.