OTT: Done and Done

Vanessa is done. I really like how she turned out. I went with purple smoke. I'm not sure it works overall, as the model behind is mostly green and orange or some variant of, meaning plenty of yellow, and the final smoke is purple, leading to an almost over contrast.


On the other side of the table, I have my Tau Ion Hammerhead, ready for the table and looking sharp.

TMI: Dice A'thon

A very busy weekend. I played five games, across three systems, won a game of each, lost a game of two. Warhammer 40k, Warmachine, and Infinity to the gills. Still in Malifaux withdrawal, but read on for the others.

On the Table: It's Coming

My Hammerhead is coming along nicely. I am up to the black parts and then details. Looking good for finishing before the end of the month.

And don't worry, Vanessa is progressing as well. All I have left on her is her hair and staff. That cursed staff. I still am not sure what to do with the energy coming off.

On the Table: Switch Style

A bit of a change up from my last paint progress post. I have started in on a Tau Hammerhead, complete with Smart Missile System and Ion Cannon. This is my test for trying to get my Tau finally finished. It will also be my entry into the forum Play It Painted contest. Don't worry, Vanessa hasn't been forgotten, she is here too, but since I stupidly forgot to take a prepicture of her, I can't use her.


See, there she is. I'm not sure you can see the changes since my last post, they are all small, dark, and subtle, but rest assured she is coming along. I hope to have her finished by Saturday, but I think the energy on her staff is going to give me trouble.

TMI: TauMachine

Another great Saturday of gaming. Sadly, no Malifaux to be had. I also failed to get pictures of my Warmachine game against Ed.

TMI: Double Down

A pretty quick week game wise. I only played a game of 40K and an intro Malifaux game. I forgot to take pictures of the 40K game, but I was playing Tau, anyway. I also forgot to pull out all of my Eldar and take a picture of that. The Demo game was against Dave, using his Viks plus a Ronin versus my Seamus box.

State of the Tau

I finally threw down my Tau in a tournament. I felt it went well, even though I place 32nd out of 47. At the end I wasn't in a terrible mood, I was even in a good mood.

State of the Tau

Another slow holiday weekend at Hobby Town, but I did manage to get a game in against Troy. We played Scenario 3 from the preliminary missions for Genghiscon. Primary was seize ground, 5 objectives; secondary was kill points; tertiary was getting infantry into opponents zone. Deployment was pitched battle.

State of the Tau

In a sort of Christmas Eve Bash(or just a game), Troy and I met up at Hobby Town for a game of 40K. We might have played Malifaux, but I couldn't print the cards he wanted, so, Tau versus Tyranids. And I forgot to take any pictures of course.

State of the Tau

I know, I know, what kind of broken trash, WAAC player brings Tau to the table. I know you all come here to get easy going, just for fun gaming. But hey, I like to win, too! Alright, joking aside, I know that my plethora of readers are all imaginary, but it is time to dust off my Tau. It's been a while, I picked up CSM, won a bit with them. Lost a bunch of tourney games with them, stupid anti-meta club meta. Dabbled in Eldar. Realised Eldar are the Tau without the shooty, but faster. And getting some games in before the new 'dex drops and ruins my day couldn't hurt.
Anyway, on to the actual topic.

Annihilate the 'crons!

So, we finally threw down the 2 'cron vs 2 Tau game. Apocalypse, no FOC, 2500 per player(5k per team). I was running late, so they rolled mission and such with out me. Annihilate! Damn! Each side had 2 assets. We took the marker field(everything marked within 24") and a Icestorm warhead(10" blast vs vehicles, all 'crons hit take a pinning test). They took some tech snag thing, single use, grabbed one of my area denial nodes. Other asset was a unit gets up on 2+, instead of 4+.
Started the game by making a destroyer squad run off the table, its becoming a theme. Took out swarm after swarm with rail rifles, killing 4 3 base swarms and 2 bases of the 5th by the end of turn 2. Almost everything else got back up. At end of turn 2 we had to barely scratched them. Supposed to finish weekend after next, but there is already talk about calling that one.
Likely next time will be objectives, with us holding a fortification on one end, going the long way. Basically a pro Tau setup, with the exception of no phase out for the 'crons. Not sure I like it, but whatever.
Biggest thing I need to do is look long and hard at that third mission. It has filled me with a undue sense of dread, and I need to face it down. I think I need to just set up my gun line and go all out for the kill. Kill a unit, move to the next. When placing on the long edge, instead of spreading across table to maximise fire lanes, and cutting off support from different elements, I should place everything in a cluster along the flank, forcing the enemy into my fire lanes. I think setting up second may not be disadvantageous. Then I can pick the weak flank and force them to move their strength to me, moving as far as possible.
For this next game, knowing my opponent and knowing my terrain setup before hand, I think I will place all my guns on the wall, plugging the hole in the center and the ends with my nodes. Likely place my HHs behind the wall, so they can move forward over the wall, landing in front, to unleash death first turn. Top of the walls will be loaded with markers, snipers, and broadside. Mind you, I will have to set up with a partner and space is limited, but it should work out, table is 5' wide. Pathfinder Devilfishes will find a place behind the nodes giving LoS for deep strike across the board. If the monoliths land in the back field, I hope to use my teammates FWs with EMPs to take them out.

Down with green!

So my Space Wolf friend and I finally got to play a game side by side, instead of against each other. And got torched. It was against the two newest players in our group. The newest played his orks, while the other played dark angels. We drew annihilate(DAMN!). Set up mostly along the back, the Space Wolves player set out a land raider crusader and a few terms(pure term army). Orks and Dark Angels deployed everywhere 18" away(accidentally bastardised dawn deploy). We held onto first turn. Opens with tons of shooting, biker nobs are just as brutal as everyone says. Usual comments about my shooting taking forever. Spend most of the game not killing Nobs, though we do eventually take them out. The angel bikers behind the fair better though, but still get taken. Kept the angel dread stunned until we could do get rid of all its range and immobilise it. Orks take a beating, I take a beating, Space Wolves get beat a little, Dark Angels come out almost unscathed. Now, that's how you use a meat shield. I'm not sure it was intentional, but they did an excellent job using the orks to tie us down, and then mop up with the space marines. Kudos to them. Sadly I think my partner and I sort of writ this one off from the start, but I don't feel either us played for the lose, it was more "Annihilate? Well damn. Geh, lets get to it then."
I need to get the killing power in my army. A side note, I recently set my list up so that I can use my broadside or a sniper squad interchangeably, this time using the squad. I take a tar getting array on the broadside, so they have always been the same points, I just list it now so I can change on the fly. I like it, little more fun I think.

Tabled turn 1

Not me actually, the guy I was playing. I felt terrible. I recently started playing with a new group, and one of their members also plays Tau. I hadn't gotten a chance to see him play, as he has been unable to make our game days. However, some of the other guys thought that I should get together with this guy and give him tips, seeming as I can almost win, and he gets trashed. So we kinda set up this thing where he and I would play a couple of other guys in a large Tau vs Necron game. Well, that's still a week away, but we(Tau players) decided to get together and do a practice 500pt game and talk strategy. My list consisted of a commander(tooled to use my new template), 1 FW squad, 1 Kroot, 1 Pathfinder, and a Railhead. I held my commander in reserve to deep strike with his flamer, airburst. I deployed my Hammer head forward, the pathfinders in a building, the firewarriors in the back on the right flank by the PF devilfish, the kroot infiltrated onto a central objective. He deployed a single, large firewarrior squad with drones and a commander(~fire knife) also with drones. I pie plated his firewarrior, killing a shield drone and 8 firewarriors, by far my best shot ever(no I know why SMs tear through me). The rolled 10 for Ld and ran. In shock I turn the turn to him. The firewarriors rolled another 10 and continue to flee. This is when I asked if he had any reserve and find out no, that's his entire force. I think I know why he has trouble bringing it on. He only had 450 pts, 250 for the commander, the other 200 for the Firewarriors. He had tooled them up with everything, plus a shield drone and a marker drone. The commander had a shield drone and marker drone as well. His plan was to shield my army with his as a sort of meat shield. I didn't like the plan before and after seeing what we would be throwing away points wise, I hated it. I pointed out what he could do if he toned down the points. More squads a definite plus, also a dropped marker light drone alone would have given him points for a broadside at least. I honestly expected him to have vehicles, I tried to plan around taking them out, they didn't exist. I wish I had scattered a little actually, just so I could have seen how he plays, but I hope it helped him with army creation a bit. Maybe different styles, I don't know.

Some nids and wolves and some necrons

So, yesterday, I had the chance to get some 40k in. Played a couple games. Didn't do so well.
First game: Space Wolves, 'Nids, and me(Tau).
Different space wolf player than I usually play. Game came to a draw, but I definately lost.
First 3 turns were a lot of terrible dice rolls. by turn 4 I was so decimated that I couldn't do much. I did have a squad of firewarriors hidden in a devilfish. Unfortunately, the nid player knew enough of me to take this out. I sneaked my warriors by, but his Trygon Prime was able to circle around and take them out. The space wolf player lost his troops, leaving the nids with a single genestealer squad to take the objective. Luckily, the SW Land Raider took them out, leaving nobody to claim the 3 objectives, giving me a draw. It was rather pitiful. It seems that my tricks are all learned, and that I can no longer play an all comers list. Need to change it up, seems to be the problem with playing the same guys all the time.
Second game was even worse(believe it or not). Forfiet on turn 5. This one was capture and control as well. Using corners, I started with the same dismal rolling. My problem here was more of ignorance than anything else. Against 'crons, I have to change my play style considerably. My standard starters out with about half in reserve, including my plasma suits. Against necrons this setup needs to be reversed. I need to keep my hammerhead in reserve(*gasp*) and put my plasma, vespids, and other low AP weapons out. Even though I was playing the SW player, I think I could have done better by having my HHs show up later, leaving them alive and in better shape when the monoliths arrive. Not having the rail support to hit those monstosities when they come out left me in a bad spot(stupid no melta).
Some changes I made recently:
Drop the FW Devilfish for more FWs
Kept the Piranha, but thinking should go for a Carbine squad. Melta isn't doing it anymore.
Cutting out seeker missiles, been using lights for targeting.