MeSBG: The Dead of Dunharrow 'Warriors of the Dead' x10 (2)

We are on the last of September and the last post for the month.  I thought it would be a good way to close off the month with some models that I just completed yesterday.

The new Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game starter box came with 20 'Warriors of the Dead', and I finished the first block of 10 on the 18th of this month, so it was time to finish up the second half of the 20.

I did purchase another 20 'Warriors of the Dead' and 5 'Riders of the Dead' which I am hoping to maybe get to sometime in October (I should be able to get to the Riders, but we'll see, there are a lot f projects in my backlog).

 Warriors of the Dead x10 (2)

 Warriors of the Dead x10 (2)

Painting Points: 10

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Privateer Press: Cygnar Mystery Box

A friend of mine in Kalamazoo recently purchased a couple of the Privateer Press Mystery Boxes (hoping for Khador) and he ended up receiving a Cryx and Cygnar box.  He posted on the Facebook Groups looking to trade someone and there were not any takers, so I contacted him if he was willing to sell the Cygnar box.  Well he did and we met today for the exchange.

My sons Warmachine army is Cygnar, so this box if for him, he really wanted to have the 'Hurricane' model.  This mystery box is a bit different than the other Cygnar ones that have been posted, instead of an Infantry Unit, it came with another Warjack (which my son and I actually prefer).

Here is a breakdown of what was inside our Mystery Box:

Battlegroup: 

Major Beth Maddox

Iron Clad

Firefly

Lancer

Colossal:

Hurricane/Stormwall

Heavy Warjacks:

Stormclad/Reliant
Cyclone/Defender/Ironclad

Light Warjacks:

Sentinel

Accessory:

Cygnar Token Set

I think for $60 this was great buy for all the Warjacks....

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Battle Report: Arena Rex 9/27/2018 Ludus Magnus vs Legio XIII

I was able to get in another 5v5 game of Arena Rex last night with 'Nero' once again in my lineup and it was another win for my Ludus Magnus.  I was actually a little shocked last night that 'Micon' finally pulled his weight and was able to Push 3 Legio XIII models into the Pits before he fell to his death.  'Nero' was again the last of my models surviving.

I think next time we may try a 4v4 and I will remove 'Nero' from my lineup to keep it a little more fair until  I can get a few more models assembled, playing against a Titan can be pretty rough, but it does feel pretty nice getting in some wins.

Scenario: Munus

A classic match evolved from funeral traditions, the Munus is a standard combat between equally matched cohorts.

Deployment: Cohorts deploy in base contact with their controlling player’s arena edge.

Cohorts: Both players bring cohorts of equal value.

Restrictions: None

Victory Conditions: The last player with models remaining in the arena is the victor.

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Guild Ball: Season 4 Player Card Deck Pre-Order

I know it has been pretty quiet for me in terms of Guild Ball (I have not played since AdeptiCon, nor painted any models) and that is somewhat due to my interest in other games and the fact Season 4 will be releasing next month.

A few weeks ago Steamforged Games announced that the new Season 4 rule book will only be made available digitally, and that the new cards will only be available for a limited amount of time.  Steamforged Games is pushing towards using an app to play the game, but I am old school and still prefer to have cards and a printed rule book.  I will have to make due with a digital rule book, but today I decided to do a pre-order of the Season 4 Player Card Deck.  It is available at the Steamforged Games web store while supplies last, and it should be shipping on October 13th (the weekend of SteamCon USA, which I cannot attend this year).  The cost of the cards are US $15.00 an shipping was an additional $5.00, not to bad.  I am honestly not sure how often we will play (never know I made decide to aggressively pick it back up again) but I wanted to have the cards just in case.

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Weekly Chronicle 2018 #38

Not much painting was completed last week, but I did start on another 10 'Warriors of the Dead' for MeSBG.  I am not sure if they will get completed this week, if anything I may have some time Friday night or Saturday morning, then I have to get ready for vacation next week.

Gaming wise, I did manage to get in 4 games of X-Wing.  The first 2 games were just from the Starter Set, but the last 2 were full 200 point games.  Pictures from game 4 will be posted later today.

Warmachine/Hordes: right now much going on with WM/H.  I still have a lot of models that need to be completed but just do not have the passion at the moment.  If I was more excited for Warmachine Weekend, then maybe.  Warmachine Weekend did finally release a small event schedule, but just a list of the tournament games, non of the fun events yet which is why I was planning to go.  Last night we had a personal setback with a broken dryer, so the funds allocated for WMW may have to go to the new dryer (we shall see).  When I get back from vacation on 10/8 I need to evaluate where I am with Warmachine/Hordes and see if we are still going to WMW.

Arena Rex: nothing new to report here either, no new models completed.  I am hoping to maybe get in a game tonight or Thursday night since it has been over a week since I last played.  If we play Arena Rex tonight, then it will be X-Wing Thursday night or vice versa.

Models Completed: 0

Games Played: 4

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Battle Report: X-Wing 9/21/2018 (Scum vs Rebels)

Last night we got in another game of X-Wing 2.0, this time a full 200 points vs 200 points.  We were still a bit slow on time (much slower than the 75 minutes allowed in a tournament game), but we are still learning 2.0 and some of the new symbols on the cards.

Since I just opened 'Lando's Millennium Falcon' expansion pack, I thought it would be fun giving it a fly.  Han Solo and Boba Fett flying siide by side with an escape pod.  Since I am still fresh on 2.0 and all the upgrade cards, I based their upgrades on the quick build lists that Fantasy Flight Games offers on their website (and in the new 2.0 packaging).

Customized YT-1300 Light Freighter - Han Solo - 71
    •Han Solo - The Corellian Kid (54)
        Marksmanship (1)
        Chewbacca (4)
        Rigged Cargo Chute (4)
        Tactical Scrambler (2)
        Lando’s Millennium Falcon (6)

Firespray-class Patrol Craft - Boba Fett - 103
    •Boba Fett - Notorious Bounty Hunter (80)
        Lone Wolf (4)
        Perceptive Copilot (10)
        Seismic Charges (3)
        Inertial Dampeners (1)
        Slave I (5)

Escape Craft - Outer Rim Pioneer - 26
    •Outer Rim Pioneer - Skillful Outlaw (24)
        Tobias Beckett (2)

Total: 200/200

My son was flying the Rebel Alliance led by Luke Skywalker in a T-65, 2 additional T-65's and an A-Wing.

As I mentioned above, I am still getting a hang of the new Action symbols, but I am liking what I am seeing so far, Boba Fett was really fun to fly (I had more fun with him than the Millennium Falcon) and he seemed to have done most of the work.

Both of my ships survived and the Scum and Villainy won the battle, but Han Solo was down to his last Hull point and Boba Fett has lost all his Shields.

I started my first two Turns with Boba Fett Reinforcing his Hull and eliminating the Stress by doing so.  The Reinforced Hull really helped his ship a lot and I need to try that tactic again next time.

It came down to the Rebels just having Luke Skywalker left, and Boba Fett had a rear shot that was able to finish him off.

Really fun time with Boba Fett and I am hoping to try him soon with a couple more smaller ships.

I realized after Deployment, I should have placed Boba Fett on the outside to take advantage of Tactical Scrambler on Han Solo.

Escape Pod launches from the Millennium Falcon.

Han Solo weakens Luke Skywalker and Boba Fett takes the kill shot.

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X-Wing: Unboxing 'Lando's Millennium Falcon'

When we picked up the two X-Wings Starter Sets, I also had my son grab one of the X-Wing 2.0 expansions 'Lando's Millennium Falcon'.  With 2.0, I am trying to play more Scum & Villainy instead of Galactic Empire and I really like the Millennium Falcon, so a good way to get into S&V would be the 'Lando's Millennium Falcon'.  The reason for the change to S&V is I get to play good and evil (if you consider the Rebels good and the Empire evil).  Since majority of the time my son plays the Rebels (heaven forbid he touch the Empire) this will give me a nice change of pace.  I'll still occasionally through down the Empire as I still like a lot of their ships.

Besides all the Conversion Kits we purchased, 'Lando's Millennium Falcon' is the first expansion we have for X-Wing 2.0.

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Battle Report: X-Wing 9/20/2018

Last night my son and I finally got in a couple of games of X-Wing 2.0.  Just to begin with and refresh my memory on how the game plays (since it has been over 3 years since I played X-Wing) we elected to just start of playing with the Starter Sets.  My son was flying the Rebels with a T-65 X-Wing and I was playing the Galactic Empire with 2 Tie Fighters.

Game 1 Deployment.

It was actually really fun playing again, our first game (as with all new games) we had our heads buried a lot in the rules manual, it was more of me forgetting on how things worked.  I spaced out my 2 Tie Fighters in deployment to try and draw the X-Wing towards one of them while I flanked with the other. In this game, the X-wing managed to destroy 1 Tie Fighter and the second Tie Fighter finished off the X-Wing.  A win for the Galactic Empire.

Lone Tie Fighter destroys X-Wing,

In game 2 I deployed both of my Tie Fighters next to each other (no pic, just to try something different).  This game moved along much faster as we did not have to reference the rules manual as much.  It was another win for the Galactic Empire as I still had both of my Tie Fighters still flying.

In these two beginner games, not much of the 2.0 rules were actually used, I did do some Barrel Rolls just to see how they work now.  We still to get some more games in with adding more of the 2.0 rules into the game.  I am hoping this weekend to give it another try, a few more games played and then we can start adding in the game timer.

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Daily Chronicle: Trying To Get Organized With X-Wing 2.0

Last Friday night I headed out to Kalamazoo to our semi-local game store to pick up our pre-order of X-Wing 2.0 conversion kits.  We had ordered 2 Rebel Alliance, 1 Galactic Empire and 1 Scum & Villainy conversion kits.  We also purchased 2 of the Starter Sets through mys sons work and now it was time to open them all up and start to get organized.

We started on Saturday night after our game of Arena Rex and hoping to get in a small game of 2.0.  Well I am still sorting through all the stuff and trying to get organized.  One hold back was a place to store all the cards.  All the cards are now full sized (besides the Damage Deck) and I did not have enough boxes to store them in so I had to wait for my son to go to work yesterday and pick up a 4 row 3200 count box.

The cards are all now organized and its time to move onto the ship cards, bases and dials.  For those I went and purchased some more Plano boxes for the ship cards and Sterilite boxes for the dials and they should all fit in them.  I went with one per faction.

Once I get all the dials and ship cards put away, I will move onto the tokens from the Starter Sets and those will go into their own box.  This is all for storage at home, I will have to try and find easy way to carry these items for when we play at a store, maybe a smaller box for the ship cards/dials that we will actually be playing with.  I cannot see carrying more than 7-8 dials and that is when playing with a Tie swarm.

My plan is to hopefully wrap up tonight while my son is at work and then tomorrow night we can finally get in a game of X-Wing 2.0.

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MeSBG: The Dead of Dunharrow 'Warriors of the Dead' x10 (1)

The new Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game starter box came with 20 'Warriors of the Dead' and I ordered 20 more direct from Games Workshop, so I have 40 'Warriors of the Dead', 5 'Riders of the Dead' and 'The King of the Dead', that is enough points to easily make 750-800 point armies.  I really wanted 8 'Riders of the Dead' so they can be their own Warband, but GW only had 5 left in stock, I'll have to keep checking back with them.

Anyways, back to my Warriors.  With 40 models, I decided to break up my painting of them into groups of 10 for ease of painting and the feeling you get when you finish a model.  If I would paint all 40 at one time, it would get very boring and repetitious.

There is not much to painting the 'Warriors of the Dead', they are dead after-all, and there are a lot of different paint schemes out there on the internet.  I recently came across one that I really liked a lot, and if I did not come up with my own, I probably would have used his (white primer, Coelia Greenshade wash, Terminatus Stone dry brush), but instead of reinvesting in GW paints, I went with the P3 paints I currently own.  I ended up priming my model all black followed by heavy drybrush of Ironhull Grey.  Once that was dry it was a full wash of Army Painter Dark Tone to darken my grey some.  I then did a full light drybrush of Underbelly Blue, followed by a light drybrush of Morrow White on the top halves of the bodies.  The last step was to add some shades of green in a few places (I saw this on the GW studio models and I liked it a lot), this was done using Army Painted Green wash in just a few places.

I actually did have to buy some GW paint for the bases, I wanted the brown ring around the base to match the existing models I painted years ago.  For these bases I did a full basecoat of Battlefield Brown followed by a light drybrush of Menoth White Highlight.  The ring was then done in GW's Mournfang Brown

10 Warriors down, 30 to go.

 Warriors of the Dead x10 (1)

Warriors of the Dead x10 (1)

Painting Points: 10

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Weekly Chronicle 2018 #37

Another week has flown by and at least I did manage to get a few models completed last week ('Nero' for Arena Rex and 'The King of the Dead' for MeSBG) and a game of Arena Rex played on Saturday night.  My son and I were hoping to also try X-Wing 2.0 after our Arena Rex game, but the organizing of all the new 2.0 items is taking longer than expected.

This week we are hoping to get in some more games of Arena Rex with my friend TJ, and more than likely finally trying out X-Wing 2.0.  We'll see if time allows to get in another game of MeSBG.

Warmachine Weekend is approaching fast in early November, and to be honest, right now I am not to excited about it.  I think the main reason is the lack of information from the event organizers.  Their website has been offline all year, and with 45 days left till the start of the event, there still is no information.  A few weeks back I even posted on their Facebook page, with no response.  It would be nice to see what events are happening so I know what armies I want to bring with and play.  If it was not for their "no refund" policy, I think I would have asked for a refund.  I am still thinking about sending them an email asking for a refund for their lack of information.

I have too many games and not enough time, new TV shows are starting up next week and it is going to get even worse.

Also in early November, AdeptiCon will be releasing their events schedule (take note Warmachine Weekend) and I need to decide what I will be playing in 2019.  More than likely I will be giving Arena Rex a try at AdeptiCon, after that, I will need to see what fits in my schedule around Arena Rex, and what games are still interesting to me.  Who knows, it may be some MeSBG, X-Wing, or even Batman.

Models Completed: 2

Games Played: 1

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Battle Report: Arena Rex 9/15/2018 Ludus Magnus vs Legio XIII

Last night my son and I played our first 5v5 game of Arena Rex.  Yesterday morning I quickly assembled 'Septimus' for my Ludus Magnus Cohort, and 'Sulla', 'Valen' for my sons Legio XIII Cohort.  With 'Nero' already being completed, we were now able to play a 5v5 game.

Scenario: Munus

A classic match evolved from funeral traditions, the Munus is a standard combat between equally matched cohorts.

Deployment: Cohorts deploy in base contact with their controlling player’s arena edge.

Cohorts: Both players bring cohorts of equal value.

Restrictions: None

Victory Conditions: The last player with models remaining in the arena is the victor.

As with all my previous games (but 1) my original 3 Ludus Magnus models went down pretty quickly, but it was 'Nero' and 'Septimus' that changed the game for me and pulled out the victory.  Slowly but surely I was able to bring down all of the Legio XIII.  I actually do have to give some credit to 'Micon', at least in this game he was able to push a model into a Pit before he fell to his death.

I still need some more practice with 'Nero' and 'Septimus' as playing with Mount is a bit different.

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MeSBG: The Dead of Dunharrow 'The King of the Dead'

It has been 8 years since I last painted a model for Lord of the Rings SBG (now Middle-earth SBG) by Games Workshop, and I honestly did not think I would be painting any more.  There are two reasons for that, first, I stopped enjoying playing the game, second, Games Workshop really marked up the prices for the models.  When I first started playing, you used to get a box of 24 plastic Warriors (2 sprues) for $25, they then decided to cut it down to 12 Warriors (1 sprue) for $36, that is a huge price hike.  With the new release of MeSBG on 9/1, Games Workshop went back to some reasonable prices.  Once again you get 24 plastic Warriors, but now for $40.  It is not as good as $25, but it is much better than 12/$36.

In the new starter box that I recently picked up, it came with 20 plastic 'Warriors of the Dead', I never had this army before and I thought it would be a fun army to try and it looks to be easy to paint.  I went ahead and ordered another box of 20 'Warriors of the Dead' and some 'Riders of the Dead' direct from Games Workshop to add to the 20 I already had (they just arrived yesterday afternoon).  Now I had to find the 'The King of the Dead' to lead this army, and luckily I found one on eBay and he arrived the other day.  So unlike most people and testing their color scheme on a plastic warrior model, I decided to go right to the top and get my 'The King of the Dead' painted first.  I really like the way he came out, and the paint time was quick.  Now I have 40 more Warriors to finish and 5 Riders.

 The King of the Dead

The King of the Dead

Painting Points: 1

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Arena Rex: Beasts 'Nero'

I was able to squeeze in some time the other day and work on 'Nero' for Arena Rex.  'Nero' is a Beast and a Titan, and he is also part of my Ludus Magnus when he has his rider 'Septimus' with him.  When you use a rider for the mount, you also have to provide a foot model for when they dismount.  So my riding 'Septimus' will be painted at the same time I do my foot version.

'Nero' also comes with two cards, or better known as Stages.  Once his Vitality Track is completed on one card, then you play his second card.

 Nero

 Nero

Nero

Painting Points: 5

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Daily Chronicle: FLG Mats Grasslands 1 4x4

Back on my post for the NOVA Open recap, I had mentioned that I purchased a new 4x4 gaming mat from TableWar Designs while I was there.  Actually he did not have the mat in stock with him, so he offered me free shipping from his warehouse.   When I got back home, I received an email on the 5th that my item has shipped with a tracking number, awesome.  I was tracking it all week and the status was still just "shipping labeled created".  This past Monday I emailed TableWar to check on the status, it turns out they only had 1 mat left and it was damaged.  So I had then cancelled my order and was given a refund (it was going to be mid October before they received anymore).

I then went to the Frontline Gaming website and took a look at some of their mats.  I recently purchased a 3x3 for BMG from them not long ago and I knew they had a lot of choices to choose from.  I found one that was pretty close to the Grassy Green that I ordered from TableWar and placed my order with Frontline Gaming.  Let's hope there are no issues with this order.

Here is the mat I ordered from Frontline Gaming.

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Weekly Chronicle 2018 #36

Wow, I really did not get too much done last week.  For MeSBG, I did manage to assemble 20 'Warriors of the Dead' along with the 'King of the Dead'.  For Arena Rex, I did assemble 'Nero' for my Ludus Magnus.  Now I need to decide who I am going to paint first this week, I am leaning towards 'Nero', although he wont be completely done until I also finish his rider 'Septimus'.

Once 'Nero' is done, I think I will go ahead and paint the 'King of the Dead', I probably should start with a Warrior model a a test subject, but I know what colors I want to use, and he should come out pretty decent, he is dead after all.

For games played last week, just the one game of MeSBG this past Saturday, not sure how much we will play this week as I have a pretty busy work schedule this week, more than likely it will have to wait till Friday night or Saturday.

Models Completed: 0

Games Played: 1

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Battle Report: MeSBG 9/8/2018 The Kingdom Of Khazad-Dum vs Minas Tirith

Last night my son and I broke out our Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game armies and had our first game with the new rules that were released last weekend.  We elected to start off with a smaller point game (400 Points) just to get our feet wet in the water again, and since it has been about 7 years since I last played a game.

In our lists, we had no Monsters nor Cavalry, so honestly to me, it did not seem much had really changed.  Yes, the Heroes did get some some new abilities, which I did not get to use because of the scenario that we rolled.  So to me it felt like the same game I left years ago (the part of the game I did not enjoy).

It probably was because of the scenario we rolled, but it was just a big scrum in the middle of the battlefield with who can roll higher for Combat, then who can roll a 6 to Wound...rinse and repeat.

The scenario we rolled was "Contest Of Champions" which honestly I fell is a very bad scenario.  I remember the name of this scenario from years ago, but they changed the deployment.  Both leaders and their warbands are deployed within 3" of the center.  You score Victory Points based on how many kills your leader does throughout the course of the battle.  My problem with this scenario, is that you can lose the game on Turn 1.  Charge into your enemy leader, you score 3 Victory Points right off the bat for killing the enemy leader, then another 3-7 depending on how many more models your leader kills.  Once you kill the enemy leader, there is no way for your opponent to win the game.  It is possible to still score 2 Victory Points based on being Broken, but no way to win the game.  Like I said, I feel it is a bad scenario.  Our game lasted 3 Turns since we had some bad dice rolling for Wounds, but my 'Dwarf King' finally fell to 'Boromir'.

I have not yet had a chance to look over all the other scenarios, but I am hoping they are better than this one with at last some objectives in the game.

Here are the two lists we played, since we were just playing for fun again, we let it slide to be a few points over 400.

400 Pts - The Kingdom Of Khazad-Dum - 401

1 Warband, 204 pts
   1 Dwarf King (Army Leader; Hand Weapon; Two-handed axe; Heavy Dwarf Armour)
   8 Khazâd Guard (Hand Weapon; Two-handed axe; Heavy Dwarf Armour; Bodyguard)
   4 Dwarf Warrior (Hand Weapon; Dwarf Bow; Dwarf Armour)

1 Warband, 197 pts
   1 Dwarf Captain (Hand Weapon; Dwarf Armour; Shield)
   6 Dwarf Warrior (Hand Weapon; Dwarf Armour; Shield)
   3 Dwarf Warrior (Hand Weapon; Two-Handed Weapon; Dwarf Armour)
   2 Dwarf Warrior (Hand Weapon; Dwarf Bow; Dwarf Armour)
   1 Dwarf Warrior (Hand Weapon; Dwarf Armour; Banner)

Total Roster Cost: 401

400 Pts - Minas Tirith - 404

1 Warband, 267 pts
   1 Boromir, Captain of the White Tower (Hand Weapon; Heavy Armour; Horn of Gondor; Shield)
   6 Warrior of Minas Tirith (Hand Weapon; Heavy Armour; Shield)
   6 Warrior of Minas Tirith (Hand Weapon; Spear; Heavy Armour; Shield)

1 Warband, 137 pts
   1 Captain of Minas Tirith (Hand Weapon; Heavy Armour; Shield)
   4 Warrior of Minas Tirith (Hand Weapon; Bow; Heavy Armour)
   4 Warrior of Minas Tirith (Hand Weapon; Heavy Armour; Shield)
   2 Citadel Guard (Hand Weapon; Spear; Heavy Armour; Bodyguard)

Total Roster Cost: 404

 Getting the battlefield setup with our 2D terrain.  Makes for a quick setup and easy storage.

The scrum in the middle of the battlefield, with the Dwarf King losing to Boromir.

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