Weekly Chronicle 2020 #48 (Black Friday Weekend)

First lets start with how the week went for Modeling/Gaming.  I did not think I was actually going to paint anything this past week, and it turns out on Thanksgiving day I did sit down at my painting table and knocked out a model.  My 'Primaris Lieutenant Indomitus' was completed for my Imperial Fists army.

In regards to gaming, we spent the whole day Saturday playing the new edition of Blood Bowl, and I really enjoyed myself (just need to be a bit faster).

Now onto the rest of Black Friday Weekend....all I can say is that I think I spent too much and will be plenty busy in 2021 building/painting models.

First there is Blood Bowl, besides the new boxed set, we also added quite a few teams, Halfings, Humans, Elven Union, Skaven, Wood Elves, now some of these are for my son and he WILL paint his teams, but I have at least 3 that I would like to get completed during 2021.

Then on Thanksgiving while painting, The Hobbit: Battle of Five Armies was playing on my TV....big mistake, this got me thinking about all of our MeSBG models and got my brain churning, then I ended up watching all 3 movies again over the weekend.  So of course I had to go and make a purchase for some Hobbit Army models for MeSBG.  I know my son still enjoys this game, so we are going to try and do a better job adding in more games of it during 2021 (while still playing Warhammer 40,000 and Blood Bowl).  To go along with new models for MeSBG, we cannot play on a bare table, of course I added more terrain that is slowly trickling in from Amazon (mainly ruins for now, I need to check my hobby train boxes for any existing trees I can use).

I am really looking forward to next month when I start working on my yearly recap and plans for 2021.

Battle Report: Blood Bowl 11/28/2020 (Humans vs Wood Elves)

Our pre-order for Blood Bowl Second Season Edition was picked up by my son on Friday from our LGS, and yesterday was our first adventure in the game (my first Blood Bowl game in 15 years).

My son was playing a new Wood Elves team that he recently purchased and assembled, and I went ahead and quickly assembled a Humans team a few days before to have ready for this game.  The box set does come with a team of Imperial Nobles and Black Orcs, but I knew I was not going to be staying up late Friday night to assemble these.

We played a full game of 11 players each on the Pitch, 8 Turns each per Half, and I knew that since this was our first time that it was going to take awhile, I had planned on starting at around 12:00 PM and finishing by 6:00 PM, and sure enough I was right on schedule.  The goal eventually is to get these games down to about 2.5-3 hours, but that is also the reason why I have invested in Blood Bowl 7's Pitch's to speed up the game (smaller Pitch, 7 players a side, 6 Turns each).

Also in this game we wanted to try out situations where there may not always come up as much, especially with Fouling and Long Passes, and those Long Passes sure came in handy.

For the Humans first Touchdown (my team), I went for a Long Bomb Pass to my 'Catcher' in the End Zone, and the dice gods were with me as I made the Pass and Catch for the Touchdown.  Later in the Second Half I also did another Pass (not Long Bomb) to my 'Catcher' in the End Zone for a second Touchdown, but that one was to tie up the game 2-2.

It came down to the final Turn for each of us and I had another chance for a third Touchdown, my good ole 'Thrower' who was reliable all game went to pick up the ball and failed his Agility roll, it was my last chance, I just had to hope the Wood Elves had nothing going for them.  Sure enough where the ball landed, it was just out of reach for the Wood Elves to score, so the game ended in a Draw 2-2.

The game was fun, really needs to be shorter for us, it would be nice to be able to get in 2 games in this time frame.  I think next time we will try 7's and see how that plays.

W40K: Imperial Fists 'Primaris Lieutenant Indomitus'

On Thanksgiving day playing on TV was The Hobbit: Battle of Five Armies and I thought to myself this would be a perfect time to watch the movie an get some painting done (along with getting the turkey ready).  Next thing I know that by the time the movie was over, my model was just about completed also.

Since the release of the latest Space Marine Codex for Warhammer 40,000 9th Edition, you can no longer run two Captains in a single Detachment which has hurt me in some of my existing lists, I guess Games Workshop wants us to start using some of the Lieutenant models they have released in the recent years.

As you saw a few weeks back, I finished a Lieutenant in Phobos Armour, now I was working on the Lieutenant that came inside the Indomitus box.  I am sticking to a pattern with my Character Units, my Captains and above all have a Gold right shoulder pad, with my Lieutenants I decided to go with Silver and have done the same with this model.

Primaris Lieutenant

Primaris Lieutenant

Primaris Lieutenant

Painting Points: 2

Blood Bowl: Mats by Mars Green Meadow Fantasy Football 7's Pitch

Last week when the urge to get into Blood Bowl for the first time in 15 years, I was also looking into the NAF website on alternative ways to play the game that may speed it up a bit.  The NAF site does have a page that does exactly this and I came across a version called 7's.

Blood Bowl 7's is basically the full game of Blood Bowl, but instead of 11 players on the pitch, there are 7.  Re-rolls also do cost double and the game is played on a smaller pitch.

The smaller pitch is what kind of scared me, because the length and width are both shorter (so it is not as easy as to just "tape" the sides) and I started googling for a 7's pitch.   I then remembered that Mats by Mars makes vinyl pitches for Blood Bowl and took a look at their site.  Besides selling full size pitches, they also had quite a few choices for Blood Bowl 7's.... perfect.  I then proceeded to order the "Green Meadows".  No thanks to FedEx, my pitch finally arrived this week.

The pitch rolls up for storage, and as you can see in the photo, it does lay nice and flat when unrolled.  I like this mat so much that Mats by Mars is currently having a Black Friday Sale (code: BFCM2020) for 25% off, that I ordered 2 more, 1 in a Frozen Tundra and 1 in a Tavern.

Weekly Chronicle 2020 #47 (Wisconsin Dells Recap)

I know I am a few days late with my weekly post, but Monday we were traveling back from Wisconsin Dells and yesterday I got busy catching up with real work.

My son and I spent an extended weekend (Thursday-Sunday) at our timeshare up in Wisconsin Dells just relaxing and getting in some games.  We packed up our Alpha Gaming table and boxed up our terrain and armies and headed to the Dells.  Since we had the points to spend on a larger unit, I booked us the 2 bedroom which also had a decent space in the living room for us to play.

After a long day of driving and shopping at Noble Knight Games, Warhammer and Cabela's we spent Thursday evening with a game of Blitz Bowl.

Friday was our first day of playing Warhammer 40,000.  The plan was to play 2 games at 2000 points each on a round timer of 2.5 hours.

My Imperial Fists got the victory in game 1, and then for game 2 we also elected to play on a chess clock with 1:15 on each clock.  Again my Imperial Fists pulled off another victory.  After a nice sushi dinner, it was another game of Blitz Bowl.

Saturday was a shorter gaming day for us.  We started the day off watching the latest Games Workshop preview show and then got the table ready for a 1000 point game.  I brought my Tau army with me and it was the first time playing with all the models for them.  The Tau managed to squeak out a victory.  We did pause the game around lunch time and headed out to town for some lunch and do a little sight seeing.  My wife and I always wanted to get a chainsaw carved bear for our house, so we stopped at Watson;s Woods (a Grand National Champion caver) and I found a bear that would be perfect for us.  He even carved in "Welcome" for us on the bears sign.  After dinner is was another game of Blitz Bowl (and final game for the weekend).

The plan for Sunday was a 3000 point game of Warhammer 40,000.  By the time we woke up and got the table ready, it was around 11:00 AM.  We set a time limit to finish by 6:00 PM so we can go for a nice final nights dinner.

Unfortunately for my son, my Imperial Fists had one heck of a Turn 1 and really crippled his Dark Angels army, it was going to be a long uphill battle for them which they could not pull off.  By the end of Turn 5, I managed to wipe out every model from his army.

So for the weekend we managed to play 4 games of Warhammer 40,000 and 3 games of Blitz Bowl.  The Blitz Bowl games were all pretty close, not so much with the Warhammer 40,000 games.

Well this week is Thanksgiving week and I do not think there will be any painting done (maybe start on a few colors) but there will be a few games played.  I am thinking another game of Blitz Bowl and possibly X-Wing on Thursday, then on Saturday we should have our new boxed set of Blood Bowl and hopefully we can walk ourselves slowly through our first game (we shall see how that goes).

Models Completed: 0

Games Played: 7

W40K: Tablewar New Size Gaming Mats

 

Well it took FedEx forever to deliver my packages (over  a week), but yesterday afternoon my new Warhammer 40,000 gaming mats from Tablewar arrived.

Tablewar is having a 15% off sale for the month of November and existing customers can take take an additional 10% off, so with 25% off, I thought it was a good time to purchase some Warhammer 40,000 mats in the new sizes.

With the release of Warhammer 40,000 9th Edition, the board went down in size.  What used to be played on a 6'x4' mat is now 60"x44" and for smaller scale games (500-1000 points) the recommended size is 30"x44".

Frontline gaming recently released new "borders" to convert your 6'x4' mats (which I also did purchase), but I went ahead and ordered one mat in each of the new sizes from Tablewar.

I like to change up the board mat every now and then so we are not always playing on city ruins, this will do that for us.

These two mats are coming with us on our weekend trip and should be seen in future blog posts.

Weekly Chronicle 2020 #46 (X-Wing/Blitz Bowl Recap)

I am pretty happy with how week #46 turned out.  I was able to get one model completed for my Warhammer 40,000 Imperial Fists army with a 'Primaris Lieutenant in Phobos Armour' and my son and I got in quite a few games over the weekend.

On Saturday we started the day off with a game of X-Wing where I decided to fly Scum with two 'Firespray' ships which I have not done in a long time against (one of them being 'Boba Fett') against four T-65 X-Wing ships led by 'Luke Skywalker'.  I managed to take out at least one T-65 but I lost 'Boba Fett' early on (rolling 8 blanks on defense on 3 rolls is bad) so it was an uphill battle.  I do like that list and will be trying it again next time.

When we wrapped up with X-Wing it was time to learn the learn the game of Blitz Bowl.  As I mentioned yesterday, our first game took us some time to finish with my Humans losing to the Wood Elves.  I then decided to try the Elven Union cards (proxy with Human models) and was able to get the victory over our forest siblings.

Most of our items are all packed for our trip this week, but we opened up Blitz Bowl for one more game yesterday afternoon just using the Humans and Dwarfs from the box.  I elected to try out the Dwarfs for this game.  This game was tight the whole time and it came down to the very last play of the game and my Dwarfs just barely got the victory 16-14, it was a lot of funny and we are getting to the point that we do not need to reference the rulebook much either (which is  good thing).

No painting is going to get done this week with the two of us leaving for Wisconsin Dells early Thursday morning, but when I get back I have a couple models I want to paint next for my Imperial Fists.  I have another 'Primaris Lieutenant' from the Indomitus box all ready to go on my table, and I just recently purchased the new 'Primaris Techmarine' that I think will be painted at the same time.

There will be gaming this week though.  Some games of Warhammer 40,000 (not sure how many yet as we are going to be trying 2000 point games along with a big 3000 point game) and we will be mixing in games of Blitz Bowl in the evenings.  It will be a good week, I am going to try and remember to take some photos this week for a weekend recap.

Models Completed: 1

Games Played: 4

Blood Bowl: Pre-Ordered Season 2

Well I actually bit the bullet yesterday and ordered a copy of Blood Bowl Season 2 from our local gaming store down in South Bend, IN.

I kept going back and forth, "should I or shouldn't I" and made the "yes" decision.  By the time I made this decision a few of the other items I wanted they were already out of stock for the pre-order.  Luckily come 1:00 PM I was able to jump on to the Games Workshop site and grab a few more items.

Blood Bowl Season 2 Box Set

The core game is the Season 2, 2 player box set that comes with 2 Teams, 'Imperial Nobles' and 'Black Orcs'.  Not sure if the 'Black Orcs' will ever see the Pitch, but the 'Imperial Nobles' most definitely will.

Special Play Cards

The Special Plat cards re used to have some fun with the games and can even up the odds when playing against a Team that is over powering.  These cards are not needed for a regular game of Blood Bowl, but I thought we should have set "just in case".

Treeman

The 'Treeman' can play for either the Wood Elf or Halflings, and since my sons main team will be the Wood Elves, I was able to get one of these ordered for him.  In all honesty, I wanted to order the model just for 'Akhorne the Squirrel'

Akhorne the Squirrel

Along with all the new items for pre-order, I also ordered another Team for myself, the 'Eleven Union Team'.  I like passing in Football games and the Elves can pass the ball.  I wanted to order them so I can have a different kind of playstyle.  It will be fun seeing these guys go up against the Wood Elves on the Pitch.

Elven Union Team

I am really glad I made the decision to order the above yesterday.  We ended up playing 2 games of Blitz Bowl yesterday and the game is exactly what I expected and wanted.  Our first game took us some time to get through as we were still learning the rules, but our second game took us exactly and hour (and I know we can speed that up a bit too).  We ended up splitting the 2 games, a win/loss for each of us.

Although Blitz Bowl is fun, I can see myself in the future wanting a little more depth in the game (when time allows) and that is what Blood Bowl is for.  The full 11 player game of Blood Bowl may occasionally take too long, but there are variants out there like 7's (7 players on a smaller Pitch) that I see us playing more frequently.  Instead of a 3 hour game of 11's, maybe just a 2 hour game of 7's.

Well our new items do not get released till November 27th, so I still have two weeks of waiting.  Until then, more games of Warhammer 40,000 and Blitz Bowl.

Blitz Bowl: Welcome to the Pitch...Again

For the last few years whenever I referred to "Pitch", I usually meant for a game of Guild Ball.  This past year Steamforged Games dropped the product that started it all for them, our Guild Ball.  There are some die-hard fans that are going to keep it going and we shall see how it goes (it can work, as you will see below).

Sometime in the 2000's Games Workshop had dropped their game Blood Bowl and the fans kept it alive for many many years.  Then in 2016 Games Workshop re-released the game with all new rules and plastic miniatures.

Two years later in 2018, they released a smaller version of the game called Blitz Bowl, to be played with 6 miniatures on your team with a playing time of around 30-45 minutes (once you know the rules).

I did not jump on any of these games because, well I had my Guild Ball.  Come 2020 and time have changed.  Back in September Games Workshop released Blitz Bowl Season 2 and in just a few weeks, Blood Bowl Season 2 will be released.

I am always looking for games that can be played quicker (to fill in some time when we are not playing Warhammer 40,000) and I thought Blitz Bowl may just now be that solution.

You can only purchase Blitz Bowl in US from a Barnes & Nobles retailer, so I placed my online order this past Sunday and my package arrived yesterday afternoon.  I quickly opened my box and got the miniatures assembled so it can be ready for a test game this weekend and then we will bring it with us next week on our getaway.

Now the question arises, do I pre-order Blood Bowl Season 2 tomorrow?

W40K: Imperial Armour Compendium (Forge World)

The new Imperial Armour Compendium from Forge World was released this past Friday and my copy just arrived in the mail today.

My son and I do not own many Forge World models, just a 'Relic Leviathan Dreadnought' each and I also own a 'Malanthrope' for my Tyranids army, but legally if we use these models in a competitive event, we need to provide a copy of the rules when asked.

The recent reviews of the 'Relic Leviathan Dreadnought' have it considered to be a "loser" in this new book, but I actually feel quite opposite.  For the build out that I run (double Storm Canon Arrays) the cost of the model went down from 350 points to 240 points.  The number of shots for the gun went down from 20 to 16 and the Toughness of the model went down from 8 to 7.  For me the plus side is the guns increased in distance from 24" to 36"and it is a Vehicle which no longer suffers the -1 to hit when moving.  

The distance of the gun is my main plus.  With the new Space Marine Codex, my Chapter Doctrine ability got nerfed and now only works with Strength 7 weapons (and this is only for on Turn 1), so for me the added 12" is a plus and the points decrease will actually see me using this model more now in 9th edition.

Next weekend I plan on doing quite a few test games with it, we shall see how it performs.

W40K: Imperial Fists 'Primaris Lieutenant in Phobos Armour'

Awhile ago I purchased the Space Marines Vanguard box set so I could have a Unit of 'Suppressors', inside that box also came a 'Primaris Lieutenant in Phobos Armour'.

Now with the release of the new Space Marines Codex, you can only run one "Captain" per Detachment, so the need for a "Lieutenant" is now greater.  So what a better time to finally get a "Lieutenant" completed.

Primaris Lieutenant in Phobos Armour

Primaris Lieutenant in Phobos Armour

I really love the way this model came out and I am finally happy with how my matte varnish spray finished.  I mentioned the other day that my favorite Testors Dull Cote has been discontinued.  Shortly after posting that I found an online retailer (semi local...same state) michtoy.com that just recently wrote a blog post about this and how he did some comparison tests.  The winner was actually from AK Interactive (and it seems a lot of hobbyist use this one) but you must apply it with an airbrush.  I am fine with using an airbrush, but it takes me longer to get it out and then have to clean it and put in back than a spray can.  At the end of his blog post he mentions if you want a spray can equivalent, then try Vallejo Acrylic Matt Varnish.

I ordered two cans that day and boy were they fast with shipping.  My package arrived yesterday and I was able to spray my 'Lieutenant'.  The finished result is much better than what I was getting lately from Testors (ever since they sold to Rustoleum) and it comes out a little cheaper too (that is always a plus).  I just hope that this can will still be easy to find and the results stay the same.

Painting Points: 2

Weekly Chronicle 2020 #45

The last two weeks have not been too bad, the hobbying has picked up a bit for me and last week I was able to complete two 'Eradicator Squads' 1 & 2 for 6 models completed.

On Saturday my son and I played 1000 points of Warhammer 40,000 and I went with a list a bit different than usual.  I wanted to run something to be more assault just to change it up a bit.  I was running 2 Units of 'Assault Intercessors' and even 2 'Impulsors' to protect them.  My Imperial Fists still manged to get the victory.

This coming weekend we are going to change it up a bit and play a couple games of X-Wing and finish packing for our trip to Wisconsin Dells.  In 10 days my son and I are going to be spending 5 days up in our timeshare just to have a Warhammer 40,000 long weekend (maybe with a mix of another game).  So instead of getting a little burned out this weekend, we'll play something else.

Models Completed: 6

Games Played: 1

W40K: Imperial Fists 'Eradicator Squad II'

As I mentioned in yesterdays post, I decided to work on all 6 of my 'Eradicators' at the same time, 2 Units of 3 are how I have them officially marked for myself, but they can be played as 1 Unit of 6.

Yesterdays models also put me over 200 Painting Points for the year.  Not as good as the previous 3 years, but I took a lot of time off late Spring, all through Summer and early Fall.  Since most of our games (actually all) have been played at home now, playing the models unpainted does not bother me as much as years past/

To mark these guys as complete, here is the second Unit of 3 'Eradicators'

Eradicators II

Eradicators II

Painting Points: 6

W40K: Imperial Fists 'Eradicator Squad I'

It has been a long time that I had models completed two weeks in a row.  It seems that late Fall through Spring is usually when I pick up the pace of my painting.  Most of the time it is with the announcement of AdeptiCon that kicks me into high gear to get models completed, but for 2021 we are still waiting for the news.  With how things are looking with COVID-19, I really do not see an AdeptiCon for 2021.  The hope/plan will then be to try and make some smaller one day tournaments in 2020.

Anyways, back on topic, after my game this past weekend I started to prep my 'Eradicators' (all 6) for painting and this week I managed to find time to actually complete them.  I am really happy with that, it seems like the 'Eradicators' are currently the "must have" Unit in an army for now, so being able to complete these feels great.

I did have some issues with the anti-shine matte spray, testing a new brand, Army Painter, since my current go to which has always been Testors dullcote has been officially discontinued.  Hopefully soon I will be able to figure out this new brand (working on some test models now).

These 'Eradicators' came from the Indomitus boxed set and each box came with a Unit of 3.  With the release of the new Space Marines Codex, you can now also run them as a Unit of 6, for now I am keeing them as 3 and can always merge them into 1 if need be.

Here is the first 'Eradicator Squad I'

Eradicators I

Eradicators I

Painting Points: 6

Weekly Chronicle 2020 #44

Well week #44 was much better that it has been for awhile.  First off for painting, I was able to finish a model for my Imperial Fists army with the 'Judiciar', then this past weekend we got in a Matched Play game at 1500 points.

My Imperial Fists had one hell of a First Turn and did not leave much of the Dark Angels on the board.  By Round 5 it was my entire army (minus 1 'Intercessor Squad') vs 'Belial'

My Imperial Fists ended up taking the victory 78-9.

I was also able to get some models prepped for painting, my 2 Units of 'Eradicators x3' had their sand glued down to the bases and primed for painting.  My goal with these two Units is to have them completed by Thursday 11/19/2020 when my son and I go to Wisconsin for a weekend of gaming.

Then I also was able to get some more models built too.  I had 2 'Impulsor' transports come in awhile ago, I finally opened the box on got both of these assembled.

So all in all, it actually was a really good week.... now lets hope I can finish those 'Eradicators'.

Models Completed: 1

Games Played: 1