Gertfaux

A mere 2 years after my last malifaux tournament it looks like I'll be attending another one.

The event is Gertfaux in Bristol, helpfully being held 10 mins from where I live.  I'm actually in as the spare player but due to drop outs I'm currently playing.  Rules for this particular event is single master and 100ss pool, being sensible I should probably only write a single list and stick with it, but I'm being ambitious and I'm submitting a pool.  That said schemes and strats are pre-announced so I should really go in with a good idea of what I'm going to do and pick the crew to match.

Here is the pool I've put together, not because any of it is particularly synergistic but mostly because it's what I have painted and lets me run a bunch of stuff at different point costs and see what it all does!  I'm going to try and read the strats & schemes tonight and try to design cres for each of them, which might result in me chaning some of the pool if there are things which are entirely useless in there. 

The draw has gone up and I seem to be playing another player not on the UK rankings, so seems it will be a total 'noob' off to start the day, lets see if we can 'noobstomp' each other out of existance, or more likely only get 3 turn in as we look up the rules for everything!

 Now all I've got to do is hope that nobody else drops out and I become surplus to requirements again!

Organising my collection – Downsizing/offloading junk!

So unusually it’s not actually a new years resolution to offload my junk, yet I’m looking at it in a serious way.  Oddly this all seems to have been spurred on by the possible changes to Warhammer forecast for 9^th edition.

For those that don’t follow the game the rumours suggest there will be drastic changes to how the game looks and plays in the next edition which is rumoured for the middle of 2015.  From 16 factions down to 6 (and there is already track record for this from the End Times books coming out at present).   So why should that really impact my collection?  Well it has been a long term goal to own one of every army for Warhammer.  But if the armies are no longer in existence do I really want to own them?  If they’re combined then what overlap do I have in my figure collection, what could I sell off vs keep without impacting me?

All of that got me thinking about the mountain of figures in my cupboards and how seldom some of them see the light of day.  For instance I have a 40k space marine army that hasn’tcome out the box in over 3 years I suspect.  It’s a battle company too, so not a small collection!  Then what about all the old games which I have stacks of figures for, will I end up playing them ever?

So I’ve begun the process of firstly carrying out an audit of what I own and the next step will be deciding what to do with it.

Warhammer – My biggest commitment, and the one with least certainty going forward.

Bretonnians – Full 3,000ish pts army, all models painted except 6 mounted yeomen but still needs based but that means I can match it with my empire to roll it forwards (it’s one of my resolutions to base it) HOLD & PAINT. SUBJECT TO FUTURE SELL ARMY.

Chaos Dwarfs – Big hat metals army.  These guys are money.  I paid a pittance for them as bought off someone that won the army in a raffle!  But I think I’ll paint them up and not just sell them off, there is something about an army that has been discontinued on multiple occasions that says holding them will only see the value increase. HOLD & PAINT

Daemons of Chaos – Chaos Legion will be one of the armies to exist in future Warhammer so no risk attached to these.  Already future proofed with my consistent basing scheme between them and my WoC.  Have a small selection of unpainted bits but only a handful of models, so should get them painted up so I can call it done.  Organised these recently into one place so can actually review what I have. HOLD

Dark Elves – Have a box full of stuff in my ‘to paint’ queue.  This is a tricky one, with the combination of the elf armies into one they are entirely redundant as I have painted WE and HE but on inconsistent basing.  Assuming 9^th makes them one army then anything in here must become duplicate with stuff in the other two books surely.  Consider selling? PAINT/SELL

Dwarfs – Massive army and a box of spares which are unpainted.  Unload surplus stuff barring things that are genuinely useful, sounds like army will cease to exist as a standalone but given a lot of what I have is 3^rd ed metals it’s holding value and desirable. HOLD & PAINT,  SELL UNWANTED figs

Empire – Bound to exist going forward in some form.  I’ve most of an army painted and plenty to expand with, these are the next army painting project, not too much additional unnecessary stuff to offload really. HOLD & PAINT

High Elves – Army done in 2014, still adding bits.  Have a box full of stuff I should just sell as of little value to me, but keep pulling bits from it to use at present, so loath to flog it quite yet.  Again the combination of the elf armies gives me some concerns over what to do with this stuff. HOLD, SELL UNWANTED, POSSIBLY SELL ARMY?

Lizardmen – Could be written out Warhammer based on some current thinking, personally doubt it but who knows!  I have a box of unpainted stuff but not masses so another one which I should just finish everything off and offload what is left. PAINT O/S, SUBJECT TO FUTURE SELL ARMY.

Orcs & Goblins – Army painted but very limited options.  Really should paint some more bits but also have a load of crap I should ditch. A staple of the GW universe, can’t see them going anywhere. HOLD, SELL UNWANTED

Skaven – already unloaded most of the unnecessary stuff, so just things I want to paint at some point left, army looks safe to exist going forward HOLD & PAINT

Tomb Kings – Got fully painted then bought a few more bits.  Get it all painted again! Becomes part of undead legion army, assume will exist going forward. HOLD & PAINT

Warriors of Chaos – will combine in UL, keep and paint what I have, some surplus stuff to unload. HOLD & PAINT

Wood Elves – Again elf legion problem, but have an attractive army that I like, so should be a definite keeper.  Have a box full of extras but a lot of it could find its way into an army, so think this is paint rather than sell, but a lot of it is metals which are replaced by new plastics.  Should I trade out? HOLD & PAINT

VC, OK, Beasts – These are the armies I don’t own at present. NOT AS STANDALONE ARMIES, ROLL INTO UL AND LOC, rumours suggest that beastmen are done for but hard to believe.  OK… combined with O&G, so an easy option to add them to what I have there.

Malifaux - Played 2 games of M2e which is now over 2 years old... Suggests I shouldn't really be too attached to it, but I've really enjoyed painting the figures so not about to sell it off, plus it's not exactly a huge model count I have.

Relic Knights - This is just a cool model range.  Again not a huge collection so I'm going to commit to painting up a force and stick with it for now.

Warmachine - This is probably the game I'm least attached to.  Played a few games a few years ago and it was ok, but since it's just sat in a box untouched.  I recently went and painted a few figs which I've rather enjoyed so might paint up the army but imagine just to increase its sale value.

Rivet Wars - never played, some of it still on sprue.  Basically on hold due to current life (small kids).  This looks like fun to pull out for a gaming afternoon when I get back to doing those.

Sedition Wars - Dead on arrival, get rid is the sensible thing, but at the same time I quite like the idea of the game and should paint it up for fun at some stage.

Necromunda - Did a good job of downsizing the collection last year, should continue to ditch this as it's just a waste of space.  Will keep 1 gang for sentimental reasons.

40k - Space marines should get offloaded, they're just dead space.  Eldar is a painting project that I want to get back to at some point, so keep those.

Infinity - Again no desire to play the game ever, should just shift it on.

Epic - I sat on stuff in a box for donkeys years and last year painted up a force, still never played the game but have a cool army ready to go when I get round to it, as had such fun doing it have actually picked up a bunch more stuff too.  Being sensible have a load of stuff I should get rid of, but enjoy painting it so gonna keep it and hardly takes up much room!

Overall I've basically got a load of stuff I should sell. But in reality I've so little reason to sell it I can't see myself offloading any.  Instead I'll just focus on painting the things I want and keep the rest hidden away in boxes!

HE painting updates

As ever an upcoming event has spurred me into action and I'm working on some stuff I can't currently field in my list.

The rather unloved griffon is getting to show his face, but not the usual IoB version. This is a reaper bones model:

And I've also done a rider, he might actually end up on a Phoenix as I think the bsb will get the griffon but still useful!

All of this being work towards a silly HE army which I'll run at a local 1 day event.  I think with that model I have everything I need for the list so can go back to painting stuff 'because I want to' rather than any need.

Sheffield Slaughter

This WFB event is a long lived beast indeed. 2015 was the 18th anniversary (older than one of its entrants!) and continued to make waves. 

It featured full end times goodness (save no khaine Magic) and a new and different scoring system. 

All in all I had good fun though I think that was aided by not coming up against any end times mega characters.


I played 3 new opponents and 3 id played once before over my last 5+ years of tourneys.


Here's my army:

My list was smashy fun and will definitely be coming out to play again. HE with 2 star dragons and 2 frostheart phoenixes plays a bit differently from anything I've used before (as you'd expect!) and led to a lot of things dying in all my games.


Summary of my games below for those that care about the detail.


Game 1 Woody
We put our armies in the middle, anything there was two of we took one each, then did alternating picks for the rest. Then shoved it forwards and called as many T1 charges as we could. Ended up a small win to woody because we didn’t add points and I think that was about right. Amazing fun to play and a great start to the event, can’t really comment on army matchups tho!

Game 2 Jake Corteen
Diagonal deployment meant I had to set up a bit more defensively as he had an entirely mobile army but he then just hid morathi behind a large building and purple sunned at me all game. Killed the warlock bunker and phoenixes got the dreadlord (eventually!) but he then purple sunned both dragons T5&6 having shot/magic’d off the characters. Think I had a phoenix at the end so lost 0-20. Typical avoidance DE with 3 bolt throwers (but I couldn’t really run at them due to the scenario) and it all went wrong!  Also Jake is a rather good player too, so not overly unexpected.

Game 3 Bryan Hatchett
A EK (DE) list with BoWD 10 warlocks, mage, bsb, lord. Peg cloak guy, 5 more warlocks, 24 xbows and some dar riders. Oh and 3 bolt throwers. This was the watchtower scenario so I knew if I killed the xbows I could probably win the scenario. He pushed them up and I failed a charge with a (both?) dragons so I blocked him from the building with a phoenix. On the other side tried to get the long charge on the peg with another phoenix but failed. Archers got to charge dark riders and beat them in combat, other unit got shot off in a couple of turns. Phoenix held the peg but then he charged in the bus and I fled (off table) but that stumbled both units allowing me to smash his xbows next turn with no come back. Put one dragon (prince) into the bus to let BoWD keep me there all game and just ate the characters one at a time until only BSB was left when started on the warlocks. Xbows lost 21 guys in a turn to dragon & phoenix (helped by an 11 on the breathweapon!). Game 20-0 with 3800ish vps!

Game 4 Kieran French
More Morathi DE, another warlock bunker but no pegs (yay)2x10 dark riders, 4RBTs. Was winning this comfortably having managed to get an early charge into a DR unit with a phoenix and other one on a double 6 with the mage dragon (just did it for the terror test) but then had a mega brain fart. 2xdragons, 1 phoenix (on 1 w) fighting bsb, lord, hero(1w) & lvl2 beasts (1w). I get greedy with the phoenix and try to kill both mage and hero. Mage survives and bubbles savage beasts. I take all 3 monsters off for 1500vps. Would have been a draw but he then shoots 1 RBT at long through a wood at archers, kills enough to panic, they run off table, unit within 6” of edge panics off too breaking my fortitude and he wins 12-8

Game 5 Andy Lewis Dwarfs
I had no magic by the end of my first phase (archmage ate a cannon ball his T1, lvl 1 spell eaten). Andy gives me the game by blowing up a cannon and failing a panic test on an OG stood 6” from a 1w dragon. Dragons (without riders who died horribly) & 1 phoenix eat his army as archers stand and watch. Army list was all HW&S guys so nothing about S4 barring characters meant a field day for the T6&7 stuff. 20-0

Game 6 Will Goodwin
Kairos & Friends. Afraid this falls into the category of utter non game. General dead from rain of chaos T1, table kills his dragon T2. Fire mage miscasts and unit flees off board. Phoenix dies to single gateway as I have to save dice for purple fun each turn from guy who swift reformed into building mid table T1. Archmage tries to make a game of it hunting Kairos but 4d6s4 does 1w which he wards then repeated PS, banishment & Gateway kills the dragon then her. I had a phoenix left killing the warriors in the building. I got 70 vps for archers shooting a horror unit to 1 model (who passed 5 wards over 3 rounds to survive!) and possibly forgot to check if the warriors were below 25% but who cares. Utter non game as he never needed to engage once two monsters went down so early. 5 channels & +2 dice from heardstone with that amount of magic & flexible spell choice is horrible. 0-20


So 4 20-0s (2 each way) and one close game where I totally blew a massive advantage. To be fair I could have just not committed and been guaranteed about 16 as he had no ranged threats that would have been able to target the dragons but I went for the throat because it is more fun and I was mid table mediocrity anyway.

Oh and the silly fun game vs woody.