#74: In the Company of (Anti) Heroes...

One of the things I love so much about Age of Sigmar is its heavy focus on Heroes (and in turn, villains) that lead the many different factions of the Realms! From the the furious Grimwrath Berserker to the stalwart Lord-Castelant, from the lowliest decrepit Skaven Warlock clutching for power to the unbridled might of the Goddess Alarielle, atop her murder-beetle of death, characters abound in Sigmar. 

If we throw our minds back to 8th Edition, which I thoroughly enjoyed but can certainly recognise that it was not perfect, it reminds us of a time where characters were oft overlooked past the bare essentials...

A general.

A battle standard bearer. 

A wizard or support character.

Some armies, of course, benefited from having more, while forces like Lizardmen could tick all three boxes with a Slann. 

But these days, your playstyle, synergies and combos are built upon the back of Heroes. Whether they are unique, unnamed, minuscule or riding atop a towering monster (sometimes the hero IS the monster), every hero has a purpose and a place in one army list or another. Sure, there are certain characters that are better than others, as with any game, but all are useful. 

On top of that, your selection of heroes can have a huge impact on how your army plays. You could field the same selection of units and alternate characters, and that army would operate on a completely different wavelength! 

I'm going to delve into my logic behind the selection of characters, using Khorne Bloodbound as a prime example. 

With any army, I think there are four categories of characters. 

Commanders, usually picked for their great command abilities. My go-to, as many would know is the Mighty Lord of Khorne.

Buffers, used primarily for their abilities to empower those around them. While Bloodstokers fall into this category, the standout Buffer for Khorne is, of course, the brutally efficient Bloodsecrator. 

Toolkits are usually wizards or heroes with a handy little selection of abilities to be used throughout battle, whether offensively or defensively. With a total lack of magic, this role falls primarily with the Slaughterpriest, with their ability to halt magic with ease and using prayers to cause chaos and disarray in the enemy ranks!

And lastly, Brawlers. If there is one thing that Bloodbound have in abundance, it's Brawlers, characters designed purely around crushing heads and spilling blood. Take your pick! From the Skullgrinder to Exalted Deathbringer, they all love killing, but my top pick would have to go to Valkia! She is just a rocket-propelled slaughter-machine!!

Obviously, other factions may have other roles, and some characters land in multiple roles, but in my mind, Bloodbound Heroes will always fall into one of these. 

After a time of indecision (see last post for a glimpse of this), I've refocused and decided to punch out the remaining forces left to complete my Bloodbound, and if there's one thing Bloodbound can boast, it's an absolute plethora of Heroes! 

This my current cast of heroes! While this gives me plenty of options, the collector in me probably will continue adding to this pool until I have one of each plastic sculpt. And while there are probably characters that I would typically not use in Matched Play, there is a significant-sized Narrative Campaign that will occur later in the year, that will delve into a Khorne-led campaign and explore the cast of influential characters as they progress through the events of the Campaign. 

But I digress; more on that later...

Heroes mould and guide the creation and operation of forces on the table, and I can't get enough of the characters that are finding the limelight on the table! From Orruks riding Maw-Crushas to the big dog, Nagash himself, the attendance of these characters adds a level of cinematic grandeur that keeps me coming back again and again to witness these titanic clashes and perfectly orchestrated combos that land the knock out blow upon their foes! 

Man, I love this game!

Do you have a go-to Hero or a must-include Champion? 

Thanks for reading,

Gabe 

#73: Hitting the wall, then knocking it down...

Sometimes, very occasionally, the hobby takes a moment to not be enjoyable at all. 

This can come in several forms. You might be sick of building your seventieth marine in a row. You might be jaded with your army in game in either it's playstyle or shortcomings. You might even be tired of an entire system. Or, like me, you can get major Painters Block. 

For the last couple of weeks, I've really struggled to get back into the swing of things in the new year. Every time I picked up the brush, my brain just hit the wall and I would sit there, staring at the models in progress with no desire to tackle the task. 

This can be really demoralising, as for a lot of people (myself definitely amongst them), painting is a very relaxing activity, where I can forget my day at work, forget my worries, flick on YouTube or a Podcast, and just immerse myself in the art of it all. Incredibly relaxing. 

So when you find yourself grinding to a halt, where do you go from there? For me, it's a 50/50 mix of stubborn refusal to be beaten and an open mind. 

As readers will know, my goal for the first half of 2016 is to focus on my Word Bearers and a Death Grand Alliance army; both ambitious goals with very (shall we say) same-ish colour pallets. Word Bearers, regardless of whether it's infantry, vehicles or hulking daemon engines, are all red and silver. Sure there are little details here and there, but let's be real. Red. Silver. 

Death has a little more variety, with its rotting flesh and its spectral entities, but there's also a lot of bone. Now, to be fair, I actually still enjoy painting the Death range. Every kit is new and exciting for me, as I've never ventured into Vampire territory before now. The one thing that has stopped me painting the Death army is something that I acknowledged when I first set this challenge for myself. 

After batch painting a huge number of Word Bearers, I could barely wrap my head around tackling ranks upon ranks of highly detailed undead legionaries. I just didn't have the mental stamina, especially after a big day of work. And so I set out upon an artistically aimless adventure through my collection; basecoating random models from different ranges that piqued my interest. I would spend some time working on that model, before briefly contemplating a full scale army based around it. The intentions were well-meaning, of course, until another random model or character caught my eye. 

This lasted about a week and a half, a portion of time usually used to crush out a decent sized unit or several characters for a single army, but here I was with a random cluster of models. 

Then, out of nowhere, after hours and hours of confusion at the hobby desk, something just... Clicked. I finished off a Rockgut Troggoth (easily one of my all time favourite models; he just encapsulates the era of Warhammer when I first entered the game as a young chap) and finishing him brightened things significantly. 

Nostalgia was strong, and having put the final touches on him, I felt as though it closed the door on Painters Block, with something as seemingly mundane as painting a single model from a random unit in an army I don't really play...

I felt refreshed and enthusiastic about painting once again! The goals that I had set myself seemed less of an unattainable feat and significantly more realistic. 

I think my biggest mistake (and what led to the grinding halt of my painting enjoyment, and in turn, schedule) was setting really big goals. I had planned a truly massive Word Bearers project (Aprox. 5000+ points), which was probably a little overwhelmingly optimistic.

So, I've decided to tackle littler goals. I might paint up a Chaos Marine formation, then a handful of units for Age of Sigmar, perhaps even finish painting my Baltimordheim Ravens for Blood Bowl! I've shifted my thinking away from painting collossal armies of massive scope, and more towards painting different units from a couple of different armies to break up the schedule and keep me on my toes. 

Well. 

That was a bit all over the place! 

I think with such a grand and diverse hobby, it's easy to get out of a rut and push through if you have the right mindset. Easier said than done, I know, but after floundering a bit, I feel more focussed and purposeful in my hobby than I have in a long time! 

How do you handle getting burnt out on aspects of the hobby? Is it a matter of taking a break, shifting focus onto a different aspect of the hobby, or do you just grit your teeth and soldier on through the down times?

I'll apologise that this post is not as, let's say, optimistic as my usual posts. It's been a grind, and I'm through it now, but I just wanted to open up and be real and honest and let you guys know where I'm at. You guys have always been incredibly supportive, and hopefully if you're going through a hobby dull spell, that you can shake it off and be re-energised for the year ahead!

This has been what feels like a solid wall of text, so I shall bid you goodnight. Enjoy yourselves.

Thanks for reading, 

Gabe

#72: The Fall of Cadia and the Rise of the Imperium...

Well! What a week in the hobby! Where do I even start...

Let's talk first about Fall of Cadia! This has been the event we've all been waiting for; the advancement of the official cannon. Abaddon is finally putting the effort in and learning how to launch a successful black crusade. Cadia, the bastion of the Imperium is getting its front teeth kicked in, and everything's coming up chaos. 

And what would a new campaign be without a few new heroes. 

The first, and most notable hero making her triumphant return is Saint Celestine. Her model is picturesque, with an incredibly dynamic pose and fleeting doves. Not only that, but she is now accompanied by the Gemini twins, who act as a sort of perpetual bodyguard unit for her, granting her a decent pool of regenerating ablative wounds! To top it off, now she has Eternal Warrior and Armourbane and can still resurrect herself with an Act of Faith (should someone actually be able to take her down). All for 200 points. For what you're getting, that is disgustingly cheap! You can add her to any Armies of the Imperium force as a HQ, giving her unprecedented use. Obviously, her abilities and strengths are accentuated when she finds a home within a Deathstar unit (Grey Knight Paladin squads spring to mind), where she can absorb wounds with impunity, as well as slingshotting out and murdering everything she can get her hands on! It's great to see Sisters getting some more (brutally powerful) love, and hopefully it's a trend that Games Workshop continues.

Next, we have the big guy everyone has been talking about. Bellisarius Cawl; the big dog of the Adeptus Mechanicus. This guy is massive, and is basically a synergy machine! He accentuates the strengths of the Admech/Skitarii faction, and finally gives them a unique named character to call their own! No longer are you stuck with the Techpriest Dominus. Now you can run the Ultra-Techpriest! He's not some frail figurehead either! Rocking the ability to regenerate wounds at an alarming rate, and having the ability to lurk within units makes this guy one tenacious general!

And lastly, we have Inquisitor Greyfax. Now, to be honest, I don't care what her rules are, because this is an incredible model! From her witch hunter hat to her crossbow-mounting Condemner Boltgun, this model is pure gold in its design! 

All in all, even though it's only 3 characters being introduced to the game,  it's a game changer if you're an Imperial player. These three characters really amplify existing armies in three very distinct ways, and I'm predicting that they will be in heavy use in the current meta of the game!

Moving forward, I can only hope that, in the next step of the story arc, Chaos received a similar degree of love when it comes to new models and new rules. A guy can dream, right?

Either way, the fact that significant events are beginning to happen again to advance the history is something I think we can all get behind. This isn't some global narrative campaign to decide the fate of some backwater system with no significant impact on the larger Galaxy (Medusa V, I'm looking at you...). This is Cadia; the bastion of the Imperium holding back the flood of Chaos. This is the 13th Black Crusade, not looming on the horizon; it just kicked down the front door. Chapter home worlds are getting obliterated (sorry, space puppies!), Daemon Primarchs are roaming realspace, and I can't wait to see where this story progression takes us! Exciting times. Genuinely, I haven't been this intrigued by 40k lore in a long time!

Now, last week, we got a look in at what's coming up for Tzeentch, and most of last Sunday's post was based around what was in White Dwarf, which led me to assume that the wave of new releases was perhaps winding down, and that aside from the Skyfire's we knew were somewhere on the horizon, we had seen all that was to be expected. But in true Tzeentchian form, the trickery and deceit was rampant in the hallowed halls of Warhammer World, as before people could say "Flickering Fire", a new wave hit us not three days after WD dropped. And it had finally happened...

Plastic Lord of Change/Fateweaver kit. Plastic Changeling character pack.

The previously mentioned Skyfires!

And even word of a Blue Horror/Brimstone Horror box set! 

What a time to be a Disciple of Tzeentch!

I'm lost for words with this release. It's extensive, incredibly comprehensive (seemingly filling every possible battlefield role for what is by all rights a brand new Faction for the game), and every model released so far is downright spectacular! Tzeentch players will not be found wanting with this book! 

This wave also rounds out the Chaos Pantheon pretty neatly. Until Slannesh gets a story arc worthy of Chaos, I highly doubt we will see any models at all on that front. But look at Nurgle, Khorne and Tzeentch as stand alone armies! They have been fleshed out and supported incredibly well. It's not a case of a core set of kits that is flavoured by what characters and monsters you take. No sir-ee! Each of the three has their own unique foot soldiers, their own set of characters and monsters to lead, and most satisfyingly, they all look and play exactly how you would imagine them!

Games Workshop can seemingly do very little wrong at the moment! It looks like their CEO is really flexing his muscles and making waves in the best possible way. GW has been making very solid profits as of late, crediting a resurgence in the hobby, and that comes down to great game and model support, fantastic community outreach via social media and the likes of YouTube, and one more vital ingredient. 

You and me. 

The company relies on the wargaming community as its life blood; the source of its power to grow and advance. And they're incredibly aware of what people want, especially in the last 12 months. We have asked, and they have given. And in appreciation, I think the community has been overwhelmingly positive, both in feedback and with our hard earned pennies! Hopefully this is the trend moving forward; to see a company whose main interest is giving its supporters great products. If they can nail that, as they have been, profits and growth of the company will naturally follow!

This beautiful game is ours to enjoy. And I, for one, am happy to put my money where my mouth is and support a company that is supporting my hobby. 

I know this post was a bit of a ramble, but as I said, it's been a big week! How are you feeling regarding GW's recent decisions and business ventures?

Thanks for reading,

Gabe

#71: Oh the Times, They are A-Changin'...

Let's talk about Tzeentch. These guys are about to get their own shiny Battletome, but before we look forward, let's look back! 

Of the three currently active Chaos deities, Tzeentch has in recent years been by far the most neglected. In the later editions of Warhammer Fantasy, Tzeentch always played second fiddle to Nurgle. Mark of Nurgle was an incredible boon for Warriors of old, especially compared to the benefits offered by the Mark of Tzeentch. Short of one or two character builds, and maybe a tarpit unit here and there, it wasn't really all that points efficient. This dilemma wasn't helped by the fact that their two "Tzeentch-dedicated" characters were Galrauch (horrifically expensive in what was a very cannon-friendly, monster-hostile meta) and Vilitch the Curseling, who struggled to decide if he was a powerful warrior or a powerful caster, but paid premium points for both!

Then we passed through the End Times and into the Age of Sigmar! During this time of transition, Slannesh faded into obscurity (allegedly held prisoner somewhere amongst the realms!), while the other two Chaos Brothers were truly, truly spoilt!

Nurgle continued the trend of being a fan favourite, both in game and with models! Not only were they gifted with the exceptional Blight Kings kit, but also three Maggoth Lords and the towering, corpulent Glottkin! Gutrot Spume filled the obligatory clampack character slot, joining the Lord of Plagues, and neatly completing an abundance of models. 

Then all attention turned to Khorne! Model-wise, it felt like the wave never ended! End Times brought the Wrathmongers/Skullreapers kit and Skarr Bloodwrath. Age of Sigmar only solidified their position as the main chaos faction for the time. The new starter box was jam packed with amazing models! From the dynamic Lord of Khorne model to Bloodreaver models who quenched the thirst for updated Marauder models. 

This was backed up by more Khorne characters than you could shake an axe at!

In that time, Tzeentch was left with scraps. They received the Gaunt Summoner on a disc. And they received the contents of the Silver Tower. And that's honestly about it. The majority of the models in the Silver Tower didn't even get their own rules. The official word was that they were substitutes for existing units. 

Things only got worse for Tzeentch when the General's Handbook dropped and stripped them of their ability to cast massed Arcane Bolts!

But although the End Times was spearheaded by Nurgle, and the glory of the War of the Realms was Khorne's for the taking, their ultimate failure left only one contender to take up the mantle as the Ascendant Chaos brother. All the events, the outcome of every battle, had led to this moment. The cunning machinations and malicious trickery had all been orchestrated by the Great Deceiver, and now power over all the legions of Chaos is his to command!

It looks like The Disciples of Tzeentch is gonna be a massive drop! There are kits for all the troops, as well as a bunch of characters, but more importantly, a ton of new rules! New spells, new command traits, artefacts, warscroll battalions. The whole nine yards! 

This is a big deal for Chaos! DoT have three distinct factions within their ranks. Mortals, Daemons and the Birdmen that seem to be the new flavour added to the mix! Tzeentch has unprecedented variety within their pool of troops, and I think a savvy general will have no trouble unlocking great potential that this Battletome offers. 

The ability to manipulate dice rolls is both very themed and incredibly powerful! Characters having access to Discs left, right and centre will give them a huge amount of mobility, allowing them to be where they need to and offer synergy to those who need it most! No doubt the Hero Phase will be brutal with the array of spells available to all of the unique casters now within their ranks! 

I'm interested to see how resilient the army ends up being! While it can pack a considerable punch, will it be able to take one and still remain an effective force! Time will certainly tell. 

Are you jumping aboard the Tzeentch train? What is making it into your legion of change?

Thanks for reading!

Gabe