Second try: What you can see here is a row of LRMBT. The one on the right is an "eradicator" varient - the eradicator cannon fires an unstable sub munitition or something. Behind them is a row of twenty chaos warhounds. A good (cheap) fast attack choice a heretics & renegades army. Behind the chaos warhounds and LR Eradicator are ten rough riders; Eight explosive tipped lances, a flamer and a melta gun.

Behind them are three scout sentinals. To the left are two platoons of three squads. All of these assets belong to 'The Tigers'

The back row are heavy weapons (auto cannon and mortar teams) these belong to 'the Bloodcoats'. No progress this weekend - just a picture.

So, how am I getting on ?

Here's the two rear turret Chimera, lined up with the others. Two more to do, and then one with an eagle door. I might let the Coy 2ic have a rear turret model as well.


I've been looking through the codecies as well. I possibly need to produce a data sheet for each unit in each army with all of the army list entry information on, the fluff (to put it in context) and then a picture of the model itself.

S'good job the first battle will only be 40/40, there's no way that I could do the whole lot before mid November.

blogger

Well, blogger seems to have settled on requiring me to sign in from scratch every time; Every time I klick on 'remember me' and every time, it doesn't.

It's probably something petty such as the fact I'm signing in using a hotmail account rather than a googlemail account.

Three cheers for ISPs and their quirks and idiosynchratic ways.

Tossers.

Yay ! It's Fri Friday, It's Fri Friday.

The Blood Coats have four mortar squads and three auto cannon squads. Now, IRL, such a heavy weapon Platoon would have a notable amount of support. Not reflected in fortykay, and an addition such as this does nothing under the standard rules for a pick up game. So no in game advantage for a Command Post, despite the fact that IRL, none of any of the indirect fire assets would actually work properly. This is a set of Rhino sides from bitzbox. The other rhino bits are from the CSM Predators. Obviously quite a lot from LRMBT, Chimera and Sentinal kits as well.

The main body is 1mm plasticard. I was given the encourage
ment to attempt this by Si on his Kataan IV project page. So I gave it a go and actually am satisfied with the result. hurrah.

QS's look around day.

I did another rear turret Chimera last night. I also cleaned up the bits for a Lord of Change, but could not face all the drilling and pinning. I have put away all of the Heretic and Renegade armour, creating a lot more space. Hopefully, my new figure case will arrive over the BH w/e and I'll be able to begin putting all the little men away as well. I want to put them away in their units, rather than just filling every available space with random models.

Link of the Day.

Tempus Fudgit are a gaming club. They organise non-competitive campaign weekends for which they take over warhammer world - as they had done when CNJ & I visited. Their website contains the downloadable packs for these events. These contain some very interesting ideas. Some of which we'll see on Devos IV.

http://www.tempusfugitives.co.uk/

Apology for blatent sexism

There, I have changed the welcome message from 'wives and gurl friends' to 'significant others'. And altered the banner headline to reflect an indeterminate number of generals. Please feel welcome...

Big monthly audit today.

KK - the vertical version. I did reply to your email. The vertical one. The horizontal one makes me feel queasy.





As for progress. Four Eldar Rangers for the Bel Tain Sacred Guard, Maugan Ra, not my favourite sculpt, but he is (allegedly) death on the gaming table, four vanilla DE warriors and one with a splinter cannon. I've also begun a WraithSeer. Which in the game is a WraithLord who used to be a Farseer, rather than an exarch (see link of the day). And most of a Ravager as well.

Here is a corner of one of the progress tables. To the left of the obvious Deamon Prince are a unit of Orks lead by the freebie Black Reach Nob. Behind the Deamon Prince are two eight man squads of noise marines and two aspiring champions. Behind them is a row of three Defilers. Behind the defilers are three Predator Anhillators (las cannon) and then three Predator Exterminators (Auto cannon and HB). Down the LHS, you can see the four Land Speeders, with two Spawn of Chaos in front. This whole lot are a chaos spaze muhreen warband. With the obvious exception of the orks, who arn't.

Chimera Conversion.

This is it with the rest of the structure on. The obvious holes will be covered by stowage items.

Chimera Conversion.

Here is a standard Chimera, from the rear quarter

And the same model from the front quarter.

This is the conversion to the more modern looking style. Only half built, but it gives a good impression.
And again from the front quarter: In my DKK, these will be for the Grenadier platoon, hence the hull mounted heavy flamer.

Link of the Day.

An on line lexicon of WH40k. Just the ticket.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Main_Page

I'm off to watch the hydrostatic test discharge later.

Last night I found and finished off the last two HB servitors. I did the third/last scout sentinal for the "Tigers". And two spotters for the Cadian sniper section. I also found that one of the peices that I've been leaving out of the armoured sentinals is actually a frame for the armoured superstructure. Ho hum.

I also found a modelling shop in Sevenoaks. More glue and fresh scalpel blades - hurrah !

Link of the Day.

I love forge world stuff. I wish I had the modelling and painting skills to actually do it justice.

Regardless of their TQM, their customer service is second to none (literally - it remains the best customer service experience I have ever had, in any sphere, not just gaming).

http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/

gimme gimme gimme.

Pressure testing is finished. The giant ampitheatre excavation is still open, though

OK; Possible skirmish weekend 14 Nov 09. Pick up your messages, gentlemen (and lady).

This weekend's progress was another 6' x 4' battlefield. Fourtykay is designed (apparently) to be played on a 6' x 4' board.

There is a suggestion that 40/40 might be played on a 4' x 4' board.

Now we have two, they could be pushed together to an 8' x 6' area for a tank battle. There is still one more to do; this would give us 12' x 6'. So us players can still reach the middle and there is enough space for the apocalypse battle.

We would, however, need trestles. Otherwise the dogs are going to stomp on the armies. I'd ask for help/suggestions, but I'm pretty sure that you arn't reading this anyway...

Link of the Day.

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/llama

This needs sound. Possibly not good for the office unless you want to get sectioned.

I spent the morning looking at Cathodic Protection possibilities.

Here's another Oruro invention for submission to God for approval:

Rod of Static Charge

This is a 9" rod about half an inch wide, semi-translucent dirty yellow, and a special woollen glove that is used to hold it, and a similar sleeve to store it It is charged by rubbing it vigorously on the skin of a live (or only recently dead) mythical cat. Up to 4 charges can be held. Any contact with anything except the glove and sleeve results in a lightning-bolt equivalent discharge to whatever is being touched. When charged it has a tendency to spontaneously discharge; every day the DM rolls a d100, and if 0-23 is rolled that is the hour in which it will do so, preferably at the most inconvenient moment. When it was first made it had 2 charges and the first went off in his pocket. The second time it went off it was in what Oruro calls his 'bomb bay', a reinforced metal box in his lab. Oruro is confident he will at some point work out how to charge it by placing it on the roof of a building during a lightening storm, but he thinks he'll also need about a hundred meters of copper cable to do so.

S'okay. This might make it into play. Two things to bear in mind:

1. An item like this will take time to research, let alone construct. And you're currently mid way through a fight at the Dread Pagoda of the Inscruitable Ones. And their Beholder chums.

2. Nymraith is your PC who invents things. Oruro stands very little chance of successfully making anything, let alone a magic item.

Today I will be auditing the oversized excavation.

This photo (a herd of Wraithlords [I'm not sure that "Herd is the correct collective for WraithLords]) was taken a few weeks ago. Gareth from Wargames Empire (there are two Gareths at Wargames Empire) asked if I could photograph the things I build. If you look at the interweb retail sites, you'll see that (at the time of writing) all of the pictures have gone. GW have stopped on line retailers from using the (GW) library images.

Which means that all of the sites will now be in a mad rush to obtain suitable pictures. Surely this runs the risk of GW products being sold on the basis of construction, painting and overall finish of someone of say, my ability ? ie not really all that good (three colours is good enough ;) ) Surely GW, giving it a moments thought, would want their products illustrated and advertised by photos of examples prepared by the 'Eavy Metal workshop ? Then all of the sites selling GW product (which, lets remember, is still £,$ & Euros in GW's coffers) would be showcasing the same high standard; GW would know that the products were being presented as they wished, not as someone else imagined them.

So, shelving for the moment for idea that GW have just stopped the use of these pictures in order to sell one more example of every item (to the on line retailers to have painted & photographed to advertise, oh let me see... those very GW products). This could be seen as the 'corporate giant' (of this hobby, anyway) relinquishing a little control to the participants. So that, perhaps in the future, most of the products are sold using pictures prepared by something other than GW itself. So that more and more, people casually looking at (40K) will see it how hobbyists see it; providing more variety than 'straight' GW depictions.
So then, last night I put five Chaos Warhounds togeather. Not a lot, but in the face of a work BBQ, ok I suppose.

Link of the Day. - Chimera Conversion ahoy !

This is the Chimera IFV. This one is in standard trim; multi-laser main armourment, hull mounted Heavy Bolter, six firing points (normal las-guns) and pintle mounted heavy stubber. This particular one has since been resprayed black pending inclusion in the DKK Mech Coy.

This design is a little 'boxy'. A lot of the IG AFVs look like WW1 vehicles. The fluff details their, erm, basic design as well. So there have been a few conversion attempts to make the Chimera look a little more, purposeful. In a more modern military idom.

http://theback40k.blogspot.com/2009/07/pimpin-my-rides.html

This shows what can be acheived. And this

http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=126013&page=19

is a step by step guide on how it can be achieved.

I dislike large, deep and almost certainly unnecessary excavations

These are my helpers. They are normally quite good helpers, as they lay about on the floor, not getting in the way, not offering advice or bothering me that much. They get restless every hour or so and then I have to take a break (good for me) to excersise them for a bit. These fine fellows are Death Korps of Krieg (DKK). Made by Forge World, they are cast in resin, not polystyrene. In my expereince, UHU sticks them together much much much better than superglue. They are beautifully sculpted. When I first began my IG, I wanted an ASL army. Only I couldn't find ASL anywhere (it hadn't occurred to me that when GW said 'collectors range' that they meant "these are the figures you are looking for") and so eventually found the DKK on the FW website and began acquiring them. They are not a cheap option. They are fiddly to get together. They represent, per figure, my greatest investment in time, money and effort when compared against the other armies.

Specifically, these guys are DKK grenadiers


At some point in the recent past, my helpers have sat on my giant figure case to see out of the window. So last nights progress wasn't new build - it was repairing 30 DKK soldiers who'd obviously been sat on. Rah boo poo indeed.

So I lost Monday night's build/paint time to socialising with my tame environmental advisor. Last night was repairs, tonight there is a project (the one I work on, not Devos IV) barbicue. Thursday night should be OK though. Possibly a Chimera conversion. After last weeks fantastic progress with the DE, this week feels a little flat.

I'm also running out of space. I need another figure case for all the new little men. And some boxes and bubble wrap for the tanks. At the minute the cabin is full of boards covered in miniatures. And boxes of used sprues; many with bits still on and a large box of bare ones. And piles of cardboard boxes and two carrier bags of plastic wrapping and trays. So I need a clear out and tidy up. Maybe that'll be Thursday's progress.

Q&A re Elementals.

1) Were you intending FG to be able to summon/control from all FOUR elemental planes, using the same list. Or will she have to know it separately for each? (Cos in the latter case, we can be 90% certain she’ll go with Fire and not bother with anything else, but if she can summon her choice of element from the same list, I think it might encourage her to be (at least occasionally) more imaginative).

Yes. All four. For exactly that reason. Now this might be a Sindalie thing, or a side effect of being an acolyte of the goddess of spell casting. Or a bit of both. Yes, I know, after all my rants about Harry Potter, I have to acknowledge that FG is "special". Harumph.

2) What sort of beings can be summoned (and/or controlled – the answer might be different for that)? Now I am sure you meant it to include ‘pure’ elementals (walking piles of rock, skipping pillars of flame, sentient waves, whirlwinds, etc.) (with their size and power going up with level). But what about more ‘humanoid’ sorts of elemental? You said you didn’t imagine it including ‘genie’ types. But I their general high power level might prohibit those (not quite sure, and maybe the tables could be fiddled). But there are many more ‘borderline cases’. KK herself, with no prompting, asked whether the Steam Mephits counted? And, I think, yes they would. They are minor elemental beings (from the Plane of Fire). And on my current version of the table, she could summon one as a 4th level spell, and Master it (so controlled without concentrating) as a 9th level spell. Basically both being pretty easy for FG.

Due to her super power of mastering all four elephantals, she will only be able to get 'vanillia' elementals; a conciousness in pure elemental form. So no para elementals (steam, lava, smoke, etc), no djinn (dao, marid, fruity) etc.

3) Assuming (for now) that the answer to (2) is at least a qualified ‘yes, a range of different elemental-beings are in scope’. How would the type of being be determined? Could she choose to summon a steam mephit, say, as opposed to a small ‘pillar of fire’ sort of elemental – perhaps in order to parboil someone/thing without the risk of burning down the building she was in? Or would it be largely random/GM’s whim. In which case the list is a lot less useful (because you just know she’ll get the wrong one quite often!)

Ha ! The answer is no...

4) Another point about summoning is the question of coercion. Are summoned beings compelled to arrive and then obey the caster? I think not, since for even vaguely intelligent beings that would be in effect slavery – which the PE is very against. (I believe KK concurs). Instead, I suggest that the summoning be conceived as like some sort of a inter-planar ‘job advert’: “wanted - one small fire elemental to come and burn something on the Prime Material Plane - transport here and back included - please reply immediately to Forgileill". This would, normally be the default for summoning spells. Even Ryz’s demon/devil summoning ‘works’ because the demons/devils/elementals WANT to come to the Prime, and are looking for a way to do so (even if it is only a short stay).

I like that idea. Make it so, No 1

5) It gets a bit more complicated with the Control/Master spells. These could be seen as some sort of ‘puppet like’ body control, or mind domination/spirit control. But this is heading to slavery again. How about them actually being ‘negotiation’ spells. Whereby FG offers the being something it wants in return for its services – basically ‘Pay’. The currency could just be Essence (i.e. power points). As a slight alternative, the ‘pay’ could be rather ‘fuel’ for its (continued) manifestation on the Prime Material Plane? This rather assumes that the being will want to stay if it can (presumably to burn/drown/crush/blow things), and if the fuel is not forthcoming it will be forced to go home; whereas the ‘pay’ version implies it is more an agreement to burn/whatever what FG wants it to – as opposed to whatever it feels like.

Yes, this idea sounds good. Also provides an elephant of uncertainty when it comes to "loosing control".

6) Revisiting the ‘can a summoned creature be dispelled’. The official D&D answer is ‘yes’ to simple summoning like this – because the manifestation on the Prime is not the real body of the creature and it is the magic that keeps it manifest here. Whereas more powerful portal magic (in D&D ‘Gate’ etc.) actually brings the real being to the Prime (possibly against its will), which is totally different. This and Qs 4 and 5 are closely related – if you know the answer to one it will probably tell us the others.

OK. What you get is the conciouness of an elemental of appropriate power (as advertised) crossing the planar boundries to inhabit a 'body' (composed of an amount of [fire, water, air, minerals]) provided by the summoner. So the thing that could be dispelled are the spell/advert/planar crossing (as an act of magic, a descrete spell in and of itself). Or the conciouness in the manifestation could be attacked (banished) as an outsider. Either of these would have to separately targetted and I think is perhaps harder to do than the glib AD&Dism of 'I dispell the elemental'.

The list attaches is very rough and subject to addition and modification and ‘fine tuning’. But I think it is pretty workable. (I am doing one of demons and devils and other things for Ryz too!)

And I like the list. The list should stay, even though FG might not be able to get 100% out of it herself.

(I tried posting the table, but it just turned out as a list - rah boo poo)

7) Erm... yeah~ what Chris just said... now, if the embodiment of an elemental can be dispelled by an anti-magic zapper (which beholders have...) can FG spell master the Magic portal and the summon elephentals to bring the actual elephental onto the Prime plane? But if it's just the 'containment' of the elephental that's magic, if you anti-magic zapp it, does that release the proper elephental to wreck havoc? Does this potentially also mean that Ryz's demon summons can also be dispelled by anti-magic zapper thing?

That's more than than spell mastery of the list she has; that is a 'planar gate' type list. The effect of the beholder's anti magic ray is dependant on the skill roll the beholder makes, just as it is for Player Characters.

Yesterday was mostly spent on tender evaluations

Last night I went out with Scott. We went for pizza in S'oaks. So no progess at all. And we saw a fox in the high street at about 2030. Hanginog around the bus stops.

Link of the Day.

Randomly, a 'site selling terrain pieces for a reasonable price.

http://www.maljazar.co.uk/

The pipe wall in the AGI night be too thin to hot tap. Which is inconvienient, to say the least.

I'm quite tired.

Link of the Day.

Dakka could be viewed as the quintessential 40K forum. It's big, it contains a lot and if you post a question, it gives you answers. Good for a lurk, good for a search.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/

No work today !

Duane and I have never met. We've SMS'd and conversed on arsebook. Anyway, he happened upon a very nice thing the other day and when our wives went out in London on Saturday, they brought it back for me.

Nice one Duane, thanks wives !

And the promised replacement Ravager arrived as well. Hurrah !

Link of the Day.

Urban Mammoth do two skirmish games in the same 'world': Urban War and Metropolis. These seem to be holding up ok on their own.

The platformer and chemical plant terrain kits are excellent. Some of their minis are fabulous. And some will even fit into our game. ie a pseudo japanese IG or PDF unit based on some of the triad models.

http://www.urbanmammoth.com/

Once again, I'd reccommend on line shopping for the best price.

Weekend working - usually quiet, seems to only be pressure testing and one ecavation today

These are GW 1st edition Imperial Guard. ie Dating back to when they were the imperial army; Officers and commissars had jet bikes, their vehicles were rhinos and land raiders and they had jump pack and beastman assault squads. Proper stuff. These boys, being painted already, are last on the list for touch up. They need one, my intention is to base them for the campaign and then improve the paint job as time allows. They are being reinforced by the very occasional cadian as well as a sprinkling of Urban Mammoth's Viridians.

I had a good night, last night - six viridian snipers turned up, along with two viridian HMG teams (I've cut off the HMG and replaced with HB, putting them on to 60mm bases). The snipers are for the Cadian Recce unit and the HB teams are for the Devos IV 2nd "Loyal" PDF Infantry Regt.

Also managed two Chimera, one DE jetbike and the last defiler. My normal rate is one vehicle or ten foot soldiers. So feeling quite pleased about that.

Link of the Day.

Bell of Lost Souls. Regular, daily, posts. Never over technical. Always inclusive. And from Texas (?!?!)

http://www.belloflostsouls.net/

More stuff through the post

These fellows are Devos IV 99th PDF Regt "The Blood Coats". Cadians with FW Heretic and Renegade torsos. I put another Raider together and found some arms for one of the Ravager gunners. I should put together the other Ravager, using the gunners arms from the other Ravager to finish the first one and leaving me where I am now (a Ravager with one armless gunner) but advanced by one completed Ravager. Then when I do get around to the outstanding twenty DE warriors, they'll be enough space armage to finish him off. Hurrah !

Moving on, being a little bored by endless DE warriors, I've going to start on the Chimera pile. There are at least ten to do. So I'll see how long I can stand Chimera production for.

My parcel ? The balance of my Chimera order from Wargames Empire.

blogger

Some of friends may believe me to be a luddite. But I have jumped into the information age and created a blog. After I created it, it decided that I needed to sign into it via goggle, rather than blogger itself. Sometimes when I click 'sign in' it does sign me stright in (with out me having to put my password in). Which surely it should not do ? I have never clicked the 'keep me signed in forever' button. Similarly, it sometimes does not let me sign in; failing to recognise the password. Now, even at my advanced years, I can remember the password for my blog. Obviously blogger/goggle cannot, so I have to go through the password reset pantomime.

These two things happen about 50/50. So far it has not yet just asked me for my password, and then on receipt of the correct password, just let me in.

And then there is the question of blog relevance. I suspect that some people will randomly come across this and read a bit and then disregard it. I have no idea even if the intended audience (of three) will read it. I should imagine that there are not really many blogs that are followed by that many persons; the blogs tend to contain the sort of information that used to be exchanged down the pub. The same with arsebook. And twitter ? Surely anyone who twitters enough to make it worthwhile is so busy twittering that they arn't actually doing anything worth twittering about ? If these people really were interesting, they'd be doing something that left no time for twitter. If people who spend all day on arsebook actually had any friends, then they wouldn't be glued to a computer for their entire lives.

Perhaps this is why hoodies are so intimidating; they are doing something real. They are in touch with their friends, all hanging out together in shopping precincts. Practicing their social as well as anti social skills. Perhaps.

And whilst we're on IT. Who really thinks that this 'cloud' thingy is a good idea ? If your data is out there in psyberspace then you are not the only person with access to it. And you are not the person in control of it's maintenance and stability. Whoever owns it could just wait until you cannot do without it and then turn it off. Or hold all of your data to ransom.

At least if your data is on your memory stick in your pocket then no-one else can get it. Unless they mug you. And it's not any less accessable for being on a stick. You still need the same hardwear to access the cloud as you would data carried around in your pocket. It is quite obviously and blatantly less secure.

And three cheers for MS calling their version 'azure' rather than cloud, "because there no clouds over Seattle, only clear blue skies". humm. Is this true ? Do they not realise that the implication of a blue sky is that there is nothing there ? ie there is no data ? So all of the data going into it is not being saved at all. Are all IT people incapable of thinking like a normal person ?

The People's Libertine Army

The PLA are led by a person now known as Chaux Na M’rrsee. She first enters recorded history as a Battle Sister of the Adepta Sororitas who were despatched to Vraks as part of the honour guard of the newly appointed Cardinal of the Obsurca Sector.

Along with many of her sisters, she was seized and incarcerated when the cardinal turned away from the Emperor. She spent many years in a cell under a stronghold of Chaos. She emerged once more into the Emperor’s light with small pox scars and radiation sickness. After her release and subsequent screening by the Ordo Hereticus, she spent four years as a Sister Repenta[1] before withdrawing from her Order Militant and began work as a missionary for one of the Orders Dialogous. At this point she was still Sister Shona.

Eventually her assignments brought her to the extremely wealthy planet of Devos IV. There she was appointed by the local Echlessiarchy to work within the community. The officials who had made her appointment were polarists[2] and most of the other people she worked with were redemptionist[3]. She was asked to befriend (in order to spy and inform on[4]) an all female group who had fallen under suspicion. Various members of this movement (some of them identified by Sister Shona herself) were identified as needing a little firm guidance. Death by torture was simply getting the rest of the ladies scared and more reactionary themselves, waves of near hysteria swept through the entire female population. Having witnessed the crowd dynamics on Vraks Sister Shona could see that the impending purge on the horizon and was acutely aware that it was being driven not by heresy in the population, but by institutional inflexibility in the Echlessiarchy.

Sister Shona tried to explain that the movement was nothing sinister and posed no threat to the Empire at all. The group with which she worked was small and less than half of the possible demographic were really interested in ‘weight loss plans’ other such things. Once again, the Echlessiarchy took this to mean that they were ingaged in sedition, heresy and the worship of chaos powers, rather than simply lacking the willpower to stick to a diet.

Sister Shona sincerely believed that the desire to be thinner, to weigh less and therefore to look better was in no way anathemical to the imperial cult. The women’s man complaint boiled down to a lack of romance, which Sister Shona quickly identified could be explained to the authorities as a bar to their duty to further increase the population of the imperium. She lobbied the Echlessiarchy for three years. A massive re-education programme took place. The women were advised that the only and infallible way to achieve their goal was through the medium of prayer to the god emperor of all mankind.

It was as this betrayal of the people by their religious leaders unfolded that Slaneesh began to whisper to Sister Shona. Perhaps Slaneesh had already spoken to Sister Shona when she was locked up under the Cathedral of Vraks. Determined that the women would get a real chance to loose weight, she set about supplementing the official, ineffective, regime with lessons from her own martial past.

Soon Shona was sending her acolytes out to other groups of women. Following her regime they did become slimmer and more attractive. In the way that these things do, her methods and organisation became a cult in itself. At first, the Echlessiarchy turned a blind eye; as Shona had promised them, they were increasingly surrounded by ever more attractive and younger looking women. The unofficial health and beauty programme spread like wildfire amongst the disaffected groups of women across all social boundaries and even to those who previously had not been members of a slimming club. The movement was soon harbouring psykers from the Ordo Hereticus, it was simply a natural progression from hiding outspoken fat women from other branches of the inquisition.

Their prayers had been answered (by Slaneesh). But now instead of the romance they craved being a distant dream they had to put up with near constant pestering from over amorous men. This was tiresome but manageable, after all, they did have their uses.

It was only when the now flawless and irresistible Shona rejected the advances of the planetary Deacon that he determined to call in some of “Sister” Shona’s former comrades that things began to spiral out of control. Shona knew that she could turn a unit of Sisters Repenta to her cause. But Battle Sisters and a Sister or Mother Superior were a danger that she could not countenance. There was only one reasonable course of action left. War.
[1] Why so long ? either she had a lot to repent for, or she enjoyed it.
[2] Believe in the absolute separation of humans and psykers; the two can be combined only in the Emperor. Even sanctioned psykers should for preference be turned into servitors or otherwise lobotomised.
[3] Militant sect, devoted to purging the sins of any and all deviants. Consider most non-members to be deviants.
[4] She could see the need for such an approach. But as a former Sister of Battle, she saw herself as the straight forward, direct action type. Asking her to do it, rather than someone else with a talent for subterfuge and lies really put her back up. The view of the Echlessiarchy was that as a woman, she already possessed all the skills necessary for intrigue and deception.

For your benefit, Millima.

I thought this might help:

IG - Imperial Guard
DE - Dark Edlar (no no no! Dark Eldar - ed)
SM - Spaze Mhureen
AC - Auto Cannon
LC - Laser Cannon
HB - Heavy Bolter
TL - Twin Linked - this proves improved performance in the game mechanics.
LR - Land Raider (the MBT of the SM)
LRBT - The vanillia Leman Russ (the MBT of the IG)
LRD - A Leman Russ Demolisher. Quite obviously an AVRE
LRV - Leman Russ Vanquisher - an MBT with an adequate ranged main weapon
LRA - Leman Russ Anihilator - mounts TL LC instead of a 'battle cannon'.
HH - Hell Hound. A Chimera with a flame thrower of epic proportions
CH - Chaos Hound - a canine from hell. Not a "hell hound", 'cause that is a tank QED.
Chimera - the IFV of the IG
RR - Rough Riders - cavalry
CC - Close Combat
DKK - Death Korps of Krieg - a flavour of IG
IST - Imperial Storm Troopers - another flavour of IG
Vostroyan First born - another flavour of IG
Valhallan Ice Warriors - another flavour of IG
Cadians - GWs 'default' flavour IG
ASL - Ammegedon Steel Legion - another flavour of IG
Devos IV - Our campaign world. Made up by me
Devos 99th Infantry Regt - Rebels. "the Blood Coats".
Devos 13th Mech Regt - Rebels. "the Tigers".
PDF - Planetary Defence Force.
ScC - Shuriken Cannon (an Eldar weapon)
BL - Bright Lance (an Eldar weapon)
StC - Star Cannon (an Eldar weapon)
SL - Scatter Laser (an Eldar weapon)
DL - Darl Lance (a DE weapon) (no no no ! Dark Lance)
Raider - DE transport
Ravager - DE tank
Talos - DE terror-machine
Falcon - Eldar tank
(Wave) Serpent - Eldar transport
(Fire) Prism - Eldar tank with FO huge laser.

Link of the Day.

Pig Iron miniatures are great. A squad of ten for £14 compares very favourably with GW. This fine fellow is one of their 'Kolony militia'. These make excellent guardsmen, especially now that they do officer and NCO packs. Buying sets of heads is nice as well. Mine look similar to this, as it is my IG colour scheme.

These are Pig Iron tanks. A little more 'modern' looking than the GW ones, as befits an Adeptus Mechanicus backed Skitarri force: The barrels are chimneys from the Imperial city set. So these babies will 'count as' laser destroyer tanks. Which is nice.

Anyway, Pig Iron are here: http://www.pig-iron-productions.com/

Deep Joy. It rained last night so today I am auditing in mud.

This is the refinary/processing plant; water, promethium, whatever. Again there is a 1st edition guardsman to provide an idea of scale. The central isle is big enough to take a Leman Russ (MBT). The original idea was to have some kind of high level gantry as well.














The issue with the gantry idea is that most of the 'sides' I'm preparing have a squad size of ten models for their basic troop types. So the gantry, to be of much use would have to take ten models, which may well make it look not so much like a gantry, more like a landing pad. The squad coherancy rules are 2" between models. To avoid all dying at once to blast and/or template weapons, it pays not to bunch up. So we end up needing a 'gantry' the size of a pizza box. Which is fine, but entirely obscures the carefully constructed terrain masterpiece below.

















The same peice with more pipe, a little more detail and a lick of grey paint.

So at the minute there may well be a gantry, but it will be more like scale gantry size, (urban mammoth platformer set sort of thing,) making it less use to full size squads. No matter. I'm sure we'll cope.

Moving on again: I found another four incubi. So this week I'm up to eight incubi, eleven DE Jetbikes, three Raiders and a Ravager. The gunners on the Ravager came without arms. I telephoned GW and they're sending me another one. And I make ten DE warriors yesterday. Twenty DE warriors and one Ravager to go. (two Ravagers, including the one that they are sending me). And then that'll be the DE ready to undercoat. Woo-Hoo !

Oooo. An audience.

"codex - coding/decoding algorithm...
IA - information architecture
raw - not yet coded...

this reads like some white paper from the more demented "Enterprise Architecture" IT goblins!"

OK.

Codex = Army book.
IA = Imperial Armour - stuff produced by ForgeWorld (FW)
RAW = Rules As Written. As opposed to RAI (Rules As Intended). Which you of all people will realise are two very different things.

Adulterating fortykay

There are units that I've built which are non-codex. There are some with IA rules and some for which I'm relying on the Eye of Terror Codex. And some which I just thought would be cool, specifically the Emperor's Children Land Speeders. So I had buy the Spaze Mhurine codex just to include them, but it's a game with my friends and like Jervis keeps saying; it's our game (well, mine at the moment, so I get to define reality for everyone else).

So as the games progress, we'll be following the codex and RAW. But we'll have a bit of fun with our mini substitution, even if we'd not be allowed to use them elsewhere; ie the PP Cephelax and drudges make good Heamonculi and grotesques. I really like the infinity models and so may make up an IG platoon or two from those.

WD when I used to buy it and the Rouge Trader book (from when citadel produced only an extremely limited number of SF minis) contained advice to players on getting minis from other manufacturers to use in the games. The WD article that proceeded 'Eavy Metal was a review of the market, not just a citadel advert. I can see how insisting on GW only product in GW shops and events could be protecting their market share. I suppose with their target market (pre-pubescent boys) that works. Us older (and wiser [!?]) folk will just do what we want anyway, QED.

So the Heretics and Renegades are backed up by a Dark Ages Firestorm warband, which fits with their idiom nicely. The loyalist Catachans are Scotia Grendal Void 1.1 Veridians and shadowforge marine special ops.

My DKK are fronted by three Panther Vanquishers;

So there it is

Link of the Day.

WH40K Empire, as was. It's now Wargames Empire. It runs very close with Wayland Games for price, there's not a lot in it, most of the time; but the clincher is that if you can be bothered to contact them for one of their "Combo Deals", you'll get even more money off. S'a winner.

https://www.wargamesempire.com/

Ways to make an excavation safer: Shoring, benching, banking, piling and/or trench boxes. Oh and doing sod all, 'cause it's less effort

This is the major stronghold for one side or other (the defending side - doh!). It is polystyrene walls on hardboard with a coating of wickes filler. There are dragons teeth (same construction) around the base. These keep breaking, so I keep PVAing them back.















Once again, these are old pictures (maybe a year or so). The base has been covered with PVA and sand and the whole thing painted grey.

It doesn't have a roof. I'll do one with aegis walls around the edge or something.

Moving on once more, Last night I went out with AP to "The Kentish Rifleman" for dinner. http://rifleman.ultimatetech.co.uk/ So was limited to eight DE warriors and the pilot and darklance bloke on three (unmanned) Raiders. Looking forward to doing the Ravagers.

Link of the Day.

Stelek (he has a real name, it's on his 'site) used to post on Dakka. He had a reputation for fine tuning army lists to "win". He also provided tactics to use with the lists and so on.

Now, 'the scene' in the US appears to be quite a bit more competitive than it does in the UK. He appears to be quite cross at what he sees as inadequacies in the tournament-go-round and almost as cross that other large entities who could (in his view) improve things are not doing so.

So accepting that his reason for playing might not be the same as mine, I do find his 'site to be a good read. Sometimes.

http://www.yesthetruthhurts.com/

Under the Sea. (nothing to do with the post, it's just work)

This picture is hardboard and a couple of peices of sheet expanded polystyrene. Despite lots of terrain building articles saying how common this commodity is, I have not found this to be the case. Neither Do-it-all, Travis Perkins, Wickes, Homesbase, Sheffield Insulations nor Gibbs and Dandy stock it. So I'm not sure where the terrain builders of the world are getting it from. This lot was from Ikea. The figure is a 1st edition guardsman.

The picture below is the same piece with a layer of filler and sand and a lick of grey paint. These were done over a year ago and have had some more work done on them, but like all of my stuff, are still not finished.

Moving on:

Last night I began work on a GW Talos and PP Harrower. I think the Harrower makes for an excellent stand in Talos. It has a huge mean looking claw, pointy legs and that soul cage cannon can eaily pass for twin linked splinter cannons. With a decent paint job it will look sinsiter enough. I actually think it looks more sinsiter than the Talos. Uhu and paper clips will hold it all together, I'm sure.

I also found four GW Incubi in the DE box, so I stuck them together as well. And the free Nob and Termie from WD when Black Reach was launched. The Termie can sub for the Inqusitrix in an Apoc game or something. I've had another look at the Trumpeter 1/35 Piranha. This will be the Inquisition pimped ride. But the undercarriage looks so complex ! I suppose I've been spoilt by the GW tanks, which, lets face it, you can construct wearing mittens. Although I'd not recocmmend it; I do have one very wobbly chimera.

About Blogger: I have now figured out that the way to use this is to upload the photos and then write the words, it'd be a bit easier. Also, when it comes to labelling the blog entries, I have the urge to label every post "scooters, holidays, autumn".

Devos IV Background Information

The Devos Campaign

The Terrain

Devos IV

Devos IV is an important Agri-world in the obscura sector. There was an important imperial shrine in the city of Xyphonica and a generally well regarded PDF of 80000 personnel. Devos IV has itself, within living memory, raised two IG regiments (one now defunct and one deployed in support of the Cadian Gate).

Seven hundred years ago the then capital city (San Cantor [pop 18.4M] was occupied by WAAAGH Burkhatt. San Cantor, the only hive complex in the system, was purged from orbit. This unprecedented (within this system) use of atomics within the Devos System is believed to have triggered the amount of Eldar traffic that was observed in system in the two centuries afterwards.

The Imperial response to the WAAAGH included a regiment of Adeptus Mechanicus Skittari from the Forge World of Ryza. The remnants of this force still exist on Devos IV and they and their equipment are an increasingly uncommon sight, but are still present in some numbers.

The planet was controlled by Governor Marcus Firth III (a former IG General) with the support of the Ecclesiasty. One of the Ecclesiastical agents was obviously seduced by the ruinous powers and has overthrown the planetary government and seized the capital.

The army of Chaux Na Mrr’see is in rebellion. The Imperium has despatched its nearest forces to crush the rebellion before the cultists begin to attract allies from outside of the system.

Benq

So far, the cultists have seized the continent of Benq. Benq is 80750 km2 There are two major cities, Xyphonica [pop 4.7M] the main city of Sommerlund and Slough [pop 2.2M] the main city of Magnamund. Xyphonica is a religious centre, this is where the Imperial Church has been cruelly overthrown and the cultists are basing themselves. Slough is a largely automated industrial mega complex on the edge of the 20400km2 ash wastes from the last WAAAGH to pass this way. The Ash Wastes themselves, locally known as the Gnaaglund, contain the ruins of San Cantor, once home to 18.4M imperial citizens.

Acer

The continent of Acer [120000km2) remains loyal. The starport is situated on the Allain peninsula to the west of the continent. The Allainlund region, generally taken to include the Allain Penninsula, includes mining and heavy industry stretching eastwards across Acer to the littoral boundary. There are three large cities: Riba [pop 7.4M] which is an industrial base only 400km from the starport. Dana [pop 2.2M] an important nexus for travel and commerce on the west coast, just across the straights from Benq. Charnport [pop 2.2M], where the starport is, on the Allain Penninsula, this city is the commercial hub of the entire system, as well as being the centre for both the mineral extraction and sea farming industries.

The southern extent of Acer, known as Helgedad, is largely agricultural and includes a vast heavily forested belt and the mountainous polar regions south of there.

The Sea

The oceans of Devos IV are arguably the most important part of its ecology. Certainly, the mostly calm seas are festooned with a vast number of floating algae farms that produce powdered and freeze dried foods for the rest of the Obscura Sector as well as the IG. The cleanliness of the oceans is important to all on Devos IV.

Devos VIII

Devos VIII is a gas giant. The Imperial Navy regularly stops in at the orbiting refineries to refuel. The presence of the easily maintained fuel stop here is vital for interstellar trade in this sector.

Devos XII

Devos XII is no larger than a small moon. It does have an atmosphere, but the terrain is too harsh and the weather too violent to allow the imperium to practice agriculture thereon. Plants do grow on Devos XII, but extremely thickly and only to height of 4 or 5 meters. It is known to have a population of feral Eldar. It’s orbit leaves it diametrically opposed to the main shipping lanes the run in and out of the system via the gas giant.

The Eldar name for this moon is Daziarn.

Devos XXIV

Devos XXIV is a cold barren moon. There are part buried ruins of previous civilisations thereon. There is an astropath station there to ensure that incoming traffic takes the correct route through the asteroid belts to reach the gas giant at Devos VIII and then Devos IV itself.

The sides:

The Rebels

The army of Chaux Na Mrr’see is growing in size. It remains popular and does not yet have the reputation for wanton destruction that follows most chaos cultist uprisings. Significantly, the PDF Headquarters was at Xyphonica. Most of the Devos PDF has now gone over to the rebellion. They are being supplied out of Slough.

Certain sections of scavvy society and mutants from the Ash Wastes are known to have joined the army of Chaux Na Mrr’see. Unconfirmed reports have been received of deamons accompanying rebel troops.

The Imperium

The Imperial Guard is able to land men and material without hindrance at the starport. However, there are problems with sabotage as imperial forces are perceived as invaders whereas the army of Chaux Na Mrr’see is largely comprised of local persons. This issue will have to wait, however, until after the army of Chaux Na Mrr’see has been defeated. Then the population of Devos IV will have to pay the price for their treachery. Restoration of Marcus Firth III, if viable, would provide a government of unity that was popular with the people and would also bring the planet back into the Emperor’s grace.

The enormous amount of effort is being expended to remove the army of Chaux Na Mrr’see with the minimum of collateral damage is due to Devos IV itself is an important agricultural world that feeds three nearby systems.

Small numbers of loyalist Devos IV PDF and the survivors of the first IG units thrown into action as a stop-gap have regrouped in the Buroklammern region to the NW of Dana. Problems are envisaged where PDF units on either side will be reluctant to engage each other with any true effectiveness.

The Feral Eldar

The dwindling population of Feral Eldar on Devos XII maintain a Webway node. They would like to be left in peace and as such allow both the Craftworld and Dark Eldar to transit the Webway and access the Gates on Devos IV. If pushed, they will join any fight against the forces of Chaos (the Great Enemy).

Craftworld Eldar

If alerted to the presence of the army of Chaux Na Mrr’see, the Craftworld Eldar will set out to ensure that the scions of the Great Enemy are destroyed.

The Feral Eldar (so called “Exodites”) have trading links to the xenophobic barbarians of the Bel Tain craftworld and the thrice damned witchery of the Ulthwë craftworld.

Dark Eldar

If alerted to conflict in the Devos system, the Cabal of the broken/venomous/bloodied claw/blade/tea spoon will come after slaves and plunder. They couldn’t give a stuff about the army of Chaux Na Mrr’see or anything other than their own profit.

Orcs

Any Orcs are survivors or descendants of WAAAGH Burkhatt. As far as they are concerned, the WAAAGH is still on. They could possibly be pursauded to act as mercenaries for one side or the other.

Monday mornings

So, I'm poised to start filling the blog up. Misfortunately, work calls. So I'll have to do some.

Welcome

Hello,

If you've arrived here because your search engine has coughed up "WH40k"; this is plog about one single apoc game. This will possibly take place in 2010 sometime. So if you're looking at this in 2012 and there are no new posts, it's because our wives and gurlfriends have us looking after babies, doing housework and DIY.

There will three types of post: Background; Project progress and everything else.