Legs. And alternatives to Cadians

For a long time, the lack of legs has hindered Vraks renegade armies everywhere. Either there weren't the legs for the renegades or there were scores of cadian torsos and heads languishing in boxes for want of some form of parambulatory aparatus. No longer. Pig Iron have finally answered the call with something more than suitable, something which cries out for another platoon or two of renegades.

http://www.pig-iron-productions.com/ 

My poor old bloodcoats have not seen enough love recently. Thrown together and haphazardly painted, they were always 'the opposition' for my beloved Iggies to defeat. And incase your havn't seen them yet, check these babies out:

 http://defiancegames.com/index.php/shop#ecwid:category=1831024&mode=category&offset=0&sort=normal

Much better than the Wargames Factory's Greatcoat Stormtroopers. I can already feel my credit card heating up.

The Doctor will see you now

An unexpected by product of this hobby (all the more unexpected for having cropped up twice), is the provision of secondary care for injured playmobile people. This poor pirate was trodden on by Steve (dad). I suspect the grevious nature of the injury has been hidden from Alex (4 years and counting). Anyway, after my sojourn in Kent, I imparted my wisdom; that broken playmobile limbs would break again if merely glued and that they need pinning. So I got the job; the bit of paperclip you can see to the left has since become the pirate's new leg bone. Now all I have to do is get him back to his ship....

Mouse Attack !

This is another not IT related rant. Most of my IG live in a "Figures in Comfort" case in the garage. I was speaking with Karitas earlier in the week and this prompted me to look in on some of the little men this afternoon.



So, I put my hand under the lid and felt damp. Odd, as the garage is dry, n'cest pas? Also there was a small amount of random material in there, tiny bits of windblown matter and other less identifable stuff. I know the smell of rodent urine and was immediately sure that Charlie (Charlotte) Mouse was using my army case as a toilet.



Removing the dirty foam sheet revealed the top of a quite obvious (and cosy looking) nest.



As I dug deeper, however, it became obvious that the toliet was next to the door, as it may be in your house, gentle reader. The picture above shows where the figure foam has been chewed up and a nest made using paper from somewhere (army lists ?) and fluff from the tumble drier. That round object is a mouse nest and does indeed have space inside for a mouse family. Fortunately for me there were no tiny pink naked bodies in there.



A shot down one side. Quite clearly there is an upside down guardsman whose foam has been chewed up, the rear end of the perpetrator (to the right of the photo) and a sizable handfull of fuselli (the English name for that shape of pasta). Charlie and her industrious family have imported the fuselli from somewhere else, I don't normally keep pasta in my army case.



Some of those rendered homeless by the mice; in this case the arbities riot squad. Neither they nor the might of the Imperial Guard could defend against Charlie and her offspring. Kizzie, who is 50% English Springer Spaniel, was disinterested as well; not the useful 50%, then...

Just as I did this, I turned back to see Charlie Mouse, bold as brass, on the lid of the open case. She didn't stop, just ran off, well within 2m of the mighty hunting dog. Who just sat there, looking at her tennis ball.



Of course, like any modern des res, Charlie's is a multi floor apartment. The Iggies who lived here will be homeless for a few weeks (it'll give time for the smell of mouse pee to disipate).

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This was her mezzanine floor. As regulars will appreciate, her ability to describe a circle is much better than mine.



This tray has the bottom of the spherical nest in it, which you can just descern.



And here are the culprit's kids. I have left the case open on the garage floor in the hope that Charlie Mouse will come back for her kids and then they will all bugger off overnight and I'll be able to assess the full extent of the damage tomorrow.

Setting the right note

In this case, in colour. Looking forward to getting these back. Makes me want to break the Edlar out again...

Plannin'

A selection of half finished stuff.

I've not got enough half finished projects kicking around. So I shall go here http://www.victorialamb.com/store.html to get a few bits. A box of Catchananans will get penal troopers torso(s) and the las gun arms (penal troops being undeserving of enourmous should guards).

A box of Gors will get Catachan torso(s) and arms. This will mean hacksawing the Gor bodies to get the legs, but will give a convincing squad of beastmen.

A box of Cadians will be put togeather with kilts and Tam'o'shanter heads. The spare legs will get FW Vraks bodies and arms.

Four quite different and characterful squads from a bit of cuttin' and shuttin'.

What would improve my hobby expereince.

A picture of a wedding - a lot of people's expereice of commitment.

I was pondering my dodgy feelings of ambivalence and general 'meh' towards 40k and gaming in general the other day. I came to the conclusion that what was lacking was commitment. On my part.

If I put more in, I'll get more out. Simples, as the merekats would cheerily chirp. I'm sure that Jervis has delivered many a homily whoes subject, direct or alegorical, has been commitment. Quite a few people in the blogosphere have made commitments in the form of lists of things to build/paint this year. Which is kool.

But looking at things which require my commitment this year (the girl in the white dress, my job, the dogs, my own looming health crisises and the general decripid state of some of my nearest and dearest) there's only a limited amount of stuff I can realistically manage.

So this year I will play three games.

That's the same as this year. Doesn't seem unreasonable. Any finished wee men or vehicles (ie finished by me) will be a bonus.

The Imperial way of war.

A huge mob of IG.

Interesting article here http://pathfinder-devilin.blogspot.com/2011/12/40k-6th-edition-what-needs-fixing.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FCFmrO+%28Pathfinder%29 about 'improving' 40K. Suneokun's ideas about the FOC and adjusting army lists for flufftastic reasons are good, IMHO.

The way he mentions the manner in which (and he uses the blood angles as his example) an army chooses to deploy itself is rarely as contrived as the normal 40k pick up game seems to make it.

For instance: the majority of campaigns against the Great Enemy are fought against the heretics and renegades of the traitor guard types - the Vraksians, Blood Pact, Sons of Sek and all of their jolly bunch of chums. Now, as hobbyists we do have options for heads and other parts to build these armies out of, but considering that this is the one major fighting force in the 40K universe that all of the other armies are fighting all of the time, they are supported only by Forge World ?!?! Shurely some mistake.

Oh well, getting back to the point: It is entirely conceivable that armies are organised in ways other than as presented in the various codices. For instance the Black Guardians of Ulthwe are a 'professional army' without being aspect warriors. This could be reflected, not just in the fluff and the statlines, but in the way they are organised as well; armed and equipped as soldiers (equal to the aspect warriors) rather than militia (vanilla guardians). They might have snipers, D cannon teams, jump troops, squad special weapons, odd squad sizes (squads of five that can mob up and split off as ordered during the game).

Most SM are described as being deployed as a 'strike force', deploying from a space ship, rarely something as grandeous as a battle barge (which seem to be reserved for multi SM Company actions). So the SM Strike Force Commander has a limited amount of material with which to complete his mission. He can get fuel, water, food etc from worlds en route. He may be able to request munitions from the Deptmento (although I can see that ending in tears). Essentially he has a very small force (of admittedly, super human genetic freaks in powered armour), with a finite amount of material with which to complete his mission. Once he is out of special 'won't-fit-IG-ammo' rockets for his missile launcher, his bolt is blown, game over, pack up and go home. They may be super tuf, but they are not war winners. If you want some individual dead, one or two objectives taken, psychos for a forlorn hope for something like that, then yes, the SM are your men. If you want to win a whole war and hold the ground you capture, you need the IG.

The Departmento launches IG armies into campaigns, usually with a huge logistical tail. There are departmento labour corps to conduct civil engineering works and supply and maintain the fighting end. There are supply chains stretching back tens of worlds, all focussed on the eventual aim of allowing the pointy bit to do its job. All of this is a huge effort and does take a long time to set in motion. In galactic terms it is not strategically agile (although this does not mean that individual IG armies cannot locally be agile; just that they are tied to their supply chain). IG win wars. If the High Lords send a serious IG army to your world, they will win.

So there is your campaign basis: the SM player is not allowed to replace any casualties he takes. At all. The IG player, like the 'nids, always has the endless wave replacement rule going. This 'realism' could be extended to other armies. Although I have no idea how.