A field of slaughter

Call to arms has come to a close, and the podium positions were so tight going into the final round that any of the top 8 could have taken out the tournament. However, as predicted, the scion of Nurgle Sam Campbell took out the top prize, closely followed by Sam Whitt in second and Peter Dunn in third. Sam also took out the best painted prize with his beautiful looking Warriors of Slannesh list and (due to an 8 way tie for best sport) the prize went to... ME. 

the Vampires went much better than i ever thought i could do, though their were no real major victories. The Vampire Lord also managed to discover his new name, Sceadugengan, the shadow walker.

without further adieu, here were the games....

Game One: Dawn Attack

Opponent: Fern Campbell

for orcs and goblins ferns list was interesting, chariot mash, pump mash, artillery mash and mangler mash backed up by a small unit of savages and a HUGE unit of poisoned Night Goblins.huge units of goblins should not instill as much fear in the dead as they caused in this game, but since her deployment allocations were terrible (her bus on the right flank, most of the artillery on the left flank with only one mangler to protect it) i went for blood and pushed over the left flank, while the Hexwraiths ran in and held up her goblin bus for three turns. a nod to fern that she should have been able to take off the zombie dragon, but her artillery, though it could hit quite reliably, did a total of 2 wounds to the dragon the entire game. bad plays from me gave her my units of Hexwraiths and the Black Coach. as well as my chaff.

Final Score: 12-8 victory (better luck next time Fern)

Game Two: Blood And Glory

Opponent: Joel Van De Ven-Long

Empire with dual chickens, dual cannons, engineered hellblaster and a steam tank backed up by Knights and a heavens wizard. i never do well in blood and glory at tournaments (best outcome so far has been 1-19) so when i heard Joel's name i groaned inside, expecting the cannons and a light council to take me off. however this game could not have gone much better. the Zombie dragon was cannoned off first turn but Joel failed to get Sceadugengan, who bunkered with the skeletons for the rest of the game. with only two magic missiles on hand the celestial wizard could not contain the Hexwraiths, and when a Necromancer left his unit to sacrifice an inbattled unit of zombies to get a 30" Boosted vortex of doom through both units of chickens, his steam tank and his Halbardiers (who had 8 ranks) Joel was forced to fall back to Damage control. the game ended with neither side broken and both of us severely mauled. however this did mark my first ever victory over Joel, so i am certain a rematch will be saught.

Final Score: 12-8 victory

Game Three: Battle For The Pass

Opponent: Ryan Lister

Slannesh Daemon Prince, Unkillable Disk BSB, two Hell Cannons, and almost as much chaff as me. Ryan's Daemon prince completely dominated this game. Ryan could not fail an armour save on his daemon prince in Sceadugengan's titanic battle with him. over 6 rounds of combat he did a total of 1 wound to me to no wounds back. he must of got sick of the fight for he very underhandedly (hiss) he sent his BSB into the flank to crumble me. with a fire wizzard and his cannons mercilessly cutting down my Hexwraiths and my Skeletons engaged in the flank and front i had no choice but to concede. he had taken off everything but the zombies and i had a measly unit of Marauder Horsemen.

final score 0-20 Loss

Game Four: Meeting Engagement

Opponent: Neil Williamson

nothing went right for Neil in this game. he was rocking an almost exclusively close combat wood elves list that made use of a big block of Eternal Guard, a Treeman, two units of Wild Riders, a noble on an Eagle and a general on Dragon. his lack of wizards and and only one set of strangle root attacks meant that he could not harm the hex wraiths without being attacked in return. turn two saw Neils worst bit of luck came right off the bat when his general failed a 5" roll to charge the skeletons, allowing them to murder the eagle noble. compounding this in the very next round was the hex wraiths he had reduced to 4 men with strangle roots running over the Treeman and doing 3 flaming, no armour save, magical wounds that instantly felled him. since that point nothing seemed to go right, culminating in him losing his last unit of Wild Riders to a unit of zombies in the last turn. the game was also memorable for a pigeon shitting on my jacket half way through the day.

final score: 15-5 victory

Game Five: Battle Line

Opponent: Tane Woodley

when i first heard those words come out of James's mouth i groaned. Tane was rocking Dwarves and i have never come out well against Dwarven artillery. he had a Bugmen list of two Ranger units, two large miner blocks, a minor miner block backed up by a rune lord on anvil and two artillery pieces. on turn one, even though he had only one cannon in sight Tane managed to take off my zombie Dragon and put Sceadugengan on one wound (>.<) but misfired his anvil. in order to save him i opted to three dice invocation to put him back on full health... and miscast. Tanes quip "miscast never really do anything" then saw me dimensional cascade myself off the board. thankfully damage to my army was light as i passed a raft of Ld 5 tests. at this point i turned around and tried to outrun his dwarven advance (i know, its very rare dwarves find an opponent that is forced to go slower than them.) then in his turn three Tane once more misfired his anvil on basic power (2+). my quip "stop choosing to roll ones" saw him role a one and blow himself up... a cat and mouse chase ensued and in the last round of the last turn he finally got my wizards, and once more every unit passed their checks. a really fun game (i know, Dwarves give a fun game, who would have thunk it) and my vote for best opponent of the weekend.

Final Score: 4-16 Loss

final placing saw me tied with Fern, but because of a lack of flock on my bases she nobbled me at the post for 2 points on painting, leaving me sitting on 20th position and her on 18th. a great weekend all up. 

the undead are pre-emptivly dancing

yippi-di-do-dah

with the release of the lists for Call To Arms my skeletons are dancing with joy.

the break down was quite interesting, here is the link to the Lists

here is the basic breakdown anyway

4 Skaven (-.-)

4 Warriors of chaos

4 Vampire Counts (o.0)

3 WOOD ELVES (0.0)

2 Daemons

2 Dwarves

2 Lizard men

1 Beastmen

1 Bretonian

1 Empire

1 High Elves

1 Tomb King

so apart from the lizards and skaven i am quite excited about this tournament.Apart from Fern, Tane, and Joel their is very little artillery on the field, and most lists don't have much magical offense if any at all. i will have to be very selective in my combat choices but my vampire lord should reach the other side of the field four times out of five, and proceed to clear out their busses.

another very (very) interesting look was the fact that none of the vampires decided to run the Black Knight fun bus. since that recent lore has stated this to be the strongest possible build for a VC list means we are going to see some slightly abnormal lists next weekend. should be good

CALL TO ARMS INCOMING

with Call To Arms coming up in two weeks time (and because i have been forced to drop from the last two tournaments because of other events/ roster stuff ups) i thought it was once more time to put the goblins to the side and bring the vampires back to the fore. for this i am going completely mad and running a Vampires list WITHOUT A BLACK KNIGHT BUS!!!!!

since lists where handed in yesterday i feel no problems with reveling the unconventional list that will be making its debut. here it is....

VAMPIRE LORD ON ZOMBIE DRAGON

with a lance, heavy armour, shield, the night shroud and the talisman of preservation, he has the quick-blood trait and is a level 1 wizard with the lore of vampires  

as Hamish found out, he is a tank. with the zombie dragon imposing a -1 to hit him and/or the vampire lord in combat, and with the night shroud forcing all those touching his (sizable) base to strike last and lose all their great weapon/ lance/ ensorceled weapon strength bonuses, he is suddenly really hard to kill. at a wopping 599 points he is a massive point sink who will make or break my force.

WIGHT KING BATTLE STANDARD BEARER

with a great weapon, the armour of fortune, and the iron-curse icon

designed to hide in the massive skeleton block, hes only their to hold the banner and keep as few troops crumbling as possible

NECROMANCERS A & B 

one with a dispel scroll and one with a channeling staff, both are level 2 wizards with the lore of vampires

both of these guys are here for mainly defensive magic, keeping the wagon going when the wheel falls off (which might happen more than i would like with my usual tournament luck)

50 SKELETON WARRIORS

with spears, light armour, shields, and a full command group

designed to at least be the major damage dealer of the core, these guys are hopefully going to hold troops up for a long time

30 ZOMBIES &  29 ZOMBIES

with hand weapons, musicians and standard bearers

lets face it, zombies are balls of the highest caliber. these guys are only here to try and hold up the enemies troops for (at least) a round, and at 100 points each their not that big a deal to throw away. yay zombies!

2 UNITS OF 8 DIRE WOLVES

hand weapons and vanguard

welcome to chaff hammer. these guys are just here to hunt small (small) units, as they are going to die in droves. pretty much artillery and scouts are the only thing these guys are good for (apart from making up the minimum 600 points of core)

2 UNITS OF 2 FELL BATS

hand weapon

continuing on the chaff list is these two 32 point units of flapping awesomeness. being skirmishers and unpanicable (trade mark Jebson 2013) these 4 wound units are going to cause some real headaches (hopefully)

2 UNITS OF 9 HEXWRAITH'S

with great weapons and skeletal steeds

i know i said their was no black knight bus, but these guys are pretty much the exact same thing. in tandem with the vampire lord these guys are the bread and butter of this list. allowing no armour save i am hoping they will cause a nasty surprise to all those people who rely more and more on their heavy cavalry/ monstrous cavalry to carry the day. being ethereal means i only really have to worry about warriors of chaos being able to harm them in combat.

BLACK COACH

with two skeletal steeds and a wraith rider

we don't see enough of the old black coach. it used to invoke terror in opponents wherever it went as it just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger. recently however it has been relegated to the shelf by most of the vampiric opponents i face. well NO LONGER! as it does not actually drain your magic pool to power itself anymore their is no reason why this beast of a chariot should not be supporting the hordes of the night.

i feel the list can fight most fights, but will lose out in four situations.

1. Level 4 lore of light/ lore of fire wizard.

lets face it, lore of light means death for my list if i can't get into combat fast enough. with no possible save on my ethereal units against S4/5 magic missiles they will die in droves. also since lore of fire has both an over abundance in magical missiles and a spell to make a unit have magical shots/strikes, i do not fell confident in those line ups

2. Dwarves

need i say more. magical artillery will make a mockery of my wraiths and zombie dragon lord.

3. High Elves

with their powerful magical lore and new fangled magical archers i will struggle to get my ethereal's to the other side of the table. also the banner of the world dragon will instantly shut down the wraiths magical attacks. and lets not mention the phoenix.

4. Wood Elves

having versed Rex Foote last week i have realized his list at least is not going to be a walk over. sure he lacks magical shooting, but with all those magical close combat attacks from his treemen and dryads i cannot allow myself to get bogged down. also never send the vampire against the treeman ancient (handy hint to all of you planning on versing him, don't get a character locked in combat against it)

THE COMING OF TAMURKHAN: CHARECTERS

a rather cool part of the coming of Tamurkhan campaign is the three armies that each player uses to control and conquer the map. each army is led by a designated general, a charecter designed by the players to add a extra level of storytelling to their games, as these charecters are ment to influence the force they are leading. to give you an example i have already put together my three (fourish, more on that in a bit) Generals for the vampire counts.

Valter Harkon

Valter Harkon is the Kastelean of the Black Fang, the undead stronghold in this area of the old world. an ancient Blood Dragon Vampire, Valter was one of the many vampires that escaped Vann Hels sack of blood keep in the imperial year of 1946. a strong tactician and awesome combatant, astride his nightmare Cauchemar,  Valter Harkon intends to lead a spearhead through the mortal races, extending the realm of the dead far far to the south.

Valter is simply a Lvl 1 Vampire Lord, with the sword of might, the dragonbane gem and a 2+ Armour save/ 4+ ward save. what really makes him deadly though is the Red fury and Quick blood bloodline traits, allowing him to hit hard, hit first, and keep hitting until nothing is left before him but mangled bodies. his armies will contain plenty of vampires and vampiric creatures.

Andemaneri

where Valter is headstrong, patient and ruthless, his ally is just plain mad. Andemaneri is a Vampire from the Necerach bloodline. content to sit in the Black Fangs dungeons as long as he has plenty of fresh bodies to experiment with, Andemaneri's mind was shattered centuries ago when he was caught by witch hunters in the city of Tillea and pegged out in the town center to be burned by the sun. escaping by creating a cloud of bats to block the harmful rays and shred his captors, the damage to his body reflected what the unimaginable pain had done to his shaky sanity.

Andemaneri is designed to be the ultimate caster of the campaign, he is a Lvl 4  Vampire Lord sat upon an Abyssal Terror to get to where he needs to be. he has a 5+ ward save and the cursed book of Naggash. its in his bloodline though that he shines, being a master of the black arts and being able to summon creatures of the night. hes going to be using lots of zombies, spirits and creatures. expect lots and lots of bats.

Cosmar and Kochma, the Black Twins of Sleeps End

Twin sorcerers of unknown origin, the black twins are a duo of powerful necromancers that have allied themselves to Valter for promises of power, and access to the books of Andemaneri. the twins are not identical yet they are almost always aware of the other one no matter how far away they are, as if they were being governed by the same, invisible puppeteer. this has led to speculation that they are in fact one in the same, and that the true power behind the two is hiding deep underground at Sleeps End, manipulating his surface puppets to create a world in which he can finally become lord of the endless hoard.

Cosmar is the actual official general out of the pair for the army. though he is only Lvl 3 (where Kochma is a Lvl 4) he manipulates the blackest magic that is the lore Undeath, where Kochma draws on the wind of Ghyran to fuel his Death magic. being on foot and easy to hide in units, Cosmar only has an opal amulet and an earthing rod. Kochma on the other hand flies around on his Hellsteed Kos`maro, so protects himself with a talisman of preservation and bears one of Andemaneri's tomes, the dreaded book of Arkahn. leading an army of skeletons and wights, the Black twins bring their cabal of necromancers to outlast their foe.

by being able to make back stories (for those who really like investing in back-story and character) should improve the flavor of the campaign, as it hopefully makes people think not about just winning, but the plight of their lords on the meat grinder that is a Warhammer battlefield

THE BOARD, THE COMING OF TAMURKHAN

alrighty took me this long to realise that my laptop had a orifice for the cameras memory card, here is the actual board in all its epic goodness. it took me about a month of painting (albeit doing about 40mins max on it each day) i decided to keep the colours simple but bright for maximum effect, they were:

Plains: base was Russian uniform (Vallejo) with a dry brush of green ochre (Vallejo)

Forests: base was Luftwaffe camo green (Vallejo) with a dry brush of warpstone glow (GW)

Fields: base was tan yellow (Vallejo) with a dry brush of Yriel yellow (GW)

Rivers/ Lakes: base was Caledor sky (GW) with light strokes of Teclis blue (GW)

Mountains: medium sea grey (Vallejo) with a dry brush of sky grey (Vallejo) with a light dry brush of the tops with skull white (GW)

roads/ villages/ embankments: base was flat earth (Vallejo) followed by Ushabiti bone (GW) on the roofs

Streams: base of temple guard blue (GW)

Piers/ wooden bridges: base of Bugmans glow (GW)

stone bridges: medium sea grey (Vallejo)

 better pictures will be posted as my camerawork improves/ the weeks go on

AND SO IT BEGINS

with the exception of Sam, who had much much heavier things on his mind tonight than the setup of the campaign, everyone turned up to prepare for the Tamurkhan campaign (only realizing i had spelt it wrong in previous posts after looking for some cover art). after a very brief intro (i was half way through a game with Hamish, and it proved why i was on the other side of the field from him. he spanked my Vampires something serious) we got around to randomizing the board. the basic rules of setup were quick and easy to follow and very soon we had a full sized, immaculate looking board to fight over. Rex rolled up to place his capital first, much to Toms annoyance, and snapped up the most heavily wooded section on the map (bloody wood elves and their tree hugging). the rest of us found nice sections to set up in, though Sam and Liam had to deploy centerish so both had to deploy hard up against another empire.

currently unable to find the cable to connect my camera to the computer we will have to go without the actual photos of the field for a day or so while i find them (the study's a mess, they could be anywhere) but, with the magic of computer gaming i can mock up a battle map that can be changed around during the weeks to show the fluctuating game board. thank you CIVILIZATION 5 for the map editor that allowed this to be possible

so with the board ready and the empires drawn, its time to draw up the battle lines. hide in your basement and pray to your false gods. for the maggot lord comes, and you shall know no mercy!

THE COMING OF TUMARKHAN

the next seven weeks are going to be tense, as the warhammer Tumarkhan campaign kicks off in Ernest. the six generals  vying for the bragging rights over the whooole club (at least those warhammer based ones).  they are...

Nicholas "unlucky" Jebson : Vampire Counts

Hamish "sly bastard" Gordon : Skaven

Rex "gangly style" Foote : Wood Elves

Sam "rigged dice" Campbell : Daemons Of Chaos

Tom "WAAAAAGH!" Keirle : Orcs & Goblins

Liam "needs more armour" : Empire

with six rounds over six weeks the infighting will be intense, the shit talking will be apocalyptic in scale and empires will rise and fall.

pictures will be posted on Friday of the campaign board and the placements of the various empires, and i will keep a running report on what has been happening on the field (and off it)