I first got into wargaming in high school when my
friend bought a copy of 5th edition Warhammer (the one with
Bretonnians and Lizardmen). We played a few games with the contents of the
starter box and were both hooked. I initially dabbled with Orcs and Goblins,
buying a couple of units and a character, but that all changed when I bought
White Dwarf issue 211.
Just in case you haven't memorised the cover of every issue.
When I saw the new studio undead army and the step by
step paint guide, I knew that was the army for me. I built up a small army, a
couple of units of skeleton warriors, some skeleton horsemen led by the still
fantastic mounted vampire lord, some necromancers and a few chariots.
This guy.
I played
many battles against my friend’s Bretonnian army and fondly remember the old
magic phase involving its own card game. We quickly tried to play large battle
as the old undead army did not fare well in smaller points battles. The
cheapest general at the time was 450pts, so 1000pts games meant having one
character, usually a Necromancer Lord with the Black Amulet (every army fielded
this item back then). Back then, death of the Undead general meant pretty much
game over as almost the entire army crumbled. These large battles meant lots of
proxies, the most unusual being card cut out into base size to represent
skeleton warriors (the horror!).
During this time, I also purchased GorkaMorka and we
had a great time running our own campaign. I think this was a skirmish game
with fun vehicles and models. I keep meaning to start a new campaign in my
current gaming group, but haven’t got round to it yet.
So much Orky fun in one box!
My first foray into 40k was with the release of 3rd
edition. This was a dramatic change to 40k from 2nd edition rules (which
I had read, but never played) and allowed larger battles to happen quickly. We
split the 3rd edition box and I got the marines. The marines were
painted up as Dark Angels as I liked the green colour scheme and this became my
first 40k army. The army was built upon significantly, but still includes the
first models that came in that boxed set. Since then, I have played every
edition of 40k and have added to my Dark Angels with Orks, Imperial Guard and,
most recently, a small White Scars force. I plan to show photos of the various
armies in future posts.
I have recently been brought back into fantasy by the
End Times series. The return of Nagash to the Warhammer universe tempted me to
start a new vampire counts army and I have been slowly collecting and painting
up a sizeable force. I am currently about half way through the End Times books
and am interested to see what is going to happen in 9th edition.
As I said, I hope to bring you pictures of my current
armies that I use. My painting is to a decent tabletop standard (I think), the
army looks good, but I am not going to win any Golden Demon awards for any of
my models. I enjoy painting, I frequently get into the zone and can get through
several units in a short span of time, then I get bored and don’t pick up a
paintbrush for months on end. I much prefer to play games, but a nicely painted
army does add to the experience. I particularly enjoy terrain projects as I
like to build large structures and paint them up quickly, I feel they add to a
battlefield and make games more interesting. I will post on some of my own
highlights over the years.
I currently game in the St Andrews area (hence the
blog name, StAnd- St Andrews). The local club meta is not too competitive, we
like to win, but not at the expense of a good game. I have been able to run a
couple of campaigns recently, one of which was a cityfight campaign based on
the old Vogen campaign rules in White Dwarf years ago.
Many, many buildings required.
So, that’s a little bit of my history in wargaming and
what I plan to write about. Comments and suggestions are always welcome.
How long have you been in the hobby and what got you
started?
I started with Dark Angels back in 2nd Ed. (1996-ish) after a good mate introduced me to the game during a camping trip. He didn't have any miniatures with him, so we made 7000 pts worth of folded paper models ;-)
ReplyDeleteGood luck with the blog!
Thanks for your comment Marc. 7000 pts of models must have used a lot of paper. How on earth did you keep on top of what everything was?
ReplyDeleteI'm glad my armies have moved on since my early fantasy days. A horde of cardboard squares advancing on the enemy is not as terrifying as it sounds.
...an awful lot of paper. We used the squad symbols in the Codex and numbers to keep track of everything, with special wargear written on the inside. For the special characters and dreadnought I copied the banners in blue pen. I still have a few stashed away; I'll post a photo of them sometime :-)
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