Terrain Showcase- Warcry Heart of Ghur Terrain

This week, I have some new terrain to use for Age of Sigmar at the club. I've had some of these warcry sets for a while now, and finally got round to painting them up. This scheme was based on the tutorial from Tale of Painters, which is a great resource for paint schemes for warcry terrain. 

These boards can be used for Age of Sigmar or Warcry, and go well with the corrupted earth gaming mat that we have. 

Terrain Showcase- Age of Sigmar Desert Ruins Board

Today, I have the completed Age of Sigmar desert ruins board that I have completed for Didcot Wargames Club. We have a slowly growing population of AoS players at the club, so thought I would invest in a couple of boards to better suit the game, as the 40k boards often don't work well for them. 

The board consists of Warcry ruins (Azyrite and Timeworn Ruins), as well as some trees I had previously made for the desert board. I also got an old GW ruined temple terrain piece for the centre. I might remove the green flock in time and add some sand to better match the board. 

Hopefully, people will be getting games on it in the coming weeks. 

Hobby Update 22/09/23- Azyrite and Timeworn Ruins

This week, I have been continuing work on some Age of Sigmar terrain for the club. This is the first dedicated AoS board that I have made for the club and decided to go for a desert theme to match the existing mats and some of the trees we have at the club. 

I really like the warcry terrain sets that I have been using. They are fast to paint up and look good with some simple drybrush highlighting and a few details picked out. 

The ruins were primes with Zhandri dust, then given a wash with agrax earthshade. They were then drybrush highlighted with Zhandri Dust, then Ubashti Bone. I then painted the details, using Waagh Flesh contrast for the green sections on the ruins. The wall sections were painted in Kantor Blue, while the metal sections were painted Bronze, followed by an Agrax Earthshade wash of these sections. Finally, the whole model was given a highlight with Screaming Skull. 

This was a similar scheme to the Chanlnath Ruins I have previously painted, and I like how it turned out. 

Age of Sigmar Temple Terrain

Continuing my work on some Age of Sigmar terrain, I painted up a temple set for use on my grasslands board. I purchased this printed Ancient Ruins set from Etsy. It's a really nice set for a reasonable price. 

I undercoated the set with Turner and Gray Grey Primer. I really like this primer, as it is darker than usual grey primers, so is great for darker ruins and shading on terrain. It is also very reasonably priced. After that, I drybrushed it with Dawnstone, then White acrylic paint. The ground areas were painted brown, and I added some scatter flock to finish it off, focusing on the cracks between the tiles on the ground. 

Age of Sigmar Graveyard Terrain

We've had an increase in the number of club members playing Age of Sigmar and fantasy, so I decided to add a couple of AoS boards to the club. 

The first terrain set was the Graveyard set from GW. This is a really nice set, and I was glad to be able to pick one up off of ebay. 

Army Showcase- Graham's Slaves to Darkness

Welcome to the first in what will hopefully be a new series on the blog, the Army Showcase. 

St Andrews Wargaming gives me the opportunity to show off my own hobby work to the blogging community, and there are many other great blogs out there to showcase their own hobby work and amazing armies. However, there are plenty of fantastic armies out there from hobbyists and players that do not have their own blogs, and I hope to help bring you some of these in the coming year. 

So before we get started with the first army showcase, I am putting the call out to all the readers out there. Do you have an army that you wish to showcase on the blog? It doesn't have to be a Golden Daemon winner, just a painted force that you are proud of and want to show to my regular readers. If you want a chance to showcase your own army, please get in touch (corrm83@gmail.com). All you need are some decent quality photos of your force (cameraphone is fine) and to answer a few short questions based on the army to get a flavour of why you chose the force. 

Today's inaugural army is Graham's Slaves to Darkness Chaos force. Graham's models have appeared on the blog before. I first met him at the Newcastle Warlords gaming club and was amazed by his Age of Sigmar armies that he uses. He does some amazing work, frequently wins painting competitions and has even had the opportunity to use his armies in live stream games on the Warhammer Community channel. You can find more of Graham's excellent work on his twitter page (@PaintedbyG) and his facebook page. 

Summer Massacre Tournament- Armies on Display

There were some great armies at the Summer Massacre tournament at the weekend. Here are some of the photos of the armies on display. 

First up, we have Graham's Death army. Graham has some fantastic armies, you can find more of them at his twitter page, @PaintedbyG . Graham was judging the painting competition, so was unable to win it (which he would likely have done given the standard of his force). 

Summer Massacre Tournament Photos (Pic Heavy)

The Newcastle Warlords gaming club recently hosted Summer Massacre, an Age of Sigmar tournament for 22 players. 

They were after some to cook the barbeque lunch for the tournament, so I volunteered to help out. Fortunately, it was a really nice day, so I got to enjoy the sunshine while I cooked. I was also able to take some photos of the event that I can share now. Hope you enjoy. 

Age of Sigmar Battle Overview- Death vs Destruction

This week, I will be sharing a battle overview of a game of Age of Sigmar at Newcastle Warlords. 

I recently decided to give Age of Sigmar another go. I've been hearing good things about the game since the release of the General's Handbook. Newcastle Warlords are running an Age of Sigmar escalation league, so it is becoming very popular at the club. 

This will not be a full battle report. I was too busy trying to remember the rules and looking up my unit rules to take such detailed notes. This will be more of an overview of the game. 

My 1500 pts Death army consisted of:

Necromancer

10 Black Knights

40 Zombies

30 Skeletons- Hand weapons and Crypt Shields

20 Skeletons- Spears and Shields

Corpse Cart

Mortis Engine

3 Crypt Horrors

A fairly generic army based on my Vampire Counts army. I really don't know what is good in Age of Sigmar in a Death army. Hordes of Skeletons and Zombies get some really nice buffs in large numbers (bonus to hit and wound or extra attacks), so I took a few units of them. The Necromancer is a good character, able to pass wounds onto nearby units on a 4+. This makes it easier to keep him alive for longer. 

Hobby Sunday 14/05/17- Vampire Counts Bases

This week, I have been finishing off the bases for some of the units in my Vampire Counts. 

First up, we have the Terrorgheist. I had planned to get this finished in March as part of Monster March, but my boarding injury put paid to that! However, it is now complete. I hope to get some games of Age of Sigmar in with this, to see how impressive he is on the table. 

Hobby Sunday 07/05/17- Terrorgheist and Ghouls

Hobby Sunday returns with some continuing work some of my Vampire Counts army. 

First up, I was able to flock the base of my Terrorgheist. Once dry, this will be given a drybrush of Bubonic Brown and Bleached Bone, followed by some static grass. This will bring it in to line with the rest of my army. 

Monster March- Week 2 Update

Welcome to my week 2 update on the progress of my Terrorgheist for Monster March. 

Monster March is a month-long hobby challenge being run by Swordmaster at "Path of an Outcast". You are challenged to get a monster model painted up over the course of March. You can find his first post detailing those participating using this link. 

Hobby Sunday 05/03/17- Ghouls, Genestealers and Ruins

This week, I have been working on a number of projects. First up, I started on my work towards my Terrorgheist as part of Monster March (posted earlier today).

While I was waiting on the Terrorgheist to dry, I decided to crack on with painting my Crypt Horrors and Ghouls. I had previously started these by giving them a couple of basecoats of Screamer Pink. I had decided to paint them up in flesh-like colours, using a nice guide that I found online. 

After the basecoat, I gave them a wash of Reikland Fleshshade. 

Monster March- Week 1

Welcome to my first week update for Monster March. 

Monster March is an event being run by Swordmaster from the Path of an Outcast blog. I decided that after the success of Squaduary, I would sign up for another painting event. 

I pledged my Terrorgheist for the challenge. I bought this model around 2 years ago, but had yet to paint it. Monster March would be a great opportunity to do so. 

Week 1 was supposed to be for assembling the model. As I already had it assembled, I decided to make a start on painting it. This helps me, as I am away on holiday for a week during Monster March, so can make up for lost time. You can check out the first update post for Monster March over on Swordmaster's blog. 

Monster March!- Path of an Outcast Hobby Challenge

Today, I wanted to highlight another awesome hobby challenge that I will be taking part in next month- Monster March!

I had a lot of fun taking part in Squaduary (run by Rory over at Stepping Between Games), painting up my Veterans squad and seeing all the other hobby content by the many participants. 

Monster March is a hobby challenge to get a monster model painted up over March. The event is being run by Swordmaster over at Path of an Outcast. These monthly challenges are a great way to dust off your unpainted pile collection and show some love to a model that has been waiting a while to get painted. 

I decided to sign up with my Terrorgheist for my Vampire Counts army. This model was purchased back in March 2015, so has been two years with only being assembled! With my plans to get back into Age of Sigmar, I decided this would be the perfect opportunity to finally finish it. 

So, head over to Swordmaster's introduction post and sign up if you are interested in taking part. It doesn't have to be limited to Age of Sigmar. There are various different game systems you could pledge a model for, even the 40k universe has a range of great monsters that could take part. 

Please be sure to check out all the Monster March posts next month. These events are great for building the blogging community and finding and following new blogs. Also, be sure to check out and follow Path of an Outcast. This is a brilliant blog that focuses on Kings of War, with some great battle reports, and Swordmaster has recently started posting some fantastic hobby posts. 

St Andrews Wargaming- 2015 in Review

As 2015 draws to a close, I thought I would take the opportunity to look at what has happened in the past year with respect to my hobbying. So put your feet up, grab the leftover turkey and join me in reminiscing over the past 12 months.

Have a random picture that in no way represent this post.

The Blog

By far the biggest change in my hobbying for this year was starting this very blog you are reading right now (or at least, quickly skimming through until you find something of interest).

Despite playing 40k for over 10 years now, I have only become a recent active member on the online community. It is only in the past 18 or so months that I have become a more active member of 40k online. I used to read the occasional blog or rumour site online to keep up to date with what was happening, but never dreamed of commenting on any posts or articles, never mind starting my own blog.
That all changed when I became more active in the St Andrews University gaming club. I became the wargames rep for a year and starting running a campaign and organising apocalypse games within the club. As part of the campaign, I started sending out weekly updates to the group with battle reports of my games that week. I started wanting to share my opinions on gaming with others, to highlight some of the terrain projects that I had been working on and to comment on some of the changes to 40k that were happening.
This all came to a head when I signed up to attend Blog Wars 9. Since I would be attending Blog Wars, I decided that I wanted to have my own blog. It was something I had been thinking about for a while and finally took the plunge in April. Fortunately, I had the club's upcoming apocalypse game as a nice starting point for the blog, allowing me to showcase a huge battle in my first few posts.

I want to give a big shout out to Dave (Confessions of a 40k addict) and Alex (From the Fang) for their advice on starting the blog and for the continued inspiration that their blogs provide. It's highly unlikely you are not aware of their blogs, but if you are not, check them out.

I have found that having the blog has been a huge boost to my own hobby progress. Wanting to share my progress on projects and games has led me to spend a lot more time on 40k than I have been previously; playing on a regular basis, actually getting stuff painted in a timely fashion, attending tournaments for the first time in over a decade, reading and commenting on many of the fantastic blogs I follow. Having the blog has given me a lot of excitement towards 40k at the moment, and I hope it continues into the future.

Second Thoughts on Age of Sigmar- Vampire Counts vs Chaos Warriors

Last week, I managed to get my second game of Age of Sigmar to try out the new system. My first game did not go so well and I highlighted many of the problems that I had with the game. Hopefully my second match would go better and I would start to see the appeal of GW's newest game.

 

This week I took on Yans' Warriors of Chaos. Before the game started, we did have a little chat about what kind of game we wanted to play. I wanted a balanced game with a reasonably sized army. I was planning to take mostly infantry with a unit of cavalry and I also wanted to try out a monster this game. I suggested capping the model count at 100, but Yans pointed out that this would not work with Warriors of Chaos as he was mostly fielding dragon ogres, who have 5 wounds a piece. So model count was out. We then settled on roughly equal numbers of warscrolls and just what "felt right" on the battlefield and see how the game turned out. Once again, I really missed points values at this point. Games are so much easier to arrange when you can say to your opponent "2000 pts, I'm taking Vampires". So, we had a go at balancing our armies, but the only way to tell would be after the game had ended.

 

For this battle, I took:

Vampire Lord (V)

Two Necromancers (N1 and N2)

Terrorgheist (T)

30 Skeletons- Spears and Crypt Shields (S1)

30 Skeletons- Ancient Blades and Crypt Shields (S2)

40 Zombies (Z)

3 Crypt Horrors (CH)

Corpse Cart (CC0

9 Black Knights (BK)

 

A decent sized force for the vampire counts. I wanted to take bigger units of skeletons and zombies this time in order to access their special rules (skeletons get additional attacks in bigger units, while zombies get bonuses to their hit and wound rolls). I also wanted to try the Terrorgheist as monsters are absolute beasts in Age of Sigmar. I also took a few magic users in order to bolster my undead forces.

 

Yans force consisted of:

Chaos Lord of Nurgle (CL)

Nurgle Sorceror (S1)

24 Chosen of Nurgle (C)

Giant (G)

6 Dragon Ogres (DO1)

3 Dragon Ogres (DO2)

Shaggoth (S2)

Gorebeast Chariot (GC)

Hellcannon (H)

Age of Sigmar- Battle Report and First Impressions

I know, I know, I'm a little late to the party with the Age of Sigmar, I've just been enjoying the new Space Marine and Dark Angels codex too much to get in to it. I finally got round to playing my first game of Age of Sigmar at the club last week against Matt's Orcs and Goblins.

 

My army consisted of:

Vampire Lord

Necromancer

9 Black Knights

3 Crypt Horrors

30 Zombies- standard bearer

20 Skeletons- Champion, Standard bearer, Musician

Corpse Cart

 

I took a nice mix of troops and heros from the war scrolls to try and have a bit of variety for my first game.

 

Matt's army consisted of:

Orc Warboss

Orc Shaman

18 Boarboyz

27 Wolf Riders

2 Stonethrowers

Doom Diver

Spear Chukka

Giant

 

Some fast moving units and a lot of shooting to go up against.



Battlefield