Homemade Zone Mortalis Board

Today I wanted to showcase one of my previous terrain projects that I have worked on, my very own Zone Mortalis board.

It all started with the most innocuous of sentences: "Have you seen the new Zone Mortalis rules from Forgeworld?" This was the question posed to me by one of the regulars at Warsoc (the St Andrews University wargames club that I attend). I told him I had no idea what he was talking about. He patiently explained to me (as one might do a child, or worse, an Eldar player) that it was a new set of rules that had been released to cover close-ranged battles in confined spaces such as a spaceship or narrow city streets, much like a 40k version of space hulk. Knowing my propensity for dabbling in terrain, they added "they've even made some boards for it too, you should check them out".

Help Wanted! Magnetizing Dark Talon

Just as the title says, I am looking for help with magnetizing my new toy- the Ravenwing Dark Talon. I have never done any magnetizing before, so am really starting from the ground up.

My new toy, freshly arrived this morning.

 

If anyone has any tips or links on what tools to buy, magnets to use and a guide for the Dark Talon (or any large comparable kit), etc., please let me know in the comments below.

Hobby Sunday- 16/08/15

This week, I have been continuing my work on the cityfight ruins that I had started last Hobby Sunday.

With the weather being a bit nicer (for a change), I was able to get the bases for the ruins cut. For the smallest section, I glued the ruins to the base and added a bit more rubble to it.

Spare parts of the cities of death sprues were added to the base.

I added rubble from cut up plastic sprue sections to the board (another old White Dwarf article trick).

 

2015-2016 Hobby Season- Plans for the coming year

I have decided to join Dave over at Confessions of a 40k addict in his hobby season to do list for the coming year. This gives me a chance to plan out what I want to achieve for the coming year for my wargaming efforts and to give myself a big old seal of approval when I achieve it.

I hope to be seeing a lot of these in the coming year.

 

My goals for the upcoming year are:

 

1. Run a 40k campaign

I have been wanting to run a map-based 40k campaign for a while now and some players over at Dundee Wargames Club will hopefully be participating in a campaign that I have had in mind for a while now. I have run a couple of campaigns in the past, so hopefully this won't be too complex of a goal to achieve.

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)

Inspirational Terrain

With a break in painting my models, I have decided to take a look at making some more terrain. I have a long list of projects that I wish to do; some are repairs to existing pieces, some are new projects that I have had in mind for a while. I got to thinking about where I go to for ideas for the projects that I plan. Below are some of the places that I look for inspiration:

 

1. White Dwarf and GW

As I have said previously, I get a lot of my inspiration for terrain and painting from old issues of White Dwarf and GW webpages. When I am thinking of new terrain projects, I frequently flick through old issues of White Dwarf to see what I can come up with.

This article gave me the idea for building some recent ruins.

Hobby Sunday 09/08/15

This week, I decided to take a break from painting and make up some terrain that I had lying around. In a previous hobby Sunday, I had finished construction of an Imperial chapel using the GW cities of death buildings.

 

I had a lot of spare parts and additional building lying around, so I thought that I would do something with them. I combed through some old issues of White Dwarf and Codex Cities of Death for inspiration and found some pieces that I wanted to try and emulate (I also put aside some old White Dwarf copies for inspiration for other terrain pieces I want to work on).

 

I set to work trying to copy the smaller section. I think it turned out pretty well, but I still have a lot of rubble and detail to add. I drew a guideline base out of 3 mm MDF which I will need to cut at a later date.

Battle Report 15- 1500 pts Dark Angels Ravenwing vs Mechanium

This week, I had arranged a game against Steve's 30k mechanium army. We had agreed to play 1500 pts on a 6x4 board using a maelstrom mission. As I have talked about previously, I am a big fan of maelstrom missions and I was happy to get another game in.

I continued my forays into the new Dark Angels codex and decided to yet again field a Ravenwing army. My army consisted of:

 

RAVENWING STRIKE FORCE

Interrogator-Chaplain- Crozius Arcanum, Rosarius, Bike, Mace of Redemption, Meltabombs (IC)

Librarian- Level 2 psyker, Bike, Conversion Field, Meltabombs (L)

5 Ravenwing Command- Champion, Apothecary, Ravenwing Standard (CS)

5 Black Knights- Huntsman has Meltabombs (BK)

5 Ravenwing Bikers- 2 Grav guns, sergeant has Meltabombs (RB1)

5 Ravenwing Bikers- 2 Meltaguns, sergeant has Meltabombs (RB2)

5 Ravenwing Bikers- 2 Plasmaguns, sergeant has Meltabombs (RB3)

Darkshroud- Assault Cannon (D)

Landspeeder- Heavy Bolter, Assault Cannon (RL1)

Landspeeder- Heavy Bolter, Assault Cannon (RL2)

I wanted to try the Interrogator Chaplain in this game and he took to the field as my warlord. I think his Zealot ability will give a big boost to the Command squad and make them more effective in combat. I gave him the Mace of Redemption for the strength increase and AP3. I have never played mechanium, but had heard that some units can have high toughness, so hoped this would be a nice counter. I rounded out the HQ choices with a Librarian, I am still wanting to try the Dark Angels Interromancy powers to see if I can use them effectively. He was given a conversion field to boost his survivability and will be deployed with the Black Knights.

I took three units of Ravenwing bikers armed with grav guns, meltaguns and Plasmaguns for some variety to take on whatever I may come up against. I rounded out the list with three Landspeeders; the ever useful Darkshroud and two ravenwing landspeeders with heavy bolters and assault cannons.

 

I had a lot of manoeuvrability, which should help with objective seizing and had a fair amount of firepower and combat potential to deal with the enemy.  

My warlord trait was The Hunt; potentially useful, but not great. The Librarian got Mind Worm, Righteous Repugnance and Maelstrom of Misery. Giving a unit such as the Black Knights rage will always be effective and I had not yet tried Maelstrom of Misery, but it should be powerful against any high toughness Mechanium units.

Fondest memories in gaming

I was putting the finishing touches to my latest battle report (due to be posted on Thursday) and was thinking about how much I enjoyed the game, which got me thinking about all the unforgettable moments that I have had in gaming over the years. I started to reminisce about some stand out memories over my gaming years and thought I would share a few today.

 

1. Invulnerable Terminators

Many, many moons ago, my gaming was carried out at GW Braehead. I would venture there most Thursdays to do battle on their amazing boards with my Dark Angels (my only army at the time). This battle took place immediately after Terminators had just received a 5+ invulnerable save (thanks to Chapter Approved from White Dwarf) and I took my only unit of Deathwing to the table that week to try it out. We were playing on a city board, featuring a river in the middle of the table and a narrow bridge over it.

On one of my opponent's turns, my Deathwing were on the bridge, leading the charge against the enemy. My opponent's Chaos Space Marines fired every weapon in the army at the Terminators; bolters, Lascannons, Missile launchers and more. Yet my Deathwing emerged from the barrage completely unschathed. I made every armour save and invulnerable save that I had to make and the Terminators were able to turn the tide of the battle.

 

Another stand out moment for my Terminators was in a recent battle report against Ross' Orks, where my Deathwing took the brunt of a 60-strong Ork mob charge without a single terminator falling. Eighteen wounds and not a single failed save! This was one of the turning points in the game. I didn't go on to win, but it softened my loss significantly.

Hobby Cost July 2015

Hi everyone, as part of my ongoing look at my hobby costs each month, here are July's figures:

• -£15.30 Sold Razorback (ebay)
• -£11.30 Sold Scouts (ebay)
• -£33.30 Sold End Times Archaon (ebay)
• £8.40 ebay postage costs
• £20.00 Dundee wargames yearly membership
• £13.30 Chaplain on Bike (ebay)
• £3.35 Bike bases (ebay)
• £11.80 Landspeeder (ebay)
• £40.30 Four Landspeeders (ebay)
• £19.81 ebay charges
• -£5.00 Sold combi-meltas (ebay)
• -£3.00 Sold Dark Angels Reliquery (ebay)
• -£4.00 Sold Ravenwing Corvus Hammers (ebay)
• -£4.00 Sold Dark Angels power swords (ebay)
• -£14.80 Sold Bastion (ebay)
• -£2.99 Sold Techmarine torso (ebay)
• -£8.15 Sold Landspeeder Storm (ebay)
• -£2.99 Sold Dante incomplete (ebay)
• -£6.00 Sold Combi-Grav guns (ebay)
• -£5.00 Sold Combi-flamer guns (ebay)
• -£5.00 Sold Combi-plasma guns (ebay)
• £15.84 Ebay postage costs

Total for July- £11.97