Battle Report: Eldar vs Orks

This past Wednesday I got a game in at good old Evolution Games.  It was also our first bits trading night.  I got a lot of good bits and have given into my temptation to start another army.  I will post some picks in the coming weeks of my new Blood Angels projects.  I know, why mon keigh? I like to paint and Blood Angles is a classic.  Plus gives me time to study the enemy and his ways.  Despite the bits frenzy I got to face one of the regular greenskin players in a Capture and Control spear hear set up game.
I used the round two revision of my GW Store Tourney series list that I was going to be using at said tournament on June 19th.  I found out I will be facing the Imperial Guard so I may change the list to adapt to this new found knowledge. The current incarnation of the list consists of;

Eldrad Ulthran
4x Warlocks.  Two with Singing spears.  Embolden, Enhance, destructor x2
The Avatar
1x Squad of 10 scouts upgraded to pathfinders
1x Squad of 10 Dire Avengers with Exarch.  Exarch has bladestorm Dire Sword and shuriken pistol
1x Squad of 5 Dark Reapers with Exarch.  Exarch has Crack Shot and a Tempest Launcher.
1x Squad of 5 Shining Spears with Exarch.  Exarch has Hit and run skilled rider armed with Star Lance
1x Squad of 10 Striking Scorpions with Exarch.  Exarch has Shawdow Strike, Stalker and biting blade
1x Fire Prism with Holo Fields and Spirit Stones.

The ork horde had one big mob of lootas, two huge mobs of boys in battle wagons, a warboss with a nice big mob of nobs in a truck, a def dread and 2 small flights of death coptas, One and two.

We had lots of terrain and to my dismay I did not get first turn.  After setting up and infiltrating my pathfinders the death coptas used their scout moves to get into firing position of the Fire Prism and the Pathfinders.  Turn one saw the destruction of the Fire prism despite the Holo Feilds, rolled a 5 and a 6 on the dice , and the pathfinders taking fire and then loosing the assault they were forced into by the death coptas.  They ran off the table.  The dire Avengers were holding my objective and stayed put while Eldrad and his Warlocks moved up with the Avatar.  The shining spear advanced as well in support on the flank.  The Striking Scorpions were in reserve doing an out flank.  The Dark reapers punished the loota  mob which despite loosing more than half its number did not run.  The battle wagons advanced on the objective while the warboss and his nobs cut off  Eldrad and the Avatar.  Once they got in range they put the truck between themselves and the big boys and assaulted the shining spears instead of Eldrad and the Avatar.  The Shining Spears were slaughtered.  The Avatar only manged to immobilize the truck. 
Things got bloody quick.  I was not rolling well at all.  The warboss and his nobs killed Eldrad and his warlocks after 2 rounds and then finally managed to off the Avatar ofter 3 rounds of combat.  The death coptas were a thorn in my side.  I did dispatch the lootas and two coptas but the remaining copta and the large mob in one of the battle wagons finished off the Dark Reapers.  I was down to one squad.

As i have said Dire Avengers can hold objective like no other.  When faced with the green tide in turn 6 they braced and blade stormed the nearest mob and cut it down to about 25% of its full size.  This took enough out to make sure they did not have range to assault me.  The game then Ended with me as the victor.  I held my objective and he did nto have anybody claiming his.

A victory for Craftworld Ulthwe but at what a cost.  If the game had gone to turn 7 I would have been done for.  The Dire Avengers Held off the tide despite heavy losses and managed to pull thru.
This list is going to be drastically changed for facing Imperial Guard at the GW Store Tourney.  I did nto do bad.  I had massive losses and still won.  I managed to keep the Orcs focused on what they like.  Shootin stuff and assualting.  Once I lost the Ability to effectively disable the battle wagons I had to change tactics to keeping the orcs at bay and slow them down so they could not reach the objective.  That means sacrificing troops and going all or nothing into that strategy.  It paid off but it was a major gamble.  If it had gone into turn 7 it would have been a very different outcome.

It was a good learning experience.  I have not fought Orcs in a long time and it was good to get a taste of something not wearing power armor.  So guess we will see what Saturday holds as I try a new list and see what I can do against some Imperial Guard.  Unitl Then........

Blood runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!!

Aspects of Khaine part 1: Dire Avengers

The Troops choice is two of the required choices in a standard force organization chart. The Eldar list has five different choices two of which are Guardians, three if you get technical. The Dire Avenger is One such choice. As the most common of the Aspect temples I will begin the series on Aspect Warriors with them.

The Squad consists of between 5 and 10 warriors for 16 points each. Armed with the Avenger shuriken catapult, a 4+ armor save and a ballistic skill of 4 they are worth every point. The range on the Avenger catapult is 18”, so you have some breathing room in a fight as opposed to guardians with their 12” range. You can still move and keep rapid fire units moving or at very least limiting the number of shots they get at the unit. High initiative, which all Eldar have, means they get to strike first in most combats with regular troopers. This is where the handicap of a strength of 3 comes in as well as no option for plasma grenades.

It is obvious the Dire Avenger is a troop type meant for shooting and doing hand to hand if forced into it. Many question why the Exarch has some of the war gear options that he has. You can take a power weapon and shimmer shield or a Dire Sword and shuriken pistol or two Avenger shuriken catapults. The last one makes sense if you are going all shooty as does the Exarch power Blade Storm. This gives everybody in the squad an extra shot. I know around Lansing the Blade Storm is much feared and lamented by those with lightly armored troops. The weight of fire it provides is also a threat to tougher targets. The odds are in your favor when you are rolling 30 dice to hit, especially when the Farseer is doing his job. The Power weapon and shimmer shield are probably the best option of Exarch war gear in my opinion. Here is why.

When you outfit your Exarch with the power weapon and shimmer shield as well as the defend power you enhance the survivability of your squad against assaults. The current mood of 40K is to get close and in the face of your enemy quickly. That said you can expect a unit capable of inflicting lots of shooting casualties to draw the attention of the close combat specialists. By using the shimmer shield power weapon combo you give everybody in the squad a 5+ invulnerable save, better than nothing when power weapons are concerned, and the high initiative and weapon skill of 5 from the Exarch ensures some possible deaths before the attacks hit the squad. The defend power reduces the number of attacks for the enemy by one. This further adds to survivability. I use this combination when I assign the Avengers to hold an objective. It also works in non objective games by letting the Dire Avengers bring up the rear behind troops with shorter ranges. They can still fire over the units and this allows them to shield units from being assaulted.

When you give them a Wave Serpent you have a very mobile objective holder. You must keep the Wave Serpent in a close support role though. The key to tactics in an Eldar army is very unit working in concert. You have very specialized troops that are basically good at one thing. They must be supported by the other units to survive. The Dire Avengers are that unit. They are a utility unit amongst an army or specialists. They do have weaknesses though.

The “weakness” most players lament is the toughness of 3. There are at least 3 other armies which also have this “weakness”. This is the average. The strength of 3 is also viewed as a weakness. Again this is the average. Not everything can be toughness 4 strength 4.

Fire discipline and the effective use of Seer powers in important. Pick targets carefully and coordinate your fire. Excessive use of Doom and Guide is recommended.

Dire Avengers are an Excellent troop choice as they are a utility unit that can support the other aspects and at the same time rack up the kills and hold the objectives.

Next time we will be covering my favorite aspect.......Striking Scorpions

Until then...........

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

GW Store Tourney Series Round 1: The Fury of Khaine

Before we delve into the tactics and strategies of the different Aspect Warriors later in the week, I participated in the Games Workshop Store tournament series Round one this past weekend. It was at Games Workshop Great Lakes Crossing in Auburn Hills. It was a 1750 strait codex rules game and the tournament runs for the next 3 months. Each month you are required to play one games. They tally up the kill points and the victory points from each round. The manager said a store champion will be crowned and the person. with the highest overall scores will be the overall champion.
The game went badly though. The troops and strategy was there. The only issue was my dice were not cooperating. I did mange to score 8 kill points ans 1630 victory points though. My first opponent was a Blood Angels army Led by Mephiston and Lord Dante.

His list consisted of

Lord Dante
Mephiston
2x Furioso Librarians 1 delivered by drop pod
1x 5 man death company squad
1x 10 man assault squad
1x 10 man tactical squad in a rhino
1x scout squad

My List consisted of

Farseer with spirit stones, runes of warding and witnessing, doom, fortune, mind war
4x warlocks 2 with singing spears and destructor. others had embolden and enhance
1x 15 man guardian squad with shuriken cannon and warlock with conceal and spear
The Avatar
1x 10 man squad of Dire Avengers with Exarch armed with dire sword
1x 6 man squad of Fire Dragons with Exarch armed with Fire Pike and Tank Hunter
1X 10 man squad of Striking Scorpions with Exarch armed with Claw and both powers
1x 3 man Jet Bike Squad with shuriken cannon
2x Wraithlords with wraith swords, one with a bright lace the other with star cannon
1x wave serpent with twin linked bright lances and spirit stones for fire dragons
1x Falcon with spirit stones

It was a bloody fight. Turn one was uneventful as the Furioso came in and the Blood Angels Advanced. My army then advanced and killed a single marine. Mephiston advanced and engaged The Avatar in hand to hand. The Avatar i have to say was the MVP. Not only did he kill Mephiston he then proceeded to battle a Furioso Librarian for two turns before killing it. He then marched over to Dante who came in on turn four and killed him after one wraithlord killed the death company with him. For his final trick in turn seven he killed the remaining Furioso librarian. He lived the whole battle and took on all the heavy hitters and won. He avenged the Farseer and warlocks who died at Dante's hands.
The army was blasted in submission, mine that is. It was a hard battle but a moral victory despite the loss. All he had left was a drop pod and the scout squad in the end. I had the Avatar and 5 striking scorpions. I lost the tanks in turn two and the Fire Dragons fled under fire as the remaining two that survived the explosion of the wave serpent. The dire avengers held up in a building until turn 4 when the dreadnought finally wiped them out. The Bikes lasted until turn 5 when the scouts dealt the final blow.
I am somewhat happy with the list but I must cut down on the kill points. I could not have gotten a win even if i killed his entire army. he had only 9 kill points in it.
The Fire Dragons were useless as always so they are going to get cut. I may upgrade to Eldrad for my Farseer and also try to squeeze in a squad of shining spears for some hard hitting hit and run assaults.
The Emphasis will be on cutting the amount of kill points i can give up and still pack a punch. I will keep you posted as time progresses and I play with a few lists

Wednesday I will begin my multi part series detailing the Aspects of Khaine. First up will be the ubiquitous Dire Avengers
Until then........




Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!

Its all about the list

Here we are again. Today we will be discussing the winning list at the 'Ard Boyz round one at Pandemonium in Garden City Michigan. Despite my lackluster performance the winning player was an Eldar player by the name of Greg Sparks. Those of you who have been around at Adepticon the past few years may have met him. Having played Eldar through 3 editions of 40K I find the army list changing a lot especially since I skipped the horror that was 4^th edition. I find Greg's list very interesting as its a list that I would not have thought to run. It uses many odd elements that seem to work with the strategy that brought it a first place finish. 2 point shy of the maximum of 72 battle points possible I might add. So here is the list

HQ: Eldrad Ulthran

HQ: Maugen Ra

Troops: 10x Wraithguard with spiritseer with Conceal

Troops: 10x Wraithguard with spiritseer with Conceal

Troops: 8x Dire Avengers

Troops: 10x Dire Avengers with Exarch armed with power weapon and Shimmer Shield

Troops: 3x Guardian jetbikes with one shuriken cannon. Has warlock with Destructor

Hvy Sup: Wraithlord with 2 flamers scatter laser and shuriken cannon

Hvy Sup: Wraithlord with 2 flamers scatter laser and shuriken cannon

Hvy Sup: 3x War Walker all armed with duel scatter laser

Fast Att: !0x warp spiders with Exarch armed with 2 spinners and power blades. Has Withdraw

Elite: 9x Harlequins with 1x fusion pistol and a shadow seer.

All this comes to 2500 Exactly. You will notice a heavy amount of troops. This is very important in a tournament list. Most tournaments will have objective based missions so you need to be able to take and hold them. As far as punch goes this has a bit. The Wraithguard and the Wraithlords are the anchors. With that many Wraithguard your opponent will be nervous and theoretically you should be able to really cause some hurt up close. There is a lack of transports as you will notice. Although this makes the army foot slog across the board it frees up a lot of points for units. This is a must with so many Wraithguard. With the Warp spiders deep striking and causing a nice distraction in the back field you can advance a little more easily. I have not tried the list yet but it obviously works given the right strategy. Once I get a game or two in with it I can give better appraisals. I only wish I could have watched it in action but alas I was playing as well.

Still no Seer council in the mail. I hope it comes within the next week. Until then I am going to test this list and begin a series of blog on the Aspects of Khaine. So for the next few weeks it will be all about Aspect Warriors.

So until then................

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!

Manipulating the Strings of Fate

Ard Boyz is over and the dust has settled.  The Eldar were victorious...........Just not mine.  Four of us went and two of us placed in the top three.  Third place went to local Evolution games Warboss Luke Slocum and Dark Future Games ( see their blog at Darkfuturegaming.blogspot.com) own Lord Solar Steve led his Imperial Guard to a second place win.  Myself and Samsquanch Monster, with his space wolves, did not do as well.  In fact he had to play Warboss  Luke's war band and I had to face the guns of Lord Solar Steve.  The winner, Greg sparks, led his Eldar to the overall win.
My first Game was against a codex marine force that consisted of Pedro Cantor, 2x 10 man stern guard squads, 4x tactical squads, a vindicator, a land raider and a land raider redeemer.  He broke his squads into combat teams giving him 10 squads capable of holding objectives.  This was a little daunting to say the least.  The set up was odd as well.  it was table corners that were essentially cut in half.  The table was divided diagonally with a 12 inch no mans land on either side of center.

This game went well until the end.  There were 5 objectives to hold.  I had control of 2 right form the start.  I had my large squad of guardians holding one with my dire avengers holding the other.  I had 3 objectives in or within reach of my deployment.  I took objective 3 on turn two once I deployed the other squad of dire avengers at it.  Eldrad and the seer council turbo boosted into enemy territory on the left flank to swoop in and take out some combat squads and one unit of stern guard.  The wraith guard in their wave serpent went to the right flank supported by the dire Avengers holding objective 2 and one of the wraith lords.  The Avatar went right up the middle.  I managed to kill off two combat teams and the vindicator in the first two turns.  The avatar made short work of two more more combat teams before he was gunned down by the land raider.  Now what struck me as odd is the Space Marine player did not advance or kill anything until turn 3.  Despite this and the fact I was killing marines enmasse he managed to come back.  Eldrad and his warlocks got dragged into combat with the stern guard and one combat squad.  The wraith guard destroyed the redeemer then proceeded into close combat with Pedro.  They killed his team and inflicted a wound but Pedro came out o top.  My squad of dire avengers was wiped out and a late game squad of scouts contested my other objective leaving me in control of one. SO I lost with a marginal defeat.
Game two was much the same I started out strong and then things went bad.  Lord Solar Steve brought his guns to bear and blasted me into submission.  A major defeat.  This is only the second time I have faced Imperial guard.  I knew i was going to take lots of fire so I used the terrain to as much advantage as I could.  With Creed and Kell on the table though and the orders flying out I could not hold out.  Lord Solar likes his Heavy weapons teams and i took them out as fast as I could.  Unfortunately he had a good number and some storm troopers to back them up.  He admitted he was worried when I got first turn and I took out a leman russ and the main weapon of the hellhound.  I was starting to see the flaw in my army list.  I lacked bright lances.  I was facing lots of armor. I had a twin linked bright lance on one wave serpent and a bright lance on one wraith lord.  I lacked enough fire power to bring down armor at range.  I had no fire dragons as they tend to become flying targets for fire when they are en route to a tank squadron.  My warlocks could take out vehicles, they did in fact, but it was an inefficient use of them.

Game three taught me a very valuable lesson.  Close combat with Space Wolves is not a good idea when the game is for kill points.  In a pitched battle with lost of terrain in a city scape I had some advantage.  I could move my army around quicker thanks to the wave serpents.  The only issue was the 2 squads of long fangs that seemed immune to death no matter how much fire I poured into them.  I have to say it was a good call on Neils part to put a wolf guard terminator into the long fang squads.  They took a lot of hits that would have otherwise killed a heavy weapon.  I was massacred by the Space Wolves.  Logan Grimnar was a beast and the long fang fire really took its toll.  So i was at the back of the pack but I did not come in last place so that is something.  I had fun and the competition was fierce.  Congrats to Slocum and Lord Solar Steve for their victories. 
I do have a treat for later this week.  I have the winning Army list and my analysis will be the topic for my next post.  I only wish i could have watched it in action but i was fighting battles of my own at the time.

I hope to also get my seer council conversion kits this week.  I have the jet bikes prepped and ready to receive their riders.
So next post we will have some more discussion and analysis of the first round of Ard Boyz as well as the winning Eldar

until then...................................



Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!

Into the Breach

The Ard Boyz Tournament is upon us.  I have settled on an army list after a decent game VS some Nercrons last night and a sound pummeling at the hands of the Dark Angels.  So the Offical list is as follows.

1.  Eldrad Ulthran with 9 warlocks.  Two with destructor, one with embolden and spirit seer, one with enhance.  The are in a wave serpent armed with scatter lasers.  It has vectored engines and spirit stones
2.  The Avatar of Khaine.
3.  2x 10 Dire Avengers with Exarchs.  Both with blade storm.  One unit has a wave serpent with Missile launchers and spirit stones.
4.  1 unit of 20 Guardians with a shuriken cannon platform and a Warlock with conceal.
5.  2x 10 Striking Scorpions with Exarchs.  Both have stalker and Shadowstrike.  One is armed with a biting blade the other with a scorpions claw.
6.  1 unit of 5 wraithguard with a Warlock.  They are mounted in a wave serpent armed with bright lances and a shuriken cannon.  the warlock has conceal.
7.  2x Wraithlords one armed with a bright lance the other with a star cannon.  Both have wraith swords.

The Wraith guard were added instead of a 2nd Guardian unit that was originally in the list.  I needed some more heavy hitters that will distract my opponent.  SO the Wraithvguard were added.  This was the list I finally settled on as it did rather well.  After playing 7 2500 point games this week I am a little tuckered out.

The Unit including Eldrad has been the lynch pin in the army from day one.  Having all the psychic powers of which  he is capable of using 3 per turn and combine that with the close combat ability of having 9 warlocks and you have a very heavy hitting unit. 
The list has changed quite a bit.  After having Fire prisms that were constantly unable to fire due to lots of fire comming their way I dropped them in favor of Wraithlords.  Despite a lack of an Invulnerably save having toughness 8 and a +3 armor save is nice with 3 wounds.  It rules out close combat wounds from all but the strongest troops. 
I also dropped the pathfinders as my troop choices.  They are great at taking out big targets.  they can hold objectives great, as long as they are in cover.  They loose their value when you must move them.  If they are out in the open they are as good as dead.  Moving to take an objective and not being able to fire is also a waste.
So the only vehicles in the current list are heavily armed Wave Serpents.  Despite being 90 points, plus weapons and upgrades, they are one of the best transports in the game.  They can fight like a tank and can get units into the fight fast.  If only they could have holo feilds.

So now we go into the breach and hopefully to some wins.  Sunday I will post the results.

until then........

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!

Finer Points of Stripping Pt 2

We now continue with the little experiment started this past weekend.  The results were a little surprising.  Apparently the clear winner of the contest was the Car Quest purple floor cleaner.

The Dire Avenger on the far left was stripped using the purple floor cleaner strait.  It was not diluted.  It took a minimal amount of scrubbing with a medium tooth brush to get most of the paint off.  The middle Dire Avenger was in the Simple Green that was not diluted.  It did strip the paint, however it took a lot of scrubbing with the tooth brush and nowhere near the same amount of paint came off.  The last Dire Avenger, on the far right, was in a diluted mix of Simple Green and as you can see basically no paint was stripped off. 

The most important part of this little project was to find a method to strip the paint that did not harm the plastic.  From this one run I can say that neither chemical hurt the plastic.  The Car Quest purple floor cleaner is the clear winner.

That said i now have six jetbikes sitting in a jar getting the crappy paint job stripped off.  I am still waiting for the conversion kits from Chapter House studios.  I am hoping to get them so i can get them assembled to the point I can use them in the ard boyz tournament.

The Eldar list did ok against our local Tau player but sadly I lost the game.  I blame my deployment and the terrain.  A spearhead deployment for Tau is great especially when My troops are mired down in difficult terrain.  I have concluded that I must make a more mobile list.  I have done a new list with an emphasis on mobility and infiltrators.  I basically replaced my guardians with Pathfinders. and added some mobile units.  the list is still in development and has 3 versions so after i play a couple games today hopefully I can work out the kinks and post the official list in my pre tournament post.   I will make an additional post before the Ard Boyz Tournament Saturday and my usual post on Sunday with an aftermath report.  Now its time for lunch and time to get in some battles.  So until next time.

 as always.......

Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!

Finer points of Stripping

Well due to Father Nurgle bestowing his blessing on the house and a friend visiting this weekend i have no battle report.  So while i play a few games this week to test the list for the Ard Boyz tournament this coming Saturday I will be doing some posts about painting and modeling.  I have some Seer council bike conversion kits coming from Chapter House Studios, www.chapterhousestudios.com,  so i can do a bike council.  I have, possibly, some bike coming from a auction on Ebay that need to be stripped.


So lets look at the art of stripping miniatures.

I received these Dire Avengers painted when I bought a large lot of Eldar from a local Player.  He had already painted them.  These brave warriors will be the lab rats for my little experiment.

As some of you may or may not know people have used all sorts of chemical and stripping agents to remove paint from miniatures.  Stripping a metal mini is rather easy.  You can use paint stripper or thinner.  Some people even use brake fluid.  The point is that water based acrylic paints will fall right off when you use any of these harsh chemicals.  Plastic is another story.  Plastic will melt.  You must use care when stripping paint off of a plastic or resin miniature or model.  I have used one method and I am trying another.

The first method I have tried with some success is using Pine Sol.  Soaking the model in an undiluted bath of Pine Sol Stripes paint and primer.  Some scrubbing with a coarse brush , like a tooth brush, is in order to get the paint that did not just sluff off.

My only two complaints are.  The pine smell is overpowering and really permeates the model.  you must rinse and scrub for a while in order to minimize the smell and get the residue off.  The other complaint is that prolonged soaking does in fact distort the plastic.  There is a film left on the model from the plastic beginning to melt and distort.  So this method is great for metal and sparingly for plastic as long as you monitor it and get the stuff off ASAP.

The next method I am trying involves chemicals like Simple Green.  It is a degreaser and floor cleaner.  I am using a generic kind from Car Quest that I had in the house.  One of the Dire Avengers is currently soaking in a bath of it in a nice metal coffee can.  Once he has soaked for a few hours I will post the aftermath.  Supposedly Simple Green and chemical like it will not harm the plastic.  I will also be trying simple green itself once I go buy some.  So we will see which will reign supreme and make it so buying that great deal you found on ebay even greater.  Greater because you know how to get that crappy paint job off of them so the model will be pristine and require very little work in order to get a good paint job on the it.

So next time we will see the aftermath of the stripping experiment and hopefully we will be starting the conversion of the Seer council on bikes.  Now wish me luck as I start a week of intense training for the Ard Boyz tournament.  T minus 6 days and as always


Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!

Farseers and Choppers

Well sadly I did not get a game in Wednesday. There were not takers for the Noise marine army that i was intending on using in the upcoming Ard Boyz torunament here in good old Lansing. 2500 points of chaos goodness.

I know I know, why was I going to use a noise marine army when I have been playing Eldar basically since the fall, otherwise known as the early 90's. I was not happy with the army lists i was making even with 2500 points to work with. Since I did not get a Game in Wednesday I had time to think and confer with other Eldar players.

I came up with a list that makes me happy.


HQ: Eldrad Ulthran with 10 warlocks in a wave serpent armed with scatter lasers, vectored engines and spirit stones.

HQ: The Avatar of Khaine ( who has been very good to me the last 3 games)

Troops: 2x Squads of 10 Dire Avengers with Exarchs. Both have blade storm.
Troops: 1x Squad of Guardians with a warlock. Warlock has conceal. Weapon platform is a shuriken cannon

Elites: 2x Squads of Fire Dragons with Exarchs. Exarchs have fire pikes and Tank Hunter.
both squads are in wave serpents with spirit stones and vectored engines. One is armed with bright lances the other with shuriken cannons.

Heavy Support: 2x Wraithlords with wraithswords one armed with a star cannon and the other a bright lance.
Heavy Support: Fire Prism with spirit stones, holo fields and vectored engines.

Now this list packs a lot of punch. Eldrad and his rather large council will be a major threat in close combat but mostly he will wreak havoc with his ability to use 3 psychic powers a turn and hamper the abilities of any psychers on the board. Most of the Warlocks have the destruction power fro some close in fun should anybody decide to get close. One has enhance to beef up the close combat ability and the other has embolden to make sure Eldrad does not fail any psychic tests.

Paring the Avatar with the Guardians, and any unit for that matter, will make it an excellent objective holder. Since any unit is fearless within 12" of the Avatar they will take a pounding and not run. The Avatar that close also means defense against bigger target that may try to contest the objective. 20 Guardians though makes for a deep wall that will not let a unit get within 3 inches of an objective to contest it though.
The unit also makes a good spear head with the Avatar at the front leading the way. 40 str 4 shots followed by 40 attacks in an assault , str 3 or not, brings weight of numbers and will force lots of saves.

The Fire Dragons and Wraithlords can deal with any armor. Keeping the Wraithlords in range of the Spirit seer in the guardian unit will make them excellent support for a Avatar lead charge. This could potentially break the back of an army, especially one that stays in one spot. Divide and conquer.


Dire Avengers are good all around troops. they pack a punch, are decent on close combat and can hold objectives. 18" range on their shuriken catapults makes it so they can move and keep the fire on. Rapid fire units are forced to move to bring mass fire and this limits the number of shots as well as the ability to assault.

Fire Prisms are a great tank buster and with the prism cannon being a blast weapon it can kill infantry rather well to. holo fields are a must. The survivability of the Fire Prism depends on it.


now all that left to be done is test the list and make some tweaks.

Now that I found my camera and realized pictures of my army and such will be coming this weekend.


I also just ordered the Seer Council Jetbike conversion kits from Chapter House Studios. Once they arrive and I get some Jetbikes I will post the pictures and the review.


Until then.....................


Blood Runs, Anger Rises, Death Wakes, War Calls!

Decent of Angels

Well I have had two battles using the Same list this week. I have started testing 1850 point Adepticon rules army lists. So far I have revised it once.

I used the original list Vs Captain Obvious and his experimental blood angels cheese list, his words of discription not mine, That list was composed of 2 Furioso Librarians, 3 vindicators, 3 baal predators 2 5 man squads of marines, a squad of scouts and a librarian leading the pack

I have always been an Eldar player. I have played Eldar since the early 90's and the days of 2nd edition. I skipped the horror that was 4th edition.

The List I used against the Blood Angels was version one of the Adepticon list and it consisted of:

1 Farseer with Spirit stones, Runes of warding, Doom and Mind War
4 warlocks with the Farseer with Enhance, Embolden and 2x Destructor and 1 with spirit seer
1 Avatar
20 Guardians with a warlock with conceal and spirit seer and with a shuriken cannon platform
5 pathfinder
10 howling banshees with Exarch. Exarch has acrobatic and warshout armed with an excutioner
1 wave serpent with shuriken cannons with the banshees.
10 Fire Dragons with Exarch. Exarch has a fire pike and the tanks hunter power.
1 wave serpent with bright lances as transport for the Fire Dragons.
2 Wave serpents with scatter lasers and holo feilds
1 Wraithlord with Starcannon and Wraithsword.

we played a Capture and control mission


Although the path finders were hellstorm cannoned the first turn the list did ok. With the guardians and Avatar holding the objective, and the fire dragons and falcons wreaking havoc with all his armor i was able to hold the objective while at the same time killing off all his ability to hold his objective thanks to my banshees and the Farseer and Warlocks. His list was relying on psychic powers and he was not having much luck with the runes of warding up. Even after he managed to kill the Farseer the powers were not that effective.

The list ddid lack troops though. I was also not all that pleased with the Falcons performance. The pulsar is nice against light targets but I was having issues with the BS of 3.

So for round two against The dreaded Dark Eldar Horde of Captain Obvious i changed the list. The Dark Eldar list he runs is very strong. A lord with 4 incubi and Drazaar is nasty. 3 Ravagers and a the squad of wyches is also nasty. The real power comes from the numerous squads of warriors though. They have lots of Dark lances and Blasters. It is a bad day for anybody who does not expect the DE to have shooty potential.

I modified my above list. I took out the Falcons and put in Fire Prisms. They have a BS of 4 and with 2 modes of fire and the ability to combine gives me more flexability and killing power for armor and infantry. I took out the pathfinders and decided to try 2 squads of 3 Jetbikes both with one shuriken cannon each. I was hoping these would be able to harass the enemy and be able to take objective quickly. Lastly I swapped the Banshees for Striking Scorpions. No power weapons , but they hit harder and get more attacks plus I can outflank.

This list did much better and despite the game going back and fourth every turn, I managed to Contest the other objective for the win. The Avatar also pimped the Lord and retinue thanks to crappy rolling.

I used this list again Vs Dark Angels. A command squad in a land raider, three tactical squads, one squad of assault terminators, a land speeder with assault cannon and heavy bolter, a dreadnought deployed via drop pod. all tactical squads had lots of plasma.

After two games I am not happy with the choice of bikes. They took objectives quick and harassed but they died quick. In the end i was narrowly defeated as one tactical squad i failed to kill, 3 remaining, managed to run from cover and take the last objective in the last turn.

My deployment was not good as well. I promise i will have more pictures and details next time.

My Rogue Trader game also went well Friday night.

It is my first time playing and running this game. I really need to read more so I can actually run combat next time. Character creation took a while due to all the jumping we had to do in the books. The rules are really spread out as well. I wish they would have some nice summaries for a quick refresher when I need it.

All in all it went well. There was a lot of interaction and they managed to botch a battle drill thy wanted to run on the ship. 7 degrees of failure makes it so fun for me. This epic fail almost cost them their trade negotiation meeting as they almost hit a ship near by as the crews actually fired the guns rather than just doing a battle drill.

Should be entertaining next session


until next time.............