First Howling Griffons game

My first five-man squad of Howling Griffons now means I can start playing games with my new force.  I did just that on Tuesday with a 450-point game at the school club.  My entire force was up against two five-man tactical squads, a captain and a dread.  As we rolled four objectives, that pretty much occupied all the troop choices on the board, whilst my assault squad quickly chewed through one squad and then the other for a comfortable debut victory.

Keen for some more practice with Space Marines, my Salamanders had an overdue outing at GW Newbury's Veterans' Night on Thursday, playing a 1000pt battle against Tom's Necrons.  With a big hill in the centre of the board, I made the mistake of advancing my Devastators for better LOS, only to be jumped by his Tomb Stalker (which he has modelled bursting through a wrecked landspeeder).  Some atrocious armour saves early on also cost me half of the Tactical Squad on my objective.

After the initial setbacks I recovered to kill the Tomb Stalker and two Annihilation Barges.  I even got as far as contesting his objective, before being ground down and losing 2-0.

Despite my poor rolls on amour and also leadership throughout the game, I did seem to have more luck against his Mindshackle Scarabs, making my first three Ld tests on 3d6 before missing the fourth one.  I also tried out a Librarian with Might of the Ancients.  Again, I failed to make two psychic tests (although I avoided perils), before wrecking one of the barges.

With new White Dwarf out this weekend, complete with new flyers, I am contemplating how useful a Stormtalon would be, given that I already have a Fast Attack choice.  The Escort Craft rule makes it quite interesting with reserves and a 36" Supersonic move would be very good for last-minute contesting objectives.  However, I didn't like the model at first glance.

Sniper Scouts plus wasp

The next unit of Howling Griffons are nearly done.  I've been working on 5 Sniper Scouts this week.  I left the gun arms and heads on the sprues for ease of painting, before final assembly.  I normally build the models completely prior to undercoating and painting, but the cloaks and big guns would have made it harder to do the quartering and details.  Now that they are assembled, I am not sure I've got the head poses right.  Hmm...

I haven't used snipers before, so I'm interested in how to get the best out of them.  I'm still deciding on my Carnage list, but now have a Space Marine battleforce, as I want to do Armies on Parade as well.  I could expand the two current units, but instead next up will be a Tactical Squad, 5 at a time, so I can start getting some legal games with a mix of units.  I will definitely be adding a Scout with Heavy Bolter at some point, too.

Off topic - I seem to have been sharing my shed this weekend with a wasp.  I wondered why it kept coming back, then noticed that it had started building a nest!  I felt mean removing its WIP, but it hasn't given up yet.  Any suggestions on discouraging it from starting again?  And no, I don't plan on lighting a fire in the shed to smoke it out...!

Back from Germany

I've just spent a few days in Germany leading a school trip. I managed to spend a bit of hobby time over there and visited the GW stores in Darmstadt, Mannheim and Frankfurt. The Mannheim one had a particularly impressive Armies on Parade winner on display. It featured Dark Angels defending a ruined chapel, with some great details, like a lone Fallen Angel lurking around the back.

Whilst away I read the rest of the Soul Drinkers Omnibus, which has grown on me a lot. The idea of modelling Tellos and some purple, mutated assault marines with Khorne Bezerker rules seems like fun. Apparently the fourth part 'Chapter War' is no longer in print, so I shall probably download the e-book from Black Library, instead of waiting for the second omnibus.

In Frankfurt I picked up a box of Sniper Scouts, to add to my Howling Griffons Assault Marines to start making a viable 800 point army for Carnage next year. Quinn has also persuaded me to do my own Armies on Parade entry. The idea of Howling Griffons defending a Griffon statue comes to mind, based on the new Empire monster.

Oh, and I finally got one of these...

GW Newbury Painting Competitions

Well I got the Chaplain finished earlier in time for the painting competition at GW Newbury.  There were two categories I entered.  The Chaplain was for the hero painting competition organised by GW nationally and the Assault Squad was for the local competition.

In terms of votes, the Chaplain did a little better than the Assault Squad.  Perhaps they were a little two shiny for most people, although I did get some very positive comments about them.  However, they were up against some very good models - well done to all the winners.  At least I can say mine were all done with the new paints and these were certainly my the best painted models I have ever done.  That is probably as much to do with the time and care I have taken over them, as with the new paints.  I do now have a lot of the new yellow and red paints, so I should make use of them and get some more Howling Griffons ready for battle.

Whilst finishing the metal on the Chaplain, I was a little unhappy with the overly reddish tint on the Gehanna's Gold colour, so I softened it with some Sepia wash.  I was then pleased to see that the gold dry colour is called Golden Griffon.  It fitted very nicely!

Getting there slowly

I had a quick 800pts game at the club on Tuesday with my guard against one of the boys there, who has a nicely-painted vanilla SM army with a couple of dreads.  It was Dawn of War - Annihilation, and I got to set up on the halfway line, which pushed him right back.  The walkers proved to be easy points, and the only point I conceded were from my Veterans, who failed to turn up by the time we had to finish.

I also went along to GW Newbury's Vets' Night again yesterday to do a bit of painting, and am nearly there with the Howling Griffons.  I did the bases with Zandri Dust and applied some 'Ardcoat all over.  I want to give the bases another coat and tidy up a couple of bits I had missed and then I will concentrate on getting the Chaplain done, hopefully by the end of next week.

Having researched a bit of the background for the Howling Griffons, I saw they had a run in with the Soul Drinkers, so I picked up their Omnibus yesterday too.

Last tweaks

Back to the grindstone today after holidays, so updates will be less frequent now.

I think the Assault Squad is nearly done, although I will probably redo the base edges.  It is currently sepia wash on a white undercoat and so it has followed the laws of gravity and only really covered the bottom half.  The textured paint on the base was a little less textured than I was hoping.

I have also got started with the chaplain.  Strangely, I have started with a white undercoat, with a Nuln Oil wash, Abaddon Black base in the plates and Dark Reaper layer on top.  I quite like the effect so far.

Finecast chaplain problems

The Finecast chaplain with jump-pack seemed to be a good character to lead my fledgling unit, but I have not had the best of starts assembling him.

It is a clear April morning, so it was a little chilly out in the shed just now.  I noticed that the crozius arcanum was a little warped, so tried to flex it once to see if it would bend back into shape.  It snapped straight off just above the hand.  Then the feet almost broke off as I was gluing it to the base.  Finally, the detail on the jump-pack has not come out very well, as there are two big air bubbles right on the top corners of the air intakes and one of the skulls on the side is just a blob.

I know they suggest applying heat from a hair-dryer or hot water makes Finecast easy to reposition, but this seems far too brittle.  I wanted to use him for the painting competition, but he seems to be doomed to disaster.

This chaplain is my third Finecast purchase.  Logan was fine, although his cloak keeps coming off.  I have also bought some LOTR dwarfs / dwarves and the extended weapons on those seem a bit weak.