The new vampire counts are looking tempting...

I just found the link on Warseer to some of the new Vampire count models (one pic can be seen here ). I must say i'm very impressed by the new look and feel of the VC's and always felt they were one of the armies lacking character in their models until now. So i'm undecided whether to jump on the VC train or expand my goblins to write up an anti HE/VC army because i'm getting the feeling we will be seeing many competitors using these two armies at the upcoming tournaments of 2008.'

On a side note I hope everyone had a merry Christmas, and had their stockings filled with all sorts of wargaming goodies :)

Thoughts on a new fluffy....

Since the new GW giant grew in size and had its base size change, im thinking of attempting to sculpt a new Fluffy, bigger and badder than ever! I've never really tried sculpting from scratch anything to a giants scale but it sounds like a lot of fun. If i go ahead with it i'll start posting some WIP shots.

WFC Tournament completed!

Well i just got back from a cruisy BBQ at Dom's after the WFC tournament. I must say i seriously enjoyed this event, it was definately the best tournament i've been to. Great opponents, fantastic venue, lots of beer and food supplied, coffee, chocolate and everything else you could hope for. A big two thumbs up for Jack (Gyrfalcon) for organising such an awesome event.

How did I go? Well if I said 11th would you think that's pretty good? :) What if i told you there were 12 participants? LOL. Not very well at ALL!!

First game was a corker, and the most enjoyable game i've had against my mate Nic to date. He has a skaven army with a reasonable amount of magic and shooting which meant i was going to have to advance very quickly to stand a fighting chance. The game changed leads many times, but i was fortunate enough to capture 3 table quarters which was enough to get a minor victory. Awesome game, had lots of fun.

Second game was against Dom's Dwarves which utterly destroyed me. Beating dwarves is always an uphill battle with night goblins but i just could not find a way to crack through the tough skin and heavy armour of the stunties. In all honesty, between Dom's excellent generalship and very tough army list I have no idea how i would beat him period. Massacre loss to me.

Last game was against a great guy Dave (lonehunter). I definately went into this game with too much confidence as he was playing dark elves which are one of the weaker armies going around IMO. However i underestimated how quickly my army would fall to terror and panic should my general die. On turn three i miscast killing my level 4 which quickly opened a passage way for his lord on manticore to come in and cause mahem with his terror. Between that, and three turns of failed animosity tests (stalling three important units for half the game) I had little chance and Dave quickly made a mess of my army. Dave has definately improved as a fantasy player, and if he can reach the same level that he plays 40k at we are all in for a lot of trouble! Another massacre loss.

Top three places in the end were -

Julian - dwarves
Mike/Mikecro - O&G (go the greenskins!!!)
Dom / http://www.warpaint.com.au/ - dwarves. Check out Dom's painting service, he is the most amazing painter out there.

But who cares about losing when you have such an awesome time :) Many thanks to Jack for putting on the event, it was fantastic.

WFC Mini tournament tomorrow!

Well i'm pretty excited about the WFC mini tournament tomorrow. 2400 points is the limit which allows me to field a goblin army i'm pretty happy with. I have included three units of 3x squig herds which i plan to keep in the army and learn to deal with and work with. I figure by the time the new VC book is out i'll be needing more units which can chew through skeletons as Vampire armies will be about as common as @ssholes.

I'm really enjoying my goblin army i'm running with at the moment and i think Mikecro hit the nail on the head when he said it's the fact it contributes to all phases of the game.

I'll post tomorrow night with news and feedback about the WFC tournament.

Staks.

To rhinox or not to rhinox?

Been chatting regularly to a mate matty (colzey) on msn a bit lately. We have been discussing different ogre kingdom builds and cool models for conversions. One of the latest conversations were about running multiple and / or large units of rhinox riders. Here is a list I had thought about proxying for fun. I think it would be pretty damaging, but im not sure how much interest I would have in playing it after one or two games.


Tyrant
- Tenderiser
- Mawseeker
- Jade Lion

Butcher
- Scroll

Butcher
- Skullmantle

3 x Bulls

3 x Bulls

20 x Gnoblars

20 x Gnoblars

4 x Ironguts (STD, muso)

2 x Leadbelchers

3 x Bull Rhinox (standard, muso, ironfists, HA)

3 x Bull Rhinox (standard, warbanner, muso, ironfists, HA)

Total 2250(ish)

So, yay or nay? Looks fun for at least a few games :)

Gobwort's go to Outpost Onslaught Tournament

Attended a 1500 point 1 day, 4 game tournament this weekend. My list was something like -

Goblin Hero (general)
NG Hero BSB
NG Hero on giant squig

3 x 30 NG's with FC and nets

2 x 5 wolf riders

5 x spider riders

2 x snotlings

1 x wolf chariot

2 x bolt throwers

1 x stone thrower

1 x giant

My opponents were all great sports and their armies included -

Bretonnians, Empire with stank, lizardmen, undivided daemons. Unfortunately i had to forfeit my last game against the daemons as i had developed a severe migrain through the day which was so unbearable I was pretty close to vommiting. The game was still in the balance with me losing my two wolf rider units to Richard losing his bloodcrusher unit although i did have his plagueriders advancing towards my flanks. Unfortunately I just couldn't continue and at the end of turn 2 i had to forfeit and take a 0-20 loss. Richard was a good sport about it, and once again apologies for cutting your tournament short. Not that he would complain im sure, he did end up winning the tournament by a long margain!

Surprisingly i still managed to come 3rd overall which I was stoked about considering i had to forfeit game 4.

Many thanks to my opponents on the day :)

Gobwort's VS Dom's Dwarves. The battle for eight peaks!

I had a 2400 point game against Dom from the Vagabonds last night. I was trying a new list I had put together which in theory had a solid battle plan. The three units of squigs would advance, eat dwarves, die and explode to slow his advancement while my warmachines and magic picked him apart. By the time he reaches my lines the fanatics and big blocks on NG's with nets should be too much for him. Right? Wrong!

For starters this game plan doesn't work very well against an army with this much shooting as the squigs don't see combat in a healthy state. Secondly, don't send your fast cav in for support or the squig explosions will do far more damage to you than the dwarves. This was my own fault and something pretty obvious but with any luck after a few more games I'll get better with playing the list. Tempted to drop a doom diver to add in trolls though, but i'm just not convinced on running dwarves with a LD7 general :(

GG Dom, you played well.

Just picked up the new High Elf army book

So today I popped into my local gaming store to pickup a copy of the new HE book. I had heard most of the rules and stats of the units from rumour posts on message boards already, and it seems they were pretty much spot on.

Some things did spring to mind after reading the units and magic items

- GW created elves to have inferior strength and toughness to other armies. So why is it that they feel the need to give them magic items to make up for this weakness? For example, there is a magic item which grants them +3 strength which essentially equals a dwarf character with a great weapon. They have armour which grants a 1+ rerollable save, and magic spells to give them 5+ ward saves. So what is the point of having an apparent weakness of low tougness in the army when the characters can offset it by other means?

- The special characters Tyrion and Teclis are rediculous. I'm glad most tournaments I attend don't allow them. I know you pay more for the abilities special characters offer, but by the time you upgrade a mage to level 4, deck him out with their magic items Teclics only works out to be about 100 points more, and for what he is capable of I would say it's most definately worth it!

- I'm not convinced at how good dragon mages are going to be. They only ride a strength 5 dragon, and are pretty vulnerable without an armour save. I'd be pretty happy to see my opponent field one of these as I don't think it would cause me too much grief.

- The ASF rule seems OK. HE are still going to be vulnerable to chariots magic and shooting so giving them a little more power in combat shouldn't be such a big deal.

- Their magic lore is insanely powerful. Had I be wanting to start a HE army I would most definately want to field three level 2's, or at least 1 level 4 and a level 2. Their magic just adds so much survivability to the rest of the army.

Overall I think most HE generals will be extremely happy with the new army book. As an O&G general I do feel a little ripped off with what we got in ours in comparison, but I guess it's a little early to say exactly how good HE are going to be.

More feedback on the new Confronation age of Ragnarok rules

Had another few games today of the new Confrontation rules. First game was using 2500 Hyenda against 2500 Scorpion. Lists were something like this -

My Hyena -

Velrys
Zeiren
8 x Archers
6 x Blood Warriors
3 x voracious
2 x Tyrants
3 x Eclipsante's

Bishnak's Scorpions
Thissan ka
2 x 10 Clones
6 x Hybrid archers
8 x Dawn Warriors
3 x Dasyatis clones
1 x Abberation Prime
1 x Abberation Prime

It was a fairly one sided event with my devourers/hyena in control for most of the game. This was only our second game playing the new rules and it definately flowd much better than our first game. The game still feels much like the original confrontation but with more models at your disposal and a larger table to move around. One thing Bish and I agreed on was the importance of taking a magician / faithful in your forces, not always to cast but to at least censure your opponents spells as in the new confrontation they can be extremely devistating.

Second game was using my Cynwall for the first time against the same hyena list above. My Cynwalls / Dargon army was as follows -

Syd de Kaiber
6 x Kestrels
7 x Asadars
2 x Nova's (damn these are good)
3 x Echahims
1 x Dragon

I must say the Dragon army racial trait is extremely powerful. It essentially allows one test (shooting, attacking, strength tests etc) per turn to always hit on 2's for the entire army! Start off by using it on your shooters / gunline to soften the enemy while they advance, and then start using it for attack or strength tests to mash even the toughest armies once they reach you in combat. The dragon mages also have a dragon summoning spell which was quite easy to get off! However summoning two dragons over the course of the game almost worked against me, as while they can be pretty devistating in combat they are still quite easy to slay with only two wounds each. As a result they give up a LOT of elixir/victory points to your opponent as they are classed as a rank 1 unit.

Overall definately two thumbs up for the new rules! ;)

Squig herds or Squig hoppers?

A very frequent discussion point for O&G generals is whether they prefer squig herds or hoppers. No matter which you choose, they have very similar purposes and are equally damaging once they reach combat. Both have their perks though, do you want to have the benefits of skirmishers or a rank bonus and the ability to explode in your opponents face?

Their biggest weakness is their vulnerability to magic and shooting thanks to their low toughness and no armour save and it's for this reason that i slightly favour squig herds, as their night goblin herders essentially act as a 5+ ward save. Afterall, remember its the squigs that do the damage in combat not the night goblins!

Currently i'm play testing a list which runs three units of herds, and while it's only had the one run so far the results have been pretty good! Although since i love the hopper models so much i've thrown a few of them inside my herd units to add some variety :)

Welcome to my squig cave.... I hope your stay is an enjoyable one :)

I guess an introduction is a good way to start, my name is Adrian but i'm known by my peers as Staks and i'm a wargamer nut with interests in both Confrontation and Warhammer. I play more warhammer these days as it's far more established here in Australia but both games are great fun. My love for warhammer started when I was 14, when i stumbled across some friends white dwarf magazines. My first love were Chaos Dwarves which have unfortunately been neglected ever since, but nevermind, if it wasn't for playing my Chaos Dwarves i would never have made the move to Goblins which have been my army of choice ever since. The other armies I play include Ogre kingdoms, and i'm about to embark on a project to create an undead wood elf army.

The goblin army I run at most tournaments now days is themed around Harry Potter and is rightfully named "Gobwort's". It's been a neverending project i've been working on for a few years now which never really gets boring as with each new harry potter movie that comes out I discover new theme ideas to create for the army :)

I tend to play on average one game a week, and while i'm not a member of any club I frequently play with one of the strong Melbourne based clubs known as the Vagabonds, or against some other mates who frequent Wargamerau such as Mikecro and (sic). It's taken me a long time, but only recently have my Gobwort's started winning games more frequently and i can safely say it's thanks to the regular games against these quality opponents.

So, what will you see in this blog? Not much other then random dribble and ramblings regarding my thoughts on various events, army books, battle reports and all things warhammer or confrontation related. When i think of silly new army lists, tactics and model conversion ideas I like a place where I can throw down my ideas on to paper.

So, until next post... Thanks for visiting my squig cave :)