A few months back, I acquired a can of Quickshade (product link here). The store owner was raving about how good a product it was and how much better it was than poly stain for dipping miniatures. I'd done a dipped army before and was comfortable with it's use, so I dropped 30 bucks on a can and decided to give it a try.
A squad of my marines volunteered. I had painted these guys up in 1999 for the Chicago GT, and they were an all-drybrush job, so they seemed like good candidates to try a varnish wash treatment on. Here they are before the treatment.
Using the medium strength color, I brushed the entire miniature and dabbed off the excess. I let the varnish dry for 36 hours and then sprayed the minis with dullcoat to remove the gloss effect of the varnish. The result was a noticable yet subtle shade-and-ink of the miniatures. It doesn't subtract from the look of the miniatures and darkens the colors only slightly, but it does fill in the joints nicely, giving them the depth they were missing in my haste to get them done for the GT years ago.
The Quickshade product is indeed superior to poly stain varnishes. It is quite brushable (unlike the poly stain), does not bubble, flows like an ink, and is thick enough to stick in all the places it needs to go in a single coat.
Unlike an ink, however, the quickshade requires a dullcoat afterward if any additional work is to be done to the miniature. that breaks up the paint surface and makes blending look funny. the quickshade also sticks to flat surfaces unlike inks, resulting in certain surfaces having a pool of darkness that really needs to be retouched. (only because of the dullcoat requirement, that's kind of difficult) The 30 dollar price tag is a bit of a bummer too.
In summation, Quickshade is a great product to do an entire army quickly and have a force that looks great from 3 feet away. It's up close you'll notice the shortcomings of the shortcut, so you won't be winning any painting awards by relying on this product. For that, stick to regular inks.
In running this year's Origins events, we had a number of interesting rulings come up, as you might expect. Most of them we ruled correctly on, a few we got wrong, and one in particular I WISH I had gotten wrong, but didn't.
I'm talking about dedicated transports. The problem is, the main 40k rulebook just doesn't have much to say about them. They're a squad option now, other units can use them but not start the game mounted up in them, and (thanks to the GW FAQ) we know they count as separate units for purposes of shooting.
But what about victory points or kill points? Or unit cohesion? Well apparently, they leave that up in the air. The rulebook just doesn't address it. Some of the newer army books do (the ones written since 5th Ed), but the older ones (and their online errata/FAQ's) do not.
So here's the problem, an actual case study from the Origins RTT... Daemonhunters army, an Inquisitor and Retinue (150 points) picked a Land Raider (250 points) as their dedicated transport. At the end of the game, the character and retinue died to a man, but the Land Raider was unharmed. And the game was decided on Victory Points.
Now Codex Daemonhunters (print or online PDF), being a 4th Ed army book, does not say anything extra about dedicated transports, so we go to the 5th Ed Rulebook to figure this out. The transport isn't listed as a separate unit, so it counts as an option purchased for the squad. So the opponant who killed the inquisitor and retinue but not the Land Raider has inflicted 50% or more casualties on the squad, but has not wiped it out. So according to page 300 of the rulebook, he gets 50% the total value of the squad, which is 200 points. (Half of the character and retinue, and half of the undamaged land raider, because it is a purchased squad option.)
But any 5th Ed Army book will say in the description of the dedicated transport that it doesn't take up a force org slot BUT OTHERWISE COUNTS AS A SEPARATE UNIT. So not only is unit cohesion crystal clear on that one (thanks guys!), but Victory Points are back to the classic way of doing it. The 150 point squad with a 250 point dedicated land raider in the above scenario is worth 150 victory points.
But the real problem... is that we are counting victory points differently depending on which Codex the army is from. Same body count, Codex Daemonhunters gives up 200 VP while Codex Space Marines gives up 150 VP. (Codex Tau Empire, for example, is in the same boat as Daemonhunters, so don't assume it's just the PDF-only army books that are subject to this.)
The solution... would be for GW to insert one sentence on page 67 of the rulebook, either in an errata or an FAQ, the same sentence they're putting in every new army book. "These vehicle choices do not use up any force org selections but otherwise count as separate units."
And if GW hasn't done this by next year's Origins RTT, expect a house rule to that effect. Victory points should never be calculated differently depending on the army being used. That way madness lies.
While we're waiting on Ranillon to get the pics and results from all our events sorted out, let's talk missions.
This is what we got the most negative feedback on this year, particularly the missions for the Rogue Trader tournament. They were a little too "Fourth Edition" for some people, and did not properly allow or account for current edition deployment or rules options. They were also not available online ahead of time, as has become custom with other RTT's around the country.
To this we say... you're absolutely right.
Like everything our crew does, the missions were delegated to one of us, and that person had real life hit him hard recently. The result was missions that were delivered to us literally AFTER game 1 of the RTT was underway. Jim and I listened to the feedback you were giving us, but decided that rewriting the missions for games 2 and 3 while game 1 was underway was not wise. So it was missions as written and make improvements for next year.
So let's talk next year.
We are running again in 2011 with as many or more events and as much or greater prize support and trophies. But this time we're getting all our ducks in a row well in advance. Missions will be posted on this blog well ahead of time. We're designing 6 missions in total and getting feedback from you, the community. Then our staff will pick two missions for the 3 round RTT and put up a poll for the 3rd mission. So all of you will be voting on mission number three.
Thanks to the 40K Basement folks for summing all this up and letting us know what major points need improvement. If they, or any of you, have any other feedback on how Origins games were run this year (positive OR negative) please leave comments on this post or send us email. We are listening.
This isn't one of those "I have a blog, hear me rant" kind of posts. It's one of those "don't let this happen to you" kind of posts instead.
Let me first say, I absolutely LOVE bartertown.com. You can take unwanted gaming material, leftover bitz, and even completely unrelated stuff and exchange it for used stuff you DO want, all without messing around with ebay or paypal. And they track all the positive AND negative ratings of each person who trades, so someone doesn't get away with pulling a scam more than once.
But you still have to be cautious. I pulled a large deal the other week, roughly $500 in trade value going each way. Now they tell you to watch large trades with users that don't have an established trade history. Trade small for a while til you build up a good rep, then you're ready for larger trades. But this fellow wanted old collectible toys in exchange for some premium 40k stuff, so I took a chance.
I didn't get screwed, but I didn't get exactly what I bargained for either. I was supposed to get a large bitz box and 30-50 sprues of stuff (much of it partially used), and the fellow took pictures of most of it. But then a lot of what he described and took pics of simply wasnt' in the box I received. I'd received descriptions and pics of things like a complete techmarine, aquila lander terrain, "tons" of tyrranid sprues, etc, etc. None of that was in there. And a fair number of the sprues contained things like "one single space marine head", or "single left arm and a grenade". Plus "tons of tyrranid sprues" apparently meant "three", and mostly stripped.
Now I got enough decent stuff in there that I don't think I got screwed, as I said. I'm also not ticked off enough to out the fellow by name. (That's just bad mojo anyway, and I would never go there.) But instead of a great trade for a box of toys I hadn't opened in 10 years, I got a poor trade instead.
So the moral is... bartertown.com is good, just make sure not to trade big unless the guy you're trading with has a great track record.
On a related note... coming soon, home made Sternguard veterans! Stay tuned...
As a father of 3 diaper-weilding children, my gaming budget is very small these days. Usually I can resist giving in to the new stuff that GW has to offer, though things like the bastions and new space marine squad options have tempted me sorely as of late.
I've gotten around my desire for Sternguard veterans by loading up on Deathwatch Kill Team conversions as a cheaper way of fielding WYSIWYG vets. $25 for a conversion kit for 10 marines seems to be the way to go if you've otherwise got a well stocked bit box and unassembled tactical marines laying around.
http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?prodId=prod1110206&rootCatGameStyle=
But every once in a while, I make the mistake of looking at Forgeworld. Sure, the greater daemons and titans make me drool on my keyboard, but every so often they put out an irresistable model that's in my price range.
So thank you, Forgeworld. Thank you for ruining my budget once more.
Please keep up the good work. =P
Ranillon has already covered the flow of the game itself. He mentioned having help from a teammate that flank marched into the enemy's rear? Those were my marines, and this is my take on the battle.
FLANK MARCH
On setup, I found our force setting up opposite a player who brought a MASSIVE imperial guard tank company, complete with superheavy tanks and backed up by a Reaver titan and a Warhound titan. While my own Reaver Titan set up on our side with space marine scouts as screening troops in cover around it's ankles, my space marine battle company was able to come in en masse over consecutive turns behind the imperial guard player, thanks to a distinct lack of jamming or chaos covens in his area.
I had intended to shoot up his transports and then assault the troops inside, so my marine company would have an assault to hide in during the IG player's next shooting phase. But I discovered to my horror that the 16 or so Chimera transports he had brought were in fact EMPTY. It seems he only had so much room in his car, so he'd left all the actual infantry at home! While this seems a very odd thing to do for an unlimited-points game, it quite nicely left my space marines stranded behind a sea of battlecannons, and only his desire to shoot my tanks first saved my marines' ability to fight. Krak grenades, melta bombs, and the odd powerfist or meltagun did most of the work.
HOT REAVER-ON-REAVER ACTION
Let's face it... no matter how you arm these monsters, a reaver titan is pretty much capable of savaging another reaver titan unassisted in 2 turns. With the sort of help you find in an apocalypse game, even a Reaver titan stands up to only one turn of firing.
My Reaver went first, assisted by a squadron of my predator tanks who downed a few void shields. An apocalypse barrage launcher stripped the remaining shields from my opponent, and I savaged him down to 2 structure points and a lot of engine hits with a Turbolaser and a stratch built Volcano Cannon. Sadly, I inflicted no weapon hits and no "cannot fire next turn" hits, which I was counting on to slow his counterattack.
The IG player's reaver went next, preceded by a tremendous amount of battlecannon and lascannon shots from an approaching company of Leman Russ tanks. They stripped my shields, and while his vulcan megabolter could not harm me, his plasma cannon inflicted some engine hits while his single shot Vortex Missile ripped through my titan like a hot knife. His Warhound titan joined in and finished me off with a Turbolaser shot.
STERNGUARDS FOR THE KILL
I had two squads of sternguard veterans in the IG player's backfield at this point. In an unlimited-points scenario such as this, both 10 man squads were fully equipped with Combi-meltas, and each squad had a librarian attached to them. The librarian's job was to give the veterans a 5+ save and, more importantly, teleport them around at 24" per turn. Though an enemy psychic hood was limiting the effectiveness of this tactic, one sternguard squad managed to teleport in behind the enemy reaver titan and unload with it's remaining 7 melta shots. The damaged Reaver titan went down quite easily to this tactic, freeing my surviving predators and razorbacks to unload on other things.
80 PERCENT CASUALTIES FOR THE WIN
Doesn't seem like much of a win, but I did sweep the IG player off the board (Minus his superheavies, which Ranillon was dancing with) and claimed an objective marker or two in the process. Oddly, about 1/3 of my marine casualties came not from incoming fire but rather from exploding tanks. With so many krak, meltabomb, and powerfist hits each turn against densely packed IG tanks, I was losing marines at a steady rate to 6's on armor penetrations when they killed a tank. One unit of assault marines in particular was reduced to a single model without ever being fired upon, due to 5 successful assaults with melta bombs.
LESSONS LEARNED
1 - For their points and/or cost in Assets, Orbital Bombardments are useless against tanks. Even strength 10 ones. Quite often, you'll just inconvenience a tank or two. If you get them free as part of a formation or as an ability from your army codex, fine. But don't waste an asset on them, and don't aim at tanks.
2 - Teleporting Sternguard Squads with combi meltas. A squad is pretty much guaranteed to kill a superheavy target and then rough up any infantry they see on the way to an objective marker. Even after they're out of combi weapon shots, they still have krak grenades at no extra cost! If you're not limited by points and you have an asset that allows all your units to be scoring units, then there is no reason not to overload on these as much as you can. Mine are represented by Deathwatch marines, since there are no current rules for Deathwatch.
3 - A Titan, any Titan, must endeavor to engage the enemy line from OVER 60" away, and use it's 96" or 120" range guns. If it cannot do this for any reason (physical limit of table size), it will attract fire and die on turn 2.
4 - Psychic Hoods are normally wonderful for cutting down on the dirty psy stuff the enemy is pulling on you. But a Psychic Hood has a limited range, and in Apocalypse it is easy for an enemy psyker to be out of range. A DARK ANGELS Psychic Hood, on the other hand, HAS NO MAXIMUM RANGE. One Dark Angel librarian with a psy hood can interfere with each and every enemy psyker in an Apoc game, no matter where he stands or how large the board.
You know, it really doesn't take this long to make trees. Not in total anyway. But recall that I'm a 40k gamer with 3 small kids and a 60 hour a week job. Trees don't take this much time, life does. =) Anyway, on with part 3.
This time around, we're skipping over painting and basing the trees (we'll come back to that later), and are instead looking at cheap scenery bases to put all my cheap trees on. Recall that I put a rare earth magnet in the base of each of the large trees? Well that's because I'm basing them on steel terrain bases. Really CHEAP steel, in the form of a used whiteboard that a friend got out of a dumpster for me.
You can see that I've marked the whiteboard up with a sharpie and laid out the shapes of the terrain bases before I make the first cut. Metal this thin can be cut with a hand saw, tin snips, or a jig saw. I prefer a jig saw, partly because I already own one and because it's much faster and neater.
The back of the whiteboard is darker and has a thin layer of rubber. That means this is the side that things will stick to better and will cover in one coat. (The white might have to be painted first, and the paint might not stick.) For this portion, get yourself some PVA glue, a disposable paintbrush, and some box lids. Don't forget to cover your workspace in paper, as this is gonna be messy!
Use the brush to coat the base in glue. Make sure you lay the glue on thick, that there are no gaps, and that it goes all the way to the edge. This may be old news to some of you modellers out there, but it bears repeating. Your flock and gravel won't stick well if the glue is too thin, and your terrain will start going bald early in life. Nobody wants that. =)
I'm using two kinds of material on these bases; brown sand and green flock. The heavier of the two should go on first. Pour the sand out in a pattern on the base, and be generous with it. You'll end up with a mound of extra sand that isn't stuck down, and that's fine. You can quickly flip the base over and catch the excess in the box lid to be reused.
Now on to the other box lid to pour the lighter green flock over it. Again, heap it on. If you have enough, you can even swish the terrain base around in the box to cover it more easily. Then turn the base on it's edge and shake and tap the excess off into the box lid.
Voila. 18 terrain bases. Spray them with acryllic sealer once the glue is dry to extend their lifespan under your miniatures' feet.
Note that the bases on the left look different than the ones on the right. One base was a failed experiment in static grass, and I switched to using finer flock. But the difference in shading on the rest is the glue. The ones on the left were done using PVA glue, and there was enough extra stickiness to trap some green flock in amongst the sand. The ones on the right were after I ran out of PVA glue and switched to a spray adhesive instead. It makes for a thinner layer of stickiness, and there's no extra to trap the second color of flock. I think I prefer the PVA glue ones better.
Stay tuned for Part IV, where I finally get around to painting all these dang trees. =P
For those of you who will be following our blog off the web and onto the convention center floor at Origins this year, you'll be able to find us by THIS 4 foot tall sign I'll have up by our tables in the miniatures hall. Look for us, find us, game with us, chat our ear off with stories of the hobby!
We'll have info about our game times and other fun details attached to it. Enjoy.
