Scourge Painting Guide – “Leviathan Style”

I have been asked by a few people to share how I did my Scrourge, which was inspired Leviathan Tyranid scheme. Before I go into my own scheme I’ll fully admit that it’s heavily based off the excellent tutorial by Tale of Painters.

This method of painting is based mainly on washes, rather than my standard approach of layering lighter to darker shades. It makes for quick painting, but also a little tricky. Less is definitely more and I’d recommend applying the washes in multiple light layers to get the right result rather than one heavy layer. Also apply the washes to the recesses, otherwise it will be harder to get a nice white contrast on the flat raised areas.

The paints used are:

• Mat White (Army Painter)
• Pink Horror
• Lahmian Medium
• Druchii Violet
• Carroburg Crimson
• Magenta Ink
• Fire Dragon Bright

First simply spray the model white. Make sure you get a really good coat on, as we will be applying a wash directly to it. You may find it easier to spray the “wings” separately before attaching:

 

Make light pink wash by mixing Pink Horror with Lahmian Medium. The wash should have a lighter consistency than a standard wash. Try to keep this wash to the recesses.

 

Carefully use Druchii Violet to add a wash to the recess’ and segmented plates on the “spines” of the ship. You really want to avoid adding the wash to the white areas themselves, apart from the end  half of the “wings” which I wanted to be darker. In fact I applied two coats of wash to these areas.

 

Apply Screamer Pink to the raised areas on the segmented plates on the “spines” of the ship (which should have a base coat of Druchii Violet).

 

Using a suitable white (I used army painter mat white), paint over where the wash has gone on the raised areas to get them totally white. I used some dry brushing here.

 

Apply Carroburg Crimson to the occulus arrays and other wepaons, in this case the BTL. I also sparingly added a bit of Carroburg Crimson to some the really deep recess.

 

I added some red wash (I used Magenta Ink, but any red wash would do) to the heat lance an Fire Dragon Bright to the occulus arrays. Also highlight the “spines” with a mix of Screamer Pink and Pink Horror.  I also generally neatened by the model as required and there you have it, a scourge heavy cruiser ready for battle!

In to the Void!

Last year I embarked on my first Kickstarter to fund Drop Fleet Commander by Hawk Wargames. The main reason for backing the Kickstarter was the quality of the models, they simply look stunning! I also liked the idea of a spaceship game, but one that was objective based sounded even better. Hawk’s reputation with Drop Zone Commander and knowing Andy Chambers was involved also helped give confidence to get in on this game early.

So after about 15 months I have received my pledge, the big question is how does it stack up to the hype?

The Models

These are even better in person than in the photos. I am collecting Scourge, as I like evil aliens, but in my opinion all of the faces feel really distinct and look fantastic. In fact I am already tempted to build and collect PHR.

The plastic is very high quality, with crisp detail. The models do take a while to clean and put together, but that’s the downside of all plastic miniatures. Each Scrourge cruiser sprue can make all 9 options from heavy to light cruiser as you would expect. In addition you can make the battlecrusiers with a small resin kit. The frigate sprue can be constructed as any of the 5 frigate types as well. This modularity is great, although like all plastics comes with the downside of lots of left over bits.

The Rules

In my opinion the rules feel very streamlined, in fact I managed to read through the rulebook within a few hours. In particular it was great to see often over complicated rules like the launch assets delt with very efficiently. Coming from playing more complicated games like Infinity and Dystopian wars this was a nice change, altough I hope the rules have enough depth for the long run as well.

I have not yet played the game, so this is just initial impressions! In my opinion there are two main rules that sets Dropfleet apart from other spacecraft games, energy signatures and objectives. the energy signatures is a fantastic idea that feels very thematic. After all in space weapons ranges would not be limited, instead locking onto moving targets effectively would be incredibly tricky. This is handled by each craft having a scan rating and a signature rating. To see if a ship can fire at a target you add it’s scan rating to the targets signature, this will be the number of inches away that you can use your weapons. Generally the larger the craft the larger it’s scan rating and signature is. This is pretty straight forward, when it gets interesting is that ships that perform special actions can also pick up spikes in their signatures, making them easier targets to get in range of. These special actions cover anything from moving extra fast, firing all weapons or even just making an extra 45° turn! It is also possible to reduce a crafts signature by going on silent running. I expect management of signatures will be critical in this game, it’s certainly unique!

The objective aspect of the game is very similar to Drop Zone Commander. In most missions you will need to get boots on the ground using troop carriers. There are also objectives that require you to have ships near objectives to claim them. Coming from playing infinity I know I like games that have missions and objectives at the core, so this was a great draw to the system.

The Game play

With all these exciting game concepts and fantastic looking models, I really can’t wait to give this game a go. I’ll have my first game next week, looking forward to seeing it all in action!

Bad Moon Rising!

To get back into the swing of blogging, here are my Ariadna Wolves!

These are the models that got me into Ariadna. The sculpts were very fun to paint, with crisp well sculpted mussels.

They are good fun to use on the table, although trickier than you might expect!

Nomad Jaguars

Jaguars are possibly my favorite Nomad unit. On the surface Jaguars may look like a lot of other warband, but they have the noticeable addition of being regular and frenzy (as apposed to extreme impetuous). This means Jaguars won’t have the additional impetuous order to get up the table, but does mean they are a lot easier to control plus they can make use of cover. Jaguars also have the great benefit of being dogged, which makes putting them down tricky!

The cheapest profile may be what you expect from warband (i.e. smoke grenades and chain files or shotgun), but the other panzerfaust/Adhesive Launcher wielding profile is more eclectic. This profile misses out on smoke grenades, but offers a cheap and deadly ARO model (dogged really helps with in this role!). It’s worth noting that between the pistol, panzerfaust and Adhesive Launcher this is one of the few models in Infinity that can get a plus 3 to hit from 0 – 32.

For this trade off the Jaguars cost more than you might expect, but in my opinion are well worth it. Personally I use the chain rifles/shot guns for back board guard duties whilst the panzerfaust profile acts as an ARO model. Of course Jaguars work incredibly well with the Nomad signature model, the Intruder by providing reliable smoke.

My personal favourite, this model looks great with two close combat weapons. I painted the skin tone using my typical purplish hues.

I love the studs on this model, it has a real gang like feel to it.

Panzerfaust wielding Jaguar.

A shotgun wielding Jaguar, with a cool mow-hawk haircut!

This was a weapon swap so I could field two panzerfaust without model duplication.

Again another wepaon swap in case I fielded more shotgun armed Jaguars. This is more for my own benefit, as it makes it easier to identify which Jaguar has a chain rifle and which has a shotgun.

Nimbus Zone – Mission Analysis

My gaming group have been warming up for the upcoming Infinity National Team Challenge being held in Exeter. In fact we have managed to put together two teams of three gamers! The selected missions include Nimbus Zone, one of the odder and stranger missions in the ITS pack and as such we have all started practicing it.

Watch out for the fog! Sorry, I mean Nimbus…

Mission Overview

The give a quick overview of the mission, there are 4 antenna which emit the Nimbus Zone, which covers 8” either side of the central line along the table’s width. In addition there are three antenna along the central line of the table. The aim of the mission is to discount more antenna than your opponent, extract data from each consoles (which can not be done until the 2nd game round), and end the game controlling more consoles (by having more specialist in base contact with a console) as well as two of the usual classified objective. The mission also has an exclusion zone which restricts infiltration, aerial deployment etc.

The defining factor of this mission is of course the Nimbus Zone itself, which is an area of low viability and saturation. This makes all skills that require LoS suffer a -3 (such as shooting, discovering etc), as well as reduce the burst of weapons by 1.

 

Nimbus and Shooting, the odds!

For those interested in an odds in practice, here is an example of an Alguacile shooting another Alguacile. Imagine the Alguacile are within 16” of each other, in cover and both elect to shoot. In these conditions there is ~47% chance that the attacking Alguacile will shot and wound its rival. As soon as you factor in the Nimbus Zone the odds of causing damage drop to only ~30%, which gets worse if the targeted Alguacile decides to doge instead of shoot, as the odds drop to ~27% of inflicting damage! All stats are taken from http://inf-dice.ghostlords.com/n3/.

Thoughts on the Nimbus Zone Mission

• Shooting in the Nimbus Zone is tough, but any negative modifier to hit soon adds up to make shooting even harder. I try to use models with some types of camouflage and use suppressive fire where possible. Even more so than usual I try to take models with some form of MSV, to try and counter my opponent capitalizing on this.
• Within the Nimbus Zone selecting dodge as your ARO may be preferable to shooting, so worth considering more than usual.
• Combat is unaffected by the Nimbus zone, so it can be more worthwhile than usual.
• Splitting burst can be useful to reduce the impact of the Nimbus Zone, especially for burst 2 weapons. This is because the burst is first split and then reduced by 1 for the saturation zone.
• Although defensive ARO-ing models (such as snipers) are less threatening (as they don’t hit as easily) they are harder for your opponent to remove (as the odds of nothing happening from a firefight are higher than usual). Personally I find this makes ARO-ing units more useful as they often can’t be ignored, which forces your opponent to potentially waste orders dealing with the ARO model.
• The Nimbus Zone does not cover your deployment zone, so you can still do some good old fashion “rambo-ing” with Aerial deployment troops or those with superior infiltration. The exclusion zone does however restrict standard infultration, so these units are harder/riskier to use offensively.
• Anti-material weapons can be very handy, as they give you the option of destroying antenna, denying them to your opponent. However it’s worth noting that the antenna are resilient with an armor value of 4 and 2 structure points (so require three wounds to be destroyed), plus being in the Nimbus zone this option can be hard to achieve.  I have seen combat units (with explosive CCW or DA weapons) work better than shooting units, but it’s very army specific.
• Engineers and hackers are of course useful, as both have a bonus to WIP rolls within this mission.

The Plan

Like many ITS missions, I think the focus of your depends if you go first or second. below are my general thoughts and plans, but of course this is very theoretical as terrain load out and army list changes my tactics massively. Still I like to go into the game with some sort of plan in mind!

Going first

If going first I’d try to concentrate on disconnecting the antenna, ideally disconnecting the two nearest antenna and destroying/disconnecting a third antenna. This would bag you 3pts on the first turn, which the opponent could not contest latter in the game. In my second turn I try to focus on getting the data from the consoles. In the third turn I’d try and get any remaining data from the consoles and then protect my specialist that are trying to capture the consoles as best as possible, setting down mines and/or suppressive fire. As there is a lot to get done I would probably not go out of my way to attack my opponent, any more than required to get the objectives done (i.e. I would not spend a turn “rambo-ing” models).

Going second

If going second I try and set up good ARO threats to make it hard for my opponent to disconnect the antenna. In my first turn I’d consider if it’s order efficient to go after the antenna (if they have not already been bagged by my opponent). If its is not order efficient, I’d just try and damage my opponent’s army and get into a good position for turn 2. In the second and third turn I’d go after the data in the consoles and try to control them by the end of the game.

Final Thoughts

Before trying Nimbus Zone I strongly believed going first was preferable, as you can discount antennas before your opponent and therefore hopefully secure 3pts straight away. After trying the mission a few times I think this is balanced out by how tough it can be to get those 3pts, compared to going second which allows you to concentrate on controlling the consoles at the end of the game (even if that is worth 2pts rather than 3pts). Now I think going first or second is fine, it just changes on how I play the mission.

Overall the mission is very interesting and I am looking forward to playing it more. I’d be really interested in knowing what other people’s thoughts on the mission are and how then tackle it!

September’s Infinity Releases!

Well this is quite an awesome month for new models, including at least four new profiles! As in previous months I will rate the models using the “Schreiber scale” (basically between 1 and 5, with 5 being the highest).

I am going to start with my personal favorite for this month, the Mobile Brigada box set! There are two new profiles added by this box, the Mobile Brigada with Missile Launcher and the Mobile Brigada Hacker. Both of these are fantastic options for these dependable, even if not flamboyant, heavy infantry. The missile launcher is going a add a very resilient ARO option for Nomads, even more so when linked with other Mobile Brigada.

The Hacker however is even more interesting in my eyes, as it’s the first truly resilient Nomad specialist i.e. one with 2 wounds and good armor. This is something I have always felt missing from Nomads, so it’s great to see that gap filled. Interestingly the Mobile Brigada Hacker is the first Hacker (to the best of my knowlegde) that can benefit from a Tinbot (as part of a link). This makes the Mobile Brigada Hacker extremely well protected in the cybernetic arena, even more so if you can use fairly dust as well! I will have to check exactly how all these rules combine and interact, but I think this could be a more deadly hacker than it initially seems. This does raise the questions of, where is the Mobile Brigada with combi-rifle and Tinbot? Personally I am hoping that this will be another blister pack further down the line.

The models themselves look fantastic, up to the same high standard as the Operation Icestorm Mobile Bridaga. I really like the female Mobile Bridaga, they really have a strong manga look to them. There is no doubt that I will be picking this box set up, so I give it a 5.

The Nisse with HMG is an absolutely devastating model on the table, being almost as nasty as an Intruder but far cheaper. The new miniature is undoubtedly finely sculpted with crisp detail. However the pose misses the mark and lets this model down. Not only does the pose makes the Nisse look caught off guard, but holding the HMG in one hand seems unrealistic. I am sure there are potential conversions to fix the pose, but I have to give this model a 2. This may be harsh, as the sculpt really is nice, but I can’t get past that pose!

The Hunzakut is a stunning miniature with an unusual pose, but one that works really well. I know the art work for this model has been around for a while, so it’s great to see it executed to a high standard. For me the model get a strong 4. I can see most Haqq players will want to pick this model up, both because it’s an amazing miniature but also it has a very interesting profile.

The Combined Army has been going in a completely new direction and the Drones are no exception. These have an almost Star Ship Troop bug feel to them, which I like a lot. The Drones also fit in far more with the standard four legged remotes of the Infinity universe. My only criticism is that they feel a bit busy and some parts are hard to identify, but this may be the paint job (awesome as it is) being quite dark. Overall I give these models a solid 4.

As for the rules, Combined Army players can rejoice as they finally get an EVO repeater! EVO’s are soon set to change dramatically (with the re-release of Human Sphere), but in the meantime these will notably provide benefits to Combined Army hackers and Ariel Deployment troops. The latter is especially important for Combined Army, as they have an excellent selection of Ariel Deployment troops. It’s also worth noting that the EVO models looks to have a gun, which I believe is the first EVO model to posses a firearm. Of course you can always build the fearsome Q Drone as well!

The Kosuil Assault Pioneers are an entirely new Tohaa unit. The first release has a K1 combi rifle which will be a great addition to Tohaa, especially for ITS missions that benefit from anti-material weapons (such as Lifeblood, Nimbus Zone, The Armoury etc). The model should be pretty resilient as well, being medium infantry with symbiont armor. It will certainly be interesting to see the full profile of this new model.

The sculpt is solid, although with all those tubes it does somehow remind me of of Bane from old Batman Cartoons! The fist bump pose will annoy some people, but I think it works with this model. I particularly like the coat and that the models looks dramatically different to other Tohaa models, so I give this model a solid 4.

Gencon 2015 – Infinity News!

If Gencon is on, so there is bound to be a lot of Infinity news! Yesterday were are tone of new images as well as information on the eagerly anticipated Human Sphere book. I have put it all together and added a few of my thought.

 

Nomad News

– Mobile Brigada box set

– Alguacile hacker (released in August)

 

Combined Army News

– The official title of the new CA sectorial is  First Contact ONYX force. This is formed from the models in the current CA starter set.

– Two new drones were shown, the Xeodrone and the Overdrone (least that’s what I think they are called). The latter looks like the CA equivalent of  a Han Huo!

 

Haqqislam News

– Khawarijs resculpt

– Bashi Bazouks resculpt

– Govads

– Female Hunzakuts (September release)

 

Tohaa News

– Tohaa Kosuil Assault Pioneers , are hard hitting medium infantry with Symbiont, K1, mines, nimbus grenades etc. These will be out in September.

– Kerail Preceptors, the Tohaa equivalent of a antipode pack. The Preceptors are accompanied by alien “reptile lions”, called Mutan and Surda.

Personally I am not convinced by the the Tohaa “reptile-lions”, somehow they remind me of the He-Man Battle Cat, but i’ll reserve judgment until I see the model.

 

Yu Jing News

– Domaru Butai boxset (apparently Domaru will get new options/rules from the new Human Sphere book).

– Zhanjing troops (to be released early next year).

– Guija Resculpt (to be released by the end of the year).

This TAG looks amazing, can’t wait to see the miniature!

 

Pan-O News

– Clausewitz Uhlan and Tikbalang box set

– Seraph

– Croc man hacker

– Nisses HMG (released in September)

It’s TAG-tastic news! It’s been quite a wait, as the Stingray series design has gone through multiple changes, but looks like the wait has been worth it. My personal favorite is the Seraph (both model and rules).

 

Ariadna News

– Desperados and Mavericks to be released this year.

 

Human Sphere News

– The new Human Sphere will probably be released by the end of this year, bring all Inifnity rules up to N3 standard.

– The fire-teams rules will be rewritten and will include the new Duo fireteam, formed of two models. The Duo fire-team should be available to generic armies. It provides no fire-team bonus, but does allow two models to move with one order.

– EVO remotes become hackers with additional programs. For the first time the Combined army is getting an EVO.

– A new hacking device called a Killer Hacker device will be made available to certain models. The device will have only 4 programs (+1 for CA) designed to kill of enemy hackers. In addition one of the programs is cybermask.

– Certain models will not be present in the new Human Sphere. This includes Halqas, Kamau as well as the Merovingians  and Shasvastii sectorical.  These models and sectorials will remain legal and will be present in the Infinity online army builder. They will be re-released when  Acheron Falls is released (possibly 2016). The Shasvastii range will be re-designed.

 

Final Thoughts

Wow there is a lot of news to take in! I think this show how far CB are going to go to change Human Sphere to make Inifnity the game they really want, rather than simply cleaning it up. I expect we will see many more changes from Human Sphere, which in the future will open up many more tactics and options.

There are so many fantastic new models coming out, as well as re-sculpts. By the end of this year anyone wanting to get into Infinity will have a complete N3 system as well as an amazing and extensive model range, not blighted by some of the older and less well sculpted models. It should give Inifnity the stable base to grow even further as well as become an even more enjoyable game.

The only downside for me is the news that the Shasvastii range will be re-designed. As I already have a fairly large Shasvastii army, it’s a shame to know they will be out of date within (approximately) 2 years. Still it’s hard to complain about new and better models!

 

Infinity Tournament: BIG in Bristol!

I recently went to an Infinity tournament at BIG in Bristol, so thought I’d get back into blogging and do a report of the event! The tournament was a standard 300pts non-spec op, with 16 players. The missions were Supremacy, Antenna Field and Annihilation.

I have been playing a lot with my Ariadna recently, so they would be obvious army to take. However I fancied a change of pace and decided to take a risk and use my Nomads, which I am a bit rusty on. At least Nomads are a flexible force that I used a lot in 2^nd edition and the missions were simple.

My list designed for Supremacy and Annihilation was:

Group1

Intruder Lieutenant

Intruder with Multi Sniper Rifle

Prowler with Spitfire

Reverend Moria with HMG

Spektr Hacker

Alguacil FO

Alguacil FO

Alguacil FO

Zero FO

Jaguar with chain rifle

 

Group2

Daktari

Salyut

Salyut

Clockmaker

Zondbot

 

With a massive 7 specialist (just one of the joys of playing Nomads!), plus two of which infiltrate I was confident I could cope with tacking control of the consoles in Supremacy. The specialist also covered all of the classified objectives, which is massively important for Annihilation where they are worth 40% of the objective points available.

To aid control of the quadrants in Supremacy I added two Salyut, which only cost 8pts but due to baggage are worth 28pts when calculating who controls a quadrant. The Salyut may be fragile but I have found they can really help keep secure the quadrants nearest to your deployment zone, allowing you to push up the field with the more aggressive elements of the army.

The list also has firepower from the Intruder, Moria and Prowler, as well as a substantial order pool so seemed well-rounded. I think the main downside of the list is the fairly obvious Lieutenant, who can be narrowed down to one of the non-infiltrating camo markers.

My list designed for Antenna Field was:

Group1

Intruder Lieutenant

Intruder with Multi Sniper Rifle

Reverend Custodier Hacker

Mobile Brigada with combi-rifle

Lupe Balboa

Reverend Moria with HMG

Alguacil FO

Alguacil FO

Alguacil FO

Jaguar with chain rifle

 

Group2

Daktari

Sin-Eater with HMG

Zondbot

 

As Antenna Field involves standing around objectives, this list had defence and tougher specialist in mind. In particular the Reverend Custodier Hacker and Lupe Balboa are both specialist that can be a right pain to dislodge, due to ODD and mimetism respectively, once they gets onto suppressive fire. Due to the exultation zone I did not go for any infiltrating specialist.

I had a Sin-Eater with HMG to team up with the Intruder sniper. I hoped these two would make it hard for my opponent to advance, whilst my specialist secured the objectives.  The list also had a Mobile Brigada to add some resilience to it. Unfortunately I could not find the points to give him a multi rifle and light flamer, so this was just the cut down combi-rifle version.

As with the previous list I think the main downside was the fairly obvious Lieutenant. At least the Reverend Custodier Hacker was another potential suspect.

Game1

My first game was playing Supremacy against Tohaa. I won the roll of for initiative and decided to go second and my opponent elected me to deploy first. That’s a pretty large sacrifice, especially against Tohaa who can rush you with flamers, but as the control of the quadrants are calculated at the end of each game round I wanted to go second, so I knew where best to put my points (or kill the enemy) to take control of the quadrants.

Table for Game One

The Tohaa force had a main combat group supported by a 3 man link. Because of this I decided to use my command token to reduce the orders of the 3 man Tohaa link combat group, as this would stop this group from advancing out of the quadrant on the Tohaa side of the table.

The first shot of the game was a sniper duel between my Intruder and Nikoul, which saw the Intruder on the losing side. With the Intruder sniper dead the Tohaa were free to advance up the table, securing both quadrants nearest to their deployment zone, whilst pushing a Kotail with spitfire into my right hand quadrant.

The Kotail was looking to be a real pain, as I had no one in a good position to tackle him, until I remembered I had a Spektre hacker just behind the Kotail. The Spektre was able to see all the holo echoes, which proved very useful as I could reveal the Spektre and go idle, forcing the Kotail to react and reveal itself. Thankfully the Spektre shot the Kotail down, preventing any intrusions into my quadrants for that game round. For the rest of my turn I took pop shots and killed of a Sakiel, Doctor and Makaul and secured both the quadrants nearest to me as well as one of the consoles. The game round eneded with us both in control of 2 quadrants.

The next turn saw a Rasail advance up my left flank, through some woodland. The rest of the Tohaa secured a console and strengthen the defence of their own quadrants.

The rest of the game saw me killing off the of several Tohaa model and eventually killing of the Rasail, which are extremely hard to get rid of especially when in woodland. I then advanced up the table and secured three of the two quadrants for the remaining two game rounds. I also completed my classified (extreme prejudice) and secured another console.

In the end the game finished 8 – 2, so was a strong start to the day. Thankfully my gamble of deploying first and going second had payed of.

 

Game 2

After a strong start my next opponent was likely to be tough. As it turned out I was facing Ian, aka the Wargame Trader with his Nomads, so it was indeed going to be a tough game! We were playing antenna field on a table with fairly open deployment zones, but fairly dense center (sometimes referred to as a “camel back”).

Table for Game Two

Ian won the initiative roll and decided to take deployment, forcing me to make the tricky decision to go first or second. As the mission is scored at the end of each game round I decided to take the second turn, think that because of the exclusion zone both infiltrators and AD troops would have a tough time storming me on the 1^st turn, plus I felt my defence was good with the Intruder Sniper and Sin Eater.

I deployed with my Intruder Sniper and Sin Eater in semi-decent vantage positions and the rest of my army prone behind what cover I could find. Ian also deployed most of his army hidden away in his deployment zone, except notably two camo markers over the half way line (which successful made their infiltration rolls) and two Grenzer with missile launchers in vantage points on his side of the table. I opted to use a command token to prevent Ian using multiple command tokens in his first turn.

Ian’s first turn saw him use his Intruder with HMG to bait out my Intruder Sniper and subsequently win a fire-fight against him, leaving the sniper unconscious. The next piece of my defense, the Sin Eater was then taken out by using a coordinated order to allow the two Grenzer with missile launchers and a Zero to shot him. I could have dodge to make it a face to face roll against all of the shots, but as the Grenzer were hitting on a 16 (we were all prone, but on equal height terrain so not in cover) I decided to go down in a blaze of glory and killed off one of the Grenzers but got blown apart by the other. A very fast Morlock (move 8/4) also ran up my right flank with a chimera pack. My deference was broken, but Ian had only secured one antenna so things were not looking too bad so far. However Ian has also moved a Bandit up my right flank to go after a camo marker, which was my Intruder Lieutenant.  After detecting the Intruder a firefight ensued with the Intruder eventually lost and went unconscious.

As I started my second turn in Loss of Lieutenant I had I was only just able to get onto one of the antenna with my Custodier. I had no orders to retaliate, but just tried to reposition my force. Whilst moving up my left flank I triggered a Spektre with sniper rifle to be revealed, further hampering my movement up the table. I did try to heal my Intruder, which I successfully managed, however I had not anticipated how close a Morlock was. The Morlock promptly chain rifled both the remote and intruder, causing the intruder to go back to the unconscious state and kill of the remote. At least that nabbed me an objective point as passing a doctor roll was my classified objective.

The second turn saw the start of the end as Ian’s Chimera pack descended on my Custodier, tearing her to shreds and then moving on to do the same to a Reverend Moria. The fast Morlock attacked my Daktari, leaving me with just a Jaguar on my left flank.

The rest of the game was wrapped up quickly with Ian decimating my army in short order, whilst securing all the antenna. There was a cool close combat between the Jaguar and Chimera, but unfortunately her superior close combat abilities trumped the Jagguar. The game ended up 10-2, which is the largest defeat I have had in quite some time! At least tough games like that give you a lot to think about and I picked up some tactics to use with my own Nomads.

I was unprepared for the 1^st turn rush and was punished for not protecting my Intruder Lieutenant better. In hindsight I should have found the points to upgrade the Mobile Brigada to have a multi-rifle, as that would make for another potential Lieutenant which would hopefully deter Lieutenant assassination attempts. I also think when I went into Loss of Lieutenant I should have used two command tokens to turn one irregular order back to regular and then make a coordinated order to put models on suppressive fire, as this would have greatly helped my defence in Ian’s turn 2.

 

Game 3

The last round I was facing Tohaa, playing Annihilation on a dense urban board. The Tohaa won the initiative roll and decided to go first. As I was going second and the table was dense, I decided to castle up. I put most of my models prone on the roofs of buildings, or in windowless buildings. To my surprise my opponents hold back model was a Gorgos! In hindsight if you are going to face a TAG it’s likely to be in Annihilation, but at the time I was totally taken off guard by this. Still I was going to keep to my plan of conserving my own army whilst completing my classified objectives. Hopefully along the way I would put some hurt on my opponent, but that was a secondary concern. I used a command token to reduce the Tohaa order pool by two orders and we started our game.

Table for Game Three

The first turn saw the Gorgos go after an Alguacil and Clockmaker. As to be expected the Grogos gunned them down. In return the Clockmaker managed to take down the Chaska helper. After causing this damage the Grogos retreated back toward the Tohaa deployment zone and went onto suppressive fire.

With a reduced order pool the Tohaa first turn was nowhere near as deadly as feared. I went about getting my classified objectives using a Prowler to go a place D-Charges on a crate and activate them. I then moved a Salyut up to the unconscious Chaska and coup de grace the poor thing. This secured me 4 objective points. My Prowler then attacked a Gao Rael, killing him off.

The second Tohaa turn saw a Makaul go after the Prowler. After using several orders the Makaul reached combat with the Prowler and took revenge, killing the prowler with his viral close combat weapon. The rest of the turn saw a Tohaa link team advance, whilst the Grogos remain on suppressive fire.

With my classified objectives accomplished I started feeling a bit cocky and I instigated a sniper duel between my Intruder and the mercenary Le Muet. With surprise attack putting the odds into my favour, as well as an addition attack dice I thought this would go well. Sadly it did not and my intruder Sniper (once again) was killed. Even worse there was a medic right next to the intruder, which I could not use as the intruder suffered two wounds. With this going badly I castled up again and awaited the Tohaa final turn.

The Tohaa link in the centre went after a Zero, killing him with a heavy flamer hit. The Gorgos moved near my High Value Target and declared that Secure the HVT classified objective was being selected.

As it was the last turn I revealed the Spektre, which had been hiding in hidden deployment all game (I did say I was castling up!). The rest of my turn saw me trying to kill of the odd Tohaa model, whilst trying to not lose anymore myself. I did however see an opportunity for a major point swing, as the Gorgos has moved close to my Intruder Lieutenant. I used my Jaguar to lay down covering smoke and used my Intruder to make a surprise attack using his light flame thrower against the Gorgos. The odds were against this working, as the Gorgos could dodge (albeit only on a 7 or less) as well as easily make his armour save. Fortunately for me the Gorgos failed both rolls and succumbed to its weakness of fire. That was one exceptionally fortuitous (and lucky) shot which bagged me extra victory points and an extra Objective Point. The game ended 7 – 5 (I think), which all things considering I was very happy about.

 

The Results

In total I managed to get a 17pts, putting me in 4^th place, although both the 1^st and 2^nd place positions were incredibly far ahead! I was very happy with this result, especially considering I have not used my Nomads all that much in 3^rd and these were untested list. I am really keen to keep playing with my Nomads and develop my tactics with them. I’d like especially like to look into playing Corregidor as those new Jaguar models look fantastic and are fun to play with!

I’d also like to say that the tournament was very well run by Peter. I’d highly recommend any of his events and hope to go to more in the future.

Read more reviews of the tournament from fellow local gamer Lee and tournament organiser Peter.

Painting: Ariadna Russian Force!

Over the last few month’s I have been busy painting away my Ariadna themed Russian Force. I hope you like them!:)

Dog Faces

 

Spetsnaz with sniper rifle and Spetsnaz with boarding shotgun

 

Tank Hunter and Veteran Kazak

 

Spec-Op and Antipode Controller

 

Line Kazaks

 

The Ariadna models were quite a departure from what I usually paint, being closer to WWII models than Sci-fi! In particular choosing a suitable color scheme was tricky, as I wanted a bright camouflage scheme (which is often a contradiction!). I also wanted to avoid the usual green colour scheme. In the end I opted for a tundra style snow white camouflage with some grey patches. I also liked this scheme as it tied in with the Russian theme.

I couldn’t resist adding a “spot color” and red seemed like a good choice. Some more realistic gamers out there might be cringing, as they see this obviously bright color next to camouflage, but hey this is Sci-Fi!:)

Next I will be painting the Antipodes and Dog Warriors, which should be great fun!