Temporal Issues

More testing of Bad Seeds I'm afraid, not much else has been going on at my end.  I'm currently house/dog-sitting for Jim and the dog requires an awful lot of walks.  It seems that every time I sit down to do something, I need to be somewhere else or get back to the house to walk the dog.  At least I've done a fair amount of painting across both my armies - though actually completing models has been somewhat lax.  Janissa is almost done and I finished Orin Midwinter.  I'm pretty sure Kell Bailoch and Janissa could be done in a single sitting, it's just finding the time right now.

As for Bad Seeds testing, the list controls the flanks like nothing else I've seen, but I'm still having trouble with heavy armour.  Normally I'd swap out a Renegade and the Trencher Master Gunner for a Mangler (and thus run 3 heavies - Nomad, Mangle, and a Defender) but the dual Renegade threat seems to have undue influence on my opponents.  Casters like pVlad do nothing but cast Wind Wall all day while the Obliterator Rockets are available.  I think I may have to adopt a technique of concentrated firepower with all that ranged infantry the list carts around.  Hit a target with Calamity, fill it full of holes.  A bit focus heavy, but I think it could work.

Such a Slag

Once again I tried out the Bad Seeds list, and it proved pretty good at what it does - shooting things.  Continued problems with dealing with heavy armour though (except Kell Bailoch, he rocked up the box cars on damage) and the Defender continues to be utterly useless except as a damage soak.  Perhaps it only really works against lists with 'soft' heavies?  So, factions like Circle or Cryx maybe?  I think I'm going to attempt to use the Mangler on Tuesday in place of the Defender and see if it performs better.

I've also been looking at my Trollbloods and what sort of lists with surprises could be made.  Burrowers just give me a headache when it comes to scenario play, and I need some sort of ranged options that aren't the Nyss Hunters.  So I thought I'd build up my pDoomshaper themed force once Magnus and his Bad Seeds are finished.  All I need to get is 3 units of Runeshapers and a Slag Troll.

Why a Slag Troll?  Of all the light warbeasts in Trollbloods (besides the Axer), the Slag Troll can really perform quite well in melee.  If I lose a heavy, the Slag Troll can actually step up to the plate.  Why not a Pyre Troll?  I found that having immunity to fire to be strangely debilitating.  My opponents wouldn't come forward and we'd engage in a staring competition between my force (with next to no ranged attacks) and their's (with all sorts of ranged attacks).  Without such immunity I've found my opponents more willing to come forward and eat a Mulg to the face.

Runeshapers.  I like them but the list does suffer badly against Circle and certain anti-magic lists.  I'd probably have to cater a second list to deal with any armies that bring anti-magic to the table.  There's something really quite pleasant about ARM 15/17, Steady, 5 damage infantry with Pathfinder.  The extra walls in the themed force don't hurt either.

Rotten Apples

eMagnus' Bad Seeds themed force gets the sticker of approval.  I'm not entirely sold on the Defender in my list, it's very tempting to swap it to a Mangler, but I *know* I'm going to get an Obliterator assassination run off and require a third ranged attack to finish off the enemy caster, at which point my Mangler will be wallowing in a vast pool of useless.  On the other hand, the Defender has been mostly useless in every game so far...  I'll try it out a couple more times for good measure, and then swap it over to the Mangler and see how things work out.  Not sure what to do with the extra point either, an extra Scattergunner?

The AMBUSHING SWORD KNIGHTS (which shall forever be mentioned with capitals) certainly do what they say on the tin.  They both ambush and sword stuff.  They do seem to be lacking in knightly chivalry however, but I don't hold that against them.  It's surprisingly easy to get Flank off, I'm not sure why but there's always a Renegade on hand when they appear.  It's never planned, it just happens to work like that.

What the list doesn't deal with is masses of heavy armour and it has a distinct power dip in radial scenarios due to way ambush works in those.  In dual and certain centre scenarios, the list rocks.  AMBUSHING SWORD KNIGHTS and Saxon Orrik can easily jam up or steal an objective, even more so when combined with Kill Box (the feat, not the scenario).

My goal is to have the list completely painted (and rebased where applicable) by the end of September.  My main worry is the trencher models as they have a million extra pouches and miscellaneous random items (I'm surprised the 10' pole isn't in there) strewn about their bodies.

Eat Your Spinage

My Bad Seeds list is soooo close to completion that I can taste the metal filings already.  I've just ordered my Commandos and Saxon Orrik, everything else is assembled and based.  There are ranks upon ranks of small based models lined up in orderly rows on my undercoating tray.  I can't say how much of a pleasure it is to paint small based miniatures again, especially ones that wear lots of armour.  Once the entire force is painted I'm going to take new pictures of everything for the photo album - though my painting techniques have improved drastically since my early Mercenary stuff.

I've been examining Rociante's artwork and I think I can duplicate everything except for his head.  I have an antediluvian Mariner that is in pieces and if I chop the cannon a bit shorter and remove the existing Mariner hand, I should be able to attach it to a Nomad's shield hand (sans shield) and then put some fine chain on it.  Voila, instant Rociante!  Almost.  Rociante's head is a bit harder to duplicate, but I'm looking into it.  I think it's going to be a job for the green stuff.

The Riddle of Steel

Right, Damiano it is.  He's more Merc-centric, and I have a bunch of mostly painted Steelheads (including my infamous half-done cavalry), and his themed force is ludicrously easy to get as I have almost everything in it already.  However, I do need double of everything I already own.  Of course, having two sets of the Steelhead Trinity (Halberdiers, Heavy Cavalry, and Riflemen in this case) does make those scenarios with split objectives rather easy.  Half the army to one objective, other half to the other objective; stomp face as needed.  Time to start running some extra events methinks!

Once the Steelheads are all done, I'm not quite sure what to move onto next.  I'd like something very thematic, preferably themed, so it might be time to wander into a Rhulic army.  Gorten and a pair of Drillers would be nice to have, and probably Brun & Lug...  All in good time however, getting all these new Mercenaries is going to take a while.  Meanwhile, what is best in life?

Feel My Wroth

My copy of Wrath arrived this morning, and I accepted it with a truly astounding bedhead.  After a few more hours of rest I actually read the thing and it's a pretty unusual update as far as the normal books go.  Firstly, there are almost no new units.  I think there's one, for Khador, and that's a 2 man (woman in this case) unit.  Everything else is basically new warjacks and new solos.  Since I like warjacks, this pleased me greatly.

However, seeing a Cryx warcaster with Telekinesis displeased me greatly.  One could say I was disgusted.  Scaverous appears to be insanely broken - though not quite on eDeneghra's scale of utterly broken, he's certainly in close attendance.  His themed force is crazily easy to get as well.

Constance is certainly interesting, and I'd like to at least get her as one of my casters.  She seems to be much like a Cygnaran defensive version of Terminus.  She collects friendly souls during her feat turn and like Big T the feat effectively gives her two turns of invulnerability - provided she isn't shot to death by mage hunters and your opponent is willing to kill some stuff for you.  She's also a big fan of Precursor Knights, as if that was a surprise.

I'm also liking the look of Damiano.  Unfortunately both he and Constance both want to run lots of infantry - Precursors in her case, and Steelheads in his.  There are certainly advantages to either style of play, it's just deciding which is more to my liking that is the problem.  Do I go with Precursors and a Highborn list, or utilize the Steelheads I already own and are painted?  Even their feats function in a similar manner for Mercenaries.  Damiano's is more straight forward, but with Transference in her spell list Constance could have 5 dice weapon master damage rolls on some of her infantry.  ARRGGG.  I'll try out both on Vassal I think and see which one I prefer.

So... my Bad Seeds force is now all build, assembled and based - barring the 8 models I haven't yet got.  I tried it briefly on Vassal and promptly crowded myself badly and totally fluffed up part of my feat turn with the Ambushing Sword Knights.  On the whole however, the list was performing quite well despite my blundering. It certainly needs a couple more games to iron out the workings of it.  It has potential anyway.

Seeing that Mercenaries once again failed to break the P+S 17 roof (even with Gallant) I'm looking wistfully back at my Trollbloods already.  Sneaky tricks may not abound, but being able to wreck anything I point at is massively tempting.  I think I'll paint what I have anyway, it's better than pulling out multiple silver/white/black armies.

Brooding Horses

My brooding mass of Mercnar models is coming together now, in a most literal fashion.  Orin Midwinter has a very nice scenic base and is on his way to being fully painted in record time, the Sword Knights are assembled, and luckily the rangers are pretty much single piece miniatures.  This means that the Trencher Commandos are clearly going to be 9 piece models each, just to balance things out.  Now I need to get working on the basing.

I'm not sure what other casters to get for Cynaries, I was thinking Constance but I have no idea what Constance does.  Hopefully Ashlynn will get a resculpt in the near future - if pNemo got one, then she deserves one! - and I'll start using her once again.  Or perhaps it's time to pick up some dwarves, there's not a lot that beats the fully boosted sprays of the blastbunnies.  I do like the look of Damiano though, and I already have the basic set of Steelheads - though it would mean having to paint those 2 cavalry models...  Oh the choices!  As long as there are no pirate models, I'm all good with the Mercenaries.

Wrath is only a week away!  Though the lack of deduction of my PG points has left me somewhat mystified, will my copy of Wrath arrive in a timely fashion or will I be the last horse in the race?

Tent Peg

Well, I got humped.  Not a good showing at all this UK Masters, I hang my head in shame.  I didn't particularly enjoy this one unfortunately, but I believe that's due to non-gaming factors in my life rather than the event.  Once again, all the players were great, there were some 'technical' faults in the way it was run, but nothing that wasn't understandable (except for the whole laptop+mobile/Richard Jennings freezing issue - that's a complete mystery).  I got to speak to the other PGs more this time around, and it's more and more tempting to just sit out the tournament and help run it.  When I'm not in the running for one of the top spots (and I wasn't as I lost my first game), my overall enjoyment certainly dips, but getting games in was good.  All the training with time was for naught, as the games ran the standard length of time - which did cost me my first game as I committed to the zones a turn early as I thought time was going to get called.  My own fault, and full credit to Ben Josling for crushing my army (4th tiebreaker though) for my temerity.

Lots and lots of Trollblood players this time around, so I think it's time to put them to one side except for the odd game for fun.  That and I got hammered like a tent peg this UK Masters...  There wasn't anything that surprised anyone in my lists, no sneaky tricks, no cunning tactics or connivery I could pull out to shock them, everyone's played against Trollbloods now and have already seen what's coming.  Oh well.

Instead I'm going to pick up Mercnar, or Cercs, or perhaps Mygnar.  I shall first do this by completing my eMagnus Bad Seeds themed force, for like all problems that can be solved by application of Mulg, I feel a similar solution to problem solving can be utilized with the use of ambushing Sword Knights.  And Saxon.  Oh yes, I loves me some ambush.  That, and no one really takes Mercenaries seriously.  That's okay though, my lists are basically stripped down Cygnar lists.  I really want to test out the RAT 12 Sentinel with a full strafe attack...  Of course I have to hit the target with Calamity first, but that's a MINOR problem!  All I need at the moment are my Trencher Commandos, a Defender, and Saxon Orrik - as these were not available at the stand apart from the Defender and quite simply, I forgot about it.

After eMagnus' list is sorted, I'll check out Constance Blaize and see if a Precursor/Highborn Covenant themed list could actually work.