It’s a been a little quiet here lately. Over the last few months there’s been far less hobbying whilst I gather my things together ready for a long relocation from the UK to the US. There were many thoughtful moments of what will I try to carry on the flight and what I will commit to the waves and just hope it survives the journey; and trying not to think just how many pieces it may arrive in…
On the waves. Half way here!
I did decide to carry my entire Tomb King collection with me. Not only does this allow me to jump straight in to games, it’s also my most completely painted collection.
I had signed up for a local discord to the area a month or so before to scope out the gaming scene ahead of my arrival, and was pleased to find it was pretty active. On my first week here, I managed to get a game scheduled, and played a most enjoyable 2v1 game; The orcs and Goblins teaming up with the Tomb kings against a High elf force.
But what that does mean is I have nothing to paint. Or… I didn’t. I caved quite quickly and picked up some Solar Auxilia models to have something to work on while I await the arrival of my collection. As of right now, it’s a battle force with an extra command squad. Enough models to take some time, but in game terms we’re only looking at about 600 points at a stretch.
Solar auxiliary command squad built
Since my paints are in the box on the waves too, I bought a small army painter starter set to get some time painting in too. This does limit the colours I can use, but it’s been nice working within those restrictions, and I’m already thinking how I’ll use my other paints when they arrives to work on top of these base colours… Only a few more weeks to wait…
With the release of the War of Settra’s fury (and the Heralds and Priests on barded steeds in addition), my eagerness to get Tomb kings on the table spiked. I had been playing mostly the Beastmen as I worked on getting them built up and painted too, but everyone knows the new shiny things are more important!
So I picked up one of each of the new models, arranged a game and scrambled to get a 1000 point list put together. Tomb king cavalry, aside from the archers, have proven to be pretty weak in most of the games I have played with them. However, since there’s now the opportunity to put new heroes with them, I thought I would theme an army around being all mounted just for no reason other than rule of cool. And this is what I ended up with;
I called this army “Oops, all horses”. Using the Nehekharan Royal Host Army of infamy I started with my core troops. A unit of 3 Chariots to be led by a Tomb Prince in a chariot with the Death Mask of Kharnutt. Two units of Cavalry Cohort (6 spearmen and 6 bows in each, with full command) and in the special slot a unit of 7 horse archers to act as chariot runners.
And finally, the two new heroes. The herald, holding aloft the battle standard (with the Icon of the Sacred eye) and a mortuary priest, level 2 wizard, both on their barded steeds.
1000pt tomb kings Vs empire The gunline awaits!
And so it was time to try it out. My opponent brought his Empire. Beautifully painted and with plenty of firepower to counted the skeleton horde charging over the board towards them. We set up and rolled for turn. Fortunately I won first turn as I wanted to try get up the table as quick as I possibly could (which, due to not being able to march, is admittedly not as fast as I would have liked)
My archers unleashed their paltry volley of bows. The great thing about the cavalry cohort is being able to volley fire on the move and with 1 higher BS than the regular Horse archer unit. The terrible thing is you get half the shots. Through both unit shooting, and the horse archer unit, only 2 musketeers were shot down.
Empire Turn 1 saw them cautiosly move their knights up, wanting to maintain distance but still progress up the board. He was cautious of the chariots, less so the cavalry. His guns let loose, ripping into my Cavalry cohort on the left flank. Fortunately due to some lacklustre rolls, not many of them died and the unit was still on the table. It wasn’t until my next turn however, I realised Ihad completely forgotten about their regeneration rolls!
Tomb king turn two, Arise! from both my Tomb Prince (due to the AoI upgrade) and the Mortuary priest, saw some wounds returning to the cavalry units. The Cavalry Cohort on the right flank charged, the Empire Knights counter charged in return. A wise choice we decided as it guaranteed they were striking before the charging Skeletons.
I saw an opening in the middle, my chariots declared the charge through the chariot runners (Horse archers) into the Empire veterans directly infront of them. Unfortunately, they fell 1″ short of the charge, so failed and stopped short behind the horse archers. The veterans, having to take a terror test due to the Tomb Prince’s Death mask, failed….but then didn’t. Lucky re-rolls!
Not much happened for deaths in the shooting phase so we wnt on to the combat phase. The knights tore apart the Cavalry cohort whilst taking no damage in response. After unstable crumbled some models, only the command group was left standing. The undead gave ground, and due to it being Empire turn 2 next, they restrained from following up, and turned to face a juicy opportunity to meet my chariots head on.
The Empire moved their Cavalry to face my Chariots Purposefully holding the line close enough to negate the impact hits of the chariots. Shooting took out the remaining horse archers and focused on my remaining chorot on the left flank. The engineer sniped the champion out of the command group on the right flank, leaving a standard and a musician on their own.
The knights continued to hold the ground against the chariots. Passing all terror checks, and saves, and only breaking after two rounds of combat. The general, being the only survivor of the unit fled, stopping short of his veteran infantry, meaning the overrunning Chariots ran him down…but also didn’t overrun into the infantry. Again denied their impact hits!
The combat versus the Veterans was long drawn. Each victory for the veterans due to their static combat res would be met with restraint, and volleys of guns. The chariots were eventually shot to ribbons, and the Tomb Prince met his demise from Combat resolution after a challenge with the heroes of Empire.
The Standard and Musician managed to charge down the Engineer on the right flank, and then overrun into the Hellblaster volley gun, winning the first round of combat and killing one of the crew, only to fall in the final round of the game. Being the last model on the board.
A very fun game! The hellblaster volley gun started off the game slow, with the hit dice not being cooperative. Until it began firing at lone heroes, then it seemed to ramp up to overkill mode.
I feel I would try this list again, but perhaps when I build upon it at higher point levels. It’s definitely missing something to give it extra staying power. Maybe just more chariots would help a lot.
As often comes to happen, life gets in the way. So I missed some posts I had wanted to make (generally keeping to my previous formula of my Monday bloodbowl and my Wednesday showcase of old paintings) due to generally being tired out from the heat (alright, it’s nto THAT hot, but I don’t do well in the heat) and work in general. So here’s this weeks updates in brief;
Monday night is bloodbowl night.
Monday saw my usual outing for a game in the league. This time it was my Necromantic team Vs High elves. I wasn’t too confident going in to this one. I know my opponent is a very good bloodbowl player and, well, it’s elves. I tend to struggle against the high agility teams. Not to mention the pile of inducements I was giving him!
First half started well, I maintained some control of the ball, and dice seemed to be in my favour. At first at least. What started off well soon turned in to some full on elf action and whule the game was very enjoyable, it ended in a 4-0 loss for me. Pesky elves.
As the league is slowly starting to wrap up and I still have many more games I need to somehow squeeze in, today I had a second Bloodbowl game. This time it was my Khorne Vs Wood elves. More elves! I again expected another loss. I’ve not really played wood elves before and I know them to be very tricky to pin down. And since I’ve not necessarily done well with the Khorne so far, I figured this might be a quick game. And it was a rather quick game in that it was oiver a lot quicker than my usual games.
A win! In a stark contrast to how my games usually go, the dice gods had decided to very confidentally sway the game in my favour. I rolled so many knock outs this game it was absurd. And an unfortunate take root roll meant the treeman stayed out of the action for a very severly outnumbered wood elf team. 2-0 to me, and a huge boost to my morale this league! This monday’s game is booked still too, but another friendly coming up 🙂
Speaking of bloodbowl, since this league is wrapping up, I’m slowly starting to decide which teams I might consider running next season. Considering Chaos dwarves…
Other painting projects this week. I had the urge to paint some of my epic Pike and shotte, so made a start on a unit of the Scots Covenanters pike and musket unit.
And then, when I was too tired for details, I’ve been priming a whole lot of Epic Napoleonic. Hoping to have this bunch fully painted for when I start a campaign with a friend. This is all the stuff needed for “The action at Thuin” start to the Hundred days campaign supplement
So much French line infantry!
That’s been my week of wargaming. I still have stuff in the pipeline. 5 parsecs I’m working on my crew and the terrain for the first mission. Once it’s done the weekly updates will roll out!
I never do ask, but what’s been on your work in progress table? What games have you been playing?
Sad Teacup Games 