WAAAGH!

Hey bloggers,

No that isn't a reference to our favourite greenskins heading off to conquer a new galaxy, it's the noise I'm currently making with all that's been going on lately! I went to put a post up the other day but blogger was down so apologies for that missed post but wow what a week its been.

On the home front I've been tidying/organising my hobby lair/study which has made my girlfriend somewhat happier. I don't have any images for you yet as it's still a work in progress but after quite a few trips to IKEA I have pretty much all the shelving I could need (well fit into the room to be precise). Once I have the desk cleared I will have to start looking for some paint storage/display options. Does anyone have a system they like or can recommend? I don't want them in a case as I think that will be harder whilst I'm in the middle of a painting frenzy to stop and swap colours, esp with the addition of non Gw paints with which I'm not fully used to yet. Please comment away!

I actually put some paint to model the Friday before last! I'll tell you it's been a while but man was it good to get back on that bike, shaky as I was. As such I worked on painting up my Tandarians as there are plenty of guardsmen who need some love but don't require the level I will put into my marines or other more elite armies, well elite compared to guard infantry.

We have Forgeworld Chaos Dwarfs coming our way and damn do they look nice. Some really great ideas and models there. I love the inscriptions on the inside of their shoulder pads and the totem on top of their standard bearer. New Dark Eldar were released but without the uber fliers we were expecting. That's cool, just another nice mini to await release. Damn it's looking more and more like I'll need to collect Dark Eldar. That's something I might do when I'm sent North for six months at the end of the year and beginning of next (don't worry, it's for work not an exile imposed by my missus). Since I will be away from all my hobby mates and hobby supplies and minis I figured I might start a totally new army which I don't need anything else for. So pretty much nothing Imperial really, or in power armour. Not that I'm not looking for some new Northern Hobby mates when that time comes!

Maelstrom Games has their new sales restraints imposed in a few short weeks which I will be away for whilst it happens. Not that I won't still support them through their other systems but after losing Flames of War and Gw it's really limiting what I can get from them.

Finally Finecast has come. This will be a talking point for sometime I'm sure especially since the speed between the announcement of such a major change in such a casual manner hasn't given everyone enough time to digest how this will affect things. Most people are probably just looking at what they buy as now being resin rather than metal. sure it'll be lighter and easier to cut but will it be brittle? If I drop my Wood Elf Dragon is it more likely to shatter or to loose the tips of its horns than the metal one? How are Gw staff going to teach Timmy Ten-year-old hold to build his new character when he hasn't built any himself? Is it safe to? So can we work on Forgeworld and other resin pieces in-store now? Do we all need to wear dust masks when in store working on our new models?

I'm sure you can see some of the implications of these sorts of questions and the big shift in how the stores are currently run to allow for this new material. And if it is a wonder hybrid of plastic and resin how do we work with it? Glue it? Will it melt whilst filing? Will it jump down our lungs and murder us as soon as look at it? (I'm sure it won't but that's how some stores treated Forgeworld when it was starting to appear at their hobby tables) And I'm sure for many others this won't spell the end of metal models. I have a back log of Gw metal models like you wouldn't believe, not just a whole host of characters and elite units but Vostroyans, Steel Legion, Praetorians and Sisters of Battle. Then there are the other companies that make pretty toys which I collect, more casually sure but there isn't a model made for Incursion that I won't buy at least twice (and have already done so or plan to do)!

Alot of stuff going on and still mulling over what has just happened, but the first thing I'll be doing is thinking if there is anything I need from Maelstrom.

Incursion on a Saturday Afternoon

Hi bloggers,

So Saturday Max came over and we had another game of Incursion. We played the third mission and I decided to take an APE Blazer for the first time to try them out (a flame-thrower). Now unlike Space Hulk he's not limited in his fuel, this bad boy came to fight. With enough Action Points (AP) and Command Points (CP) you fill the board around you with flames and help to halt the advance of zombies.

So for those of you unfamiliar with Incursion it works quite similarly to Space Hulk. Each action a model takes costs a certain number of points; moving forward is 1 AP, throwing a grenade is 2 AP and so on.

Each model has an AP value determining how many actions they can take normally, now this can be altered by the cards you draw each turn or added to by CP. CP is a pool of points, determined by how large the mission is, which you can allocate to your models to take them far beyond what they can normally do. At the beginning of a turn you can secretly bid your CP to allow you to take your turn first but obviously this leaves you without them during that turn win or lose. CP can additionally be used to "kill" cards that are played either as events or on characters (both yours and your opponents).

Everything started off fine with the flamer effectively shutting down Max's ability to bring on zombies as they would be melted down into Tyler Durden's favourite source material as soon as they stepped into the flames. But since my APEs are so slow compared to Ilsa and the Blitzhund they were able to get moving away from the flamer. Since you can control the shape of the flame within line of sight you can ensure you are able to block off a room's entrances.

The Blazer slowly advancing forward managed to take down the Blitzhund (who had been shot previously by the APE by himself) and wound Ilsa. Unfortunately for me Max had a hidden tunnel card and set one up right behind me and ran zombies at all my APE suits managing to take a wound off the APE supporting the Blazer. I then beat them back in my next turn expending my CP to ensure I would be safe during his turn only to have a Booby Trap card played against the same APE and with Max only rolling sixes whenever he tried to wound me he pulled down my APE suit.

After Ilsa grabbing the Pinger (the Mission's objective is to get it off the board) more zombies raced towards the isolated APE from the Trap Door and without the fire support from the now extinct APE they managed to pull him down under the weight of their attacks. So down to just the Blazer I had to knock out the Trap Door and focus on pulling down the much more nimble and deadly Ilsa.

After doing so with a possible victory in my grasp Max played a brilliant series of cards meaning I just couldn't bring Ilsa down before she could win the game for Max. As a Cave In occurred blocking the Blazer's line of sight Ilsa also had Blaze of Glory played on her meaning if I or the flames I had lit were to kill her she would instantly activate and have a full turn of AP to spend on her before she died meaning she could sprint off the board no matter what happened.

After bidding everything I had to take first turn I killed her Blaze of Glory with a SNAFU but Max drew and was able to play it again thanks to Ilsa's ability to draw an extra card every turn. This was the final nail in my coffin as Ilsa was able to stroll off the table to victory.

 Max's final hand of cards.

With Ilsa stacked with 3 wound counters a Blaze of Glory ensured her victory unless I could strip it before her death. Alas it was not to be.

Again this was another great game and just cemented with Max and I how good this game is. I will have to get a start on assembling my models once the expansion SNAFU gets here with all of its other goodies!

Happy Easter Weekend and ANZAC Day

Heya bloggers,

So I don't know about you but I've had a pretty busy Easter Weekend. I hope yours has been a good one. With the ANZAC Day march this morning I wasn't able to get any hobby done today but for the past few days I have gotten a bit done. I will hopefully have my camera back in the next few days but until then I have been using my iPhone camera so I'm sorry about the poor quality of some of them.

On Friday I played Cliff in a game of Incursion. We played the second mission with Cliff playing the Allies APE suits and I took the Germans with Isla Von X once again playing a starring role and providing herself to be invaluable. My first blitzhound was taken out early moments after Isla blew apart two APE suits! it looked to be going my way but holding my second Blitzhound back too long and playing Isla too timidly as well as Cliff's great gaming meant it was a really close game but a victory to him in the end, just closing the last airlock and winning the mission.

Previous to this game Cliff had just finished played Little Max and after these two games decided he's getting Incursion for himself. So tonight the three of us ordered the new SNAFU Pre-order deal. I can't wait to get my hands on all the new minis as well as an expasion book double the size of the current rulebook. We're getting it from the Australian distributor at the same price as we would from the American store, so hopefully we'll save a bit on the shipping.

Speak to you soon!

Incursion Order Arrives!

Hey guys,

Just a quick one here. Yesterday Cliff and I were working on magnetising our Valkyries so that not only did it have interchangeable weapon options but a removable roof (so I can paint the interior) and magnetised doors. We've got a few cool ideas but need to get a hold of some smaller magnets to continue.

So the other day I went down to the Post Office to pick up my Pre-Ordered copy of Incursion!! Well both copies of them :D

I got the resin doors and bases with them and Max has just ordered some as well so there's some creepy WWZ action headed our way soon. In other news they've just posted pictures of the greens of the new MI-13. I'm looking forward to these guys and will be keepoing a closer eye on the Incursion Blog.

After taking the photo it did seem to be a bit of a product shot but honestly that's my cutting mat!!

In other news Jason seems to be talking about my Armoured Sentinels we were discussing last Saturday and he gave me a hand to further tweak my list so I'm pretty happy with it!