Well it’s been a long while since I have posted on this little blog here, and for that I apologize.  The massive amount of geek related work that I have been undertaking as of late has been mind numbing.  Between the Penny Arcade Expo, Anime Boston, and the Band of Gamers L4D LAN party, I am very tired about how much I have been traveling as of late.

Now is not the time to get weak though because I have much more geekiness to partake in.  I have an upcoming World of Darkness campaign night to Game Master, and that is certainly take a lot of my time.  On Saturday though, after a long time of that, I have another trip down to South Jersey for the next round of PBL.

As we have documented on this space before, I have been working on my Tyranids in many different facets over the past few months.  I have gotten a good army build going thus far, and I have improved greatly in painting them.  Now though it’s time to move onto some of the conversion work, specifically for the Harpy and Tervigon.

My progress on the Tervigon has been slow, mostly because I am cannibalizing one of my older Carnifexes in an effort to save money.  Basically in my army composition, I replaced a shooty Carnifex with a Harpy, so therefore it is fine for me to rip it apart and make it into a Tervigon.  The body is looking fine, but I need to work on the Talon legs and that I simply have not done in a while.  I think I have come to a good spot to get the legs on there, I just need to sit down and do it.  I’m hoping it will be done by Saturday.

The Harpy on the other hand, I have made some decent progress with.  As you can see on the right, it is starting to take shape and is looking very much like a focal point of the army.  This has been the current build structure for what is there right now.

• Bought the new Nazgul on Winged Beast boxed set and used that as a base.
• Cut the tail off, and replaced it with the toxin stinger from the Trygon box.
• Placed two venom canons with acid sacs on the wings, and will cover them up with green stuff to look a bit more natural.

I still have some work to do though.  The greenstuff work is very important, and also I need to finish up the neck and head work.  I have learned that a Tyranid Warrior head is too small, and a Carnifex head is too large.  I am probably going to get a Tyrant Head to work with, or I am going to use one of the Trygon head carapaces and green stuff a face around that.

That all being said, any suggestions on what I should try would be very welcome.  I’m hoping to have all of this done by Saturday so get those comments in early!

Once I get to PBL on Saturday, I’m looking forward to getting some games in and I hope that I can continue my winning ways.  Like I have said often as of late, I have a target on my back now and victories are going to be very difficult to come about.  If nothing else, I just want to try and get two different opponent games in so that I can get closer to that campaign condition.

If you have a challenge, then please feel free to use the comments below, and I will do my best to uphold all of them.  Until that day though, prepare for the next iteration of the Hive Fleet.

*UPDATE*

As promised, after I did some house chores last night I started work on my two new Monstrous Creatures.  I decided to try out some new techniques and work with greenstuff (in this case grey) and see what I could do.  I posted the pick on the right of the finished product that I’m extremely happy with.  Here are the steps that I took to get to that point, building from figure I showed you above.

• Took the Fel Beast neck and clipped off the tongue and spines.
• Used a Mawloc head plate and glued that to the neck piece.
• Used my clippers on a standard Carnifex head and cut off the top plating, and cut half of the face.  Specifically everything after the jaw bone.  Sanded down the top of this piece and the back so that they were as straight as possible.
• Glued the Carnifex face at the front of the neck piece, lining it up with the Mawloc head plate, and the bottom part of the neck.
• Used the Privateer Press modeling putty to fill in the gaps I had created and smoothed it out to make the face look more natural.
• Cut down the Toxin Sacs for the venom canons, put them close to the body, glued onto the wing on either side.  Used the putty to again make it look a bit more natural.
• Cut down the venom canons on the top of the wings so it didn’t have a blatant arm muscle on it, so just the gun.  Again, used putty to go over this and make it look like the gun was a natural extension of the wing.

And that was that!  I am happy in that the model now has the Tyranid feel, while still being a Lord of the Rings model as a base.  The additional bitz I used feel natural and don’t look out of place, and really that’s all I can ask for at this point.  Comments on my first greenstuffing experiment?  I know it’s not the best picture but as per usual I left my normal camera at someone else’s house so my DROID will just have to suffice.

The first weekend of March was a very interesting time for me.  After the snow storms that had ravaged the state of New Jersey, but before the rain and flooding that sought to wash it all away, we mighty few Champions of North Jersey once again descended on the southern part of the state to take part in more Warhammer 40k for Paul’s Basement League.  This was officially the third weekend of games for PBL Season 2, and the competition is quickly starting to heat up.

I came into the weekend sporting a record of 2 wins, 0 losses and 1 tie.  Solid start, but this week was going to really make or break my chances to win the league.  Was lucky enough to fit in two games this week, and I am proud to say that I came away with two victories.  My first game was against one of my best friends, tQ and his Imperial Guard.  We played Pitched deployment with Seize Ground Objectives, and the end result was 4-0 in favor of me.  It sounds like a lot but the game was very close, and also had a little bit of a friendly controversy.  For a specific rundown of the game, Read the Battle Report at tQ Studios.

We both forgot some special rules and weapon upgrades that we had, and so the game might have turned out differently.  tQ and I though are good sports and thankfully no bad feelings were exchanged and we really look forward to the next game!  Even with all of that though, I learned some nice pointers from the match.

• 1750 points is where my army starts to really sing.  Gives me 2 more Zoanthropes for more consistant tank busting, and all my Monstorous Creatures gain regeneration.  Just makes my balanced list more durable.
• Tried out the Harpy and I really like it.  It gives me yet another Flying Monstrous Creature with a twin-linked Venom Cannon / Regeneration for less points than a Carnifex.  Fits in with my reliance on flying bugs.  Also, Hive Guard did well, but I will need to not run squads of one each, run one squad of 2 for redundancy.
• Outflanking Genestealers continue to impress.  Giving a squad of Hormagaunts outflank via the Hive Tyrants special rule is also great.  Might have to give that ability to a squad of Tyranid Warriors in the future.

After my match with the Imperial Guard, I played my good friend Corey and his Bad Moon clan Orks at 1500pts level.  I pretty much played the same list as I did against Pedro.  You can read the full army list here.  Only difference from that list, is that I dropped the Venom Cannon Carnifex, replacing it with a Harpy and giving the Tervigon the psychic power to grant Feel No Pain.

The game for this game was once again a Pitched deployment which gave me the full field, and objective was simple Kill Points.  I had the first turn on this go around, and I used it to my full advantage.  I quickly rushed my full army up, keeping my Genestealers in reserve and deep striking the Trygon.  The first two turns were not pretty for Corey and da Ork Boyz, as I was able to destroy two trukks and one battlewagon and left many of his Orks having to footslog along the board.  Second turn got worse for Corey, as I was able to bring in my Trygon Prime and my Genestealers.  The Genestealers were able to quickly destroy his entire Loota squad, and the Trygon put some serious hurt on one of the Slugga Boy squads with his 12 shots.

Within the first two turns, I had tallied up about 6-7 kill points and had not given any up.  The rest of the game was much closer to that, and Corey quickly began to use his Power Klaws and his great number of close combat attacks to his advantage.  Second turn saw Corey get his Kommandos outflank in, but it took them two full turns to kill 3 Tyranid Warriors, and lost most of their squad in the process.  Even after they were able to kill the Warriors, they died in a hail of Termagaunt fire.

The Orks were also able to start inflicting some damage as Corey uses Ghazghull very effectively, taking out the Trygon, and Zonathrope in quick succession.  Even with the accompaniment of a Pain Boy and Nobz though, Ghazghull and that squad was just far too exposed in the middle of the table and was taken down in size due to small arms fire and then finally killed my the Genestealer Brood.  Making matters worse, was at the end game, Corey’s Stormboyz were just about to deep strike in, but landed on my Hive Tyrant.  This causes a mishap and I put the entire squad way in the corner and out of position.  Even though that squad eventually was able to kill the Tyrant, it had taken far too long to get to him and by that point the game was over.

Like any other battle, I learned a few things from this as well.

• I already knew that Orks were durable in close combat, but this game really proved that.  While my Tyranids are amazing in close combat, they simply don’t have enough attacks to wipe out an entire Ork squad, no matter what it is.  When the Orks eventually fight back, it’s just too many armor saves to make, and I will slowly lose.
• Having squads of 1 Hive Guard each, really hurt me in Kill Points.  Once the enemy gets them in close combat, despite their Toughness 6, I am essentially giving away Kill Points for free.  I will resolve this by keeping them closer to my Tervigon and his brood of Termaguants.
• The Trygon deep striking in is still working, but in a game like this, I simply lost him too quickly due to being too close to Power Klaws.  For a game against Orks, where their BS and weapons are really terrible, I should elect to keep him on the table and use his Fleet ability to get into position, and then open fire.  This will make sure he has smaller creatures to protect him, and open up close combat opportunities for him.

So at the end of the weekend I have been able to come away with 4 wins, 0 losses and 1 tie, gain some painting points, and am now up to 7 Hexes.  I need 10 Hexes to win, along with playing 8 different opponents.  Thus far I have played 5 different people so I’m close to being able to win soon, but the level of competition in PBL is far too great.  I expect a lot of close games coming up and I most certainly have a target on my back now so it’s going to be exceedingly difficult to win.  That being said, I’m just happy to get some good games in, and glad that my Army List and tactics are proving to be up to snuff.

[View with PicLens]

In a move that shocked the world, my wonderful wife Katie agreed to help me paint some figures.  Now I know, you are just as shocked as I was!  What is even more shocking is that, is the fact that Katie asked to paint some of my figures, I didn’t have to bribe her.

This is not the first time she has surprised me with Warhammer related activities.  It was a few months back where I needed a partner to play with as my Tyranids were going against a Tau / Space Wolves team, and Katie picked up my Orks and helped me to victory.  The more I have told her about the Orks, the more fun she had with the models and the fluff.

So of course when she wanted to paint last night, I gave her one of my Trukk’s and said, “Have fun!”  I think she’s doing a great job with it, especially considering my limited painting pot colors that I currently have.  With her painting my Orks I set back to work on finishing up my Tyranid Warriors and got 5 out of 6 finished.

Overall I am really happy with the fact that this nerdy little hobby of mine is something that I can share with the woman I love.  Have some fun as you take a look at some pictures from the event!

[View with PicLens]

I first bought my Tyranids as a side army, something to work on while I played with my Chaos Space Marines.  Over time, I grew tired of the my little Chaos crew.  I did it mostly because after playing a few games in the Campbell basement, along with playing in a Rogue Trader tournament, I just didn’t feel like I had any more desire to look at a MEQ army.  What I do look fondly on are the times that myself and Chris spent in his basement where we spent so much time working on building and painting our Chaos forces.

While I had fun painting regular marines, it doesn’t mean I was great at it.  As you can see, I definitely had some room for improvement …

Not terrible by any stretch of the imagination, but not fantastic either.  I didn’t work at all with any sort of watering down of colors, no washes, no drybrushing.  For the most part, the only thing that had changed from when I was working on my Orks back in High Schools, was that my hand was a bit more steady.

With the Tyranids, what drew me to them was the models look fantastic, they play more to my balanced style, and from what I had heard, they were easier to paint.  As I have spent the past few years working on them, I can now say that I absolutely love painting them.  While my quality could only be best described as table worthy, I am still having a lot more fun with it!  What I wanted to present to you tonight was a look at the kind of progress that I’m making and hopefully people can offer suggestions.

I am do this fairly standard as I started with Hormagaunts and Ripper Swarms, the basic troop choices.  Now I am starting to move up in Tyranid Warriors, and I can already say that I’m love the bigger models.  More space to work, more detail to work on, and they simply look fantastic even by my standards.

At this point, the figures had been assembled for years.  Time for Prime!

My favorite unit, Genestealers, start to take their icy color.

Hormaguants lead the assualt as the first painted units.  The Warriors are soon to follow.

Hormaguants, Genestealers and Warriors, oh my!  Now the army is starting to look fearsome!

This past weekend as I part took in Paul’s Basement League, Week 2, I went into the event knowing that I was trying things that were out of my comfort zone.  I was taking a bevy of new units that I had never used before, including Gargoyles, Hive Guard, a Tervigon and the mighty Trygon Prime.

I was also playing Pedro one on one for the first time in 3 years.  The last time we played, different armies represented us.  He was protecting his rune priest as he rolled with his Space Wolves, and I was attempting to out Close Combat him with my Chaos Space Marines and their upgraded Chaos Lord.  He beat me on that day oh so long ago, but the match was close.

With all of that in mind, Pedro and I strode up to the snow table at Paul’s and the match was setup for Dawn of War deployment, with a mission type of Capture & Control.  With the exposition out of the way, now I can get into my specific thoughts on how the new units did, and how I feel like my Hive Fleet is doing through three games.

I did two things that I don’t normally do.  I used Deep Strike with the Trygon, and that worked out ok.  I’m not necessarily sold on the concept.  He came out and fired 12 times at the closest squad and did some damage.  He was also tough enough to survive small arms fire and some close combat, even with his average initive 4 going last against the fast Eldar.  I just would have prefered fleeting him up I think.  I think he would have done more damage.  Then again, the effect he had with being that close to the enemy, is pretty good as a psychological factor, not to mention that it is a fire magnet to take off the heat from my many other figures.

The second thing I did, was use outflank with a brood of Genestealers coupled with a Broodlord.  That entire squad worked out perfectly and I can completely understand why Josh and his Imperial Guard use it so much.  They came out on exactly the right table edge, kill a group of Pathfinders in front of them, held the enemy objective, and were able to kill off a weakened Harlequin unit gunning for them.  I feel like I will be doing this a bit more often in the future, and feel like it can most certainly help me out against other opponents.

The biggest thing that this new balanced list has going for it, is that I am able to make an opponent go on the defensive very quickly, and it’s tough for them to prioritize what they should take out first.  By the time the Genestealers and Trygon had come out in the enemy backlines on turn 2, I already had Gargoyles, Flyrant and Carnifex starting to take pot shots at the front of the army.  Add to that, my Tervigon which spawned a total of 34 additional Termagaunts when the game was over, and it’s insane to try and figure out what to shoot at.

Speaking of the Gargoyles, I really felt like my change from Hormagaunts to Gargoyles for the same amount of points worked out really well.  They offer consistant speed with their 12 inch movement, and also have automatic wounds (AS allowed) on to hit rolls of 6.  Plus from a fluffy standpoint, they really work well with my Flyrant and give the army a really great look.

The list has a bit of swarm, and a lot of monsterous creatures to keep people occupied for awhile.  The hive guard which I tried out, didn’t get a chance to do much as the Dawn of War deployment really had them moving a lot more than they should.  I still believe in them and feel like they can give me the necessary tank busting that I need.  With them, Carnifex with Venom Cannon, and the Flyrant, I feel like I can take out tanks when needed.  I haven’t had too much of a problem, but we shall see as I face more mechanized armies in the future.

Overall I am pleased with the codex and feel like it is a very balanced effort from Games Workshop.  I can only hope that the rest of the codex releases this year are as on point as this.

If you’ll excuse me now, I’m off to think about the potential for an all Tyranid Warrior Brood.  =P

I have been going nuts with the new Tyranid Codex, trying to maximize efficency, while at the same time staying fluffy / balanced.  Yes I could make a ludicrously cheesy army list, but what’s the fun in that?

What follows below is my second attempt at a list for the second weekend of Paul’s Basement League.  I’m hoping that I have enough fluff, tank popping, redundancy, and new fun models to keep the games close and me happy.

As always, comments are of course welcome but a few notes so you know what I was thinking when I put this together.

• I went with a Trygon Prime, to maximize my Synapse network, and to get more firepower.  He is 40 points more expensive, but his gun shoots 12 times now, and increases to 18″ range.
• It was a tough decision to get rid of my beloved Acid Tyrant but the reasons are a few.  Namely, at this point people have started to ignore him, and I need people firing into him for no reason at all.  Next, he and his guard cost 350 points.  I felt like I needed more options and I can do his job with a Carnifex for cheaper.
• Hormaguants suck now.  Gargoyles rock and can provide a cover save to my Flyrant.
• I like the idea of the tarpit Tervigon, but I couldn’t bring myself to use anymore than one.  Points wise and fluff wise, I just think more than one is lame story wise.  None the less, a toughness 6, 6 wound MC that counts as a troop and can hold objectives just rocks.
• Hive Guard look so amazing!

Hive Fleet Cerebus

HQ

Cerebus DNA Strand Tyrant (230 points)
Hive Tyrant
- 2 Scything Talons
- Psychic Scream
- Life Drain
- Wings

Elites

Hades DNA Strand Zoanthrope (60 points)
Zoanthrope
- Warp Blast
- Warp Lance

Anubis DNA Strand Hive Guard (50 points)
Hive Guard
- Harpoon Cannon

Anubis DNA Strand Hive Guard (50 points)
Hive Guard
- Harpoon Cannon

Troops

Corporal DNA Strand Warriors (90 points)
3 Tyranid Warriors
- Scything Talons
- Devourer

Corporal DNA Strand Warriors (90 points)
3 Tyranid Warriors
- Scything Talons
- Devourer

Spartan DNA Strand Genestealers (140 points)
10 Genestealers
- Infiltrate
- Rending Claws

Master Chief DNA Strand Broodlord (60 points)
Broodlord
- Infiltrate
- Rending Claws
- Aura of Despair
- Hypnotic Stare

Inferno DNA Strand Gaunts (60 points)
12 Termagaunts
- Fleshborer

Brood Mother DNA Strand Tervigon (170 points)
Tervigon
- Thorn Volley
- Dominate
- Toxin Sacs

Fast Attack

Whelping DNA Strand Gargoyles (60 points)
10 Gargoyles
- Fleshborer

Heavy Support

Raiden DNA Strand Trygon (240 points)
Trygon Prime
- Enhanced Bio-Electric Field
- 2 Pairs of Scything Talons

Ripley DNA Strand Carnifex (200 points)
Carnifex
- Heavy Venom Canon
- MC Devourer

Total: 1500 points

One week ago I claimed that I did not like the new changes made to the Tyranids in their new codex which has been released just about now.  I downloaded a leaked copy of the codex and proceeded to play my owning two matches in Paul’s Basement League with the new list.  How am I feeling about it right now?  Well, let’s just saying that when you are winning, everything seems perfect.

I played two games last weekend, first game against Paul’s Space Marines, and the second game against Jonathan’s Chaos Space Marines.  This was a interesting matchup, only in the fact that when I play games against the North Jersey crew, we really don’t have any Marine players, which of course is not the norm.  So for me, it was the first time I had played against the well rounded squads of the Emperor in awhile.

I won’t go into a turn by turn analysis, if you want that GO HERE, but I will offer some ideas on what changes I like and which I don’t.

First off, I like how much Dakka we can take.  Monsterous Creatures can unleash a ton of shots per turn, not to mention the three shots each for Tyranid Warriors.  Overall, we have a lot of shooting options, and they can really put a hurt on someone, especially when we can shoot well and be dangerous in close combat.  Genestealers getting infiltrate for free, is amazing.  I utilized all of their skills in both games and they were easily the most valuable squad I had on the table.  Can’t wait to add a Broodlord to the squad.

The Mosntrous Creatures not having invulernable saves is annoying but understandable.  I will have to factor that in.  Also, now that the units are just fearless, the fact that they take extra armor saves in close combat if they lose, is terrible.  This means that instead of tarpitting people in close combat like my Hormagaunts should, they are simply dying far too quickly to be effective.  Walking Tyrants with Guards are so difficult to kill, it’s almost unfair.  Give a Tyrant 2-3 guard and he’ll be around all game.

Also while on the topic of Tyrants, their psychic powers are unbelievable.  The three free ones that you have to choose from are great for either Flyrants or Walking Tyrants and they really can make a difference.  Meanwhile, the additional powers that you can spend a lot of points on, allow you to customize the entire army to a particular playstyle (heavy close combat, heavy outflank / reserves, etc) that you may want to try out.  It feels like the codex takes awhile customizions, but it really doesn’t, they are just done in a different way.

Let’s see what else?  Taking out tanks is still a bit of a problem.  We have the Carnifex which is good, and we can Rend them with the Genestealers, but as far as shooting, the only really reliable option is Zoanthropes.  They by the way, are amazing and I will be fielding a squad of them no matter what game or opponent they are just too useful.

Overall, the army feels very balanced and I feel like my current models are not ideal or perfect, they are a solid base that can absolutely beat any opponent given the right movement and target priority.

[View with PicLens]

I’m not pleased with the new Tyranid Codex.  There I said it!  Now let me clarify …

No matter what the codex was going to turn out to be, I knew that I was going to have issues with it.  Namely, just taking the fact that I spent a lot of time modeling these figures to coincide with the previous codex.  Once this new codex came in, I knew that the majority of what I worked on was going to be changed.  I knew that the models would be vastly different, and in addition the specific rules would be a shade of what they were.

Upon first inspection of the compiled Codex list that I got from Paul (thanks BTW), the major change is in how Synapse will change.  Figures are now no longer immune to instant death while in Synapse range.  That’s fine, I am not surprised.  It makes my Tyranid Warriors now vulnerable and takes me some thought in order to better utilize them.  Before they were so OP that I made sure to tell everyone about it.

Add to that, some weapon options that I had modeled on my Carnifex and Tyrant are no longer available, and I am none too pleased.  Hormagaunts are no longer beasts so no more 12″ charge, which of course is a major part of my strategy … Will I make it work?  Of course I will, because I love my Nids.  It will just be a bit of an adjustment.  I am going into this upcoming weekend of Paul’s Basement League, Season 2 as a chance to learn the new rules and see what I will need to stock up on when the new models are released next week.

With that in mind, here is my 1500 point list using the new rules.

Hive Fleet Cerebus

HQ

Cerebus DNA Strand Tyrant (230 points)
Hive Tyrant
- 2 Scything Talons
- Psychic Scream
- Life Drain
- Wings

Acidic DNA Strand Tyrant (205 points)
Hive Tyrant
- Heavy Venom Canon
- MC Devourer
- Psychic Scream
- The Horror

Royal Acid Guard (120 points)
2 Tyrant Guards
- Scything Talons
- Rending Claws

Elites

Hades DNA Strand Zoanthrope (60 points)
Zoanthrope
- Warp Blast
- Warp Lance

Troops

Corporal DNA Strand Warriors (90 points)
3 Tyranid Warriors
- Scything Talons
- Devourer

Corporal DNA Strand Warriors (90 points)
3 Tyranid Warriors
- Scything Talons
- Devourer

Spartan DNA Strand Genestealers (168 points)
12 Genestealers
- Infiltrate
- Rending Claws

Inferno DNA Strand Gaunts (60 points)
12 Termagaunts
- Fleshborer

Purgatory DNA Strand Gaunts (72 points)
12 Hormagaunts
- Scything Talons

Heavy Support

Grendel DNA Strand Carnifex (210 points)
Carnifex
- Crushing Claws
- Scything Talons
- Regeneration

Hercules DNA Strand Carnifex (195 points)
Carnifex
- Heavy Barbed Strangler
- MC Devourer

Total: 1500 points