Feeling more Lupine these days...

So, back to Wolves….  Now, I’ve been playing these lads the longest through a bunch of different incarnations…  Started out when “Leman Russ” was just a normal Marine who happened to be the commander of the “Space Wolves” Legion.  Have the old Mini, though I apparently lost the 2 Wolves that came with it at some point in the last few decades.  RT era, so the scale is WAY off against the current models, he makes an excellent “Scout” mini though…  And I do find it amusing to put it out on the table…  Who is to say that when Russ returns that he won’t simply slip in with the Wolf Scouts?  Guessing the Ragabash among the Scouts would find it a VERY amusing joke/trick to pull off and would likely go far out of their way to assist…  J  Well, more than their natural loyalty to their Primarch of course… 

So, on to modeling and renovating…  Picked up some “Instant Mold” and liquid Green Stuff last week, but still haven’t broken it out…  Will I think be making GS shoulder pads and Storm Shields for the lads.  We’ll see how well it works out. 

For a weapons loadout, I’m looking at a few Terminators with Chain Fist and Storm Shield for the weapons, though that is 68 points…  So, it’ll be a weird loadout, but one I think I can convert fairly easily.  The dual “Wolf Claws” might work, but with only the 5++ save I am concerned they might never actually get to hit anything in HtH.  WC/SS might be a better loadout, but EXPENSIVE.  Scouts are fairly well set, just have to decide on 2 Plasma Pistols or 1 with a Power weapon…  The Mark of the Wulfen on the one Sniper Rifle in the squad is amusing, and while I seldom use the SR, it is nice to have on occasion…

So, running a LOT of Scouts and Wolf Guard…  Very much like my old 2^nd edition army, though lacking the jump troops…  I just can’t bring myself to field them these days.  And Long Fangs…  Fortunate I suppose I have a LOT of the old models, so I’ll be fielding at least 2 Packs…  We’ll see how well this stuff works out…

Back to Wolves I guess...

Playing a few weeks at the 500 point level, so it'll be a fairly "gimmicky" game in any case...  Looking like I'll field my ancient Confrontation Wolfen in the Gunn kilts with Wolf Scouts and see how they fare...  No HQ or Heavy options for the first 2 weeks, and unfortunately, the basic Troops of the Wolves really need the support...  The other option I see is a Wolf Guard unit and Grey Hunters...  The WG can help out the leadership and such, but lacking any heavy weapons really...  Just too much they could come up against that they simply cannot handle...  Mind, at the higher point levels, they wouldn't be the only things there to deal with it...

Got a few things in mind for the higher point levels, we'll see how they actually work out.  Wolf Priest with Saga of the Hunter for Stealth to run with Logan's Wolf Guard.  Makes them fearless, gives Preferred Enemy against one "class" of thing, Infantry, Bikes, MC, choose at the beginning of the game...  The Long Fangs are coming out, and I'll likely have a mix of weapons rather than just all Missile Launchers with the Necrons and the like hitting the table...  AV 13 from them and the Sisters, 14's from the loads of Land Raiders we have in the store....  And of course, with the Terminators out there...  That and I've always been a big fan of mixing out the weapon loads, kind of a holdover from when I carried that silliness myself.  AT-4's, LAW's, Recoilless Rifles, M203's, .50's, etc...  We'll see how it all works out as I continue breaking more of the 2nd edition lads out of deep storage and repainting them...  Yeah, maybe I had too many Wolves back in the old days...

Craptastic...

Well, Adepticon opened up registration Tuesday and I missed it...  The 120 spots on the Team Tournament got taken REALLY quickly, less than 24 hours...  We're #19 on the wait list, so there is I guess a chance of fielding a team up there...  Wait, #18, so we've already moved up...  Still, getting the 4 players together and given the distance some of the teams are travelling (Sweden being the farthest I've seen thus far) means that most folks who signed up will very likely actually go, I'm not holding my breath...  So, looking like more "regional tournaments" before the big "national" level ones...

End of year League...

So, back to my first army, Wolves or keep with the Grey Knights for the time being?  Painting a bunch of the ancient Grey Knights I have around, Purifiers and normal lads...  Trying a different paint scheme for the Purifiers, we'll see...  At the least they'll stand out among the silver armor out there.

Also, painting a group of old Wolf Scouts in preparation for that army...  Dusting off the Wolf Guard and Logan Grimmar himself for the 1000+ point lists.  Grey armor everywhere.  And I'm finding more of the ancient missile launchers around...  Time to get them painted up since I'll be fielding a group of them...  Wonder how fast I can get a fully painted Wolf army up and about...  'course I'll be using my Clan Gunn Wolfen from Confrontation as the "Wolf Cavalry"...  Should be interesting at least...

Wolves for Adepticon or the later escalation league

Looking more seriously at the Wolves for a longer term team solution...  So, mostly disjointed thoughts...

Throwing together some test lists for the later parts of the escalation league:
Just a basic framework of course...
Logan Grimmar 275
Wolf Guard Pack...  Terminators, 33 points for the "basic" SB/PW terminator, one with the CML, a few random weapons
Wolf Guard Pack (Random weapons to detail out as Squad Leaders)
Wolf Scouts (full loadout, melta gun, PP, PW, MotW) 133
3 Long Fang Squads...  Missile Launchers, Meltas, HB's, etc...

So, Logan makes Wolf Guard "Troops", so I could bring 6 packs of them if I really wanted to...  1 to be my "HtH Pack" in Terminator armor, I can load them out pretty heavily.  The second will be detailed out as Pack Leaders elsewhere if I need to, else I plan to have them sit in a Razorback and camp objectives.  But a lot of the missions involve kill points, so having a few of the small units just disappear before deployment might not be a bad thing...  Especially since it will reinforce the other units.  One Scout unit might be enough, just thinking  that 2 might be better...  Standard "Military Safety Factor" from doing demolitions work there, figure out how much you NEED in terms of explosives, then multiply by two to guarantee the result...

But for a 1000 point "Team" setup...  Logan w/ 2 of the 3 man Wolf Guard Packs is 383 points, leaving a lot of room to get "extras"...  Logan giving Relentless to a squad of Long Fangs as they walk onto the board should give a bit of an advantage during night fight or reserve missions...  With split fire, CML Terminator and a Rune Priest or two...  Should be a REALLY nasty surprise for a lot of armies out there...  Still concerned that I do not have a counter to a true horde force other than "we shoot them to hell and hope for the best"...  One other possibility would be Logan leading out a Wolf Guard unit with Wolf Claws and enough Storm Shields to survive in a modern game...  Giving them re-rolls on the to hit AND to wound they should guarantee a LOT of dead Orks if push comes to shove, but still not the best solution I think...

Next League...

So, I have to decide which of my armies I'll start the next league out with...  Doing an escalation league starting at 500 points, working up to 1850 at the end of the 8 weeks.  We'll be allowed to switch at the 4 week mark, and I might...  So, Wolves or Grey Knights is what I'm looking at with Adepticon in mind.  Now, Jamie is wanting to have a "more fully painted" group of armies on the field with us focusing more on the "hobby" aspect.  Suits me fine as I'd need to have the lads all painted for the road trip to the Chicago area anyway.  Now, the Wolves were my first army, and I still field a LOT of lead...  The ancient RT era "Assault Marines" that I've had for decades.  I also haven't played my old Wolves for a while, but I think I burned out pretty had on them...  Was painting a few of the old Scouts, so I might be about ready to break them out again.  On the other hand, I'm rapidly painting and converting a whole bunch of Grey Knights...  Think I might at least start out with them and see if I can't scrape enough together for a Storm Raven.  I REALLY think that it fits my GK/FT armies, and while I won't have the minimum of 2 that most hard corp "competitive" types would insist is the only way to field them...  Yeah, might not be the optimum solution, but I do think I can make it work :-)

Trying out some different conversions and weapon options to go with the different paint schemes for the Knights...  Seem to be a fairly powerful force, we'll see how they end up working for me...

Flatcon Results...

Well, overall, I have to say I had a great time, Dave was a great partner and we did as well as could be expected really...  I have to say the only thing I was REALLY disappointed about was the lack of painted armies.  I know I brought an army of "what I have painted" rather than a "this is my best force"...  Didn't really make THAT much of a difference overall, but as good as the Spartan class LRC is, I think we would have been FAR better off with the 3rd squad of Deathwing.  For 250+ points it just doesn't put out THAT much firepower and with Melta weapons all over the place, really quite hard to keep alive against a decent player.

I'll upload the pics I took when I dig up my camera, just a bit dead on my feet at the moment...

I fielded:
Belial (LC)
2 Deathwing squads (2 LC, 3 TH/SS CML)
Land Raider Crusader
2 Land Speeder Typhoons w/ MM/TML

Dave had:
2 Rune Priests
2 Grey Hunter squads loaded out in Razorbacks (Assault Cannons)
2 Long Fang squads (1 w/ 5 ML, 1 w/ 3 Plasma cannon, 2 MM)
Land Speeder w dual MM

Round one put us against a REALLY well put together Eldar/Ork force.  From memory they fielded:
Eldrad
min squad of Dire Avengers
Min squad of Pathfinders
6 man squad of Fire Dragons with Exarch in Serpent
Squad of Dark Reapers w/ Exarch (crack shot, tempest)
Falcon

Ork Warboss
3 x 30 Ork squads, all w/Claw Nobs, 2 choppas one shoota
2 5 Ork Loota squads
Death Choppa?

Think that was it...  Mission was Dawn of War, they lined up at the mid point with a big mob and some other stuff, so we were in trouble from the get go...  Not saying that armies like the Deathwing have hard counters, but...  This is one my lads simply cannot face down successfully.  Good game though, but melta destroyed the LRC and we got buried in the green tide...  We didn't get wiped off the table, but it was really a matter of time I think.  His Warboss decided to duel Belial to his regret...  Lightning Claws striking first even with my dice rolling usually win that one...

Round two was against an IG/Chaos Marine list...

Lord Commissar
Platoon command squad (Chimera, random special weapons)
2 Squads (Chimeras, heavy weapons)
Hellhound
Leman Russ Punisher (? heavy 20 main gun, Pask for BS 4 and +1 vs vehicles)
Heavy weapon squad (2 Las Cannon, Mortar)

Sorcerer Lord (lash, force weapon)
Khorne Berserkers (1 PF)
small squad of Terminators
2 Land Raiders (Possession)

We started off slow, but when the reserved Land speeders and LRC arrived, things went quickly bad for them...  One of my DW squads marched across the table to take an objective, the other engaed and destroyed the Khorne lads and Sorcerer...  Not before Belial died though...  He was avenged as the remaining lads in the squad wiped the Chaos Marines and consolidated back to the objective.  I think the Speeders were the MVPs though, with Multi Meltas and Missiles to deal with the Armor in our faces, things turned rapidly in our favor when they arrived...

Game three was against a really well thought out Grey Knight/Wolf force...

Rune Priest
Grey Hunters...  Lots of them in Razorbacks and one in a Rhino, I think 3 Razorbacks?  Though his Fangs might have had one...  Las Cannons and some with Las/Plasma... Wolf Banners in every squad I think...
Long Fangs (5 ML)
Wolf Guard to detail out to the squads...

Brotherhood Champion
Purifiers
Storm Raven (Above in this)
2 Strike Squads (Psycannon, Psy ammo)
DN (Rifleman class)
?  Was that it?  I seem to remember there being more, but...

We started off with a big bang seizing the initiative and destroying 2 Razorbacks...  Then...  Well, things went rapidly downhill :-)...  His Purifiers hit one of my squads, their weight of fire simply wore us down, and it went "poorly" for us...

So, 1 and 2 for 3 excellent games against some very fun opponents...  All in all an excellent tournament.  What did I take away from this?  Well, pretty sure the DA are NOT the force to take to Adepticon...  Just too many hard counters.  I also did not read the force org charts as well...  If I had known only one Troop was required, I think Dave and I could have made a much better force...  Finally, I think that I REALLY should have gone far more defensive with Belial.  The TH/SS option is pretty much the only one that I think should be fielded.  Yes, I "lose" an attack and the I5, but I am hitting with the "I Don't Care" weapon in a Thunder Hammer and I have the 3++ save to try to stay alive...  I died twice in the Tournament to power weapon/fists because I couldn't make that many 5++ saves...  So, Grey Knights, Fleshtearers or Wolves...  Will have to see what the rest of the "Team" decides to bring...