Eldar on the move...

:-)  Not sure what direction to go with for the league...  But a bit bored with some of the more overpowered forces so Wolves and Grey Knights are definitely taking a breather...  The Dark Angels are powerful but REALLY limited in terms of viable armies, and a LOT less fun to actually play after a while...  IG are also potentially really too powerful coupled with the fact that they require WAY too may models...  Trying to get fully painted armies to the field, and even after watching Zulu again I doubt I could keep that level of interest in painting my Light Rifle Company...  Yeah, the bulk have a "base coat", but still...

In any case, I'm playing Eldar.  Looking at Imperial Armour, I'm really liking what the Eldar get...  The Hornet is what the Viper really should be in the current ruleset.  The Warp Hunter is their version of the Marine Vindicator, and it is I think better in a lot of ways.  Might be a bit overpowered offensively, the "Inferno" template fire mode for the D-cannon combined with the 5" blast for the main fire mode...  Both modes are "D Cannon" for the rule, so 2+ to wound, 6 is ID and 2-4 for a  glance and 5+ for a penetrating hit....  Yeah, I'll still roll lots of 1's, but AP 2 and no cover save is really quite deadly against a whole lot of things....  The Hornet and Jaeger look powerful but really fragile.  The Wraithseer looks like a potentially "fun" option, but with so many choices being made for me by simply choosing the Wraithseer...  Need another HQ AND a unit of Wraithguard...  So, my "Eldar Castle" army would work, but that leaves so little for anything below 1850+...  Eldrad, full Wraithguard squad and the Wraithseer comes to 800+ points...  So, tough to take down in a kill point mission with the potential for a unit of Fearless T6 FNP Troops with re-rollable cover and armor saves... Good luck killing them quickly.  But it makes for a one trick army...  Good trick, but only one...

So, Pathfinders as Troops...  Not particularly resilient, but could be hard to catch if I run a flank with them...  So, one squad, maybe 2...  Storm Guardians maybe?  Dunno, I've never been a fan of throw away suicide troops, and the SG are just not really good at anything...  Jet bikers are amusing, but WAY fragile...  I know, a running theme for Eldar.  Dire Avengers are "eh" at best in my opinion, but I suppose running around in a Wave Serpent can get me a scoring light tank...  I'll field my usual Scorpions and I've dug up some ancient Dark Reapers...  Thinking they might be nice against all of the 3+ armor out on the field at the Gopher at least...  And I snagged a bunch of Fire Dragons to shore up my horde of Aspect Warriors...  For some reason I only ever had a few of them.  Painting a bit on the Banshees, but I doubt I'll field them...

Eh, it'll be interesting at least :-)

January, what next?

Well, I might break out one of the "several" ancient Eldar DN's I have to convert over to be a Wraithseer...  Horribly overpriced it would seem from first glance, but I do sort of wonder what I could do with one...  Rules are "OK", nothing really overpowering it seems, but might be a bit of a surprise hitting the modern tables at the Gopher...  So, Green Stuff and time...  Looks like I'll have a bit of time someday :-)

Glad my wife doesn't wander down to the basement much :-)...  My armies are taking up more of the space as I try to figure out what I actually have...  And I'll probably switch over to Eldar for the next league, so digging them up and fixing various broken things...  I now have 5 of the ancient "Ghost Warriors" to fill out my Wraith Guard...  Good enough for local stuff, but not sure if that would fly elsewhere...  Might, it IS a GW model and it is what the WG started out as...  So, my lads will come out of retirement yet again...  :-)  The Warp Hunter will be a bit of a shock for both turns it survives, but it will be fun I think...

40K these days...

The state of the game…  Yeah, sounds pretentious J…  Now, this is all just my opinion as always, and mostly just based on my experiences and the armies I play.  I am getting the feeling that the game is becoming less and less balanced.  I’d be a bit hesitant to say that certain codices are “broken” or bad for the game, but Grey Knights would be one that I’d say brings it REALLY close.  An entire army loaded out with Power Weapons, Str 8 vs Str 7 for Autocannons and their Psycannons everywhere…  Before the GK’s, the Blood Angels have Rhino Hulls that are just better than everyone else’s…  It seems more and more like an engine that is getting itself further and further out of balance as it runs longer.  I think that there really are “first tier”, “second tier” and “others”… 

First tier I have as: Wolves, BA, GK, and IG…  Of course, only certain “builds” are really the powerful ones, even these armies have subpar units…  It’s kind of annoying on some levels as those are 4 of the armies I play, and I’m REALLY trying hard not to play the “Uber” lists…  Not sure if I could come up with anything other than “I think this is true” to back up my opinion of course.  Well, that and of course I have an excellent record with the above armies.  It is difficult to come up with better lists than some of the “hard” lists I CAN field with a first tier army…  Especially if the army on the other side of the table is not itself a first tier army…  Can still be beaten of course, but the odds are stacked against it…

I enjoy playing Eldar, but with so few viable options, it is an exercise in futility against a well-built “modern” army.  The stuff in IA2 does bring good things to the army, and it is looking like the new IA book (http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/New_Stuff/IMPERIAL-ARMOUR-VOLUME-ELEVEN-THE-DOOM-OF-MYMEARA.html) seems like it does bring a LOT of things that could do a lot to bring the Eldar up to more modern standards…

So, Eldar and Dark Angels (Deathwing or Dual Wing) are my “second tier” armies…  Extremely limited builds, very narrow focus, and not viable outside of that…

Outside of the ones I actually play, I can’t really say where a lot of armies end up…  Tau were hard to beat prior to BA and to an extent Wolves, and now I think they simply cannot compete with the GK or Necron lists…  Orks have their swarms and walkers which are also a bit of a swarm…  They can compete in a somewhat limited fashion against all but the GK I think…  DE are good if built right, but not sure if they are first tier…  Sisters are “eh” these days…

Looking forward to 6^th edition and I am hoping the IA stuff livens up the scene a bit…

IA/next army...

So, what army next J…  I guess I’ll keep painting my Wolves for the moment because I am moving along quite nicely there and honestly I’m actually enjoying it at the moment.  Back to conversion work I guess as my Wolf Guard need their Combi-weapons…  Thankfully it looks like the stuff I picked up at the Gopher will allow me to make a few here and there with Green stuff…  And then I’ll have to magnetize Terminators…

So, I guess I’ll be bringing it up for the local gaming group…  Wanting to include IA (Imperial Armour) rules in our 40K games…  The new editions have been rewritten and split up to indicate if they are 40K or not…  And the IA 2 book does seem to indicate that they are completely legal for GW events, so we’ll have to be sure everyone actually knows what the rules and options ARE…  There are some pretty neat things in the books, and honestly I am looking forward to some new things hitting the tables…

Post Christmas fun...

Picked up the Imperial Armour Apocalypse Second Edition this evening…  Sometimes the Gopher gets in some really interesting things on consignment.  Read over it, guessing I already knew most of the things there but I do think that they are doing it right these days…  Now, they do print that the things labeled “40K” are legal to play in “official” 40K events, and it does look like they’ve fixed all of the more obvious broken things…  Like for instance the Lucius class Drop Pod is NOT legal for Blood Angel Marines J…  Have to admit that was one I WAS planning on putting into a team tournament force… 

Cranked up the bike today, didn’t take her out, but it was REALLY nice turning the engine over.  Maybe this week I’ll still be able to get in a ride or two before I really have to put her up for the year.

Christmas was pretty fun, had Matt and Kaitlyn up from Ft Cambpell along with the wee girls.  Pretty mellow…  Wound up making a normal lasagna for Christmas eve and then a seafood lasagna for Christmas… 

Mkay, pretty much done for the night J  Off to Peoria tomorrow for Christmas with my parents…  At least the girls will probably have fun…

Now what?

Mkay, so where to go from here…  Pretty sure I have the Wolves all worked out.  I can min max the hell out of them and throw a BUNCH of heavy weapons out on the table…  The army then is not nearly so much fun to play though in my opinion.  Also, if the dice themselves are against you as they were for me last week J…  Normally it would have at least been a slugfest, and to an extent it was, but Dawn of War and SO MANY 1’s and 2’s on the dice were rolled for me J…  Honestly I just had to laugh it off, and that in and of itself made the game a LOT more enjoyable for me, just seeing how unlucky I could possible get…  Sadly, even with the luck factor and the DoW silliness weighing against me, I still nearly pulled out a tie, so I feel the Wolves are a few more powerful army than I had originally given them credit for.  If you build them “right” I guess.  Next week I break out a “fun” force with Logan leading out his lads…  I think I’ve run out of opponents though, so guessing it’ll just be against whoever happens to be around.  Kind of scary actually, and if Dave and I build our “Team” armies “right” next tournament we wander off to, I can see us doing fairly well…

Not sure I’ll be able to play New Year’s Eve tournament with some friends of my wife’s coming into town…  We’ll see, I’d like to get away and play a bit, but who knows really…  And given the choice of playing for the day and annoying the wife J…  Well, I’ll just play the next week I guess…

Other than that, just Christmas preparations going on…  More cleaning out some ancient boxes and the like from the basement of doom, found some more interesting ancient toys, both gaming and firearm type…  Now to clean them off J… I think I want to lay out my armies to get pics of the “whole lot”…  Just to see how many exactly I really have here…  Interesting to see, and a “real” reason involving insurance since I’d really have no clue what was lost should the house disappear today…

Looking forward to 6th ed...

If for no other reason than perhaps the "Dawn of War" mission can just go away...  Not sure how best to say just how fucking much I hate that mission...  :-)  Yes, subtle I know...  But what the fuck were they thinking making such a stupidly unbalanced mission that gets played 1/3 of the time... Of course, it could be just my bitterness about the fact it really screws over almost all of the armies I play.  HtH hordes just dominate because they start half way across the field, and the other side has a "very limited" set of deployment options...  And of course the game starts off completely screwing any Infantry based force...  Mech, not AS much, but even then, turn one is almost always a wash...

Back to power munching ibuprofen here...  Don't think I broke my tailbone, but it is a possibility I guess...  At least I can say "My broke ass" :-)  Yeah, tomorrow looks like a LONG day...