NRVCon Wrap Up

NRVCon 2016 is in the books, and while the 40k tournament was a bit smaller than we hoped, it was still a great time. Thanks to everyone who played. You can see the results on Torrent of Fire. Also, before I get into the event, a ton of thanks to the TO Elle for running the event.  I had three great games and ended up taking home Renaissance Man, being runner up, third in BPs, and second in Paint Score, but more on that toward the end.

NOVA Bound: Playtest Bat Reps

Earlier this week I managed to get a couple play test games in with my Arachnophobia list, against two fellow Invitational players. In both cases we played Crusade (Mission 1) on Vanguard deployment. We also ran out of time to complete both games, but got to turn 4 and were able to postulate on how it would have turned out.

Bat Rep: Tyranids vs. CSM/Daemons - Road to the NOVA Open Game 3*

I set up a weekly game night at my place for the Road to NOVA league games. For the first session last week, we were planning on playing our Week 2 match-ups and missions. However, Tom wasn't feeling well and Chandler was delayed, so Rick and I ended up playing our Week 3 matchup in advance. Week 3 is Mission 3, from the NOVA Mission Pack, which is a modified Relic Mission.

Gaming Weekend

Last weekend I hosted a gaming weekend at my place. We've expanded a bit since our early gaming weekends, and this time I had three tables set up, with the possibility of setting up a fourth, though we never had more than six people playing at a time. I was a terrible blogger and failed to take any pictures except for one of my Vaul's Wrath Battery proxies for the weekend:

Daemonkin Codex Special Rules Leaks

Today we have some of the initial rules leaks dropping from this weekend's upcoming Khorne Daemonkin Codex. Namely, we have a series of pictures from the Appendix including army wide rules like the Warlord Traits and Blood Tithe, as well as the Artifacts, one of which summons a Bloodthirster when the bearer dies! Check it out:

White Dwarf 60 First Look: Khorne Codex

This week's White Dwarf is out, announcing the long anticipated release of a Legion/Chaos God combined codex. Leading things off is Codex: Khorne Daemonkin, with expanded new rules for different Bloodthirsters using the new End Times kit.

SpikeyCon 2014, part 2, Bat Reps and Mission Thoughts

To follow up on my first post about SpikeyCon, Chandler and I participated in the Iron Man tournament from 8:00pm until 5:00am. It was a blast, and I'm still recovering. I took the FTN suggested DE allies with my Tyranids.

Battle for Blacksburg Bat Rep - Game 1

We recently had our Battle for Blacksburg tournament and I got to play three great games against three great opponents. As often happens, while I had intentions of recording each turn to provide context for my battle reports, by round two I started forgetting, and by round three, only remembered to take a photo partway through the game. 

Battle for Blacksburg Tournament Review

This past weekend was the Battle for Blacksburg, a small local 1,850 Tournament, and hopefully the first of many to come. The tournament was a one day, three round event, with 12 players showing up day of. The room was big enough for 16 players, so there was plenty of room.

Full results can be found on Torrent of Fire, but FTGT represented well. To start the day, I won best painted (voted by players' choice). After three rounds of battle, Ron came away with second place, with Sean Barkley taking home first prize.

Crimson Slaughter Supplement First Look

Picking up the Crimson Slaughter Supplement, I'm sure it will surprise no one that like all other special codices and supplements, the book is predominantly fluff and very light on actual rules. We'll take a first look at those rules that are presented, which are predominantly new Warlord Trait tables and Artifacts. 

Bat Rep: 1,850 Pts. Chaos Space Marines vs. Tyranids

The final game of our last gaming weekend saw Chris crossing over to 40k to play my Tyranids with a highly proxied Chaos Space Marine list. I would be using my planned NOVA Tyranids, so I wanted to make as strong a CSM list as possible. To that end I reached out to the guys at Forge the Narrative and the 40k Wrecking Crew for help strengthening a Nurgle CSM list.

SCARAB GT: Day 2, Game 4 - Tyranids vs. Necrons with CSM

Continuing right along, after two victories helped in large part to my opponents' dice hating them in Game 2 and Game 3, Day 2 saw me matched up against Trey and his Necrons with Chaos Space Marine allies. His list was roughly:

Destroyer Lord: MSS, Sempiternal Weave, Warscythe
4x5 Warriors: Night Scythe
6 Wraiths
3x Annihilation Barge
Daemon Prince
10-15 Cultists
Heldrake
Aegis Defense Line: Comms Relay

Cypher Dataslate Review - Final Advent Calendar Day

On the final day of Games Workshop's Advent Calendar (25 days of pure terror to some), the final release was Cypher, a figure clad in mystery and the most infamous of the Fallen. I couldn't help myself and picked it up.

Huzzah Hobbies December RTT Review

On Sunday, I made my way to Huzzah Hobbies for their monthly RTT. I had to be in DC again for work, and having seen the recurring tournament on Torrent of Fire, I thought I would head up a little early to get some gaming in. The regular tournaments were at 1,999+1, so I had to work some things around from my planned SCARAB list to make up the points and also make up the pieces I didn't have; namely, two of three spores.



IG with Space Wolf allies, Inquistorial detachment, and Tau Firebase

Walking around the hall as people were setting up, it was quickly clear that there was more to differentiate that from my LGS's monthly tournaments than just the points. I was actually feeling left out having not brought a display/transport board, which is someting I didn't expect.

Battle for the Abyss (Horus Heresy Book 8) Review

Back to the Horus Heresy Series, I recently finished up Battle for the Abyss. After Legion, I had a bit of a book hangover and took a couple breaks in the reading of this novel. Not because it was bad by any stretch, but it was certainly a good bit more direct and so, there was a bit less suspense I felt. As I mentioned in my Galaxy in Flames review, I've been a Ben Counter fan since Soul Drinker; I think he does an excellent job of developer characters through action and not having to divide the two. You get to learn about a character as the plot progresses swiftly, without stopping for a lot of background. At the same time, while the plot progresses quickly, the characters don't end up as boring, static action heroes.

NOVA Wrap Up - Day 3 and Final Thoughts

As detailed in previous posts, Day 1 saw me go 1-2, progressively getting better after being tabled in Game 1 while on Day 2 I went undefeated, setting me up to play the semi-finals of my bracket on Sunday morning.

Weekend Tournament: Fun N Games

So yesterday, (Sunday), my friend John and I ventured to our LGS Fun N Games for their monthly Warhammer 40k Tournament.  John has Orks at his home but here in Blacksburg, he's got nothing but us and +Evan S's armies; Evan set him up with an in your face Ork army, while I came there with 2 lists ready for hopefully a fun day.  My Lists were basically the same with a few minor exceptions.  I had one list that was a Monster Hunter list while the other was Bjorn making another appearance for the Wolves (Three Player Game).  Upon arriving at the store I was greeted by a wonderful sight of 7 other players besides John and myself and a variety of armies, including Tau, Dark Angels, Tyranids, 2 Orks, Imperial Guard, Chaos Marines, Space Wolves, and another army that I can't recall.

I was (un)lucky to draw Tau, Chaos Marines, and Imperial Guard.  It was a fun day full of surprises.

Courtesy of Games Workshop

Bat Rep: 1k Nids vs Chaos Space Marines

To continue from the previous bat rep (here) which was game 1 of a tournament, game 2 I was pitted against a small Chaos army. 

  vs.

Heldrake image from http://www.warpstormlights.co.uk/

His list (minus upgrades) was:

Chaos Lord w/Mark of Khorne

Daemon Prince

5 Plague Marines - 1 Plasma gun

5 Khorne Berserkers

5 Khorne Berserkers

Forgefiend (Represented on my maps by a defiler)

2 Obliterators

The mission was once again Emperor's Will (2 objectives), with board edge deployment (technically it was Hammer and Anvil, but we were on 4'x4' boards).