tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-83239732318838803122024-02-20T16:57:59.562-08:00Caldera40kCalderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-69544540588969843332012-07-09T09:50:00.001-07:002012-07-09T09:50:36.569-07:0040K 6th EditionSo 6th edition has arrived and we've been slowly digesting all the in's and out's. Everyone has been having fun with it so far it seems. There are a few tidits that need tweaking but other than that I really like it. There are lots of changes ot my army that I need to adjust to but thats alright. I wanted to go over a few things I have discovered so far about my Dark Eldar army with this edition change and what I think of them.<br />
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<strong>Vect</strong> - With the change to power weapons, he is no longer worth it I think. I used to take him for the ability to one shot mephiston of the table for me! He can no longer do that. :( <br />
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<strong>Drazhar</strong> - My new homie!!! I've always liked this guy. Even played with him in quite a few casual games during 5th edition. Always riding around with his incubi buddies. Now since AP2 is king, the FAQ has changed the 2handed version of demiklavies to AP2! Yay! So a klaviex and Drazhar in a unit do nicely against 2+ armor dudes. And that's at Init 6 and 7! Rawr! Not to mention the lookout sirs on D's 2+ armor shenanigans! I like him alot now.<br />
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<strong>Lelith</strong> - She hasn't changed much from last edition. She is pretty good in challeneges vs the right kind of characters but no eternal warrior still hurts. She does ignore armor though!<br />
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<strong>Baron</strong> - Stealth and Skilled rider have changed. I have not played with him and his crew yet with the new rules. Off the top of my head though, stealth will give them a 4++ cover save I think since most terrain will be 5++. Skilled rider got a boost though, just flat out ignoring dangerous terrain and adding to jink saves, which jump infantry don't get I don't think though. So overall not too bad. A side note, Hellions aern't as afraid of power weapons now like they used too!<br />
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<strong>Archon</strong> - I have been taking him as a grenade caddie with the incubi crew in my last couple of games with this edition so far. The changes to power weapons hurt the available weapons to an archon. He can call out a squad sergeant and snipe him in a challenge pretty reliably though as long as they don't have 2+ save.<br />
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<strong>Dark Light weapons</strong> - AP2 is +1 dmg on the chart now! Yay!<br />
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<strong>Wyches</strong> - Are still amazing. Haywire grenades rock vehicles now. Blast pistols are not bad options now that running before charging isn't an option anymore.<br />
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<em>Agonizers and Venom Blades</em> - I don't think agonizers are worth it anymore. 20 pts is steep for a weapon that doesn't hurt 2+ armor and requires a 4+ to wound whereas a venom blade is only 5 pts and wounds on a 2+. I've switched all my Squad leaders to this and the pts gained are basically funneled into blast pistols instead.<br />
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<strong>Warriors</strong> - Still pretty good. Changes to movement on a model by model basis is awesome! Also being able ot move and snap fire a heavy weapon is pretty slick. Also, in a raider you can move 6inches and fire all spinlter rifles 24 inches. Splinter racks are not a bad choice now. Moving 12 and snap firing at 24 inches is also not to shabby.<br />
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<strong>Reavers</strong> - I've only played one game with them so far but I saw some pretty good imporvement on them. They are still a little expensive but I think a little more surviveable now. They still have a 3++ save when going flat out, can flat out up to 36In in shooting phase as well as the 12 inch move in movement phase. They can move shoot and move in assault phase potentially further away. skilled rider is super nice for them as well.<br />
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<strong>Scourges</strong> - Haywire transfers well to thier weapons. Always being able ot strip Hull Points instead of just shaking a vehicle is pretty nice.<br />
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<strong>Ravagers</strong> - The new change to skimmers always having a jink cover save (most of the time) means no more flickfield is nessecarry. Unless you really want them to have a save vs things that ignore cover. To me this means Night shields come into play, especially since we can pre-measure.<br />
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<strong>Flyers</strong> - These guys are pretty dang awesome and add a unique way to play into the game. These will be high in demand as anti-flyers and hard to kill otherwise. I like the bomber because of it's immunity to bolters and option to carry implosion misslies. Flickerfield are essential to allow you to never have to go into evade mode with them. Night shield are nice on them if you have the points to spare.<br />
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All in all I think we turned alright and even gained a bit. I look forward to adding a contigent of Farseer and Dire avengers to get some much needed psychic defense! The powers available to other races are pretty potent now. So here's to 6th edtion and the fun to be had!<br />
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<br />Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-31093693706837641402012-04-02T08:28:00.000-07:002012-04-02T08:28:24.374-07:0040KSo I just started playing Demons of Chaos recently. They are alot of fun in both 40k and Fantasy. I got a hefty check for tax return and decided to pick these guys up for fun as they play alot different than everything else in 40k. I play a mix of Tzeentch and slannesh. It's not the best but whatever, this isn't for tournament play. I found out the hard way this weekend at our local FLGS tournament with them. I beat Grey Knights with them and got to make fun of Goatboy for losing to grey knights in that same round hehe. I'll admit he lost because he mishaped his 800+ point crusherstar :P I told him, well maybe he should mishap :) I have yet to mishap in my 7 games of demons(knock on wood).<br />
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I haven't play alot of Star Wars lately because I have been playing warmachine and warhammer alot. When I am not out playing I am painting furiously to get my Legion of Everblight army ready to go for Adepticon. I am really excited to play in all the warmachine events. Even got my girlfriend to go with her Trolls :)<br />
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I want to play with some non-standard Dark Eldar lists in the coming weeks and see how that goes. First I am going to try out a drazhar/Baron list, that might be fun :P Tournament season is upon us and I am looking forward to trying to place in something!!Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-34785395325652896582012-01-30T10:25:00.000-08:002012-01-30T10:25:45.446-08:00SW:TOR Level 40So it's been awhile. I've been playing alot of 40k, Warmahordes and STAR WARS!!! Heh. I'll talk about 40k and warmahordes in other posts. What I want to talk about today is star wars. <br />
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If you haven't picked up Star Wars The Old Republic by now, you are sorely missing out.. That is if MMORPG's are your thing to begin with. Just regular RPG's like Mass Effect of Final Fantasy for that matter. The thing about playing swtor, is that in the same amount of time that I would have spent playing say WoW, warhammer online or Rift, I don't get NEAR as much accomplished in that same time frame. The reason for this is the story. The story is so well written that i actually care about the characters and events involved. When I walk up to a quest giver and click on them, I'm not clicking through the text just to see what it is they want me to do and then going to do it. I actually listen to what they have to say. That's also something that is new, they are telling me the quest through voice instead of just reading the text. I believe that is the big thing that makes it stand out. No longer am I disconnected from the story, I am a participant.<br />
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Even though we all end up going to the same planets and killing the same mobs, we are doing it for different reasons and have different stories. I think that is awesome in and of itself. The dark side/light side choices also effect how your story turns out to a degree. I love everything about the story and how it is progressing and how it effects my gameplay. I hope in the future, fantasy style games take this approach.<br />
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There are a few gripes but it is only that, gripes. Nothing serious that makes the game bad, just things that I've noticed and said to myself, "Really, you used that again?". What I am talking about are things like body movements, alien languages that sound similar because they are in fact the same sound bit. How many times are they going to use the sound bit, "Wa wanna wan-kee" to mean different things in different languages? If that means something in Huttese and some other alien not speaking huttese says that phrase....just seems not polished and they didn't have time to make something else up and stuck that in there. There are a few things like that in the game that fall under this category, re-used. <br />
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Other than that I find the game to be truely enjoyable and will probably keep playing it for quite awhile. There are multiple story lines to play still!!Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-6497410941825972492011-11-29T09:07:00.000-08:002011-11-29T09:07:12.628-08:00SW:TORI now have two beta weekend test events for Star Wars: The Old Republic under my belt. I will now inform you why this MMO is different than others and why I will be telling everyone and thier mother to play it! So a couple things that make it stand out as different to me are that it's sci-fi, story, immersion and it's frakkin Star Wars. <br />
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Some people don't like sci-fi in an MMO. They would rather play with magic, sword N' Board, or bows n arrows. I get that. I feel like that some times. I like the sci-fi aspect though too. Blasters, blaster rifles, rockets, light sabers, lightning, and all that jazz. As well as cool looking space ships flying around and other mechincal walkers and such. <br />
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The story is well thought out for each of the classes. I only played a few though, so that could be untrue. The bounty hunter, Jedi Consular, Trooper, and Sith Inquisitor all had great stories. So much so that I now find myself thinking very hard about what I want to play when the game comes out. I love both the Bounty Hunter and Inquistor stories that much! <br />
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Immersion is something every other MMO lacks. For the most part at least. SWTOR really brings this aspect to light in the story telling and the instance play. The first instance you can run with a group is called Black Talon. So I went on a run through that place and let me tell you, that it is by far the most fun I have had in an instance in a very, very long time. As soon as you step in you are thrown into this story and it is amazing. You are on a small military vessel called Black Talon and a Moff has asked you to help them take a republic general on another ship captive or kill him. The captain of the ship has refused though and you get to go take care of the situation so that you can continue the mission. With that taken care of, you jump in to hyperspace after this other ship. When you exit hyperspace, you begin firing on the other vessel and they board you! So you repel the boarders and go get on a shuttle to fly over and board their vessel! Then you fight your way to the general and decide his fate! One of the cooler parts of this whole experience is when you talk to the story NPC's on the ships, it requires all party members to be within a certain distance and you all take part in the conversation. Who ever selects the correct message to respond with, thier character is the one who speaks up. Now I don't know what happens when everyone chooses the same thing though. Maybe the story happens differently if you do? Choosing light side options or dark side for instance. That's what makes it great, it's your story!<br />
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The last little bit I wanted to mention, is of course that is is star wars after all. Who doesn't like these kind of games and not like star wars!? Getting to play out a character who is a ruthless bounty hunter or a heroic Republic Trooper?! It's frakkin awesome is what it is!<br />
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You guys should pick this up and play it even if all you do is play solo.Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-9599556386526014532011-09-14T06:41:00.000-07:002011-09-14T06:41:46.361-07:00Space Marine!!!This game is one of the funnest games I have played in a long time! I absolutely love this game. I play on xbox so take that for what you will. Some prefer shooter games on PC. Well me personally, I think there is a reason why Modern Warfare is one of the most successful games of all time and is on xbox.<br />
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On to the game play. The campaign is sweet. I play on hard only cause I'm cool like that. The campaign was indeed hard at moments and stupidly hard at others. I say that only because of some of the design elements of the game. As someone who originally wanted to design games, I tend to spot these things with regularity. Example number 1 : while enjoying smashing face with a thunder hammer and quite enjoying myself, I died several times to stupidly accurate rocket fire.....from orks!!! Now heavy fire like that is supposed to make the game hard I know and make you move around to avoid it. It was just something that nagged at me because of fluff. Orks just are not that good at shooting, so why in this game are they deadly accurate with their rockets? I started to learn how to time the dodging of the rockets or take the time to take those out first so not a game ruiner at all, just kind of peeved me is all.<br />
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As a 40k player, this game has an astounding amount of detail in it. Anywhere from the sound you make when you run to weapon sounds. It's just amazing. Almost everything you do in the game functions like you imagine it would. <br />
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The fun wrought in the campaign was just Delicious! Things the orks say and do are hilarious. When you throw a grenade at them they scream, "Oh no, stikbomb" and run away from it! haha. The executions in the game are violent as all get out but I think any normal person won't be bothered by it. I thought they were cool as hell. Some of them made me giddity. For me, I know it's just a game and I get to act out this side of my imagination. You get to take the thunderhammer and use it like a baseball bat to the nobs, it's awesome! Also, suplexing chaos marines and then smashing them to bits is frakking sweetness!<br />
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Multiplayer is stupendous as well. Imagine a cross between gears of war, halo and call of duty. Third person shooter, your armor = your shields basically and you gain experience towards leveling up and unlocking perks. You play as either a Space marine or Chaos marine. This is chosen randomly depending on what team the computer assigns you to, similar to terrorist or marine in Modern Warfare. If your in a party and you join a new game the computer seems to randomly assign the group to fill spots in the ongoing game, so you can find yourself killing your party members. Quite amusing :P After the first game though, you get assigned teams together which is fine with me. <br />
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The game play in multiplayer is really fun for me. There are many different ways you can play. There are three main classes - Tactical, Devastator, and Assault. Within these classes there are lots of different weapon loadouts you can choose from. Once you have unlocked them that is, and it doesn't take too long at all. By level 20 you have unlocked all the different types of weapons. You can also choose to specialize in your weapon of choice simply by playing it more often and getting better with it. There are two perks you can unlock for each weapon mostly. Those perks make you do more damage or have more ammo for example. <br />
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The balance needs to be tweaked slightly but not too much I think. There is a semblance of paper vs rock vs scissors in Space Marine. Where the Dev is a rock, the Assault is paper and the tactical is scissors in my opinion. All the classes can kill each other, they generally have set in weaknesses though as to not have one class dominating. <br />
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So I am really really enjoying this game, and I imagine I will be for a long time to come. My handle on Xbox is Caldera02 so send me an invite if you wanna game.Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-30040344856432146492011-08-16T07:36:00.000-07:002011-08-16T17:30:02.301-07:00'Arrrrrrddddddd Boyz!!!!!So the weekend has come and past. Ard Boyz round one is over and the dust is settling. I took 2nd place with 63 points! I am looking forward to round two in San Antonio. Overall, I think my Dark Eldar did really well. 2500 points is alot of stuff to play with! hehe.<br />
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Matchups were:<br />
Round 1 - Grey Knights<br />
Round 2 - Space Wolves<br />
Round 3 - Grey Knights<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
I'll do a quick synopsis of those battles.<br />
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<b>Round 1 - Grey Knights played by my friend Brian "The Dirty" Moll</b><br />
Coteaz<br />
Libby<br />
DCA's w/ Crusaders in a stormraven(libby rode here)<br />
DCA's w/ Crusaders in a land raider redeemer(coteaz here)<br />
2 Auto Cannon Dreads<br />
4 Razorbacks(las-plas mostly) 2 of which has 5 man guardsmen dudes with 2 meltas in them. Other two were bought for DCA's and were empty.<br />
2 Rhinos with 10 man strike squads with 2 psycannons.<br />
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I focused on trying to take out his firepower and taking pot shots at transports for first two turns. That didn't work out too well for me though as I failed to do much and his return punch hurt like hell. I rolled 18 flickerfield rolls before I made a single one. Failed all the flat out cover saves too! I thought I was out of it by the end of turn 2 for sure. Brian just wrecked my day good. I decided I needed to stem the bleeding and get some pressure on him to give me some room to work with.<br />
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I had exactly two mobile raiders left that were shaken and or missing thier guns. I didn't need those anyway! So I jumped forward and dove on his two dreads to lock down with my haywire grenades. One was immobilized from previous shooting so was going to go down quick. The other was healthy so I needed some decent rolls to bring it down in combat. Turn 3 saw me take out that dread, pop a rhino and one razorback I think. I stunned/shook everything else, which was promptly negated with Fortitude! Drats!(I never saw anyone fail one of these all day! haha)<br />
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His turn 3 is where I think my luck turned around. I started making key flickfield and or cover saves to let me skin by. Turn 4 my bikes were still doing good, melting stuff. My trueborn finally decided to wake the hell up and blew open the land raider for me. About damn time too, I had assaulted with grenades the turn before and only took off one redeemer cannon and shook it. One fortitude roll later and that squad was reduced to a Succubus, Hemo and 2 wyches! ouch! This was huge for me though cause since he didn't kill my hemo in that squad he was able to lay down the shattershard on that DCA squad in the raider wreckage. Got Coteaz, techmarine and 2 infantry. Venom's finally had things to shoot at and melted that squad down to one running crusader, who I promptly ignored for the rest of the game lol.<br />
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So at this point is was still relatively even but after takin down one of the dreads I was able to get at my traitor and gain a lead on Kill points. I had momentum at this point and was starting to knock things out. Finally got the storm raven with my trueborn the last turn but we were running out of game time. The other dread kicked one wych and I failed leadership and ran away....8 man squad counted as destroyed cause they were falling back at end of game :( <br />
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Well the game ended with 19 to 10 kill points. I managed to hide his traitor in the middle building and go to ground.<br />
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<b>Round 2 - Space Wolves - Mike C.</b><br />
Land raider crusader with Logan, Njal and 5 Termies<br />
2 Long fang squads with 2 missles launchers, attached wolf guard with cyclone and 3 heavy bolters<br />
2 Rune priests with living lightning attached to LF's.<br />
2 rhinos with grey hunters<br />
Dakka Pred<br />
Drop pod with grey hunters<br />
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I got to go first and was able to put a huge amount of hurt on my friend mike. My fighter did about 30 wounds to one squad of long fangs. He had logan and Njal in the squad which I think netted me some more models to hit with the template. Njal and the priest both had a wound and Logan un wounded was all that survived that barrage. Venom's opened up on the other long fang squad and whittled them down all game. <br />
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Since his long range firepower was cut down, I was able to control the game from then on and I got max points.<br />
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<b>Round 3 - Grey Knights - Shawn S.</b><br />
Crowe<br />
6x10 Purifiers w/4 Psycannons (one had 3 and 1 incinerator)<br />
3 Psyfile dreads <br />
6 Rhinos<br />
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This is what I had to churn through to get second place! lol Shawn has done pretty good with this list, getting to the top tables at wargamescon with it. The only thing I don't like about this list is that it's simplicity is both a strength and a weakness. Lots of built in redundancy and durability. However, this makes it easy for me to know what I have to fight. When everything is the same, the threats are all the same, no surprises. So in fighting against this list, all I really had to do was focus fire and gang up on the squads and they all went down. We added up points at the end of the game and he has one weaponless rhino and I had roughly 900 ish points left. Couldn't kill that little bastard! lol Also, my HQ was only 90 points so gave up 180, his was 150 and gave up 300! heh<br />
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All in all, it was a good event. I had 3 great opponents and 3 good games. Something I wanted to mention that was kind of silly was the guy who ended up getting 1st place. So not to really take away his win but his last game was stupid easy for him and his list. So round two, Tyson had to play this new kid with tyranids. The kid didn't know the rules of his army so heavily slowed down the game. Dice down was called and they were not able to finish the game, giving a major victory to this kid. So he got vaulted up to table 2 against a 3 Land Raider and Jaws list. 4 monstrous creatures taken down with 1 Jaws.......massacare. So yea, easy?<br />
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It's on like donkey kong for Round 2!<br />
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Edit: Oh right my list!<br />
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Succubus w/Agoniser, haywire<br />
Hemo w/Shattershard and liquifier gun<br />
Hemo w/Liquifier<br />
Hemo w/Liquifier<br />
9 Bloodbrides, Syren w/Agoniser, haywire<br />
4 Trueborn with blasters<br />
Venom w/dual cannons<br />
3 Trueborn with Splinter Cannons<br />
Venom w/dual cannons<br />
Warriors w/Blaster<br />
Venom w/dual cannons<br />
Warriors w/Blaster<br />
Venom w/dual cannons<br />
10 Wyches, Hekatrix with Agoniser, haywire<br />
Raider w/Flickerfield, Aether Sails, Grisly Trophies<br />
9 Wyches, Hekatrix with Agoniser, haywire<br />
Raider w/Flickerfield, Aether Sails, Grisly Trophies<br />
8 Wyches, Hekatrix with Agoniser, haywire<br />
Raider w/Flickerfield, Aether Sails, Grisly Trophies<br />
6 Reavers w/2 Heat lances, Arena Champ with Venom blade<br />
5 Scourges with Dual haywire blasters<br />
Ravager, Nightshields, Flickerfield<br />
Ravager, Nightshields, Flickerfield<br />
Razorwing Fighter, Splinter Cannon, Flickerfield, Nightshields Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-61617911327371051232011-08-01T21:55:00.000-07:002011-08-01T21:58:13.640-07:00Rhyas....and my first tournament win.This past weekend I played in a local Warmahordes tournament at Dragon's lair. Ian, our other PG ran a nice 4 round Steamroller for us. There were about 20 people in attendance so it was a pretty good turn out. We had a few people from San Antonio and Waco that I know of.<br />
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I've played in two other tournaments before this one. My first one I placed third after getting my @ss handed to me by Gooch in the third round. That was my first time playing against eVlad and that guy is dirty! lol My second tourny I placed roughly 4 - 6th I believe. This was one where a Houston guy playing Circle knocked me out first round. That was a really good game. I had no idea the movement shenanigans Circle could do! hehe.<br />
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I had some really good games this weekend. I've really been wanting to play Rhyas since I started Legion but never got the model until recently. I have been enjoying her immensely. A lot of people around the interwebs are naysayers about her performance. I believe it's because she is not an easy button caster. She takes patience and will not win games for you by herself. You have to use all the other cheaty bits from Legion to do that!<br />
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On to my list I used.<br />
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Rhyas<br />
Typhon<br />
Ravagore<br />
Nep. Protector<br />
Shredder<br />
Shredder<br />
Max Swordsmen + UA<br />
Sheperd<br />
Sheperd<br />
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This is the Rearguard theme list, tier 3, so the UA is free. I am really liking this list. Start the game with upkeeps, whole army has stealth first turn, and the free UA. I used this list for 3 of my games out of 4 and won all three of those. My first game I used Saeryn and won that one.<br />
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Round 1: Saeryn vs Cryx<br />
Round 2: Rhyas vs Thyra<br />
Round 3: Rhyas vs Dr. Arkadius<br />
Round 4: Rhyas vs Garryth<br />
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I think I am starting to get pretty good with her. The guy in the last round I played against won the Wargamescon steamroller and Lock N Load as well I believe. Really nice guy and a great opponent. He even asked me if we could get some more games in some time for him to practice against a good Legion player. Made my day :PCalderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-32964937361964614502011-07-26T12:03:00.000-07:002011-07-26T12:03:16.899-07:00Court of the ArchonSo rumors have been posted with screenshots of the two new Finecast models for Court of the Archon. The Ur-ghul and Medusae. The ur-ghul looks like a skinned DE man. Kindy freaky looking. The medusae looks like a headcrab with tentacles, which is what it is supposed to look like.<br />
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I really like the medusae of all 4 of the options in the court. D6 strength and D6 ap flamer template is hawt. As is now though, you can only take 2 and then have to take 1 of the each for the other three options. Really lame. Takes the potential right out of that Codex entry. The T5 guy? Why bother, his toughness never matters! Now if you could pick and choose, that would add so much flavor and potential for a really awesome unit. Buuuuuut Gw continues to put together some really awesome new books but then have an entry in it like that to just make you go, "Wha?!". Pyrovore comes to mind. <br />
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I'm looking forward to the last few pieces of the Dark Eldar line to come out. The special characters and especially the Bomber!Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-37716833889838714462011-07-22T14:20:00.000-07:002011-07-25T16:41:12.563-07:00DE vs Grey KnightsSo the Grey Kniggets have been out for a while. I believe I know how they tick now. So I am going to go over some things to look out for when facing up against the elite of the elite.<br />
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Overall the Grey Knights are a very tough force. They may not have a high model count if going the paladin route but they can withstand punishment. If they opt for an all purifier list then it is still 40+ marines. I will just go over the various units in the book and talk about what I think of them in relation to Dark Eldar.<br />
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<b><u>HQ's:</u></b><br />
<i>Draigo</i> - Eh, honestly he is whatever to me. Pretty standard 250+ space marine HQ. You shouldn't treat him any different than you would say Lysander. They pretty much have the same stats and so die the same. He buffs the army pretty good but there is nothing to change what he has already done for his army.<br />
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<i>Librarian</i> - Now these are how Librarian's should be! Buying what powers you want for 5pts a piece?! Sweet! Anyways, these guys are a real good buffing units and/or for the squad they are with. The powers we need to watch out for against them are Sanctuary and Shrouding. Weather you are assault based or shooty, one of these two powers is going to play havoc with you. Sanctuary will give anyone trying to assault the squads around the libby pause for sure. Don't let that be a deterrant though. That would be playing to thier advantage. They would rather you not assault them and be content to sit and shoot you to death. It also depends on the situation. If they are not sitting on an objective, you don't nessecarily need to assault that squad. Kill points however, that squad will have 2-3 kill points in it so it's worth taking out. I think being hyper aggressive in positioning is important here. Get as close as possible before launching the assault, don't try and long shot an assault because you will pay for it. Shrouding plus bolstered ruins anyone? Yea that's going to be annoying to try and shoot them down. However, the good news is with that mighty 2++ they can still roll ones.... So volume of fire is going to start playing a big role in this kind of situation. I now play with 4 venoms in my lists for this very reason(helps against other armies too).<br />
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<i>Bro-captains, Champs and Grand masters</i> - Really the only thing to look out for against these guys is the Heroic Sacrifice ability. Don't send an expensive HQ or other model to kill this guy, he might get you too!<br />
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<i>Inquisitors</i> - Whatever, these guys are chumps. They can bring some cool wargear and change FOC but I would not go out of my way to try and deal with them. <br />
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<b><u>Elites:</u></b><br />
<i>Purifiers</i> - These are probably going to be the mainstay of most non-paladin armies you might face. They are pretty dang good for what you pay for. They might even be troops to boot if they pay the Crowe tax. So they can get up to 4 Psycannons in the squad and can equip I6 halberds. Guess what? They still die like marines. The only thing that causes me to think for more than a second about weather to assault them or not is Cleansing Flame. With the new FAQ out, wyches get our 4++ against it. Couple that with Feel No Pain and you won't lose as many as before the FAQ. So I have no problem assaulting in on these guys anymore.<br />
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<i>Techmarine</i> - The now infamous grenade dispenser. The only thing I despise in this codex is Pychotroke grenades. Rad nades are fine and so are blind. But man, I win nades? They should be more expensive honestly. They are a joke for only power weapon cost. Most of the time I see this guy carrying a warding staff for the 2++. They still only have one wound, easily delt with.<br />
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<i>Paladins</i> - These guys can take a beating! 2 wounds, 2+ save, standard 5++(4++ in combat). Very respectable. Access to an apothecary as well. Not to shabby. Normal small arms fire won't put a very big dent in them. You know what does though? Lances. Lances smoke paladins pretty good. Shrouding will make this a bit a pain but is still your best ranged answer to paladins. In combat they can weather a fierce storm. 20 paladins with libby and Draigo can hold off 40+ wyches and two HQ's pretty handily. I think the key here is to wear them down with lances and small arms before engaging to get the numbers down and overwhelm them.<br />
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<i>Assassins</i> - I love these guys. Just fight them like normal and they die, nothing special you have to do really. Vindy will be most common, but he can roll 1's and 2's just like everything else. The calidus you have to wait till she comes out to deal with. Her template can kill swaths or our infantry. Having leadership 9 helps causing then she only kills on 5's but still, it's a template so be careful of being clumped up. Once she is out though, she can be dealt with standardly though. <br />
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<b><u>Troops:</u></b><br />
<i>Grey Knight Squad</i> - All force weapons and a couple of psycannons. Just regular marines to me. They die to shooting and assaulting like regular dudemans. <br />
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<i>Grey Knight Terminators</i> - Not as dangerous as paladins. Die just like regular termies. They are kind of a cross between C:SM shooty termies and assault termies. so they have a 4++ in combat, unless halbreds, and can have psycannons but not as many as in a paladin squad.<br />
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I would comment on the inquistorial squads but I don't have alot of experience on them yet. From what I've seen though they are just guardsmen with fancy wargear is all. They are still BS3 and T3, and crappy armor. The only thing to watch out for really is the death cult assassins and crusaders. These guys don't have grenades so keep that in mind if they are on the board.<br />
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<b><u>Fast Attack:</u></b><br />
<i>Stormraven</i> - Pretty Standard. The only thing different is the missles and those mean nothing against us.<br />
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<i>Interceptors</i> - They can teleport once per game, so keep in mind for objective grabbing. Also, they can cary incenerators and are jump infantry.<br />
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<b><u>Heavy:</u></b><br />
<i>Dreadknight</i> - The only scary thing about this guy is the heavy incenerator. Other than that he's a monsterous creature so......go posion! lol<br />
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<i>Purgation Squad</i> - For a solid 100pts these guys can pack 4 incenerators!!! Yikes! I treat them the same as when I see burna boys on the table. Kill them asap!!!!<br />
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<i>Dreads</i> - Strength 8 auto cannons. These are what you will see most often. They need to die as soon as you can get them. Becareful though, they have foritude so shaking them won't do.<br />
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Those are my thoughts on most of the units in the Grey Knights codex. If I didn't list them, they don't really matter. They have some neat toys but they are still just marines. <br />
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<span style="color: red;">If you guys have any subjects you would like me to go more into detail about Grey Knights drop me a line at </span><a href="mailto:caldera40k@gmail.com"><span style="color: red;">caldera40k@gmail.com</span></a>Calderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8323973231883880312.post-17721569792289255872011-06-24T13:39:00.000-07:002011-06-24T13:39:58.632-07:00And so it begins...My name is Caldera. I've been playing warhammer 40k for 14 years now with a gap where 4th edition should be. Armies I have played and know pretty well are Tyranids, Chaos Marines and now Dark Eldar.<br />
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With that out of the way, the reason I am writing this article now is to relay my gaming experience with others. I would like to share my thoughts on my favorite army with you all. be it the avid gamer or newer person to our hobby, my hope is that everyone can take some small piece of the article and apply them to their gaming. <br />
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I have wanted to play Dark Eldar for a long time now. Back when this all began for me Dark Eldar, had just been released. I had a choice between them and something else that peaked my interest, Tyranids. Nobody in my area played Dark Eldar though, so I ended up with the nids. Also, the models for DE back then were hideous! Now with the arrival of the new Dark Kin, my eyes just lit up with how gorgeous the models were. I was compelled to rekindle that initial yearning for them. Ok enough of that, on to the meat and potatoes.<br />
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My initial thoughts:<br />
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<u>Speed</u> - Holy cow this army is fast. I love it. Coming from Tyranids, the outright speed of this army is overwhelming. I didn't know what to do exactly. Even an all foot DE army is fast via web way portals.<br />
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<u>Fragility</u> - The army can pack a punch against every other army. With that said though, it hurts to get punched back! This was something I had to learn the hard way how to deal with. Vehicles are opened very easily and my squads can not with stand too much of a beating.<br />
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<u>Options</u> - There are so many ways to play this army, it makes me ecstatic thinking about all the ways you could play this codex. All wyches, check. All coven, check. All Warriors, check. Hybrid, check. So many possibilities.<br />
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I started with my Dark Eldar in November when they were released. I've played hundreds of games with them versus almost every other combination of army(I love my gaming scene here in Austin). Also, I have taken them to lots of local tournaments, Adepticon, Alamo GT, and Railhead Rumble. I have done fairly well with them so far but they are going to take some more time to master. Dark Eldar are not forgiving of their archons making mistakes!<br />
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Now on to what I have learned since I began playing them:<br />
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<u>Speed </u>- One of our best assets when you get comfortable with how fast this army can be. The speed becomes a very valuable tool for you. If your opponent knows what your army is capable of, it becomes a weapon for you. It plays mind games with your opponent because they can't make mistakes or they will pay for it. Usually in most games, your opponent only has one good round of shooting to cripple you or you are going to get where you want to be.<br />
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<u>Fragility</u> - Pain tokens, pain tokens, pain tokens! The only one that matters is the first one. The rest are just a bonus. With Feel No Pain, my wyches no longer fear being blown out of their transports(which is will happen). Also, when you get in a fight, your durability goes way up. This will cause your opponent to have to deal with your units with more force, in the process limiting their options.<br />
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<u>Options </u>- This one just pulls at the hobbyist in me. So many ways I could play this one army. I still have not played with every option yet! I have played with so many different variations though. The things<em> </em>I have found out about them is that there is not a whole lot of bad units in the army. So you can pick the units you like and still have a solid army.<br />
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In the end, it all comes down to play style. Thankfully there are many ways to play this book and that is truly fantastic. Some things to take away form this article hopefully; Dark Eldar are a glass cannon, lots of ways to play them and it takes patience to play them long enough to learn the In's and outs. Dark Eldar are not forgiving or easy to play, but they are very rewarding once you get the hang of them.. You will hear the cries of your opponents and it will bring pleasure to your dark soul......as it should be!<br />
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CalderaCalderahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16481355458725299341noreply@blogger.com0