So 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.
Vect - 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. :(
Drazhar - 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.
Lelith - 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!
Baron - 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!
Archon - 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.
Dark Light weapons - AP2 is +1 dmg on the chart now! Yay!
Wyches - Are still amazing. Haywire grenades rock vehicles now. Blast pistols are not bad options now that running before charging isn't an option anymore.
Agonizers and Venom Blades - 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.
Warriors - 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.
Reavers - 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.
Scourges - Haywire transfers well to thier weapons. Always being able ot strip Hull Points instead of just shaking a vehicle is pretty nice.
Ravagers - 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.
Flyers - 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.
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!
Monday, July 9, 2012
Monday, April 2, 2012
40K
So 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).
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 :)
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!!
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 :)
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!!
Monday, January 30, 2012
SW:TOR Level 40
So 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.
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.
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.
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.
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!!
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.
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.
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.
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!!
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
SW:TOR
I 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.
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.
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!
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!
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!
You guys should pick this up and play it even if all you do is play solo.
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.
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!
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!
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!
You guys should pick this up and play it even if all you do is play solo.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Space 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.
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.
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.
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!
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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!
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.
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.
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.
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.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
'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.
Matchups were:
Round 1 - Grey Knights
Round 2 - Space Wolves
Round 3 - Grey Knights
Matchups were:
Round 1 - Grey Knights
Round 2 - Space Wolves
Round 3 - Grey Knights
Monday, August 1, 2011
Rhyas....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.
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.
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!
On to my list I used.
Rhyas
Typhon
Ravagore
Nep. Protector
Shredder
Shredder
Max Swordsmen + UA
Sheperd
Sheperd
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.
Round 1: Saeryn vs Cryx
Round 2: Rhyas vs Thyra
Round 3: Rhyas vs Dr. Arkadius
Round 4: Rhyas vs Garryth
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 :P
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.
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!
On to my list I used.
Rhyas
Typhon
Ravagore
Nep. Protector
Shredder
Shredder
Max Swordsmen + UA
Sheperd
Sheperd
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.
Round 1: Saeryn vs Cryx
Round 2: Rhyas vs Thyra
Round 3: Rhyas vs Dr. Arkadius
Round 4: Rhyas vs Garryth
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 :P
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)