Adepticon Day 1 Recap - 40k championships

As promised, I'm wiped out but will be recapping the first day at Adepticon.  I had a great time at the 40k championships and learned a couple things

1. Need more practice games to learn the little tricks and make adjustments
2. I have to stop taking "one trick pony" armies.  This sanguinary guard list is a lot of fun but relies on the matchup.

With that said, I placed 15th overall in a field of 246 players... not bad for the biggest championship ever!  Go figure if I could have done a little better!

Since I get wrapped up in the moment, I'm not going to do detailed battle reports, just some nice pictures and an overview.  I'll come back later with my opponents' names as well.

First game was against one of the top 16 finalists.  Great painted tyranid list.  I was facing somewhere in the 50+ genestealer range, so I knew I had to be extra careful in assault.  Lucky for me there was a nice piece of forest mid way through the table... with bugs not getting "frag grenades" I knew I'd strike first.

That was the brave last stand of the blood angel force.  I repelled wave after wave of genestealers, but in the end what got me is the tervigon granting feel no pain.  My opponent rolled 12 out of 14 saves with feel no pain (in combat resolution) and multiple phases there were only two enemies left.  I never was able to jump out and get at the big bugs intact.  Was a fun game, but in the end I was tabled!

Second game went a little better, I matched up with a beautifully painted (in progress) iron snakes army.  He didn't get the chance to do the freehand icons but I am really looking forward to seeing his army finished.  It was one of those games that just went my way, his rolls were not so hot and I was able to dictate the flow with my jump troops.  The Sanguinar was a beast in combat and killed h is weight.  In the end I ended up with the win.  Here's a couple of great models from the game. 

Third game was against a really well played eldar player with beautiful subtle colors and gorgeous freehand work.  It was the typical air cav and I knew he had the advantage when it came to mobility so I had to try and corner his troops.  I decided to not even try for grabbing objectives and focus on "mark for death" and killpoints.  I was able to corral some of his units in a corner and then once I had the killpoint advantage I ran away.  For three turns the angels did a "tactical retreat".  The funny part of the game was Dante and Eldrad going toe to toe for 6 combat phases.  The psycher kept killing a few assault marines mixed in the fray and winning combat resolution by always making his fortune saves!  All said and done, my ancient Dante pulled it off.

Finally my fourth game, I died in a pathetic "almost tabling".  The chaos army of doom with three squads of oblits, two demon princes, dropping melta terminators and lots of deathguard in rhinos.  It was brutal.  I tried to bait his units back, but some not  so hot rolling on my part didn't help.  I ended the game with only a couple of guard left.  The Sanguinar wiffed a couple of times as well and left a demon prince with one wound who proceeded to work my army!  Hey, these things happen.

All said and done, not a bad showing.  I always try to end up in the top 25%... soft scores really helped me get the placing that I did.  Looking forward to the team tournament tomorrow.  4 games down, 7 to go!!!

Here are some great army pictures I saw of awesome armies from the con.

Sanguinary Guard Done! (with basing)

It's so nice to see a finished product, I just wish I was a little better at taking pictures.  Here are the shots of the 4 squads of Sanguinary Guard with the basing finished.  These miniatures took way longer then I expected.  I'll have shots of the 2 squads of assault marines finished tonight after I'm done with the backpacks.

For each of the squads, I tried to match their right leg knee-pad.  For gaming purposes, I also numbered the bottom of the base so I can identify which squad is which easily.

I had a lot of fun basing some of the taller resin bases.  With the ruins, I was able to glue some dried flowers against the facing for support.  Places like Hobby Lobby or Michaels are perfect to find supplies.  One plant is worth decades of projects.  I'm still using the dried plants/flowers from my kroot project a few years ago and I haven't even gotten 10% through the supplies.

Tonight, I'll have the backpacks done for my assault squad and I'm going to try and get as far as possible on the five objective markers.  I'll be sure to post progress.

Wings, how I hate thee

I'm hitting a wall with my hobby progress, mainly due to the lack of strength in my painting hand.  I think it has to do with the fact I've been cramming in way too much painting and repetitive strokes (insert repetitive strokes joke here)... mainly due to the damn Sanguinary Guard wings!

Figuring there is about 30 feathers per side, that's 120 feathers per model multiplied by 21, that's 2,520 feathers.  Seeing that I do three line highlights per feather, we're talking 7,560 repetitive motions.  Oh, that doesn't even count every shoulder pad with all the wing grey colored details too and the weapon "feathers".  Argh. Combined with typing on the computer all day for my job, I need to give my hands/wrists a vacation.

I'm really close to finishing them off, here's the work in progress on my chapter banner.

On to the home stretch, less then 2 weeks until Adepticon.  I'm hoping to (wishful thinking) finish the Sanguinary Guard tonight.  That will leave me with:

- 10 backpacks
- finish the drop pod
- 5 objective markers
- Warboss on bike
- Big Mek
- finish the mekboy stompa
- Snikrot and 10 pals
- 6 killa kans
- 7 nob bikers
- 3 grot helpers
- pretty army lists
- touch up an old display base
- do all the grass/flowers/foliage on all the bases
- write the Adepticon quiz show questions, 51 in total and get Jeopardy ready!
- most importantly get supplies for Adepticon (beer, etc.)

Yeah, this will be a last minute rush this year.

B.A. Priests done, & lots of assembly

It's crunch time now with only a few weeks to Adepticon.  It's time to maximize painting time when I'm not traveling and I really need to get some practice games in.  Here's the finished product of the priests and the non helmeted assault marines (minus backpacks).

So what does my hobby A.D.D. do?  Makes me want to procrastinate by assembling a bunch of models.  It was nice to spend some time on the couch with my wife and I got to put together the storm raven, two dreads and 5 death company.  I bought the forgeworld chaplain dread awhile back and by adding bits of the new furioso dread, was able to make a sweet looking death company dreadnought.

I've decided in my gladiator list to add Snikrot & Pals to one of the sidebars.  Traditionally there is one of those missions where a model is able to carry some sort of nasty titan killing vortex grenade.  Snikrot should be the perfect vessel.  I bought the standard kommandos, but needed a few more so I added some old backpacks and bitz to a few ork boyz to make them part of the crew.  I had the chance to make two of the new ork burna boyz too... great plastic kit.

Currently on the workbench is my custom Dante (figured I'd make him look better in plastic) along with the Sanguinator.  As I was working on the priests' power swords I worked on these at the same time.  Additionally in this batch I'll be painting the chapter banner and power fist for the Sanguinary Guard.

Tomorrow will be a non-stop hobby day at the Chicago Battle Bunker where I'm hoping to get a practice game in with my Blood Angels and Ork Gladiator list.

Red & Gold: Blood Angels Update!

Now that I've finally settled in to the new place, I have my photo booth up and running.  Adepticon is fast approaching and it's time to kick up the updates along with getting painting done!  Here's some progress I've made on my assault marines and sanguinary guard.  I haven't added any folieage or grass to the bases yet, I like to do that in bigger batches.

I've also experimented with a new way of doing blond hair.  What do you think of this method?  I start with Tausept Ocre, then line in some bleached bone, then a little bit of lining in white. The example is on the far right.

Tonight will be another update, as I'm going to take a good look of my total project and what I have to do!

Sanguinary Guard Test Model

Had a blast painting up my first test model for the Sanguinary Guard.  A little tedious on the wings, but overall I think the model turned out nice.  Waiting for my scenic bases to come in, so I'll hold off from doing a lot more models until they arrive.  Crazy, an 1850 list will only be 34 models!  Almost done with my standard assault marine as well, should have pictures up on that tomorrow.