Dark Eldar colour scheme tests

The DE raider is a pretty cool kit. Lots of options, and the guys hanging off the side can be a great source of bits. They're also really useful to use as guinea pigs for colour scheme experiments.

I've been back and forth on how I want my DE to look. I wanted to avoid purple as I have a few purple armies kicking about already. I'd probably avoid green too, as my skaven use that as their main colour. I narrowed it down to the following 3 schemes. All of which are, admittedly, slightly sloppy (bad priming for one) but they should get the idea across.

SCHEME ONE


Pros: Yellow is pretty striking. Yellow is pretty unique as well, so I'm less likely to run into someone else with a similar army.
Cons: Took ages. Painting yellow is a pain and I don't the way I did it looks that good. Painting yellow on the smooth flat vehicles will probably drive me insane.


SCHEME THE SECOND



Pros: Looks the most vibrant of the 3 in real life. Scheme would be very easy to do on vehicles as well as infantry.
Cons: Fairly standard looking DE scheme, perhaps? No distinction between the clothy bits and the armoury bits like there is on the other 2 tests, but I can always play around with that I suppose.

SCHEME C



Pros: Red and black looks suitably evil, I think. Contrasts nicely with the bright hair colours that will be dotted about the army too.
Cons: Very similar to my Dark Elf scheme, if and when I decide to pick them up again. Even with foundation paints, getting a smooth red on vehicles might be a challenge?


Anyway, what do you guys think? Which is your favourite?

Which Wych is which Wych

The festive season descends upon us like an angry Blood Angel, only with less whirring chainswords and more chocolate reindeer.

Speaking of Blood Angels, I took my Dark Eldar for a game against Mr. MCT last week. It was my first time sending them up against anything wearing power armour, so I was curious to see how I'd do. Here are a few things I learned.

Wyches seem to be a solid assault unit. I'll be running 2 units each with a fighty HQ in my 1500 list, and I think this should be a good balance between being able to eat units, but not so powerful I automatically steam roll stuff and get shot to hell next turn. Which is good.

The loss of the Haemonculus really hurts when my transports inevitably begin exploding. However, the main reason I took them out was the H's lack of fleet, which I still think is vital enough to Wyches to be worth the trade off.

I'm liking Razorflails a lot more than I thought I would. I'm tempted to swap out the Hydra Gauntlets for a Flail in each unit.



I'm going up against what I think will be an all-infantry Raven Guard list on Monday. This should be fun, as I've faced mostly mech lists so far. I'm resisting the urge to swap all my Dark Lances for Disintegrator Cannons though. All-comers fo life, yo.

More DE HQs

Not started painting any of them yet, but I've been assembling Dark Eldar for ages and ages, it seems!
Anyway, most are standard so I won't bore you with pictures, but I have been messing with HQs.

Here's my first. She was originally meant to be an Archon, but she came out looking a lot more...nude than I was imagining to begin with. I think she'll make a pretty good succubus though.




I decided I needed an actual Archon still. At the moment she's just blu-tacked together so I can see how the pose etc looks. Thoughts? Not sure about her right arm either. Maybe a blast pistol?

Dark Eldar 3 games in

I managed to get a mighty 3 games in this week, to break in my new DE force. The good news is there was plenty of pain and despair inflicted. The bad news is that most of it was inflicted on me.

My army list was a bit of a hodge podge mix of things. Stuff I liked the look of from the miniature range (most of the first wave of releases), stuff I already owned (Harlequins, the forgeworld Pheonix Bomber) and a few things I wanted to try out (Lady Malys and a Haemonculus).
Here's what my 1500 list looked like.

-----------------------
Lady Malys

Haemonculus
(Agoniser)

9 Wychs
(Hydra Gauntlets, Hekatrix with Agoniser)
Raider
(Flickerfield)

9 Wychs
(Razorflails, Hekatrix with Agoniser)
Raider
(Flickerfield)


10 Warriors
(Blaster, Splinter Cannon, Sybarite with Agoniser)
Raider
(Flickerfield)

10 Warriors
(Blaster, Dark Lance)

6 Reavers
(2x Caltrops, 2 x Heat Lances)

Voidraven
(Flickerfield, 1 Shatter Missiles)

6 Harlequins
(Kisses, 2 fusion pistols, Shadowseer, Death Jester)

1494
-----------------------

First game was against craftworld Eldar, a guardian horde. With the exception of 3 warwalkers, everyone was on foot. This ended up being a fairly non dynamic battle, sadly. He was new to his army as well, so we both sort of kept our distance and slapped each other around a little before drawing with an objective each. I had set up for a bit of a first turn assault on his forces (using Malys' redeployment abilities), but got the initiative seized on me, which took the wind out of my sails a little. I did manage to run down a 15 man squad of guardians using only a single sybarite however, which was pretty entertaining.

Second game was up against Imperial Guard. A valk and a Vendetta, a bunch of Chimeras, a Manticore, a Deathstrike, and a single Russ. This time I think I made the mistake of heading in to a stand up fight, rather than engaging all of my forces against part of his. I really don't have the numbers to be able to commit a portion of it as a distraction. AV 12 was my bane this game, as it continues to be for my gaming career. Give me multiple Land Raiders over multiple Chimeras any day. I don't think I managed to crack open any of his transports. By the end of the game I had a single Reaver left (albeit the most bad-ass reaver in existence; throughout the game he survived numerous bolt and las shots, a straight up lascannon hit, and being set on fire numerous times). On the plus side however, I got the hang of a couple of tricks that will work for me in the future. One was using cover with my raiders. Whilst I was hit with a lot of fire power, I think I managed to claim a save from most of it (in which case I might be able to trim Flickerfields to free up some points in the future. Will need further investigation). The other was how to use my bikes. I deployed them behind cover out of sight of most of his army. First turn I moved forwards 12 to unleash my double heat lance on one of his fliers, before using my assault move to dodge back behind cover. Granted, the part of my plan that involved rolling more than a 2 with the hit dice apparently failed, but the movement part seemed solid. My Voidraven also got immobilised but still managed to nuke the russ and the manticore. I like the Voidraven. Maybe one day I'll get to drop the mine.

3rd game I went up against a (mostly) mechanised Tau force. 3 Hammerheads (2 with rail guns, 1 with an ion cannon), 2 Devilfish fire warrior squads, 2 on foot fire warrior squads, and a big pack of outflanking kroot. Oh, there was a commander and squad of suits in reserve as well but they didn't show up till the last turn, by which time I was mostly out for the count. The jetbikes did tons better this game. I kept them turbo boosting throughout most of it, decapitating a whole squad of fire warriors in one pass. You know that must have looked awesome on the battlefield. I kept the Voidraven in reserve again, which I think is a solid tactic. It protects the thing from unwarranted enemy attentions, plus I can bring it where it can do the most damage. My main foe this time was my horrible anti-armour. I think someone must have forgotten to change the batteries in the lances before the battle, because I failed to do anything more than a stun result to any of the vehicles.

Ok, enough rambling about that. I've made a few tweaks based on what worked and what didn't. I've added in more manoeuvrability, and more lances. I've dropped the Haemonculus, too. The free pain token is nice, no doubt about that, but I think the lack of fleet hurts when I'm trying to get my wyches into the fight.

This is what my new 1500 looks like.

-----------------------
Archon
(Shadowfield, Agoniser)

Succubus
(Agoniser)

9 Wychs
(Hydra Gauntlets, Hekatrix with Agoniser)
Raider
(Flickerfield)

9 Wychs
(Razorflails, Hekatrix with Agoniser)
Raider
(Flickerfield)

10 Warriors
(Blaster, Splinter Cannon, Sybarite with Agoniser)
Raider
(Flickerfield)

10 Warriors
(Blaster, Dark Lance)
Raider
(Flickerfield)

6 Reavers
(2x Caltrops, 2 x Heat Lances)

Voidraven
(Flickerfield, 2 Shatter Missiles)

Ravager
(Flickerfield)

1496
-----------------------
As I said, more speed and more lances, which should help get the foe out of their transports, and get my wyches into the foe. I've also changed up the HQ a little. A fighty character with each squad should, I hope, give them the extra punch they need when I go up against more close combat orientated forces. I ripped through Guardsmen and Fire Warriors in close combat, but I suspect those Flesh Tearers that I sometimes fight may give me more of a fight. We shall see.


I'm mostly done with my epic quest of glueing grey plastic together, so hopefully I should be able to get some more painting posts up soon!

Sybarite Fashion; Winter collection

Just a quick post for you, I'll get something more substantial up over the weekend.

When assembling my Kabalite warrior squads, weapon choice was a bit of a problem. Internet group think can give me some ideas, but how do I know what load outs will suit me best? What do I arm my Sybarites with? Do I even want the Sybarite upgrade at all? Knowing what unit upgrades I can afford in my army list is problematic when I'm still figuring out what units I'll be using in the first place.

The answer was a bit of everything. I made sure both my Kabalite leaders were armed with Splinter Rifles so I can field them as fancy-looking-but-ultimately-regular-warriors. I also didn't want to waste any power swords or anything on them. Gotta ration out my bits for making cool characters. In the end I gave each a swinging chain blade from the Wych kit, which I think works as an agoniser if I have the points to spend.

Plus dudes loaded down with weapons look awesome.

Commissar Cosplay and Bolt Pistol auction

Earlier this year I went to the MCM expo in London. My GF was going in costume, so I decided to step up and make myself something to wear as well.
The obvious choice of course was an Imperial Guard Commissar (Alas, I lack the 8 foot physique and jutting jawbone to get away with dressing as an Ork).
Here are a few pictures. Beware, my horrific visage is incoming!




Anyway, I've been cleaning up and getting rid of a lot of the junk I love to accumulate, and have decided to put my modified Bolt Pistol up on ebay.

Auction is here
EBAY

Post Apocalyptic Pictures

Well, the last reactor has gone nuclear, the last plasma gun has cooled, and the last chainsword has been dislodged from the last head.
Had a great day yesterday, and our little 40k game was certainly apocalyptic.
Most importantly, my Phoenix got to shoot something (killed a mighty 8 chaos marines before we had to call time) and my Shadowsword got to kill something (mostly our own guardsmen when it exploded), so I was pleased!
Here are a few photos I took:

Overview of the Imperial side's forces all unpacked. You can see, from closest to furthest away, my Iron Hands, Raven Guard, a chunk of the Imperial Guard armour, the bastions, more Guard tanks, Tau, and right at the back are the Blood Angels.


We also had a few members of the Ultramarine first company.


Last but not least, Operation: Human Shield


Spies were sent to scout the enemy's forces, but only this blurry picture made it back to us


Both sides line up ready for the carnage


Things start badly for the Imperium. Orks and Chaos advance as our left flank vanishes under the initial fire storms. Our right flank remains smug under a shield generator. We also start the battle long trend of welcoming lovely chaps wearing terminator armour to view the rear armour of all our tanks. They are quite insistent that we show it to them, as they stroke their melta guns and cackle to themselves.


That's Wazdakka in the red, and that's a Vortex Grenade he's just thrown at us.

The battlefield clears out a bit after the middle stompa goes nuclear


Robo-Lysander and a sternguard squad, moments before they are mobbed by orks. When we finished the game at the end of turn 3, Lysander was still surrounded by baddies, swinging his thunderhammer at them.

Other highlights that I failed to get pictures of include:
Our disruptor beacon working like a champ and sending Abaddon, 5 terminators, several squads of obliterators and 2 demon princes off to the wrong side of the battlefield.
Alistair's colonel furiously punching an obliterator to death with his power fist before consolidating calmly into a bunker.
A combined outflanking force of Kroot and Grey Knights pouncing on a large group of Necrons.