2011-10-14

Pre-heresy Thousand Sons (concept)


Although I am proud Blood Angels player and a strong loyalist, I have felt the need to build a Pre-Heresy Thousand Sons army to honor their once proud and noble legion. I wanted to create clean looking models that reveal the corruption at a second closer look. Well, here’s the first squad. What do you think?
From Thousand Sons
From Thousand Sons
From Thousand Sons
From Thousand Sons
From Thousand Sons

2011-08-31

40K and ergonomics


Well, second BoLS article has been published and I have to say I really like the experience of writing for BoLS, mostly because of the nice compliments I get in the comments. Knowing the comments section fairly well I always brace for impact, but surprisingly everyone is pretty positive. I guess it’s because I bring a fresh perspective to BoLS and to make sure it stays that way I plan to only write something when I really have something to say. With this approach I will write as long as BoLS is willing to accept text and I’ll keep writing even if the comments aren’t favorable.
Speaking of comments, they gave me some interesting new insights into 40K and ergonomics:
  1. I figured that back pain must be well known among 40K players as we are not necessarily the sportiest type of people, but I was still surprised how many and how openly readers shared their experiences.
  2. Heavy duty boots are not only good in the military, but also when playing 40K!
  3. 6-inch bed raisers are perfect to raise the workspace almost exactly to your desired height.
  4. Some people like to clean parts on a full recliner while watching TV with the paint station on their lap. Yes, I guess that’s comfortable although your arms will get tired after a while.
  5. Anti-fatigue mats seem to be popular… although I am not sure yet how they’re supposed to work.
  6. One guy reports painting while wearing a lumbar support belt (which is usually used during heavy lifting exercices). Never thought about that, but I am tempted to give it a try.
  7. Many gamers say that the gym is their best friend. I guess we gamers are better than the stereotype after all!
On a related note, Brent wins the “successfully googled Parcival’s blog although he was warned to die of boredom” award. Seriously, I feel very honored that he looked up my little blog and even left a comment. I like his way of writing a lot, although I agree that with his particular style you either love it or hate it. For me, Brent kinda falls into the same category like Tasty Taste as they are both great guys to meet in person, but on the WWW they successfully maintain some aura of obscurity that leaves you wondering to what kind of human being you’re exactly talking to. Some people get enraged, some people simply get entertained. Knowing that I will never entertain people like Brent and that it’s pointless to copy him, I will just continue to do my own thing while secretly admiring and teasing him in my own articles. ;-)

2011-08-21

ETC 2011 in pictures


Here you find my complete set of pictures from the ETC 2011:
ETC 2011
You can find my written impressions in my first BoLS article.
Update: you can now find all ETC 2011 40K results on T3.

2011-07-24

Blood Angels are in the upcoming Space Marine game


The Space Marine preview has always been breath taking:
I kept telling myself though that I won’t need this game since it will take away from my painting time and honestly, who wants to play Smurfs? But then they released this video covering the multiplayer customizer:
I just had my second look at it tonight and yes, you can do Blood Angels! If you move on to like 5:37 in the video and rapidly click play/pause until you see pauldron badges page 6/8 (around 5:41), you can clearly see the mark of our beloved Sanguinius. Customizing the rest of the armor with the various armor pieces provided and the colors you can choose from should be no problem for any devote Blood Angels player. Now just keep those Chaos Space Marines coming!

2011-07-21

Back from Wargames Con


It’s almost a week now since I have come back from the Wargames Convention in Austin, TX, and I still have happy and vivid memories of that trip.
The BoLS crew is extremely nice and all players were very welcoming and you can see me and my Blood Angels in a Video Battle Report and today’s Pic Of The Day.
You can also have a look at my very own Picasa photo album covering the event – well, a small part of it:
Wargames Convention 2011

2011-05-24

Back at painting BA and upgrading my army


Well, after my Warmachine hiatus it feels good to be back at painting BA. However, the detour was worth it: I painted my Cygnar army for the first time with a palette and those models have tiny little details, so I think that experience transfered into my new BA models having smoother blending and more nicely painted details. What do you think?
Sanguinary Priests
From Blood Angels
From Blood Angels
From Blood Angels
From Blood Angels
More Marines for my two existing Tactical Squads to add more punch:
From Blood Angels
From Blood Angels

2011-02-23

GW lives in a parallel universe


Really. GW always appears awkward and clumsy to me when they are trying to explain to their readers how they turn their army into a winning army. Their tactics may work in their local metagame, but when I read their advice I always get the thought “there are ways that let you hit still way harder”.
I just ran across their blog post on on how to kill a Blood Angel. It shows the general GW symptoms of overly hyping the latest releases (Storm Raven and Furioso Dreadnought in this case) and then offering meager advice on how to counter the threat:
Blood Angels can be a bit trickier to take down as they have Death Company and Assault Squads as troop units too, but the principle is the same.
Umm, you noticed in the Codex that Death Company can’t hold objectives, right? Just outrun them.
Take a look in your Codex to find the weapon with the biggest blast, highest strength and lowest AP, it’s guaranteed to cause a few worried faces.
Unless the Blood Angels player is sporting an Honor Guard equipped with Melta Guns, in that case the worried face is probably yours.
However, he comes my favorite part (added bold type face for emphasis):
Walkers are a great way to hold up Blood Angels units that would otherwise be chewing through your weaker squads or holding objectives. As long as the Blood Angels don’t have a power fist or a thunder hammer in the unit, your walker will be practically invincible.
Hello? GW? Reality check? Have you recently been playing games outside your dorm rooms and noticed what every Sergeant is equipped with?

Blood Angels Assault Squad