Ah yes, gaming! And a lot of fun it is... but should it be miniatures or MMORPG?
31 October 2005
October '05 wrap-up
1. Finished the Tau stealth suit squad
2. Started working on ruins terrain pieces
3. Started assembling the Tau gue'vasa squad
4. Played some EQ2 (conjuror is now level 27, cleric alt is level 18)
5. Started this blog!!
Not very good, but it is a start
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30 October 2005
The Tau - victorious!
The set-up
Orks on the left, Tau on the right. (please forgive the 'unfinished' look of our pieces!) Kroot, in the trees, facing shoota boyz, gretchin, and 2 Zzap guns. Directly behind the Kroot is the Tau HQ and the Hammerhead.
In the Tau center, a gundrone squadron and Gue'vasa (human helpers)
On the far side, the Orks have a trukk (with boyz), HQ, 2 killa kans, a dreadnought, and a mob of slugga boyz. Directly opposite them in the corner are Tau fire warriors.
The scenario - Seek and Destroy (from the 4th ed. 40K rulebook)
The table - 4' by 4'

End of turn one - the horde moves forth, with only the Tau center moving forward in a desperate attempt to grab the ruins... the gundrones were wiped out by the trukk boyz. The Kroot are able to shoot most of the zzap gun crews down.
End of turn two - orks continue to move forward, Kroot, HQ, and Hammerhead shoot up the shoota boyz. The gue'vasa are defeated by the trukk boyz, who then try to visit the fire warriors.

End of turn three - trukk and boyz gunned down by the fire warriors and the timely intervention of deep-striking Stealth suits. Ork HQ closes in on the Hammerhead, but is shot up by tank, kroot, and Tau HQ. The Hammerhead loses its rail gun in the exchange to ork melta bombs.

End of turn four - the ork HQ is destroyed by the Kroot in hand-to-hand, leaving three hounds as the sole survivors. The killa kans are neutralized by the fire warriors and stealth suits, with one being destroyed, the other being immobilized and the big shoota destroyed. The dreadnought and sluggas continue to advance...

End of turn five - Sluggas and the dread move the fire warriors off the hill by fire, but the fire warriors stop at board edge (bonded!). Tau HQ sends off the remaining shoota boyz and moves to finally help the beleagured fire warriors.

End of game - the last remaining burna of the slugga mob being hunted down by Crisis suits, the rest of the mob having been gunned down by the fire warriors and stealth suits.
This was another fun game. It doesn't really matter to me that I win or lose; I just like to push the pieces around. I think that I need to be more aggressive with the Hammerhead though. It usually sits on the battlefield like a giant pillbox.
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27 October 2005
Success!!!
Then, on Sunday, I played some EQ2, the first time for almost three weeks. And some good timing it was too! Some other guildies (including one of Nomad Elf's characters) were on the trail of one of EQ2's special Halloween quests. This one involved some heavy combat (for our levels) with the mighty Pumpkin King. This is a 2-group raid mob, for our levels at least (I run a level 26 conjuror as my main). The four of us waited around for a long time until finally grouping with 8 others to try the King. With a full raid group, the Pumpkin King went down fairly easily, although Nomad Elf's druid went down as soon as the King spawned... I guess he doesn't like elves. The best part was the loot. I will find links to the items, but one was a +8 INT ring, and I received a +10 INT headpiece after a guildie won it by lotto after the fight. He was nice enough to just give it to me (his character is a Berserker). All in all, a great EQ2 night!
20 October 2005
Projects
The first project is a Tau army for Warhammer 40K. I have been following GW games since 1987, but I had never become seriously involved (for some this project is not a 'serious' 40K project!). The catalyst is of course the interest my sons have in 40K. I am only working on approximately 1500 pts of Tau, which is not a large force but is perfect for me.
Project 2 is a Reptus force for Warlord from Reaper. Warlord is a skirmish-scale fantasy game, and Reaper is producing an entire line of miniatures to support it. So far, I have only 10 minis for my Reptus force.
Number 3 is the ever-present naval project. At the moment, I am approaching my naval collection is a different way. Instead of buying bunches of minis (see a pattern here), I want to purchase only those minis needed for a specific battle. I see naval gaming now as more of a break from painting figures instead of my main collecting focus.
Once I get my digital camera straight I'll post some work-in-progress shots...

