Sunday Afternoon's Alright for Football?

Bloodbowl is awesome. If you don't agree then you're wrong and I don't think I can be seen in public with you.

The game takes maybe 30-60 minutes to play. Bloodbowl is much more like rugby than football Americano. It affords you the opportunity to make fantastic conversions. Instead of points each player is worth a certain amount of money. The game is actually based on playing a season in a league so your players can gain experience, purchase new players, or your players can DIE HORRIBLY!

Orcs vs. High Elves 1.1 Million Dollars (or whatever currency)

I really won't go into details but orcs are brutal and they can bring a troll. Most of the game was spent smashing elves into the turf while the elves ran around them.

• The orcs got the first touchdown after beating the crap out of the elf with the ball, taking it, and then running it in.
• The elves scored after by throwing a very desperate pass but making it (if only).
• The elves would have scored again but the runner fell over right before the end zone and died. How did this happen, you ask? Each model has a set movement but you can move two more squares as long as you DON'T ROLL A ONE. On my second move I rolled a one. Every time you got down you opponent rolls against your armor. If they pierce your armor they roll to see what happens to you on a 2D6. 1-9 is stunned, 10-11 is seriously injured, 12 is dead (those rolls might be off). Needless to say my elf fell over and died right in front of the end zone.
• The crowd went wild and proceeded to riot ending the game in a tie (we ran out of time but the crowd CAN riot or possibly kill your players during the game).

I seriously suggest looking into it at some point. Wood elves are really hard to hit (as their players are wardancers). Vampires... well, all the undead are as slow as molasses but their specialty units can hit really hard. Although I once played as Tomb Kings and spent 3 turns with my quarterback just TRYING to pick up the ball.

Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting!

"Don't give us none of your aggravation

We had it with your discipline

Saturday night's alright for fighting

Get a little action in"

-Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting, Elton John

Aww yeah, round three brought the return of the Chaos warriors and a new HE list.

Chaos vs. Hight Elves 3k pts

Standard line-up-and-fight

Terrain: left to right

• space
• forest (a little to the left side of the board)
• Haunted Mansion on the right side of the forest
• space
• closer to my edge:
• marsh with the regen
• fence

Deployment:

Chaos

• Hellcannon
• Khorne nights (like 12?) with the lord on a juggernaut (bitch)
• Tzeentch warrior block (TW)
• Marauder blocks (50 with great weapons) (MGW) with a death mage lvl 2
• Khorne warrior block (KW) with a death mage lvl 2
• dogs
• HC

HE

• 2 Great Eagles (GE1L, GE2L)
• 9 Dragon Princes (DP) with the BSB (no special banner, just heavily armored)
• Prince (AR of Silvered Steel 2+AS, Vambrances of Defense re-roll AS 4+WS) with great weapon riding on a Star Dragon (that's the biggest one we've got) [To which my opponent replied, seriously?]
• 2x20 Phoenix Guard (PG1, PG2)
• 2x27 Lothern Seaguard (LSG1, LSG2) with mages attached to them: life and high magic.
• 2 Great Eagles (GE3R, GE4R)

Turn 1

HE
LSG1&2 move up to get in shooting range, PG1&2 and DP move up and to the right of the haunted mansion, Prince on a Dragon moves up behind the mansion. Eagles both fly up on the flanks. Magic: I get curse of arrow attraction on the KW (re-roll shooting vs. target) and take out a few.

Chaos

Knights and dogs marched forward to the left of the forest, TW with them. MGW and KW march forward. Magic: mages fail to do anything substantial. Shooting: left hellcannon misses, right hellcannon eats a few of its crew. Mages detach from the MGW and KW.

Turn 2

HE

GE2L on left charges dogs, GE1L on left charges Hellcannon. Prince on a Dragon flies over the Mansion but out of line of sight of the knights and the TW. Right GE3&4 fly up some more, PG move up, and DP move up waiting to try and pounce the Marauders. Magic: My life mage miscasts and kills a few LSG standing next to him. Shooting: take out a few more KW and my dragon, my STAR dragon opens fire on the TW and does nothing. CC: GE1L stalls the dogs, GE2L stalls the hellcannon (luckily its thunderstomp rolled a 1).

Chaos

Marauders charge PG2 but I didn't align them quite right and so PG1 was out of the picture for CC. Knights are stuck because the dogs are in the way so they turn around and try to go around the forest towards the TW and my dragon. KW charge my LSG but don't make it, getting a free round of arrows in the face (keep in mind I'm hitting on 4+ and wounding on 5+ and they get a 3+ AS). Magic: mages manage to get off some debuffs on my PG2, not good. Hellcannon on the right actually hits something but doesn't do too much damage. CC: Hellcannon on the left kills the GE1L, dogs actually beat the GE2L. PG2 lose combat and since they are -3 to leadership from the debuff, run. Luckily PG1 was right in front of the MGW that they ran into them first!

Turn 3

HE

GE3&4 charge the wizards. DP charge MGW. PG2 rally and come about to face the MGW. Prince on a dragon moves out of range of the knights and TW but still blocking their path. Magic: my life wizard miscasts again and killing himself and a few LSG (I never had him roll more than 3 dice at a time and he miscasted twice). I was able to get curse of arrow attraction on the KW again and shot more of them down (5 were left). CC: DP and PG destroy the Marauders and overrun them. Wizards are tied up with the GE.

Chaos

Dogs finally make their way around the forest. Knights and TW move up facing the Prince and PG1. KW finally charge my LSG2. Magic: nothing really happens. Shooting: the right Hellcannon eats the rest of its handlers (meaning it will soon rampage off) and the other fails to hit anything. CC: GE4R kills its wizard but GE3R gets killed by the wizard near the mansion. KW (all 5 of them) have about 50 billion attacks so they beat the tar out of my units of LSG2 who break, and barely don't get caught or get overrun.

Turn 4

HE

Ralley LSG2. GE3R (after overrunning the wizard) charges the dogs. PG1 and Prince charge TW. PG2 gets ready to fight the Hellcannon when it decides to flip out. Magic: I can't get anything off. Shooting: I kill off everything but 2 of the KW. CC: GE3R wins against the dogs, who run, the eagle overruns. Unit champion challenges Prince accepts and kills him. HOWEVER, because he is dead the dragon does not get to attack meaning I can't get overkill... TW beat up some PG and we actually draw combat.

Chaos

Knights charge prince. Hellcannon on right charges forward into PG2. KW charge LSG2, stand and shoot killing one (champion is left). Magic: the last mage runs forward and proceeds to self-destruct by miscasting but fails to wound anyone. Shooting: the Hellcannon to the left doesn't shoot as everything is too close together now.

CC: PG2 beat up on the Hellcannon, win but the HC is unbreakable.

Khorne Lord on Juggernaut (KLG) challenges my Prince. Initiative order: Prince does 2 wounds on the lord, PG deal wounds into the TW, KLG fails to hurt the prince, TW beat up on the PG, dragon kills the lord. But the real kicker is that I still lose to static combat resolution by a lot. So much so that I need a 3 to keep my PG or Prince from running.

I make both rolls at a 3.

Turn 5

HE

DP charge knights, GE charges TW, LSG1&2 charge hellcannon right. Magic: nothing. Shooting: nothing.

CC:

PG and LSG1&2 kill the hellcannon.

Initiative order: prince kills knights, DP kill knights, PG kill TW, TW kill PG, remaining knights kill DP, dragon kills the rest of the knights. TW lose and run off.

At this point my opponent has a hellcannon with 1 crew left.

Result: victory High Elves!

What went right: some very lucky rolls for leadership, GE's are fantastic for redirecting movement. Between the eagles blocking the dogs and the dragon stalling the deathstar unit of knights and TW I was able to take out the rest of the army before getting steamrolled by his monster unit.

What went wrong: GE have stomp! Miscasted twice killing several LSG. I had to make some very lucky rolls for leadership.

I should probably had my Prince charge the knights in the first place so my DP could have flank charged the TW causing them to lose their combat resolution. Then again they still would have been stubborn...

While the star dragon is intimidating it didn't do anything that a GE couldn't have. So for almost 4 turns I had a 600 point distraction which could have easily been an archmage and more PG instead of a dragon... Or a dragon mage dodging things and hitting people with spells.

I like how this list functioned. The PG can take some serious damage and with curse of arrow attraction the LSG could actually dish out a good amount of firepower. I really do want to include a dragon but I also want to include an archmage and possibly some more PG.

I could drop the life mage, take a archmage with the book with life magic, drop the star dragon for a sun dragon...

Hmm I'll have to post more on this later.

Friday Night's Alright for Fighting

Friday Night fights! Same players, different army to face. This time my opponent brought the Empire to bear on me. Not wanting to give up on my last list I stuck with it for this new fight.

Empire vs. High Elves 3k pts
Standard line-up-and-fight

Terrain: again, scattered across a line

Left to right:

• Altar of Khaine
• Bane Shrine or something
• Sigmarite Shrine
• Forest with a fence on my side
• Surprise! Fezzick's Folding Fortress (heretofore to be named F3 or F cubed) in the middle of the Empire deployment zone (that item is actually pretty damn awesome)

Deployment:

Empire:

• General with a block of great swords
• 10 handguners one with a Hochland (the champion has a special rifle and is essentially a sniper and can take out characters in units)
• Vanilla knights
• Pistoleers screening the knights (these have been my BANE before)
• A battery of cannon and mortar with an Engineer
• F3 with a unit of 15 crossbows and a level 4 wizard with life magic
• Block of greatswords with the BSB, warrior priest and a attached unit of vanilla Empire warriors
• Unit of hand guns with a level 2 wizard
• Battery of cannon and mortar with Engineer
• Somewhere in there was another level 2 wizard but I don't recall really doing anything.

HE

• BT
• LSG
• PG with GE hiding behind it
• SG
• WL

Turn 1

HE

Marched forward the PG, SG, WL, GE. Magic: able to get a little life magic to boost the SG and toughen up the PG. Shooting: BT open up and take out all of the pistoleers. Unfortunately this is all the BT succeed at for the rest of the game...

Empire

Knights march forward, followed by the block of greatswords with the general. Magic: nothing really happens as this time I remember the anti-magic banner on my SG and was able to dispel everything that came my way. Everything else stays put and shoots at me. Empire Engineers are now fantastic as they allow you to re-roll artillery dice. Cannons and mortars lay into my LSG and SG, killing a few.

Turn 2

HE

GE charges the battery next to F3, PG, SG, and WL march up again. Shooting: BT fail to hurt the knights the other misses entirely. Magic: buffed up the SG with regen from life magic, mindrazor to the PG to accept the inevitable charge... CC: eagle wiffs its attacks, the engineer actually wounds it but it stays, tying up the engineer.

Empire

...which never happens. Empire sits tight, knights and greatswords move forward. Magic: this is where things got bad for me: remember that life mage in the F3? He irresistible force casts 'Dwellers Bellow' on my PG. I lose over half the unit and the archmage inside it. They resist panicking but the damage has been done... Shooting: Hochlands wound the other wizard, artillery kills off some LSG and some SG. CC: the eagle wounds, but so does the engineer thus ending the flight of the lone eagle.

Turn 3

HE

SG charge the greatswords, WL flank charge the unit of handgunners on the right with the attached wizard. PG wheel about to face the knights, LSG move up to help the PG. Shooting: wiff wiff goes the two bolt throwers with perfect line ups to flank shot a 6x3 unit of knights passing by, this was actually the second time they missed. At this point I had had enough of BT's. Magic: given that my mage had been brought down by the dwellers my life mage couldn't get anything off to save his life. CC: WL destroy the handgunners and mage then roll into the battery on the right. SG actually do a decent job at hacking up the greatswords. Of course returning hits whittle me down but I hold.

Empire

Knights charge the PG, general's block moves up. Magic: buffs all over the place and death negatives on me. Shooting: not much happens. CC: WL take out the battery, charge into the unit attached to the greatswords. Knights take out the PG and overrun into the SG.

We both know the game is over at this point given that my LSG are too far away to help, the knights were raised with life magic back to full health, the remaining SG were debuffed to T2. We fought the round of combat and I lost because of combat resolution. SG fled, WL held, knights killed SG and wheeled about to face the WL.

What went right: initially my BT did well, my eagle charged the battery, my mages kept my units alive via life buffs. I never rolled well for my power dice I think the best I got WITH the banner of sorcery was 6.

What went wrong: BT and LSG didn't do a thing to the knights. Archmage and PG DESTROYED by a spell. Also, PG cause fear! At no point during this or the previous game did anyone take fear tests before CC!

Result: HE got rocked (again)

Despite that I felt a little better about the game. I was never sure about the WL but now I'm pretty certain I won't continue using them. GE aren't useful unless you take them in groups. I'm done with BT's and SG. Not having cavalry is a tremendous liability, I can't close on anything or get quick flank charges.

Thursday Night's Alright for Fighting

I've got 4 battle reports to post! Given that they happened a few days ago the details are a little shady. Additionally I might have forgotten exactly what each of us brought to the table.

Thursday:
Chaos Warriors vs. High Elves 3k
Standard line-up-and-fight

Chaos:
Tzeentch Lord on a Chaos Dragon
Block of ~ 36(?) Warriors (Khorne), full command
Block of ~ 36(?) Warriors (Tzeentch), full command
Block of 50 marauders with great weapons, full command
2x10 hounds
2 Hellcannons
(I have no idea what items my opponent took)

High Elves:
Prince, White Sword (KB, great weapon), AR of Caledor (2+AS), Guardian Phoenix (5+WS)
Arch Mage, lvl 4, Book of Hoeth (doubles = irresistible force with no miscast except 6's)
Noble BSB with Banner of World Dragon (immune to magic)
Mage lvl 2, Annulian Crystal (steals one power dice from opponent and gives you a dispel dice), Silver wand (+1 spell)
50 Spearguard with full command
19 Lothern Seaguard with full command
30 Phoenix Guard, full command, Banner of Sorcery (+D3 power dice)
19 White Lions, full command, Banner of Swiftness (+1 movement)
2 Bolt Throwers
1 Great Eagle

Set-up:

• Left to right, basically everything was thrown into a line down the table, my opponent really doesn't care for terrain in the middle of the battlefield so his placements were off to the sides
• Anvil of Vaul Hill
• Idol of Gork/Mork
• Haunted Mansion (awesome)
• Marsh (that gives regen or something)

While the terrain selection is actually very interesting and can add new and unique things to the battlefield, it became really tedious to set the whole thing up. Having no scenery at all we just cut out pieces of paper. After my third battle I really appreciated the amount of scenery on the board and how it could disrupt a gun-line or allow you to avoid combat with nasty units later.

Deployment:

Left to right:

Chaos

• Knights with hounds screening them
• block of warriors
• Lord on Dragon
• Marauders
• block of warriors
• Hellcannons

High Elves

• Bolt Throwers (BT)
• Great Eagle (GE)
• Lothern Seaguard (LSG)
• Phoenix Guard (PG)
• Spearguard (SG)
• White Lions (WL)

Turn 1

Chaos

Marched everything forward, hellcannons peppered my SG and WL taking a few out. The Lord attempted to cast a few things but to no avail.

HE

BT opened into the dogs, causing them to flee. Eagle flew over to try and outflank something. PG, SG, and WL marched forward to the right of the mansion. Magic was uneventful despite the fact that I took the Book of Hoeth. LSG shot at something but didn't do much.

Turn 2

Chaos

Marched forward again, they probably could have charged me but the Marauders stayed put at the right of the mansion, knights came over the hill. Magic, Lord got of pandemonium, which was really bad. Not only could I roll well enough to cast, I couldn't roll well enough to dispel. Hellcannons shot a few things but didn't really do anything of note.

HE

Charges: SG into Marauders, WL into warriors, PG didn't really have enough room to get in there so I wheeled them about to try and face the oncoming knights. Magic: got off Mindrazor on the SG, then I tried to cast an offensive spell but rolling doubles of any sort causes a miscast because of Pandemonium. This was my first big mistake as I should have spent my time dispelling Pandemonium before anything else. I rolled my miscast table and got a 3, then I rolled a 1 to see if my wizard gets sucked into the Abyss (you needed to get a 4+ for it not to die). My wizard gets pulled into the Abyss AND a huge explosion kills off several of the PG who fail their ward saves causing a panic test which they (thankfully) passed. Shooting was uninteresting. Combat: my SG killed over half of the Marauders, the Marauders killed about 15 of my SG. I win, they flee and I chase them down... Leaving the unit completely exposed.

Turn 3

Chaos

Another block of warriors charge into my SG, knights charge my LSG, Lord charges my WL. Magic: the Lord could basically walk all over me now. He gets off Pandemonium again and then does something to my SG to make them weaker (I forgot, entirely, that I had the anti-magic banner). The hellcannons missed or ate a few of their handlers or something. Combat: LSG smashed by knights, SG smashed by warriors, the Lord challenges my Prince and my prince loses (but not before dealing 2 wounds to the lord) but static combat resolution causes the Lord to lose combat and then BARELY flee away from my WL.

HE

PG charge warriors, WL charge a different unit of warriors. BT fail to do anything useful. Magic: (cries). Combat: draws across the board. I played them out just to see what would happen but at this point I admitted defeat.

Result: HE got rocked.

What went right: ...

What went wrong: I didn't dispel Pandemonium, I forgot about my magic banners, I chose the wrong targets to fight, I had no cavalry.

High elf production

As promised, the results of my kit:



My battle standard bearer mounted. The base is covered in spackle and sealed with glue. I thought it made it look windswept or like a lava flow or something. No idea what I was doing really but it seemed like a good idea at the time. We'll see how it turns out once painted.





Prince/Noble on foot. This one wears the Armor of Caledor or Silvered Steel giving him the 2+ armor save on foot, nothing to scoff at really. I gave him an axe and the head off of the White Lion Chariot kit making him look, well angry. I wanted a fierce leader and the other High Elf heads look... ridiculous with those ornate helmets. Ellyrian reavers at least make sense with all the feathers but the wings and the sculpted dragon is too much. The long hair and braided top knot with the yelling give him a more aggressive look.

Someday I'd like to pose him jumping forward, axe overhead, ready to swing down at the enemy!

This week: there will be no goals this week as I am going camping. Fear not! Provided bears don't eat me or anything my soldering iron should be waiting for me when I get back. SO! Next week will be to make a skeleton for the phoenix!

Level One of the Pagoda: the Plan!

Following some sage advice I made a list and then laid out everything I need to do it.

3000 points High Elves:

Prince 250
White Sword
Armor of Caledor
Guardian Phoenix
Talisman of Loec

Archmage
Level 4
Book of Hoeth
Lore of Shadows

Noble
BSB
Dragon Armor
Enchanted Shield
Talisman of Endurance

Mage
Level 2
Seerstaff of Sorcery
Lore of Life: Throne of Vines, Flesh to Stone

Lothern Sea Guard
19 full command

Spearguard 50
full command
War Banner

Phoenix Guard
30 full command
Gem of Courage
Banner of Sorcery

White Lions
18 full command
Banner of Swiftness
Ironcurse Icon

Swordmasters of Hoeth
12

Repeater Bolt Thrower
2

Great Eagle
1

The Prince and Noble BSB hang out with the White Lions and kick some heads in. The Phoenix Guard will provide power for my shadow irresistible force mage and generally act as an anchor. My spearguard will provide 50 ASF hits (first two rows, third for spears, fourth for citizen levy, and fifth for horde). The Seaguard will bunker the shadowmage while the spearguard get the life mage to boost their toughness. Swordmasters get flanking duty. Bolt throwers hit small units or big monsters and the eagle distracts/goes warmachine hunting.

A grainy picture of what I have so far. As you can (sort of) see I'm missing only 35 spearguard (of the new variety) and all of the Lothern Sea Guard. And the ongoing project of the phoenix (great eagle).

What will it take to get everything? One phoenix project and 3 boxes of High elf spearguard/LSG kits. All in good time.

Mud and leadership

This weekend was mostly spent at Run Amuck. And by that I mean mostly cleaning myself off afterwards. Being caked in mud gave me some interesting realizations. For instance ever notice how we (and by we I usually mean the royal we) paint something standing in the grass or dirt but their lower legs are unmolested by the ground they walk on?

For example, high elves in their ridiculous white robes usually do not have a spot of dirt on them! Naturally I intend to change this but that is an endeavor for another time. First I need to paint the buggers!

Last week I put together my prince on foot. I did not use the head pieces from the hero box because I think the big HE helmets are a little on the outrageous side. The wings/dragon helm looks neat but at the same time ridiculous in its size. Instead I found one of the extra heads from the white lion chariot kit. The hair is coiled and blowing in the breeze, the face is angry and he appears to be shouting in rage. I gave him an axe and left his right arm free. The pose is simple, he is gesturing with his axe and shouting a command. The look will go well with the white lions. I may even go as far as putting a white lion cape on him furthing the look and feel of a prince from Charce (or is it Charace? Wherever the white lions hail from).

The rest of the hero kit is going to be composed of the mounted battle standard bearer. Again, I don't intend to use the head-piece but everything else, including the lavish pre-made banner will be used. I wanted to do something different for the base so I took some spackle and using my fingers globbed some on the base and then pulled away creating a swept look to it. This created a jagged rocky appearence. After letting it dry I placed a little Elmer's Glue on as a seal. I know it isn't 100% consistent with the rest of my model's look for the base but I wanted to experiment a little. We'll see how it turns out once I mount the model on there.

Pictures to follow later today.


This week's goal: complete the wireframe for the phoenix (great eagle) and order a clear flying base for it. Additionally I may have miscalculated my army list so there might be room for 2 eagles. We shall see!