Now what?

I made a resolution at the start of the year that I would use an army other than Empire at at least one tournament this year. There are a number of events coming up in Melbourne, however with my resolution not to go overboard with tournaments this year, I am only really expecting to enter one of them - Axemaster. That being the case, it seems to be crunch time if I am going to follow through on my resolution.

Axemaster is a 2600 point tournament running on the 7th-8th of September. The player pack can be found here. It's a well-established event and traditionally tends to be one of the largest on the Victorian calendar. I'm actually the defending champion from last year, but given I have no intention of trying to win anything this year, I expect someone else will take the title. All I need to worry about is what I want to use instead of Empire...


I'm sure this shouldn't be a difficult decision, but somehow it is. It's been a long time since I used an army other than Empire at a tournament, and it's become a habit. I have plenty of other options, but each has its pros and cons: 

I could use Ogres, however my old Ogre army has few options and none of the newer toys and I don't intend to paint anything more to match them. At some point my Empire Ogres will be an army in their own right, but 2600 points is well beyond their reach for now. Maybe next year. 

I could use Dwarfs, but again I don't have a vast supply of those painted, and I think it would be a path to frustration with the current Dwarf rules. I don't really want to inflict that upon myself or others.

I could use High Elves, but they're really all the rage at the moment with the new book and I hate using the same thing as everyone else. I also don't have any Phoenixes and I think I would feel like I was missing out without one or two of those. I look forward to using the new army, but maybe after the initial excitement (and popularity) in the tournament community has died down.

That leaves me with 2 real options - Wood Elves or Orcs and Goblins. 

I haven't used the Wood Elves for years, and they have the advantage of being unpopular. It could be because their army book is extremely ancient and they are in danger of feeling like a forgotten army. I have always liked my Wood Elves and it would be good to give them a run once more. To that end, I even started to re-base some of my older models so that they could be updated to not look quite so sad and old (some paint would be required as well). Wood Elves are still a realistic option, although I have since discovered at least 2 other people who are planning to use them at Axemaster, so maybe they're not quite as forgotten as I had imagined.

A number of my old Wood Elves undertake the de-flocking process

The process is simple. You leave the models in ankle-deep water (over the tops of the bases, but not over-doing things) for a few hours, and it softens the PVA without having any real impact on the paint.

Then you take a scraping tool (I was using a scalpel) and the grass and PVA comes off in a paste. Things are a little damp and messy, but it's a pretty efficient process. Far better than trying to scrape off the grass when things are dry. 

Finally there are the Orcs and Goblins. These guys saw plenty of tournament action back in the day, but that day was a long time ago. I haven't really played with them since the current book was released, and of course this means that they lack the new toys a bit like my Ogres do. Unlike the Ogres however, this bothers me a bit. I have a lot of painted greenskins and I really feel like they should be a viable army. I need to add some of these more exciting elements to bring the Orcs and Goblins back up to speed. There were also only about half as many greenskin players as High Elves, Empire and Warriors of Chaos players at Convic a couple of months ago - so they're not exactly super-popular at the moment. For the record, I would not be fielding a list with a Savage Orc "Death Star" and all the world's war machines and chaff. We'd be talking something more like this...

They're BEHIND YOU!!!

So this is my current dilemma. Do I go the Wood Elves, or the Orcs? Both are a "minority" army at the moment. Both need modelling work, and entering a tournament with them would give them a boost in that regard. 

What do you think?