Absence makes the heart grow fonder...

Well. My last post, about taking it easy for a while, was over 2 months ago. Maybe I took things a little "easier" than I had anticipated. 2 months is a very long time between posts. And this was largely reflective of the amount of hobby-related stuff I was doing during this period. I might have played a single game of Kings of War during the gap. Maybe. 

I only really started to pick up a paint brush about a week ago, too. I really was slacking off admirably. Basically I was suffering a bit from burnout and a lack of specific motivation. And distractions always abound. Especially when you're kind of looking for distractions...

Anyway, as slack as I have been recently, I'm not dead. And now I'm looking to blow off the cobwebs a bit and get back into action. As I say, I've started doing some painting again, although thus far my progress has been limited. My efforts have been focused on getting my Ogre Siegebreakers closer to finished. I had deliberately held off adding colour to them for reasons relating to our Albion campaign, however things got a bit derailed there as we were coming up to the end, so it seems likely that we'll never actually get around to properly resolving it. It's a shame, but I guess these things happen. I actually have photos from at least 4 more games that were played, but those were so long ago now that I doubt I can remember the details to go with them...

Wait, I was talking about painting. Yes, I have been painting metal ogres.

When last we saw them, these guys were almost purely metal. Steel with a little brass on the shields.

They're still not done, but they're closer.

As I say, they're  not finished yet. I am now trying to clean up the eyes a bit, which is difficult. I am having trouble making sense of them. Maybe because of the variable quality of my moulding process, maybe because my eyes are tired. Anyway, you can't see this in these photos anyway.  I also need to go through and make some shoulder detailing, probably by sculpting a master on one guy and then using that to press mould it onto the others. I need more colour on the Ogres themselves. They're a little too... metal.

In other news, I have committed to a plan for Cancon, which is now about a month and a half away. I was tossing up several options, including Kings of War and even Blood Bowl. In the end I have decided to play Warhammer 8.5. Basically it's 8th edition with a few rules tweaks, many of which I agree with, and numerous updated army lists (notably those army books that were release prior to 8th edition, as well as most of the Storm of Chaos lists). In some ways this choice represents the easy option. I expect this event to be small and really relaxed. Less competitive attitude. Right now that is what I am looking for.

And what army will I use? Well, I haven't made a list yet, but I think I have decided on an army book. I suspect I will use Dogs of War.

Taking it easy

Sometimes it happens that when you push too hard to achieve hobby goals, you end up suffering from a level of hobby burnout. After all the rush around the most recent battle report, this has happened to me. I haven't painted anything, nor have I pulled my models out and played any games. And as a result, there has been no real activity on this blog either.

Obviously I have not been entirely inactive since my last post. Rather than trying to make myself spend time doing hobby stuff when I don't have the drive, I have been playing PC and video games instead. Normally these games and hobby stuff are warring for my time, and often the hobby wins out, either because I am working towards a specific goal or because time spent painting models feels like long-term progress and works better with watching TV shows with my wife. At the moment it's not really much of a decision, though. I might as well catch up on some of the games I've been ignoring.

Given there's not much happening on the blog from a hobby perspective, I figured I might as well discuss what I've been doing with my time.

MechWarrior Online

One game I had been meaning to try for years is MechWarrior Online. As someone who has played nearly every Battletech-related video game over the years, read nearly all the books and played the odd game on the tabletop, it's hard to believe that I have managed to wait 3 years since the game came out of beta before giving it a go. It helps that a number of friends have jumped in alongside me, so I'm not playing it all alone.

Give-away winners!

Well the time is up for our Grim & The Grave give-away, so it's time to announce the winners. I gathered all the entries together into a list and then rolled dice to determine the winners, as any true gamer would do.

So without further ado, our winners are:

• DeusArchon
• Tom Zom
• mpc

Each will receive a code for the DLC, just as soon as I work out how to send them messages. Maybe I have to add them as friends in Steam. Such mystery...

Congratulations to the winners, and thanks to everyone who responded.

Giveaway - Total War: The Grim and The Grave

To celebrate the release of Total War: WARHAMMER The Grim & The Grave, I have 3 copies of the DLC to give away! Just leave a comment on this post, make sure you include something so I can identify who you are (Steam handle or something similar), and answer the following question:

• Do you come to Total War:WARHAMMER as a player (or former player) of the tabletop game, or is Total War your first involvement in the Warhammer world?

On Sunday (11/9/2016), 3 of the responses will be chosen at random to receive one of the DLC codes I have in my possession.

Answers will be used for the purposes of careful research (ie: I am just curious).

Also, if you have not already seen it, the guys over at Creative Assembly had a go at recreating the Battle of Vanhaldenschlosse at a more sensible level than the hilarious disaster I oversaw here. Go check it out!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy63LVztvdY

The Battle of Vanhaldenschlosse: Total War

Having played through the Battle of Vanhaldenschlosse on the tabletop, the plan was then to go back and try to recreate it in Total War: Warhammer – The Grim & The Grave. Well, two of us did go through with the plan. The results were… interesting. 

For starters, although we’ve both played the game (James has played it a lot more than me), neither of us had ever played a multiplayer battle before. It was cool to see all the options, including being able to have up to 4 forces a side with either PC or human controllers. We decided to make use of this, as we realized that the battle we had fought was loaded with plenty of Lord choices, but you can only have one per army in TW. We also figured that it would be helpful to have PC allies controlling some of the forces to take the load off us a bit. We then set about roughly recreating the forces. The balance is a bit whacky given that unit sizes can vary wildly on the tabletop, but are set in TW. We went with what we felt best represented a TW version of the armies, which basically meant filling up all 80 available slots on either side. 

We chose the Castle Drakenhof map as it seemed a reasonable fit. We had no control over late-arriving flanking forces, which was slightly disappointing given that it’s something that happens regularly when you’re in the campaign. So we were not able to recreate the flanking element of the tabletop battle. Oh well, we figured we would just line things up and see what happened.

The loading screen. I was using Volkmar. James' lord was actually Vlad, so I assume he must have set a PC player as the no 1 player on his side for Ghorst to show up here. Or the game just moves in mysterious ways.

And then we launched the battle and my PC wept bitter tears of overloadedness.

The Battle of Vanhaldenschlosse: Part 4

This is the final part of the Battle of Vanhaldenschlosse report. You can find the previous part here, or go back to the main page here.

Empire Turn 4

Empire Turn 4

The battlefield was littered with corpses and broken bones and everywhere the snow was turning red with the blood of the living. The Empire lines were holding their own, however the right flank was being sorely tested and the Grand Theogonist himself was in grave peril.

The Battle of Vanhaldenschlosse: Part 3

This is a continuation of the Battle of Vanhaldenschlosse report. You can find the previous part here, or go back to the main page here.

Empire Turn 3

Empire Turn 3

Volkmar decides to get his hands dirty.