32nd Inquisitorial Guard – I salute you!

12 04 2012

With the advent of no inducted Imperial Guard in the new Sisters of Battle ‘Codex’ (Codex being used in the loosest sense of the term) I have decided to part ways with my IG, painted to represent the 32nd Inquisitorial Guard (I wanted to distinguish them from the ‘regular’ IG troops.

I took them to my FLGS last night and put them up for sale in their cabinet for a modest $65 (only $5 more than buying a Chimera and a box of guard). I’ll leave them there for a month, and if they don’t sell, it’ll be off to Ebay with them. Is it sad that I got a little sentimental when I walked out of the store last night? I guess when you invest time, money and passion in something, you put a bit of yourself in what you produce, but it did feel like I was saying goodbye, lol!

Hopefully someone will be able to use them and give them a good home. Here are some pics I took last night before I took them to the game store:

Give ‘em hell, boys!


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Categories : General

WTF Wednesday – Sisters of Battle – underwhelmingly ‘meh’

10 08 2011

 

Honestly, WTF? Originally I was going to post something about an incantation of Doomrider, which read very much like a Judas Priest song, complete with double entendre lyrics. That was, until I just opened my email now and saw a newsletter from Grim Workshop. The heading read thus:

‘Divine intervention – the full Sisters of Battle range’

Now, having that subject line got me excited, blown into the beyond as quickly as it arrived upon opening said email:

‘Whether you’re looking to start a new Sisters of Battle army, or wanting to add to your existing one, games-workshop.com has the full range of miniatures available to you. Head on over now to see the Sisterhood in all its glory.’

Seriously? are you frakking kidding me? I own ALL of the minis from the range, in multiples too, why the frak would I need more of the old shit? HELLO? the secondary market took care of my Sisters needs, getting a squad of sisters for the price of two blisters. Boring miniatures, boring poses, but hey! check out the website for all the shit you’ve seen already, but we took down for a few months!

Vampire counts have stolen any blood and thunder that could have been used to push the Sisters. Even the GW Facebook page is dominated by VC stuff, with barely anything pushed about Sisters, with the exception of a picture of some >yawn< cosplayers in Sisters gear.

I am now hearing that GW have themselves even said that they have no intention of releasing new minis, or indeed releasing the old shit in Finecast even. What the hell??

I know, i’m just having a belly rumble, but while everyone else (except Necrons and Tau) have new or newish books, minis, plastics etc, we Sisters fans are being royally fisted, and i’m not happy about that. I dunno, maybe Sisters have too much ‘original’ flavor to them still, and that doesn’t fit in with GW’s thinking any more. RARGH!!!!!

 


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Sisters of Battle… What is happening?

29 07 2011

Sister Wishlister

Hmmm. Suffice to say, I was deleriously excited when I saw the inside back cover of last months Games Workshop Monthly Release Catalogue White Dwarf and I noticed the little box that declared ‘Next month – Part 1 of the Sisters of Battle Codex!’. While I was disappointed initially by the fact that my girls only seemed to warrant a Chapter Approved WD codex, I got over it and moved on. I rushed up to my FLGS on Wednesday to purchase the latest issue (even after reading all the venom online about the codex) to see wtf all the fuss was about. I was pretty disappointed that a vast majority of the issue was devoted to Vampire Counts. The Sisters debut of the ‘new’ rules were stuffed at the back of the magazine almost like an embarrassing afterthought. A whopping 14 pages out of 120… I can only hope that next month will see the Sisters maybe even gracing the cover and taking center stage, although with the preview of next month being focused on Ogre Kingdoms, i’m not too sure. We are promised at batrep of the Sisters Vs. Orks, although elsewhere they said it was against  Tyranid Hive Fleet Leviathan, so either they will publish more than one batrep, or they just did a shit job proofreading before going to press.
 
Now i’m not about to launch into whether this new set of rules is going to make them more competitive etc etc, as there are a deluge of blogs out there who are already doing that (and very well, I may add). I’m just trying to get my head around what exactly GW are doing with this army. A cursory glance at the first part of the glorified pamphlet Codex shows us a little bit in the way of the origins and key conflicts, then jumps straight into the Army Special Rules. I wonder if newcomers to the game will look at this and think ‘holy shit! this looks awesome! sod the other armies out there with their shiny books packed with background fluff, i’m rolling with these ladies!’. I guess I have to ask, has this been put together with current non-sisters players in mind, or are they simply appeasing an older crowd who play them? If it is the latter, then I’d be suprised, as i’m sure GW will want to milk as much moolah out of it as they can, so if it’s the former, it’s not particularly impressive. Shit, they’re even regurgitating old artwork for filler.
 
I’m not sure how I feel about the new Faith Points system. At the start of the Sisters player’s turn, a D6 is rolled, and this is the amount of Faith Points available for that turn. As mentioned on many other blogs, it makes little sense to have this the same for forces of any size.  A 3000 point Sisters army would have a max of 6 Faith Points available? Seems a little goofy, considering the religious fervor these ladies are supposed to have…
 
Gone are Inquisitiors and their retinues, as well as allied forces of Imperial Guard or Space Marines. We do get Priests, with ‘Ecclesiarchy Battle Conclaves’ which is where Crusaders, Arco Flagellants and Death Cult Assassins have now been lumped. If I remember correctly, weren’t the arco’s weapons in the previous Codex classed as power weapons? They have added Feel No Pain, which I guess is pretty cool, and gone is that bloody horrible ‘stim injector death’ rule.
 
We don’t see an entry for the Repressor in this list. This was one of the things that was getting me excited about the new lists, was the posssibility of plastic sisters, and a plastic Repressor (any one who has attempted a FW one will know how much of a pain in the arse it is to put together). In fact, the only minatures in the book are old ones, so are they saving that up for the next issue? will they get new minis or will it be the old range redone in Finecast? No fire points on an Immolator now? No 12 inch ride-and-fire either? wtf?
 
Gone is Lord Karamazov on his toilet Throne of Judgement, and back is Arch-Confessor Kyrinov and Uriah Jacobus, who have returned from a well earned break between Codexes.
 
There are some interesting little tweaks here and there, but the army seems to be lacking the somewhat ‘medieval’ feel they had to them before.
 
On the whole, it seemed pretty anti-climatic. I can only hope that GW redeem themselves by releasing new minis, vehicles etc in the next issue, and while i’m not going to be sending my army off to Ebay just yet, their days may well be numbered.
 

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Games Workshop and customer service…

26 08 2010

I like the idea behind St. Celestine. I bought the model, many moons ago. I couldn’t ever make up my mind if I like the idea of what looked like a curtain being held up by two Cherubim behind her. I like the Cherubim, but decided the cloak/drape/rug/curtain/shower curtain just looked limp, so I decided not to use it. I was strenghthened in my decision by the illustration in the Codex, which shows her as an angelic being with majestic wings. Why, then, not do that with the mini?

Anyway, confusion aside, I’d thought about converting her and giving her some feathery wings in homage to the illustrated version. Finding a set that actually seemed in scale was a bit of a task, and over time she got forgotten about. That is until I found some sweet ‘steampunk’ wings at my FLGS. They are reminiscent of the Imperial Aquila, so I thought these would be even better. I stuck them on with some poster-tac to give you an idea of the vision:

Pretty neat, huh?

I also managed to lose the hand holding her sword (but not after I had already stabbed myself in the thumb while trying to drill and pin the impossibly small join), which brings me nicely to the point of my post. I ramble, I know, but it’s my blog, geddit?

As many of you know, back in ‘the day’, Games Workshop used to sell individual bits. So, every seperate bit of any multi-part mini had a serial number, and could be ordered seperately, for converting, or even missing pieces. Wonderful! Brilliant! Genius even!

Well, they stopped doing that.

I found that out this morning when I called their customer service to inquire about buying a replacement arm for Celestine. The chap I spoke to said they no longer offered that service. Bummer. I figured at that point i’d have to jury-rig something to replace said part. I had an inkling they didn’t do that anymore, but it doesn’t hurt to ask, and it didn’t hurt to ask today, as a few minutes of just shooting the shit with Madison (the CS rep) he asked if I had an account with GW. I said yes, and confirmed my email address, and my mailing address before telling me that he would ship me a whole Celestine mini to me, at no charge! There was much rejoicing. I thanked him a number of times, and tried to get a scoop on SoB stuff (no luck, lol!) and came away from the experience very happy.

So, GW may seem like some tyrannical oppressive multinational corporation, apparently vehemently hated by the gaming community (although they keep buying their products…) and are an easy target for the whiners and nay-sayers out there, but you know what, they’re a business. (gasp!). While they may have some odd marketing ideas, and may be on the higher end of the pricing spectrum, they still know how to take care of their customers.

Today is a WIN + FTW for GW.


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Witchhunters/Demonhunters codexes officially gone from the shelves?

27 05 2010

It would appear so, along with the disappearance of the box sets from the shelves of both GW outlets and independent stockists. I’m still busting to know what this means, and if it means an overhaul from these forces, when its going to happen.

I noticed in the latest edition of White Dwarf that the WH and DH ‘dexes will be available free of charge in a downloadable PDF format through the GW website in either May or June, although you do have to sign up on there. (it’s still free though!)

So whats the dealio, Games Workshop? there are legions of us out here slavering at the bit for some Inquisition news!

Lastly, what was this piece of art commissioned for???

Did anyone else notice the figure on top of the Titan? St Celestine???


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Categories : Uncategorized, Warhammer 40k, Warhammer 40000

Sisters ‘Angels of Deliverance’ Seraphim.

13 04 2010

Well, I finally finished my Seraphim squad for my Sisters army.  I had one casualty while I was painting these, one of them fell over and the backpack pinged off. After an outburst of cursing it was taken care of, but this goes to show how unbalanced these minis are. Very top heavy. Take into account this was also on a flat surface. As anyone who has played against my sisters at Colins place will attest, they fall about all over the place as though the were drunk off their asses.  I have noticed, since taking these pictures last night and uploading them this morning, that there are a couple of touch ups I need to do, but anyway, here they are:

And there we have it. As I had mentioned in previous posts, I hope that we SoB players won’t have to wait too much longer for some updates, and new minis. With the recent Blood Angels release, with the fast attack squad having some pretty sweet ‘feathered’ wings, could this be a pointer for what else is in store…? Plastics are definitely the way forward, its just unfortunate that some of us are being held back.

C+C welcome!

Paul


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Categories : Miniature painting and techniques

Updating ‘Aut Pax Aut Bellum’

24 03 2010

Yes, it is true… I actually have started listing some of my Sisters force under their banner which I created aaaages ago.  It’s WIP for the most part, but I wanted a central reference point for my ongoing work on the girls. I’m sorta beginning to regret my choice of colors, simply for the amount of work that has to go into it, and free time is something I don’t get a lot of. I’m currently working on my squad of Seraphim. I am working on five of them, although I have another four, but to be honest, these figures are ass-paralyzingly boring to work on. With the exception of one in particular, the poses for the most part are boring and unimaginative, and lack any ‘movement’ it actually looks like they are in a cheerleading squad, doing some jumps. Maybe I should switch out the bolt pistols for pom poms…

I’ve been lurking on numerous forums, trying to glean any further information about any imminent Sisters updates or releases, as the GW stores have been yoinking their stock from the shelves, and they have been gradually disappearing from the online store as well. GW employees are usually full of information (when you ask) and obviously most of it is hearsay (heresy? lol!) or blatant wishlisting.  I just hope that whatever the ‘great plan’ that GW has for us legions of loyal Sisters, or =][= players that they do us proud and release a fine selection of minis to accompany a new Codex. If the recent releases are anything to go by, then I may just have to permanently carry around a box of tissues.  The recent pictures of the advance order Blood Angel stuff are incredible, and make me hope (read: wish) that we =][= players have something in the pipeline soon. Can you imagine, an army of Battle Sisters that aren't all in the same pose? Glory to The Emperor! Beloved by all!

Thinking about what we currently have in our 'dex, I don't really think we'll actually lose anything. Maybe some tweaks here and there, and obviously adjust some points costs (50 pts for Rhinos? HELLO?????). I am rather hoping that we get some new heavy stuff, or maybe some =][= specific transports. One big thing I am hoping we DO NOT lose, are the inducted or allied options.

Time will tell I guess. In the meantime I will paint my one pose army and dream of glories yet to come…

oh, and the updated page can be found here lol!

http://whencannonsfade.wordpress.com/aut-pax-aut-bellumeither-peace-or-war/

Paul


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Categories : Literary musings

An unnerving talent….

1 03 2010

I was spacing out the other day, wondering what was going to be next on the project table for me to tinker with when I realized that all the armies I choose to collect, painstakingly paint and game with all seem to be obsolete (pretty much) or do so shortly after my decision.

Sisters of Battle.

Well, we all know where this is right now, well, we don’t, thats actually the whole point. I started collecting my Witch Hunters force back in about 2004 when I wanted to just start collecting and painting minis again. I bought the codex too. It wasn’t until I went uber serious with gaming again (thanks Colin) that I decided to ctually get a playable force together and went out nd bought the 40K rulebook too. Double whammy on this one. No less than 6 months after me buying the rulebook, then that edition was updated to the current edition. DOH! No matter. I picked up the mini ‘rules bits only’ book from the AoBR set, which I still use. Then, all of a sudden, we find out that the Inquisitorial forces of the Imperium are slowly vanishing. Are we getting an overhaul? are we going the way of the Squats? will we actually get plastic Sisters? The last few months have seen Witch Hunters stock disappearing from shelves, including the codex, and then, in turn, the stock becoming unavailable online through GWs web portal. There’s been a lot of nay-sayers and doom bringers on the interwebs, but conversely there have also been some very positive hints and possible ‘leaks’. For the most part, it seems to be the way of GW to snipe a line from sale for it to be released further down the line. This seems positive, although I hope it’s not going to be another year or two off. 50 points for a rhino? pffft! updated codex please!

Black Templars

I decided I wanted to dabble with the Emperors finest, Space Marines. I didn’t want a vanilla force, and certainly not Smurfmarines. I saw the codex for Black Templars and fell in love (figuratively speaking). Maintaining an almost grim, medieval kvltness about them, I thought they were perfect. Well, now I hear that these chaps will be getting a makeover soon, although I also heard on the grapevine they might be axed. I’m more inclined to believe the former rather than the latter, considering the fluff, and the the fact they are a progenetor chapter of the Imperial Fists. Still, I guess we’ll see. Just as well I am putting together an auxillary of Salamanders…. ;)

Tomb Kings

I got bitten by the WFB bug again, and with Colin amassing an Empire force, I wanted to get in on some axes and maces action. I went with Tomb Kings – Skeletons =cool. Egyptian skeletons with a host of nasty stuff and something akin to the Lost ark of the Covenant = epic WIN. I have managed to score an obscene amount of stuff on Ebay for this, which is awesome, so I don’t feel too bad about collecting this army. It wasn’t until I was surfing one of my regular haunts that I started picking up on other TK players getting twitchy as the army doesn’t seem to be getting any love, apparently because of it’s somewhat ‘fringe’ status, and it not being as popular as the usual Orcs, Chaos etc. I’m hoping for a new army book, although it has just been announced that Orcs and Gobbos are to be released in May, so yet again, something else that will probably be the end of this year, start of early next year. I’m reaaaally hoping they make some new minis to coincide with this, as the Liche Priests and Bone Giant minis = f*cking awful.

With so much being up in the air, i’m wondering whether to shelve the SoBs and TKs, concentrate on my Templars see what happens. At least I can proxy the marines :p

Which leads me to my Lizardmen. A newly refurbished army, new book, new minis, and i’m collecting them! HA! nothing can go wrong with this one….


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Categories : General, Literary musings, Warhammer 40k, Warhammer 40000, Warhammer Fantasy Battle

Sisters of Battle FanFiction posted.

6 01 2010

I have started my own fanfiction dedicated to the Daughters of the Emperor. The first part can be seen over at http://whencannonsfade.wordpress.com/ante-mortem-sisters-of-battle-fanfiction/ Hope you enjoy it!


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Categories : Literary musings, Work In Progress (WIP)

Planetstrike Tourney – Chicago @ Black Sun Games!

28 10 2009

FYI:

This tournament will begin on Sunday, Nov. 1st and end on Sunday, Nov. 29th. Armies will consist of 1750pts. of painted miniatures and will utilize both 5th edition and Planetstrike rules. Players are free to play at their leisure, so long as all battles are completed by Sunday, Nov. 29. I will provide my cell # to all participants so I can be reached if any problems arise and I am not present.

There is a $10 registration fee for entering. The fee can be paid at Black Sun Games or via my Paypal (please PM for Paypal information). Deadline for registration is Saturday, Oct. 31st.

Prize support will be provided by Black Sun Games.

Please email your army lists in either MS Word, Excel, or PDF format to ancientsociety79@gmail.com by Thursday, Oct. 29th

Basic Rules

• This tournament utilizes the normal 5th edition 40K rulebook and the Planetstrike expansion. The AdeptiCon INAT FAQ will be used (Updated 03.19.09). This FAQ can be found here: http://www.adepticon.org/wpfiles/inat/INATFAQv3.0.pdf

• Individual units that may have multiple rules versions will follow the rules presented in that army’s codex. Please take the time to review the relevant GW/Adepticon FAQ’s for clarifications.

• Special/Unique/Named Characters may be fielded, provided their individual rules allow them to be used in armies of 1750pts or less.

• All models must be WYSIWYG. Any model not represented properly will be removed from play. If this results in an illegal unit (below minimum squad size for example), then the entire unit will be removed

• All models MUST be fully painted to a 3-color minimum. Any model not painted to this standard will be removed from play. If this results in an illegal unit (below minimum squad size for example), then the entire unit will be removed

• Armies are limited to 1750pts. total. Please provide a clear, concise army list to your opposing player and the judge

• This tournament utilizes the Planetstrike force organization chart for all scenarios. The Planetstrike FOC is as follows (underlined units are COMPULSORY):

For attacking – 1 HQ (+2 HQ), 6 Elites, 6 Troops, 6 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support

For defending – 1 HQ (+2 HQ), 3 Elites, 2 Troops (+6 Troops), 3 Fast Attack, 6 Heavy Support

This will mean each player can have two separate 1750pt. army lists. If doing so, each list MUST be clearly marked as “Attacker” or “Defender”.

• Tournament judges’ rulings are final

Scoring

192 total points. 48 points per scenario divided into primary (20), secondary (15) and tertiary (10) objectives with three (3) +1 battle point modifiers.

Victory points will be used in the case of a tie.

Objectives

ANY non-vehicle unit (unless specifically stated otherwise in their relevant codex) may claim an objective, even if there is only a single model remaining, if it ends the game within 3”. Should an objective be claimed by both sides, it automatically counts as being claimed by the defender.


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Categories : Warhammer 40k, Warhammer 40000

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