Mounted TROOPS... right.

Sandwyrm and I squared off at the new FLGS, with 1850pts of a lot of models. He took his favorite 1850IG mech list. I brought the menagerie of WH with inducted IG, and allied GK's.

above you get a good view of Protem (who brought and set up our terrain), and myself moving an Exorcist into better firing position. You get a good look at the bottom half of Sandwyrm, with his hellhounds, a chimelta squad, and Marbo Gimpie sitting in reserve.

I got first turn, with spearhead, and 4 objective markers.
We got through 3 turns. Admittedly, we need to play faster. We do joke a LOT when we play, and I'm not the fastest player. I take time to mull over my decisions, when I need to remember it's just a game of toy soldiers.

so here's a quick rundown:
Setup:
I had 2 Exorcists (extra Armor), 2 Rhinos (extra Armor and smokes) w/SoB squads (VSS w/book, Hflamer/Melta), 2 IG Chimera w/vets (3melta), a Leman Russ w/lascannon, a Landraider, w/9GK's (2psycannon), and a Jumpy cannoness (who I totally forgot)

I need to look up the validity of GK's taking a LR as a transport when they're allied. The codex was a lil fuzzy. I know Inquisitors can do it.

Sandwyrm had 4 Chimelta squads (just like my 2), a Chimera command squad (astropath, 4plasma),2 Hellhounds w/hull Multimelta (I think), a Leman Russ w/lascannon, a Demolisher w/Hflamer, a squadron of 3 autocannon scout sentinels, 2 5-man IG Stormtrooper squads w/2meltas, and Marbo.

yeah, this was gonna get messy. Sandwyrm failed to sieze the initiative and make me cry.

1st turn:
I moved the long edge rhino forward 12", and popped my old school smokes (which are excellent BTW). and moved the chimera up 6", keeping the rhino blocking most of LoS to the chimera. This way the chimera could get some potshots off, and still be out of range for Sandwyrm's chimeltas, and out of LoS for his Russes:


The chimera killed one sent, and an exorcist killed off the other two in a screaming barrage. The Demolisher was immobilized, and the chimelta squad on Sandwyrm's left flank was demolished by the other exorcist.

In Sandwyrm's portion, he knocked off the smoked rhino's gun, and an Exorcist's gun. I had moved the Landraider back a bit from it's approx 25" away from the Demolisher, leaving an immobilized Demolisher to fire at the rhino. I wasn't too keen on both russes firing at the LandRaider, killing it, and then killing off the GK's, so I played it safer.


My turn 2:
I advanced the rhino on Sandwyrm's left flank out from behind the rocks, and popped smoke, and pulled 6" out with the chimera, using the Rhino for mobile terrain.
the Chimelta squad and Sisters on his right flank both charged forward 12" and disembarked (to get in melta range)
The exortcists, LR, and Russ all shuffle to get board position for shots.
the chimelta squad unleashes a volley of 3 meltagun shots into the Russ, only to immobilize it. The Sisters manage to stun the chimelta squadon Sandwyrm's right flank.
My russ got lucky with a lascannon shot and exploded the Demolisher. The exorcist next to the Russ took out a chimera

Sandwyrm's turn2:
lots of stuff was going to come in from reserve. 2 Stormies, a chimelta, and Marbo.
Marbo sat down in in my back quarter, and tossed his Demo charge a lil short... on himself, but he's got cool cover saves.
The Chimelta... well it came in and got excited:

once the 'good touch, bad touch' 1inch rule was enforced, my vets felt not so violated. Sandwyrm rolled a wrecked, but not destroyed result, and I had to get out. Which caused us to read the Emergency disembark rule, thanks to Protem knowing where it was. I was going to have to disembark, and make a diff terrain roll to climb up on my chimera to shoot Sandwyrm's. nope. the rule lets me get out, and take a pin check. that's pretty much it.

Sandwyrm put a stormie squad behind the big rock on his left long tagle edge, you can barely see them in the picture above. They had their sights set on LandRaider rear armor. The other Stormie squad scattered to the opposite side of the rock, about 7" from the sisters rhino. The Land Raider Stormies immobilized it, and the rhino stormies shook it.
Over in Sandwyrm's left flank, the chimelta vets can't shoot because of the stunned result on their chimera, and Sandwyrm had forgotten to get them out to shoot. The Russ knocked the socks off 9 of my 10 Vets with a well placed large blast at the rear of my chimera. The lone Meltagun stuck around thanks to the book of St. Lucius on the Sisters nearby.


Turn3:
I opened up the left flank chimera with the lone meltagun vet, and hosed Sandwyrm's vets down as they exited their chimera with the Sisters. the exorcist wiped the smile off Marbo's face, and the sisters near the Land Raider moved to wipe the squad behind the rock off the board, while the GK's got out of the front of the LandRaider, and made their way towards the Stormies in front of the rock, to charge and kick their butts. my vets in the corner moved up allong the side of Sandwyrm's chimera....
and destroyed it.
then there was the charge from my vets onto Sandwyrm's vets, which bogged them both down, as we found my vets didn't pay nearly enough attention in close quarters fighting training, and were slowly going to loose. I think the land raider shook Sandwyrm's Russ again, and My Russ shot a chimera..
it got kinda fuzzy for me.

Sandwyrm's turn3:
the CC grind kept going between the 2 vet squads.
Sandwyrm's give 'em Hellhounds both showed, and hosed down the sisters squad over on his left flank. a few of them died. a few more died to plasma fire as the command squad crowned the hill, and let loose plasma death. One of his meltavet squads also made it to the hill, to claim an objective.


Summary:
and we called the game, since the shop was closing. Sandwyrm had 1 objective, and I was just outside reach of another one, with one movement phase away from a second one. I also realized I'd forgotten to bring the Jumpy cannoness to the party. oh well.

I really like running chimelta vets in tandem with Sisters squads. Between the two they pack quite a punch, and the Sisters enhance the Vets leadership, which is nice. I also really like using a rhino with the old 'glancing' smokes as cover for chimeltas.
This was my first 'big' game in a long while, and my first game in a while. 1850 is an interesting point size, as you have more units to play with. I usually end up bringing more of the same stuff, however. Even at this level, I was looking at 5troops selections, and 3 Heavy selections. Of course, I had 0 elite, and 0 Fast attack slots filled. I like filling out troops slots, since SoB's are still a pretty good troops slot choice, as are chimelta vets.

I like the new 'ard boys induction rules for IG. Stuff is CHEAP. I think the new Chimelta vets compliment Sisters nicely, and a Russ comliments 2 Exorcists very well also. Inquisition with inducted IG build this way might still be weak on long range AT fire, but I really like how the combines elements work.

before, I was using chimera (miltilaser and Hbolter) and an autocannon squad parked in cover for fire support. It was a fairly cheap way to get a Leman Russ, and give some long range fire support. It left the Sisters in their rhinos hanging out on their own, to get shot up however.

The WH w/inducted IG now is a much more dynamic force, with the vets and sisters SUPPORTING each other much more closely.

I did take advantage of the Mech IG's shorter range in this game, but probably should have boldly moved the Land raider forward 12" in turn2, to puke out some GK's to charge. I played it safe, like I would have if we were playing 5-6turns.
I think that had we kept playing, I would have cleared Sandwyrm's guys off the board by turn6.

we'll definately have to have a rematch. and post game beer.

Ahh. That 'New Store' smell

Sandwyrm, Protem, and I went to the NEW shop in town, Saltire games (saltiregames.com). It's not really too far from where I live, and has good gamespace available. It even has that 'new stripmall' smell to it (like 'new car' smell, but with paint, drywall, and carpet smells). (where Saltire's at)

I don't think they've got much of a 40K group courted. Several of the guys from the North Game Preserve will probably trickle over. I like the North GP, but there's not really space for gaming, which is too bad. They ARE a Mall store, and keep up appearances for random people filtering in at the 'Fashion Mall' as the Keystone mall is dubbed.

I'm pondering approaching the management about getting a league going, or maybe even running a tourney. I've not run a tourney, and it would be a good way to get people to actually come to a new store, use entry fees to get store credit, and see what the store can do for us. I think between Sandwyrm, protem, and I we could come up with enough terrain for 5-6 tables. Even if some of the terrain is my models, or random strange looking things we paint up a bit with spray adhesive and sand.

next: Sandwyrm goes backdoor on vets, or... hot chimera love

You've Got a Purdy Little Glacius...

The number one thing I'm always asked at both pick-up games and tournaments by the people I meet is "How do you paint your tanks?". Since I decided to finally start painting up my Hellhounds and Chimera conversions, I thought that I would do a quick how-to for everyone as I went through the steps.

Step 1: Undercoat the Model

For this step, I use Tamiya Neutral Gray spray paint, which should be available at any general hobby store. It's an enamel-based paint intended for aircraft models. So it goes on extremely smooth, with a very plastic looking sheen. This is important, because the techniques I use will accentuate any roughness in the primer application. Acrylic-Based primers tend to create a rougher surface.

Step 2: Apply the Base Color

Here I use an airbrush to apply the base color. Which for my desert-themed models is the old Bronzed Flesh that GW doesn't make anymore. There's still some in the stores though, so I've bought up 7-8 pots of the stuff. I figure that should be enough for the next 3000 points of models I need to paint. :)

This is easily the most time consuming part of the whole process. Since Bronzed Flesh goes on thinly and therefore requires multiple coats to cover the primer.

Step 3: Apply the Ground Color

Now I pull out the airbrush again and spray on some bronzed flesh with more red and orange added. This is to simulate the color of the dust that would collect on the lower parts of the tank over time. I also spray it on the tracks and into the surrounding surfaces a bit.

Note: If you bottle your custom colors like I do, you only need to mix them once! That's a huge time saver!

Step 4: Apply the Dip

Now for the fun part! This step will shade the recesses and crevices in the model, making the small details "pop" from the surface. This is done using minwax. In the past I've also used inks to do the same thing, but the floor wax goes on more evenly and discolors the raised surfaces less.

Librarium Online has a good article on dipping models here.


The wax itself should be thinned by about 10% with mineral spirits and applied to the model with a brush. You don't actually "dip" the model into a jar or anything. The brush application lets you put just as much shading on a particular portion of the model as you want. If you apply too much to an area, you can wipe off the brush and use it to lift the extra wax off of the model.

Once you're done, leave the model alone for 12-15 hours so the floor wax drys thoroughly. If you handle it too soon, you'll leave fingerprints on the model!

Step 5: Dull the Shine

Once the floor wax is dry, your model will be very shiny and reflective. To get rid of the shine, I spray the model with Testors Dullcote spray varnish. Do this in light coats that you build up slowly. If you spray on too much at once, you'll get the foggy look that you can see on front of the leftmost Chimera above. Whoops!

Step 6: Start Drybrushing

Once the shine is gone, it's time to start drybrushing. First I drybrush on the original base color starting from the top of the model down to the middle third of the track assembly. Then I drybrush 3 more layers using progressively lighter shades of Bronzed flesh. Each pass covers less of the model than the one before it, so that there's a nice graduation in tone and color from the top of the model to the bottom.

The tracks were then washed with Devlin Mud and drybrushed with Chainmail.

At this point the basic coloring is done. All that's left are the color accents on the weapons and the various small details that I'll paint in later. But for now, the models are tourney-legal and very presentable on the battlefield until I finish them off completely.

Why Farmpunk Is All Wet

So, what kind of 40K player are you? Earth, Fire, Air, or Water?

Here's an interesting link that talks about these different play styles. It was written for 4th edition, so it badly needs updating. But I found it very interesting nonetheless.

I used to be an "Earth" player, standing still and trying to survive the rush my opponent sent across the table, with a bit of water thrown in when I could still infiltrate half my army using doctrines. Call it "Mud" if you will. :)

Since the IG-5 Codex came out though, I've transformed my army into a much more effective "Fire" force. Which is kind of odd, as I'm extremely shooty, but have almost no close-combat ability at all. My strength lies in short-ranged melta and template weaponry instead, combined with protecting myself from assaults through speed and armor. Hey, it works!

Farmpunk is thoroughly in the "Water" camp, however. Though he's been fiddling with other options lately, deep down he wants to react to what you do. Turning your blows against you and frustrating you into failure. Problem is, Codex-creep is slowly taking away his best water-options.

He used to happily run an IG drop troop army, but IG-5 has taken away the doctrines he depended on for that. Right now, Farmpunk's only option to get it back would be to buy a crate load of Valkyries. But that's an expensive route to take. I think he's stuck somewhere between going all-Fire with his Sisters, or trying to do something water-y with his Daemonhunters combined with IG. I'm still waiting to see what he comes up with, but maybe the DH info at the link will help. :)

'Ard Boyz Semi-Finals Report: Part II

(This is part two of my report. For part one, click here.)

Here's the list of other armies I counted at Semis in Louisville:

6 Chaos (5 Mech and 1 Mixed)
5 Guard (4 Mech and 1 Six-Valk List)
3 Orks (2 Mech, 1 Horde)
5 Eldar (All Mech)
1 Tau (Mech)
1 Necron (Mostly Destroyers)
1 Black Templar (Mech)

I've been seeing Mechanized lists on the rise for the last year, but this was amazing. Of the 22 players, including myself, there were no less than 19 Fully Mechanized lists at this tourney. Even two of the three Orks players were Mech'd up!

Even amongst all the IG armor on hand, I got a lot of attention for not only bringing the most Chimeras (7), but for having Hydras too. I got the ultimate complement for my conversions when more than one guy asked if my Chimeras and/or Hellhounds were the new fall-release models. Hehe. :)

My List

HQ
185 - Commissar Yarrick
195 - CCS w/3 x Melta, Astropath, Fleet Officer, Chimera (Hull Heavy Flamer)

Elites
265 - 5 Ogryns w/Chimera (Hull Heavy Flamer)
105 - 5 Stormtroopers w/2 x Melta
105 - 5 Stormtroopers w/2 x Melta

Troops
155 - Veteran Squad w/3 x Melta, Chimera (Hull Heavy Flamer)
155 - Veteran Squad w/3 x Melta, Chimera (Hull Heavy Flamer)
155 - Veteran Squad w/3 x Melta, Chimera (Hull Heavy Flamer)
155 - Veteran Squad w/3 x Melta, Chimera (Hull Heavy Flamer)
155 - Veteran Squad w/3 x Melta, Chimera (Hull Heavy Flamer)

Fast Attack
120 - 3 Sentinels w/Autocannons
145 - Hellhound w/Hull Multi-Melta
145 - Hellhound w/Hull Multi-Melta

Heavy Support
165 - Leman Russ Demolisher w/Hull Heavy Flamer
330 - 2 Leman Russ Battle Tanks w/Lascannon
150 - 2 Hydras

Yarrick and the Ogryns were a late addition intended to bolster my center for the third game. I'd seen what the winner of the recent South Store tourney had been able to do with the same combination and a similar scenario. My reasoning was that Yarrick would be able to keep my guys from running when I needed to push what would possibly be several units off that center objective late in the game. I knew it was something of a gamble, since I normally consider Ogryns to be horribly overpriced. But it felt right. I figured that in the end I'd either fail big or do really well with them. :)

Game One: Mech Chaos

I'll call my first opponent Mr. Smile, as we were joking and laughing all the way through the game. Complete with funny voices and one-liners for the Demons and dying guardsmen. He was everything an opponent should be, hence this match was easily the most fun I had during the entire day.

Mr. Smile had a nice Mechanized Chaos List:

HQ
2 Winged Daemon Princes (One Nurgle, One Tzeench)

Elites
5 Terminators in a Land Raider

Troops
2 Rhinos carrying Vanilla Chaos Marines
1 Rhino carrying Thousand Sons
1 Rhino carrying Plague Marines

Heavy Support
1 Unit of 3 Obliterators
2 Predators with TW-Lascannon Turrets and lascannon sponsons.

This was the match I'd been the most worried about. I had pretty much written it off due to each of my Vet Squads being 4 KP with it's Chimera added in. My hope was to try and pull a draw or only a minor loss and then make up for it later in the last 2 games.

But remember that lousy terrain? I rolled first turn and chose the more open side that would allow me to move my tanks around. While Mr. Smile had his movement more constrained. So it pretty much became a game of line up on the cover and wipe his guys out as he came through the sieve. The Hydras made short work of his Daemon Princes (Go Hydras!). While the Stormies dropped right behind his Land Raider over on my left and wrecked it. Forcing Mr. Smile's termies to walk into my melta/lasgun fire.

Yarrick and the Ogryns beat down his Plague Marines in the center, while my Russes popped one Pred and knocked the turret off the other. I got just a little too agressive in the last couple of turns and put a Chimera too far forward into the ruins, losing both it and the squad inside, oh well. I can't say it was the most exciting battle ever, but my opponent's good cheer made it fun to play.

In the end, I won the mission by 2 KP. We looked at the rules sheet for the scenario, and were surprised to find that a draw was specified as both players having equal kill points. But a minor victory required one player to have 6 or more kill points than the other. WTF? There was no case for someone having 1-5 more kill points than the other! Good job GW!

So we went to the TO and asked for a ruling. He thought about it for a couple of minutes, going back and forth a few times (We didn't try to sway him.). Finally, he decided to give me a minor victory.

Result: Minor Win

Game Two: Mixed Infantry/Mech Chaos

I'll dub my next opponent Mr Grim, since he was quiet and stand-offish at first. I had to keep throwing jokes and other silliness his way until he finally loosened up about half-way through the match. Considering how much of an introvert *I* am, this was really something.

His list was a mixed mech/foot force:

HQ
Winged Daemon Prince w/Mark of Nurgle
Chaos Terminator Lord
2 Summoned Greater Demons

Elite
4 Chaos Terminators in a Land Raider

Troops
2 10-man Plague Marine Squads in Rhinos
2 10-man Chaos Space Marine Squads with Lascannons.

Heavy Support
1 Defiler
3 Obliterators

I won't go into too much detail about our game as the actual playing of it didn't matter. There were good and bad rolls on both sides, but neither of us was able to push any troops into the other's deployment zone. The game was won on turn 4 when the second objective came up next to the first on the right-hand side of my deployment zone directly in front of 2 of my Chimeras. Mr. Grim's surviving troop choices were on the left-hand side of the board. So all he could do at that point was to try and get more kill points than me to deny a massacre, which he did. So major (pure luck) victory for me. Talk about hollow wins! The conspiratorial part of me blames this mission on the GW marketing department wanting to sell more Valks this quarter, as only armies with fast skimmers could hope to beat the dice in this mission.

The insideous thing about having a random mission like this for the second round was how it screwed up the ladder for the 3rd round. Since the ladder was luck-based instead of skill-based for round 3, there were a lot more one-sided massacres in round 3 than there would have been otherwise.

Result: Major Win

Game Three: Horde Orks

This is when my luck ran out. I've shown you the table already. There was only one good quarter to deploy in. Which my opponent chose after winning the roll-off. As if the placement forward on the hill wasn't bad enough, some kindly terrain bleeper had scattered a bunch of area terrain through what room I did have.

Here's a picture of my deployment zone and the effective areas to deploy tanks. My opponent wanted to say that any rock showing would be difficult ground for a tank to cross. But I argued him down to only having rock at least 1" high be difficult to cross, which gave me 2 small paths onto the mesa. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to move up to the objective from behind the mesa at all without making butt-loads of difficult terrain tests.

As it was, I still had to put 3 Chimeras and 2 Hellhounds in reserve because I just didn't have room for them in my deployment zone.

I'll dub my opponent Mr. Shady, in honor of his sportsmanship. He took over 40 minutes to set up 150 models one-at-a-time from his foam cases. While my own deployment took just 5 minutes. He was a deliberately slow player. We only finished 3 turns in 2.5 hours, which is absurd. More than once I had to ask him to speed up his one-model-at-a-time movement. At one point I thought he was going to ask the TO a question. Instead he bought a drink from the girl at the register and had a short chat with her before I waved him back over to finish his turn.

Here's his list:

HQ
Warboss on a bike w/Power Claw, Attack Squig, and Cybork Body
Mad Doc Grotsnik

Elites
2 Squads of 14 Lootas

Troops
1 Squads of 30 Boyz w/Sluggas/Choppas
2 Squads of 30 Boyz w/Shootas
1 Squad of 20 Boys w/Shootas
1 Squad of Nob Bikers

Heavy Support
1 Squadron of 3 Killer Kans armed with Rokkit Launchas

Anyway, Mr. Shady had the advantage of a nice, open field to move across. While I had to fumble around in the rocks and leave a third of my tanks in reserve because I couldn't fit them into the room I had.

It was a massacre, of course. Could I have played it better, despite the table? Sure. In retrospect I should have deployed all my infantry on the Mesa to maximize Yarrick's stubborn bubble and my CCS's orders while I sent all of my Chimeras forward empty to flame and block with. But even then, we would have run out of time, possibly as early as turn 2 given my opponent's stalling. As it was, he did well enough in 3 turns that I didn't figure it was worth raising a fuss over his slowness. But I'm going to be much less tolerant of this sort of player in the future.

Conclusion

So there you have it. I won the missions I rolled first turn on. I assume most of the other players did as well. Good job GW! If you repeat this garbage again next year, I'm bowing out of 'Ard Boyz so as not to waste my time and money getting ready for epic fail like this.

As for Pet Shop Comics, it's obvious that they love the game, and I respect them for that. But they should also respect the competition enough to plan out terrain that's reasonably fair to all players. It's not about how pretty your tables are or "mixing it up". A competition shouldn't be won or lost based on a single die roll. So if I make the Semis again next year I'll skip them in favor of Dayton, which I heard was much better run tourney.

Army Builder 3.2

Lone Wolf has released AB 3, the good news is that if your copy of AB2 is current it is just a simple download.

While I haven't worked on the authoring side yet the basic interface is nice and much cleaned up. Almost every option is now in one widow so you don't have to flip back and forth through your units option windows. Never a big deal but it was nice to be able to see more at once.

The only issue that I have had so is the mobile viewer seems a bit cumbersome for Blackberries, in the end I just went back to saving lists as word docs and using the "docs to go" application.

I can't say that I have seen enough changes to warrant buying if you have let your AB2 lapse, but it if your license is current it is definitely worth the download.

'Ard Boyz Semi-Finals Report: Part I

I'll just come out and say it: It was a crappy tournament. Most of the credit for the smelliness goes to GW for writing a set of lousy missions. But Pet Shop Comics also deserves a slap on the hand for some really outrageous terrain issues. Some of which helped me, and some of which hurt me. It really just came down to who rolled first turn.

So in the end I really can't say how well I did compared to the other players there. I won 2 of the 3 games, and I have a ranking (13 of 22). But since the missions and terrain were so random, I don't consider either the ranking or the games I won to be a valid measure of how good or bad a player I am. I might have been the best player there, or the worst. But in the end only the lucky ones moved on to the finals. And that's just not right.

Mission Fail

I liked the 'Ard Boyz scenarios for the first round. They were a nice mix-up from the usual pick-up game missions. That is, they were interesting without being overly problematic. But the second scenario for Round 2 was so bad that I actually considered not going to the Semis. Here's a quick breakdown of the 3 missions:

Game 1: "Break Their Back!"

It was annihilation with a pitched battle deployment. Except that every troop choice was worth 3 Kill Points. HQ choices were a single KP, while all the other choices were 2 KP. Dedicated Transports were 1 KP each.

Game 2: "Dying of the Light"

This was the clusterbeep. You had to place 6 numbered objectives at the start of the game. On the beginning of turns 2, 4, and 6 you had to roll a die. Whatever number you rolled would make one objective "active". Duplicates were to be re-rolled. So at the end of the game, you'd have 3 active objectives out of the original six. And wait, did I mention that the night fight rule was in effect for the ENTIRE game?

Game 3: "Crushin' It"

Spearhead deployment with a single objective in the middle. Standard 3" capture/contest rules applied. This one had a random game length whereas the other scenarios were restricted to 6 turns.

Terrain Fail

Pet Shop Comics was a really neat place. They put a lot of effort into having a lot of very interesting terrain. The problem is that the placement of that terrain was not conducive to a competitive tourney.

Have a look at these pics:

This is the first table I played on. Notice how all the cover is in the center, which is an interesting idea. But it's also significantly off-center. Which is going to give a big advantage to whoever goes first.

This table is symmetrical as hell, but it's also off-center for some reason.

This table is relatively OK. But notice the sparseness of the tables behind it. That thing that looks like a Titan BTW, is just a huge statue of some guy with a sword.

Here's a table that you could win a spearhead mission with just by going first. Note what the signs say on the wall, these guys are serious about their terrain.

And here's another unbalanced battlefield. This table, BTW, is the one I played the 3rd scenario on. But more on that later.

So here we have a collection of extremely different tables that all offer a very different play experience. Some are wide-open, with almost no terrain at all. While others are overloaded. Infantry will do well on some of these battlefields, while tanks will dominate on others. Ug!

If GW's sin was to craft a set of missions that were too random for competitive play, PSC's sin was in not attempting to provide a reasonably consistent battle environment on all it's tables.

And it's not like they didn't know it. The self-proclaimed "Terrain Nazi" at the store made a special announcement at the start of the first round that "These tables have a lot of terrain, get over it. There's no crying at 'Ard Boyz!". So I assume that someone had complained to no avail.

To be continued...

Well, at least the Store was nice.

BlueMoon and I went down to Louisville today for the 2nd round of 'Ard Boyz. I wish I could say it was as fun as the first round, but I really can't. Part of that is GW's fault for the lousy missions, and some of that is the store's fault for bad terrain setup. But despite the generally good sportsmanship all around, I really only enjoyed the first game. I'll write up the details in a later post, but I did want to share some pictures of what has to be the single largest game store I've ever seen.


I really didn't know what to expect when I went down. I grew up in Louisville and had been to Pet Shop Comics' old store about 10 years ago. But since then they've moved into a huge 9000 square foot space. It's actually 2 storefronts with a connecting door. One side is for retail, while the other is purely for gaming. So not only did they have many more tables than we needed, but they also had benches to eat at and some comfy chairs, plus a sofa.

Here's some closeups of the city table up front:


Their GW stock wasn't anything special, but they did carry a full range of Battlefoam trays, which I bought 2 of. They also had a very nice historical WW2 section in addition to tons of different comics. So if you're ever down that way, check them out. I was very impressed.