How in the H#@L do Ruins work in 40K?

by Spaguatyrine

So as the February Tournament Season is coming and I am getting ready to knock some heads and hopefully represent this blog and Space Wolf players well, I cannot help but ask this question....How in the H-E-#-L does this rule get so......

Should GW Open-Source 40K?

by SandWyrm

Sorry for the light week of posting, but the family and I have been sick with Sinus Infections. I did, however, have a question today that I wanted to throw out to theBack40K community.

Should GW open-source the 40K ruleset and/or background?

Color Question: Dark Eldar Army Scheme

by SandWyrm

I've been a huge fan of the site for a while now and I've got a color-related question that I was hoping you could help me out with. I'm trying to come up with a scheme for my DE and am having some trouble figuring it out.

Dark Eldar vs Blood Angels

By TheGravemind

I had my first games after a couple weeks of sitting out, and man was it great to be back. My first game went kill points 9-4 in my favor, and we started early enough I was able to pick up a second game afterward. Game two was vs Dark Eldar, and it was 5 objectives with pitched battle deployment. I roll a 2 to go first and thinking "great, I'm going second against DE," but he rolls a 1, and is not running Vect. So I deploy my toys and am ready to grab some objectives.

The Top 12 Misconceptions About Win/Loss Tourneys; Part III

by SandWyrm

This is the final post in this series. You can find Part I here, and Part 2 here.

No "Happy Winter Holiday" From Us

by Sandwyrm, Farmpunk, Spaguityrine, and the rest of theBack40K gang

Merry Christmas!

Peace on earth, and goodwill to all men! For our Savior was born this day! 

Tron Legacy

by SandWyrm

I was fully expecting it to suck after all the critical hate. But it actually turned out to be pretty good, with a tighter story than the first film. My only real complaint was the a-bit-too-fast pacing and the zoomed in, shaky Galactica-cam during the action sequences. It needed a long shot or two to better convey what was going on in those scenes.

It's pretty obvious that there will be a sequel within a year. Cillian Murphy (Batman Begins, Inception) was playing Dillinger's son in the boardroom scene, and he doesn't do bit parts anymore. :)

ULTRAMARINES Movie Review

by SandWyrm

I finally got to see the new Ultramarines movie. So what did I think? (Mild Spoilers)

My Stormraven conversion part 2

By TheGraveMind

 

 My Stormraven is complete! Well, as finished as it is going to get. To fit my theme of the chapter Plasma Drakes, I'm calling it the Night Fury pattern storm raven. The wings of a B2 stealth bomber, and my obsession with plasma weapons I think justifies it. It has been a long time coming, with many months of effort, and a couple tubes of super glue it seems.

My Stormraven conversion part 1

by TheGraveMind

A Stormraven, The landraider of the sky. After seeing many great conversions, and some not so great... I started thinking about making my own. I was tired of the Landraider-front/Valkyrie-end look.  So I spent three days, and some notebook pages coming up with designs,.... and then it hit me.

TWO! TWO years! ah-ha-ha-ha!

by: farmpunk

the Back40K has been around for two years now. Two years ago, I was bored at work, and had been reading blogs associated with 40K for a while. After reading Bell of Lost Souls one day, and probably a couple of BoLS associated blogs, I thought....

Ultramarines The Movie: Quick Fix

by Chambers

So yeah, I am a not so closeted Dan Abnett fan boy. So when I found out that he wrote the movie and the graphic novella I went a head and ordered the disc set.

The Universe Has Been Canceled

by SandWyrm

In case you haven't heard, the "Syfy" (not Sci-Fi) channel canceled Stargate Universe today.

Whatever Happened To Guardsman Hawke?

by SandWyrm

Ok, I just recently finished reading Storm Or Iron, by Graham McNeil. Afterwards, I'm left with two reoccurring thoughts (spoiler!):

Does Win/Loss Really Encourage WAAC?

by SandWyrm

Yes, I already addressed this question in a previous post, but Strung Muppet had some more to say on the matter and I want to make sure the point is properly explored.

Battle of the Newbies! Uberdark vs Spaguatyrine

by Spaguatyrine

The mighty Ork invasion force comes back from looting a nearby village to see it's home base being surrounded by puny looking Space Marines . Some of them are riding wolves.

(Sorry about the blurry pictures. I checked my settings afterword and the auto shake feature was turned off)

Everybody loves a Batrep!

by Anonymous Foodie

A while back (I won't say how long, because I don't want to give you any ideas on how lazy we've both been with getting this finished) I played a game against a Uberdark's Speed Freeks. And if you don't remember this army from a while back, shame on you.

Painting Question: Line Highlighting

by SandWyrm

Dear SandWyrm,

If you have a moment I would like to pick your brain on the popular painting style "line highlighting". Ron at From the Warp brought it to my attention recently with his "Back to Basics" series of articles. I guess I haven't really been paying much attention to it but after it was mentioned I noticed that its something that the staff at Games Workshop likes to use almost exclusively. Personally I am not that much of a fan. I have tired it on a few minis and I cannot seem to get the look to come out right. Even when I have painted the model the way that I intended it just doesn't seem to look "natural" for a lack of a better term. To me it appears that its a method to create a false contrast.

The Top 12 Misconceptions About Win/Loss Tourneys; Part II

by SandWyrm

This is a continuation from part one in this series, where I go through and respond to all of the major objections that people have raised to the idea of running Win/Loss style 40K tournaments. All of which were aired after people read my previous post on Why Battlepoints Are Gimping Your Tournaments here on theBack40k, and it's later appearance on BoLS.

To Stun, or Not to Stun

by Anonymous Foodie

Of late I've come across a few discussions about Hellions, and the infamous Stun Claw upgrade.  For those unfamiliar, what this lets you do is basically grapple an enemy IC and pull him out of the squad.

Interesting Tournament Items

by SandWyrm

Here's a couple of interesting links that relate to our recent discussions on tournaments.

The Top 12 Misconceptions About Win/Loss Tourneys; Part I

by SandWyrm

There's been quite the debate in the comments for my post on Why Battlepoints Are Gimping Tourneys on both theBack40K and BoLS. Particularly from FireTeam_Nova, who runs a lot of events at the GP-South here in Indy. He (and others) raise many objections to W/L which I feel deserve a post of their own for a proper response.

Interesting Comments on BoLS

by SandWyrm

In case you haven't noticed, my article criticizing battlepoint tourneys was picked up by Brent and re-published over on Bell of Lost Souls yesterday. The response has been impressive: 200+ comments as of this writing.

Reader Question: IG Army Advice

by SandWyrm

Dear SW,

I have followed your posts on Theback40k and read alot you have written.

I was wondering if you would give me some feedback on my IG Mech List ?

Marbo In A Mech Army; Valuable Saboteur or Easy Kill Point?

by SandWyrm

Proiteus asked me this question about Marbo yesterday on Librarium Online:

WAAC vs. Competitive

by SandWyrm

Let's define properly what a WAAC (Win At All Costs) player really is.

My two blue Baals

TheGravemind

As Sandwyrm and Farmpunk like to joke about, I play marines with the Blood angel codex. I've scratch built my entire army combining chaos and loyalist bits. Why? Because I like the greaves of old armor better, and the horns, and generally chaos looks cooler, though I don't like all the spikes. When I started my marines, I told myself I would paint them blue and silver, my two favorite colors. So this bastard child of my two dreams has been the fact that I own two Baal predators... and they are blue..sigh.

Sir, There are orks infront of us!

By TheGraveMind

"...and behind us, and to the side. They are everywhere!" Had my first game (couple weeks ago almost) against the infamous Archfiend and his band of Orks. He pulled out a Trukk list for me, we played at 1750. I used the same list as when I faced against Nemesis the day before. We rolled up two objectives on 12" deployment. He won to go first, and deployed up. I fool hardily kept my three jump pack squads in reserves again. Sigh, could have charged 2nd turn if I hadn't. After his first turn, it felt like he had a 36" deployment, he was practically in my face.

[Warning, picture heavy]

Tournament, Feb 12th. Missions

By TheGraveMind

Stop, Mission time! So we are given two months to fine-tune our lists for these missions, should be good. Again I'll be lazy and just copy paste, greatest function ever.

holy crap thats a lot! or when does it stop?

by UberDark

Jack says 40k is A-OKAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So being into 40k for 4 years now, I've amassed a huge collection of miniatures.  Last night I played a 2.5k game against a friend of mine, and it was at that point when I realized with over 100 orks on the table and a bucket load of other accouterments, that HOLY CRAP, IS THIS TOO MUCH!!!1?????

Upcoming Tournament: Feb 12th.

by TheGravemind 

The information for the February 12th Tournament was emailed in. Call me lazy, I just copy pasted most of it see as it's after midnight and I'm busy on finals. As you may have noticed, Tournament ideas have been bouncing around here, and I'll say it's good to have one I think a lot of people can get behind. The Missions are also in, and I'll post them in a day or two after Finals have ran their course. Now for the real info.

New Grey Knight Rumors: Part II

by SandWyrm

Here it is, the rest of the new rumors from Blood of Kittens that were posted in Tasty's members-only area. (Don't worry, he gave everyone his permission to spread them.)

New Feature: Color Theory Archive

by SandWyrm

If you look just below our banner, you'll see a new perma-link for our Color Theory Archive. The page it leads to has links/descriptions to all of the best posts in that category.

Over time, we'll add other perma-links like Tactics, Battle Reports, Hobby Stuff, etc. Enjoy!

Let's make a mission

by: farmpunk

We've been discussing powergaming and WAAC a lot recently, and with some good, civil discussion. There's been talk lately about resurrecting an Indy 40K tournament league, and whether Battle Points or W/L is a superior method. This all plays into something I've been ruminating for a while: Making Missions for tournaments.

New Grey Knight Rumors: Part I

by SandWyrm

Here's the newest rumors from over at Blood of Kittens concerning the new Grey Knights codex. Along with my own commentary in red.

Why I Love This Blog

by SandWyrm

You know, I'm consistently amazed at how civil and thoughtful everyone's comments are on this blog. Where else do you get such well thought out replies? Especially this last week. I'm really impressed!

Congrats everyone! And THANK YOU!!!

Why Battlepoints Are Gimping Your Tournaments

by SandWyrm

It's a plain fact that 40K tourneys have a bad rap amongst the greater 40K community. They're often seen as nothing but an excuse for WAAC (Win At All Costs) players to throw fun out the window and bring the most "broken" or "spammy" combos they can to grind other players into the dirt. Certainly, the most common experience for new players attending a tourney for the first time is to lose two or more of their games. Often very, very, badly. Which, when combined with the tension of a typical event, will often sour them on ever going to another tourney again. 

But is it the competitive players that are responsible for this perception, or is the result of a flawed competitive system?

Powergamers - A second opinion

by Anonymous Foodie

As some of you know, I tend to shy away from the tournament scene.  I did make a trip down to Bloomington recently, and may jump on the bandwagon a bit more to try for some store credit toward a few new DE minis, but overall, I vastly prefer the friendly setting.  With beer, if at all possible.

Video: FAAC vs. WAAC

by SandWyrm

From UberDark's comment in Spaguatyrine's last post. Too funny!

The Point Sink: or How to put all your piddies in one basket.

by Uberdark

So lately I have been trying some new things out with my ork army. I have kitted out my bikers, made them all nob bikers and given them a painboy, and FNP.  all this for a huge 650 points.  I have been told by multiple people that this is waaaaaaayyyyyy too much to be doing.  Although a few have been inquisitive and asked how it works.  So here it goes.  The point sink. pros and cons.

Poll Results: Kill The Emperor!!!

by SandWyrm

The results of our poll are in! 50 readers (86.2%) voted to kill the Emperor and move the story of the Imperium forward. While 8 readers (13.8%) like their galaxy the way it is.

Time to contact Inquisitor Booth and make the arrangements. :)

1500 point tournament in Lafayette, Indiana January 15th

by Spaguatyrine

Will you be here for this tournament?

Happy Thanksgiving!!

by Spaguatyrine

HAPPY  THANKSGIVING TO ALL!!

Sandwyrm and me a few weeks ago in his mancave!! I am
the turkey in the Middle! :) Scott is watching on the right.

Enjoy your time with Friends and Family.

The things I am thankful for:

"Who's got the best psyker in the land?

by Spaguatyrine

Is it me?

The Problem With Al'Rahem

by SandWyrm

I've never been a big fan of Captain Al Rahem as a Platoon Command Squad upgrade for the IG. But Marnepup over on Librarium Online really summed it up nicely today.

Has It Occured To Anyone Else That...

by SandWyrm

...If the rumors are true, the upcoming Grey Knight Codex will make a pretty good Iron Warriors Codex?

Shall We Kill The Emperor?

by SandWyrm

I got into an interesting debate on BoLS a couple of weeks ago, and I can't stop thinking about it. It all started with Just_Me's post on Thorianism. A sub-sect of the Inquisition's Puritan faction that's obsessed with resurrecting the Emperor so he can once again lead the Imperium.

Uberdark: the man, the mystery, the awesome(-ishness?)

by uberdark and farmpunk in white

Some of you folks will recall a sweet-looking orky army that's made it's way onto theBack40k via SandWyrm and Anonymous Foodie. We've refer to him by many names at the shop, but have referred to him as JB here on the back40k.

You've seen his work: I think I have some local painting competition

and in SandWyrm's Battle Report here: A fine Looking Battle

How Many Guard Is Too Many?

by SandWyrm

With my new-found love of IG platoons, I've been pulling out a lot of models that I haven't used since I was running a mostly foot gun line. This got me to wondering... How many points of Guard do I actually have painted?

New FAQ for the 40K Rulebook!! My army just got better!

by Spaguatyrine

This came out yesterday and there are some changes that affect my army and yours!

Stormtroopers Are Way Overpowered...

by SandWyrm

...In Kill-Team vs. Marines.

I've never seen the Astartes hug cover like that. :)