WarriorFish's Legio Venator Blog

[WarriorFish]

The HG are almost complete, and mixing some white and gold on the other cruxes worked nicely. Unfortunately I slightly underestimated the amount of detail remaining so with daylight well and truly gone work must stop for now. My eyes could do with a rest too, I'll pick up the remaining stuff during the week :)

[WarriorFish]

Finally complete! Painting in the evenings isn't great and doesn't lead to brilliant pictures either but better than no work:

also a close up shot, showing the LEGIO and TERRA script as well as the alternate weapons:

I'm very pleased with them, they should cause some mischief on the table top too. I'll be sure not to leave a project so long again (even if it did benefit them a lot, but we'll ignore that )! As you can see on the middle Marine I mixed some white and gold in an attempt to dull the white and while the pure white crux looks fine here that won't be the case with other Marines who'll have less going on to level it out.

As it happens I think the white and gold looks really good so I think I'll be using it more often Maybe even retroactively adding it but we'll see I think my next Marine project will be sorting out the rescued Scouts so watch this space

[WarriorFish]

Since this is the home of my Marines I figured may as well post them up here - first of two battles from today:

Game 1

1750pts vs Blood Angels

Mission and Deployment

We're fighting it out diagonally across the table, with six objectives to capture. With a Land Raider full of Death Company and a Storm Raven with Vanguard I know I have little other than my Honour Guard to counter effectively. It's going to be important to manage that! I have my Vindicators sitting on the right flank waiting to intercept there, with my Dreads as pickets supported by the Land Raider with the Honour Guard and my Captain hoping to intercept.

This objective seems familiar...

Deployment:

Turn 1

I fail to steal the first go, so I wait as the BA come towards me. The Redeemer is mean of course, but I'm not worried about the cannons with my combat squads safely further back. Luck is with me, only losing a hull point on the right hand Vindicator. In response there's not much I can do either, but I shuffle my units around and take a hull point off the Baal. The Dreads swap positions, the Ironclad waiting to counter a push to the left and my Land Raider moves up, but not too far as to hedge my bets. Rhinos back up a bit ready for the BA Rhino and my Vindicators move out a little.

Vindicare fires his first ever shot at the Dread... and misses. A good summary of the turn!

End of turn 1...

Turn 2

The Blood Angels move in closer, again we're in a bit of a stand off over Land Raider disembarking but I'm lucky again with no real damage to speak of. This is a good opportunity to try and capitalise on my fortunate and my B&C dice don't let me down. My Dreads come out for an ambush and with the Vindicators do some good damage to the Redeemer. Lascannon fire from the combat squad strips another point off the Baal and the Multimelta squad forces the Attack Bike to jink. Land Speeder Storm comes in but doesn't have much to achieve so waits behind some cover.

Down to a single Hull Point:

End of turn 2:

Turn 3

The Storm Raven turns up, and comes zooming in to blow up both my Vindicators Fortunately they'd done a lot for me already so despite the loss I was confident the rest of my forces could deliver a good turn. The Rhino releases its Tactical Squad due to only having a single Hull Point left, but with only flamer weaponry they only strip a point from the Speeder. The rest of the Blood Angel turn achieves little, crucially the immobilised Redeemer letting my Venerable finish it off.

My Dreads move in on the Death Company, the plasma cannon managing to scatter back but fortunately without damage. The Scouts disembark along with the Rhino combat squad and manage to force a failed morale check. They don't fall back far, allowing my Scouts to assault where they roll extremely well and finish the squad off with only one loss!

Ready for the charge:

My Scouts pursue the fleeing Tactical Squad:

As we got to the Dreadnought combat resolution my opponent concedes, with little left that would be able to successfully take on my army. In case you're wondering, the Land Raider didn't disgorge its cargo! Not the first game my Honour Guard were hoping to write home about, but a win is a win even if it was mostly made from my opponent's consistently poor rolling.

The game as it ended:

[WarriorFish]

Always good to see your painted army on the table. Second game with the same list against Grey Knights:

Game 2

1750pts vs Grey Knights

Mission and Deployment

Same mission, but this time going length ways across the table. Once again I lose the roll off and deploy second but this gives me a good opportunity to respond with my own deployment and I think I get a pretty good set up. I'm not too concerned about the PAGK other than their pesky psycannons but the Paladins will be a pain. Plan is to apply Vindicators until they go away but that could be difficult with the Land Raider Crusader...

Deployment:

Turn 1

The Grey Knights move forwards but again ineffective fire only takes a hull point from a Vindicator and a couple of Marines. In response my Vindicators target the Land Raider and with some blessings from the Emperor explode both it and the Razorback beside! What luck, that sets a great start to the game topped off when lascannon fire takes out the Multilemelta Dread. Feels like I've almost got the game in hand already! Vindicare sticks to his game plan and fails to snipe the apothecary, lazy git.

That's going to hurt... you're on foot now!

Turn 2

As you'd expect a massive spanner or two have been thrown in the works but it's not quite over yet. Hull points are stripped from my Dreads, the Ironclad also losing the melta/hammer arm and my right flank Rhino immobilised. Not great, but I'm still well up. Unfortunately the Paladins and commander make a sprint of a charge into my Ironclad and hammerhand glances from the big cheese take him out

This can work in my benefit though, some extremely accurate Vindicator fire takes down a couple - could have been more but an excellent series of saving throws stopped that. Though I did almost kill my commander... he issued his rending trait to the squad and along with supporting lascannon fire drop some more Paladins and crucially put a couple of wounds on their commander. Pretty good results, I'm sure they can be handled in combat now which is exactly what we do. The commander is felled and his squad takes yet more casualties, the burning blade doing its thing. A Rhino is also popped, putting the nearby PAGK ready for a supporting charge.

Prior to the freem and rending fusillade:

End of turn 2:

Turn 3

The surviving Rhino squad takes out the Venerable Dread before it can get close enough to charge, otherwise it's just the charge to support the lone Paladin from the demechanised squad. All the power weapons are no better than butter knives against artificer armour though, so it's not a battle that goes well for them. The Paladin survives the onslaught but his peers can't say the same, he flees only to be shot down in my turn.

The remaining Grey Knights are cut down and the survivor flees, taking an Honour Guard with them but with this there is only the Rhino squad left. With my Rhino squad and Land Speeder Storm behind enemy lines capping objectives (or maybe coming round for an encirclement) my opponent concedes. Again I was aided by luck but that's the nature of the game!

After the charge:

End of game:

Always great fun to play, though I can't say I enjoyed my games all that much as short of making the most of what opportunities lady luck gave me it didn't feel like I earned my victories. Vindicare was a little disappointing but didn't really have decent targets, he did a good job shooting tanks though. Honour Guard literally did nothing first game, but I felt they did well in the second even if that was helped by some excellent shooting to thin the squad first.

Not sure on future projects yet, perhaps finally adding some grav to my Marines might be a good idea.

[Arkaniss]

A victory that feels cheap is also a defeat that feels unjust - but as with all 40K games the Dice Gods decide! As long as everyone enjoyed the game and socialising while throwing some dice around and moving little plastic men, that's the main thing :)

 

Anyway, a nice couple of battle reports. I always like batreps with pictures to help convey the changing fortune of war.

[WarriorFish]

Indeed, and you should never pull your punches either. Bad enough that your dice betray you but worse still if your opponent feels he must take pity on you I need to work a lot more on my batreps though, a few more pictures other than end of turn would help - though granted little exciting enough to warrant that happened here. Mostly I need to record in more detail, I tend to forget or gloss over the more minor things. I'm not sure people want to hear about a hull point lost that meant nothing, or a combat squad scooting around the back field in their Rhino looking for objectives

 

I should try and read some more batreps to help me see what's best, maybe get some tips. Short of making notes during the game I'm not sure how you can be sure of having all the info, but it feels like that would be rude to your opponent.

[Arkaniss]

Make a few notes of important things perhaps? It wouldn't disrupt the game for more than a few seconds and a sentence or two on each event would surely be enough to remind you what happened when it comes round to writing up the Batrep. That said while I like a good battle report to devour I don't want to see a wall of text describing the game in every detail so a balance must be found!

[WarriorFish]

I'll give that a try next time. Pictures say a thousand words as the saying goes, so along with some short highlights of turn events should cover it well enough without being too long a read

 

Next plan for the Legio is sprucing up my Dreadnoughts so I can post them to the Dreadnought show piece topic, that should keep me busy until my next project arrives through the post...

[WarriorFish]

Speaking of Dreadnoughts... their King just arrived in the post:

Fancy box and a ream of bubblewrap too, a different world to when I last ordered some resin! Unfortunately I have a busy weekend but you can be sure I'll be finding as much time as I can for this

[Kierdale]

So this is where you keep your (loyalist) marines!

Good stuff.

And congratulations on those wins. :tu:

[WarriorFish]

The Legio aren't ones for making their presence known unnecessarily :P Running behind on my plans (as ever) but I'm keen to get the Leviathan done, but new projects are on pause until I can source some more primer :(

[WarriorFish]

Working on my Leviathan at the moment, my hope is to get it finished this week with the Easter bank holiday! It's a fantastic kit worlds apart from the old FW I have (though they're still good of course). I've cleaned the bits up and there's only a little bit of GS work I'll need to do to patch up which is great. I was planning to fill the little grooves on the phosphex bombs anyway so they look more like hunter killers so this way I won't be wasting and GS.

 

I've got the arms sorted and it's cool that you have the option for left or right on each (not that it makes a big difference, but you know). It's a bit unfortunate that due to the cabling you don't really have as much choice in the pose of the arm but as I'll only have the one not much of an issue. Great that all the bits allow for some detailed construction in how it works (elbow and knee bits!) but this leaves me with a problem in that I'm not sure how to assemble and glue the arms, being that I was only given two hands...

 

My gel superglue is wonderful and saves my bacon all the time, but it has no patience and sets quickly. Does anyone have some tips on getting the arm poses lined up for the cables ok for gluing?

[WarriorFish]

The Emperor looks after this own, Easter weekend presents me the extra time I'll need to finish my Leviathan:

As is traditional now there's a bit of magnetising. I decided not to go with the arms in the end because I realised I'd never get more arms and I don't think the Storm Cannon is all that great especially for the price on something that really, really wants to be ripping faces off. Besides if I want range I have HKs for that:

Now prepared for work to being in earnest tomorrow

[WarriorFish]

Late night GSing is probably not a good idea, but I did a bit of work:

Also a small hole fill on a foot. Might look rubbish in the morning but should be serviceable enough after a bit of cleaning up, ready for priming

[WarriorFish]

Progress yesterday was good, the base green and metals are done:

A bit of touching up and the highlighting on the green and I'm nearly at the finishing line! Good job I did some of the base yesterday too in-between bits I should be able to get him done today As is typical for the Easter break the sun has gone into hiding but such is life, the model doesn't have lots of details to paint so it shouldn't be a problem. Until I try to take the completed photo that is

I may return to the model to add some bits and "40k" it up a bit but I'll see how it goes. Plan is to be battle ready by the end of this week as the priority.

[WarriorFish]

Sod's law that the sun decides to come out after I've finished... but at least it let me take better pictures. Though the sheer size of the model didn't make that easy...

Pleased with him, though there's more that can be done. A bit of 40k bits might not go amiss so I'll give it some thought for future additions. The stagnant puddle is still setting but it turned out well thanks to some unintentional PVA

Hidden Content

Squad Cato's guns had almost literally not stopped spitting death, but still the xenos tide came. Again and again accurate bolter fire tore their bodies apart but each one that fell was replaced by another in moments. No words need be said; the Tyrant had to fall but the dilemma was that it couldn't be reached. If his squad left the gate it to combat the Tyrant it would let a surge of Tyranids through and their fight would be for nought. The xeno no doubt knew his squad was stuck, and fighting a battle against time they could not win.

"For the Emperor!" he bellowed as a xenos warrior's head swallowed his bolter's round. This was much as to feel like he could still hold sway over his fate as anything else, but he was gratified to find his squad not yet pressed enough to be unable to join his exaultation.

"Squad Cato. Hold. Reinforcements momentarily" his vox clicked to life, the voice of the Captain's clipped tone clear.

"Understood." he growled through clenched teeth as he reloaded once more.

Brother-Sergeant Cato knew why his Captain didn't specify the nature of the reinforcements. There was no need, true, but the sight of the Leviathan striding forth from the drop pod was enough. Were things so desperate? Was nothing else available? The noble form of the Dreadnought was one the chapter knew and cherished but all the same, he knew full well what this meant.

"Hold the gate" the vox enhanced voice rumbled through the battlefield.

The xenos creatures were no match for the hulking frame as it waded purposefully towards the Tyrant, not even bothering with its flamers. He'd never have believed it if he hadn't seen it, but the powerful charge it broke into upon sighting it was startling. More shocking, and what made Cato's blood run cold was the words accompanying:

"I am... MORTIS REX! FACE ME TRAITOR!"

As Cato watched the Leviathan tear the Tyrant apart he was glad the fear was for others.

The strength of will and kinship with the machine was always strong among the Veterans of the chapter, yet even this was not enough for the strain of the Leviathan. All who entered would be himself no more, but Mortis Rex. Said to be the name of vengeance given to a mighty champion during the heresy, his great oath to crush all traitors strong enough to last beyond his first and second deaths...

[Olis]

Boo for the lack of Volkites on that Leviathan! Boo, I say! 

 

Nice story, although the Dread shouting "Traitor" at filthy xenos tells me he might have had a head wound at some point. 

[Arkaniss]

Looks awesome! Any chance of a picture with something else for scale comparison? I've never seen a Leviathan so it'd be neat to have some more familiar model to compare it against.

 

Edit: Forgot to say - purity seals will make it more 40K in short order if you have any spare ;)

Edited March 27, 2016 by Arkaniss

[WarriorFish]

Boo for the lack of Volkites on that Leviathan! Boo, I say!

Nice story, although the Dread shouting "Traitor" at filthy xenos tells me he might have had a head wound at some point.

Think you might need to check yourself out for that head wound Olis, perhaps you should check out the Leviathan's rules and background bits before re-reading ;)

Here's the comparison shot:

I'll add some purity seals as part of the upgrade I'm sure, but I need a bit of a painting break for now :P

[Kierdale]

He's a big boy isn't he?

I bet he had two wheatabix.

 

Great work, WarriorFish :tu:

[WarriorFish]

Two wheatabix, warm milk and early nights Thanks Kier I'm pleased with how he came out, though the water effect needs topping up - seems you can only gradually build it up as all my attempts to try and get a thicker application to work don't pan out. I'll put up a small batrep on his first battle this evening

[WarriorFish]

Quick batrep for Mortis Rex's first game:

Dreadageddon

1750pts vs Grey Knights

Legio Venator

Hidden Content

Tech Marine w/Servo Harness

x2 Servitors

x10 Tacticals w/Flamer, Missile Launcher

Sgt w/Melta bombs

x10 Tacticals w/Melta, Multi-melta

Sgt w/Melta bombs

x5 Scouts

Sgt w/Power Fist

x2 Dreadnoughts

w/Assault Cannon, Stormbolter

w/Assault Cannon, Heavy Flamer

Ironclad Dreadnought w/Hunter Killers, Heavy Flamer

Venerable Dreadnought w/Lascannons, Stormbolter

Stormtalon w/Typhoon Missile Launcher

Vindicator

Vindicator

Leviathan Siege Dreadnought w/Ceramic Plating, Drill, Hunter Killers

Mission and Deployment

We're fighting it out diagonally across the table, with three objectives to capture. All seems quite familiar... My CSM serve as the objectives because why not. Against the GK I have confidence I can out number and armour them, just depends on how much it takes to bring them down. With my Dreadnoughts I should be able to exact a heavy toll in combat, and the Vindicators have rightly earned themselves a reputation to be feared.

I neglected to take a proper picture (you'll note its a running theme this game) so this is only my deployment. Scouts and Stormtalon to come in from reserves to hopefully cause some trouble otherwise I set a defensive line as I want to close as much as they do. Vindis threaten the open space in case the Land Raider chooses to come down it with combat squad Tacs dotted around to advance and support the line.

Deployment:

Turn 1

Sadly the initiative is stolen from me and the GK make good use of it. Some kind of witch trickery lets them deep strike in immediately with a re-roll. Just as well as the first would have plonked them on top of the Leviathan. Then the psychic power rolls for the librarian come in and Vortex of Dooooom lands on Mortis Rex

Damn it. The Servitors may look suspiciously like Blood Angel Scouts, this is because I forgot to pack them.

Fortunately the Emperor supports His true servants and the Leviathan manages to save against it. Huzzah! Still stuck with it in my lines to scatter about and be annoying. Also the Librarian and his squad Gate of Infinity off to be annoying. Damn witches and their trickery. Otherwise the turn is ok, with the Venerable taking two HP loses - seems he gets a lot of flak each game.

Finally it's time for the righteous, and guns blaze. Hunter Killers do what they do best (i.e. nothing) but some HPs are plinked off the Rhino. Venerable Dread regenerates a HP and freems his opposite number to bits gaining a measure of vengeance. The Vortex of Dooooooooom scatters a bit but I elect to ignore it and let the Emperor protect, movement is mostly shuffling to the right to deal with the Land Raider.

Pesky Psykers, end of turn 1...

Turn 2

Now the Dreadknight Deep Strikes in, being all annoying. Plays it safe with landing but has longer ranged guns and takes out the Venerable Techmarine gets two wounds and rolls two ones like an idiot, no luck on FnP either. Otherwise not all that much happens, lucky for me! My response is better. Reserves pile in and pop a Dread, Assault Cannon Dreads pop the Rhino letting the Vindicators do what they do best to the hapless GKs. One scatters and immobilises the Land Raider. Nice! My Ironclad and Leviathan move up some more, but are wary of the Dreadknight.

End of turn 2, also of my photos as I forgot to take any more.

Turn 3

The GK move up and things are about to get busy. The Land Raider passengers disembark to move up, as do the Librarian and Dreadknight. Another Vortex of Doooooooom on the Leviathan, fortunately does nothing. The previous one dissipated too. Nice. Dreadknight charges the Ironclad after taking a HP off, but they strike mortal blows each. Good job over all as this frees my Leviathan up for mischief.

And mischief he caused! The Librarian stood too close and got melta'd in the face. Bolter fire reduces the squad. Vindicators obliterate the Land Raider Squad and Assault Cannons tackle the remains of the Rhino squad. The assault phase sees the Leviathan make short work of the surviving two GK. Game is all but in the bag as my Scouts hold one objective, despite being under fire and my combat squads were about to claim the others.

Turn 4

The GK have few options, the Land Raider failing to stop the Leviathan and the Scouts holding true but one of the Dreads is lost. In response the Stormtalon that had zoomed in to support the Librarian's death drops into hover and finishes the five man GK squad off in one salvo, protecting the Scouts. The Land Raider is torn to pieces by the Leviathan and the remaining GK picked off by various weaponry. All objectives held and the GK annihilated!

Not a bad game overall, my forces managed to push an advantage early on and it went from there. Lots of armour and plenty of threatening weaponry made for a durable list that wasn't easy to handle. Plus with all the Dreads plenty of serious CC power too. The Leviathan did well, but for 325pts you'd hope so! I need to get a lot better at batreps (and remember the damn grass cloth...). I also need to try and sort some psychic defence because I'm a bit tired of the GK doing all their rolls for this and that and being unable to do anything about it.

Edited March 31, 2016 by WarriorFish

[Arkaniss]

A successful battle! Shame about the lack of pictures at the end but I guess it is a bit of an annoyance to have to break the flow of the game for pictures all the time. I can't say too much as I never document my games :P

 

I think you might struggle to counter GK Psychic powers - they are all Psykers after all and you won't be able to compete. I would think your only option was a Librarian with a Psychic Hood and keep him near your main units to help defend them for any hostile powers.

[WarriorFish]

:D It's hard to remember sometimes as you're too busy doing battle with heretics. They walked right passed those Chaos Marines for example... surely a sign of their falling from the Emperor's light? :P

 

I was thinking of my TDA Librarian as well as my biker one as the only options I have. Both need updates so might be a nice little project or two. I should check out the Inquisition again to see what they can offer too...

[Knight of the Raven]

Something tells me you like to field dreadnoughts.

 

I like that you gave the leviathan heavy flamers, the volkite just look too much like erzatz tau guns to me. I must say I like the venerable dreadnought better though, solely because of the contrast the gold gives.