My Fists

[tvih]

I think I've more or less settled for a list that I could perhaps even try joining a tournament with next month. With the purchase of Shadowspear and the Repulsor Executioner - as well as the Impulsor - the only thing I put in it that I don't yet have is the Invictor Tactical Warsuit. If I don't buy that (main reason would be trying to save up for Sisters), I'll have to shuffle some things around, but should be a reasonable list. Not that I'd expect any wins in the tournament with my lack of recent experience and it still not being 100% tournament-optimized, but at least it's not as handicapped as any of the other factions' lists I could field and maybe I could at least get some decent battles out of it.

[Kolgrim DeathHowl]

Great looking army well painted!!

[Mandragola]

Have you seen that there's now a vanguard start collecting set? It has the marine half of shadowspear in it (actually minus the captain and Librarian). It's currently the only way you can buy suppressors, and unless they eventually release a full kit, it'll stay that way.

[tvih]

Yeah, I'm aware, but the reason I mentioned missing the other Shadowspear is that I could've gotten it for the same price as the Start Collecting box, with double the models. I could've easily offset the price of the models I would've kept by selling the ones I wouldn't have. Of course, even the SC box is still quite a bargain compared to buying separately, but I reckon I'll make do as is considering I'll have lots of Sisters to buy soon.

 

For my tournament list I have the Primaris tanks and the Shadowspear stuff waiting for basecoating. Sisters have been taking up my most recent efforts again. And I did slightly alter the list to include my three Centurions... but two of them are still not even assembled. With three weeks to go until the tournament, I really should stop slacking.

[tvih]

You wouldn't think I was worried about prices considering I was pondering whether to buy the Invictor or the Redemptor - since the latter could potentially benefit from Siegebreaker Cohort if I play with IF rules in the upcoming tournament - and since couldn't decide... I got both. Derp. What's more, I was originally considering the easy-to-build Redemptor since I should've had random bits to convert it to have the secondary onslaught cannon etc... but went with the expensive version instead since I wanna try some fancier posing for it. 20€ is a lot to pay for just posing but let's hope I can then at least live up to my "visions".

[War Angel]

Lets see it man!

[tvih]

30+ hours of work - where did all that time GO? - and here it finally is.

 

 

I guess I mostly managed to make it the way I planned, though I wish I had the chops for properly modeling figures like they're being crushed. As is for the one being stomped I tried to model the rubble as though the dude is getting crushed into/through it. First time that I use other models as pure decoration, by the way.

 

I was a bit worried about the brush marks on the armor panels since my airbrush is out of commission, but luckily the lacquer spray magically made 98% of 'em vanish, which is nice.

 

Other than this the Centurions are in progress, while the Invictor needs to go into assembly soon. Not looking good regarding getting the infantry done properly in time for the tournament though. Oh... speaking of infantry since I haven't posted it here yet, here's an eliminator sergeant and a CF/Deathwatch dude that I made before starting on the dread:

 

 

Sarge needs eyes and the cloak isn't fully done, but overall fairly happy with these two. Main problem being DW cannoneer actually looking like CF rather than DW because the blue highlighting I was trying out makes his black armor look almost the same as my dark CF scheme. In normal room lighting the two schemes are nearly indistinguishable for my eyes at least, but in this "studio" pic you can of course tell the difference.

 

"Funny" thing is that due to this I ended up going back to trying Vallejo's Night Blue for the Redemptor and it indeed was lighter in tone... until I put on the supposedly-matte lacquer spray which due to the reflections make it look just about as dark! Some of the terminators were made with Night Blue as a test and I thought it was the same, but I recently noticed some of the terminators are in fact lighter. So eh, probably I'll just use Night Blue going forward for that tiny bit more of definition.

Edited January 8, 2020 by tvih

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Excellent work on the Deathwatch members. The Dreadnought looks great; don't forget to paint blood leaking from every seam in the Traitor Marine's armor, as he's crushed to death.

[tvih]

 

This took too long too despite no heretics added, to the point that I most likely won't get the list ready in time for the tournament (given I remembered that my tanks are only base- or undercoated at this point as well). Oh well, that's life. Next one is in two months, so maybe by then :P

Edited January 12, 2020 by tvih

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Good job on the Invictor.

[painting.for.my.sanity]

Nice work on the Invictor - I think I might have done the whole fist in red though.

[tvih]

That IS the whole fist - it's forearm and wrist that's blue ;) Less red on the Redemptor even... not putting the Red into Redemptor there, I guess!

 

Having missed the tournament deadline I haven't really gotten anything done since. But I really I should try to see at some point if the same basecoating method works at all on a tank as I used on the Redemptor and Invictor. Why can't airbrushes ever work?

[ranulf the revenant]

The dreadnoughts/ err... "walkers" are cool. Maybe the metal parts could use a little more depth, and/or weathering though? An oil wash or something similiar? Just a thought :)

[tvih]

They are washed, albeit lightly. In normal room lighting they don't look as flat, the "studio" lightning is so even that it does away with almost all shadows and as a result... well, they look like they do in the pic.

[tvih]

Tournament list still as unfinished as ever, next tournament coming up in less than two weeks... ugh. On the upside though, I have had my first CF monocodex games this month, four of them in fact. That's more than I played total in 2019!

First one was 1000pt against Eldar.

My basic list:

Captain w Power Sword & Primarch's Wrath

Lieutenant with Fist of Vengeance & MC Boltgun

3x5 Intercessors w Stalkers

Invictor (dakka)

Redemptor (dakka)

5 Hellblasters

3 Inceptors (dakka)

It was a weird list with three Night Spinner thingamabos, Wraithblades (2x5?), a jetbike HQ and a caster HQ. Well, long story short two of the spinners never left their out-of-LoS hiding spot so I never even touched them. Blew up the third. Killed both HQs. Three Wraithblades left. And that's actually what cost me the game, the Wraithblades were making their 4++ saves somewhere between 2++ and 3++. Couldn't get anything through most of the time. It ended up something like 9-11 (damn conspiracies) and I only had the beaten-up Redemptor and two Intercessors left. The Spinners were such a pain in the ass, ignoring cover and LoS. And then people bitch when TFC does the same but with a fraction of the damage potential. Pfft.

---

Second game: Orks

Same list as before, except using Bolt Rifles.

Facing two boyz mobs, on grot mob, two buggies, two trukks, weirdboy, warboss, tankbustas. Started off by blowing up his tankbusta trukk, killing like four bustas with it. Overall it was quite a bit of a slaughter as you'd expect with the current codices. Score-wise it was only 6-3, but he was off the table while I still had at least 4 intercessors, 4 hellblasters, both HQs and both walkers. Since I had to play the objectives I did take some extra casualties, having to go near his mobz instead of just plinking away from a distance.

---

Game 3: Thousand Sons

Same list as game 1

He had two rubric squads, a tzaangor squad, a scarab occult suqad, Ahriman, and a daemon prince. The opponent went first this time, which cost him - as planned - since I only lost like one Intercessor to his Heldrake and when he moved forwards I then blasted both of his Rubic squads off the table on turn 1. Ouch! His tzaangors shared the same fate as well. Dakka level: over 9000. His psykers did exact quite a toll on turn 2, and when the terminators deep striked they were a real pain to remove from cover, eventually falling to rapid-firing hellblasters. Score was 7-5 or so, he lost all his units, I still had... hmm. Both walkers, 5? Intercessors, 4 hellblasters, both HQs.

---

Game 4: Thousand Sons (different opponent though)

List: upped to 1500 by adding a Spearhead detachment with:

Terminator Librarian

Thunderfire Cannon

Eliminator Squad

3 Centurion Devastators (dakka)

This was against a fairly new player. He had a Daemon Prince, a Sorcerer, 2x5 + 1x10 rubrics, some sort of terminator sorcerer, a Defiler, and three Helbrutes. That I can recall. As you can see, not much was visible on turn 1, with him starting. Unlike previous games, this was a CA mission, 4 pylons. His helbrute killed one of my Centurions, while Defiler only used smoke for some reason. Not much else happened really. I gave retribution by blowing up the helbrute and Defiler, maybe rubric or so on top.

I had foolishly deployed on the top floor instead of on top of the wall in the picture, which caused me some headache in trying to shoot things. It felt like most units weren't really accomplishing much, but the end result spoke otherwise. His two remaining helbrutes attacked my walkers. Redemptor was left with like 5 wounds in the end - Librarian's, who otherwise did nothing, Psychic Fortress blocking at least 4 mortal wounds aimed at it! - and Invictor with just 1 because the Helbrute did 12 damage on the charge! Ouch. Actual casualties for me were limited to a few Intercessors, Captain to a suicide-striking terminator and Inceptors. The Inceptors were largely to thank for killing his Daemon Prince. They rolled eight 6s on overwatch, which then got doubled, and four wounds went through. Then when two of them died in melee, the remaining sergeant whacked two wounds through with melee! Nex turn disengaged and others shot the remaining wounds off.

After his turn 3 we already stopped as he only had some rubrics and the terminator remaining, of which at least half the rubrics and the terminator would've died on my turn 3 anyway. End score was 7-1.

---

The Redemptor is yet to die on the table. The damage-halving stratagem saw use in all of the games, quite handy. Admittedly it would've of course died had we continued the Eldar match further.

I'm not too happy with the Intercessors so far damage-wise. The Stalkers do nice damage on vehicles IF they hit, but the limited shots and mobility do hurt. I really ought to get the Infiltrators done so I'd also have more mobile troops on the table if I stick with Stalkers. Inceptors have been solid, both dakka-wise as well as in absorbing enemy fire. They've died in all the matches, but not easily. Kinda wish I could fit them in my tournament list, but to do it I'd have to drop Impulsor and either Eliminators or Suppressors. Not too enamored with the Eliminators based on the one game, they suffered from much the same as the Intercessors. But gotta keep trying. Invictor is nice, though not being able to halve the incoming damage hurts compared to Redemptor. Longer range is definitely nice though.

Next game should be on Thursday. Might be a rematch against the Orks, though I'm not sure yet.

[tvih]

Ended up being two 1500pt games against the Ork player. Compared to my last 1500pt game I dropped the Centurions and terminator Librarian, instead taking normal Librarian, 5 terminators and a Land Speeder with HB+AC. First was an objective game with spearhead deployment that ended after the first turn since I went first and blew up nearly half his army despite the intentional unit downgrades (and terminators not even being on the table yet). He caused what, like 5 wounds on his turn? I would've just shot him completely to bits on turn 2 anyway so we didn't go further. His fatal error was getting to choose who goes first, and deciding to go second. Lesson learned.

 

We then decided to go for an Ambush scenario to give his orks a fighting chance. We also heard about the FAQ as we were setting up the game, so I decided to integrate the changes for the second game (obviously wouldn't have mattered for the first game). My screening units obviously already got charged on turn 1 already and it was tough going from there, but as I managed to completely yet barely destroy one of his two boyz blobs - that didn't get to charge - on my turn 1 in retaliation, which certainly helped. As we decided we'd be also using a Sudden Death victory condition (tabling = victory) I went for that goal rather than trying to only run across the board to escape. In the end I won after 3½ turns - his darned warboss survived way too many melee attacks (rolled four 6+++ saves for example) on my turn 3, leaving it at 1 wound. And then it attacked with melee TWICE on my turn and once on his turn, before my Intercessors managed to get that last wound through. It killed two of my Eliminators and my fully intact Invictor that had charge it (it was already in melee with the Intercessors from his turn).

 

Also sadly my Redemptor finally died, a victim of Lootas (always rolling 3 shots per model) and tankbustas. I didn't have much left in the end: Captain, Lieutenant, Librarian, Eliminator Sergeant, 3+1 Intercessors, Land Speeder, Terminator Sergeant. A much nicer game than the previous two for sure, since it wasn't nearly as one-sided.

Edited February 27, 2020 by tvih

[tvih]

So as not the spam the FAQ thread with my specific and uninteresting stuff, moving it here... I mentioned running a CC oriented funky list. But that got me thinking about the smash captain part. I've not actually run any smash captains in 8th. Or maybe even 7th? Of course, characters were quite different then anyway.

 

Being CF, there's an obvious weapon for a smash captain: the Fist of Vengeance. So the smash captain would look something like this:

Jump Pack

Power Fist -> Fist of Vengeance

Storm Shield (though I'm tempted to try make do with 4++ and give him a gun for the initial round or two when he can't just run off to die)

Warlord Trait: Iron Resolve (+1W, 6+ FNP)

Stratagem: Sentinel of Terra -> Stubborn Heroism (can't fall back, halved damage - suicide ftw?)

 

Then I got to thinking that as Bob Ross says, everyone needs a friend. So why not a smash-Chaplain?

Jump Pack

Power Fist -> Gift of the Phalanx -> Fist of Terra

Stratagem: Master of Sanctity -> Catechism of Fire (for when not going to combat at the start), Mantra of Strength. Litany of Hate is default of course but going with his buddy that's a bit pointless since they hit with 2s and reroll 1s anyway.

Stratagem: Hero of the Chapter -> Tenacious Opponent (because smash ALL THE THINGS)

 

I kinda wanted to have a Lieutenant to go with them as well to reroll those pesky 1s to wound. But I realized there's no way to give them invul saves without relics, so it'd be slighty problematic in that sense (so much CP used as it is). A mobile Librarian would be cool to cast Fortify or Might of Heroes on the suicide Captain and more importantly (needing mobility for) Null Zone would be nice since many bigger things the Smash Bros would like to Hulk Out on are likely to have invul saves. But the Librarian would actually cost more than the Captain just by adding a jump pack, since for some reason it's 9-10p more than for the Bros? At least in BattleScribe, I don't have my codex with me to confirm. Seems odd the cost is different for all three characters.

 

Worst part is that while I started out wanting to add lots of relic guns to my tournament list I'm now wanting to add these smashy guys. Nuts. They'd definitely add some counter-charge capability, and they'd also be quite evil in the terminator-centric fun list. That was supposed to have Kantor, but he wouldn't have the mobility for the aura to help much and costs so much... same goes for the terminators unfortunately. Though they could move out early in the battle I suppose. The four characters all together would be a sight to behold.

 

Regardless, both a bunch of shooty chars and smashy chars are something I want to test. The Chaplain with the +1 to wound for shooting would definitely go well with 3 relic bolt weapons too. Right now I made an alternate version of the tournament list that has the two main Smash Bros and a Primaris Lieutenant with Duty's Burden, but who knows what I'll end up with.

Edited March 2, 2020 by tvih

[Flokitheboatbuilder]

Deathwatch look excellent! Very clean and crisp.

[tvih]

 

Well, the tournament came and went this weekend. Went pretty much as badly as I expected upon first seeing the list entries. Got trashed in all five games. Pretty much the only highlights were killing Draigo from 6W (took a Perils wound or something prior) with Duty's Burden in one volley in the first game, and killing Magnus and a Chaos Knight in the last game (not having fought a Primarch of a Knight before). Though if that fricking Magnus didn't roll 3++ like it was 2++, would've killed a second knight too. But it is what it is. Oh, and I did get a "best model" award for my Redemptor, so I guess there's that.

 

Things gleaned:

 

- First of all, playing as CF instead of IF is pretty much pointless. I think I got the +1 to hit bonus like twice in the entire five games even though all my units are minimum size. The only upsides are the Duty's Burden and Fist of Vengeance relics, but for the latter with the lack of actual melee units in support, the smash-Captain and smash-Chaplain were essentially suicide units. If I ever bother with a tournament again, I'll just play as IF. Pretty much everyone else seemed to be already ignoring my cover, while for example Mechanicus in game four had their own cover for the entire game which nerfed me pretty badly.

 

- Things with only two wounds just don't survive when every goddamn thing seems to be putting out two wounds. If not for mortal wound spam in two of the games single-wound models would've probably fared better in terms of points for durability.

 

- Kinda confirmed my earlier observations about Inceptors, they're tougher to kill not being 2W (T5 helps too to a point) and now with Tactical Doctrine their guns are even better. And in a list hurting for mobility, theirs was nice to have. In the last game I did a deep strike to assassinate a filthy Chaos Sorcerer, lost only one model to return fire, retreated to score some points at an objective... job done. I reckon another 3 of them at least would be nice to have.

 

- Knew it beforehand of course but I'd need more Centurions, also for the durability reason. But problem is of course their mobility. With 24" effective range for Hurricane Bolters they were often out of range as it was. If I ever get more, I was thinking equipping the other three with lascannons and running them all in the same squad to protect the lascannons from dying first. And having six (or more) would warrant actually running Siegebreaker Cohort as IF. One game was against RG who sure have it easy with deep-striking Centurions, even after the nerf.

 

- Repulsor Executioner. Sure it has lots of firepower, but as expected it just kept blowing up. Models that expensive really need a way to get some invulnerability. It doesn't even have 2+ armor after all. In five games it got to shoot only five times, not even doing its point value's worth of damage, total. Hooray? The Chaos Knight I did my only real damage against with it cost 65 points more and got +8W, 5++ (with 4++ 1CP stratagem), even more firepower (against vehicles/other high-toughness targets for that variant at least) and not-as-limited mobility (I mean, with Repulsor you get Fly, but move over 5" and shooting suffers) for the bargain... plus of course some actual melee capability. Tournament status: paperweight.

 

- Only three Eliminators have a hard time killing targets. In one game I managed to one-shot a TFC gunner with a Mortis volley, and in another managed to get FOUR Mortis hits with just two models and then rolled sixes to wound for them all, killing two approaching Kataphron Breachers, but other than that... not much effect.

 

- 2 Whirlwinds and a TFC didn't kill much, though at least they weren't instantly blowing up most of the time either. TFCs have the benefit of being easier to place in ruins than Whirlwinds. I guess overall I'd need more TFCs too, but the (monetary) cost is nutty. I have one extra Techmarine so I guess I could try to somehow scratch-build a cannon for him.

 

- Walkers mostly just died, without doing much damage at all. With Duty Eternal nerfed, Redemptor just can't last. Can't try to hide it out of range either since it has a low range of its own. Of course if they're shooting it, they're not shooting something else, but small consolation.

 

Basically any future list would probably have to dump a major portion of current one (like probably walkers, almost certainly Repulsor) and buy at least 3 but preferably 9 more Centurions, another 1-2 TFCs, more Inceptors, maybe try the Suppressors, include the Impulsor for some troop mobility... and even with all that I'd be stuck with mostly low mobility and probably still not enough antitank given the low range of Centurions. And since it'd still not be possible to get all that while upgrading to a dual battalion, I'd still be stuck with too few CP as well.

 

In short it doesn't look like there's much point going to another tournament any time soon (though the next one is 2 months away anyway). Even if I scrapped my other armies' purchase plans to work on this, probably in the next Codex at the latest the models I bought would become expensive paperweights again knowing GW's "balancing", and I can't afford that. And this game absolutely sucks for anything competitive as long as they don't introduce alternate activations or such for the "kill phases" like Kill Team does. Losing 700 points of your army in turn 1 when you're not going first with there being absolutely nothing you can do about it just isn't good game design not matter how you spin it.

Edited March 9, 2020 by tvih

[tvih]

Got a bolt rifle (and the arms) from someone on Saturday, so during the night/morning between tournament days I most made this guy from the Dark Imperium sword lieutenant, as I don't really see myself using the bolt pistol + sword combo much (though the arms are magnetized just in case).

I was using the other lieutenant as its namesake with Duty's Burden, but going forward this one gets the job instead of being an Intercessor Sergeant. For some reason it's one of my favorite Primaris models I've done so far, despite being such a simple conversion with a random pair of arms. The pose just kinda... works. Of course being my first Primaris model with proper CF shoulder plates helps too.

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Your models are well-painted. I commend your skills and efforts.

[tvih]

Brother-Librarian Helas suffering from a headache due to his brothers always being late with their book returns.

It's a bit of a shame these Phobos characters are so points-intensive. Even in more casual lists I quickly tend to run out of points. It'd also be cool to try a Phobos-only list, but alas I don't and won't have the models for that.... well, maybe 1000pts at some point but even that's far from certain. Anyway, the Librarian model is definitely my favorite out of the three that came with Shadowspear.

[Dumah]

Well done on the Libbys cloak! And your blues are beautiful!!

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Good job on the Librarian.

[tvih]

Got around to making this guy: