The Diseased Sons are back

[Muskie]

I've actually played 5 games of 9th Edition and typed up a battle report for each one. But due to mysteries of the warp (and Apple) I was locked out of the B&C. Now I'm back on the B&C  but I still do not know my password. What I do know is our crusade starts today and someone wants my lifetime collection of bits...

 

Our campaign is called The Siege of Vanithros's Bastion and I honestly don't know why, spelling it is going to drive me bonkers. 

 

If you know who or what Vanithros is or you just want to follow along as I paint and play games of 9th Edition Warhammer 40,000 with my vintage army you can subscribe to the blog and I'll try to update this thread until I get locked out of the B&C again.

 

If you think my army is suboptimal, I'm an idiot, plague marines shouldn't be purple, maybe you should keep those opinions to yourself.

 

Purple Plague Marines by Andrew McKay, on Flickr

Edited March 5, 2022 by Muskie

[Warhead01]

I'm enjoying your battle reports! 

[Marshal Mittens]

They look cool, and very unique. Love the classic sculpts and unique color scheme! Edited March 5, 2022 by Marshall Mittens

[Muskie]

Only some of my plague marines are purple, but in the olden days I caught a lot of flack for it, but Nurgle loves all his children and grandchildren. We did start our campaign. I did start typing up the battle report but I think I'll need a little more time to edit it and the photos.

[Marshal Mittens]

People sometimes get upset with alternative color schemes, though I think folks are more accepting now, and ultimately they are your minis! Personally I rarely paint exact color schemes! I think your dudes look neat!

[Muskie]

I haven't always done the best at photographing my miniatures and they were painted over a long period of time so my colour matching isn't perfect, but I became infamous for one particular batch of purple plague marines. Most of my army is in fact green but I'm leaning towards introducing more pale colours into the pallet. And one reason I'm looking forward to painting cultists is I plan to have them not be terribly uniform. 

 

I seem to have finally solved my B&C login issues so hopefully I can keep this thread going, but painting, blogging, and helping to run a campaign is a lot of work. I also have a real job, which may require me to work extra hours a lot in the next month or three. But here is the first campaign games which took a lot of effort to type up last night and this morning.

[Marshal Mittens]

Nice! Thank you for sharing that! Stuff like that makes me want to get back into playing instead of just painting!

[Muskie]

So like always they took longer than they should have, but I painted or have almost finished painting four Death Guard Chaos Cultists. They've already seen the tabletop in a partially painted state, but now they look the business, so they'll probably die faster. I should get in a game this coming weekend.

[Muskie]

I may or may not get to play 40K tomorrow, it depends on when a driver arrives. But I did update one of my many galleries of painted miniatures. The model below is not in that gallery, but was painted in the same batch, the same batch of Chaos Cultists linked to above, but I took hopefully bigger better pictures and put them on Flickr.

Necromunda Redemptionist by Andrew McKay, on Flickr

[Marshal Mittens]

Love the hair! Great and unique looking minis!

[Muskie]

So my charity donation worked out and I then got to play 40K. We also keep recruiting additional campaign victims, I mean participants when they happen by us in the gaming store, so momentum is building.

[Muskie]

I have updated my blog once again. This time I assembled three new plague marine models. I also mused again on the optimal plague marine squad, so if you have thoughts on that you can share them. I am going to max out on plague flamers in one squad because no one else seems to be doing that.

[Marshal Mittens]

I am far from a competitive player, so I don't know if it's "competitive", but how I have done most of my squads is either as melee or ranged, with the 10 man melee squad having 2 cleavers, 2 fails, 2 melta guns, champion has a power fist (and probably a plasma pistol because they look cool), and 3 normal bolt gun guys.

 

Ranged squad has 2 plasma guns and 2 blight launchers, champion has plasma pistol and sword or power fist, and 5 bolt gun guys.

 

 

I know technically you can give the leader a plasma gun too, but I dont have any of the aspiring champions with a plasma gun model, and didn't want to just use a plasma gun guy as a champion, but thats probably better if you have the plasma gun leader. I left a few in each squad as just bolter guys, as they are the cheapest option, and can be removed as casualties first.

 

Just my suggestions!

Edited March 21, 2022 by Marshall Mittens

[Plague _Lord]

I have updated my blog once again. This time I assembled three new plague marine models. I also mused again on the optimal plague marine squad, so if you have thoughts on that you can share them. I am going to max out on plague flamers in one squad because no one else seems to be doing that.

 

I've dabbled around with lists that have a full flamer squad but I don't think they would work very well. First of all they probably need a ride (sure you can boost their threat range to 23'' with the strat but you then leave them out in the open and plague marines drop like flies) and second of all flamers on an assault unit aren't that good of an idea. Any unit you can kill with the flamers, will also melt in close combat. The only list they would work in would be in a mortarions chosen sons army for that 2dmg flamer strat but then again why not invest the same ammount of points into 2 flamer bloat drones that have str6 flamers and can actually get better mileage from the flamer strat (wounding T4 on 2s due to contagion).

 

And let's do comparison of the blight launcher vs plague spewer. They cost the same. Blight launcher has to hit and has 1 less shot on average, but when it hits it has str6 ap2 and 2dmg so more chance of doing something then the str5 ap1 1dmg plague spewer. Oh and you can't shoot the plague spewer after advancing, because it's heavy... The math is also on the side of the blight launcher - the blight launcher has a 58% chance of killing at least 1 marine, while the plague spewer has only 40% chance of killing a marine, on average ofc. 

 

What are the pros of a flamer squad? More chances of wounding planes than the other specials probably but then again 10 plague marines costs so much that dealing a few wounds to a plane just isn't worth it. Oh and the other pro - burning guardsmen to the bone with acid is probably fun!

[Muskie]

I don't have any blight launchers painted and having to buy 7 models to get the one special weapon guy you want is odd. I'm used to being able to buy just special weapons or just the bits needed to convert the special weapons. I'll have to haunt the bits shops and eBay. But I did go Chosen Sons, how could I not? And what the flamer squad is, is cinematic. They have to creep forward to get their flamer in range. Is four flamer type guns optimal, probably not. What I found in the past was one flamer was enough, then I'd want two meltas because I have way more trouble killing armor. Bolters are also strength 4 and with the new rules you can shoot bolters quite a bit. I'm tempted to try one plague flamer, one melta and one blight launcher, but for now for the good of the campaign and the Internet, I will build the four flamer squad.

 

Where they really shine is when you get to use them on Overwatch. So if your regular opponents like to make a dedicated H2H unit, they can just get in the way and take the charge. Then I usually can wear down the enemy in H2H once they have been thinned out.

[Jorgend Lupus]

In my experience too many different weapons in a squad is never the best ; I like the "jack of all trades" cool aspect, but I think that we need multiple special weapons to make them more reliable.

The 4 flamers' squad is tempting, but it will probably just be focused by ennemy fire, or be charged by a transport before any tasty target has a chance to get toasted...

 

I havn't tried it yet, let us know how your opponent deals with it ;) !

[Muskie]

They always charge the flamer squad, because I always put it on a key objective. I am still painting the heavy plague flamers. I think switching to points would change your thinking, but in our campaign in PL, you want to cram special weapons, icons, and gear on your champ. I still want every squad to be different, every champ, every model if possible. But now we are crazy busy at the work, so maybe no painting for 18 days.

[Muskie]

Just finished typing up a battle report against Sisters of Battle our newest campaign force. He didn't charge the plague flamer squad but he did fall back from them. I ordered some Blight Launcher bits from eBay not sure when they'll arrive or I'll get around to painting them, but I have a plague marine heavy force.

[Marshal Mittens]

Blight launchers at least give the squad some pretty decent ranged firepower. I do hope flamers get more love in 10e.

[Muskie]

My army is several editions behind. I will revise my troop squads and add some junior HQ. I don't know if I have the time to paint a lot of daemon engines. My Hellbrute did not impress, but I need to field an army instead of random models which is what I seem to be doing. Also I need to have a think before I deploy, next week hopefully we can learn our mission in advance or at least read the subset, but then again I just may have to work...

[Muskie]

Another entry into our narrative campaign as a new hero emerges, witness the carnage!

[Tallarn Commander]

Thanks for the fun batrep. Hopefully you remember your Contagion in the future.

 

If it makes you feel any better I also forget it. And when I'm playing against Death Guard I sometimes have to remind my opponent, "Um, my Defiler is actually T6 right now remember."

 

:)

[KingYertle]

Enjoyed the Bat Rep, and the pictures looked great.  Your color pallet is nuts. I LOVE It!

 

For my Death Guard Crusade Force I ditched the Death Guard Crusade Advancement Charts and am using the charts from the Core Rule Book.  I've been much happier with them.  While the codex has some ok advancements, like +1 to Hit, there are some that are straight up lame.  The Core Book has great Infantry advancements for Death guard like increased speed, reroll 1s to hit (ranged & melee) and even a 6+++ Feel No Pain!  

[Muskie]

I keep trying to stick to one book. I've ordered some game aids and I made some to try and remember all the rules and yes sometimes opponents remind you of advantageous rules and sometimes they don't. Apparently some people may have been overly favourably interpreting their own rules, so this weekend who knows I could win, but some people seem to be loading up their squads and characters than me. I still have units I've paid for and not played in the campaign. You have to be prepared to play either 25 PL or 35 PL, we still might try to recruit another player but we will build towards bigger games, new Codices and rebalancing slates may see some changes, but we are playing for run, I think there are more competitive players than us in Calgary. 

 

The big question is will my lord turn into a spawn, that is what everyone is waiting for...

[Marshal Mittens]

In 8e I wrote my self "phase notes" to remind myself about things I needed to do and common good strats for phases so I wouldn't forget. So many things going on and all that. Might be a helpful gaming aid to write one up for yourself!