1500pts Test for Astro

I met up with a friend of mine to try out a 1500 point list for the upcoming Astro. He too is planning to play a FW army so we thought it would be cool to start tweaking and really getting to know the rules of our respective FW armies.

Billy is a great sport and fun to play. Check out his blog here. He was running a Grot tank army. It was shaping up to look really cool. Luckily Billy allowed me to run with some proxies as the Elysians are not put together yet. I ran cadian's with things like the Autocannon squads became Heavy Bolter squads (Elysian's can't take ACs).

Anyway, it was a real close game. It ended in turn 6 with me being the winner but if it had gone one more turn it would either have been a draw or a downright win for him. All I had left at the end of turn 6 was an immobilized Vulture, 1 Missile Launcher Squad (on an objective), 1 Valkyrie, and 3 guys left out of my Veteran unit that was sitting on the other objective.

He still had a lot of hate and discontent on the table. I'm not sure they could of gotten into objective taking range but he could of easily wiped out the two squads and forced the draw. Our armies lists looked like this:

My Elysians:

1 Command Squad with 2 Plasma Guns, a Medic, a normal guy and the Commander

1 Platoon, 1 platoon command squad with 2 Meltaguns in it, and then 2 squads with plasmagun and the sergeants had plasma pistols.

Attached to the Platoon were two drop sents with Mulit-meltas, 2 Heavy Bolter Squads and 1 Missile Launcher Squad

1 Squad of Vets in Carapace with 3 Meltaguns and the sergeant had a plasma pistol. Mounted in a Valkyrie with Multi-laser and 2 multiple rocket pods.

1 Squad of Vets in Carapace with 3 Plasmaguns and the sergeant had a plasma pistol. They were mounted in a Vendetta (base model)

1 Vulture with Armoured Cockpit and twin linked punisher cannons. That Armoured Cockpit more then paid for itself on the Vulture. I'm thinking I might take the flare/chaff dispenser.

I had other addons in wargear etc, but you get the jist of the list.

If memory serves me right his list looked like:

1 Mek in battlewagon with force field

1 Nob with power klaw and 'eavy armor boyz (20 I think)

1 Nob with a unit of shoota boyz (20 again I think)

1 unit of 3 Kans with rokkit launchas

1 unit of 3 Kans with rokkit launchas

1 Deff Kopta

1 unit of 4 Grot Tanks

1 unit of 4 Grot Tanks

1 Grot megatanks or some such. (looked cool and evil ... spent the vendettas time shooting it)

So a few things I learned in this fight, I need more men for staying power (granted the grot tanks were excellent infantry killers with their blast cannons.) I also need to remember that open topped vehicles allow those evil buggers to assault out of them. I think I might take Meltaguns in my line platoon but leave the sergeants with the plasma pistols. The Plasmaguns were ok but rarely did they get a shot out to 24, everything was within that distance fast.

I might take an addon to the command squad. Maybe the Master of Ordnance to get that big blast template. Also maybe look at a navy flyer... not sure on that yet, but it would be cool ;)

Right now I think my "big" change will be to see about adding a squad in and changing things to meltaguns instead of plasma.

Thanks for the great game Billy and I look forward to several more in the near future :)

Veteran Grenadiers

So I completed my test model for my Veteran Squads with the Grenadier option.

May I introduce Lance Corporal Davis:

He is my Meltagunner from my AT Veteran Squad. They'll be cruising along in a Valkyrie thats equipped to take out infantry. Pop the vehicle with the MeltaGuns and then have the Valk eat the infantry.

I'm really pleased how he turned out, although the flash washes out a lot of his detail work. Still I'm liking him.

Now to paint a heck of a lot more. Ugh...

At least I now have paint schemes for my troops and my "spec ops" guys. I really like the look of these STs over the newer Kasrkin models.

Community Thoughts

Greetings all,

I wanted to know your thoughts on something.

I'm looking to take a Vulture to this year's Astro with my Elysian army. I know it's not necessarily the greatest heavy choice, but I think it looks cool. So with that said, I've been tempted to go ahead and load it out as a horde killer. I'll have Vendettas as my AT firepower, as well as a couple squads with meltas and melta bombs if I really need it.

So what do you think, Twin-linked punisher Cannons. Giving me 20 twin-linked S5 AP- shots or should I go with the twin-linked ACs (for popping Transports and Light Tanks) and Multiple Rocket Pods. Nice thing about the Rocket pods is they are considered Defensive weaponry since they are only S4.

I feel that 20 rerollable shots might be a bit better then the dual purpose ACs and rocket pods.

So thoughts?

Astro-Dallas

Astro Dallas is coming up soonish. Sure it's more like 6 months away, but I have got to get started on these Elysians so they are ready for the Astro.

What I have to paint:

30 Elysians (normal troops)

2 Heavy Weapon Squads (12 total)

2 Valkyries

1 Vendetta Conversion

20 Storm Troopers (which will be Vet Squads)

1 Drop Sent with Multi-Melta

1 Drop Sent with Heavy Bolter

I need to buy and paint

Vulture (not sure how to load this one out yet, thinking Punisher Cannons for Anti-Horde duty)

That's pretty much it. I need to tweak weapon load outs and such and possibly drop the Vulture for something else (but I like the coolness factor of it). I have a few points left over and will probably tweak weapon load outs, who rides in what Valk/Vend and of course if I want to scrap it all and go with something else (I like those Tauros vehicles, might replace the sents).

Anyway, that's whats coming down the pipe. Already have a Valk built and primed white, need to magnetize the wing hardpoints (multilaser and lascannon already magnetized). And then get painting on it. Keep an eye out here for that and also my Vendetta Conversion. I'll be putting that together this weekend I think. Long weekend for me so I'll put it to good use.

Paint Scheme Redeux

So with a huge delay in getting pics, here's one finally. I present to you Trooper Callahan:

New Paint Scheme

So back to working on my Elysians. Going off what Col. Hessler's idea of washing the entire model in badab black I tried it. Did not like the way it looked, so added some sepia to the wash and it gave me the shading I liked. Basically I've also changed paints, I'm using Tamiya paints. I am using Desert Yellow as my base coat, which I then wash with the black/brown wash and then highlight with I believe it's Deck Tan.

I'll see if I can get some good pictures this evening and post them. Right now the clothes are the only thing painted since I wanted to insure that I got good colors.

Off we go

Okay,

So with the store up and running. I'm now able to get back to my blogs and get some good posts out to you people. So stay tuned for some new posts this week. If you're ever in the DFW area, stop by The Gamers Realm, it blows away conventional thinking when it comes to "game stores".