April wrap up

So painting for the month was 42.5 points. Overall, I am happy with this and believe it would have been better if not for a block and life in general. But I am very happy that I am quickly approaching my next goal. Which I should be able to finish within the next week or so.

Spending was a bit bad for the YTD with -$108.72.  I am going to need to sell off some more stuff to buy what I want and try to stay under that $250 mark.


So this is what the painting and spending look like to date.

Spending YTD total: -$169.29

Painting YTD total: 167.5 points

Painting update, New paint shelf and Gw

First let us start with what GW has done to the blogosphere in the last 24hrs. I have seen many arguments about whether they did something wrong or not or whether they are treating the fanbase as crap again. Honestly, I am not sure, I started playing back in 1996. And at that time I enjoyed GW and there support for the community was much better. But since then I have come to despise many of their business practices. Which has made me invest in other companies. You will note I still have 2  40k armies. But I buy bare minimum and never by WD magazine. Gw has in my opinion been a bully too long. So I buy minimally to keep my armies up to date and by second hand when possible. They bully their fanbase, independent retailers and their past employees (look up stuff relating to the now defunct GW historicals).

EDIT: also BOOOO gw is in the process of dropping all their specialist games. I have always wanted BFG and Epic is what got me into 40k in the first place.

Ok now on to the good stuff. On sunday night I put together a new paint stand for my desk out of foam core. Took no time at all and was dirt cheap to make (less than a dollar). Still even has some extra space.

I also assembled and put the omni stand parts on all my dindrenzi ships last night. Tonight I will hopefully get them started. I plan on painting them as much as possible with my airbrush. So should only need to do details with a brush.

Then we have my DW ships. I have completed all the metal parts. Though I still need to figure out the engines on the sides. I have also started doing all the detail.

Completed most of the detail on this bad boy. He still needs touch up and to be inked but then he will be done. The detailing on him took me forever (about and hour and a half).

So as you can see some FSA is next up along with maybe a tau or two. On the sides I have also been doing foam for my newest box as I try to condense stuff down. This whole GW thing still make me crazy to no end. But there isn't much I can do besides what I have done. I rarely buy anything new from gw and usually if  I do it's from my one local store just so I can support him. If they sold other games I played I would never buy GW stuff.

Anyway more later this week.

Aruki

Being a wargamer in South Korea and an interesting dice post.

First off check out this link http://natfka.blogspot.kr/2013/04/the-quest-for-holy-grail-average.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Faeit212+(Faeit+212) . He did a great study on dice that I think everyone should read.

Now the main event. To begin with this post isn't made to criticize or anger anyone. I am just trying to give out some info for any wargamers that come to South Korea. Because I know from experience it can be very difficult to find any information.

Being a wargamer in South Korea is very tough. There is only really one store in all of South Korea. (see the Orc Town link) It is a great little shop but it is a little shop. Also if you don't live near it, it can be very tough to find the time to go there. You tend to rely heavily on internet based companies to get models and supplies you want. This is because there are not many model stores and such. Usually if they exist they only sell the Tamaya range or a Korean brand. Mainly the stuff is car, airplane, gundam or train focused. However, what supplies you can find are usually reasonably priced. Case and point would be my air compressor and spray booth. ( I will be trying to review more Korean model supplies in such in the future)

Finding people to play games with can also be tough if you play something that either hasn't been introduced here or just isn't popular. A good example of what is usually played in Seoul at the moment is 40k, fantasy, PP, infinity and FOW. Other than that there isn't much else. There are a few other foreigners, like myself, that play historicals but other than that you're in trouble. But for example, I also have FSA, DZC, DW and a few other games that you just don't see and some have never even heard of.

There do exist multiple other clubs in Seoul for playing, but they are basicly korean only. Some welcome foreigners but to be honest the few people I have known that have gone to them have had a mediocre experience with them at best. I myself have never been to one mainly because the store is closer to me than any of the clubs. Only a small number of the koreans (who wargame) I have met over the years speak much english and are willing to play foreign players even if they don't speak english. So speaking Korean is a huge plus if you want to play a lot and maybe have a great experience at these clubs or even join one. Now I should point out this is basically what's open to the average joe.

Cost wise, things like 40k and fantasy are a bit more expensive but that is mainly due to the cost of importing it. The cost difference is usually rather small but not always. That is why when the only store in South Korea doesn't sell what I want, I usually turn to companies from the UK.

The future of wargaming in South Korea I think will get better as time goes on. Most of the Koreans that play are in there 20's. And it attracts a lot of different types of people. They actively discuss and many of them are above average in painting. If more stories open up in the future I am sure the base will grow dramatically. One of the things that I think is killing the industry here is how hard it is for people to get the models. I would love and hate to try and open a store here in South Korea. The cost for space in a decent location is crazy. Nevermind trying to import all the stuff. Even running a club here would be rather expensive.

The best part of the experience for me personally has been the people I have met and the things I have learned. In the learned category I have learned a lot about being a better player and practical things like painting and such that I never learned when I first started playing about 15 years ago. Outside of Seoul it is even harder. If you are curious by how much more difficult  take a peek at this http://miniaturesaga.blogspot.kr/2011/07/wargaming-in-south-korea.html

Anyway just figured it might be an interesting bit for anyone thinking of wargaming in South Korea.
Aruki

New stuff and more spending

Well first off my omni stand order showed up last night so I can now outfit all my firestorm armada and Dystopian wars stuff and still have enough left to outfit my DZC when I get to it. I admit they are a bit expensive but I think it will be well worth it in the long run.. So check them out.http://corseceng.com/omni-stand/

Then we also have my order from Warbases . I got 30, 60mm x 50mm mdf 2mm thick bases. This is for an upcoming project I haven't bought yet. But I am really looking forward to it. Their prices are fantastic and delivery was fast and reasonably priced, so check them out.http://www.warbases.co.uk/

I also picked up the new tau darkstrider and fireblade models.
So that makes Aprils spending:
April: -$53.75
bases: -$13.61
tau: -$41.36
April total: -$108.72
YTD: -$169.29

Till next time,
aruki

Fighters finished ships are getting there

As the post says the ships are about 50% done.

 

The fighters are finished. All 43 of them. I did 13 bombers, 15 torpedos and 15 fighters. Though I may go back and make their squad markings another color because they are a bit hard to see. I am also not interally happy with the cloud effect I tried to do. Will need to do more research at some point to fix them.

So that brings this months painting score up 21.5 points

April: 42.5 points

Ytd: 167.5 points

So quickly approaching my next goal which makes me happy because I can buy my next project. Teaser on that soon. As for other things in the works I want to do up a test model for my redone tau and really get going on my firestorm armada.

Till then,
Aruki

More DW Progress

 Here is a bit more progress. Most of the time was spent touching up the blue paint on the fighters and painting the wood sections on everything. Not bad for an hour of work. Tonight and tomorrow night I am planning on finishing off all the fighters and then focusing on the boats and bombers. Going to do a silver for the edges of the fighters and then denote their type by white, black and grey markings on the wings. Main thing I am still trying to decide is how to change the colour of the water they are flying over.

So thats it for today. By the way does anyone know how to rotate pictures? Can never seem to get them to go the right way.

Till thursday
Aruki

Just a tiny bit of progress

Honestly I haven't made much progress. Between life, being sick and having a painting block, I have only managed to complete one model. The dog that goes with my roman general.

On the DW front I got them all based and started doing the paint scheme I had thought up and realized it looked horrible  So striped and resprayed the base on the battleship  Then it took me almost two days to figure out what to do. After that I was stupid and was hand painting fighters when about halfway through I remembered I have an airbrush. So the next night I blasted all of them out. More progress will happen in next few painting sessions so minimal update today

So YTD painting is at

April: 21 points

YTD Total: 146 points

Till later

aruki

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Tau list ideas

Here is the first concept I came up with for my Tau. Please note this is 2500 points because this was the point level I most commonly played at in the past (little over a year ago).

HQ.
Dark Strider    100 points
Cadre Fireblade  84 points
2x gun drones

Elite
3x crisis suits    162 points
3x twin linked fusion blaster
3x bonding  knife
3 advanced targeting system
2x shield drones


3x crisis suits   174 points
3x twin linked missile pod
3x bonding knife
3x plasma rifle


3x crisis suits   174 points
3x twin  linked missile pod
3x bonding knife
3x plasma rifle

Troops
12x fire warriors   154 points
12x bonding knife
2x gun drones
Shasui


12x fire warriors   154 points
12x bonding knife
2x gun drones
Shasui


12x fire warriors   154 points
12x bonding knife
2x gun drones
Shasui

10x kroot              70 points
10x sniper rounds

10x kroot         70 points
10x sniper rounds

Fast attack

10x pathfinders   200 points
10x bonding knife
2x gun drones
3x ion rifles
shasui
pulse drone
blacksun filter


10x pathfinders   200 points
10x bonding knife
2x gun drones
3x ion rifles
shasui
pulse drone
blacksun filter


10x pathfinders   200 points
10x bonding knife
2x gun drones
3x ion rifles
shasui
pulse drone
blacksun filter

Heavy Support
2x marksmen     159 points
9x sniper drones

2x broadsides (railgun) 236 points
2x bonding knifes
2x seeker missile
2x shield drone
2x missile drone
2x velocity tracker




2x broadsides (high yield missile pod) 206 points
2x bonding knifes
2x seeker missile
2x shield drone
2x missile drone
2x early warning override

So here is the idea behind the list infiltrate and cause as much trouble as they can hopefully near objectives. Missile/plasma suits rush up to support and hit light vehicles/infantry as much as possible. Melta suits try and tank/walker/infantry hunt. Darkstrider joins 1 of the pathfinder squads a bit forward while others go for flanks. Cadre fireblade goes with a fire warrior squad up near the pathfinder squad. Other pathfinders go for flanks of that formation. Broadsides will be in support and raise whatever havoc they can. Other fire warriors will also support. While sniper team kills whatever it can.

Changes:
I am thinking of trimming points from crisis suits/firewarriors and few other places to squeeze in two devilfish for two smaller fire warrior units. That way I can do some more support/objective grabbing.


So what do you think. I mainly face a lot of marines and most admit I have never played a game in 6th so not sure how this list will work out.


thoughts??
Aruki

spending, painting and what's on the bench update

First off, let me apologize  The painting update itself is minimal  I spent a lot of time completing another project, starting to look more at what my tau need and practicing with my airbrush. What I did do I did last night. Which was using my airbrush for the first time to basecoat the 43 fighters for my DW Britannia. I also prepared all the ships and will basecoat and do some other painting with the airbrush on them tonight.

 As a side note I used this Vallejo surface primer on the right for all the base coating and it worked beautifully.

The Following pics are my workbench were I have started taking apart my old broadsides and crisis suits so I can convert and paint them more. To be honest my tau are abysmal  I basically did a black coat tossed in some green and gray so I had the 3 colour min I needed for playing and that was it. So you will see a lot of these guys as I get them up to spec. 

Spending wise all I have bought recently was the tau codex.

April: - $53.75

YTD: -$114.32

Better painting update next week once I have had a chance to actually paint. Over next couple days and weeks I will also be posting more tau related articles and getting to work on my tutorials. 

till then,

Aruki

Old vs New sniper drone teams

This was one of my favorite units in the old codex and I would almost always take a full unit of 3 teams.

Old codex:
Overall the biggest thing I loved in the old codex was the ability to spread these teams out to cover all avenues  Then you add in the networked marklight which made it easier for them to boost their own drones. That and the ability to hit 4 different squads on the same turn with just 1 squad. The downside of course was if the spotter died the whole team died and at 240 points for a full squad they cost more than a 3 man non-upgraded broadside team.

The good:
3 separate teams in 1 slot that you could spread out.
stealth field- always made attackers roll for night fight
networked marklight
target lock on drones
rail rifle was ap3 str 6

The bad:
expensive at 80pts a team
rail rifle was only hvy 1
spotter dies everything dies

New codex:
With the new codex overall I am happy with the changes. The full unit is now much cheaper (174 points). The drone controller allows the drones to use the bs5 as there bs. The guns have a much longer range, sniper and are rapid fire. They are also able to stick around if the controllers die but revert to bs2. The things I don't like are the stealth though I listed it as a good. This is because they will normally be in cover so any little extra bit is great. But I think the night fight rolling was better in most cases. The other big one for me is they are no longer separate units but 1 giant unit. hiding a 12 man unit is much harder than a 4man.The higher ap and str x also make it harder for them to just straight off kill all those pesky 3+ units. Though the sniper ability somewhat makes up for this with it always wounding on 4+ and 6's be just plain beautiful.

The good:
much cheaper (58 for marksman and 3 drones)
If marksmen die drones stick around
higher BS
Stealth
support fire
longer range gun that is rapid fire and sniper

The bad:
1 giant unit
marklight
ap5  str x gun
stealth
lower ld
no bonding knife option for marksmen
no blacksun filter

Conclusion:
Overall I am really looking forward to getting a game in with these guys because I think they will be able to contribute quite a lot to my tau. It will be interesting to see how they handle themselves. At the moment my plan for my 2.5k (common amount for most games I get to play) I will be running a unit of 9 drones and 2 marksmen. Just wish they still had that networked marklight.

One last parting shot. BOOOOOO to missile drones being broadside exclusive. My firewarriors really needed them.

aruki

Ps. painting update thursday or friday.

New Tau codex

Just a few quick first impressions about one of my favorite armies.

The good:
Overall, I like the new codex. The huge amount of new special characters and the changes to drone squads and pathfinders I like overall. Not sure how I feel about the changes to suits in general as I was never a huge fan of them.

The bad:
Honestly there is only 1 thing that stuck in my craw about the new codex and it is the fluff. Personally I think they could have do more to develope the fluff. Overall there was very little added to fluff except for some interesting stuff about farsight, a few of the ethereals and of course the new characters. The one thing that really confused me actually deals with the kroot. Supposedly they no longer know why the Kroot eat certain things. They only have an idea. So gone are the days of oh the kroot do it to absorb the dna they want. This also goes for all the other types of kroot. This I feel was done more from an imperial point of view than tau which kind of annoys me.
I really wished they had done more on all these other alien races especially those that supposedly have died off. Or explored more about there problems with other races.


Conclusion:
Overall I do like the new codex and it opens up some interesting new options and ideas. The only thing that really annoys me overall is about the new broadside models. By making them so much bigger it kind of puts me in the place of having to replace my 4 regular ones (will convert them to crisis suits) and my 2 forgeworld ones. This for me is more annoying than any problems with list and fluff (mainly due to cost of replacing them).


I will do a review of a couple interesting changes over the next few weeks. Starting with one of my favorite units: sniper drone squads.

till then
aruki

Lascannons and my next project

As you can see from the title and pic its easy to see what is finished. These 6 lascannons finally clear the way for me to get started on another project. Mainly because I need a change of pace.

So that's 6 more lascannons finished. Which brings me up to:
April: 20 points
YTD: 145 points

In the picture you can also see my 43 fighter tokens and the 9 frigates for my dystopian wars Britannia fleet.
I'm also rather excited to get my hands on the new tau codex will post my thoughts once I have a chance to give it a once over.

Until then
aruki

New stuff and painting

Still can't seem to get picks to rotate but heres the box of new stuff that showed up today. FSA rule book, Shaltari starter army, braves blister, neptune blister and immortals blister.

Next up is the painting I have finished up. From right to left: 3 flamers, 4 melta guns, 4 plasma guns and 3 spotters. You may notice they don't have standard SM special weapons. I am using tau suit weapons because of the background I have been working on for them.

This brings my painting for april up to:
April: 14 points
YTD:139 points

My current project is to finish of the 6 lascannons and then I am planing on starting on some more dystopian wars. I am saving my FSA until I am more comfortable with the airbrush and my omni stand order. Because I want to do almost all of their painting with it. After that I am planning on painting some of the mountain of epic 40k I have.

Until then
aruki

March round up

This month was pretty good overall for painting. I would like to average 35points a month over the year.
March:49 points
YTD: 125points

I have also decided to move my final goal up to 500 points.

Spending it was a crazy month.

+$538.10 for IG army sold on feebay
-$100.85 for compressor
-$64.15 for tools/paints/etc
-$70.06 for DZC models and FSA rule book
-$96.88 for DZC shaltari starter
-$54.19 for FSA dindrenzi starter
-$93.01 for omni stand order

This brings March's total to:

+ $58.96

Ytd the total it

YTD: -$60.57

Which will only increase with this months new tau codex and my plan to buy my baccus army and bases. Tomorrow I will post a new update for painting where I finished a bunch more models and talk about my next project.

until then
Aruki