6th ed – the rumours and what they mean for your army.

There’s several things that are apparently coming out that make me unhappy about 6th ed. premeasuring, random charge ranges, random psychic powers, random terrain (mysterious forests), the random movement jetpacks move in their assault phase. The dice make the game random where it should do the rest of these things are just shit. Despite this I can’t stop feeling excited, it may be a let-down, it may be a fun new game. So I started thinking what will be good and bad about my armies based on these rumours, it seems apparent to my armies at least that close combat has been nerfed and shooting has been buffed.
First up thinking about my wych cult as this is a very basic army without many variables to playstyle. And I think it’s going to take a swift knee to the vulva for the following reasons.
* FNP is 17% less effective.
* The average charge range under 5th when assaulting out of a raider is 23.5” (12” raider move, 2” deployment 3.5” fleet, 6” charge) under 6th edition this drops to 13” (6” vehicle move, 7” charge).
*Snap shot at my charging wyches
* Agonisers AP3
* IC challenges (no T3 character wants to fight the Emperor’s finest, that’s what the shardnet wych is for).
* No charge bonus for multi-assaulting
* In shooting, casualties are taken from the front meaning Im further away from CC
* Cover dropped to 5+
So how does my army benefit?
* Dark Eldar night vision completely sees through the darkness
* Haywire grenades can be thrown and en mass can really mess vehicles up!
* AP 2 (dark lances) gain +1 dmg on the vehicle dmg table.
* Fast skimmers I believe are faster
See a trend? Assault nerfed, shooting buffed.

 
So how do these rumours affect my CWE? As my CWE are a much more dynamic force I’ll have to look at each unit individually.
Farseer: As long as I can still BUY powers from my codex I think 6th will be a buff for this guy. I think lots of armies will take Eldar as allies just to get Runes of Warding, everyone’s going to be wanting to use the new powers and blowing peoples brains out via RoWarding is just funny. Also the Ghosthelm will be the ONLY item that prevents a wound from Perils (no more invul saves). I think I’ll be taking 2 farseers, one using Doom/Fortune from codex the other taking the Divination school as there is some pretty brutal combos with those two. (not to mention 2 RoWarding on the table).
divination
primary target unit rerolls failed hits - Eldar guide power now for everyone!
psycher and unit gain counter attack and get full BS for overwatch
target unit gain 4++
target unit must reroll passed armor saves - Inverse Fortune? Could be good!
psycher and unit ignore cover - Good against dug in units...or fast vehicles
psyker rerolls failed failed hits, wounds and armor saves - And Eldar fortune+
psyker roll 3 dicechoose the result you want when rolling for reserves, outflank and mysterious terrain - WINNING!
http://www.lounge.belloflostsouls.net/showthread.php?t=22709
Imagine combining the 4th power in that list with doom. I get to re-roll failed wounds and you have to re-roll successful saves. Somebody pinch me!

Howling Banshees: These girls suffer the same way wyches do but have less redeeming qualities.
* Average charge out of a vehicle under 5th 11.5” (2” deploy, 3.5” fleet, 6” charge) under 6th it will drop to 7” (average of 2D6 charge).
* Power weapons AP3
* Snap fire
* No charge bonus for multi-assaulting
* In shooting, casualties are taken from the front meaning Im further away from CC
* Cover dropped to 5+

Dire Avengers: These guys see a few buffs
* Able to snap fire
* In shooting, casualties are taken from the front meaning Im further away from CC
* Cover dropped to 5+ (it hurts my DA’s as well but generally I have more small arms shooting orks etc than there is Ap4 weapons shooting my Avengers.. I hope.).
* Random charge length see’s units falling short to assault me
*Pre-measuring gives me guarantee on the two things I want my Dire Avengers doing and that is moving and shooting

Fire Dragons: same benefits the Dire Avengers receive in addition AP1 weapons gain +2 on the damage table.

Wave Serpent: I am still on the fence with how vehicles will operate in 6th. Currently I never anticipate my Serpents being able to shoot due to being stunned so often, if they do that’s just a bonus. So here is the pro’s and con’s as I see it.
Pro: Able to fire 2 weapons at normal ballistic skill when moving 12” – Time to bring back those chin cannons!
Move a total of 30” when going flat out instead of 24”
Glancing hits don’t prevent the vehicle from shooting
“jink” save?

Cons: Every serpent, every game, every turn seems to be shaken but they can see out the entire game this way. Hull points mean 3 glances and they’re down.
Only able to move 6” and deploy – what a jip!
Regardless of how fast I move only 3’s to hit me in CC…

Warp Hunter: Most the same as the Serpent however something more prominent is +5 cover save vs ap2 large blast!

Hornets: Same as above

So what are my thoughts for my CWE? The Banshees are going to live in their box in favour of more dakka, everything else should be fairly ok.

So Im writing this at 3am. I hope it makes sense.

I just keep plodding away.

So with the change of my apoc game from Space Wolves to Orks I changed my list up slightly. Dropping the Shadow Sect of Karandras (I think I'll need my Scorpions defending my front lines instead of attacking the orks back lines) and I picked up another squad of guardians, and I upgraded some vehicle weaponry. Here is my 10k pt force currently. Bad quality pictures as always!








I am rather unsure how I will go in this game, I know for sure I don't have the ability to tackle several hundred orks. Thankfully Paul tends towards Speed Freaks so there will be less bodies and more vehicles around which I can deal with. Anthony tends towards randomness, so high potential if things go his way. It'll be interesting.







Depending on the setup, I think I will run a similar deployment as I had planned for the previous game. Avatar, Reapers + Maugan Ra, Dire Avengers, 1 squad of guardians defending my home objective. 2 squads of guardians, wraithguard + lord guarding the other one. Scorpions lurking between the two. With my aspect assault wave I'll assault their weaker objective. The prestige may come in early to assist them. My rapid response force will come in late, as I suspect Paul may be running 2 warbosses on bikes, coming in behind my lines along with Snikrot. I suspect there might be 1-2 baneblade equivalents (skullhamma fortress?). I'll send the Cloudstrike squad loaded with dragons into them and with my super heavies focus big threats. The nightspinner will have a field day if there's any uge mobs :p I really lack strength 6 guns =\

The big let down and a conversion idea.

Well little blog once again you've been neglected. The apoc game was all planned out, had everything packed, bought extra food, had the venue arranged. Wade decides to stay up all night, sleep all day then sell us a bullshit lie. So I've been really perturbed about wargaming as a whole lately from this.

Thankfully some other friends who seem more keen might be jumping in to take his place instead.

So a part from this let down, I participated in my first real big tournament. I ended up coming 14/62 with 2 minor wins, 1 major win, a draw and a minor loss. I'll make a post more about this later.

So onto the conversion, it's not all that original but with bits readily available off Ebay it might make a nice alternative. The conversion will be of a Swooping Hawk.

Wings: Scourge Wings
Head: Scourge Head
Body: As the scourges lack spirit stones I'm thinking Dire Avenger, I'll need to see how compatible the wings/back is to the Dire avenger chest
Arms: Dire Avenger
Gun: Corsair lasblaster
Legs: This one is tricky, the scourges have really nice legs but their taloned feet and sharp edges give it a strong evil feeling instead of pretty CWE. Thus probably be Dire Avenger of guardian legs, with knee reposes.
Swooping Hawk Grenade Pack: The little guardian targeters.

Updates

It's been some time since I last posted anything. The Apoc project is still going strong. Here is a comment I made 2nd of Jan

Items that still need painting:
HQ - Jetbike Autarch, Irillyth, Warlocks Wave Serpent.

Elites: 2 Scorpion Exarchs 4 Scorpions, Wraithguard, one warlock, 1 fire dragon.

Troops: 4 rangers, touch ups on guardians, weapon platforms, all 9 jetbikes.

Fast: 4 Warp Spiders, 3 Swooping Hawks, Vypers scatter lasers, Shadow Spectre Exarch, both Hornets

Heavy: Repaint wraithlord (might do this last as it's already painted just badly), 1 Falcon, touch ups on another, Warp Hunter, Night Spinner.

Super Heavy: Both the Cobra and the Scorpion.

So lets see what I still need to do here
Jetbike Autarch, 1 scorpion exarch, 1 scorpion, warlock, fire dragon, fire dragon exarch, started GJB and guardian weapon platforms, 4 warp spiders, 3 hawks, vyper scatter lasers, wraithlord.

So this means I have finished: Irillyth, wave serpent, 5 wraithguard, 4 rangers, spectres exarch, 2 hornets, warp hunter, night spinner, falcon, cobra and scorpion.

Sadly the apoc game has been put back till the 9th of May which means I may be able to finish some other things in the mean time. Over all 13 models that are primed and 11 base coated remaining is pretty good for a 10,000pt army =D

My focus now however is Battle in the Vines. It's only two weeks away. My normal list has been modified to include hornets in place of fire prisms and a warp hunter in place of Dire Avenger exarchs. I've managed to have two test games so far and the list has done well. I've been reading other armies that will be coming including a 20 kill point space wolves list (I hope it's not spammed up bullshit like Wades) and a white scars army which will be an interesting match!

Apoc Project: Cobra WIP

Along with my purchase last year of my Scorpion I also bought a Cobra. This tank looks pretty devastating and I can't wait to see the look on my friends face when I pull out a 10" template.

Here is an early picture. This is just after I got all the green shading done but before the extreme highlights.



Now here are some pictures since then, I've completed the thorns, the main Biel Tan rune and the extreme highlights. I'm going to rework the canopy as I'm not satisfied with it. Also the Brightlance is going to be swapped out for a EML so I could afford to include the Nightwing into my apoc list.

There's something wrong with how this picture was uploaded to imageshack. Even though there is no thumbnail you should be able to click on it and you'll be taken to a larger picture.





This picture may be a bit blurry however the colour in this picture is also closer to that of the actual tank (no flash).



I still need to clean up some edges here and there. Also the top of the tank next to the main gun housing looks a bit plain so I might incorporate a smaller Biel Tan rune, or perhaps more thorns.

Along with this I've been doing touch ups on my Warp Hunter, Falcon, Night Spinner and Hornet. I still need to paint the rune on these vehicles and something about the hornet doesn't look right so it'll need more work. I've got to run down to the local hobby shop to grab more dark green paint before I can start work on my other hornet and falcon.

An unexpected turn of events.

I've never really been interested in fliers in game before (titans for that matter either) but just lately, since getting excited for Apoc... I've had a niggling to acquire say 4. I'd like, eventually, 2 nightwings and 2 phoenix bombers. I decided to check ebay just dreaming, and what did I spy? A custom built nightwing for really cheap. The photo looks great it's lacking some of the detail compared to the FW one but for less than half the price of FW before shipping I'm not complaining one bit! Only wish the seller had more for sale.

I'm really really excited for this!

To fit it into my apoc list - which is oddly bursting at the seams - I'm going to drop star engines off all my serpents and tank hunters off my fire dragons.

Apoc Project: Scorpion!

Ever since I first saw it I've wanted a Scorpion type 2 and over Xmas with the release of IA 11 I bought one. I've yet to test it out in game but I thought I'd upload some WIP pics.

Here is one of the earliest pictures I took. This was with flash indoors so the colour is somewhat jaded. The EML and turret are both magnetised. I got the rune idea from the artwork in the IA11 book.



Here is a photo I took today. You can see how rich the greens are now in natural sunlight. I still need to finish the EML, the base and need to do touch ups on some of the white (and the bottom as well). Also have to add gloss to the gems.



Here you can see the heart rune more clearly.



I've also started work on my Cobra. It's about halfway done so I'd better take some pics to record my progress :)