March 18, 2011 Games

Another Warmachine Hordes night on March 18, 2011. I had 3 games using Cryx. Lost 2 games and won 1. Changed my list up a bit by using 2 Seethers and 1 Defiler instead of only 1 Seether, 2 Defilers and 1 Stalker.

First game I went up against Taks' Kara Sloan. I got my head handed to me and learned that I should be more careful by blocking LoS to a ranged attack heavy army. kara basically pasted Venethrax with her weapon master rifle shots. Good lesson learned.

Second game I took on Kei's eCaine. He was winning this one but he made a mistake in a sequence of moves and so decided to concede the game. Had the sequence been correct, a Seether blocking LoS to Venny would have been removed from play and probably result in Venny being assassinated.

Last game I went up against Louie in a 15 point match. I tried a melee heavy 4 model army against a balanced Cygnar force and Stryker basically just earthquaked my Seethers and Venny and that ended the game. I should have decided to go for broke and cast Blood Rain on the Black 13th as well.

The tutelage of Venethrax continues.

Rango

(photo taken from www.rangotrailer.net)

Watched Rango last Sunday with the wife and kids. It's definitely a most Western genre film. The story is about a chameleon who dubs himself Rango just so he can create a legend for himself to avoid getting smacked down.

Rango is basically a liar who makes up stories and yet he can be creative enough to pass for a cowboy/sheriff. Like in all western films, the bad guy usually is one of the highest ranking individuals in this case the town mayor. He's basically hoarding the currency, in this case water, so people will be forced to sell the land to him dirt cheap (note the "land" is basically in Nevada very near Las Vegas well, you have to really dig deep into the suspension of disbelief to see how he can control the land with all the hummies about)

In any case, Rango does unravel the plan and with only one bullet saves the day at the end.

The movie is entertaining enough but only from a western genre point of view. It's definitely not much of a comedy. Not as fun as Incredibles but it will entertain you for the hour and a half that it pans out. The graphics are ok but not something you haven't seen before. I'd give it 3.5 stars.

Gaming at Chico's 03/14/2011 Part 2

Here's a summary of my second game at Chico's yesterday. I went up against SJ who brought an Epic Madrak list with 2 units of Troll Champs, Skaldi and a solo backed up by an Axer and DTM. This is my 6th game with the same Cryx list.

I won first turn and ran my models up the table with Venethrax casting Lamentation. SJ runs his trolls forward as well.

Second turn, I put my first squad of Mechthralls in B2B with his Trolls basically tarpitting it and positioning my second and third wave at the ready. My Defilers also spray and hit some trolls with Corrosion and Venny also casts Blood Rain for more Corrosion. Skarlock casts Soul Harvester on the first wave of mcThralls.On SJ's turn, he cleared away a couple of McThralls and pops eMadraks feat, killing some more and eliminates the squad with Soul Harvester.

Next turn, Venethrax pops his own feat and manages to get 2 soul tokens. I manage to kill only a few trolls due to bad rolls and SJ making his Tough checks. SJ then on his turn kills majority of the McThralls on the table. SJ also manages to damage Venny with the Impaler slamming the Seether onto Venethrax.

Fourth turn I stand the Seether and Venny up and I still upkeep Lamentation and just move him to my right flank and kills Skaldi. McThralls kill some Trolls as well as Seethers giving me 3 soul tokens to use on my next turn. SJ then positions his Champs will killing a lot more McThralls and kills off the Seether and brings down Venny to 1 hit due to the Impaler hitting him.

Last turn, I just decide to go for broke and charged and killed the Impaler, Troll Champ solo but failed to kill 2 Troll Champs. I tried to block the way to Seether by running the Skarlock but there was still an opening enough for SJ to charge in with a +3 to Str buffed Madrak and finish off Venny.

On hindsight, I realized I should keep a couple of McThralls near my Necrosurgeon so I could keep bringing a few more back. I also think I forgot to get some more corpse tokens when the trolls died. Anyway, good lessons to be learned for future reference.

Gaming at Chico's 03/14/2011 Part 1

Today I had a game again at Chico's. Played 2 games, one versus Chico and the other vs SJ. Here's a short summary on my game with Chico.

We played the No Man's Land Scenario where one had to contest a 6"x24" area on the center of the table. Chico won the roll to see who goes first. He moved his models up and the Behemoth shot at my Defiler. The first shot missed but the second deviated beautifully onto my Defiler and Stalker. The Defiler wasn't damaged much but the Stalker had its movement box crippled with the boosted bombard damage. My turn I just ran all my models up while Venny casts Lamentation.

On Chico's second turn, he moves his army up a bit more and the Behemoth shoots again. This time hurts Venny with boosted damage from a deviated shot. This time however, my McThralls are in range so I charged Drago and a Kodiak and my McThralls took an arm offa each.

Chico's third turn Karchev moves up and pops feat and kills some McThralls and the Behemoth manages to kill some McThralls via bombards and hurts a Defiler. Beast tries to go for an assassination run by Trampling towards Venny. Problem was he only had one focus on him and while the attack hit, Venny weathered the damage. Drago and the Kodiak killed some more mcThralls.

In my turn, I shot and Death Chilled Karchev. a McThrall squad charged and did some damage to Karchev. My Seether then went up to Beast and hit is and threw it to Karchev and managing to hit knocking them both down. Seether damaged Beast enough to destroy it via boosted 2 hand throw damage. Venethrax also went for a Hellfire shot for a few more damage.

Chico's fourth turn and I was afraid he would go for the bombards kill on a very wounded Venethrax. I had done a very stupid thing the previous turn by moving my Defiler out from the Behemoth's melee range resulting in a free strike killing it. I should have just kept the jack in and sent the Stalker to attack the Behemoth as well. He did some other things tho killing more mcThralls so I was spared. Karchev could not do much as he was Death Chilled and Knocked Down so he allocated focus to all his jacks. The Behemoth tried to kill the Skarlock but missed and did some damage to the Seether with its bombards.

My turn and I went with the Seether again. Attacked Karchev, did some damage and threw it towards Drago. I then charged in with Venethrax for the assassination.

Glad to see Chico is playing again and while he was rusty, he was starting to get the hang of the game again. Really hard to take down the jack heavy list and I should have been a goner with the Behemoth's bombards.

More lessons learned.

Sunday Gaming at Fortress 03/13/2011

Last March 13, 2011, I had a game at Fortress. i went up against a new player, John B (I wasn't able to catch the surname). He plays Retribution and I played my usual Venethrax list. John sent out his army for the first turn and I went and ran my McThralls and the rest of my army up. Second turn, my Pistol Wraiths tried plinking and killing some Sentinels and I moved up my army again.

Third turn, he shoots up a godawful lot of McThralls. However, he advances Ravyn and exposes her. My turn, I went with my Pistol Wraiths first killing some more Sentinels and using the second shot to shoot at Ravyn with boosted rolls. I then ran one of my Defilers forward and then Venny activated and arced Hellfire for the kill.

I was at an advantage since I went up against a newbie playing hsi first 35 point game. I did try to take it easy with him but the opportunity just presented itself and so i took it. Am sure with EJ, my army woulda been cleared by the third turn. :)

Good to see new players getting into the game. :)

Gaming at Chico's 03/12/2011 Part 2 - Remember to Dismember!!!

Here's a summary of my game vs SJ last Saturday. I only had one game and went up against SJ's Grim Angus beast heavy Army. Our scenario was Sacrifice. Hard to explain here but it's a scenario created by Privateer Press. Suffice to say we needed to control points. I had won the dice roll and decided to go first.

I sent 2 squads of my Mechthralls to the right while Venethrax and his battlegroup and a squad of McThralls went left.

SJ sent his army against Venethrax' battlegroup.

Everything was mainly movement until turn 3 when both armies finally ground against each other.

I don't recall all the details but the more glaring one was Venethrax charging 3 beasts. I was able to kill 2 after which SJ assassinates Venny with his remaining 2 beasts. Good game. Then afterwards SJ reminded me that I should have been rolling an additional dice for Venny's Dismember ability. Had I remembered to do so, I should have been able to kill the 3 beasts and would most likely have survived the last beast. Well, after that snafu, for sure I won't be forgetting anymore. LoL!

I could only play one game that day as I had to go somewhere at 5 pm. All in all, a fun gaming day.

Gaming at Chico's 03/12/2011 Part 1

We had a nice time playing at the Quema brother's place of abode which I will hereby unoffically name Chico's. Here are some pictures:

Above shows Chico, Kim and Kei. We had just arrived and were setting things up. Chico also showed us the result of being inspired to paint again. To wit: Butcher's battlegroup below:

Kim also brought some beautiful terrain pieces over:

The terrain piece above was a gift to Kim from Sir Lito Tan of Bunker.

Above is SJ's Mulg. Interesting way to paint and the eye is quite a sight. Heheh.

Waves

The other day on March 11, 2011, Japan was hit by two kinds of waves. First it was rocked by a massive Intensity 8.9 earthquake, shaking the land with waves upon waves of movement. Watching CNN, I was quite surprised at how long the earthquake lasted. Things were literally shaking apart.

Then came the second wave, literally. A towering 10 meter tall wall of water hit the northeast part of Japan inundating the coast and doing quite a lot of damage. It was both fascinating and horrifying to see that wave crashing inland and mowing everything down.

I was thinking at first Japan was lucky the quake happened out at sea instead of over land but the sight of the tsunami hitting it made me reconsider. News has been coming in daily. Nuc plants were automatically shut down but one plant was having problems and an explosion actually happened yesterday which the result seemed to have lessened the danger, surprisingly. Power lines were down and a lot of the country has no electricity. Infrastructure was hit pretty hard as well with the bullet trains initially halted and now operating but still not at 100%.

Makes me wonder what would happen if a big one hit near Metro Manila. If we could survive the quake. I think we would be protected from tsunamis because of the way Manila Bay is formed but I fear a lot of the buildings here would be severely damaged. I hope a big one won't hit. I pray a big one won't happen.

Gives a grim meaning to the song currently in my head: "we're gonna party like, like it's the end of the world, we're gonna party like, like it's 2012". I hope this is not a preview of things to come.

Something Different

Was pleasantly surprised to see a film I really like on HBO this afternoon. Titled French Kiss starring Meg Ryan and Kevin Kline as the main characters with support by Jean Reno and Tim Hutton.

I liked the story about the girl trying to win back her man but in the end falling for the ruffian. I also like the songs in the movie: Someone Like You, La Mer, La Vien Rose and Dream a Little Dream of me.

The countryside of France was also shown and was a much nicer representation of France rather than its more famous landmark of Paris. Quaint, green and you can almost smell the fresh air.

Favorite quote in the movie: "For me, bullshit is like breathing."

Cankerworm UnLiving Color

Here's my Cankerworm. Though actually it was formerly Fred Escalona's. I had given him a Prime Deneghra in exchange for painting my bare metal Cankerworm four posts ago. So that I could play the Cankerworm immediately, he just got my Cankerworm and swapped his in its stead.

So now, have got my painted Cankerworm. Now, have to do something with Prime Asphyxious...

Pictures for Posterity, March 4, 2011

Hello. Nothing new to add the past 2 days so I thought I would put up some pics I took of last Friday's WMH Nights at the Bunker.

Here's a pic of those who came. From left to right - Arvin, Kim, Maybelle, Kei and SJ.

Here's the army I used for that night. It was led by Venethrax with a couple of jacks and lots of McThralls:

Here are some pics of the battles that night. First of, Kim's 30 point army which was used by Maybelle as an intro game to WMH. It was pVlad, Beast, Drago and 2 Kodiaks.

I hereby name Kim's Kodiaks as Kody and Diody.

And here's the battle proper. I couldn't take more photos as SJ arrived and we went to play.

Here are SJ's trolls. He was squaring off against Kei's Cygnar.

Here's the only shot which I was able to take in my match with Kim. Sugod mga kapatid!

That's all for now. Enjoy! ^_^

Learning Curve Part II

Continuing from the previous post.

In my second game, I went up against Kim's Prime Vlad toting 2 Kodiaks, Beast and Drago. This was a 30 point game only so I just removed a Defiler from my previous list.

I won the toss and deployed. Kim placed his army and then I put down my cloud effects after which I moved my entire army up behind the clouds. Venethrax casts Lamentation and keeps the remaining focus. Kim having an entire army which could run, well...ran them all. Hehe.

Second turn I upkeep Lamentation and string out my McThralls. I move my Pistol Wraiths on opposite ends of the table. My Stalker and Seether are doing bodyguard duty for Venny.

Kim's second turn, he decides to pop his feat and then moves Vlad into cover, taking Beast and Drago along for bodyguard duty. Kodiaks attack, I will call one Kody which is on my left and the other one Diody which is to its right. Diody didn't reach his target McThralls and activation ends. Kody managed to reach his at which point it kills the McThralls in his melee range.

My third turn I assign 3 focus to the Seether, upkeep Lamentation, give a focus to the Defiler. Stalker activates first and I attack Kody with a Fist, Tusk, Fist attack. The fists having hit, I opted to try a 2 hand throw. I rolled low in my strength check and I was not able to throw it. The first squad McThralls finished it off. Second Mcthrall Squad damaged Diody by a third. I manuever the Pistol Wraith behind pVlad and the other Pistol Wraith stays put. Skarlock, Stalker and Defiler positions for possible attacks. Venny moves up a bit to catch pVlad under Lamentation.

In Kim's turn, Diody kills 1 McThrall, Drago kills 2 more and Beast runs up. Kim does something audacious, camping Vlad's focus and running Vlad up to Venny since he could not cast his more important spells under Lamentation.

Fourth turn and again, I give the Seether 2 focus and this time, not upkeep Lamentation. I move the McThralls in front of Vlad out and one eats a free strike. I then move up the Seether, spend a focus for a Power Attack 2 hand throw and boosted it for a successful attempt. I throw Vlad at Diody and do 10 points of damage as I boosted the damage rolling Str10+4D6 against Vlad's Arm 23. Once Vlad was knocked down, I sent some McThralls against him, plinking for some damage. I tried. At this point I also realized, I forgot to put a focus on my Stalker and I thought that was the game because the Stalker had the attacks which could kill Vlad this turn since it had Arcane Assassin which ignores focus adding to armor. The McThralls finished off Diody.

Venethrax tried to get into the act but I couldn't damage Vlad enough since I was hitting at P+S14. I though this was it unless I can get a Pistol Wraith to Death Chill Vlad. The other Pistol Wraith was too far. The other took me a few minutes to see where I should put it. I finally asked Kim if Vlad could be seen from the Pistol Wraith's perspective since Vlad was on higher elevation. Kim gave it to me and I maneuvered the Pistol Wraith. It was just enough base peeking past Beast's base and I managed to Death Chill pVlad.

Vlad's turn and he sacrifices movement to Death Chill and sacrifices action to stand up. Gives 3 focus to Beast and casts Signs and Portents. Beast tramples toward Venny and buys an attack. The first attack misses and the second hits dealing me 10 points of damage. Basically that was the game. Kim allows me to finish off Vlad come my turn.

Overview
This is my first time playing Cryx and throughout my 2 games, I was really busy with the learning curve. So much that I forgot to take pictures of both of my games. This is my first time to play with that many models even in a low points match and it can really tire the brain out.

I learned McThralls with Necrosurgeon are a bothersome tarpit. In my game with SJ, I was bringing a few of them back. I also learned my apprehension with Venethrax as a caster was overly pessimistic. I thought SJ's trolls could have easily rolled up my army and that I couldn't deal damage to Kim's Warjack Brick fast enough. I also found that Venethrax has an interesting feat, causing denial of charge lanes to Venethrax by creating clouds. Sure, a Mage Hunter Strike Force can still ignore the clouds to damage Venny but it stops Eyeless Sight cold.

I also like Venny's Tier benefits as those same characteristic clouds block the LoS to my army. 12" of fog are quite handy.

I look forward to playing with Venny some more in the near future. Overall an army which has still has a lot to teach me about Venny.

Now if only I can get pics. to put in the blogs...

Learning Curve

Another fun night of Warmachine Hordes at the Bunker.

First to arrive was Kim, Kei and Maybelle. Maybelle wanted to try her hand at Khador and had a 30 point match with Kei. I arrived around 615 pm. Their game was getting interesting where the armies were getting into engagement range when SJ arrived and so we got our match going.

SJ playe eMadrak with Mulg, Axer, Fennblades, Pyg Burrowers, Fellcaller, the tablet carrying 10 Commandments solo and another model or two. I ran my first game with Cryx using Venethrax, Seether, 2x Defilers, 1 Stalker, 3 units of McThralls, a Necrosurgeon and her Stitch Thralls and 2 Pistol Wraiths.

I got first turn and deployed my models. SJ deployed his. Before the game started, my list being a tier list allowed me to put 1 3" diameter cloud effect per unit in my army. This means I must put down 4 cloud effects and so I used them to block LoS.

In my first turn, I ran my units forward. Venethrax cast Soul Harvester on the first unit of McThralls and cast Lamentation and moved forward. Seether and the other jacks also just moved forward. Pistol Wraiths moved left.

In SJ's turn, he moved his infantry forward as well, buffing his Pyg Burrowers which promptly went underground. Mulg went onto the forested hill and the Axer moved beside it. He gave the Fenn Blades some protection by making succeessful melee attacks by warrior models against them would knock the attacker down.

My turn and Venny upkept Lamentation and Soul Harvester. I ran my Defilers forward. Venny then cast Hellfire on the Fell Caller Venethrax activated and killed it to prevent it from protecting the Fenn Blades. Second Defiler sprayed and killed 2 Fenn Blades. Pistol Wraiths tried to shoot at Mulg. First one was out of range and the second one flubbed the Death Chill roll.

SJ's turn was a big one. He killed quite a few McThralls with hie Fenn Blades Vengeance move though this meant corpse tokens on the Necrosurgeon. Then on his main activation, he killed quite a few more McThralls and both Pistol Wraiths while popping eMadrak's feat. His Pyg Burrowers killed off a Defiler and heavily damaged the other one and his Fenn Blades finished it off.

My turn saw me not upkeeping Lamentation, though I still upkept Soul Harvester. My first McThrall unit got me 3 corpse tokens as well as soul tokens. I then activated the Skarlock and put Soul Harvester on the second unit which netted me another one corpse and another soul. The Venny popped feat and moved and got 2 more corpse and soul tokens for a total of 6. The Fenn Blade unit he attacked also failed its Terror Check. Venny was now surrounded by 2 cloud effects protecting him by blocking LoS. I revived a couple of McThralls to boost the numbers on 2 of the 3 McThrall units.

SJ in his turn killed a few more McThralls which gave me a few more corpse tokens. All the models he killed also created a cloud effect which causes 1 point of corrosion damage. He bravely moved eMadrack up and camped 3 Fury with the Beasts not full.

My turn and the Soul Tokens I collected turned into focus and so Venny had 13 total focus. He then went on the attack using his focus to kill eMadrak by the 6th focus. It could have gone either way.

Venethrax wins by Assassination.

Second game summary to come later. For now, am off to sleep.

So Irritating!

This morning someone texted me about a DSLR camera that I was selling for my brother. Texted for quite a bit, haggled and finally agreed on a price. I was asked if we could meet at a Starbucks in Manila and so I said yes. Final text was she would text me bet 4-5pm whe she would be available since she had classes.

And so I let time pass. Around 930 am I texted her to confirm the time and if tuloy. No reply. Around 1 pm, I text again. Still no reply. Fine, I assume she has classes. 3 pm I decide might as well go. Would be difficult if she suddenly confirms and I'm still at home. I get at the appointed meeting place and I text her again if tuloy. Still no reply. This was around 415 pm which she said her last class ended at 4 pm.

Quarter to 5 I tell her I am already at the meeting place. Still no reply. Around 530, I decide it's a waste of time and text her am leaving na.

Now I don't mind if a transaction falls through. Business is business and things like that happen. What I don't like is my time being wasted. If you decide you don't want to go through with the transaction, it would be nice to just tell me instead of having my energy, gas, time and text wasted. Now, while in fairness she did say she would confirm the time, it would have been nice had she dignified any of my 4 texts with a reply, regardless of whether it is positive or negative. I would have expected she had time in between classes to send a simple text saying she changed her mind. I cannot believe she couldn't even send a simple reply.

Gaddengit! SO IRRITATING!

Cantankerous

(photo taken from Battlecollege.com)

The Cankerworm. This bonejack was a bit of a terror in Warmachine Mk 1. I've heard comments about it from people ranging so-so to disappointing in Mk 2. Mine is still in its blister pack waiting to be put together hence the picture above from Battlecollege.

Being a first time Cryx player and not having seen much of it in Mk 1, I find its rules ok on paper. It's speedy, stealthy, has a high enough melee attack stat. I like Armor Piercing weapons of which this model has in its Bite attack. It has a tail attack as well. It can take a weapon from a wrecked jack and use it as its own as well as heal itself from the wrecked jack. Defensive abilities are right there with the other bonejacks and it can disengage without eating a free strike.

Personally I like it. Sounds like a very opportunistic model. I can see it in a Cryx army as a counterattacker or finisher of jacks. It won't be in the front line that's for sure but following. It has an Imprint with Asphyxious that might allow it to be placed in the front line as it can move after its activation. Deneghra can also help it as well as the Witch Coven. I probably won't be able to use it with Venethrax. However that's all on paper.

Speaking from a Khador player's perspective, the Cankerworm is a threat to my jacks and so I have to use my infantry to help keep it from damaging my jacks. A line of blockers would be best as the Cankerworm can't finish them all and infantry would have the best chance of catching up with them.

On the Legion side, I have quite a few beasts which can counter the model's speed and armor. The nice thing is the Cankerworm can't salvage anything from beasts so I can afford to be more aggressive with my beasts against it. Also have warrior models which can keep it honest.

I'll be putting it together later today. Hope to have it painted up and used in the future.

UPDATE: Here's my Cankerworm. I pinned the head and the body and tail together. The fangs I had to just glue together because I don't have a drill bit that can drill that small. Still a bit cloudy and cold so I won't basecoat it for now. But at least it's a work in progress.

New Look

Many thanks to Ian Kim Navarro for helping me with my Blog background. It was boring and I liked the way he fixed up the WMPH blog and Luigi Scarella's blog as well.

For background on the background, the pic on the far left is Karchev the Terrible, my favorite Khador model. The one on the right is Thagrosh the Messiah, my favorite Legion of Everblight model. The one on the immediate left is Venethrax, my main go to Cryx caster.

I think it's a great improvement to my site. Makes me wish I had the creativity and programming skill of Kim. Galing!

If you need any online layout and/or programming done, give him a call.