Other kill teams

So following on from the Deathwatch kill team, I have decided to have a quick run down of the other teams I'm planning. Some of these teams are going to be full 20 man rosters, some of them are going to be just 10 man rosters or maybe somewhere in between. Some of these teams are also complete and some are still to be purchased or even released!

I'll start with the ones that are at least complete, in terms of the fact that I own all the models needed to complete the teams. These are mostly Marine based teams but there are also a chaos and tyranids team as well. Im also starting here as these are the teams that I will probably use most of all, after the likes of the guard and AdMech anyway.

Eagle Knights

The first team I'll talk about will be the Blood Angels. Now, the Blood Angels are generally associated with combat and assault packs, so this is the main theme of the force. There is very little shooting, with only a handful of weapons that can shoot over 12 inches, as in 2. One bolter on a tactical marine and a special issue boltgun on a Stern guard Sgt. Other ranged weapons include a tactical with flamer and a tactical Sgt (acting as medic) and 2 vanguard vet both with bolt pistols, and that's it. Nearly Half the team, 3 company vets and a vanguard vet, don't  have any shooting capacity at all. Although what the vanguard vets do have is jump packs, making them fast and the company vets all have storm Shields, making them fairly resilient. The basic idea with these guys is simple, get up close and personal and then try and chain combats. Against elite armies, this team should do well but might struggle against horde type armies as they just don't have the power to reach out and touch that many units at a time.

Stone Dragons

One team that shouldn't have much trouble with hordes however, is the Space Wolves, or Stone Dragons. There is only one man that doesn't have a ranged weapon and only 3 that can't shoot over 12 inches. Within the remaining 6, 3 have storm bolters, 2 bolters and the last man a plasma gun. Space Wolves are not known as a long range chapter and that's reflected here as well with a number of combat weapons spread around plus there are two vets with jump packs for extra mobility. This all means that there is a good mix of fire power and shooting, with the force being best in the 0 to 12 inch range, as opposed to the 0 to 1 inch range of the Blood Angels. This force is also a bit of general purpose list, with the ability to take on elites with plasma and also hordes with storm bolters and boltguns.

Dark Guardians

Yes I know it's a biker, but it's the only full painted model

So, we have a combat oriented and a short\medium ranged team in the mix but there is not a lot of options for a long ranged team, so we're going in another direction now and going for some resilience, as the last marine force is the Dark Angels, or Dark Guardians. This force is very different again and is formed around a core of terminators, in fact half the team is armoured in TDA suits. These suits are a combination of combat and ranged, with twin claws, a TH\SS, heavy flamer, storm bolters and an assault cannon in there. These are supported by a number of power armoured Marines and by support I mean support. Now you could just use 3 termies, with no other units, but 2 with a couple of Marines in support would be best. This force is would be capable of taking on both elite and horde style armies, although fast moving armies would prove a bit more of a challenge due to the termies slow speed.

The last marine team to talk about is the scout team. This is the first full 20 man team and is formed of 17 scouts and 3 full battle brothers. These guys are a mix of weapons, with two heavy bolters, two sniper rifles, two shotguns, X bolters and X bolt pistol and combat knives, with X having chain swords to act as scout sgts. The full Marines are a tactical with plasma gun, and two sets, one with chain sword and plasma pistol and one with Combi plasma, as the whole premis of the force is a small squad of scouts lead by an experienced tactical Sgt. The force can be split in to two rough factions, long ranged with heavy bolters, bolters, sniper rifles and shotguns, and short range with pistols and knives, although there will no doubt be some overlap between these.

The next force is also power armoured but is not a standard marine force, as it belongs to the Grey Knights. This force will be a smallish force, 10 to 12 models. This force is just a basic force with a few of each type of model in. There really isn't a theme or purpose to the force, I just wanted a Grey Knights force in the collection. Dispute not really having any theme to this little force, I'm still looking forward to playing this force.

The last imperial faction I'm going to collect is the adepta sororitas or sisters of battle. I've been looking forward to collecting and building since they announced the new plastic sisters. The plan is to build a force around the battle sisters with only one, modified sister to represent a repentia. I won't be using arco-flagellants at all, as I don't see them as being part of kill team, to unreliable and I can't imagine they would be very good at sneaking through enemy territory to raid or assassinate. The force will contain at least one of each heavy and special weapon, plus a couple of variants of sister superiors. The will also be a minimum of 7 regular battle sisters, one with a Simulacrum Imperialis, one modelled as a medic and 5 basic models to fill out the team.  The repentia will be a modified sister of battle, modified to carry a couple of chain saw. This is because I want the force to have very coherent look and feel to it, like it's a single squad, or two squads, of sisters sent out on a mission. Of all these forces, this is the one I'm most excited about!

After all the imperial forces there are a couple of other forces in the mix, one chaos and one xenos.

The chaos force is formed of a core of Marines, supported by a number of cultists. There are effectively two teams here, a ranged team and a combat team. The Marines are armed with various weapons, a couple with bolters but some have assault weapons, like axes and claws. The cultists are armed with 2 flamers and 2 heavy stubbers, along side several cultists with autoguns and several with auto pistols and brutal assault weapons. While I don't plan on using this team much I have a plan for them. The cultists are going to be painted in very dull and bland colours, with only minor bright colours on sashes or bands, dedicated to the specific god that cultists follows. The marines on the other hand will have very bright and colourful armour, in keeping with there old legions or god. These will form the "bad guy" faction for me to play when I feel like a change.

The final team at present is the only xeno's team and is that of the dreaded Tyranids. This team is actually pretty sizable, about 30 or more models. The main movers and shakers of the team are a Tyranids Warrior, with a big gun, possibly a venom cannon, maybe?, and a lictor. Apart from these two big monsters, we have 12 Hormagaunts and 16 Termagants, with a selection of weapons. There are 4 spinefists, 6 fleshborers and 6 devourers. This force will mostly be used as a enemy force when playing at home, rather than a force to play at the club or tournament. It is also a force that has just grown up as I've gathered bit and there has been no thought or process to how it's been collected.

There are also 3 other teams that I am considering if I get time. The first is a custodies team, which will be formed of just 3 custodes, a spear and two swords. I would basically be collecting this force as it's the only outstanding imperial faction. The second force I might consider is basically a copy of the chaos force but built as an imperial faction, something similar the Ultramarines and their auxiliary forces. Lastly, I might consider another xeno's force, namely an Ork force, just because it would be fun to bash a force together and be a very fun team to play when I fancied a change.

Xmas POP's

Time for something a little more visually pleasing I think. So without further ado, feast your eyes on these little fellas;

Ok, so we've pretty much all seen them these days and they are no doubt decorating many painting table around the world but I think there freaking awesome!

Technically only one of them is mine, the red one, the other belongs to my son.

Flame red hair, tribal tattoo, axe and bolt pistol (??), everything a son of Russ should have.

Oh, and cool Mohican hair job. 

The details on this thing are spot on to me. Every element you'd expect to find on a model is there, from the hair to the wolf pelt. They really have captured the essence of a son of Russ.

My model is a Blood Angels Assault Marine, resplendent in the armour of Baal, with the classic Inferno pistol and chain sword.

Classic beakie marine

While the left pad has the classic Blood Angels iconography, the right shoulder pads has the markings of the Second Company, the yellow blood drop, along with the lightning bolt of the 7th squad on his knee. 

So the Blood Angels from the 7th squad, second company and the Space Wolf is from Ragnar's great company and I believe is a Blood Claw. Either way, I love them!

Hopefully we'll get the other two models and maybe more if they bring out more,  like maybe a guardsman?

2020 resolutions

So, I've been through last year's resolutions and all the previous ones and this year I've set myself the target of clearing all the backlog from previous years. Whether I manage to achieve this target is anyone guess, however given previous years, I doubt it!



1) complete my deathwatch kill team.

This is definitely priority number one on the list. I will try and concentrate on this first before moving to other items on my list but that might change depending upon time I get to hobby.

2) paint and base terrain.

This is number two on the list as it should be something I can do in bits and pieces, spray a bit of terrain here, cut a board there type of thing. As it's not a sit down and concentrate sort of job, I can do it on the fly at a moment's notice.

3) complete chaos kill team.

I've started this and have a clear plan. They were not supposed to be started before the Deathwatch we're finished but you know how these things go sometimes.

4) complete marine kill team.

Now this one is a little more complicated that the rest as technically it's 4 things not just one;

a) scout team

I need to finish cleaning (don't ask me how long the models have been in the jar of detol), priming and painting these boys.

b) Blood Angels

Surprisingly close to being finished, as only 1 models needs painting. Ok, so I cheated slightly here and used some models from the Eagle Knights army in had already painted but still......

c) Dark Angels

The models are primed and ready to go, some already have some paint on but only very basic splodges of colour here and there.

d) Space Wolves

I thing two models have some colour on but on the whole these need the most work of the three chapter specific teams

5) Marneus Calgar.

Paint up Calgary and his retinue. So 3 primaris Marines and 2 guards plus Calgary himself. The apothecary is already done (by previous owner I might add)

6) paint up the remainder of the Dagr Ormr Militarum Tempestus force.

We'll see about this one, even if I just get them primed I will be happy!

7) get as much of the Hrossey Yeomanry primed and base coated as possible.

Shouldn't take much as I think there is only about 2 commanders, a vet squad and a special weapons squad to paint. But then I said there wasn't many models to paint last year and I didn't manage that!

So, not an exhaustive list but there 8s still quite a bit on there to do. I recon there are 90 models to paint before we get to the last two items, which will have at least the same again to do. I really do t know how much time I will get this year but I hope it will be more than last year, fingers crossed either way!

2019 review

It's that time of year again, time to look back over the past year and see what I've managed to achieve and how well I did with my 2019 resolutions. This year there have been some big changes, with the arrival of child and with the wife being on maternity leave, plus changing shifts from nights to evenings. This meant that I eventually ended up with both more and less hobby time. In the beginning I had more hobby time at night, when the big kids were asleep and the wife was out dancing with the little one. Later, when the wee one went on to a bottle, he was left he with me and as such my limited hobby time disappeared completely. As such I've barely touched a brush in months.

So what did I actually achieve from my 2019 resolutions?

1) complete my deathwatch kill team.

There has been very little progress on this one. The only thing that has changed is Elites and the addition of 5 vanguard vets. So there has been a bit of silver painted, mostly the silver arms and that's it. So this is most definitely a fail.

2) complete my inquisitorial\scions kill team.

Done! Yep, got this one done pretty early on and have been played a couple of games with these guys.  There not done to the standard I had hoped to get them to but I figured 8t was better to have them done and finished than dragging out waiting for the dinner details to get done.

3) complete AdMech kill team.

Almost done. I say almost as the painting is done, all I need to do is to quickshade the models. Again, they are not quite as detailed as I wanted but they are done and finished, so I'm happy.

4) paint and base terrain.

Well, I sprayed up one test model. Pretty much just sprayed up grey, which is fine and I plan on trimming some bases and flocking them. All very simple but hopefully effective, anyway, that's going to have to roll over until next year now.

5) finish building my custom storage trays.

Kind of. My custom kill team storage trays are built but not my 40k ones. I plan on actually building another set for kill team, one for each of my teams but the 40k ones have pretty much been put on hold for the moment, as the main focus of them was for the various Marines armies and they have also been put on hold, hence not much need for proper storage trays. So I'm counting this one's a half done and the other half as no longer necessary.

6) complete chaos kill team.

Started but nowhere near finished. I've started the cultists and have a plan for the Marines but not had anytime to complete them lately, hopefully they will be completed next year!

7) complete marine kill team.

Well this one's has gone up and down several times over the year. First it went down to just a scout based kill team, then it went up and down and finally back up to the current level. At the moment were at a full scout team and three 10 man Marine teams, a BA, a DA and a SW team.  Only the BA team is anywhere near complete, with only 1 model to paint, the rest however shouldn't take too long to finish next year!

8) Marneus Calgar.

This model is a year old now and has finally be built (in the last month or two!) The idea for the force is not complete as well, and will form part of a supreme command detachment with a primaris captain, two lieutenants, the two guard and either an apothecary, ancient or champion, or possibly a small honour guard. Currently I'm leaning towards the apothecary, to keep Calgar going a bit longer.

So, there were 8 objectives this year and I managed to complete 3. Ok, so I did manage to complete 3 of the 4 main objectives and made a start on most of the others. I managed to paint up 39 models out of the 60 main ones I wanted to paint, with the 21 others being started but not finished. So, all in all, I don't think I've done to badly. Next year's objectives will continue on from this lot with only a few additions.

With 2019's list done, let's have a little look further back.

2018 had a number of outstanding items.

¹) paint up the remainder of the Dagr Ormr Militarum Tempestus force.

Still not done, not even primed.

³) finish building my jungle plant terrain.

This item has been on every list for the last couple of years and was on last year's and will be on this year's. As there is little point repeating the same item every year, I'm going to scrub all previous entries from the various lists.

⁴) get pictures of the complete hjaltland LI and Eagle Knights.

Still not done and the Eagle Knights have been packed up for storage, so probably won't get done for them. I have an almost complete picture for the Hjaltland LI so that's good enough for me. Marking this as done.

5) get as much of the Hrossey Yeomanry and Dark Guardians primed and base coated as possible.

Dark Guardians have been primed and sort of base coated (both being black!) and packed up for storage. The Hrossey Yeomanry have mostly been primed with the exception of a couple of models, so I'm gonna called this one done.

6) update my narratives, taking in to account the 8th edition universe.

I have done this a bit but I should do more. This should be a rolling thing, so I'm gonna call this one done.

8) add in new models, ogryns bodyguard's and MT transports.

The ogryn, or rather bullgryns as they actually are, have been built and added to forces, however, no more models are going to be added to anymore 40k armies. My focus this year, as last, will be on kill team. So I'm also calling this one done.

From 2017, there were 3 outstanding resolutions:

1) table terrain and gaming surface. Having just got a mat and mdf terrain for Christmas, I need  to get on with building and painting the terrain. 

As mentioned above, I'm scrubbing all there separate entries for terrain.

6) finalize a list for the Dark Guardians.

With the dark Guardians being parked for the foreseeable future, I'm scrubbing this one off the list.

9) sort out my storage, I have cases but no storage trays. Empty cases are pretty useless.

As mentioned above, a rejig in priorities means this is not relevant anymore and so I'm scrubbing this too.

From 2015 and 2016 there are no outstanding resolutions!

So, all in all  not to bad. I think I can scrub quite a few things off the list this year, both from last year's list and also from previous lists. The resolutions for this coming year will consist of all the remaining items from all the previous years to try and wipe the slate clean and start a fresh.

Kill team annual 2019

I know I'm a little behind the times on this but then again I usually am, so nothing new there! With Christmas just behind us, we have had the usual Xmas releases, battle boxes, Chapter Approved (in two parts this year!), and also, new for this year, Kill Team Annual.

While I don't have the manual yet and I don't plan on getting it just yet, I thought I'd put down a few of my thoughts. There's quite a bit to this book but large chunks of it are are copy and paste jobs from other sources, so the information is not new.

The book starts with the new build your own specialist, an open play thing only and something that seems a bit of a waste of time to me. Yes it could be good fun but it's not for me. I think that it's a little to WAAC for my tastes, ok so in the right hands you could create some very fun and interesting specialists, but I think a lot of people will just pick the good ones to create some super combo's with little thought for story or "realism".

The next section, which takes up the first big chunk of the book, are the missions, both for match play and also narrative mission. These missions are not new but are a collection from all the rule books and additional box sets, both the battle zones and the small force box sets. It should be a complete collection of all the missions released and a very good resource for players. Whilst I'll probably only use the matched play missions, I would still like to have all the other missions.

Next up is the compendium of points from all the books and it seems that despite this being a full collection of the points, there haven't actually been any points updates in this book, it's more bringing all the various updates that have been released through FAQ's, white dwarf's and the various rule books. I would have thought that there would be some updates, as there are some units that really need a bit of adjustment to make the more balanced. I think this is one of the biggest issues with this book.

The next section is dedicated to datasheets. Now this isn't a complete collection of datasheets but just the ones that were published in white dwarf and also the Sisters of Battle. Now most of these datasheets are not of any interest to me, as they relate to units I won't use. I don't own, nor plan to own, any Blackstone stuff. In addition I have no plans to ever own Kroot or Daemons. I may, at some point get some of the vanguard marines but not any time soon and there may well be an update before I do. The chaos CSM update is interesting but again, I don't plan on updating my chaos list from its current format any time soon. The final datasheets however are of great interest to me, as they are the sheets for the new sisters of battle.

The sisters datasheets include sheets for battle sisters, repentia, arco-flagellant, canoness and repentia Superior. I have plans for a sisters kill team but as yet I have not had a chance to study the datasheets properly but I don't plan on getting any arco-flagellants, as I don't really like the models and I really don't think that they sit with the idea of kill team, as in my eyes it a small stealthy team infiltrating an enemy area, not really somewhere for a drugged up crazy death machine. Repentia I can see being used as they might be zealous fanatics, they are at least in charge of there wits. I will go in to more detail in another post but right now, let's just say this is the bit of the book that most interests me.

The last section of the book has all the tactics and psychic powers for all the factions. The exciting thing about it is that there are some new tactics for various faction and also includes all the tactics from the faction boxes. There are a number of good things here. Firstly, there has always been some argument over whether the tactics from the faction boxes were legal to use in games or if it was just WAAC to us them and now they are all compiled in to one book, I see no reason why you should not be able to use them. This is added to by the second good thing here, extra faction tactics for those that didn't get faction boxes. This was always an issue for many people as it did give a distinct advantage to certain faction but this advantage should now be nullified.

While I'm not going to go through every single tactic, I will highlight a few that caught my eye. I don't know if these are new or not as I don't own every book to check. The one that everyone seems to be going on about is the marines Death Denied which has gone up to 3 cp! That is some investment and not something you can use every turn now. Another faction that got some updates are the AdMech, although at present I'm not sure what the updates are, apart from a slight increase in some of the tactics, so I will have to check that out in due course. The one that interest me most out of this section (apart from sisters) is grey knights. As far as I know, they never got a faction boxs and so have now received a number of faction specific tactics, which are useful. I will have to have a proper look through them before I build my team. They are going to be even better in the psychic phase. The last faction that I'm interested in is the chaos space Marines. The new datasheet are not of I interesbut a couple of the tactics look great, especially the one about killing a cultists to have the others pass morale, guard should so have this as well! While I have a nids force, I'm not bothered about there tactics and such, as there really there to play with my son.

Other that that, there are a number of factions that also got updates in here that I really don't care about. Custodies got a load of tactics, as did harlequins, death guard and thousand sons. Some of them look quite good, such as the quins being able to shoot after charging or 1k sons buffs against Space Wolves (situational but cool). Necrons and Tau also got a couple of new tactics, including Tau's retreat after overwatch, as if Tau needed any help in that area.

Lastly there seems to be some confusion about the cost of various Ork wargear. It seems that the points might have been mixed up or something. I don't actually know what the issue is but it seems that some models pay points for stuff they didn't use to and visa versa. Like I said, I'm not sure what the issue is, nor do really care.

Overall,I think that this is going to be a really good book and I'm quite looking forward to getting my hands on it.