Talk about the devil... while writing part one of the article and rambling, that my airbrush set hasn't arrived yet, my doorbell rang. And guess who was standing in front of my door? The guy from the DPD courier service. Hoorah! Now I only need to buy a travel AC adapter, since the UK and Germany don't use the same power plugs.
Now let's move to the remaining subjects:
Damn, start painting!
I'm going to use the airbrush on everything except for my jetlock council, so after working out how to dilute vallejo model/game color properly for airbrush use, I will start exercise a little bit with the airbrush gun on old space crusade models and a unused 1:35 self propelled howitzer. When I get a grip on the basic airbrush techniques I move over to my eldar tanks.
I'm not really sure if I want to pain the infantery models right after that, maybe I only airbrush them with the two basic colors I use and then move over to my ork army. The reason for that idea is the fact that my painting skills were never above average and to call them "a little bit rusty" would be a major understatement. With the tanks done and my mech-eldar playstyle, I should get a least half of the softscore points most tournament around here award for painting. If I paint those bunch of ork models and tanks right after airbrushing my eldar skimmers, I should get my skills back from rusty to only average. Maybe that way I don't end up with a bunch of decent painted greenskins outshining a eldar force with a rushed paintjob.
And now it is time for the last subjects of todays posting...
New codex please?
Don't get me wrong, I don't want to use this topic to rant about GWs dev-team or how they manage the update cycle compared to other companies. I started collecting GW models back in edition 2, so ranting about how outdated/overpriced some units in the eldar dex are won't get me far.
I rather like to talk about the consequences of the codex creep in regard of my modelling and painting schedule.
After playing one tournament with a eldar force this year, a testgame using a ava/seer combo and the TOS, where I ended up playing against two eldar players with my borrowed IG force, I found a solution to my mediocre motivation, which has me ended up with a unpainted army and lots of DA, guardians and other models bits lying around in two screw boxes collecting dust.
The solution is to go through the eldar dex, rate all units for their effectiveness and put all of those, who don't perform well in the local metagame and are still not assembled or even bought, on hiatus until GW relaunches the eldar dex with updated rules&model range.
So which units make the cut? Let's divide them into the categories "first priority" "stay on my workbench" and "back into the box"
First priority:
Yriel conversion: I'm moving away from the jetlock-lists, thanks to the high amount of double libs/runic priests lists running around. My new black is pure reserve denial and I rather upgrade the lousy autarch into yrial, than waste those points on holofields for my prism tanks. Converting him is rather high on my to do list, but painting is not. A special character should be a visual gem in a force, so I wait for my rusty painting skills to improve before I put a single layer of paint on him.
Fire Dragons: With the return of the terminator wall (instead of the LR/Ass-Term combo) and the new "FNP for all" BA dex I will bring my dragon force up to three full squads. Not sure if I start painting them right on, but the force increase is part of my monthly budget.
Dark Avengers: After skipping the idea of a fully converted army, I go for a raider/craftworld/exodite coalition force and use the plain DA models instead of the DA/WHF corsair conversion I originally had in mind. I have 14 assembled DA and most of my lists use 3x5 hidden savely in serpents/falcons, so I need to assemble another one and rebase all of them to fit my army theme.
Vyper squadron: Overpriced as hell but I need two to fill the last points in this months 2k tournament lists. The decision for the spare points was either get holos on my prism tanks (no assembly needed) and add two twin-SC vypers to the list (only one unassembled), or play ~7-8 spiders and maybe upgrade the autarch into one wearing a WSG. Since I sold both my spiders and my WSG autarch one year ago, I went for the HF-Prism+Vyper approach. Guess I will try to keep them out if trouble as much as possible and use them to deny objectives in the last turn of mob up single survivors, while keeping the bulk of the enemy forces occupied with 3 squads of dragons and the whole tank-force.
Skimmers: Will see a nice airbrush paintjob in the near future, so I only need to scratch the moldlines of from some of the turret weapons, magnetize those and rework my fly-bases. The magnet solution was a nice idea, but didn't work out that well on the battlefield. The force of the magnets beats the power of the super glue after a while, ripping them off from the hull.
Stay on my workbench:
Jetlock council: I just need to finish another jetlock and add some helmet details, to help identify the different powers on the battlefield. Paintjob wise they share the same fate as yriel, being one of the eyecatchers of my army. They won't see many use in the future outside of friendly games, since the local surrounding is now full of SM/BA/SW and a lot of CSM players have startet either using the BA/SW rules for a heretic force (zerkers riding crushers as count as Thunderwolfcav) or dug out a SM force, which was hidden somewhere in their closet. I haven't seen a single SM(+variants) army on the german TOS skipping the lib/runic priest, except for the single BT player, who refuses to switch over to codex SM and so can't field a psyker anyway. I don't want to run with a huge squad of jetlocks right into the range of multiple psykers, esp. if they are backed up by either TWC, full squads of terminators or lots of FNP-Marines. Neither can a council withstand the firepower those new marines lists dish out w/o being fortuned, nor does the low amount of witchblade attacks dish out enough damage to break 2+ armor saves, W2 models with multiple wound groups or FNP enhanced vanilla marines.
Guardian Jetbikes: Depending on tournament restrictions and pointsizes, I may end up need a small squad of or two of these guys for a legit tournament list, so they stay at my workbench for a while.
Wraithlords & War Walkers: All of my lords and walkers are already glued together. Since airbrushing them should work quit well they stay in the workbench category, but won't see much usage on the battlefield.
Storm Guardians: I want to give those guys a try in the near future, as a insurance for a possible rise of orks and tyranid forces around. How soon they end up on the workbench depends on the upcoming Night Spinner rules. If the spinner keeps his transport capacity and his gun rules work out as I hope they do, I might swap either a falcon or both of my prism tanks for spinners. Together with tripple DBF/CS Dragon exarchs that should be enough to counter horde armies, so I rather use my time on converting ork modells and keep the stormies in the closet until GW drops their point costs with the new eldar dex.
Banshees: Candidate for the box department, since they don't beat using a third squad of dragons (esp if yriel is allowed) in a reserve denial list and I don't want to rush their paintjob anyway.
Back into the box
Warpspiders: I may build a test model in the near future, but without any real use in my denial lists, the lack of AP against tanks and the fact that we talk about a fully kitbashed/converted squad, they won't see the light until GW gives them a buff with the next dex. Or maybe launchs new models, which aren't as static as the old ed2 spiders, thus baiting me into buying them.
Jain Zar: If a tournament allows spec chars, I rather field Yriel and with her being an eyecatcher I rather wait for my painting skills to improve.
Warlocks: Same fate as the jetlock council. There isn't a single model converted yet and having a squad of non-fortuned 4+ inv T3 looking into a bolter muzzle at rapid fire range doesn't works well as a motivation to start working on them.
Guardian Defenders: 8 points for a crappy statsline and a 12" gun stormbolter? I rather wait for the nex eldar dex before I start clipping even one of my 50 guardians out of their sprues!
Harlequins: Most of my squad is in a rather sorry state. I got them from a friend of mine, who tortured two boxes of quins with a saw back in ed4, when clown-falcons were the flavor of the month. They don't fit into my denial lists, so I rather skip the surgial process for a while.
Dark Reapers: Own a squad of ed3 reapers, but they don't fit into my style right at the moment, so I rather use my spare time on getting the other parts of my army done or start working on my orks.
Now let's move to the remaining subjects:
Damn, start painting!
I'm going to use the airbrush on everything except for my jetlock council, so after working out how to dilute vallejo model/game color properly for airbrush use, I will start exercise a little bit with the airbrush gun on old space crusade models and a unused 1:35 self propelled howitzer. When I get a grip on the basic airbrush techniques I move over to my eldar tanks.
I'm not really sure if I want to pain the infantery models right after that, maybe I only airbrush them with the two basic colors I use and then move over to my ork army. The reason for that idea is the fact that my painting skills were never above average and to call them "a little bit rusty" would be a major understatement. With the tanks done and my mech-eldar playstyle, I should get a least half of the softscore points most tournament around here award for painting. If I paint those bunch of ork models and tanks right after airbrushing my eldar skimmers, I should get my skills back from rusty to only average. Maybe that way I don't end up with a bunch of decent painted greenskins outshining a eldar force with a rushed paintjob.
And now it is time for the last subjects of todays posting...
New codex please?
Don't get me wrong, I don't want to use this topic to rant about GWs dev-team or how they manage the update cycle compared to other companies. I started collecting GW models back in edition 2, so ranting about how outdated/overpriced some units in the eldar dex are won't get me far.
I rather like to talk about the consequences of the codex creep in regard of my modelling and painting schedule.
After playing one tournament with a eldar force this year, a testgame using a ava/seer combo and the TOS, where I ended up playing against two eldar players with my borrowed IG force, I found a solution to my mediocre motivation, which has me ended up with a unpainted army and lots of DA, guardians and other models bits lying around in two screw boxes collecting dust.
The solution is to go through the eldar dex, rate all units for their effectiveness and put all of those, who don't perform well in the local metagame and are still not assembled or even bought, on hiatus until GW relaunches the eldar dex with updated rules&model range.
So which units make the cut? Let's divide them into the categories "first priority" "stay on my workbench" and "back into the box"
First priority:
Yriel conversion: I'm moving away from the jetlock-lists, thanks to the high amount of double libs/runic priests lists running around. My new black is pure reserve denial and I rather upgrade the lousy autarch into yrial, than waste those points on holofields for my prism tanks. Converting him is rather high on my to do list, but painting is not. A special character should be a visual gem in a force, so I wait for my rusty painting skills to improve before I put a single layer of paint on him.
Fire Dragons: With the return of the terminator wall (instead of the LR/Ass-Term combo) and the new "FNP for all" BA dex I will bring my dragon force up to three full squads. Not sure if I start painting them right on, but the force increase is part of my monthly budget.
Dark Avengers: After skipping the idea of a fully converted army, I go for a raider/craftworld/exodite coalition force and use the plain DA models instead of the DA/WHF corsair conversion I originally had in mind. I have 14 assembled DA and most of my lists use 3x5 hidden savely in serpents/falcons, so I need to assemble another one and rebase all of them to fit my army theme.
Vyper squadron: Overpriced as hell but I need two to fill the last points in this months 2k tournament lists. The decision for the spare points was either get holos on my prism tanks (no assembly needed) and add two twin-SC vypers to the list (only one unassembled), or play ~7-8 spiders and maybe upgrade the autarch into one wearing a WSG. Since I sold both my spiders and my WSG autarch one year ago, I went for the HF-Prism+Vyper approach. Guess I will try to keep them out if trouble as much as possible and use them to deny objectives in the last turn of mob up single survivors, while keeping the bulk of the enemy forces occupied with 3 squads of dragons and the whole tank-force.
Skimmers: Will see a nice airbrush paintjob in the near future, so I only need to scratch the moldlines of from some of the turret weapons, magnetize those and rework my fly-bases. The magnet solution was a nice idea, but didn't work out that well on the battlefield. The force of the magnets beats the power of the super glue after a while, ripping them off from the hull.
Stay on my workbench:
Jetlock council: I just need to finish another jetlock and add some helmet details, to help identify the different powers on the battlefield. Paintjob wise they share the same fate as yriel, being one of the eyecatchers of my army. They won't see many use in the future outside of friendly games, since the local surrounding is now full of SM/BA/SW and a lot of CSM players have startet either using the BA/SW rules for a heretic force (zerkers riding crushers as count as Thunderwolfcav) or dug out a SM force, which was hidden somewhere in their closet. I haven't seen a single SM(+variants) army on the german TOS skipping the lib/runic priest, except for the single BT player, who refuses to switch over to codex SM and so can't field a psyker anyway. I don't want to run with a huge squad of jetlocks right into the range of multiple psykers, esp. if they are backed up by either TWC, full squads of terminators or lots of FNP-Marines. Neither can a council withstand the firepower those new marines lists dish out w/o being fortuned, nor does the low amount of witchblade attacks dish out enough damage to break 2+ armor saves, W2 models with multiple wound groups or FNP enhanced vanilla marines.
Guardian Jetbikes: Depending on tournament restrictions and pointsizes, I may end up need a small squad of or two of these guys for a legit tournament list, so they stay at my workbench for a while.
Wraithlords & War Walkers: All of my lords and walkers are already glued together. Since airbrushing them should work quit well they stay in the workbench category, but won't see much usage on the battlefield.
Storm Guardians: I want to give those guys a try in the near future, as a insurance for a possible rise of orks and tyranid forces around. How soon they end up on the workbench depends on the upcoming Night Spinner rules. If the spinner keeps his transport capacity and his gun rules work out as I hope they do, I might swap either a falcon or both of my prism tanks for spinners. Together with tripple DBF/CS Dragon exarchs that should be enough to counter horde armies, so I rather use my time on converting ork modells and keep the stormies in the closet until GW drops their point costs with the new eldar dex.
Banshees: Candidate for the box department, since they don't beat using a third squad of dragons (esp if yriel is allowed) in a reserve denial list and I don't want to rush their paintjob anyway.
Back into the box
Warpspiders: I may build a test model in the near future, but without any real use in my denial lists, the lack of AP against tanks and the fact that we talk about a fully kitbashed/converted squad, they won't see the light until GW gives them a buff with the next dex. Or maybe launchs new models, which aren't as static as the old ed2 spiders, thus baiting me into buying them.
Jain Zar: If a tournament allows spec chars, I rather field Yriel and with her being an eyecatcher I rather wait for my painting skills to improve.
Warlocks: Same fate as the jetlock council. There isn't a single model converted yet and having a squad of non-fortuned 4+ inv T3 looking into a bolter muzzle at rapid fire range doesn't works well as a motivation to start working on them.
Guardian Defenders: 8 points for a crappy statsline and a 12" gun stormbolter? I rather wait for the nex eldar dex before I start clipping even one of my 50 guardians out of their sprues!
Harlequins: Most of my squad is in a rather sorry state. I got them from a friend of mine, who tortured two boxes of quins with a saw back in ed4, when clown-falcons were the flavor of the month. They don't fit into my denial lists, so I rather skip the surgial process for a while.
Dark Reapers: Own a squad of ed3 reapers, but they don't fit into my style right at the moment, so I rather use my spare time on getting the other parts of my army done or start working on my orks.
1 comment:
Looks like a solid analysis and plan. Kind of sad that it comes to that, but I understand oh so well.
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