It seems like a very long time since I have written an article for this blog. Of course, it isn’t, but after being on holiday in sunny Spain for two weeks and being a but off colour (long story, not going there), I feel I have neglected my blog writing duties.
Mentions in Dispatches
Before I start, a mention should be made of a really sad lost to the game community in the UK. On the 10th February Anthony Barnes, President of the Gaming Club Network, very suddenly passed away.
I was a little torn whether of not to talk about this here, but as almost a month has past at least some mention in dispatches is probably in order. For my part, I only worked alongside Tony for all too brief a time while I was President of the GCN and I found him to be an extremely enthusiastic, no-nonsense, and diplomatic ambassador for the hobby.
Knowing the challenges of keeping the many different and varied gaming clubs pointing in vaguely in a similar direction, I know that Tony’s dry wit and common sense will also be missed greatly by everyone who knew him and by the community as a whole.
Rest in Peace sir, it was an honour and a privilege.
Hobby, How I Missed Thee
While family holidays are great, and gods knows we needed one; they don’t normally allow very much time for hobby, so after returning home and engaging in some post holiday recovery, I was damn happy to throw some dice around this week.
Unfortunately, my first game, Rahn vs Gaspy1, went poorly. Shall we just say that trying to assassinate the Cyrx caster on my first turn could have been a very bad idea. Thankfully my opponent’s dice proceeded to fail him dramatically which kept the game live for a few turns (much to my surprise). In the end I was looking good on scenario, and then Rahn took two Hellfires to the face and I lost.
Still, I’m sure the Houseguard Thane I’ve almost painted will help. He was going to done before Eiryss 3, but that didn’t happen. However a quiet weekend at home (a bit of a rarity around here) and he’s gone from undercoated to varnished. Result.
The idea will be to use the Thane to speed boost my Halberdiers and make an already jammy unit, more jammy. And better still, he is a Commander and solves the Halberdiers fear of things that go ‘boo’. I’m not sure the strength 9 weapon master sword will get much work done, but I guess it might come in handy.
I’ve also assembled a Chimera in a fit of madness. This wasn’t in the original plan and is a model that I probably wouldn’t own if it didn’t come in the Retribution Battlebox.
Giant Elf Robots are Cool
I’m not entirely sure which list he will fit into fit, although I’m sure Rahn, Kaelyssa and Issyria can all make room for him. I am also considering this single Chimera as an interesting addition to eVyros’ list. Although the Chimera’s arc node would be largely pointless, Apparition with the big guy’s movement shenanigans could be highly entertaining. And that’s without considering a synergy boosted combi-strike.
War Room Update
Last week, I fairly major upgrade to War Room dropped into the iStore (and its Google and Amazon equivalents). Amongst a host of technical changes that have improved the performance and battery usage of the application, Tinkerhouse has finally added support for all of the various theme forces in the game, including list validation and discounting points.
While not perfect, this is a huge step forward in making War Room a practical army building tool for Warmachine and Hordes. Consider this muppet suitably impressed by the ongoing support for this product, although considering Privateer Press are involved, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.
So that’s what’s been going on in my hobby for the last three weeks. I will have a few new toys winging their way into my painting queue in March, and at somepoint I need to pickup the new Warmachine Vengeance book.
Anything Worth Doing... 