40k is a Shooting Game? Pt. 2

First off thank you all for the particiaption in the last post. There were some good thoughts but this is one I wanted to address directly as it King does a good job at stating why he perceives the games as slanted toward shooting. This is naturally open discussion. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and I'm not cutting or slamming TKE. I felt I should point that out as, while I'm sure TKE knows it, I wanted to make sure other readers did too.

TheKingElessar wrote:

Vis-a-vis a shooting game, however, I have to disgaree that the two are perfectly balanced in the core rules. The fact that you hit vehicles on the Rear is poor compensation for hitting them on 4+ or 6s virtually any time you catch up to one you haven't already damaged, only getting a single strike from Grenades, Melta Bombs not being AP1, and then the myriad issues with time constraints, distances, blocking, bubblewrap, and the fact that (barring Kharn) it will always be easier for skilled shooting units to hit and thereby have a chance to inflict damage than for combat units* - there are a great many more limiting factors to inflicting melee damage than shooting damage.

Is the gap as wide as perhaps it is sometimes asserted? No. However, if hyperbole is the only way to get people to pay attention to the debate long enough to see for themselves the inequality, then I have no qualms with that.

* - For anyone who doesn't already realise, this is two-fold: the fact that you can hit on a 2+, and often with a re-roll built in, shooting, but can't in CC; but also because shooting rolls to hit are based only on your own ability without the comparative process for Weapon Skill. A Shooting unit will always be exactly as good at hitting in any circumstance, but a combat unit is inherently less reliable, despite the variation being small and unusual, but they also variably take damage BACK, a much more important factor as they can hit things that kill them much more easily than they'd like.

The Nova, Terrain in 40k, and 40k is a Shooting Game

So…..lots of stuff in that title J

This post is going to be long. It might be a bit ranty here or there and might be a bit holier than thou in some places but I feel some of it needs to be said. Also I’m going to try and intersperse it with photos to break the text wall and entertain you with boobies (images stolen from my buddy Spags at TheBack40k cause I'm at work and looking might not be a good idea).

We’ll start first with NOVA. This part is a little gushy. This is the event that started a firestorm. There was a cry for a while for a more competitive format (in terms of clearly defined winners based on record) and Mike Brandt stepped up and took on the challenge of creating a tournament to provide it. His ideas influenced quite a few events in one way or another and normally in a good way.

Clarification: Now to be clear I’m not saying that Nova is the only or best format but I do feel Mike’s openness in his approach and his general urge to reach out to the community has helped create the environment we have on the circuit. Right up there with the guys from Adepticon, WargamesCon, and newly on the scene Reece’s group over there at Frontline Gaming.

And this format is Mike’s baby. He’s constantly tweaking and playing with it. He takes in ideas on how to make it better from the community and builds on it. In other words he’s a great TO. Some of you might be wondering why I’m blowing smoke up Mike’s ass. It mostly has to do with the fact that, as an event that is often considered the flagship for competitive 40k (even if all 40k is competitive in its own way), Mike takes a lot of hits from parts of the community and that can be draining on a person. Especially when the heat he catches is primarily from a small subset of people who consider themselves a big part of the competitive community. Most recently it’s been about terrain which segues nicely into the second part of the title.

The Source GT May 19-20 - I'm Going

Well I can't help but support another local GT that's coming up a week from Saturday. It does include re-rolls which since I've signed up so late I'm not going to get but that's ok. I'm just down for playing some more games. That being said I'm breaking out my Daemons for the event. I'm currently painting the 12 new fiends I've built and the 2 heralds of khorne. Here is the list I'm taking.

HQ

HoT in Chariot w/Bolt & Master of Sorcery
HoT in Chariot w/Bolt & Master of Sorcery
HoK w/Juggernaut, Icon, Rending, Blessing of Khorne
HoK w/Juggernaut, Icon, Rending, Blessing of Khorne

Elite

6 Fiends
6 Fiends
6 Bloodcrushers w/Rending & Musician

Troop

5 Horrors w/Bolt
5 Horrors w/Bolt
5 Horrors w/Bolt
5 Horrors w/Bolt & Changling
5 Plaugebearers

Fast Attack

12 Fleshhounds
6 Screamers

I'm Thinkin Orks.....1850 Summer GT Starter List

Adepticon is past and I've still got 3+ GT's lined up for the summer and as I was going thru my models and reorganizing my cases I've found a metric ton of my mostly built Orks. This got me thinking that I'd like to get another army painted up and that I kinda want to bring back my orks. I've got everything I need 90% built but the whole army needs a painting and this is what I'm thinking of running right now:

We Are the Champions!

Well even though one of my teammates beat me to the punch I’m putting up more of the details and breaking it to anyone who doesn’t read his blog or that hasn’t heard yet.

 In Order: Aaron, Nick, Brad(Me), Andrew

That’s right my friends. My team of ringers carried me to the top spot at the 40k National Team Tournament. The team consisted of Nick Nanavati, Aaron Aelong, Andrew Gonyo and myself. All of us have either won Best Overall or General at a GT in the last year. I met Nick two years ago at the first Nova and met Andrew and Aaron this year at the Nova. I got along great with all three and thought it’d be a great group to get together. Well, at least one that wouldn’t kill each other or inspire other teams to kill us (outside of pure jealously for our amazing good looks that is J).

Adepticon - Army Option 3

Here is my third and likely final option since I didn’t have the time to finish up my Admech Daemons like I’d planned (stupid real life getting in the way). It’s another all foot list but one I think is very strong. You’ll notice that it’s a bit different from the list I won the Darkstar with.

Adepticon – Army Option 2

Here is the second bag that is sitting by my front door in anticipation of leaving on Thursday. I think you can guess from the picture which book this army crawls out of.

Adepticon – Army Option 1

With Adepticon fast approaching I figured I’d put up some of my army lists over the next three days. So this is my first list I’m considering taking to Adepticon. Everything is painted to a decent standard and I’ve done well with this sort of list in the past.

So........Adepticon

I know it’s been nearly a month since my last post but life just got a little to nuts personally for me to spend much time on the hobby. However it looks like things might finally be moving toward normal and with Adepticon on the horizon I figured I’d put some stuff up here.

First off I’m super excited for the 10^th year of Adepticon and can’t wait. My schedule for the weekend looks like this:

Thursday: Arrive in the early afternoon. Meet up with some friends and team mates. Basically register and socialize J

Friday: 40k Championships! It’s a 4 game day for those who aren’t aware. I currently don’t know what I’m bringing yet but I’m sure I’ll figure it out before I head out in six days.

Saturday: 40k Team Tournament. My team, “They Shall Know Fear”, will be rocking it out with GK’s. I’m looking forward to an awesome day of gaming with Nick, Andrew, and Aaron. And thanks to Andrew we’re going to have a fully painted 4k worth of GK’s stomp the yard with.

Sunday: Either hanging out or playing in the final 16 from the Championships. In all likelyhood I’ll be hanging out J so I’ll probably be bouncing around noon or so. Might get a game in against some people from across the country that I don’t get to see often.

Hope to see you guys there. If you’re around and see me don’t hesitate to say hey!

I’ll be trying to post more often leading up to and after Adepticon J

Adepticon Daemons - Thoughts.....

I've been wracking my brain since I got back from the Indy Open about what my next project is going to be. So far this year I built and painted a GK army that has gone 10-1 over 2 GT's and now it's time to change up a bit. As most of you know I'm easily distracted and lately Daemons have been on my mind.

Now I have a soft spot in my heart for Daemons. I've never loved nor loathed an army so much at a tournament. You can see pictures of my Admech counts-as army in the army picture tab and I really am proud of how those turned out. I ran it at 2 GT events and at both events had that dreaded drift game where everything went wrong and my urge to kill rose. My Daemons actually accounted well for themselves but I admit I got a little frustrated with the lack of consistancy. But I've had my fill of consistancy it seems since I'm seriously considering Daemons for at least Adepticon if not the local GT in May as well and maybe more.

So that brought me to my main issue. Do I add models to my existing converted army or do I rebuild it from scratch? Well I've wracked my brain and come up with several fun themes for a rebuild like:

-40k Beastmen
-Iron Warrior/Dark Adeptus Alliance
-World Eater Legion Warband

GT Review: The Indy Open

Well weekend before last I braved the weather and snow to travel down to Indianapolis for the first GT in Indiana at the Indy Open. It was quite a haul thanks to the weather but worth the trip. This is one of my GT reviews and will rate the various important aspects of the event and also have a small list of ways to improve it going into its second year. I review on a Great, Good, Average, Needs Improvement, and Bad scale. Onto the review!

The event was run by the local group of pretty competitive gamers down in the Indianapolis area. It was the first event they’d ever run and I can honestly say I had no idea what I might be getting into. That being said I knew the guys running it and had high hopes J

Off the Shelves and Outta the Warp - 1,850 Daemons

Well damn Brent anyway but he’s got me thinking about running Demons again. Now I’d probably paint up an entire new army as I’m slowly shifting my converted admech over to a pure guard army since I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea regarding WYSIWYG.

Anyway I was reading Brent’s blog and the bastard had a great idea, especially in an environment that is almost 50% GK at this point. Collars of Khorne! No hear me out. It’d be a list that looks like this:

We Be Krumpin - 2k Orks

I was talking to the owner of my FLGS about an upcoming tournament he is attending and we started brainstorming on Orks. Now on Orks my thoughts are all out offense all the time. I don't think holding back does anything for them in the current state of the game. That being said here is a list I think could be a lot of fun.

Hobby - Tyranid Re-Paint (Test Model Done)

So at an RTT this last weekend I was again inspired to run my Nids. I've come to realize the main reason I don't wanna pull them out is that they are nowhere near the paint level of my other completed armies. It bothers me enough that I'm not bringing them out even when paint isn't important.

Dark Star - GT Review

Well as you most of you may have noticed I attended the Darkstar two weeks ago and it's time for my standard GT review which I've been doing for the major events I hit since last year. For those of you not familiar the Darkstar was a 5-game first year 40k only GT. It was not a Nova format but instead more soft score oriented with 45pts for painting, 75 for battle, and 50 for sports. Overall was determined by the total of these points and Best General was BP's and Sports combined. This made soft scores important which was the reason for me painting up my GK's and running them.