More Space Wolves

Alright. First pic here is my kitbashed Thunderwolf Lord. This is my second Wolf Lord so far, and I think I will follow one of my friend's suggestions and call him MC Hammer. 6 s10 power weapon attacks on the charge is nothing to sneeze at, especially when you can ensure that he always hits on 3+.

This is my first wolf lord, Heihachi. I hope my poor paint job doesn't spoil the resemblance. I usually run him with either Warrior Born or Saga of the Bear, depending how I'm feeling. Both have their advantages, as being killed by a hiding powerfist is never fun, but wiping out a squad before they can strike has it's perks too.

This is the same TH/SS Wolfguard that I took pics of earlier, but with a better picture quality. This is one of the few models I've painted that doesn't look like absolute crap, so enjoy!

And here is my Wolf Priest. Runs along with skyclaws and makes sure they behave. Simple enough to convert from a Jump Chaplain, new head, new staff of office, little wolfy talisman. DONE!

If you'll notice, His foot is a little... absent. When I got the model, his leg just ended in a blob, so I called up Gw and they sent out a replacement. I still thought that the defective model had character though, so i tried to clip the blob that was his foot off in an attempt to give him a peg leg. Strange, I know. The end result was that I broke my favorite clippers.

Techmarine on "Thunderwolf"

My yet to be named Iron Priest on his "Thunderwolf". I didn't think that a techmarine would run around on a biological mount, and though it may be confusing since an Iron Priest can also take a bike mount, I think once I have it painted up with a wolfy-looking paint job, it'll look more believable. I didn't want to shell out loads of cash for a techmarine when i was just going to use him from the waist up, so i made my own from the rhino driver front chest plate and shoulder pad, and i modelled his backpack from the space marine command sprue and the servo arm from the rocket launcher backpack. Simple, easy, and using almost exclusively leftover bits. Pretty effective, and beats spending 40 bucks on Canis and 20-30 on a techmarine.

Random Thoughts: Haven't Posted In a While

First off, this model is beautiful. So Beautiful that it is going to take up over three quarters of this post.

On to the random thoughts- I did promise them after all.

I got my first two games with a wolf lord on thunderwolf today. He absolutely destroys. His loadout is runic armour, TH/SS and a thunderwolf. In my first game, a 1k vs eldar, he killed eldrad, some guardians, a squad of fire dragons. Not bad all things considered. Second game, 2k vs Blood Angels. He squashed a Baal Predator and then got charged by Dante and a ton of jump marines. He flattened a few jump marines and batted Dante out into orbit-not bad for a first run. Then he got chainsworded to death by normal troops. Did I mention Dante had the charge? I can't imagine a unit of these guys-they are deceptively fast, even through cover, and one character mounted on one does a great deal of damage... a unit with a character seems like it'd be a little broken.

Tau- Lots of talk going on about them getting a new codex sometime within a year. This has me really excited. With all the ridiculous stuff the new IG, Nids, and supposedly Blood Angels are getting, Tau should be able to rise back to being directly comparable with the best armies. I've personally never understood why an army that is widely and correctly perceived as the worst close combat army in the game has only mediocre shooting ability as well. After playing Tau for about a year and Space wolves for what I would assume is 6 months, I can honestly say that the wolves are better at shooting and impossibly better in close combat. Now, I know the reaction most IG or marine players have hearing Tau whine about their Ballistic Skill. Most will say that the increased strength of the basic Pulse Rifle is enough to make up for this.... I'm not so sure. Compared directly with Guard Veterans, guard veterans win by quite a bit. Vets are 3 points cheaper base. Let's just assume that a pulse rifle is worth 3 points more than a lasgun(It's not, really). So now we're equal, right? Well Vets have a better BS, WS, and I. Lets say the additional BS is worth 2 points, and the additional WS and I are 1 point together- a decent price I would think. Now the FWs are down by 3 points. Considering that the Vets come with a Ld8 character standard, and include the option for special weapons, I'd say the Vets are an absolute steal.

Now lets compare the Fire Warrior to a Grey Hunter. The Grey Hunter costs 5 points more, but for 5 points he gains 1BS, 2WS, 1S, 1T, 1A(extra CC weapon), and has increased leadership and a better save. A Fire Warrior has +1S and 6" more range- thats it.

That said, here's what I think the new Firewarrior squads will look like-70 points for 10, including a Shas'ui and EMP grenades standard. Similarly, I think that the Devilfish needs a massive overhaul to be effective. Currently, at 80 points starting cost, It's kind of useless. Most players need to upgrade it heavily to make it more durable and killy- mine usually run 120 points and that's the only effective way I've run them. Considering that Marines can get a AV13 Tank with a S10 large blast for a few points cheaper, the Devilfish better see a points drop of at least 30, and hopefully 40 points. I think 80-90 points(upgraded) is a fair price for what the Devilfish really does-carting around firewarriors so they can Rapid Fire or grab an objective. This would decrease the cost of my usual firewarrior squads from 240 points to 150-160, quite a hefty discount really, and I may need to rethink whether that would fall in line with recent codex power.

Well it's going on 3 am here, better get to bed.

Wolf Guard Terminator

My first Wolf Guard Terminator "finished" so far. This particular guy is armed with a Thunder Hammer and Storm Shield, not because I think it is an efficient layout, but because it looks pretty damn cool. At 63 points a model for this particular layout, I wouldn't dream of trying to spam these! In tactical terms, This guy and my Wold Lord are going to serve as meatshields for the rest of the squad, If needed. The plan is to have 2 power weapon/ frost blade termies, a power weapon/frost blade/heavy flamer, and a TH/SS. They should join a Wolf Lord w/Wolf Claws and a Wolf Priest in a Land Raider Crusader and barrel towards enemy CC monsters and deathstars, rerolling to-hits and 14 Wolf claws to wound. Against Similar squads they should hold their own, with maybe a bit of advantage from a pre-charge flamer blast and fearless. Against things like Nob bikers, they should be able to lay down an impressive number of wounds at I5-4, and then deal an instant death or two(if I'm lucky). If the ork player allocated away from the painboy, the final thunderhammer blow has a good chance of Instant Death-ing him and taking out his Feel No Pain in preparation for another unit to charge later, or for shooting to pulp them later should the combat end badly.

More Skyclaws...

This guy here was my 2nd test model after my last post. On the previous model I used a 50/50 mix of Space Wolves Grey to Shadow Grey base, did the detail colors, then washed the whole thing in black before highlighting. On this model, I did the same thing with an Asurmen Blue wash instead, and it turned out horribly. I still think it looks pretty bad, but models in Africa don't have any paint at all I suppose, so I'll have to save a re-do of it till later.

This guy, on the other hand, turned out quite a bit better. After the usual basecoat, I washed him heavily in Asurmen Blue, then filled in the details, then washed with black. Even after highlights, it still came out a fair bit darker than the other model, and I think it looks a ton better too.

Skyclaw w/Mark of the Wulfen

A Few Thoughts...

Clearly I am not the sort of gamer that has any skill at painting, modelling, or converting. I can try my hand at each of these in a usually futile manner, but I like to pretend that my particular skill is in tactics and list building. When I first showed up at my local game store's 1750 point tournament with little more than a few vehicles and a horde of firewarriors and kroot. Since then I have diversified my army and expanded it to include at least one unit of each type available in the Tau Empire codex(with the exception of Sniper Drone Teams).

Still, I have NEVER understood why so many players use one particular unit-

XV8 Crisis Suit, Missile Pod, Plasma Rifle, Multi Tracker

over 60 points a model for something that is.... well, versatile. And that is about it. You have a unit that is quite expensive, not too accurate at all, and has a weapon loadout that supports generalization over excellence in any area.

One the one side, you have the Missile Pod. Essentially an Autocannon on an infantry model. Relatively cheap, long range, mid-high strength, this weapon is KING at taking out light to medium armour.

One the other side, the Plasma Rifle. Essentially a Plasma Gun you have to pay extra for, plus less strength. At least it doesn't get hot, right? This gun has a single purpose-blowing away heavy infantry at medium to close range.

So we've got two very different weapons, one designed for light armour busting, and one designed for heavy infantry killing. One is close range, one is long range. One has High AP, one has Low AP. Neither really have anything to do with each other, so why would you spend such a high amount on a suit that excels at nothing? Consider your Multi-Tracker as well-that's 5 points that only exists to allow you to fire both of these weapons at one target... not very efficient.

Now let's look at a new suit- XV8 Crisis suit, TL Missile Pods, Target lock/BSF. Here we have a far better transport busting unit, as twin linking the missile pods greatly increases accuracy. I personally prefer having a mix of target locks and blacksun filters in my unit, as it allows for a few suits to split their fire if needed, it differentiates units for wound allocation, and it nearly ensures that you get the crucial first turn hits on dawn of war deployment. Doubling sighting distance WITH rerolls is very mean indeed, as usually all you will need to roll is a 4 or 5 on 2d6 to sight your enemy during this deployment. Even better, this suit costs a little over 40 points, so is cheap, and if the situation should call for it, it is disposable and distracting as well. Most player's I've faced put a disproportionate amount of effort into killing your "elite" looking units, and if they spend a turn or two chasing after them, your plan will usually prosper. This unit can perform a lethal alpha-strike in dawn of war or any other deployment, crippling light transports and then seeking out targets of opportunity. I've had games where a unit of 3 have immobilized 3 Chimeras simultaneously.... while they were still in the deployment zone!