MiniWarGaming Down

So it seems MiniWarGaming had a bit of a computer issue, and they are likely to be down for the next couple days (as well as any associated site, such as the store, forums, and Apocalypticon site).  Obviously, they realize that they should have had a backup plan, but really MiniWarGaming started pretty small and has become a steamroller in the miniature gaming community, as evidenced by the highly successful Dark Potential fundraiser.

So I hope they get some luck and are only down for a day, it's rough for a business to loose a very large part of the revenue stream for multiple days.  It's even harder for us gamers to loose a large portion of entertainment streamm, LOL.

Tormentor Titan update 2

Just a quick update on the titan.

I added the jump jets, and protective plating, I built the guns that were supposed to be Splinter Cannons on my home brew datasheet.  The arms are to the point of complete, I'm contemplating how/if I want to make them removable.  It has sort of taken a back burner the past week because of my newest delivery. . .

So at this point, the plan is to hit Apocalypticon in Hamilton in just under a month with approx. 7500-8000 points in tow.  Hopefully I have more soon.

6th Edition planning and insights

So FINALLY, I'll get to try some 6th edition and I'm really looking forward to it.

Currently I've read the book a few times, and picked out insightful ideas to try.  First thing I'm going to do is try and modify my webway list.  This shouldn't be a huge deal for me because most of what I had coming out of the portal was shoot then assault type units, like the Talos and Cronos, and Wracks.  I'll maybe put the scourges in the webway instead of deep striking for a little more control.

One thing that I usually ran was two 10 man squads of wyches one from the webway and one from a raider.  These are getting a couple slight changes, one unit will become warriors coming out of the webway.  That second unit in the Raider though, they are going to take a single upgrade and be run in the exact same 'take on anything' role as before.  Now most people have given up on assault because of snapfire, especially for light armoured units like wyches, but I found a gotcha.

Better than a Holy Hand Grenade

That brings us to our single piece of wargear, the Phantasm Grenade Launcher.  In case you don't know what it does, it is an upgrade for the squad character, the Hekatrix in this case, and it makes the unit count as having both offensive and defensive grenades.  5th Edition = meh, who cares, 6th ed though? Portable cover save vs snapfire.  One of the new quirks to 6th is a change to Defensive Grenades.

ShootingA unit equipped with defensive grenades has the Stealth special rule against all attacks targeting them. so long as:

• They are within 8" of the unit firing at them.

• They have not gone to ground

So what does this mean? With your average assault range being about 7" with the fleet reroll, you are going to want to be within 8" anyhow, so when you declare a charge you get a 'who can get the most 6s' roll off.  So this means you could get a 6+/5+FNP for your wyches.  

I'll give it a try this weekend and report back.

My 6th Edition rant for the pile

So I got to go over the 6th edition rules and FAQ quickly, I'll give it a couple more intensive reads later.  Overall, I'm disappointed with the rules changes, but have a hard time being surprised at such bad design.

I think the thing that frustrates me the most is how every new or interesting change that seemed to add balance, was followed by a line like "except for models with and they shall know no fear", or "except for drop pods".  Just put a giant disclaimer at the front that says BUY SPACE MARINES OR DON'T PLAY!

Anyhow, I'll have to do some playtests, but I'm absolutely certain that my lists will be changing dramatically.  So I'm just going to go over a few observations that I've made for my Dark Eldar army, mixed with a few general observations and opinions I've read/heard else where.

• So lets start with the obvious, WWP Assaults are dead, FAQ double slaps us, no assault out of a WWP(no surprise), but also no allies out of a WWP.
• Assault is going to be harder to get into with random charges and overwatch
• Wyches are much less viable, slightly less threat range on average, subject to shooting if they come from WWP/reserve, and then subject to overwatch with a very real chance that they fail the charge and get shot again.  Wyches + shooting = dead wyches.
• Beasts threat range greatly reduced, and will be more vulnerable moving across the table.
• Flyers are slightly less effective shooting, no more single turn alpha strikes with all the guns and missles.
• Warlord rules don't do much for our army, most of these abilities we can get from upgrades/combat drugs/pain tokens
• FNP nerf hits us hard, with 5+ and 6+ nerf armour saves, the 4+ FNP was what most units survived on.
• Jetbikes got better, with a 4+ cover save all the time thanks to jink + skilled rider they may be viable shooting units again.
• Gunboats are back, splinter racks will become valuable now
• Raiders didn't really get as nerfed as other vehicles with Hull Points.
• DE Archons/HQ should excel at character hunting/challenges, huskblade/soul trap was made for this.
• Drazhar became very powerful with how difficult 2+ saves are
• Incubi will excel at what I'm going to dub the "Aspect Trick"
• Opinion seems to agree wound allocation slows the game down drastically, so points levels will likely fall back to 1500pts

There are a few others that I'm going to test a bit first, but I want to explain one thing I mentioned near the end, the "Aspect Trick".  Incubi, and all Eldar Aspect warriors for that matter, have a "character" that fights at a different initiative value than the rest of the squad, this allows your character upgrade to be the ultimate CC sniper.  This takes advantage of the new close combat wound allocation, and some sneaky charge movement, as I said, I've only read the rules once so feel free to correct me.

Aspect Trick: Move the Klaivex into B2B with high threat target, making sure not to touch any other models.  Klaivex strikes at I6, while remainder of Incubi strike at I5.  Thus when Klaivex makes attacks at I6, he should be the only one attacking at that Initiative on your side.  Wounds don at I6 can only be taken from models in base to base with models striking at I6, thus the high threat target the Klaivex maneuvered into B2B must die.  Bonus: If the Klaivex rolls a 6 to hit, he may use the Precision Strikes to allocate to another model in the combat, and still snipe his B2B target.

I expect this to be a HUGE advantage if the squad makes it into CC with anything with limited power weapons.  The problem I see arising, is a lot of units, the power weapons go to the characters, and they will get a "look out sir" roll.  But something like the grey hunter squad with a couple meltas and a power weapon, this will be gold  And don't we all expect to see more of those grey hunter squads in 6th?