Dust is pretty cool.

Last night down at Ye Olde Game Shoppe (Stormcrow) I played and watched some Dust Tactics from Fantasy Flight. This is basically a wargame/ board game hybrid. It's a nice way to do it. The game is played on "terrain" of 2x2 squares of different tiles and features.

The mechanics are actually very simple and easy to use, and a lot of fun. Every unit has a card with all their stats except for a pretty diverse and fun set of universal special rules and special weapons. Such special rules include artillery weapons, and rules for units and characters like "Bad Ass" and "Black Ops".

The newly revised rules can be found free online HERE.

Besides having movement speed, armor, and health on the card, each unit has a weapons block. Each weapon has a range in squares, from 1 being adjacent, to U being unlimited. Each weapon compares unit type and armor, to give a certain number of dice to roll and a certain amount of damage per hit.

Here is an example, these are US armored jump troops. How cool is that? They have a Dual Victory MG as a weapon, it has a range of 4, and can mow down normal infantry. Going to that weapon, go over to the 2 under the infantry section, this is the average toughness for foot soldiers. Each model rolls 5 dice and scores one damage for each hit. Brutal. But they really can't do much to a tank at range. This is where the Rocket Punch comes in. It only rolls 1 die for each model, and only scores 1 damage per hit, but it can hurt even the hardest armor in the game. The MGs are also good against aircraft( these have no been introduced yet, it's just a tease). Also the "Jump" rule allows them to jump over cover and  buildings.

The core mechanic is rolling a number of special hit dice, essentially the game is played looking for a hit symbol (5+ on a d6), though some units like snipers reverse this and look for blank dice ( a 2+ on d6). A hit symbol does a listed amount of damage, each damage takes out a model in a unit, or a hit box on a vehicle or character.
Like I said pretty easy to use.

Each turn starts off with players rolling 3 dice for initiative, or 4 if you have a character with "Black Ops". The winner choosing who goes first. Players then alternate activating units until all units have be activated. A unit can perform 2 actions on it's turn, move, shoot, and use a skill. They can take any action twice except attack, however a unit can "Sustain Fire" by using both actions to shoot, this allows the unit re-roll any non hits that they get.

Here is the start of the demo game I played, I was the US, he played zee Germans.

 I started off well, killing his walker on the far left with 1 shot from my napalm tank, on my far left. The napalm is short range, 2, and gets 1 die against tanks up to 4 or 5 armor, and if you roll a hit, they die. But this was basically the highlight of my game and he stomped me thoroughly. It was a lot of fun.

Here is a picture from the first game I watched, basically I was able to pick most of up from watching that one game.

Ogre Mages Complete

Well, I've built and painted my Ogre wizards that follow different aspects of the Maw. 

First we have the Death wizard, he cares as much about the taking of the life as about the eating of the body. He even makes sure that his prey is dead before he eats it. Quite a blessing for those that he grabs really. 

True to the plans laid out in the last post, I went with a voodoo/ Los Muertos theme, and it came out well I think. This also seems to be the only way to get more power dice using this guy, can't wait to try him out. 

Next we have the Beasts wizard, he is concerned with the beasts that the Ogres hunt and eat, maybe he used to be a Hunter before he felt the call of the Maw.

He will be great for providing +1 S and T to a big ol unit of Ogres and characters, or maybe even better a unit of Mournfangs( the spell is even easier to cast on them!). 

I didn't really have much of an idea what to do with him, but once the owner of our local Stormcrow Games offered that the skull should fit on his head with minimum effort, I took off from there. Aaron while not only being a game shop owner and a great guy, also has a painting service Stormcrow Studios. 

I hope you can see the rusty gut plate. I'm crap at picture taking, sorry. 

Finally we have the eye on the sky Heavens wizard, always on the look out for another comet sent to punish the Ogre race. 

I really think this is a cool lore, not all about offense, but about support, giving wide swaths re-rolls, or making my opponents army re-roll its needed high rolls. But there are a few nice zappy spells, and of course the comet, which is really in keeping with Ogres fluff I feel. Though with me needing to get close and charge for full effect, a big boom in the middle of the enemy night hurt, but it will be cool. 

This guy much like the death one turned out pretty much just like I planned. 

Well, I am going to a review of what I think about the army so far, but I need to get in more games. 

Also, HOLY FUCK I WANT DREAD FLEET. 

Magic Ogre Princesses!

Sorry no princesses, just Ogres with magic. That's what I am going to talk about today, my own amateur take on the lores of magic usable by the Ogres. Gut, Fire, Heavens, Beasts and Death. I currently have a butcher model, and a firebelly model, so I am going to need to make the other three. 

Here are some not quite as bad as I thought sketches of my plans to make Ogres in the other three lores of magic available to the army.  I plan on just converting normal ogres to be these casters, those that follow the Great Maw trust enough to not wear a gutplate, but those who follow other ogre religious philosophies are not so trusting in such a capricious deity. Also less green stuffing.

First the Death butcher,  he will be getting a nice normal skin dry brush, then have all the rest of his skin dry brushed black. Then I plan on drawing nice white bones on him, like a voodoo priest or a halloween costume. A  white skull on his face and ribs, a spine, arm and finger bones to make him look fierce. I might even tattoo the death magic symbol on him in purple or white.

On to the lore-
Spirit Leech- With low Ld the signature spell seems a bit chancy to be effective, but taking out other mages and maybe a standard bearer to help with fear would be nice. Also 12in isn't that far, but that may be the 40k player in me.

The lore attribute here is basically the only way Ogres can get more Power dice as far as I can see.

Aspect of the Dreadknight- We already cause fear, and making enemies run away sounds cool for the boosted version, I'm not too impressed  though. But maybe I don't understand the whole terror/ psychology/ panic stuff enough yet.

Caress of Laniph- Now we're talkin', this will take out wizards and generals and all sorts of things, if you get close enough, yeah 12in for the base version is a bit short, but it allow for more dice too.

Soulblight- Ok, this is cool basically I would need 2s to wound you and you will need 6s to wound me. The boosted version is even cooler. This would be nice on other tough things, like chaos warriors etc.
Doom and Darkness- This would make fear pretty hardcore at -3 Ld, and even the boosted one isn't too high of a casting value.

Fate of Bjuna- More short range character(or monster I guess too) sniping, this one is pretty hardcore, if you can cast it, while in range, and they don't dispel it, you can probably take out most characters, especially if they don't have a ward save. Or that damned reverse ward save Dark Elves get, that thing sucks!

Purple Sun- This sounds cool, but I would be quite worried about casting it and it hitting my guys, or messing up and it hitting my guys, a small template can kill a lot of Ogres and we have shit Initiative. Quite scared of this one showing up across from me.

The Beast butcher, I can't really think of many parts to put on him, and my sculpting might not be up to making a shaggy pelt for him. But I might try. I think I will actually use one of the normally stupid looking bear traps on him, a beast holding a bear trap that works. I want to use as little metal on him as I can, mostly just the gut plate.

Wyssan's Wildform- This is why you're taking the 100 point dude, throw him in a horde with characters and holy crap. Normal Ogres are S and T 5, a Tyrant is 6. That's dragon tough! And it can't be dispelled once you cast it.

Flock of doom, the gut magic version is better.

Impenetrable Pelt- So a T 8 tyrant, also another awesome one taking him in a horde with a tyrant and BSB, they are all super hardy, but that requires him to be lvl 2, and need to cast a pretty high number.

Amber Spear- this is pretty cool, it penetrates ranks, does d3 wounds and doesn't allow saves. A good knight killer if you could hit them on the side, it casts easier on them too. The boosted one is S10, and d6 wounds.

Curse of Anraheir- a pretty cool debuff with long range. Would be nice if there was a lot of terrain. I need to learn the terrain rules.

Savage Beast- Oh my gods  put this on a tyrant or even a bruiser, or hell a unit champion or the butcher himself. Wow. +3 attacks and +3 strength, the attacks more so, the strength will just be icing, you can molly whop a dragon to death.

Transformation of Kadon- This sounds pretty badass, don't know how good it would be. But sounds awesome.

Finally Heavens, this guy is going to have a beard and be looking up at the sky. A dark blue gut plate with a white spiral drawn like it is above. He'll have the heavens symbol on him, and if I can get one of those sextants from an empire wizard kit it will be awesome.

OK, the lore attribute is kind of crap, but could be good against an eagle or something.

Iceshard blizzard- This is pretty cool, with shooting being usually on 5s and 6s anyway, this helps a lot. Also, screw cannons and templates half the time. Negating something that hits 4 or 5 ogres at a time with a 4+, that;s cool.

Harmonic Convergence,- Oh hell yes. Wolf standards for everybody within 24in?!?!? Oh what's up mornfangs, you have a 2+ armor save? If only there was a way I could choose my spells.

Wind Blast- this would be cool if you could have it on multiple wizards. Kinda meh otherwise, but could move someone out of charge range.

Curse of midnight wind- re-roll all 6s, to hit wound and armor saves? Screw all of the other guys stuff on a 20+. With ogres needing 5s and 6s to be wounded by normal troops, and enemy saves being reduced by ogre strength, this is pretty awesome. also 24in!

Urranons thunderbolt- d6, S6 hits 24in range, and 48!( like a missile launcher) for only 3 more on the casting roll? Sign me up.

Comet of Cassandora- This is so fluffy for Ogres to use. Also, random, cool and possibly devastating. Mostly random.

Chain Lightning- this just sounds fun, helpful against lots of small units, or if cast on a horde it will be within 6in of a lot of the other sides units.

Over all I think these lores would be fun and interesting, I can't wait to get more money or trade for some Ogres so I can make those other mages. Now I just need more points!

OGRES!

Alright, sorry for the delay school, family life, PAINTING A NEW ARMY the usual.

What we have for you today is the first two core units and lord choice of the joint Dissentingdice Ogre army.

The Big Horn Mercenary Company. Though I'm sure the lovely shade of orange will get groans from local players. 

You can see it a little closer here. For our international readers( so cool that we have those) this is as close to University of Texas (my alma mater) burnt orange as I could get. After I painted orange over brown on the tyrants pants because it looked good with blue shoes I knew I had to do it. 

Here is a little closer to reality picture without the flash. I've mixed up a whole pot of burnt orange paint, I can't wait to see it all over the army.

Finally a closer look at the tyrant. He has his to go cup Gnoblar, holding a cask of Bugman's (super fine point Sharpie's are great). The Ironguts all have kegs on them as well, they are his drinking buddies. In this picture you can also see the longhorn shape on the Ogre unit champion, I'm not sure how happy I am with how it turned out. Any pointers?

Well, that's all for now. Hook 'Em!