Tournament time

This weekend I played my first competitive tournament since I got back into the hobby.  Not that I have been a prolific tournament player in the past either so it was interesting to take part in as well as a learning curve.  The game was 40k – not on the top of my list of fave games having cut my teeth on WFB and now with the Napoleonics looming and my continued obsession with Zombie Apocalypse games; but still I’ve enjoyed playing some small games with Rich.  The problem is my lack of 40k models and a distinct lack of codexes.  I have got an Eldar army but it’s a bit light in the vehicle department and I don’t have a codex.  So I had to “compete” (I use that in the loosest of terms) with a makeshift space marine army with a borrowed codex from Rich.  The army was terribly unbalanced and I lacked the tools to do a decent job - very little anti-tank, almost no vehicles and no mobility.  It was all a little piecemeal and added to that my lack of competitive experience and 40k games under my belt I only managed a single draw!  That coupled with two losses meant that I was rock bottom on the day.  A very lowly position to find myself in indeed considering I have been gaming for ** years; in fact longer than at least two of the competitors have been alive….

Still the experience is all and I do love to play no matter what the outcome!  It was real fun playing against new opponents and new races/armies.  I got to see first hand how powerful the S/Wolves, B/Templars and the Necrons are and how important it is to have an army that you have created with the tactics you favour in mind. Da Gobbo has retreated back to his grotto to plot and scheme and paint an army ready for the next time.  Maybe a change is order though, something different, something which reflects me a little…..

Step forward the Tau!!

Busy, busy, busy!!

Very scarce in the old blog posting at the moment.  Other blogs are updated on an almost daily basis but sadly not this one.  Not because I haven't anything to say - because I have, but literally because I haven't had time to breathe let alone post about it!  My other great passion is St John Ambulance and I've been clocking up the hours on duty as I look toward ambulance crew training in the not too distant future (I hope).  This has had a bit of a knock on effect on my gaming time.  Of course I've still been doing bits and pieces and I'm steadily working through the backlog of british redcoats on my painting table; a task not helped by the addition of 60 highlanders and a trio of artillary.....  I've also just finished building the first half of my games table - a 4'x4' section mounted to the Grotto wall, I'm still waiting for some cash to finish it off.  I've also been creating some terrain - a waterfall and 2 hills, pics will follow...

I've also been to my local wargames club.  Now in my neck of the woods we have a choice of two clubs, both meeting on the same day however they are poles apart in their ethos.  One club is very much GW in its game choices, predominantly WH40k with a sprinkling of WHFB here and there.  Nothing wrong with that I know but my love of GW is waning in direct relation to their lack of commitment to their hardcore fans.  I still love the games and the genre but my fanatacism has taken a bit of a beating.  Fortunately for me the 2nd club will not play any GW product and instead offers a plethora of other systems and minis -excellent!  My visit saw me involved in a FOW game (my first) and it was cracking, alongside from me a couple were playing Warmachine and along from them was a game of Gods of War (never even heard of it!) outside in another room a gameof heroscape was in full flow.... I think I've found my spiritual home!

Thanet at War

This weekend just passed I was on duty with St John at an event called Thanet at War.  it was a fascinating festival with dozens of military vehicles from the second world war.  Being a bike fanatic this was my fave display - what I wouldn't give to ride one of these bad boys home!!!

Absence makes the heart grow fonder....

A severe lack of posting recently - oops!  However circumstances have conspired against me (it's bloody busy at work) and all sorts of distractions at home have meant that I've not had time to put together battle reports of the ultimate battle of the Skull Island campaign - High Elf victory! or of the squad level 40K games we played out - one win each!  I have however managed to paint 16 of the 92 napoleonic figs I snagged for the princely sum of £36.  i have also got hold of some polystyrene board that will become hills and have sparked an idea for a permanent table with carved river beds and other scenic features.  Some pics of the redcoats will follow as will the hills/board in transistion.

these boys are from the 3rd regiment of foot - The old Buffs.  A Kentish Regiment founded only 20 miles from my town!!

Up Guards and at them again! - Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington

I have expanded my horizons!  Last week I won a competition and received a copy of "Grand Battery" a Napoleonic historical wargame.  I absolutely love this period of military history and am astonished i've never pursued historical wargaming before.  So inspired by the book was I that I rushed out and spent 36 of my gaming tokens (pounds sterling) on 3 regiments of 28mm British Redcoats, this equated to 92 minis - 92!! compare that to GW where you'd get between 30 and 40 minis.  The Redcoats were sculpted by the Perry brothers who also sculpt for GW so the quality is great and the detail admirable.  So why the price difference?  Anyway it means I can afford a decent size batallion and dive into the history of the Pennisular War.  Not sure whether I'll stick with the rule system in GB; i'll give it a go but there are tons of other publications out there so no problem there.

I'm so looking forward to this.  For the glory of King George!!

Zombie Hell !!!

played the first little trial run for my ZA game.... and it sucked hard!! combat system was far too slow and clunky, TBF it was designed for RPG and was too detailed for a skirmish game.  Hacked it to pieces the next day and played a stripped out version with an instant kill rule and it flowed like a river, it was cool... yaay!!

I'll be fleshing out the whole system now I know the combat basics work out.  It still needs refining but lets face it if it takes you 20 minutes to kill a single Z then somethings wrong! The newer version still has an RPG feel to it with PC generation and a detailed critical damage for your own guys but when you go toe to toe with the undead you can reap you some skulls - woohoo!

A million projects

Phew..... I've got just about a million projects going on at the moment and absolutely no time to blog about them or sort them into any kind of order.  I'm currently writing a zombie apocalypse skirmish game combining some old rules I'd written for another RPG genre years ago and spinning it onto the tabletop.  I've painted up some basic floor plans to represent the interior of a medical facility and our intrepid survivors must break their way out of the zombie death trap.  Will be using old GW ghouls and Necromunda minis until I can purchase some models that can be a bit more representative have got some good leads from another blogger on some cool gear - thanks Wee Blokes!

Played the last battle for the Skull Island campaign last night which ended in a emphatic win for yours truly as the HE proved their mettle at last.  More details will follow as and when I can dig them out!

Finecast

Got my first Finecast model for father's day! thanks kids, daddy loves ya!

Caradryan is amazingly stern and forbidding and unlike some Special Character renditions doesn't look overly done with lunaticly oversized weapons or uber-exagerrated features.  Now I'm gonna have to buy some Phoenix Guard for him to lead - shame....

The only problem (if you can call it that) is that now I will have to expand the High Elf army and add some more points to my already adequate 2000 pointer.  With a limited budget though it does mean that the Dark Elf highborn retinue may have to be put on hold or at the least slowed to accomodate the growth of their enlightened cousins. 

One other thing on the subject of Elves, my daughter now wants to begin her tabletop wargaming journey and she wants to start with the very mystical Fae - Wood Elves!  looks like all three of the major kindreds will be inhabiting da Grotto soon.....

Stop the Pidgeon

Played another skirmish for the SI campaign.  Next game will be a substantially larger one, 2000 points worth and will be the first time I use more or less my entire High Elf collection.  Can't wait to see how it fares and what tactics I can determine from the performance.....

all change please

Changed the title of the BR page to the Skull Island Campaign.  I'll put unrelated BR's on here from now on as it is easier to edit etc.  This Blogger is so darn clunky!!

Battle 3 of Skull Island Campaign

I've added the conclusion to the BR for battle 2 and a quick narrative for battle 3 as well as the outline of the battle and objectives.  We have actually fought this battle so will add the BR as soon as I can get it typed up.

Skull Island BR

Managed to fight the last part of the second battle in the Skull Island campaign I'm fighting with Rich.  Have added the BR to the BR page (doy!) I like to write these reports as a narrative rather than a turn 1, turn 2 kinda thing.  I love the fanatsy genre so much I hate to see it shown as a dry turn by turn process.  When I play games I like to try to picture the various ebbs and flows of a battle and hear the roars and screams as my enemies are immolated by Flames of the Phoenix - hee hee!! just wish that I could figure my tactics a bit better and start getting results.....

Battle report update

following last weeks battle I 've done half a battle report and posted it on the BR page if anyone's interested....


Second half tonight and maybe battle 3 & 4, which are skirmish games so shouldn't take too long...

more terrain please....

The last few days I've been up to my elbows in cat litter.  No da Gobbo isn't a little bit strange with regard to cats and whatnot but rather it is one of my favourite modelling materials when building terrain pieces.  I've started putting together a series of river pieces and the banks will be made up mostly with cat litter and sand to give it that rapids and rocky feel to it.  The pieces look really rough and ready at the moment and resemble nothing better than the bottom of my cat's toilet tray, but when the glue is set I will get to work painting it and preparing the river beds for the resin I will use to represent the water.  This will be the first time i use resin so I hope that it will go well - fingers crossed, especially as it is quite expensive (sorry Frugal Dave..).

unpainted river sections

Rich and I fought the first 3 turns of battle 2 in the Skull Island campaign, a full battle report will be posted after we conclude the final 2 turns soon, thankfully the grotto can just about accomodate my battle-scape (battle mat glued to the back of some old carpet tiles) so we can leave the game set up.  things don't look rosy for the High elves as my main mage was overrun when the spearmen unit she was with lost a combat, however the flames of the phoenix spell is awesome and my second mage wiped an excellent 16 halbardiers out in one turn and is set to eliminate more in the next.  Still there are so few elves left that I'm wondering what I can do to stave off the multitudes of humans that are left...

Wagons roll....

I've completed the baggage wagon and if I do say so myself it looks great.  Ever since WFB 3 was released many moons ago I've always wanted to create a baggage train for one of the armies and never got around to it.  Now there will be a few more scenarios involving the all important part of campaigning of how to lug all your gold about!! Talking of which i have made up some treasure counters to add some objectives in some of the upcoming games and some more terrain as well including a rock feature.  All of these latest projects have been using existing resources and therefore haven't cost me a penny, excellent.  Which is good because I need to save my Warhammer tokens for my next army collection....

Now that I have gathered 2000 points of High Elves I think its time to look to another army (although I will finish painting this one first, only 40 models to go..) Over the last week or so I have been rereading Malus Darkblade (brilliant book by Dan Abnett, local author only lives about 50 miles from me) if you don't know it, why not!?! It's an excellent book filled with the delightfully evil Druchii.  So my next army is going to be the twisted kin of my mighty High Elves.  I love the idea of a Highborn retinue, a band of trusted retainers mounted on powerful nauglir, backed up by a troop of raiders with wickedly razor sharp spears and fearsome repeater crossbows.  The GW models are a little gimpy but i'm sure I can figure something out.  The old citadel models were cool so maybe I'll see if some of those are knocking about.

First things first though, concentrate on painting all my high elves cos don't get me wrong although i'm looking forward to collecting my druchii warband I still love me some pointy eared do-gooders!!!

Baggage...

Started work on the baggage model over the last couple of days, I knew all those matchsticks I bought many years ago would come in handy!  I rummaged around in the ol' bitzbox and found a couple of really old imperial warhorses that can be turned into nags.... Also found a pouch of chariot/wagon wheels (sadly not the yummy chocolate kind) I'd bought way back for my chariot racing game in preperation of making a ton of wacky racers - cool!  I had the right ingredients for a pretty decent model that will be a great centre piece for the "ambush/raid" scenario I'm planning for the Skull Island campaign.  Will be painting it over the weekend I hope.  As well as that in order to try and get my High Elf painting back on track I've drybrushed all 20 of my spearmen in one sitting, should be able to bang them out over the next week in time to hold off Rich's troops in battle 2 of the campaign - Forced Landing.  I've uploaded the scenario onto the BR page and will update it with army lists and the results soon.  The elves will be led by Prince Andris's able advisor and lifelong friend Webril Feylight

 Webril Feylight

Kurnus's Pride - part 2

Finished my High Elf White Lion Chariot and it looks absolutely amazing even with my rather pedestrian painting skills!  I love the iconic feel to chariots and the images that they invoke, there will certainly be some Tiranoc chariots coming soon I think - just as soon as I can sell a kidney to fund it!

That said I once had in mind to field an entire Gobbo army purely of Wolf Riders and Wolf Chariots, mostly because I loved the idea of a purely nomadic tribe, picking up and moving from hunting ground to hunting ground and raiding Humie outposts, picking back up before more organised resistence is formed....hmm may have to revisit that idea when the Elves are done.....

Talking of which I have started painting my fiery mage Webril Feylight.  With a flaming sword and staff the model is looking really good and I couldn't wait any longer to get stuck in.  It has disrupted my painting plans as I was due to start on the spearman unit next but there you have it I'm a creature of impulse.  I've also had an idea to create some baggage items and treasure pieces for later on in the Skull Island campaign so it looks like they'll be postponed even longer - poor sods.

Talking of Skull Island better crack on with the next scenario and start having a think on how my poor 800 points will cope with the vast multitude of men 1000 points can bring to the party....

Skull Island Campaign begins

For weeks I have preparing for a WFB campaign with my mate Rich, my first campaign in years and my first with Rich (himself a novice to WFB) so it had to be good.  Hours flew by as I at first pondered the shape of the games and the various conflicts and indeed gaming systems that could be used within the campaign.  Firstly I needed a map, that always cleans out the ol' cobwebs and gets the creative juices flowing.....

right then... so a map.... I needed inspiration, glancing round the room I spotted my daughter's favourite emblem and Skull Island was created.  I will attempt to take a pic of the campaign map but as it is drawn onto a whiteboard at the mo, the quality might not be any good.  We decided that we were going to pit the might of my High Elves versus the puny humans of Rich's Empire troops.  With the adversaries decided it remained to pick names for our characters and devise a history for each to add more flavour to the games and invest more into the history of why we were fighting over a piece of rock off of the Lustrian coastline.

As this was my campaign I decided to think through a basic shape but allow the game to grow more organically with a battle only directly deciding the future of the next one and so on.  With that in mind yesterday we fought our first battle as a naval engagement using the ManO'War rules, a cracking game from GW sadly out of print now and not even available as a specialist game - boo! hiss!

I have attached the background and a battle report on the BR page.

Prince Andris Deftblade

Kurnus's Pride rolls into the Grotto....

Yesterday the peaceful solitude of the Grotto was interrupted by the sound of massive paws pounding a frenzied beat, an almost inaudible swish of greased axles and the whisper of displaced air as an enormous Lion Chariot of Chrace - "Kurnus's Pride" coasted in.  Boy oh boy is it an awesome piece of work.  I just had to have one when in the Army book for High Elves I spied the artwork of a gigantic lion tearing into a Cold One.  Although I don't know any Dark Elf commanders I'm positive that my lil kitty cats will be brilliant mousers against the pathetic rat things that comprise the massive Skaven horde that will be arrayed against my glorious Asuryan and tear big lumps out of the puny apes of Rich's Empire troops too! 

The model is excellent and it's stat line is fairly impressive for the relatively low points cost, a total must have and the final componant for my 2000 point army, but I get ahead of myself guess I'll have to blog about how da Gobbo has got to this point!  I just couldn't help myself had to blurt out how cool it is to have a new chariot (I love chariots, even designed a game once that was all about chariot racing, play tested it and it was good too......)

Anyhoo better get back to the backstory build up....

First battle....

As any hard bitten gamer will testify to, you gotta play man, you just gotta play! da Gobbo's no different.  Just as soon as I had put together the figures and chucked some slap on them, the Fae were ready to rock and/or roll!  My army consisted of only the models in the IOB box set and I had to download the sample army list off of the GW site as I had no army book but I was champing at the bit to unleash my pent up fury!

Oh how I was gonna smash novice player Rich and his puny rat-things... oops...well....maybe not quite smash....

Things did not go entirely according to the plan, I cannot remember the blow by blow as this was about 2 months ago but lets just say curses to Skaven magic and their wacky war machines! I showed all the tactical nounce of a 4 week old spaniel.  I do remember letting his warmachines pound my low toughness/saving throw infantry to little green glowing pieces without reply, his warlock chucked warp lightning about like Zeus on speed.  My Griffon mounted general wasted his time and talents pulping a clan rat unit and putting them to flight but this was only after a couple of rounds of combat.  My Sword Masters who stood poised to mince his Rat Ogres, quailed at the sight of the mutated monsters, failed their fear test and were promptly dispatched..... all in all it was a disaster!! eeek!!

Back to the drawing board....

Like a Phoenix...

It seems fitting that the rebirth of my fanatacism for gaming goes hand in hand with the choice of my first new army in quite some time - the mighty High Elves, loyal elite warriors of the Phoenix King!  You just gotta love the pointy eared ones, totally iconic of the fantasy genre Elves are an almost mandatory requirement for the Warhammer enthusiast and as soon as I saw the new Island of Blood figures I was hooked in!  Just like an addict I was jonesing for  holding the sprues in my hands and getting the painting started - I was back baby!

My first ever army way, way back in the day was an alliance of Wood Elves and Dwarfs that I bought from a mate of mine and going back to the Elves (albeit their rather more sophisticated cousins) seemed perfectly natural.  I also love the idea of an elite army, precise in it's execution of whatever task you set before it.  Need a long range army that destroys it's enemies from afar? Step forward units of Archers, Sea Guard, Eagle Claws and devastating Mages.  Want to get up close and personal? Try out the awesome Sword Masters, White Lions, excellent cavalry and magnificent Dragons.  Another great thing about the army for someone who is just getting back into the hobby is that because it is an elite army it is also a relatively small one!  No unit after unit of miniatures to paint (my last army was an immense Skaven horde!) So you can be good to go in a relatively short space of time if you prefer to play with painted figures, which I do.  That said I just wanted to get stuck straight back in so I bought a big can of spray undercoat and the whole army from the IOB box got glued and sprayed in a single weekend and I was ready to face my mate Rich's Skaven scum!

Welcome to da Grotto!

Welcome one, welcome all to da Gobbo's Grotto! 

This blog will I'm sure be just like every other gamer's blog - battle reports and whatnot.  But guess what I don't care!  I just want a place to be able to share my enthusiasm for all things gaming with the world. I've just got back into the hobby after a break of about 5 years only to discover that you never really destroy the geek gene only suppress it's symptoms for a while....

This blog will be a glimpse into my inner gaming geek and the celebration of it's rebirth.....