Necromunda : Delaque

My gaming group (including myself) has been talking big about trying out some other games (other than WFB), Necromunda has come up a few times.  I've never played it. As a veteran BloodBowl player who loves SciFi, why on earth haven't I played Necromunda yet?

So we're going to have a 6 (or so) player mashup, everyone on the same board, on the Sunday afternoon once all of our WarhammerFB gaming is done on the Saturday.

I like the look and sound of the Delaque.

I was going to just go ahead an buy the models from GW when someone pointed out these lovely minis from Heresy.

I couldn't resist. A solid 9 of them are winging their way towards me now. I had promised myself that I wouldn't buy more models that would lie unpainted (like that box of Infinity minis that's sitting on my shelf), but sod it. I have some coding projects ongoing (including finishing up FMH), and in all likely hood I will not have time to paint these fellas before the end of Nov (when our 6 man punch up happens).

We shall see.

Hardcore History

I've been listening to "Dan Carlin's Hardcore History" podcast, a lot.
It's perfect while painting (not that I've been getting much of that done recently). Each podcast is a good 1-2 hours long, and I'm finding them damned interesting.

It's very entertaining, I really like the way he tries to explain, and get you into the mindset, of the peoples he's talking about at any give time. He's quite emotional & emphatic himself.

I just finished listening to the third episode in an ongoing series about the Mongols, and Genghis Khan.
I'm also in the sixth episode about the fall of Rome, which is just absolutely fascinating. The first five Rome episodes were about 1-2 hours each, and the final one is a six hour marathon, so there's a lot of material and listening to enjoy.

FMH : Great Success

Huzzah! On Friday the 28th I hit the 1000 active user mark.

That was a long, tiring trip, and a lot of work. More than I would have expected, and there's still tonnes of stuff to do with the app before I'd even consider it finished.

Thanks for all the kind words / twitter RT's / recommendations on twitter, and the really great reviews on Google Play.

1005 on 30th Sept.

HAPPY CRAIG IS HAPPY \o/

More Android Market Stats for FMH

As of 16th Sept 2012

939! So close to my one thousand mark.

It's weird, it's been 5 days since I released 0.68 and I haven't had any time to write any code for FMH. It's not so bad, it's only been five days right? I've been working on the guts of it for so long, that it feels like I'm taking a 5 day holiday - even though I'm working full time.

I do have a 'to do' list though.

Next up are some bugfixes for Ogres which Mr.Vaughan sent in, and also I'm going to look at including a settings page which the user can choose 'stuff' - like text sizes on all the screens, perhaps a default popped open armies from the unit picker, and some default unit choice(s) from the unit picker.

Other suggestions are welcome! @FantasyMathHamr or email to clockworkcraig [at] gmail.com.

Android Market Stats for FMH

For the record, here's where FMH is at:

The total installs to date, since April 22nd or so.

Total Active installs

Active installs by country

FMH 0.68

"We az got da powah now."

Just released to market, it'll be up there soon.
Get V0.68 here.

Thanks to Aussie Gamer Vaughan Keyburn for all his notes on O&G bugs.

O&G bug fixes listed here.

General:

• Demigryphs armour was  heavy armour, fixed to be full plate armour (and extra point of armour save).
• Derpy Mounts: I implemented mount attacks in combat in v0.50. Unittests showed that they were totally broken, the mounts would act as their parent unit and just use their stat line when attacking i.e. Demigryph knight mounts would use their knights statline when attacking. Fixed.
  Demigryph's (and other mounts) are a lot better now. Sorry about that.
• Cavalry Mounts were receiving supporting attacks. Mounts should not get supporting attacks. Fixed.

Ohiohammer app mention

I was interviewed by the awesome Andrew Sherman, of the Ohiohammer podcast, about Fantasy MathHammer! \o/
It starts about 34 mins in. It's a ten minute segment, in which I almost succeed at not sounding like an idiot.
Get it here: Episode 29.

My thanks to Ohiohammer for having me on the show.

If you're not familiar with Ohiohammer, it's a staple of my Warhammer Fantasy podcast regular listening, I thoroughly recommend it. I was hooked from the hilarious "let's roll" intro sound-byte.

FMH - nights of bugfixing

I've been busy.
A rather decent chap in Australia (how cool is that, someone literally around the world is using my app!) sent me a lengthy email detailing a tonne of bugs with O&G.
I fixed the vast majority of them tonight.
A bunch of facepalm type ones, for some reason I had all cavalry as down as 20mm wide. Seems like they're all 25mm wide, there's no such thing as 20mm cav!

There was an almighty bug in the code which determined how many models could attack units of smaller base sizes, with fewer models. This is now fixed, it took a good 5 hours of work to fix this bloody thing. When I fixed trolls attack count, it broke cavalry attack counts. When I fixed those, it broke larger monster attack counts. Thank fark I started implementing unit tests, else I wouldn't have known I'd broken the attack calculator for other units.

That's me, and the demon is the bugs. RAWR.

CHANGE LOG:
New special rules handled:
- Regeneration
- Thick Skinned
- War Paint
- Swarm
- Unit special rules printed in debug logs at start of each combat log

BUGFIX CENTRAL:

• Mournfang were classed as monstrous cav and on 40mm bases, should have been on 50mm basses. Fixed.
• Default cavalry base size was 20mm, DERP. Fixed to 25mm.
• Terradon's were on cav bases, should have been monstrous cav 40mm. Fixed.
• Demigryphs were on 40mm bases, should have been 50mm (I'm not an Empireplayer!). Fixed.
• Fixed Pegasus knights, they were on 40mm bases and should have been on 50mm. Mounted Yeomen were classifed as infantry, not cavalry. Fixed.
• Added more unit tests for monstrous inf vs inf, caught another bug in mathhammer._how_many_can_hit(attacker, defender). Fixed.
• VC BlackKnights were wrong base size of 20mm, fixed to 25mm.
• Empire units: Knightly orders, Inner circle knights and Reiksguard Knightswere all using a basesize of 20mm, fixed to 25mm.
• Fixed issue with monstrous inf getting too few attacks against inf block frontage.

  Orc Boyz, Orc Boyz big uns, Orc arrer Boyz, Savage orcs,
  Goblin wolf riders: fixed to have 25mm base size
  Savage orc big uns + Orc Boyz big un fixed to have WS 4.

  Savage orcs & Savage orc big uns now get their WAR PAINT
  bonus of 6+ ward save

  Night goblins armour fixed, they were getting light
  armour bonus.

  Forrest Goblin spider riders:
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - Armour was 4+, fixed to 5+ armour and 6+ward (parry)

  Black Orcs
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - note: armed to da teef is not yet implemented.

  Orc Boar boys:
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - had 5+ armour, fixed to 4+ armour
    - light plus 2 for boars THICK SKINNED

  Orc Boar boys big uns
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - WS3 fixed to WS 4
  - had 5+ armour, fixed to 4+ armour
    - light plus 2 for boars THICK SKINNED

  Savage Orc Boar boys
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - Armour fixed from +98! to 5+ armour
    - 2 for boars THICK SKINNED
  - They now have their 6+ ward save

  Savage Orc Boar boys big uns:
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - Armour fixed from +98! to 5+ armour
     - 2 for boars THICK SKINNED
  - They now have their 6+ ward save
  - had WS 3 fixed to WS 4

  Night goblin Squig Hoppers (also check hatred vs dwarfs not yet programmed)
  - armour fixed to 6+
  - added squig attacks, NOTE: these are currently treated as rider + mount, app doesn't yet handle concept of handlers + multiple models/herd

  Snotlings:
  - now crumble like a SWARM should

  Arachnarok
  - fixed from 40mm wide to 100mm
  - number of attacks fixed. Note: poisened attacks and multiple wound attacks not yet handled.
  - Crew now get their 8 attacks s3
  - Fixed armour save from 3+ to 4+
  - NOTE: Thunderstomp not yet implemented.

  River/Stone troll
  - stone troll now gets it's 5+ armour save
  - 4 plus regen is now implemented
  - bug in frontage where only 2 trolls could attack
  - NOTE: river troll doesn't yet have it's -1 to hit bonus

the testing of DOOM & unittests

This is in reference to FantasyMathHammer, it's about boring coding stuff and not warhammer specific.

Still here? Cool.

Up until now I've been feverishly adding new units, and any vital special rules those units need (for instance, undead units really do need unstable), but avoiding the less necessary rules like special weapons - like Halbards (I added those last night btw).

I foolishly didn't write unit tests as I was developing and instead tested it by running the app myself and checking the full debug logs I had already added into the app.
Slowly, and surely, checking and debugging anything with this method started to take more and more time. It's also quite error prone, as you can imagine.

Eventually I reached a place where a few things occurred.

1. Debugging like this was clearly taking more time than if I just wrote a unit test for the same instance. Starting the app, picking the exact units and formations, all took time vs pressing the UP arrow, and enter to run some unittests.
2. There were vast swathes of code, nay, entire plains worth, which I was afraid to touch in case I broke anything. My testing method meant that I couldn't go back and retest everything, I could only test for a specific case or thing which I had just added. Clearly not a good place to be.

I should have known better, I did really, but was attempting to fool myself. No really, I should have known better. WFB is a massive set of rules, all thrown into the same mix and interacting with each other. What did I think was going to happen? That I would construct a massive & intricate spiders web of interconnected code and it would all be fine? 

Yesterday I decided it was time to pay the unittest piper.

The unit tests I've written in 3 hours have already picked up some juicy bugs:

• Derpy Mounts: I implemented mount attacks in combat in v0.50. Unittests showed that they were totally broken, the mounts would act as their parent unit and just use their stat line when attacking i.e. Demigryph knight mounts would use their knights statline when attacking. Fixed.
  Demigryph's (and other mounts) are a lot better now. Sorry about that.
• The Mounts were receiving supporting attacks. Mounts should not get supporting attacks. Fixed.

If you're reading this and aren't a coder of some sort, unittests might sound like some magical easy band aid. They're perfect for my situation. Once they're covering a lot of the app's code it will mean I can add new code, or edit existing code and if I break anything the tests will throw an error in the relevant test case.

The downside is that they're going to be a metric tonne of work and I won't be adding armies or special rules handling while I'm implementing tests. Still, catching bugs like the above ones make it worth while.

MENTAL NOTE:
UNITTEST THE SHIT OUT OF STUFF FROM DAY 1.

Unittests are nice! I like!

Tonight's coding music is

MC Frontalot.



Here's a playlist of his stuff.
Ever play Zork? Then this track is for you.
I like. Now you like.

FMH v0.65 - Beastmen of Gojiranotronia

Version 0.65 is out. Get it here.

Wow, I really wasn't lying in my last post when I said that positive feedback is my development jamba juice.
I spotted this review as I was about to log off and head to bed.
"Currently I give it 5 stars because the UI is lovely and it's really easy and quick to use. Far better than a regular warhammer calculator especially for during games and quick things. If you add Beastmen I will give you 10 million stars."

Dwarven eyes twinkle while imagining TEN MILLION STARS OF WEALTH.

It's now jaysuschristoclock, and I'm off to bed after a productive few hours - the Beastmen are in, and I pushed it to the market place.

I hope I didn't break anything in the app with my frenzied coding and lax testing standards...there is only one of me after all.

FMH v0.6 - TombKings

I've released v0.6. Get it here.
I added the Tomb Kings, cause Steven complimented my app so nicely. Thanks for that Steven, positive feedback is my development jamba juice.

I fixed some other things that reddit folks pointed out, like no Orc & Goblin Big 'Un units in the app at all, and that Choppas didn't work.

I also added Lances while I was at it, as they are so similar to Choppas, I didn't get a chance to implement anything to handle the Brettonian Lance Formation though. Maybe next time, though I'm prioritising getting all of the armies into the app before I start on each and every special rule.

This is the 11th army in FantasyMathHammer. Woo!

Here's the release notes:
v0.6
Added:
- Added TOMB KINGS!
- Tomb Kings work with UNSTABLE special rule.
- support for LANCES for all races (HE/EMPIRE/DE/VC/BRETS).
- O&G CHOPPAs rule support. mmm, choppy.
- Orcs & Goblins GIANT. Not yet handling giant special attacks though, just gave him 4 attacks.
- Empires Inner Circle Knights
- all Orc Big'Un units.
Fixed STEADFAST rank counts, in certain circumstances the
last horde rank wasn't counted when checking for STEADFAST.

Garagehammer App mention

Woo! My app got talked about in today's Garagehammer, Episode 55.
It's about 10 minutes in, and they chat about and around it for a good 10 minutes. Unfortunately being iPhone users they haven't actually used the app (heh!), but they still went and had a look.

Thanks a million guys, much appreciated.

Get my app here.

Dwarfs vs. Lizardmen, 2.5k

I used Battle Chronicler to put the report together. It's a really nice application, though there are a few gotchas to it. I really like it though, get it free (!) here.

Army Lists:
Dwarfs

Core
DW1 40 Dwarf Warriors, FC, GW - 425
DW2 10 Dwarf Warriors, Musician, GW - 105
DW3 10 Dwarf Warriors, Musician, GW - 105
Hero
H1 Dragon Slayer, with RoSmiting, 2xRoInitiative 85 points

BSB with Strollaz Rune
Runesmith with MRoBalance + spellbreaker

Runesmith with MRoChallenge + spellbreaker

Runesmith with Spelleater

Special

H2 30 Hammerers, FC - 390
S1 25 Slayers + 5 Giant Slayers - 423
S2 25 Slayers + 5 Giant Slayers - 423

Lizardmen
Core 
S1 30 Skinks + 3 Kroxigors - 337 points
S2 10 Skinks 50 points
S3 10 Skinks - 50 points
SS1 7 Skink Skirmishers 70 points
SS2 7 Skink Skirmishers - 70 points
SS3 7 Skink Skirmishers - 70 points
JS1 Jungle Swarm - 45 points
JS2 Jungle Swarm - 45 points

Special 

TG 28 Temple Guard, Temple Guard - 467 points
Rare 
SHP 2 Salamander Hunting Pack - 150 points
Lord
SMPB Slann Mage-Priest BSB - 300 points
SMP Slann Mage-Priest - 275 points
Hero 
SSV 3 Saurus Scar-Veteran - 160 points

Deployment

Turn 1 - Dwarfs

Turn 1 - Lizardmen

The 3 saurus scar veterans charge the slayers, and start slowly but surely wiping them out, killing 8 this turn. The slayers score only a few wounds, all of which are saved.

The 3 units of skink skirmishers move and shoot at the warriors, amazingly they only kill 6. The warriors don't panic.

Turn 2 - Dwarfs

DW2 Dwarf Warriors on the left flank charge skink skirmishers, killing 4 and routing them. Persuit roll succeeds and runs them down.

S2 Slayers continue to take wounds, while causing none. 1+ armour save, which is re-rollable, or ward save of 4+ (depending on which veteran I target) is very hard to brea.

S1 Slayers charge the Jungle Swarm, wiping the swarm out and overrunning into the Salamander Hunting pack.

Turn 2 - Lizardmen

SS1 Skink Skirmishers kill another 3 DW2 Dwarf Warriors. The warriors do not panic though!

S2 Slayers continue to take wounds, while causing none.

S1 Slayers wipe out the Salamander pack, and overrun for a second time (!) into the Skinks. I think this was a mistake, they should have faced off against the temple guard letting DW1 get into the fight.

Turn 3 + 4 - Dwarfs

S2 Slayers continue to take wounds, while causing none. They reform into a 5x3 with remaining troops. They're not going to last much longer.

S1 Slayers wipe out the Skinks and reform to face the temple guard. They change into a 5x4 with their remaining 21 models.

Turn 4 - Lizardmen

The Scar vets and the Slaan BSB charge the warriors, and do some damage. The warriors fail to cause any wounds against the Scar Vets, but hold as they are steadfast.

Turn 5 - Dwarfs

The H2 Hammerers attempt to charge into the flank of the scar vets, but fail their required roll of a 6 with double 1's. ARGH.

DW1 continues to die slowly to the Scar Vets, they do manage to do a single wound this turn though!

The Scar vets target the BSB in the warriors, killing him very very dead.

The S1 Slayers kill a few of the Temple Guard, but take more wounds themselves. The Slayers went with GW's for this combat (since the combat started that is).

Turn 5 - Lizardmen

The BSB Slaan finally gets a spell off (up until now, the Dwarfs have used roughly a scroll a turn, even with RoBalance and 3 Runesmiths for 3 dispell dice, it's hard to handle a +4 caster). The Slaan has previously been using death magic spells which targetted the BSB in the unit, leadership tests for wounds and damage.

He casts Purple Sun (ARGH!) and it side swipes the DW1 Warriors, and the Hammerers. It lifts about 13 warriors and 16 hammerers.

The Scar Vets finish off the Warriors, the Slaan BSB persues and catches them to wipe them.

The swarm chaff moves in front of the hammerers to block any charges.

Turn 6 - Dwarfs

The H2 Hammerers charge and destroy the Jungle swarm, but the overrun angle means they can't make contact with any other units. Instead the Hammerers reform to avoid any flank charges.

Turn 6 - Lizardmen

The Lizardmen finish off the slayers, but don't charge the hammerers - playing it safe and not wanting to lose any points.

What worked well:

My measuring tape...

My first overrun into the chaff which lined me up nicely with the salamanders.

I like Slayers being unbreakable, but they don't seem quite choppy enough on their own. They did take 3 full turns (~6 turns of combat) to be destroyed by the 3 [SSV] Saurus Scar Veterans, which kept the SSV's away from other more fleshy things.

What didn't work well:

Not having cannons:
I couldn't deal with the 3 Scar Veterans, just couldn't scratch them.

Cannons would probably have dealt with two of them. But taking cannon against 25 scouting skinks that can throw out 50 poisoned shots every turn, means I'd be lifting any cannons pretty quick.

I kept forgetting about the Rune of Challenge, though the Runesmith with it was in the Hammerer unit and couldn't have done much. 

Mental Note: Rune of challenge could be used on chaff which is about to block your unit, to get the chaff to charge or flee during opponents turn. It might be a bit of a waste using it on chaff, but if it means your unit gets a decent charge into an important spot the next turn, then it is worth it.

What I would do differently: 

I was overeager. "RAWR! I have teh Strollaz! I must run as fast as I can at you and do DAMAGE!"

He had no warmachines, and a bunch of shooting which was concentrating on my 10 warriors, I didn't really need to run ahead quite as fast. It's just so tempting when you take Strollaz, to use it.

Dawn attack really screwed my hammerer and warrior unit. They were pretty much out of the battle (though double 1's didn't help for their charge!). I outnumbered the lizards unit to unit, I should have waited in the centre while I brought the Hammerers over to somewhere usable.

Next time, if I know a unit is a bit fooked, I might leave my BSB behind the unit before they charge / get charged. The BSB can be picked out by death magic anyway - though I would be exposing the BSB to a hail of skink fire. It might be worth it for the Runesmith though. They're really just there for the dispel dice, and suck in combat.

I still feel like this slayer build could work, but I'm missing the Anvil. It's just so...expensive, and vulnerable.
This slayer list will be back, I'm not done with it yet. No sir.

FantasyMathHammer v0.55 - Brettonians added

FMH - now with 100% more
Brettonian flavour.

Another update, this one adds the Brettonians to the app, bringing the grand total to 10 armies out of 16.

Get it here. The market should have updated with the new version within the hour.

Be warned ye Brett players. The app doesn't yet handle lances on the charge, or 'The Grail Vow' which gives Grail Knights Immune to Psychology. It will in the next update.

I'll get there (to 16 armies that is), but gosh darn it it's a lot of work to add a new army.
Bed time now. nn o/

FantasyMathHammer v0.51 'ColdBlooded Ed.' released

Can now specify a General's higher
leadership  to use for a unit.

Now with added Lizardmen, and a slew of bugfixes.
Get it here.
There are a few big changes which I'd like to highlight:

• Lizardmen!
• Mounts now get attacks. They didn't previously, so if your Demigryph knights seemed underpowered, it's because they were. This required a bunch of work for all existing armies so that their mounts now fight properly (DE/HE/VC/Ogres/Empire).
• The ability to use a "general's" leadership, and override your units leadership. This should be useful for those skaven slave units, or other porridge units which have low leadership.
• UI Guide:
  The app now attempts to guide you through the process. Once you've selected two units, the UI will jump to the next screen to choose unit numbers. If you change the unit size and front rank size of both units, the UI will jump forward to the unit options screen.
• The back button works on all screens now! I'm sure it was amazingly annoying to everyone, that previously the back button quit the app. Sawwwry about that. It should be working hunkey dorey now.

The full change-list:
v0.50
New bits:
- Added Lizardmen
- mounts now get their attacks against enemy units
- use General's leadership
- updated to Kivy version 1.3
- made the unit picker UI text size larger, should be easier to pick units now
- back button now works
- UI guides you through process
- tree node press vibrates
- accordion press vibrates
- scaly skin armour values
- put unit numbers in fight button & result box
- update popup
  - show popup with latest updates list
  - option to never show popup on start up again, but it's accessible via menu screen

Bugfixes:
- hammerers and other units were getting shields (and a ward save) allocated to them by mistake
- stop model numbers buttons from turning off if pressed again
- Phoenix guard get their 4+ ward save now.
- fixed a bug where if the front rank equalled the max num models that could hit in that unit, then the front rank wasn't counted.
- if difference between strength and toughness was MORE than 2, it fell through the if/else check, and defaulted to a roll of 4 to wound.
- limit number of melee rounds to 12
- fixed bug where fear tests only passed if rolled less than leadership. Equal to leadership was a fail.
- impact hits bug - only the top unit got impact hits (if the unit has the impact hits ability)

Tonight's code monkey music is...

WFB shecksy models - Bloodletters

The herald of Khorne points out his enemies...you know, in case they weren't sure.

20 Bloodletters charge headlong into a unit of 30 Dwarf Warrior Rangers. Somewhat surprisingly, the Warriors hold and start winning over two turns. Until the Bloodthirster showed up.

Meanwhile the main bloodletter unit is about to decimate the Hammerer horde, killing over 23 models in the first turn. Goooood, feel your hatred.  It gives you focus, it makes you stronger and lets you re-roll hits in the first round of combat.

FMH : Lizardmen & more

Been working away whenever I have some spare time to put in, knocked the following off the to do list. These haven't been pushed to the market version just yet. I'll release another update once I've finished a few more items on the todo list.
Hooray for progress!

New bits:

• added Lizardmen
• mounts now get their attacks against enemy units
• leadership proxy - is general nearby? allow user to override units default ld and specify a generals ld value to use
• updated to Kivy version 1.3
• back button now works instead of quitting app
• change UI layout for unit numbers
• UI now tries to guide you through the unit choosing 
• tree node press vibrates
• accordion press vibrates
• highlight unit numbers when switch to default unit models tab (20 and 5 for front rank)
• flip both units accordions when 2 units have been chosen
• lizardmen get their scaly skin armour values
• put unit numbers in fight button 
• put unit numbers in result box
• unit log names updated to include their original number of models for easier identification if the user has chosen two units of the same name

Bugfixes:

• stop model numbers buttons from turning off if pressed again
• hammerers and other units were getting shields (and a ward save) allocated to them by mistake
• Phoenix guard get their 4+ ward save now.
• fixed a bug where if the front rank equalled the max num models that could hit in that unit, then the front rank wasn't counted.
• if difference between strength and toughness was MORE than 2, it fell through the if/else check, and defaulted to a roll of 4 to wound.
• limit number of melee rounds to 12
• fixed bug where fear tests only passed if rolled less than leadership. Equal to leadership was a fail.
• impact hits bug - only the top unit got impact hits (if the unit has the impact hits ability)

I will not...

leave any units which take leadership tests outside of my BSB's 12" bubble.

A unit of 40 Warriors with GW's, 8 ranks deep, were steadfast, but failed combat on a roll of a 10. They fled and were run down.

I will not leave any units which take leadership tests outside of my BSB's 12" bubble.

I will not leave any units which take leadership tests outside of my BSB's 12" bubble.

I will not leave any units which take leadership tests outside of my BSB's 12" bubble.

I will not leave any units which take leadership tests outside of my BSB's 12" bubble.

I will not leave any units which take leadership tests outside of my BSB's 12" bubble.

I will not leave any units which take leadership tests outside of my BSB's 12" bubble...

WFB shecksy models - Ogres + Warriors of Chaos

The Ogre Kingdoms & Warriors of Chaos alliance face off a horde of Dwarfs.

A 15 block of Warriors of Chaos with a Mark of Tzeentch) hold off a horde of 30 Hammerers while also being rear charged by a block of 20 miners for 3 turns.
The WoC general was heard to genuinely remark: "Those dwarf hammerers are ridiculously good, how are they still alive?"

Some very pretty Chaos Knights charge a cannon. This photo is slightly out of focus, but they're still pretty boys. Get a room party knights!

Brocon - battle report 2 vs Dark Elves

Here's the army list I took.

Battle 2: Vs the Dark Elves  

Scenario: 
Watch Tower
This one caused me trouble, I hadn't accounted properly for it in my list. If you can't occupy the tower as a dwarf in turn 1, it's either empty or your enemy has it. If it's empty, it takes you three turns to get into the watch tower. No other army will take as long, so you're fighting a losing battle to get them out of the tower.

Army:
From left to right in the above pic, Dave took:

• 40 Executioners - these nasties have killing blow and GWs. I believe they had a banner giving them always strike first. So striking first, rerolling, great weapon Str6 troops. Scary.
• 1 Repeater bolt thrower 
• 10 Crossbowmen 
• 1 Lvl 2 caster in with the Crossbowmen 
• 30 Corsairs 
• 20 Spearmen Cauldron of blood, with hag and another character if I remember correctly (the cauldron is directly behind the spearmen, but just out of camera shot) 
• 1 Lvl 4 caster (I think?) in with the Spearmen 
• 1 Hydra 
• 7 Shades 

Who went first?
The Dark Elves.

What Happened:
Shade scouts were deployed 12" away from my hammerers, and in their first turn they marched into range and repeater crossbowed a grudge thrower off the board. Some good shooting there. You can't even see the grudge thrower in the first picture above as it's already been removed, it was behind the hammerers.

On the left flank:
The cannon did some damage to the Hydra before it charged the hammerers. It then killed the bolt thrower.

The executioners advanced, I faced off my warriors and quarrellers backing each other up, increasing the charge distance the executioners would make and readying for a counter charge. I was expecting a charge from the executioners which never came!

My quarrellers pinged the 10 man unit of crossbows over two turns but having reformed into 5x6 (expecting a charge from the executioners) they never did enough damage in this formation to cause a panic test. I was hoped to panic them and have the lvl 2 caster flee with them. The executioners never charged, so kept hitting them, but the cauldron gave them a 5+ ward save.

I decided I was screwed unless I made an attempt at the tower, so in the warriors charged, while the quarrellers moved backwards increasing the charge distance the executioners would have to make.

I kept hitting the executioners with the grudge thrower, taking out a sizeable chunk more. Realising I was out of time, I also charged the quarrellers into the executioners. The quarrellers were winning, but it was already too late - turn 6 had arrived for this flank. The warriors were soundly beaten over two turns and fled the combat.

In the middle:
The hammerers moved forward to give the organ gun a clear shot at the shades. It killed 5 of them, they panicked and fled off the board over the next two turns. The next turn the organ gun decided to misfire and roll a 2, which means destroyed. Bye bye organ gun.

The remaining grudge thrower targetted the corsairs until they got in the tower, it then targetted the executioners on the left flank taking 10 of them away over two turns.

On the right flank:
The cannon on the left flank did some small damage to the hydra, which then charged the hammerers and was murderated by them.

The hammerers moved up with the idea that they'd either assault the building, or chase points behind the building via the lvl 4 caster general type in the spearman unit. They would have wiped the floor with them, and kept gunning into the cauldron. After killing the hydra, they marched forward in turn 3. It was turn 4 before they started to attempt charges on the spearman unit. Unfortunately, those charges would fail for the next 3 turns.

Result:
15-5 Loss
Because I didn't take the watchtower, the score started at 15-5.
I did enough damage to take it to 13-7, but adjusting for SCALE the Dark Elf army was a 0 and I was a 2, meaning it was back to 15-5.


What I would do differently: 
Ignore the building, or get into combat with it much faster.

What didn't work well:
The organ gun misfired and removed itself from the board. Sigh.
Assaulting a building with frenzied corsairs in it. They were putting out 23 attacks a turn.

What worked well:
Same as last time, I had spent a lot of points on anti magic and poor Dave had his magic phase shut down.

Missed Rules:
Buildings!

• When assaulting with 10 people, step up rule still applies. We played it that if the corsairs killed 7 warriors (they frequently killed more) then I only got 3 attacks. Wrong. Attackers always get 10 attacks assuming they still have 10 models. 
• When assaulting a building, even if you win CR your attacking unit is moved back an inch thereby not getting a followup round of combat in the occupying players turn. 
• If you win combat res, and the enemy fails it's Ld roll and flees, you can combat reform INTO the building. 
• I also didn't know that skirmishers could march and shoot. Barstewards.

Brocon - battle report 1 vs Warriors of Chaos

I played in Brocon in Limerick last weekend, t'was my first time playing in a tournament. It was really good fun, and most importantly every person I played was really nice. No bickering over millimetres or anything, which I was worried would be the case.

I had 5 games in total, 3 on the first day and 2 on the second. Here's how I got on:

• loss v Dice Chucker Mike's Warriors of Chaos 18-2 (dawn attack, Mike won the tournament!)
• loss v TLC Dave Dark Elves 15-5 (stupid watch tower)
• win v Hans' Vampire Counts 17-3 (meeting engagement)
• win v Dice Chucker Tony's Vampire Counts 17-3 (blood and glory)
• loss v TLC Nigel's Demons 20-0 (pitched battle)

I was super tired at the end of the second day, I'm sure the 3 games on Saturday tired me out. The drinking on Saturday night couldn't have had anything to do with it.

I won best painted army on Sunday, which was a very pleasant and complete surprise. Huzzah! \o/

This is the first battle report, with some hazy details, probably some whining, maybe some analysis / what I should do / what I would do next time against that particular army.

Here's the army list I took.

Battle 1: Vs the Warriors of Chaos

Turn 1, set up.

Scenario:
Dawn attack (= no castling for the dwarfs).

Army:
From left to right Mike took something along the lines of (I've never read the WoC army book so this is very likely wrong):

• 20 core warrior guys, with a lvl2 caster
• war alter thing which gave random gifts like extra attacks, or ward saves to units within 12"
• 15 elite troops, which had an extra attack (Mark of Khorne?), FC + halberds for Str 5
• 15 elite troops, which had a Mark of Tzeentch, I think it was a 5+ ward save in combat when combined with parry
• 40 Mauraders with GWs (a bargain at only 245 points!)
• 5 fast cav flesh hound things
• 6 chaos knights with ensorcelled magic weapons for Str 5

I should really go read the Warriors of Chaos book...

What Happened:
As his battle line advanced, I divided up my shooting. I really should have concentrated fire. I targeted the marauders with both of my grudge throwers, taking out about 12 of them. Organ gun and quarrelers fired on the non ward saving elite troops, with the cannon firing on the alter.

I don't remember which turns, but there were plenty of misfires. The organ gun didn't shoot for a turn, the cannon couldn't shoot for 2 turns, a grudge thrower couldn't shoot for a turn, and when they were firing the grudge throwers were less than accurate.

Turn 2

On the right flank:
The cannon took out a few of those knights, they were frenzied so charged my 40 block warrior bus. They eventually lost, I couldn't catch them with a pursuit roll of, literally, 2. The warriors failed their follow up charge and didn't get into combat with the flesh hounds.

Start of Turn 4 - Dwarfs

In the middle:
The hammerers were facing off against the tzeentch block of troops, and the marauders. Which ever side they went of the obstacle in the middle, they were guaranteed to get a flank charge the following turn. I charged them into the tzeentch block, where they did some small damage but not enough to win. The marauders got their flank charge in, and over a few turns (god I love stubborn) they wore the hammerers down. The hammerers didn't win a single round unfortunately.

Start of Turn 4 - WoC

On the left flank:
The 5 slayers charged into the warrior block aiming straight for the caster. Unfortunately the giant slayer was killed before he got to attempt any blows by the high initiative caster (who turned out to be quite choppy). The 4 slayers were wiped out in the same turn by the chaos warriors, again with no chance to retaliate. I had hoped they would hold them up for a turn, but how and ever.
The chaos warriors charged into the organ gun, taking it out and overrunning into the cannon.

To the right of the warmachines...
stood a 30 block of quarrelers. These boyos shot at the generals unit (the one with the extra attacks / mark of khorne) for two turns, taking out a few models, before reforming and taking a charge from them. They didn't last past the first round of combat. The already choppy khorne marked unit, got a boon of +1 attacks from the alter, which meant a ridiculous amount of str5 attacks and the end of the quarrelers.

Out of my 3 blocks, only the 40 block of warriors on the right flank did ok against the 4 chaos knights. The remaining chaos knight fled, and unfortunately the warriors failed to catch him.

Result:
18-2 Loss

What I would do differently:

• concentrate fire, big time, on the elite troops. Ignore the mauraders - it was tempting to fire on them because they could do a lot of damage and they didn't have an armour or ward save.
  In reality they were only 245 points, and they weren't the hardest hitters of the WoC army.
• <moan> dawn attack messed up my deployment quite a bit </moan> 

What didn't work well:
Too many misfires with arty. I don't like Grudge throwers. With two of them, each having a rune of accuracy, I hit the mauraders twice over 4 turns killing approximately 12 men.
Even the organ gun misfired, taking it out of the game for two turns.

What worked well:
I spent a lot of points on anti magic, he didn't get off a single spell the whole game.

Demons Army Board

Fantastic stuff. I just wish the image was higher res.

Twitfacepostlink.

K.Flay : this evenings painting music

Here's her latest EP, it's rather fantastic (make sure you listen past the first song 10th Ave which imho is the least bestest).
http://eyesshut.kflay.com/

Slayers

I've been playing with a small unit of slayers in four of my most recent games.
Either a 15 block, which is a worthy roadblock/porridge unit, or a 5 block as chaff.

I like slayers. The fluff behind them is great. I believe that in the older rule sets of warhammer (I don't know which edition) you lost victory points for your slayers if they didn't die! Vice versa, you gained victory points if they were wiped out. That sounds great to me. Slayers aren't the best unit at the moment, they could really do with a little something extra to spice it up.

A ward save would be nice, but bringing back something fluffy like 'this unit has to die' would be great fun. It would change the unit's dynamic quite a bit. They wouldn't be a priority target for small arms or spells. It's amazing how scared people are of them, when they usually just die horribly in combat, I know I know, it's because they're unbreakable. Anyway.
Your opponent might even go so far as to attempt to avoid the slayer unit. It just really fits in with the fluff, a crazed unit of mentalist dwarves on the battle field shouting for someone to just face ME.


In related news I've started reading the first omnibus of Felix and Gotrek. Love those books.  I read them before a good few years ago. They're just good fun, and don't take themselves too seriously.

Tourney & Army List Thoughts

Sent in my army list last night. It had to be in before today to earn an extra 10 points.

I just spotted this battle report: More Dwarfs??
The list is remarkably similar to what I've chosen, except it managed to squeeze in an anvil. I'm not sure about it, but I think I'm regretting not getting one in. For a list that's practically a gunline (trust me, it could be a lot more gunliney) the anvil with wrath and ruin would have been great.

I'm approaching this tourney as a learning experience. I've been told it's a bad attitude, but I'm expecting to lose big. We're talking serious wooden spoonage.
I just don't play very often. And when I do play, it's the bi-annual get together of my gaming group for a weekend of warhammer.

I've upped the number of games I've been playing in preparation for brocon (my first tourney btw).
We had Basterdcon 7 (a friendly get together) in mid June where I got two games in.
I've played 3 games in the last two weeks, Demon's, Vampire Counts and High Elves. I have another High Elf match up next Tuesday.

I am enjoying playing much more though, so I'm going to make an effort to get a game in once a fortnight in future.

What that's shown me is how little I know about other races, their army books, their current favoured army builds and what they aim to do. I just have to play more, suck up some losses until I have a better idea of all of the above.