Cadians vs Valhallans; The Scouring

Yesterday I played a game of 40k against my friend Peter. I played with my recently finished Valhallans and Peter took his nicely painted cadians along (my pictures don't do them right, sorry Peter). It turned out we had brought rather similar lists, but with variety to make things interesting. I fielded the list mentioned in my previous post. Peter fielded the following units (mostly determined by what he could fit in his transport bags; we both really should get a driver’s license and a car):

-Primaris Psyker (using Biomancy)

-2*5 stormtroopers, one unit with plasmaguns and one with meltaguns

-Marbo’s Penal Bunkmate

-PCS with flamers in a Chimera

-4 infantry squads with grenade launchers and assorted lascannon/missilelaunchers

-Heavy weapon squad with autocannons and a missile launcher

-Penal legionaires

-Melta veterans in a Chimera

-Vendetta

-Scout sentinel with autocannon

-Demolisher

-Manticore (Ouch!)

To save time I’d arranged the table beforehand, shifting terrain pieces until we were both satisfied with the setup. The table was diagonally split in half by a road, with some ruins along side of it. One short side had some fortifications and a bunker(building AV14) near it, the other a large dilapidated arbutus precinct (building, AV12). My photography skills turned out to be less than stellar, so unfortunately there’re but a few.

We rolled The Scouring, with a diagonal setup. As it turned out I had the 1 and 4 point objectives in my deployment zone, with peter both 3’s and the 2point objectives ending up in no-man’s land.

Peter reserved his vendetta, stormtroopers, penal legionaires and sentinel, I left the roughriders and valkyrie with melta veterans in reserve.

Peter's setup (please ignore the Vendetta in the corner)

My setup

The Valhallan 532nd

As mentioned previously I am busy  painting and finishing my Valhallan army. The last year I played a number of games at a thousand points. But now I'm painting it up to 1500. I selected the units partially because they were what I had lying around and partly to have a good mix of different units to show my friends, who were new players at the time, the different rules and mechanics of the game.

For those interested a short armylist of the Valhallan 532nd regiment:

-Company Command Squad; RPG (you should never refer to them as Missile Launcher, unless you're looking to taunt the dice-gods), Vox and Boltgun for the officer, loaded into a Chimera armoured transport.

-Primaris Psyker

-Marbo's Valhallan Comrade

-Platoon Command Squad; 3 Grenade Launchers and a Vox

-3 Infantry Squads; Flamer, Heavy Bolter, one squad with a Vox and another with a Commissar

-Mortar Squad

-Lascannon Squad

-Veterans; 3 meltaguns

-5 Rough Riders

-Valkyrie with Rocketpods

-Griffon

-Leman Russ Battle Tank Squadron; 2 tanks, both with hull Heavy Bolter and Heavy Bolter sponsons.

-Hydra Flakgun


Here are some pictures of the HQ and elite units of my Valhallan army. Hopefully I'll be able to show you more pictures of my army later this week.

The Company Command Squad

The Primaris Psyker and Commissar

Marbo's Valhallan Comrade

A Confession

A confession: I don't like miniature painting. On our attic lies at least a few thousand euro's worth of mainly GW produced plastic and metal miniatures, with a mild sprinkling of historicals. Enough to last most wargamers a lifetime.... Last week, while trying to paint my latest 40k purchases, I realised the only models I do sort of enjoy painting are my 40K imperial guardsmen. Luckely for me, I have been collecting these for the last 15 years, so I have a reasonable collection to pick from.

I decided to cast aside my current project (A Sons of Malice Chaos Space Marine Warband of which I may show you some pictures later), and first try to finish the two imperial guard armies I've had lying around for years, mostly painted but not quite finished.

So first to arrive on my painting station are my Valhallans, a force I started to paint recently to use against a few of my friends who finally started wargaming last year (amazing what a baby and bit of peer-presure can accomplish). After that I have my trusted Praetorian/Mordian infantry army lying arround, waiting to have the dust brushed off and almost finished for the past 5 years or so. And on the horizon blooms a veteran Catachan jungle fighters strike force (must finish other armies first, must finish....).

The start of something new

Well than then, here goes my first attempt at blogging. I'm not what one would call tech-savvy; I don't have a MSN or Twitter account, my family shares one computer (and my wife's E-Book) and my phone doesn't even have a camera on it. Still, there's a first for everything. My passion for tabletop gaming has had me lurking on the net, watching other people share their growing collections and gaming experiences.

Last weekend I decided that maybe it would be fun to try something similar. So without further ado I present to you my first Gaming and Painting Blog. Enjoy, and please tell me what you think of it.

Maarten