Vlad2 vs. Mohsar - Salt Mines

The Vlad2 game series continues, and apparently he's been doing a lot of skirmishing into Circle territory. This time he faces off against Mohsar, the Desertwalker on a table with many more trees than the previous game and markedly less desert. Someone in the Circle is trolling him and Cassius.

Salt fueled slugfest after the break.

Vlad2 vs. Cassius - Three Trees in The Desert

This past Monday was the grand opening of a new local game store: Bel Air Games. My friend and I headed over to check it out, and maybe get a game in if they had a table open.

Quick review of the store: its excellent. Lots of space, open area, and light; three things that most game stores severely lack. The staff (or all of the staff I met at least) were very friendly, and they seemed knowledgeable about the products in the store. The store has plenty of space for hobbying and gaming of all sorts (with tables for miniature wargaming, painting, and card games, as well as a room for P&P gaming.) It's definitely got a great base to work off of, and I'm looking forward to going there more in the future, especially for Warmachine events (which are rather lean in the half of the state I live in.)

Since we got there early, my friend and I were able to secure a table and get a game in. Report, picture (yes, singular,) and thoughts after the break.

Three Quick Movie Reviews

As part of vacationing recently, my wife and I watched three movies (great way to spend a flight): The Wolf of Wall Street, Her, and The Iceman.

Quick reviews/thoughts after the break for each movie, with possible spoilers so beware!

Minion Battle Engine Spoilers: Sacral Vault and Meat Thresher

Courtesy of this thread over on the Focus and Fury boards, here are some (very "grain of salt") spoilers for the upcoming Minion Battle Engines:

Sacral Vault: (Minion Gator Battle Engine)
SPD: 4
MAT:0
Rat: 5
Def: 9
Arm: 20
CMD: 10
20 health boxes

Gunfighter, Eyeless Sight

Weapon: Spectral Fury
Range: 12, RoF 1, Pow 13
Rapid Fire: d3
Deathly Dominion ( Bone Shaker on a gun). Costs 1 soul

Abilities:
Crypt of Souls: Gain 1 soul for each living model that is destroyed in its command area. If no souls are on it at the beginning of your Control Phase it gains d3 souls. Souls can be spent to boost attack and damage rolls.

Arcane Vortex: Spend a soul to negate a spell targeting the Vault or a model within 3'' of it.

Soul Sacrifice: Warlock can remove a soul to gain 1 fury point during the Warlock's activation [I'm assuming this is "at the start of" or something like that.]

Soul Storm: While this model has 1 or more soul tokens enemy models entering, or ending their activation within 2'' of the Vault take 1 damage."

Meat Thresher: (Minion Farrow Battle Engine)

COST - 9
FA - 2
Spd - 6
Str - 12
Mat - 6
Rat - 5
Def - 10
Arm - 19
CMD - 10 [maybe 12? Mostly irrelevant]

Inherent model special rules: Bulldoze/Ride-by/Weapon Platform

Chaingun:
ROF: 1
Range: 10 [maybe 12, not sure]
POW: 12
Special weapon rules: autofire 2d3

Crusher:
Reach? - NO
P/S: 16
Special weapon rules:
Blood reaper (on first melee atk, make an atk on all enemy models in LOS and in melee range)
Grinding Wheel (additional die on atk rolls vs small based models)
Knockdown (models hit are knocked down)
Trash (additional die on dmg rolls vs knocked down models)

Other things of note that I found in the thread:

- The Sacral Vault can hold a maximum of 5 Souls.

- Both Minion battle engines can only work in Pacts; they cannot be taken in other Faction armies.

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Both of those BEs sound pretty damn slick, and the Farrow one is honestly amazing if those are the final rules. Considering how much the Farrow are hurting for competitive options, I hope those spoilers are pretty close to the final rules (if not them exactly.)

The Sacral Vault seems like a cool, fun support piece that has some value in Gator lists. They don't need "strong" models quite as badly as the Farrow (having Gatormen as your core infantry choice is...pretty damn good,) but I think the Sacral Vault is good enough to be used without being an auto-include.

Rumor has it these models will be available at Lock and Load, so we'll see how accurate these spoilers are soon!

More Giant Robot Battles - Harkevich vs. Sturgis

No matter what else I get into, I'll probably always cycle back around to playing Harkevich. I really like the kinds of lists he can run, and even though it can be pretty frustrating sometimes, the "fun" moments are amazing.

The Mechano-ham beckons...I must heed it's call

Since I had the good fortune of getting an extra game in last week, I wanted to try out my most recent Harkevich iteration again.

Full report and thoughts after the break.

The Battle of 8 and 9

Since I'm trying to ramp up excitement to paint more Retribution (and also because I haven't used them much after my initial foray,) I decided to break out my "starter" Retribution army for my weekly game. What follows is a game where both sides needed to roll a lot of 8's and 9's, and proceeded to so way more than either of us expected. Not at all to undermine the game; it was just a funny situation.

Full report after the break.

Karchev Quickie

Sadly, not the title of a new harlequin romance novel from Skull Island Expeditions (but I am open to writing it if PP sends me an email.)

This is reference to the list idea posited by Nigel Brooks in Muse on Minis Episode #171. That list tries to answer a question I've been unable to adequately resolve for a few years now:

How can one make a Karchev list that doesn't suck?

More after the break.

House Shyeel's Used Car Lot

This blog will probably read like a layer cake of trains of thought. You can tell whatever I've been thinking about for the past week/month based on the stream of posts I've kicked out.

"Two Retribution based posts in a row? Whatever is he thinking about?"

The answer shouldn't surprise anyone: my homebrew rules that answer the question of how would Harkevich run if he could use Retribution warjacks.

Seems okay, but does it come in red with crappier RAT?

I kid, I kid. Legit Retribution talk after the break.

Retribution - Where To Next?

I have a "first world miniature game problem": I don't know where the hell I'm going with my second Warmachine army.

Harkevich and Conquest - Reexamining The Pair

Conquest is a funny colossal. It's not an amazing, faction defining model like the Stormwall, Galleon, or Earthbreaker, but it's also not quite the janky fit that Judicator or most of the Gargantuans are. It exists in the state that PP was probably aiming for: good enough to take sometimes, but not so overwhelming good that it's your new "default" battlegroup choice.

Apparently a dedicated 'B' student

 (more after the break)