Personal Painting Challenge Update #3

When I set up this personal challenge to myself earlier this summer it was an attempt on my part to manifest my re-commitment to 40K and create a challenge to try to fit this into what is always a busy summer schedule for me.  I knew I had put some pretty heady goals for what I was trying to accomplish based on my limited time I could set aside for painting, my penchant for slow as molasses painting even with me dipping, and hard end date of Labor Day.  I'm not throwing in the towel, but the challenge is going to go down to the wire, and hope is fading.

That said, I have made progress.

My Nobz are finished.  I touched up the paint and finished dipping this week.

My Deff Dread is still a work in progress and the painting is coming along.

I have done nothing with the Ork Boyz since getting them ready to be primered.

How can I finish the challenge?  Simply put I need to buckle down and get the Deff Dread done.  IF I can focus on the Deff Dread and get done painting him by the weekend, I have a chance.  Ork Boyz are pretty basic for painting, and with large mobs of them I don't do a lot of detail work.  Yes they look good, but I don't spend the time on them like I do the other models.  I could, if time permits, feasibly get them painted in a weekend.  However it is a holiday weekend, and I am not sure how much time I will actually have.

Its' gonna be close...hopefully I can get them done.

New Email Address

As 40KNeophyte evolves I've decided to help give it its own identity.  It's still my blog, it's still just me writing about 40K from my own perspective, but I've created a separate email specifically for the site.  Behold!  Today I unveil 40kneo@gmail.com, the new official email address of the impressively non-existent 40K Neophyte Empire.

40K Neotube - Space Marine Demo Trailer

The Space Marine Demo is available, and there are some people who want to tell you about what it's like to be a Space Marine.

Hit the Jump to see what they have to say.

Space Marine Demo Available

I spent the weekend camping with my family, so I haven't downloaded it yet, but the Space Marine Demo is now available from Steam.  I am planning on downloading it tonight and playing the $#!* out of it.  You can see the details here, but remember you need to have Steam installed and an account set up to get it and play it.

Battle Report Week of 8/1/11 - 8/5/11

In an attempt to get more playtime in, my buddy Steve and I decided to take full advantage of him working from home for a week to try to get a game in.  It took on a bigger life when his son Connor decided he wanted to play too.  We decided to use a variation on the Cleanse battle scenario from 4th edition, but rather than split the board into 4 quarters, we created an imaginary Y section for the battle.

Hit the jump for Army Lists, pictures, and a breakdown of the awesomeness that was our game.

My Personal Challenge - Update #2

In my quest at trying to find ways to fail, I think I've set up a pretty good method this month.  With two camping trips scheduled in August those weeks tend to be a complete loss for painting progress as we spend our evenings packing the camper, and getting stuff around to go.  Or at least that was the case last week.  I wasn't able to do much of anything because I was either working hard to pack stuff up, or was just too exhausted from work and everything else to focus.

But I did get some stuff done after I got home Sunday.  I glued together some of the pieces of my Deff Dread that I wanted to paint as a whole and primered them.  I've finished painting the arms of the Nobz, and have only some of the boss poles that go with them to finish up.  My Nobz bodies are all at my buddy Steve's house in the middle of a game so when that is finished I will bring them home and finish gluing them together and dip them.

I planned to magnetize and start painting the Deff Dread Wednesday, but ended up getting home late from seeing some family.  My plan is to not do much to recess the magnets, because I'm envisioning the arms looking like they are barely connected...which I think will look very Orky.  I'll have to experiment some.  I'm magnetizing the small arms to make it customizable, and the big arms to avoid breakage in transport when I take it anywhere.

The Ork Boyz have had nothing done with them, because they are currently in the middle of the same game that my Nobz are in.  So I'll clean them up and primer them when I get them back to the house.

40K Neotube: Mini War Gaming's Open (Video) Letter to Games Workshop

I know I am way behind the curve on this video.  Honestly I really hadn't perused much in the way of online 40K videos since I had tabled 40K Neotube as a regular feature.  I pull it out every now and then when a new trailer from Relic comes out, or if something is making the rounds that I happen to see.  But in this case, I didn't see it until this week.  So before I play the video, I want to discuss my thoughts on Games Workshop and the players who play 40K.

The Proxy Conundrum

I realized something as I chronicled my first draw.  It was also the first game I proxied a unit I didn't own.

Proxies are just a part of the game for our group.  We all live very full lives with lots of family activities and other hobbies that pull us in multiple directions.  Combine that with new players, and completely painted pieces are still a bit of a luxury.  We try to reduce the number of proxies, or "counts as" units with each game.  But the reality is, while our armies are looking better they are far from complete.

For me, I've always proxied units that I own.  The proxy wasn't so much an attempt to try something new as it was just a means of getting something on the board.  Normally my proxies represented an item I had that was possibly unopened in the box, not table ready, was at a state of "in progress" that had them in pieces, or were still on the sprue.

It wasn't until I was being regaled with battle reports of other people that I realized they were using their proxies to not only represent units they had, but units they wanted to have or hadn't gotten yet.  Without realizing it I did the same thing, and only after the fact it dawned on me that I had shifted in my behavior.

Now, for the record I own quite a few Ork pieces and am working diligently to get them painted.  So proxying is still primarily a means to get something on the table to represent that which I haven't finished yet.  But as my army grows in completeness, and my acquisitions become less "Oh my god I need more Boyz" to "What don't I have yet that I could really use" I am transitioning my proxy behavior.  I still have units that I run as "counts as" or are shells of their future selves, but now I'm running things I haven't bought yet to either try out, or because I just spent a bunch of money on some other Orks, and some things I want I just can't afford yet.  Right now I'm playing a game during my lunch hours this week where I have 5 Ork Boyz that count as Lootas that I am buying from a friend but haven't been able to meet up to make the transaction, an unpainted Warboss as a Wierdboy because I wanted to try that unit out, and a foam block as a Looted Wagon because after using it in my draw I've decided I like it and plan on converting something (probably Tau) when I save up some more money.

So how does everybody else handle proxies?  Do you set time limits for how long a proxy can be used?  Do you keep it to things you own?  Do you use it to test a unit out before buying it?    Are there restrictions to what units will be allowed to proxy for others?  What I mean by that last question is not so much a grot for Thraka, but I'm thinking do you make HQ proxy for a named or alternate HQ, or troop for troop, and then a similar sized object for vehicles? I'm just really curious how other people and/or gaming groups handle the Proxy Conundrum.

My first Non-Loss

I've mentioned before about the desolate arid isle of emptiness that is my won/loss record.  It's been a bother, but I know some of the issues that have helped exacerbate it (long gaps between playing, poor list design), and have been working to correct those.

So I'm trying to get more gaming in.  It's hard since our gaming group is spread out of southeast Michigan, and Northwest Ohio.  However, I recently took a new job that has me working 5 minutes down the street from my buddy Steve's house.  A couple weeks ago we tried to get a 400 point game in at lunch when he was home for the day.  We actually only got 1 1/2 turns in before I had to get back to work.  Last Friday Steve gets a hold of me and says our buddy Chris is coming over to play 40K with him that weekend and we need to finish up our 400 point game to clear the table.  Now, I had thought we were done and that it had been taken down to protect his board and miniatures (I was using his AoBR Orks) from his cat.  So last Friday I went over to his place and we finished up the game.

I don't have pictures or a turn by turn break down like normal.  The nature of the game (trying to get a quick game in) and the layoff between starting and finishing all killed that.  But I can tell you played a 400 point annihilation game to a draw, and can map out what happened.

The lists were kind of as follows:  Steve had his Librarian with a Scout Unit, tactical marines in a Rhino, and a Sargent.  I had My Big Mek w/KFF, 20 Ork Boyz, Deff Dread (as a troop), and Looted Wagon w/Boomgun.

The game started with my Boomgun destroying Steve's Scouts.  Steve tried to use a psychic power on my Ork Boyz, but thanks to my use of the full 2" unit cohesion he was only able to take out 2 Orks, and then another when he pinned me with his Sargent who was a sniper.  My Boomgun rained death and despair down on his tactical marines, and then my Deff Dread finished up the job with its skorcha and close combat attacks.

Steve was able to eventually get my Ork Boyz in a tight group when he assaulted, and I piled in.  He was unable to hurt any but I put a wound on him.  He failed his morale check, withdrew, regrouped, and dropped a psychic attack on my bunched up Ork Boyz, taking them out with that, his Rhino, and his Sargent.  His tactical Marines also put killed my Big Mek that I had moved into base contact with my Deff Dread to try to negate any future Crew Shaken results.

After the 5th round we had to call it because I had to go get my daughter, but in the end we both took out 2 units.  I was still sitting pretty with my Looted Wagon and Deff Dread who were both ready to take aim on his Librarian (I had already hit him with the Looted Wagon that he saved).  So it's hard to say how the rest of the game would have played out, but at least it wasn't a loss.

It also set up our idea to game at lunch this week.  Steve is working from home so we are going to try to get a 1500 point game in over the course of the week.  That one I am taking pictures and really doing my best to record what happens round by round.