30th September Duelling Gamers: Duel failed.

Well this is the final installment of my contribrution to Duelling Gamers, I have failed to complete my final targets for the Duel with 5 way watchers, the way stalker and basing the army left uncompleted. I will complete these in October but as far as the duel is concerned the deadline has been reached it is time to down brushes and show my final status.

Duelling Update

Still to Assembled.

NIL

Still to paint 

NIL

Painting in Progress

5 way watchers
1 way stalker

The red base coat of failure.

Another view of the way watchers.

Completed this Month

1 Spell Weaver on foot
1 giant eagle

1 kitbashed noble asb on foot
1 Kitbashed noble on elven steed.

1 Treekin base filler
3 Glade guard, all I could summon the energy to paint after Axemaster.

Front View

Left View

Rear View

Right View

Completed in past Months

Drycha

1 Spellsinger on foot

12 Dryads

Dryad unit filler

25 Glade Guard

6 Glade Riders

3 Treekin

Treeman

1 giant eagle

That is enough of what I have not completed, now for the good news I have a core heavy painted 2000 point army even without my Way watchers , and I am extremely happy with how the look of the Army is coming along. This challenge and the end results provide an excellent kicking off point for the rest of my Wood Elves that are going to follow and expand the army.

Dryads, Treeman, Glade riders and Eagle

Glade guard, Treekin, Deep wood scouts and another eagle

My Characters, two Glade captains, 1 branch wraith and 2 spellweavers

Another View of the Army on the Shelf, with an Owl looking unhappy below.

Another slightly different view.

Learning outcomes from the Duel.

• Be flexible with monthly goals and try to stay on target: This i found a hard lesson to relearn.
• Have a color scheme organised: I lost perhaps a month of painting time just trying to figure out how i wanted my elves and tree spirits to look, one dyrad I paint four times before I was happy with it.
• Chip away at it: I have learned to organize 1 hour painting sessions so that I do not get bored, as well as to take advantage of 15 minute windows when they present themselves as the 15 minute slots can add up to a couple of hours over the course of the week.
• Have something to listed too whilst painting: Midsomers murders, podcasts and music really helps, i tried to also listen to Game of thrones and Battle Star Gallactica but found i was watching them instead.

My very supportive Wife during one of my late night painting sessions.

My very unsupportive cat how loves my warm seat.

The painting station where all the Magic happens.

So i guess the question that i feel i must ask and answer is

Would you do this duel again: The Answer is a resounding Yes, The Duel has reinvigorated my hobby.

Cheers Lupus.

Duelling Gamer's : On target sort of, with a change of plans.

With a change of priorities for the Duel I have modified my final goals. Instead of 5 wild riders, 5 way watchers  and a Citadel wood that I planned to complete, Instead my revised goal will be
1 x kitbashed mounted noble, 1 treekin unit filler (represents 1 treekin), 5 waywatchers, a waywatcher noble and 3 more glade guard.

The reason for this is simply that I have struggled for the last three months to find a color scheme for my wildriders that I was happy with, I will not rush these figures for the duel , so instead I have decided to revise the target instead.

Duelling Update

Still to Assembled.

NIL

Still to paint 

3 Glade guard.
1 waywatcher lord

Painting in Progress

5 waywatchers

Completed this Month

1 Spell Weaver on foot
1 giant eagle

1 kitbashed noble asb on foot
1 Kitbashed noble on elven steed.

Right View of Steed

Front View

Left View

Rear View

Right view with Ferastella

Front View

Left View with the detail of the Shield

Rear View.

1 Treekin filler base
Using the leftover leg of my Treeman and various Spites, i had hoped to give it the look of the Spites defending a fallen spirit.

Front view

Left View

Rear View

Right View

Completed in past Months

Drycha

1 Spellsinger on foot

12 Dryads

Dryad unit filler

25 Glade Guard

6 Glade Riders

3 Treekin

Treeman

1 giant eagle

With this revised target I have a total of 9 more figures to complete and of course base the army, which should be achievable.
Hang on to your hats this is the last week.

Cheers Lupus.

Axemaster day 2.

Well the good nights sleep did not happen for a number of reasons, but I did get some sleep so that combined with a good breakfast and a 40 minute hot shower had me refreshed as I was going to get and ready for the challenge  of day 2.

After the failure of my tactics on Day one I decided to throw the plan out of the window and try some different tactics, I mean it could not go worse then it had , or could it?

Game 4 

Opponent: Josh 
Army : Brettonian's, 
Deployment: Battle for the pass deployment

His Army from what I remember was
2 x Lords
2 x lv2 beasts ladies
2 x trebuchets
2 x 10 peasant archer regiments
1 x 8 grail knight regiment
1 x 3 peg knights
1 x 6 knights of the realm
1 x 12 knights of the realm
1 x 9 knights errant

Spoiler: This was my most enjoyable game of the weekend and that is saying a lot considering the amount of fun games and the interesting opponents i played against.

My Deployment.

Josh's deployment.

A closer view of the Knights of the realm and Errants.

Waywatchers at the moment of their victory.

The action as it happens

Notable occurrences of the game.

• My waywatchers defeating Peg knights in close combat
• A unit of Glade guard flank charging the large unit of knights of the realm and pinning them for two turns.
• Wild riders tearing through the bsb and his bus and into combat with his general, and killing him.
• My Treekin standing toe to toe with the Frost Phoenix most of the game
• The result was 13-7 against me, what a great game.

So with the first game of day 2 I scored more points then the entire day before, happy with the start.

Game 5 
Opponent:David 
Army :High elves
Deployment: Battle line deployment

His Army from what I remember was

Prince on Dragon

Dragonmage on Dragon

Mounted BSB on elven steed with Banner of the world dragon 

Dragon knights or Silverhelm bus i forget which type

3 repeater bolt throwers

Frosthearted Phoenix

Seaguard unit 

Archer regiment

Notable occurrences of the game.

• Shooting the Dragon mage off, and then casting pit of shades on his Sun dragon and getting that as well.
• Wild riders tearing through the bsb and cav unit and into combat with his general, and killing him.
• My Treekin standing toe to toe with the Frost Phoenix most of the game.

No Pictures of this game as they came out super blurry, which for me means they were really rubbish.

The result was 15-5 my way me, what a great game and my first victory of the event.

Game 6 
Opponent: Andrew
Army : Dark Elves,
Deployment: Battle for the pass deployment

His Army from what I remember was

Malekith on coldone

Bsb on Cold one

lv1 or 2 on foot

10 cold one knights

3 units of dark riders

4 reaper bolt throwers

2 units of corsairs

2 Hydra's

The only picture that i took of the Dark Elves, love the lavender cold ones, I see you Malekith,I see you.

Notable occurrences of the game.

• My Wild riders failed to charge the cold one bus needing five on 3d6 and I only rolled a four.
• Getting the witch king  and his BSB down to only 1 wound each , but not being able to seal the deal and missing out on the 900 odd vp they were both worth hurt , but did not really change the outcome.
• Expressing to my opponent Andrew how I wanted to go to attend another tournament next year called Rumble in the Bronx held in Geelong, as I had only heard great things about it, to discover that he was the TO of said event, so we laughed at that.

Anyway the result was 20-0 against me, but i had a great game, next time Malekith, next time.

Final Result 
 So lets review my goals I set for Axemaster.

1. Have a lot of laughs: Yep I did that every game, and a fair amount in between games as well.
2. Meet new gamers: Met a lot of people that share the same interest's always a good thing.
3. A fun weekend: I have said it before the entire weekend was a blast.
4. Score 30 battle points: Well 28 battle points is not bad, i blame Malekith for my shortage of 2 points.
5. Win 1 game: It was looking touch and go there for a while, but yes i did manage to win a game.

And in the final wash up I finished last at the event , but i did not leave empty handed.

My trophy for Best Sportsman.

My unexpected prize for best sportsman a box of Chaos warriors, the start of a new army perhaps?

To finalize this post I must thank the following people.
First my family for giving me the leave pass to attend over the weekend.
My opponents who made my games a fun experience even when I was losing, which you cannot come last if you are not.
Hoodling for his blog that restarted my interest in the hobby.
The Hampton games club for hosting a great event.

Anyway I have rambled enough.

Cheers
Lupus

6th September Duelling Gamers: A time of Magic

I have managed to be super productive on Thursday and Friday night and have completed my Spell weaver, it has been a welcomed change painting a character, and I have relished it, painting this Spell weaver has been relaxing  particularly going to town on all the detail, with out any of his buddy's looking at me and waiting their turn for the brush, which is how i feel when painting regiments.

With the Spell weaver figure I have never liked the horns in the shape of the crescent moon on his back, so instead I decided to swap them out for a spite and an owl. I have always like the imagery of the good and evil manifestations of yourself on each shoulder trying to sway your decisions, and I have tried to represent this here with the Spite for evil and the owl for good.

Anyway onto the pictures.

Duelling Update

Still to Assembled.

NIL

Still to paint 

5 waywatchers

Painting in Progress

5 Wild riders
Citadel Wood
1 kitbashed noble asb on foot

Completed this Month

1 Spell Weaver on foot

Front view, typical fella the only thing in focus is the groin region.

Side view with the back of the Spite.

Rear view with the cloak vines and leaves in good detail.

Right side view.

Close up of the owl.

Attempted close up of the Spite.

1 giant eagle

Completed in past Months

Drycha

1 Spellsinger on foot

12 Dryads

Dryad unit filler

25 Glade Guard

6 Glade Riders

3 Treekin

Treeman

1 giant eagle

So the plan for this week coming, finish the Wild riders and hopefully not get very distracted by my Third army reveal.
Wish me luck we are on the home straight.

Cheers Lupus.

Duelling Gamers : Stay on target, Stay on Target.

JULY COMPLETE.
Well finally I have completed my last remaining eagle from my July goals , I am really happy with the results and like how the army as a whole is coming together. My take on Autumn themed wood elves is starting to look how I  thought it should.

This week I have managed to assembled and undercoated my remaining figures for the Duel and tonight I plan on starting my Spell weaver and hopefully have him finished before fathers day on Sunday.

Anyway time for pictures or it didn't happen.

Duelling Update

Still to Assembled.

NIL

Still to paint 

1 kitbashed noble asb on foot

5 waywatchers

Painting in Progress

Citadel Wood
5 Wild riders
1 Spell Weaver on foot

Completed this Month

1 giant eagle

Front View, with the eagle and base already glued together

Raised front view to get a better idea of the colors of the feathers.

Left view, because of the weight of the eagle was forward on the base, that meant the tree needed to be right at the very back of the base so that the model as a whole balances correctly, this will make charging in the rear an interesting proposition to rank up correctly, but all will suffer for my art.

Rear view, the branch was added on the right of the tree to try and add  more dimension to the model as a whole.

Right view and not a bad picture of the wing colors.

Completed in past Months

Drycha

1 Spellsinger on foot

12 Dryads

Dryad unit filler

25 Glade Guard

6 Glade Riders

3 Treekin

Treeman

1 giant eagle

Until next time.

Cheers Lupus.

Duelling gamers : The clock is ticking.

The final month is upon us and I have a lot to complete in order to finish this duel on time, if I am to be honest I am not entirely sure that I will finish all of this by the end of the month.
It may be sometime in October before it is all finished, but that is not going to occur without a good hard slog at the painting table, with the wood,eagle and 5 wild riders still left to complete I have added the following to the target.

So on with my final shop for the Duel, my final $100 retail plus the $2.07 saved from last month I have purchased the following.

1. 1 noble asb on foot for $4.00 kitbashed from various kits saving $19.00  but counting as $23.00 towards the challenge,
2. 2 Waywatchers from birthday presents and 3 old school scarloc rangers which I have had since my teens , these I will be using as Waywatchers all these for $0.00 saving $48.34 but counting as $48.34 towards the challenge.
3. 1 Spell Weaver for $0.00 from birthday presents saving $28.00 but counting as $28.00 towards the challenge

So money spent for this month is $99.34 and for the entire duel is a grand total of $697.27, all things considered as close as i could get to the target $700.

So after six months of purchases for my Wood elves my final breakdown of the expenses looks like this.

Actual money Spent $ 188.42

Actual money Saved $ 508.85

Games workshop retail equivalent $697.27

So all things considered , I have managed to build a Wood Elves army worth $700 Australian retail  and around the 2400 points mark for less than $200 Australian with a combination of trading , online stores, local games stores and of course timely birthday presents. Now the hard part needs to happen, all I have to do is have it painted and ready to go for Axemaster in three weeks time, which of course would be easier if I did not have to finish the balance of my  July / August painting.

Duelling Update

Still to Assembled.

1 kitbashed noble asb on foot

5 waywatchers

1 Spell Weaver on foot

Still to paint 

NIL

Painting in Progress

1 giant eagle
Citadel Wood
5 Wild riders

Completed this Month

NIL

Completed in past Months

Drycha

1 Spellsinger on foot

12 Dryads

Dryad unit filler

25 Glade Guard

6 Glade Riders

3 Treekin

Treeman

1 giant eagle

So the plan for this week is to finish the other eagle and the Spellweaver, with some minor conversions again to make him mine. Wish me luck we are on the home straight.

Cheers Lupus.