The Half Arsed Gamer

Long time no painting table post. Well I have had quite a bit on the go with moving house and demolishing rooms then rebuilding them. Now I am back on the hard stuff! Recently got through more of my background projects as well as picking up some starter Age of Sigmar boxes, they are real great value and me and the wife can play some small games. Lovely.

Recently got into the pure narrative driven gaming side to this, I even wrote a back story for my lady necromancer. Overall these were ace to paint up and I'm looking for more skellies to tackle along with the big guy Arkhan the Black and some Avatars of War vampires to add to it. I also started the paint scheme for the Sylvaneth box, they look lovely.

I also managed to finish off this guy for our new campaign. Boba Fett ready to bag n tag.

I managed to get quite a lot of dropzone commander finished including Praetorians, several tanks and a lot of terrain as well as all my scourge. Result!

So my Scythe pledge landed too, hurrah! Painted the leaders up, am really loving this fine game.

Continuing from the Scourge strike on 18th June 2264, on the best kept secret and fringe planet Taros it was clear the Scourge were planning something... President Wut Whent Wong had pumped money into the development of the orbital defence lasers and a satellite grid program to detect incoming spacecraft to provide early warning to it's inhabitants. Little did he know his advisor Hoo Flung Dhung had been siphoning off money into his new-swiss bank account.

And so on the 12th August 2265 the United Colonies of Mankind were caught with their pants down.

Slipping through a hole in the defence grid The Scourge commanders were able to mobilise a strike force on the orbital laser batteries before they could be brought to rain hellfire on the carriers. At 05:29 on the 12th of August Harkounen Fleet engaged the Scourge Fleet suffering heavy casualties and having to retreat into the darkness of space. UCM land forces were mobilised to repel the incoming dropships heading for the gun batteries at Guan-Yo.

The opening minutes of the fight saw General P. Stacey's forces making their way into the combat zone. Mortar teams firing on targets from afar whilst Sabres and Katana's rolled onto the board followed by a wing of Falcons. However LIME battalion was being held up due to a recently applied spray coat in the garage on the Gladius not being fully dry. With severely limited forces humanity needed to hang on.

Taking to the buildings, flak teams and more legionnaires awaited the incoming wave of Scourge. All was quiet... Suddenly two huge orbs of plasma hurtled through the air landing directly on the orbital laser. Foundations shaking the building held up but it was in bad shape.

He quickly organised a sally out to hit the ordnance delivering behemoths hard but was it too late? The Ferrum's drones went down in a hail of Scourge AA. Followed by the wing of Falcons who managed to dent the Annihilators.

Scourge moved in on the flanks supported by the crab of doom Oppressor and a wave of minders. UCM anti-air lit up the skies taking down dropships and light aircraft galore. Hunters moved in quickly to take shots on the facility which was quickly reaching its structural limit.

Finally the UCM reinforcements arrived but all hope was lost. The General issued the order to maximise Scourge casualties and minimise their losses. The Gladius and Sabres pushed into position and hit the Annihilators hard, taking one down. UCM began to retreat taking out stray vehicles.

The house came down on the mortar team burying them in rubble and finally the orbital laser caved in on itself into a pile of melted metal.

In the debriefing that followed funds were traced to advisor Hoo Flung Dhung who was subsequently offered to the Scourge as a host. Losing the orbital guns was a big blow to the UCM but a surprising number of initial casualties were sustained by the Scourge, however they have made a safezone now and can land with impunity, how will the next few hours pan out for Taros? We will see next time!

Having recently got the Dropzone Commander bug (something about an epic 10mm struggle in urban environments between squid like alien monsters and humanities last remnants, oh and destroying tower blocks like independence day...) our gaming group has started our narrative campaign, The Conflict at Taros. Totally made up fluff for our enjoyment.

The scene was set one hazy afternoon on June 18th 2264 over the picturesque cityscape of New Brighton. Suddenly the sky darkened as drop-ships broke the atmosphere. Sightings were confirmed and the UCM stationed out of city mobilised under command of General P. Stacey. Soon after Scourge vessels were confirmed to have landed in other key cities including Zau Tun and Nostros. How did they spring this assault without any early warning?

Either way the General had his orders to repel the invaders and secure intelligence on them so that it may help determine how they managed to go undetected.

Meanwhile the Scourge Hive mind led by an oppressive Squid currently using Andy McGarry's body as a host had other intelligence that they wanted to gain control of...

The battle erupted with both sides making dashes for the key buildings early, The Scourge commander however got the drop on the UCM and managed to embed their forces further forward with their speedy grav-vehicles.

Wolverines scouted down the park off main street, soon after a call came in from Scouting Lieutenant A. Schwarz. "Light em Up!" quickly followed by precise orbital strikes from the Kodiak Command centre. The UCM brought the firepower and the Gladius quickly followed by taking down more lightly armoured scourge units.

In the maelstrom of heavy weapons fire both a special forces Raven and a Scourge Intruder got clipped whilst flying low and took the brave soldiers with them to the grave.

The UCM were winning the ground battle but The Scourge quickly shot ahead on gaining intel. Storming buildings with Devastators and vast numbers of units they overran the UCM defences. General P. Stacey called in a coordinated effort on the large commercial tower owned by D. Trumpet raining glass and masonry everywhere. Soon after the Praetorian's lived up to their name by storming and taking the tower from the Scourge and claiming the intel and an objective.

As it became clear the intel in the region was being exhausted units began to dig in with what resulted in a 3 day firefight to the death for the scourge who were never reinforced and hopelessly outnumbered once the global UCM forces were mobilised.

Soon after, President Wut Whent Wong of Taros spoke for the people. "We will hawden ouwa wesolve. We will wight the wongs of this Scouwge atwocity. We will webuild..."

Over the coming months a great deal of money was redirected to reinforcing and developing the early warning, orbital and planetary defences at Taros but what was the reason for this isolated attack? Mankind can only wait and hope.