We're Back! Sort of ...

 After a long long long hiatus, we're finally ready to get back into wargaming action - I think. A lot has happened in the past year, including moving to different town, packing away models, moving models, storing, looking for stuff in storage, fixing models damaged in transit and storage, finding out some stuff are somewhere other than where they should be, etc, etc, etc ...

Anyways, not to bore you with the minutae, but an old wargames buddy also happened to move to the same city, and we started to talk about 40k and the topic of Ravenwing came up. And I realized that I actually never did read the Dark Angels codex I bought last year. So I managed to dig up the codex (by accident actually, I really forgot all about it) and finally started reading it.

And what a read that was. I guess I'm one of the last Ravenwing players on earth to get excited about the new teeth this army has been given. I've been playing Ravenwing since 2003, and they did well back then, even coming in a decent Top 5 finish at a tournament in 2009 (which was the year I finally painted the army).

But the Ravenwing has always suffered from a severe case of chronic crapcodexitis, and any successes had to be hard-fought. When I first started playing the Ravenwing, they had a different Master of the Ravenwing, and he only rode in his Land Speeder with a 4+ invul save. Every biker had skilled rider and an always-on 6+ jink save (I think that was the first time I heard the term "jink" in 40k). Then Sammael came along, the bikers lost skilled rider, and the army got even harder to play.

When the Black Knights were first introduced, it did help a bit, as they now finally had a decent close combat unit. But the army as a whole lost traits that would help it survive because of its speed and manouver, as befitting an all-bike army. Then last year's codex came out. And it's brilliant!

Well at least on paper. I'll be trying it out this weekend hopefully. Looking forward to that.

And since my friend also plays Ravenwing, I'll be bringing my old Thousand Sons buddies over to have a go against his Ravenwing army. I finally unearthed them from the crypts last night, and thankfully there was only minimal transit and storage damage (Land Raider's smoke launcher and Ahriman's staff had to be glued back, and there's a tiny paint chip on the staff where it joins his right hand, but nothing too serious). I'm looking forward to see these guys back on the table this weekend, and share the magic of their modest 10+d6 warp-charge dice.

Because of the minor repair work I did last night, I also unearthed my complete and fully-functional modeling and paint toolbox, and I'm excited to get back into hobbying. Here's what I have in mind for the rest of the year:

1. Updated Ravenwing. For this I need to paint 18 Black Knights (including the Command Squad), Chaplain on bike (with a suitable-looking mace), a Dark Shroud, and 2 more Land Speeder Typhoons. 11 of those Black Knights and the Land Speeders have already been assembled and undercoated (which means they are also base-coated, ahh .. the wonders of a black-liveried army).

2. Updated Eldar. I procured all the models for this update almost exactly a year ago. I think I'll need to paint 1 Hemlock, 3 more Dark Reapers, 1 new Dark Reaper Exarch (because the old one is ... old), 2 more Warp Spiders, 2 more Swooping Hawks, and 6 more jetbikes.

I will be getting back to my Denerair Highlanders, but that's a huge project which my temporary quarters is not capable to handle. So that's going to be a 2017 project.

I'm totally looking to some furious dice rolling this weekend, and I'm lucky that the town's brand new game store is like 7 minutes away. Love it!

Let's roll them dice!

Ravenwing Land Speeder #1

 
This took way longer than I thought, and in the end I had to rush it through to make sure I finish it and that it doesn't end up in my burgeoning KIV pile :)

I realized that this is actually the first ever Land Speeder that I've done. My previous encarnations of the Ravenwing were all exclusively bike armies, and I never got around to painting the old Master of the Ravenwing Land Speeder model before the jetbike version came out.

I assembled 3 of these, making up 1 squad, and I also realized that I had 2 versions of the kit. 1 was the old one with the issue of the warped hull. The other 2 were from newer sprues that solved that issue. And I must say I enjoy those better.

The crew helmets and Ravenwing shoulder pads are actually extras from the Black Knights. No, these aren't Black Knight speeders - I just think they look better :). The Ravenwing icon on the front hull is from the Dark Angels vehicle sprue, I think.

I must admit painting this I remembered why it took so long to finish my Ravenwing army in the first place. Painting black is not the most exciting thing on earth. Conceptually, it should be fast and easy, but hey ... So it's pretty basic - Citadel black spray, Shadow Grey line highlight - up to Space Wolves Grey. Mechrite Red missiles, Gunmetal on the metal parts, Gold on the heavy bolter ammo. Agrax wash for the metal parts. The insides of the jet nozzles got an extra blackwash. Standard decals. Done.

 

Up next on the Dark Angels, in order of personal importance to me: 2 Land Speeders, 6 Black Knights, 5 Ravenwing Command squad, Nephilim, 20 DA marines, Rhino, Predator, Aegis Defense Line with Quad gun.

But what's being organized right now are 11 IG models + heavy weapons: 6 heavy weapon crewmen, 3 autocannon (plus 3 heavy bolters that I can switch to if need be), 2 heavy flamer men, 2 snipers, 1 Major Winters with bolter. Now that sounds like a very tempting distraction :)

Keep rolling them dice.