Space Wolves again...and Grey Knights??!!

Sup guys.  Wow have the releases been hopping lately from GW.  This last weekend we saw the release of the new Space Wolves codex and coming up on the heels of its release the rumors are telling us that Grey Knights are next.  Rumor no more as various websites and 40K talking heads have confirmed the rumor not to mention a buddy of mine just shot me a pic of next weeks White Dwarf with you guessed it, Grey Knights on the cover.  So before I start with this whole Grey Knights mess, I wanted to give my first impressions of the Space Puppy book.  On first impression the book is great.  It manages to keep a lot of the flavor of the old dex and bring the costs in line with other newer space marine books.  Instead of the beefed up chapter master, they get the beefed up thunderwolf lord with access to runic armor and storm shield at a points discount.  Not just that but thunderwolf cavalry are now cheaper and thus easier to take in lists that will not sacrifice a lot making them perfect bodyguards for your lords.  The new flyer is also very good with the transport one being the true winner allowing you to take 16 models or 8 terminators and still providing great supporting fire once the cargo has been delivered.  The new murderface Dread has great rules and wont cost you an arm and a leg to use.  I can only hope when blood angels are redone they get a special dread too.  The supplement just improves on the rules and gives you the type of flexibility that I as a CSM player can only dream about.  You want to run 6 wolflords, go for it.  You want to run a scout army, do it.  Space Wolves always get great books and this is no exception.  Yes grey hunters got nerfed a bit but you have to realize that they were way under costed compared to other marines (hint, hint CSM).  They were brought in line with other imperial marines and for the most part the strength of the codex and supplement really hides this short coming.  About the only bad thing I would say about the space wolves release is the Grimnar santa sled.  I don't know if someone at GW is hooked on history channels Vikings but making a chariot look like a mini viking longship complete with shields on the side is just horrible.   Overall though the pups got a pair of great books. 

And now Grey Knights??  Wow what a surprise this was.  Right on the heels of the Space Wolves release we get codex Grey Knights.  No models for this release just updated rules which is ok in my book.  There are several armies that need to be updated and a quick rules update to an army that already has great models is good for the hobby.  Release new models with white dwarf rules and your good to go.  Now as expected the grey knights are indeed getting the nerf treatment with the rules leak that I have seen so far.  Removing all inquisition models, most of the special characters and rules, changing psycannons to salvo weapons, losing psybolt ammo are few of the nerfs that are coming.  Along with this a price reduction on all models and some new items including a force weapon gun, awesome formation and maybe the calls of this book sucks could be premature.  We only have a couple of days left until the book is released and so everything will be confirmed. 

Pics are of my almost complete Storm Raven for my blood angels/space marines.  I am hoping to get this army done by October.

40K Campaign - Death Co. test drive..

Sorry for not posting in the last month or so, but real life has gotten in the way, we recently moved to a new house which has taken all of my time. I haven't done anything 40K related be it painting or modeling. A couple of weeks past, the local FLGS manager began a 1750 point 40K campaign in which more then 5 teams will be competing. Each team has a total of 5 per team and any army can be used including Forge world units and army lists. Upon hearing of this I thought that the time had come for me to pull out my newest army, my Death Company Air Cav army. I am taking the following with some changes based on who I will be facing such as switching out one of my chaplains for a librarian for some anti-psychic ability -

1750 Pts - Blood Angels Roster - 1750 pts New Dual leader air strike force

HQ: Astorath the Grim
1 Astorath the Grim

Elite: Chaplain in Power Armour
1 Chaplain in Power Armour

Troops: Death Company (8#)
1 Death Company, 0 pts
1 Death Company,(Thunder Hammer)
6 Death Company
1 Death Company,(Power Weapon)

Troops: Death Company (8#)
1 Death Company, 0 pts
1 Death Company,(Thunder Hammer)
6 Death Company
1 Death Company,(Power Weapon)

Troops: Tactical Squad (10#)
9 Tactical Squad
1 Sergeant

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#)
1 Stormraven Gunship

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#)
1 Stormraven Gunship

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#)
1 Stormraven Gunship

Troops: Death Company Dreadnought (1#)
1 Death Company Dreadnought

Troops: Death Company Dreadnought (1#)
1 Death Company Dreadnought

To say that this army is fun to play is an understatement, I know that if I I have a turn of bad luck, that I will probably lose the game, however with the speed of the storm ravens, I can redeploy quickly and strike any where on the game board. My first game of the campaign was against an imperial guard Death Korp of Kreig army with 6 Leman Russ tanks. To be honest, I thought it was all over even though I got first turn. We rolled table quarter deployment with Kill points. My opponent deployed castled up in the opposite corner with all 6 of his tanks split up into 2 3 tank squadrons. I deployed as close as possible to the center of the board with my tactical squad Storm Raven hanging a little back just to give my opponent another target. Lucky for me he didn't steal the initiative and so I rushed forward with 2 of the Storm Ravens; I still wasn't in range to get the 2 dice for damage as I was about 18 inches out however due to him having his tanks in squadrons even though I managed to roll the lucky 6 to glance with one of my multi-meltas, I rolled a 2 which he could just ignore. My other Storm Raven opened up on a squad of rough riders (These Death Korp riders are freaking sweet models)and I ended up killing all of them which put me in the lead with 1 kill point. His first turn should have been the death of me, he fired all of tanks at both of the storm ravens carrying the death company squads and dreads however due to some hot dice on my part, all he was able to do was stun one raven and shake on. I kept making my 4 ups covers like it was going out of style which just demoralized him. He tried to assault the closest storm raven with his commissar lord and his squad of veterans but due to moving flat out, he needed 6`s to hit and failed to do any damage. Suffice to say that by turn 2, my entire army was in his lines multi-assaulting every thing in my path. By the end of turn 2, i was up by 6 killpoints and my opponent decided to call it as I had managed to kill 4 of his tanks with only losing 4 death company in that turn and pretty much he didn't have any place to go. My next campaign game was against a wolfguard based army led by Grimnar. This game was a lot more challenging as my opponent had a lot of missile launchers and was able to knock out 2 of my storm ravens by turn 2 and had taken off all of the weapons on the 3rd one. His 3 dreads also highlighted a major weakness with my dreads, as they don't have their power fists, if they are assaulted by a rival dread, they will get owned which in fact happened to one of my dreads. This game came down to the wire with me winning the capture and control game by contesting his home objective with my last storm raven. So far the army is a blast to play and I hope to continue to use this army for many games to come, now I have to finish painting it. Lets hope my luck holds up for my future campaign games. Pics are from a GW article that talked about painting the Storm ravens.

coming attractions...

With the coming of the new year, opportunities present itself. My lovely wife graced me with 3 storm ravens and what I refer to as a cheater dreadnought for my budding Death Company army for Christmas. When GW first released the storm raven, I admit, i really hated the model, it just looked like a jet plane out of metal slug, you know chibbi style. After seeing the kit up close I actually grew to like it and was inspired to start a fun army based around 3 of them and all death company models. I actually bought a Astrath the Grim model when he first came out as I wanted to use him for a Nightlords conversion but decided against it. I am glad I did as it meant that i didn't have to pick up another one when I got the idea to start this army. Seeing that I also have a budding Draigowing Grey Knights army as well I have decided that I wanted to make the storm ravens dual purpose so I am planning to paint them in a dark grey scheme with magnetized emblems. The kits themselves were really straightforward to put together as GW for once put a decent how to manual in the box. In fact all of their new stuff that I have gotten have had decent manuals so kudos GW. The kit comes with all of the options that the storm raven can use such as all of the weapon options for the turret weapon as well as the nose weapon mount. Below is the list that I'm building, let me know what you guys think.

New 2000 pts Death Company Air Cav

Total Roster Cost: 2000

HQ: Astorath the Grim (1#, 220 pts)
1 Astorath the Grim, 220 pts

HQ: Reclusiarch in Power Armour (1#, 150 pts)
1 Reclusiarch in Power Armour, 150 pts = (base cost 130 + Melta Bombs 5 + Infernus Pistol 15)

Troops: Tactical Squad (10#, 170 pts)
9 Tactical Squad, 147 pts = 9 * 16 (base cost 16) + Sergeant 26
1 Sergeant, 23 pts

Troops: Death Company (10#, 260 pts)
1 Death Company, 0 pts
1 Death Company, 50 pts = (base cost 20 + Thunder Hammer 30)
7 Death Company, 140 pts = 7 * 20
2 Death Company, 70 pts = 2 * 35 (base cost 20 + Power Weapon 15)

Troops: Death Company (10#, 260 pts)
1 Death Company, 0 pts
1 Death Company, 50 pts = (base cost 20 + Thunder Hammer 30)
7 Death Company, 140 pts = 7 * 20
2 Death Company, 70 pts = 2 * 35 (base cost 20 + Power Weapon 15)

Troops: Death Company Dreadnought (1#, 125 pts)
1 Death Company Dreadnought, 125 pts

Troops: Death Company Dreadnought (1#, 125 pts)
1 Death Company Dreadnought, 125 pts

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#, 230 pts)
1 Stormraven Gunship, 230 pts = (base cost 200) + Hurricane Bolters (each side) 30

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#, 230 pts)
1 Stormraven Gunship, 230 pts = (base cost 200) + Hurricane Bolters (each side) 30

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#, 230 pts)
1 Stormraven Gunship, 230 pts = (base cost 200) + Hurricane Bolters (each side) 30

I eventually want to go with Gabriel Seth as my other HQ just for the fact that nobody takes him and to add some more anti-vehicle other then the Storm Ravens and some infernus pistols. I dont know about you but an HQ who swings a strength 8 weapon at initiative with rending is nothing to sneeze at. That and the ability to auto-hit anything in base to base will make it so even vehicles will have a need to fear the death company even on foot.