Bayou Battles Report

Bayou Battles is in the books and once again, I took a savage beating. After a convincing win over a Dwarf army in round one, my orcs got their comeuppance again and again. Rounds two and four were against armies of small cavalry units, and I had no answer for them. Rounds three and five, I had possible answers, but bad deployment and bad decisions threw the games my opponents' way.

However, I took the opportunity to try out my recently inherited D40 and document the armies that caught my eye. Sadly, I know there are some armies I missed, like the cow/dwarf army from my game three and the ship-bound high elf army. There were also at least two beautiful tomb kings armies I missed and another wood elfe army I know of that's really nice.

If anyone recognizes an army and can put a name to it, please tell me so I can add a name. If it's yours and you don't want the photo up, let me know and I'll take it down.

My offering to Bayou Battles this year.

Dwarfs - Andrew Heinrich

Tom Dietzel's Orge Kingdoms Army

I'm not sure if he was going Dwarf or Chaos Dwarf, But I like the army. I don't know his name, but I see him at every event.

Ogre Kingdoms - Jeff Franz

Dwarfs - Tim Delmas

Wood Elves

Ogre Kingdoms - Ryan Smith Took second in Player's Choice and third in Best painted (Or maybe those were reversed.)

Skaven - Jeremy Lamonte

Daemons of Chaos (or Warriors maybe) - Scott Filgo

Lizardmen (Yes they look like Spartans, but they're apparently lizardmen).

Dwarks - Pete Reese. The blades on the gyros actually spin, and the barrels of the guns light up.

Skaven

Empire - Russell Helms Too second in Best Painted and third in Player's Choice. (If Ry'an's was wrong, then so is this one.)

Warriors of Chaos - Chris Cole (Not his army, but he was playing it.) The was my round five loss. The game was lost on the last combat of round six. Excellent game.

Ogre Kingdoms

Orcs and Goblins (Apparently with some lore of undeatch) Matt Reisch

Vampire Counts

Dwarfs

Daemons of Chaos - Jeff Swann The photo does not do the display justice, not that the photos do any of the armies justice.

Warriors of Chaos

Dwarfs - Julien Lesage

Orcs and Goblins - Nate Culver

Daemons of Chaos - Edward Oh - (Won Player's Choice and Best Painted)

Daemons of Chaos - Chris Davis

Dark Elves

Skaven

Skaven

Chaos Dwarfs

Thoughts on the "Death of WFB" and the Birth of the "Age of Sigmar"

I never intended to get into WFB. I got into WFB due to my interest in 40K. I never intended to get into 40K. I got into 40K due to my interest in Mordheim. Mordheim was my introduction to tabletop mini games. Before that I'd used minis for playing D&D, but that was it. I usually borrowed a mini from a friend to be my character.

What made me finally get my own minis and start painting them and play games was a good group of people to play with. It started with one guy. He and I had some absolutely epic Mordheim campaigns, starting with 500 point (GC) warbands and generally retiring them when they got out of hand. I've still got some minis lying around that are missing an arm or leg, or have an extra head or tentacle.

Chauncey (real name, BTW), pretty much stuck to a couple of warbands. he had a pretty nasty witch hunter group, some tough Reiklanders, and a beastman warband that was coming along okay. I had just about one of everything. Reikland, Middenheim, Marienburg, WH, Chaos, Undead, Skaven, Ork, pirate, dark elf, shadow warriors. I had a warband for just about all occasions (most of them unpainted). Most of them I still have.

Part of me is wondering if any of those models might be appearing in an upcoming AoS army. For big games I still have way too many orcs and a whole lot of elves. but for a small game I may come out with any number of things. Who knows.

My wife refers to Mordheim as my gateway drug to miniature gaming. She's entirely right. I'm wondering now if Age of Sigmar will be that gateway drug that GW has been missing for so long.

Wolf Riders

Here are the guys I started before our trip to Uganda. I'm running them as two squads of six with the intent of being chaff. After Bayou Battles, I'll likely add command to flesh them out at fifteen total.

 

Today's background noise started with the 1974 Three Musketeers, followed by The Quiet Man,  and finished with Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. I've seen all three enough that I don't need to see the screen, except when the good parts come up, like the epic fifteen minute brawl at the end of The Quiet Man. Tonight's painting beverage was pink gin & tonics. I never cared for neither gin nor tonic, but while in Africa I learned that combining them with a little lime and aromatic biters makes a tasty beverage.

Mangler Squigs

Here we have the first mangler I made after a bit of priming. I didn't like how the feet came out, so i broke them off at the arches and redid them with greenstuff. I added what I intended to be gore dripping from its mouth with greenstuff as well.

This was the second one, Like the first, the main body is sculpey with the eyes and front parts of the feet are green stuff. Rather than having Empire milita soldier bits hanging from its mouth, I used skaven bits to have one trying to escape.

Here we have the beasties with some paint on them. 

I gave up on the its of gore dripping from their mouths. They looked more like tumors hanging off the lips than gore. Maybe if the squigs weren't red it would have looked better. The process was fun, but my sculpting skills need work. 

Goodbye old friends

I traded my tomb kings, over 3000 points painted, for a crap ton of orcs and goblins. Most are unpainted, some base coated, some finished, and one or two looking really nice. All those will go into the Simple Green. The only one that won't is the Arachnarok that I haven't gotten  yet. The original owner is having it painted. I can't bring myself to strip it if he's actually paid someone to paint it. If I take one to tournaments, I'll just use the one I have.

So now all I need for my Bayou Battles army is a second mangler squig. The first one is molded, baked, and has bits of greenstuff curing on him. I need more sculpey to make another. Making the mangler squig has me looking at how I can sculpt things for other models as well. For example, I used a scrap of the sculpey from making the MS to make a rock for a savage shaman to perch on because the model won't rank up otherwise.

I also learned something yesterday. When the carport is to full of cars, and other stuff, and you want to base coat models, DO NOT take them out into the alley and put the tray on the recycling bin. The wind will kick up and blow the tray and wet models into the dirt. So yeah, the goblin wolf riders went into the Simple Green.

I may have enough black orcs now to run the Black Orc Bock list at Alamo this year. I thought I had enough mounted units to do a cavalry based army, but I don't have enough spider or wolf riders to make the minimum core.

Getting Squiggy With It!

With the TKs on the way out the door, I'm taking a look at the Orcs and Gobbos. One model that's been missing from my waugh has been the mangler squig. The problem has always been the cost, not the points, the dollars. The models way to expensive for what it is. So what does a cheapskate do? HE makes his own.

A trip to the hobby store and we are on our way!

I started with a small block of Sculpey III. I went with white. No reason. I ripped off half of the block to form the body.

The body takes initial shape. This part was going EASY! I am the master!

The face begins to take shape. It turns out that teeth are hard to sculpt, so maybe I'm not quite the master.

Another 1/4 of the block plus a little and the legs begin to take shape. While legs are easier than teeth, neither are easy. 

90 minutes in the oven at 230 degrees (F) plus letting it cool overnight. Turns out the sculpey only truly hardens all the way after it's cooled. I added some bits for silliness and now he's ready for green stuff. to fill in some gaps and smooth out some bits. 60mm bases are on the way as well. Things are looking squiggy.

Screw That!

So I won't be going back to Lone Wolf GT. $60 for entry, another $100 for a hotel, and two tanks of gas is a bit too much to pay for the shittiest single tournament I've ever been involved in.

A major part of the problem was my crappy performance with my crappy army. I've got no one to blame but myself for the performance of my list. I brought a soft list and played it badly. The few times I did everything right were foiled by the dice. It happens.

Another problem was I get tired of looking across the table at unpainted models. All five people I played had unfinished models on the table. 3/5 had major parts of their army unfinished and two of those had 60% or more with little or no paint at all. One of them had 2/3 of his army based black with a splash of red and silver so he could get credit for three colors in judging. He admitted as much to the paint judge.

The number of people who had bad days or weekends due to playing against those displaying abysmal behavior didn't help either. I didn't have any bad games, I just had too few good ones. One spent too much time talking smack to the organizers to pay attention to our game and one was pissy the entire game because of the way the comp scores worked. Around me, however, I saw players tantruming and throwing fits because things didn't go their way in games they were winning.

Questionable judging was the final straw. The armies that took prizes for appearance deserved their recognition. Looking down the list, there were armies that were judged far more harshly than deserved while others were given far better scores than deserved. It seems being local or affiliated with the right club was an important factor in paint judging. Two armies that had unfinished models on the table actually scored better than mine for paint. That guy with the three stripes of paint? He scored one point less than me for painting. The models he had that were painted were nice. They  weren't based. So lesson learned - based coat with a spray can, smear a couple of blotches of paint, and go. You'll get scored at mid level. Or be local. That seems to matter.

I realize that much of this is out of control of the TOs, but that last bit is on them. Judging paint is thankless and subjective, but the scores from LWGT show a distinct bias or base incompetence. Either is inexcusable.

Either way, the event left such a bad taste in my mouth that I think I'll save the money and effort next year and stay home.

EDIT: Some of the bitter has faded, and I realize much of my bad time was brought on by choices I made. Still probably not going next year.

Skellingtons invade Ft. Worth

So here we have it. The major differences in this list and previous versions is fewer skeletons, no BSB, more Tomb Guard, dropping the hierotitan and colossus for three necropolis knights and adding a light council in place of the lvl 4 death caster.

I'm really looking forward to this weekend for a couple of reasons. First, I've never been to Lonewolf GT, I hear it's a great event. Second, I've never played a comped tournament. This should be interesting. I have no illusions of winning, but I hope to at least have some good games. Finishing in the top half would be nice too. Hell, winning another game at a GT with this army would be nice. Finally, I haven't dragged out the Tomb Kings in a while other than as Undead Legions, and this looks to be a list with possibilities.

Anyway, I hope to update as the weekend goes.

The Deed is Done...Mostly

It's six days out from Lonewolf GT and my army is entirely painted. (I'll post photos later.) What should I do with SIX WHOLE DAYS of prime painting time? Well five really, because Friday evening will be for travelling.

I also discovered that my army simply does not fit on the display board I was planning on using. So I guess I know what I'll be doing with my free time this week.

Edit: Screw it. I don't have the time to to the job properly this week, so the lid of the tub I'm transporting the army in will be my display board. That being said, I do have a plan for an appropriate display for this army now.

Last minute painting...

It just wouldn't feel natural to be doing some last minute painting leading up to a GT. Threfore, in the two weeks leading up to Lonewolf GT, I find myself needing to finish three Necropolis knights, three liche priests, and a casket of souls.The necroknights are getting there, the casket is base coated, and the liche priests are have some primary levels painted in. Not the hassle of the first time I played TKs at a and had 60 models to go with two weeks left.

Enough is Enough...For Now

I know I've said it before, but this time my inherent cheapness might carry me through. No more armies for the foreseeable future. I started playing the bigger events with Bayou Battles 2012 with my Orcs and Goblins, and in the following two years, I brought entirely new armies to BB2013 and 14, being Tomb Kings and High Elves respectively.

The thing is, I've never gotten good at playing an army before picking up a new one. Right when I started having a littlle success with the OG list, I started playing TKs, which though they can apparently be played effectively, apparently not by me. HEs are already my most effective army in that I had my best finish ever at a GT, which while not all that great, was an improvement.

In addition, the last minute flurry of painting before BB this year saw my paint score drop, which I expected because I did a sloppy job and the army looks unfinished. So I've got my work cut out for me before Alamo to make the needed improvements.

So rather than put the Elves aside when I get them looking better, my goal is to go back to either of the other armies an make them look better, find out how to play them better, and improve my skills as a painter and player.

Besides, I've got enough unpainted models of all three armies to just about make another army of each of them. Let's not even go into my old Black templar army that I stripped the paint off of to start over or the Necrons that I still have about 1000 points of that are unpainted, not that I even play 40K any more.

A little bit of progress and experimentation

I'm out of the Valejo black I used to get the blackened look on the White Lions armor. So while I wait for a chance to go pick up more, I worked on a few more things.

 

I tried to paint up the loremaster the to go with the swordmasters, so I went with the Gehenna's Gold, followed by a Seraphim Sepia wash, then a light drybrushing of Auric Armor Gold. For the sword, I used the Valejo Black with a touch of Metal Medium. This is the same batch  used on the WL test. Shortly aft this I ran out of the Valejo Black.

The Archmage still needs a little work, but  the fun experiment was the headpiece, vambraces and pauldrons. I used Valejo Light Turquoise, with a touch of the metal medium, a touch of black, then a touch of white. I then gave it a light wash of Nuln Oil and a light drybrush of Valejo Silver.

 This one was the big failure of the evening. I Started his armor with Ironbreaker, then a Nuln Oil wash, then a light highlight of Runefang Steel. I was trying to get the look of red metal so I used a Bloodletter Glaze. I'm not sure it can be saved. He may have to go into the Simple Green.

BB Elf List

So here's the list I brought to Bayou Battles 2014. It still needs a little work.

Here's the test model for the new unit. I have some of the old metal White Lions, and some of the new plastic ones. I thought I'd use an old one for the test model. I was tired of painting gold armor, and was trying to get a blackened steel look. I didn't get what I was after, but I still like the effect.

The  back. I still need to whiten up the cloak a bit.

Bayou Battle...Not as Bad as Last Year

First, Bayou Battles in Houston has been fantastic each of the three times I have been. When I say it was not as bad as last year, I refer to my performance. I think my paint score will be worse than last year, because I was in a rush and a little sloppy. Tomb Kings are far more forgiving of quick painting than High Elves. However, I achieved a grand total of 31battle points in five battles last year, which came from four losses and a draw.

The Dragon Army (with no actual dragons and dragon models representing things that are not dragons) won two and lost three and, adding in bonus points, the total for battle points cam out to 57 this year. The best I have ever done in BP before at a two day tournament was 42 at the 2012 Bayou Battles.

The Dragon Army:
Prince: armor of destiny, Sword of Might
LVL 4 Archmage with high magic, dispel scroll talisman of preservation
Noble: BSB, Shield of Merwyrm, Crown of Command
LVL 2 Mage with light, channeling staff
Noble: reaver bow, potion of strength

28 Spearmen, full command, Banner of Eternal Flame
22 Archers, standard bearer and musician
5 Reavers

23 Swordmasters of Hoeth, full command, Banner of Swiftness

4 Repeating Bolt Throwers
Great Eagle
Great Eagle
Frostheart Phoenix

Game 1: Erin's Dwarfs
Erin's army was nicely painted and unique in that many of her models, one unit and two of the three characters were female minis. She brought a block of 29 hammerers, 28 Longbeards and 20 quarrellers, two gyrocopters, 1 each of cannon, grudgethrower, and organ gun, a BSB, a runesmith and a thane.

She forted up around her artillery, I forted up around mine and we both tried to flank with out flyers and fast cav (well, my fast cav and our flyers).

She focused most of her shooting on my phoenix and archers. I focused mine on her war machines and then quarrelers. Between the bolt throwers and reaver bow, I killed the by turn two. Then I killed the organ gun with more bolt throwers in turn three. Also in turn three, I started moving across the board, finished off the quarrelers with mass shooting, and dropped fiery convocation on the longbeards, killing about a third of them. On turn four I charged the longbeards with the swordmasters from the front, an eagle in the rear and the phoenix in the flank.

On five, she counter charged the phoenix with her hammerers, giving it a couple of wounds. I then counter-charged the hammerers with my spearmen and charged the thrower with the other eagle. On turn six, the pile of nasty finished off the longbeards and the eagle finished off the thrower. However the pile of nasty could not get the BSB or Runesmith, and the hammerers finished off the phoenix. That's how it ended. She had her hammerers and characters. I lost the reavers and the phoenix. I'd gotten 1500 and change and she got 335.

I realize that walking across the board was unneeded as the shooting exchange had left me up 600+ to 95. All of her shooting was gone by the end of turn three except the thrower, so the likelihood of me killing it with shooting in the next round or so was pretty high. She'd also misfired it on turn three, so it was taking turn four off., giving me a free round of shooting at it.

However, there were still three turns and over an hour left, so I went ahead and committed to combat because it seemed like more fun. Thinking back now, I could have expended better effort for the final VP, but I just now thought of that three days later. I was pretty sure I'd come out on top in combat, and win anyway, but perfectly willing to accept defeat if I'd gotten smacked for it.  It turned out to be a good thing, because Erin kept telling me all day and the next about how much fun she'd had and what a great game it had been. I missed out on one the bonus point, so it ended up 19-5.

Game two: Alan's Wood Elves
This was another pretty army, in fairly standard WE color scheme just very nicely executed.
He brought:
Lvl 4 Spellweaver w/ Metal, and the Sceptre os Stability
Lvl 2 spellsinger w/ Heavens on an elven steed, with a dispel scroll
Glade Captain BSB with the dragonhelm, and the Hail of Doom Arrow on an elven steed
10 glade guard
6 glade riders
6 glade riders
6 glade riders
6 glade riders
10 deepwood scouts
10 deepwood scouts
10 wardancers
8 Sisters of the thorn
5 wild riders
5 wild riders
6 waywatchers
6 waywatchers

He killed two bolt-throwers on turn one before I had even gone, I killed a number of small units, but he killed more of mine and stayed away from my big units. Because there was so much more movement in this game, I do not remember it as well as the first, other than he used his movement and shooting to pick me apart, killing all the bolt-throwers, the phoenix, and archers. He got most of the scenario objectives and I got none. Final score was 5-17.
Despite the fairly solid beating I took, this was a great game. Like Erin in the previous game, I had a great time losing.

Game three: Brian's Warriors of Chaos
This was a nasty list run by a good player who placed in the top three in both the 2013 and 2014 Bayou Battles for Best General. In addition, it was an awfully nice looking army with some very intricately kit-bashed models, specifically the daemon, which he said was made of bits from (I think) 12 different models. I recognized the head and arms of a Minotaur lord.

I don't know the WoC book well enough to know all that he brought, other than a block of 24 or so warriors with a caster in it, two chariots, a daemon prince, a nasty mounted character, three small units of hounds, a hell cannon-thing, and five of the big cavalry dudes. I managed to kill a chariot and some hounds with bolt-throwers in turn one and then they quit hitting. For the rest of the game, all bolt-thrower shots missed. I did manage to kill the chariots, the hounds, and two of the big cav dudes.

He had me tabled by turn four, except for the phoenix, which was fighting the cannon. both were down to a couple of wounds when the DP and cav hero showed up and finished off the phoenix in turn five.
I do not think the game turned on my bad shooting, but it did not help. I think he would have won anyway, I just may have had some models left by the end of the game if I could have weakened/killed some of his nasty units. I did get one objective by using more of the bonus scrolls than my opponent. Final score, 6-19

I finished day one with 30 points, one point shy of my 2013 total and 12 short of my 2012 total.

Game 4: Ryan's Dark Elves.
This was the only unpainted army I faced all weekend, but I could see where he was going with it, and I hope to see it when he's done. It should look really nice.

He brought a block of witches and the cauldron, a block of executioners, some cold one riders, two scout units, three fast cav units, and a general on a flying thing.
VPs didn't matter, only capturing the objectives.
Pit of Shades. That sums up the game. All of my tough units got pitted twice, and I managed to avoid his witches for most of the game. He used his fast cav and scouts to take out my war machine. I used fiery convocation to kill his executioners who were holding an objective. I lost my objective rying to make a last turn stab at getting his, which worked, but left me barely in the charge arc of the witches. At that point I conceded the game. He wanted to play it out, but I pointed out that he already held two of the three objectives, I had nothing left to take the objectives he held already, and my six swordmasters wouldn't hold out to the two cav units and flying general that were about to charge it.

I might have actually managed a bad game vote from him because he seemed pissy the entire game, and despite winning, argued the stupidity of the HE rulebook when he did not like how some magic items stacked.

I managed two objective points for holding my primary objective for at some point, so the final tally was 20-7. The funny bit, and part of why I cannot really complain is that of our three arguments during the game, two were based on each of us trying to give the other some kind of benefit.

Game 5: Chad's Brettonians
This was not the prettiest Brettonian army I've seen, but it was at least above average for the armies I saw at BB. He had two knight buses, one with a character, a lord on a hippogriff, three pegasus knights, two trebuchets, two units of peasant fast cavalry, a block of fifty spears, 25 halberdeers and a big block of archers with a naked level 4 heavens caster, and a grail knight with ten extra peasants.

My first two shots with the bolt throwers hit a knight bus, but failed to wound on a 2+ roll. my third missed, so I changed targets and used the repeating shots on a peasant cav unit, killing them. That panicked the peg knight, who ran off the board the next turn after failing two Ld9 tests.

Over the course of the game, he kept hitting my spearmen with the comet spell, I plinked at his cav and knights. He killed on BT with his trebs and took a wound off another. He got a two man cav charge against one of the BTs, but there were only two peasant riders left, and the crew killed them before they could attack. That left the archers and that BT facing down the remaining 6 knights and the lord on the hippogriff.

Between those two units, the lord and the hipp, died and the archers reformed narrow to receive the charge from the knights. The archers lost the first round of combat, but were stubborn due to ranks and held, won the next round. The knights fled, and the archers caught them.

On the other end of the board, the swordmasters charged and killed the grailknights over two rounds of combat. Comets killed a BT and half the spearmen. The remaining spearmen failed to charge the halberd, but the phoenix made the charge. The halbers failr the terror test and got run down by the pheonix, leaving him one inch in front of the archer block, who were in the back corner. They shot the phoenix the next round, failing to wound due to ward saves and few hits.  His big block of spearmen got dropped to 20 from 50 by fiery convocation while my spearmen failed to charge them. The sword-masters turned to receive the knight charge coming, and went narrow.

His archers failed their terror check against the phoenix, who chased them off the board. He got back just in time to join in on the finally successful charge against the peasant spearmen, who ran after losing combat and were run down.

As that went on, the seven man knight bus, hit the swordmasters, and lost three riders right off the bat and killing two sword masters in return. They ran from combat, but out-paced the swordmasters by an inch. On the ensuing charge, they died to a man, leaving only the character, who had a wound remaining.

A huge difference in the game was my MVP, his artillery die. Between two trebuchets, in six turns, he rolled six misfires, losing a turn on two of them and had one blow itself up on turn five. So out of eleven tries in shooting, over half were misfires and he lost two shots. Of the three shots that went off normally, he killed a BT and took a wound off another. He had a character with a wound left, and a trebuchet with two. Due to the scenario rules, I got half points for each of those. He killed the reavers and two and a half BTs, and half the spearmen and both eagles. My lvl 2 caster also lost a wound due to a miscast, so he got half for that. VPs ended at about 2250 to about 650

The final tally ended up 20-5 as I got all the bonus points. This was my most lopsided win, but that wasn't what made it my favorite game. Chad's attitude was infectious, and we had a great time agonizing over or celebrating every misfire, miscast, missed shot, crazy save, improbable hit, or crazy dice roll that screwed one of us and helped the other. It was also the only game that by the end of turn four I wasn't sure how it would turn out. Had one of his comets blown up at a better time and weakened my spearmen even more, or had his halberds, pegasus knights, and archers not failed leadership checks and been run down/off the board,  had he not misfired 6 times and blown up one of his own artillery pieces, or had I not rolled so well when shooting at his general, this game would have taken a very different turn.

Things to work on:
1) Paying better attention to how I lose. I seem to be good about knowing how I won, but not how I lost.
2) I need to add some more HTH punch to the list.
3) I need a plan for when shooting fails.
4) I need to start painting earlier.
5) I need to upgrade my painting skills.

So the Deed is Done...Mostly

I'm not going to say my high elf army is finished, however it is as done as it will be for Bayou Battles. The last two units need a little touching up, the banners need their final images, and the movement trays are only base-coated.

What matters is that I won't be going to BB with unpainted models. I'll post a photo tomorrow.

The Deed is Done

My list for Bayou Battles is submitted. Swedish comp 1.13 says it's a pretty rough list. I don't know. I think I may be calling it suspect because it's my list and I have a pretty poor track record at GTs. I am betting I'll be getting fed to the lions in round one. I hope to beat last year's performance, at least, which shouldn't be too tough since I don't remember winning a game last year. (Just checked. I didn't.)

As it is, I'm really looking forward to the event. I'm just way behind on painting for a number of reasons. I'm committed to this army, but I am not sure I'll get it done on time.

When Geekdomes Collide

One of my other hobbies, which consumed much of my life for the last 20+ years has been historic fencing. Through that organization, I also got to continue my interest in archery that began in college and was furthered for a number of years instructing archery in day-camps during the summer.

I FINALLY got to start applying paint to my elves this afternoon. I started with the archers and, to my amusement, I found myself wanting to correct their form and advise them that wearing shirts with big sleeves would risk interfering with their bow strings. Then, of course, I found myself thinking, "But they've been doing this hundreds of years, so maybe they know something about form I don't..."

Progress with Kit-Bashing

My skills in molding and customizing models are not even what I'd call developing. I did a little minor kit bashing for my elves, though.

On the right is an elf spearman. On the left is a spearman I made using the body and legs from some old dark elves I had left over from an attempt at a DE warband for Mordheim. Some extra spearman bits and some trimming of the shoulder armor, and he looks the part.

The kneeling legs, bow, and right arm are extras from the HE archers box. The head is an extra from the spearmen set, and the body is another DE torso.

This guy was originally intended for a D&D campaign, but I was able to add a HE banner and put a sword hilt on the scabbard to make up for the one that went with the hand that was holding it to make room for the banner. Hopefully I'll have a fairly unique BSB.

The Good, Bad, and Ugly of the Weekend

Don't get me wrong Bayou Battles was great. I loved it and plan on going next year.

The Good:
The people running it are awesome. Despite losing all five games, I still had a great time in all five games. I didn't witness any bad behavior, There were more FANTASTIC looking armies than I've ever seen before.

The Bad:
Hangovers on Sunday morning. Spending so much time getting your army painted you have never played that list or one like it before. It would have helped me in my first two games. The fourth scenario drastically penalizes slow armies and drastically benefits fast armies. Still nearly pulled out a draw, but it was a lot harder because my opponent nabbed all three objectives on turn 1.

The Ugly:
Being on a low carb diet while there. There is barely time for fast food for lunch, and we went to a Cajun place for dinner. Bad choice on my part, but I'm going back next year when I'm not on a low carb diet. Using Diet DP for a mixer late at night means I'm drunk and wide awake. better drink choice next time. Finally, seeing all these GORGEOUS armies makes me want to start a new one. NO! I've even planned out the  models I need. NO! I've got this great idea for a theme. NO!

What I really need to do is pretty up the TKs get to work repainting my Black Templars. They were my first army when I first started painting. I've stripped a bunch of them and plan on getting back to work on them soon. NO NEW ARMY...yet.

The Pillaging of Houston!

Okay, not so much pillaging, but when you go 0-5, you usually don't come home with loot from a tournament.

We arrived Friday evening, and before he broke out his paints to finish his ogres, and even before we cracked open the booze, Tom brought out the "care packages" sent by his wife. She even attached cards to identify them.

Just for showing up, we all got a "Bayou Battles X" pint glass. Andrew and I were drinking out of ours that night, while Tom finished his Ogres. He picked his up in the morning. I won a door prize as well, which I totally need!

In my first game I played Xavier, from the Wargamers of Arkansas. They gave their opponents beer mugs containing candy, salt and lime, and the following message. "An offering to a worthy opponent in anticipation of a battle well fought. May your death on the field be both glorious, and bold. ~ Compliments of WAR ~" Sadly, I'm on a low carb diet, so Tom and Andrew helped me out with the candy, and I'm drinking diet soda out of it instead of beer. For now. I can not say enough how much this meant to me as a show of sportsmanship and camaraderie. I am totally stealing the idea.

I'm not saying HOW a foam dart from someone's (Andrew) gun ended up behind the dresser with the TV on it, but in spelunking under the dresser to retrieve it, I found the dark fellow on the right and the barrel of TNT. At first glance, we thought he was a ninja, and were confused about how a ninja was going to remain stealthy using a barrel of TNT. More spelunking for the rogue dart uncovered the fellow on the left making us think, "Cool! A ninja AND a Pirate WITH DYNAMITE! You just can't beat that." Then we started paying attention and realized that the ninja was, in fact, a pirate, and while pirates with dynamite are cool and all, they are not as cool as pirates AND ninjas with dynamite.