A really fun weekend Overall i thought everything went really quite smoothly, and a big thanks to Steve for organising it. The only real issue i felt was lack of access to decent reasonably priced food and drinks - the stuff put on for the convention was still pretty expensive (£1.70 for a bottle of water, £7 for a rather ropey small portion of food, although the other stuff in the hotel was fine if rather pricey), but overall a good venue - just a shame there isn't more stuff nearby!

So anyway, as to the games themselves:

Game 1: Andy's Biel Tan
Andy was plagued by some key bad activations in this game, and while i had a spate of complete armour save failure at one point, i was steadily stripping away activations over the first 2 turns, and by turn 3 i had a good few extra, which allowed me to destroy the remnants of his BTS, which was handily sitting around near his Blitz, which allowed me to sneak a rather cheeky 4-0 win in turn 3 for a full 32-0. With a couple of better activation rolls things could have been very different though, as even though Andy kept winning first turn, he seemed to consistently fail to then manage to actually activate the key unit he needed to get back into the game, the worst being his BTS on turn 2, whose failure to activate really did cost him the game.

Game 2: Dave T's Marines
An interesting game, and pretty cagey for most of it. I worked on destroying activations over the first couple of turns again, while Dave worked on gutting my AA. He had some trouble turn 2 however when his Landing craft got into a bit of trouble, and got broken, along with a unit of predators he'd sent to take my blitz, after he made a play to kill off a nearby stormserpent - which then of course drove over and dropped off a unit of Wraithguard to deal with them. With my blitz secured i was able to focus on his BTS and blitz, and again with out-activating in turn 3 i was able to get positioned in turn 3 for a run on both the blitz and killed the bts - although it was somewhat brown pants time after Dave almost took down the fully loaded Vampire that was sending in the assault unit. An exceedingly surprising 3-0 win turn 3.

Game 3 - Mike T (Ulani)
Ironically this was the one game that i was really confident of winning, what with my Iyanden being fully loaded with hot macro death. Mike played a superb game, and after some epic failed engages from the Wraithguards, i just couldn't take out sufficient units, and was constantly plagued by bloody gryphons and shadowswords. Still, by the end of turn 4 both our armies were looking worse for wear, and despite by best efforts, a lone basilisk which had managed a cheeky rally on the previous turn managed to march over into my half of the board and contest an objective to keep the game to a draw. I was really impressed by the demolisher tanks and gryphons, and if i ever do manage to get my Ulani army painted i'll definitely be looking at more than just a bunch of standard russ tanks! Mike also had the distinction of being the only person to manage to kill my BTS throughout the event, after a cheeky crit on turn 1, and then a shadowsword fwooming the other one in one shot on turn 3. The shadowfieldless one then had the misfortune to be killed by some fighters after another fail from my AA. Poor little Revenants...

Game 4: Mark's Marines
The final game of the event, and Mark rocked up with a Warlord titan no less! I spent the game trying to avoid it and focus on his smaller units, going for the activation advantage for turn 3, and getting rid of his AA, and it paid off again - while i couldn't quite keep him out of my half of the board, i did at least mange all 3 objectives and his blitz for a nice 2-0 win on turn 3. Oh, and where my armour saves were a bit ropey in the first and third games, they were completely ridiculous in this game. I must have made almost 14 saves in a row at one point, which was a real problem for Mark in some key engagements.

I rather liked the 4 games over 2 days format, certainly made it rather nice and relaxed, and it was nice to have at least some time to look around all the trade stores, it was just a shame that we were pretty much playing for the same time period that they were open. I am however really looking forward to the Britcon marathon in a few months time!

I had a great time this last weekend at Expo. Four tough games and a good night putting the world to right again. Venue brilliant, accommodation brilliant, cost of food or any type of drink dreadful and stopped me from buying more toy soldiers.

I’m not sure if I’ll take two Hydraphants and two Dominatrix in the same army again. As with those a Harridan, two Nest Swarms and a Hierodule made the list very war engine heavy but activation and shooting light which cost me in the end.

First game was a loss to Simon’s Iyanden, then I sneaked a win against Alex’s Nids in a game which he was winning but just lost at the end of the fourth turn.

Second day I had a go against Kev and his three Decimators – always a tough game and we fought each other to a dead draw. Final game was against Mike and his Ulani this was tough as Mike’s Shadowswords and his Executioners/Demolishers were frightening and happily taking chunks out of my Doms and ‘Phants. Numbers and winning strategy rolls helped me scrape a 2:1 victory in the fourth turn.

Thanks to every one for a great weekend and see you for the next one.

Anytime Steve, I think it was the two hour massage in the spa that put me in such a relaxed and generous mood. Next year we'd be honoured to be equally generous :-) (massage dependant).

We should have some pretty rocking boxed sets for you next year too...

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Tom Webb
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Just to clarify, I didn't spend Expo massaging Tom

Full results now up
http://epic-uk.co.uk/ukepicachampionship/t5c.php?tid=62

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NetEA NetERC Human Lists Chair
NetEA Chaos + Black Legion Champion

.

Maybe next year.

_________________
Tom Webb
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I don't know with all the gushing I was doing on the Sunday I'm surprised you didn't drown Tom. Oh love the Behemoth now i just have to work out how I'm going to paint it.

Talking of the Behemoth, Tom - love the colour scheme you have on the one on the Exodus Wars site - could you perhaps post which paints were used on it?

Just to steal the thread, don't forget that there are still 3 tickets available for Britcon for even more 4K goodness. http://britcon2013.eventbrite.co.uk/?ref=ecount#

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@MephistonAG for all sorts of twitter madness

I'll pass this Q straight to the expert...

WMN, wanna field this one?

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Tom Webb
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Super quick rundown:

White spray undercoat, Desert Yellow basecoat. Wash Grypphone Sepia (but try not to overdo it on the armor plates, leaving some of the original Desert Yellow without wash - I try to cover about 50%-60% of a plate) to give it a warm tint. Then pick out all recesses with Devlan Mud wash - The wash will flow in quite nicely, so it is is a lot easier than it sounds. However you do NOT want to wash everything with Devlan mud, or the colour will go too dark and murky. Once dryhighlight with a couple of layers of Desert Yellow/skuyll whjite mixes (depending a bit on the area, I think I've used between 3 and 5 - larger flatter areas need more for a smooth transition)
Paint metal areas with a mix og mithil Silver and chaos black (boltgun metal or similar is probably fine). Drybrush with some mithril silver and wash first with a coat of Devlan Mud and once that is dry, a coat of Chaos Black. Pick out a few edges with a bit of light metal color (perhaps mithril silver with a touch of black in it)

Then pick out the detals. Windows, lights and certain weapons look good with bright contrasting colors like blue, green or red to set the details off from the more natural colors of the armor.
The red/brown heraldric stripes are painted Terracotta, washed with Devlan Mud and highlighted with Ogryn Flesh.

I hope this helps

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Sofa General

Nobody expects the Inquisition!!!
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Superb, thanks for that

I've passed on feedback to Richard who runs Expo - pretty much the same as he has heard from others (expensive food+beer, hot room). They will be happy to have us back next year and I've said we will be back.

Probably sticking to 4 x 4k with a nice long break on Saturday for buying stuff

_________________
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NetEA NetERC Human Lists Chair
NetEA Chaos + Black Legion Champion

This might be the best I've been to yet, thanks largely to the evening beers no doubt. Much cud having been chewed by all.

Game 1 was exactly as Richard described. From my perspective it was a game of nearlies. Nearly but not quite destroying storm serpents, winning strategy with the classic rolling assault lined up but failing to activate. The lowlight, which Richard alluded to, being my BTS failing 2+ to retain on T1, including reroll. Then failing 2+ rally, which meant I failed the activation on T2 (yes, including the reroll again). 5 x 2+ fails in a row must be a record even for me. Lets face it though, it was richard and he played a tight game, I was disappointed in the score but i cant say i deserved to win! Highlight was my night wings running the flak gauntlet to knock a Vampire full of wraithguard out of the sky.

Game 2 basically involved me lining up my army (playing corners), avoiding most of the T1 bombardment and facing off against in my deployment zone. It was a bit of a bloodbath at the beginning to be honest, failing to activate after the spaceship didn't bode well for the marines but they made a fair fist of it (surviving, at least, in the way marines do). I cocked up not realising there were T hawks to come on, I was a bit complacent up to then and went a bit medieval, knowing my teleporters were yet to arrive. In the end we didn't make it to T3 though, so a flat draw it was. Oh, the night wings nixed another full transport.

Game 3 was Alex's Nids. I felt a bit on the back foot here, I don't like being on the defensive. To start I sacrificed some rangers and concentrated of neutralising the biovores, I just find eliminating artillery makes life easier. I probably didn't get the best use of my formations though, as Alex's positioning made it very hard for them to be effective without overexposing themselves. I had a nasty sense of foreboding as the bugs doubled into the middle of the table and I generally hid and took pot shots. Aside from breaking the Dom (which took a bit of a beating). I wasn't sure I'd be able to actually win the assaults needed to prevent myself being overwhelmed. I cocked up the next turn by activating rangers first to deal with lictors instead of the important bits in the middle, and then of course they failed their activation (yep, with the reroll). I think the lictors also failed later on though. I felt much better after I made my play with the swooping hawks on Alex's back line, they made a mess of multiple formations and really split his army on two fronts as he needed to turn a lot of units back to deal with them. Things were poised for an interesting finale but alas we ran out of time, hence another draw.

Game 4 saw me facing mikes emperors children, in not at all familiar with chaos on general and pretty much winged this one. For a change I decided to target the painlord, by the end of T3 it had a couple DC left and a crit but we never did roll to see what happened. I think this game hinged on two things: firstly Alex's unfamiliarity with some tactics and rules (especially skimmers), and second the engagements (namely, I won all of them as I in most cases got to dictate the terms). By the end of T3 I just had too many activations and was able to break most of what was left and move onto the objectives. It ended 4-0 in the third. Watching the painlord unload onto the guardians for the reward of a single blast market can't have been too joyous, and summed it up a bit.

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Coming from London, I found the beers insanely cheap. Plus who doesn't love £12 for a bottle of wine. We got wrecked and have the photos to prove it .

It's my new favourite venue. Who doesn't love a free sauna / steam room / jacuzzi and pool. Hell, one of the EW team (not me alas) even managed to get laid.

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