Fire Prism Progress III

Was going to call it quits on the fire prism but wanted to fix the bleeding while I was in a painting frame of mind.  Got to say I'm happy with the way it is turning out.

Fire Prism Progress II

Worked some more on the Fire Prism.  The masking tape did not work as well as I had hoped.  I still have to layer some paint on the blue armor plates so I will have to be extra careful when painting around the stripes.  Don't think I'll try masking the yellow off in case the blue bleeds into the yellow stripes.  The yellow itself turned out well.  3-4 layers of iyanden, 3 layers of golden yellow and 4 layers of sunburst all watered down and applied in thing layers.  The under undercarriage I sprayed with white primer, then painted deneb stone.  There is a wash of sepia applied as well.  Going to add the next layer with bleached bone.

As for fixing the yellow stripes, because I used so much paint on my yellow layers there is a bit of a ridge. If I'm careful I'm hoping the ridge will prevent blue paint from spilling over and maintain my straight edge. Here is a photo from the side.

Fire Prism Progress

Worked on my Fire Prism and have a solid base coat down.  I think I messed up though by taping of the wings for the yellow stripes.  After getting down about three - four watered down coats of Iyanden yellow, I realized I should have finished layering blue on the armour plates to make sure I had straight lines.  Hopefully I don't have any bleeding when I take the tape off.  the next step is to give a wash of sepia on the yellow bits then another light coat of Iyanden.  After the paint dries I'll start layering up to sunburst yellow.

Not sure how to approach the undercarriage.  I think I'm going to try and go with some for of layering to achieve a brownish wraithbone colour.  I'll finish the top plate and turret first any way before I begin the bottom plate.

I've settled on finishing up painting a thousand points of Eldar.  I'm so close.  This is the list that I have on que on my painting table.

HQ:
Farseer - Singing Spear, RoW, Guide

Troops:
10 Storm Guardians - Warlock, Embolden, Singing Spear, Wave Serpent, EML, Stone
10 Dire Avengers - Exarch, Blade Storm, Dual Catapults, Wave Serpent, EML, Stone

Elite:
5 Fire Dragons - Wave Serpent, EML, Stone

Heavy:
1 Fire Prism - Holo-Field, Stone

Total Points: 1K

31 models

2 singing spear

3 twin linked EML’s

7 meltaguns

Fire Prism pie plate

32 bladestorm shots.

4 tanks

Tactically speaking, the Farseer's guide is handy as I can effectively twin link a set of weapons.  Plus the RoW will shut down enemy psychics.  The Wave serpents EML’s have a 48 inch range so they can sleuth around the table trying to stay out of range and pop transports to slow the enemy down.  The Fire Prism has a 60 inch range and will follow closely to the farseer.  Blade storm for anti-infantry as well as the large pie plate from the fire prism.  Anti-transports with EML’s and fusion guns.  Hand to hand the list suffers. 

As for the painting, I’m not happy with the way the models look right now.  I like the paint scheme but the models cold do with a face lift.  Not sure how to approach painting though.  Practically speaking, I should finish painting my four tanks first.  That way on the table top the army looks complete at 1k (until any units disembark).  

Order of painting:

1)     Fire Prism – I need to get this model done first as it is in the most pieces.  Once it is complete I will not have loose pieces of plastic tumbling all over the table top.

2)      Avenger Wave Serpent – This tank is nearly done.

3)      Guardian Wave Serpent – This tank is about ½ completely painted

4)      Fire Dragon wave serpent – Round it out with this tank that only has the base coat on.

5)      Finish my farseer and seal it.  The paint is chipping so I need to get it repaired/finished and sealed up.

6)      Guardians – need work done on their arms and weapons (unpainted) plus bases and touch ups.

7)      Dire Avengers – I want to give these guys a major face lift.

8)      Fire Dragons – I have my old ones with a crappy paint job that will do for now.  When the rest of the army is completed I will go back and paint my 5 new style from scratch.  Also, if the new resin models continue to replace the metal ones I might pick up a box of them so that my entire list is plastic but for the HQ.

Dual Autarch Reserve 2k

After thinking about it some more what about the following list at 2k?

HQ:
(2) Autarch's - fusion gun

Elite:
(2) 5 Dragons - wave serpent, twin linked shuriken cannons, under slung shuriken cannon, stone

Troops:
(6) 5 Avengers - wave serpent, twin linked shuriken cannons, under slung shuriken cannon, stone

Heavy:
(3x3) Warwalkers - shuriken cannons

Total Points: 2k

Total strength 4 shots a turn: 30
Total strength 6 shots a turn: 102
Total strength 8 melta a turn: 12
Total scoring units: 6
Total armor 12/12/10: 8
Total armor 10/10/10: 9
Total kill point count: 21

The idea is the same as before, opt to go second and reserve everything (the warwalkers outflank).  Bottom of turn two 5/6's of the Eldar war host is statistically on the table.  The warwalkers provide nice rear armor shots and allow me to manipulate the opponents deployment.  Against land raiders where rear armor means nothing I have 4 bundles of melta gun shots.  Once the Autarchs use their reserve role modifier they (and the dragons) become suicide units.  My wave serpents will be split into two groups coming in on both flanks.  The idea is to coral the opponent into the middle allowing me room to maneuverer on the edges of the board thereby protecting the rear armour of the wave serpents.  I've tried to implement the MSU concept allowing me to split my torrent of strength 6 fire across the board.  

I think this list would do well in the meta of todays game.  Sure it lacks RoW however, 102 potential strength 6 shots a turn makes up for this.  Looking at the way the Grey Knight lists have been developing (strength 6 and 8 spam) I figure the Eldar could do it better.  This list is very manuverable and fast.  The only army that I consider has more manourerbility would be the Dark Eldar; however, Dark Eldar cannot produce the durability of Eldar mech spam.

I don't have the models though.  As it stands I have 4 wave serpents and 3 warwalkers.  Not sure I want to invest in buying 4 more wave serpents and 6 more warwalkers...

1850 Tournament List II

Just fooling around with army builder before work.  I was thinking the following dual Autarch reserve list might work at being competitive:

HQ:
(2) Autarch: Fusion Gun

Troops"
(6) 5 man Avenger Squads: Wave Serpent, stones, Twin Linked Shuriken Cannons, under slung Shuriken Cannon

Elite:
(3) 5 man Dragon Squads: Wave Serpent, stones, Twin Linked Shuriken Cannons, under slung Shuriken Cannon

Total Points: 1840

6 Scoring Units
54 Strength 6 shots a turn
17 melta guns
9 wave serpents (AV 12/12/10)

The idea would be to place everything in reserve and opt to take turn two.  That way the army can reliable come in on the bottom of turn two (2+ reserve roll) and deny the opponent two turns of shooting.  The list suffers from lack of runes of warding.

Back on the Eldar train...

I think its time I put my money where my mouth is.  Back on the Eldar wagon and I'm confident I can take on Grey Knights.  As far as I'm concerned they are over priced vanilla marines when my runes of warding hit the table.  I've got two lists: 1k and 1.85k

1000 points

HQ:
Farseer - Row, Singing Spear, RoWard, RoWit, Doom

Troops:
10 Avengers - Wave Serpent, Stones, EML
10 Storm Guardians - Wave Serpent, 2 Flamers, Stones, EML

Elite:
5 Dragons - Wave Serpent, Shuriken Cannons, Stones

Heavy:
2 Fire Prism's

1850 points

HQ:

Eldrad

Elite:

5 Dragons + 1 Exarch – wave serpent, cannon, stones, fire pike, crack shot

9 Scorpions + 1 Exarch – power claw, wave serpent, cannon, stones

Troops:

9 Avengers + 1 Exarch – dual catapults, bladestorm, wave serpent, EML, stones

10 Storm Guardians + 1 Warlock – 2 flamers, destructor, wave serpent, EML, stones

5 Avengers

Heavy:

2 Fire Prisms – holo-field, stones

1 Falcon – holo-field, stones, EML

Total Points: 1840 (not surehow to spend the last 10 points)

Infantry: 43 models

Tanks: 7 models

This army is over ½ painted, I need to paint 17 infantry and finish my tanks.  While I've built my Flesh Tearer's army, I've nearly painted my Eldar army.  

My game plan is to put the two fireprisms in my corners and divide the rest of the army into two groups on each flank.  If I get first turn I use Eldrads divination power to move one group of the tanks to the other flank and pounce on the enemies week side.  I want to replace the scorpions with banshees at some point though (for fleet and power weapon attacks).  If I get second turn so be it I will turbo to one side and still refuse a flank.  Eldrad goes in the falcon and fortunes it.  The falcon then is surrounded by three  wave serpents preventing melta attacks.  That way Eldrad is in one of the toughest tanks in the game shutting down psychic powers and giving me force multipliers. 

To take it up to 2k I think I would add a fortune farseer (so three tanks can be fortuned a turn) fill out the dragon squad.  The major weakness is the lack of anti-tank.

Wraithseer Built

I put a little more work in on the Wraithseer and gave it a D-Cannon and added a few more bits and bobs.  The next step after the glue has dried is to base and prime.  I've been fooling around with some lists to try out my new model.  I want to make sure I include a 10 strong squad of Wraithguard as a troop unit as well.  They eat up a ton of points though so the list needs to be built around them and the Wraithseer (and likely another Wraithlord).  I also think that the Wraithguard would pair up well with Harlequins though I only have five models and I'm terrified of trying to paint them...  I think Scorpions might also work by walking behind the Wraithguard up the table.  Ultimately I really have no idea how to build a list around the Wraithguard and Wraithseer.  I think I'll spend some time scouring some internet forums for some ideas and play test some lists (time willing).

Counts as Wraithseer

I tried my hand at building a Wraithseer.  I found the head going through an old bitz box from way back when: its the head from a warlock titan.  Its the first time I've attempted to use green stuff.  I definitely need to work on that skill set.  Anyway, I'm going to proxy this model as a Wraithseer and try my hand at some of the new forgeworld rules.  As an aside I'm looking forward to IA11 and the attention that is coming the Eldarway.  So next Thursday I'm going to try out the following list:

HQ:
Farseer - RoW, Fortune
Wraithseer - D-Cannon

Troops:
10 Wraithguard - Spirit Seer, Conceal
6 Rangers

Heavy:
Wraithlord - EML, Brightlance

A very unbalanced list but I want to see if a full squad of Wraithguard are anymore durable with a Wraithseer along for the ride.  Just going to walk the list forward and see how much punishment it will take before crumbling.  Also want to see how a mobile D-Cannon plays out.  Over all 235 points a hefty toll to pay for an HQ that does not fulfill the HQ requirement.  One thing is for sure, I hope I don't run into a Grey Knight list that one shots the Wraithseer with a nemesis weapon.  I'll get a battle report together in any event.  As for the Flesh Tearer's, I've got a couple of games in the last week.  Both losses, but I'm coming to grips with what the list can and cannot do.

1850 Flesh Tearers Assembled

I've been wanting to get some bigger point games in and have come up with the following 1850 list.

HQ:

Seth

Librarian – Fear the Darkness, Shield

Honour squad – chapter banner, 2 melta guns, power sword, rhino

Troops:

10 man tac squad – missile launcher, meltagun, powerfist, rhino

10 man assault squad – 2 meltaguns, powerfist, rhino

5 man assault squad – melta gun, twin linked las cannon

5 man death company – power fist

1 death company dreadnought

Fast

2 Baal Predators – assault cannons

Heavy:

Storm Raven – extra armour, plasma cannons, multimelta

So keeping with the flesh tearer theme it’s got Seth.  The general game plan is to start the storm raven in reserve if I get second turn.  Death company and dreadnought are in the raven.  The tac squad will be split into 2 5 man squads with the missile launcher sitting on my board side providing support fire.  The 5 man assault squad does the same and stays on my board edge to provide support fire.  Seth and crew, the full assault squad and the 5 man tac squad (with meltagun and powerfist) push forward in a group.  They get the feal no pain and 5++ cover save bubbles.  The librarian rides with the tac squad.  Each rhino has two very good weapons shooting from the hatch each turn (5 melta guns and the librarians fear the darkness power).  I will only disembark to counter assault or if my rhinos get popped.  The Baal preds will scout each flank and go for side armour shots. 

Over all the list has 4 scoring units very good anti-infantry, some deadly assault elements but light on long range anti-armour.  Up close the army has sufficient tools to deal with armour and ultimately that is how I want to play the list.  I think it will have trouble against grey knights (as I have to get into assault range to use my meltas), however the death company dread and the twin linked plasma cannons will provide some nice options to use against grey knight terminators.

I’ve tried to incorporate the 4+2 build from yes the truth hurts.  The big problem though is that my death company takes up 2 of my forward slots.  Over all I think a fluffy and effective build.  It’s not over the top but has a lot of the elements from the blood angles book that make them unique/good.

To bring this list up to 2k, I think I would add a chaplain and a priest to buff the above list.  The chaplain would ride with the death company and the priest would ride with the razor back assault squad to give them and the combat squad with the missile launcher a feel no pain save.

What do you think?