RIP Pontiac

Just read some sad news: Stricken car manufacturer GM are shutting down their entire Pontiac division. Positioned as a more sporty brand than Chevy, Pontiac produced such cars as the Firebird and the GTO. Some of the later fare was less than spectacular (the Pontiac Grand Prix, to my mind exemplified everything wrong with the US car industry), but they did produce some top cars. I think it's a bit sad, but unfortunately inevitable; there're simply too many car plants and brands in the world at the moment. GM are right to concentrate on the remaining brands, although I personally expected Buick to go first as they sell so few of them. I guess there's just not much difference in market position between Chevy and Pontiac these days. Well, I'll always remember driving down to LA in my rented Pontiac Solstice.

Anyway, here's a picture of a Pontiac Firebird Trans-Am.

Hammertime: The Sequel

***UPDATE***

Played against Tau this evening, 1,000 points annihilation. Scraped a win, despite the school boy error of splitting my force, partly through Lysander's sheer badassery, but also through krak grenades smashing tanks! Woohoo!

Hammertime

So, I'm in the States! Last week was a bit awkward, a series of meetings between The Company and our supplier. All got a bit fraught with emotion. Ho hum, not sure I can really write about that here.

On to more fun stuff! (Warning - this post contains a lot of Warhammer 40K)

Well, I've had a few good games of 40K over the last few days. The hammers have certainly had an impact ( ho, ho, ho), cutting a swathe before them. Three games so far, two wins and a draw - and I think I'm learning just how different the current version of 40K is from the previous.

First up was Vince (an Irish-American, who I make a point of oppressing whenever I see him) and his Imperial Guard. Unfortunately, let's face it, the current (old?) codex is not very competetive. Infantry exploded from Whirlwind barrages, got set on fire by tactical squads, whilst Old Man Telion showed his boys how it's done by blowing up their Basilisk. Lysander and Squad Hammer just strode up the middle hammering things, tanks, infantry, characters, whatever. There was a particularly epic combat where the Terminators, in typically Imperial Fist style, charged a unit of ratlings and routed them off the board (For those that don't play 40K, imagine 8' tall genetically enhanced super-warriors wearing tank armour and wielding giant electro-hammers. Now imagine them fighting Hobbits). Oh yes, songs shall be sung about that battle. Anyway, I had both objectives, Vince had none, cue mock-outraged shouts of how Storm Shields are 'broken'.

Next up was a daft Apocalypse game between Imperial forces and the new Ork Stompa - which is a much nicer kit than the photos make out. Again, if you don't play 40K, imagine a 40' tall robot with chainsaws and cannons for arms - and a beer belly. The first turns consisted of inneffectual fire from Imperials with the Stompa's main guns wiping out whole squads. Fortunately, the Imperial Fists were there to save the day! Despite a Chainsaw the size of a lorry, the Stompa couldn't get through the Storm Shields and the Terminators were safe. The Stompa on the other hand, was detonated in a single blow from the mighty Captain Lysander and his Fist of Dorn Hammer (Three structure points from one hit!) leaving the Stompa in a ruin and the game over.

The final game was 1000 points against an Ork army. An Ork army where over half the points were sunk into a single unit of Nobz warbikers led by Wazdakka Gutzmek. Well, I figured as I'm probably going to face these all the time at tournaments, I may as well get some practice at facing them (Right, 9' tall 'orrible green aliens with giant axes, robot bodies, filled with drugs and riding giant motorbikes equipped with huge machine guns. Oh, and led by a 10' tall green alien with a hydraulic Klaw and armed with a huge ray gun - they're HORRIBLE). Fortunately - and you may be noticing a theme here - Captain Lysander and the Thunder Hammer Terminators were there to soak up the horror. Two-wound models with medics don't like instant kill Thunder Hammers. I lost the Terminators, but Lysander finished them off before hammering a Battle Wagon to shreds. The remaining Orks were no match for the rest of the marines and were roundly slaughtered. Unfortunately, the result was a draw as three pesky Orks remained on the opposing objective, having survived four rounds of shelling. Grr... with another turn, I could have done it. Oh well.

So, to sum up, in three games, Squad Hammer have taken out:

• 25 Guardsmen (including HQ)
• Leman Russ Demolisher tank
• 10 Ratlings
• An Ork Stompa
• Seven Nobs Bikes, including Painboy
• Wazdakka Gutzmek
• An Ork Battle Wagon

In every game, they've killed at least their points value. They're pretty powerful! And I think I've worked out a general tactic with them. It's not very subtle, and it's very similar to the Ork one of loaading the Ork Nobz up on bikes and smashing all before it. But basically, that's pretty much it. You have one or two devestatingly powerful shock units (and the old 'eggs in one basket' issue isn't as important now due to the deimse of victory points) which rampage through the enemy army whilst your horde of Troops choices scuttle to the objectives. I'm not too worried about spending points on making the troops more killy as they're there to hold objectives, although I'm willing to spend points to make them tougher. It seems to be working fine so far! And I plan on taking it one step further by doubling the size of the hammer boys from five to ten. I look forward to seeing how they fare at Vanguard Vanquish in April.

And finally, just to annoy Ben, here's my current rental car. Unfortunately they were all out of Dodge Challengers.

And for those of you who aren't interested in toy soldiers or cars, here's a photo of San Francisco at night.

Can the Department of Homeland Security please not unpack my models this time?

As most of you know, I'm shipping out for the States next week for a fortnight (cue jokes of, "We'll see you in six months then, ho ho ho!") and right now I'm packing the important stuff for the trip.

Yep, I'm packing up my toy soldiers.

Well, there is a tournament in a month's time (Bristol Vanquish , if you're interested http://www.bristolvanguard.co.uk/BV/Vanquish_09.html).

I need to get some painting done for said tournament, and I need to something to do whilst I'm out there, so I might as well take the Fists. I may even get a game or two at GW Stoneridge Mall (or if you're Willard Foxton, GW San Dimas - Wyld Stallyns!).

Anyhow, this is the main thing I'm going to be painting - a squad of Thunder Hammer Terminators.

They're very bad ass, in theory. They'll be led by Captain Hammer himself, Captain Lysander, and most likely the good Dr Octavius. I had considered taking Captain Shrike (modelling a yellow, lightning clawed, jump packed captain and calling him Captain Strike) to make them all super fast Teriminators, but that was by common consent, too bent for words. So, the one man wrecking crew, the unit-in-a-model, the man with eight limbs that is Forgemaster Octavius will be joining Lysander in building bases and smashing aliens.

In other news, I've been cooking more lately. In a terrible bout of middle aged middle classness, Dom, Ben and I have been comparing notes on cookery. Dom did a very nice Normandie Pork chop with apple cider sauce and shallots and some very tasty meatballs in special sauce. Ben and I have been concentrating on Chinese, particularly from Ching-He Huang's book. Here's a picture of my chilli chicken and noodle with spring onion garnish.

I've also done some sweet and sour chicken (sauce made from scratch) for our gaming night on Monday. Everyone said it was good, so either it was, or they're just trying not to hurt my feelings. I choose to believe the former.

Snowmen and other fun

I'd meant to put these up earlier, but through a combination of slackness and other things didn't quite get round to it. The weather's been... unusual lately - just the opportunity for everyone to slack off and frolick in the snow instead of going to work and school. Unfortunately, walking to work these days I didn't have much excuse to stay at home. Although at least one morning I did leave the house and Jason with, "I'm just going outside - I may be some time".

Anyway, Laura came up at the weekend and we built a snowman, which was a lot of fun.



We couldn't exactly agree on what to call him, so as a compromise, he became known as Bob Frosty.

And then Dom forwarded me this photo - no idea where it is, but there's some great ones in there. Check out Ninja snowman (he's camouflaged), alien snowman, and Bert and Ernie Snowmen. Jason now has it as his computer desktop.



Continuing the snowman theme, we have Calvin and Hobbes. On seeing these photos, Jason said, "It's all very Calvin and Hobbes". So I investigated (i.e. I typed Calvin Hobbes Snowman into Google) and came up with these gems:




And finally, a real life version. Which is AWESOME.



ACTUALLY finally, I had to post this as well. Although it's on Youtube, I didn't actually find it there... I found it in a much geekier place...

"Small cars parked in fields fear many things... They fear discovery, they fear retribution, but most of all, they fear the Wrath of the Space Marines!!!"

I had been planning to write a new post this week (I don't update this as often as I should) and it was going to something cheerful and jolly, like playing in snow and with silly models.

But right now I don't feel like it. The father of a good friend of mine has died this week, and I'm sitting here feeling increasingly angry about it. I'm not sure what I'm angry at in particular, but I do know that it shouldn't have happened. I also feel sad that now I shall never get the chance to meet a man I've heard so much about, who sounded so witty, brave and interesting. I find myself wondering how many more are going to be affected by the times we live in.

I'm so sorry for you Will, and all your friends are here for you if you need us. You've got our phone numbers.

Everything is Easier with Four Extra Limbs

As it happened, they didn't all return. One of them never made it to Nottingham. Like a moron, I managed to leave one of the Scouts at home 'guarding' the painting table, necessiating the borrowing of one of Jason's spare Mantis Warrior Scouts. Oops.

Anyway, we had a great time at the 40k Doubles tournament. We finished mid-table, with three wins, a draw and three losses. We also got nominated for best army, but as Willard Foxton correctly predicted, were beaten by Andrew and Nicola's Black Dragons and Witch Hunters. I'm forced to concede that their victory was entirely justified.

In gaming terms, I think we did pretty well given the entirely non-bent army that we took. A good mix of infantry, vehicles and characters. Unlike some armies that were there - common themes were dual Daemon Prince with Lash of Slaanesh, Tyranid monstrous creature armies, and Orks. Lots of Orks. Principally Ork Warbike bosses with nobz bikes that then become a Troops choice, aaargh! Fortunately we didn't meet those. As Jason pointed out, we didn't win enough games to face them (At this point may I apologise to the startled man in the lunch queue who looked somewhat shocked when a complete stranger berated him as 'a total bender' for taking said army). Our army was a lot of fun to use, with the stand out components being:

• Dr. Octavius, Forgemaster of the Imperial Fists. With his four extra robotic arms, mounting claws, flmaethrowers and plasma cutters, he's a whole unit in one model! His ability to build a base also helps.
• Librarian Shimio of the Mantis Warriors. Has the 'Gate of Infinity' power (or teleport to you and me) which he uses to drive what became known as 'The Fun-Vee' ("I'm sorry, this is the Fun-Vee. The Humdrum-Vee is back there"). This was himself, ten more Space Marines and later Dr. Octavius jumping around the board, setting fire to things and generally being rowdy. But with psychic powers.
• The Imperial Fists Whirlwind Artillery tank. No-one really expected this one. Certainly not Owen Rees and his Master of the Ravenwing Landspeeder, which we proceeded to fire missiles at the back of.

Here are some of the highlights of the weekend (I'll post a seperate article featuring the Fists, just for you Will!):

Paul McCabe desperately finishes his army in Bugman's bar on Saturday morning AGAIN. Despite being nominated for best army (along with GW Cribs' Johnny), some of his models were still on the sprue ten mintues before the first game.

The Imperial Fists bravely charge over the top towards the most powerful tank in the game, the Land Raider. Hmm, good luck with that.

In a fortunate bit of desperate rulebook flipping, we found that Jason's Dreadnought was able to clamber on top of the enemy's wrecked tanks, thus saving the Fun-Vee from the terrible Twin Chaos Lords, J'aake and El-Wood.

Andrew, Nicola, Jason and I celebrate after winning the Bugman's Pub Quiz. Hurrah for free drinks!

Our combined army having been nominated for best painted.

Andrew's Witch Hunters

Nicola's Black Dragons.

Will Hayes' and partner's Ork Band.

A very cool Ork Warboss on bike conversion, modelled in a General Grievous style rolling machine thing. Note the Squig being dragged after him.

Owen Rees' slightly bizarre Watcher in the Dark mounted on Cyber-Manticore.

A very cool Apocalypse board (12' x 6') with an Eldar artefact being excavated by gaint diggers and bulldozers behind an Imperial Fortress. The attackers go up hill through a ruined town, taking cover behind wrecked Titans and Baneblade.

A demonic red cow we spotted on our way back from Bugman's to the hotel on Saturday night. Despite being drunk, it turned out be real.

An only slightly less terrifying thought for many of you, I'm sure - Warhammer World's gaming hall, filled with over 250 gamers.

Finally, GW had a display of their old Warhammer sets in cabinets at the front. This one in particular caught our eye. Jason: "Hmmm... He is pretty tragic".