The Boys in Blue - Squad 1

Well, I have completed squad 1 of my Dire Avengers. Now the boys in blue have arms and guns! I think this picture is one of my favorite out of the set that was taken.

The Eldar Boys in Blue:


Ok, on to the normal pictures. Here is a set from Table Top distance both from the Front and the Side.



And here is a quick shot of the back, showing one of the Avengers with his plasma grenade hanging off his belt.



So that's it for Squad 1. I am considering painting the crests of Squad 2 Black and Green, but have not settled on that yet. Following Squad 2 is the already assembled Exarch, then modeling/painting Exarch #2. Following that I am not sure. I have a unit of Wraith Guard that are already painted but need some basing done. They are in Swordwind colors (good) and painted well. Picked them up from Ebay but they will fit nicely. I will probably base them and then figure out next steps.

I am seriously thinking about taking my Spray Gun to a couple tanks. I have to check my box's, but I believe I have 2 wave serpents and a Falcon to paint up.

Another step along Avenger Road

Ok, I got a little more work done today, yet another stage along the path of completing the Avengers. I added the bone coloring to the tidbits hanging off their belts, and painted the helmet crests grey in anticipation for some Green and White. I also got some primer and a base coat onto the arms. Next steps are washes and highlighting the guns.

Here is a quick picture of the workspace. Very crowded with the arms and guns still on the sprue. In the top right corner you can see a quick and messy base coat on my Exarch's Tau victim.
A closer look at the base coat on the arms. These will get a blue wash, then some black and bone touch up on the guns. Clips will be bone, scope will be bone. I will use some grey to draw out the richer black on the rest of the gun.


A look at the profile. You can see the grey on the crest and some bone on the tidbits in back if you look close enough.

Here is a rear view of some avengers. You can see the bone added.


Quite a funny little tidbit. I was trying to figure out what these two tidbits were and I finally got it. This is an extra clip for the Avenger Catapults.


And something that surprised me, Avengers carry around extra scopes for thier rifles!

And thats it for this afternoon. I am off to pick up the kids and will post more after my next painting sessions.

Dire Avengers Stage 3 plus an Exarch

Another update only a week after the first! Unfortunately its still another month. I feel good today and even though my painting is certainly slow, but its coming along steadily.

Ok, the first set of pictures is my first Dire Avenger Exarch. This is a mod I have been considering for a while and I believe it is going to come out looking good.



And here is a look at the model staged with the Tau held by the neck. I did not stick them together yet, I will do that after painting. The arm holding the Tau is resting against the body.



And a close look at the Tau and arm alone.

Ok, I have gotten more done than just the Exarch model. I also have put down some grey/white/green on the 18 Avengers. Here are some pics.

Squad 1 - From a tabel top view distance.


Squad 2 from a table top view distance.


Here is a close-up

And here is a table top view of both squads from the back.


Another Close-up view of an Avenger.


The Eldar get in their first game!
I also had a combat patrol (400 point) game with my son and his Orc's this weekend. This was my first game of 5th edition and I have some thoughts overall. First, let me post the lists:

Eldar:
10 man Warp Spider Squad
9 Warp Spiders
1 Warp Spider Exarch with 2x death spinner, power blades, withdraw
9 man Dire Avenger Squad
9 Dire Avengers
9 man Dire Avenger Squad
9 Dire Avengers


Orc's
1 Wierdboy
10 Boys
8 boys with Slugga/Choppa
1 boy with Big Shoota
1 Nob with Power claw/Slugga
1 Truck w/ Big Shoota, Grot Rigger, Red Paint Job, Boarding Ramp, Reinforced Ram
10 Boys
8 with Slugga/Choppa
1 with big Shoota
1 Nob with Power claw/Slugga

We played an Annihilation mission, since we both had 3 kill points. It was an overwhelming vistory to the Eldar, but a well fought battle from the Orcs. The game went to the bottom of turn 4.

A couple observations for 5th edition.
1. The missions in the book are built for a 6x4 table with full FOC armies.
2. Wound allocation prior to rolling saves actually helps more than I thought.
3. The new vehicle damage chart is not as bad as I thought.

Let me expand a bit on points 2 and 3. On point 2, there were 2 turns when I unleashed shots on his orc units. I unloaded 18 shots on the an 11 man orc squad from the avengers. 18 shots translated to 13 wounds. 13 wounds were assigned as follows:
8 wounds to Boys
1 wound to Big Shoota
1 wound to Nob
1 wound to Wierdboy
2 more wounds to boys.

This ended up killing 3 boys.

Now I unloaded the spiders on the same unit. 22 shots translated to 19 wounds. 19 wounds were allocated as follows:
5 wounds to Boys
1 wound to Big Shoota
1 wound to Nob
1 wound to Wierdboy
5 wounds to Boys
1 wound to Big Shoota
1 wound to Nob
1 wound to Wierdboy
3 wounds to Boys

Final tally was:
13 Saves to the boys
2 saves to the big shoota
2 saves to the Nob
2 saves to the Wierdboy

End result, Boys, Big shoota, and nob fail thier saves.
Wierdboy makes 1 save and stays alive.

In a similar turn-out in another round of shooting, the Nob of the other squad stayed alive with 1 wound and but ended up running off the table.

Now, regarding my comment 3 about the vehicle tables. I will admit that I was firing on an open topped vehicle so that made better. My death spinners can now penetrate vehicles, even though they get -1 for being an AP - weapon. Overall, my penetrating hits were rolling at -1 on the chart, which means no Explode result, but a Wrecked result was possible. Glancing hits are at the normal -2, so Immobilised was the best I could get. Overall, I think warp spiders will be good for vehicle hunting due to the torrent of fire they can dump out. With Str 6 and 22 shots from a full squad, thats a whole bunch of chances for damage. Then, its just a matter of adding up a lot of Weapon Destroyed and Immobilised results to stack them for a wrecked.