Tale of Only Two Gamers: Empire are here!

I finally sold enough Orcs & Goblins to get my Empire army ordered, at least the beginnings.  I put in this order to the Warstore on Monday and had a box full of goodies on my porch Thursday afternoon.  Awesome.

To get started with the army, I ordered 2 Battallion Boxes(40 State Troops, 20 Handgunners/Crossbowmen, 2  Cannons/Mortars, and 16 Knights(for sale).  I also ordered a Wizard box, a Hellblaster Volley Gun and the new Griffon model, which will be an Amber Wizard on Two Headed Griffon in bigger games.  I just had to have the Griffon, as it is awesome and huge.  I also bought the 8th edition rulebook, a couple army books I am missing from collection and some misc items(mostly Army Painter Tufts and a couple paints and magnets).

I have finalized my 500 pt list and will hopefully make some progress building some this weekend during our first "Monthly Game Day".  So here is the list:

Captain - 60 pts

Warrior Priest - 65 pts

Halberds x 25 with Full Command - 180 pts

Detachment - Handgunners x 10 - 90 pts

Mortar - 100 pts

495 pts

I know I should drop one character and get more dudes, but I purposefully did this so I could get this army together and painted a little quicker.  Our rule of having only painted models during "Tale of Only Two Gamers" will be a tough task if we want to play games this year, haha.  Our current plan is to play our first Fantasy games in August, so I really have to get cranking.  I have about 10-12 weeks, so I'm hoping to get 3-4 models per week painted, which will be tough when I throw in the fact they are all still on sprues.

And I have a small predicament.  I really want to build my Stir River Patrol themed army, easy enough, except I really want to build them as an Undead Stir River Patrol themed army.  I could then use the Core from my Empire army as the core of Skeletons for a Vampire Counts army(which I would really like to have).  This would save me cash for sure and be a cool theme I could carry through two armies.  I think with prices going up, we gamers will need to start coming up with ways to make our money go further, like building an Undead Empire army that doubles as a Vampire Counts army with only a few additional models needed.  So, this means I need to build and convert EVERY model and have painted in 10-12 weeks.  Like I said, tough, especially with 50 hour work weeks, wife, two children(ages 1 and 4), and a garden.

So, what do you think?  Should I just build an Empire army and forget about the VC, or go ahead and convert with Skellie bits(I have plenty of skellie and zombie bits) to make a dual-themed army?  I would love to know what you think about the Undead Empire idea and how you would go about converting these minis.

Tale of Only Two Gamers

In order to kickstart the hobby again for us, reklawsj and I are going to start playing Warhammer Fantasy again.  We haven't played in years, even though we both own a couple huge armies.  We have also decided that a monthly game day is a must.  We are now setting a schedule in advance of the day we will play and game system and points well in advance.  For now, the first couple game days are going to be small games of 40k with some modelling/painting and terrain building.  However, we are both starting to build/paint new armies for 8th edition.

For me, this means I have to get the new rulebook and read a lot.  Also, I pretty much lost interest in my Orcs & Goblins, mainly because they are way to random for me(I have much of it on Ebay now at this LINK).  So, I'm starting a new army.  I have always like Empire, so with the new book and great models I decided to jump in.  We will start playing our first Fantasy, hopefully within a couple months.  We are making self-imposed rules  to only use painted models.  The first game day will be 500 pts with 250 pt increments each month.  I have thoroughly read the Empire book and have decided on a themed army based on the Stir River Patrol.  They are pretty much the Stir River Navy, protecting merchant ships and manning riverside forts.  My first 500 list looks something like this:

Warrior Priest with Great Weapon(in with Halberds)

20 Halberds with Full Command

10 Handgunners as Detachment to above

Mortar or Helblaster

10 Crossbowmen

This is very rough draft so far.  I have no experience with 8th edition or Empire, so hoping to build a solid core in 500 pts and add what I need each month to build nice army.

Reklawsj will be playing his Warriors of Chaos army.  They will be of the mostly Tzeentch variety.  His initial plan is to start with a basic Marauder army and add stronger units with progression, much like a Chaos warband would do in the fluff.  I think this is a great idea and fits what we are going for in the "Tale of Only Two Gamers".

Hopefully, this spur in hobby activity will get this blog kicking again with some actual painting and gaming content, albeit mostly of the Fantasy variety, but with a smattering of 40k, Dreadfleet, Mordheim, Necromunda, Bloodbowl, Warmachine, Hordes, Malifaux and anything else that strikes our fancy that month.

So, this should be the beginning of some good hobby in the future.  I really haven't touched anything hobby related in 6 months, needless to say, I'm getting excited about starting this up.