Blog #3 - Rant - How Long Until We Should Buy?

Some of you might be having a problem with this, i dont know, but right now im going through it. How long should we look over and research the new army you want to get before you start to devote money to it? I have been doing serious research in my new Doom Eagles Space Marine army, and its been weeks, and i still dont feel completely confident in what im doing. The main reason(at least for me) is making a list that is both extremely lethal, while still having every unit i could ever want from that army(or at least what i can afford at the time, which would mean expanding later, but thats for another day). The balance is sometimes hard to find, since although it would be awesome for your dream unit to have everything you can give it, it probably wont be too effective, depending on what unit it is. Since im typing this on my phone, i will need to wait and post my army list later, but i constantly feel myself getting closer to that balance.

Now comes another question we need to ask ourselves: how important is proxying your army before the buy? Do you even feel the need to proxy? This is also be a decision to make, and it mostly depends on your experiance. If, for example, you have played eldar many times over, with quite a bit of variation between the armies. You would have more knowledge of how eldar units work than if youve only played one or 2 games against them. This is where proxying would be a safe option to take, just in case you dont enjoy playing with your army on the tabletop. Play with friends mostly, since they will(most likely) be the most willing to let you. Thats not to say that anyone at your LGS wouldnt be willing to, just the opposite; i rarely meet a player that isnt really kind, a reason why i love this hobby so much.

I can tell that this is going to go on for a long time, so im gonna cut this off for now and continue later. So until then!

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Blog #2 - Rant - Tau EMP Grenades: Worth It?

Now, I started the game with Tau, so they are pretty close to my heart, and I thought I'd talk about a piece of wargear that I always found interesting: EMP grenades. With the way the Tau fight, I've always questioned why this upgrade was put in the codex in the first place. When would you need anti-tank assault grenades on your Fire Warriors or Pathfinders? I'm gonna go through some numbers and look at the possibility of fielding EMP grenades in a game.

The first unit this upgrade can be given to is the good old Fire Warrior. Lets start with a small squad of 6 in a basic Devilfish. Thats 168 points, and with it you have a small scoring unit in an AV12 transport. This is a unit normally designed to be anti-infantry, and to hold objectives, so to attempt to use the grenades would be putting this unit far out of its norm, and put it in pretty serious danger. Besides, even if you're only going to use it for anti-tank purposes, your only going to take out one vehicle at the most, since they are going to get assaulted or shot to death. Plus, in terms of anti-tank, you can get 2 Broadsides for about 20 Points cheaper. So that won't work.

Now, lets move on to another unit that could make more sense: Pathfinders. Despite being more expensive to start out, you do get scouts, so you can come in and take out any pesky artillery piece(a lot of IG vehicles come to mind, whirlwinds, maybe predators, other hammerheads, maybe fire prisms if you can hit it before it zooms off) you might see out on the table. Once they have done their job there, you can move on to using your invaluable markerlights. A good size squad (I'm gonna say 6, not too small, not too big for Pathfinders) with a basic Devilfish will run you 170 points. Only 2 points more than the Fire Warrior squad, and you lose scoring, but you do get markerlights which are, as I said, invaluable to your army. You still only have a 4+ save, so watch out for any heavy weapons, and stay in your transport as long as you need to. Once again, if used strictly for tank hunting, the same cautions apply as the above Fire Warriors, and Broadsides would be a better option.

So, to sum everything up, EMP grenades won't justify having anti-tank assault units, Crisis suits fitted with Fusion Blasters or Piranhas with Fusion Blasters will do better for close-range anti-tank power. If you have the spare points to just throw some into a unit, go for it, but you probably have better things to put your points into.

Blog #1 - Rant - How do You Get Over Painting Procrastination?

I might as well start my blog with something that has really been bothering me for a while: How do you stop your painting procrastination? Why do we get it in the first place?

I guess we start with the basic question: Why do we get it in the first place? If your like me, then you're not very good at painting, but you find it pretty fun. So why does the desire to paint go down in the first place? Is it simply because of being busy in real life you'd rather do something other than paint in your precious spare time? Or is it because your not completely confident in your choice of paint scheme? It's truly a strange thing to explain, but nevertheless, we still need to get rid of it.

So that brings me to the second part of this curious equation: How to stop this laziness. Well, some people probably have a lot of different ways to do it, but I'm going to start with some basic ideas. First off, try to bribe yourself. Let you get yourself something, or be able to do something. For example, maybe after you paint all of your current models(depending on how many you need to paint), you can finally use your saved up cash to start another army you've seriously been wanting to get for months. Or you can sign up for a competition that requires all your models be painted. That would really get you into it.

Or, you could look at the small details of your painting area: it could make a BIG difference. So, walk into your painting area/room/whatever, and ask yourself these questions:

• Can I get easily distracted from outside sources while working in here?
• Is the chair I sit in to paint comfortable?
• Are there any lighting/noise/etc. sources that are annoying?

After that, it's time to check out what you do when you paint. Do you have a TV on? This could be a source of either distraction or relaxation, make sure its on a channel that you find interesting, but not to the point where you have to watch it all the time, and only paint during commercials, that could make you rush, which could ruin the quality of your models, or just stop painting completely to watch your show. Second thing to ask yourself is: what am I listening to? Music can also be a large portion of your ability to focus and enjoy painting. Any rock or rap is always distracting, and whenever I listen to my favorite podcasts I always find myself focusing on listening to it instead of actually painting. The only music I find relaxing that helps me focus is Gregorian Chant. Not a lot of words to listen to, nothing insanely loud or intense to distract you, just turn it on and start painting.

That about does it for this rant, if I ever think of anything else I continue it in another post, but for now, I'm gonna find something else to talk about. Until then!