The Beard Bunker

In the immortal words of Britney Spears, “Oops!... I Did It Again.”  This time it wasn’t entirely a surprise.  Unlike my usual approach to these articles, I don’t have a complete army ready to share already, instead I’m taking a more Jeff-like approach and intending to bring you with me on this journey.  I don’t want this project to become all-consuming, so I’m intending to lean on the lessons from my previous armies.   Why I mentioned in our yearly update that I’d been thinking about some Aeldari Corsairs.  There’s a few models in the Aeldari range I’ve always really loved.  The Wraithknight is one, the plane another (and I do love warhammer planes).  So there’s been a constant niggle in my head about finding a way to get a small force of Aeldari together to mostly ally with other Aeldari players, but allow me to knock out a few of my favourite units.  And, yeah, ok, a Wraithknight is not a small commitment, shush you.   So when G...

Nothing speaks to the flexibility of tabletop wargames like mixing in a spot of roleplay and strategic map shenanigans. Having finally gotten to do so as a player rather than as the GM I can confirm that while your mileage may vary, it is, for me, the tits. Four days of having my cake, eating it, and finding another cake in the cupboard. I cannot take you to this magical realm, but this post might just offer a glimpse of it. Perhaps you can find your own way there. Or you might think bloody hell, I'd rather just play a competitive round robin and keep life simple. And hey, look, maybe methodone's your thing. Before I go any further I should probably offer some context. What we did Essentially a weekend-long roleplay campaign (think D&D etc) but where the encounters are fought with 40K armies rather than a band of adventurers. Tom was the GM, Drew and I were the players. It's not a format that lends itself to more than two players without also having more than one GM. ...

Osinell of Craftworld Iybraesil Two years ago I used two of my friends to test the theory that RPGs could be an effective gateway drug for tabletop wargames. You can read the original interview with Becs and Drew-Deece  here , but with the very scientifically rigorous sample size of 2, the answer appears to be yes. Albeit slowly, on account of an actual pandemic . Becs is painting her way through her Delaque gang as I write this. Drew not only painted up a gang to fight in our first  Necromunda  campaign, but also borrowed an undead army to participate in the  Border Princes campaign , and has now painted enough Craftworld Eldar that we've started playing 40K every Sunday (the UK is still very full of plague right now, but she's in our house's bubble). Words cannot express how good it's felt to put minis on terrain and throw dice, but that's by the by. I sat down with Drew to discuss how she's found getting into wargaming, and specifically 9th edition 40K. Her a...

Everyone has those elements of the hobby that are a refreshing favourite. Some bits - no matter how much you want to do them - feel like a chore. Others are just a delight. For me, small warband type things where I can really focus on every individual model as an individual and still play a game at the end. So when I need a bit of a hobby-refresh I tend to reach for this end of the hobby. Inq28 is just perfect for this so despite the fact that I already have an Inq28 warband I just had to plan another. This time it is the warband of one Edythe Hinzer, Ordo Xenos Inquisitor and a bit of a renegade. ...yup, that's more aliens than an Inquisitor should be friends with... I'm going to build the warband up gradually and share them as I finish them each time I need a little pallete cleanser. For each of these I'll talk a little bit about the painting and then introduce the characters as Edythe, her backstory will build up and fill in over these posts. So lets meet these fi...

Hi folks, recently Em and I got the chance to throw down (I don't get to play her nearly enough) and busted out our respective Iyanden Eldar and my Blood Angels. Thinking that the yellow vs the red would make for an attractive game I brought my camera. Here's the results. Enjoy! Blood Angels deploy amongst the gantries. Iyanden take the township and seemingly hunker down and prepare to repel borders Lovely windrider jetbikes, first time I'd seen them in the flesh. So much better than last edition Em's shiny new fire prism sneaks in to take aim at my blameless tanks. The Dark Reapers lock and load atop the tower. Blood Angels bikers, acting as outriders for the tanks advance on the flank. The Fire Prism advances up the ramp to get up the right angle. Seconds later a Razorback was aflame. Guardians spot the incoming bikers and ask the Wraithguard to deal with it. The Wraithguard round the corner and ready their D-Scythes... ...

In March, I declared I was “about to embark upon a campaign which will be a 50-50 mix of wargame and roleplay. Like Hornblower in space, what with BFG always harking back to the Age of Sail.” At the time, several of you asked how I planned to run it. Well, we finished the campaign last month, which means I’m now in a position to look back on the whole thing and share what worked and what fizzled. Mostly it worked… mostly . The final confrontation. Having made a precarious alliance with a band of Eldar refugees, Commodore Ortano's fleet launches an assault on the ork flagship. The problem is that there are so many things I could talk about. I’ve made multiple attempts at writing this post, and all of them have descended into a sprawling ramble. I’m left with no choice but to resort to democracy. Oh how the High Lords of Terra would disapprove. It seems to me that talking about this campaign could be broken down into the following topics. If you’re actuall...