Good news everyone

Don't call this a comeback. It's more of a rebrand...

I've invented a device that will cause you to
 read this sentence with my voice.

Yes, this place has been awful quiet over the last year. For over a year actually. I managed to get some more important stuff out of the way (the Bar) and so the hobby side of things took a back seat. It turns out the timing was was impeccable: GW released 6th edition 40k and it was appalling. Thankfully I managed to miss out on it almost completely. I did a few tournaments up to November 2012 and didn't bother with it afterwards because it just wasn't up to scratch and wandered off to Warmachine like so many others.

I know that it is a subjective matter (one of my gaming group reckons it was the best edition of 40k they've had) but I reckon there's enough data to back up my theory that it was a terrible edition. Arguably the worst produced. So bad it had to be rewritten less than halfway through its life cycle and the company's stock has bombed as a result of people abandoning ship and spending money elsewhere. Like on Kickstarters that may never arrive...please Kingdom Death, just announce a shipping date. Please. 

But good news is on the horizon: 7th has been released and isn't a complete turkey (from my limited experience), the Space Wolves are on the way and arguably the biggest news for GW in a long time: Tom Kirby will be stepping down. Apparently.

Warhammer Fantasy and Specialist Games stuff up for sale

Who else popped their gaming
cherry with a Specialist Game?

It's only been 6 months since I've last posted here. While I could clean the cobwebs and watch tumbleweed roll past I'm just going to dive straight into it. I've got plenty of Specialist Games stuff lying around my gaff that isn't going to be used in the foreseeable future and I'm looking to pass them onto someone that'll enjoy using them as they'll only spend their time in a box in a wardrobe otherwise.

I've already shifted on some Blood Bowl stuff and now its Necromunda's turn with these Van Saars. There'll be more to follow in the coming days with more Necromunda, Warhammer Fantasy High Elves (lots of them) and Warhammer Quest characters too.

DA Codex Follow-up: No Cypher.

Unlike Tom Cruise, the Dark Angles
are now out of the closet with their new book.

Well I've got my hands on Codex Dark Angels and having flicked through it quickly I've seen that there is no Cypher in the list anywhere. Sorry for getting your hopes up by the way. He does get a mention in the fluff on page 14 but alas he's nowhere to be found in the unit entries. I am disappoint, if I'm honest as it would have been nice to see him but it does leave room for him to appear in White Dwarf in the future. I'll try and make up for this by highlight some of the units in the 'dex.

Looking at some of the unit entries there are some things that jump off the page: 10-man Tactical Squads for 140 points without Special Weapons. I can see a wall of these guys parked in front of a Standard of Devastation to re-roll Morale and Pinning Tests and give them Salvo 2/4 Bolters. Combined with Grim Resolve (Stubborn and not allowed to auto-fail Ld tests) they'll be hard to shift. Even if the Banner is 65 points and has to be given to a Command Squad (Death/Raven/Greenwing variants available) which are at least 100 points to begin with...

New DA Cypher's rules leaked (en Espagnol)

This will be a quick one from me. Pics and rules have finally started to emerge of the units in the DA book and one of them is none other than the dual-pistol-wielding Master of Something, Cypher. I'm glad to see him back in the game, even if I dislike the Dark Angels intently.

It might help if you can speak Spanish but I'll give it a go and type up what I think I can pull from it within the next 5 mins before I go back to lunch. I'll ask Chivite to have a look at it for me.

WS 7 and BS 8 look sweet but I'm wondering why he has S and T 5? It seems a bit much for him and combined with Eternal Warrior and a 2+ save he appears tough as balls.

I don't know what to make of his C'Tan Phase Knife though. I thought it was a shard of some sword belonging to the Primarch...

Of Monsters, Malifaux, Broken Joypads and Boobs

How you could you not like this Spidicules guy?

This is the post that I had before I was sidetracked so I figured I'd try to get this one out before the Kickstarter deadline for Kingdom Death's Monster hits (it has 2 hours left and is at $1.85 million as I type this: edit - 1.86 million; edit - 1.87 million; edit - 1.88 million; edit - 1.89 million).

Most of the lads in Cork will tell you that I've been raving about this for the past month or so and I've managed to drag a few lads into giving it monies (thanks for that James) so there should be a Lantern-fetish gaming scene in place down here by the end of this year. I'm just gutted that I can't get my hands on more stuff (Oh Spidicules, how I adore thee) but I can wait until he hits the shelves to add it to my games. At least you get enough stuff in the box to keep you entertained for a long time.

While I'm waiting for that to arrive I have Malifaux and my Xbox with Dark Souls to keep me entertained. Dark Souls: what a horrendously difficult game.

I owe the National Newspapers of Ireland €1000. Allegedly.

My gold. Mine

I've enjoyed the Christmas break and hopefully you have too. Having lined up an article about the other game systems I'm playing at the moment and how much I hate my xbox, I was completely blown away by something I read online. A friend passed this to me on Facebook and I had to laugh. Eventually.

A solicitor firm in Dublin (McGarr's) have pieced together a brilliant story about how the media (or meedja as they're known in certain parts) have tried to come up with alternative routes of generating money, which ended up with them issuing a demand to a women's domestic violence charity for them to cough up for linking to a newspaper's website a story about their fundraising efforts that had appeared in the print version of said newspaper. I'm not joking: see the link here and feel free to criticise, review or ask questions in the comments below.

So I figured that I'd do my bit and see if I could get them to issue me with a warning. Apparently 26 links to various websites of members of the National Newspapers of Ireland means they'll charge me €1350. Which is £1094 or $1767 at the time of writing thanks to xe.com (I hope they don't charge too). This got me thinking about things that more traditional forms of businesses are doing to keep their profits coming in: see Ruport Murdoch's losing battle with Google (and Chrome and Firefox's Murdoch-block app) and I thought of GW, seeing as they are the biggest of the Titans when it comes to miniature wargaming and some of the many things that they've been doing in, or not doing, in order to keep their shareholders happy.

Blood Angels: Synchronise!

Some of Burkhardt's Blood Angels.
They're much nicer than yours. And mine.

As Duncan will tell you, this article is late. Like, really late. No, it isn't a crude reference to Blood Angels bleeding profusely and suffering from insanity for 5 days a month: nor is about the phenomenon of menstrual synchrony; its about a few blogs that have got together to throw up a few ideas about how 6th edition has affected how they build Blood Angel armies now and how they've changed compared to how they were in 5th. I've just had to deal with the fact that I've been too ill to post recently despite this article being almost entirely complete for two weeks already. I'll add a few ideas to how to build army ideas that the lads have suggested beforehand and things I think will work based on games I've played, such as Allies which the lads have given scant regard to.

Little Dave over at the Red Thirst and Caolán of the Skibb Wargamers and are my co-conspirators in this endeavour, although I hope that a few more heads will contribute their thoughts on how they've rebuilt their BA (or their own armies as is the case with Dan from Tzarkahn40k and his Guard), especially with a return to the scene of an ETC veteran (2007) in the shape of Big Rog (pronounced Roj) recently running a Blood Rodeo list and Burkhardt (such pretty, pretty models) overcoming his distaste for anything random and inefficient. How un-Germanic - it must be the case that he has been here for too long already.