Grubnards at the Da Boyz GT

The 2013 Da Boyz GT is officially over. Before I get into a recap of my weekend I just want to give a shout out to the members of the Da Boyz, Bill (from Beef n' Wing), and people from the Erie(PA) gaming group for volunteering their time and effort for putting on a great event. I've attended the Da Boyz event each year since 2009 and by far this has been the best experience I've had in terms of a smooth running event, the event location, and the players I faced off against on all three days. I'm sure you will be hearing more from the other guys who write for this blog over the course of the week with their experiences and thoughts but let's get started with a brief recap of the event.

The Monks March to War

That's right, the Da Boyz GT kicks off today with the 40k and Fantasy team events. Since each of the blog authors have been busy over the past week trying to finish their armies, touch up their display boards and stocking up on alcohol we decided that we would compile our posts into one blog that sums up our thoughts going into the weekend. We are also planning on posting updates to either this blog and/or our forums page at http://thegrandstrategery.proboards.com/ so be sure to check out the sites periodically as each day progresses. So without wasting any more time, let's see what each monk has to say...

Da Boyz GT: T - 3/2/1 Weeks - Calypso2ts - Prep G1

I had originally planned to write up this Da Boyz GT preparation tournament from 4 weeks ago at Millennium as part of my road to Da Boyz.  A few things stopped me in my tracks though as I started writing.  The first is that my 2 year old took and hid the memory card the photos from the tournament were on.   I have just recently recovered it - she actually recovered it by walking in the room one day and placing it on the table.  The second is that the tournament prompted me to work through some changes to my list in response to the way the list has played over the last two events.  For that reason, I have been busy making preparation for the changes I decided to make.

This tournament was the formal Da Boyz GT preparation tournament as people brought and tuned their armies with 6-7 weeks before the event.   I think it is only fair that - before the GT - I showcase how I arrived at the army I plan to play - mainly so I can effectively second guess myself later.  To this tournament  I brought my previous iteration of Daemons which included:

DaBoyz GT - Crunch Time!

Two weeks from today the team event kicks off DaBoyz GT 2013.  I've been painting as much as I can without totally killing myself.  Here's a small hobby update and some thoughts going into the final push.

Grubnards GT Countdown T-2 Weeks

That's right...the Da Boyz GT is almost upon us and I'm getting pretty excited. This past week was pretty productive as far as working on terrain, my display board, and my army. I was also able to get in another game this past weekend that did not go well for me at all. Since list submissions are due within 6 days I've been busy making some changes to my list that I will cover below. So without any delay, lets looks at last weeks progress....

Grubnards GT Countdown T-3 Weeks

 ... Or less than a month until the GT....

This past week I was able to finish painting my Dark Apostle. All that is left is to add the basing materials and paint the base. I'm pretty happy with how the tattoo of the chaos star on his head turned out. I was also fortunate enough to get in two games with the guy who runs the monthly events at our LGS. Look for my feedback and thoughts on those games farther down in the post. With this being the last week in October I started to categorize what I still need to paint, build, and play test. So without any further delays, lets look at what I did this past week.

Da Boyz GT: T - 4 Weeks - Crispy

     We're a month out from Da Boyz and it's crunch time to get everything finished. On top of that, I'll be heading down to the Warstore Weekend to participate in the Colonial Fantasy GT Optimally, I want to get everything wrapped up over the next week and a half.

     The Colonial has historically been in the spring, but this year they split the event in to 2. The 40K event is still in April, but the Fantasy portion is being run at the Warstore Weekend. With the Colonial moved to the beginning of November, our gaming group didn't think we'd be able to swing 2 GT's in a month (Colonial Nov 1-3 & Da Boyz 22-24). Well, it turns out that there's a lull of activity before the holidays and we all wanted to get a few more games in before the holiday hibernation comes along.

     On the list of things I need to finish, I can cross off the Movement Trays, Trolls, and Night Goblins (see below the fold). Now I'm just down to touch-ups and single models. For single models, I still have a Savage Orc Shaman, and a Night Goblin Shaman. In terms of touch-ups, I'd like to redo the wood parts of a few chariots I have, and maybe even re-paint my Arachnarok.

     Here's a taste of my trolls. Check out below the fold for more Troll pictures, Night Gobbos, Fanatics, and movement trays.

Grubnards GT Countdown T-4 Weeks

switching tracks...

Last week I announced that I was going to switch from the Tau army I had planned to bring to the GT to instead run my Word Bearers army. The more I thought about this decision the more sense it made. I am very familiar with the Chaos codex as I have played it many times over the past year, plus the army is pretty much all painted and has a lot of conversion work and details added to the models. This decision alone gives me plenty of breathing space to add more details to my chaos army plus I gain time to work on terrain and my display board. Over the past few days I started working on my display board for the Word Bearers. So let's take a look at what I have done...

Da Boyz GT: T - 4/5/6 Weeks - Calypso2ts

The inevitable painting countdown is beggining and while I am in better shape than last year, things are starting to get a little tight overall.  The unfortunate part is the really key units I want to use are precisely the ones that need painting (Seekers, Flesh Hounds).

Limited progress on the Seekers so far but I did manage some on the Flesh Hounds.  There is some detailing left in the face, but I am going to leave them as is to get at least a minimum standard on the rest of the Hounds and the Seekers.

Tyranid Spires Pt 1 and DaBoyz GT Tau List

Grubnards GT Countdown T-6 Weeks

This week I thought I would showcase part 1 of the Tyranid Spires terrain that I have been working on for a good part of the past month. This portion of the project was much more difficult than the other terrain pieces since I was working with new material and did not know what to expect. I will be breaking up the project into two part, this week focusing on the initial stages of development and next week I'll wrap it up with the final results. This weekend is also the Da Boyz GT primer being held at Millennium Games and Hobby so I plan on bringing the full set of the Tyranid terrain and see how it holds up before next months GT.

Grubnards GT Countdown T-9 weeks

Da Boyz GT Practice Games

This past weekend I attended the month tournament at Millennium Games along with the other members of The Grand Strategery and co-authors of the Mandulian Chapel. The event format was 1850pts with no comp restrictions but the guys from the Grand Strategery (and the guys from Beef and Wing) decided that we would run our lists using the GT format to test out our lists. Now this would mean that most of our opponents would be playing lists without any restrictions but this would help us see how well our lists would hold up in an all comers format.

As most of you know I would be bringing my Tau. Prior to this weekend I have only had one other game with my Tau since the new codex came out and this was also going to be my first games using the riptide and Missile Pod broadsides so this weekend was going to test my abilities using this army.

Da Boyz GT: T - 10 Weeks - Calypso2ts

This week has been a tough one to get a lot of preparation completed for Da Boyz - with the Fall rounding out and cars that need maintenance, driveways that need repair and other assorted (neglected) home projects I did not get a chance to hit the paintbrush as much as I would have liked.  In spite of that, I made enough time to push forward some significant progress - with the goal towards having the army ready to go by the monthly tournament at Millenium Games.  I had a chance to clean up the basement - and my gaming area - this week with all the other chores so I could snap a shot of my Daemons laid out across the table:

  

DaBoyz GT T - 11 Weeks - hyv3mynd

It's been a boring week on the hobby front as I've been scrambling to assemble and prime the final pieces of my 1850pt GT list.  I was able to finally sit down with a brush and work on the spirit seer's mask.

Da Boyz GT: T - 11 Weeks - Crispy

We’re 11 weeks out from Da Boyz GT and it looks like I’ll be representing the Fantasy side for the blog. This will be my 4^th year at Da Boyz, and 2^nd year playing fantasy. I’m looking to pick up a few more painting points and maybe bump my placement up from last year’s 10^th overall finish. Sadly, my dismal generalship will probably ruin those plans.

Grubnards GT Countdown T-11 weeks

In the theme established by Hyv3Mynd, I will be posting updates of my trials and tribulations as the Da Boyz GT draws near with my army list updates, display board, and terrain building.

For 2013 I will be reviving my Tau army. The Tau were what initially drew me into 40k and I've been collecting them towards the end of 3rd edition but due to a lackluster codex over the past few years I was always hesitant on playing them at a major GT but with the release of the new codex I feel that I want to give them a try this year.

Here is the list that I am currently planning on taking. The only comp restrictions in place for this year is a 0-2 cap on all units except for troops, a maximum of 4 flyers in the army, and only 1 named special character in either the primary OR allies detachment.

Da Boyz GT: T - 11 Weeks - Calypso2ts

Hyv3mynd started up the countdown last week to Da Boyz Gt here.  he may be the only one willing to admit it is so close with all the preparation still required by many of us.  I have been struggling with a list for Da Boyz - which has some light composition requirements.  No more than 4 flyers or flying monstrous creatures and no entry can be replicated more than twice except troops.

Composition requirements have received a lot of flack over the last several years, but I really enjoy playing in the environment that emerges when players are compelled to bring a bit more diversity to their lists.  The list I settled on this year (for now?) for Da Boyz includes:

Gaming, terrain, and theory - oh my!

The last couple of weeks have been a mish-mash of hobby related activities so I figured I would share some of my experiences and thoughts as I get back on track with terrain building and gearing up for the Da Boyz GT in November. Next week I will try to get up a battle report or two with a game I have scheduled with Hyv3mynd for tonight. We are both running lists that we want to test out for the next monthly tournament at Millennium Games and depending on how the games goes I would like to work in a narrative element into the report along with the awesome pictures Hyv3 always takes during the games. But until then here is a brief recap of what I have been doing the last few weeks.