Napoleon Total War

I have always been a fan of the Total War franchise, but in my opinion none of them have been all that great.  Good and fun in most cases, sure.. but great?  Eh not really..  All of them have had their share of issues of which Napoleon TW shares some of them.. NTW is by far the most refined version so far and a lot of fun but, I’m not quite sure it peeks the “great” meter just yet.. I will say its pretty darn good and a lot of fun though..

Totally worth the price as it’s clear to me that Creative Assembly (the developers) are getting better at their craft but the game has one staggering short fall that it shares with all it’s siblings;  Horrible AI.

This is the 6th iteration of the game core concept and the AI is still just dreadful..  I’m pretty sure we could train a monkey to play the game better..  I know AI is very complex and as a programmer myself I’m not sure how to solve this problem, but dang..  The computer is down right bad.   Given enough time you probably could beat any army with just about any force..  It’s actually fun trying to do just that.. heh

In comparison to Empire Total War, it’s immediate predecessor, Napoleon is the clear winner.  The game is much more polished and refined than ETW ever was and it makes me feel like ETW was what NTW was supposed to be, but they ran out of time and money..  I will say that the AI in NTW is better than ETW, but when up is the only possible direction….

I will say this, NTW is beautiful.. There is nothing cooler than watching your line of infantry slowly disappear in a hazy cloud of black powder smoke as a line of enemy advance forward.. Or the small skip gashes that are cut into the scenery as a cannon ball goes whizzing by.. Great stuff..  The level of care and detail there is pretty high..

But the AI is so dumb that the enemy unit of 120 line infantry will happily walk into a line of cannon..  Or horse melee units that charge into the barriers (only to die immediately in droves)..  Or how the diplomacy system is completely pointless..etc..

The AI is the killer.. It’s just not good..

One way they got around that was to introduce the notion of “drop in battles” in which you can, during your single player campaign, enlist a friend (or complete stranger even) to play the part of the enemy during some of the battles.   I will admit.. This was a damn good and innovative idea.. Well done guys..  I love this..

Whats nice about it is that the other player when he’s playing your enemy, or when you’re playing his enemy in his campaign, isn’t really invested in the same way..  So if he loses it’s almost like it’s not a personal loss.. after all its not like you chose the force..etc..   I like it.. this was a good addition to the game..

For the next iteration of the game I hope they go more into the trading, and economy aspects of the game.   I want to be able to set individual tax rates for a single province.. or define whats being traded where..etc..  Right now its fairly limited.. you’re either trading or not.. etc..  I know this game is more about the killin and less about things like trade and diplomacy but I still would like a more rounded game experience in these areas..

All in all… Not “great”.. but pretty damn good and a lot of fun against like minded friends..

Additional;

I really think Games Workshop should get with Creative Assembly and make Warhammer Total War.. Dear god.. talk about two franchises that absolutely belong together..  This engine, plus GW’s IP?!  WIN!!  It would be like chocolate and peanut butter man..

How cool would it be to see a pack of Skaven march into a pack of Witchelves (dead Skaven)..  Or see a bunch of Jezzails take out some Coldone Knights.. etc..  Hot..

I think this is such a good idea I’m going to send them a letter…

I also believe in having multiple armies for your game.. I have two 40k armies; Tau and Orks.  I like them both and am not really looking to change them..   But right now I only really have one fantasy army;  Skaven.  I love my rats, but I want to find another army to play and have been looking for a while..  I tried Ogre’s and I tried Tomb Kings but really didn’t get into them.  I have a lot of TK stuff painted up and I very much like the models and the lore, but for whatever reason the TK army just doesn’t excite me..  The Ogre’s never even got that far..

So I’m back on the hunt and I think I have settled on getting a Daemons of Chaos list going.

I think all of the models are pretty neat, and I like that that its sorta 4 armies in one; one list for each god.  Something that also appeals on a lesser level is the fact that they are the exact same models used in Fantasy and 40k.. So if you have them ready to go in Fantasy, its easy to use them in 40k.  (Just have to solve the bases problem which I’ll get to in a moment.. )

My number one reason for picking this army is because I dig the models.  I am most likely going to go an all Slaanesh army, or if that’s not viable I’ll fill in with Nurgle or Khorne..   I’m going to leave Tzeentch out because it seems it’s what ever one is doing and I like doing things others aren’t..

I really look forward to painting these guys (gals?) up.. I think the Slaanesh models all look pretty cool and should be quite fun to paint.. I know I wont get anywhere near as good results as the professional painters do, but still they look good and should come out okay..

The only issue at this point is that the new core rule book is coming out in July and is rumored to nurf the Daemons down something harsh..  If the current rumors hold true then the DoC army as a whole may be unplayable.. I find that unfortunate, but not enough to dissuade me from getting the army in the first place..

I have also heard tell that half the reason for the new rule book is to correct issues in the DoC army and a couple other newer armies that introduced issues into the game.. It’s really too bad they feel the need to completely rewrite the main rules, instead of just fixing the issue with the individual army..

Fantasy and 40k approved!

The Bases:  So, I listed above that these models can be used in both fantasy and 40k.. that’s pretty cool.. The only issue is that fantasy uses square bases, and 40k uses round bases.  That issue can be complicated further by the fact that 40k bases are one inch in diameter, and fantasy bases are typically 20mm or 25mm square..  So, if you want to use the same models in both games (as opposed to buying the same models twice.. ) then you have to get clever about your bases..

I solved it this way;

1.  I got some washers that are smaller around than both the 40k bases and the fantasy bases you’re going to use.  With the Daemonettes I was in luck, they use  25mm bases so I could get a slightly larger washer than if I was stuck with 20mm bases.  Also make sure the washers have as small a center hole as possible.  The washers I’m using are 7/8 (0.87″) with a 7/32 (0.20″) inner hole, got them at Lowes for $3 or $4 for a hand full..

2. I then assembled the model as I wanted it and glued it to the top of one of the washers — trying very hard not to foul the hole in the washer.

3. I then drilled 4 itty bitty holes in the base and stuck in some of the tiny magnets I have.   I mean it these things are small.. 0.05″ is small man..  4 of them hold the washer down nicely, and are small enough to not cause clustering.. (Where a bunch of magnets jump to one another.. )  Drill all the way through the base with a drill bit slightly smaller than the magnet, and then enlarge it a bit by in and out movements..  This is a tiny hobby drill bit.. Once that’s done, I glued the magnets in from the underside so they wont go anywhere.

4. I then got a dowel from Walmarts hobby area that was the exact fit for the washers..  You can get a bag of like 20 of them for $0.89..   I drilled a whole in the direct center of the base and pushed the dowel through.. I had to be very careful not to split the base.. And I made sure to push the down through the hole a bit so that it touches the table the same time the edges of the base does.  It helps with gluing later.

5.  I then took the thinnest washer I had ( they are varying thicknesses for some odd reason ) and slid it down the dowel until to stuck to the magnets..  Put the dowel in a vice, and used a coping saw to cut the dowel at the washer.  Once that was done I applied glue to the underside, again ensuring that nothing goes anywhere.

6.  And that’s it..  Paint and flock it up.. When you flock the square base you want to make sure that you use an extra washer because it gets kinda nasty.. And when it dries you might have to do some minor surgery to get that washer off.. I had to carefully Xacto around the edges to free it from its flocky jail..

Click the image to see the results.. it works out nicely..  The 40k round bases snaps up in there and only requires a touch of flocking on the top of the dowel.. the fantasy base you see snaps down nicely too almost 100% hiding the washer..

Skaven

I have been a Skaven player since the early 1990′s.  They were the second fantasy army I got into after Orcs & Goblins.  Once I found the blessing of the horned rat however, my love of all things green didn’t last very long..   The Skaven were here to stay!  I love these little guys.. Primarily because back then they were as damaging and deadly to themselves as they were to anyone else..

Later revisions of the Skaven codex very much removed a good portion of the wild and whacky from the army entirely and they sort of became boring.. I stuck with them through all these years but eventually ventured into Tomb Kings just to try something new..  Well with the new Skaven, I’m back baby..

And my opponents are doomed!

Or, well I might be doomed.. It all depends on the dice I suppose..   Either way it promises to be fun!

I really like where they are going with the army.. I mean I know the army is bound to be more powerful than the current armies are simply because it’s the latest army..   That’s just the way of things.. Games Workshop is a company in the business to make money and the way to do that is to make the lastest revision just a smidge better than previous ones so folks will flock to it.. But having said that, I like that they army is back to being quite self destructive..

New Doomwheel

Firstly, they have added the doomwheel back to the roster.. Something they completely omitted from the last book entirely.. Not only did they bring it back in the new book but they released a new model for it and its great!

I still have my old doomwheel model on the shelf where its sat for the last 10 years or so not getting played.. and when I read that the new book would have a doomwheel I blew off the dust getting it ready for play..  Then I saw the new model.. Holy crap.. Yeah okay.. back on the shelf you go.. I’m getting the new on and painting it.. (See image)

Plus it’s all plastic!  Yay!

I remember the day when the metal models were all way more detailed than anything they could come up with in plastic, but those days are long gone.. Give me plastic all the way..  Well it appears GW has heard our pleas and is intending to release all new models for the Skaven..   They have already put out a number of them, with a few more in the wings to come out.

Plus the codex has a bunch of new units that they will have to produce models for sooner or later so I expect even more..

Stormvermin Before and After

The new stormvermin plastic kit is fantastic.. Gone are the days of having to purchase a buttload of individually packed blisters at$15 each just to have a 20 model unit.. The new stormvermin box comes with everything you need to have a fully functional unit of 20 models..

They paint up nicely and the dip method works perfectly on Skaven.  Click the before and after picture to see what I’m talking about.  That model was painted in about 15 minutes.. I did what I can only call a slap/dash job of painting him with basic colors and then performed the magical “dip” at which point he came out looking great.

Add to the mix the WAY over the top new characters and warmachines and you have one powerful army..  I look forward to building a force to play with..  The only down side is it looks like I will have to repurpose all my old models as they aren’t what I would build now..  The up side is, I now have more slaves than I know what to do with..

Wow versus War

I love the Warhammer universe.  I have been an avid player of the various table top miniature games as well as the couple RPG games in the same universe.   So when Warhammer Online came out a year ago, I was stoked!

I figured it would be pure liquid awesome and finally give me a computer version of the game world I have enjoyed playing in for so long.

Of course I was let down quite a bit in that the game was lacking..  but I get ahead of myself.

When I learned that Warhammer online was licensed to Mythic Entertainment, I was less than thrilled. Their only other game of note is Dark Age of Camelot which was a one trick pony (realm versus realm combat) that has no long term play associated with it.. And while the game is still around, it’s just not fun. There is nothing there to keep players like me playing the game.. I just don’t enjoy it nor does it have the massive fan base that it could have if they had bothered to keep innovating.

WoW on the other hand has gobs and gobs of things to do long term as well as lots of mindless achievements and other end game elements to keep players attention.  They are adding new content and new fun things to the game all the time and this is from a guy who really doesn’t like WoW..

When it comes to long term play, WoW is the clear winner. I play it still today and have for a while now. My guild has killed the end game boss (Yogg) many times at this point and is starting to work on getting to the next guy..

I’m playing WAR too at this point, but it’s just not that fun and my interest is waning.. As I played WAR originally (and as I am relearning more recently), I realize it is exactly the same game as DAoC just in a slightly different universe. It suffers the same issues that DAoC did and really brings very little new to the table..

What WAR does wrong:

• The PVE aspects of the game are absolutely horrible.. The questing is painfully linear and just about always forces you to venture into PVP areas even if you don’t want to.
• The zone’s are confusing and poorly laid out which makes navigation with out the flight system near impossible.
• The flight mechanic from zone to zone is long loading and lame — considering that you must use it, it needs an overhaul.
• The models are pretty bad, but the animations are down right dreadful…
• I can go on and on but will leave it be as otherwise this list will be too long…

What WAR does right:

PQ’s, SC’s and PVP.

The public quest system is neat and I wouldn’t be surprised if blizzard “adopts” such a system in the near future.. It’s well thought out and works quite nicely. This I think is likely to be the single innovation that folks will remember WAR for in several years..

So far the majority of the scenarios (SC’s.. Think battlegrounds for you WoW players) are a lot of fun. Again way more so than any of the BG’s in WoW which I find to be tedious and boring.

DAoC’s big plus was the Realm versus Realm thing.. Mythic of course followed that same model in producing WAR and as such their PVP model is excellent. The realm versus realm thing is a lot of fun.. for a while.. it becomes tedious and boring fairly quickly, but still the PVP is very good.

The PVP in WAR is far far far better than what is offered by WoW. Period. Full stop.

The reason for that is how the classes are balanced as well as the fact that blocking is turned on. In WoW it’s perfectly reasonable for a frail clothy to stand toe to toe with a fella in full plate and win. Generally in WoW PVP any one class well played, can defeat any one other class.. What’s the point?

In War, this is unreasonable and usually punished harshly. As a bright wizard (weak clothy) I know that if a tank (guy in plate) charges me I have only a few seconds to react before death.. I better make them count! Each class in the game has a specific function and is only really good at that function!

With blocking turned on (collision detection) the tanks can stand in front of the more frail classes and prevent them from being slaughtered..

The only place that this fails WAR is you have a lot of WoW players playing WAR who don’t realize their place and as such just charge in and die, or refuse to block, or simply wont heal..etc. I can’t fault War for the players being stupid..

The problem here is that the game somewhat encourages players to play stupidly in that even if they don’t work together in a SC the losing team still gets’ a lot of experience for it.. but that’s an aside.. again I really can’t fault Mythic for morons..

What I can do though is fault Mythic for producing a game that is so completely unrefined. There are so many little things about War that is a complete fail..

The Macro system is bad.. The map system sucks.. The models are lame.. The animations are really bad.. The PVE content is tedious.. Some of the classes seem out of balance.. The crafting system is horrible and pointless.. etc.. It’s just not that fun of a game and a lot of that is due to these little things..

Let me be perfectly clear.  I don’t like World of Warcraft.  I don’t enjoy the universe at all, the stylistic game play, the mindless grinding, the life sucking raiding..etc..    I play it solely because my wife enjoys it..  Fine I’ll play for her..  But I don’t really like it.   I do however have to say that Blizzard has made a good game.   It’s very refined in that stuff works.  It has it’s own problems too.. (the inability to launch more dungeon instances is a big one.. )   But over all WoW is a good game.

Mythic with WAR however isn’t all that good.  It really seems like they doggedly stuck to their one trick (realm vs realm) in the hopes that it would make a WoW Killer and not bother to innovate.  Okay fine, PQ’s.. but that’s ONE thing..   And of course just as DAoC’s one trick failed to make the game a success, the exact same trick on WAR also failed..

The real issue I have is, it’s been a year..  the game has done nothing in that time and at this point it doesn’t look like its going to do anything..  If they don’t care enough to fix their game, or innovate and make it better.. then I don’t care enough to play it..

Can’t fix stupid.

Ork Dip -- Click me!

So I am going to be entering in a 40k tournament in August.  I’ll be entering as an Ork player and have been tuning and playing various lists in preparation..   I have a lot left to do though..  I also have a lot of painting to do because one of the requirements is that you have a fully painted army.  It doesn’t have to be professionally painted but it does have to look generally good, and have more than 3 colors on the model.

That’s fine, except I have a LOT of models to paint and I generally take far too long to paint them.  I can spend 2 hours painting a single dude, and considering I have over 100 dudes (not counting vehicles)  yet to paint.. I have a daunting task ahead of me..

I told my friends that there would be no way in hell I could paint all 100+ models in the time left.. It’s just not possible.. That’s when my buddy got after me to use the “dip” method of painting.. It’s fast and easy, and you don’t have to “color in the lines”..

So tonight I gave it a try..

I knew that if I were going to have full 2000 point 40k Ork army ready for this tourney I’d have to paint each model in about 10 minutes, so that’s what I did.. I gave myself 10 minutes to paint the model. Period. (Not counting the spray prime dry time or dip dry time.)

I went to the store and got some light tan colored spray paint that I’d use as my primer/base coat. It’s pretty light in color but I knew the dip/stain would make it darker so that’s what I went with..

0:30 — I came home and randomly selected one Ork not knowing if this would work worth a damn. I took all of 30 seconds or so to prime the model with the spray paint then let it dry. It took about 30 minutes to fully dry because I got the spray can nozzle a tad too close..

I then went inside to prepare my painting area.. I selected the 5 colors I was going to use, Boltgun metal, Catachan Green, Fortress Grey, Brazen Brass, and Calthan Brown and then got my water, paper towels and brushes ready.

9:30 — Once the primer was dry I sat down and hit the stop watch. I then took 9 minutes to paint the arms green, the helm and gun boltgun metal, some bitz got a bit of brown and some others got some grey while his shoulder piece got brass.. I was going to do some more brown and grey but the clock hit 9 and I put the brush down.

There is more I wanted to do, but I stopped at 9 minutes.

10:00 — I picked up the model and walked out to the garage where I already had the can of minwax stain open and ready to receive.. I used a pair of vice grips to dip the model all the way to the base in the stuff and let it sit in there for about 5 seconds..

I pulled it out and shook it off as hard as I could into the trash can making sure it got all the drips..

That’s it.. Done. You see the results above.  It takes about 6 hours to get to the point where you can handle the model, and then a full 12 hours to make it so it’s not tacky (or so I’m told.. I haven’t passed the 12 hour mark)..

A couple things yet to do is to spray paint a matte or satin varnish to dull some of that shine, paint the base black again (Should have done this prior to gluing to base.. lesson learned), and finally flock the base..

It’s not perfect by any stretch but as a 10 minute paint job it’s not half bad.   I’m going to refine my process and paint like 10 at a time to speed things up but this is definately my process.. here it is.. this is how I’m doing it..

I’ll post more pictures once I get more.   I’ll also post a left and right comparison of a model I actually took 2 hours painting versus one that is dipped just to see..

30 Minute Loota

Additional:

So after some game play I decided I needed some Loota’s in my army. Here is one I painted using my new method.. It takes a bit longer in total due to all the bitz that are there to paint. So probably 30 minutes total went into this one. I haven’t flocked the base or matted the model yet so its a tad shiney still.. Either way this method works very well here too..