October update

I haven't been sticking to my plan of updating weekly but its better late than never they say. I haven't had much progress in the painting department with only two units built and primed, one unit of 10 grots and a unit of bullgryn that will be used for retinue characters for our ongoing quest through the Blackstone Fortress. I've had the good fortune of plenty of stellar war games since my last update with the clubs narrative campaign coming to a conclusion which I will talk about later in this post as well as introducing my girlfriend Kat to Kill team. My Ork warband is still my priority on my hobby desk and I want to finish a handful of models that most people would consider trash. I decided to make up what I could of the bits and pieces of a second hand purchase I brought early 2018 and made up twelve Boyz, two Burnaz and three Lootaz. These models look terrible but I really don't mind. Why paint the best models first when my painting skills are still developing? My goal is to complete one unit of Orks a month starting with the Boyz and Grotz.

Blackstone Fortress
This game has been great for drawing me back into tabletop gaming on a few different levels. My partner Kat has always loved board games and has a closet full of them stacked as high as a mans is tall and was just as eager as I was to delve into the Blackstone fortress and see what awaits our team of desperate opportunists in arguably the most grim of fictional universes. With our latest journey having ended with discovering what's inside the Hidden Vault we have plenty more adventures ahead. I have set myself the goal of painting to completion one Explorer and one unit of hostiles each month until finished.

Kill team.
My girlfriend Kat randomly suggested I show her how to play Kill team this long weekend which I jumped at. We played the game at its most simple level. Two teams of seven Cultist including one Leader, two gunners and four with Autoguns. It wasn't a mirror match as our teams leaders were armed differently and one team had a grenade launcher and the other a flamer. We played the basic mission Covert war and rotated the different primary objectives. The series was a draw with each of us winning one game and one game drawn. Kat had fun and picked up the game quickly. I hope to gradually add complexity to the future games like the use of specialists and command points. The simplicity of these introductory games really appealed to me and I put that down to my time spent playing computer games that don't throw you in the deep end but rather have you unlock the options along the way. I've always loved basic troops in the 40k universe and I love to put them to use and see what they're capable of.
I had been thinking of all the teams I could make up with my existing models and which teams could be created in the future with a bit of converting and background flavour, namely the Blackstone explorers. I finished reading the Blackstone fortress novel by Darius Hicks last month which named a few characters who aren't included in the board game. Janis Draik didn't come to the Blackstone fortress alone and Kill team is a great way to create these characters and include them in narrative driven games. I would like to have a team of House Draik guards accompany him. Theres also two other teams that would be fun to make from Warhammer quest, two Religious groups with Daedalosus, UR-025 and X-101 in an AD Mech team and
Taddeous, Pious Vorne and Gotfret de Montbard in another.

WAAAGH!
Fellow club member Scott put together and ran a narrative campaign over three club days and it was a hell of a lot of fun for me. These were my first games of 40k in twenty years. Each player fielded 1000 points with the battle line drawn between the Imperium against Chaos and Xeno. My Blood Axe warband got to go up against Imperial Fists in game one, Cadians in game two, Grey Knights and Black Templar in game three and Imperial Fists/Space Wolves with the grand finale being a 2v2 with my ally Simon playing Tyranids. These matches taught me the value of piggy backing leadership off other Ork units and the power of Da Jump. I managed to table Scotts Imperial Fists in game one but that wouldn't be the case now that the IF Codex supplement has been printed. Ignoring cover is a soft counter to my Blood axe Klan Kulture. Also Scott had one eye on our game and his other on the other tables as he was running the series and answering questions which may have been why he still had 5 command points left at the end of our match up... maybe. Game two against Alexs' Cadians and he could have easily taken the victory had he remembered to evacuate one more unit off the board which was how he scored victory points in that game. The mission favoured my warband in that particular game but I only won the game narrowly. Game three was the closest against Connors force of Grey Knights and Black Templar. Glory was to be had as my Orks ignored holding the hidden objective and crashed into the space marines. With the battlefield littered in still warm dead the final fight was between Connors wounded Dread-Knight and a handful of Orks, one of which had a Power Klaw that landed the killing blow on the Dread-Knight giving the Orks the win. The final match taught me the power of the Wulfen as my Orks teamed up with Simons Tyranids in an attempt to beat down the Imperium once again. A Tsunami of Orks and Tyranids surged up open ground and were picked off by the dozens turn after turn by Scott's Imperial fist that held fortified positions (but not his Predator tank). My Weirdboy used Da Jump to slingshot unit after unit at the Imperial front line which held strong. Tom's Wulfen appeared, slew a unit of Grots, then an unit of Boyz then a unit of Nobz and finally a Warboss. They just wouldn't die, and when they did die more Orkz died with them.
I'm pretty fortunate to have group of fun guys to play locally. The only disappointment came from me having a half painted army.