The Shattered Kriel of Madrot Marsh - Week 2 Report

15 point list:
Grim Angus [pic 1 / pic 2 / pic 3]
* Irontooth the Dire Troll Mauler [pic 1 / pic 2]
* Jurt the Impaler [pic 1 / pic 2]
* Swampfire Troll (aka Pyre) [pic 1 / pic 2]
* Comfort Food (aka Whelps) [pic 1]

Painting & Modeling:

Wow these guys turned out great (compared to my usual standard)! I love the bases, a lot easier to do than I would have expected although still very time consuming.

Battle Report #1: 15pt vs Skorne (run by fellow Gamer’s Journaler GeminiX6)
[pic 1 / pic 2 / pic 3]

Skorne player brought Makeda, a Gladiator, Savage, Shaman, and Paingivers.

The long and the short of it was that Grim failed to hit a DEF12 Gladiator with a boosted Headhunter shot, which meant that my Rage’d Mauler couldn’t make the charge distance for the intended alpha strike. I tried to reposition the army to deal with the incoming Skorne charge, but the Gladiator had juuust enough of an angle to slam the Mauler across Grim’s base. This knocked out the Mauler’s spirit, so I couldn’t force him to shake off, so he was basically unable to help on the next turn, during which Grim had to try and deal with the Titan himself. Unwilling to risk a free strike to walk Grim out of melee, I tried dealing with the Gladiator with a Rage’d Pyre and a Rage’d Impaler, but had no luck. The Gladiator almost destroyed the entire army through transfers, then finally got Grim for the win.

Battle Report #2: 15pt vs Protectorate of Menoth
[pic 1 / pic 2 / pic 3]

PoM player had eFeora, Vanquisher, Redeemer, 2 Vassals, min Choir, and Wracks.

This game was frighteningly like the first. Grim failed to hit DEF10 Vanquisher out front (yes, he rolled two 1’s), so the Mauler was unable to hit it first. Pyre was the MVP, landing an AOE smack over the support pieces and killing two Vassals and a Choir boy. Vanquisher ended up in melee with Grim, Grim walked out (and transferred a terrifyingly strong free strike away) and KD’d him with the snare gun, and then I unleashed a Rage’d Mauler on it, wrecking the jack without even maxing out the Mauler’s Fury. Of course, moments later eFeora charged Grim and removed all but one Fury through transfers, and left 2 health on Grim. I didn’t realize that I couldn’t transfer Continuous Fire damage, hence holding the one last Fury, and then since Cont. Fire can’t expire in eFeora’s area, he had to basically roll a 5+ on the fire damage roll to kill Grim. Failed Tough, and that was game.

Moving from 15 to 25pts:

I’ve learned from these games that I have absolutely no idea how to play Grim! I’m going to try and hedge up some weaknesses in my 25pt list. I’m considering the following choices:

* Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (4): On turn one, I don’t have anything to do with Grim’s Fury other than Cross Country, so I can fill it up then. The ARM buff would have done wonders with my list, especially with all of the damage transfers I had to make. If I have the points, the Elder UA would go in, but I probably won’t max the unit out at 25pts.

* Fennblades (6): Reach tarpit unit, hard to kill, and can spread out to protect Grim from getting tied up.

* Champions (3): Bait the Line can get them charging 10” and Grim has lots of DEF debuffs to help their freight train attacks hit.

* Stone Scribe Chronicler: To buff either unit I end up taking.

* Swamp Gobbers: Thematic, and they can plop a big cloud down in front of Grim for LOS blocking. Since Grim can see through it too, there won’t be a lot of concern on my part for the order of operations with these guys.

The Shattered Kriel - 95% done on the first list

Title says it all. I have the following left to do:

* Ink & drybrush the Pyre
* Drybrush the Whelps
* BASES! I have the water effect on-hand, but wasn't able to get to that today. I'll be drybrushing and water-effecting Fri or Sat, and then foliage-ing (See? I invented a word!) Sat or Sun for the completion.
* I'm going to mark front arcs, probably by painting the rear arc dirt colored to match the bases.

That said, pics speak louder (and attract more clicks) than words! [click pics for larger ones]

The Sapphire Guard - Paingivers

The Paingivers are done! Here's a pretty good idea of the color scheme and what I'm going for, hope you all like it! Tomorrow the Savage is going to get done. I've realized that whether I paint fast or slow, I still end up with a similar end product, and it's definitely good enough from a table distance, so I've come to terms with that and I'm happy with my skills. Feedback is welcome, and click the pictures for bigger versions!

The Shattered Kriel - Update

Quick update: Jurt the Impaler is done except for his base, and Grim requires just a couple of touch-ups plus the base. The Mauler is about half done - I'm prepping him for the ink wash that will cover the entire model top to bottom. Pyre and Whelps are still gray right now, but I'm not worried.

The Envirotex for the water bases arrived today (I can tell I'm spoiled by Amazon Prime - I was annoyed at a whole week wait!), so once I get the rest of these guys painted up I'll slap some swamp water down and should be good to go!

I'm looking at my 25pt list, and am on the fence about one unit: the Krielstone Bearer. Back in MkI, I know that Grim didn't get along with these guys because the 'stone couldn't keep up with Grim's army, but I also know that the 'stone can move 10" and still pulse these days. Think its worthwhile?

For the next 10, if I don't take the 'stone, it'll be:
* Fennblades (6)
* Fell Caller
* Either Alten Ashley for anti-beast (nice with only the one heavy) or the SSC (for making the Fenns better, but with a 'caller they don't necessarily need it).

If the 'stone comes, it'll start as a min unit and replace the Fell Caller for the time being.

The Shattered Kriel - Jurt the Impaler

Just a few shots of Jurt, Grim's trusty Impaler. I color corrected these, so the yellows and browns are close to spot-on. Jurt's base isn't done either - just base colors slapped down, and no water effects yet (which will go over the green areas) or plant life. There's also a sneak peak of Grim in the background there, he's coming together nicely.

The Sapphire Guard - Week One

Sadly, I don't have much new to report. I -did- finish the first paingiver completely today, but I didn't have a chance to take a picture, and I'm way too tired right now to do that. What I will do, though, is get a good picture on Wednesday, when I hope to finish up two more of them. With Mother's Day this past weekend and a number of other things, painting was just not the top priority.

I'm excited about the list, though. I hope to get it all done by Friday, and I think I can if I really focus each night on painting as much as I can. Now that I've dusted off my painting cobwebs, and now that I've got my color scheme down pretty good, I think I'll be able to fly through these models a little faster. And I'll definitely need to, since I'm going to be adding a whopping 13 models to the next tier of the list! If I can get into the "two models per night" mode I'll be totally fine, but I'll have to keep that up while also going to a bachelor party and a wedding in there somewhere. Fingers crossed!

The Shattered Kriel of Madrot Marsh - Week One Status

With a resounding crack of a gunshot, the last human of the supply convoy fell to the ground, dead. Grim Angus scoured the roadway ahead through Headhunter’s scope for any movement, and then raised his rifle, satisfied. Out of the swampy terrain on either side of the roadway ran a handful of trollkin clad in brown and yellow, awkwardly carrying their poorly cared-for weaponry. The charging trollkin soldiers came up sharply when they saw that the battle was over before it had even begun, and began rifling through the wreckage of the human caravan. Grim stopped himself from reprimanding the untrained trollkin for their behavior, painfully aware that they were all freshly drafted into the fight.

Two weeks earlier Grim had made a stopover at Madrot Marsh, a fairly peaceful and insular kriel in the western Thornwood region not far from Grim’s home of Wythmoor. When he arrived he found that the entire kriel had been razed to the ground – they had had the poor fortune of being directly in the path of two warring human armies, and as the village center itself was some of the only solid terrain in the marsh, it had become the center of the fight.

Grim and his longtime companion, the Impaler Jurt, immediately began searching for survivors. Over the next few days they had located the remnants of the kriel, living as nomads throughout the marsh to avoid the forces still warring in the area. Offended by both the treatment from the humans and the Madrot Marsh kriel’s despondency, Grim took charge of the trollkin and began organizing them into a resistance force, a weapon with which to inflict some damage to the outsiders.

Taking the most skilled of the surviving trollkin, primarily hunters and trackers, Grim began leading lightning raids against the interlopers, striking equally against all outsiders, human or otherwise. Inadequately supplied and poorly trained, the warriors of the shattered kriel of Madrot Marsh have began to fight back, determined to exact some small amount of retribution for the callous atrocity that had been committed.

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For the Gamer's Journal, I decided to take my completely unpainted and unplayed Trollbloods, whittle down the huge pile of lead into a viable army list, and paint them entirely. Taking models I like the look of the most, here's my 15pt list:

Grim Angus
* Dire Troll Mauler (aka Irontooth)
* Troll Impaler (aka Jurt)
* Pyre Troll (aka Swampfire)
Troll Whelps

Models at the start of the Gamer's Journal:

Models at the end of Week One of the Gamer's Journal:

At the end of Week One, I'm farther behind that I'd like. All the models are assembled, but they aren't even all primed (stupid greenstuffed Mauler!). I have one model, the Impaler known as Jurt (honored with a name only because in the few games I've every had with Trollbloods, he has a 100% Critical Smite success rate), almost done - he's at the inking/highlighting phase. Once he's done and my scheme is locked in, the others will go a lot faster I know (plus Grim is the only other model with clothing and equipment to slow me down).

Speaking of the Mauler and his greenstuffing:

Luckily, the previous week was so unproductive because it was my hectic week. This coming week, Tues through Fri, I have literally nothing going on after work, so I'm hoping for 4-6 good painting hours each night (By comparison, I've had maybe 6 hours to assemble, base, prime, and paint so far, resulting in one nearly-there Impaler!).

I hope to be able to take the Madrot Marsh boys out for a spin at the end of the week, probably against Gemini, painting schedule-allowing.

Final thoughts: I'm confident that I'll reach the "15pts painted" deadline of this weekend, but may need to revise my 25/35pt lists to lower the model counts and go heavier on beasts.