Review: White Dwarf December 2012

A little late I know, I actually got my issue quite late this time around (got it on Monday . Also I have been sick so I haven't managed to write this review until now. So because of this and also the fact that the design and layout is the same as the two previous issues I won't go into that any more in detail. So on to the rest then.

New Releases
Big focus on the big release this month with The Hobbit: An unexpected Journey Strategy battle game of course, with the new rulebook, the Starter set with a limited ed. Radagast miniature, trolls, orcs, goblins, the white council a couple of characters and a kit called Goblin Town which are walkways and ramps like in the Starter set and makes a good addition if you want to expand the battlefield. We also get a Hobbit Figure case and Paint set. Not much more stuff besides the Hobbit stuff then, but we do get a nice Wh40 k Campaign book called Crusade of Fire and looks like a W40k version of Blood in the Badlands for Fantasy.   They also releases the Imperial Defence Network in three separate boxes.

Painting and Modelling
Yeah we know the drill by now do we. We get the usual segments like in the last two issues like Blanchitsu, Parade Ground showing different nicely painted flyers for W40k among them a reader's flyers and this time it's actually Garfy from Tale of Painters, great work btw. We also get the Kit Bash showing villains and and monsters, really nice stuff and a segment I really like. In Battleground we get a look on the big Somaro Starfort, a cool looking Orbital Space Station which is one of Battlegrounds in the Crusade of Fire book. Paint splatter is showing us how to paint the different Dwarfs and Goblins from the Hobbit Starter Box. Very briefly though as they just show us which base colours to use, and from what I can tell there's more into it than that to paint them to this standard. I don't mind these easy painting tutorials but I would like to see a `Master Class` like before now and then as well showing us how to paint a miniature from start to finish. I like the Keith Robertson part though where we get to see how he does his rust effect seen all around his army. And this army is shown in the Army of the Month segment in this issue, a really large Ogre Kingdoms force sporting even Halflings and Chaos Dwarfs and we get a little of the classic look as well with green painted base rims. For last we also get two pages of Hall of Fame showing us the beautiful Coven Throne.

Rules and Fluff
Not much of this in this issue either, we some here and there where they explain the new Hobbit game but not more than that.

Gaming
A Hobbit battle report of course, showing us one of the scenarios from the rulebook. It's nice and clean but as I have said in the past two issues, I think there are to many small pictures and we don't get any pictures showing us the movement on the battlefield. This makes it a lot harder to follow in my opinion.

The Rivals segment is back this month with Andy Clark saying that Ork Nobz can be kitted out to win any fight versus Simon Grant who thinks that Wolf Guard is the most powerful unit in the game. They then do three mini battles with 500 pts Nobz against 500 pts Wolf Guard just trying to kill each other and then in a bigger battle with two 2000 pts armies. I like this segment even though I thought the first one was better.

The Other stuff
In 'This month in' White Dwarf we see some of the painting projects the team is working on for both Fantasy and 40k. In the Design Studio it was focused on the different Hobbit miniatures made by Alan & Michael Perry and Aly Morrison and what they thought when they sculpted these miniatures. In Forge World we get some nice new photos of the Averland BSB, Night Goblin BSB and Dwarf Thane as well Legion Space Marines with Autocannons and the new Land Raider variant called Cerberus. Also from Black Library we get two interviews with CL Werner and James Swallow, so all in all a good read from all the 'This month in' articles.

Conclusion
The best part of the new WD format is that even if we have big release we also get something for those who's not that interested in that release. This was not the case before where we could get a magazine filled with only stuff regarding the latest release on not much else except ads. So I hope that this will stay, other than that I also hope that they change around the segments a little. You know, instead of just showing us the final result in Battlegrounds instead show us how it was made. Just as an example. So finally, it's a solid issue but it lacks something really interesting I think, maybe it has to do with that I'm not really that interested in the new Hobbit stuff.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

100 000 Views!

Yeah that's right, this blog just hit a milestone today and went past the 100 000 views mark. Well it may not be much compared to 825 million views for PSY - Gagnam Style over at youtube and so on but I couldn't imagine that I would got this much views when I first started this blog in 2008! Yeah it's that old, and well it I didn't have many visitors at first with only 250-500 views each month from 08 to 10. This weren't strange at all though as I didn't update the blog that regularly and I didn't promote it much. In 2010 and even more in 2011 I did this though and added my blog to different wargaming blog networks and started to update the blog more regularly. And soon 2012 is over and for this blog it has been the best year ever with an all time high month in October with 16 722 views.

Enough with all the statistics though, it has never been the goal with this blog. Even though I of course want it to be as popular as it can. But the main thing about doing this blog is to try and inspire other people when it comes to painting, sculpting, or just to continue with this hobby I for one loves. And even if it takes a lot of time and effort it's all worth it when I get all the nice response from you guys reading and taking your time to write something in the comments.

So I'm glad to say I'm going to continue to write my post here and I also have some plans how to expand the blog further, with some permanent pages with Army Showcases for example, just to make it easier for you to find the stuff you are looking for. So, some new things coming in the future and if we look closer to now I can say I got the new WD late this time so I got it today. Have to read through it more before I post an review. I also have some of my projects going on and currently it's mostly about my Empire and Chaos Warriors and when talking about the Warriors I actually got all the stuff I ordered from Wayland last week so I have been assembling some of them more about what I'm doing right now further down.

Been painting my Juggernaught Lord and can't decide on the painting scheme I went with this brass colour for the main body and I was thinking of painting more red parts on the actual lord, also as you can see I need to re-base this dude so it fits with the rest of the new Skullcrushers.

Been painting more Greatswords which just need their bases finished and some final highlights, also have some more Halberdiers and the Demigryphs which I intend to finish next.

Well that's enough of my babbling, I hope you enjoy this blog and continue to visit it in future and for last I must say a big 'Thank you all' who visit this blog! It means much that people are interested in what I do and it's because of you I continue to do this, and I hope you will continue to visit this blog and find it interesting.

News: The Hobbit game is up for advance order

GW has put up all the new Hobbit stuff for pre order on their site. Hefty prices on the boxes but as I still haven't gotten my WD this month is nice to see the pictures of the stuff as well as what we get in the boxes. There is for example an huge box with all the new Hobbit stuff in it, for 5434 skr! (£447, $745, €568). The most interesting thing is probably the starter box which is also quite expensive, but looks like a quite nice box. Won't be buying it though.

Pictures are from the GW website for more pictures and info go here: www.games-workshop.com

News: New Mantic Ogre pic

Mantic Games is celebrating Thanksgiving by giving us a new picture of their upcoming Ogre army. And I must say this one looks much better and the legs don't look as small as on the first one (found here). Really like the look of this one and I'm hoping that the rest of the upcoming army will look equally good. What do you guys think? Anything for you Ogre Kingdoms players or does this look differ to much from GW? Tell me in the comments below. 

News: Dec White Dwarf pics

A little late on the news about this today as I have been busy at work all day. I have not gotten my WD early this time around, but luckily we got pics from a Spanish blog called La Taberna de Laurana where you also can get additional info regarding the new Hobbit game that will be featured in Dec issue of WD.

Also got this info about all the Hobbit stuff from Warseer found here. All in Italic is from this thread.

Release: 1st of december, with Preorders starting 1 week ahead, november 24th. All info regarding the new boxed set should be in the new White Dwarf, december issue, which is released at the same day.
Guesswork: Pictures (leaked) from the new White Dwarf around the 20th of november, based on other releases.

In this wave: I've heard there will be only a boxed set this wave. Danny76 mentioned more miniatures are to be releases shortly after the movie hit's theatres, along with a standalone hardback rulebook

New set of Rules: A completly new set of rules, compatible with older LotR releases. The sourcebooks from earlier ths year should still be valid. This probably means that the basics of the game will remain intact, with tweaks for balance and an overall better flow in the game

Boxed Set : The Boxed set will be the first thing released for The Hobbit tabletopgame. It's name is "The Hobbit: Escape from Goblin Town" It is rumoured to contain scenery and more miniaturs then Dark Vengeance (that would put it over 48 miniatures). [i]most likely contains Gandalf the Grey, Bilbo Baggins, Thorin Oakenshield and Company. The opposing faction probably consist of the Great Goblin, Goblin forces, and could contain wargs, trolls, giant spiders, mountain giants and possibly gollum?.
Rumours of a limited edition have reached my ear. Nothing solid, though.
The price is located somewhere around 100€. For comparison to non-€uro currencies: The price for the Space Marine battalion is exactly 100 € atm.

This Release List showed up. Thanks for sharing!

Escape from Goblin Town Limited Edition: 100€ (56 figures!)
Hobbit Rulebook: 65€ (288 pages)
Hobbit Paint Set: 35€
Custom Figure Case: 50€
The White Council: 60€ (4 fig box)
The Trolls: 65€ (3 figure box)
Goblins of the Misty Mountains: 30€ (18 figure box)
Goblin Town: 45€ (scenery set?)
Hunter Orcs: 30€ (12 fig box)
Hunter Orcs on Fell Wargs: 35€ (6 fig box)
Bolg: 20€ (clampack)
Narzug: 15€ (clampack)
Goblin Captain: 13€ (clampack)
Fimbul the Hunter (ft & mtd): 35€

Comment: After looking at the pictures and read some more about this I must say I'm a little disappointed actually. First of all that it's only Hobbit stuff as it looks like and no new 40k or WHFB stuff at all which some rumours suggested, I would have been delighted if there where some Dark Angels stuff in there as well So what about the actual shown content then? Well, I think the miniatures looks good., not fantastic, not bad but good. It also looks like a quite expensive game, which doesn't makes me jump up and down and makes me want to go out and buy this game. I do like the LOTR books and films and I also like the The Hobbit book and hopefully I will also enjoy the films. But from what I can tell from the info and pictures we got I can't see myself getting into The Hobbit miniature game, doing multible armies in both WHfb and 40k is expensive enough.

I must say though that even if I do have the first LOTR boxed game and some more minis I never really played a game so I can't really say if I like or not. But if you want an opinion from two dudes who actually played and really like the old game and it's expansions go and check my fellow bloggers blog post about it, it's good read for both LOTR gamers and we who never got into trying it out back in the day.You find the blog post here.

The Empire: The Unit filler is finished!

I got inspired when painting this so I actually finished it quite fast for being me. Really happy with how it turned out and fits in nicely with the rest of the unit which are now up to thirty five soldiers, so just 5 more to reach my goal and fifteen more to cover the whole fifty man base. Not much more to say really, it was fun to paint and even if it may be difficult to see on these pictures I also painted some spilled wine on the paving.

 I actually forgot to paint his teeth I saw on the photos and that is taken care of now, but if you have any suggestions on more unit fillers, how I can do this one better or anything really just let me know.

News: WH Forge Mourngul and AoW Dwarf Ironshields

Got this in the mail today, pictures of the Mourngul fron WH Forge. We have seen it before but not as good pictures as these. Really cool miniature and nice to see something new from WH Forge for once.

From the Forgeworld webpage, where you also can find more pictures:

Dreadful tales are told around huddled fires of those lost in the killing cold of a mountain winter, driven by famine and pain to hunt their own companions and former friends for their meat and the warmth of their blood. There is no salvation for these damned souls, for the horrors in which they indulge cannot save them and they become things neither dead nor alive, condemned to an eternity of empty hunger and terrible isolation.

Spite, desperation and malice force these thrice-damned creatures to linger beyond death, the most insidious and destructive winds of magic coiling about them to warp and twist their cadavers into inhuman proportions. Soon they become something neither ghost nor revenant – a Mourngul; a monstrous razor-thin shadow of cold flesh and cracked bone with a gaping maw of needle-teeth and a cavernous stomach that hangs open like a dreadful wound.

The Mourngul, designed by Edgar Skomorowski, is a finely detailed multi-part resin model. Redolent with sinister menace, this creature stands 5.5" (140 mm) tall and makes a fantastic centrepiece for any Warhammer army. The Mourngul is available to pre-order now for despatch from Monday 26th November, and rules for it can be found in Monstrous Arcanum.

Also found these over at Hobby Horse, new Dwarfs from Avatars of War! Looks like these are only for the supporters of their Kickstarter as a start though so we other people need to wait some more to get any. Really cool looking though.

The Empire: Unit filler WIP

As you may now I like do make Unit filler for my units, just to add some flavor to unit. But sometimes it's hard, and I find it extra hard for ordinary Empire state troops actually. But when I decided to go with more "Morr:y" feel on the army and I had these leftovers from War Altar this idea came to mind.

The whole army is around a big Morr graveyard so graves would be seen here and there, also the main enemy the army will be facing in terms of fluff is Vampire Counts so a occasional zombie or skeleton may be seen as well. So first I decided to go with the pillar grave, hand coming up from the ground and a vulture looking after something to chew on. First I thought of just adding one ore two soldiers standing before it but then I got this idea instead.

Put a drunkard in front of the grave not knowing what is trying to dig it's way up behind his back.  So I went with this idea, the whole thing may look a bit rough at the moment but I think it will look quite nice when it's done. What do you think? Should I add something or do something different, tell me anything you like.