Christmas in November

That's a lot of box.

Looks like it's been almost a week since my last post.  That's no good.  In my defense I've been cultivating a chest-bursting alien life form since the weekend, but I think my diligent schedule of removing said alien squirt by thick yellow squirt through my nose is finally paying off.  I lost a beautiful weekend here that would have been perfect for varnishing, and there has been no painting done of any sort in more than a week.  Hobby progress has ground to a full stop.  I did (finally) make a banner for the site though, and spread my spore into further corners of the interwebs, so my convalescence hasn't been a total loss.  [In vital, if unrelated, news, my infirmity was not serious enough to keep away from Verizon center to see Dale Hunter's return to the Caps, this time as the head coach.  Since I'm not down any limbs I'll also be there tonight to (hopefully) see the Caps get their first win for Hunter against the hated Penguins tonight.  But this is a gaming blog...]  Fate has conspired against me getting any games in today, either against EV or at the FLGS, but Fate didn't give me a complete shafting.

Behold, storage space!

While not as dramatic as Christmas in July, a little stack of holiday cheer was waiting for me when I got home last night.  The smaller box held little mystery as I'd placed the order myself.  The larger box also held little mystery as I'd sent a link to what I was after, but having not done the ordering personally there was still an element of the unknown (even if it was a tiny element).  My expanding Khadoran horde has all but outstripped my carrying capacity, especially for medium and large based models.  With two full units of infantry, plus a handful of solos, arriving (in the small box), even my regular infantry storage would soon be pushed beyond its limits.  With this in mind, I did my usual futile holiday routine: I asked for gaming supplies for Christmas.  This hasn't worked since I was in middle school, but I keep plugging away all the same.  In an amazing turn, this year it worked.  Not only did it work, it worked early, and my storage problem was solved before it had a chance to become too cumbersome.

Welcome back random rotation.  I haven't missed you.

There are lots of bags/cases out there, and I did my due diligence in looking through the options.  In the end Battle Foam won out, and at first blush it's everything I hoped it would be.  The new bag easily swallowed my collection, which filled about half of the available slots.  The new jacks (Ivan and Torch) bulged their compartments out a touch, but nothing troubling and a vast improvement over the previous shoehorning into a GW case.  The problem models like Doom Reavers and the Koldun Lord still need some special attention, but they too fit into the slots just fine and much better than they used to.  Best of all, I can now carry just the one bag instead of a miniatures case and another bag with dice, books, and other random implements.  There's a three ring binder spine on the back of the bag to hold sheets for cards which I'm not 100% sold on yet, but I'm sure I'll head out later today for sheets to see how it works.  When I give it a shot I imagine I'll wonder why I ever doubted it in the first place.

These guys have a new home.

Of course a day or three after I learned the order had been placed (a week before Black Friday, which I pointed to as a good time to take advantage of sales, but ultimately I wasn't doing the ordering) I found that a new, larger bag was on offer from Battle Foam.  After hearing the news I figured I'd just missed out on a better solution, but looking at the new bag and comparing with the one in hand I think I'll be satisfied for quite a while with what I have.  The new bag has wheels, which I can't stand, and looks monstrous.  My collectionof Khador, even when it hits its ultimate end, should fit just fine into the current bag, and it will be quite a while before I have another faction built up to the point that it outgrows the GW cases (or the pistol case I got a year ago and haven't decided what to do with yet).  If I get to the point of having multiple factions of significant size then I'll reconsider a larger bag, but I can't see that happening before this time next year at the soonest.  There's still a full infantry tray that hasn't been touched, and may not be even after I fill it with the Warstore order plus the Winter Guard bits currently being painted, so I can double up factions for a while if need be.

One of these things is not like the others.  Do you see?

The smaller box held plenty of flash as well.  Though I knew exactly what was in there, I was still surprised at the amount of stuff tucked away.  (As a former shipping and receiving worker, I was particularly impressed by the box the Warstore sent out.  I would often customize a box to fit a particular shipment and minimize wiggle.  It took all of 20 seconds to do and made damage at the hands of the not-always-interested delivery drivers less of a concern.  My one eBay experience was tainted by the horrible job the seller did of boxing my purchase.  By contrast, this box made me less inclined to look into other online venues for my minis.  I've seen some cheaper sites recently, but attention to detail is worth something, and this box shows that the folks at the Warstore know what they're doing.)  First up should be the wreck markers and blank large bases (for objectives) that I got to be as ready as possible for the upcoming tournament, but there's a great chance that I'll start with the Kayazy instead.  It looks like most of them are a single piece, so assembly should be quick, and I've detailed my new zeal for the unit previously.

A starting point?  Plenty of time to decide.

I've already taken a long, slow flip through the Legion book and I think I'm in trouble.  Everything looks new and exciting, with lots of crazy combinations jumping out on the first pass, and no doubt plenty of dirty tricks that are not as apparent.  My issue with Trollbloods is that their book feels very much like the Khador book: heavy hitters that can be made to hit harder, tough models that are easy to hit but hard to damage, slow and steady, quality infantry.  Solid, if unspectacular, and familiar.  Legion has the heavy hitters, but they're fast and somewhat delicate, and it looks like the beasts are the ones who will do the damage.  I spotted a couple beast-centric warlocks, and the whole range is intriguing, with none that look puzzling (Zerkova) or like filler (Harkevich), though I'll put that down to new shiny.  To put it another way, the first thing I tried to combo together with Trollbloods was high ARM/STR beasts supporting solid infantry, very similar to what I do with Khador, whereas with Legion I started looking at movement shenanigans, nasty special effects (Eruption of Spines?), and quantity of attacks for beasts and infantry to support those beasts.  The difference is less apples and oranges than oranges and clementines, but those differences are what allows variety within consistency.  Drawing in another gaming thread, I'm a big fan of the Exalted setting, to the point that I have the entire run of the first edition.  Looking at Legion, the overriding influence that I felt was Abyssal Exalted, who are either the most beautiful or horrifying creatures you've ever seen.  It feels like a good fit, and I think I'll run with it until I find something better.  In the meantime, the Motherland has received reinforcements that I need to help find the battlefield.