Warhammer-Empire.com

Laughing at the ugly models will help morale!

http://imgur.com/a/wwtTy

I dont know about you but when I see those Tzeentch Chariots all I can think of is this..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX9CZWXZZ7M

Thanks for the compliments.  This is my usual style but I do change things up depending on a project.  I did traditional animation for several years which has heavily influenced my style.  If I'm just kicking out a sketch, I lean towards a more simple toon style rather than a heavily rendered piece.  I'll try to locate more heavy renders but they're rare.  If I'm investing that much time in a drawing its usually for work.  When I sketch I'm usually looking for weight and form, I don't bother too much with light/shade or details since that's the easy stuff for me and I can invest in it if I feel the drawing deserves more attention.   

I'll post more soon,  this evening was a date night so no computer time for me!

Grutch

One more. 

When my  12" Wacom Cintiq arrived at my desk at work, I sketched this up on photoshop.  I'll dig out the other Empire art I've done entirely digitally, but there's hundreds of sketches from my books to scan,  fortunately I have spawned two slaves to do my scanning for me!  Get to work kids!

If you're a GW vendor, please PM me.

Thanks!

My Review-  Another MISS!  The Losses outweigh the gains!

For all the pretty things that Fandir lovingly wrote,  Detachments now suck because they lost their automatic flank charge making them far easier to deal with than before.  Shooting detachments no longer support shoot a charging enemy into your prime unit without penalty,  and now detachments cause panic!
I never waste points in detachments anymore. 

 The Empire lord choices are still stupid.  The Arch Lector is still the no brainer choice over the General of the Empire unless you're gonna romp around on a griffon. 

The Hero Choices are not bad,  I think they pegged the Warrior Priest about right. 

I never bothered with the witch hunter.

Core Choices
Point increases and Nerfs,  what's to like about anything Cruddace did with our infantry. 
9 point handgunners?  7 Point Swordsmen?  6 Point FreeCompany?

Knights are cheaper,
Inner Circle Knights moved to core

Reiksguard knights are interesting,  I wish Cruddace would have considered making other special Orders of Knights.  Frenzied White Wolf Knights, speedy Knights Panther, Extra Toughness Blazing Sun Knights, would have been interesting. 

Special:
Flaggelents-  GW design must have come up with this a week before the final draft.  What a fail. 
Greatswords  Yay a banner!  But I never have the points for it anymore

Pistoliers= the Same!!?  Fucking bastard,  could you have at least considered giving us the fusillade rule again?

Mortar-  Oh hell just kill me now I give up.

I'm thinking of a special section of the site that showcases all these models.

I really want to be there, but May is the worst possible month for me.  =(

No suggestions really!?

Quote from: Fidelis von Sigmaringen on November 30, 2012, 02:30:02 PM

Quote from: Baluc on November 30, 2012, 02:24:53 PM

8th edition infantry are better than 7th edition infantry. You also need less 8th edition infantry that you needed 7th edition infantry to do the same job. ie; hold, Thanks to steadfast you don't need 20+ infantry to generate the static res needed to not break from cav. Also in a basic 5 wide formation 8th edition infantry get 100% more attacks.

I agree that infantry got better compared with cavalry in the 8 edition. However, you definitely need more infantry, precisely everything is now down to "who can pound the longest". In 6th and 7th, my infantry blocks were a maximum of 30. Now that has become the minimum.

I can't agree with this. To do the same job, ie; stand a chance against a 5-10 man cavalry charge, Offensive infantry are good a 18, defensive are good at 20. Against massed combat infantry units your going to need to have a combat block which yes will start at 30 dudes, but to win, your going to need that flank support, and those units would need to be 25-30 minimum in 7th as you we relying on a) taking out the enemies ranks, and b) not being extra combat res to multi attack units. In 7th flank charging khorne halberd warriors gave the unit an extra 6 attacks, and when you are only rocking like 10 yourself thats a huge deal. 

Now you can make do with 15-20, knowing they will negate charge bonus, and give you +1 combat res. With supporting attacks even khorne halberd warriors are only getting an extra 4 attacks to their original 24, while you keep the 24 from your horde, and gain 10 from the flanking unit. Empire are especially good at this as the detachment rule allows you to spam Hatred, prayers, stubborn and steadfast keeping the flanks of you hordes secure with some certainty, even against the most killy of units. Where as other armies have to choose which unit is going to get any sort of buff.

Nice theories Baluc but that's not my experience at the table at all.   Give us some battle reports!  I'll admit from my own perspective Im rusty and haven't played a game in months.  (That will change soon ).  Again thanks for your input,  I'm really enjoying your posts on the site and I implore you to make it a trend.

-Grutch

I'm going to put myself in the limelight as say this Empire Book is a sucess.

An excellent and detailed attempt to justify the unit points in the book!  Are you sure you're not Mr Cruddace himself or a member of the design team?

I disagree wholly on the points increase for handgun/crossbow units.  They're worse than goblins in CC and few generals are going to take a unit with more than 20 considering all the blocking terrain that is scattered in 8th edition games. 

On the mortar, perhaps we should run a month of the mortar and collect some statistics?  I just dont get enough games in these days to be able to do a comparison.   Are you talking 7th edition mortar in 7th edition rules or the 7th ed mortar in 8th edition rules?

-Grutch

I'll give you a couple of fundamental design decisions as to why the book is a failure.

A good army book is one where every unit, war machine, or even special character is a functional unit worth its points.  The player will find himself at odds over what to take for his army because every unit appears viable on the field.  This is clearly not the case with the Empire book.  Infantry suffered point increases based on potential buffs they would see from other unit choices being one of the most absurd design decisions.    What puzzles me is the point increases on virtually ineffective missile troops.   I rarely took them in 7th edition, and now they will never find a place in my army after Crudface worked over the Empire. 

Special rules should make sense and have a functional purpose in the game.  Specifically,  the Empire Detachment rule is not really that effective.  Unless you're playing a new player who has never experienced a countercharge, you're never going to succeed with your detachments.  I personally loved the old detachment system  just for their throw away speed bumpiness since destroyed units did not panic others.  This is all changed now,  detachments have a harder time countercharging,  Stand and Shoot without penalty is gone (hence making missile troops even more worthless to take as detachments etc.

It is clearly evident that Crudface and team had a hit list of current player hates of the Empire and worked diligently to address them. 

Great cannons too powerful - point increase
Mortars smashing up the field - nerf and point increase
War Altar too powerful - point increase
arch lector, warrior priest dice generation - nerf!

It's also clearly evident that Crudface and team cooked up mage wagons and tested the army based on those buffs,  then appointed new unit costs according to those factors.  Perhaps it was a scheme to force you into model buying,  but I would suggest more it was a time constraint on their small design team and GW's refusal to playtest this stuff with the public. 

This book has me lamenting GW's archaic rulesystem that is somehow surviving in the digital age.  It's very frustrating to be saddled with a book that is poorly written over the course of years and crossing my fingers that GW will have a better designer at the helm the next time the rules are reconsidered.   

I'd really like to see the rulesystem go to an online format.  But Im sure a bean counter somewhere would piss himself at the idea of not selling all of those pretty books! 

More on this later,  I'm working on a game right now.  pew pew!

-Grutch