Dark Sphere and back: Circum-navigating the globe

Dark Sphere and back: In NZ again after 30 days' circum-navigating the globe

Back to blogging: I am back at the keyboard after 30 days of travelling the world, many great experiences and addition to the ever growing pile of un-built models.

 Luc and I are now working on our lists for the NZTC Warhammer  Tournament (Team Champs) coming up in March. He plans on fielding an Ogre list, and I am working on my Dark Elves (No surprise that, eh, with the great new rules and models)

Our trip took us around the world, from NZ to the land of cheap electronics (Malaysia), beach paradise no 1 (Koh Lipe, Thailand) The land of affordable Warhammer models and Anglophile history (UK), the land of Guiness beer, whiskey in a jar, and folk music (Eire), the land of great cheese, foi gras, garlic and red wine (and things Napoleonic) - France, to Tinseltown (US), and finally to beach paradise no 2 (Moorea, Tahiti) before winging our way back to Aotearoa (NZ)

One of the highlights of our trip was a visit to Dark Sphere, London's biggest gaming store, now in Lambeth, London. They recently moved, and are now situated a stone's throw from the Imperial War Museum. This shop just cannot be missed! We arrived at this gaming cornucopia after a visit to the Natural History Museum. (Trade-off with Lisa, as she didn't want to go to the IWM, and they are renovating for the 100th Anniversary of WW1 anyhow.

The bulging shelves of the right hand side of Dark Sphere's new home.

The purveyors of joy at Dark Sphere were still unpacking, having just moved into the new premises. Boxes of models were piled up to 3 metres high in places, and it took great discipline to stay within budget.

Needless to say being free of the mark-up we endure in NZ made the experience all the sweeter. We had to tear ourselves away, as it was getting late, and as usual when games meet we fell into taking about our hobby.

Looking forward to the next year of gaming the two of us had to discipline ourselves severely to stick to the agreed budget. We ended up buying a DE cauldron/medusa, warlocks/dark riders, scourge runner, Ogre fire belly and a unit of ogre bulls, an ironblaster (yes, Luc needed more ogres and another blaster!), Gor Rok, and a Carnosaur/Trogothingy, and board game that retails for $120 here, for the grand sum of 150 pounds ($300) Would have been even cheaper had we ordered it online beforehand.

I had to refrain from getting more Chaos Daemons and Empire stuff, as we still had 2 weeks of travel ahead of us, and resolutely looked past the racks and racks of Privateer Press, and almost any other model maker you could imagine. Yes, Battlefront was also there, but with price equity in NZ. Only Plastic Soldier Co was absent from the racks, and some of the more obscure brands, such as Wargods of Hyperborea (Crocodile games, which I had hoped to find there)

I have just calculated the cost of our GW haul if we had bought it here - $563NZ! (Not counting the $120+ board game, which would have brought the cost to $680+ had we bought these here)  We are talking almost a 100% mark-up. Surely this cannot be justified on transport costs alone.

Anyhow, we got the expected scolding from mommy dearest when we arrived back at our accommodation with 4 bags bulging with models and games. We swiftly de-boxed the models and posted them back to NZ for the princely cost of 15 Euros when we got to Dublin. (26-28 NZ$).

Leaked Lizardmen Photo

Warhammer: Leaked Lizardmen Photo or Bullsh*t?

Rumoured to release in August, the Lizardman Army book is causing all type of rumours:

Trolling the net with my own observations:

I would expect monstrous cavalry ? Carnosaur riders?
A "giant dinosaur kit" (bigger than the Carnosaur)
New plastic "Terradon" kit - about the same size as the High Elves Phoenix (Terrordon? )
Couatl (may be the alternative build for the "Terradon" kit) - see I told told you, a giant flyer!Finecast Slann


New plastic carnosaur (singular); as well, but nothing concrete. 
It may also be the first time in 8th Edition (to date) that a character will be able to ride the same monstrous beast as a unit in its army 

Slann now becomes a multi-part plastic set - availability for a Relic Priest (Kroak, including Deathmask), a normal Priest, and a special limited edition plastic combination pack (similar to the Exalted Daemon Chariot) that combines a Stegadon and a Slann Priest to recreate Mazdamundi. In addition, they get access to Disciplines, but these may not be taken more than once. Reading into rumours suggests that Slann have Loremaster (see below for reasoning).

All Saurus armies become "viable" thanks to the return of Sacred Spawnings - units can purchase Sacred Spawnings like a Mark of Chaos, while characters get access to them off the bat. 
One will allow them to join Temple Guard units, others will give benefits to specific units, like Magic Resistance or Devastating Charge (Sotek?), while others (like Itzl, or whatever the Cold One Riders are), are already included within their stats.

Razordons and Salamanders become a Dual part plastic Monstrous beasts + handler kits, 2 Monsters and 6 Handlers to a set.

Couatl model - working like a Terrorgheist in that it can be both a mount (rumours are to be available at sub-200 points to allow 2 to be taken for heroes in 2400 games) and a monster, presuming rare.

The Stegadons become special choices as well, with a unit "upgrade" to Ancient stats, and a weapon "upgrade" to didgeridoo blowdarts. Skink Mounts still available IIRC.

Skink Priests gain access to Beasts as well as Heavens. In addition, Skink Priests may become "attendants" to a Slann - basically I read it as a Skink Priest option allowing it access to the same Lore the Slann itself knows. Reading into that suggests that Slann have Loremaster as standard.

The return of the Arcanadon - one thing that every non-lizard player is going to hate, a pokemon venusaur/stegadon crossover which takes in solar power to create a blast of magical light, in the form of a cannonball/stone thrower/flame cannon/breath weapon monster. Although nothing concrete about the presumed dual nature of the kit, it could possibly be a much "wanted" Thunder Lizard capable of making thunderstorms. 
(I think this bit unlikely)


Apparently Nakai will return - an apparently unbreakable "autohealing" monster non-general hero choice.(This is more likely)

Trolled across this on the net:



source:
http://kaughnorscave.blogspot.ca/2013/06/leaked-lizardmen-photo.html