Where has the month gone?

Somehow, this last month has just gotten away from me. Sometimes real life sucks. For several months, I had a really nice schedule that let me spend the time I wanted to spend on my hobby (or plastic crack addiction...). Recently, I haven't had that time anymore, and I think I'm having withdrawals.

Suddenly, my schedule has filled itself to the brim. the normal gaming nights for our club have filled with other things, leaving only one night a week to maybe play wargames. My lack of playing time has manifested itself on this blog as well. the less time I play 40K, the less time I spend blogging about it.

My life right now...

Introducing: The Mockingbird

A Harlequin Razorwing er, I mean Mockingbird!

As my harlequin army has grown, and as I have gained some experience playing them, I have found that they have been lacking in one crucial area. long range firepower. most of my army not only excels at close combat, but relies on it to keep from being shot to pieces. unfortunately the longest range anti-tank shots I have are only 18" blasters.

In order to be slightly more competitive, I needed to find a way to get some long-range fire into my list. unfortunately, I have basically exhausted the set of units that have a nice one-to-one relationship with a model or unit from the old harlequin army.

After looking through some old fan codexes I found at some point along my quest to create a harlequin army, I found a unit that could at least provide some inspiration. One fan codex introduced the Mockingbird, a vyper/venom with a vibrocannon strapped to the back of it. So how could I get this concept into my current list? read on to find out

The Harlequins: Death Jesters

The Death Jester is one of the more unique members of a harlequin troupe. In my opinion, they are also the coolest models in the range. I've always loved the death jesters, even just looking at pictures of ancient harlequin armies from back in the day. No harlequin army was complete without at least a few of these guys.

It makes me a little sad that no one uses them anymore. Not that I blame you all. taking a spare shuriken cannon isn't that impressive, and paying points for it in a dedicated close combat unit is just stupid. so now one of the coolest eldar models made by GW never even saw the tabletop.

So when making a new harlequin army, I knew death jesters had to go in! In this article, we'll take a look at the Death Jester. we'll look at the fluff, the models, and the rules for the death jester.

Harlequins at WarGamesCon

So I think I have finally recovered fully from wargamescon (almost a month later), and now I've finally gotten around to writing up how my army did in the team tournament. Of course, as always I was terrible at taking pictures. In fact, I didn't take a single picture of any of the armies I played against! I took pictures as I milled around looking at cool stuff, but none of them ended up being team tournament opponents. oh well. Because of a lack of pictures, I will be writing up the short and sweet version of our battles.

the army lists that we used (along with the fluff piece that we submitted with the army) can be found  here

The Eldar Go To War (GamesCon)

It’s been a while since my last update. Real life and other projects keep getting in the way. Hope I haven’t been disappointing all 2 of my followers J

I have not been playing my Harlequins a whole lot since Adepticon, unfortunately. After playing them nonstop from December to April, I was ready to let my other armies out to see the light of day again.

Tomorrow is the third annual WarGamesCon (third if you count BOLSCON). This year I will be playing my Harlequins alongside a force of craftworld elder in the 40k team tournament. 3 rounds with 2000 points per side.

The Following is a Count-As Article

 
For some reason, in the last few months, "Counts-as" armies have become a topic of heated discussion. People have been really bashing some of the writers on the Bell of Lost Souls for articles on "counts-as" armies. Reading the comments on these articles, I was surprised at how many people were loudly complaining about counts-as armies. but after reading many many comments on the topic (many not even commenting on an article about counts-as armies), I have decided that there is one major problem with counts-as armies...

The Laughing God - Cegorach

I haven't posted in a long time! Real life has been crazy, and being a new blog this was one of the first things to slip out of my todo list. After adepticon I was a bit burnt out on my harlequins after non-stop painting and playing since January to get an army ready by Adepticon. but now I am ready to jump back in! so lets take a look now at one of my favorite characters in 40K:

Cegorach, The Laughing God, the Great Fool, the Trickster God. Cegorach is the patron Deity of the Harlequins and one of the last remaining gods of the Eldar pantheon. Little is known of this particular Eldar god, as he seems to take almost no part in Eldar myths from before the Fall. Here I have attempted to piece together what is known of the Laughing God from various sources to paint a picture of one of the most interesting characters in the Warhammer universe. 

 

Road To Adepticon - And 'Ere We Go!

Adepticon kicks off tomorrow night. I am finally finished painting, basing and packing my models, my lists are printed and triple-checked, and everything is in the car ready to go. tonight we will be on our way to Chicago for the biggest tournament I have ever played in. I've never been to Adepticon before, so I am super pumped about it.

On top of that, I actually managed to get everything finished. There were a few spots in there where it looked like I would run out of time, and I was worried that a squad or two would have to make do with little to no detailing just to get a legal fully-painted army on the table. Somehow I managed to build, convert, paint and base an entire 1850 point army in 3 months. Sweet! and on top of that, I painted up the last 15 or so models I needed for gladiator, should I lose on Friday.

with that said, I wanted to post some pictures of my army I took last night as a finished project. I am also putting up my finalized list for the championship tournament. Enjoy

The Harlequins: A Harlequin Troupe

Harlequins generally travel and live together in groups known as harlequin masques. these masques are very similar to our current-day gypsy camps, where member live and work together as they travel from place to place performing their arts. Harlequins form these tight-knit troupes and travel freely between Eldar communities to perform their ritual dances.

On the battlefield, a harlequin Troupe refers to the basic fighting unit, which consists of a harlequin avatar and his/her entourage. A Troupe is often accompanied by various support elements, such as scouts, heavy weapons teams, etc. All of these support elements and Troupes are part of the Masque and always work together during performances and day-to-day life, but they are not always involved in battles. a single Troupe of harlequins is often more than enough to handle an entire enemy force.




In this article, we will be looking at the Troupe as a battlefield unit. We will examine the roles of the Troupers on the field and in their art, as well as looking at the models used to represent this cornerstone of a Harlequin force.

Hobby - Basing My Army, Part 2

in my first hobby article , I talked about making a decision to use resin lava bases for my Harlequin army. As I started moving my models from their plastic bases to the new resin bases, I realized it was going to be a lot more complicated than I had originally intended. You see, resin doesn't bond with plastic glue like your standard GW bases, and even superglue has a lot of trouble getting a good bond with the stuff. superglue works ok for steady models (though even the one steady model I used superglue on fell off without much force...), but for leaping harlequin models (especially the metal ones) superglue didn't even come close to being an ideal solution.

After discovering that, I made my first attempt at drilling and pinning models. I know a lot of people pin and drill every metal model they use, but I have never given it a try. If you already pin your stuff regularly, this article probably isn't for you. This is more for people like me who had never tried to pin my models and couldn't find a good guide to working with pins and resin. If that interests you, read on!

Warning: this tutorial is fairly pic-heavy...

Hobby - Basing My Army, Part 1

I don't know about you, but I hate basing models. I really do. Some guys seem to be able to flock and base models perfectly for very little effort, displaying their dudemens on amazing snow-covered bases or some other bases that make the whole army look a cut above the rest. it's always disappointing to see a wonderfully crafted and painted army sitting on white-primed bases. they just look so... unfinished.

I have attempted flocking my bases in the past, but I have never been happy with the results. even following some great tutorials online, my guys don't end up looking anything like those awesome bases that our local guys show up with. granted, the "local group" I'm talking about here is the BOLS crew... But that's beside the point.

The point is, while going through the trouble of making a new Harlequin army, I decided that this time I wanted an army that looked great from head to toe. that along with all of the converting, green-stuffing, and fluff writing I was going to do, I needed to actually have some good bases to finish out my hobby project army. It isn't going to be hyper-competitive, so it darn well better be good-looking while getting destroyed by a bare-plastic IG gunline...


with that in mind, I decided to go a new route with my bases this time. Read on for more

Do your bases look like this?

Weekend Tournament Results

This weekend was my second local tournament using my Harlequin force. it was an 1850 point tournament without any kind of restrictions/comp score. the list I brought was (using Codex:DE names for simplicity...):

Archon - drugs, huskblade, soultrap, shadowfield, blast pistol
Heamonculus1 - WWP, venom blade
Heamonculus2 - WWP, venom blade, crucible of malediction

7 incubi - klaivex with glaives
7 harlequins - shadowseer, master, 2 fusion pistols, kisses
4 trueborn - blasters

15 wyches - leader w/agonizer, 2 shardnets, haywires
15 wyches - leader w/agonizer/, 2 razorflails, haywires
10 wyches - leader w/agonizer/blast pistol, haywires

6 reavers - heat lances, cluster caltrops

Talos - CC weapon, chainflails, haywire blaster


 

Road To Adepticon

This year I will (finally!) be making the trip up to Chicago for Adepticon. This will be only my second GT, so I am pumped! When Adepticon signup opened, I registered within the first week. At the time my Harlequin army was still little more than an idea, and I only had a handful of assembled models. It seemed almost impossible to get all of that done before Adepticon, but I made it my goal anyways. A month out and suddenly things look much better! Assuming I don't run into huge problems finishing my army out, I should be able to field a fully painted, fully based, all Harlequin army! After the jump I will talk a bit about my progress and list

Introducing the Harlequins

The harlequins are a subset of the Eldar race. They share a common history, up until the Fall of the Eldar and the birth of Slaanesh. This article is the first of several that will explore the backstory of the Harlequins and the Eldar race. Though the Eldar are one of the major factions of the Warhammer universe, it seems that a lot of people don't know much about the history of the Eldar. We will begin by looking at the history of the Eldar race and the events that led up to the "creation" of the Harlequin faction in Eldar society.

Welcome to the Webway.

This site is a collection of my thoughts opinions and background pieces related to the game of warhammer 40,000. The site will focus on one of the most enigmatic of the factions in the diverse 40K universe, the Eldar Harlequins. I have always been fascinated with the Harlequins, from the time I started my first warhammer army (Eldar) in 2005. Games Workshop hasn't released a harlequin codex since the Rogue Trader expansions, but that hasn't stopped many people from creating and using harlequins in their collections.