Well it has certainly been a while, and with good reason. I've recently moved from Florida to Maryland. It was a bit of an ordeal, but I'm in the process of unboxing everything and getting settled. Part of this was paying a visit to my local Games Workshop store which is just minutes from my new house. During a conversation with one of the red shirts, I discovered that this was going to be the last year for Games Day to be located in Baltimore. That was sad news as both I and a friend were looking forward to attending a few while I was up this way. I decided that I needed to get out there this time as it might just be my last opportunity.
I went up to see the big show this last Saturday. I had an excellent time, met lots of great gamers, saw tons of great GW/Forgeworld models, tables, and I even got a game in. It was time well spent. I took tons of pictures, and as soon as I find the USB transfer cable (I've no clue what box the movers packed that thing in) I'll be sure to share with you some of the fantastic things I saw.
The game I got in was interesting. I hauled my Orks up there in the 1850 point configuration I enjoy playing. I bumped into a guy named Evan who wanted to get a game in as well. We had the pleasure of playing on one of the GW tables. Cover was non-existant as it was a desert themed table with a large river running across the middle. The table was 8x4, which didn't really help my Orks. My opponent brought a mechanized Guard army. Armor EVERYWHERE! If it wasn't a Chimera; it was a Leman Russ. If it wasn't a Leman Russ, it was a Manticore. He basically setup the world's most fearsome gun line on the opposite side of the river, guarding the ONE bridge, and just blasted away. The only thing that saved me from humiliation was my two squads of Deff Koptas and my Kommandos, all of which out-flanked. One squad of Deff Koptas managed to come in directly behind his line, killed the Manticore, then they got shot up, retreated, and STILL managed to take out another Leman Russ. The Kommandos popped the Chimera carrying the Psyker Battle Squad, and took a few of them out before good 'ol Snik Rot met an untimely end against them in assault.
While the kill points weren't tallied up, as he was in a rush to make it to another event, I wasn't terribly far behind him. As I recall, I was only a couple kill points out. He informed me, as we were packing up, that I had managed to cause more damage to his army than anyone else. I'll take that as a moral victory. Guard are insanely difficult opponents, and if you want to have a chance against them, you better hope you have some sneaky units to strike them where they aren't looking. Oh and 3+ cover saves don't hurt.
I'll have all those pics soon, so stay tuned.