Six for Sixth

If you ask anyone who knows me, or if you've seen my digital footprint as of late, either of them will tell you how absorbed I am by Warhammer Fantasy Battle Sixth Edition. This was my first wargame, which came out in the year 2000, and was my fixation back then as well. I have dozens of chewed up Army Books and White Dwarf Magazines from that era (chewed up is synonymous with well loved,) and in the last 2-3 years I've been digging through them all again with renewed vigor. In the aughts I played maybe four matches, all against different people (uncannily similar to what driving experience I have as a lifelong passenger princess,) and so I never got a handle on how to play the game, at least during my teenage years.

But it was enough; I was hooked and it became my career anyway. Go figure.

Since rejoining the hobby around 2015 (happy ten-year anniversary me,) I've been working my way back to WFB6E, and after two Old World Army Challenges I can now host that game, making the playing of it an achievable goal. In fact, I've had two games this Summer with more in the works, which is more matches in one wargaming system than any other I've played all year.

This is good and bad; good because I like having fun and playing games and making friends, but bad because I'm developing a vision for how I'd like to grow into this system, and I am predisposed to scope creep.

All of that said, I have a number of plans (six in fact,) and by this point I've filled notebooks with self-soothing yapping about my hobby hopes and dreams surrounding WFB6E, and now I'm putting those notes to blog in hopes of exorcising them from my fingers, and so here they are. Plans will generally consist of themed army pairs/collections with projected Stillmainian points values, and terrain aspirations.

Tiny-hammer

Did you know that I like gnomes? I know that I like gnomes. As I've said a million times, I have three gnome armies in varying states of battle ready, but I'd like to get them all rallied for larger games to explore the gnomish fantasy world. In my canon, gnomes live alongside communities, adopting traditions and garb from their neighbors, but retaining an inherent mischievousness from their own cultures. As it stands, the three main armies of this setting are as follows, alongside their aspirational point values.

Alpine gnomes - 2k+ (using the Byron ruleset and spell list)

This army is mostly done. The auxiliary force I did to round out my list for the battle report game with Stephen needs touch ups, and I need to sort out a second cannon and second giant before I can give it a true break, but all of those feel well within grasp.

Chaos gnomes - 2k+ (using the Chaos Dwarfs list for 6e Ravening Hordes)

What I have here feels the most finished (I just need to seal them properly,) but the flexibility in unit choice is not quite there yet. I hope to add some more blunderbusses and hobgoblin cavalry to add some mobility and firepower to the force, and also a K'daii Destroyer to compliment the army's heavy cav. (K'daii Destroyers do not have rules in 6e, and so I would have to write my own: a prospect I am warming up to more and more these days.

Undead gnomes - 2k+ (using the Vampire Counts Army Book for 6e)

This is the army I originally did for Dragon Rampant some number of years ago, and ever since my first OWAC, I've been contemplating rebasing and organizing this force for 6e. I've recently ordered the VC army book so that I can better map what I have to what exists, but I'm projecting that I'll likely need to do some conversions to make my army legal, and that I'm going to need a ton of spare undead for my necromeisters to summon.

Other Armies - Ogre Kingdoms and Pirate Gnomes, 500-750/ea 

When I was doing the research for my chaos gnomes project, I learned that the cannons the ogre Leadbelchers used were generally the result of trade with the chaos dwarfs. I thought this was really exciting, and so I drew up a small schematic for a spinmold that would produce a barebones ogre army after a few spins. I'd still like to make those models and that mold at some point, and having them be a part of this microsetting might help bring that plan to fruition a bit sooner. Also, the size contrast of the ogres and the gnomes in both stature and army size feels comedic, but still fitting since the gnoblars are more or less the same size as your average Alpiner.

Also, what's a Pirate Gnome?

I got fixated on Long Drong's Pirate Slayers, and started imagining an army of swashbuckling gnomes with sea dogs and land ships. I don't know how viable it is, to make a fourth gnome army and to write the rules and make the minis myself, but its something I've put a nonzero amount of thought into, and its possible that I might end up making more than one army to stir up trouble in the gnomish lands.  

(note: other tinyhammer armies I've considered doing (writing and building) include but are not limited to the kobold dragoncults and the corgis templar.) 

Terrain 

WFB6E has a number of appendices that make the game most games you could imagine, and appendix five is all about siege in the Warhammer world. I think sorting out a castle situation would be a ton of fun, giving the short kings proportionate ramparts to defend and assail, and giving me reason to make itty bitty siege engines to go alongside them. 

Under-hammer

My first White Dwarfs covered the epic saga of Bugman's Lament, where the esteemed brewmaster lost everything he'd ever loved. It was a raucous back and forth between goblins and dwarfs and had so many awesome hobby opportunities woven into it, that I've been gobsmacked ever since, and wholly obsessed with the campaign.

Additionally, Skaven were my first true love in WFB, and a thing you realize early on being a fourteen year old trying to build a skaven army is that fourteen year olds don't have the patience or the budget to build a horde like a skaven army. The few games I could play with it, my army took as many bells and whistles as it could hold to stretch my measly 50 minis into the 1k point range. This undoubtedly led to my slinking off quietly and leaving the hobby for some number of years, but I've always kept an eye on these freaks, and have love them from afar... 

A few years back, an intenet friend sent me the remains of his rats, and upon opening them up, I remembered a story from the Ten Tailed Cat comics. It was a tale of a dwarf who had tried to plunder the ruins of Bugman's old brewery, but he and his friends were beset by ratmen and lo, he was the only one to make it out alive...

That's when it clicked, that I could do all three armies and have them duke it out under the mountains when they weren't recreating the lament. It was the perfect plan... but boy is it going to be a lot of work. 

Dwarfs - I have 1k of non-gw dwarfs that I cobbled together out of the discount bin. I tried making them a mini-owac last year, but my fall was full of boogers and so I did a whole bunch of nothing.

Goblins - Ages ago, I backed the Heartbreaker minis kickstarter and got a buttload of goblins. Never enough mind you, but enough that I could IMAGINE starting something of a horde. My current fixation is chariots, so I may have to get crafty when it comes to fulfilling these dreams, but there are worse fates in this world.

Skaven - This force feels like it'll be just walls and walls of clanrats, backed by the occasional zappy gun and plenty of hulking rat ogres! It'll check the boxes of both the stupidity and the shooting through combat rules, and with any luck, I'll end up with enough moulder or skyre that I can pivot into one or the other for flavor reasons.

Sylv-hammer  

Warhammer Skirmish is another appendix where ideas were fleshed out for a Mordheim-like experience using the 6e system. I think it'd be neat to have a little self-contained venture into Sylvania, barony of the Von Carstein bloodline of vampires. These forces would likely be very small (sub 500) but would ideally have a great deal of personality to make up for it.

Stirlanders - this is your run of the mill mob with torches and pitchforks, led by some hunters and maybe funded by a burgher. Not all of these villagers are what they seem though, and among their number one might find a masked stranger with a predilection for murder!

Sylvanians - a vampire and his undead minions (zombies, skellebones, and ghouls,) and perhaps some wolves and bats that respond to his every beck and call.

Mootlanders - their wagon broke down just up the road! These halflings are the target for all sorts of monsters 

Forest Folk - The fae of the glen have no love for the vampires nor the villagers, and the price owed by those who break the silence is often steep paid in blood.

The Reanimator - a mad scientist who has fled the empire begins his greatest work ever, reigniting the spark of life in the bodies of those who've shuffled off the mortal coil. I don't know what list I would use for these, but I've always wanted a Frankenstein's army, so if it's at this small scale I've really no excuse to deny myself the pleasure.

Sib-hammer

I have two siblings, who's names occasionally grace the WFB6E books in my collection. One enjoyed Tomb Kings of Khemri when we were kids, and the other is a big Lizardman Appreciator. I could see myself making a pair of 500-750 point armies for them to play. Although geographically this is one of the less likely matchups, I think the contrast between scale and bone would be really fun to witness on the table.  

Daemon-hammer

On youtube, I watch a lot of a channel called Kim's Talisman, which has showcased a number of highly customized armies from the current Warhammer: The Old World game. A handful of these armies have been from the legends "get you by" rules for Daemons of Chaos, which were inspired by the rules put out for 6e's Storm of Chaos expansion. The Nurgle and Tzeentch armies that this youtuber has produced are gorgeous and exhibit a lot of hand sculpting that really resonates with me, given my interest in traditional modelmakers still working in the Oldhammer styles.

One of my earliest attempts at WFB6E aside from the starter box (Empire and Orcs) and Skaven was a Nurgle Hordes of Chaos army, and so I have a number of middlehammer plaguebearers ready to heed the call. I have nothing of the Tzeentch minis, and so I look forward to making more than a few sucker-fingered friends in this apparently limitless spare time I project myself having in the future.

SIXTH-HAMMER

So it's not actually sixth edition, or a sixth the size of my other minis, but I have a Warmaster Army fresh in the box that I promised to paint two summers ago. Its a little Empire force that I'd like to do up as either Nuln or Marienburg (for the landship) so that I can reach out to the very nice person who gifted it to me, so that he can slaughter me in a game I don't know. I'm still very intrigued and excited by these liliputian warhammer models, and I'm optimistic that this will be their last year wrapped in plastic.

And those are them.

It's a helluva thing, finding your groove, and hopefully it'll continue to be just that as we groove on into the darker months of the year. I look forward to keeping the lights on for you <3