Christmas Report

Well Christmas came and has now gone, and I had a nice few days. This year instead of going away, Megan’s family stayed up north, so me and Lindsay got to spend the day with them. 
We did the traditional Botterill thing of waking up and having bacon and mushroom stotties, although a lot earlier than usual, 7am to be exact! And then we opened our presents. I was a bit worried about what I got Megan and Lindsay, but they both loved what they got, so that made me happy.

I got some quite cool things, a pack of Wulfen for my Space Wolves and some Haemotrope Reactors as well as a Stormsurge, Pandemic – Reign of Cthulhu, Fallout 4, Ghostbusters (2016) on Blu-Ray, some drill bits for the drill I got for my birthday and an amazing pair of Joker Converse High Tops!

We then travelled down to Megan’s parents where we had a lovely dinner of beef and turkey, piled high, not quite as high as my Nana’s, but pretty high. In the afternoon we played some games and watched a bit of TV, then had a tea of party food, including some low sugar cakes and gingerbread that Megan made especially for me.

When we got back home that night, we had left the wrapping paper on the floor, purposefully, so we sprinkled some pellets in it and let Gandalf dive into it and make a mess like he loves to do!

Boxing Day I spent in the house on my own, which gave me a bit of time to just chill out in my own, and with that time I did a of reading, and some painting.

All in all a really nice Christmas, different from the Christmas that I have developed over the years with Lindsay, but sometimes it’s nice to mix it up a bit, and I have promised the Ruffell’s a Botterill Christmas next time they stay up north for the 25th December.

What I am Modelling

Still working hard on the Word Bearers, but I need to really get my arse into gear if I am to have all 3500 points read for the 22nd January.

Over the past week I have finished up a Praetor for the list, it’s the event only mini, which I picked up at Warhammer Fest, armed with a Combi-Volkite and a Thunderhammer. Absolutely love this model and feel like it’s full of character. I have the same one painted up for my Ultramarines and am tempted to get another to paint up for Space Wolves.

I also painted up a squad of Cataphractii Terminators for which is used a few bits form the Special Weapons Upgrade Kit, specifically the Reaper Autocannon and the Power Maul. I didn’t think that the Power Sword really suited the Word Bearers whereas the Maul really did. The model was inspired by a piece of artwork that SN Battle Reports have been using for their Horus Heresy event, it really captures what I wanted to express with my model and I hope you can see that.

Then there is the lone MKIII Marine with a Meltagun. One of the things I want to do with the Word Bearers is to use them as Chaos Space Marines for 40k, but I can’t simply plop my Legion Veteran Squad in as a squad of Chaos Marines, sadly they can’t take two heavy weapons. So that’s what this guy is for, he will substitute for one of the Missile Launcher Marines to give me a 10 man squad of Chaos Space Marine armed with a Missile Launcher and a Meltagun.

On Boxing Day, I was left to my own devices as Megan and Lindsay were off elsewhere and I was able to paint up a Spartan Assault Tank and a plastic Contemptor Dreadnought armed with a Kheres Assault Cannon. I also built and primed a squad of Ashen Circle which I shall begin painting tomorrow.

What I am Reading

In audiobooks I listed to Perpetual, a story by Dan Annett which formed part of the Black Library advent calendar subscription. I really enjoyed it, was nice to catch up with some characters who are off on one of these side missions which will probably not finish up until the Siege of Terra. I did have one issue with it, and that was that the actor voicing Ollanius Persson seemed a little too old. The artwork of him from Know No Fear shows a man of middle age appearance but still quite vigorous, and his voice actor in the audiobook of that story I think captured him perfectly, whereas in this one he is just a tad too old, more like Robert De Niro, old and retired but still with it, than Liam Neeson, if that makes an sense.

I also listened to Children of Sicarus in which we got a bit of historic information about the home world of the Word Bearers and a bit of character building for Kor Phaeron. We also were introduced to the first Kairic Adept in the 30/40K lore which makes me wonder if they will be introduced when GW get round to do some more Tzeentch models for the game. We got to see what a self-serving got Kor Phaeron truly is, how he puts himself ahead of everything, even the will of the Gods he claims to serve.

A criticism would be that it describes M’Kar as a member of the Gal Virbak, when I just listen to the story of his assent to the ranks of the Daemon Princes in The Mark of Calth, and he is quite well established as such in the rest of the lore, typical GW not keeping tack of its own more I suppose, LOL!

I got finished reading Sons of the Forge, and overall, I didn’t enjoy it all that much, it was very jumpy and filled with plot holes and dead ends, which is a sad thing to say because it had lots of potential.

I then moved on to a few of the recent shorts that were released during the Advent event, The Painted Count, Exocytosis and The Last Son of Prospero, all of which I enjoyed a lot. But Last Son of Prospero was a tad weird, it’s an interesting ending and I am wondering where they are going to go with it, but it does seem to have undermined all that had been built up around this character up to this point.

What I am Playing

On Christmas Day, I played a couple of games with Megan’s mum and sister along with Lindsay and Megan. We started off with Joking Hazard, we played to 5 points and Lindsay won it, was a lot of fun and we made some very funny comics. We then played a game of Timeline British History, which I had gotten Megan for Christmas, and Lindsay won that, after declaring at the beginning of the game that she wouldn’t win because she is rubbish at British history!

Durham Raiders had an all day gaming session today, but sadly I was unable to make it until much later on, by the time I arrived most people were either leaving or had just started another game, so I sat with Aidan whilst he was building his Sylvaneth for the slow build Age of Sigmar and I built the Genestealers from Lost Patrol. 

But after I had done that Phil and Gareth had finished their games of Age of Sigmar and The Horus Heresy, so we played a game of Gorechosen with Christopher. I had not played Gorechosen up until this point, although I had always wanted to pay a game, and it was really really good. I even won, but very early in the game I took a real beating from Gareth’s character until he and Phil realised that Christopher hadn’t taken a single wound, and they then ganged up on him! It’s a really brutal game and I had a lot of fun, so much so that I intend to get a copy at some point, as much for the minis as for the game itself. 

What I am Backing

A Bahá’í friend Jody Cooper is running a Kickstarter to fund a concept album of songs he wants to produce, it’s called Serenades and Odes to a Cracked World. He is a rather talented musician so I suggest you check it out.

What I am Spending

Well all the Christmas presents I needed to buy were bought, so I treated myself, I did some demo work last month at the Newcastle Film and Comic Con, so with my pay for it, I got the Tau Empire Targeted Reconnaissance Cadre battleforce box set, a Tidewall Rampart and Stormcloud Attack. With my normal hobby budget I bought a Ghostkeel and a Broadside. So I probably spent a bit much on the hobby this month than I should have done considering my backlog of projects.

I also got a killer deal on an old box set, the Blood Tide of Khorne from my FLGS, they found it at the back of the storage area, it had arrived damaged and unsellable a few years ago when it was sent in by Games Workshop, and they were sent a replacement, so I was given it for a steal, the only real damage I could find was to the box, the sprues themselves are in perfect order, so I snapped up the offer, and this will form part of my slow build Age of Sigmar Khorne army.