Oh, you both feel good. Yeah, great.
Very good. I couldn't find my high off but
and then remembered I had a spare so so I've got that one
right. So I might get distracted
everyone then by weird writings and scribblings in the book
because it's not mine that someone's done that.
That that does upset me a little bit when I see that people
scribbling and writing in the book and it's like, why?
Why would you do that? Like he's written a price on
Alfarian. It's like, what are you doing?
What do you do? Yes.
I've, I've got to say, this has been really useful for me just
for the fact that I was reading through my books and found my
missing empire book tucked at the back.
So I was like, yes, there it is. Fair dudes, you know, I put all
mine, all mine kind of stacked up ready to go for whenever he
looks like they said I don't know where I put my high open.
Then I had it out recently for like the start of this month and
then I don't know where I put it.
Yeah, not an organised person. Compared to me, we, we we played
the was it the Scaven game? The 1000 points Scaven game, was
that right? Josh's online campaign I'm sure
I had a game is. That the one that never got
finished? It never got finished, no.
Campaign, Yeah. I I was wood elves.
Oh. Yeah, yeah, the orcs in that 1,
I think. Was it orcs?
Oh, you're the orcs OK. Yeah, I think that was one.
I played the dwarfs I remember. Was it dwarves?
Yeah. No, I played with Orcs, but I I
played dwarfs and I played. Yeah, I think that was the game
that never got played with. That was like the round that
never got played. So you guys didn't play each
other. There was one game.
Right. OK.
Oh, I see. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. I couldn't remember which one
was which. It feels like such a long time
ago now, yeah. Yeah, it was so.
Yeah, I think, I think you did Goblins and Scaven think you
played Tim's goblins and against Yeah and then.
That was really good fun. You managed high elves and
dwarves, probably you played, I think against, I can't remember
off top, Yeah. Yeah, I think, yeah.
I watched them. It was a long time ago.
Oh, it's been writing on the pages.
Why would you do that? Shocking anyone?
If you have one unwritten copy, that's fine.
I. Guess.
Oh yeah, I do. I do have my original 1 from
back in 199293 March 2 roundabout.
Then commend them. Yeah.
So. Oh yeah.
OK, tell us, do you have the rough running order for the
Empire to hand? I do, actually, yeah, I'm.
Johnny Marshall says can I? Yeah.
Right. So yeah, Goodwin, we're able to
have this sort of a tail end of September.
Indeed. September has been the month of
high UPS so. Yeah, we're just squeezing it
in, as it were. Probably get posted in in
October, but hey, yeah, yeah. But.
You know, that's the way it brings in.
It yeah, right. So yeah, I don't know, maybe if
Tim, if you want to just to, you know, tell a little bit about
your high of back story if you want to.
Mine isn't too long because I had never played High Elves.
I played plenty against High Elves, but I'm not a high of
player myself. Yeah, I, I, I guess I started
with high elves, I think because of a lot of people, because they
came in the box, if I'm perfectly frank.
But I mean for me I fell in love with the models in my games
local games workshop window. I mean I'm sure we're going to
move on to this but the the Techless and Tyrion models for
me are the greatest 2 models of all time and as an 1112 year old
I was enthralled with them and there was no other army I wanted
to collect so I actually swapped my mate's box full of goblins so
I had his half of the high elf army.
So most of my time my army was just what it would have been. 40
Spearman, 40 Archers and tearing and tetless so.
And maybe those cardboard cutouts of the Bond thrower.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I did use the cardboard cut out.
Yeah, I know it's it's, it's one of these things that, you know,
I am one of these guys that used a lot of special characters.
But I think everyone did back in the day, you know, they were
economical really, because they took up such a big chunk of your
army, you know, 4 or 500 points. That's an interesting view of
economics. It takes up a lot of the
economic or most people would say we mean little.
Yeah, but no, we it. Makes some point.
I get, I get where you're coming from, but it's an interesting
take on economical, yeah. We almost always did that as
well. And I mean, for Empire, pretty
much all the models released, the character models released in
fourth were special characters. I mean, there were hardly any
like generic characters. So we sort of assumed, yes, you
know, everything was special characters.
So that's pretty much what we did.
And and, and just for me as well.
I mean, obviously I'm incredibly biased, but I think the high
elves have the best special characters out the whole 4th 5th
set of armies. You know, I think they've got
the best back story. I think they're the best
designed, they got the best paint job, and they probably has
the most love from Games Workshop.
So it it it seemed to me that every other issue of White Dwarf
had a picture of Tyrion or Teknis.
Yeah, I can definitely agree on the the vicious aspects.
The other ones, you know, arguable but and and you saw
that in Golden Demon as well at the time.
I mean it was almost always in the like single models, Tyrion
or Teknis or both. Well, if if Empire was the army
they used to launch 4th edition or you know, they, they
redesigned it just full 4th edition.
It was what appeared in almost all of the white, you know, the
white dwarfs and also all the battle reports to start with
Heil's really worthy kind of post release.
Yeah, flagship. They were the ones that once it
was released, they were the ones they got quite a lot in the in
the magazine. So redesigning obviously
previous to to 4th edition, they didn't.
You can't just had elf models. They weren't really certain ones
were definitely would elf certain ones would definitely
darker was different. But what I mean by just some
ones is in just good elves and you could pretty much use my
just wood elves or you could use them the higher we spend on how
you painted them. Yeah.
And I think that's sort of the same.
We, yeah, we talked about the. Yeah, yeah, true.
Yeah. But it was the first time really
with, you know, the 4th June box set that Hyos got their own
dedicated range, really. And they really went for it,
didn't they? I mean, I mean, Jazz really
pulled out all the stops. And I'll agree that there's some
of the best models done in my opinion ever.
Whether they have the best special characters does
miniatures wise I I could go along with it.
But actually, I don't know 4th I was quite a quite a quite a big
undead player and they've got a good old plethora of decent
undead in another month. But I'm just saying I don't know
if I agree with you totally. They they, they also featured a
lot in the artwork so they were on the main box cover.
They were also on Chronicles of war.
They also loads of white dwarf covers.
You know the exposure of the high elves.
They they, they must have been the higher ups favorite.
I mean, I have no idea on how how many numbers they sold or
what sort of, but it seemed to be one of the most popular ones.
Yeah, basically transitioned into higher was during 4th, it
was, it was an open gobbling player up until then.
And during 4th he transitioned into into higher.
So that may have had something to do with it as well.
Yeah. And I think it's of popularity
and I think that's probably quite true.
Well, because they came with the box, as you said, they came with
the box sets. A lot of people started with
them so. And I think for at least for
some time, they were one of the most recently priced if you
wanted to get back to full edition.
But now I think maybe it's catching up, it's everything is
pricy. So I don't think you can get
them on discount now, but they were at least more recently as
in. As in eBay or?
I don't. I haven't really looked at Games
Workshop prices to be honest with Ohio's these days for
whatever their stupid name they've got now.
I think they still sell a cut. I mean, I think we're going to
talk about this later, but they still sell a couple of models.
I think there's a couple of eight edition ones they've got
on the website or last time I checked anyway, but.
Not as nice, Not as. There's definitely a hard cut
off point. I think the late 90s.
I'm a massive fan of the Gary Morley High Elves.
I know not everyone is, but I really love those don't.
Dislike them? But from then onwards I tend not
to worry about it. I I think the sick dish and
plastics weren't the best, especially the spear men look a
bit goofy, yeah. Yeah, the plastics, I'm, I'm
talking about the late the late 90s.
Yeah, no, I know. I'm just agreeing with you on
the cut off. So kind of Morley's in 5th
edition, let's say. I think we're probably the
ending of the really great high off.
Models. After.
That they're not. They're not.
Unpleasant. But the big thing for me is I
couldn't really afford many metal models when I first
started. It was really the special
characters that I bought, so I didn't really have many of the,
the Ally Morrison ones, you know, when they were first out
in the range for falls. It was only really.
When the broad ones, yeah. Yeah, it's only really when I
got a job, you know, 1516 that I was able to afford the the, the
latest stuff, which is probably why I like the Gary Morley ones
more because I was exposed. To those, I was very lucky in
that I was in a white in a, in a white dwarf.
Sorry, I was in, I was in a white dwarf.
I was in the Games Workshop and I don't think it was a proper
sale. I think it was it.
It certainly wasn't on the grand openings and it certainly wasn't
publicized say all day. But I was in there and they were
just trying to get rid of a load of old stock.
And I, and I can't remember exactly when it was, but there
was a load of 4th edition metal stuff.
So the old Marauder metal stuff and just sort of dirt cheap,
really, really cheap. I just picked up loads of them.
So price for that. Unlike you, I mean, I, I pretty
much had the plastics. I had probably I, I had the all
of them from one set of it. And then I mean, I literally
bought it. Me and my brother brought it as
it came out and I had the heels. And that was the first time I
properly collected. I've been planning to collect
dwarfs up until that point. And I'd be meaning to pick up
things like Prince Luther's, Bugman's, all the kind of the
register, renowned and those sort of things.
And my brother's mate worked in Games Workshop.
So. So the plan was that I got him
to buy, I give him the money, he'll buy them.
And he just never materialised. And then 4th appeared.
It was like, oh, OK. And I got swayed by the the
amazing pictures in in the white dwarf just before they launched
it. So, so the the one with the
front cut with the full visual front cover on on it, That's the
one before they released, released it the next issue.
And just the pictures in there were just like, oh, dropped a
gorgeous. And yeah, just like you said,
you know, I fell in love with everything that came out the
first few months. And then for my birthday, pretty
much I'd got techies before then.
And the 20 that came in the in 20 of each came in the box set.
And my birthday is kind of March time.
So it was released what, September, about October, I
think it was released October. And I'd played with the, with
the plastics from the box set. And I think we've got techies
just before Christmas. And then Nixon Woodall's My
Brother's Collection and played with that for a while.
Then my birthday came around and I picked up a load of extra
stuff. So I picked up the silver Helms,
the book. Weirdly I think 3 packs of the
five I plan to pick up more. But then I decided to pick up
something else instead. So ended up like with with 35,
which is a really weird number of of Spearman and Archers.
Just as I said, the silver Helms where I I again, I was just a
bit stupid. I picked up a rather pick up the
standard where I picked up an extra Lancer.
So I ended up with a load of Lancers in the champion.
So I just used one as a standard bearer model and Tyrion as well.
That's one. And that was my army for a very
long. I went to repeat of Ultra and
that's my army. For me, I I very rarely played
with the full command just because I couldn't afford it.
You know, it was one of those that was an extra luxury.
Like now I play every single regiment, every single unit has
a full command because I love the look of the banner and you
know, but but back then, you know, I never had a full command
you. Know I had two jobs at the time.
I was delivering once a week paper round and working in a
corner shop. I wasn't earning a lot of money
at all. I was probably the two jobs
combined. I was lucky if I cleared £10.
So on a Saturday I'd go over to go into my mates.
It was like every Saturday we'd go over and so I'd pick up
things like a command group or I'd pick up one blister or
something. I wasn't painting at that time,
so it wasn't it. If it was painting, it'd been
great, but you know, give me a week to get them painted and
then buy my next blister. That sort of I wasn't so, but
yeah, no, I was picking up things like that.
So I've got AI, got a command group for my Spearman.
I think I picked up one for the one Archer command group as
well. I mean, enough to get like 2 of
each, but I didn't bother. So yeah, not really command
groups like you at the time, but no very fond memories.
And you know, an awesome army. But I don't remember a lot of
the games. The main ones I remember are not
the games themselves, but I remember playing normally we'd
play most weekends only against my brother, but we'd play most
weekends and it'd be Empire and autumn gobbins on on the
Saturday and on the Sunday kind of in the evening.
So pre going back to, you know, bed and then going back to
school, we would normally play a high off versus undead game.
I'd take my high offs and brother use use undead.
But it was pre book undead so it was the white list undead.
It's very typically the white list undead because that meant
they were using dark magic and with the neck dramatic spells
thrown in. And we're using your request
characters for the for the undead.
Very, very vivid memories of that.
I don't remember the games themselves, just doing that as
it were. So talking about the the
whitelist we discussed in the Empire, it was quite they were
quite similar, were quite a few changes for the full book.
So what did that look like for Hayams?
Was the whitelist representative?
What did it change? The yeah, it kind of more
represented the Warhammer armies missed from 3rd, which a lot of
them did because obviously they were translating from that into
4th. So you had Phoenix Guard, but
there wasn't any fleshing out of what Phoenix Guard were.
So yeah, exactly in the previous edition, Guard, you have called
things like that, it's called Guard and they they were like a
elite for troops. So they have the same my idea
came with Spears as standard rather than how was you can
upgrade to halberds And I think that's in the white book and I
think that's in the white book as well that they come with
Spears initially. You can upgrade to halberds only
one behind there's the standard. Feel free.
I'm just flaming the comments of whatever publications goes out
on if I've got that wrong. Just basically going off memory
from many, many, many, many, many years ago.
It's not something I've looked at recently because I love the
book so much. So I wouldn't use the white
list. Other armies I've used the white
list and I think that's partially because I was one of
the first books, so I never really used the white white and
probably for a few months I used the white book.
So yeah, replaced. The other armies used it for a
couple of years maybe. Well, maybe what felt like a few
years, but probably actually was.
It was probably. One you You never played third
edition, right? So I, I, I was 11 years old when
fourth came out. So I was just about the right
time. Played hero Quest and, and, and,
and all that jazz like I'm sure we all have.
I had 0 experience. The third I had no exposure to
it whatsoever. But I have actually got
tremendous joy from digging into the past and, and going back and
looking at all the different, you know, the old white dwarfs
and the old books and things like that.
And it, it feels like a completely different army to me.
I know, I know that, that the foundations are there, but the
aesthetics, even though it's just Goodwin, it feels quite
different. You know, there's a very
distinct like sea elf, high elf thing going on.
And, you know, the look at the yeah, the war dancers, you know,
the, the look of them as well, that they're like quite Nordic.
They're quite, you know, got a tinge of Viking to some of the
models. It looks to me, you know, with
the axes and other things like that, you know, and the only
thing that I, I, I did really enjoy reading about was how
notorious the, the dragon kin were that they were in every
list in, in the older games day events and you just turn up with
a load of big Dragons and just defeat everyone on the table.
Well, how old's we? Unique and well, not unique.
There was a couple of moments where it happened, but fairly
unique in that there was nothing in the high off list.
You had to take every other list.
There was a compulsory element. You had to have X number of
this, Y number of that piles. No, you could just take whatever
you wanted. There was no compulsory troops.
So you get away with doing the dragon thing because you didn't
have to spend points on anything else.
So, yeah, Dragonkin as a unit. So Dragon riders as a unit, rank
and file unit. Yeah, that's that.
That was perfectly allowed by the lists and nothing to stop
you doing it. It's not like you could only
take X percent of your points. No, as long as you had a
character in your army, everything else could be
Dragonkin up to the number that you were allowed to take.
But this is the thing as well as like, I really like some of the
3rd edition Empire models, you know, you were chatting about
before and that they were a little bit historically based.
And I think some of them still work really well in the 4th
edition armies, and they fit really well.
But with the High Elves, I've got a couple of models from the
3rd edition and they stand out like a sore thumb to my eye.
Yeah. The scales out a little bit.
The scales out. Yeah.
I I I I love. The aesthetics different.
I, I love the, the, the, the, the mage on the Unicorn because
it's so iconic and, and that's about the only one I think I can
tolerate in my army. What about the I haven't got
him, but that's one. He's got plenty of them.
But what about the Eagle Rider? I don't have the eagle rider.
No, I don't have the Eagle Rider.
You had him because my only issue with him.
I thought that was wood elf. I thought, is that not high elf?
No, no, there's an eagle rider with a bow.
That's right. The the, the Mike McVeigh ones a
conversion. So.
Right, OK, that's my. I'm getting confused.
Yeah, he. Uses the War Dancer from
scarlocks made by the rider and converts him into a Rider.
But the actual model that was, I mean, there were great eagles
without a rider. They sold, I'm pretty sure.
But there was a high off one that was released that I think
it's another Marauder 1, I think off the top of my head.
He's a lovely model. But yeah, he's, if you've ever
seen the back report Hills versus Chaos Dwarfs, where
there's a Griffin riding general for the high Morley's the Chaos
dwarf general. That's the wood elf rider.
That's another wood elf, Wood Elf Rider and the High of Eagle
Rider, That one, it's, it's a lovely, lovely model, but kind
of disappeared as when the Pegasus rider came out.
Yeah, another fantastic model as well.
Yeah, I've got him just sat on the side here ready, just so I
can get a bit of inspiration. All right, that's.
Nice, he is a great model. Fantastic.
Just a shame Pegasus is rubbish. He.
Needs a parachute.
Does that model? Yeah.
Right, yeah, we moving on. We talked a bit about what the
appeal of Hail force and me from sort of the outside perspective,
I really love the stories they had in like Grumps invasion of
Ultron. I thought it was really awesome
and of course the looks of the models and any general idea how
how do they play, whether it's suppose were they good or better
or? From my point of view, there are
pretty much a point and click on me, put them down, shoot.
It's pretty much that you know, and then use your coverage
account to charge and you know when they're getting close just
charging. I've rarely done like a flanking
maneuver with cavalry going out separately once or twice, but
it's mainly that you're arches down.
Shoot, fingers crossed you kill. What?
About your experience, Tim, did you dominate the battlefield or?
Yeah, I mean, this is one of the things like I'm, I'm, I'm sure
I've heard someone say before that Warhammers won on movement
and, and, and they have a very high movement value.
So you, you can, you know, if you're good in that phase, you
can do extremely well with them. Unfortunately, I'm not
particularly great in that phase.
So I, I, I kind of just, you know, charge forward with my
silver Helms and, and hope for the best because they've got
such a, a large range, You know, it's, it's I, I like that
cinematic look and I like just getting in there and, and, and,
and not hanging around. I'll tell a life.
I'll tell a life I didn't put a little bit of couple of bolt
throws on a hill, you know, and and sheep from a distance.
But The thing is, the great thing about this is I've I've
I've reread all the books, of course, and you know, and and
gone through a couple of things. And there's a couple of things
that you spot in these books that does make you chuckle.
And the thing that made me laugh was, I mean the books written by
Andy Chambers and and every book gives like a little high of
tactics. And one of the lines for me was,
he says. You've got arguably the best
defensive troops in the game all.
Right, that's. The and that's Andy Chambers
says that and I'm not sure I agree The.
Best. Defensive time.
I think at the time he's right. Yeah, yeah, it's the second time
was. Released.
Yeah. The the.
The time, yeah. The biggest weakness for me for
elves is their high cost versus only toughness 3 That was always
the big thing. They, they went down to a, you
know, a light breeze for me, you know.
Yeah. So, but as you said, yes and
there was one other Omicbook to compare with maybe that was.
Officially, yeah. Yeah.
Phoenix Guard are absolutely beautiful models.
They're probably, you know, one of my favorite models, but
they're an awful unit and I'd never take them, you know?
Wasn't they're awful. They're quite high cost, they're
only in toughness 3. You know you have heavy armor
though, rather than just light. They're heavy armor.
There's only +5 though if they haven't got Shields, you know.
Yeah, yeah, no, the two handed weapons, well, yeah, can't
assure. US.
Yeah. Oh, no, sorry.
Not 2 handed weapons. Sorry.
They're halberdiers aren't they? Sorry, no, no halberds.
Sorry, not halberdiers. Halberds.
But. Yeah, though I quite like them.
I've got to be honest. I I rather like to.
I haven't used them very often again, but I only painted them
up and then didn't get many games in after I painted them
up. But but that in theory, yeah,
OK. They're, they're pretty in sense
of if they get attacks, you know, if they get charged or if
you're getting charged, you've made a mistake anyway because
they've got high movement rates. They should be charging.
They're charging, they're striking first.
You just got to do enough on the charge to, you know, in the
initial attack, they're not taking many attacks back, you
know, You know, they shouldn't be able to do that.
Yeah. But I mean the issue with a lot
of the elite infantry in in fourth was of course they only
had one attack each and you had usually you know from the five.
So and you will still miss on one and two.
So even though I mean they had good strength and good weapons,
can you maybe get 2 kills and you know that doesn't perhaps
get you that far. It doesn't.
But how many kills is your opponent getting as well so
maybe? It's Chaos Warriors.
With high yeah, well, yeah, but maybe things got against Chaos
Warriors isn't the best move anyway, but.
You know, yeah. But I mean, even if you get the
chance to shot, I mean, you're not, you know, guaranteed to
win. Against no, no, no.
But very few units are. You know, in reality, yes, OK,
you need a bit of luck with them, but you do with most
troops. You know, just just taking a
unit of 10 probably isn't going to get you very far.
You do need to rank them up. You need to have those ranks.
Maybe a magic banner. OK, yes, he pushes up their cost
even further. That's not like a banner of
might on that unit. Yeah, no, I mean that it was the
way it was back then. So they didn't, you know, stand
out in any way. But you, you could always, you
know, half expect your elite to just bounce off and do nothing.
I mean. Now white lions on the opposite.
On the other hand, I adore the white lions.
They're my some of my favorite high off models, says Marauder.
White lights because they just looks they're like beefy elves,
but they definitely suffer from the from the same issue as great
swords, the striking last with very little armour.
You know, they've got light armour on.
So, so, so they have all the problems that we discussed with
great swords. Yeah, OK, yes, they have an
extra point of strength. They have an extra point of
weapon skill. Yeah, that's great.
But they just aren't going to survive.
No, they're going. To die so so fees God.
If you take your argument in fees God but amplify even
further like like beautiful models but they just this is not
worth taking them. They look good on the tabletop,
but they don't perform very well.
I think the elite High elf inventory don't perform well.
And you know, if, if I've I've never really played
competitively, but if if I were to, I'd never take any of them.
Good thing we don't, so it's all about.
You see 4th 4th is my favorite edition by a a country mile.
But I do like the they made them slightly more fluffier.
In later editions they added a a couple of things that made them
feel a little bit more. Yeah, I mean, we, we talked
about that in the Empire review as well, that there were very
few troops that I had any kind of special rules.
They basically had, you know, stats that set them aside or,
you know, the aesthetics and that that was it pretty much.
And I don't know, did any of the higher troops have special
rules? They had sword masters.
They had special rules. Yeah, strike first sword
masters, even though they had. Well, don't strike them small.
Yeah, it's more they don't strike last from they strike
first. You mean it's?
It's oh, yeah. Sorry.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. They just won't always strike
last. Now what?
4th I think. That was another addition where
they strike. Yeah, sorry, I get get my
additions conflict. Yeah, I think all my arms do
eventually, yeah. But they start.
What they start from is, is the transition of third into 4th.
In that with third, you charging didn't guarantee that you strike
first. Yeah.
So having a high initiative was really good because you were
more likely to strike first when they removed that Heil suffered
from that one all they all suffered from that one because
all of a sudden having that really high initiative only
mattered it latter rounds and because you didn't push back
anymore. So a lot of the time you were,
if you charged in, did a lot of wind, you're breaking the enemy.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, so you need to be less
important. So you're paying a lot of points
for having a really high initiative.
So most of the time you'd strike first so there was little
striking back against you. But in fourth that became less
relevant. So those armies that had high
initiative suddenly were penalised almost.
So that's probably where that is a hang up from from that one I'm
afraid. You kind of roll with the
punches. So with Empire, we talked about
a little bit about the the actual book, the army book.
They it was the first one. And maybe they, you know, the
layout was not very user friendly.
It was just, you know, they threw you into the background
and really tell you what it was all about in the book, you know,
how it was pursued. Did that change for the high
book? Was it for you when you started?
Yeah, yeah, there's a little. Bit more, but not lots.
So what what was the experience for you Tim, when you started?
Was it easy to understand what how you were supposed to play or
how did you? Yeah, it's it's, it's, it's not.
I don't think it's a whole lot clearer from the Empire book.
But the the big stand out for me is it was by Andy Chambers and
Bill King. And I think Bill King had a big
part of involving himself in the law and, you know, the, the,
the, the background, you know, and, and then it really pulls
your way. And, you know, the one of my
most favorite pages in the whole book is actually the map, you
know, and coming from Lord of the Rings, how a lot of people
do come through this way is I have to spend hours just looking
at the maps, you know, and, and the old world map and, and the
maps in the books is a really big pull for me, you know, and I
love the map page and it's only a few pages in, I think, but
it's those sorts of elements and those sorts of details, you
know, that I really love, you know, but it's such great
background material, you know, Bill King did such a brilliant
job. Yeah, I mean a proper author.
So I mean he. It's a proper author, but it's
interesting as well that it's the only book that says with
Jess Goodwin, he, he, he gets a credit, as you know, as one of
the authors and he he doesn't appear in any of the others.
So he must have had quite a big, quite a part of putting together
the book together. Rick talks about that kind of
thing in one of the, you know, those film drink or film deck,
whatever they are interviews. He talked about that kind of
thing and he intentionally tried to move away from accreditations
to people that were involved because A, it was becomes the
long list of people. Yeah.
But B, there's probably a commercial aspect of it too.
If you're not accrediting everyone there, there is
possibly a commercial aspect. I'm not going to try and throw
shade or anything like that, but there's probably a little bit of
financially it's a different set up to a few credit absolutely
everybody. Yeah.
I don't, I don't know if that's exactly the reason why, but he
does say he tried to move away from that.
Just say it's a collective effort from the company.
Bear in mind he was part of the buyout.
So, yeah, yeah, could be something financial there, I
don't know. Yeah.
Yeah, we did. We have got into the the
background and the, you know, the story part and a bit.
So I mean, obviously that evolved a lot from 3rd and maybe
there wasn't much of that at all in 3rd, but in both they got a
pretty, you know, strong back story and they have the Tyrion
Teklas. And I remember there was this
timeline as well and I was reading through that and there
was these little mini stories. There was some Empire total tail
invasion of invasion attempt of or something.
They just got massacred on beach and good stuff.
Well, the Emperor will try, Empire will try was the Empire
was the Emperor was it? I can't remember something after
a year ago. I think there was something
about, you know, they had 500 nights or something and they
were trying to attack. Oh, OK, all right.
Yeah, it's a very long time since I've read all the
background I. Recently.
Yeah, I seem to remember that, I think.
It was Neil Farian stories, and they're still just.
Yeah. So which is your favorite story?
Fantastic minor that's that's probably the difference is
third. They kind of encourage you to
come up with a narrative yourself, and ardent third
players who aren't necessarily enamoured with 4th will turn
around and say 4th is when they start spoon feeding it to you.
But it's bloody good, so I'll open up and swallow the spoon
feed for now. Even more fleshed out.
It's a little bit too much, but for now I think there's still
enough there to do your own thing.
For me personally, I'd say one of the biggest disappointments
from that period is I never got to have an Aryan on the
tabletop. Like an Aryan for me is one of
the greatest characters of all time.
Like his story, his his arc where, you know, he's fighting
back the hordes of chaos. And yeah, I know and, and picks
up the, the, the sword of Cain and, and all that.
For me, I absolutely loved all of that background story and in,
in the Empire book to just to go back to your previous one, you
know, you had a dead character in there.
You had Magnus the Pius, so they had historical characters in the
special characters list. But he never got a model.
Though he he didn't get a model, but you could, you still had the
rules, so you could, you know, at least play him on the
tabletop. And he was a bit rubbish.
He he wasn't great. Because he appears me never
tried him so don't know still need to do.
That he would have, he, he would have been massively overpowered
because he was, you know, he took on like 4 greater demons at
once and things like that. But I'd loved a couple of
historical characters because the background is so rich and
because there is so much there, you know, we didn't get any in
the 4th. Yeah, but it's all I guess you
could argue it's kind of. Here are the characters, IE the
actual army list characters, not special characters.
Build your own. Yeah.
Yeah, that was kind of more the attitude the the special
characters were a brand new thing, really in full, you know,
we're only two books in. Yeah.
So that's one of the reasons why I don't think I always get many
special characters. It was more the the plethora of
special characters for the Empire was that they made the
models for them initially, whether they were going to be
special characters or just kind of, you know, just to generate
it was going to be an elect account.
And then they made a few more and thought, well, there's oh,
we might as well give them names.
I don't know, I don't know the exact thinking behind it, but
special coaches were a brand new thing at the time.
It wasn't going to be something that necessarily was going to
take off the way it did. They were popular in the end.
So they added more and more in. You know, they gave another high
of 1 further down the line. Only one more, not not loads
more in fourth, but they give us one more they could.
Have done. Maybe we need to take a short
break. Now we do need to because I'm a
cheapskate and I'm not paying for Zoom.
One thing we didn't talk about really, Tim, how was your
painting experience back in the days?
Did you? Was it a necessary evil or were
you into it? So what was your situation?
I mean, I, I did try and, and I was thinking to myself till,
till when I was younger and I, I can't decide whether they're the
easiest or the hardest army to paint because it's one of these
things that spray the mic, put a bit of methyl silver on bit of
blue here and there and they're kind of done.
Easy to paint, hard to paint well.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, what is the easiest army
to paint? What is the hardest army to
paint? That's quite a tricky question,
isn't it? Yeah.
I'm dead is the easiest beyond the shadow of it out.
But you need to take a lot of, I mean, it's so you need to, you
know, paint a lot of skeletons. If you paint like a chaos on you
could anyway with 30 models. I mean when I very when I first
started most of my spin and had broken Spears because the
plastic would snap off and they they looked pretty dreadful
anyway. But I mean, when I got a bit
older and I started buying more of the metal miniatures and,
and, and, and the, the special characters, I, I did a attempt
to paint, but I didn't know any of the techniques.
I didn't know about, you know, washes or anything like that,
you know, so it was basic blocking in.
So they were the first. Army paint in the right part of
the model. Yeah, Happy with that.
Yeah. They were the first army I ever
painted or tried to make an effort to paint.
But I was really lucky that my local Games Workshop store, I
was allowed to borrow the models from the cabinet so I, I could
borrow their techless Centurion in my army, even though I had my
own, But so it looked as though I had quite a, a well painted
army, you know, because everyone focuses on the, you know, your
general ignoring the dodgy ones at the back.
But you know, I idolised after all of the heavy metal, you
know, images that you saw in White Dwarf and the, the, the I
could never match them. I was never particularly good.
I mean, back in the days it looked totally impossible to,
you know, reach those levels. And today, you know, yeah, for
some of the paid jobs are obviously iconic, but I mean, a
lot of models you were all ordered by back in the days.
Today, you know, more average perhaps.
But things has happened. And I mean, for us, it took
years before I even laid eyes on any really well paid models
because we didn't have any Games Workshop stores and we were just
a small isolated group played. And I mean, I had maybe at most
half, half painted army and I was way out of everyone else in
that group. So no one really painted the
models. So it was just, you know, if you
wanted to see anything painted, you had to go to the White Wolf
Bat report. So that was pretty much play
sort. Yeah.
Understandable. Yeah, Yes, I.
Think The thing is as well for me is like if, if if you use a,
a spray can of white, blue goes on really well on white blue
goes on quite well on, on, on most undercoats, you know, and,
and, and methyl Silva works quite well, you know, so you
could usually slap on one coat and you were done.
You know, it wasn't like, you know, if, if, if you were
playing an Imperial Fist Space Marine army where you had to put
15 coats of yellow on it, you know?
All right. So, yeah.
So when when did you actually get your first painted army?
How long did that take before you guys had any fully painted?
I probably I did paint the high off Army and it was the 4th
edition models, but it was probably 2000.
I painted anything probably in the 2000s, but prior to that I
did have a 4th edition paint design but it wasn't painted by
me. I basically left all painting to
my brother who did art at school, so I felt he could do a
better job of them, whereas my artistic ability at that time
was negligible. I tried especially when Rick
Precis did an article about painting high holes, probably
about a year or so before it hit 5th, because that's when he
switched over to high. It was roundabout.
Then when Fat Dwarf came along, it was like one of the first
issues of Fat Wolf and it was quite a, quite a good article
and it inspired me to have a crack at it.
And that's probably transitioned into the army.
You know, it took me about five years to actually get around to
painting enough models to class it as an army, though.
But I sold that one off. And then I've had about 5 or 6
different attempts to paint hives since.
Just about managed to do something I'm content with.
I'm not. I'm really happy with it because
it was painted very quickly before the birth of my son.
Very quickly. It's basically just base colours
and a soft tone Army painter. Quick shade wash probably.
Works. Yeah, that's.
OK, but it could be cleaner. I mean, what, what really got me
into paying more attention to painting my armies was getting
in an hour early to games days because I found out that if you
entered games work at the Golden Demon Awards, you'd queue up an
hour early to get into games days.
So that was my motivation. So when we went over to what was
it the, the NEC in, in Birmingham, I think it was 96,
the first one I went to, but I, I, I painted it would have been
it would have been like AI think it was a high of general or
something like that. I might be getting it confused
with something else, but was the highest general on the on the
horse? I think it was.
But it it was a terrible job. You know, I didn't do a
particularly good job of it, but it was A at the time I was
incredibly proud of it. And it it it made me step up my
game and it made me sort of try and push myself a little bit
more to make a bit more of an effort to the rest of my army as
well. You, you, you kind of start with
your special characters and your your main generals to to put
that bit of extra, extra effort in and then it kind of bleeds
out to your other things, you know, so when.
I'm making when I make an army I always try to do the infantry
first to just get the boring stuff out of the way and do the
characters later. But from a learning curve like
that makes sense of course. It's always building up to the
special characters to me that it's a chore the the Lion
Infantry. Yeah, but I'd like to get them
out of the way first, so yeah. Yeah, all.
Right. So when did you actually like
achieve a fully painted army? About when?
Probably a year or two after that.
I'd say probably 9798 would have been my first fully painted
army. I mean, it would have been 1500
points, 2000 at most, I think, You know, I mean, now as an
adult, I think my last count was about 1111 thousand.
Yeah. Was was that a?
Fully painted army. A fully painted army.
Just a quick question, was that 1500 including Tyrion and Texas?
Because if it was, that's about 500 points.
I'll be perfectly honest, I was too intimidated to paint Tyrion
Tetless. I was so scared of doing them
wrong that I kind of left it. I, I because Mike Mcveigh's, you
know, such fantastic work, so iconic.
I didn't really do them. I didn't really paint them
because I didn't want to ruin them.
Because they they looked so good just.
How could you ever achieve that level?
Yeah. My my paint job would have made
them look so much worse that I, I, I never painted them.
I've painted them obviously since coming back into the hobby
but back in the day I always left them because I was like
right build up to it when I'm good enough and I've never felt
good enough. Until recently.
Yeah, so, so a fully painted army, a fully painted army, you
know, didn't include the the top end just because I didn't have
the guts. I wasn't comforted enough.
I can't blame you for that one. That's that's very true.
They are very daunting. I know throwing him a little bit
less so I think he's still a lovely model, but he's not quite
that pinnacle that he's Tyrion Techlist from the 4th edition
Army. They're just I'm actually trying
to do now to to paint him. I plan on giving it to my my
friend who got me into the hobby who played always played high
elf and I know he doesn't have his army anymore.
But yeah, I just want to finish Techlist for him for.
Him. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah. The the the only thing I would
say about that Tetless model is that the bloody staff always
snaps off. The head of the staff seems to.
Depends how well she manhandled him, yeah.
Yeah, yeah. That's.
Down. Look at him.
Don't touch him. OK with quite a few models.
I think the what's his name, the special character the empire
whistle as well. He's not the grantee of he's
being patriarchal. For me it's the high off swords,
it's it's the swords on the standard bearer that that's
holding the sword against his chest and it's Tyrion sword.
Technically stuff ain't got an issue with but Tyrion sword
because it the metal comes into a really thin bit where it meets
the hill. Yeah.
Most if you look on eBay, If you look at Tyrion on eBay, a lot of
them have got broken swords. Yeah, and the nasty sword it
was. Yeah.
Sun hanging.
What's that one? Yeah, yeah.
All right, So should we get into the actual list and, you know,
do a bit of review of the entrance?
Entrance. And we did talk a bit about the
Phoenix Garden, the white wolves, so that I don't actually
have the list in front of me. Should we do some sort?
Of well, I've done about team, but I I I think probably
characters bog standard ones is not a lot to say differently
about them to the empire in the sense that you know, they are
just bog standard. You know, yes, OK, they are, you
know, better qualities than the than the Empire, but the actual
principle of hero Lord, you know, battle stand bare, those
sort of things, the principles of them don't change.
Whereas the regiments, there's a bit more variety there in what
they are, if that makes any sense.
The, the one thing I would say about the, the high Alf General
and you know, is the toughness 4, you know it, it's got a
toughness 4 and it is one of the few models that's not a special
character that's got a toughness 4.
And that makes a massive difference.
And and when it moved over to 6th, I can't remember if it's
the case in 5th, but in 6th everything's toughness 3, you
know, and, and, and it's like you could spend a lot of points
on your characters, kicked them all out in all the special, you
know there. Wasn't even that many special
magical armours that are any good in 6th for high elves
either. It made them really brittle.
Yeah, the, the Toughness 3 is such a, you know, it's the
biggest weakness, I think of the High Elves.
And having that toughness 4 on the general is is is a luxury
you can't often afford. Yeah, there's a, there's an
article that Gav, I think it's Gav thought right.
So you did the dark output because that was the first
output they did for sick. It was dark out.
And he talks about a conscious decision to make more toughness
3. And I thought, you're a Dwarf
player, you gig. You done that intentionally.
It's it's like the high cost because they are are high cost
models with, you know, the toughness 3.
You know glass? Yeah, so.
What was your point or both of your points on about the BSB
that standard bells, did you use them or were they?
Didn't used to. No, I didn't used to do now.
I, I love having them because they're a good centrepiece for
my army when I play for the, the visual aspects of the game, you
know, that, that, that having models on the board.
But yeah, back in the day I never played with Battlestone
bearers or anything like that, you know?
Yeah, and talking about Bristol, I mean they had one wound and
Toughness 3, so yeah. But almost, almost 100 points,
it's, it's quite a big investment.
It is, but that re roll of break.
So anything that gives you a re roll that was useful because
it's a nice game. So anything that gives you that
is really useful. So in game terms now, I love
battle standard bearers, but yeah, you're right.
They are. They are.
You know, as soon as you start giving them, you know, magic
items, then their points cost is pushing up for something that,
as you say, 1 wound. It's it's yeah, they are.
Yeah, I don't think Kyle said any special characters, better
standards. No, no, I think, I think, Oh, I
suppose you could class Niblet as one.
I think Empire's the only one. Empire, Austin Goblins.
And if you class Niblet, they're the only ones with a special
character. Battle Santa Berra, I think.
I can't think of any others. There there was an absolutely
fantastic conversion I remember seeing in one of the golden
demons of a high elf battle standard bearer.
I can't think what issue which issue it is.
Is that the it's the one up on its legs?
It looks absolutely amazing. He is, yeah.
He's awesome. I think he, I think he's in the
there's, there were a load of books that you'd read about that
time as well, about converting and paintings, all that.
I think he's in one of those as well as as a showcase item.
So yeah, no, he's a beautiful, beautiful model.
He uses the same banner as the drawing following up for the
battle standard bearer in the high off book.
He uses that standard and he's probably the inspiration
actually for the model looking at it.
Yeah. You know, yeah, but he's
amazing. You're absolutely right.
Yeah. Awesome all.
Right. So the troop choices I guess is
next. Yeah, it starts with the
cavalry. So you've got your Silver Helms,
your Evenites, and then your Dragon Princess.
And back in the day I never used Dragon Princess because they
were more expensive. And as far as I could see,
Silver Helms did the same job but were marginally cheaper.
Yeah, OK Dad. Pointless on the armour side,
but I'd always go Silver Helms had the models and I didn't like
the barding on the Dragon Princess back in the day because
the silver helm was a nice flowy, you know, material
guarding and then the Dragon Prince had hard metal guarding.
I didn't like that. They were too different.
My autistic mind couldn't handle it.
They were different. I don't know what's going on
there. I don't like that they've got to
be the same. But yeah, I don't know how.
Tim, how do you do you use Dragon Princess at all?
I mean, I, I just love the models, you know?
I mean, most of my love of High elves goes back to the models
and dragon pinchers I think are superior in in terms of the
design of them in in my humbled opinion.
But I, I. I I.
Get them on the table. Yeah, each one is a bit of
character, yeah. I get them on the table as often
as I can because I just think they look amazing.
Yeah my my friend, my regular porn of T is will buy them as
well so I always pay. But in in terms of points, I
can't think of any more expensive.
Like is it chaos nights maybe? Far more recently doubled
potentially. Chaos Nights, but up up there is
one of the most expensive cavalry you can buy, aren't
they? Yeah, for sure.
Yeah. And of course in the end there's
other issues. The elite troops as well.
The they only had one attack. So I mean you rarely had more
than 5 wides. So I mean, if you rolled a bit
poorly, it was. You know.
The thing that stopped me taking them more than anything else is
the fact that because I split my box with my mate who had
goblins, he would obviously take, you know, fanatics and
fanatics. No armour save toughness 3, you
know, that's your whole, you know, what would it be if you
took a, a unit of 10? That's 430 points.
Did you? Did you normally place your
general in the unit or how did you do that?
I mean, if, if, if, if I could, it was usually on a horse,
usually with the the the dragon Princess.
So yeah. So.
It. Didn't fare very well.
Looked good. It did look good, didn't play
very well. And did you use light cap?
I did because I had the models, But back in the day, I could
never really figure fast cavalry out.
They're a bit more of a tactician's you cavalry, aren't
they? And actually, in fact, they're
really, really useful. Back in the day, no, it didn't
really seem like are you? I mean.
I gave a machine so you're no longer fast cavalry most of the
time so. Yeah, I mean, they think they
didn't have heavy arm and no dances and stuff and it's
boring. It's so manoeuvrable, you know,
with that, with that movement of, you know, the only thing
that can compare with obviously Flyers, the only thing to
compare with them is wolf riders or slanishy demonettes on stage.
Yeah, but they had insane. Movements.
Yeah, I know, but that's what I mean.
That's the only thing you can compare with Revanites.
Well, I suppose you've got the Dark Elf and Wood Elf
equivalents, but you're actually better, obviously, because
they've got the stupid special rules.
But yeah, Revanites now I need to get some painted.
But no, I do plan to use them quite extensively and possibly
more so than heavy cavalry because I think maybe having
fast covering out there doing what it's doing and then have a
defensive line of of spin and basically would be the starting
point for an army for me. But.
That's just it. I mean, when I when I play now,
Revanites are one of the first units I put in my list.
I absolutely adore them. I love them, you know, they're,
they're good at harrying the enemy and they're good at doing
a bit of shenanigans and March blocking and things like that.
Back in the day there were another one that slipped me by.
Just affordability really more than anything else.
I I think I got 5 Gary Morley's in towards the end of, you know,
5th in my army. But I, I never had the IT was it
Marauder the were they originally Marauder revenites
where they had lances? Yeah.
Nerelli Morrison. Yeah, I think so.
I. Never had those.
Yeah, I've got those that did, Payton.
I they they seem quite rare those models because I never
really came across many people using them.
They're out there. Yeah, they are out there.
You can find me, baby. They are.
I don't know how expensive they are now.
I bought loads of them back in the day.
I mean I I got back into Warhammer.
I'm not getting off on the one on here so I'm going to try not
to but basically when the old hammer movement started I was
for. I didn't create it at all, but I
was in at the at the early days of it.
At that time you could pick up miniatures on eBay for next to
nothing like. That, yeah.
So I've got loads of Reed nights then I just need to paint them.
Yeah. But I think since we all have
that in common, we didn't really appreciate the finer values of
the tactical movements and stuff.
It was more, you know, heavy heights.
Cool. Yeah.
Yeah, then you've got the really unique Tyrannock Chariot.
The 4th edition version or with one blooming one crew?
It's not gorgeous, the model. Lovely old stunning model and I
often. Gorgeous.
Model on foot as a general because he was on with a
halberd. So you know, in low cost games
you didn't need a magic weapons. You're a halberd and he's a
stunning, stunning model. Yeah.
But the Tierra itself is very brittle because he's only got 1
crew. Yeah.
Could you put a character on the sheriff back then or?
Yeah, but he replaced the one crew, man, 1 crew, but probably,
possibly, you know, if he has, if he has more wounds and you
know, an idea of three or four of them charging in probably
looks quite cool and reveal more survival.
Obviously back in the day he's buying 3 tier knot 3 or 4 tier
knot Chariots. You're lucky to buy one.
Yeah, I guess that's with all characters.
I mean, you just had to kill one of the horses and it was.
Pretty much exactly, Yeah. So never you really.
I had the model for quite a long time, but didn't really use it
that much. I said I think a unit of three
or four now probably get my hands on.
I think I've got them in pieces somewhere.
So that one is something to try that might be quite cool.
But no, back in the day they didn't really use to knock
chariot. You see, this is the the weird
thing for me. I mean it, it, it was never a
word when we were growing up, but the the meta back then, you
know, so I, I played fantasy for seven years in in the 90s and I
very rarely saw Chariots. Like not very many seem seem to
take Chariots. I don't know why it it just
didn't seem to be a popular. I think it must have been that
they, they were simply too vulnerable that they could get
disabled so easily. I mean, any, any shooting
attention, they were at big risk of just becoming a, you know, a
terrain piece. Yeah, and and you can't March
with them as well. So even though they should be
fast, they were quite slow. Yeah, it's, it's a bit of in
terms of money, it's an investment of money for one
modelling effect. Yeah.
So, so you know, if, if the cost of a year of, you know, 3 Dragon
Prince is like that was a box set of three models, 43 points
per model. So you got 120 points in effect
in that, but or 130, you know, around about there 200 charity
72 points or more than the dragon Prince box set.
So people just weren't buying them because from a from a
points to or rather cash to points.
And I it's not necessarily the one to go down because then you
get arguing slaves and goblins and those sort of things.
But just literally from a higher point of view, you know, from
terms of you know, I could spend my money and get get value for
money or I could buy A2 knot chariot that is quite OK strong
on the charge. But in everything else weak as
heck and vulnerable as you said, you know, easy to take them out.
Yeah, I don't, I don't think Chariots are were fiscally worth
it at the time. Yeah, because it's an addition
that randomized what you hear. You.
You know strength 3 arrows.
Enough of them would easily take down a chariot, wouldn't it?
Take out the crap. Yeah, You could either shoot the
guy off or they could kill. Yeah, Yeah.
And I mean like 10 bow shots and you had a pretty good chance of,
you know, rendering it. It's a big reason why they
changed the chariot rules and turn them into one model.
Yeah exactly. Turning into 11 stat.
But it did look awesome. It did look so.
Cool. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. No chariot.
That chariot was gorgeous. Another.
You know, it doesn't matter which entry you look at.
Yeah. In this in the book, all the
models are gorgeous. I've even fallen in love with
the Marauder sword masters, which was a hard thing to do
because those Rd. sword masters are very goofy.
Yeah, because their legs don't. But the shape of the the
clothing, the skirt, what a better term the legs need.
The feet weren't in the right position for it looks like
they're wearing corsets underneath the the legs aren't
in the right, the feet aren't in the right place for the shape of
the. But when I painted them, I fell
in love with them. Actually painting them, seeing
the character develop as you paint the model.
Oh hell. I prefer them over the the
Morley ones now. Hands down.
The Morley ones are more beautiful.
I don't know if it was Morley or one of the other one of the guys
under. It's Morley.
They're beautiful. They're more beautiful than the
high off one, than the high. Sorry, than the Marauder ones,
but the Marauder ones have so much more character.
I don't think the Morley ones have as much character as the
Marauder 1. I tell you, just looking at it
now, the, the, the mark given sketch of the of the sword
masters. I really love that picture.
Yeah. Yeah, iconic that one.
Yeah, and they did have the rules that sort of negate the
two handed weapon, yeah, disadvantage.
So I mean, that made them, I think.
There was one issue with them and they they sold it with
Chronicles of War and as a champion given a double handed
weapon wouldn't have that rule. Yeah.
So he was striking last. But then in Chronicles of War
they gave you sort of ho with which was a double handed sword,
the death strike last with for 25 points.
So that was kind of automatically the give for a for
a champion. But prior to that he was like OK
so the sword masters want to be striking last, but a champion
would be if you give him a double handed weapon and he has
to have a double handed weapon or another different magic
weapon obviously because he's a champion so has to be on the
same as his unit. I mean the sword masters is what
I would take more often than not in terms of elite infantry.
I I I would tend to pick the sword masters even though
they're the most expensive with 16 points each.
I would tend to choose sword masters over yeah, you know, the
Phoenix Guard or or or the. White lines.
The Wolf. The wolf lines, White lines.
Sorry, white lines. Yeah, yeah.
I mean, they have a pretty good chance of actually getting their
attacks off. And I mean, yeah, 5 is still not
bad at all. So and it is it weapon skill 5
or 4 on those? Five, Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, actually. Strength 5 as well on you know
when they're using the the they're.
Going to hit both troops on threes and moving on, you know,
twos or threes. So that's not bad.
In actual fact have to use double hand sword because
according to the unit entry they don't have a handle weapon, even
though every model is supposed to come with a handle weapon and
standard in. Yeah, but they can't choose to.
No, same as Venus actually, with halberds and yeah, white lines,
double handed axe again, they they don't actually have a hand
weapon, so all three of them have to use that weapon.
Yeah. I mean, that's what you did back
in the day, so I don't think. Oh, absolutely.
You never repeated on it. And they and they quite have
Shields, so there's no reason not to use that weapon.
I suppose you could argue, well white lines is still about
strength for, so potentially you might use them just with their
hand weapon against some troops because in some cases you don't
need the strength of. No, I mean, if the choice was
getting some attacks off or probably not.
So yeah. Yeah, they still got strength 4
anyway, so. So I think there is an argument
for them having hand weapons, but they don't.
So you don't have. Makes things easier.
You don't need to make any choices, you just deal with it.
So I guess we covered the elite infantry then that was that was
three and. And then it comes the weirdness
of High of Spin in Luther and Sea Guard and health Warriors.
That's because you're also looking at when they design the
book, they're also keeping the old range in mind where you had
handle, weapon and shield armed warrior models.
So that's why you've got High of Warriors in there as well.
You know, I think if this had been further down the line in
fourth they release this book, you don't have Spearman, Lother
and Sea Guard. They might even lump Lother and
Sea Guard into the Spearman entry as well, possibly.
But what was the equipment choices for the the normal
warriors or the? Weirdly, you could give the
warriors Spears. Yeah, and what's the end of the
Spearman? Spearman.
L4 is the same stats, right? And the only other thing you can
give them is Spears. Oh, and you could also give them
light armour. So the spear men came with light
armour and shield and sword and a spear?
Yeah. Then your elf warriors came with
a hand weapon and a shield, and you can give them light armour
and Spears. Yeah, bit of a redundancy.
It just seems a bit damped. There we go.
And of course Lothian Sea Guard, which are spear men with bows as
well. Although although in their
initial entry, bows are an upgrade.
So there's Spearman who can take bows, you've got Spearman,
Spearman who can take bows, and Spearman.
They don't have Spears, but you can give them Spears.
They're the three entries for Bob.
Studded infantry for you. Feels a bit weird.
You can also give the Roth and Sea Guard halberds as well.
They're never released that. Yeah, no, you can.
They're never released models for them, so you'd have to have
converted. Well, they weren't, well, they
weren't lost NC Guard models until fifth.
There were no both NC Guard models.
You were you kind of took Spearman and either said they
had bows on them even if they didn't, or you ordered some
separate bows and you know, quivers and stuck them on their
backs. But yeah, until until the the
Morley ones are fifth, there were no often C Guard models and
comes from actually the Lothern Sea Guard principle.
Well, obviously they were Lothern Sea Guard really, really
early Warhammer days and we were resident of renown to start
with. There was Lothern Sea Guard
really early high off models. But really what that comes from
is in 3rd you could have merchant companies where half of
them had bows and the other half had Spears.
So you line them up in OK, that makes sense.
Spears, bows at the front, Spears behind so they could poke
them through and attack. But they ditched that sloth and
see on and then gave it to dark Elms in City guard when it came
to the Dark Elm book. So I was a bit weird.
But that's what that's mainly where that idea comes from, I
think kind of like the ship's company and the and the merchant
company from 3rd. So yeah.
But obviously Spearman, I mean they are iconic high of troops.
They were usually present in most almost I guess.
So it would be weird if anyone didn't take.
Them I did a really silly thing where I was no, I was determined
to swap all my plastic for metal when I started again.
So I got rid of all the plastic Spearman and replace them with
the metal ones. But the legitimate version it it
it. So I've I've got 60 of them.
Yeah, I thought. I'd do my with 40 some more now.
I know I was really happy when I got that 60th because it took
took such a long time to troll through eBay to get that last
one. But yeah, they're, they've
become like my favorite prized possessions because.
And they're all painted up by now or.
They're all painted up. Oh yeah.
And how many of them are individuals?
I guess some of. Three.
There's three variances, isn't there?
I suppose if you've got the 5th Ed ones that are holding the
spear like that as well. Yeah, yeah.
And. You knows.
I've got a couple of those, but it it's it's mainly the the 4th
Ed ones I've got. The three variants, yeah,
there's not a lot of variation between them either.
You can tell they're variants. You have to look closely, but
they are gorgeous models. They're they're some of the yes
betweens Jessica wins. Absolute finest.
Stunning. Absolutely stunning.
It, it, it's when I started collecting again, you know, as
as an older gentleman that I kind of appreciate the, the
detail in a metal model versus plastic gets a little bit soft.
I think some of the detail in in in the the 4th edition high of
plastic models, but the the the metal models are definitely
superior. So oh A. 100% hundred.
Percent, yeah. And when I play back in the days
for my Empire army, I didn't have any of the metal state
troops because, I mean, they were expensive and they weren't
around really. So now I have them.
But yeah, it's it's not very easy to get those.
So you definitely need to put some effort into it.
But I agree, they're definitely very nice.
So I mean, the monoliths has their shown, but still, yeah.
I was always really lucky as well that when I, when I played
back in the day, every single battlefield I played on featured
a fairly decent hill. So I was able to park my, you
know 2 lines of arches on top of the hill and then a good block
of Spearman in front of them. And that was almost my default
deployment every single time. You know it's.
Standard for health? I I play today and it kind of
upsets me the lack of hills there are on battlefields.
It's like it's. It's they're doing you dirty.
I probably do that to me. Then I play some dwarfs.
The other day my brother did that to me.
Didn't have a single hill for any crossbow men to stand on.
Exactly. Just a reminder here when we.
We are, we are. I was just going to say, I was
going to look from the spinning into The Archers.
The Archer metals had a lot more variation than the than the
spinning metals did The Archers. You can definitely tell the
difference between each model very quickly and very easily.
Gorgeous models as well as were the plastics, yeah.
But I I think that's pretty much the troops.
Most yeah got shadow warriors who are useful against dark
elves and useful skirmishers, but they're pretty much just a
bog standard Archer disabled skirmish really can have a
shield as well. The only thing really left would
be the war machines with you bolt throws being 50 points.
Tim, do you upgrade to 100 points per bolt throw?
I don't. Tell the truth.
I don't. I'm honest.
I mean I I love 4th edition, it's my favorite edition and I
think high elves are a disadvantage against most other
armies so I think it's a good balance having 50.8 or
something. I don't know how to.
Oh yeah, no, don't, don't, don't be a Dick about it.
Yeah, but that's the same with most things with warm, isn't it?
As long as as long as you're reasonable.
Then I can hold my hand on my heart and say I've never taken
more than two. Yeah, that's fair.
It depends on the size of game as well I think.
I think probably 1 per thousand points isn't taking points.
Yeah, yeah. So yeah, to sum up my comment on
repeat of both, I don't know where it cut off.
Yes, I think it's fine to use them, just don't be a Dick with
them at 50 points. Yeah.
They're they're they're definitely one of the stand out
units. I think in the the higher for
Army, you know, it's like you're always going to take at least
one, you're always going to include one, you know, at the
very minimal, you know, it's, it's, it's an iconic model as
well, you know, yeah. 100 percent, 100%.
Good stuff, right. So we'll try to finish this off
with the special characters. And Tim has already claimed they
are the best in fourth mission. Might not get full agreement
from the other members, but yeah, I mean, they're definitely
very nice looking at and they have, you know, good background
and all, so can't argue too much about that.
But let's, yeah. If I were a very anal kind of
person, I'm not. I'm not.
Then there is one big drawback to the high of special
characters. At least there is for the three
that are in the high of book. There's nothing anywhere
officially that says they could be your general.
So strictly unlike the Empire book that actually has a a
comment in the pre army list blurb, Ray says any of these can
be your general. Yeah, any of these are general.
So there's some sort of comment that qualifies as being a
general. Hope it doesn't have that that
comment. OK, you'd have to be an asshole
not to let someone use. I hope no children are watching
or listening. Sorry you asked me a bit of a
nasty person not to let Ohio player use them as your general.
Especially Tyrion considering and now throwing that both of
them, the stories very definitely states that they are
generals. Yeah, but that's the story.
It's not the rules. So strictly speaking, none of
them could be your general. Though I think Imrich that
actually did put in a comment about he can be your general.
And I think they did that from the open gobbling books onwards,
book onwards, they started putting in the actual character
blurb that that person could be a general or this person could
be a general. Don't do it in the Hive book.
So strictly speaking, you can't take me to general.
But again, you'd have to be a complete whatever not to let
someone use, especially Tyrion as your general would have to
be, you know? Yeah, I imagine Tyrion would
appears generally in plenty of I've armies at the time.
Yeah. Oh yeah, he's probably Joe Most.
Yeah, yeah, my friend did that one as well.
So he was he was all over the place, let's just say.
I found Delfarian more usable because because he's got the
Tasman Hoareth as well. So he's another wizard, right?
And he can move, or I mean, Mal Andy is fast, don't get me
wrong, but he's not as fast as a flying monster.
So I but that was back in the day.
I think now I'd probably find Tyrion the better character.
Yeah, he certainly mixes anyone he touches.
Yeah, and I guess he was a favorite of your team.
Yours team. I I mean, he was also the model
I used as a a my higher general as well, because you know, it,
it, it was such an iconic model, but a movement 12 as well.
I can't think of many is. Is there any other?
Slannishy steeds, maybe? Yeah.
I think those are the ones that's about it's I think.
Obviously flying flying characters beat it.
Aside from flying characters, you know that movement 12
always. Yeah, but I mean, with the
shots, it would have the range of a flyer on the ball.
Yeah, it's pretty, pretty awesome, Yeah.
Yeah, the only problem is is that encourages people to
disregard going in with support, which may not be the best site.
Yes, he he minted something he touches, but just going solo
still might not be a great idea. You know, he can.
He can, he can. You know, you can definitely get
in ahead of the Seal films and the Dragon Princess and the
Revonites, but. Yeah, that's true.
He, he, he is a little bit more tankier, you know, I mean with,
with, with his two saves and also, yeah, you know, if, if, if
he's reduced, reduced to 0 wounds, he'll come back.
With one, one wound. Yeah, yeah.
But still, I mean he was hard enough to kill the first hand
he. Will he will take a lot of
punishment, but he's not completely invulnerable so going
in without support might not be the best idea.
That's all I'm saying. Yeah, he can actually shoot a
bit of this sword as well, couldn't he?
Yeah, some sort of flaming. Yeah, once per game I think it
is. He can.
He can shoot the flames out from something.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's probably one of
those abilities you should probably just use as soon as you
can, but a lot of people might try and save up for.
Same with tech Lizzy Sword. Everyone kinds of oh, I'll hold
on to those D6, you know, lightning strikes, just in case
I need them. Just use them because otherwise
you'll hold on to them forever and use me against goblins or
something like that because you're going to be able to use
it against Neil. Yeah, we'll forget about it
completely and get to use it right.
So yeah, we talked a bit about Teklis and we haven't talked
about High of Magic so far, but I mean, it was good.
Just quickly hold on, just quickly.
Tektis is one of battery just because of it's it's one of my
few anecdotes I've actually got of playing Hilos.
So Tekleis in a game against a cardboard chaos army.
My brother cut out like from cardboard from my shoe box, cut
it up and use an army like, you know, back in the day.
And he obviously he had made a plan for getting rid of Texas.
Sneaky, sneaky, sneaky man. He made a plan.
Oh boy. At the time he made a plan.
So he mounted a Chaos Army standard bearer.
Bear in mind this is white book Chaos, not army book, so he's
only a champion. OK.
But anyway, he mounted this Chaos army standard bearer up on
a disc. That's why it was each because
he could have a disc and gave him the blasted standard and
flew him straight towards Texas and smiled and giggled and
cackled as he as he sent the blasted standard into Texas.
Because basically the glasses standard, if it hits you, it's
probably going to kill you. Was it 2D6 or something?
I'll come off the top of my head, but it's it's pretty
nasty. It's and it's a one.
It's a one to it's a one off magic spell.
So if it's one off, it's going to be very nasty.
Not a banner of Wrath. It's nasty, but you can do it
every turn. This is only once once again, So
it's going to be a really nasty spell.
So he he sent it crashing into tech and he's laughing his head
off thinking now I've got him. I've taken out that 600 points,
but no, no, no, no, no tech and he's had rebound and glass the
sky minute. It was hilarious.
Because he. He'd always been thinking up
this plan for ages. He'd come up with it, and he was
finally pulling it off. He was doing it.
No, no, no, no, no. You're not doing that very
funny. Yeah.
It exhausted all my dispels, all that stuff.
He knew the spell would get through, he thought.
Nothing could go wrong. Yeah, it was just, it was just
hilarious to smile. His face soon dropped.
My big thing about Tyrion and Tactless is in the law.
Tetless is meant to be like weak and you know, feeble, but uses
his magic to make himself stronger and things like that.
But he's got 4 wounds and Tyrion's only got 3.
Yeah, yeah. Because he says he loses his his
potions and stuff to give him vitality.
And then if you use the moon, half says all his
characteristics, half, don't they?
So you've got to be very careful with the number of wounds he's
taken when you choose to half his characteristics.
Yeah. So strictly speaking, I guess if
he's on one wound, you'd keep one wound, I would assume.
Yeah, because. You always.
Yeah, but it's still dangerous though.
Yeah. You know, you go from 4:00 to
2:00 potentially, that's dangerous.
So you've got to be very careful using the moon stuff.
And then he does become a bit rubbish because, you know, every
single characteristic half. Oh dear, including his
toughness. So, you know, he's, yeah, not
great. So yeah, with high of magic
really good, you know, dropping hints and stuff and you know,
they had a great magic missile sort.
Of the the best magic missile in the game, full stop.
Yeah, you know, we we fire a convocation.
They I suppose is is it a magic missile because it remains in
play. Yeah, but I mean basically it
works like. Yeah, Basically, Yeah.
Yeah, No, Yeah, The best magic missile spell in the game.
Yeah, Yeah. Nothing else comes close.
I don't think so. That one.
So was magic. I mean, in 4th edition magic was
big. Obviously it could cost him both
players turns so he didn't want to be caught without one.
But. Yeah.
Oh, absolutely. It was high off.
Magic just reigned supreme. It was.
There were more offensive decks, but the flexibility of it, you
know, the the fact that you also had a spell like Tempest that
could do more damage to you than your opponent, which was a bit
weird. So I'm not sure Tempest
necessarily was the best spell for high Elms to cast.
It seems more like a almost a scathing spell.
Tempest really to me. I'm a bit weird, I suppose.
I suppose you've got, you know, maybe they want to stop cannons
firing and stuff like that. But generally speaking, that's
probably hypothesis. Would I I didn't use that really
back in the day because that's resurrecting character.
Yeah, that in Tempe is probably the two dodgy spells and it was
and and a three power drain magic.
But after that, all the rest of them great.
Yeah, what are you thinking? What were your favourites?
Yeah, it it was always, I always found magic in form at 4th.
Quite random in that some games it could win you the game.
You know, if, if if you played it right, it could win you the
game. But sometimes just didn't draw
the right cards. You didn't get a a power level
card, you didn't get a, you know, you, you got 3 dispelled
cards in a row or something like that and you couldn't play
anything. But it's sort of a a mini game
on its own. So yeah, it was, I mean, I
wouldn't want to be without it. I think if you and and that's
one of the issues with dwarves. I mean, I I always miss the
magic face if I play. Usually I don't but.
Yeah, I did like it in 5th when you could use a dispel as a
power card. That was good.
Close wasn't the other way round could you was it?
I don't know, I don't play 5th in years but I seem to remember
it was power cards as a dispel. Oh, maybe it was the other way
around. Sorry.
I'm thinking maybe it was just. You're right.
I'm thinking of darker. I'm sorry.
Yeah. But that was that little bit.
Yes. Well, I mean the lesser version
was in fourth. Was it that you could put back
power cards for hire also I think in order to try and get
dispels and vice versa for darker so that you can put back
dispels to try and get power. I think that's the way it.
Was. Makes sense because offensive
spells you're trying to get more spell.
Yeah, that would that would be the way around it was I'm pretty
sure, but they didn't go quite as far as aisles as fifth know
where you could just use the card as which actually, yeah,
that's that's probably one of the few upgrading 5th well
upgrade in 5th that I'd I'd go with were were decent upgrades.
So I don't remember exactly but was technically a better cost
than a standard one I guess. Was he level 5 or?
Yeah, he's level 5 with his Warcraft.
It was the first level 5 and then the gash they added and
accepts. Yeah, no, actually, because
Walcott Safari wasn't limited to just technically wasn't a
technically's only magic item. So you can give it to any high
off wizard. And then Nagash came along with
the book of Nagash and you can use the book of Nagash plus,
obviously you could use the book of a shirt.
But yeah, yeah, if you're playing campaign.
And they really did need to bring in some sort of rule for
that, because everyone just use the book of a shirt all the
time. Yeah, like 50 points and you
could choose. Exactly.
Yeah, it it was the same cost as a spell for me, but you actually
got the level and you could use any deck.
Yeah, so I mean, you could make a goblin shame and as good as,
you know, insanely expensive. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, I mean, he obviously you've got to be careful with
the goblin because boom, you know his head.
Yeah, Head. Bang.
I mean but the the. The the the Sword of Techlist
always felt like a waste of points.
The wizard, yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, it was the same. We talked about the the Ice
Queen. She had a yeah.
I I think the sword of Techlist, not necessarily the always
wounding thing, because I've got a problem with always wounding
but not affecting armour saves anyway because it kind of you
might wound, but you've still got, you know, the armour safe's
still there. But for him, I think it's more
the D6 light loss. It's the get away from me when a
when a flyer comes in and attacks him.
Yeah, he's got he's standing on the hill next to repeat a bolt
for her and the flyer comes in. He says get away from me last
ditch effort and try and save him.
But I I would rather not take it and save the 100 points if yeah.
Got to be hard blade or something like that.
But he would be super overpowered though if you could
take that off if you could remove magic items.
Get him some other item that was.
You know better. Yeah, still very quick.
Always wondered and I don't. I don't know how true this is,
but I always wondered if initially the plan was that
Techies was going to be the war, the warrior and Tyrion to be the
wizard name ones because the sword of techni in the initial
box felt like a warrior's sword. Yeah, could be.
Yeah, I don't. I can't remember a blurb.
I probably if I read the blurb, I'm completely wrong.
It's just literally I say you always thought that.
It's just literally just occurred to me.
Now sitting here, I'm in the chat, I say I always thought,
no, I didn't mean that at all. What I meant was I've just had a
thought. Yeah, you get the question out
to the right. So what's left?
It's Altarian. Well, Faring, yeah, in my eyes
one of the best all round characters because you'd also be
a wizard as well. Although you could only take and
this was a mistake everyone used to make back a day.
Even made it in a battle report, which isn't rare.
I've made a lot of mistakes about reports.
The Talisman you could only take college magic actually.
It's actually in the right up of the magic item.
OK, the lower, higher you? Can't take no magic for it.
Yeah, so. So yes, you can have two spells,
but I have to be 1 of the the eight colleges he takes.
So typically I'd, I'd normally take amethyst, not amethyst
celestial, because that's kind of storms and stuff like that.
And he's, and he's very much Storm Wing, you know, That's,
that's yeah. Makes sense?
Yeah, but but yeah, he's sort of a bit poo though.
He's fangs. He's got a great the Fang sword,
but it kind of OK. It's a parrying blade and a
blade of sea gold in one. So it's minus to say we've
actually got a wound though, and that was always his issue is
actually wound. OK.
He's got a lot of Griffin that should do wounds, but you know,
wounding with him was the issue. Yeah, straight forward doesn't
really count it against, you know, hard characters.
Exactly. So that yes, OK, they would
probably lose their their arms saved mostly.
But yeah, actually getting the wound in in the 1st place was a
problem. Lovely model got a Lance.
But but you know the I think the rules actually state if you've
got a magic weapon you use that. I think the rules even state
that. So the Lance would never be
used, even though that's what he needs on the charge, Yeah.
Yeah. He's he's still on my bucket
list of things to do in a game where I've never actually got to
charge grom the paunch in a game.
I've I've I've I've played a game where Otharion and grom the
paunch feature, but my friend got a very lucky rock clubber
hit on us Arian and killed him and I never got to do that.
We'll, we'll, we'll mug thronged at boil at some point.
Yeah. Yeah, like a Sunday game was all
that. We'll mug from wheel and you can
play Hoils. There you go.
Try again. Awesome.
And then of course you've the last character not in the book
though the last character, Prince Enrique, he was another
stunning model, absolutely stunning.
And his star Lance very expensive for being +3 to
strength I think. Does he does he hit
automatically? No, he doesn't.
I don't think it hits automatically.
That's the dragon blade Lance. So it's it's a fairly expensive
because Lance is 2 points and is +2 to strength.
That that's fifth, though in Miracle, isn't he?
He came up in fifth, no. No.
Was he? Yeah, he was.
He was in Fourth. He was.
His rules are in Chronicles of War, but they were in White
Dwarf. Right.
He wasn't in the book, but he was in White Dwarf.
He was released a model obviously designed after the
book. Was that a It wasn't common, but
did any other that you know add editions, official editions, but
not in the book? No, the closest you'd probably
get would be Chaos Dwarf that were in the book that weren't in
the list that was released in White Dwarf.
Yeah. But actual additional
characters, no. I think he's in fourth anyway.
I'd about later editions, but in fourth he's the only one that
was there was no wonder. I suppose you could argue White
the white dwarf who was who was issue 200 literally the issue
before they they released 5th edition, but he was fourth.
He wasn't. But yeah, they only two then I
used to yeah, set 2 special characters, but not in the in
the books, yeah. Yeah.
I mean, if if we're going to bring in Imrich, that surely
backs up my idea that High Elves have the best special characters
out of the. I don't think he's a great
special character. I think he's a lovely model.
I don't think he's a great special character.
I, I, I, I, I don't actually mean in terms of the rules.
I just mean in the aesthetics models, you know, as an all
round. Thing I would never argue
against that one, I'll never argue against that one.
I think Scaven could have given the run for money if they'd been
smaller, but special characters were too big.
The models for Scaben. They just don't fit in with the
rest of the Scaben at the time. Yeah, I really love the the
Scaben special characters. They might, you know, borderline
the, you know, a little bit silly in some cases.
Maybe I don't. Know I did.
That's fair. Yeah.
It was a funny idea. They were comic.
Every single one of the Scaben characters is Comic Relief.
Yeah. You know, the high off
characters were kind of cages, were serious.
There was no humor really in the high off farm.
No, no, no. It was a serious army, yeah.
And also that I suppose you had ogres and and and halflings for
Empire, but they're, they're two armies.
There's no silliness involved in those two armies really.
Whereas whereas skaving is all about silliness and.
Yeah, and orcs have a fair bit of, you know, sort of sillings,
yeah. Absolutely, but but no models
wise aesthetic Yeah, no I agree with you that the high of.
Pressure. Yeah, we give you that 10.
Yeah. Thank you.
They're right up there. I.
Can't argue with that at all. Thank you for the points.
Yeah, yeah. So I guess maybe we'll call
that. Yeah, that's cool.
Probably the day and. Thank you very much to both of
you. Yeah.
Thank you a joy and look forward to look forward to the next one.
There's also Golden next right? Yeah, October, everything got
planned. Yeah, done.
Makes sense. All right, Thanks for Tom.
No worries. And.
Cheers guys. Thank you very much.
Yeah, yeah. Bye.
Bye, bye, bye.