GW does it again...

So,

Just last week GW released Age of Sigmar Soul Wars on the public and a bunch of my gaming group took notice. Now, I am an old Warhammer Fantasy Battle player from back in third-fifth edition. I thought I walked away from GW for good, but with the re release of Blood Bowl, then Necromunda, GW was pulling me back in. But I really had no interest in Age of Sigmar (AoS) when it first came out, as I wanted to go with smaller armies and fewer models on the table. I was a skirmish gamer now and large blocks of infantry were not my thing anymore. But...

There is always a but, isn't there? Well my but was for a longing to go back to my first army I ever had with Undead/Vampire Counts, but as AoS had blown up the Old World, I felt pretty safe with not seeing that army. But with the release of Soul Wars, there were new undead models about to be released onto the world and these models are incredible. But I felt safe with the fact that a few of my friends (Drunken Samurai being one of them) wanted to build this new Haunt army. As cool as the models are, it really didn't fit my idea of a Vampire army.

So as Drunken and I talked the weeks leading up to the release of Soul Wars, he mentioned that Vampires were still alive (meaning undead of course) in the game world under the Nagash lists. But something caught my eyes while looking at books at my local store, the Flesh Eaters army book. Here is an army that is all based around Ghouls and a Ghoul King. It was different, and only really had a few models and it became a possibility to build.

I had pretty much decided that if Drunken Samurai took the plunge, then what could it hurt, right? Well He did take the plunge by picking up the first edition AoS box game that he found for 40% off while we were out checking out game stores. With him buying it, it sort of solidified me into picking up an army. And in my mind I said if I find a Get started collecting box and a big reinforcement box that I would take the plunge with him. Well as karma would have it, at the very same store where Drunken picked up the 40% of 1st edition box set, low and behold there was exactly what I was looking for on the shelf. So as an addict does, I grabbed both boxes and headed for the sales counter!

What happened next is still a blur, but as I started assembling models, I knew I had to have more. So I went out a few days later and bought another reinforcement box and the Flesh Eaters army book. I still had not looked at the rules or even bought the new rules, I was just happy building up Ghoul models again. And before I even read one page of the rule book, I had three Crypt Flayers painted up!

First of many

With those done I quickly started assembling the rest of the models, in fact, Drunken and I set up a game the next weekend so I needed to get everything assembled for the game. Since both of us had never played, this would be a test game. He brought all his Stormcast and I put down all my Flesh eaters, which included Zombie Dragon and King, 4 Crypt Horrors, 5 Crypt Flayers and about 50 ghouls.

The game was a blast and we learned a lot about how AoS works, which has similarities to Lord of the Rings, but different. I was so jazzed up about the game that I started painting on more models, which has been rare for me to get excited about painting anything. I knocked out the Crypt Horrors and then had either start on the 50 Ghouls or start on the Zombie Dragon (which I really wanted to paint!).

Cyrpt Horrors

Well this past weekend I had another game set up for Sunday with Drunken or another buddy, Randy. So on Saturday I decided to start painting on the 50 Ghouls. I painted all day Saturday and was in the zone to have them all finished by about 8:00pm that night.

50 Ghouls ready for action!

So with that done in time for Sunday's game all I had to do was start working on the zombie dragon, something I really really want to paint.

Well it was decided that I would battle Randy and his Khorne Boys in a battle, he had 780 points and I decided that I would try to match points. I wanted to see just how sturdy my army was, so i took the Zombie Dragon and King, three Crypt Horrors an three Crypt Flayers, a total of 7 models up against Randy's 37 models or so.

A Flayer takes on some Khorne troops! 

 Everyone kept asking me where my army was and laughing and making jokes, but as the game progressed, the Flesh Eaters started killing Khorne models pretty quickly. And about that time I realized that the King has a special Command ability to bring on free models, and then the game turned in my favor. At the end, I lost about 36 wounds to Randy's 68 wounds, which left nothing left on the table top.

So, after two games, I think I am in love with this army and will be expanding it to at least another get you started collecting and a few other models. It took me a long time to come around to AoS, but no that I am here, I think I like it! And I didn't know GW had such a hard pull on me, I thought I was strong, but I was fooling myself!

Now, as to what other army do I start???

TK