Dwarfs are big news at the moment, so naturally I have been looking through my collection and pondering all things short and beardy. At some point I am going to construct an army list to play against an Empire army, with the twist being that we will play using Warhammer rules, then some other rules such as Mayhem, Armies of Arcana and others. My original intention was to use the existing dwarf army book and ignore the new version, convinced as I was that the release would leave me cold (as did the Chaos Warriors book). However, I have to confess that the buzz around the new book has got to me. I am seriously considering breaking into the warchest for this release!
The nice thing about having an army that's 10 years old or more, is that you can pick up the latest book, nothing else and just start playing. If you play tournament style then you may feel compelled to add in the latest must-have units and drop the new donkeys - melt down your anvil and cast it up into squads of gyrocopters. I won't be doing this as I don't play tournament style so I am quite happy to use what I have and see how it gets on. I will probably add a new unit or two just for variety sake. I quite like the look of the irondrakes and am patiently waiting for Avatars of War to release their not-hammerers. In the meantime I am casting my eye over my existing toys.
The disadvantage to having an old army is that it can look a bit tired next to the new shinies. The newer models finally match the awesome artwork that attracted me to dwarfs in the first place. Tough, grim warriors with finely crafted arms and armour. I would love to start from scratch with a few sets of new figures, but time and money prevent this, so I will be soldiering on as best I can with the old stalwarts. The basic dwarf warrior has never been a brilliant model, much like many of the core ranges that are over 10 years old. If I was painting them today I would certainly use different colours and techniques to the ones I had used on this regiment so many years ago. The best things about this regiment are a) it's painted and ready for gaming and b) I have finally painted on a banner design. There's no sign of the humble dwarf clansman being redesigned, so if I wanted to draft in some new warriors I would invest in some AOW warriors - if they are ever re-released in plastic. For the time being, this unit will have to be good enough.
2 comments:
I'm still painting away on the new Dwarfs. I really like all the new sculpts (well, most of them). Especially the rank and file like Longbeards, Hammerers, Irondrakes etc. I'm almost done a unit of the Irondrakes - they are pretty easy to paint since so much metal area :)
I am a little discouraged though, because I frequently come across posts about how boring the Dwarfs are to play and/or play against :|
Lastly, I like those AoW Dwarfs a lot - but I tend to stick to official GW in case I want to play at a local (relatively casual) tournament or sell the army later to tourney players.
Games are made by the players, not by the army lists. I like to think that I give my opponent a good game when I command the dwarfs. I have never played a gunline army, that would be boring for me as well as my opponent. They don't have cavalry or magic, but if you want that style of game then choose Empire! Really, I can never understand why somebody would choose an army that they consider boring, especially when you take into account the money and time involved in putting it all together, even if you speed paint it.
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