Prospero Burns The Judgment of Valdor

I finally have a chance to read the Journal Tactica: Prospero Burns The Judgment of Valdor. I'll give a brief run of spoilers - too exhausted to write a detailed account. And no, I'm not using AI to read the Journal Tactica and summarize it. Anyone can do that, it'll defeat the purpose of me having a blog.

Speaking of AI, I use AI to code. I have a visual novel I'm creating, so I'm now technically an indie developer. Yay? But let's talk about that another day. For now...Prospero. As a Thousand Sons guy, I was psyched when the Journal Tactica was first announced, and I knew I was going to get it. Not for the Tzeentch Daemons. I'm a Loyalist Thousand Sons, so I have no intention of starting a Tzeentch Daemons army.

Not yet, anyway...

So we begin with the notorious Council of Nikaea, also known as The Trial of the Sorcerer. Long story short (go watch Arbitor Ian's video on Thousand Sons and Prospero if you want the full details), the Emperor summoned a council on Nikaea to decide what to do with the Librarius project and the use of psykers in the Legiones Astartes. Despite Magnus's impassionate plea for wisdom, the Emperor ruled that the use of psychic powers is forbidden, and so Magnus skulks back to Prospero, sulking, and isolates himself for like 3 years.

Instead of obeying the Emperor's edict, Magnus decides to continue using psychic powers anyway, and he learns of Horus Lupercal's treachery. He then uses psychic powers to send a message to Terra to warn the Emperor, instead of y'know, sending an astropathic message like others. Maybe he thinks astropaths can't be trusted and their message will get intercepted in the warp or something. Perhaps he just wants to be vindicated in his defense of psychic powers as indispensable to the Legiones Astartes.

That results in Magnus's folly, where he accidentally breaches the wards the Emperor set up in the Imperial Dungeon, and causes hordes of daemons to invade Terra. The Emperor is rightly pissed off when his Webway Project is in tatters and he's stuck on Terra holding the gates closed to deny the daemons entry to his world, so he sends a Censure Host to bring Magnus back in chains, with Constantin Valdor as his representative.

The Captain-General of the Legio Custodes, he is accompanied by the anathema psykana Sisters of Silence and the Ordo Sinister, which includes not just the Psi-Titans but also the Questoris Sinister! Whoa! We now have...psi-Knights? The leader of the Knights is Stator-Xabulus Erydani Colm, the Commanding Scion of the Obsignatus Lance of the Questoris Sinister. I kid you not.

So basically 5 Psi-Titans of the Ordo Sinister, and a single lance of the Ordo Sinister's vassal Knight household, the Questoris Sinister, which is like 16 Knight armors. And they're escorted by 1,000 Secutarii Sinister, the support troops for the Chamber Occidentalis of the Ordo Sinister.

They meet Leman Russ and his Space Wolves in Beta-Garmon, because only a Primarch may apprehend or execute another Primarch. Leman Russ is determined to kill Magnus instead of arresting him, apparently because Horus talked to him. Valdor and Russ clash over this, but in the end Valdor has no choice but to let Russ do what he wants, which includes grabbing proscribed exterminatus grade weapons and phosphex from the armories of Beta-Garmon.

They then head to the Prospero system, where the Thousand Sons fleet is conspiciously missing. Magnus has used his magic to blind his people and cloud their sensors while dispatching his fleet elsewhere, because he intends to accept his punishment and dies. Russ, on Valdor's urging, sends a heartfelt message to the Thousand Sons, asking them to surrender, but Magnus the moron remains silent because he's playing the victim (Vulkan is sort of right here). Sigh. Why, Magnus...

I'm a Thousand Sons player, and even I think Magnus is dumb for doing this. This is even after reading Graham McNeill's A Thousand Sons, by the way. But I think Vulkan has a point after reading Aaron Dembski-Bowden's Echoes of Eternity.

Anyway, Russ runs out of patience and bombs Prospero to oblivion, but Tizca is safe because of the psychokinetic forcefield. The Space Wolves land, like 30,000 of them, in Old Tizca, and they proceed to crush the poor Prosperine Spireguard and Airguard. Ouch. They do meet more formidable resistance from the Magdan Auxilia across the Lemsa River, the Solar Auxilia Cohort having experience fighting alongside and against Legiones Astartes, and thus familiar with their tactics.

The Thousand Sons, led by Ahzek Ahriman, finally mobilize, and they mop the floor with the Space Wolves through their psychic powers. They're backed up by elite Spireguard Veletarii and psi-automata. Awesome.

Constantin Valdor realizes the Space Wolves might actually lose, so he sends reinforcements. Custodians and Solar Auxilia land, including the Saturnye Rams. The Custodes even overpowered the Sekhmet Terminator elites of the Thousand Sons, forcing the latter to withdraw. Ouch.

Still, the Thousand Sons's sorcery allow them to match the Custodes as they attempt to punch deeper into Tizca, and slaughter the Space Wolves...until Valdor calls for the Sisters of Silence to nullify their psychic spells. The Thousand Sons are thrown back and have to retreat further into Central Tizca as the Golden armored warriors and their accompanying support (Sisters of Silence plus Solar Auxilia) make headway.

Kalophis then activates Canis Vertex, a Titan, and annihilates the enemy invaders before he goes kaboom from the excess warp energy, which means Canis Vertex also detonates in the middle of the city. Lots of Thousand Sons also devolve into Chaos Spawn. Ugh. At the same time, plenty of Space Wolves also mutate into Wulfen or werewolves, and they start tearing into each other. Damn.

Here's the new material not covered in A Thousand Sons or even Inferno (the black book). So apparently, Phtohonos Shield Host breaks into the Order of Ruin's Praefurnium Aeturnus, apparently to pilfer the secret trove of lore that the Thousand Sons have there. They fight a running battle against the Order of Blindness the deeper they descend, and eventually, they find a bunch of Thousand Sons Sorcerers conducting some weird ritual.

Needless to say, this ritual summons a bunch of Tzeentch Daemons, including a Lord of Change. The horrors, flamers, screamers and other Tzeentch Daemons bring down the Custodes and Sisters of Silence while the horrified Thosuand Sons retreat. The leader of the Shield Host, Tribune Achernas, proceeds to duel the Lord of Change.

Above, Magnus finally emerges to fight against Russ, gets his back broken, then teleports his Sons and himself to the Planet of Sorcerers. At that moment, the Lord of Change either is defeated or disappears, leaving the surviving Custodes dazed and stunned.

By the way, about 1,000 Custodes participated, along with 3,000 Sisters of Silence, tens of thousands of Solar Auxilia from the 3rd Terranic Auxilia, 1,260th Tyrian Exo-guard, 9th Saturnye Rams, 10th and 42nd Sarcosan Voltigeurs, Charonid Sentinels, and Sydonia Taghmata Elements Ekriss.

We get rules for the Oblitum Pattern Cohort, which represents the psycho-conditioned Tyrian Exo-guard. They ignore negative Leadership modifiers, but need to make Willpower checks for reactions or score Objectives. At least you can take them as allies to your Legio Custodes army, which otherwise forbid you from taking Solar Auxilia allies. You also get to take a free Helot Tercio for your Veletaris Tercio, which lets you field more expendable troops and a single fire support unit.

I won't go through the Tzeentch Daemons list in detail because I'm too tired and confused to understand all the interactions (with other Daemon types, like Infernal Tempest, Formless Distortion, etc.), psychic powers and rules, but basically, you get to field a Daemon Prince as high command, a Herald of Tzeentch as normal command, flamers as fire support, screamers as fast attack, horrors as troops, and a Lord of Change as Lord of War.

Thousand Sons can also summon an auxiliary detachment called Aetheric Incursion, but only if you're Traitor. Which I'm not, so... anyway, you'll only unlock this if you're Traitor and you bring an Esoterist or Prosperine Sorcerer. No, Librarians don't count, apparently.

But if you're sick of Legiones Astartes for some reason and want to play mortals, but psyker mortals instead, you get the Fateweaver Cohort Doctrine for Solar Auxilia, which gives them a 6+ invulnerable save against Perils of the Warp or Psychic weapons (...that's it?). Command models are pskyers, yay! But only Fateweaving psychic discipline, so no pyromancers for your Solar Auxilia. Also, if you take an infantry tercio, you get a free Aetheric Incursion detachment! Nice! So your mortal Solar Auxilia psykers can also summon Tzeentch Daemons!

...I kinda want the Custodes Dreadnoughts, though. They look cooler than Daemons. Anyway...that's it for the lore!

Ciaphas Cain and Centaur

It's been a long time since I last posted. Sorry, I've been super busy with work and my own personal projects. Starry Knight is still far from being completed, sigh. I think I have 14 more pages to color, and worse, I'll have to redraw a few of the colored ones. I think I'll finish coloring everything first, post them, then slowly redraw and replace them later, when I have the time and energy.

Anyway, I finally had some free time today. Phew. After about a month of procrastination, I finally assembled Ciaphas Cain and a Centaur rapid strike vehicle. And of course, Jurgen.

The Centaur is meant to be an armored rig, a dedicated transport for my Ryuusei Grenadiers. I'll probably buy a plasticard to cover the open top because I want him to be an enclosed vehicle. I'll do that after I get and assemble 2 more.

I plan to have 3 of these eventually, for my 2 Grenadier squads and 1 command squad, for Imperial Militia. Yes, I know he's an Imperial Guard vehicle for modern 40K, but as you can see, I've replaced the heavy stubber with twin heavy stubber and added a "hull" heavy flamer. That's an Imperial Militia Armored Rig. Hah! But I can still run him as a Centaur for 11th edition games if nobody minds the heavy flamer and extra heavy stubber. Of course, he'll only count as having a single heavy stubber.

Ciaphas Cain and Jurgen are looking good! Honestly, buying him was a no brainer. The whole reason why I got into Warhammer 40,000 in the first place was because Ciaphas Cain, and that's also why I'm an Imperial Guard player. The first ever Black Library novel and Warhammer 40,000 story I read was Ciaphas Cain: Hero of the Imperium. Or rather, Fight of Flight. One of the best Warhammer 40,000 stories I've ever read, and I've been booked ever since.

You can tell why I was so excited to get Ciaphas Cain. Would have assembled him sooner, but y'know. Life. Ugh. Anyway, this isn't the place to whine, so I'll leave it at that.

Hopefully, I'll have more time to either write about Zone Mortalis, Operation Imperator, or assemble my Armory of Old Night Grenadier command squad for Imperial Militia!

The Second Week of the Siege of Death Mire

The Imperium managed to repel the second wave of Orks from Death Mire. Yay!

Wanted to post this yesterday, but was too busy and exhausted (I literally worked until 3am yesterday, and that was after I worked through the weekend). Finally got to leave the office on time today, so I can finally post this.

My Guardsmen and Knights will stand strong against the Orks!

...and no, I have no intention of talking about the reveal of yet another Ultramarine Character.

Reincarnator x Regressor

Yeah, I've been busy the past few weeks, unfortunately. I'm still working on Starry Knight, but I thought I should feature this as an aside.

I'll try to balance this and Starry Knight, but since they're both going on my Pixiv account (I'll set it up soon), we'll see how it goes. Till then.

The first week of the Siege of Death Mire

The first week of the Siege of Death mire has ended, and it is an Imperial victory!

As Yarrick said, soldiers of Armageddon, be proud! The Imperial Guard (NOT Space Marines) have held the line and repelled the Orks, and now we tactically retreat from the Tempestor Victorum line to the Cloisters to better defend against the greenskins.

Soldiers of Armageddon, make ready.

Oswald is proud of you all. He'll toast you some sacra.

Big Summer Preview

The Big Summer Preview has just streamed, and there are tons of information to dig into. Funnily enough, I don't have much to say about actual Warhammer 40,000 stuff. The starter sets don't really appeal to me as I don't play Space Marines or Orks, but the ready painted terrain is cool.

For people like me, who don't really enjoy the painting aspect, this is an Emperor-sent product. Sounds expensive, though - costing over twice a Combat Patrol makes me nervous, don't know if I have the budget. Ouch.

Anyway, the news that I'm really interested in. Let's start with...The Horus Heresy, which can also double as Warhammer 40,000. Literally on the box, and they emphasized in the stream that you can use them for both Warhammer 40,000 and the Horus Heresy. Because the Custodes are unlikely to have changed their weapons, equipment and wargear over 10,000 years!

The big Dreadnought in the room, of course, is none other than the Telemon Dreadnought. Now you have all the Horus Heresy Dreadnoughts that were previously resin, released in plastic! Woohoo!

I am tempted to get all the Custodes Dreadnoughts (one of each), led by a Shield Captain or two, and a couple of Custodian squads, just because of how cool they are. Eventually, I'll want to add Aquilon Terminators if they're ever released in plastic, but that's for the far future. Games Workshop prices are premium and near unaffordable, so I can't really buy as many miniatures as I could in the past. It feels like their prices have doubled over the last ten years. Whereas my salary has not. It's insane. Can't keep up with the price hikes, so I'll end up buying much less. It's fine - I do have other hobby stuff down the pipeline, so it's not that much of a loss.

However, the release I'm most interested in is the Journal Tactica.

As a Thousand Sons guy, I'm defintiely getting this. Prospero Burns? The homeworld of my Thousand Sons! Poor Ignatius. Anyway, it seems the Legio Custodes have their own agenda going into Prospero and razing Tizca. They come with a new Cohort Doctrine, plus rules for a specialist Solar Auxilia detachment called Adjutorum Sodalities who will support the Shield Host. Yes, Warhammer Community only says retinues of specialists, but the livestream mentions they are Solar Auxilia. Interesting.

What agenda does the Legio Custodes have? Apparently, they are hunting Daemons. And in this Journal Tactica, we get rules for Tzeentch Daemons! Screamers, Horrors...maybe even Lord of Change. We finally get Daemons dedicated to specific Chaos Gods for the Horus Heresy. Very cool. As a Thousand Sons player, I'm so loking forward to this, but my Thousand Sons are Loyalists, so...uh...I don't know. Also, I don't have the budget. If I had money, I'll just buy the Custodes Dreadnoughts. Hell, before that, I need to actually buy more Imperial Army stuff (Centaur RSVs, a Command Leman Russ tank, maybe a Dracosan to kitbash as a Command, etc.), the Saturnine box, then the Custodes. Ugh. Damn, I still haven't bought the Knight Defender. Sigh.

Also, Exodites have been announced.

I don't play Aeldari and I also don't play Kill Team, but I see this and I think: kitbash and conversions. Might get a couple of boxes just to turn them into Astra Militarum or Imperial Militia Rough Riders. 6 dino-riding dudes, enough for a mounted Force Commander and 5 guys. Plus Beastmaster Troops as Caimans. Nice. But that's also for the far future. Though, I'm excited to see what rules Exodites get for Aeldari in the wider Warhammer 40,000 tabletop. Will be fun to include them in your Aeldari army! With the new Detachment system, you can add an Exodite detachment alongside your Wraith one!

...I forgot about my favorite stuff from the preview. I can't believe it. The Titans.

If you remember the Mori Quake cannon, the twin gatling blasters, twin turbo laser destructors and conversion beam extirpator, which used to be in resin - and I actually have them - they are back! And soon to be available in plastic!

Not just that, the volkite destructor, macro gatling blaster, paired Vulcan mega-bolters and a graviton ruinator! I have almost all of them in resin, but I might purchase the sprues separately to get the ones I don't have (e.g. paired gatling blasters, Mori quake cannon, graviton ruinator).

The Reaver Titan appears to be completely new, though! He comes with a volkite annihilator and graviton obliterator, which are different from the resin carapace versions, and caparace Vulcan mega-bolter and conversion beam dissolutor - you choose one of them! Awesome! I can't wait!

Made some progress

Got a little burned out at work, so progress on my webcomic has been slow. Very slow. Apologies.

On the other hand, I created an MCP server to help me speed things up, but I dunno if it'll work. But for the most part, I drew everything - including the backgrounds so far - myself. But if I get overloaded, I'll use my MCP server for help.

Anyway, here's what I have so far.

These are screenshots with printscreen function, not the actual stuff yet. Work in progress. Just to let you guys know I'm still working on it. It'll take me months at this rate, but hey, I'll do what I can.

By the way, any football fans here? Both Warhammer 40,000 and football are British, after all, and Warhammer 40,000 has a lot of football influences (the Orks are influenced by footbal hooligans, for example - for more information, you can watch Arbitor Ian's video on Orks).

If you are, you might recognize the jersey Mikhail (the protagonist) is wearing. Heh.