Progress continues on my Blindwater side of my Minions project, both in painting and list creation. I’m fiddling with three different Warlocks to begin my serious inquiry into the faction: Jaga-Jaga, Maelok, and Rask. I think each of them bring some solid tools and effective play styles for me to work with.
On the painting side, I am working toward a fully-painted core of a force, and exploring the various types of model that I’ll be fielding. To that end, here’s some progress:
Maelok the Dreadbound is the first Minions warlock that I’ve finished. He was an intimidating model to paint, as there’s a lot going on with him. But I think it turned out really nicely–special bonus Mr. Meeseeks voodoo doll in his pouch to torment any Trollbloods with.
This Blackhide Wrastler shows a lot of what the faction will be looking like from an alligators side. Red cords, two-tone skin “top” and “bottom”, slight trend toward yellow on the more prominent spikes and scales. I’m really pleased with this one!
The Boneswarm was honestly pretty easy. My technique for painting bone is quick enough, so he went fast. Maybe I should play some Barnabas2 just because I could get his kit painted faster than most everything else!
The Bullsnapper painted up pretty easy as well. He doesn’t have quite as many sharp scales, so is a more simple thing with a bit less yellow along the top (it’s very fait, just on his head and tips of the darker spine scales).
Despite focusing my painting efforts on Maelok first, I started experimenting with Rask and Jaga-Jaga as well in my first two games. But quickly broke out Maelok as well.
(Clockwise from left). First took Jaga-Jaga vs Savage’s Kromac2. Managed to survive two rounds of assassination attempts due to mostly luck and some positioning mistakes, won on scenario after that. The new Circle Thunderbird is a scary piece to face! Then took on Steve’s Issyria with a “Neomodern Rask” list (all credit to Matter of Pact Minions Podcast for coming up with the list). Managed to win on scenario with this one as well. Finally dropped Maelok into Larry’s Ossrum list. He forfeited near the end of the game due to needing to run to an appointment, but it was going to be an assassination kill of Maelok unless the dice were exceptionally poor–so I’m going to count this one as a loss.
(Again, clockwise from left) Fielded Maelok vs Mike’s Cygnar and Major Beth Maddox. Was a good learning game, and while Maddox got a shot to assassinate Maelok she came up a bit short and he was able to finish her off personally. Next took Rask vs. Larry IV’s Mercenaries Magnus2 list. Managed to stave off scenario pressure with some key placements and ambushing husks, which let me get to the point where I was able to assassinate Magnus2. Finally took Rask into Syvestro, which taught me that I definitely need more practice into Crucible Guard and more experience playing into infantry swarms with these lists. Was a solid scenario loss for me.
As I was doing with Skorne, I am going to sorta do with Minions as well. I’m going to track number of games I get in with my chosen focus warlocks leading up to the America’s Team Championship (ATC) and Ontario Team Championship (OTC) coming up at the start of the year. Hoping to hold myself to 30 games played of each of the two warlocks that I end up bringing to those events.
| Primary Warlocks | Games | Secondary Warlocks | Games |
| Maelok | 2 | Midas | 2 |
| Rask | 3 | ||
| Jaga-Jaga | 1 |
365 Points Challenge Progress (2018):
340/365
Battles (Privateer Press):
Overall Totals 2018: 101 (Win/Loss 63/38); 2017: 120 (Win/Loss 86/34): 2016: 123 (Win/Loss: 74/49); 2015: 43 (Win/Loss: 29/14)
Minions:
5 Wins (Vlad1, Issyria, Kromac2, Maddox, Magnus2) / 3 Losses (Venethrax, Ossrum, Syvestro)
Convergence of Cyriss:
3 Wins (Haley3, Vlad1, Caine2) / 11 Losses (Heretic, Rask, Kaelyssa, Xerxis, Siege2, Testament, Bradigus, Vyros2, Ossrum, Stryker2, Vlad2)
Legion of Everblight:
38 Wins (Denny1 x2, Scaverous x2, Issyria, Wanderer, Skarre1, Sloan, Naaresh, Gaspy2, Madrak1 x2, Strakov2, Kaya3 x2, Helynna x3, Sorscha2, Kaelyssa, Dreamer, Jaga-Jaga, Denny3, Elara2 x2, Thexus, Sorscha1, Maelok x3, Heretic, Strakov1, Borka2, Caine2, Karchev, Baldur2, Gaspy3, Gaspy1) / 18 Losses (Denny1, Krueger2, Dreamer, Sorscha1, Jaga-Jaga, Old Witch3, Caine1, Issyria, Child, Helynna, Gaspy3 x2, Karchev, Vlad1, Barnabas, Heretic x2, Madrak1)
Skorne:
10 Wins (Anamag, Sorscha3, Kolgrima, Gaspy2, Feora1, High Reclaimer, Vlad1 x2, Haley2, Skarre3) / 5 Losses (Rahn, Magnus1, Denny1, Haley2, Syvestro)
Protectorate of Menoth:
8 Wins (Gaspy2, Helynna, Vlad2, Sorscha1, Vlad1, Kraye, Garryth, Naaresh) / 1 Loss (Madrak1)
The Dark Muse 