Tale of Wrath - Post Numero Uno

I've been meaning to write about some Wrath of Kings for quite a while, now.

For real!  I'm serious!

This game has become my main tabletop game (aside from its older brother Dark Age) that I am able to play on the regular, with our group even establishing a once-a-week game night for it.  I've been getting curb stomped with my Nasier repeatedly since... garsh, like November or thereabouts.

Hey, I'm a painter, not a tactician.  Don't look at me like that.

ANYWAY!  Our group has somehow amassed around 8 people... but no Teknes players.  Having a few Teknes models laying around from the Kickstarter, I decided to take it upon myself and become our group's Teknes contingent.  Luckily for me, at the same time the folks over at SCREWED-UP-DICE have started up a paint and play initiative focused on Wrath of Kings, called "Tale of Wrath".

So, the good-news-made-even-better-news about your interest here on P.O.W.'s focus on Wrath of King's Teknes faction is that, should you decide you want to see blogs about the game's other factions (you traitor!), they are readily available on S.U.D.'s hub page:  Tale of Wrath Hub (http://www.screwedupdice.com/p/taleofwrath-hub.html)  You could still even sign up yourself, should you want!

Okay, now, back to me.

The logo of the Teknes peoples of all shapes and sizes.

Teknes is a funny choice for me, because upon first looking at the game, they were easily tied for last place alongside the werewolf/vampire horde of Goritsi.  It's not that I didn't appreciate their fiction or their slice of the world, because on that front they're possibly my favorite.  It's that they're weird as hell.

In Wrath of Kings, each faction has a kind of... underlying aesthetic and theme.  Nasier are demon summoning, kabuki mask wearing samurai, mostly, and are aggressive individualists.  Shael Han are the Golden East, with lots of cool dragon imagery, and they are profoundly synergistic with each other in battle.  Goritsi are, as mentioned, vampires and werewolves and dark European aristocracy, lashing out with high speed and maneuverability.  Hadross are the ocean-dwelling children of the Old Ones, with anthropomorphized sharks, jellyfish, crabs, etc, ready to slow creep across the field in a dense group, take a punch to the face, and punish you for it.  And then finally, you have Teknes.  They're kind of like communist Russia, but with technology and mutants?  They're the mad scientist faction, and they wear armor, and... I don't even know.  They seem to be the median of everything else, nestling comfortably in the middle of the pack, jack-of-all-trades.  Their troopers seem decent, their specialists really good, and their leaders trying desperately to make everything else better than just decent.

Here is a good example of what I'm talking about:

Left-to-right:  A Union Worker, the C.O.R.E., and a Lineman

On the left, we have the regular trooper/infantry/grunt/whatever that is a Union Worker.  These pigmen are what I see typically associated with the Teknes faction, and what people tend to think of first.  They're cheap, they get better when they get hurt, and their leader is literally a dude named the Union Boss with a whip.  These pigmen were normal people once: criminals, "volunteers", and the like, before getting a large dose of Science.

In the middle, we have the specialist unit called a C.O.R.E., which by his being a specialist means he fits into a different slot of the army composition making him limited.  He's a funky robot who either just dropped a phat beat at the turn tables, or dissed yo momma, or was astounded by the lack of an opposing werewolf's fashion sense.  I mean, just look at that left hand!

And finally on the right, we have the regular, steampunk-armor-wearing infantry dude, simply called a Lineman.  They're cheap like pigs, but more of a defensive piece, with rules to "rescue" friendly models from engagements by moving them around.  These guys are going to be my bread-n-butta.

Oh, and there's these things as a troop choice, as well:

Floating psychic murder babies.  Yeah.

 So, like I said... weird.

I have to give credit where it's due, though, and say that the sheer originality of the Teknes is surprisingly refreshing.  Also, while I wasn't crazy about a lot of their models from seeing pictures, actually having them in hand makes a world of difference, and I think they've maybe become my favorite?  Stockholm syndrome, maybe?  I don't even know.  But now I think they're rad as hell.

So that brings us to this:

A faction starter box, and a heap more of the Linemen

Now I have to say, and not just because I'm a fan of the game, either... but I have to say, Wrath of Kings has the best faction starter boxes I've ever seen in a miniatures game.  They are affordable at a retail price of $70.00, and they are absolutely packed to the gills with models.  We're talking full field-able army at the mid-tier range (not the "intro" tier, but typical mid-tier game size).

So many models. So. Many. Models.

Now, like I said, the Linemen are my jam.  Wrath of Kings is a game with a slotted composition system, simply meaning you're allowed X number of "ranks" (points, essentially, but all models are either 1 or 2, respectively) of infantry, X number of "ranks" for leaders, X for specialists.  That's literally as complicated as it gets.  So you're able to slot in however you like, but paying heed to obvious bonuses of something like having the Union Boss on the table leading the Union Workers for the best effect.  I'm going to build primarily Linemen, with *maybe* a small group of unionized pig people.

Even just a box of infantry comes with tons of dudes AND two leaders!

Also of note, every model in these boxes comes individually bagged, making organizing assembly and storage of the remainder much more convenient (no big sprues to cut up, here).

Much convenient. Yes.

And that's, basically, an unboxing of one of these things, too.  Just a pile of those bags and a heap of bases.

And now... assembly!