For the WPS Cities of Death Campaign Weekend, I decided to take a Genestealer Cult army. I spoke to the campaign organisers who suggested that I base the list on the Eye of Terror Codex, using the Lost and the Damned lists. Armed with the codex I set about finding the models that I had available. As well as playing 40k I am a big fan of both Necromunda and Space Hulk, owning the original box set and the two expansions. This considered I had quite a few Purestrains and Hybrids to use in the force. In addition I had collected a number of metal hybrids and the Magos and Patriarch models. Using the Lost and the Damned list I selected the following units.

As Genestealers I opted to use the Daemonettes entry taking two units of twelve, they are a favoured unit being a multiple of six! Rending Claws and in most cases first turn due to Warp Scream.
To summon these nasties I took two units of Leaping mutants, six inch move, fleet of foot in the shooting phase and twelve inch charge move. Equipped with two flamers and pistols and blades. These were represented by Hybrid models.
For the armies fire base I took two units of traitors with a lascanon, and an icon to summon the daemons to if they ran into any trouble. This entry comes with infiltrate for free, the only downfall is their poor leadership! The unit was represented using old rogue trader imperial guard models.
To bolster these troops I took a Chaos lieutenant with the demagogue ability and the doombolt physic power, this was represented by an old genestealer magos figure. 
My HQ choice was completed by an arch heretic with lighting claws and spiky bits to represent the genestealer patriarch.
The obligatory Leman Russ and Basilisk were taken as heavy support.
The army has a classic blue and purple look with grey on the vehicles and traitor guard elements.

Having sat down to work out the roster and work out what models I still needed. I found that I needed virtually a full unit of leaping mutants! My usual hunting ground for this sort of model for me is eBay. A quick search revealed very few genestealer hybrids for sale and the ones that were available were quite expensive. I really wanted to spend as little as possible on the Army, so I tried a wanted ad on the Warhammer Forum’s “Market Place” I received two replies and promptly arranged swaps and a cheque payment. Still a few short I raided my bits box and press ganged a few plastic Orks with Purestrain head swaps. They looked pretty cool and fitted in with the old Space Hulk hybrids. I have subsequently acquired a few of the Genestealer Familiars which I am going to use as icons for summoning the Purestrains.

Having never played a Cities of Death game I went to the Weekend with some trepidation, I got to Warhammer world around about three o’clock and quickly picked up a game with Chris Appleford’s Space Marines, as there were no Cities of Death buildings we opted for a standard mission which I think I won.
Next up was Dave Pike, who designed and built the COD buildings, so for the first game of COD here I come. Some Extremely lucky saves, daemon summoning and ordinance shots sealed this one for me. I like this game roll on tomorrow!

Saturday morning comes along and I find myself on the opposite side of the table to Charlie Clift’s Harlequin, and Dire avenger 400 pt force. I always struggle with the smaller games and so predictably I lost the first game.

Next up was the grudge match against Geoff Hamilton’s Daemon hunters. Geoff is rapidly becoming my bogey as I have not won in 3 games. I quite fancied a win against Geoff as I would benefit from the “Without Number” rule for the daemons. A really good game ended in a win for Geoff, and the hapless Daemonettes trying to foot slog back into close combat.
 

For the Third game I drew Dave Pike again, buoyed with success from our first game I felt confident, I don’t remember much about the actual game, which ended in a draw. Playing against Dave is always good fun and I was quite happy with a draw.

Game four, and I am facing Gaz Taylor’s Space marines. Gaz is a really nice Guy and has a nice Army as well!

Game Five, first thing Sunday morning, Chris Appleford stands opposite me looking distinctly worse for wear, I get him a mug of tea that seems to go down well. We settle down to another game, which ends in a win to me.

Game Six, Lee Griffiths’ Necrons. I start well with prelimary bombardment taking a couple of Wraiths out. In what was a close game I seemed totally unable to make any of the ordinance shots count. And the game went right down to the wire, me needing to kill just a few warriors to achieve phase out in turn six. Alas it was not to be and Lee scores a well deserved win.

And so we move to the awards, I was delighted to have got voted most sporting player, as for the tournament statistics Win 16% Draw 50% Lose 33%. I was quite pleased to have drawn so many games and thereby reduced my lose rate.