The new TAU Codex is right around the corner and we know how excited our Warhammer 40K players are about the news. To make it easier for new TAU commanders to launch their armies and to help existing TAU players bolster their existing forces, we're happy to announce the Little Shop of Magic's first ever Call to Arms Challenge!

Call to Arms: TAU will help us create an instantaneous cadre of new TAU players in our store, ensuring that you will have others to play with going forward, and giving you an opportunity to build your army along with others. So what are you waiting for? Answer this Call to Arms today!

The Details:

Entry Fee: $120.00

What You Get: $140.00 in TAU miniatures (your choice and no, that is not a typo: the deal is yours just for signing up for the challenge), along with a chance for earning more prizes from the victory pool (see below).

Challenge Start Date: Monday, April 8th (you may register at any time)

Registration Window Closes: Sunday, May 19th

Challenge End Date: Sunday, June 16th, 11:00am

Challenge Rules: Each player must try to complete a Codex legal, 1,000 pt. TAU army by the contest end date. Armies should be assembled, painted (3 color rule) and based in order to be considered complete. Armies can be composed from miniatures obtained with the entry fee (see above) as well as any unpainted miniatures already in the player's possession or miniatures purchased at a later date. Unpainted status must be verified beforehand by one of our Wizards.

In addition, contest participants will be required to submit at least two progress reports for inclusion into our Call to Arms story by the challenge end date. Progress reports are simple updates on how your army is progressing, and can include pictures if desired.  Participants can submit their journal entries here.

Victory Pool: The Little Shop of Magic will add $15.00 in Dragon's Dough to the Victory Pool for each participant in the challenge. Contestants that complete their force (see guidelines above) and submit their required journal entries by the challenge end date will be given an equal share of the Victory Pool.

Final Showdown: On June 16th, the Little Shop of Magic will host a small tournament or mega-battle in which the victorious participants will have an opportunity to test their armies against a varied group of opponents. In addition, each victorious army will be photographed for a special 'armies on parade' section of our website's gallery.

The following commanders have answered the Call to Arms: TAU challenge, find out who was victorious and who was defeated below!

• • Challenger		Status
    Erik Gaarde		DEFEATED!
    Jamie Franco		VICTORIOUS!
    JT Wanner		DEFEATED!
    Justin Jacobson		DEFEATED!
    Matt Connor		DEFEATED!
    Roger Ortiz		VICTORIOUS!
    Sean McNamara		VICTORIOUS!
    Zach Richardson		DEFEATED!

This Call to Arms challenge is now complete: each of the victorious challengers will receive an equal share of the $120 prize pool.

Check back here soon to see pictures of the victorious challenger's armies and get ready for a whole new challenge with our Call to Arms: Convergence of Cyriss Challenge!

Sean McNamara Progress Report #1: Build & color selection

When I first noticed the call to arms I didn't give it much notice. I had once owned a Tau army many years ago but gave it away to a friend returning from work abroad and I wasn't really interested in starting a new army again. My interest was sparked when I started seeing the new Tau models such as the Riptide and the new battle-suit commander. Finally I was able to look at the new codex and that is when I decided to invest in the greater good.

My first decision is where should I start with the new collection? I had no inventory of Tau. The Little Shop of Magic's Call to Arms offered a great deal and a starting point. There was one Tau battle-force left on the shelf and what better way to start a new collection than with a shiny new box set. I still needed to reach my spending limit so what better way to supplement a Tau army than with the epitome of Tau forces, a second battle suit. All of this was done with limited exposure to the book and I had doubts about buying the box set simply because of the inclusion of the Kroot. I wasn't sure how they may perform in the new codex. They did fulfill the second troop choice and are part of the greater good. After reviewing them in the codex I am cautiously optimistic about their functionality with the availability of sniper rounds.

Now it was time to start building and come up with a paint scheme for my new battle force. I primed everything black as a base and blasted the kroot with a khaki color as a base. While spray painting my mind was wandering. What else would I need to make a thousand point army, still no codex to back up anything i was planning. I always liked the hammerhead, but was also thinking of the riptide. I didn't know about the new models so i started reading the online forums to help sway my decision. Another brief exposure to the new codex and i discovered Tank commander long-strike. My mind was made up. I needed out a hammerhead.

Sean McNamara Progress Report #2: Working the points

I have been working on completing my new Tau army now for a few weeks and with only a few weeks left to go in the challenge I have had a lot of choices to make on what to use for my force. Thanks to a generous donation from a friend to the greater good I have now added 2 more crisis suits and an old school broadside to my force. I also picked up another firewarrior and pathfinder team, and an ethereal to lead them.

My final 1000 point challenge army will be as follows.
72 points.   12 Kroot  with the ability to infiltrate
216 points. 24 Firewarriors split into 3 eight man teams
116 points.   Devilfish transport with seeker missiles, d-pods, and sensor spines.
90 points.  3 man stealth team. Infiltrate, stealth, and shrouded.
110 points.  10 pathfinders. Scouts and marker lights.  
346 points. Crisis suit commander and 2 body guards with 2 drones each.
50 points.   Ethereal, invocations.
 
Still need to finish painting the Kroot and the ethereal but I think everything else has been completed for the challenge. I hope to grow my army with the addition of a riptide, a few more stealth suits, and more fire warriors and Devilfish, as well as a second hammerhead in the future.

If this challenge has taught me one thing it is to never use white again. White is nearly impossible to make look good, at least at my skill level. I even tried a coat of grey beneath the white but still have to do multiple coats and it still doesn't turn out right.
Other than some of the chalkiness of the white, I am extremely happy with the way the army is looking and can't wait to use them in a tournament. Looking forward to allying them with space marines for the feast of blades in August.

Jamie Franco Progress Report #1: Build & color selection

I didn't originally want to start a Tau army, but I knew that I would eventually so I figured why wait. I went ahead and ordered the new battleforce and some broadsides while purchasing some firewarriors to start on. My biggest problem right away was my own procrastination. I always have time on my hands, but I knew I had over a month to get everything done and just let the firewarriors sit there until the day before my order would come in. In one day though I got the whole box built and painted.

There weren't many decisions to make for assembly. I hate skin, so everyone has a helmet. I put on 2 of the carbines on the warriors because I thought pinning might be helpful. For the color scheme I wanted something that sort of reminded me of their box art while still being different. I also wanted a cartoon look like gundam, which tau remind me of. I ended up with orange for armor, yellow for... non-armor... and white for weapons, techy stuffs and their logos. All three of which are a pain to paint and required many layers to look decent.
By the end of the first week, after my battleforce and one broadside came in, I had assembled most of the models and painted a full unit of firewarriors and a broadside. They still needed those little details, but that could wait for later.

Jamie Franco Progress Report #2: Finishing touches

After all the easy guys I went on to the piranhas, stealth suits, crisis suits, and the last broadside. All needed magnets which required some extra work. I was low on magnets though so I had to resort to magnetic paint. The stuff goes on thick and requires 3 coats to hold decent, but still fall off easily. Painting went by faster as I learned to base coat white so the orange and yellow would paint on easier. Finally I went to base my guys using Snow tex, a white paint with some texture in it. Glued some static grass and threw some splotches of brown wash to make it interesting. I felt good after finishing all the suits... until I realised I had all the drones left.

Roger Ortiz Progress Report #1: Call to arms mad dash!

Tau was the first warhammer army so I had some older models that that I wanted to strip and repaint making this call to arms a perfect excuse to do so. I decided just to paint as much of my army I can then make a 1k point list at the end.

First I bought some new models like the riptide and a box of pathfinders.  Then I stripped all the older models before I primed everything at once. I'm planning on painting my tau with the sa'cea sept color scheme (blue and orange). To try to speed things up I tried out the army builder crystal blue but I really didn't like how bright the models turned out.  So I called up my buddy Juston and he made a really nice custom blue color mixing the Vallejo paints in the pictures.  All the models got primed white and then base coated with the blue using an airbrus in the past couple of weeks I've only finished 2 full fire warrior units and now I'm working on the pathfinders.  I should've painted a little more but I've been distracted with other games.  Now it's a mad dash to finish, wish me luck!

Roger Ortiz Progress Report #2: It's a wrap!

Last week I finally finished panting 24 fire warriors and 16 pathfinders. This week I worked on making and painting the bases. I used 3/32 cork and a bit medium basing grit. Airbrushed then all with a dark brown so the models would "pop".

After I was done with the bases I started working on painting the hammerhead and the riptide.  I tried doing a camo pattern using a stencil I made but I'm not sure if I'm happy with it yet.

Well I think this will be my last update because by the time I have new stuff painted it'll be saturday lol see you guys there!