Week In Review: Frosty 12th Heroes!

This week I managed to finish up a project that I've been working on for a while now.  It started as something simple and then... yeah, I might have gotten carried away but I'm really pleased with how it turned out.  What is it?  Let's find out!

Auril the Frostmaiden

Yep, that's right.  It's another Auril, but this time I think that she is a bit more impressive.  Here she is in all three forms.

These are a set of figures that I purchased on Etsy from Light And Luck Minis, and they did a really good job with this.  Nice and clean prints with very good detail as well.  The biggest difference between this set and the official set is... well, they're bigger!  The third form on the right is mounted on a 25mm base but the first two forms are both on 40mm bases.  This technically puts them out of the medium size category but it's still shy of the large so hopefully it works out for my friend.

Of course since I painted up this special set of minis I decided that I needed to make a box to put them in as well.  I could have just gone with a plain old box but what fun would that be?  Time to get creative with foamcore and hot glue!

I used the glue on the foamcore to give the box a frozen look to it, which I tried to emphasis with the blue white paint scheme.  My daughter suggested putting the window in the top, and I love how the frosting effect turned out to make them look like they are inside a block of ice.

The cover goes almost the full depth of the bottom and I lined it with some white felt as well.  This should protect the icy detail that I did on the bottom plus it gives the box a bit of friction so the bottom doesn't just fall out.

I've been working on this project for a while so it's good to see it finally complete.  On to more projects!

Daqan Knights for Song of Blades and Heroes

With my elves done, I pushed on to get my Daqan knight troops done as well.  First up was one of the missing crossbowmen.

I didn't write down my process on this one so I was kind of winging it, but I think I am close enough to have it consistent.  I did decide to paint the helmet and torso armor as well, which I hadn't done with the spearmen but I really like how it makes the figure pop.  In fact, I liked it so much that I touched up one of the spearmen so that it would match.

This change will help to tie them together and gives them a more finished look.

The other troops for this little force will be the Outland scouts that I already painted up.

When I looked at the artwork later, I realized that they did the chest armor as metal instead of leather, but I like the hardened leather look.  Not sure if I'll do the rest of them with leather, but I'm happy with these guys so far.  Once I finish up the one remaining crossbowman then it will be time to get back to some Songs!

The 12th Company for Bolt Action

The date for the upcoming Bolt Action event was finally announced so it's high time for me to start working on the 12th company again!  To that end, I decided that I needed to dirty up the Opel Blitz that I'd already painted.

A little bit of rust and a lot more dirt, and I like how worn it looks.  I still need to mount a machine gun at the front of the bed, but that should be a quick addition.  For vehicles I still need to pick up another truck and I'd really like to grab an SdKhz 251 instead of just running the regular M3 half-track.  It's not essential, but I love the idea.

And that was it for this past week.  Things are going to be getting... interesting... as well.  Shorter week for me this week, plus I'm looking to come home from the field for a couple of weeks to help with a project at the office.  Perfect timing since I just got my hotel work station set up just the way that I want.  LOL.  Is what it is, right?  Until next time...

Week(s) In Review: Whoopsy! Missed A Couple There!

Yeah, I missed a week... or maybe two... whoops!  To be fair, my schedule has been a bit hectic but, hey, it is what it is.  So did I actually do anything during that time?  Heck yeah, so let's take a look!

Trollbloods of Erehwon

That's right, more Trollbloods!  In fact, I figured out a few units that I have completed!  First up, my Trollblood stone scribes (aka crazed psychotic axe wielding maniacs).

I know that I had mentioned using Madrak as my chieftain (aka the lord) but after thinking about it, I decided that he would be the perfect leader for this unit.  I still have one more of the regular scribes that I could paint up but it's that whole two sculpt problem, especially since I need a leader for the unit.  Throwing in Madrak breaks up their look and he does look pretty badass as well.  Perfect!

Of course this means that I'm missing a leader for my army... or am I?

No I'm not, because I finally repainted Borka!  This picture is kind of dark but I think you get the idea and I just love this sculpt!  He's just an absolute bad ass and I love the idea of being able to use him in a game again.

Latari Elves for Song of Blades and Heroes

I've had an itching to play this game again, and I finally finished my little elven warband.

I thought this would be a good starting point for this force.  It has some balance between ranged and melee so it should be interesting to field them again my Daqan Lords... when I finish them.  I wanted to have a balance force on their side as well but I haven't painted up two crossbowmen yet.  They are started though so I should be able to finish them this week... or I could just be a rebel and play them withoug finishing them!  Craziness!

Funko Madness!

So Funko isn't painting but it is something that I have collected a lot for.  In fact, a lot more than I had realized.  Behold the wall of Funko!

I had stopped picking up sets for this but my friend decided that I had to have some more, in this case the Avengers four pack and the Thanos single.  There are plenty that I missed but I'd completely forgotten how much of this game I had picked up.  As I've said before, it's not a bad game and there's a lot more to it than I expected.  So many combinations you can throw together just for the insanity of it all.

So one of the big problems with this one, is actually what you see above.  There are so many boxes!  It's just not easy to cart around, ya know?  But... I think I have a solution.

This is a Rigid tool case and as you can see, it fits all of the Funkos that I have (30 figures total... for now...) and there is some room to spare in the middle for the tokens, crystals, and dice.  Of course there isn't anywhere for the maps and cards, but I figure I can consolidate most of those into one or two of the four pack boxes.  Overall, this will be much more portable, plus my daughter calls it my murder box.  I mean, look at the thing.  It kind of makes sense; this thing is a beast!  Now to finish packing up the last of the bits then there will be Funko pandemonium!

And There Were Games... Lots And Lots Of Games

Last year, I track a whooping 45 boardgame plays for the entire year.  45!  What the heck, right?  Well this year, we are already up to 25 plays.  In 10 days!!!  It's crazily awesome and I really hope that we keep this momentum going because I've really been enjoying it.

Beyond all of this, there has also been some role playing, both playing and running so there has been map making as well.  Lots and lots of stuff, and it's been a lot of fun, and now I'm headed off to do some more stuff.  Until next time...

Week In Review: Heros Clicking With Trolls!

With Christmas falling on the end of the week, this was a short week for hobby but I'm happy with what I managed to crank out.  So what the heck was it?  Let's find out!

Trollbloods of Erehwon

Slow but steady, I managed to get a little bit more done to move my Trollbloods towards the finish line!  Another stone scribe joins the unit, leaving just two more to go!

I like these models but... yeah, I'll be honest, the whole two poses that they come in makes it a challenge.  Just kind of gets to be "Oh look, it's another copy of the same miniature."  Yeah, it's only five minis for the whole units but still it feels like it's a bit of a grind.  That said, I've been making sure to mix up the colors for the clothing.  This is a minor touch but I feel like it breaks up the continuity some which is good.  This is just a base unit so it comes in at 117 points.  Feels pricey for a unit with no armor but I'm hoping that them being stubborn psychopaths works to my advantage.

Next is my impaler with his whelp "crew".

Yeah, I've already shown this one a couple of times but think this is the first time to have the finished unit together.  I love how this unit looks, especially the contrast between the massive impaler and the tiny whelps!  This unit is a whopping 111 points and I was thinking this would be a unit I would expand to include later, but it's just too fun not to have in the army!

And last but not least (so far anyway...) is my chief and his bodyguards.  Again, it's not Borka (yet...) but Madrak is still a pretty cool mini with that giant axe.

For this unit, I've kicked them up to big axes and stubborn which brings them in at 127 points.  I'm really tempted to give the chief either wound 2 or tough 2 but I want to give them a try as is first.

So all of this gives me 355 points (once I finish those last two scribes) which isn't a bad start... but it still needs more which they will get in the form of a unit of scatter gunners!

Yeah, more work to do on this one as well but there is progress!  Once completed, they will add another 110 points to the army, taking the total point value up to 465.  I still want to add more troops to force (namely some regular troops to bulk out the ranks) but this is a solid start.

Random Heroclix Repaint

I also decided to get some paint onto one of the Heroclix that I'd picked up.  She's been sitting on the painting table for a while but I finally decided on a paint scheme and got to work on her.

Yeah, she's mainly dressed in red which is kind of predictable but I like how she turned out.  Rather than just start with a dark red, I actually did a base coat of bloodstone before bringing the color up with a dark then regular red.  I like the depth this seemed to give her kimono.  For contrast, I just went with a basic white but again I used a different color for a base, in this case Menoth white which is more of a cream or tan.  After that, I used white to pick out the raised portions on the neckline of her kimono, the torso, and her head band.  I might go back a try to freehand some flowers or something similar but... I don't know.  It's good to push yourself to improve but I'm pretty happy with how she looks.

She fits in nicely with the other repaints that I did for our Betrayal Legacy game for the male and female companions you can meet in the game.

This also gives me a good comparison point since I did red for both of the female characters.  I feel that the folds on the kimono are more distinct than on the skirt.  I might try a quick repaint on the woman's skirt, plus I have several shades of yellow so I might try hitting her sweater with that.  I think that would help add a bit more definition to some of the details on the sweater that are pretty muted right now.

And that's about it for now.  I did also do some work on stating up my new crew for Core Space, and I've got another couple of ideas for my campaign reboot but these are still in progress.  More on that soon!  Until next time...

Random Updates: So... That Was A Week...

So I got back out to the field, and started painting like crazy.  The BrushFu minis had come in, then Black Star, plus a friend asked me to paint his Auril the Frostmaiden minis...  I'd even put together a post with pics of the stuff that I'd painted but... yeah.  Just wasn't happy with them.  Very flat and just blah, ya know?  Really uninspired so I just set the blog aside for a bit to think about things.

I realized that I was pushing to get the painting done so I could post pictures of what I'd painted, but they were just meh.  Honestly I thought about just putting the blog on hold for December while I figured things out.  Once I stopped focusing on the blog and just painted... well, it seemed to go better.  So for a while, I'm just going to switch to posting on the weekends and do more of a recap.  Just feels like it will be a better fit, so let's look at what happened this week!

BrushFu For Core Space

At the beginning of the week, my BrushFu minis came in.  Huzzah!!!  With the first order, some of them came with bases as part of the print but this time they were all loose.  I kind of wondered if that might be the case so I ordered ten cyberpunk bases so I could keep that basing scheme going through these minis.  Not only did I get the ten that I ordered, but they also included enough extra bases for the minis that bought with this order, which I thought was very cool!

As for the prints themselves, they all looked very clean and crisp again.  I was a little worried because one of the minis didn't have a head, but then I found it in a ziplock by itself.  With that panic sorted, I grabbed the glue and got to basing.

The first two minis that I painted were the droid waitress and the techie.  The initial paint scheme... yeah, they just didn't work.

The color combo on the techie wasn't bad but she just needed more, and I wasn't sure where to go with it.  The droid on the other hand... yeah, she was a failed experiment.  My initial thought was to go for a tarnished and worn look for her since she's a droid out on the frontier.  Maybe she wasn't serviced as often as she should be?  Maybe it's a lack of supplies?  Either way, she was just way too dark.

It was pretty disappointing because I thought that things were flowing better and these were just... well, crap to be honest.  I set them aside and decided to come back to them later in the week.  As I thought about it, part of the challenge that I was facing was the details are almost too fine.  Might be time to grab some magnifiers but for now I just decided to pull up the images from Etsy and enlarge them.  Man, did that make a difference!  This helped me identify some of the details that just wasn't seeing, and I decided to hit them for round two.

This time, I'm a lot happier with the results.  On the techie, I painted some of the base colors on her skin, top, and coveralls to add a bit more depth.  I'd initially only done the base followed by a shade, but I think that the extra base helped pull out the details more.  Looking at the enlarged pictures, I noticed the trim and belt on the overalls so I painted these up as well and I really think this helped.  No, it's not display quality but I feel like its perfect for gaming.

For the waitress, I tried to pick out her body panels with a bright gold that I have, but it seemed to thin to give good coverage, kind of like you usually find with yellow paint.  I could have built it up but decided to grab the cold steel instead since that has better color density.  A short time later, I had the raised and more shapely panels painted up and I like how they contrasted with the recessed spaces.  Her calves and feet are far more industrial in appearance, so I left those the original color.  Overall, I'm much happier with how these two ended up, and I think that stepping away for a day really helped clear my head and refocus.

Trollbloods Of Erehwon

In between the other projects this week, I also grabbed by impaler to get some more work on him.  Initially, I wasn't too pleased with him but then I started to pick out some of the contrasting colors and it really helped bring him to life!

There is still more to do with him (the bases, the tree trucks aka spears) but just adding the touches of the cloth wraps and the bronze trim add so much life to the figure.  I also love the two chickens hanging from his belt!  Just an example of the fun little details that the Trollbloods have.  This guy is gonna look great on the board with his two "crewmates" and I might have to paint up the other one just because!

Auril the Frostmaiden for D&D

A friend of mine is running the Rime of the Frostmaiden adventure for one of his many D&D groups, and he asked me if I could paint up his Auril minis for him.  "Sure!" I said, and then realized that I had no idea what I'd agreed to.  Thank God for the internet, right?

It took a few weeks for us to actually exchange the minis but he was finally able to get them to me last weekend.  I'd hoped to be able to get through all three this week, but the cyberpunk bump that I had really through things off.  Even so, I was able to rally and push through two of the three forms.

Her first form is known as the Cold Crone.  This was an interesting one to paint because of all of the rich details that are sculpted into it.  The ridges in the horns, the texture to the fur, the drape of the robe... all of these are very pronounced details so they just came screaming out of the mini when I painted it.  Love it when they make things easy like that!  The fur was done with three different shades which let me keep around the eyes darker so they could really pop when I painted them.  I do still need to give the claws a touch of black but overall I'm really happy with it.

The second form is the Brittle Maiden.  Again, the details on this mini are nice and crisp so washes and drybrushing were my friends.  I ended this with a thinned white that I painted onto the ends of the crystals to make the edges pops.  I like how the figure ended up but I've got to admit that I'm not that big a fan of the sculpt.  I get what they were going for but... I guess it just seems really clunky.  Not that I could have done better, it's just that compared to some of the other collector series minis GF9 has released, this one seems to be on the lower end of the quality scale.

I still have yet to tackle the third form, the Winter's Womb, but since it's the smallest of the three I will be able to knock it out this week.  Heck, I could have done it today if my supplies weren't down south but I really don't want to get into hauling all of my painting stuff back and forth every week.

And there we have it, the week in review!  Think I'll start calling this segment that in the future but I'll stick with Random Updates for this one.  There might be the odd post that I throw up during the week, but for now I am going to shift my focus and just be posting on the weekends.  Until next time...

Trollkin of Erehwon: More For The Kriel!

Edit: Huzzah!  I was going to post this yesterday but Blogger wouldn't let me upload the pictures for some reason.  Apparently things are working normally now so on with the Kriel!

Yeah, so I was a bit of a slacker this week.  Well, not really but one of the things that I was working on I can't post yet.  I did make some time to work on my Trollkin though and I've got to admit that I'd forgotten how much fun they are to paint!  Of course I didn't have time to break out my light box for the photos, but still think these give an idea how they are coming along.

First up is my chieftain with his bodyguard.

I'd originally planned on using Borka as my chieftain but I had Madrak done so he will do for a stand in.  The two bodyguards are champions that I'm using for now.  I might switch them out for Warders eventually, but for now these guys will work perfectly.

Next are my stone scribes.

Yeah, still only two of them are painted but I added some finishing touches to them.  I was going to wait on these ones in favor of filling out the basic kriel warriors but I think these guys will be amusing to play so I think I'm going to but them up in the cue.

And last but not least is the first of my two impalers.

Just the base drybrushing done on him but now his two buddies are by his side to give an idea how the unit will look.  The whelps are just a riot and remind me a lot of the snotlings of old, though I think that a whelp would probably kick a snotling's butt!

Next week, my BrushFu order should arrive so I'll be digging into those minis ASAP.  On top of that, Black Star Rising is supposed to arrive on Wednesday so even more goodness to get into!  Plus, a friend of mine just gave me some minis to paint up for his D&D game so even more for me to paint on top of wanting to keep pushing on with my Trollkin!  Definitely looking forward to see what I can knock out this week.  Until next time...

Trollkin of Erehwon: They're Impallingly Bombastic!

All of the minis that I have for my trollkin are some variation on foot soldiers.  Be they warriors, gunners, or guard, none of them really fit the bill for an artillery unit.  Of course, there is actually an artillery piece in the Hordes trollkin mini line, but I'm trying to be thrifty (aka cheap) so I decided to see what I could cobble together from what I have.

Part of the plastic kriel warriors box is three caber throwers.  The models are pretty cool and full of character as is typical for the Trollkin, but I had no idea how I could use them.  A caber is thrown, so a ranged attack of some kind makes sense.  It should hit like a ton of bricks because... well, it is a stone caber after all but this also means that it shouldn't have too much range as that would be silly.

It took some digging through the dwarf list but I think I managed to find a way to slot them into my army, complete with a crew.  In the dwarf list is the bombard which has a minimum range and a relatively short long range which seems like a really good fit.  It is also overhead attack and does d4 hits, which again seem to line up nicely.  It is a giant piece of stone that the trollkin is chucking after all.

To represent the piece on the table, I'm going to field one caber thrower with two of the old metal kriel warriors.  This gives me a crew of three, and having them move as a unit while maintaining base contact will turn them into a large miniature.  This also gives me something to do with my original kriel warriors since they are a bit runty compared to the plastics.

One artillery piece is good, but two?  Well, that sounds priceless doesn't it?  Again looking at minis that I already have, the impaler is a light beast armed with giant javelins.  Looking at the dwarf list, I can see two options that this could line up with nicely.  The large bolt thrower and the small cannon are virtually identical in their stats, except their ranges are quite different.  The bolt thrower goes all the way out to 60", while the cannon only goes out to 40".  Personally, I'm thinking the bolt thrower since literally that is what he is doing and it gives me a longer range artillery option which could be handy.  As for representing the unit, this time I'm thinking use the impaler with a couple of the trollkin whelps.  These little guys are adorable and would look great next to the oversized beast.

With these two options, I'm pretty sure that I've bumped my available points to over 1,250 which means I've got a lot of options!  Just need to keep on plowing through them with the painting while I make a list, then I will be good to go.  Until next time...

Trollkin of Erehwon: Slow And Steady, Just Like A Kriel Warrior

The weekend is drawing to a close, but I was able to make a lot more headway than I expected to with my Trollkin.  Behold, one unit of kriel warriors almost done... with assembly at least.

I've been enjoying these figures though they didn't go together the way that I thought they would.  I had plan to assemble them using super glue... unfortunately the very first one the parts just didn't line up well enough for the glue to adhere.  Thankfully I still have a small amount of the Procreate floating around so I've been packing the joints with this to make the connections.  No idea how well it will ultimately bond but fingers crossed!  I have been putting some score marks into both sides of the pieces to try to give the putty something to hold onto.  So far it's worked out?  As far as I can tell?

There are still a couple more unit choices that I want to try to represent, but that's more for my own entertainment.  Right now (once I get everything assembled), I can field field over 1000 points.  Heck, I might be even be able to push it up to 1250.  The only store that I'm aware of that plays the game regularly seems like they run either 500 or 1000 point games, so I'll be good for either of those.  I've also got a couple of ideas for cobbling together some artillery units using the minis that I already have, but more on that later.  Until next time...

Trollkin of Erehwon: And Stuff Was Done!

This is a holiday week in the States (Thank you for your service, veterans!) which means that I have slightly less time for hobby.  I could have packed up my paints and brought them home but... to be honest, I'm usually pretty busy at home so I don't know how much I would have gotten done.

That said, I did grab my Trollkin kriel warriors and scattergunners so I could work on their bases while I'm home.  Rather than just glue them down and leave the giant gaping slot in the base, I use Procreate to mold a ground and hold the feet in place.  Oh course I don't have a lot of Procreate floating around since I haven't used it since I did the Trollkin for my Frostgrave warband, but I had just about enough.  Maybe?

Since I had three scattergunners that were assembled before, I decided to base two more of them and then a full five kriel warriors.  Ideally I'd prefer to have two units of five warriors, but I'm not sure I have enough to base them all.  Then again, I do have the original metal minis but they are pretty small compared to the plastic ones.  They will work to fill the ranks but I'm glad I picked up the plastics.

Something that I did find surprising is that Privateer Press used the same bodies for the gunners and the warriors, just with different arms and bits.  Now I've just got to make sure that I don't mix up which bodies go with which sets.  Not sure how well they would swap so I'll just keep them separated until I get the arms on.

This also leaves me in something of a conundrum.  I like the plastics more than I thought I would, so there are two more sets that I've got my eyes on.  Then again, I've actually got a good number of points already so... not sure how that will play out.  Suppose I'll figure it out once I actually get the minis I have finished.  Until next time...

Erehwon: Trollbloods Of Erehwon!!!

As I mentioned in my previous post, my trollkin have been talking to me and I'm looking for options so I can finally use them.  In addition to Song of Blades and Heroes, I really want to use them for Warlords of Erehwon but how?  Naturally there isn't a trollkin list for Erehwon and while I could build a custom list for them, I want to be able to run them in casual play without the list being an issue.

Looking over the current lists on This Gaming Life, Rick Priestly's blog dedicated to Erehwon, the best fit I can find is actually the dwarfs.  Ironic since the trollkin tower over the dwarf minis in my collection, but otherwise it makes sense.  Both are clan based cultures that have access to some black powder weapons, but also tap into the power of runes.  So with that decided, let's take a look at how I'm going to line up the trollkin with the dwarven units.

First and foremost, every army has to be lead by a lord.  Of my trollkin leader minis, Borka has always been a favorite of mine so that's an easy choice!  And no lord worth his salt doesn't have a bodyguard so two of my champions will hop on over into his personal retinue.

Next is the hero and this is another easy one.  Who is the ultimate hero in a trollkin's eye?  The fell caller, of course!  A couple of big axes and a stone torch as a back banner make him the perfect hero for the kriel!

And speaking of kriel, you can't really have a kriel without having some warriors to defend it.  And this is where I hit a bit of a snag.  I never bought kriel warriors myself because the minis were (and are) very expensive.  As these were pewter minis, and hefty ones at that, I can understand the need to have a higher monetary cost, it was just hard to justify that when the unit was so... average?  The one unit of these that I do have I bought from a friend that realized the Trollbloods just weren't for him.  Sounds good, right?  Except he only had nine of them for some reason.  As a single unit I can make this work, but that's the only way it will work.  With a minimum of five models per unit, ya just can't make two units out of nine!  

How to solve this?  By slightly breaking my rule to not buy any more miniatures this year... dang it!  Then again, I was able to snag the new plastic box of ten warriors and three caber throwers for just over half price so that's not too bad.  Not sure what I'll use the caber throwers for yet, but I'm sure I can find something.  Maybe a counts as catapult?  Could be entertaining...

Next I wanted to incorporate some ranged ability for my list which made the scattergunners I'd picked up the perfect choice.  In this case, these are counts as dwarf handgunners... which seems a bit silly?  A scattergun should be a bit more potent than a pistol but ah well... these are the choices you make with a counts as list!

And the last unit (so far anyway...) are my stone scribes.  Now these are a bit different since they don't really have any armor to speak of, at least compared to the other trollkin.  Then again, in the lore they are supposed to accompany the krielstone bearer and are willing to sacrifice themselves to keep him alive... sounds like a good fit for the dwarf crazed psychotic axe welding maniacs if you ask me, which makes them a fun little addition to this list.

Of course there are still some options that I want to look at adding... a runesmith, some kind of artillery... but what I have gives me a solid core for a good sized army so this is a great start.  Now if only I hadn't left my procreate at the house so I could start working on filling their bases...  something to add to the list for this weekend!  Until next time...

Warlords of Erehwon: The Rune Golem of Lord Ramsay the Grey

I've been doing a lot of for the Zone lately, but that hasn't been the only thing on my painting table.  There have been a couple of rune golems sitting on my table for a while, so I decided that it was time to put some paint onto one of them to see how it would look.

He's a little monotone but that kind of fits with the background I've made up for my Knights.  The house troops of the army will be in blue like the spearmen around the rune golem.  These units are going to form the building blocks at the core of my force.  To expand beyond the core, I want to assemble a few more blocks of 250 points so I can plug them into the army in different ways.

The first of these blocks is going to be focused around Baudric the Red (he popped up in this post here).  The next of the blocks is going to be Vallios Ramsay the Grey who will be bringing his "pet" golems to the party.  In addition to a pair of rune golems, Ramsay himself is mounted on a rune steed with two knights to accompany him.

Ultimately I'm thinking I'd like to have a block of peasants that I could put into the force as well, just to have some cheap "troops" to give me more numbers but these are going to wait for now.  I'm planning on getting some of the Fireforge Northmen Folk Rabble for these.  Since they are plastic figures, it should help keep the cost down a bit, but I just realized that I have 60 Stargrave minis, 20 Panzergrenadiers, and a bunch of other Rune Wars minis that I still need to assemble, never mind paint, so I'm thinking I need to slam the brakes on my purchases while I work on the backlog... especially since that's just the plastic figures... and it doesn't include the Ghar army box that I still have yet to crack open.

Oh boy... this might take a bit.  Well, until next time...

Bolt Action: The Making of the 12th Mechanized Infantry Platoon

After more list building, I figured out a 750 Bolt Action list that I think will be fun to play without being cheesy at all.  The core that drove the shape of this force is the story that I came up with.

The 12th mechanized platoon is one of the units involved in the push through occupied France in1943.  As they went deeper into enemy held territory, the unit came under fire and lost their transports but were able to capture German vehicles and continued to push forward.

Is this historically accurate in anyway?  No idea.  I did some cursory research for to figure out a time and location but the rest of it I made up on the fly.  I might flesh it out more as I build the unit, but for now this gives me a solid framework to hang my concept from.

I also started working on the new paint scheme and so far, I'm really pleased with it.

The base is Vallejo US Army olive drab primer which I then hit with Citadel Agrax Earthshade to give it some depth.  Once this was dried, I tried to pick out the raised areas with some P3 Traitor Green to give it a little more depth.

Rather than leaving the helmet the same color, I painted these with P3 Thornwood Green to make them slightly darker, and I also hit the handle of the shovel with the same color just to mix things up.  Next came the brown pants, in this case P3 Gun Corps Brown and the shoes which are P3 Bootstrap Leather.  Once these were both dried, I went over them both with a shade of Citadel Seraphim Sepia.

The last step (so far) was some Citadel Rhinox Hide for the weapons.  I'll probably go back and pick out some of the hardware on with Citadel Abaddon Black eventually, but for now the Rhinox Hide is so dark it might not even show.

Once this was all dried, I coated them with Vallejo Matt Varnish to give them a bit of protection.  Then it was time to finish dressing up the bases, which in this case just meant painting the edge with Abaddon Black to give it a more finished look.  Once this was sealed as well, I took a white ballpoint and wrote BAR on the appropriate soldier to make it easier for me to see who has what.  I'm going to do this with the NCO's as well.  The labeling is only on my side so it doesn't disrupt the visual of the mini too much when you are looking from the front

There is still more to do with the 12 Platoon but I like how they are starting out.  The details that I added are nothing major but I like how they break up the solid green uniform and make them a little more interesting to look at.

I'm also taking a different approach to how I am painting them by only doing them one at a time.  Typically I would try to do blocks of troops but I'm really liking this approach more for some reason.  I'm also trying to mix up the skin tones a bit as well, instead of the ghostly white that I'd originally used.

Next will be more of the troops for the 12th, plus the first of their captured vehicles should be arriving this week, a Warlord Games Opel Blitz.  And I've also started some work on a couple of old Vor the Maelstrom Neo-Soviet rad troopers that I've been thinking of using for Zona Alfa.  Lots of fun stuff in the works and hopefully I can get back into my hobby streak by working through them one at a time.  Until next time...

Bolt Action: The Green Machine

I was planning on posting about the Green Machine before our Combat Patrol tournament but... better late than never!  See let's take a look at just what the Green Machine is and just how it did at the tourney.

A couple of weekends back, I was able to make some good headway assembling the minis I need to make the Green Machine a reality.  Thankfully I already have a good chunk of the minis on hand, but one of the things that I was lacking was a engineer squad... or more specifically, the flamethrower team that can be part of an engineer squad.

Yeah, it was that kind of list.

I did a bit of hunting around locally to see if I could find the flamethrower team mini in stock but no such luck.  Instead, I had to resort to bashing one together and overall I'm pretty pleased with the results.

In case you're wondering, Sparky is the one in the front to the right of center.

I'm the first to say that it's not perfect; the "flamethrower" should have a nozzle on it, not to mention the complete lack of a hose attaching the weapon to the fuel tanks.  That said, I'm quite pleased with the results and I was looking forward to terrorizing people... I mean, fielding this unit at the Combat Patrol game.

Along with the engineers, there was a 2nd LT with minder, three six man infantry squads (each with a BAR of course), a medium machine gun team, and Stewie (AKA an M3 Stuart light tank with LOTS of machine guns).  And since I was just looking for quantity over quality, everyone except the engineers and Stewie was inexperienced... hence the unit was "The Green Machine".

Brownie points if you've already noticed what I did with the paint scheme!

As the curveballs kept coming, I realized that I wouldn't be able to paint them up the way that I wanted so I did the next best thing; I painted all of them green.  Yep, the Green Machine went from being a Bolt Action army to being a bunch of plastic toy soldiers in a matter of minutes and it really made me happy.  People also got a kick out of it at the tourney which is a plus in my book.  I wasn't going into the event to be uber competitive, I just wanted to push around some minis a goal that I was able to achieve readily.

Doing even vaguely well in the ranking?  Not so much.

At the end of the day, I managed to lead Stewie, Sparky, and their buddies all the way to 12th place our of fourteen players!  What made it even better was I scored lucky 13 for my point total and I had a good time in the process.  There were a couple of "Really?" moments as one of the players introduced some house rules to the event but whatever; it was the last game of the day and I just wanted to kill stuff so I rolled with it.

So will Bolt Action possibly become a thing again for me?  Quite possibly.  My LGS will be hosting another event this fall and I want to try to field a real army for it.  Not real as in list building minutia but what that has a story behind it.  I'm thinking the mechanized platoon that I've always wanted to run, except I'm going to pick up a couple of SDKFZ's instead of using M3 half tracks.  I prefer the look of the SDKFZ, and I like the idea of a late war US force that was been pushing into German territory.  Their own vehicles were damaged or broke down so the did the next best thing; steal from the Germans!  Of course before I can do that, I need to buy the models which is all the more reason to pace things out.  I believe the earliest that they are looking at for the next event is September so I should be able to get some practice games in plus start making my minis look like a real army.  Until next time...

Antares: Starting LIfe as a Ghar in Exile

I have had my Ghar minis sitting on my desk for a while as I've agonized over their paint scheme.  I had decided to go with just bare metal since the Ghar are only concerned with war.  Why not simply churn out the warmachines and send them out as is?  It kept feeling like there needed to be more though but the question was what.

As I mulled this over, my Ghar collection continued to expand like a gremlin that got wet which is when the Antares Facebook group started talking about Ghar Rebels and Exiles.  This got the gears going but it was the Mandolorian that finally sealed the deal.  After watching a few episodes, I sat down with some Menoth white base and started painting in panels on one of my assault suits.  I hit it with a wash of seraphim sepia, painted a couple of panels different colors to make it look more ramshackle...  and now I'm working on painting up my first armored trooper squad.

I'm really happy with how they are turning out and since I took this picture, I've been working on five more armored suits, a couple of outcast disruptor cannon teams, and ordered a set of rebel outcasts to mix into my outcast squads for a bit of variety.

One of the questions for me now is what I'm going to do with my command crawler.  In the Exile list the command crawler has fewer options available and even looses Command, Follow, and Leader but its still a beast of a machine.  Ultimately, I think I'll have to figure out a what kind of cap I want to look at for my list and then build accordingly but for now I'm just going to aim for 750 as a good starting point.  Planning to get a chunk of that completed next week and then there will be more pictures.  Until next time...

Workbench: Spearmen, Space Barrels, and Some Gardening Too!

More progress on the painting challenge but things have been going... a bit... slower...

I've started work on the spearmen that I had drybrushed and I've gotten half of them painted already.

I decided to split knight army up a little bit to add some flavor to the whole thing.  The soldiers in blue are the affiliated with the Crown and will form the core of my army.

In addition to these core troops, one of the two leaders for the army will be Baudric the Red (aka Lord Hawthorne from the Daqan forces of Runewars).

His set comes with a mounted figure and one on foot which will give me some options in the army as well.  Baudric is definitely the more imposing of the two figures so if I field the full army, then he will move into the champion slot.  Beside Baudric is one of the mounted knights that will accompany him, plus I will be painting up a unit of spearmen in his colors as well.

The next items are terrain pieces.  Nothing too fancy but I'm excited to have them to add into the mix.  What are they?

Spaaaaaace barrels!!!  (this is a call out to Table Top Warlords YouTube channel... check them out if you haven't already!)  I'll admit that I have no idea what Kevin made his out of but I made mine from assorted plastic bottle lids hot glued together, then painted.  Quick and easy!

Last but not least, I added some detailing to my plant terrain.  Originally I was going for quick and easy so I didn't bother with any ground cover.  Well, I decided that it was time to change that up so I hit Michael's and grabbed some lichen.

This is just a sample of but you at least get the idea.  It's just a minor touch but I really like how it added some realism and depth to the pieces.  I've been holding off on setting up my full terrain board since I'm going to be bouncing rooms again soon but once I'm in a more permanent location, I'll have to see what I can do.  Still more to do this month but this is a good start for this month!  Until next time...

Workbench: And the Painting Continues!

January is wrapping up and I've made great headway with my painting challenge!  I posted earlier that I was up to 21 minis painted but I've blown past that all the way up to 33!  On top of that, I even made a cheap little "light box" so I can take some better pictures of my minis as I go along.  So without further ado, let's see what I've gotten done!

After picking up my tectorists, I had to grab the next mini that has been on my radar ever since it came out; the Hukk bounty hunter for Gates of Antares.  In addition to the hunter himself, the blister also comes with three angkriz hunting beasts.

These take up a tactical slot and operate together as a unit.  They can also be used by all of the factions, including the Ghar due to their alien nature.  The unit is highly customizable (as long as you have the points that is)  and gives you number of options for the models to go with him.  In my case, I maxed out his drone compliment, giving him a spotter, medi-probe, and two shield drones.

The trickiest thing about these minis is figuring out what to paint which color.  These are completely alien beasties so it really is just up to your imagination.  For mine, I decided to paint the hunter and beasts with bone colored carapaces, while the skin tones are similar to the one paint scheme that Warlord has shown for these critters.  As for the drones, these were an open canvas as well.  Since these are buddy drones that the hunter has picked up over time, it really opens up the palette for them.  I even custom built one of the shield drones just so they would look more ramshackle.

And next is the first mini for my Warlords of Erewhon knight army.  I was originally looking at going with an undead army but it sounds like they're pretty popular at the store (go figure) so the knights were a good second option.

These minis are some of the Daqan outland scouts from the now defunct Runewars game by FFG.  In addition to this set of minis, I also grabbed not one but two core sets so I've got a bunch of minis to work with.  There are a few more figures that I need to pick up to round things out but by the end I should have two full armies for a discount price which is always a plus in my book.

For next month, I've already got a head start as I have 16 Daqan spearmen already drybrushed just waiting for paint so I should be able to push through those really quick.  Of course the Antares Facebook group is trying to distract me with talk about running Zona Alfa reskinned with an Antares flavor.  This sounds like an amazing idea and has me thinking of the possibilities of sci-fi/pulp adventures.  Must stay strong and focus... argh!!!  Until next time... unless I get lost in some long abandoned research station looking for the lost arc of the Concord.  Wish me luck!

Gates of Antares Battle Report: Algoryn vs Concord Reinforce the Position, Part Two

And now the conclusion of the Reinforce the Position battle report.  At the end of turn three, neither side had managed to gain the upper hand.  The AI assault squad had taken a lot of pins from a net round early in the game but managed to quickly shrug them off, only to be hit with another net round.  The Algoryn were giving as good as they were getting though, lobbing multiple net rounds at the Concord support drones, rendering them virtually useless.  Which side will reign supreme?  Let's get back to the game and find out.

Turn Four

This turn opened with the AI assault squad trying to take advantage of their position to charge the nearby Strike squad.  Unfortunately they couldn't manage to pass their command check and were forced to go down instead.

The nearby AI squad showed them how it was done, charging into assault against the same Strike squad.  The Concord troops tried to ready themselves against their opponents only to fail their reaction miserably.  This combined with the incoming fire from the Algoryn left the Concord troops seriously rattled and made them useless in the assault.  Loosing one of their own, things looked grim for the Concord soldiers but somehow they managed to keep it together long enough to weather a follow up assault and even take down the micro x trooper in the AI squad.

After the fight, both squads consolidated back towards cover to try to get into a better position for the next turn.

The AI squad in the center of the board went next but they were still too rattled by the previous attacks, going down as they failed their command check to run.  The Algoryn streak continued though with one of the x-launchers firing.  They dropped another net round on the support drones and this time it was too much for them to process.  The drones broke and fled the table, leaving one of the Strike squads standing in the middle of the board with no batter field.

Hoping to return the favor, the Concord x-launcher lobbed its own net round at the AI assault squad, adding another single pin to the unit trapped in the woodland.

The second AI support team fired next, this time using a conventional x-launcher round against the severely shaken Strike squad on the western side of the board.  Unlike all the net rounds, this one went wide and exploded harmlessly in front of the Strike troopers.

The Strike squad in open middle of the board braced themselves and opened fire on the assault squad.  Several shots hit home but bounced off the reflex armor with no effect.

The Strike command squad ordered the nearby Strike squad forward and the two units ran into the woodlands by the AI squad laying in ambush.  Most of the AI troops couldn't get a line of sight though so they held onto the ambush order a bit longer.

The mag cannon team felt differently, letting loose a round that blasted a hole right through one of the Strike troopers.

The turn ended with the western Strike squad rallying to shed a majority of their pins and the AI medic team moving up to support the AI squad in the nearby woodlands.  Wrapping things up, the AI squad on ambush return their die to the bag, and the down AI squad and assault squads both pass the test to return their order dice as well.

Turn Five

Concord started this turn with the deafening sound of silence as their x-launcher team tried to fire a dude round.  Ironically enough the Algoryn didn't fare any better as their assault team, now free of pins, got too tangled in the woodland to move at all.

The western AI squad went next, opening fire on the nearby Strike squad who took the opportunity to fire back.  A flurry of rounds later and both units had lost a trooper to their opponents fusillade.

The Strike squad in the center of the field advanced brave as brass and fired on the batter AI squad that had run to get into cover.  They didn't have line of sight to the whole unit but they were able to get them down to a sole survivor who bravely stood his ground.

The eastern Strike squad went next, advancing out of the woodland to open fire on the AI squad.  Most of the rounds bounced off harmlessly but one of them did strike home, killing the AI squad leader.

Undaunted, the AI squad charged the Strike squad, taking down the Concord squad leader in turn as they charged forward.  Neither side could get an upper hand in the ensuing melee and both squads fell back to regroup.

One of the AI support teams tried to follow up against the same Concord squad, dropping a standard round right on top of them.  The Strike troopers were to well dug in though and easily weathered the blast.

The Strike command squad opened fire on the AI squad but their plasma bolts bounced off the Algoryn reflex armor, having little effect.

The rest of the turn was the Algoryn troops repositioning and readying themselves for the final turn.  The medic team held their position, the mag cannon support team went into ambush, and other support team moved forward into the woodland to try to get a line of sight.

Going into potentially the last turn, things were still fairly balanced though casualties were starting to pile up on both side.

Turn Six

This turn a miracle happened; the AI assault squad actually did something!  Charging forward from the mass of brambles they had been tied up in, the assault squad slammed into the Stike squad in the center of the field.  The rejoicing was short lived as two of their number were gunned down by the Strike troopers but the caused a casualty themselves so all wasn't lost.

With their d-spinners set for plasma grenades, the three remaining assault troopers tore into the Strike troopers... and took only took out one of them while two of the assault troopers fell.  The squad leader was undaunted though and held his ground!

The Concord troops followed up their advantage and dog piled onto the assault leader, taking him down though another of their numbers fell in the melee.  Overall not the most impressive showing but it was definitely better than being stuck in the woods.

The remnants of the Concord squad fell back into the nearby woodland to try to get some cover from the other AI squads that hadn't activated yet.

The Concord support team went next and landed a net round right on top of the closest AI squad.  This proved to be too much for them and they quickly ran from the field.

The western AI squad opened fire on the same Concord team as last turn but this time the Strike were caught by surprise with one of their numbers falling to the incoming mag rounds.

Looking to press their advantage on the shaken Concord squads, one of the AI support teams launched a net round to try to break them.  The round went wide, just falling short of hitting the nearby Strike command squad.

The second support team fared better.  Their round deviated but still managed to hit their target, racking up a number of pins on the command squad.

The central Strike squad tried to take a shot at the closest AI squad but it the strain was too much, forcing them down for the turn.

Meanwhile, the AI medic team advanced to the edge of the woodland and opened fire on the western Strike squad.  Their tender ministrations dropped another C3 trooper and sent the last one running for the hills.

The eastern Strike squad opened fire on the lone AI trooper hiding behind the building but weren't able to get any of their shots to connect.  He responded by firing back but wasn't able to pierce their hyper light armor.

And with that... the game was over.  The die roll for an extra turn came up with a 1, definitively drawing the action to a close but the question remains... which side won?  Since neither side was broken, the point values of the units that were removed are used to determine the winner.  On the Concord side of the table, the C3D1 light support drone unit was taken out along with one of the Strike squads, coming up with a grand total of 273 points.  On the Algoryn side, they lost the AI assault squad and one AI squad for a total of 267 points meaning they just barely squeak by with a win.

Mistakes Made and Things Learned

I believe this was the first time that I tried fielding such well rounded lists and it was interesting to see how the pieces all fit together.  The support units really do help round out the forces and can be a valuable asset to have though in the future I want to try running them differently.

I think it would be better to split up the C3D1 drones and give them each a batter drone.  This would let them move around the battlefield independently and provide cover for other units as they advance.  That said I think I would leave the spotter drones off of them.  Since I see them a supporting tactical units which should already have spotters, it seems a bit to redundant and kind of a points sink to put them on the support drones as well.

Meanwhile, I think I'll skip the batter drone for the support squad with an x-launcher.  With overhead spotter patching, the support team will probably be out of line of sight so the points for a batter drone would probably be better spent elsewhere.

On the Algoryn side of things, I want to get some more AI assault troopers so I can field a larger squad.  I'll admit that they really haven't been very effective for me but hopefully with another couple of bodies in there it will help.  I really like the concept behind them so it would be great to have them be a viable choice for an army.

The other thing I might do is drop the medic team.  I've never had them in position to use them as medics though having a small two man team with mag guns isn't a bad thing.  Still I can't help but wonder if perhaps there might be a better use for the points.

Something that applies for both factions is the various special ammunition types.  This game I primarily used net ammo to pile on the pins.  I looked at the other kinds and tried to look for situations that they would be helpful but I just wasn't seeing anything.  I might try dropping the other types for now and then expand to include more as I identify situations that they could be useful.  This would probably be easier from a rules point of view as well as I would only have to remember one type of speical muntion instead of five.

The same applies for the special munitions for the micro-x and slingnet launchers.  I genuinely forgot about overload and slingnet munitions so I might drop down to one of them for now so that using it becomes second nature.  Once this happens, I can look at adding or swapping in the other type as needed.  It will also free up some more points and give me a bit more to play with.

Of course none of these things are really mistakes, but there was a doozy that I was making; spotter OH patching can only be done through one spotter drone.  I was thinking that you could patch through multiple drones which is the main reason there was some much overhead fire in the first couple of turns.  Whoopsy!  Let's count that as a lesson learned, shall we?

Final Thoughts

So now the question is what's next?  I'm thinking I might break out the Ghar and give them a test drive; see how the distort die and all their other rules change the game.  That said, it also might be good to do another game or two with the more normal armies to make sure some of these rules are second nature first.  I also have a friend that has said he would be interested in a demo so I need to figure out when we can fit that it as well; it's always better to have another opponent to play against instead of just pushing around the models solo.  There is also at least one gaming store locally that I want to check out, plus another in New Hampshire that I know hosts Antares games so there are definietly some options out there.  Until next time...