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...

Week In Review: More Frosty Core And Murder Hobos!

And another week is in the books!  The question is what did I manage to get done this time?  I'll admit that it feels like less than last week but this is also my 5e week which does take up part of my schedule.  Even so, I'm feeling pretty happy about the progress I made so let's take a look!

BrushFu For Core Space

Two more for the horde.. of random civilians!

Picture is a bit washed out but hopefully you get the idea

These last two are a corporate and a kid.  Only logical for a cyberpunk style game, right?  You've gotta have a corporate in the mix somewhere for things to be truly cyberpunk, and the kid just seemed like a fun addition.  This model is also available on a hoverboard which could be an interesting twist as well.

And that takes me up to nine civilians... or workers?  Since I have Black Star Rising, I can throw that little twist into the game as well, which I think will add an interesting depth to the game.  And as for the miniatures, I really like them.  These are printed by BrushFu Studios, but the sculpts themselves are from Papsikels. I love the variety of the sculpts that they offer, and I've really enjoyed painting up the minis that I've purchased.  I can't help but notice that the first batch I'd received seem to be larger than the second batch.  I kind of wonder if they might have been 32mm instead of 28mm but either way works for me.  If anything it gives them a mix.  After all, we aren't all the same size, right?

That said, it felt like the details were easier to pick out on the larger figures which makes sense in the most basic way, but it seemed like the sculpts are probably designed to be printed at 32mm height.  The 28mm still look good, things just seem to get a bit cramped on them which makes sense.  Think of a river running between two mountains.  At one height, it is clearly there but if you move higher up the detail of the river starts to fade until it becomes a meaningless line between the two ridges of the mountains.  Now translate that analogy to a fold between pieces of clothing and hopefully you can see what I'm getting at.

Next I want to mix things up a bit and grab some aliens.  There's a collection called Novus Landing which has got a great mix of civilians, bounty hunters, merchants... I think it'll add an interesting dynamic to the whole collection.  The store that I'm looking at for these, Resonating Prints, lists all of these minis as being 32mm so I want to see how they compare with my current collection.  Plus I'll be honest, I'm just having fun painting up all of these civilians and populating an imaginary world.  How can you have a fight in a bar without their being anyone else around?  Or in a market?  It just doesn't feel right so adding these characters just feels right, even if they just stay in the background.

Devastators for Core Space

Back in the beginning of the year, I put paint onto my Purge for Core Space.  I'd painted up the harvesters and devastators in the same color thinking that they would be easy to tell apart.  After playing a few games... yeah, not so much.  Instead, I decided to fall back to the original color scheme (at least partially anyway) and I repainted my devastators red.

And man are they red!  The Menoth white that I'd painted them with was a perfect base.  I'd thought that between the off white color and the shade that was on it that the red would be darker but this definitely works.  I did consider painting the heads white but I like the way these pop.  Really need to get this game to the table again soon, especially with all the new minis.  Really need to make some stat cards made up for them soon, or at least rework the ones that I've done.  The captain seems to be about right, but I think some of the crew need to be toned down a bit.  Might work on that this weekend.

Auril the Frostmaiden for D&D

I also wrapped up painting the three forms of Auril this week as I got paint onto her third form, known as the Winter's Womb.

Compared to the other two minis, this one felt like the details weren't quite crisp enough.  They are still there, but no where near as pronounced as the ice shards on the Maiden or the fur on the Crone.  This is also the smallest of the minis which is saying something as the other minis already seemed kind of small.  Even so, they were fun to paint and interesting change of pace for me.  Plus, they led to me picking up another trio of minis but I don't want to post about those yet.  I don't think that my friend even knows about my blog, but I don't want to spoil the surprise in case he does.

The 5e Waterdeep Murder Hobos

Last but not least, we had our biweekly 5e session and man did it get dark!  We've really been trying to stay clear of the law but this week... yeah, it's gonna be rough.  There was a gang fight that quickly escalated ("What do you mean we are doing non-lethal attacks?") followed by a visit to a shopkeeper.  My connection lagged out when we went to his shop, and when I got the connection back a couple of minutes later we were killing him.  Ummm... okay?  I guess?  Thankfully we have several players that can heal.  As long as he didn't take enough damage for an instant kill, we should be able to salvage the situation... maybe...

And that about sums it up for this week.  As I mentioned, I want to work on stating up some of the Core Space characters so I can get that to the table again next week.  Plus I have some terrain that I need to put together for my next Five Parsecs scenario...  really feel like I need some canals for this one... so we'll have to see what I can get together.  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...

Hmmm... Having A Momentary Disruption At The Moment...

So I was throwing together a quick post but... yeah, I can't add any pictures.  Not sure what is going on with Blogger at the moment, but I've been up since 4am so I'll check again in the morning.

Core Space: The Black Star Is Rising

While I'm waiting for my new cyberpunk minis, I decided to take stock of what I have to look at making them into characters for Core Space.  While I've got lots of options, I really was feeling like I was a little limited in the options that I have.  The rules from the basic rule book are civilians and I was looking to make some of these characters more tied to some of the locations.  Based on what I've read, it sounded like the worker rules are what I'm looking for so I decided to bite the bullet and order a copy of the new Black Star Rising expansion.

Black Star Rising is one of the new expansions for Core Space and features rules for both workers and scavengers.  Instead of just wandering around aimlessly, it sounds like the worker rules tie the characters to a specific location so I really want to see how they fit in with the regular rules.  All told, I will have nine NPC characters just from my Etsy orders so I'm excited to see how they help to flesh out my universe.  On top of these figures, Black Star also comes with four more NPCs which means I'll have a ton of options between the existing crews, civilians, workers, scavengers... it's going to be just like its own little universe and I'm really excited to explore it more!

Now I just need to wait for Black Star to arrive... plus my Brush Fu minis (which have finally shipped!)... yeah, gotta love the waiting game.  Until next time...

Random Updates: Mutants And Zombies And Chainsaws... Wait... Who Took My Chainsaw?!?

I had some spare time this Friday morning so I went to the game shelf and grabbed one that's been way down on the bottom collecting dust for a while now.  It's an oldie but... well, yeah... an oldie... It's Chainsaw Warrior released in 1987 by Games Workshop!

My brother had picked this up for me literally decades ago and I vaguely remember playing it a few times.  The concept is interesting enough; there is an evil force that is going to do something horrible in New York and it's up to you to save everyone but you only have 60 minutes to do it!  And you might be able to do it with a chainsaw!  Maybe... Sure, it's literally the name of the game but that doesn't mean that we are just going to hand you a chainsaw mister.  There's a process here, paperwork to fill out, we need to check the storeroom to see if we even have it in at the moment.

The mechanics of the game are simple enough.  In the turn, you advance the clock by 30 seconds then draw a card.  Depending on what you draw, you might have to fight a zombie, a cultist, avoid a trap, or maybe even find nothing at all.  The fighting all done with 2d6 (no shock there since it's a GW product) and that all seems straightforward enough.  In fact, the game play as a whole doesn't seem too bad but there are some specific parts that left me thinking "WTF guys?!?"

Before you start the mission, you need to create your character and to do that, you need to roll some dice.  The first stat you roll is your endurance which can be anywhere from 4 to 24.  Now this has nothing to do with how much damage you can take, this only tracks radiation poisoning and zombie venom.  If you are wounded by a zombie, you gain a point of zombie venom plus it might increase just from encountering a zombie.  This could be trouble but it seems manageable, especially compared to radiation.  As soon as you draw a mutant, you take d6 points of radiation just from looking at him.  There are fewer mutants than zombies but given the widely variable range on your endurance, this seems a little aggressive.  The rest of the stats are variable as well, being either one or two d6 plus a set value.  My first thought was at least this was a little more balanced but I think that this was just from the relief of seeing a set value being incorporated into the roll.  You are supposed to be some kind of retired super soldier after all.

Once you have your attributes, then it's time to kit out but wait!  There's still another die roll!  Another d6 but with a +2 this time, and that's how many points of equipment you can get... at random.  Yeah, apparently the stockroom you are being kitting out from has been pretty badly ransacked so maybe you can get that chainsaw that the we mentioned before... but probably not.  In fact, to be kitted out with the gear that they show on the character (chainsaw, flare gun, u/v emitter, medi kit, wire cutters, knife, acid, blaster, steel gloves, anti-rad capsules, and implosion waistcoat) is actually impossible.  All of this gear would cost you 12 points of gear but you only have d6 plus 2... drawn at random.

At the end of the day, I'd played it twice and then set it back onto the shelf.  The first run, I made it half a dozen or so turns into the game when a lunatic grabbed the only weapon that I had that could win the game.  Nothing to do at that point but go get a beer!  The second run went a lot better until I ran into the Meat Machine, a bizarre cyborg creature that rips off parts of you flesh to add to itself.  I was holding my own for a couple of turns, but as soon as it started hitting me it was over.  Not because I was dead, but because even if I managed to kill the Machine, I was so badly mauled that I wouldn't be able to shoot the big bad and actually hit.

An interesting concept with some mechanics that weren't too bad.  I could probably mod it so that it would be more playable but... not today.  Back to the shelf with you for now.  Until next time...

Zona Alfa: One Crew Done!

Well, it's taken long enough but I finally finished my first crew for Zona Alfa!  Huzzah!!!  The last man for the crew is Chatterbox with his friendly LMG.

And with that, it means that it's time to start working on getting a board together so I can actually start heading out into the Zone.  I have decided to shelf the Southwestern Exclusion Zone idea for now, just because I have terrain that I can already use for a more temperate region.  Where will it be set?  No idea, but it will be somewhere green!  I do want to get some deciduous trees as all I have right now are the old standby Christmas pine trees.  At some point I want to make these look... well, like they aren't covered with crusty toothpaste, but for now they will work.  I'm also going to focus on a more rustic setting so I'm going to break out my Battle Systems fantasy village to get some quick country terrain.

I do need to also throw together some of the Zone floral that I'd picked up months ago.  It's literally right next to me in the hotel room, just waiting for me to finally throw it together.  I'm thinking that will be on the table for next week, depending on when my Brush Fu order comes in.  I missed out on being able to leave a review for my first order because I didn't realize that there was a limited window for leaving reviews, and I'd like to avoid that this time.  Barring that (and work commitments... and... believe it or not... college... because I've decided that it's finally time to get that piece of paper), the Zone terrain is at the top of the list.  Until next time...

Random Updates: More Brush Fu For Me!

I've been sitting on another order with Brush Fu Studios for a bit now, and since they just started a 20% off sale it seemed like the perfect time to pull the trigger on it.  In my first order, they were nice enough to throw in a bunch of cyberpunk bases which I really appreciated.  I wasn't planning on using them at first but I'm glad that I decided to.  Rather than just hope they threw in more freebies, I ordered 10 of them so I'd have them on hand just in case.

Next there is a droid waitress, a street kid, a techie, and a corporate woman.  These are all minis that I want to incorporate into my Core Space/Five Parsecs universe that I'm working on building up and they will be interesting characters to have floating around in the background.  The kid could be some kind of informant, the techie is a store owner, the corporate is a Mrs. Johnson, and the waitress... probably just for the background but she seemed like a fun addition.

The last two minis in the order just seem like they will be fun to paint.  One is definitely an homage to the Knight Sabers from Bubblegum Crisis.  Might not be too easy to incorporate into the game but I think it will be fun to paint.  And then there is the dwarf barmaid pinup.  She doesn't fit in with the rest (in case you didn't notice) but she amused me and she was only a buck.  Easy way to kick the total up to get free shipping so why not!

I'm still waiting on this order to ship, but I'm very happy with the other prints from Brush Fu so I don't mind.  I have another set of minis that I ordered as well which I'm currently working on, but more on those soon.  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...

Zona Alfa: First Crew Almost Done!

I managed to get a quick paint scheme on a couple more of the members of my Zona Alfa crew.  First up we have Potshot.

For his scheme, I decided to go with a basic olive green uniform with dark grey armor plates.  I thought about adding a camo pattern to the uniform but I really like the basic look for him.  Perhaps not the best for a sniper, but I like the end result.

Next up is the other red shirt... I mean, recruit... for the crew, Shades.

For the rest of the crew, I tried to follow more of a military appearance but I wanted to do Shades a little more civilian.  Generic dark green pants with a tan jacket, with a mishmash of colors for the improvised armor plates.  Only one left to go and the crew will be ready!  Now I just need to start figuring out some terrain.  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...

Five Parsecs: Campaign Turn One: The Adion Babysitting Club

Freshly arrived on the planet Adion, Randis wasted little time setting his crew about their various tasks.  Randis and Zav headed off to trade, Kultak and Oracle did a little exploring, and Vargoth and Aris... well, they managed to stir things up to keep any of their "friends" off their collective tail.

Randis managed to trade for an old military fuel cell, while Zav stayed with the fundamentals and rustled up some grub for the crew.  Meanwhile, Kultak meet an alien merchant and Oracle stumbled across a "retired" Unity arms merchant.  Credits are tight though, so both decided to pass on making any purchases.

Meeting up back at the Avadora, they found a message from Kultak's patron, Vertex.  One of his agents needs to be escorted to a data terminal in a questionable part of the city.  To make matters worse, a group of alien thugs from the a local trade union are making trouble there.  The information is time sensitive though, so Randis and the crew geared up and headed off for the meet up.

For this game, I grabbed the small 2' x 2' board that I'd boshed together for Deadzone and set up some of the Kaldstrom terrain to make a small urban center.  The thugs in this case are technically punks from the criminal element list.  Given my minis, reskinning them as unruly alien trouble makers just made more sense.  Some day I'll have a bunch of punk minis... but not today.

Next was the agent from Vertex.  Since its a data drop, I grabbed an old Rogue Trader era scientist mini that I had.  He has some kind of headset/implant thing so he just screamed at me when my eyes landed on him.

The last mini in the bunch was from the notable sights table, which I had skipped over when I first rolled up the mission.  In this case, I rolled up a "person of interest" and thankfully I have a mini that can fill the bill for this as well.

With the minis picked out, there was only one thing left to do... play the game!

As they moved into the sector, Oracle was able to interface with the local network and tap into the surveillance systems.  Having pin pointed the rabble rousers location, the crew quickly advanced towards their target.

The first step is rolling to seize the initiative, which Oracle was able to do quite handily!  Aris and Vargoth head to the left, while Zav uses his jump belt to go to the high ground!  The rest of the crew went to the right so they could get the data terminal in sight.

Round 1...

Hearing the cries of the thugs in the distance, the crew decided to hold position so they could respond to their opponents first move.

That's right; it wasn't bad dice, it was a personal choice to go last!  And if you believe that...   The thugs spread out into three groups.  One of the specialists headed to the left with two thugs, the leader went for high ground with the other specialist, and the remaining thugs cautiously moved to the right.  No shots were fired, but the one of the thugs was able to get line of sight to Kultak!

Kultak called out "Contact!" and sprinted across the narrow road to cover as the rest of the crew sprang into action.

While Kultak ran over to get back out of sight, Randis moved to a covered position while Oracle headed up to get to the high ground.  Meanwhile, Vargoth moved up to the cover of the building to keep an eye on the thugs, Aris sprinted across to make his way up the ladder to the landing platform, and Zav jumped again, ready to make contact with the person of interest they had heard about.

Round 2...

The dice were more favorable this round as the crew rolled three 1's!  I quickly assigned these and the crew sprang into action.  Randis set himself up for snap fire in case anyone got within range while Oracle scrambled up to the roof and got ready to start sniping.  Aris climbed onto the landing platform and rounded the air car, only to see the thug armed with a hunting rifle in the distance.

The hunter thug fires at Aris but the shot goes wide.  The other hunter heads up the stairs, prompting a snap shot from Randis which fails to connect.  Unfortunately for Randis, the hunter isn't rattled at all as it draws a bead and takes him out of action... or would have if I hadn't remembered about story points!  One point spent, and Randis was able to dodge back just in time.  The remaining thugs charge forward to close the gap.

Zav talks to the mysterious stranger... while shots are being fired... the way ya do, right?  And Vargoth crosses over the road in the hopes of setting up a shot at some point.  Curse the short range of scrap pistols!

Kultak peers around his cover but the thugs are still too far away, while the agent runs over to the same cover in the hopes of getting to the terminal quickly.

Round 3...

Aris and Oracle both get the drop on the thugs and choose the perfect target... the enemy leader.  The shot from Aris connects but only stuns the leader and Oracle... he shots the side of the building.

In response, Aris becomes the thugs number on priority!  Shots rain down on him from the leader, both of the hunters, and three of the thugs but nothing connects.  The rest of the thugs charge towards him... and then the shotgun blasts happened.

As the mysterious stranger leaves, Zav steps around the air car and fires on two of the thugs, killing both of them.  Randis and Kultak try to lend their own support but unfortunately their shots go wide.  Panic starts to run through the thugs and the leader and one of the hunters quickly exit stage right.

Round 4...

This time Vargoth feels his feral instincts burble up and he charges forward towards the thugs, but is still to far away to fire on them.

The closest thug to Aris charges him, beating him back but not taking Aris out of action.  The remaining hunter attempts a shot and the other two thugs run up to the bottom of the landing pad.

Regaining his wits, Aris levels his colony rifle at the thug that attacked him and gunned him down.  Zav runs over to the edge of the landing pad and lets loose two shots, taking out the two thugs at ground level.  The rest of the crew move up towards the center while the remaining hunter decides that he needs to make better life choices and gets out of dodge.  The agent retrieves the data, and the crew fades back into the shadows.

Post Battle Activities...

 The crew escorted the agent back to Vertex with the data safe and sound.  Thankfully there was enough confusion the that labor union don't know who broke up their demonstration so the crew won't have to worry about any future retribution (aka they didn't become yet another rival).  Vertex was generous with his appreciation as always, paying the crew handsomely for their help (5cr payment, taking them up to 13cr in the bank).  He had also been doing some digging and was able to get Randis more information about the Neknima sect that should help them track down the holy site referenced on their map.  Vertex also told them that he was already lining up another task for them and that he would be in touch soon.

Once the crew left, Zav told Randis about his encounter with the mysterious stranger and the information that they provided (plus one story point to take them back to four, and an additional rumor to take them up to two rumors for the Neknima quest).  Aris also revealed that he was able to "secure" some essential spare parts when the thugs withdrew (2cr worth of starship parts for future upgrades to the Avadora), while Vargoth found a damaged assault blade and bipod as they were leaving which were added to ship stores.  The battle looked sketchy at times, but overall the crew came out wiser for the experience (plus three XP each, except for Zav who earns four).  What will the future hold for the Avadora?  We will find out soon.  Until next time...

Five Parsecs From Home: Introducing The Crew Of The Avadora

Last week, I managed to get more paint onto my crew for Five Parsecs so I thought it was time to start introducing them.  First we have the feral of the group, Vargoth Mistrunner.

Vargoth is from the lower levels of the hive world of Tasoth.  An explorer by trade, Vargoth explored the lower levels of the hive looking for "treasures" that he could sell.  This went well enough until he stumbled into the territory of a group of fanatics known as the Sapphire Angels.  While Vargoth was able to escape, the Angels have been pursuing him since then.

Next we have Aris Salia, the resident agitator from the industrial moon Vilia N65M.

Aris managed to cross the Todov Consortium, the group that runs most of the operations on N65M.  With time running out and the goons closing in, Aris signed up to be part of trader Fol's crew.  This left his trouble behind for now, but the Consortium has a long arm.

We have the unlikely duo of our Engineer and Soulless up next.

Kultak ne Tenalu hails from the Tenalu enclave (hence the name... see what I did there?) located on Rivis.  While most Engineers focus on the technical, Kultak is actually a bounty hunter by trade.  His last contract was to track down a Soulless that had become severed from its hive mind and started calling itself Oracle.  Kultak found it on backwater trade hub and learned its true story.

Oracle had actually escaped from the Tenalu enclave and they were the ones to sever its link.  Kultak and Oracle quickly became companions and decided they would be better off forging their own path away from the enclave, which lead them to employment with trader Fol.

And finally we have the core of the crew, Zav Dezaran and trader Randis Fol himself.

Randis was a member of the Fehyn merchant family.  During one of his trade negotiations, he came across a text for the long dead Neknima sect which contained a damaged map to one of their lost holy sites.  Much to his family's chagrin, he decided to pursue this lead and struck out for the Wilds with his merchant cruiser, the Avadora, and his friend Zav Dezaram.

Randis met Zav when he was on one of the mining stations orbiting Sebunus.  The two quickly hit it off and Randis offered Zav a position on his merchant ship.  Since then, the two have been inseparable so it was no surprise when Zav helped Randis when he decided to head off to chart his own course.

I'm quite pleased with how my crew came out, and I'm glad that I've been able to churn my way through the boxes of Stargrave minis that I bought.  Between this bunch, my Zona Alfa crew, and my nameless heroes for Core Space, I've gone through sixteen of the sixty plastic minis so far... and that's without making up some targets... I mean opposition... for those two games.

And speaking of opposition, I started by first campaign turn for Five Parsecs!  I'm going to grab the board I'd done for Deadzone, throw together some opponents, a bit of quick terrain... and them we'll see how this ragtag bunch of ruffians fare!  Until next time...

Zona Alfa: Mountain Maw And Crew Update

Well, it been a while since I dabbled with the Zone but since I had free time I decided to finally put some paint on a mini that I've been sitting on for a while.  Introducing the mountain maw!

While there is only speculation on the origins of some of the creatures that have appeared in the Zone, the mountain maw was pretty easy to track down.  Some kind of mutation of the common mountain lion, the maw is a ferocious beast that exists only to kill.

This is one of the nexu from FFG's Imperial Assault.  I've thought about painting this one for a while but I've always been on the fence with it.  Sure, it's an interesting looking critter but I've never seen how it fit in with anything I was working on until I started picking critters for the Zone.  The nexu is a really big beastie next to a human so it's a perfect fit for the large mutant.  Not sure what I'm going to use for the regular mutant but I'm sure I'll figure something out.

And that's not all!  I've also been working on painting up more of my first squad.  In addition to Jonesy and Walker, I've also painted up Doc.

Though he seems to have some kind of actual medical training, Doc doesn't talk about his past.  Whatever demons and skeletons might lurk in his background, the crew knows that he can pull them through in a pinch and in the Zone, that's all that matter.  For his gear, I went with a mishmash of patterns and colors since I don't see him being concerned with such things.  As long as it's rugged and durable, nothing else matters to Doc.  I also did a bit of a shout out for his blue gloves... Browncoats forever baby!

There are still the last three to paint up for the crew, plus I still need more bandits and a few other beasties... plus figure out some terrain... it's getting there though and as erratic as my painting has been, I've really been enjoying it and dare I say I even feel like I'm getting slightly better... man, I hope I didn't just jinx myself!  Until next time...

Marvel United: United And Alone!

With work being rained out again, I spent most of my day working on minis.  A date was finally announced for our local Bolt Action tournament so I decided that I needed to get off my duff and actually start painting.  So far I've got one squad of the 12th Company finished up, plus my new transport which currently looks like it's fresh off the showroom floor... but more on that later.

After spending a number of hours painting, I decided to take a break and play a game.  I have a few of them out here with me, but a number of them are... heavier?  Not necessarily from a rules stand point, but length of game.  A short game is good for breaking up the monotony but I wasn't feeling like sitting down for a long play this time.  In the end, chibi super heroes seemed like the way to go.

I had seen Marvel: United back when CMON ran the Kickstarter for it.  It was really tempting.  I enjoy the superhero genre and the chibi figures just looked adorable, but a CMON Kickstater?  Now that is anything but cute.  My first experience with them was the Relic Knights Kickstarter which I ultimately wound up getting a refund on.  Too many delays and it was just starting to feel like they were never going to deliver.

Jump forward to now and preorder has become synonymous with Kickstarter, at least from CMON's point of view.  They do a good job with them, but they also push the envelope of the Kickstarter exclusive to the extreme.  In fact, I've even heard it said by a reviewer that if you don't do the all in pledge, there almost isn't a reason to buy their products... and I tend to agree.  Needless to say, I decided to pass on Marvel: United.  After all the extras, it was massive but it was also quite expensive for what it looked like you were getting.

Then again, when you find the base game on clearance from Wal-Mart for $15... yeah, I had to pull the trigger on that one.  Turns out that I'm glad I did.

The base game is for two to four players with seven heroes from the Marvel universe to choose from, trying to work together to defeat one of three villains.  The main game play is from cards that the players lay down that have different powers associated with them, but that's not all you use.  In addition the the powers on the card that you play, you also use the powers on the last player card that was played.  This means that if you do it right, your heroes can string together their powers to ultimately take down their foes.

Yeah, that's a really high view of the game play but there are plenty of other people that have reviewed it, and probably have dug more into it all than I would.  But is the game worth picking up?  Based on my two solo plays today, I say yes.  Both games were against the Red Skull (the beginner villain) but I mixed up the heroes for both games.  The first was Captain America, Iron Man, and Captain Marvel, while the second featured the Hulk, Black Widow, and Venom.  Even just from a single play for each of the heroes, I could see from why the decks were constructed that they nicely focused on the various heroes strengths.  The mechanics are also very tight, with everything laid out step by step in the rule book.  

The first game I had a couple of mistakes that went both ways, but in the end managed a win... just barely.  The second game... well, let's just say "Hail Hydra" and leave it at that.  This is also a game that you can't slow play, which I love.  You drag your feet, and those villains will walk all over you so you have to push forward as fast as you can.

Now the question that I had before I bought this game was do I need to have all the exclusives to make this game worth it?  No, you definitely don't.  Just the base game has enough in there to make for fun gameplay, which is really good because finding the exclusives... yeah, not too easy.

In my research for this game, I found out that the exclusives for this one weren't necessarily driven by CMON, but by their partner Spin Master Games.  I did find they have released a new bundle through Amazon that includes the base game, the Into the Spiderverse version of the base game, and Dr. Strange.  This is selling for $50 which isn't half bad for as much as you get, and if I didn't have the base game already I might have snapped it up.  Either way, if you are looking for a quick and easy family oriented co-op, I'd say this one is worth tracking down... as long as it's for a reasonable price.  Until next time...