Crabs in da Grotto......scratch....scratch

Hi all

once again I find myself apologising for my title, couldn't help myself....

Another reinforcement for my Bushido Jung Pirate faction and this is one of the best yet!! So this time we have Tetsuso.  This monster burst onto the scene last year and I was stunned not to see him in a Pirates line up at the tournament last year. On a 50mm base he is a stunning "tank" of a miniature and brutal in combat.

There comes a time after many cycles when a Korusea has spent so long living a life on the waves that he starts to become more comfortable on the gentle rocking of a ship than the solid earth of land. Tetsuso has been touched by the Kami of the sea and turned into a monster of shell and claw, a formidable adversary capable of snapping bone and steel alike.

looking at his card then, first of all you see he weighs in at a hefty 10 rice putting him an expensive bracket but you get loads of bonuses for that 10 rice.

"Armour (3)" and a hefty 10 point wound track means this boy/crab/monster is gonna stay in the fight and with 3 melee dice, a choice between his Naginata or Kami blessed claws he'll either strike first or finish the fight with relative ease. Combined with his Ki feat "Crushing Blow" giving him "Brutal and "Armour Piercing" he can really tear it up! He causes "Fear (5)" meaning it's likely his opponent is going to lose a dice in melee too.

base colours

 Paint wise he was fairly simple as I blocked the legs and shell with Vallejo's "Orange Brown" and painted the "man" part with my Jung faction colours.

shaded

For shading I pretty much covered the whole model with GW "Carroburg Crimson" except for his hair and weapon. I then re shaded the shell and legs with Army Painter "Strong Tone" and another coat of Crimson.

highlights

Fight wise, the guy is a tank and can be thrown right down the centre of the battlefield causing trouble and being trusted to hold his own against most opponents.  Like his "Sharky" brother he is rather unsubtle and not really to be used to interact with scenario objectives.

hope you enjoy

dGG

derrr dum........derrrr dum.......dum, dum, dum,dum dum dum

cue the ominous music.........

Hi all

welcome to a new addition to da Grotto and joining his Jung Pirate Faction brethren meet Arata...

The fury of the Chrome Sea, the shark is the apex predator beneath the waves and Arata is just as frightening above water. Dazzlingly fast, driven wild by the smell of blood, he is a pure monster when unleashed. Whether savaging startled enemies with a maw of razor sharp teeth, or bowling then over with tremendous force he is a formidable warrior. Like all those changed by the great Kami    Sumiyoshi Sanjin, little is left of the man he once was but this does not matter in times of war.

As soon as this miniature was released I wanted him in my faction, in fact he was the reason I wanted the faction in the first place. I mean a frickin' Man-Shark for goodness sake! No matter what his stats were like or his rice cost he was gonna get caught in my net (ahem, sorry) as it happens his very reasonably priced in the game and worth the punt.

Looking at his card he stacks up pretty well, for just 7 rice he comes with 3 dice in melee with a charging bonus of slam attack (0) or an extra 1" to his move and sweep attack (0) if the model is wounded at all.  Causing models to lose a dice in melee or an activation through his "Fear (4)" trait enhances his chances of using those razor sharp teeth on his opponent! If he gets the Ki "Hammer Strike" all but ensures that he'll batter through any defence. He also comes stacked with "Sixth Sense" which is useful for sniffing out those pesky ninjas or seeing through the Bakemono induced "Darkness" that has been plaguing my games recently.  With a healthy 8 point wound track it's hard to find something not to like but then you get to "Impetuous" as a trait and you can see that tactically he's not all that subtle... This trait means he always has to be activated first which can be a real pain and can offer the tactical advantage to my opponent.  However not to worry, just point him at the enemy and let him munch his way through them with abandon!

Arata emerges from the briny deep to raid the market place...

or maybe he just wants a "freshly" cooked burger from the Cupid Burgers franchise stall

maybe he's not that hungry after all as he slips back into the harbour waters

Paint wise he was relatively simple as a I used GW "Fenresian Steel" as a base coat for his rubbery hide and coated it with a healthy dose of blue ink and highlighting up.  The breeches are the faction colours to tie it in chiefly GW's "Emperor's Children Pink" and shaded with red ink.  The base was a very simple sand to represent a piece of coastland.

Use wise, he's simply there to bring the pain! no point in him trying to work the scenario as he always has to go first, so just point and shoot - job done.

hope you enjoy

dGG

The Lucky Orc dice bag winner is.................

Hi all

the deadline for the draw was yesterday and this morning Mrs Gobbo drew the winner....

Michael Awdry

Sir Michael if you would like to email me at (get rid of the spacing and use the appropriate symbol)

da gobbos grotto (at) google mail (dot) com

and I can arrange the prize to find its way to Awdry Towers.

todays regular post has been postponed until Friday as I've just finished uploading a video battle report to my YouTube channel (it took a shattering 20 hours+ to upload).  This is battle 3 of the "Starter Set Wars" between Damon and myself.  It's actually the 5th game we've played for this series but 2 videos of my STS vs Ninjas haven't worked so we went with my new Tengu vs Jung Pirates, we have upped the quality to HD and actually finished the game too.  The game lasts for 90 mins so give yourself some time and as ever feel free to comment on either the game or the format.  For future games, there might be some 7TV2e or other genres so they won't always be Bushido, but Damon and I are determined to grow this excellent game and there isn't actually many videos on this genre (most are bloody WH40k - yawn).  However I am planning on putting up some terrain videos when I begin making my next board in a couple of months and happy to put together other (hobby related) videos that people would like to see.

The link to the vid is https://youtu.be/xBVWIfLeJo8

Please subscribe to the channel if you can, there is no cost and no i don't get any cash either....

hope you enjoy

dGG

Korusea

hi all

The last of my Bushido posts from the plastic minis I nabbed from Damon 'Rulez' Carlton's "Docks of Ryu" - the expansion set from GCT's successful kickstarter boxed game "Rise of the Kage".  Last pirate post at least for a while and at least until Black Friday brings some more Piratey goodness my way.  But to round out this series of minis and to give me a usable faction until reinforcements can be raised I give you the Korusea....

The Korusea make up the bulk of the veteran seaman of the Jung, skilled sailors and warriors, armed with wicked curved blades which gut a man as easily as a fish. Their secondary weapon is a web woven from light but very strong twine, used to subdue an enemy up close or at range.

another dual track model so again I painted up two!

These guys will be damned useful with their immobilise attack slowing up the enemy and making it easier for my front line fighters to pour on the pain.

and finally a group shot with the boys so far...

hope you enjoy 

dGG

Kohanin

hi all

sorry but it's another Bushido post for my new faction the Jung Pirates, again taken from the models the boxed game "Docks of Ryu" and expansion of the Bushido Board Game "Rise of the Kage". These games I'm sure will be showcased by Damon 'Rulez' Carlton at a later date (hopefully on this blog if I can persuade him!).

Next up is the Kohanin....

A life on the waves makes you hard, bodies muscled and lean, the sway of the ocean becomes as natural as sitting under a tree. This is the life of Kohanin, their lives before swearing loyalty to the captain forgotten. Their crimes washed away as debris from a beach at high tide. More comfortable on deck than land, they are capable sailors and fighters, turning their weapons of labour into deadly instruments of battle in an instant.

These guys were also released as metal versions following the release of the board games so I post up, as previously the GCT version and special card followed by my own.

As a dual track model I can field more than one so I painted two!  They will be my workhorses, turning Idols and completing scenario objectives.

base colours, slightly different for one of them now

shading 

highlighted, although without tattoos

I added tattoos to each of these guys to further tell them apart

you can also see the basing better on these two models

as the sun goes down they're still working hard

hope you enjoy

dGG

Everyone needs a good 2iC

Hi all

Cracking on with the really cool Jung Pirate models I manage to "borrow" from Damon 'Rulez' Carlton's Docks of Ryu set.  They will form part of my Bushido New Dawn Jung Pirates faction. Next up is Yuji...

 All captains must have a trusted Juhin and there is none more trusted, in any port in the Gulf of the Three Brothers, than Yuji. A seasoned sailor and servant of the Jung, for many cycles he has barked the orders of his captains, the Kaizoku darting to complete his commands, an inspiration to them. Never far is his oldest friend Same, no one is able to catch Yuji napping with the old monkey around.

As before I will show you the GCT Studios version of the miniature which is cast in metal and his special card and then my version of him cast in the soft plastic that comes with the boxed game.

Next up my version...

base colours

shading

with the final highlights

with his basing, as a command model he gets a dock too...

sorry about the poor photo

Yuji is very much a support model, with his "Inspiration" Ki feat he can motivate another model to fight harder, adding dice to their combat pool.  His "Command"trait means he can move other models in a single activation and his "Battle Stations" Ki feat also gives him the Order trait, all useful for moving lower cost models around the table easily for less activations allowing you to outmanuvere your opponent with ease.

hope you enjoy

dGG

Jung Pirates

Hi all

Ok 3 posts in 2 days is getting silly but yesterday's two were bonus posts for me and we now go back to our regularly scheduled programming ;-)

I said I was going to start my next faction for Bushido with the starter set BUT then Damon "Rulez" Carlton of the Nerd Herd found someone selling their entire Kickstarter set 'Rise of the Kage' and the expansion set 'Docks of Ryu' with two lots of extra minis for a ridiculous sum of money.  

This board game version of Bushido pits the Ninja clan 'Kaze Kage' against the Prefecture of Ryu and the Dockyard thugs of the Jung Pirates.  The game is yet to be played by us and I will let "Rulez" run you through the unboxing and our first games rather than do it now. The amount of minis that he got with the game is astonishing and although cast in soft plastic they are to an amazing detail (as you would expect from GCT Studios) in fact they are the same as their metal counterparts that were released for the tabletop version of the game albeit the detail is marginally softer, marginally and for the princely sum of about 75pence compared to £7.95 for its equivalent it's a bit of a no-brainer!

Because of this I sifted through his extra set of minis and extracted the dockyard thugs (as well as a few choice Prefecture minis for my Ryu faction). First up is Minato Jung...

Although trained in the ways of the Samurai, Minato was always destined to follow his own unique path. A brute of a man, more at home in a water house than the courts. His body tells the stories of countless battles, wearing each scar proudly as a mark of honour to his physical prowess. That is not to say that he is all brawn, a cunning and clever leader, hiding from the Prefecture in plain sight. In battle he wields his trademark anchor, launching it through the air making it appear as light as a Tengu feather. Those unlucky enough to be caught by his attentions sent sprawling, dazed and disorientated.

I've shown the studio version of the mini first for a reason (i don't normally show them at all, why show up my own painting! lol), The studio version is the metal miniature that they released following the successful kickstarter and the release of the boxed games.  It's a particularly gorgeous miniature with really crisp detail but I wanted you to compare it to the plastic version and, paint job aside I defy you to see a big difference between the two.  The detail as I stated earlier is softer but it really is only just.

base colours

with shading

after highlights

rear view - ooh er! you can see some of the Prefecture models in the background.  The ninjas (green) are Damon's

to me the differences are so slight and once on the table you would be hard pushed to tell the difference unless you picked the mini up!  The plastic, where it had been stored and sent was a little bent on the anchor and spear shafts and swords on the other models but easily corrected with a little boiling water and ice water dip.  Then a quick trim and scrape got rid of most of the mold lines, finally a spray of whatever primer I had lurking in the shed (I had some white and some Dunkelgelb) finished off the prep.  The pinky red colour I chose on his "hakama" contrasted nicely with the yellow and he was fairly easy to paint in the end.  Finally I shamelessly stole a basing idea off a chap - Matt Sophisticat on the Bushido - The Game Facebook group whose Jung Pirates are amazing!  Not only did I pinch the feature on the base but also the LoS markings on the rim of the base, something I've been struggling with for some time.  If you let me know what you think, because if its a thumbs up I will probably do the technique for the rest of my factions (a process that will take a looonnnggg time!).  First up though this is the injury I received while cutting the minis off of the supplied bases using a flawed cutting technique....

This guy was always going to be added to my Pirate faction as he is absolutely brutal in combat and will take up the majority of the fighting tasks while the others crack on with the scenario conditions, so I'm really glad I managed to get him so cheaply - thanks Damon!!

Finally the base LoS will be more prominent on the next couple of posts.

hope you enjoy
dGG