Free Space Marine on this week's White Dwarf!

I was somewhat excited by all the rumours about there being a free Space Marine on the cover of this week's White Dwarf Weekly, and so daughter and I dutifully bundled round to my local branch after walking the wife to work.

Upon arrival though, whilst the rumours are technically true, it's not the model we were expecting on the front of the magazine...

Ah well, still bought it anyway to have a nose at the upcoming game (and hey, a limited edition badge is cool too I guess?).

Apparently there's going to be a Word Bearers badge on the front of Warhammer Visions in December, but I don't think that's enough to entice me to pay for that...

Project distraction

Oh, it's already been nearly a month since the last post! I know I was all set on finishing my Space Marines, but playing Star Wars Battlefront with my godson yesterday put me in the mood for some miniatures from a galaxy far, far away, so I dug out these:

Although as it's our paper anniversary, my wife got me this:

Which has given me a hankering to clean up some miniatures for my The Last Of Us project. Alas, Miniature Mojo is currently still not taking orders, or (as soon as I build up more of a buffer on the Tally) I'd be grabbing some of their Infected as conversion material...

Speaking of the Tally, John gifted me a miniature for donating some bits from my bits box for a Blood Bowl ogre conversion:

I didn't ask for anything, but he knew I'd managed to get the tally back into the black... Still there though:

37 vs 36 = 1

In other news, I've got another upcoming project that will continue to divert me from getting any painting done:

Flags of War Fantasy flags

Flags of War have recently released a set of flags that look like they'll come in handy for anyone doing a Game of Thrones / Song of Ice and Fire project:

Looks like I'll be needing some of these for when my hobby focus swings back round that way! They're available from here:

http://www.flagsofwar.co.uk/index.php?route=product/category&path=165

Geekfest 2014

A handful of pics live from dreary Folkestone:

It's hot and full of people here.

There's a whole load of stuff from Blade Runner though, which is pretty cool...

I mean, I'm not normally that excited to see an umbrella, buts when it's this one: 

Or even this:

Hmm, Blade Runner in 28mm anyone? There's been nothing suitable for miniature gaming, alas, although I did pick up some old issues of Inquest, to remind myself of older, simpler times...

The apes have infiltrated us. I fear for our lives.

Also, I suggested that this man might be cosplaying as George Lucas:

But didn't get a chance to get a better pic, largely due to the half-naked lady that keeps walking past. We assume she's here for the body-painting, but she's no more painted now than she was an hour ago...

Not wildlings sighted!

Looks like Silent Invader at miniature mojo is working on some miniatures that would be perfect for wildlings:

Full details are available over at:

http://wargameterrain.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/miniature-mojo-new-medieval-wild-winter.html?m=1

I'm quietly quite excited about this, as I've been looking for some suitable attired wild types for when my ASOIAF project eventually heads north of the wall, and these are near enough exactly what I've been looking for! Either way, I've been eyeing some of SI's minis for use in my currently forming The Last of Us inspired project, plus the fact that it'd be nice to support him - many moons ago, I bought (and actually painted!) the first mini he ever released (which you can just about see on the right in this pic from my very first post here)!

[edited 12/05/14 to add links!]

White Dwarf no more...

So, as you may or may not have seen in my previous post, after actually seeing the new White Dwarf magazines in hand, I cancelled my subscription. In another blog post, that I realise as I'm typing that is still at the as yet unpublished draft stage, I mentioned what I think is the crux of my issue with modern White Dwarf - there's nothing really in it any more! In the golden age of WD, there's be conversions and scenarios and all sorts of exciting articles that would actually make me want to get out my brushes or my modelling tools and do something hobby related, whereas in recent years it's become a showcase for nicely painted miniatures.

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate a nicely painted little man, but I have the internet (where I even get to choose what sort of exquisitely painted little man it is I get to look at!). I'm not a display piece painter, so it's not going to fire me up and inspire me to greater heights of painterly achievement like it might the next guy... 

It's really just that WD became something to glance through when it arrived, then maybe pick up again once or twice to dig deeper into an article that was actually interesting (ooh, no I did not in fact know that interesting fact about the development of the imagery and iconography of Space Marines, or wow they really are struggling to find new ways to say that John Blanche sometimes uses *gasp* parts bases or paints that aren't GW!). Alas, when I saw the new mags, I saw that Warhammer Visions is literally just pictures of nicely painted miniatures (lovely, but I flick through those pages looking for some meat and find myself half way through the thick mag...), and White Dwarf Weekly is £2.40 for 30 odd pages of rules... Most of which I don't care for (honestly, when did I last actually play a game? I want to, but hey...) and I just can't justify that any more. I know, it's only the first one, they might start actually writing interesting articles again one day, but for now I'm out, I quit White Dwarf.

As it was a Christmas present, I got to choose some toys with the credit, and (after much grumbling about the lack of things I want actually being in stock) I came away with a preorder for the new plastic Dragon Slayer (because I have a box of slayers waiting for their day in the sun, and he looks pretty snazzy), some technical paints (because hey everyone needs more paint right?) a pot of what is supposedly the same paint as Fortress Grey (we'll see) and a box of Spess Mehreens, because I actually quite enjoyed painting my test nerdmarine, and might see about painting up a whole squad (and thought a box of tactical marines would give me the most options for adding some variety to the push-fit marines I have from old starter sets and donor parts to salvage old miniatures that are missing various limbs that I'd acquired over the years when buying job lots on eBay that I've recently dug out of my bits box...) - the theory being, if I can paint a whole squad, I can paint two, add a character and boom there's a playable force (but we all know how those plans work out...)

I mean, I'd have bought the bits I need for a Path to Glory Slaanesh warband or some LOTR ruffians to convert for ASOIAF if they'd had them in stock, but alas. 

This little bundle of goodies unfortunately takes the tally further in the wrong direction, down to:

1 vs 15 = -14

And since it's Super Bowl Sunday tomorrow, I don't expect to get a whole lot of hobby done in the foreseeable future...

Hey there wait a minute mister postman...

So, it's February 1st, the day my year long subscription to White Dwarf starts (that my wife bought me for Christmas) - I was originally concerned that despite getting a subscription to White Dwarf I'm not actually going to be getting White Dwarf (as apparently GW have decided that I want 'Warhammer Visions' instead, without consulting me) but now I'm more concerned that nothing at all has actually turned up...

Edit, a phone call later: apparently I don't have a subscription, despite paperwork and receipts to the contrary. Looks like the redshirt in store fucked up. My wife is more pissed than I am, and I quote: "I've been buying you this for more years than that guy's worked for Games Workshop!"  Let's pop in and see if he's working today...

Edit part deux: turns out it wasn't a redshirt, it was the manager. And apparently it was a mistake centrally, they've been dispatched, but not yet arrived (despite today being the 'big launch' day). Having actually looked at the new magazines though, we've cancelled my subscription, which is taking some time...

It's a pity, as my wife always gets me a subscription for Christmas, but c'est la vie...

My ongoing quest

Herein lies the tale of my quest: three years, three long years now have I sought that which I seek, but to no avail. I am, of course, referring to the release of the excellent 'Broom Riding Wizards' sculpted by Soapy:

(male and female sculpts viewable on Soapy's blog here and here)

For three years now (as of January 16th, and yes, I emailed on that day to announce that it was the third anniversary of my campaign to get them released), I've been bugging various people in the hopes that they will take my money. Every Salute, I ask Soapy, and he says ask Gripping Beast; every Salute, I ask Gripping Beast, and they say 'oh yeah, send us an email in the week and we'll look into that for you'. Every few months, I leave a comment on Soapy's blog, or I email Gripping Beast, and always the same answer: yes, but not yet. If anything, they seem to be getting further away from me, despite the number of times that they've been 'bumped up the queue of production', but still I live in hope (I mean, had they been available when I'd first enquired, it's entirely possible that I'd have even gotten round to painting them by now!)

So what's the point of this blog post? It's not going to make them get made any faster; and I'm going to ask about them again at Salute even though I've been told they won't be ready then; this is just to let people know that they could potentially exist, and to document my approaching ridiculous perseverance (and hey, the male sculpts were originally done in 2009, so there's probably someone somewhere that has spent five years emailing Gripping Beast every few months, rather than my paltry three).

Many many (around fifteen) years ago, I wrote (well, half-wrote, the campaign rules never got finished) a set of rules for a tabletop version of Quidditch, researched extensively through poring though the original release of 'Quidditch through the Ages' to ensure that it was the most accurate representation of a fictional sport with nonsense rules that I could make, so I guess having waited this long for suitable miniatures to become available I can wait a few more...

New gw paints have new pots!

With a new hinge system that holds the lid open! Although they're not going on sale for another fortnight, so we'll see then if that prevents the usual spillage issues... Also, the lids on the shades and glazes can be a bit of a bugger to open, but that could just be me lacking manual dexterity...

[update] not all the paints will have the new pots, bases (what used to be foundation) and layers (what used to be ... well, paint) will still have the old style pot 'as you shouldn't need to leave them open'...

Other points of interest: the new 'base' paints are thinner than the old foundation paints, which should mean they last a bit longer before turning into a gloopy unuseable mess, and the new 'drybrush' paints aren't really paint at all, more like a mousse, which will take some getting used to...