Wizard-Mystic

I finished this chap off this morning. On the whole, I would recommend the Bones figures. They're very affordable and the detail is good. Given the choice I would prefer GW style hard plastic, but it's not to be had for the money and the sculpts are very nice. 

I painted this chap with a quick blast of Army Painter white primer and a purple base.  I then added washes of red over the base in the hope of bringing out some of the folds in the drapery, a far cry from my more normally workmanlike painting. It looks rather better in person than it does in these pictures, but I think this shot from the real captures some of variety of tones that I was looking for. 

The staff was painted with dabs of diluted white with added dots. I had hoped that this would look like stars and galaxies, but it doesn't really seem to have worked. But it makes the figure look a little different and that's no bad thing. 

I had two minds about what I was going to do with this chap - but I have come up with a plan. A special game for Christmas I think, something a little different from my usual stuff. 

One last shot. 

So a definite yes on the Reaper Bones. Looking through the collection, there isn't a lot there for the historical gamer. There are plenty of fantasy types that could be pressed into service in medieval armies and a few cowboys, but beyond that not very much. Ed Pugh of Reaper Miniatures has told me that there are definitely Second World War and Wild West figures coming, but beyond that he didn't care to speculate. 

And I shall leave you with a Wizard of a different colour.  

Reaper Bones

The Mystery Box

For those of you who don't stray outside the Historical end of our hobby - this is going to be a somewhat dull post. Some time ago there was a miniatures company called Reaper.  They've been producing miniatures for quite a while now.  Their work always looks rather American to my eye, reminiscent of Larry Elmore fantasy covers, but they make very fine figures in that style. Myself, I'm more of a John Blanche and Frank Franzetta sort of chap. 

But be that as it may - Reaper decided that they were going to produce some of their miniatures in plastic and floated a project on Kickstarter to raise funds. The campaign was ridiculously successful raising $3.4 million dollars.  When it began the basic pledge offered approximately sixty figures for seventy dollars, but as the really big numbers began to arrive and the economies of scale began to kick in, that number shot up and up. 

Savage is opening the mystery box

The end result was that Savage and I pledged about sixty quid each on one box of about two hundred and sixty figures. I'm not even sure what we'll do with half of them, but even for just the figures I wanted the Kickstarter was a good deal, so the extra figures are a bonus. Savage wanted the fantasy figures for a campaign he was thinking of running and I imagine we'll be giving some to friends. 

...or at least he will after the gin and turpentine punch he had for breakfast wears off. 

The box arrived at Savages house some time ago and with iron self control, he prevented himself from tearing it open right there and then. I can only presume he had been rendered temporarily unconscious in a hookah explosion and was unable to struggle free from the wreckage. 

It's a magic box filled with miniatures

This thing weighed quite a bit, I shudder to think what it cost to post this lot. Everything was professionally packed and very well put together. There was something special in the big box on the right, but more about him later. 

It doesn't look like much does it? 

This box was absolutely stuffed with figures and there were some real crackers there. I realise that there aren't actually any pictures from that because Savage and I were too busy sitting on his living room floor opening bag of toy soldiers tossing them back and forth and thinking of things to do with them.  I suspect some of very simple Dungeon Crawling game in Savages future, possibly with a combat system based on doing shots of Tequila. 

I have only now just realised that this photo is upside down. 

I am an idiot. 

There were some extras - like this  carry case. It holds 150 figures and is probably one of the best of the breed I've encountered.  I have actually been considering getting a case for my Cold War figures because they don't work as well as Napoleonics in A4 document boxes. I think it's because they're singly based and don't spend their time in tightly packed ranks. 

Great Cthulhu

This figure is bloody enormous. Nine inches tall gentlemen, he is absolutely huge and despite coming in several pieces fit together very well without any glue. I will definitely be writing a skirmish scenario based around this chap - Napoleonic Royal Marines versus Cthulhu. 

Or Hornblower versus Cthulhu. 

Wow - just wow. 

Savage and I split the contents of the box.  I took most of the Science Fiction figures while he took the Fantasy chaps. It was like Christmas morning - there were toy soldiers all over the floor. Savage seemed particularly taken with some of the giants, while my favourites were definitely the Cthulhu-oid monsters.  I would have taken pictures, but it would have ruined the moment.  It was a great time to spend with a friend. 

I pulled this chap out tonight and decided to give him a lick of paint. The Reaper Bones plastic doesn't respond well to water, so it is best to either give them a quick undercoat or use undiluted paint for your base coat. This chap painted up reasonably well, though I want to try and put some sort of lightning design on the staff as it's a bit dull at present. The detail is good and there's not so much that you can't catch all of it. I was able to get him done in relatively short order - I started painting him while Mrs Kinch and I were watching "Die Hard", which turned out to be a serious mistake. 

Mainly because these two kept talking during the exposition.  It was a good thing we'd seen it before otherwise we would have been completely lost.