Comrade! (Part 2)

Back from my far too short visit to family in the UK and I think, am over the jetlag, finally.

(Never took this long before - I must be getting old.)

Got two more Soviet troops painted up for my Bolt Action army. Holding back on the snow basing until I have a bunch to dress up at once as the recipe is greedy on ingredients and I don't want to waste any.

My first Greatcoat paintjob. Might be a bit of a dark-grey for historical accuracy's sake, but I like it. Future ones will be an assortment of shades (And brown ones too) to show a bit more of an outfit that's been around  and also seen replacements come in with newer uniforms, etc. The Greatcoat fellow is armed with a rifle carbine which I thought looked pretty cool.

Rear view shows off the classic warm boot covers on the left fig. I am sure his mate in the quilted uniform is jealous as hell.

Also slapped some paint on a Reaper Bones Wolf from their Animal Companions set and three other metal Wolves from an older Reaper minis pack. I'll be using these in my Frostgrave games and also rpg sessions.

Quick and dirty paint jobs. Scheme is based off Northwestern wolf pictures from the internet. Wanted a black wolf too for the pack leader so used a random image I found on the net for that too.

All of these sculpts were really nicely done and the Reaper Bones plastic wolf fitted in just nicely with the metal wolves.

Wolf bums. 

I also got some work done on my 15mm corn field stands for my ACW project. Loads more to go before they are presentable, but they should look pretty darn good once finished. Though looking at how much space they cover, I fear I'll have to pick up another set for a better looking table once me and Stew are finally able to get playing.

Lastly, got a couple turns in with my boy in our first Frostgrave game! So far, his Skaven have already retrieved one treasure token and I've taken out his Crossbowman. It's been fun though and he seems to be enjoying himself too, so here's hoping it'll inspire him to try other games in the future!

Hunter

Finished up this fellow recently, a barbarian setting hunter/ranger of some sort. In my rpg campaign, he'll be the miniature for the Ranger Character. More of a hunter than a warrior, though no less deadly with that bow pinging off arrows at his enemies in support of his more combat-based pals.

New set up in my room is causing photographing my models to be trickier than before. Pics seem to be very bright for some reason. 

Per usual, Tre Manor @Red Box Games has produced a great sculpt with loads of cool and not over-the-top detail. 

Thought about giving him some tattoo's or some such on his arms, but decided against. I like him being business and simple. Just the Barbarian to go (Who will get some tat's.) and then I'm done painting stuff for my roleplay game!

I finish with a pic of Pickles, who due to an aversion to rain, has taken to peeing indoors. We are not amused.

Scruffy pup is scruffy

Scenic Ruins I

This weekend allowed me time to work on a scenery piece. I realised that all the work I'd been doing on minis is great and all, but counts for naught if the terrain they're playing on looks like turd in contrast.

These are some "Administration Ruins" by Tectonic Craft Studios that I picked up when they ran their Kickstarter 3-4 years ago or some such.  Nicely designed for a mdf piece and went together relatively simply. Painting too forever though and I am now wondering if I might have made my job easier should I have used my airbrush instead? (I tend to feel like I spend more time cleaning the bloody thing than painting!)

It'll make for some appropriate ruins for my Frostgrave games and also rpg sessions if I can fit it into the setting somehow.

Tried to give the impression that one side of the ruins sees the sun, this side not so much. Grass is barer over here and moss/green slime grows here and there.

This is the sunny side - flowers and bushes abound. 

Lazily painted tile to contrast from an all grey alternative result. Looks good enough for gaming.

Dark and grimy in there. Am sure it's where zombies live.

And here's my Forstgrave warband with a scenic picture behind.  

Next up, hopefully the remainder of my 1st ACW Confederate infantry regiment. The 15mm Bolt Action game got cancelled and I don't see me being able to play until mid-Feb now as I'm soon to be off on a visit back home to the UK to see my ailing Gran, which I'm a bit trebidatious about as it'll almost certainly be the last time I get to see her in person.

Not Grod (1st painted mini of 2016)

Spent the majority of my painting time this holiday weekend making my Gorilla pretty. Tried for fast and dirty (See the lazy highlights on his torso.) so he's done and ready for play. He's white to be appropriate for use in Frostgrave, but also so he'll stand out all the better.

Glare on the background image.... Grr. 

Like I said in last post - No idea of the publisher of this sculpt, perhaps Reaper? It's a grizzly one (Which my son adores for that reason) and I figured that half a beaten opponent would make a bit of a bloody mess so added Tamiya Clear Red + brown ink for blood effects. Poor Greek-themed warrior fellow never stood a chance if you ask me.

Tiger skin for his rear loincloth to match his "cloak".

I felt to offset the gribbliness of the sculpt that flowers on his base would be appropriate to help dumb it down some. Think the effect works, at least to a small extent.

White Gorillas in Frostgrave are pretty fearsome opponents, but I don't like the official sculpts all that much, they seem a bit dull overall. I think this hulking ape will look far more intimidating on the game table.

Painting the tiger skin too longer to get "right" than the rest of the whole mini!

After I was done with this piece, I worked some more on my individually based 15mm WW2 British infantry. I'd forgotten just how much I dislike batch painting infantry at this scale! I'll need them done though by Sunday as I've a game of 15mm Bolt Action coming up. My PBI will be facing German Fallschirmjagers though, and I do not much fancy their chances...

Not much progress

So far 2016 hobbying has gone off with a whimper. O well. I'm sure I'll get my painting mojo back sooner or later.

Got some work done on my 15mm Chain of Command/Bolt Action British Infantry Platoon. Based, Primed and base-coated green helmets. A pal I met at the Flames of War tournament scene was interested in playing so he's also currently painting up a small force of German Fallschirmjäger paratroops and we're going to try out the Bolt Action rules at a smaller scale (Which I've heard it fun). 

We're starting out with 500 point lists. Not pictured are a Jeep and flame thrower team that are all prepped for paint as well. Best thing about 15mm is that we can use our Flames of War vehicles that are already painted! 

Also started base coating this old Reaper (I think) Gladiatorial Gorilla to use as a White Gorilla for my Frostgrave project. (Far more interesting sculpt than the official ones imo.)

Not only displaying his recent  kill, but also sporting an eyepatch! Not to be trifled with methinks.

Got some work done on the last two character minis for my Frazetta-style roleplay campaign. Barbarian and a Ranger respectively.

These are figs from the last Red Box Games kickstarter. Typical RBG lovely sculpting with loads of crisp detail.

Also cleaned up the remaining plastic 28mm Winter Soviet infantry models and got primer on all the metal support teams and weapons. But there's nothing exciting to see so no picture. 

Hopefully this weekend will allow for some more time to get at least one of the above finished?

De[ad]cember

The end of the year is nigh....

Ominous eh?

Okay, maybe not. Goodbye 2015, hello 2016 - I turn 40 later this new year, now THAT is ominous!

My Kickstarter rewards from the last Red Box Games Kickstarter arrived along with a set of their lovely zombie models and I've been painting furiously during my week off (Which is now at an end, I go back to work once more on the morrow - another ominous moment.). This set of 9 undead are all individual sculpts and great ones too, which was great and all are on the gore-lite side of zombie, which was also somewhat refreshing, but also made for painting to be a quick and simple affair. I'm not really inclined to put amazing amounts of effort into low hitpoint badguys as they'll probably spend little time on the tabletop in my rpg, being so easy to kill! (again)

Group shot - lots of shambliness and minlessness about this lot. Which i like very much.

Really like these sculpts - far more creepy side of zombies captured in contrast with the typical goriness and violence that other manufacturers produce like say, Mantic or GW.

These are all seem best suited to a fantasy environment due to their attire seeming rather poor and peasant-like.

And all bald and incredibly scrawny, which indicates less violent deaths, and probably more virus/disease-based endings for these poor souls.

Now I think about it,  these zombies will also be perfect for use with the recently released Dragon Rampant (Currently on sale, cheap! Click the link to see details.) rules set by Osprey Publishing!!! (Their fantasy version of their awesome Medieval/Dark Ages skirmish rules set, Lion Rampant - also currently on sale, cheap!)

 Also got this crossbow wielding fellow finished for my Frostgrave project. He's a rather old Citadel Miniatures (I think) orc, with exquisite detail sculpted throughout I think. I've painted him up in my Hobgoblins scheme rather than a typical green due tot he fact that orcs in my settings are of the pig-faced variety.

Lovely determined expression on this one.

A pouch of bolts and a nice hand axe hanging from his belt. Thought the red grip on the axe contrasted well with the brown leathers and purple jerkin.

Sheepskin seemed the more believable choice for his furs - sheep are easier to "hunt" than wolves or bears.

Lastly and again for my Frostgrave project, I slapped some paint on this 1983 TSR warhound. A fun and very simple sculpt and I decided he'd be a Doberman. At least that was what I was going for.

Per-dullcote, so the grassy loose pieces are long cleaned.

And a little out of focus on the face in this one, the chainmail also looks more defined in real life.

Not sure I'll get in another post before the New Year comes around proper, though I am working on my final two character miniatures for my rpg campaign, which will allow me to commence running it in the next couple weeks or so! (I'll be sure to leave an account here if there's any interest.)

Happy New Year to you all - I hope hobby-wise, it's a fruitful and fun 366 days! (It being a Leap Year and all.)

- Dai

I'm a Maserati in a world of Kias

Frostgrave starting warbands are typically made up of a Wizard who represents “You”, his Apprentice who offers more opportunity to throw spells around each turn and a mixed assortment of mercenaries that you buy with a gold coin allotment.

To battle my son’s Ratmen Necromancer warband, I decided to go with the very opposite wizard type, a Thaumaturge who specializes in healing majicks and the like. For my wizard mini, I went with my already painted-up (For my rpg campaign) Druid. As his apprentice, I then decided to use my only other druid mini shown below. He’s a metal Privateer Press sculpt, Potent Bradigus. My son had the idea of painting him up with a completely different skin colour to his master, I also added some black dots as a type of tattoo after seeing an old black’n’white picture of a north African tribesman with similar markings. Not sure I carried it off right though. With this fellow done, I now have a fully painted warband to play with!

I like this sculpt - all sorts of quiet intimidation about it. The "axe" parts to his staff are painted up as stone rather than steel. Seemed more druidish to me.

Green cloak like all good druids should sport. Tried to give the shoulder pads a wood look, again to seem more "natural" than if he had metal.

Wizard and Apprentice. I think they'll do just fine against those evil rats... should.

 My son also got a couple more of his own Skaven ratmen painted up - a thug and a man-at-arms. He only has to paint a Templar and a Ranger and he'll also be ready for play. Now I just have to get all my terrain painted too.... Ugh.

1980's Jes Goodwin Skaven Slave and a more recent plastic Skaven Clanrat with a weapon switch. No idea why he needed one though.

A long time ago in a country far, far away a much younger self felt a need to cut the tip from the Skaven slave model. I have no recollection as to why. My son though, was delighted to find this out and gleefully painted blood effects accordingly.

 After finishing up my Apprentice, I had more time last night so slapped some paint on this late 90's GW Daemonette. Just a cheeky grey primer, white drybrush and a load of successive washes to get a fair pastel effect. My son and wife think she looks creepy for some reason. I'll be using her as a "Medium Demon" for Frostgrave.

Unlike the original 80's sculpts, these girls were far more brutish in design to get them away from the very sexualised originals. Whilst I do like this version very much, the lithe originals and current versions fit the descriptions for these Slaaneshi daemons far better.

This deadly young lady seems not to be lacking in rump.

And last up, a real quick paintjob on a Reaper Bones animal companion sculpt. It is meant to be a hawk or some such, but I wanted it to represent a raven or crow instead so went with black. It'll do for both my rpg campaign and Frostgrave's new Lich King supplement that I bought for my Kindle to expand my mission selections and also check out the cool sounding campaign.

His head seems to blend in with his body in this photo. Not that there's much to see. 

"Nevermore" quoth another raven. Not this one, he prefers Dylan Thomas to Ed Poe.

Last fortnight of the 6MMRPC!

Of course I slip up and forget to get my post up in time for last week's submission. Guess it'll mean that this post will be longer then, so make sure you're comfortable.

No games played since last post and I won't be able to get my FoW game in for Cameron's campaign in before the deadline of... tomorrow either. Which is poo. Ah well, real life schedules and all that.

Lots of painting done though and all over the place topics-wise at that.

First up, I went and bought the Frostgrave rules after reading some very good reviews and AAR's in blogs. I also loved the fact that I could use existing minis from my collection, so won't have to purchase new figures just to play. I even managed to get my son interested (Seems more into the hobby side of things than gaming for some reason.) and he's started painting up my odd collection of GW Skaven for his warband - of course, he plans to play them as Necromancers. So I'd like to present his own first members of his warband that he finished painting up over the weekend.

Wizard on the right, and Apprentice on the left. Wizard's right eye had a small miscast and so my son rightfully painted it up as a scar!

Whilst he was happy slapping paint about, I worked on some bits and pieces for the game, some treasure tokens and a boar incase it gets rolled for as a Wandering Monster.

The boar is an old Marauder Miniatures sculpt that had an orc rider. The greenstuff is to bulk out where the rider's legs would have sat. The bits for treasure tokens are random things from my bitsbox.

All painted up and ready to go. My son asked why the skull and femur were painted green - at first I want to say they were made of Jade, then instead told him they were just moldy. 

Squeal piggie, Squeal!

I also got a trio of Jomsviking Bondi painted up. Will do their shields when the whole unit is painted so they are more uniform. Saying that, shield-less, they are perfect candidates for use as Thugs in Frostgrave!

Picture looked just fine on my phone last night... O well, here they are, a bit out of focus. The bloke on the left actually has far more contrast between his gold faceplate and his beard, but this pic buggered that up. Regardless, I think this would count as a Movember entry. 

Bums!

This fellow grabbed my attention, so I worked on him too. He's an old 1980's TSR sculpt I think. Didn't realise until I was painting his flesh colours on that he has pointed ears and tusks(!), so I decided to see if I can include him in my rpg campaign. His background will be as a half- hobgoblin, half human bully-type and due to his mixed heritage, he'll be nicknamed the Ha'penny Hob!

Loads of fun detail on this sculpt, very unlike most of the TSR figs I own. I do love his big bushy eyebrows too!

Sneaky sod is brandishing spiked knuckles, yet hiding his real weapon behind his back!

The knuckles though I think had a dagger blade attached originally, but it must have broken off. His knife sheath was empty so I made a quick knife handle and glued it in on his hip. Also this pic shows his well sculpted ears!

Last up! For my ACW project, I managed to finish and base the command stand and an infantry base for my first infantry regiment.

The base on the left will be the one I stick printed unit details to, hence the Non-Com with the sword to make it easier to track. I'll be printing flags once all the regiments are painted. I think these fellows would count for a Movember entry don't you think?