From SebastianR: Behold Kaladrax! [Oversize books] (80 Points)

I told you I'd be back.

I've had this one in the pile of shame opportunity for a long time, and after being thwarted in my last attempt to claim the oversized books location I decided there was no better time than the present.

I also did a lot of anxious procrastinating.

I've never painted a model this big, nor as... prestigious. I didn't buy the original reaper bones kickstarter; I got this figure from facebook I think, for around £50, almost a decade ago and lugged it around ever since.

I love skeleton dragons and was hoping that this bad boy could become the centerpiece for an undead army or be the end boss for a particularly messy Pathfinder campaign, but he's just too damn big. Impractically big. In fact, according to a couple of sources I stumbled across while searching for painting tips, due to a miscommunication with the manufacturer, he was molded larger than intended, maybe even three times as much.

Instead he'll spend his days perched on a shelf, waiting for people to ask, "That's a neat dragon; what the story there?" at which point I will regale them with the tale of the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge that forced me to finally paint him.

And isn't that the purpose of the challenge? For us to ignore the projects we actually need to complete in order to chase internet points with fearfully ignored figures from the bottom of the lead reaper bones worryingly soft plastic pile?

It's still too humid to trust a varnish, thus the glossiness on parts of the base.

I have no idea what this is worth points wise. It's 20 for the challenge, and it's technically a 28mm monster, but given the mis-sizing and the sheer size of the model (14"*14"*9").

And that's me I think. Once again I get to within unlocking distance of the Snowlords challenge, but without the time to actually complete the challenge. See you all next year!

____________________________________

That is a fabulous undead beastie, Sebastian! I love his sickly green interior and wing membranes. Very cool. I'm delighted that the Challenge prompts some folk to do as yourself and unpack almost-forgotten treasures to submit to the event. That warms my heart! I also really like your 'Returned' library stamp. :)

Due to the shear size of this fella lets equate him to thee 28mm vehicles, so 60 points plus the Oversize bonus.

Until next year Sebastian!

- Curt

From PeterB - Into the final section with some more 2nd Ed 40K and friends - 145 Points

I've finally hit the last section of the library. As you can probably tell I am unnecessarily trying to cover every set of stacks. So first of all, Oversize books.

Having been playing some Gaslands, I felt I needed a vehicle with a bit more craziness. What can be crazier than a monster truck with oversized tyres. This beast is definitely going to be intimidating the other drivers.

The vehicle is originally a cutesy cartoon vehicle from a kids show and had a smiley face on the front. A no-prize to anyone that can name the character/show. Some additional bits added from the instruments of carnage sprue from North Star and it now looks the part.

Next up, we head to true crime.

In the Warhammer 40,000 universe, the job of investigating crimes and keeping the peace amongst the miserable masses falls to the local Adeptus Arbites. (At least from third edition 40K onwards anyway,) Amongst the underhives of the spire cities where gangs roam, they are mostly kept in check by these guys, keeping them from bothering the rich families of the upper levels. Quite obviously inspired by the Lawmakers from Mega City One in the pages of 2000AD, these Judges are also Jury and Executioner when required. 

Then we head to cookery. 

I struggled at first with this category, then a delve in my "to do" box and I found this Spartan taking a break on campaign. Not sure of the manufacturer unfortunately, it was a second hand gift from a friend amongst some other bits. I also pulled out some pots and fire left over from the Renada Viking House set and a bunny from Bad Squiddo Games. It looks to me like the soldier is wondering what he is going to cook that evening, then has inspiration when an inquisitive rabbit appears. Maybe he is about to cook up some carrot broth and will share the carrot tops with his new friend?

Next we head to self help.

As everyone knows, the keeping and caring of plants is also an excellent balm for the mind. I myself am not that green fingered but do enjoy planting the odd bulb here and there to make the garden look nice. Although after completing this project my fingers were indeed definitely a shade of goblin green.

Some of you old school 40K players may recognise these plants as inspired by all those magnificent battle reports from old White Dwarfs that have been the inspiration of my main project this year, 

Yep, you too can have dangerous alien plant life as terrain on your wargame table by shoving some cocktail sticks into polystyrene balls. (Some are actually egg shaped, handy it being Easter soon.) The whole project took a lot longer than expected due to the layers of cheap craft paint taking an age to dry and needing multiple coats. The balls were attached together with very careful application of hot glue, too much and the polystyrene would just disintegrate. PVA glue however just didn't cut the mustard.

Scale shot for reference

The cacti are around 3 inch cube and there are six of them, so probably 15 points?

Finally, not for any location, just a little bonus for those of you that were missing the back banners and skulls. I present Zodgrod Wortsnagga. (That is a mouthful of a name.) Zodgrod is a slaver amongst the Ork society, preferring the company of Grots/Gretchin. 

A member of my local club very kindly swapped some old school Orks with me for some Chaos Dwarfs, so I had to paint this chap up this week for my retro Ork army.

To the scores...

1 x 20mm vehicle = 15 points

5 x 28mm Arbites infantry. 5 x 5 = 25 points

1 x 28mm Spartan infantry = 5 points

4 x locations. 4 x 20 = 80 points

terrain points = 15 points

1 x 28m Ork infantry = 5 points

Total = 85 points 145 points

 

 Sylvain: Nice completion of locations this week! Your "Big Foot" vehicle is hilariously tire-obese. Fantastic submission.

From TomL: Oversized & Selfhelp (115 points)

Bringing us to the next two sections in the final room of the AHCP via the library cart are two May dancers from Crooked Dice Miniatures.  These were painted using Foundry skin triads, ProAcrylic whites, Vallejo Ivory and contrast paints for the wreaths.

 

 

 

Surely such an innocent, wholesome maiden can be trusted?

 

First section we reach this post is the Oversized Books where things that are better when bigger are located.  We present a really big stompy robot whose cares where he stomps - the Iron Giant.

This 107 mm tall fast food toy was cleaned, molded copy right and advertising scrapped off and superfluous stickers removed.  A few coats of various shades of grey with the airbrush, grey brown on the recesses, fluorescent yellow eyes and some battle damage on his head and he was complete.

Guiding us to the next section is another fair May dancer.

We all can use some help in life.  What can be more helpful than centering yourself and working on your enlightenment in this busy noisy world?  

These Pulp Figures monks were painted using Two Thin Coat paints and Foundry skin triads. The larger wooden Buddha I inherited from my grandfather. I am not a Buddhist but I have always thought it looked best surrounded by plants.

Points: 115. Millsy, I'm guessing at the points for the Iron Giant so correct as needed.  The Ho scale kids & scenery were completed for one of my son's school projects long ago. 

Library Cart - 20 pts
Oversized Books - 20 points
Self-help - 20 points
7 28mm figures @ 5 - 35 points
1 107mm figure - 20 points [Millsy - sounds about right!]

From Millsy: I reckon by now you must have the largest collection of female miniatures of any challenger Tom. The May dancers are wonderfully characterful and I can see them both as NPC types for flavour or as protagonists e.g. cultists. The giant is a big guy but a simple paint job so let's score him like a 28mm vehicle. Great work!

From PeteF: A Phoenix for The Oversized Section (40 points)

Fire is hard to paint! And there's plenty on this rather lovely sculpt from Mantic Games.  It's a Kings of War model, a Titan, which can be included in both the Salamanders (Lizards riding lizards are definitely something I want to paint more) and Basileans (haughty paladin do-gooding types) factions.

I got the model as prize support at a tournament a while back - I guess the original owner decided against painting all that fire.  It's been sitting on the Pile of Potential waiting for the right moment to rise.  I have to thank Curt and the other Challenge organizers for the themed sections - I don't have an overarching project on the go at the moment and having to come up with models for each section has forced me to try new things and leave my comfort zone.

This one also gave me an excuse to try some new paints from AK - my local store has really branched out now with Vallejo(game, model and air), AP, Citadel, AK, Scale Color, Turbo Dork and I think a few more.  Two yellows an orange and a red make up the fire effects set and I loved using these paints.

The model is about 6 inches high and 8 inches across - full stretch wingspan would be around a foot- quite imposing on the gaming table.  I'll have to paint a whole bunch of lizards or knights if I want to use it for Kings of War.  

Maybe score this as a 28mm vehicle for 20 points plus 20 for the room.

Challenge XIV got off to a slooow start for me, but since January I've managed to perambulate through various sections of the Analogueville Library and make a weekly post.  I don't think I'll have time to complete all the sections but with the phoenix that makes at least two sections of four rooms - which I think means I can request a visit to Rare and Antique Books - hopefully there's enough time left to complete this - and maybe a few more challenges.

Great work, and great to hear that you are moving outside of your comfort zone with the challenge here. Was wondering what you would do here, and this looks to be the business for bigger is better. 

Great job, and 40 pts for you
Kyle

From GeoffreyT: A very big recalcitrant book and other monsters (Oversized books, Self help, autobiography, 85 points)

Hello Challengers,

This week I have only a few miniatures, but quite a few bonus points.  This will be tempered in future weeks when all the bonus points are gone.

The first is a home sculpt of the Agrippa, which is an oversized book.  

According to "A book of creatures" website, it is from folklore of Brittany.  It is a malevolent grimoire the height of a man, which must be beaten and fought by the reader or it will not reveal its secrets and will just show blank pages.  I made it from two bits of plasticard and some milliput between them. 

The sculpt is 30+ mm tall, as shown next to its mates.

For the Autobiography section we have a Tasmanian Devil, by Grenadier Miniatures, sculpted in the 80's.  I too am from Tasmania where I was born and bred, although I no longer live there. Indeed the reason I have not much painted this week was I was down in Tasmania visiting relatives.

And next we go to the Self Help section, where I browse through books on painting and sculpting of monsters.

My interest in miniatures is primarily derived from the Hobby Art aspect of the genre, gaming is mostly a social outlet for my hobby.  I have enough miniatures for the games I like, but I still do like to create.  I find it quite relaxing and calming.  In particular I like monsters.  These two below are home-sculpts inspired from fantasy gaming art.

An 'Axebeak', a large flightless bird with an axe like beak and a goblin with a moon shaped head, moon shaped glaive and moon shape on his shield.  The former is more a D&D style monster, and the latter more in keeping with Warhammer.

The library map update

So this week we have:

4 x 28mm miniatures = 20 points

3 x library sections = 60 points

Total = 80 points.

Kind Regards

Geoff.

From Millsy: There's just so much to enjoy here I almost don't know where to start Geoff. Your sculpting skills clearly exceed mine and the book of creatures is a really cool choice of subject for the Library theme. The clasp and embossed cover motif are brilliant and really give it a feeling both of something that shouldn't be messed with! The Tassie Devil is also a great mini and very evocative of the Looney Toons incarnation. Have another 5 points for your sculpting efforts. Awesome work mate!