PitFiend Tu Bellum

beatenzone @ 2009-11-17T18:12:00

2009-11-17T18:12:12Z

Painting

Finished all of the stuff I was working on (building FoW buildings, IG Valkyrie and a ton of Cryx). I magnetised the heck out of the valkyrie. The weapons are all magnetised, and so's the cockpit, so it fits back into the box the kit came in.

I'm trying out colour schemes for my Cryx now. My test bonejack model has lots of ice blue-to-white on the armour, with occasional black raised edges, and with bone for some of the plates. I've also got some detail in glowy green. It looks very pale and very good on the jacks, but I'm having trouble transfering the scheme effectively to the infantry. Think I'm going to have to mix in more colours.

Playing

Tried out playing Monsterpocalypse with Nathan at the normal club and with Mike, the manager of the new shop, Chimera. It's fun, beer and pretzels play, with certainly more tactical depth than the first look (pre-painted monsters, units and buildings on a printed fold-out paper map) would suggest. And it hurts the brain less than trying to do complex things in Warmachine. So, my tentacled cthuloid thingy munched on Nathan's space alien monster, and my giant deep-one body-slammed Mike's dinosaur into the flaming inferno left by a wrecked building.

Last Tuesday was Warmachine. I took out an all-new force of Cryx against Biscuit's Magnus's Agenda. I should have won. I failed badly to remember to cast Jump Start to stand up the knocked down Deathjack, when he could have, if stood up, walked up to Magnus and shoved him in the soul furnace. And the next turn I failed to roll an average roll on a shot from a Defiler that would have set Deathjack off after the run-away Magnus, to the same result.

Deathjack did smash his Mangler in one charge though, which was good. Biscuit sensibly spent the game falling back and trying to whittle me away with guns. I'd been chasing him and lining up the charges, while crippling his shooting as much as possible. Unfortunately, we didn't get to finish, as we ran out of time. And from a position where we were both missing about the same amount of stuff.

Played Felix at Warmachine on Thursday. He also didn't play as aggressively as last time, and played a much more canny fight. He used a solid line of hard infantry, with two heavy jacks behind it (Reckoner and Fire of Salvation), and Feora sat behind them. Any charges into the infantry just mean he's in place to counterattack with his heavies. I wasn't happy about doing more with this than shooting at him, until he send the Reckoner around the wrong side of a building in the middle of the table, seperating it from the rest of his force, and allowing me to start in on the rest of his stuff, with less risk of a heavy counter-strike. Result was that Feora, unlike Magnus, went straight in the soul furnace.

Deathjack lived up to its reputation and tore apart the Fire of Salvation, 4 Knights Exemplar and finally Feora. I did get a little luck on my side this game. After Deathjack smashed the FoS and the Exemplars, Feora herself cast Engine of Destruction, and charged and smashed the Deathjack. She only disabled it, rather than wrecking it, as there were still a damage box or two left, so my Necrotech got to the Deathjack and repaired it enough to get it back on it's feet. At which point it makes the kill.

The Mechanithralls surprised me, as, while being the cheapest infantry I can field, and their primary purpose being to feed to Deathjack in case Deathjack goes out of control, charged his isolated Reckoner and nearly totalled it. If we'd completed the final turn, they would have pulverised it. Also, the Leviathan did a great job. It made a great firebase, worked beautifully as the catalyst for Death Race, put a couple of rounds into the FoS, shot and trampled 7 of his Flameguard (my first ever trample attack), and was in position on the final turn to snip Feora in half if the Deathjack had failed to do the job.

I really like the combination of Mortenebra, Deathjack and Leviathan. It's kinda vicious if there's any enemy infantry on the table at all (Death Race works best with some squishy targets to trigger off the deaths of). Her spells Spectral Steel, Terminal Velocity, Jump Start and Death Race, not to mention her Recalibration feat, all combine to put a jack through terrain, ignoring being knocked down or frozen, past blocking models, into contact with the enemy caster from a long way away, and then make it significantly easier to hit the target. Deathjack is vicious enough to destroy anything in its path normally, and the Leviathan isn't shabby at killing things once it's got a to-hit buff. It's beautifully nasty.

I won my first tournament on Sunday. Went to the Leadbelt Wargames Show on Saturday, which I'd only heard about on Wednesday, got told, whilst there, of a Warmachine tournament on the Sunday. Turned up on the Sunday morning, no one else does, and I claim the win by default. Arf.

In theory, it should have been a good show. They had Harvey Hadden Stadium's gym, where the Club Challenge was in previous years, and had half gaming tables, half local model companies (Warlord, Hasslefree, Heresy, etc). There was meant to be a Flames of War, a Hordemachine and a Warhammer Ancients tournament over the weekend, but only the FoW got the players. I think there were about 20 of them, and not a great number of other folk showed. The FoW games did look awesome though. Next time, the organisers say, there's going to be more warning, and a lot more advertising...

beatenzone @ 2009-10-26T00:27:00

2009-10-26T00:59:38Z

And in other news.

Modelling

I've finished the Deathjack and 98% finished the Valkyrie. The Deathjack was actually even less fun than Lich Lord Terminus (Sister for scale reference) to stick together. And that's including pinning Terminus' poxy wings on (very small contact area and wings that size...).

Deathjack doesn't have feet at the end of his legs. He has a thick base pin. Then the feet stick on the side of that. And, once you've got him glued down, you've got a massive, metal body and arms, which are all in front of the legs, and there's no support to stop him toppling over forward...

At least the Valkyrie is a joy of chunkiness to put together. The only bits to do are PVAing the windshields and magnetising the weapons. I love this model, but realise that the resin version would have been a pain in the proverbial to build...

I've also got a ton of smaller Cryxian bits and pieces cleaned up, based and glued.

Gaming

On the tabletop, I filled in for Jake in a campaign game, dismantling Biscuit again in the process. I tried out my small privateer mercenary force led by Broadsides Bart against his secondary force led by Magnus the Traitor. I basically had Bart loading cannonballs into his Mariner all game, blasting things to pieces with the additional shots provided by the Broadsides spell, with the damage boosted by the Hotshot spell. Meanwhile, my Buccaneer threw nets over Biscuit's jacks, and the Freebooter got in the way and smashed what it could, all in order to slow his advance with his melee jacks, letting the Mariner do its dirty work. It also didn't help that most of Magnus's dirty tricks revolve around knocking enemy models down, then smashing them on the ground, and all my jacks are designed to stay upright on a moving ship, so are immune to knockdown... I didn't realise how much sting that would take away from him when putting the list together...

The campaign is looking like it may go on hiatus for the minute. We did the opening brawl and two rounds of the planned six so far. However, of 5 players, Jake is being out of town and the two Riches are both talking of being burned out on skirmish games, as they've been playing nothing but for a year and want to do something larger scale for a few weeks. Hopefully this isn't a death knell...

I also got to play in a random game against a random dude called Felix in one of the new games shops in Nottingham. We've suddenly got somewhere between 3 and 4 new shops all opened at the same time, all covering some combination of comics, board games, wargames and ccgs. The big thing they bring over the two existing comics shops is playing tables...

Felix took Menoth, which is the first time I've seen them on the table. And I put out Searforge as they're the only Warmachine faction I have with more than a couple of models with paint on them as yet. He played very very aggressively, burninating my infantry and smashing my Driller with his caster on second and third turns. I took full advantage of this, as he did left his caster up front and a bit exposed, so I bit her head off with my armour plated bear. Felix, unlike my usual crew, plays very very fast. It's something I need to do too...

beatenzone @ 2009-10-26T00:10:00

2009-10-26T00:26:04Z

Sister of Battle army.

1500(ish) points. Based using plastic stonework sheets from the local railway modelling shop. I've got a few more Sisters as well as all the weird stuff (penitent engines, repentia, flagellants, inquisitors, living saint) to paint.

Army painted with flat colours and a Badab Black wash, in order to get em looking like an army as fast as possible.

The Cannonesses. These two got light conversions and got painted properly:

Battle Sister squad 1. Half of these guys got painted properly:

These pics are ugly due to the flat colours and the flash on the camera flattening the colours (and showing up the wash where it settled on the surface instead of the cracks).

Seraphim squad 1. Second rank have had hand flamers converted into inferno pistols:

Seraphim squad 2:

Spare Seraphim Sister Superior. I say "spare", but she's usually first pick, as she's the one with the power weapon...:

Battle Sister Squad 2:

Battle Sister Squad 3:

Retributers. With lots of Heavy Bolter goodness:

Rhinos. The one that's an Immolator minus its turret will be getting a magnetised cupola ring at some point soon, so I can swap between Rhino and Immolator.

Exorcists:

beatenzone @ 2009-10-25T23:55:00

2009-10-26T00:09:10Z

Warmachine Searforge Commission mercenary contract army.

1150 points (500 points is a usual evening game), made up of rhulfolk (dwarves), ogruns (ogres), warjacks and one giant armour plated bear. Based with Iron Halo's Deus Ex Machina resin base inserts. A couple of them are missing base inserts as I added them to the army after ordering the first batch of inserts. This represents all but one of the models I've got for this army. The missing model being a recent converted Bokur that hasn't seen paint yet.

Army painted with flat colours and a Badab Black wash, in order to get em looking like an army as fast as possible.

These photos are ugly from a combination of the lack of depth to the paint and the flash completely flattening the colours.

Warcasters Durgen Madhammer and Gorten Grundback:

Wroughthammer Rockram and Ghordson Driller heavy warjacks:

Grundback Gunner light warjacks:

Grundback Blaster light warjacks:

Hammerfall High Shield infantry, minimum size unit:

Hammerfall High Shield infantry, second unit, max size:

Horgenhold Forge Guard, max size unit:

Gudrun the Wanderer and an Ogrun Bokur:

Herne and Jonne:

Thor Steinhammer and Lord Rockbottom:

Lug and Brun Cragback:

Wake me up, September, etc.

2009-10-07T13:28:31Z

Painting:

September saw the painting of the rest of the first 1500 points of the Sisters. 35 Sisters, 5 Seraphim, 2 Rhinos, 2 Exorcists, all based, base coated and washed.

Added to the already painted models gives me:

2x Canoness with jump packs and either Eviscerator or Blessed Weapon.
2x5 Seraphim with Sister Superior and a mix of special weapons.
3x10 Battle Sisters with Sister Superiors, heavy flamers and a mix of special weapons.
1x10 Retributers with 4 heavy bolters and a Superior.
2x Rhino for 2 of the Battle Sister squads.
2x Exorcist.

And that's 1500 points done.

I picked up the Rhino to Immolator upgrade sprue some time back before they stopped selling bitz, so once I realised that the AFVs were looking really plain, I dug out the sprue and pimped them out. They look so much better for a couple of bits apiece.

Modelling:

The FoW buildings are a bit stalled, but are nearly there. Two of them just need a bit of modelling clay (for door lintels and suchlike) and they'll be ready to paint. The tomb needs a roof building, plus a bit of clay, and it's ready to paint.

Recently I've been doing a round of building stuff. Been working on complicated Cryxian nightmares (Lich Lord Terminus and Master Necrotech Mortenebra rank up among the hardest builds I've done yet), cleaning and gluing a Soviet Tankovy company for FoW, and some random stuff from other forces.

I've got those FoW buildings, the last couple of Cryx bits, a couple of Pirate warjacks and my plastic Valkyrie to build, then it's back to the painting, starting with the Cryx I'm using in the campaign. I got the Valk on pre-order, and it's still on it's bloody sprues...

Playing:

We got the Hordemachine campaign going at the end of August. We did a 5-way brawl to start with (I got eliminated first, with Jake the ultimate winner), and are into the second round of resolving declared attacks. I lost my first game (against Nathan) due to taking my eye off the ball, and my second (RichB) by fractions, but took Biscuit apart in order to win the third, leaving me 1-3 instead of the expected 2-2 (I expected to beat Nathan and Biscuit, and to be out-bearded by Rich). Seems to be going well so far.

The Mk2 Warmachine rules have been released in full now, but without the Hordes Mk2 field test, we can't move over as 2 out of our 5 players are using Hordes factions in the campaign, and everyone but Jake has models for a Hordes faction.

beatenzone @ 2009-08-24T16:17:00

2009-08-24T15:36:46Z

This month, I have mostly been building things.

Maelstrom Games had their big re-opening at the start of August, with 25% discounts on everything. So I went berserk on Hordemachine stuff and a little bit of FoW. I've since spent the last 3 weeks building things (when not sat in a field in Derbyshire watching metal bands), and only touched a paintbrush for the first time last night. Still haven't finished building everything. I've got 3 heavy warjacks and 2 heavy-warjack-sized warcasters still to build...

I'm also most of the way through three more African buildings for Flames. Two larger Adobe buildings to match the first two I made, one with a courtyard, and a tomb, also with courtyard.

I bought a set of FREEM dice off Turn Signals on a Land Raider some time ago. Lovely things, but they're silver and cyan marbled, and while the FREEM is in white, the spots are silver. Can't read them in the light in the pub I play in. So, the first painting in a month was to respot them with white. I wanted to put some base colours on Sisters last night, but didn't get home from beating the Imperial Fists with my Iron Warriors until late.

Just about to kick off a Hordemachine campaign. I has written rules. I hasn't written any background or fluff, just rules for handling the campaign. Please make some noise if you see something I've forgotten or have obviously cocked up:

This campaign is intended to give some continuity and background to the games, and to encourage painting and scenario use. It is intended to be simple and straightforward to run. Extra stuff, such as special locations and special rules, tend to complicate and bog down the campaign part of the game, so I've tried to keep them to a minimum. The handicap system is obviously there to help maintain a challenge for all players involved. If there's any suggestions on how to make the campaign rules work more smoothly, I'm all ears.

Each person should pick which of their factions they will be using for the campaign at the start. If two people use the same faction (eg Khador), then they operate as two seperate factions for campaign purposes. You should use forces from this faction exclusively through the campaign. The exception being that if you're Seconded, then you can use one of your non-campaign factions. So, for instance, I'll be using Cryx as my campaign faction, but, if I play a game as a second, then I would probably use Mercenaries, Cygnar, Khador or Circle for variety.

At the start of the campaign, each player rolls d6, and takes it in turn, in descending order, to pick a territory hex. Go round in 3 times until each player has 3 hexes. There will be a neutral hex in the middle of the board may not be chosen, that will be claimed by the winner of the first game.

The map will be put together using Mighty Empires territory hexes. The hexes should ideally be used to decide the theme of the scenery that gets placed during the games, eg mountainous, coastline, river. I will put a number of extra bits in some of the tiles, such as towns, for more scenery inspiration.

If someone drops out, their hexes are no longer valid territory, but we'll keep them as part of the map in case someone else joins in. New players joining in get 3 hexes added to the existing map, using up disused hexes if possible. If someone drops out, then comes back, they get the same number of hexes back that they left with. Even if you can't win, you can still play kingmaker...

Each fortnight round, each player rolls d6 for order of action. In descending sequence, each player takes it in turn to pick a territory adjacent to one of their own to attack. They then have 2 weeks to arrange and play the game against the owner of the other hex. If they win the game, they claim the hex. If a player can't play, then they ask someone else to Second and play in their stead. The Second does count the game for their win-loss record.

Each player can only be attacked twice in a given round in order to not be overwhelmed with games. If a player has no hexes left, they may pick any hex on the board to attack, as their troops launch guerrilla attacks, or their faction launches a new expedition into the area. This is an ideal opportunity to theme a force with a different caster/'lock around either guerilla warfare or a new incursion.

When playing a game, please use a scenario chosen at random from the books, unless both players agree to an alternative. You'll need a list prepared for a normal scenario, as well as a list for if Mangled Metal/Tooth and Claw is rolled, where only your chosen Caster/'Lock and their immediate jacks/beasts are allowed. The 2 lists may be completely different if you choose.

Games are played with the following handicap, as appropriate to the size of game:

500 - ((Wins - losses) x 10)
350 - ((Wins - losses) x 5)

So, a record of 1-1 gives:
500 - ((1 - 1) x 10) = 500 - (0 x 10) = 500

Or, 5-1, gives:
350 - ((5 - 1) x 5) = 350 - (4 x 5) = 330

So, a player with a 3-0 record, versus a player with a 0-3 record, would be playing a 500 point game with 470 points against 530 points.

Winner of the campaign is the player with most hexes after 8 rounds. First and eighth rounds will be multiplayer matches. Winner of the first game claims the neutral hex. The winner of the final game can claim any hex on the board for his faction. Round 1 will be September 1st, and will be King of the Mountain. Round 8's scenario to be decided.

King of the Mountain scenario:

http://losthemisphere.wordpress.com/2009/07/07/king_of_the_mountain/

Purely for the King of the Mountain game, we'll keep the list of banned Casters/Locks that the Lost Hemisphere boys voted on. Feel free to use them in the rest of the games:

Khador – Vlad, Sorscha
Cygnar – Haley, Darius
Menoth – Kreoss, Harbinger
Cryx – Deneghra, Asphyxious
Circle – Baldur
Legion – Rhyas
Skorne – Hexeris
Trolls – Calandra

beatenzone @ 2009-07-24T14:08:00

2009-07-24T13:24:56Z

Brief update.

I came to a conclusion. I can spend lots of time making models look pretty, or I can spend time battering through many models making them look OK in order to actually have painted models on the tabletop, and then come back later and add more layers of paint.

So, this last month, I've been getting a base coat, then a layer of Badab Black, on all my Searforge Commission models (these guys, these guys, these guys, and their mates). I've also been putting resin base inserts onto their bases, which has meant clipping all the base tabs and drilling a pin into each foot... There will be photos once I've completed the painting.

I has a proper dining room table now the dining room is painted, so I've also been acquiring scenery. Made contact with a GW staffer I'd not seen in a bit, who happened to be having a clearout, and I've now got a big heap of Epic and Cities of Death scenery and the plastic trees. Shiny.

Finally tried out Flames of War at long last. I've been mostly playing Hordes/Warmachine this year, and that one's all about individuals pulling nasty combos on the opposing models, where FoW is very much about company level play with weight of fire being much more the deciding factor, so the feel is very different.

Hopefully going to have a go at running a simple Hordemachine campaign very soon. Going to use it as impetus to paint up more models, as well as a chance to have more background and scenario play to the games.

beatenzone @ 2009-06-13T00:16:00

2009-06-12T23:20:11Z

Finally. Bloody. Finished.

I'm not happy with the photo with white models on a white background. Pale grey or blue would have been better. I'm not happy with the pale colours all around the head of Belakane. Either the hair or cloak should have been darker to make her face pop more. I need to work on shading the reds more, I need to smooth out the white more, I need my black highlighting blend to be smoother, and I need to speed up with painting these things.

*pant* *pant* *pant*

Other than that, very happy with them. Huge improvement on where I was with a brush 2 years ago.

Sisters (post 2 of 2)

2009-06-03T11:34:37Z

My first 5 finished Battle Sisters. Very happy with the sacred roses on the sleeves, and with the overall look. I still need to work on smoothness of finish and on how to highlight the red effectively. And on turning them out a bit faster.

And WiP Canonesses. I was only going to do the first one of these, but kinda got carried away with painting both, as I'm loving painting the second one. She's got all little extra details all over her that keep my attention. The "Madonna" style breastplate is a bit silly though.

Stonework (post 1 of 2)

2009-06-03T11:33:58Z

I was looking at resin buildings for the Flames of War, having bought a very nice ammo dump from Kerr & King. Both Battlefront and K&K do 15mm resin Adobe buildings, Battlefront's are the more expensive, but come pre-painted. I wasn't massively happy with the pricing of either, especially when I thought "wait up, those adobe buildings are just boxes with a bit of detail, really". So I went and got the foamboard and the Polyfilla. I'm very happy with the results, especially with the little Milliput tarpaulins I added.

Going to do some bigger buildings at some point, and I've got some brickwork textured plasticard so I can do some courtyards and some bits where the plaster has fallen away.

Middle piece of the first pic is the resin Kerr & King ammo dump.

update 2 - test models

2009-05-19T16:25:22Z

Some colour testing on one Warmachine model and one Hordes model. It's a Cryxian Nightwretch, he's a Reeve of Orboros from the Circle.

I wanted to try something different on the Cryx. I'd tried painting another Nightwretch in greens, with orange, black and bone, but I wanted to let the gubbins be in green for fluff reasons, rather than the orange I was using, which didn't work with the existing test colours.

I'm very happy with the look of the head of the Nightwretch, and am amused by the idea of painting hideous evil warmachines and undead in pastels. The spikes, which aren't so obvious in this pic, are shiny silver over a black layer.

I love how that panel of the cloak looks on the Reeve. After finishing the rest of the cloak in the same way, I'm going to use a similar technique on the rest of the army using black through purple and grey into white for stonework (which there is lots of in the Circle army I've bought), and specifically in his case, his arrowheads and blade.

I've gone for a brown under-garment with autumnal shades for the rest of the outfit. I'm not 100% sure about the panels of red in among the yellow shades, but am going to see how some highlighting tones it down.

The front of the Reeve.

Just cos I'm impressed with the sheer size, that on the right is my Gnarlhorn Satyr, who's been on backorder since about January. He's huge. That's a 50mm diameter base he's mounted on.

update 1 - Sisters

2009-05-19T16:25:02Z

Sisters of the Sacred Rose Canoness. This is just base coat and lots of Badab Black.

Veteran Sister Superior. Pretty much done. I think I've reduced her eyes a little and given her lower lip a darker shade since this photo.

I'm having real problems getting smooth looking white. Grahgh.

Celestian. I may do a little more to emphasise the detail on her bolter.

Battle Sister.

The roses I've painted on the Celestian and the Sister.

Some Sister WiPs.

2009-05-15T16:32:27Z

I'm painting 2 squads of 10 Battle Sisters, 5 Seraphim, 1 Cannoness, and 2 Rhinos in this painting block.

Two Sisters. Sister on the left is base coat + Badab Black. Sister on the right has some tidying and a little highlighting going on.

The first full squad. Base coat + Badab Black in this pic. Devlan Mud went on the faces though, rather than the black wash. The one with the helm will get more detail, and will be used as a Celestian along with the other helmed ladies when I want to use Celestians in the army.

Swapping the turretted bolters for a storm bolter made a huge difference to the look of the vehicle, so it's been done on both Rhinos and both Exorcists. This is base coat + Badab Black. (I can see paint from the previous incarnation of this Rhino under the white, dagnabbit.)

Canonness conversion.

Seraphim. This pic is just really to show the look of the wings, cos you can't see owt else. They're straight from the Swooping Hawks.

These are a proper pain in the proverbial to attach en masse, as you've got a lot of drilling accurately into a very small area to do in order to pin them. It's a problem as if you get it wrong, you tend to end up with holes in your thumb and finger, which then tend to wind up with metal shards in them from the drill. Fun. Even more so when you stick the drill down an existing drill hole in your thumb. I wounded myself more in getting 13 of these sets of wings attached to assorted Seraphim backpacks than I've ever done in 20 years gaming.

One thing GW have never released is a Seraphim with paired Inferno Pistols. I realised that the conversion is ridiculously easy.

1: Take a Seraphim with hand flamers, like so:

2: Cut off the fuel tank. Cut off the squirty nozzle at the front. Drill out the barrel. Tidy up.

3: File down one side of the fuel tank, cut the detail back on one side of the pistol so the fuel tank will fit cleanly, and attach. Voila. One mini-melta-looking pistol.

For the bases, I took a packet of these from my local Friendly Railway Modelling Shop:

They look good, but are very thick plastic. I couldn't find any equivalent in the plasticard ranges, so gave these a try.

I cut out a rough 25mm circle, cut it along existing gaps in the "flags", then cut down the Sister's base tab as shown. I had real problems with cutting the tabs without bending the legs of the model in the process, as my side cutters tend to push the pieces they're cutting through apart, and the knife doesn't like the thickness of the metal. Suggestions are welcome about techniques to use...

Line up the base tabs with the larger half of the slabs. Mark the plastic with pencil where the tabs need to go.

Cut into the plastic at angles, so as to cut out the holes for the base tabs. Use a sharp knife, and make small cuts. Cut once vertically, then make small diagonal cuts toward the vertical cut, chipping away at the plastic.

Then go the other way.

Until the base tabs fit the holes nicely. They don't need to be tight, or perfect, just so long as the tabs don't protrude out from the plastic. If the tabs do stick out, the two pieces of plastic won't meet nicely.

Glue the smaller piece to the slottabase, so the front edge of the piece is in line with the rear edge of the gap in the slot.

Then glue down the front piece, and insert your model in order to make sure the model can actually fit into the base.

Then it's just a case of trimming the edges of the plastic so it's flush with the slotta. Using a file should get a smooth finish to it, but I didn't go that far.

beatenzone @ 2009-04-29T18:38:00

2009-04-29T17:43:27Z

I've got a bit more done on painting the Sisters. Not much, like, because I've been prepping and gluing way too much Hordemachine and FoW stuff. I also find that working on working out *how* I'm going to paint something takes an awful lot longer than when I know what I want to do and can just plough on with it.

When painting, I've been experimenting with blacks and whites. There's tutorials on Brushthralls (black, white) I've been paying attention to, and I'm trying to get the look of shiny black hair and matt black robes, rather than just paint black in one way. I'm happy with the way the hair works, but less happy with the robes, and I'm really struggling to get a smooth white on the armour. I found this a couple of days ago, and I love the subtle purple on the flat surfaces, and I'm going to have to steal it.

And it looks like painting the white roses on each model isn't going to be quite as painful as I thought it'd be. Good job, as that's ultimately a rose on each and every one of the fifty+ Sisters infantry I own...

It feels a bit weird applying mixed "grades" of painting to the parts of models. In order to progress though, I don't want to spend all my time on getting all the techniques sorted out and making one perfect model. I want models on the table.

Recorded my first win at Hordesmachine against Ritch last night. Cryx, with Denegra, 2 Nightwretches, 2 Pistol Wraiths, the Revenant Crew and Gorman versus his Everblight (the Sigil as warlock, Seraph, Teraph, 2 Harriers, 2 Shredders). Basically kept his caster and Teraph knocked down with constant arc-noded Scourge spells, while whittling away at his beasts, until all that's left is his Teraph, one of my Nightwretches, one of my Revenants, and the casters, and Denegra finally got her chance to skewer the warlock on her spear. Very hard fought game, that I thought mistakenly I'd won on turn two with a Scourge hit followed by both Pistol Wraiths opening up on his caster. Only being able to transfer damage to one of the beasts saved his caster from a very quick demise...

Biscuit, who's struggling to work with the combos with his Skorne, I've pulped twice now. Ritch, I've got caught out by his Everblight twice so far, and that was the first win. I think I'm now on 3:2. Which is nice.

While looking at Weird World War stuff, I've been eyeing up either Secrets of the Third Reich or AE-WWII rules. They both sound, from the reviews, very straightforward and adaptable. I realise that I'm looking for less detail, more abstraction, but with elegance and "feel" from my rules sets. Hordesmachine is looking good. Confrontation errs on the side of too detailed, I think. It'd certainly benefit from some streamlining of the way the skills are presented, in just so much as to take the skills that essentially do the same thing, but for a different stat, and to call them skillname (stat). So, for instance, maybe Master (Att) would let you roll up 5s and 6s on Att rolls, and Master (Def) would do the same for Initiative rolls.

And ramble. And relax.

Armour plated, covered in spikes and rolling over your gran's house.

2009-04-08T16:31:46Z

The last month has seen a few things.

- I've stuck together a ton of WarMachine/Hordes and Flames of War stuff. This involved lots of drilling, wire and 2 entire tubes of superglue (some of that was used on the SoB bits as well). And I'm not done yet.

- I converted a few more SoB bits, including winged jump packs for the Seraphim, a second Exorcist, and working out a simple Inferno Pistol conversion for the Seraphim.

(The wings for the jump packs are Swooping Hawk wings. I bought a job lot of em just before they stopped selling bitz for just this porpoise. And I've drilled and pinned all of em. And I put several holes in my thumb with the drill and a sizeable slice into my finger in the process. I'm normally very good at avoiding modelling injuries...)

- I played Ritch B and Ritch T (the latter is aka Biscuit) at WM/H. Against Ritch B and his Everblight, my Pirate Queen Skarre got squashed by his respawned Carnivean (which she dismembered in the first place) after a proper back-and-forth bloodbath, and against Biscuit, his Skorne got mashed by Gorten Grundback pretty much singlehandedly. Gorten took out his Titan Gladiator and then his caster with the aid of his trusty hammer on turns 2 and 3 respectively.

- I started painting SoBs. The first squad and Rhino got base coated and washed, and look really good for it. The hard part now is getting the highlighting right. Especially the black robes and the black hair.

- I successfully sold the Necron BFG fleet. Battleship, 3 cruisers, 14 escorts. All gone. I've got a raft of other stuff lined up for more Ebaying, I just got to get round to it.

- I may have bought more stuff, including several Panzers for Flames of War, a couple more Seraphim, more stuff for the WM/H heap, and a small handful of the Monsterpocalypse 'I Chomp NY' units. I may have also put an Imperial Guard Codex and a plastic Valkyrie on advance order. But this may just be a vicious rumour.

Oh, and I went to the Forgeworld open day. I sawed lots of titans in the flesh, a game of Aeronautica with 40k scale aircraft, some sketch books of some of the artists, and some shiny new Chaos nastiness.

Mmmm... Chaos nastiness...

Pics of the painted:

Epic Lost and the Damned Contagion Demon Engines of Nurgle.

Epic Lost and the Damned Thunderbolts.

Man'o'War Chaos Plaguegalleys.

Girl on the left is wash over basecoat. Girl on the right has some highlighting. The highlighting on the weapon went wrong, as I didn't have enough light to see that it was going wrong. *sigh*

All just basecoat and Badab Black wash. The red isn't so pink in real life.

Again, just basecoat and Badab Black wash. Swapping the old bolters for the newer Stormbolter model makes a huge difference to the look of the Rhino.

One thing they've never released for the Sisters is a Seraphim holding a pair of Inferno Pistols. They are basically the pistol version of the Melta. I realised that the conversion is actually dead easy a couple of weeks ago.

Start with a hand flamer.

Cut the nose off. Cut off the fuel tank. Shave the side of the tank flat. Stick the tank to the side of the weapon. Drill out a hole where the nose was. Tidy it up a little. Voila, one Inferno Pistol.

beatenzone @ 2009-03-11T19:20:00

2009-03-11T19:30:29Z

Woo. Productivity. 3 Plaguegalleys, 4 Contagions, 2 Thunderbolts, all painted in about 8 days flat. That leaves just 7 ships worth of sails and masts to make in order to complete 1500 points of Plaguefleet, which is where I'll leave that army. And the Contagions and the Tbolts bring me up to 1200 points of Lost and the Damned, of the 3000 planned.

Also this week been frantically pinning and gluing the assorted Warmachine/Hordes stuff for last night, and converting a second Exorcist (aka the very first Whirlwind model) for the Sisters.

Aaand, I even put a Necron BFG fleet up on Ebay on Sunday.

Not going to add up how much I've bought this year though. It's quite depressing how little willpower I have for this sort of thing.

Played my first Warmachine/Hordes game using my Orboros models against RitchB using my Cryx last night. I was well on the way to smashing him into the ground when I used my warlock, Baldur, to obliterate a Deathripper. Unfortunately, I threw all my fury into mashing the 'jack, and didn't leave enough to spawn an defensive measures between me and his warcaster, War Witch wotsit. She steps forward and spears my dude. Game over, defeat snatched from between the jaws of victory.

Good fun though. Gonna play more next week.

beatenzone @ 2009-03-01T21:21:00

2009-03-01T21:22:21Z

This is the last infantry base for the second LatD cult. I was spending a bit more time on it for a competition on Ammobunker.

beatenzone @ 2009-02-27T16:27:00

2009-02-27T16:27:29Z

Remaining handful of Panzergrenadiers plus transports.

Lieutenant and spotter for Nebelwerfer artillery. Ruined building is scratched from plasticard, sprue and polyfilla.

Objective markers. These are resin castings from Kerr & King.

This is all the DaK I have painted to date. This is now a tabletop legal force of somewhere around the 500 point mark.

This is almost all the DaK I have.
(Spotters guide to the unpainted stuff:
- Behind the trucked infantry there's a platoon of HMGs.
- On the left, that's 2 Stugs, 3 Panzer IIIs, a Scout platoon with motorbike transport and a Panzerpioneer platoon with halftracks. )
(There's also a battery of 4 anti-tank guns, a pair of truck mounted flak guns, and a handful of trucks and staff cars that aren't pictured as they're not assembled.)

Nurgle Lost and the Damned cult number 2 of 5. The trucks are Skytrex 6mm WWII ones.

Everything that's painted for the LatD to date. The objectives are built from bits from this set.

beatenzone @ 2009-02-27T13:28:00

2009-02-27T13:56:56Z

Hellfire. It's the tail of Feb and I've not posted anything in 6 weeks.

Right.

Gaming is back on course. I've been to the Hammer'n'Ales club 5 weeks running, and to the 1st Coy Veterans once.

I've been playing Confrontation with my Mid-Nor at Hammer'n'Ales, and while these are my first 5 ever games against guys who've been playing for years, doing ok for the most part. Regenerating, respawning, zombified, possessed dwarves are really quite tough. It's fun absorbing a charge, regenerating the damage, then smacking the opposition in the face with curse effects and sharp things.

I took an almost pure Sisters force to the Veterans, and they're quite mean. Divine Guidance (aka Rending) on Heavy Flamers is just horrifying. As is the Exorcist when it's got terminators in the open to hunt. However, I've not made it back for another go as I usually end up wanting Thursday nights to myself in order to chill and paint and watch Boy Films.

The Pledge is, as is traditional now, going badly. I've been buying odds and sods (more grunt Sisters, more Monsterpocalypse, a griffon for use with both High and Wood Elves, 6mm zombies, flak for the DaK), plus I've started a Circle of Orboros force for Hordes (human tree huggers, armed with walking rocks and hairy monsters), as well as a Seaforge Commission force for Warmachine (dwarven mercenaries).

On the other paw, I sold my (almost untouched after 2 years) Forgeworld resin Valkyrie on Ebay for about retail price, the Sunday before the pictures from the new WD of the plastic version surfaced on Bell of Lost Souls. Score.

Also, painting is going well. Since the last update, I've completed 5 infantry bases, 2 transport vehicles and 2 objectives for FoW, and 13 infantry bases, 7 transport vehicles and 3 objectives for the Epic LatD.

The 14th LatD infy base, the Arch Heretic, is having a bit more care taken over it, though that's deadlined for completion by the end of tomorrow. I've also got base coats on 4 artillery and 2 fliers for the LatD and the last 3 ships for the Man'o'War Plaguefleet, which should all take no time to finish.

Once these latter are done, those chunks of the DaK and LatD armies are off my painting table.

Ooo. Nearly forgot. In terms of conversions, I thought I'd not done anything yet. I was wrong. I scratched up a little ruined building for the DaK artillery spotter to lie on top of. While I can see where it could be improved, I'm quite proud of how that one's turned out.

Next up, I'll be taking a week of selling, building and converting. Then I can add 400/500 point forces of the Mid-Nor and the Cryx to the painting heap to keep the Sisters and Eldar company. I've also got sails for the last 7 of the Man'o'War ships to make.

At some point, once some of this lot is done, I start painting Panzers.

beatenzone @ 2009-01-20T01:34:00

2009-01-20T01:47:03Z

Epic Lost and the Damned army list includes an option for a Zombie Plague. 3d6 rubbish teleporting bases for 175 points. It's a nice cheap activation, and the only really suitable Citadel model is the original Epic Imperial Guard support weapon crewman, and it'd be ridiculous trying to amass 90 of them...

Score:

http://www.exoduswars.com/store/edenite-zombie-horde-p-72.html?osCsid=481e6c93568b07c1aa0cc53f5e1c78ec

Braaaains.

Pledge Summary 2008

2009-01-12T20:57:48Z

In summary: Fail.

But, I did paint an awful lot more than I'd normally get done. And, it was mostly due to a burst of interest in non-GW stuff that the buying happened. And a High Elf army.

Painted:

28mm:

8 XV-15 Stealth suits
8 Shield drones
2 Marker Drone
1 C&C Drone
1 Commander Shadowsun
3 Fireknife XV-8 Crisis Suit
4 Piranha
1 converted XV-88 Broadside suit
2 Devilfish
1 Skyray
1 Hammerhead
12 converted Honour Guard Firewarriors
2 Sniper Drone Spotters
6 Sniper Drones
52 (126 (battlesuits=2, piranhas=5, tanks=10))

2 Iron Warrior Vindicators
2 Iron Warrior Bikers
8 Iron Warrior infantry (sorceror, familiar, drummer, icon bearer, 2 autocannon, 2 missile launcher)
12 (32 (bikes=2, tanks=10))

3 IG Basilisks
1 IG Chimera
4 (40)

1 Marauder of Vile Tis
1 Halberdier of Mid Nor
2 Cryx Deathturkeys
4 (5 (ogre-sized infantry=2))

Man'o'War:

2 Plagueships
9 Plaguecrushers
3 Plaguegalleys
1 converted Plague Blimp
1 converted Bileship
16

15mm:

4 DaK Trucks
2 DaK Kubelwagen
3 DaK Command bases
8 DaK infantry bases (6 mg, 1 antitank rifles, 1 light AT gun)
3 DaK nebelwerfers
1 DaK bike + sidecar
21

6mm:

21 LatD infantry bases
21

grand total painted: 126
counting tanks as 10 each: 216
(plus pre-painted models: 271)

converted:

28mm:

1 XV-88 Broadside
12 Honour Guard Fire Warriors
1 Slaaneshi Demon Prince
4 Imperial Guard Rough Riders
1 Manowar Plague Blimp
3 Manowar Plaguegalleys
1 Manowar Bileship
1 Manowar Cloudship
1 Cthulhu
1 Manowar Crystalship
1 Hive Fleet Naga Tyranid Warrior
1 Sororita Palatine
1 Sororita Confessor
1 Plaguetrencher
14 Zombies

grand total converted 44

sold:

28mm:

88 Marines
1 Dreadnought
6 Marine bikes
95

bought:

BFG:

1 Adeptus Mechanicus Battleship
1 Vengeance Grand Cruiser
3 Defence Platforms
5

Epic:

2 Epic Warhounds
2

Man'o'War:

3 Eagleships
1 Plagueship
3 Plaguecrushers
7

15mm:

50 Japanese artillery crew
50 Japanese infy in hats
50 Japanese infy in helmets
8 Japanese field guns
6 Japanese Chi Ha Shihota tanks
3 Japanese Ka Mi tanks
assorted extra infantry models
(58 infantry bases, 9 tanks)

4 DaK AT guns
3 DaK Kubelwagens
4 DaK Trucks
11

28mm:

12 Samhaino Elfball players
14 Pharoahs of Viktoria
13 Deadlings
1 Deadwood Treeman
2 Mini Deadwood Treemen
6 Black Rock Dwarven Centaur
47

18 Cryx infantry and Warcasters
5 Cryx Deathjacks and Mercenary Heavy Warjacks
5 Bonejacks
28

1 Chaos Space Marine Sorceror
1 Chaos Space Marine Autocannon
1 Seraphim Sister Superior
1 Flagellant
21 Tyranids
25

1 Masque
5 Plaguebearer command
12 Daemonette riders
18

11 Psychic and/or Mutant Scrunts
20 Chaos Dwarfs
4 Chaos Dwarf Bazooka crew
35

1 Wood Elf Dragon Lord + Dragon
1 Skaw the Falconer

67 High Elf infantry
2 Eagle Claw bolt throwers + 4 crew
4 White Lion Chariots, each inc 2 crew + 2 lions
9 High Elf cavalry
80

4 Therian heros (Tiamat, Urash, Atis, Nina Zero)
4 Golgoths
6 Bane Goliaths
11 Assault Golems inc 5 Nanoguns, 2 Overseers
15 Grim Golems inc 9 Flamers
20 Storm Golems inc 6 Sonic Guns, 1 Overseer
60

29 Soviet NBC troopers.
29

grand total bought: 380
(in summary: 1 High Elf army, 1 small Chaos Dwarf army, 1 Therian army for AT-43, 1 Cryx army for Warmachine, 1 15mm Japanese army for Flames of War, 3 Bloodbowl/Elfball teams, and bits and bobs for other armies.)

summary:
painted 126 (216 (271 including prepaints))
converted 44
sold 95
bought 380 (more if you add on the bonus points for big models)

beatenzone @ 2009-01-12T17:55:00

2009-01-12T17:57:35Z

Well, I've started the year in a mixed fashion.

I've got all of the little groups of models I want to work on first this year converted, glued, based, and undercoated and ready to go. I've also got the two High Elves finished off and a layer of gloss drying on them, and am drawing up an army list for taking the Sisters out to play on Thursday at Warhammer World.

High Elfs. I'm really happy with the way the orange detail works. The Lions are meant to be woodsmen, yet the normal paint job is with bright red in their outfits. And the green variants I've seen people use online just doesn't sit right with me. The archer started from a black undercoat, the Lion from white. I'm going to start using white undercoats, and, as the mail turned out so much nicer on the archer, paint that over with black solely when there's metals or such to go over it.

On the other proboscis, I have punted up for 7 Blights for demons for the Death Guard, 3 Hellblades for the Epic Iron Warriors, 3 Salamanders for the Epic IG, 2 Apostate Preachers because they look awesome, and 1 Yasheth from Monsterpocalypse because I'm an utter sucker for tentacles.

Mmmm... Tentacles...

Part of the pile I'm putting together for painting in the new year is the next 500 points of pointyheads. I painted this first 500 in 2007 while living in the hotel in Uxbridge. I'm not going to change the style any for the next batch, as they should fly off the workbench that way.

I painted the bikers with the icons of 3 households on the canopies, intending expanding them ultimately to 3 squadrons of 6. I'd have done them as just 2 households, but I wanted to make sure I didn't lose a design that only existed on a piece of paper somewhere...

beatenzone @ 2009-01-06T17:23:00

2009-01-06T17:23:27Z

Well, I got the decks pretty much cleared. The first waves of the DAK and the Lost and the Damned are done. Pics are in the two previous posts. Only the accursed Basilisk tracks and the 2 Warmachine Cryxian deathturkeys still outstanding from last year's workbench.

I think I may just revert to using the old favorite technique of drybrushing the tank tracks. It looks pretty good when tested on the underside of one of them, and it's a little less psychotic than hard-edging the lot.

I'm not going to do a Scale of the Problem post. It'd be too scary and depressing, bearing in mind that just to start with, I've got 8 WHFB armies alone (Warriors, Demons, Beasts, High Elves, Wood Elves, Tileans, Goblins, Chaos Dwarfs) that have very limited paintedness...

Instead of worrying about that lot, I've been working on getting the next batch of work prepared and ready to paint. I'm getting all the conversions, (most of the) basing and the undercoating done for everything, before painting anything.

I'm lining up:

- 3 converted Plaguegalleys. These will be the last of the Man'o'War Nurgle.

- 15 DAK infantry models and 2 DAK transports. To bring the painted part of the force up to a playable number.

- The second Epic Lost and the Damned coven, plus a support formation. 14 bases, 7 transports, 4 artillery.

- 20 Sororitas and 5 lightly converted Seraphim.

- and a small heap of Saim Hann Eldar. 6 bikers, 3 Spears, mounted Warlock, mounted Autarch, foot Autarch.

All of which will be batch painted and should be done nice and fast.

Last night, on a bit of a whim, while working on preparing the lot above, I put paint to the High Elf test models. A White Lion and an Archer. I'm really happy with how they look, and they should be nice and quick to paint in bulk, so once a reasonable chunk of the above list are done, some High Elfs will get into the painting heap. Pics up soon.

beatenzone @ 2009-01-06T16:52:00

2009-01-06T16:58:58Z

Epic Lost and the Damned Coven with Demagogue, 16 cultist units and 4 Fire Support stands.

I've painted the skin of the infantry in an angry pink, trying to suggest inflamation and illness. The dude in the pale armour is a converted Death Guard keeping an eye on the Demagogue. I'm not massively happy with either the Death Guard conversion or the photos (not enough light sources). When I figure out how to do a decent backpack for him, I'll do some closeup photos.

Closeup without the base done.

This is the support coven. The other 4 covens will be 14 infantry instead of 21, with lots of mutants (beastmen models), and transports. Then there will be Demon Engines, Thunderbolts and a pile of lesser demons to keep them company.

beatenzone @ 2009-01-06T16:52:00

2009-01-06T16:55:19Z

Deutscheafrikakorps Panzergrenadiercompanie HQ section, Nebelwerfers, and Rifle Platoon.

I'm very very happy with the trucks, particularly with the windows and the iconography. I'm less happy with the photos of the infantry, as only using the flash from the camera has flattened them a lot.

HQ section. Commander, 2nd in Command, 2 transports.

HQ anti tank section. Anti tank rifles and a light AT gun.

Nebelwerfer battery.

Rifle platoon transports.

Rifle platoon infantry.

This isn't a tabletop legal force yet. It needs 2 more rifle bases, a second rifle command base, a truck and a kubelwagen to carry them, and an observer team for the nebels. That's the next job when I'm next working on the DAK.