Testing mobile blogger app...

Hi all, nothing much to report due to DIY commitments (laying laminate flooring is not as bad as I thought it would be). The purpose of this post is to test the mobile blogger app, and to let you know I'll be at Games Expo in Birmingham this weekend. A couple of the Ancible team are entering the X-Wing tournament, and I'm going to be trying out some new board games, and doing a little light shopping...

The attached (I hope) picture is of some Victorian British Bobbies I did for another Ancible team member quite a while back. They are for his "Gentleman's Club masquerading as Police" Empire of the Dead faction. The cobbled bases were made with green stuff, and worked really well for my first attempt at that sort of thing - the recipient was happy too, which is the main thing! The miniatures were a royal pain in the arse to paint and put me right off Foundry miniatures...

As always, comments are very welcome! !

Salute Post 2 (Delayed)

Well, it's been a while since Salute, and I completely forgot to post up a picture of my haul...

From the top, I got Ticket to Ride for Mrs Walker as part of her Birthday present.  It's a lovely, simple, yet elegant game that's loads of fun - if you've watched Wil Wheaton's TableTop show on YouTube, it's featured in an episode.  Very highly recommended (both the game and the show)!

The first row of blisters are all from Micro Art Studios.  Two packs of resin bases (which will appear in posts soon I hope), and Moist Von Lipwig and Adora Belle from their Discworld range.

The next row starts with Guillermo, Kaylee and some leather shields from Hasslefree.  Next is a rather stunning miniature from Origen Miniatures, and "Live by the Axe...Zombie Hunter" from Ax Faction.  I got to chat to these guys for a bit which was very cool - I find it more interesting to talk to the small companies, they seem to have more time for people.  You'll also see the Orange special Salute 2013 dice in that row too.

Along the bottom is the Salute 2013 model (which is rather nice actually), and then a couple of Demonic Familiars, Sebastien the Apprentice Mage, and a Wood Elf Sorceress from Heresy Miniatures.

Now, my cunning plan (OK, it's not cunning, and it's barely a plan...), is to get all the miniatures you see here painted before Salute 2014.  Now that doesn't seem much of a challenge, but as you may be aware, I am easily distracted by new things, and my haul from Salute 2012 is probably only 25% completed, so I have work to do, and focus to keep.

There are 11 miniatures in the picture, so I plan to do one a month (with one month off for good behaviour), interspersed among my other projects.

Wish me luck...

Salute 2013

I have to say I had an absolute blast at Salute this year, and I think it was a much better event than last year.  The stands were better laid out and I was able to see much more, talk to people, and it didn't feel quite so manic, even though there seemed to be more people this year.

Obviously the big highlight was the bloggers meet-up, where I finally got to meet the third corner of the Tale of Painters triangle, Mr Michael Awdry from 28mm Victorian Warfare, plus some new people I didn't know before (and new blogs to follow) and meeting up with some previously known reprobates (that'll be you Fran...and Mike...and Ray...).  It was really good to talk games, painting and blogging in general, comparing lead mountains and painting backlogs, and the joy of Oldhammer.

I'll give a run down of my purchases tomorrow (I spent quite a bit to be fair), but for now, here are a few demonstration/participation games that caught my eye.

Like a muppet, I didn't take note of who was running these games, so I'll have to take a look at the event programme when I get the chance and try and work out who was who, and what was what.  I do however know that this one was the Wolsung participation game, run by the lovely people at Micro Art Studio.  There was so much detail on what was quite a small board, it just blew me away.

I'm pretty sure this is terrain produced by Warmill, it's very "Starship Troopers" and would look good for games of Infinity.

These two were lovely Japanese themed boards - a few of our gaming group have Bushido warbands, so I may be tempted to give this style of architecture a go at some point (yeah I know, yet another potential project which will get listed and never see the light of day...).

Last but not least was this rather fantastic Dungeons and Dragons terrain piece.  There seemed to be unpainted D&D miniatures available to buy (I think they were called "Collectors" or something, I don't know, I haven't had much sleep the last week...), which I hadn't seen before.  The purple light was provided by LEDs, which was really effective.

Fran told me I had to post more (he gave me "the look" as he said it), so this is my attempt at posting more.  Hopefully tomorrow you'll see my addition to the lead mountain, with a few comments on retailers and stands and then I'll try posting something I've actually painted recently...

As always, comments welcome!

Going a bit "old-school"

Sometimes the old ones are the best.  That's a statement not usually applicable to jokes, but I really do think it applies to GW Chaos Miniatures (see the Realm of Chaos section here).  I do like some of the newer Chaos stuff, but it all seems too regular - a unit of the new Chaos Warriors is a regiment of almost identical looking, similarly armed soldiers that appear to be marching in unison - where's the "Chaos" in that?  Surely that look of the unit would be more suited to "Lawful Evil"?  Why are Daemons and Beastmen separate armies now?

Just needed to get that off my chest...

There are a few "Oldhammer" blogs (and a forum) out there at the moment, and I love both the idea and the nostalgia.  While I'll never have enough old miniatures to create a valid army, this time last year I thought it would be cool to create some warbands for games like Skulldred and Get The Girl, Kill The Baddies, using some lovely old miniatures, and maybe mixing in a few newer figures that "fit".  My first warband was a group of Barbarians, but I got bogged down with other projects, and never did much more.  The bug bit again, Easter came around, and I spotted this miniature sat around in a box:

He had a ropey old paint job that was probably 20 years old, so I stripped him and started again.  It's a quick paint job, so it has a few rough edges, but I'm pleased with the result.  The "old-school" (I don't like the term old-school very much, but I couldn't think of anything else, and it's at least better than "retro") in the title should give you an idea of the look I was going for, and although the green is possibly a little too jade green for Nurgle, I think it works.  It's a base coat of Caliban Green, washed with Agrax Earthshade, then highlighted with the green and then mixing in a bit of Steel Legion Drab, and then some Rakarth Flesh to finish up.

The leather bits are a base coat of Rhinox Hide, again washed with Agrax Earthshade, and then highlighted with Rhinox Hide and then mixing in more and more Snakebite Leather.  The axe handle is the same, but with Dryad Bark and Steel Legion Drab instead.  The metallic parts are simply Army Painter Gun Metal base, washed with Nuln Oil, Chestnut Ink and a little watered down Dryad Bark.  This was then highlighted with the Gun Metal and Chainmail, with a combination of blending and dry-brushing.

The shield is my favourite bit of the model.  I've never really done a lot of freehand work, so this was a little trial and error.  I tried to combine a lot of Orlygg's tutorial here with a bit of Realm of Chaos/John Blanche style.  It's possibly a little too "regular" (it should have been a little more "swirly"), and the eyes aren't great, but I'm really pleased with it.

So with Krull N'Garth completed, I've been digging out other old miniatures to fit in to the "Soul Hunters" warband.  I have a Sorcerer (a hooded chap with a scythe), a couple of old Marauder beastmen and a couple of old armoured zombies that will make "nice" plague victims.  One thing missing so far is toadstools,  a must-have in all old Warhamme,r so I will get the greenstuff out and get creating them.

How this will all work out as a warband I have no idea, or even if I'll ever get to play with them, but  painting them will be a whole lot of fun.  :-) 

In other news, the Ancible team had a grand old time at Firestorm Games in Cardiff, playing Star Wars X-Wing, shopping and hurling abuse at one another.  My win record in X-Wing has dropped to 25%, which is probably a lot better than most other games I've played, but even in my losses we've had some fantastic games.

It was also really great to meet up with Jeff from Pirate Viking Painting, who I haven't seen for a few years, and just ramble on about life, painting and gaming for a while.  :-)

As always, comments and criticism welcome!

Ancible Issue 20

Hi all, Ancible Issue 20 is now out...

Download Link

The download will now cost you £1, but I hope you will think it's worth it.  I have a couple of articles this issue, a review of one of Reaper's "Bones" range, and Watching Paint Dry is a quick and dirty guide to painting Kingdom of Britannia soldiers from Dystopian Legions.

In other news, we're getting into Star Wars X-Wing (like everyone else it seems).  Currently our group has 2 starter sets, a Millennium Falcon, and a Slave 1 - which are enough for 100 point games.  I hopefully should be getting a starter set this weekend, so we can vary the forces quite a bit.  I REALLY like the rules, especially the movement dials, and the funky dice seem to work really well too.  It's a really nice fast-paced game and it's got a proper Star Wars vibe about it, so it's loads of fun.

I'm a little disappointed that the miniatures are pre-painted, but they are done really well for pre-painted stuff, and Si has worked some serious magic on the engines of Slave 1 and Millennium Falcon, so they look superb.  

If any of you are in Cardiff on Saturday a few of us will be at Firestorm Games having a few games (40K and X-Wing probably).