End Of The Week (0)+(32)

This has been a week of prep. I had envisioned getting a bit more painting done. I have been whinging about this al week. Still I now have enough stuffed primed and ready to go to just about see me through to spring. 

Since the last post I have gotten some of the Fallout stuff I got for Black Friday last year. Not all of it, but a good chunk of it. I have finally got some mojo back for the project. This is mainly down to Modiphius having another stock clearance sale. Much of which fits in with my idea for NukaLand (which is not Nuka World). Maybe a story for another time. I am guessing there are about thirty minis on the way. 

Some are actually Skyrim: Call To Arms minis. Not a full army but rather some terrain and some odd minis. Dwemor robots, flame atronarchs and sprigans, along with some terrain. This is the stuff I have wanted for a while. I wasn't going to by them because they were a bot pricey and in general I wanted them for other fantasy games. I may just give it a try now and I am tempted to go out and buy some more.

As for actual work? The Crusader Quar are he biggest project. A box of twenty four infantry, another four specialists and twelve mounted and dismounted cavalry. There are three boxes of the cadier mounts. I had originally envisioned them more as dragoons but maybe I will give the riders helmets and call them hussars an light infantry. I could always use some more specialists and there is plenty of metal stuff yet to buy along with STLs and vehicles. I should also get round to finishing the Coftyran Quar first. This is a fairly addictive project. Well as much as my non-addictive personality will allow. I can see a few more armies are coming out but I will finish what I have first.

Next are the Elf and Dwarf villagers from Wargames Atlantic. Twelve of each, split between male and female. I started with the regular villagers set and the guards. These were finished a few months ago with a view to get some more or maybe even move into Baron's War. I have enough suitable stuff to start at least but I keep looking at that starter set. The plan was to use the villagers for games other than Guards of Traitors Toll, mainly for the Nornmen project. I now have a hankering to play GoTT. A few more arms would have made things easier but there is a lot if good stuff on the frames. The elves are pretty good but the dwarves are amazing. Really what I have been after for a long time. Human civilians are easy enough to get hold of but demi human, not so much. I may get another box and finally do some Titansgrave.

My bench is always full of projects. One of which is the sUnderDground. I have some police which were brought for several previous iterations of the ideas. These have had some webbing and gear added. There are some more general minis and the last of the Athena Miniatures. There are also quite a few rando soldiers for the game. These needed a little fettling and some green stuff to finish off. I do like these guys. Whilst at Tabletop Scotland (that was a fun weekend) I purchased five Bad Squiddo minis, four armed ATS and a Scots Officer. You can never get enough female minis for most of my games and these fit in nicely. Not sure how I feel about painting tartan.

The largest total number of figures for any project is for Star Wars Imperial Assault. Some were already primed when I got them so I can't lay claim to them all. There are about ninety of them. Some of which are fairly chunky. I was somewhat non-plussed when Legion came out in a different scale. This initially put me off both. Business is business and I do love me a bit of Star Wars. This is a project that is giving me ideas. A lot of them. It's also one with a few more purchases on the horizon and a desire to integrate it with Descent.

There is a lot of random stuff here too. Some trench works, gladiators, fandom Frsotgrave bits, and bits of scatter terrain. There are also all the minis out of Frosthaven which even if they wrest of the game was disregarded, are a bargain. I spent a fair bit of time hoovering up anything that was left on the bench. 

Then there are also a whole load of wattle fences and gabions. Not to mention some cheval de frise (which I recently learned effectively means something like Spanish cavalryman). Some of this was purchased for Sludge, the cheval de frise and especially the gabions. They do have a lot of uses. The wattle fencing will work best with the dark age stuff and anything up and even beyond the renaissance. These should be an easy job although there is a lot of them. A couple of anvils from the Dwarf and Elf box found a way in too.

Finally these is the recently acquired Paranoia stuff. Not too much of this although I may well get some more. I have some smaller bots I also got at Tabletop Scotland.  The plan is these will get rolled into the project. I even have some old GDub metal Paranoia stuff. More bots I think although I will have to find them. 

Winter is coming. To coin a phrase. This little foray into prepping and priming is to make sure I have enough to paint over the winter. Which I have probably already said. It is not always raining in England. As the summer will attest. It is however easier to prime in warmer temperatures. So better to do it now.

The world news is looking a little bleak at the moment. Diesel is just hitting the £2.00 a litre barrier. I currently can't fill the cars tank with my card at the pump. I have to go into the kiosk if I want to fill up. Everything else seems to have started a slow creep in price increases. But not hobby stuff. There seems to be some element of price drops. This may be good for me but may be a bad sign. This is starting to make travelling any distance painful. So I am guessing that I will get a bit more time for painting. 

That Friday Feeling

 For most people Friday is a good day. I mean who doesn't love the end of the working week right? For me it always feels like another week is drawing to and end and there is no way I have managed to get enough stuff done. I feel like I have missed out on a lot lately. Time is marching on.

This doesn't mean I haven't got stuff done. In fact I have manged to get quite a bit done. It's just the mundane stuff that I am pretty sure won't make interesting reading. Not even for my daughter. It has been a hard week emotionally. There is rather a lot going on at the moment. There is a lot of it I should probably tell my daughter although she is way too young for this to be productive right now. Ignorance is very definitely bliss.

Apologies if this is a little all over the place today. I have a lot on my mind.

Although the minis I have in the immediate plan are not almost ready, they just need some primer, a lot has got in the way today. The rain being the least important. I used what felt like the last really good day to get a lot of outdoor jobs done. I do feel better for that. There is still some work to do for before what looks like stormier weather arrives. I have had a few problems about three years ago. These now look like they are coming back. I've already had to face a couple down. I suspect more are on their way. The only way out appears to be to keep going.

Still, I have a plan. Which is mostly to go on the defensive. This is probably going to keep me busy for a bit. Tomorrow is going to be a good day. In fact the weekend is looking like it will be a good one. 

Start Of The Wednesday

It's been a busy week and not the good kind of busy. Still here I am. Given the almost total absence of time poverty, I can't believe how far behind I feel. I can't even blame Skyrim.

Earlier in the week I got some stuff done. It is mostly Wargames Atlantic minis. The Crusader Quar stuff is now based, textured and stuck together. This will fill in the gaps in force. Well most of them. I'd like some more individual units. Some artillery, high ranking officers and specialists, like a medic. I had thought I would be pretty close to done with these. 

I've moved on to the Wargames Atlantic Dwarf and Elf Villagers. I would like them to fit in with what I have already. These have been focused very much on Viking mythology. So effectively light and dark. For the light elves I have already started a plan. These look like Saxons in blue with literally white skin. I've used metal stuff in the past. So I wasn't thinking of anything other than dark elves. What I have is actually designed as high elves but painted black with a minimal of purple with a lot of variety in metallic paint. I am thinking these will work.

The dwarves bring up an existing problem. I have about forty metal ones. Most are older metal sculpts which were done by Grenadier. Very much back in the day. I have been thinking about using the Oathmark range. Not to mention the long standing plan to buy Celtic and Roman dwarves

 from Checkpoint Miniatures. Despite what you might think, these fit better with my "Viking" world. The plastic is a much cheaper option. 

A while back I had wanted to do a project based on Titansgrave, the RPG. The plan had been to to be able to use figures with the rules. Which didn't really work so I progressed to the standard fallback, Savage Worlds. The project kinda died as I had problems finding suitable minis for the dwarves and elves. Some of these, with the Oathmark stuff might just work.

Then we are on to the Imperial Assault stuff. I'd really like to get these painted so I can get a game in. I am running out of storage for other projects, so I might try and use one of the boxes to store the minis. This may be an ordeal so maybe not.

This all needs priming. The plan is to do that tomorrow and hopefully start work on painting tomorrow evening. It will give me an excuse to sort out the shed.

End Of The (Hell) Week (0)+(2)

This has not been a fun week. The world seems to be out to get me. There was a significant extension to the stay of a high maintenance visitor. The police doing a safe and well check in the early hours of the morning for someone I have never heard of. Having fought my way around town during a local run day, finding the mobile phone of a much loved relative in my car, causing me to have to travel back through the aforementioned mostly closed town centre. My guest then also left their phone, actually two phones, and their glasses in my car. This was a bit of a bind as I dropped them at the airport to go home. I have forgotten how much fun it was to organise an international delivery of something valuable. Then a somewhat valuable package (well valuable to me) failed to arrive.

Some good stuff too. I've spent a couple of afternoons with friends. Talking shite, but entertaining shite. Then there was some time with the much loved relative.

This was always going to be a bad week for painting. I have looked at brushes but haven't actually picked one up. I decided that instead of painting I would do some prep. The plan did not get as far down the road as I originally hoped. Not the end of the world.

I did a bit of comfort purchasing. My guest did most of the shopping last week so there is a bit more money to spare. For my money I got a couple of Imperial Assault villains at a very reasonable rate.  So I now have an angry jawa and and angrier looking tusken raider on a bantha.

An order arrived a few days ago, massively overdue but not a bad price.  Most of this was Quar related. More infantry, cavalry and specialists for the Crusade. On the picture these are next to the ones I've already painted. I need to remember which gaps in the TOE should be filled.

Some twenty foot containers and finally some elf and dwarf villagers. I need to figure out what I am going to do with them. Perhaps I need another frame of the regular villagers for a bit more variety. All of these and the Quar Crusaders out of the box and attached to a base with heads and arms needing to be attached. 

The plan had been to base prep and prime, so texture on the base before I get the rattle can out. I feel like I have been at it all day and got nowhere.

Going forward I still want to finish the Soviets. A similar ideology to my Americans, whereby if I lose I don't feel bad. This is really a nice to have. As I am halfway through the the extant project (I probably need some more to cover my options, only one more box, and half a dozen weapons, and some trucks, and tanks, and armoured cars).

I now have a lot of Imperial Assault minis. This is the new shiny and will probably be the first out of the traps next week.

Quar was the previous shiny. There are twelve dismounted cavalry and probably another twelve mounted cavalry by next week along with about thirty moee infantry. 

Looking at what's on the table there is a lot of random crap. In general the plan is to finish the prep and prime process ready for winter. This is already a lot to work through but the plan calls for more. A lot more.  So I think the week ahead will involve more glue. texture and primer. Maybe I will get to painting mid week and I will aim to finish another ten Soviets. This may morph into stormtroopers.

I am now going to wind down and raid some more chests in Skyrim.

Start Of The Week. Insert Eye Roll Here

I am kind hopeful that normal service will resume. My recent house guest is now on his way out of the country. I've only just got back so its not going to get there tonight.

With a bit of luck I will have another batch of Soviets completed. I have some more to prime but I also have some more Star Wars Imperial Assault stuff to prep and prime. Imperial Assault is the current Shiny and I may have to put the Soviets on hold. There are still quite a few Soviets to finish.  Indeed there are some more still to buy. I remain hopeful for another freebie. I've gotten hold of a box set and a couple of villain packs for Imperial Assault. I was expecting another set with some extra minis for a knock down price, but no luck so far. Despite it showing as being delivered.

A few weeks back I put in an order for some more Wargames Atlantic stuff. Not from WA direct but with a really nice deep discount. I wanted to finish off at least one of my Quar forces. Well finish for now as I need to stuff I cant get hold of or print. So another box of infantry, another cavalry and a single frame of specialists arrived. I've also got a box of Dwarf and Elf Villagers which I think are for Guards of Traitor's Toll. 

There is a single box of shipping containers (which is odd as I ordered two). I made some of these a few years ago but could never get the paint to look right. These will have a multitude of resources. Right now I am looking at them primarily for XCOM. Eight seems like a lot and I suspect there will be few times when they all make it onto the table together but I still want to use one or two on multiple boards.

Kobolds: There A Little Bit Like Gremlins

Kobolds. I love Kobolds. What they lack in strength and resilience, they make up for by large numbers, being small target and being sneaky, tricksy little gits. They are, in my opinion, one of the best bad guys in D&D (which may not be saying a lot as I am not a fan). Not powerful, but good enough to keep the players thinking.

I was doing some tidying up I found the box with them in. They are very old Citadel minis from back in the days when they were a fun company to deal with. I saw some pictures of them in a flyer I got in my first Citadel order and wanted some. I could only find two at the time and the poverty of being a teenager meant that I didn't get any more. I got a single kobold in a box of D&D plastic figures. One badly sculpted kobold was not going to be enough. Then I found five resin ones from Reaper. Nice, but very D&D and something totally un-Viking, which is my particular flavour. Then I managed to order a load more on eBay. So now I have just short of fifty. So I painted them up a while back.

For the Viking game, kobolds are perfect. My arch villain needs needs minions and I could not have made these guys any more minion like if I had painted them yellow and given them goggles and dungarees. In Savage Worlds they are small, swift rather than sneaky but sneaky is all down to the referee anyway. They are skilled at hit and run which always annoys the players. Which is fun.

I

Playing The Walking Dead: All Out War

I found myself with an afternoon free a little while ago so I thought about what I could do. Accidently I had watched a video about the game on YouTube about its reissue, so it was sticking in my mind. Since I bought the game mainly for the figures, the game was more or less an afterthought. From the first time I saw it online, the game game seems to have some nice ideas and and playable mechanisms.

Until the point this game out I felt that a lot of games like this had produced fairly low par minis. Whilst not the best I have ever seen, these are still pretty good. There are plenty of them. Like a lot of games, I continually think I should rebase them so that they fit with everything else I have.

As a way to get the game going, Mantic created The Road To Woodbury as a solo experience of the game. It's a game for one character that helps teach the mechanisms. It is a little dumbed down but not too much. The idea is to see whether you can get past the three zombies (and any friends they might acquire along the way) to recover the three potential resources. 

On the face of it, this is a game of three against one. Not such great odds. The way the zombies operate (the A.I. if you like) means that although it is a challenge you can win as long as you don't do anything stupid or get really unlucky.

I went on to play a couple more games. The original plan was to use these for other games. I haven't found anyone who wants to play with little toy zombies recently. Big sigh....

If you want to have a look at the figures for the game I painted them previously as part of Zomtober.