Year in Review 2016

Hello!

That's right, I'm not dead. Still alive and kicking, however I'm still just as useless at updating a blog regularly.

I'm determined to give it one last push to keep a regularly update wargaming blog, and if it fizzles out this time, then I guess that's a sign to stop :)

I initially wanted to give this a go with a brand new blog, and a clean slate rather than the multiple restarts i've attmepted here after what was at one point a regularlry updated blog with what I percieved as decent content. However, I don't want to lose all the content here and have to re-host any photos or lose any articles I particularly liked. I have had a bit of a play with the way things look though which may or may not change in teh next few weeks. This all depends on if I can work out how to create a new image for the blog header for example :)

Let's look back at the year so far and see what there is to work into a new blog.

- I went back to the Leeds game night early in the year and began with Hordes, and a few games of Malifaux there too. In no small part due to the faff of getting home so late on games night after the long train ride home afterwards(all on a work night), I stopped going to the Leeds game night.

- A long time friend of mine was also getting into Malifaux around this time and since then we have played many games and expanded our group of two in to 6-8 people now playing Malifaux. We have even had two 6 player three round 'tournaments' on boards at home (My wife and I took 1st place at one of each of these, just sayin'..). My wife also plays Malifaux now as her first ever tabletop game aside from D&D, which means I play more wargames now than I have since I was a lot younger.

- A new independent hobby shop has opened in the town nearest to me, so now that our budding Malifaux scene is developing, we are hoping to support them by booking out enough tables there for our next event. It's important to support things like this as there hasn't been a hobby shop closer than Leeds for maybe ten years!

- Whilst I will still be playing (Mk2) Warmahordes with friends, I have downsized my collection, and parted ways with my Gators, leaving me with my fair size Skorne collection for the occasional game.

- I mentioned in January this year that I had just re-jigged my desk setup in the study, giving me a lot more hobby space, and better access to various projects and making it generally easier to paint and make toy soldiers etc. i will hopefully post a few pictures in coming blog posts.

- I have refined my magnetic storage solutions, and again I will be going over this in future posts :)

- I have made what I think are massive improvements in my painting with my Malifaux collection and will try to feature these (again) in some posts in the future. I got a wet palette for my birthday this year and I think that this has helped a lot with me moving away from drybrushing and starting to paint 'properly' with layered highlights.

- With the recent release of the new Thousand Sons Chaos Space Marines, my friend and I will be reworking some of our very first armies that we collected and played together, with me starting fresh with some of my most loved miniatures, the Space Wolves. This will mainly be a modelling and painting project as we are both just as disillusioned as always with the constant rules updates to games systems leaving us out of touch. We will be sticking to 6th/7th edition 40k for the games we play.

This pretty much covers what I hope to write about in the next few posts. I would also like to make some kind of posting schedule to help keep me posting regularly. Things like WiP Wednesdays, and product reviews.

Yet again I've dumped a wall of very uninteresting text with no pictures, but this blog is as much for me as it is for anyone else that reads it ;)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Consolidating Interests

I've been on a bit of a binge recently with payday coming up.

I mentioned in a past blog post that some of my 5+ year old paint collection had dried out and was useless. So, whilst replacing some key colours (metallics mainly) I've also added a whole new raft of colours - Purple for my eventual croak hunters (poison tree frog style) a couple of extra green shades for diversity (also in my Blindwater), and some blues (who doesn't love too many blue paints?..)

I also treated myself to some new brushes (and spent the most I've ever spent on a single brush)
Round Synthetic Sables from here :) http://www.princetonbrush.com/heritage-series-4050/

I have also been getting some work done in the meantime on Lady Justice & the judge, who I'm pretty pleased with and are nearly finished

I'm also pretty much done with the 'official' Boneswarm, and have done a bunch of work on my proxy second Boneswarm which I envision more like a gelatinous D&D style beasty

That's it for now, I'm really hoping that the Basius webpage is up soon so I can get my Malifaux guys sorted, but I'm enjoying being back hobbying again and think I'm making some pretty good progress for the year.

Thanks for stopping by :)
Lofty

Getting Carried Away

EDIT: Refinements have been made since this post, found here :)
I've recently re-thought my miniature storage solutions in a rather complete overhaul kind of way.

All my models until now have been stored in either KRMulticase card or aluminium cases, and to this day I would recommend them as a solution to anyone that wanted foam for their toy soldiers.

I saw a video a long time ago and I've wanted to attempt something similar ever since. Fast Forward to when I started my Eldar Exodite project, and I had large dragon models which were unsuitable for foam due to size, and I came back to this idea to attempt my own version.
The video in question uses a brand of craft items which seems to only available in the US, so I humbly present my UK version of the entire thing.

The case itself
A cupcake carrier, available here (bearing in mind you will be removing the inserts designed for the cakes and thus the pink), they are also compatible with each other with regards to the clips on the side to join layers.

Magnets
You will need to magnetise both the carrier, and your miniatures. I use the magnetic sheeting self adhered to the bottom of each section of the case, on which I use a baking tray. The beauty of this is that, instead of permanently affixing sheet steel or similar to the case and then popping magnetised miniatures on/off this, the baking tray is removable, and perfectly serviceable as a 'tournament tray' to move minis between tables etc.
As far as magnetising miniatures go, I won't reinvent the wheel and describe the process as it is done here near perfectly. the only extra steps I take are to build the green stuff up the sides of the magnet a bit and then drench the whole assembly in super glue. I'd rather the magnet stayed inside the base when I remove the miniature than remaining connected to the tray.

Transport
For some of you, you're done! Congratulations, your new army transport solution is complete bar personalisation (stickers/painted logos, I've no idea - go nuts) and expandable by the purchase of further carriers whose trays can click to the bottom of your existing case.
My own solution however has one further step. Call me vain, call me paranoid, call me what you will, but I don't relish the thought of going to work, and subsequently carrying my (transparent) case around Leeds city centre during the evening. I'm also not convinced that the plastic handle & lid would bear the weight of a whole tray full of say metal troll bloods and another tray of metal dire trolls for example.
What I landed on here is a simple, cheap holdall in which the case sits very comfortably, and leaves room for a jumper/jeans & tshirt/books/dice/templates etc.

Caveats

• I've yet to work out a way of transporting gargantuans and the like using this method. My first thought was to have a new case, removing the bottom floor of the top case and permanently affixing it to the bottom, making a double tall space for them to stand in. I've no idea how to do this though. Hot glue and a dremel are my first thoughts but I don't know how this would change the rigidity of the whole thing etc.
• Some models need more than one magnet underneath to prevent them sliding if the case is jostled at all - getting on and off the train etc. This isn't really a concern though as the magnets are cheap enough to add a pair to metal warbeasts rather than just one. Three to the base of the likes of extreme models etc etc
• Tall models won't be happy here. straight off the top of my head i'm thinking of Molik Karn/Mulg. I don't yet have a solution, which is disappointing because I won Molik, and will own Mulg soon enough. However, all my blindwater guys fit in there just fine, the tallest of which being a Blackhide Wrastler I guess, I also tested a Bronzeback Titan.

All in all, I'm really pleased with my version of this from the original video, and think it's a pretty solid solution.

Let me know what you think!

Thanks for stopping by

Lofty

Breaking Radio Silence

Hi all


I know its been a while, but I'm getting back into the hobby world again.


Long story short, I've just started a new job and its one in a team of people whole play role playing games and inline games so being 'the guy with the toy soldiers' is in no way an issue :)


I've been to my first Leeds Warmachine gathering on Thursday just passed and will be attending them every fortnight when they are on. My intention is to play alternate Hordes and Malifaux and maybe even Guild Ball and Infinity in the future.


I've got a lot to update so I won't go on for much longer in this post, other than just to say that I'm hoping to keep up a regular log of what I'm getting up to with my hobby :)


This evening, and evenings this year in fact, I've been doing odd bits and bobs and I've finished off a few WIP blindwater pieces which I spray coated in a large batch today. I'm hoping to get some airbrush basecoat time soon.

Thanks for stopping by

lofty

Northern Son

I'll be honest, I lost a little steam after the bank holiday on Monday.  I'm not sure the pre-shading has worked on Hyperion if I'm honest, and it looks like I will have a fair amount of work to do once it's base-coated.
I was also a bit dejected when I started work on my witch doctor conversion. The piece I had bought as a skull mask for him doesn't have a chance of fitting over his face without a lot of Dremmel work to remove the mass inside it, whichj i struggled to do with hobby knife/files.
I managed to salvage the skull into a Wrastler looking one which I will use on the base, and try to add some runes/OSL glow to the eyes maybe. Back at the drawing board for this one, and maybe I will try a different type of headdress.

So tomorrow and Sunday I will be pushing on with Hyperion when I get chance, and hope to at least get the grey base coat and metallics sorted so I can think about how to approach highlighting.  At the moment, I'm leaning towards using standard brushes to shade and highlight, which I'm disappointed about, but there may hopefully be chance to airbrush at least the white on the shoulders, if not some kind of stencil work to make it stand out as a centre piece.

Based on recent experience however, my current airbrush set-up really makes me feel like it will just be a tool for priming and base coating.

I've been looking at some of the convergence of Cyriss photos to come out of Lock n Load as well and I really like the aesthetic, and have been juggling potential colours schemes around in my mind this morning.  I have been pondering about a second Warmachine faction for a while, but I can never really justify it to be honest. I still haven't picked up any of the new 'jacks for Retribution, and I pretty much prefer playing Hordes anyway if I'm honest (I'd love to pick up some Trollbloods).

My first thought is that I can magnetise a Vyre 'jack kit or two (learning from my mistakes with the first Shyeel kit I tried to magnetise...), and grab the last 'caster is missing along with a solo or two I'd like and call it done, unless the next book or two drag me back into the faction.

For Skorne, there is very little I'd like to add to my forces, save perhaps a second unit of Cetrati at some point, but I have pretty much everything I like the look of etc. so I'm happy with painting them up for now.

It's a similar story with Gatormen, I have Rask now to put together, and with the exception of the witch doctor/shamblers unit in the new book there isn't anything I'm after greatly so, again I'm happy painting up what I have.

As far as Cyriss/Trollbloods go, I think I'll wait until at least the end of July (after my birthday) and see how I feel then. I don't play at all hardly any more due to various reasons, so it's difficult justifying any large layouts at the moment, so we will have to see where the future lies

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Committed

As I mentioned in previous posts, I have things coming up which I've committed to with the amateur theatre group that I stage mange for, and of course I have literally zero time at the moment for hobbyisms.  It's all hands on deck until Sunday morning, including not getting home at all after work & rehearsals 'til gone 10/11pm.

It's not all bleak news though my friends, fear not!
I've two 'missed delivery' slips from the postman, so I'm hoping that my copy of Gargantuans is waiting at the post office, along with my respirator.
Which leads me nicely on to the fact that I will be airbrushing like a man possessed in order to get Hyperion painted. I learned recently (Tuesday) that there is a Colossals release event at my LGS in two weeks on Sunday. Pretty short notice if you ask me, but no-one did. Of course, me being me, I went into panic mode and started trying to cram on the new rules, and on casters and tactics etc... Where as what I think I'll be concentrating on is painting.

All I need to complete is Ravyn, an Arcanist who are both at around 80% and of course Hyperion.
I do have a plan of attack on how to approach the big man, involving pre-shading and weathering/battle damage, so we shall see how he turns out.  I suppose I can always go back and add to the model if I feel like it needs it at a later date.

The only thing I have literally no idea about is lists. I will be using pVyross and Ravyn, but other than that I've no real clue what to field.  I won't have time to get my Destors assembled for Ravyn unfortunately, but I've never really played her before so I'm stuck for other options.

Can you guys help suggest anything for these two casters at 50 points? The only Ret models I DO NOT OWN are;
Vyre 'jacks
Houseguard uints
eEiyriss
Sylys

Radio silence for now then, but hopefully I'll be back to it on Sunday with something to show on Monday late on.

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Sugar Rush

Late night/early morning productivity is what's on at the moment. I'm hopped up on energy drinks and combating fatigue from today's lunchtime run along the canal (Long story, but basically I'm training for a 10k later this year).

This seems to be a good state to be in though, as I've managed to get Calaban from primed to pretty much finished except for the many and varied skulls on the model, and the details like his glowing skull and face mask.  There are some really good colour contrast areas on this model, from warm to cold and light to dark so I'm looking forward to seeing how he turns out. 








I've also made some progress on the Skorne Tyrant (standard bearer not started yet). I've used red as the colour for his robes, which is one of the ideas I had surrounding changing my colour scheme for my Skorne, and the theory here is that Whilst Xerxis' house colours are blue, Makeda will use red, so any tyrants other than Xerxis will use the Baalesh house colours.  Hopefully the armour colours and blue accents will still tie it all together visually.

It's payday on Monday, so I can place my monthly hobby order. I'm going to pick up Gargantuans, Rask, a couple of paints and I'll also be getting hold of some airbrush friendly varnish to save my poor warbeasts from chips/abrasion from any case foam (I'm not convinced that this is what has happened, but I'd rather be sure), as well as a respirator to enable me to use the airbrush more often and more safely.

I'm also ordering a single gatorman in order to convert it into a second witch doctor.  I've mentioned a couple of times that I'm not a  fan of the current sculpt (despite how quickly/well it painted up).

I've been inspired a great deal by some posts on the PP forums, namely these few.  Specifically these ones posted by PG_Gift.  I've got my eye on a few games workshop pieces to bits order to help with this conversion so hopefully I'll be able to progress with this this month also.

I've got some commitments next week with the Drama group I'm involved with (as stage manager, I don't act) so perhaps Bank Holiday Monday will see some hobby time. I'll try and update where possible, but hopefully Mr Gravewalker above will suffice for now.

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Weekend Warrior

I managed to get the witch doctor finished :)

I like the albino style colour so much that I will use this method for all my witch doctors (Currently only Calaban) when I manage to convert up some more.

I also played around with my new colour ideas for my Skorne, but I couldn't get any of them to look as good as Xerxis currently does in what was the final iteration of my bone + blue scheme, so I will be continuing with that :)

This week will be working on Maelok I reckon, and then seeing what takes my fancy after that.  I didn't manage to get a respirator over the weekend, so I will try and get one on payday this month a long with some bits and bobs like varnish, as some of my beasts have chipped at some point, or have paint rubbed off by foam, which is less likely.  This of course means that I will need to finally add water effects to those that need it, and I can do this all at once, and hopefully varnish the next day :)

Once I've got a respirator though, I will be working on my minions units, and trying to use the airbrush to get them done quickly, whilst not rushing them.  The bog trogs especially I can see as being laborious to paint after not particularly enjoying putting them together

I will also hopefully be picking up Gargantuans on payday so I can catch up on all the fun :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

WIP Lash

The time has finally arrived! Yes that's right I have painting to post! Feast your eyes my friends;

It's nothing much really but I've been rattling through this miniature considering that it was the model that I wanted to get done 'collaterally'. Whilst searching for inspiring pictures of the model, I found a really good albino version on Bell of Lost Souls which I really liked so here it is.
I've also made a real effort to use something other than drybrushing to layer paints, and this can be seen here on his cloak/rags, and skulls (which I'm not happy with as I think I started with too dark a colour, but hey ho). I'm really pleased with how this is turning out and hope to have him finished today at some point.

I've also been practising this new layering malarkey on an elf model I'm going to use in my DnD campaign, and layering blue on his cloak as practice. I really like the effect, and think that it can be achieved relatively easily. I would like to buy something to keep the paint wet for longer though, and I think that this is readily available from most paint ranges so I'm going to take a look for pay day :)

Other than all this activity (it feels good to be home guys :)), I've been toying with the idea of painting up a custom unit of terminators as a hobby project, with decent bases and unique look/weaponry etc, so that might be coming soon too.

I've also pretty much decided that I'm going to re-paint my Skorne with a darker feel, and (shock horror) no blue! So once I've got the doctor finished, and Maelok well on his way, I'll try my new ideas out on a couple of primed 'spare' swordsmen that I have and see what you guys think :)

Lastly - I'd love to get my hands on some gatormen for converting another witchdoctor or two, but ebay seems pretty bare with only full units available.  I'm going to try bartertown today I think, but if anyone knows of any for sale then please let me know!

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Mayday mayday

Managed to get a brief painting session in today after our weekend away.  Had plenty of housework to catch up with though so it was only maybe an hour or so of painting.  

I took the advice that most people had been sharing, and painted the things I felt inspired to paint. So I added some more layers of pallid flesh to Maelok, and began to think about what else needs adding. This model has a bewildering level of detail, and a lot of layers. By which I mean not only does he have skin, candles leather accessories, but he also has rotten skin, innards, and exposed bones. Lots to get on with, but I really really like the model and his back story so I enjoy painting him.

To complement this, I also chose a '15 minute model' which is an idea I picked up on the ppforums, and is a model which you may not particularly like/enjoy painting and trying to work on this model for just 15 minutes every time you sit down to paint.  My victim is the Gatorman Witch Doctor, who I've mentioned previously that I do not like, so I'm hoping I'm able to get him painted alongside something I do enjoy.  I've decided to make him a little different also and try an albino style paler skin tone compared to the rest of my Gatormen.

The reason I'm not going nuts with my freshly undercoated Hyperion model is that I really need a respirator of some description.  The dustmasks I've been using to work with the airbrush really aren't sufficient when I'm working so closely with the atomised chemicals coming out of the device.  I can't begin to describe the headache I had the other day when I was bascoating.

I'll have the window open wherever possible, in order to avoid a build up of fumes, and take regular breaks so as not to fumigate my dear wife who shares the study with me

So hopefully at the weekend I can get basecoating a few other miniatures, and start to work properly on Hyperion.  

That's all for now, hopefully have some progress pictures at the weekend

Thanks for stopping by

Lofty

Into The Groove

After my post the other day, I turned my attention to the PP community at large, and repeated the text on the forums. I was reminded yet again why this is one of the best communities in wargaming - solidarity and support from the start.  You faithful followers here are always just what I need to keep me blogging as well.

I'm typing this after being at home all day waiting for an engineer to fix our phone line and get us back online. During that time, I've got Hyperion ready for undercoat, and tidied up my work area & got eVyros out ready to gap fill, and hopefully undercoat.

I've also been considering all the advice I've had from various sources over the past week or so, and come away with the following lessons;

- Goals - The last time I got any considerable amount of painting done was to the deadline of Breast Cancer Brawl. This is a great way of staying motivated, as it takes away the need to motivate yourself, as there will be others painting to the same deadline, and (I personally) would want to appear with as few unpainted miniatures as possible.

- Variety - One of my biggest problems recently I think is that I've decided I want to work on my Ret' but then spent all day at work daydreaming about how I could airbrush my bog trogs, or what I'm going to change about my Skorne scheme.

So in light of all this, the next few things I'm going to be working on are;

- Minions - Some really great models for the airbrush here, farrow bonegrinders will be great to 'two tone' with grey fur and darker brown skin. Bog trogs similarly so, coupled with the fact that it was a real chore to get them together so I'd love to be able to get them painted quickly and add the detail.

- Skorne - I've been racking my brain and trying to decide what it is that I'm not happy with about my current paint scheme, so I'll hopefully be posting some examples soon of what I'm going to modify to get some opinions on this.

- Retribution - I've slipped a fair way from the fully painted collection I once had, so I really would like to drive this home. As it stands, I've WIP solos/Ravyn to get finished, Destors, eVyros and Hyperion all nowhere near started so this will be a long haul interspersed with the other projects to keep me going.

- Other models - There are a number of ranges that I own models from/intend to pick up models from, like infinity and Malifaux for example. I doubt I'll ever really game with these miniatures (except Malifaux with the wife) but they are nice enough for me to paint for paintings sake, and provide a decent amount of variety.
I also want to pick up a few GW display pieces. Their recent releases have really grabbed my attention, but they've priced me out of their games forever. I don't mind picking up a centrepiece as a project (magnets etc) but I won't be buying enough to play ever again.
First up in this regard is a unit of custom terminators with round shields, watch this space :)

Sorry for the lengthy post, but I'm hoping to start getting more hobby work done, and that can only mean WIP pictures a plenty once I get going :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Progression

I'm about to sit down and do my first hobbying since the blitz on my Blindwater congregation ready for the BCB and I really don't know what I want to get on with.

I've my Ret (Destors, Ravyn and Discordia away from fully done)

Skorne (a massive amount to paint)

and finishing the Blindwater (I have my alt boneswarm and snapper now too)

I'm going to be able to get one with the custom bases for the give away as well this week, so I can get them to their 'lucky recipients'

I also have a £20 voucher from the BCB raffle to spend.  What do you guys think I should pick up and get on with?

Cheers

Lofty

Brawlin' - The aftermath(pt2)

As promised, here's my photodump from the BCBtourney at the weekend along with a brief write-up of the day as I remember it.

Professional badasses before the first game

I took a single turn in the first game against Tony Moore's Legion. I moved Barny quite far forward in swamp pits to protect from (what I thought would be inevitable) sprays/assaults. turns out eThagrosh's feat turn was more than enough to do me in. Short but sweet






Guess what mistake I made in the second game? Yes I am that stupid, Simon's Angelus applied liberally to Barny's face, again, I played a single turn.

Third game was versus Trollbloods, controlled by a chap called Chris.  I got a second turn assasination after a posse took down the sons of bragg, and the feat removed Rok's melee range allowing them to charge Borka for the win. Nice chap, good chat, good game.

Final Game was against a friend of mine from the club I used to frequent on Mondays.  Very enjoyable game proving how tenacious Gators can be, with Barny surviving multiple rounds against (epic I think?) Vlad.  In the end though, I couldn't hit the guy, and If Vlad hjadn't done for me, Drago would have obliged I'm sure!

On with the photos!

One of the few (only) Ret' armies in our meta

Showdown!

Aftermath...

Pink Merc's!

Some Very well based &  Painted Cygnar

Brawlin' - The aftermath(pt1)

A very brief update today just to say that the Breast Cancer Brawl event (pictures incoming I believe) run today by LeedsWarmachine was a blast. I've some pics, and a more full write up on the way, but just wanted to check-in and say that it was a really good day, and a lot of effort was put in by the organisers, so thanks for that, ans thanks as well to everyone that took part and raised so much! (I'll let LeedsWarmachine reveal donation totals).
For my own self indulgence though, I won best single pink miniature for my Thrullg which was rewarded by a Warmachine MK2 poster signed by the Privateer Press staff. I also snagged the pink Bloody Barnabus card for best in faction (I was the only minion player!) a £20 gift card for the LGS hosting the event, and a Minions coin unclaimed after the domination event which I bid for.  On top of the pink PP bandana that everyone got (and cupcakes!) and the wooden spoon from the Domination event which was a black PP bandana). What I was by far most pleased with though is that I got a lot of kind comments about my painted miniatures, which really made all that effort worthwhile!

All in all, very pleased that I went and that it was so much fun, and I'll be adding a more thorough write-up & photo dump at some point in the coming week

Thanks
Lofty

The calm before the brawl

As you guys know, I'm attending a Breast Cancer Brawl event run by LeedsWarmachine on Sunday. I've been busting a gut this week trying to get things finished for the day.
Of course, this being the worst time to have loads of none hobby related things to do, thats when everything happens.
All I've really managed to do this week is tidy up base rims and get a glaze down on the swamp horror to unify the layers (VMA blues are amazing for any use) and to be honest I'm excited about how it's turning out.
I've managed to clear tomorrow entirely to give me a fighting chance of getting at least Maelok and the swamp horror done, and maybe even a start on the witch doctor. Hopefully I'll manage to meet these targets. As I've said before though, all 3 models are from my secondary list so it isn't a huge loss.
The upshot of all this is that it's unlikely that I'll have any progress shots this weekend unless I do well tomorrow. I'll definitely have some pictures from the event though, and a full army shot either before or after I go :)
After the event, I'm going to take a week or so away from my miniature hobby to try and avoid burnout after the mad rush I've had on these lists.
Upcoming projects though in no real order:
- Trench templates for Griffin (forestmans.blogspot.com)
- Giveaway bases
- Destors, and last few Ret pieces to get back to fully painted
- Maybe some Vyre 'jacks?..
- Skorne
And hopefully far more gaming than I usually get (more vassal at least would be good)
Wish me luck for Sunday, it's a great cause!
Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

A Black Tide Rises

I haven't made a great deal of progress this weekend unfortunately.  We had a visit from some university friends on Saturday, and Sunday was spent catching up/playing Vassal.
I did however mange to scrub and dry my recent purchases ready for assembly this week :)

I really enjoyed the Vassal game, the write-up of which is here so I wont expand on it much further. Suffice to say that Gators are tough :)
It was the first test I've had of the Barny list I will be running at the BCB event this month though, so it was good to see how that panned out. I should rally try and get at least one game in with Maelok before the event though I think!

I've exchanged a couple of sketches with Griffin (forestmans.blogspot.co.uk) about the trenches he wanted for eHaley's tier so I can begin assembling them soon enough I hope, Just need to pick up a few ingredients, which I can do hopefully in town this week :)

Other than that, I'll be assembling, basing and trying to get more added to Maelok this week. The recent purchases are the only models I need to get painted by the event, but once they are done, I am aiming to get the rest of my Blindwater collection painted, as all that is left is Calaban and the small based models that I own for the faction.
Hopefully it is something which is achievable by year end. After that, I'm just Destors away from fully painted again with my Ret', and a whole bunch of unpainted Skorne :P
Funtimes

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Weekly WIP

Plenty done this week. I seem to be on a good roll at the moment with getting things done which is great.

I've got both bases for my Wrastlers made and Barnabus, and I'm pleased with how they're looking.  The Green stuff will be painted to look like a snake (hopefully).

I've also made a fair bit of progress on Maelok this week, but to be honest, I'm struggling a little. I've got the bone sections pretty much done, and I've started painting the exposed muscle parts.  My original idea was to make those sections look fresh, and add a gore effect to them, but I'm not sure if this will be a little too over the top considering the amount of gore this would require.

Any ideas/suggestions?

I've made his skin purposefully darker than the posse etc, and matte to boot.  I'm going for less of a putrid/rotting flesh kind of effect than a cured hide kind of effect. Hopefully this comes across.

I received my newest beasts as well this week in the post so I'll be working on them when I get time at the weekend, and maybe have them under coated along with the bases I made this week.

I've also looked into sourcing some alternatives of the same models. As with my Wrastler, I dislike duplicated models, and my confidence for a major conversion is pretty low. Keep an eye peeled for future posts with alts of the Boneswarm, Snapper and Witch Doctor.

Possibly the biggest news this week though is that I've been asked to make some trench templates for a eHaley tier list for a friend. It'll be a long term project and I'll be blogging when I have significant updates etc. At the moment I'm in the design stage, and hope to be able to send some kind of concept out by the end of the weekend, which I'll then share with you guys :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Gators gonna Gate

I've put a lot of time in today and I've got both Posses to a stage that I am happy to call them finished.  After a great suggestion on my last post, I decided to give the second Posse war paint, to further distinguish them from the first group (on top of skin tone, and custom weapons).  I will be trying to add the war paint colour onto Maelok in order to try and emphasise that they are part of the same village/tribe maybe.

The only work left to do is tidy up the green stuff used to secure the arms & weapons (painted separately) with a sharp knife and a splash of paint once it's all dry.

Enough waffling, here's the pics

As you may be able to see, I have found an
awesome desk lamp. It even came with a daylight bulb, I've been trying to find
a decent lamp for a while and I stumbled across this in my local supermarket,
as strange as it sounds!

I feel really pleased with how everything has turned out, and am looking forward to getting them on the table with the rest for BCB!

Speaking of which, I ordered yesterday (payday) a Witch Doctor, Bone Swarm and a Swamp Horror, as I felt that any list I made for Maelok was just a Barny list with a different caster :(

Should be fun to get those put together, and primed next week(end), I have a few ideas of how to use my airbrush for the Horror, so stay tuned to see the results!

Only other news this week is that I finally finished cleaning up my assembled tourney tray, so I've more base size options than I will ever use, and everything fits in nicely, without any sticking anywhere, all in all a fantastic investment in my opinion.

Thanks for stopping by!
Lofty

Back from the black

It's been too long.  There's many and varied reasons why it's been so quiet on this blog, but the upshot of it all is that I hope to be blogging regularly again.  I'm in a new job, and  a far better frame of mind along with it, so I'm hoping to be able to dedicate a lot more time to the hobby, gaming and painting as well as being part of the community again.

A friend of mine finally took the plunge and bought the Cryx book and a 35pt force (so far) and we have been having semi-regular games on Sundays.  Strange to be gaming together again, as we started playing Warhammer Fantasy maybe 15 years ago!

In other news, I've been to a couple of larger events in Leeds this year, and fared relatively well with Rahn/Vyros at the first, and not so well with Xerxis/Naaresh in the second (some questionable out-of-activation activations by one opponent in a  very close game didn't help). I did however win a coin for being the only Skorne player, taking my total to two! Small victories and all that.

The last real update from the year so far is that, after watching videos on youtube, deliberating and plotting for so long, I took the plunge and bought an airbrush & compressor with some birthday money.

I've been struggling to get to grips with it all, but it's an enjoyable learning curve so far :)
I'll be making a post tomorrow, which I hope to be the first of many describing my experience with the new method of painting etc :)

That's it for now, stay tuned though for what will hopefully be a far more regularly updated blog!

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

WORK in Progress

Still having trouble leaving on time, which quite frankly is depressing. had to cancel a game at the club (again) today. Both messing around a friend, and missing my weekly warmahordes fix.

This also unfortunately means that this week's progress is limited to base coating & washing the first layer on the posse, and dry brushing the shell of the Spitter. Progress is progress though :)

I've been leafing through Domination as well this week. Pleased with the results for Skorne and Minions. Once I'm painted up with Minions, I'll be working on Xerxis at 50pts, and picking up Naaresh, and Tiberion.

Hopefully by the time I'm through with all that stuff, the Vyre Myrmidons might have seen the light of day, so I can work a little on my much neglected Retribution. It's good to have a plan right? :)

Sorry there isn't much of note today, late home and all the rest. Hopefully this week I'll have some more done. I'm also hoping to pick up some decent desk lamps & bulbs (if anyone has any tips for bulb types/wattage, it would be much appreciated) as well as a portable photo booth for painting and photos, let's see what Santa brings ;p

Thanks for stopping by