Sunday Showdown - Gaining Grounds

We threw down again on the tabletop this weekend, just my wife and I though.

We played GG18 for the first time in order to try and start getting used to the schemes & strats. I took Titania again in order to further cement the rules and intricacies in my head. I was facing down Marcus in a (shockingly) beast heavy list.

I thought I was being clever taking a Waldgeist in order to slow the progress of the supply wagon, only to later realise that it is unaffected by terrain. This did however allow me to clog the path of the wagon with the Waldgeist's extended melee range when in contact with his germinate markers.

Barbaros once again earned his keep, with his challenge aura and Fears Given Form, but it's still Titania I feel that I'm not getting maximum use out of really. Practice makes perfect and all that :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Sunday Showdown - First of Many

We christened our gaming room this Sunday when our friends came over to play Malifaux :)

I faced off against Kirai while my friend and my wife played Mcmourning into Marcus respectively. The strategy was Extraction and I took Dig Their Graves and Quick Murder.
My list was:
Titania
-6cache
-Aether connection
-An audience with the queen
-Behold my Glory
Barbaros
-Malifaux Provides
Nekima
-Fears Given Form
Thorn
Tooth
Primordial magic
Mysterious effigy

Barbaros and Nekima were definitely MVP in this one, challenge Aura sitting in the middle of the board can ruin a lot of plans. I didn't manage to combo it with Titania's Behold upgrade, but having it next to Fears Given Form was a good stack. Nekima did cause more points of damage to friendly models than I care to admit if I'm honest :p especially Titania herself.
I scored full for quick murdering Izamu, full for dig and dropped a point in turn 5 when I moved Titania to stop scoring from Claim Jump. The final score was 9-7, I struggled vs accusation as I don't really know how to prevent it happening to be honest. I still feel i'm under utilising Titania herself, but feel like I'm getting the hang of it, and feel like this crew was very well suited to the strategy and was succesful to boot.

Lots of fun and a great way to start with the new gaming space :)
My (Mcmourning) friend was also very interested in my Infinity models in a strange turn of events and was asking about game play and mentioned Nomads, so who knows what will happen there. I'm going to plan out some scenery/gamemat purchases so that my work friends can come over to play eventually, as well as it being usable for both Necromunda and 40k at a push :) I also want a few more pieces of Malifaux scenery as well to fill out both boards.

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Once More Around The Sun

I've never really been big on New Years. I know some people like resolutions and that kind of thing, but I just see it as a day like any other.

We have done the same thing for the past few years though which is to Play Malifaux at our friends house, and have a few drinks afterwards.
I played Titania again, and really stumped myself on scheme selection. 'Leave Your Mark' would have been far easier than 'Dig Their Graves' for example. Especially having The Primordial Magic to score late game. Anyway, another lessons learned game which is fine by me as I still really enjoy the master, and the knights from her box. I want to try and get my head around Titania herself as it's her I seem to use to least effect. I know there's a Schemes & Stones episode for her so I will check that out as soon as I'm able.

Following on from previous posts, I will still be listing Up & Coming items for the coming month, but they aren't targets to be hit or missed, rather what I want to be working on. As such they are subject to whim & whimsy, and are likely to change :)

So below is January's activity

-Update Project lists

-Add weathering to Hoffman's Constructs

-Get Nightmare Mccabe Table ready (should just be a case of getting wheels painted before I can pin them to bases and use them whilst the painting continues)

-Finish Titania's crew

Here's to a productive hobby and making happy memories this year

Thanks for Stopping by
Lofty

Femme Fatales

My wife and I christened our new Gaming table setup over the holidays as well, and I had finished putting together/magnetising/undercoating my Titania crew on Xmas day so I decided to use them in our game.

Titania was a lot of fun, and very different to any of the other masters I play for any faction. I can't help but feel that I would have fared a lot better if I had read the cards for new models & upgrades before playing though...

In general, I seem to not have strats/schemes in mind when I'm picking a crew, rather just picking what I want to use, so there is often a bit of square peg round hole feel to my play. I also struggle to think what my opponent might be trying to achieve whilst also trying to achieve my own poorly understood objectives. We are hoping to play a lot more games though. It was certainly a lot less fuss setting up/packing away having everything all in one place and the table already sorted and ready to go.

I look forward to more games with Titania, and might pick up a couple of the newer models to use with her once I work out what will suit her well.

Xmas day evening was also the first day in a long time that I have felt like painting. I decided to make a start on Titania after enjoying the game with her, and wanted to include at least one of the Infinity models I need to get ready for the first game, so I picked the only one who probably doesn't need a second coat of blue armour which is the Oznat.

I've been heavily inspired by a thread on the Infinity Forums, as well as a blog on the Combined Army, and I wanted to try and include the dark purple from the Umbra Samaritan, and some of the colour choices/recipes from the Morat blog.
I'm not the biggest fan of the outcome of my own painting but I think that's relatively common amongst gamers. I think I have a tendency to overcomplicate things and could probably get some decent results by following the example of the 'Games Workshop method' of basecoat wash highlight, instead of trying to emulate people like Dr Faust who I never get as good results as despite trying different things to get thin layers.. This all depends on neatness though and it isn't something I'm good at. Painting more can only help this so hopefully this year will see some improvements :)

Thanks for Stopping by
Lofty

Fresh Air

I promised that I would get some airbrushing done over the break. I tried talking myself out of it for various reasons like the time taken to set it up, finding all the bits and bobs, etc. In the end I managed to see through my own weak excuses and got everything plugged in, sorted and ready to go.

Although it's still a temporary setup, and goes away again after use, the booth & compressor setup easily and without a great deal of fuss to be honest.

The newer of the two airbrushes works just fine with whatever needle/nozzle combo it ended up with, and in general is a more pleasant tool to use than the first cheap brush I bought.
I wanted to at least make a start on the Morats, and after touching up the coat of black primer with VMA Black, I went ahead and primed a mix of VMA black Primer and VMA Grey primer from 45 degrees to help with shading. I mixed this originally for the Titania crew models I wanted to include in this session. I then basecoated the blue I had picked out for some of the armour panels on the Morats and used the rest on the Gorar from the Titania box before the heat cutout on the Compressor stopped the whole thing short.

A couple of learning points from the whole thing. First being that if I have a list of models which I want to get done, with relevant colours, I can be more efficient. The amount of primer I had mixed was more than enough for what I wanted to get painted so I was looking for more models to undercoat in order to not waste it.

The second is that I want to get 'proper' airbrush versions of colours which I will use often through the airbrush. the dilution of blue I used for the Morats seemed fine on them (although it maybe wants a second coat) but when I used it on the Plastic Gorar, it seemed to run off a bit? this is possible due to using flow improver rather than airbrush thinner/water but isn't ideal nonetheless.

All in all, a successful attempt, and promising for future uses. I don't think the airbrush I have is really suitable for anything other than basecoats really, or my use of it isn't at any rate. I want to speak to my Infinity buddy at work when he is back off leave to see what his airbrush is like :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Quick Work

After a good weekend, despite not being at home very much, and a music festival providing a strange morning/evening routine with bands on until late, I did manage to get done the airbrushing I planned previously.

The 5mm needle in the older brush is far too big, it throws out gallons per seconds worth of paint, only some of which gets on the model of course due to a wide spray cone versus a relatively narrow model profile. The Ortegas that got sprayed took a whole heap of paint, but when using the 3mm needle in the newer brush (being too lazy to clean out the brush for a second colour had a surprising benefit), the paint is much more targeted, and didn't really take that much longer. Coupled with the fact that less paint overall was used for only one good coat instead of multiple brush coats, I'd call this a win! This doesn't seem like much at all, and is far from exemplary use of an airbrush, but it's progress, and saved time :)

There are a couple of further notes I'd like to make at this point about the equipment I'm currently using.

First off, the airbrush booth doesn't seem to drag away a massive amount of the paint... This is either because I still hold the miniatures i'm working on quite close to me whilst working, or for other as yet unknown reasons. Also, probably because of the sheer output of the 5mm needle, there was some paint which made it through the gaps in the fold out parts of the booth and onto my desk. This was easily cleaned with some airbrush cleaning fluid on some paper towel, though so not a massive issue. Lastly some paint DOES still come out of the filter at the back, so unless the booth is venting out of the window using the parts provided, some paper behind the vent at the back is necessary to preserver whatever might be behind the booth in your setup (my monitors/items on the monitor shelf).

Second, the newer airbrush is far superior to the first one I bought. It feels smoother in the trigger, and paint flow, and clogs less which is a huge plus! It says something that the older brush clogged more with VMA paint and paint thinner than the newer brush did with VGC paint and thinner...

Lastly, regardless of using an airbrush booth or not, ALWAYS wear a filter mask. This is probably related to my holding miniatures so close to me still while working on them, but I felt a bit light headed after I was done, and breathing in atomised airbrush thinner can't be good for any aspect of health really. Look after your lungs!

Bank Holiday Business

After posting the other day, I started thinking more closely about what models are currently outstanding with a view to what would be the best use of an airbrush session.
Checking the Guild project page gives us the below likely candidates for some quick coats of brown leather:
Malifaux Child
Metal Sam Hopkins
Master Queeg
The Latigo Posse
Death Marshal Recruiters
Abulea Ortega

Of these, a lot of them will need basing work doing, which I will try and get at least some completed tonight.

After 'recent' games with the Guild, this will also expand my playable model count considerably. Especially if Brutal Effigy and Limited Francisco get anywhere near completed soon.

Lastly, some Neverborn models are ready and waiting for paint, and will benefit massively from an albeit very different basecoat:
Lelu
Lilitu
Black Blood Shaman
Widow Weaver
Mysterious Effigy

This weekend is pretty much a write off as there is a music festival that my wife and some friends want to go to (not my first choice for music) so I won't be at home much for any useful hobby time until Monday.
Let's see what happens based on this mission plan (despite the fact that planning things out for hobby time seems to be the guaranteed way to make sure it doesn't happen :P)

Thanks for Stopping by
Lofty

Mother of Monsters - In The Flesh

I wanted to post all this on Wednesday night, but then the trains were a mess, so it's ended up being today.

I've managed to do three things to share today - 1 Finish my Lilith crew. 2 Use my lightbox  and 3 Have something other than WIPs to show :)

I've not photographed absolutely everything, mainly because I wanted to see how the lightbox turned out.

The only things I might change with these are some additional blood effects at some point in the future. I'm really pleased with the way they look, especially after how long it's taken me :p I might post a full crew shot at some point in the near future too :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

In Summery

You love puns, I know you do.

This weekend saw a lot of sun for us over in rainy old England, so I finally got a whole heap of models spraycoated. The only things I now have not ready to paint are the Titania box set that I'm still assembling. Including some of my wife's models I basecoated 30 or so models in the sun on Sunday.
As I was home alone, and had some family plans cancelled, I also managed to put in some time on my Lilith crew, and only have the lady herself and teeth/blood effects on the Nephilim before I can call them don and be happy (as happy as you ever can be when you finish a model i think)

I had started some basing ideas for the Ortega family, wanting to do something different from the cobbled streets of the rest of my guild collection in order to represent their remote frontier operations. I originally tried to do wood planking using coffee stirrers, but it's really not so easy to cut these in a way that allows them also to look realistic, and they all ended up with sharp corners and blunt ends on a round base. After deciding to make-do with the bases I had made, I stumbled across a great website detailing a good process for wood grain bases, as well as a video being released the same day for the same effect. Not being one to ignore such a huge hint, I stripped my handiwork off the bases and started a greenstuff replacement, using Abuela Ortaga's base as a pilot as it will mostly be obscured if it had not turned out well.

I really like the look, and will continue this for the other Ortega models :)

We played again on Thursday, and I took Lilith as we were playing GG17. I really enjoy Lilith anyway, but she seems far better suited to the new scheme marker heavy pools than Guild would be. I was considering a Sonnia list with stalkers/Handler combo and an arresting Daschel, but flight and sprint are fantastic for getting pieces in position and dropping markers. Personal highlight in this game for me was Nekima's grow upgrade letting me summon a Mature Nephilim from a heavily wounded Young Nephilim. I love me some Mature Nephilim!
Seems like this is the year of Neverborn for me :)

Lastly, I managed to snag myself a Nightmare McCabe 'Wild Ones' crew box which is currently in transit from the US, so more to follow on this as soon as I'm able. Excited isn't the word!

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Mother of Monsters - On Wings of Darkness

Managed to get some work put in on Friday as I had the day off. I've got my limited Barbaros model to the same stage as my other Neverborn models, wich is waiting for wing membranes and purple cloth highlights, which I guess wont take long. I think I mentioned previoulsy that I had tested the colours for wings on the Mature Nephilim and Nekima, but never took pictures so I have those today, along with Barbaros and his blue tinted steel sword.

I just got news that we are getting a bonus this year from work, so I will be picking up the rest of the bits and bobs I want for a decent home photography set up in the coming weeks, so I can stop taking such terrible photos of mediocre paint jobs :p

Something I've noticed myself doing recently is highlighting up through from only a basecoat, despite knowing full well that the first coat im painting is intended to be a darker shade layer. For example, I went back and painted more of Hoffmans shirt when I realised that it wasn't overalls, but a waistcoat with a shirt. I use a shadow grey kind of colour path for white, so I started out with shadow grey and then just highlighted up from that which leaves him with almost a blue shirt... What I had envisioned was a shadow grey base, 70/30 shadow grey/wolf grey basecoat and then highlight up to white.

I find myself doing this far too often, so It's something I need to bear in mind for future as it can be easily remedied and will have a real impact on the finished model :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

On The Payroll - Brothers

Just a quick update today as I've got a busy weekend but did manage to snap a picture to share.

I managed to get the majority of Hoffman and pals based and built completely ready to be primed (whenever it stops raining outside...) for the lowers areas of the bases, I used liquid greenstuff to simulate an uneven 'water' (Sewage?..) texture which I will paint up and then use the paint effect I mentioned previously to hopefully good effect.

In the background you may also be able to make out the alternate Barbaros that I managed to pick up recently which I'm very much looking forward to painting.

That's it for now, keep everything crossed for fairer weather tomorrow sop I can get some miniatures spray coated. My wife also needs a few things sprayed as she 'has run out of models to paint'! I don't think that has ever happened to me :p

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Weakly WIP

Yeah I'm trying out puns as post titles again, bare with me, but I'm not sure it's going to last long :P

I've got a couple of things on the go at the moment, but more so because I'm weak (oh look, it relates to the title....)

I knuckled down and primed all the Neverborn bases on Saturday morning, I mixed up my own dark grey, watered it down and went to work. It took a reasonably long time as I had to use a relatively small brush instead of just glomping it onto the bases in order to preserver the already pained skin parts of most of the models.

Setting these aside to dry, I decided to start assembling some of the Hoffman miniatures I caved in and bought with some cash I received from family at Xmas. I went ahead and did Ryle and the Guardian first, along with their bases. Just missing greenstuff topping to take flagstone details.

I am going to be pinning unfinished miniatures to unfinished bases and priming the whole lot together with this crew. I seem to have a habit of owning WIP miniatures that can't be used until they are eventually finished, which is not only frustrating, but not really a good use of the minis :p

I have my Peacekeeper (WIP) is based on a sewer style of base, and I will carry this throughout the Guild Constructs.  The idea of Hoffman working on his creations in some kind of mad engineers laboratory, is one that I really like :) I also added some 'charging points' to the Peacekeeper, as he was giving me a very 'Igor' vibe, and I love the idea of him getting recharge via some mad lightning conducting thing... I may have over thought this a little. Here he is, WIP anyway.

There is a technical paint that I've seen from Games Workshop which looks like a decent slimy green kind of effect so I intend to use this to add some interest to the bases, as well as perhaps some blood, because the sewers of Malifaux end up with all sorts down there...

That's it for now, lots more on the painting desk though :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Mother of Monsters - All your base are belong to us

I had recently written a post about a new basing method which I had waited for (delayed) delivery of before being able to base my Neverborn models which were otherwise ready to undercoat and get on with.

I sat down over the weekend (1/1/17 it must have been) and tired to use the mountain themed Basius pad to make the bases I wanted. I don't know whether it was me not following the picture guide provided on their website, whether it was the greenstuff I was using, humidity, alignment of the moon etc. but I couldn't get any results worth using. the bases had either nice crisp details and rounded amorphous edges, or stuck to the pad which I had drenched with water, or a mess of greenstuff that didn't make its way into the details of the texture pad properly.

After working on trying different things all afternoon, I decided I could use my time a lot better, and in the hour after putting the greenstuff away, I had cork/gravel bases made up for all my Neverborn models and got them pinned to their bases, which I also added magnets to.

I was a bit disheartened if I'm honest as I use cork and gravel on most of my models so I wanted to try something different and I had hoped that this would allow me to do that. If I'd known I would end up doing this I could have had everything based a long time ago ready to use.

I'm not giving up though, I'm going to give them another go when I get around to the infinity models I have to paint.

In better news, I did get a game with Lilith this week. We visited our friends on New years eve and played a 50pts game and a henchman game before some drinks for new year. I proxied Lilith using my guild models and some empty 40mm bases and had a great time.
The scheme pool had me scratching my head whilst I was thinking in Guild mode, but once we started playing I soon realised just how different the approach to these schemes was as a Neverborn player. There are a lot of rules for Lilith which I felt aren't worded fantastically on her card (Tangle of Shadows is tricky). This wasn't helped by the fact that I was looking at the cards for the second time only whilst playing as I hadn't read and learned them, thinking I wouldn't be playing until I had finished the crew. Very different from the Guild though which is a really nice change of pace
All in all a success though, and a lot of fun to look forward to once I've got the crew painted and ready :)

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty

Mother of Monsters. Neverborn - Making a Start

Because I don't have enough projects on the go at the moment...

I bought a bundle of Neverborn a while back as an alternative to my guild collection, mainly I thought to break up the leather colours and greys that I had picked for the guild. I got them assembled pretty quickly but then I wanted to wait for the Kickstarter basing pads that I had backed to get them ready to paint etc.

Fast Forward to last the beginning of the month and I had bought a white and a grey primer as my wife wasn't a fan of using black primer. I tried to prime the Neverborn using a zenithal priming technique to see how it would work out. As it turns out it didn't really, but now I have them all primed and ready to paint.

And now fast forward to this week, and I wanted to get a master ready to use that wasn't the two I've been using for my whole time playing the game.
I've had the idea for colours since I bought the models really, and wanted to do a pale blue and dark purple contrast, so off I went :)

Sticking with a departure from my previous drybrush and wash crutch, I've been using thin layers and glazes and I'm happy with progress so far. Obviously a long way to go yet, but I think the skintone is pretty much finished. Looking at Nekima makes me think I need to go back and do maybe one more layer of a paler colour though :)

Hopefully able to make progress soon and get the bases sorted as well.

Thanks for stopping by
Lofty