Monday 30 July 2012

Dystopian Wars: Wading Metzgers

My visit to the Attack wargames show, in Devizes last Saturday, was a last minute decision. I went without any purchase list (always a dangerous plan) but was pleased to come away with only a couple of things that needed to be painted. I was greatly tempted by a Rorke's Drift box set from Warlord mind you....

So, what did I buy?  A copy of the new Spartan Games Dystopian Wars Hurricane Season scenario book, plus a blister pack of a pair of wading Metzger robots for my Prussian force. The book is a lovely hardback thing (not a bad comment from someone in the print industry) and not only does it contain a full campaign to play but has the complete Antarctican force list plus new rules for landing craft. Spartan now produce some lovely resin models of these but I must resist for now as I still have an entire Prussian land force to paint

Anyway, yesterday, whilst trying to avoid all of the Olympic television coverage, I painted both of the Metzger robots. I sort of followed the Spartan picture for one but left off the large red cross on the chest piece whilst the other I painted using the Vallejo German grey that I had painted my fleet in

Both robots took a total of three hours to paint including leaving them to dry for the matt varnish. Quite happy with the look but I now want a walking one as well!

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click picture to enlarge

Friday 27 July 2012

Firestorm Armada: The Directorate

We have played Spartan Game's Victorian sci-fi game, Dystopian Wars quite a few times at the Wells club over the last year but we have never tried their space based game, Firestorm Armada. So, a group of us ended up with a fleet each to give the rules a try. I went for the Directorate, knowing nothing about the setting but liking the saucer like hulls that are vaguely reminiscent of Star Trek Federation ships

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Wanting a fleet done quickly I went for a minimal paint-job on these. Starting with a black undercoat, I dry brushed all of the metal areas with Vallejo natural steel. Next I gave the hulls a coat of Citadel Foundation solar orange (the excellent Foundation range is now discontinued so grab what you can) and once dry I ran some red/orange ink into the panel details. The panel edges were picked out with Vallejo sunburst yellow to give a bit more definition. Finally some areas of the ships were given a wash of blue ink to give a 'glow' effect. The entire fleet was then matt varnished for use
 
The bases are magnetised with neodymium magnets I bought from Dom's Decals to allow removal for transport, and hopefully not end up with any broken stands. The entire fleet including the additional cruisers & R&D ship all fit nicely into a new KR Multicase Aquilla 4 bag that I bought especially. I can't recommend these cases highly enough!

Ready and just waiting for the first game now

Tuesday 24 July 2012

Scenery: Barricades

Getting myself back into the mood for painting, I decided to paint up some resin scenery pieces that have been sat on the side for a while. These were purchased for 'large scatter' for 7TV/Left4Dead zombie type games that are being planned. I have a large collection of this type of scenery and it always comes in useful

First up is a junk pile that comes from Black Cat Bases. It has a dumped fridge, sofa, wheelie bin and a pile of mattresses. I toyed with the idea of putting a tuft or two of grass on it but in the end I left it bare

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These are a pair of car wrecks that come from Foundations of War, via their eBay shop. Each contains a pair of wrecked cars with barrels, bricks and masonry scattered about. The first one has a pair of older cars whereas the second is definitely modern

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click picture to enlarge

Wednesday 18 July 2012

Quiet

Sorry, there won't be any new posts for a few days, I have just lost my pet cat following a short illness and don't feel like any gaming or painting right now. Normal service will be resumed in the near future

 RIP Dotty, the best cat & friend ever

Saturday 14 July 2012

Flintloque: Kyng Gorge III LE039

The latest delving into the  lead mountain unearthed a small collection of limited edition Flintloque figures that I bought a while ago. With these figures, you either love or hate them, the style is very cartoony and can be crude in sculpting style but they have a charm that appeals to me

The figure I chose to paint is of Kyng Gorge III, the ogre ruler of the orc nation of Albion. In the Flintloque world, the British are orcs whilst the Germans are ogres, hence the reason why this figure is the race he is


For historical reference, here is a painting of the real King George III


This gave me a good indication of a uniform, especially what was going on with the cuffs. For the rest I used my own choices when I got to painting them

Once I had cleaned and based the figure on a 30mm lipped style base (my bases of choice for these figures) I scanned around for some suitable pictures of this miniature painted. The only one I found was the version on the shop website, although to be honest it doesn't really inspire...


He is a nice figure once painted, a big chunk of metal at 50mm tall and stands head & shoulders over most other figures. The only thing I would have liked was a straighter sceptre as the moulded on one is curving to the right and is too attached to the figure to do much with

So, here is my version. I think he looks a bit better than the one above...

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This particular figure is casting 200 of the 1000 produced

Monday 9 July 2012

Worms: Part 3

A good weekend on the painting front resulted in the last of the worms figures painted and finished. I now have enough worms for five players, each having four worms, or less with some spares to swap out

So, the final worms are; female & male Hellraiser worms plus Frankenstein worm

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Classic mummy worm, leatherface worm with chainsaw & shape-shifting T2 cop worm


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The last to be finished is Jason worm and another sheep missile
 

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I've also managed to source some cheap resin barrels via eBay. When they arrive I'll get them painted and make up some landmine markers, that will be everything I need for the game. All I need to do is print out the map, cards etc

Thursday 5 July 2012

Worms: Part 2

I haven't had much time to get much painted the last few days, a dry evening last night was used to cut lawns and the previous night I was out playing a 5 person free-for-all Magic the Gathering game (we called it a draw as time was running out)

I have, at least, managed to finish a few more worms and I gave them a varnish first thing this morning and photo'd them. This leaves me one, maybe two more lots to finish for what I need for the boardgame I mentioned last post. I still need to source some drums/barrels and make up some landmines but I will look at those when the figures are done

So, here are flamer worm, vampire worm, were worm, Arnie worm and crates, all from MJ Figures as before 


 click picture to enlarge

click picture to enlarge