The everything miniatures wargaming thread

[sbr]

How's your painting going?

I missed this previously, which is just as well as the painting was going nowhere.  Like almost every other project I undertake I get about 80% done and lose interest, luckily (or unluckily depending) the league didn't care if models were painted or not.

The league ended a couple of weeks ago - I finished 4-3-1 for 6th place in a 16 team league, no playoffs though- and I refocused on getting them painted.  A big driving factor is that I think I am going to go up to Vancouver B.C. for the Spike! Magazine BB Tournament, one of the major BB tournaments of the year.  They didn't turn out quite as well as I wanted, but it is my first time doing anything like this.  Maybe I'll strip em down and retry later after I get more practice, which is coming. 

I have accidentally bought a bunch more teams recently.  I backed a Kickstarter by Willy Miniatures for their new Nurgle team, then used a Stretch Goal discount to buy their Vampire team as well.  Then I backed an Indie-go-go project for a Lizardman team from a small group I had never heard of before.  Then I bought 1.75 copies of the old 3rd edition board game so I have enough Humans and Orcs to make teams from those as well.  I also bought the 6 models I needed to turn this Necro team into an Undead team.

Some finished pics of the Necros, not sure how they they ended up so shiny I used a Matte varnish.



Wights - never got their faces fixed



Flesh Golems - meh



Werewolves - Really like the brown one, the grey one is still no good even after stripping it down and starting over, oh well



Ghouls - these I like



Zombies - couldn't deal with a lot of the gore details on these but they ended up not terrible.  I love the story behind the Orc Zombie.  The original Orc Zombie was killed in one of my early games, so that model just sat around for a while.  Then in my last game of the season I just destroyed this Orc team including killing one of his Black Orc Blockers, who was raised as a Zombie and the model I had for that Raised Zombie just happened to be my Zombie Orc one.  Very cool!!

[The Brain]

Sweet! I did some BB teams a few years back, it's so nice to be able to focus on a just few models instead of hundreds, and there's so many cool opportunities for weird and wonderful figures.

In other news:

I recently ordered a few more 6mm armies for the Great Northern War (I already have some unpainted Swedes and Russians).

I got the Aliens vs Predators boardgame, mostly for the Alien figures.

I got some plastic Saxons and Vikings (I already have some painted Vikings, but not many opponents for them).

I haven't gotten any painting done in a while though. So many projects.

[Sophie Scholl]

Nice work, sbr!  Pretty cool you played in a league.  I'd say 6th is pretty decent for a rookie.  I'm tempted to purchase/paint up some warbands for Muskets and Tomahawks.  I love the F&I/frontier American Revolutionary era.  A lot of fun could be had.  If I could find someone to play.  Hahaha.  I always fear I'll make the plunge and end up like Seedy with a bunch of games/minis and no one to play against.

Muskets and Tomahawks:  http://www.studio-tomahawk.com/gb_index.php

[sbr]

Thanks Brain and BA.   Yeah 8 months ago I would have never imagined I would be playing in a tabletop league, but my youngest moved out leaving me here alone and looking for some new hobbies and a then some sort of Google vortex led me to the group that plays Blood Bowl here in town and I decided to take the plunge.

I am a table top rookie for sure, but I have played well over 200 on-line matches which would be a huge number for someone only playing tabletop so I am not exactly a rookie to the game itself.

I think I would like to try real wargaming with miniatures; the group I play with also has a pretty sizable WH40k group.  As much as my bank account hates Blood Bowl at teh moment, I can't imagine what trying to build one of those 40k armies would do to it.

[Sophie Scholl]

Hahaha.  Yeah.  I've always wanted to build a 40k army (especially now that Forgeworld has a whole range of 30k Horus Heresy models) or a Warhammer Fantasy army.  The cost is just insane though.  I don't mind spending the time on painting, but the money?  Jesus.  It's madness.  That's one of the reasons I'm looking at Muskets and Tomahawks/Saga/Studio Tomahawk's games, the amount of models needed and price seems to be a lot more reasonable.

[Jacob]

Yeah that's a much better set of games to pursue IMO.mpersonally, I've finally given up on GW games after about a thirty year run.

For fantasy, I recommend Dragon Rampant by Osprey. Theres much more leeway with the minis (including using your historicals), and of course you can use cheaper makes too.

sbr, are you looking at some of the alternate manufacturers for "Bloodbowl" minis? I believe there are some around and they're cheaper too.

[sbr]

sbr, are you looking at some of the alternate manufacturers for "Bloodbowl" minis? I believe there are some around and they're cheaper too.

Yeah, I haven't bought anything from GW at all, nor I have I priced anything from them.

The Necromantic and Undead are from Meiko Miniatures
The Vampire and Nurgle are from Willy Miniature
The Lizards are from Star Player Miniatures
The Human and Orc teams are GW but I bought them secondhand.

I'm not sure why Spain is such a hot-bed of miniatures manufacturers but they are all from there.

[Jacob]

sbr, are you looking at some of the alternate manufacturers for "Bloodbowl" minis? I believe there are some around and they're cheaper too.

Yeah, I haven't bought anything from GW at all, nor I have I priced anything from them.

The Necromantic and Undead are from Meiko Miniatures
The Vampire and Nurgle are from Willy Miniature
The Lizards are from Star Player Miniatures
The Human and Orc teams are GW but I bought them secondhand.

I'm not sure why Spain is such a hot-bed of miniatures manufacturers but they are all from there.

Hang on... let me fire up the google machine.

[The Brain]

Now that I finished the Nagato (see thread in main forum) I am thinking about maybe painting my Perry Samurai, for skirmish wargaming. Haven't made a final decision yet. If I do I also have a collection of pretty nice 4Ground Japanese buildings to assemble.

[Sophie Scholl]

So I made the plunge.  I purchased some of the new Thousand Sons models and some rulebooks to try out 40k.  I'm keeping it relatively small at the moment, which is easy with Thousand Sons as they cost so bloody much pointwise per model.  I'm aiming for a 10 man squad of Rubric Marines, a squad of Scarab Occult Terminators, and a duo of Exalted Sorcerers to lead them.  I'll be looking through the new book they released on the Sons to see what color scheme I want to go for.  My initial thought is the Blades of Magnus, which flips the coloration of the usual blue/gold pieces.  Anyone have any experience working with gold paint?  (I'm looking primarily at you, Brain.  I remember you did some Tomb Kings a while back.)  Any suggestions or tips would be appreciated.  I'll try to post some pics as I paint.

[The Brain]

Cool, BA!

I did indeed paint a Tomb Kings army. My experience with gold is that it's a bit harder to get a nice even coat than it is with other metallic paints (gunmetal/silver is great for getting even coats, that's why I used that color scheme for my Space Marine guys in this thread). Small details or smaller areas are not a problem, but if you want to paint large areas gold then it might be more challenging. Of course different gold paints behave differently and it was 10 years ago I painted the TK army, maybe when you paint your guys you won't experience any significant problems at all. Picking a good base color for gold will of course help, but I'm not sure what's the best, I didn't optimize this aspect when painting my TK.

One thing I did pick up from my Nagato project was the use of Tamiya spray cans. Of course there's a bunch of different kinds of spray paint avaliable, but the Tamiya ones are designed for modelling. If like me you are too much of a pussy to go full airbrush, but still want to be able to get nice even coats on larger surfaces, then those pray cans work great. Depending on your color scheme it might possibly be an idea to spray gold first and then paint the non-gold areas with a brush. Just throwing it out there, it might not be a great idea for your situation at all. I used gold spray for the Nagato propeller shafts and propellers.

In other news I'm torn between the Perry samurai figures (I prepared and primed a bunch but got no further) and the Mikasa 1:350 battleship. Leaning towards the Mikasa right now, but we'll see...

[Sophie Scholl]

I appreciate the advice, sir.  I am going to look more into it as they arrive and I read through The Wrath of Magnus to further determine a plan of action.  I'll attach an image of The Blades of Magnus for reference.  As for your decision, I would go with a Samurai perhaps to start, as a change of pace from the Nagato.  If it simply isn't holding your interest, then continue onto the Mikasa.  I imagine the ships are a much larger endeavor than an individual samurai?



The Tizcan Host are also an option I have looked at.

[The Brain]

That's a lot of gold!

The Mikasa is significantly smaller and simpler than the Nagato, but it sure is more work than a samurai.

[sbr]

My work in progress, my Lizardman Blood Bowl team that will start up in a new league on Tuesday.

Top picture is the 7 Big Lizards right in the middle of getting the bone highlights done.

Bottom picture is the entire team (with the bone highlights done on the Big Lizards) the Skinks are still just primer black.

[The Brain]

Very cool.