Progress and Anti-Progress

So, I had a wonderful surprise this morning, and what was the most surprising part you may ask? I was surprised! I am hardly ever surprised, but this, I absolutely didn't expect.

So, now I am the new owner of a book that I didn't even know existed?

Anyway, it is fantastic, and now it can be added to my growing Tolkien library...

Now, according to the heading, I have made some progress as well as anti-progress. Well, lets get the worst over and done with.

My charming dog pulled a table cloth from a table which resulted in the very loud noise of a kilogram or two of lead smashing into nice wooden floor. Goodbye ogres!

The damage was bad, but not as bad as it could have been... I like metal, but sometimes plastic is just a little bit more survivable (not to mention cheaper!).

That aside, I made a little progress. Here is another svenska man of House Goldenroy.

Followed by a mantic skelly, the first skeleton I have ever painted.

And, woohoo! Three goblin town goblins! They are not green, but muddy pink. This is because, according to my own theory about orcs, orc skin gets darker the more it is in the sun. These slaves spend most of their time deep underground and so see very little natural light. They are also, of course, too cowardly to go up into the light!

Now, their paintjobs are abominable, and it just makes them ugly as a goblin, BUT, I don't really mind as they are just there to die, and they are better than grey plastic. Also, they are cheap, ugly SNAGA! They may rot in goblin hell for all I care, but at least they can go slathered in a 1:1 mix of paint and wash!

A New Hope (and we are not talking about x-wing here, or anything Star Wars related)

After thinking deeply and considering all my options I have decided to paint something different. Well, different colours that is. So, after painting lots of green and yellow, I decided to take a leap of faith and dive into a completely new direction. Yes, you guessed it. Blue and yellow.

Why blue? Its a nice colour and I have a blue wash, so yeah.
Why yellow? Just don't ask. It has to have yellow in it. Yellow is the best colour to paint with. If I could paint every miniature I owned pure yellow I wouldn't because it would look awful. But I have been tempted.

So, without further ado, may I present, Adolf Goldroy of the Goldroy family.

And Applejon his diminutive pet wizard. Despite having a tail?! Applejon is still human, just rather small. Seems to be a side affect of being a wizard. Puts me in mind of another small wizard that I've painted. hmm. Better not start a trend. Anyway, I like my paint yellow and my wizards small!

And finally two dour unhappy Goldenroy guards. Yes, the Goldenroys are that rich that they can afford personal guards in blue and yellow. With halberds... in case that means anything to you?

Otherwise, I have been moping around, considering writing rules so that I can play yonder game.

But nah, I'll put it off for another week.

But other than that, I have forged ahead with some more goblins for lotr! That explains the large writing up top. Because the fact that I am drifting back towards lotr gives me hope.

Yours truly,

Very busy trying to get some more painting done,

Joshua

Battle for Newblüdfendorf

So, after doing a hasty rules write up, I set out to test them. The basic concept is fine, I just need to do some more work on them.

This battle was between the pestilent followers of the Mad God Byle and the Kingdom village of Newblüdfendorf.

The Kingdom forces had one turn to prepare, yet they were still woefully far away from a battle line.

Some plague zombies lurching forward.

The Byle sorcerer, Slet Vorskin and his ratman familiar, Zet Sawskin.

Pestulent Retch leads the charge against the enemies centre, along with two more zombies and a familiar.

And finally, three ratmen on the left flank.

The battle begins with some lucky shooting from a Kingdom handgunner, who wounded Slet

Yet this only angered the plagued sorcerer, who cast back a cloud of buzzing plague into the handgunner, killing him.

Meanwhile in the centre, Pestulent and his familiar bring down Donald, but the beastman takes a wound in the process.

The Road Warden tries his luck next and is also defeated.

Finally, the towns militia have rallied and now bravely advance towards the bloodied beastman.

Meanwhile, a soldier, a priest and a drunken dwarf turn five zombies into some rather rancid mincemeat.

To my sincere surprise, Pestulent was finallu put down by a lowly peasant, although the brave soul took a nasty cut in the process.

Meanwhile the zombie slaying threesome on the right flank move to engage Vorskin.

Who promptly dies.

And the last remaining zombies trade their unlife for the lives of two more villagers.

The survivors huddle around the barn/church in the aftermath. Reduced but alive.

The machinations of Byle are thwarted! But for how long...


Anyway, before I take my leave this evening, I would like to just apologize for the lack of posts recently. My hobby is at a low at the moment (too much school methinks).

Hopefully I will get some more stuff done this weekend.

Zombies, a wizard and more!

So, the fruits of my efforts over the weekend. Not much. But I had a busy weekend. It was my grandparents fifty-first anniversary!

Anyway, down to business!

You might recognize these chaps from way back a few months. Yes, I finally did their bases. That's D6+1 zombies thank you very much. All ready for summoning! The Mad god of plague and disease, Byle, is pleased with my efforts... mwahaha!

And next up we have the sorcerer for my Cult of the Redeemer warband. He is a chaos familiar model but I'm using him as a diminutive wizard. He was cursed, naturally, never to grow any bigger. He is a perfect fit and a great addition to the warband.

And here are two something elses. A middle class citizen and a peasant, ready to be chased by rabid plague zombies. How quaint! I painted these two up on a whim. They were "just because I felt like painting, but nothing too complicated" kind of models. So, that makes four commoners done so far. Soon I will have enough for a hamlet!

Oh, yes. Before I leave you, I might just announce that I might be starting a campaign with some buddies. Might. To playtest the Realm of Madness rules that I am working on at the same time as Arisen. I can help myself. I always end up writing my own rules for games... Its sad, but fun.

Still...

Could be worse... I could have insomnia... I could have a plague zombie under my bed... I could trip, fall and split an atom in my knee cap and blow up half of Cape Town...

So lets be thankful its endless rule writing instead. Hey?

Fluffy, Hound of Vengence

And Bruno... plain old thug.

So, although I have had very little sleep of late, I was able to finish these two off. They are going to join my "Cult of the Redeemer". A Chaos/Madness inspired warband.

And to oppose them I am putting together a new warband for the forces of relative order. Fun fun fun!

But not as fun as the "Cult of the Redeemer" warband. So, who thinks there should be an ogre in this warband. I love ogres for chaotic warbands. They are such nice centre-pieces.

Oh yes, and I'm painting a wad of peasants and common folk. For NPC's and stuff. Or just stuff for the followers of the Madness to slaughter, mwahaha!

Yes.

Now, the reason why I churn out a post every time I paint a miniature is because, for me, I hate it when there are no blog posts for me to read. Even if they are not particularly interesting like the stuff above and other stuff over the last two weeks, it still occupies a minute or two of your time, and while it might not be a minute or two of your time well spent (I can think of far more productive things to do), it is, hopefully, time slightly enjoyed. Anyway, even if you just look at the pictures, it still makes your mind start working. Around a full 24.7% of my inspiration comes from seeing other peoples work, no matter how convoluted.

What I am saying is that this blog is not very professional. But I am happy if at least one person raises a metaphorical eyebrow in surprise (good/bad surprise) at least at one convoluted paintjob.

Hehe. *sniffles/emotional crap...

Anywho?

Good bye! And always remember...

n' Seekoei dat spring is a gevaarlike ding!

Sack of Loot 3/3

Yipee! My last Christmas present has arrived!


Six handgunners, six peasants, five beastmen and a chaos hound from wargames foundry!

I think this might inspire me to paint some more oldhammeresque stuff! I already have some plans...

Other than that, here is a chaos spawn that I converted out of a mantic zombie. Second paintjob... first I was just messing around and wasting paint. I like the fleshy look of his face, like all the orifices have mutated over.

Aaaaand, last, I have treated myself to getting some sculpting tools at last!

Like last year, I am determined to teach myself how to basically sculpt. Very basically... ;)

So how's life? Hmm, hectic... School is baie (Afrikaans for very) intense. Loooot of work. :( I'm lucky if I am able to paint anything in a day. Not even complete. Just put brush to lead or plastic.

ya, ya, ya...

So. I have been thinking. Yes, amazing as that is, what is more amazing is what I am thinking about. And I am thinking about why painting miniatures for me is so enjoyable. Now first off, when I was younger, I didn't paint anything! Or hardly anything. There was no time to! Any spare time was spent actually playing with the miniatures! But then I began to paint stuff here and there, and then I began blogging. And now I refuse to play with an unpainted miniature. Just look at what the internet does to you!

So, what changed. First, I am now rewarded for painting miniatures by being able to share them on this here blog. It gives a very definite sense of satisfaction to finish a miniature, and put it out there. It completes something somehow. Even if the painted mini is crap... ;) Then I can pretend the lighting was bad or that the cast wasn't good or that I'm still learning. hehe.

Anyway, I take joy in painting because one it is like bringing life to dead plastic/lead. Also, I often find it very relaxing to forget about everything else and just focus on the miniature. I find myself making up numerous backgrounds for the model that I am painting, or if he is a character, I think up who his family are, what connections he has, how wealthy is he. I think off all the future engagements the model will fight in. Its quite fun. And then its done. And I blog it.

So, if your reading this, please enlighten me  about what you think about when you paint. I would be really interested, actually.

Thanks.

See ya.

Arisen Battle Report

So, I have called this game system that I am working on Arisen.

And here is my first batrep done with my now updated rules. For this battle I pretty much used all the starwars ships I had. Hmm, perhaps I could get some alternate ships made by someone. But anyway, that's all in the future.

So, my valiant opponent had a Merchant Guild Hunter Frigate (left). A Merchant Guild Bi-Wing (middle) and a Merchant Guild Balurian Gunboat (right).

My forces comprised of a Sect Bi-Blade Advance (left) and a Sect Freighter-Cruiser with two Bi-Blades docked (right).

I started off by moving my Advanced into the relative cover of an asteroid while my Freighter-Cruiser was able to launch one of its docked Bi-Blades.

My opponent moved forward with everything, the Hunter Frigate and the Bi-Wing making a bee line towards my Freighter-Cruiser. The Hunter Frigate casually blasted the disembarked Bi-Blade almost all the way to Timbuktu (yes, you guessed it, I am busy studying the Songhai Empire in History...).

The Hunter Frigate and the Bi-Wing split up while the Balurian Gunboat makes its first appearance on camera.

In a bout of absolute madness, the pilot of my Advanced decided to go kamikaze and ram the Hunter Frigate.

This resulted in the destruction of the Advanced and the loss of the Hunter Frigates shields. Then after violently exploding, the Advanced managed to take the Frigate down two more health. Even in death...

So, here I forgot to take a pic or two but pretty much, the disembarked Bi-Blade was disemboweled by the Frigate while the Bi-Wing turned about, ready to face the Freighter-Cruiser.

However, inspired by the Advanced's selfless act of insanity, the Sect Cruiser decided to ram the Balurian Gunboat. This really didn't work out for the poor Merchant Guild Gunboat who promptly lost all its shields and lost three HP while the Cruisers shields didn't even flicker.

In a desperate effort to take down the Sect Cruiser, the Hunter Frigate and the Bi-Wing sprayed down the hulking vessel with Pulse fire. Luckily they managed to take out the Cruisers backwards shields however victory was not long lived as the Cruiser fired off sixteen shots back into the Frigate, who, being on only one health, popped violently.

After a round more of shooting, the Cruiser still hadn't got its shields back up and was now down to only 8 HP left. Still, its sheer weight of firepower blew the Bi-Wing. It was up to the Balurian Gunboat now to save the day for the Merchant-Guild.

Finally, the second Bi-Blade disembarked but it wasn't able to turn yet. In the distance you can see the Balurian Gunboat creeping up on the unshielded rear of the Cruiser.

Only three more HP till it blows!

Chug chug chug (the Balurian Gunboat only has a max move of 4"). In a desperate attempt to seize the day the Cruiser fires off another round at the Gunboat, popping its newly repaired shields.

But fate was not favouring the Sect as finally the Freighter-Cruiser fell. Booom!

So, what do we have left. A poor litte Bi-Blade and a Gunboat without shields.

Managing to turn, the Bi-Blade survives a round of shooting from the Gunboat and then initiates a fly-by on the opposing craft. Hammering off another two HP.

And, just out of sheer luck, I manage to turn while the Gunboat doesn't. I score target lock and...

"Get out of my Space you damned Merchant Guild!"

Still, I must say that the Balurian Gunboat must have been Ship of the Match. Its a tank.

The game was fun! There were a few tense moments when an opportune shield up would have changed the course of battle. Firstly if my Cruiser had got its shield up, then the game would have been over much sooner as nothing my opponent had at the time had enough fire power to get through the shield. That's a small point that I might just have to change. Similarly, if the Gunboat had got its shields up, there would be nothing that the Bi-Blade could have done really. Still. GG :D


And to top it all off, here is a 40k mini that is now being used for Oldhammer!
 Woohoo! Cultist time! He doesn't have any gun so what the hell! Why not? He is quite big but... swollen with the power of Chaos and all...

Cheerio then, and thanks for reading!