Monday 18 March 2024

A short update - Bretonnians, a Limited Model and playing 40K

 
Between work being busy and being Out out, I've not got much hobby done at home. The other half of the Bretonnian command group are mostly done-ish, and I'll be getting on with them over the Easter weekend.


A friend was up at the Warhammer World Open Day and kindly picked up the Steel Rook for me. I love this model - it calls to basically all my aesthetic buttons. Not sure what I'll use it for just yet, but he looks great.


I also managed to arrange my first game of 10th edition Warhammer 40,000 with my Deathwatch. A full write up will come later, but I'm much happier with how 10th plays than my short experience of 9th.

In the upcoming week I've got my Infinity League game on Wednesday, and the Red Star Blues tournament at HATE on Saturday. The weekend after is Easter, where I'm aiming to get a bunch of hobby done alongside some tidying up around the flat.

Monday 11 March 2024

Assembling Bretonnian Men at Arms

 
So, it's been a long while since I've painted anything for a large battle game rather than a skirmish game. I did a little bit of a stock take, and decided I have enough models for two units of 25 men at arms, and one of 20, leaving me with 36 archers. To bring it up to 4 units of 10 archers, I ordered one sprue of 4 archers from eBay.

I've started by sorting the basing. I've really liked how Krautcover "Common Earth (dark)" looks so far, so I'm using that. I glued it on using a bunch of Geek Gaming Scenics glue I got free in some goodie bag at some point.


I was a bit nervous about how much might flake off over time, so once the glue was dry, I mixed up some more with a bit of water, and soaked them all in a layer of water and glue with an old brush. Once it dried, I wasn't losing any material when I tapped them. Success!


I started assembling the first unit and glued a couple of them to the bases using super glue. After leaving them overnight, I confirmed my suspicion that I couldn't be this lazy and that they were very wobbly due to the connection between the basing texture and the base. I quickly pulled them off and pinned them.

I'm already thinking during assembly of how I want the units to look. I like the idea of naming units, so thought about what their backgrounds could be. For the first two big blocks of men at arms, I've decided to split them between peasants raised from the countryside, and a town militia. This unit is going to be the country unit. In assembly, this will mostly be down to what they're not - I'll be using all kettle helmets for the town militia!


To pin the dog, rather than try and pin through the leg, I ran a pin up into the body up the inside of one leg. You can't see it at any angle you'd view it on the table. I'm really pleased with how it turned out! I decided to use the dog with the "rural" unit as I felt it fit quite well.

For the town militia unit I'll be digging through the internet for town names in Mousillon. For the rural unit, I'm thinking of using the name The Good Folk of Mousillon. It's a nice medieval sounding phrase, and is a nice counterpoint to the later fate of Mousillon.

Thursday 7 March 2024

Infinity Game: Nomads vs Yu-Jing: Acquisition

 
Popped down to the club last week for a pick up game of Infinity. My friend was running his Yu Jing, and we randomly selected Acquisition as the mission. I threw a basic list together including the Gator, won the Lieutenant roll and chose the deployment edge, meaning I got to go second.


My left flank was effectively and brutally rolled up, and a Shaolin made a run for the backfield, getting hit by an E/M mine laid by Billie to end his rampage.

I was deeply worried about my opponent's Hac Tao, and tried to use a Heckler Jammer to deal with it. The Heckler failed and was quickly shot to bits, and I saw at the weekend my opponent is now assembling a Tian Gou with Jammer after finding out how amazing they are.

So yeah, sorry locals, that one is on me.


I sent the Gator out to clear a Total Reaction remote, but he could only draw a bead on it when outside of cover. He messed up twice, and on the second go, failed two armour saves and spent the rest of the game hiding.


A Lu Duan made an offensive run up the board, dropped a deployable repeater to inhibit the Gator, then found Jazz and took her out with a Heavy Flamethrower.


Things were going badly enough on my second turn that I brought my Tomcat Doctor on to heal up a couple of models just to mean I had some orders in my third turn...


But it wasn't enough, and the Hac Tao secured the central tech coffin to win the game. I was thoroughly outplayed here, with a pretty well tuned Yu Jing list (that I think I've just helped tune up even more). I'm still pottering through different unit picks in Nomads, and haven't truly gelled with a build just yet. I definitely still love the faction and am enjoying playing them, but I haven't found the build or models that really bring me joy. There's some little elements I'm definitely getting on with and I'm liking some bits and pieces, but I'm still on the search for the That Thing I Love...

Monday 4 March 2024

Plans for March

 
I've got quite a few commitments this month, but lets try and set some goals. I had a delivery a while ago for the next "big" project. I'm not sure I'll get it all assembled this month, but I definitely want to get started... And the reveal as to what it will be is coming a little later on in this post.


Along with the Frameworks kits I looted for parts in January that I got assembled in February, there were two more that I got in case I needed them then didn't open... One is just short basing texture, the other is still on sprue. Lets get them assembled, shall we?


That said, the "ready to paint" tray is basically full, so no more "fun little side paint" assembly until a whole bunch of this lot get painted... If I really want to assemble stuff there's all sorts of dull repairs sitting waiting to be done, even if it doesn't generate any content for the blog...


I've got this small assortment of half finished works in progress to sort out. None of them are particularly time consuming, so should be good for the delicious brain chemicals you get from finishing something. There's plenty to pick from the tray once these are done...


As the project assembly is a biggie, I've dug out the Imetrons I had been thinking of painting last month before I got distracted with a couple of Battlemechs. While the big work this month is project assembly, I want to keep the pace going on getting projects painted.


So, the big project assembly... This is sadly not full boxes. I sold the knights ages ago, leaving only the peasants. Still, it's not the end of the world, I can pick up new ones once I've got these done. The current plan is to paint a Mousillon force, as Warhammer: The Old World is set before its fall.

One thing I haven't decided yet is the colour scheme. The canonical scheme for the Duchy of Mousillon in this time period is blue with fleur de lys, but other sources have them in a yellow and black quartered scheme. I quite like the yellow and black scheme, but I reckon I could do a really solid blue scheme too. I'll probably paint a couple of the palette cleansers in each scheme to help make me the decision.

Why am I putting time into assembling Bretonnians while also saying I have enough stuff assembled? I split my hobby painting between "projects" which are things I game with or super fancy time consuming paint jobs, and "fun little things", which is random bits and pieces and D&D models that are smaller numbers of models who get simple tabletop paint jobs. I've ended up focusing more on the latter for a while, and while its built my painting momentum, it's time to get back to getting stuff done to play with.

Thursday 29 February 2024

Reviewing February Goals


It's been a pretty productive month all told. The various half done models from the D&D in person game prep are all assembled, undercoated and ready for paint. (A couple have even started being painted...)


The original plan had been to paint a couple of Combined Army figures as this month's "project", but the fact I had two Battlemechs that needed some colour correction won out because they fell under the "half finished" banner. I also got a lance worth of 'mechs prepped up as planned so there's more selection of projects on the "to do" pile.


I also exceeded expectations a little bit by painting this little mushroom I sculpted with leftover milliput. I've also been trying a new paint technique and am halfway through the four 3D printed civilians from the Sheffield Satellite using it - meaning I got five miniatures painted this month in total.

So, a month where I set myself some sensible goals and proceeded to hit them. Possibly unheard of? Still, it's a busy month in March, so I'm unsure I'll be as successful next month...

Monday 26 February 2024

Just one wafer thin update

 
I sadly spent a good chunk of this week unwell, and much of that unwell time asleep. This has not done wonders for hobby productivity, unsurprisingly. Still, I managed to finish the undercoats on these Framework miniatures over the weekend in between catching up on jobs around the house.


I also had a moment of illness induced weakness and picked up REM Racers by Corvus Belli. This is a board game where you play pilots of giant remote controlled cars with assorted weapons. There's even card controllers for the remotes you using during the game. I shall report back when I've managed to fit in a game.

Thursday 22 February 2024

Phandelver Monsters

 
The latest lucky dip D&D miniatures set from Wizkids is the Phandelver set, based on the new, updated Phandelver campaign. The campaign book is mediocre, and this miniature set kind of matches it. There's a whole bunch of standard models like goblins and zombies with pretty shoddy paint jobs, but going through the store I go to for individual minis, I picked out a handful of the better sculpts and paint jobs.

First up is a Roper. A classic D&D dungeon encounter, this is a nice fun sculpt I thought was worth picking up. It's a good low to medium level encounter for D&D characters. Interestingly, I've noticed that while it's CR5 in D&D, its a hefty Level 10 in Pathfinder, making it a much tougher encounter for medium level PCs in that system.


This Young Amethyst Dragon is a CR 4 creature who hates Far Realm creatures. It works as a nice potential ally to PCs in the right type of campaign. It doesn't feel like it's the right level for acting as an opponent to a party whose Warlock has done a deal with a Far Realm entity or similar - that feels like a challenge that should come in later in their arcs.


I already have some excellent Reaper Wolves that I've painted up, but thought I'd pick up another. This one just isn't as nice looking and is a little glossy. The difference really highlights to me the benefit of painting things yourself if you have the time.

The Nothic has a slightly better paint job. He's a nice little weird aberration that could either be a low level encounter, or be a weird minion for some higher powered thing that should not be.


In the Phandelver game I ran, Stirges absolutely wrecked the party in large numbers, so I felt it would be worthwhile to pick up five for a nice little flock of bloodsucking horrors. They're a staple low level weird animal encounter that I enjoyed running online before, so will now be able to do in person as well...


I also got a Flameskull, which is another classic in the original Phandelver adventure. My party did not have a good time with it, as they failed some stealth rolls trying to spy on it while they were incredibly low on health and healing, so it lobbed a fireball right into the middle of them. It was sad times.


The Flameskull is, accurately, really quite teeny. Here it is next to a hero with a sword planning to put an end to its fire based reign of terror. It's a fun little critter that works well as part of a larger encounter, able to put out a lot of damage while remaining relatively fragile once hit...

So, all in all, I did OK at skimming through the Phandelver set, but I wouldn't be taking a risk on any of the blind boxes. People who split the boxes and sell the individuals are the only reason I've ended up investing in the models from this set, as the hit to miss ratio is particularly low in this range.

Monday 19 February 2024

Keeping the hobby pace up

 
I got another one of the 3D prints from the Sheffield Satellite painted up this weekend. This one is obviously based off Aramaki from Ghost in the Shell. I went with slightly different colour choices to try and move away from that look a little bit.


I've got a Battletech lance undercoated and ready for paint for March's project. There were a few mould lines to clean up, some basing paste and then a bit of nice weather on Sunday which allowed that gave me a bit of time to get them undercoated...


Back on the painting desk, three of the D&D Frameworks models have a base undercoat on. I'll tidy it up with a brush and add a zenithal before ticking them off. I started painting the two Oathmark Dwarf characters when waiting for other paint to dry. Getting them done will be a happy bonus. I've still got two Frameworks characters I bought for parts that I didn't use - the Tiefling Rogue is now assembled and just needs basing material and undercoating, while the Human Rogue still needs assembly.

I do have a couple of bits and pieces listed on eBay right now. There's a few PanOceania miniatures where I needed some of the box, plus a few Fenris miniatures where I accidentally ordered duplicates of models. I've listed everything at 99p to start, so there's a good chance of grabbing a bargain. 

Thursday 15 February 2024

HATE Infinity League: Supremacy vs O12

 
My local wargaming club, HATE, has started a new Infinity League. I'm running Nomads for it, and the first mission was Supremacy. I drew against O-12 for this round.


I lost the Lieutenant roll, and my opponent chose to go first. I picked deployment and set up defensively. I ran a Kriza Boracs, Jazz and Billie, the Uberfallkommando, a bunch of mid-field camo and support units.


I built most of my deployment decisions off placing the Uberfallkommando opposite the QAZ creature my opponent placed as a violent warband is the quickest and easiest way of clearing them.


My opponent ran a Gamma HMG up the right flank, protecting it with Team Sirius and a Varangian Guard.


The Epsilon took advantage of some smoke to clear out the Reaktion Zond. The O-12 player completed the first turn with two buttons pressed.


The Uberfallkommando headed up the table and one of the Pupniks hit and cleared out the QAZ creature.


My Libertos then attacked the Varangian and the Sirius remote, getting injured by the Gamma and going Dogged. I was keen to get rid of the Repeater on the Sirius remote to let me move Robin Hook up so her Repeater would hold the Gamma at bay.


I hid the Pupniks and Robin Hook around one of the consoles to hold things up. A Raveneye came up to try and take out Robin Hook, but was unable to target her from cover, meaning she was able to take the Raveneye Officer out.


My Kriza headed up the right flank and took out one of the Madtraps, before going into suppressive fire.


A Delta with Boarding Shotgun then came on behind the Kriza and managed to cause it a wound but walked into range of a Heckler with a Jammer, and ended up isolated.


My Sombra had revealed to do some hacking, and a Gangbuster then opened fire on it, when it failed a guts check and had to fall back into the line of fire of the Epsilon sniper. Fortunately for me the Epsilon didn't have any orders left to take advantage...


The Sirius snuck up on Robin Hook and took it out, but it took a whole bunch of orders to do so.


The Pupniks then counter-attacked and took out the Sirius trooper, freeing up the Chimera to throw an Eclipse Grenade between the Epsilon and the Sombra to let it move freely. I could have moved one of the Pupniks to trigger a remaining Madtrap, but decided not to.


The Sombra then moved up to flip the switch on one of the consoles on the O-12 side of the board. I had misjudged the distance and ended up Immobilised as a result.


The Sombra then survived two rounds of shooting while Immobilised before getting lucky and managing to break out of the glue. He then managed to take out a Bluecoat, switching the control of the quadrant to Nomad control.

In the end, we tied on quadrants for all three turns. I took two consoles to O-12's one, and also scored my classified, with an extra point for the type of classified it was. This meant I ended up with a 7-4 win.

A lot of this was down to luck - the Sombra really shouldn't have survived, and it won me the game. I've picked up a few more practical tips around using Nomads, with plenty more still to learn...