The week after Salute . . . and future plans

So, how has my week gone? I've made a few posts about Salute, with the pics of the Forge World display unsurprisingly doing well, but with a surprising amount of interest in my post about Troublemaker Games. I'm guessing this is because I got a shout on the Tactical Command forum. God knows what will happen if I actually start playing Timeline 300 rather than just the wife.

ClauseIV1918's Grey Knights

On Wednesday I pottered down to Dark Sphere and saw that things have been getting busier on 40K nights since I was last there. ClauseIV1918 has been expanding his Grey Knights, and his blog is mentioning he's also branching out with some Imperial Guard allies.

Ravenwing, about to massacre some Chaos

I got in a game against the Ravenwing on a cityscape board, and got comprehensively beaten - although it wasn't, on reflection, the massacre I first thought it to be.

Which leads on to my upcoming posts! I still have one more Salute 2013 post to do, which will be a general summary of how the event went for me. I should write up a battle report about what happens when Sammael and Mephiston decide to hang out together and shoot some Guardsmen. I've also been tinkering about with Sarissa kits to add some extra detail to them.

Look at those beautifully recessed doors!

Finally, I've booked in for some events. I will be at Grumpy Old Wargamers Con in June, and Enter the Citadel at Warhammer World in July. They will likely, in turn, lead to some more blog posts of their own...

I'm going to shelve the aborted attempt to paint the Salute Mayan for now, try and finish off the Scribe and Vindicare, and really knuckle down on the Tzeentch Herald, Malifaux Collodi Crew and Sarissa Buildings, with any spare time going into getting a little more progress with my currently stalled Imperial Guard.

Salute 2013: KR Multicase: Now Doing Furniture, Soon To Do Scenery

As long time readers of my blog and my friends will know, I'm a bit of a fan of KR Multicase. While their tray system can be a little difficult to get your head around, once you've worked it out, they're incredibly flexible.

So yet again, I find myself throwing out another internet blogging 'exclusive' for something that was on display at Salute but not many people seemed to be talking about. If I'd been a little more professional and clever, I'd have remembered to take some more photos - of their furniture range, and of the giant "KR" sign made out of their foam...

My wife bought one of these

As the blog title subtly hints, KR Multicase are now doing furniture. There were book cases which had deliberately been made with the dimensions of their cases in mind so they fit perfectly. Pictured above is a desk that folds out into a four by four gaming table. They also have larger gaming tables with storage cupboards underneath.

This stuff was all available to pre-order, and Sim happily picked up a new desk for her to work at that can turn into a nice little skirmish table. But you will notice that there are little peg holes in the table above - why are they there?

The answer is that what KR are going to be doing next is gaming boards and scenery.

Obligatory shot of KR staff with new
board carry case

The tables and the boards both have recesses in which allow simple pegs to be placed in them to keep the boards securely in place but still easy to pack away. Its cheap and simple, and my careful investigations showed that even the clumsiest of players is not going to catapult the table across the room.

I had an interesting little chat about why magnets don't work for the same purpose - they had looked into them, but their shear strength is terrible - and once it fails, it fails spectacularly as once the magnets are apart, everything is loose.

The KR scenery range is going to start off with modular terrain boards - I believe with simple or luxury options and a variety of different climates.

This is, I believe, one of the luxury ones

There's also going to be stuff like a lava board, but if you want a game without lava, you'll be able to get a piece of terrain that neatly fits over the lava so you don't have to have it that game.

They're also making terrain sets which will fit in with their carry case range in a clever and sensible manner. Here is an example of how a set of hills will work.

One hill...

Two hills...

Three hills!

 The final product, when it's done, will have foam to fit around all the terrain pieces for protection too. The rocks you see also fit cleverly around each other to go in a KR box. They've spent some time thinking through having all the different bits of their range work together. In theory, with one of their big carry cases and a couple of board carriers, you could take a full board, terrain and army on the train without it being horrifically painful.

I'm really looking forward to this stuff. I'm not sure what things I'll go for myself - there's way too many different manufacturers I love to rely solely on one source of terrain, even if it is convenient. Despite that, I really like what they've done with it, and am a bit excited to see the full range when it's done.

Isn't it pretty?

Salute 2013: Troublemaker games - Resource Management Steampunk Wargaming. With Martians. (Or: How To Get Money From My Wife)

One of the new games that my wife picked up at Salute was a little 10mm game called Timeline 300. It's made by a little company called Troublemaker Games.

Its an alternative history setting, where a mysterious "HGW" has been altering history time and time again to try and avert the end of the world - and this is the events of one of the timelines where he failed.

In it, Steampunk British forces clash with Marxist German Zombies and War of the World style Martian invaders.

The British forces seem to have the most models at the moment, with a number of different sized land ships.

The Martians, however, have awesome looking "War of the Worlds" style walkers.

There was a pretty display board set up with some Martians and British Land Cruisers facing off.

My personal favourite unit: British adventurers - nobles armed with eccentric firearms, chainsaws and who knows what else.

This is the biggest model available at the moment - the British Land Cruiser. Troublemaker are hoping that if they make enough money from Salute, they can make similar sized models for the Germans and the Martians. Good luck to them!

The Martians also have flying saucers, which are armed with the deadly "Black Smoke".

German Zombies - because they love their country, and President Marx so much - sometimes they come back to continue to serve!

Some German infantry - relatively ordinary, but standard line troops generally are.

 German tanks. Now, the interesting thing about this game is that it's a resource management game - it's about controlling the coal mines on the board and  teleporting new units onto the battlefield.

These are new models! So new, I can't find them in the rulebook or on Troublemaker's website... Its not often I get 'exclusives' (although yes, they were at Salute, I've not found anyone else talking much about them on the internet yet - technicalities count, right?)...

As you may have guessed from the title, Troublemaker parted my wife with a good chunk of her hard earned money - she has two armies so other people can play, too. Once we've got them painted and assembled, I'll report back - but it may be a while, we have a lot of things to go through!

Sa-lewt 2013: Return Of the Shopping

As promised, here is a post listing my purchases from this year's Salute, in a similar vein to last year's post.

I feel I should confess my "get things finished from last year's Salute" failed abysmally, and I didn't even finish the Mayan. Still, I intend to get him done eventually...

My blogging has come a long way since this time last year, so this time, you get pictures!

So, it being Salute, there was a free figure...

This year, it is Jason, as in "Jason and the Argonauts". It's a nice plastic cast with an alternative hand (holding a hydra head or a shield), and maybe this one will actually get painted in time for the competition next year.

I had pre-ordered Imperial Armour Volume One: Second Edition, so I could look at all the pretty pictures of the tanks.

I intend to do a bit of a review / ideas post when I've done more than scan read it. It is a weighty, pretty tome that I am spending a lot of time gazing at adoringly.

I also picked up some etched brass for some friends who are involved in a 40K LARP and who wanted some more symbols to convert their Nerf guns with.

Despite my incredibly slow painting speed, I am getting more confident, so I decided it was time for me to invest in my first Studio McVey piece. After a bit of umming and ahhing, Mike warned me that Ruby was starting to run low, so I decided to buy her. My darling wife had been trying to persuade me to get Zeeona, as I have a tendency to darker colours in my painting and I should do something out my comfort zone. I'm feeling reasonably out of my comfort zone with a cowgirl riding a dinosaur, but I do take her point about brighter colours - I should find something along those lines to try out...

It isn't as impressive as the finished model...

I hadn't been planning to get many more minatures, but I may have kind of slipped a little bit when chatting with the chap responsible for Arcworlde - who runs Warploque Miniatures. He is still at University, but is planning his first Kickstarter.

I picked up a little swamp critter of some kind and an elf war chief. They were good value for money, excellent and different sculpts, and I'm really interested to see how his rules beta testing goes.

Then, we hit the 'big' purchases... My main objective this weekend was to improve the stock and quality of my available terrain.

Given that I already have a painting backlog that stretches back years, I was heavily drawn to Tablescape. They do good quality, reasonably priced terrain that most importantly for me comes pre-painted. Money spent, and no additions to the backlog!

This stuff is ridiculously good value. The industrial stuff, shipping containers, crates and barricades all came to less than £100. Here's a top down shot so you can see how much of a footprint this stuff has.

The chap who makes this has also thought it through - all the terrain is done to either be at chest height for a 28mm figure, or much taller than them, to cut down on the potential for arguments. Well done, robust and affordable. I can't sing their praises enough.

Finally, with time ticking down, we headed over to Sarissa Precision to spend my remaining money. With a little bit of chatting, I picked up five buildings in total (and Sim saw one she had to have, also pictured).

I also put some money in the tin for Goblin Aid - which is something very close to my heart for a variety of reasons. I look forward to the goblins being finalised and made available, as I will be putting some serious money down when they are all done.

Anyway, this is enough of me wallowing in materialism! I'll leave you with a different angle of the awesome Tablescape scenery.

Salute 2013: Forge World Display

I'll have my more personal take on Salute 2013 in the near future, but while I'm writing that, I thought it would be nice to throw up a few photos of the models Forge World had up on their stand. I'm not sure if any of these are unreleased yet (I'm really not up to speed on Horus Heresy units), so please do comment if you spot a new one!

Cerberus Heavy Tank Destroyer

Land Raider Proteus?

Fellblade

Necron Tesseract Ark

Emperor's Children Contemptor Dreadnought

Mechanicum Thallax, with a show only model to the left

Justaerin Terminators?

(L to R): Apothecaries?,
Legion Champion and Master of Signal,
Legion Rapier Laser Destroyer

Mk IV Recon Squad (Contemptor in the background)

Abaddon and Loken

Abaddon and Loken, from another angle

Salamanders with Autocannons?

Deathshroud Terminators

Word Bearers with Rotor Cannons?

Word Bearers with Volkite Calivers?

Night Lords with Plasma Guns

I hope you like the pictures! Further posts will follow later.

How the week has been going

The Mayan is proceeding slowly, but I'm not happy with how he is at the moment, so no pictures of that.

I have gotten a little further with my test Dark Angel - not hugely far, but more than when you last saw him.

Oh, erm, surprise Mayan in the background. He's further along than that now.

Anyhow, I'm quite liking the base coat and dry brush on the power armour, but I don't feel the bolter is the right colour. I'm going to leave it be, though, and try painting other things to find the right combination to get the colour I'm after.

The Marine is also further along a little more than that now - he's had a bit of base coating of his eagle and the edging on his shoulder pads.

To distract me from the painful sadness of the Mayan, I have started tinkering with the Sarissa Warehouse I have from their infinity range.

I'd been planning on just assembling it out of the box when my darling wife asked if I was planning on offsetting the doors. I then realised I had to do that!

What do I mean by that?

Well, this is how the walls with doors in for the Sarissa warehouse come:

And they're all flat and flush with the wall. Most big doors are either recessed into the wall, or sticking out.

So, first I detached the doors. Watch out if you're doing this, because the little bits of connection left won't necessary snap where you want - I've had to repair a door as a result.

The tab above should be like the one below:
Its split horizontally so half is on the door and
half is not - but I've fixed this now...

I've then taken the offcuts from previous Sarissa buildings and use them to create something to glue the doors into their new position. These are now drying overnight before I add the next layer of offcuts to act as the actual surface to glue the doors to. More pictures will follow when there's more progress!

Never throw useful bits like this away!

What is the technical name for these bits?
Anyone know?

The progress so far

I am also drafting, off and on, some thoughts about Rogue Trader and 6th Edition. At some point I'll get them into what I think is a coherent format and publish them for other people to read. There's still a way to go so they aren't a random stream of consciousness...