Wizkids and Reaper Bones Adventurers

 

My last batch from Brushchewer had a few Wizkids adventurers, along with a Reaper Bones miniature I'd not gotten around to.

First up were a couple of female dwarf spellcasters. I'm quite excited by the Pathfinder adventure Sky King's Tomb right now, so dwarfs seem particularly cool to me at the moment.

Meanwhile, we have a fighter with two weapons who's gained some blue warpaint, and Andowyn Thrushmoor from Reaper. A few more heroic adventurers for when I finally set up an in person game...

Taking stock at the end of July

 

I've had a productive month all told, despite having wandered off LARPing during it. I'm kind of most happy about the Reaper Bones Wolves, because they're something I bought, assembled and painted pretty much straight through. This is much more the sort of thing I want to be doing - not working through backlogs from years ago.

On the subject of backlogs from years ago, the third of the four Oathsworn dwarfs I was given as a present are now finished. It's a good feeling to have older stuff finished. I'm probably going to take a pass of all the things I've got assembled and ready to paint and see what I'm still emotionally invested in doing. Things that I'm more keen on being done than doing myself, I'll get out to one of my commission painters.

I also got this Urbanmech done. There's a whole bunch of games I've got lined up that I want to play but haven't made the time to. I'm probably going to have a bit of a think by the end of the year about how many games I can realistically play, and move a few games to either "I'll paint a few of their minis for fun" or "admire from afar rather than collect" to have a bit more of a realistic attitude to what I'll actually get done.

Infinity remains my favourite game to play, and I'm now keen to get to my first faction love - Nomads. I do need to take a mature and sensible approach to that project, though, and make sure I've got rid of enough clutter that I can properly dedicate time to them, rather than get frustrated that I'm not getting anywhere with them because things are in the way...

Let there be (painting) light!

The replacement part for the broken hobby room light turned up quicker than expected, and I managed to be productive! First up is this Dwarf Shieldmaiden from Oathsworn Miniatures, though I believe she's now out of production.

I'd started painting her with Contrast, but decided to finish her up with normal acrylic highlights. I suspect I could go in and spend another hour on tweaking her a little more, but she's fine for RPG purposes, so I'm calling her done.

I deliberately went with brighter highlights than I'm used to, sometimes blending, sometimes not depending on the materials I was highlighting. This is all stuff I'm doing more of following the Roman Lappat beginner's course, which has really changed how I think about painting.

The cloak was a particular problem as the Contrast hadn't done a great job there. I got it OK in the end, but I think I'd definitely start it differently in future.

Then I realised that the battery for the flexible light I use for front lighting photos had also started to die, possibly just to mess with me. I ended up having to charge it and retake the photo of these Reaper Bones wolves for D&D as the first ones were way too dark...

I've got one last Oathsworn dwarf to finish, and have been getting a few more O-12 models ready for paint too. I'm also starting to get paint on these Mutant Marshes scatter terrain pieces for creepy horror games.

After LARP, a little hobby

 

The weekend before last was Empire LRP, so most of this week has been recovery and tidying. Still, I took the opportunity to settle down to a bit of painting and finish up the last four pieces of the Mantic Terrain Crate "Dungeon Debris" that has been a deeply cursed project for me.

Getting it finished and off the paint table feels like a bit achievement, even if I was literally down to only doing a final drybrush on the last pieces.

The next two weekends I'm roaming the country looking for trouble. Specifically, Steel City Insurrection in Sheffield, and a tournament the following weekend in Norwich. Both are Satellite tournaments.

I've been practicing with my White Company for Sheffield, and am still trying to pin down exactly what I want to take. For Sheffield, the missions seem relatively simple, but I'm undecided what to take. While White Company are an option, there's a small temptation to just take a really violent Dahshat list instead.

I also took advantage of the nice weather to undercoat all the beasties I have for wild shape and familiars for D&D. But next, I need to do a little "stock take" of what hobby needs doing and work out what I'm doing over the next few weeks.

Hobby Admin

 

I've not been getting much painting done of late, but I did spend the weekend getting a whole bunch of "hobby admin" done. I had two commissions back - this big pile of Nomads back from my Infinity assembly guy, and another Terrain Crate back from Brushchewer Inc. So the painted models need photographing, and the assembled ones need checking and putting away.

I've started playing D&D in person. It's a campaign with multiple games of D&D in a linked world. It's good fun, if not hugely deep due to the number of players. I went along with a couple of ideas and ended up jumping into playing a Kobold Druid, because I haven't played one of these small agents of chaos in forever.

I already had the Frameworks Kobolds minis, so I headed up to the storage unit to dig them out.

I hit level 2 after my first session, so I also grabbed the box of horses I had at the unit so I could Wild Shape into a bigger lad if needed.

The "miniatures to borrow" for new players were also a bit limited, so I grabbed some spare Frostgrave sprues I'd been planning on selling to assemble and paint for them instead.

I didn't have a bunch of the things you can Wild Shape into, plus the campaign allowed the Strixhaven backgrounds, so I grabbed Find Familiar via that to allow some additional nonsense. To cover all those options cheaply, I picked up the Reaper Bones Wolf pack and Familiar Packs to get some simple models done for that.

And finally, I ordered a single sprue from the Wargames Atlantic Giant Spider box to make me a Giant Wolf Spider. The seller was also selling single Battlemechs, so I grabbed a Locust for my small militia lance.

I also had a couple of Infinity boxes that were going "Last Chance to Buy" show up, and picked up a few other D&D things from the storage unit because I was full of keen, and all together, that's probably a Bit Too Much to be doing. I'm spending more time sorting stuff out than I am painting...

The Horus Heresy minis are going into the "abandoned projects" pile for now as I stalled out on sorting their bases. I'll finish up the dwarfs and the last of the Dungeon Debris, then move onto something new to get me motivated again.

Comparing Wizkids and Reaper Bones Black Oozes

 

I picked up some Reaper Bones to give me all the duplication options for a D&D "Black Pudding" alongside the Wizkids miniatures I already have. The larger one is marketed as a "Carnivorous Pudding" while the smaller ones are "Acidic Ooze"s.

Here's a size comparison to the Wizkids models. The "Carnivorous Pudding" is smaller than the larger Wizkids model, and while it's a bit bigger than the smaller Wizkids one, they'll do OK on the same table as two that are technically the same size. And the "Acidic Ooze" is just the right size for smaller, broken off ones.

I'm also happy with how the model sizes work alongside typical D&D miniatures. Here they are next to some recently painted models I've done by Oathsworn Miniatures and Bad Squiddo. They seem pretty well scaled for existing miniatures, so I'm pretty happy them.

Last week's painting - 100 miniatures challenge

 

I had a week off over Christmas, and had the sudden realisation that my painting total was sitting at 81 painted miniatures. That would mean I only needed to get 19 models painted to have done 100 models in a year! I gave it a go, but a couple of days before the end of the year it became clear I'd had too much else on to be close to hitting the target, and rather than try and crunch to hit it, and leave myself with a huge backlog of housework from neglecting that, I was better placed to redirect my efforts to tidying up and setting myself up to be in a good place going into next year.

That aside, I did have a productive week, getting four models finished. They all ended up being D&D models for no reason other than my painting whims. There wasn't a particular plan to what got picked out and painted. I'd already been part way through two of them, so I finished those first and got a couple more done.

First up we have this Griffin that I bought from Iron Gate Scenery at Salute back in 2021. She had a couple of small misprint areas on the feathers that I just darkened up to hide rather than do anything clever. The stone blocks on the base area from the Rubble City pieces made by Fenris Games.

Having a good "scary big monster" for low level D&D is something I feel I should get a nice bit of use out of, so I'm pleased to get this one done. It's the sort of "work horse" monster miniature that should see a good bit of use. It's not going to come out as much as bandits or goblins, sure, but having a bigger monster come out now and again for variety keeps things interesting.

Next up is this really lovely dwarf miniature I got from Otherworld Miniatures. I think he's one of the best dwarfs they do, as there's a realism and a character to this one eyed veteran wielding a hammer. I spent a bunch of time hand highlighting his coat and am really happy with how it turned out. A real contender for my favourite model of the year.

Another Salute purchase, this time a hag from Encounter Terrain. I really wanted to up the creepiness factor on her, so after painting her in contrast, she got a quite heavy off white drybrush to make her pale and faded, with a few spots then re-painted with contrast to add a little more tone where needed.

Her unhealthy skin tones were achieved by using Magos Purple for the first coat, the aforementioned off-white drybrush, then a second pass on some areas with Guilliman Flesh to bring it a little more towards human tones but still not quite right.

Finally, we have Hakkle the Gnoll Pirate from the Reaper Bones line. He'd be undercoated in Zandri Dust, and I gave him an Agrax wash before starting painting. This did leave him a little too dark for Contrast in some places - I ended up using a layer paint for the trousers and sash in the end. At that point, I'd have been better off basing the other colours traditionally, then doing the wash and adding some highlights. Never mind, you live and learn!

Still, he's a troublesome Gnoll ready for mischief and villainy on the table. In higher fantasy settings I like the idea of adding a sole Gnoll, Goblin or Drow into a Bandit party to change up an encounter. This fellow seems like the sort of down on his luck miscreant who might have thrown his lot in with a pirate crew or bandit band for a chance of coin and luxuries.

So, all in all, while I didn't manage to get 19 miniatures painted during my holiday, I did have a pretty productive week, and got some miniatures I really like painted and ready for gaming with, so it wasn't a bust. Hopefully you all have had a good holiday season and have a more positive New Year.

A handful of D&D figures

 

To get back into painting post LARP season, I decided to knock out some quick tabletop paint jobs on some of my fantasy figures for D&D and skirmish games, some of which may have been hanging around for quite a while...

First up we have this Liche from Heresy Miniatures. He's a nice simple sculpt, with a couple of alternative heads to let you make a warlock or an apprentice mage. For the main robe, I used the new "Stormfiend" Contrast paint. Without watering it down, it turned out to be quite blotchy, so I used a couple of GW Air paints to add some highlights. I found that they didn't blend well, leaving tide marks as I tried to feather the paint into a blend. I eventually got a paint job I was happy with, but it took a bit more faffing than I'd have liked.

Next up was Enrieth, Harefolk Rogue, a Reaper Bones USA model. I'd based her with Zandri Dust, then gave her an Agrax Earthshade wash followed by a white drybrush. I then "coloured her in" with contrast paints. This worked very well and I had very few problems at all. She was an absolute joy to paint without too much detail to have to pick out.

Finally I painted the human cleric from Oathsworn Miniatures "Heroines in Sensible Shoes" line. The hair has come out a little glossy, but I think that will be fine once she gets some varnish on. This was another contrast paint job, with a little bit of highlighting on the face. I've not quite got the hang of non white skin tones just yet, but I'll definitely be keeping on practicing.

The contrast orange wasn't quite light enough for the torch, so I drybrushed it with Kindleflame then used yellow contrast, which turned out really nicely. I also added a few dings and scratches to the shield with a metallic paint, though I think I needed a brush with a better point to make it work.

I reckon with another half hour you could really step her up to a really nice paint job, but I'm happy enough with what I've got here to leave it as is.

This was a good weekend's work, and I'm cheerful about my progress. I've got a few more models painted and ready to use. If I can keep this pace up over the winter, I'll have a whole bunch of models finished.

Getting a good start on the month

 

March went pretty well, all told, with five models painted. I decided to start off April by finishing off this Otherworld Miniatures Pack-bearer I've been faffing over since last year. I got the backpack glued on, tided up the bits of the paint job the glue had damage, and got his base sorted out.

My current front light is a bit yellow for my preference. Still not got the photo rig exactly how I want it, so more tinkering is needed!

The big plan for this "quarter" (April - June) is to get any Combined Army I've owned more than a year painted up and table ready, and get all the Infinity models I got back from my assembly people based up and paint ready as the "next batch".

I could have been a little more ambitious with this, but I realised that with Empire, the LRP I play, starting up again, I'm going to have slightly fewer weekends available. I also want to spend a bit more time clearing out the tat lying around my flat and making it more pleasant to live in, which will also take time.

I also had a small Reaper order turn up that I decided to assemble straight away rather than having it go away into a box. Reaper was selling a model to fundraise for UNICEF to help in Ukraine, and I added a handful of other models into the basket to make the postage worthwhile.

I'm not a fan of the integrated bases the models come with, and they're too thick to hide by gluing to another base and then building up the basing material, so I decided to take them off while catching up on Critical Role.

While using my clippers to get the worst of the material off, I discovered that the Siocast that Reaper are using for the Bones USA figures has a tendency of shattering. Fortunately, it breaks very cleanly and is super easy to glue back together again.

Here's the little nightingale back together again. But every single model I've tried to trim the base off has had this happen - and twice I've lost a little detail from feet that wasn't recoverable. I don't think I can complain too badly, though. I'm definitely using the miniatures in a way that's "not intended", but it's certainly something to bear in mind for other hobbyists with a fondness for conversions or similar.

So, I've got the nightingale bard all assembled and ready to paint.

I've also sorted the Bugbear Fighter and Gnoll Ravager done too. The Gnoll Pirate is following on behind as he wasn't quite finished assembly when I did this batch of undercoating.

I'm aware I've been getting more assembly and painting done this week, and it's a trend I'd like to reverse - I've got tons of models assembled and ready for paint already. Part of the issue is around space and time - I can do a lot of my assembly work while doing something else, while the painting is something I need to concentrate on.

Also, for Life Reasons, the hobby desk was a little hard to access this week so I took some assembly through to my office desk instead. Having the hobby space easy to access is clearly something that helps significantly, so it's something to bear in mind going forward.

This Oathsworn Miniatures Magic User is about 30% done now, and shouldn't be much effort to finish. I went with brighter colours for her clothes than I typically do for D&D miniatures. My logic was that wizardry is quite an expensive thing to study, so you're likely to see a number of adventurers who might be from richer backgrounds taking up wizardry than other classes.

I also started blocking in some colours on the Noctifer Spitfire. There's a whole bunch to get done so I'll start painting a few more at once, at least with blocking the colours in.

After thinking about it, I've requested a cancellation for the Goonhammer Open in May. Looking at the infection numbers in the UK, I'm really not comfortable in getting on public transport for a long while, or staying inside with a crowd of people for two days. Right now, I'm not even comfortable going out for a game in person for four or five hours for a learning game inside. Back to gaming on Tabletop Simulator it is!

Over the weekend, I did think about blitzing through some scatter terrain in the near future. However, looking at my available space, I realised I need to get the Infinity models I'm assembling finished up and away before I'd have the space to put the scatter terrain. Remembering to finish a thing and put it away before starting a new thing so I don't get cluttered and overwhelmed is a good step, and I wanted to celebrate avoiding the heffalump trap I could have fallen into!

Looking back on June

 

While most of this month was hijacked by the Corvus Belli painting competition, it turns out that a ton of other things got painted at the same time while I was sitting at the hobby desk. Definitely a lesson for making sure I spend time at the hobby desk because tons gets done.

First up is the Kickstarter preview I got sent by Bad Squiddo Games. I've not yet heard when the Kickstarter is, but I definitely promise to let people know when its announced...

I also managed to get the Pneumarch HVT model for my Shasvastii off the "half finished" pile. It definitely made me feel really positive about finishing anything for my army, which is good, because I'm trying to get a whole bunch done!

I am super happy with how Brath the Stag came out. It's such an excellent sculpt and it was remarkably easy to make him look this good. You can get your own from Fenris Games in the UK or Barbaric Splendor in the US.

I also knocked out a quick "Sheriff Drumfasser" which is a Reaper Bones Black model. Not super in love with him, but he is another finished mini.

And finally . . . finishing the month as I began with a Bad Squiddo miniature. This was an impulse purchase at a show. No, still don't know what I'm doing with them . . .

Looking forward - I'm trying to get my Shasvastii done for the Corvus Belli painting competition. Also, Age of Sigmar 3 has now been released, and I really really need to get a playable force for this edition, having missed the first two editions without managing to get a game in . . .

Maintaining the pace

 

So, my main focus at the moment is still on getting ten Shasvastii painted for the "Organised Play at Home" event by Corvus Belli. It's going to be super tight to get them all done in time for 14 July, but it's not impossible yet!

These two jesters are another Bad Squiddo sculpt. They were on the "shelf of shame" so I grabbed them and threw on a little contrast paint to get them done.

I also had this "Sheriff Drumfasser" model which is a Reaper Bones Black model. I found that contrast didn't stick to it very well, so just dropped a base coat and Agrax wash on him to get him finished up.

Not sure if I'm going to keep him long term or not. I threw paint on him because he was on the desk. The clean up wasn't great either.

Still, the focus for now is Infinity models. Onward!