An Early Happy New Years!

Im going to get this in early doors today as I doubt i'll be seeing in the new years haha, the missus and I are knackered from decorating all day and have been up since 3.30am with gitish children!

So I wish all my friends, clients, fellow bloggers and casual readers a happy new year and may your dice roll 6's and the paint flow freely hehe.

This year I have painted a grand total of 862 models, well over 500 for clients which has made me really proud... the total is higher than the last two years combined on both counts.




My vows for 2014 were as follows:

1) Fully paint my Drunes for Darklands
2) Fully paint a new force for Warmachine
3) Fully paint my Amazons & Wendigo for Wargods
4) Fully paint my Banebrood for Godslayer
5) Only start 2 new games this year... Darklands and Wargods



1) Completed up to date
2) Searforge and Thornfall fully painted
3) Not arrived from Crocodile Games yet :-(
4) Completed and then sold on
5) Success haha


Pretty good I think, so how about for 2015?


1) Fully painted Farrow for Warmachine
2) Fully painted Gators for Warmachine
3) Fully painted Pulp City
4) Fully painted Darklands


Those are my vows, hopefully I can achieve them again :-D

Thornfall Alliance: Slaughterhousers

This is my second unit of Slaughterhousers for the my still growing horde:

 

 

I will be picking up a third unit of these bad boys during the journeyman league next year haha



Spotlight: Illumistation from Westwood Woodworks

First of all, Happy Xmas brush brothers! Hope you have all had a great day and got a great haul for the lead mountain hahaha!


This year my awesome wife bought me an Illumistation from Westwood Wood Works! What a result hehe! I really fancied getting one of these to replace the shoebox lids I normally use as paint stations since I saw them advertised a few months ago but now I have one they are epic:

The last photo hasn't come out too well but it shows the two trays for storage of the plug wiring and also brushes/greenstuff etc. My wife ordered me a black one so I can get my logo stickered on to the side yeah boi!

My thanks to Andrew and Jenny Westwood for a swift and safe delivery.

 

Conspiracy of the Cult: Filling out the ranks

Ive started to go back thru the older releases for the Cult of Yurei to fill out my collection:

 

Large Rat Swarms

 

 

 

Wanyudo

 

 

 

Gok

 

 

 

These four take my force to 190 Rice and I only need to pick up Harionago, two Kairai Villagers and two Kusatta Kairai and I will have two completed factions yeah boi!

 

 

At that point I may look and building up a third...



Thornfall Alliance: Helga and Max join the party

The 5th Farrow Warlock, Helga the Conqueror and Maximus the Doom Pig arrived at 4tk on Saturday afternoon so I busted up there to get them painted in time for a tourney at Wayland on the next day haha

 

 

 

 

 

 

These two additions to ma piggies did me pround, I chalked up two wins out of my three games with Helga and im really impressed with her kung fu.... Max is just a bad ass missle you can send at the enemy or dare them to approach knowing that Bacon Doom awaits them haha



Bushido: Bunkermitzu 2014!

Yesterday was the second annual Bunkermitzu Bushido tournament, this year held at 4TK Gaming in Colchester. Numbers were down a few on last year with inflexible work shifts and sudden child related sickness defeating a number of sign ups at the end but we still managed a decent number of eight players to fight it out over three rounds to decide the Champion. I ended up having to play rather than just run the event so brought along the most silly list I could think of with a horde of kairai zombies and the Puppet Master... he was only included and I didn't own 50 rice of super cheap zombies haha

 

Round 1

The opening game was the Seiygo scenario where combatants had to fight for control of three idols across the centre. I was paired off with Mr Stu, a relatively new player sporting a decent looking temple force. he secured the first vp before my guys had got half way towards them! Stu had a commanding position before the bloodlust set in and Master Akari charged a Kairai farmer who after some dice of destiny proceeded to murder the offending raccoon in one hit haha. More epic dice followed over the next turn or so as my zombies were able to force the monks back and take control of the objectives, gradually killing off Stu's fighters until only Tsutemi remained to play his mandolin thing as his doom approached...

 

Round 2 

 

 

This game was played using the Ryodo scenario where there are three small zones to control diagonally across the board. I was paired off with my good friend Darren Lysenko, fellow painter and owner of Flare Miniature Painting and his amazing Ito force. I plonked Araka squarely in my home zone stopping any enemy from contesting it and set the rest of my forces to go for the other two... 3 kairai headed for Darren's zone held by Kaihime and Naoko, and the rest of my force went force the neutral zone to face off against Itsunagi, Kenzo and Sakura! Darren scored the first vp as my slow slow zombies couldn't get to his zone in time but we fought on to cancel each other out in turn 4 and me scoring the vp in turn 6 having killed off a few Ito... just not enough!

 

 

 

 Round 3

 

 

Round three was the Ichi no Riten scenario with its two large zones and VIM to create an interesting mission to test people out. I faced of against my perpetual nemesis Sherwin and his dastardly Silvermoon Trade Syndicate. The STS are a difficult faction to initially master but Sherwin has done an awesome job with them and was also last years Champion so my legion of shambling turds had an up hill struggle... luckily with nearly the entire force being dead, frightening and not going to be using kii feats, the worst of the STS Bull**** was avoided haha. Both forces came out of the gate strongly with Sherwin sending the majority of his warband at the left zone that I had most of my guys in to create a grind that my Cults resilience eventually started to take its toll on the two Buto Warriors. The right zone was all silvermoon tho as Manu defended like a boss against 3 kairai for pretty much the whole game, keeping me well out of scoring in that zone. Turn 4 saw a comedy highlight as Kato engaged Wasapu, the STS VIM and turned him into a zombie, only for Tadao (My VIM) to be taken out in the next combat after I got the bloodlust going for a kill on the stricken Fitimurua... Thems the breaks, and Sherwin was the deserved winner and retained the Bunkermitzu crown!


 It was late in the day when we finished up so I didn't get a chance to get awards photos done but below are shots taken of the winners trophy sword and the Best Painted Bokken:

 

 

 

 

The guys all said they had had a great time at the event and are eager for a third one this sort of time next year. This will be going ahead as will a number of other Bushido events over the next 12 months ;-D

 

 

Final standings for Bunkermitzu 2014 were as follows:

 

1st Sherwin STS

 

2nd Undead_Ich Cult

 

3rd Darren Lysenko (Best Painted) Ito

 

4th Shearov Temple

 

5th Rid (Me!) Cult

 

6th MrMccook Temple

 

7th MrStu Temple

 

8th Tom Wall (Spoon of Enlightenment) Ito

Gatormans: 35pts is done yay!

These few models take me to over 35pts painted whicg is enough for the tournament next weekend at Table Top Nation:

Thrullg

 

 

 

 

Witch Doctor

 

 

 

 

Swamp Gobbers

 

 

 

 

The Thrullg is an anti magic solo, he can get rid of upkeeps from models with his attacks, the Witch Doctor is a great support solo to make my units undead and tough haha, and the Swamp Gobbers provide a big fart cloud of cover to hide my important models. 



Gatormans: Blackhide Wrastler

This is the last of my battlegroup beasts for now (Not getting a Boneswarm), I still have Snapjaw to paint up but he can come later, and may pick up a 2nd Bull Snapper:

 

Blackhide Wrastler - Heavy Beast

 

 

 

 

The Wrastler is the heavy beatstick of the Blindwater but he's not the best by a longshot, but with Rask's Fury spell he can go up to colossal smashing levels haha



Gatormans: Beasties!

I finished off three of my beasties last night:

 

Swamp Horror - Heavy Beast

 

 

Bull Snapper - Light Beast

 

 

Ironback Spitter - Heavy Beast



Gatormans: Jaga-Jaga

This is Jaga-Jaga, the 5th Warlock released for the Blindwater Congregation, and the first lady gator model to boot!

 

 

She is one massive model, far far bigger than Barnabus, and is roughly the equal of an Ironback Spitter! Speaking of beasts, I currently have four of them on the paint table at varying stages of completion... note to self, don't try that again!



Cobby gets into Dreadball

Regular viewers will have seen a few posts over the years showing some of my stepsons early efforts in painting some of his little men. Recently we have been playing quite a bit of Dreadball, and Jacob asked for a Teraton team for his birthday a few weeks ago so he could paint it up himself:

 

 

He's done a pretty good job with these, and with some more practice he'll be crushing my humans haha! I am planning an Asterian team to use in our next dreadball league at the club so I will bump them up then schedule to get some games in with him.



He also painted up some of his forgefathers for warpath:

 

 

I love the forgefather range, its really quite unique and characterful, They are one of the armies im looking at when warpath gets the kickstarter treatment next year hehe





Gatormans - 2nd Posse and Feralgeist

The second posse below will help give my fledgling force real staying power on the field in small games of 35pts or less... bigger games will need that 3rd posse!

 

 

The Feralgeist in the second picture is a cheeky little solo who can be used to keep dead beasts on the field for longer (Yours and your opponents), and unless they dedicate some magic to killing him there is naff all they can do about it haha



Gatormans - Bloody Barnabus

Every Hordes army needs a Warlock so here is my first one:

 

 

Bloody Barnabus

 

 

Barny is the big bad fella that started up the Blindwater Congregation, he's a cranky old git who was so badass that he might be the first gatorman to die from old age... being over a 1000yrs old already!

This wasn't good enough for him so he has embarked on a mad quest to ascend to godhood by killing thousands of people haha



Born on the Bayou - Blindwater Congregation for Hordes

To maintain my "Competitive edge" in the cutthroat world of Warmachine and Hordes I felt I needed a Gatormans list to compliment my pigs for certain match ups... That one list has now turned into 100pts of them with every option hahaha


This is the first unit I have painted for them:

 

 

Gatorman Posses are one of the best units in the game and will form the core of just about every list I use except Rask's theme force. I have three units of these to get done so they will be a lot of the early updates.

Gators are a minion force like the pigs so it made sense to link them together with a basic scheme, in this case the yellow of the farrow clothing and the gators skin colouration!



Unleashing the Ito: Mizuki

Mizuki Ito is finished, just needed to do the basing this morning:

 

 

 

Whilst she might not be able to turn hapless heroes into stone like the real Medusa, she can still put the fear of god into the enemy on the table! She can buff friendlies with the poison trait, and since the ito can give that out to just about anyone she will be gold in a well constructed list.



Conspiracy of the Cult: Yugio

This is Yugio, the latest release for the Cult of Yurei faction in Bushido:

 

 

 

The model is brilliant and a joy to paint, so detailed and full of character! He's also pretty handy in the game too, able to reduce the cost of friendly kii feats and disrupt the enemies ability to generate kii all together haha.



Searforge Commission: Tactical Arcanist Corps

I had picked these up as part of my Cephalyx army but subsequently sold that on before I did any work on them. I kept this unit out of the trade as they would find an acceptable home in y small Searforge force:

 

 

The dwarves are a small army I use from time to time but I will be steadily building them up to a full collection, especially having seen the art for the Rhulic Battle Engine spoiled on the forums... Hopefully it will be along in the Reckoning book due in March which will spur me on to add to my forces hehe.



Confrontation: Drune additions

I scour ebay every now and then for odd bargains to add to my already rather large force for of Drunes for Confrontation:

 

Lanyfhs of the Black Woods

 

 

Drune Persecutors

 

 

Drune Minotaur



Twilight: Kickstarter goodies have arrived!

A pleasant surprise greeted me this morning as a big brown box from Twilight Miniatures arrived in the post yeah boi!

 

 

First out of the box was the starter kit which has the resin activation stones and the metal combat stones which replace dice for the most part in the game:

Plutons Mechanicals, one of my two starter forces of around 250pts in the game, plenty to get me and Jacob into battling around Anyaral. The Mechanicals are a Delgon force, a northern branch of Fubarni that split from the Empire many years previous and now are waging war against them!

 

 

 

 

 

The second of my starter forces are the Dhogu Raiders, a more primitive Fubarni culture who often serve as mercenaries to the Delgon. I really like these models, especially the Warlord who rides a yeti/goat monster haha

Next up are some of the bonus items I acquired through my pledge level, a resin Gil Marshall, Baby Gil and Engineer Beru, all special characters that can be used in the game.

One of the stretch goals was a full map that Mike had wanted to create for a long time. Its hand drawn and very detailed! This will look great framed and on the wall of my games room :-D

 

 

 

 

 

Chronicles of Anyaral is the compilation of the two earlier books and the one funded by the Kickstarter. A few months ago Mike sent me a draft copy for some QA and I have to say its a fantastic read, even more so now I have it in book form rather than on my tablet. 

Another stretch goal was to create stat cards for all the models in the game, very handy for speeding up play as it saves thumbing through the rulebook. The pack includes some blank ones which will come in very handy for the next photo...

Frenu!!!! An alpha playtest fourth culture for the game I have signed up for do some testing on. This is the rules for them as the models are still being created but I cant wait to get cracking on them.

 

 

 

 

 

An awesome box of toys to get me started playing Twilight and im looking forward to building and painting up my forces in the near future

 



Dad's Army: Civvy Street

The 11 civilian models in the set are now completed to:

 

 

The "Baddies" Warden Hodges, The Verger and the Reverend

 

The Main Cast in civilian gear

 

 

 

 

That's the full set done now, hopefully the Wife's Dad will like them for his birthday haha. This set is much recommended for fans of the show, the fact they are useable in Bolt Action or 7TV is just a bonus :-D



Dad's Army: Do you think thats wise?

Here's the rest of the main cast in fatigues:

 

 

For those of a younger generation, L-R back is Sergeant Wilson, Medic Godfrey, Private Frasier, Private Pike and Front L-R is Captain Mannering and Private Walker.



That's all the soldier versions done, now I have the civilian versions of these, Warden Hodges, the Reverend and the Verger to go.



Dad's Army: Corporal Jones

As the great man said... they don't like it up em!

 

 

Jones in fatigues was done as a tester for the 7 soldier versions of the main cast, im pretty happy with how he came out so will be doing the rest of the boys the same way before tackling the civilians.



Bolt Action: Dad's Army!

Over the next week or so I will be painting up the Dad's Army set from Warlord Games for my wife's Dad for his birthday haha.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope to be able to produce reasonably faithful recreations of how the characters looked in the TV show, Warlord supply a rules pack that has full colour photos of them, along with full rules to integrate the characters into your British Army for their Bolt Action game!

 

 

 

 

 

 

More to follow soon :-D