Not much painting today (or recently)

So, my original plan was to get in a game or three over the holiday season, and get some painting done as well. I figured that, with the addition of a bunch of Blackbane's Raiders, I would finish up a full unit, add to my painted percentage, and generally round out the year on a good note.

So, today I headed down to Games Plus, a bit south of the in-laws, for some hobby time, and possibly a game.  I did not get nearly as much painting done as I had hoped, and I did not get in a game at all.  But the time was well-spent, since I helped talk a couple of guys into splitting the two-player starter for Hordes, and walking them through a rough outline of the rules.

So, Games Plus should be picking up a couple of new players - one Circle and one Legion.  IIRC, Games Plus plays on Saturday, and I told the guys that there are games played on Wednesday nights at Unique Gifts & Games, and on Thursdays down at the Dice Dojo.  And I told them about some of the groups that are out there, so hopefully they find a welcoming community here in the Windy City.

I did get some done - my Blackbanes are all assembled, I got some base colors onto the Revenant crew, and I did a little work on a very long-neglected unit of Bane Thralls.  As an added plus, I finally broke down and picked up a couple of nice brushes, instead of the cheapies that I have been using for all these years.  Hopefully, they will serve me well.

Mildly productive day yesterday

First of all, Maelok is still in pieces.  I haven't even tried to fix him yet.  But the Boneswarm is almost done, and I basically finished 4 of the Blackbane's Raiders yesterday.  Unfortunately for the 5 points per month deal, I need to finish the minimum unit before I get any credit, so hopefully the rest of the unit arrives soon.  I need to base all 5 of the figs, but that's a quick and easy project.

I hope to get a bit more done this afternoon, but my main focus will be grabbing what I need for possible demos - with any luck, I will get to make a Thursday night trek to the FLGS.  Thursdays are normally Warhammer night, but with the news of the impending GW price increase, there may be fertile ground for some demo games.  I'll just take the four main battleboxes & warpacks, plus the additional figs from the 2-player starter.

I'll also take my paint and brushes, plus some other figs.  That way, even if I don't do demos, I will feel as though I have gotten something accomplished.

Tomorrow, I'll have DW chose another deck at random, and I will pick and pack my army for Saturday.   I think I will have her chose until I have gone through all the factions, although I may have to start rolling a D12 or something after the full rotation, since she might remember which deck is which.

And, on a final note - by this weekend, I should have the dates chosen and fliers made for the June & July events at the store.  Steamroller tourneys, at least one of which will be 50 points - after all, people have to practice for GenCon, right?

Hard to post . . .

. . . when you aren't playing anything at the moment. For various and sundry reasons, I not only have failed to play a game in the last couple of weeks, I also have not had a lot of time for painting. As a consequence, I just haven't had much to say - I could post daily "lack of progress" posts when it comes to my pile of lead, but frankly, I would run out of good excuses in a week or so. And, I am trying not to theory-machine all that much - I need to try armies actually on the table.

But, I do have some minor news - the 4 Blackbane's Raiders are trimmed and primed, and I should have them done soon. I have base colors done on three Khador MoW. I have gotten some base colors done on a couple of Khador jacks as well, and I have Sturm & Drang mostly reassembled, after his little accident. I started getting Maelok put together as well.

And, if you head on over to Clockwork Arms, you can find this post. It's a step-by-step guide to magnetizing and painting one of the new Vyre myrmidons. And, it arrived for me in the mail today. I'm a happy, happy camper - and I can only hope that the press ganger who got the Bokur that I painted a few weeks ago is as happy when he gets it.

Exchange fig is done!

Need to take a better pic, but the camera batteries were pretty low, so it will have to wait. In the meantime:

He's an Ogrun Bokur (obviously), but painted to indicate that he serves the greater glory of the Dragonfather.  I'm reasonably happy with the fig, and certainly would play it in my army.  But, he's off to some random press ganger, and I will be getting something interesting in return.  I do think that I need to get another of these guys, and paint him up in a similar fashion.

The Ogrun and the Pistol Wraith are each worth 3 points, which gives me an official total (so far) of 6 points for April.  Good enough for the 5 pts/month challenge, but nowhere close to making anything but the most miniscule of dents in my collection.  Oh well - more painting tonight, and my pile of lead will be diminished by at least a little bit.

SR tourney pics

Presented without commentary at this time:

SR Tourney pics

Still looking at dates for the next couple of months.  I hope to havedates ironed out and official for events from the end of May through the end of August.  An (extremely) rough concept is as followings:

End of May (possibly) - 35 pt SR
June/July - 3 more events, roughly every 2-3 weeks, aimed mainly at GenCon-style events, to give people a chance to test some armies
August (post-GenCon) - painting event.

The May, June & July events will probably have entry fees of $5, which will be used for a prize pool in the form of store credit. (And, he should be getting more stuff in - I hope to make some Thursday nights and convert some WFB/40k players as well.)

See, I'm painting!

Managed to get a couple of things done tonight. First, I am almost done with my exchange fig. All that is left is the basing, and the sealing. Hope to get those done tomorrow.




And, I finished up this guy:



I've also worked on a bunch of other things, although I did not bother taking pics of them. For various and sundry reasons, I did not stick to only one faction for the month, although I am not yet certain whether this has hurt my painting or not. I haven't gotten to play much, although now that Vassal 4.2 is out, I might try and get in some games that way.

Anyway, the Bokur and the pistol wraith would fill the points requirement for the month, but I am going to try and finish some other figs - mainly infantry, actually. I have a minimum unit of Blackbane's Raiders on order - if they get here before the end of next week, I might manage to get them done as well, since they will be painted in the same way as the pistol wraith.

First tourney

So, I ran my first Warmachine/Hordes tourney on Saturday - a 25 pt, deathclock, mangled metal event. Although turnout was a little light (5 players total), it seemed like everyone had a good time, and I'm already putting together some ideas and trying to schedule my next couple of events.

I'll be posting pics of it later, but a quick text recap is that we had Legion, Skorne, Mercs (pMagnus), Retribution and Cryx, so no duplicates. Cryx won in the end, although if another round had been played, it could have gone to Mercs. (No worries - some of the players had to split, so the final results were copacetic, and everyone, as I said, seemed happy at the end of the day.)

I learned a few things - first, I need to work on some of my prepping and organization, to reduce some of the time lost between rounds. It wasn't a huge deal, since none of the games actually went full time, but it could have been, and I need to prepare for it.

Second, I need to cut more zone markers, and make a bunch of objective markers and flags. I wound up duplicating some scenario types (though not scenarios), just because I was not as prepared as I should have been. It goes without saying that more of my terrain should be finished and painted, of course. Already, I have finished a few more hills since Saturday, and a few more will be finished by tomorrow night.

Third, while I could use the tourney software, I ran into a couple "Huh?" moments, simply because I was not as familiar with it as I should have been.

But - and this is a big but - everyone had fun, and it all worked. I just see some room for improvement, that's all. I already have an idea that I want to try for the next one, which (unfortunately) means that I have to not only finish the terrain that I currently have, but just about double it. It will make for a couple of big boxes, but I probably won't be bringing anything for someone to borrow unless they ask for it ahead of time. I'll still bring loaners for weekly games, but I think a tourney is going to (generally) mean that everyone has to provide their own figs. (That said, if a novice is willing to come to a tourney and get curb-stomped, albeit in a nice way, and learn the game the hard way. . . I'll loan them an army, if they really want.)

Terrain update

It won't all be painted (heck, most of it won't be painted), but each table now has something like 14 different pieces of terrain that I can place. Still have to finish cutting the last of the zone markers, but that should not take long tomorrow, since most of them are marked out, and just need to be cut out.

On tap for tomorrow - make sure everything that needs to be printed has been, make sure appropriate docs are on the laptop, make sure I have the software on the laptop, get all the terrain packed up and ready. I am going to try and pack up some extra figs to loan tomorrow as well, but that may not happen until Saturday morning.

And yeah, I have the stuff pretty much packed up for painting.

No terrain work last night.

Originally, I was going to work on terrain last night, but instead, I spent the evening cutting templates for the various controls zones used by the scenarios. I'm not done with them yet, but only because I ran out of the materials I am using to make them - a quick trip to the fabric store tomorrow will let me finish them up tomorrow afternoon, I hope.

After Scouts tonight, I want to work on all the various terrain items made out of pink foam - I may not get them done, but I should be able to at least cover up all the fields of pink.

I think that I will follow the lead of Felix, and take stuff to paint for when I am sitting at the tourney. I haven't run one for PP yet, so I don't know how much time I will actually have to work on things, but a few minutes of painting here and there is probably possible.

Terrain update

Well, the good news is that it looks like I will have enough terrain for each table - I capped the event at 16 people, so 8 tables. Each table will have the same items and same general setup (eg, each will have two hills, or two patches of rough terrain, etc), and will be roughly symmetrical. And, as an added bonus, I will be able to change the terrain around a little bit after each round.

The downside is that I won't have everything finished and painted, so there will be a lot of pink foam or bare plaster, etc. But that's for this tourney - I am looking to events for the next couple of months, and by the next tourney, this stuff will be painted. And that's not idle boasting - I can make and paint terrain a lot faster than I can paint a miniature.

And no - I am not taking pics. I don't know who reads this, but I don't want to give away any hints before Saturday. I will take pics and post them then, however.

Yikes! Less than a week!

So, it just hit me - I am running a small tourney in just under a week (16 player max, 25pt MM/T&C), and while the game store has some terrain, I should do some work to make sure that there will be enough for each of the 8 tables to have a decent setup.

I will be doing all the setting up, of course, and yes, it will change some from round to round. But I need to go down to the basement and take stock of what terrain I have already made, and make some of the stuff that I am missing. It won't be painted for this tourney, but if I can get it made by Saturday, then I should be able to have it painted for another tourney sometime in May, right?

The good news is that the hills and walls should either be done, or nearly done, so I can concentrate on some of the other things.

Woohoo!

My FLGS has finally started getting PP products in stock. It's been a long, hard road sometimes, but as of last week, he had in two of each of the 4 basic WM starters, a couple copies of Prime, three of the faction books (Cryx was backordered), three of the decks (missing Khador, I think), and some dice. And yes, some of it has already started selling. Got to play a couple of games this afternoon, and wound up doing an impromptu demo, which is always nice.

More stuff should be arriving Monday or Tuesday - including some stuff for me (which was also backordered, but supposedly already on its way).

He has also agreed to a tourney, so now I just need to decide the format, make up the flyers, and spread the word. Hooray!

The flipside, of course, is that I need to make sure that I have enough terrain for 8 tables, and really know the SR2012 docs. So, while I am going to keep working on painting stuff for the 2012 challenge, I might wind up just finishing two bonejacks tomorrow for the 5 point minimum, and then start working on terrain.

Painting piggies

I really need to take the camera with me when I head down to the basement. It's not that it is this huge distance, I mean, from the computer I am using now to my painting desk is only 30 feet or so, but it's just enough that I am not really willing to head down there again, turn on the lights, and take some bad pics.

Anyway, though there is no proof of it, you can take my word that the piggies are coming along, albeit slowly. This week has had a lot of real-life distractions, and the week isn't done yet, so they'll just keep coming along. But, the Slaughterhousers and the Bone Grinders have been the primary beneficiaries so far, but the smaller units are letting me test skin tones, armor schemes, etc without much worry. (And, since the Bone Grinders are single-piece figs, I can strip them a lot easier than other stuff, since I won't have to worry about reassembly afterward.)

One slaughterhouser and two bone grinders are actually approaching the point (and may pass it by Sunday) where they might be mistaken for fully painted models. Once I know how I like the armor on one slaughterhouser, I then repeat the process (much more quickly, since I am not deliberating on colors or anything) on the rest of the unit.

The brigands are still stuck mainly on skin tones. Not because I do not know where I am going with them, but simply because there are 20 brigands, and that's a lot of models to paint. One war hog is undergoing repairs and a slight modification to make it fit on the base better, and one gun boar is more than half done, I think.

My other project is basically done, but I need to take pics of it. And, I need to plan an event or four between now and GenCon, because I have the feeling that I am going to want a lot of PG points in the next few months. So, it means I need more terrain, and I need to reread the SR 2012 rules.

Journeyman league announcement

I don't think any of my reader(s) are in the Kalamazoo area, but just in case:

It's been posted at the store for a bit, but just in case anyone is in the area, and did not know about it:

On Jan 7, 2012, we will be starting a Journeyman slow grow league at:

L & J Hobbies
8675 Portage Rd # 1
Portage, MI

We will be using the rules from the Slow Grow .pdf (available at http://privateerpress.com/files/CompleteJourneyman.pdf ), but the basics are below:

Week 1 Battlegroup box set only - Mangled Metal/Tooth & Claw scenario
Week 2 15 points: Battlegroup box set contents required - Kill Box Scenario
Week 3 25 points: Battlegroup box set contents required - Kill Box Scenario
Week 4 25 points: Battlegroup box set contents required (’caster swap allowed) - Kill Box Scenario
Week 5 35 points: Battlegroup box set contents not required ('caster swap allowed) - Kill Box or Killing Fields Scenarios
Week 6 35 points: no restrictions - Kill Box or Killing Fields Scenarios

Players will also be earning points for painting models in their chosen faction.

This event is geared for those wanting to start a new warcaster/warlock for their Faction, and for new players. Veterans and new-comers are both welcome.

Darn batteries

Still not charged. Had the recipe correct, Stingers are progressing nicely, and the Harriers are primed and started. Raek is assembled, as is Kovnik Joe. eThag is started in the assembly pipeline, as is the Blighted Sorceress, and the Nephilim Soldier. They probably won't be more than assembled before the weekend, but that's okay.

No word yet on my store order - I'm hoping that my 2-player starter is in, as well as my NQ and a couple of other things. The order was kind of a beta test - the store is hoping to get stuff in, so I placed an order, and now it's just a waiting game.

Once the store starts getting stuff in, it's time to start advertising leagues, and maybe organize a Foodmachine tourney for sometime next month.

And in other news. . ..

As of earlier today, I am officially a pressganger for Privateer Press. I guess this means that I need to get more stuff painted, as an example or something.

No pics, but. . . .

I also finished a squire. I think it brings my total painted Warmahordes collection to 20, out of 620. It means, among other things, that my total painted forces are now at 3%. (Hah! 3.2% - even more impressive.)

Meh. A deal is all but certain for my IG army - I'll "lose" 60-odd infantry, about 15 vehicles, some heavy weapon teams, and some other odds and ends. On the plus side, it means that my Warmahordes will gain another 60 models or so, and I will have a playable 35-pt army for every faction in the game. If I took some of everything, and someone wanted to play Retribution, I could say "Yeah, I got that" and loan out a 35-pt army. Skorne? No problem. Trollbloods? Easy. (That has to be worth something on my PG app, right?)

But until the figs arrive (and I am not ordering them until I have the cash for the IG in hand), I can't do that for Khador or Everblight. (Technically, I can't do all four contracts, but I know that I can do it for Searforge, and I am close, if not there, for Four Star and Highborn. Need me some pirates for Talion though.) It does look as though I will accomplish my goal of having a 50-pt army for every faction before the end of the year.

Pics from the PG app

Realized that I never did post these. Poor quality, but should be good enough, right? I really need to invest in a lightbox or something.

Anyway, I have been working on some other figs - a unit of gun mages is currently soaking in Pine Sol to get them ready for repainting, a Squire, magnetized Cygnar heavy and a Firefly are coming along, and I should be about ready to finish the basing on those poor Gators.

Filled out my app

Filled out and submitted my app to become a press ganger. Now, nothing to do but wait - and, with GenCon on the horizon, I figure it will be a couple of weeks before I hear aynthing one way or another.

No pics, but they are done.

OKay, technically, not quite done. I need to finish up the bases, and then seal them, but my Khador and Cygnar battleboxes are done. Finished. Painted. Completely. Not as well as I would like, but well enough for hardcore standards, and, more importantly, well enough for me to snap some pics of tomorrow and put in an application. With any luck, my area of Michigan will have a press ganger soon. Well, soon-ish, since it is con season and all.

I think tomorrow I will start on a couple of the Hordes warpacks. Probably trolls and either Everblight or Circle. Nothing against Skorne, but I would have to fix two of the savages, or assemble two savages (yes, I have four of them - my Skorne army is unpainted, but unbound material nonetheless), and then get my gladiator back together. Fixing a couple damaged figs doesn't seem as easy as putting either a warpwolf or a carnivean together, although that may be famous last words.

Oh yeah - getting those 5 models finished (the entire Cygnar group plus Sorscha) will bring my total number of painted models to 14. Only 588 to go. (But see another post about that.)