Public Gaming

Once upon a time, I used to play many (many) games of Warhammer 40K at my local Games Workshop shop. I used to cycle or walk into town with my army in a carry case and play two or three games, one after the other, against whoever was there. I'd often go down two or three times a week in the holidays. Once, back in the days of 4th Edition 40K, I even got into a tournament and went up to Warhammer World to play - I came third from last. Nowadays you can't just go in and play any more; the local manager having pulled the plug because people coming in and playing were distracting customers, telling them negative things, and telling them about other companies and other places, all ultimately reducing his sales and thereby hurting his own paypacket. I don't blame him, I just miss the days of old... kind of. Now I'm not a spotty teenage boy, when myself and JY went in today for a two hour, 1500 point, game of 6th Edition, it was fun - but not as much fun. The endless, loud, talking of the slightly-too-keen slightly-socially-inept man and the lack of people working on their own models (another activity now forbidden without vouchers earnt by spending in store) dampened the atmosphere.

JY and I did, however, have a good game. And, most importantly of all... I won.

 Deployment (start of turn 1).

 Righteous Fists Turn 2 start. Note casualties on both sides, but importantly for me his Pathfinders on my right flank have been knocked out of the game.

 JY surveys the terrain at the start of my Turn 3. I've suffered more casualties, but the Terminators have just teleported in and the Assault Squad is about to start moving forwards.

 Start of my Turn 4. The Terminators will move to the edge of the pad, and the Assault Squad are about to mount a charge on the Firewarriors on the left. The Firewarriors in the centre are about to be blown apart by the combined fire of the surviving Devastators and remaining Terminators.

 Endgame (end Turn 4). My Tactical Marines destroyed both Piranhas - one by shooting, one in combat - and all the Firewarriors are dead or running away.

The view from the other side. I hold one objective and JY holds none.

I also finished the last of the Four Good Women yesterday at work; the half-demon fighter with the flaming sword and hooves.

 I don't know why the photo is so indistinct. It's a shame, she's turned out beautifully, but I can't take a good photo of her to save my life. Oh well. You can at least see the demonic sheen to her skin and the magefire of her sword!

 The star gave me real problems. In the end I decided to paint it as if it were made of six huge, polished, gemstones. It looks good now, but it's part accident!

 Tarnished bronze and shiny red flesh - a sight to chill the bone. Good thing she's a decent person and honourable warrior, eh?

All of them together. I tried to work green into the half-demon and ended up going for tarnished bronze armour; it's very very subtle but there is green there. Just enough to tie her into the rest of the party, as well as having her both compliment and stand out from them.

Talking of yesterday, my partner S and I went to her sister K's student house last night to play A Game Of Thrones with her and St, her boyfriend. We ended up with a six-player game after roping their housemates G and O in; the game went on until the wee small hours and ended with my victory as House Lannister on Turn 9 (of 10)! It was very close-fought and a good game. I've now won with all four of the main Houses, so I'm quite keen to get more six player games in to increase my chances of playing as Tyrell or Martell.

Oh, and today I came home to find the figures for the Dragon Age RPG I'm playing in at the minute had arrived from Hasslefree, so that was nice - Iorek, my dwarf, looks suitably grim for a dishonoured, angry, death-seeking violence-monger. Accomplishments so far include punching a man into a coma and building a litter to drag him back to town on. Oh, and trying to set fire to a forest. We're plunging back into Ferelden tomorrow night, so I should have more antics to report soon.

Painting Points: 1
2013 Total: 267(178x 28mm, 2x 54mm, 10x vehicles, 2x spaceships, 3x 28mm cavalry, 1x flag)

A Weekly Update?

It's been a week since I last posted. In that time Al Front has finally finished his wargames shed, complete with stove, I became 27, and I have played more games than you can shake a stick at. No wargames though! I played A Game Of Thrones with S, her sister K, and her partner ST (I won as House Stark!), Labyrinth with S, my partner (she won) and Talisman with AC, JC, JY, JS and SB (I won), took part in a Dragon Age pen and paper roleplaying game with AC, MB, SB and S, and narrowly lost as House Lannister in a game of A Game Of Thrones against JS, JY and S.


Character creation - human mage (MB), GM (AC), city elf rogue Widget (SB). Not pictured: Wild elf rogue Schneeki Schnea (S) and Iorek the Shamed (me).

 Victory! House Stark rules the North with the seizure of Flint's Finger from House Greyjoy proving the vital final battle (I'd not long before taken King's Landing, too, so sod King in the North, try King of Westeros!

 Carrot cake lovingly baked by S, with candles lit by JY and I. TOP TIP: don't light birthday cake candles underneath a smoke detector. It won't end quietly.

I've also been busy at work, with lots of deliveries coming in and tasks to complete as Christmas nears. But I haven't neglected the painting, either:

 A Lamenter scout, armed with a needle sniper rifle and high-tech NVGs. Note lack of markings beyond his tactical Chapter Badge. No weather is too foul for the Emperor's servants to destroy His foes!

 The whole squad. I have another sniper squad to paint up for my Lamenters force, which will be fun.

A beautiful figure from the talented hands of Kev White at Hasslefree Miniatures - I've painted her up as an adventuring type for a D&D campaign I've been plotting for ages, where the player party are all Good aligned female characters trying to assassinate an Orc High Chieftan.

Wood elf mage from the Dungeons and Dragons boardgame. This completes the adventuring party (below).

 The brave (foolish) adventurers! L-R: Mage, Fighter, Priest, Rogue.

 More Kev White goodness! This is my take on his Dwarf slayerette, combining both Games Workshop concepts (the orange hair), my own ideas of Dwarf society and ethnicity in my personal little fantasy sandbox world, and Justin's trews.

And another adventuring party! This one is the all-female, all-Good one. L-R: The half-demon fighter, the Elf priestess, the Dwarf barbarian, and the Human mage. All from Hasslefree Miniatures.

And, just to bookend the miniatures: a Lamenter from the Death Company. Death! Fire! Blood and fury! Etcetera. His armour has been repainted in black, the colour of mourning, and marked with the symbolic wounds of Sanguinius. This Marine will surely die, either in action or from his wounds afterwards. They're not known as the Death Company for nothing! Four more of these chaps to do.

Painting Points: 5
2013 Total: 266 (177x 28mm, 2x 54mm, 10x vehicles, 2x spaceships, 3x 28mm cavalry, 1x flag)

I need to pick up speed if I want to average one point a day... Must paint more vehicles!

Now For The Vehicles

On Saturday I painted a Space Marine Scout Sergeant. On Monday I painted a Space Marine Scout with a Heavy Bolter. On Tuesday I painted a Space Marine Scout with boltgun, and thus finished the last Scout Squad for my Righteous Fists' Demi-Company:

And what I painted today? This fellow:

It's TANCRED REGDAR! Human fighter from Dungeons and Dragons the boardgame. Hits things with his sword, or shoots them with his bow... then hits them with his sword. A simple-minded man.

Painting Points: 4

2013 Total: 261 (172x 28mm, 2x 54mm, 10x vehicles, 2x spaceships, 3x 28mm cavalry, 1x flag)

My Secret Project Revealed, And Other Things

As you may recall, about a month ago I started talking about a secret project. It's a modification of Games Workshop's Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game to enable me to fight skirmishes in Westeros, to take part in the War of the Five Kings made famous by the books and TV series of A Song of Ice and Fire. I've started putting together a House Baratheon force led by the minor noble Lord Chulain of Risingsword. Lord Chulain began by siding with Renly, but moved to Stannis once Renly was killed.

So far I've only painted up Lord Chulain and some of his retainers and Sworn Swords, but I have begun to build the rest of his force (and the OpFor, a bunch of Jaime Lannister's men). Here are the painted figures:

From L-R, they are Ser Boros Greenwood, Ser Waldon Banefort, Lord Chulain, Merryweather and Ser Geraint Blondel. Banefort, Chulain and Merryweather and Heroes, while Greenwood and Blondel are Foot Knights and thus simply Warriors.

I have used - and am going to continue to use - the simply splendid Perry Miniatures' Wars of the Roses figures for this project, although I may dabble with Fireforge Games' Templar types. We shall see.

In addition to those sound fellows, I have begun to paint up the playing pieces for the simplified 'Dungeons and Dragons' board game I bought for 50p in a charity shop a few years ago:

L-R: Lawful Good Human Priest of the Green Man, Chaotic Good Halfling(?) Rogue.

Not the best sculpts but they painted up easily and look ten times better now than in bare plastic. I still have Tancred Regdar the Human Fighter and the Elf Mage to do, too.

And I've made a lot of progress on the last few bits of my Righteous Fist force (for now):

The rocket launcher and kneeling scout in the first four pictures were painted last week at work, and complete Scout Squad X of the 10th (Scout) Company, Righteous Fists. I'm currently working on the last two members of Scout Squad XI - I finished the Sergeant today (no pictures as yet).

Demi-Squad VIb of Squad VI, 2nd (Battle) Company, Righteous Fists, and the whole squad. Again painted up during my lunchbreaks in the week before last at work. The Forgeworld rocket launcher and flamer are great, although I did have to cut up the backpack on the rocket launcher chap to get it all to fit vaguely right. Very odd. You'd think they'd've allowed for the exhaust vents. Note that the Squad Leader is wearing a full set of Mk 8 Powered Armour, a real rarity because it is an advancement and development of the much more common Mk 7 suits worn by most Marines in the 41st Millenium.

Flying Wombles from the 1980s! A Rogue-Trader era landspeeder armed with a multi-melta and a melta, not to mention the passenger's boltgun! A tiny little thing that looks flimsy next to the 2nd Edition landspeeder and positively puny next to the 3rd Edition plastic behemoth. Great fun to paint and really just awaiting a big flag for the aerial - like all the Sergeants are, now.

Painting Points: 19
2013 Total: 257 (168x 28mm, 2x 54mm, 10x vehicles, 2x spaceships, 3x 28mm cavalry, 1x flag)