Ikiryo – Geisha of Yurei

Hello fiends! As I sit here with the tempestuous skies closing in on Chicago, and the tumultuous rumblings of thunder, what better to get into the spirit than to post up my newly completed Ikiryo, one of the miniatures from the Cult of Yurei starter set for Bushido?

I have to say, that I’m really excited about the prospect of getting a painted warband for Bushido. Each of these miniatures has a lot of personality, and I’ll confess that more than once while I was painting Ikiryo, I wondered what her story was. On a whim, this was what popped in my head:

“Many nights she wonders alone with her thoughts, lamenting the day she gave herself to the Cult of Yurei. With each passing Autumn she loses a little more of what humanity she had left. Ikiryo serves a different master now.”

Now while the Bushido rule book is rich with background of the Jwar Isles, and of the different factions overall stories, there’s no actual details of the individual characters. I suppose this is a good and a bad thing, good if you want to create your own narrative for the characters, bad if you don’t, and would be happy using the supplied ‘fluff’. Your mileage may vary.

All that aside, I agonized for a while on what colors to use. I decided to keep the palette limited, with two main colors – jade and another whose name escapes me right now, but a very complimentary pink color.

Autumnal leaves succumb to frost…

I did toy with the idea of putting a pattern on her kimono, but decided against it, and opted for simplicity, and just going for a design on her parasol instead. I made her face slightly paler than the rest of her skin, as a sort of ‘it could be makeup or could be a mask’ feel, emphasizing the facial wounds and stitches. I painted the eyes completely over with a pale blue, and highlights white to give that supernatural feel to her.

I love that the miniature and the posing is so demure, but looking at her face you know that she is quite possibly terrifying to be up against on the field.

A few moments of tomfoolery on my phone and I added some fog for atmosphere:

Within the fog she waits…

Completing Ikiryo also knocked another dent in my D20 painting table. I also painted up a Deep Wars figured as well from the table, but haven’t had chance to get any pictures yet. Stay tuned, and thanks, as always, for reading!

 

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Terraforming – Bushido style

I was in Chinatown over the weekend with the family, and I picked up a handful of the little red Buddha figurines, thinking that they may work quite well as objectives or just straight up scenery for Bushido.

A mere $6 later and i’d picked up these little fellas. I washed them in warm soapy water and then based them up with some cork and MDF bases I had kicking around:

After the glue had dried, I textured the base with some modelling pumice and left overnight to dry (I prefer using this than the PVA/sand option, as I feel this has more resilience).

A quick blast with some grey car primer and a wash with some Agrax Earthshade, then random washes of the GW green wash (forgot the name!) and we’re on the way:

I used a splash of green to simulate the weathering and discoloration of stone through being left out in the elements. I didn’t want to get too crazy with the paint job on these, just something quick and easy. I grabbed a couple of different shades of grey and drybrushed the little fella, followed up with a last light drybrush of white.

After painting the soil and drybrushing that up too, I hit the base up with some static grass and added some flowers, and voila! a quick piece of terrain to dress my Bushido board. I’ve put my Cult of Yurei Ikiryo figure next to it for size comparison. I didn’t want a huge statue, just something that could be like a roadside shrine or something.

I can’t wait to get the Bushido board finished!

Cheers!

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By Chaos You Are Boooound!

Any excuse to have an intro by the mighty Bolt Thrower and I’ll take it! Anyway, it was the lead in to me posting the pictures of the Foul Blightspawn miniature that I finished last week for a painting competition at Grognard Games. He kinda looks like a Ghostbuster, or maybe a Grossbuster? I don’t know. I know I’m not much a fan of the name (some of the Nurgle character names are a wee bit silly) but I had a lot of fun painting him, and it reminded me why I’m such a fan of Papa Nurgle – lots of rust and decay and opportunities to make your miniatures pop.

My only gripe about this miniature, and maybe the newer Plague Marines, is that they have sooooo muuch going on with the miniatures to the point that it’s so busy when it’s done, it’s hard to see the wood for the trees. Sometimes less is more, but whatever!

Thanks for reading!!!!

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Burnout getting you down? Too much stuff? Fight the fatigue!

I think it goes without saying that being in this hobby we all come to that point sooner or later where we have amassed a ‘Pile of Shame’ – that drawer/box/cupboard/closet/storage unit that has a literal mound of unpainted miniatures and vehicle and scenery kits. This is not to say that you don’t have  plans for them and that you’re just buying up lots of plastic or metal for the sake of it (or maybe some of you do? hey, I’m not here to judge).  We as gamers (for the most part) suffer from the OITNS or “Ooooh, It’s The New Shiny”, and it’s very easy to fall into this. With the number of new games, companies, Kickstarter campaigns, new releases etc growing exponentially it’s very easy to get blown around by the winds of change (maybe Tzeentch has a hand in this?). There is SO MUCH cool stuff on the market now, it’s hard to turn around and walk away (I’m guilty of this for sure).

All this aside, I was watching a Tabletop Minions video on YouTube on the train ride home from work the other day, and Uncle Atom hit on this very subject. Take a few minutes out and watch the video below >pa-CHOW<

Uncle Atom certainly hits on some interesting points for sure. I’ve recently been on a bit of a purge through my Pile of Shame and took a bunch of stuff  to my FLGS to trade in for store credit (Sisters of Battle – 2019, remember? Speculating to accumulate baby!). I had begun to feel a level of anxiety every time I went into the Nerd Closet, being greeted by lots and lots and lots of unpainted or undercoated miniatures staring back at me.  It was then I realized that this is a hobby, and it shouldn’t be making me feel crappy and down about having so much gathering dust. So, as well as cashing in a bunch of Forge World items and some other guff, I thought to myself “how can I start chugging through and get some momentum going with painting this stuff?”. It presented a set of challenges in that I needed to prioritize what games I was playing and the frequency of those games. At the moment I play almost exclusively Infinity, but then I thought “well, I’m going to get burnout if I’m painting nothing but Infinity miniatures”. So with this in mind I approached it from a different angle.

And thus the ‘D20 table was born’.

The D20 Table was basically an idea I had to make the selection process for my painting a little bit more fun, and to enforce some variation to keep the interest going. It’s a simple idea, I created a table in Excel with twenty line items which are all minis from games that I play/are about to play. The 1-20 obviously corresponds to the dice roll that randomly selects what i’ll be painting next. I’ve been using it for the last few weeks, and here is what I have struck from the list so far:

I’m currently working on number 8 – three PanOceania Fusiliers, which are almost done:

It’s given me a hand with wanting to get my minis painted, and it feels good to strike another line off the list. I get either my son or my wife to roll the dice, so they actually become a little invested how their ‘selection’ is coming along. The other thing that has helped is to make a conscious decision to paint to a decent tabletop standard. The Fusiliers above have taken maybe about 5 hours from start to this point, with maybe  a half hour left in them to paint the bases and varnish them. It almost felt like a weight being lifted from my shoulders when I told myself that not every single miniature needs to have 10-15 hours spent on it, as that would be when the hammer blow came in and I’d get the burnout when I look at the tons of other stuff I had to wade through.

PanO bot – another item from the list – DONE!

I feel that stocking up (I won’t use the term hoarder) and burnout/fatigue can go hand in hand, so I’m really trying to make an effort to knock some effing great holes in my inventory over the coming year, so this will be an ongoing saga. I hope that you’ll join me on my journey.

I’d love to hear any comments on how any of you combat the burnout, or the Pile of Shame in the comments below. Thanks for reading!

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Are you not entertained? (Arena Rex)

Greetings all! it’s been a little while, but i’m back to talk about a game that I recently tried out at my FLGS called Arena Rex, by Red Republic Games.  For those of you out there who are unfamiliar with the game, it’s essentially a 35mm figure system that is based on gladiatorial combat in an arena reminiscent of those you would see in ancient times.  The difference with this game is, that while you have predominantly ‘human’ players (characters? victims?) you can also employ beasts into your ‘cohort’ or even gorgons or titans. The prospect of being able to ride a giant scorpion into the arena, or to have a colossal half snake/half human creature fighting for me was too much to resist!

The system is relatively easy to pick up. Games are typically played with 3-5 models each side. The opposing cohorts start off at either side of the arena, and the ultimate goal is to obviously emerge victorious by slaughtering the other side. Throw in hazards like pit traps (instadeath!), obstacles that can impede your movement or indeed beasts like lions that will bite off a chunk, and you have quite a quick paced game that is a lot of fun.

Character stats are all listed on cards that come with each miniature, as well as wound points and an interesting ‘damage tree’ system which can make for some unique, game changing moments when your’e successfully putting the hurt on your opponent. You also start off with a small amount of ‘favor’ – which is generated by the roaring crowds, slaughtering an enemy, trigger events that are listed on the stat cards and so on. These extra dice can be used to buff attack or defense rolls, but you have to use them wisely.

Stop! Hammer time!

One thing I really liked about the game was the fact you had to think a turn or two ahead. It isn’t just a case of running forward swinging a sword, oh no. Each character gets a ‘free’ move, then anything after that causes them to either be ‘fatigued’ or ‘exhausted’, which can be fatal if you suddenly realize that you have a fatigued model in the open with no support, and a ‘fresh’ opponent within striking distance. You really have to be a little conservative, and a lot creative, with your positioning and timing until your tired models recover.

I only played one game against my buddy Joe, under the watchful eye of Todd who runs/owns Grognard Games in Roselle, IL. It was a lot of fun learning the rules and making mistakes, and seeing how the system works. Check out the video below to get a flavor of the game:

All that said, it was the miniatures that initially caught my eye and had me inquiring about the game. They are simply stunning figures. Cast in resin and exquisitely detailed, I knew I had to get involved. There are several different cohorts to choose from, though you can mix and match between them (although you do get bonuses for having exclusive cohorts). I chose Morituri, as I was really digging the Egyptian flavor they have going on. I have painted up my first character, Tiet-Khebi:

I’m going to go back in and repaint her weapons, because they look way too bland. She was a lot of fun to paint, and I love the dynamic posing that a lot of the miniatures for this game have.

The rules are available to download for free from the website HERE – but I would also encourage you to buy a copy of the rules too. Seriously, they are a meager $7.50! Also, do yourself a favor and go and look at the range of miniatures, like the Medusa…

(Borrowed from the AR website)

You will not be sorry!

This game has been around for a couple of years, but I’m really glad that I found it. The low model count and quick learn rules are a win-win for someone like myself who doesn’t have hours and hours to play games. Couple that with beautiful miniatures and you’ve got yourself a winner!

Thanks for reading!

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Its official – Plastic Sisters of Battle drop in 2019!

I almost made a tit out of myself on the train ride into work this morning by (almost) shouting out “HELL YESSSS!”. I saw an email from GW with news from Adepticon that’s happening this weekend, so I took a look.  Some relatively interesting stuff, but as I read on and on, I thought there maybe a chance that some Sisters news might be incoming, and in my head, I thought ‘maybe they’ve saved the best till last’.

They did not disappoint:

and here is what they said:

“Yup, plastic Sisters of Battle are on their way. For reals.

We know many of you have been waiting patiently (and impatiently…) for a long time for the Adepta Sororitas, and that for many of you this is more than ‘just’ a new army. So, we’re going to do something we’ve never done before – right up until the release, we’ll be bringing you updates on the Sisters of Battle, sharing images and snippets of info and a whole ton of behind the scenes goodness.

Emperor willing, the Battle Sisters of the Adepta Sororitas will be ready to take the fight to the renegade, the heretic and the unbeliever in 2019.”

So it looks like GW will finally get me back again in some form. Going by the recent Necromunda, Daughters of Khaine, Inquisitor Greyfax, Celestine etc etc, these new sisters plastics are going to be absolutely beautiful, and I for one, cannot wait.

Bravo, Games Workshop, bravo…

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First Infinity Tournament

Welcome to the future…

OK!! so last week I jumped feet first into my first (ever) tournament, which was held at Grognard Games. It was with much trepidation that I went into this, mainly because I’m not really interested in playing tabletop games in a competitive environment, I much prefer to have casual games with no pressure. Couple this with the fact that I’m still really a n00b and not familiar with the rules as much as I’d like to be, well it makes for an intimidating prospect. Had it not been for the fact that my fellow Infinity players had said “ah don’t worry about it, it’ll be a good learning experience for you” and that they are a friendly bunch, then I’d have had no part in it at all.

On the mean streets

In my last post I put up the list I intended to use for said event, as I’d been playing it on the Thursday night games and wanted to test it a little further (but mostly to familiarize myself with how things work). It is a fairly straight forward list, nothing too crazy, and in my head I wanted to make sure I had good long range heave hitters (sniper rifle, missile launcher), good mid-range stuff (HMG, Combi-rifles – both of which can suppression fire), and then some good up-close stuff like boarding shotguns.

My first game was against Haqqislam, and held up relatively well, although I achieved no objectives (I took down the most troops though). My 10 orders against about 16 was not fun. Coordinated orders, targeting and other shenanigans kept me from getting to my objectives. My second game was against Tohaa I believe, and while I was quick to get guys down into the streets, securing one objective, I got literally slaughtered by a bunch of stuff that had some obscene ARO nonsense that just steamrollered me. Ouch.

Game three I fared slightly better than game two, but not much, and this time I was actually able to take some enemy guys down. I tried to learn from my previous losses and use my Aquila in a more aggressive way, which kinda paid off a little, but ultimately I was crushed under sheer weight of numbers. First lesson: Keep your cheerleaders (Fusiliers) to hold ground, send your heavy infantry to start putting the hurt on the enemy. Second lesson: TAKE A F*CKING HACKER AND SOME REMOTES!

Anyway. Despite getting my dangly bits served up to me on a plate, I had a bloody good time, and learned a lot about the game, so it was a winning situation for me ultimately. Some of the best games I’ve had are ones that I’ve lost. Your mileage may vary, of course.

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Infinity, Elvira, stuff and things!

Ye gods! It’s already the end of February? what the heck? I guess when you hibernate for the winter (read: become and antisocial git that doesn’t want to go out anywhere) you don’t notice the time whizzing by.

That’s not to say I haven’t actually being doing stuff here and there. I’ve been dragging my ass up to my FLGS most Thursdays for some Infinity. I’m still crap, but I’m getting way more comfortable with the rules etc. The last couple weeks I’ve been running a ‘vanilla’ PanOceania list, which has netted me one devastating loss (against Yu Jing) and one win against Nomads (yay for missile launchers and suppressive fire!). I’ll be using this list this weekend for a league that Grognard Games will be putting on, here are the deets:

It’s 4 points over the 300 point limit, but hopefully it should be OK. As one of my Infinity buddies recommended, “keep playing the same list to get used to the nuances, then switch out a troop here or there once you’ve got a handle on it”. Such simple advice that makes total sense. It’s easy to get overwhelmed quickly with all the troops and weapons and bells and whistles in this game. Anyways, much fun to be had.

I just finished a PanO Father Knight about a week ago, and it was my first real stab at doing NMM, which I think works well for Infinity:

Let us not go to Camelot, it is a silly place…

Also, as the title mentioned, I picked up a bunch of figures of Ebay and in the group was an Elvira mini that I can’t find any info about. Such a great little (true scale) 25mm miniature! here she is in all her >ahem< glory:

I made the base up myself with green stuff, I think she’s a great little model. If anyone out there knows the manufacturer, or indeed anything about this release (which I’m 100% sure is unofficial) please let me know!

That’s it for now, cheers all!

P

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October Rust. Couldn’t think of a title…

Mornin’ all! just a super quick post while i’m enjoying some Dark Matter coffee…

Had a really fun game of Flames of War about a week ago against my arch nemesis Colin. Once again his German forces tried to overthrow the British lines, but to no avail. One thing that scares me witless are those bloody tanks that the Jerrys have, and they made short work of my Sherman armored divisions (I really need to try some other tanks!). I responded in kind with some ruthless artillery strikes (which weren’t always that great, but when they hit, they hit hard!). Also, infantry assaults on tanks are a lot of fun…

Infantry that are dug in are great for holding ground, and are a pain in the arse to get rid of. Colin did whittle down some of my rifle platoons, but true to their nickname of the British Bulldogs, they gave the Hun no quarter.

This was our first game in probably almost 2 years, and we were both relearning the game as the new rule set is out. I have to say that the game seems to flow a little better with this new set, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

A little phone app magic added…

In other news, I painted up Beastman that I received from Quest Miniatures. I went with the FILMation colors and am really pleased with the results. I used a white undercoat as the colors were going to be primarily brighter than I normally paint, and I forgot how much fun it is to be painting in a vibrant palette. Years and years of painting ‘mighty grimdark’ 40K stuff got me undercoating nearly everything in black. Anyway, here he is:

Grrrrrr!

And finally, I finished another ORC Trooper for my PanOceania Infinity force. I was inspired by Priss from Bubblegum Crisis for the colors, and I think I’m going to get 3 more ORC troopers and paint them up in the other Knight Sabers colors. Infinity is basically a Manga skirmish game after all…

Konya Wa Hurricaine!

Cheers for now!

P

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