A fire in the Jungle

Something new emerges from the Jungle... fierce and brimming with fire.  That is the Salamanders from Kings of War by Mantic!

The Salamanders join the Trident Realms as the two new lines of miniatures added to the range.  Here are some views of the sprues, which come with a number of options.

You can create a hand weapon with shield, or a two handed Salamander for additional crushing strength.  There are also some extras on the sprue, such as little flames and a flaming banner.

There are enough heads and arms to create lots of variation.

This package contains the leg/torso base, as well as more weapon options.  Most of these are the two handed variety.

Here's one more look at the bodies and the arms.

Now for a look at the first painted Salamander!!  He's on a 25mm base.

I went with more of a traditional color scheme on this first figure, but many others are planned!

I am rendering the shoulder pads as a tortoise shell, so they will be a slightly different color from the rest of the scales.

The views from above show the base and the paper foliage.  When I start doing the multibased units, I will try to have them advancing across a jungle landscape which has been partially burned.  I will also paint some of the weapons glowing orange as well.

I'm really looking forward to creating a Salamander army based around these figures!  I already have a number of the beasties from my old army.  More are on the way, so stay tuned!

Dug In

This is the first of the completed French artillery teams!  I wanted to test out some things with the foliage, so I began with one of the less complicated basings.  

The green leaf foliage is from Hangar 18 miniatures, which is normally intended to be more of an ivy.  However, at 1/100 scale, it looks like full sized leaves!

That's the ironic challenge here.  Most of my foliage is designed for 28mm or larger figures, so I knew this scale could potentially restrict my choices.  The grass tufts are from Gamers Grass at Kings Hobbies and Games.  

There is a brand new product from Gamers Grass that will be perfect for this scale.  They will look like large bushes or even saplings when added to some of my finer tree branches.  I can't wait to try those!

Much more to come!  I am painting up a number of these, including a few with the ruined buildings, so stay tuned!

The Skulls shall scream

As part of the overall design of my display board for the old Tomb Kings army, I created this Screaming Skull Catapult.  The sphinxes which serve as a mount for the mechanism reflect the statues that were made for the above ground level of that board.

I used some balsa wood to create the uprights and the catapult arm itself.  All that remained was to add LOTS of skulls :-)

Here's a better view of what was added to the ground to fill out that space.

I couldn't resist adding the carrion bird, and painting it like the carrion in my full sized units!

It's unlikely that I will ever use this warmachine in anything but huge games, but who knows... it might appear in the new campaigns by the Ahmuntites in their quest to take bake what was theirs!!

Stay tuned...

Forest Guardian

We return to Middle Earth with the angriest elves around!  Back when I was playing Lord of the Rings on a regular basis, I created the Knights of the Blood Rose.

These were elves who refused to leave Middle Earth to the race of Men.  They had been there far too long to simply shuffle off to the Grey Havens and leave it all behind.

They were also heavily engaged in warfare with the Easterlings.

Typical LOTR tournaments of the time had you bringing both a Good and Evil army, which you would play three times each during the tournament.  This was actually a very fun format, and I enjoyed it very much!

My favorite tournament of all time was a six game LOTR bash that saw my Elves and eagles as Good, and my Easterling/Khandish alliance as my Evil.

There are a number of articles on the creation of both armies, and the army board "Fortress Falls".

I am still adding to all of it, putting in spiders and Morghul Knights on the evil side, with more eagles on the good side.

He's also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/322017997236?

Where it all began

This was the first of the jetbikes to be converted for the Dark Eldar army.

Here's a peek at the initial conversion:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/08/dark-eldar-arena-champion-test.html

This one was the most complex of all the conversions, so it's the only one that had sculpted wings, etc.

This did make it an excellent stand out leader for the squad, however!

I had to make sure there was enough of the sculpey pieces on the base to act as a counterweight.  This worked perfectly once I located the center of gravity on the jetbike.

The main reason I did the extended blade vanes was to provide a nice canvas for freehand and the blood streak effects.  It certainly worked out that way!

Doubling up the hull sections also meant that I could do some nice inner glow effects.  It took some doing to get the brush into some places, but well worth it in the end.

Pretty in Pink

Of all the different basing ideas I had for the French artillery, this is the one I was really looking forward to trying out!

I had already done something just like this for our Memoir '44 terrain, and it had worked out very well for that scale.  Now it was time to give it a try for Flames of War.  The pink foam that you see is less than 1/4 inch thick, and is used as an underlayment for flooring.  It usually comes in 2 x 4 foot sheets.

When I made the terrain stands for the Memoir figures, I did two broken walls, leaving one end open.  This will be perfect for the artillery.

I chipped away at the edges and outer surfaces to create blast marks, bullet holes, and even a window.  I must be sure to leave enough room for the crew however!

Here's a peek at the outside walls.  Who knows, I might even put a bit of ivy on them. :-)

In order to get them glued together, and provide some additional texture, I mixed the Oxide Paste with Elmer's glue to give it more adhesive power.  Not only did I use it to glue the two sections onto the base, but I also used it to mortar them to each other.

You can also see the tiny pieces of foam which I cut to use as bricks.

I simply place the bricks into the Oxide Paste and glue mixture at the ends of the broken wall sections.  Again, I want to leave room for the footprint of the gun carriage and the crew.

I added my normal series of rocks and gravel, trying to create piles of faux rubble.

With the crew incorporated, I used more rocks and sand to blend in the bases.

The crew and gun all fit nicely on the base, even with the rubble.

The crew are also spaced far enough from the walls so that I can still get a pint brush on them.  Minor details!

On the far left of the tray, you can see that I did one of these shattered ruins for a command team.

I think I tried to make on base of this style for each of my artillery units.  This was the most challenging, as I also had to deal with the limber.

This technique also works well on a slightly large scale, which means that I can make a host of burned out ruins in no time at all for a ravaged village or even a small city for our Flames of War games!  Stay tuned...

A Nation in Darkness

One of the four new factions from the latest Wild West Exodus kickstarter campaign was the Dark Nation, a twisted, warped version of the Warrior Nation.

While the Warrior Nation shuns the RJ-1027 powered weaponry of the other factions, some of their former brothers embraced it, and have been corrupted by it.

This is one of the Close Combat Savages of the Dark Nation Hired Hands set.  As with all of these sets, there are five Close Combat and five Long Range hired hands.  Each is in a completely unique pose, so all ten figures look dramatically different.

It was really interesting painting RJ glow on Nation figures... especially after painting several of the Scalpers with the natural blue energy!

Much more to come, so stay tuned!  Some of you are probably going to be getting your own kickstarter Dark Nation figures quite soon...