Out for a Stroll

These four Zombie Vikings (or zombie Saxons) must have been pieces from a board game, because the plastic had that kind of consistency.

A series of earth tones kept the overall colors scheme muted, and a few rust/corrosion effects were put in for good measure.

There wasn't anything super fancy about these figures, but these compressed palette exercises are always useful!

The plastic was slightly bendy, but not enough to make painting things such as the swords too difficult.

Scaley Steed

We head to the way back machine to check out another old unit from days gone by.  This Cold One and Saurus rider were part of the first Golden Demon winning unit that I ever did in 2007.

Lizardmen were my first Warhammer army, and this was the most challenging of the early units.  I heavily converted some Saurus Warriors to make the Temple Guard, along with the Terradons and Engines of the Gods.

The unit itself never saw much action, since it was too slow to keep up with other fast units, and not fast enough to outflank most infantry blocks.

I believe I have mentioned the vast amount of failed Stupidity rolls with these poor guys.  After failing that 4 turns in a row, I gave up on the unit for good.  The opponent didn't even bother to shoot at or charge them, since they had wandered aimlessly into a forest, not scoring a single point.

Some you you will also recognize that these are the older version on the cold ones from 2002-3.  While the more recent plastic versions have more dynamism than these... there is sentimental value in the original unit!

A Brand New Medium!

This will be an unusual blog post today, in the form of a link.

I have been experimenting with facebook live broadcasts the last few weeks, to see how those work, and many of the technical aspects involved.

With each session, I learn a bit more, and there is new equipment that I am trying to secure for future improvements.  The best thing about them is that there is no limit to the number of people who can watch and participate as it's happening.

This makes them very interactive, yet there are no interruptions in the lesson... the questions only add to it!  That's great!

For the moment. I am using an ancient phone for these broadcasts.  I am hoping to get updated equipment which should make a huge difference right away.

In the meantime, I will focus more on large scale figures and vehicles, since it seems that the current device works more readily with them.

My ultimate goal is to be able to do sessions like these almost every day, if not a few shorter sessions each day.  Basically, I want to just "turn the camera on" and let people see whatever it is that I am working on at the moment.

Here's a link to the most recent session, where I continue to work on the Trenchworx vehicles, testing out a brand new paint!

This is from Wilder, and these thinner, fast drying oils are fantastic!  They are so much like the regular miniature paints we all use, but with all the benefits of oil paints... take a look:

https://www.facebook.com/james.wappel/videos/vb.1056181987/10209553700813482/?type=2&theater

Extra Shots

While I have not been able to squeeze these extra shots into my French lists yet, I am hoping to scrounge up those points somewhere and give them a try!

I do enjoy working on the early war French, and I just realized why.  All of the other armies that I have under way are non-greatcoat figures.  

Making the greatcoats have an interesting set of shading and color variations is more challenging, especially when you pile a bunch of packs and equipment onto it!

The basing continues to be summer forest, but with a touch of mud to represent that brief weather delay that plagued the German advance.

I will get back to more step by step articles on the French once I have finished off the last sets of figures that I need to have complete squads.  With the V2 changes, I need to add at least 2-4 extra bodies to each unit for the morale reboot!  Stay tuned!

Feathered Friends

Here are some final views of the sculpted carrion birds for my Tzeetch tainted Tomb Kings army.  The bases were also carved from baked sculpey, which tell the story of Psuesennes and his corruption by the Tzeentch God.

The carrion were actually his pet tropical birds, which became horribly changed like all the rest of his kingdom once he foolishly accepted the God's unholy bargain.

That is one reason for the bright coloration, along with the Tzeentch taint.  I gave a few of them two heads to try and indicate the corruption as well.

Carving the pillars was definitely the hardest part!  Since they were round, the carving tools always wanted to scoot off the edge, and not where I wanted them.

There are also glowing skeletons inside the carrion birds.

Here's the story of Psuesennes:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/06/tainted-pharaoh-pseusenes-fate.html

The movement trays all declared the warning... "All those who enter the Tomb Cities of Pseusennes shall suffer a fate worse than death".

They are also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/222409810956?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649

Itsy Bitsy Spider

In the days when we played Lord of the Rings, I loved my Easterling/Khandish alliance force.  It was so unique among LOTR armies, nobody had any idea of what to make of it at the one tournament event where they appeared.

I enjoyed that advantage, and seeing people furiously waste precious ranged shots at the chariots instead of what they should have focused on.

To expand on that idea, my next plan was tom combine mounted Morghul Knights with a Spider Queen, some regular spiders and the little swarms.

The Spiders were insanely fast, and could go through any kind of terrain like open ground.  This could flush out prey from rough terrain into the open for the Morgul Knights to run down.  Also, the Spider Queen would help to turn the odds in a scrum to my favor by creating some broods on the spot and sending them forward into existing combats.

I still have the Knights and the Spider Queen, along with the swarms.  The original spiders were regular Goblin Spider riders from Warhammer.  I'm sure that I could find some interesting spider miniatures today!

I had to convert these spiders a bit, to resculpt the areas where the goblin rider would have been.

Here's an image of the conversion process, with a link to the original post:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/12/mordor-is-stirring-and-my-spidey-sense.html

He's also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/322436878725?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649

Launch Tubes

This mortar team was painted up for a fellow player's BEF army, so I tried to keep the basing and other things in line with the early war France '40 basing that I have been doing.

Since I have been enjoying the Woodland Scenics delicate foliage, I have gotten a few new batches of it.  That material works incredibly well for these kinds of artillery and weapon teams, making them seem like they have just cut and pushed aside some undergrowth to make a space for the weapon.

As with the other bases and stands, I used the Mig AMMO heavy mud products to get that extra bit of texture on the base.  Even the finest sand when painted has only a 'loose dirt' feel, while the mud products have a smoothness of texture that can't be matched by the sand.

It's also very handy to blend the figures into their environment, as I spatter it or place it onto the lower legs and boots, thus "anchoring the figures" to the base.  Now they really look like they have been playing in the mud.