28 September 2016

[Catacombs] First expedition

A few more pictures of this little project while I tidy up the rules before sharing them.

The first expedition laid out, with our brave little retinue ready to confront and banish the undead horde raised and controlled by the wicked necromancer:


25 September 2016

[Catacombs] First glimpe

Just one more archer to finish painting before the first squad retinue is complete and ready for photographed action, but this should give you a glimpse into the way the game will look:



From front to rear we have: retainer with longbow, knight with shield and enchanted blade, retainer with lamp and sword (lighting is important in the catacombs), and retainer with crossbow. They're just waiting for another retainer with longbow to catch them up before they open that door.

What menace will they have to face? Well, it's boney...

The pieces and doors are by the excellent Will Meddis of Billiam Babble/Inked Adventures fame. Delightfully oldschool, hand drawn and digitally coloured, I tweaked them in photoshop to match the board piece shapes of a certain famous space-based conflict in narrow corridors, before printing them onto A4 stickers and mounting them on 3mm baseboard (thick card). I'm very pleased with them.

You can get your own Inked Adventures dungeon pieces here - go support him, he's Good People.

More as it comes,
Rab

24 September 2016

Averaigne campaign - Session 21




[The story so far]

Session 21 - The tomb of the iron god (i)
NB - this uses Matt Finch's excellent Tomb of the Iron God module and may contain spoilers

It had been an uneventful sail upriver from Corcelle through the fertile farming lands and hunting estates to the North of the city. Despite the strong current, a friendly wind and the skill of the captain saw them make swift progress and, in a mere three days travel, they found themselves unloading their kit at an unexpectedly empty jetty. "They're a superstitious bunch up here," the captain had reassured them, "probably keeping their heads down if their precious temple really has been destroyed. Well, Alathea go with you; that's the direction you want." And he pointed to a waymarker with an ornate letter F above the an arrow pointing Eastwards, away from the river, and the words One Mile. They went!


18 September 2016

Averaigne campaign - Year 2: Prologue




[The story so far]

Gaming Year 2: Prologue

It was three days after the Spring Festival in Corcelle. The festival itself had been a triumph, starting with a solemn ceremony for the dawn to praise Alathea that swiftly segued into a joyous, almost riotous, carnival of music and dancing and feasting and drinking. Revellers thronged the streets, spring flower petals were thrown in great bucketloads from upper windows to cascade down upon the crowds below. Everywhere there was joy. Now the headaches had faded, the pilgrims were packing up to return to their homes, and the city was returning to normal.

15 September 2016

[Catacombs] Retinues WIP 2

Progress continues apace, by my standards anyway, for the figures needed to play Catacombs, my fan-fantasy-reskin of Space Hulk. I've already got the monsters sorted thanks to last Deadcember's output because hordes of skeletons will take the place of the 'stealers.

Here are the heroes so far:

11 September 2016

[Catacombs] Retinues WIP 1

Rather delightfully, new projects (even little side projects) require or allow new miniatures. They are a spur to collecting, modelling, painting. Small projects, particularly those that are self-contained like this, also give a chance to try out new methods or styles knowing that if they prove to be onerous or underwhelming, they aren't going to need to be repeated ad nauseam. Fun, eh?

Here are the retinues for my Catacombs project, in their pre-painted state. I'm not very used to plastic kits, but cutting and sticking three different kits together (Conquest's Dark Age Archers, Fireforge's Foot Sergeants, and a couple of heads from an old GW Bretonnian set) proved rather enjoyable and allowed a certain level of creativity from your truly. They didn't all work out as well as I envisioned, but I tried to be guided by the archery and sword-fighting I've done over the years as I did my best with the nice range of bits in front of me.


The two metal figures, oldhammer stalwarts seeing service, finally, since their moulding in the 80s or 90s, are the two knights who will lead their retainers into the darkness. There is one figure missing from the line-up, the mage. I've chosen a figure that has no company stamp on its slotta base, and merely says "WIZARD" on the other side. He looks decidedly 80s and will fit in nicely.

Speaking of bases, you might have noticed that the figures above have no bases attached to their feet. That's because I'm going to take advantage of the "small project" freedom and try my hand at sculpting some flagstone bases for this lot and then pin/glue them directly in place. I have some Mantic bases that will form the canvas for my putty-pushing.


I'll keep you posted,
Rab

8 September 2016

Catacombs teaser

Whatwhatwhat?! This looks dangerously like a new project...

Sprues from Fireforge and Conquest Games (bought from 2nd City Games at a very reasonable price per sprue):


5 September 2016

Boney ogres

Last Deadcember I purchased two skeleton ogres from Ral Partha and blogged about how one might use them in WFB 3rd edition. I was quite pleased with my noodlings but really wanted a unit of three so the project stalled.

Enter Justin Coutange on the Oldhammer FB group who sculpted an absolute beauty of a third ogre, excellently picking up on the classic ogre captain by Jes Goodwin, Hrothyogg:

Picture from Stuff of Legends

2 September 2016

[GS review] - July and August


I realised I never posted July's data, so here I give you a particularly thrilling double whammy of me not quite achieving what I wanted to , except to play more games! Lots more games, particularly Space Hulk, with my two little boys.

The overview: