28mm Barricades - Now in colour!

After some quickie paintjob, here are my barricades, almost ready for the table. The basing is till a bit undone, as I haven't yet made up my mind just what shade my gaming board will eventually be, and I will finish these up then to mach up.

...and here are some action shots. Just because.

A couple of 28mm scale barricades

Having managed to increase the 'ratmen' portion of the Ruins & Ratmen -project, I was inspired to make some advancement on the first part of the name also. From the very beginning of this project, I had wanted to make some barricade-style terrain, but somehow never managed to actually make any. But after the skaven, I felt that it was time to tackle this obstacle as well. So, I cut some fibreboard to 1"x3" pieces, filed the edges round, and dived in to my parts pile to dig up some stuff to use. At first, I envisioned the the barricades to be built mainly from stones and wooden beams from the collapsed buildings, but after a while I began to want some more hastily constructed ones. It required some scratchbuilding, but soon I had a table and a couple of benches made, and the first barricade was practically done. The metal barrels and cartwheels gave the pieces some weight, in addition to adding some more interesting shapes overall, and the HirstArts small bricks and ruined fieldstone pieces anchor these terrain elements visually to the rest of the City in Ruins -style.

After the first one was done, the rest kind of just happened. The hardest part was to find a suitable figure for the dragged-down statue; I would have liked to make it with a 40mm - 1/32 scale figure, but could not find any suitable one, and in the end decided to use some old 25mm Grenadier figure. I still kind of want to do a similar set-up with a bigger figure, but I think It will be a singular terrain piece at that point.
Next step is to spray on some black basecoat, and then it's painty time!

6 Skavenslaves painted

For a blog where one big portion of content is themed Ruins and Ratmen, there has been a dearth of the latter in presentation. A big reason for this is simply that most of my Skaven figures predate this blog - well, some of them predate the Internet - although, to be honest, some of them are in a state that would need a good cleanup to be presentable. However, there were several Skaven figures on my to do -list, late arrivals and eBay finds that I just haven't gotten around to paint, and after I had finished with the Vampire spawn, I decided to give these guys a go.

If memory serves, these hail from the 6th edition of WFB. They are a little bit smaller than the bulk of my Skaven, which mostly consists of the WFB 3rd edition era Jes Goodwin figures, but don't stand out too badly and in fact help to break up the monotony of the figures. I intended to use them with WFRP, and now they are going to fill up the Trooper slots in Ruins and Ratmen.

For me, these were a quick job, finishing six figures in just a couple of evenings. Well, there was nothing fancy in the colour scheme, and they were quite small figures so I might have overlooked some tiny details. But I have to say that painting six similar figures on one go is kind if maximum for me, which does not bode well for the 9 Red Box Lesser Undead (zombies) next on the queue. Although they will have even simpler colour scheme...

Vampire Spawn (Reaper Dark Heaven 3383) painted

There are times that getting old really hits home. Like the graduation or marriages of your younger relatives, that you still thought were just kids. Or the twentieth anniversary of Nevermind couple of years back. Or the realization that no, you haven't gotten progressively worse about painting minis over the years, it's just your eyesight that is showing it's age.

Fortunately, there are steps to be taken at least about the last one. I have previously used a headband magnifier for some precision freehand stuff, now I just have to use those for most painting. It takes a bit of an adjustment, as I have never needed any kind of glasses, and have no problem of reading from print or from screen. Well, not yet, anyway. But apparently painting minis happens just at the range that is no longer naturally available for me.

Anyway, I have had my eyes on these Reaper figures for a while. However, last time I did order directly from them I had to pay customs charges, so even though they still have quite a generous free shipping offer, Reaper figures have been out of bounds for me. Luckily, there's eBay, and that's where I snatched this pair. Somehow, purchasing a couple of figures here and there does not sting as much as making a 'bulk' purchase.

I really like the sculpts of these figures. In fact, they're almost too good in depicting the over-the-top posturing and bravado of a freshly turned vampire. The figures have almost a kind of LARPish feel, and they could easily pass as some wannabe-vampires in a modern setting. I wanted a quick and simple colour scheme, and it turned up quite alright.

Formless Spawn by Avolak Castings

I haven't really done much at all with miniatures recently. But as I was making some random browsing for Deep Ones/Kuo-toa in miniature, I came across this guy, and was instantly smitten. Available from Avolak Castings, who have a small but impressive range of Lovecraftian miniatures. Officially it's depicting a Formless Spawn (of Tsathoggua), and I have great plans for it.

The body is tow-part resin cast, the hands and some tentacles are from metal, and everything fitted together very well. I mostly ended up pinning everything out of habit rather than need. There was some minor flash on the resin parts, actually hardly even worth mentioning, and if my aging eyes did not deceive me, a couple of air bubbles on the resin body might have been worked over with some clear filler, which was quite impressive dedication to quality. Despite all that, the whole miniature cost 12 euros, so there's tremendous value for money here. There was no real webshop on the site, but everything worked out via a couple of emails, and a professionally packed figure arrived from Spain to Finland quite speedily. And the postage did not cost arm or tentacle, either.

The figure fitted neatly on it's 50mm round base, but it would not look off on a 60mm base either, especially if one intends to do some scenic work with the base.

There are good miniatures, and then there are great ones. I had not thought of Ruins and Ratmen for a while, and yet as I saw this miniature, I a) knew that I needed to have it, and b) I instantly thought of an endgame scenario for R&R. So welcome, little guy. I hope my meagre skills can do you justice.

New Painting - Heresy Cyclops

Heresy Narbrot - 'Classic' Cyclops

Here's the figure that was missing from the previous post about Heresy Cultists, the Cyclops, or rather a Demonspawn as he wants to be known in those circles. And yeah, he actually does have a pair of eyes, due to the head I chose for him.

I really like the way the skin tones came out with this figure, mainly perhaps because there was strong enough detail on the model. The pose is also simple but effective, and it would be quite easy to mod it to get quite a range of beasties out of it. The size hits also a sweet spot, being big enough to stand out of human-sized figures, but not too bulky or towering.

New Painting - Foundry Hydra

Okay, finally had time to finish the Foundry Hydra. Lots of dry brushing, even more ink washes (hence the glistening) and some awkward brush angles due to the placement of some of the heads. In the end, the result was somewhat more colourful than my usual palette, but it suits this model, if I say so myself.

New Painting - Cultists, from Heresy Miniatures

Here are some preliminary pics from Cultists faction for my Ruins & Ratmen game. All of the figures are from Heresy Miniatures. The Cultists themselves were a no-brainer, as they were the only line of fantasy cult members I could think of. The Mutants, however, are of Heresy's ghoul range, with some Reaper Miniatures Creature Components - tentacles, claws, etc. - added for good measure. I had had the ghouls for a long time, never having the inspiration to actually do anything with them, until I realised that with a bit of tweaking they are just what this warband would need. And actually, it was easier to add the Reaper bits than to pin the ghouls as intended.

As there were only three poses with the regular troop types, it was a  very easy decision to convert some of the models to get a bit more variety to the warband. I decided to to give them single handed weapons, essentially shortened versions of their pole arms, and since the standard (not yet painted) featured a shield design, adding that seemed a good fit for the unity go the band. I copied the design on Green Stuff, and made the shields I needed from that mould.

In addition to these figures, there's the standard bearer yet to be finished, and a demonspawn (a Heresy figure as well, their classic Cyclops), who missed this photo shoot. There is still some good Reaper bits left, so more mutants might be in order, or maybe another demonspawn if I find a suitable base model. Also, all of my war bands seem to have some sort of animal troops in them, so maybe some giant insects would fit the theme. Centipedes, perhaps?

Foundry Hydra assembled

Woops. Time sure flies. Nevertheless, here's some pics of the assembled and based hydra. Despite the figure having seven heads, and the body in multiple parts as well, this was one of the easiest pinning jobs I had done, thanks to the relatively soft metal, and having big enough surfaces to drill in.

The figure settled nicely on a 40mm round base, and I made the cobblestone basing by making first a 2"x2" square from HirstArts blocks, then making a Green Stuff impression of that, and finally pressing that mold on the GS I had put on the top of the base. Worked out quite well, and now I have a ready mold for similar use at the ready.

The figure is now basecoated, and is waiting in the to-do shelf for an inspiration. Mainly, I have two conflicting colour schemes in my mind, and I can't seem to be able to pick my favourite. The first is 'eldricht', which would mean pale green underbelly and darker green back scales; the other one is 'poison', with bright orange (yellow highlights) bely, and black scales in the back, may haps with some reddish striping. Something resembling a coral snake. Then again, I already have some small spiders in similar colours. Oh well.

(Argh! Why does Blogger want to correct my English spelling and how do I get rid of that?)

((Okay, after searching in vain through Blogger preferences and whatnot, I realised that it was OS Mavericks that did the auto-corrections. I've switched it to UK English, although I suspect that it's only a matter of time until I have to switch it off altogether.))

New Arrivals: Foundry Hydra

Here's a thing that arrived today: snake-bodied Hydra from Foundry's Tribes of Legend -range. I instantly liked this figure the first time I saw it, and when I noticed it was available at Foundry's eBay outlet, FlyteofFantasy, and with postage paid, there was no excuse not getting it. I have in the past postponed some purchases, only to find out that the models have been discontinued, the store closed etc. (Red Box Helsvakt, I'm looking at you...), and I was not going to let it happen on this model.

As can be seen from the image, it's going to require a lot of pinning and filling to get the parts fit, but that was expected. Besides, having seven necks in only three parts is not that bad. And from the production point of view, having the two types of head separately makes perfect sense. Besides, there are 5 open-mouthed heads, and 5 closed ones in the kit, so one could mix and match, or even model the figure with some off-cut heads, and some necks where two heads have sprouted from the cuts. Only thing I'm bit iffy is the fact that the tail of the creature is two-forked, (which of course does not show on the image...) I think that I'll cut the other tailtip away.

The size of the figure is pretty much what I expected. It's big compared to a human-sized model, but not overtly so, and most importantly it can be built robust enough to properly function as a game piece. It will fit comfortably on a 40x40mm base, or a round equivalent. The fit of the joints is not the best, and there's quite a bit of flash on the studs, so simply gluing it together probably would not work.

Overall, the purchase went smoothly (well, I've never had any trouble with any eBay transaction yet), and was delivered promptly. And they were nice enough to include some skeleton figures in the order, as well. Probably some miscasts from their skeleton ranges, as one of the figures was cut from the middle and had a misshapen hand. But hey, freebies! Besides, the day you don't have uses for skeleton bits is the day you're tired of the whole hobby.

Some Hasslefree goodness

HFH057 Ferrus and HFH065 Veda-Ann

Here's a couple of Hasslefree minis that arrived into my mailbox recently. I just could not put them in a drawer, to wait for a better time, but had to assemble and base them right away. Pinning Veda-Ann's sword arm was especially nice: it's always a special kind of thrill drilling a 1mm diameter hole into a 2mm piece of metal. I also had to do some 'stock removal' on Ferrus's axe and Wolf's sword to fit them to my taste, although the latter is still by no means dainty. There are still some mold lines to tackle with, and some gaps to GS, and then I can perhaps leave these to wait for their proper turn. Well, maybe basecoat them first...

That's pretty much the rest of the Personalities I need for the Wulfheimer warband. Finding the regular troopers might prove trickier, though...

HFH046 Wolf and HFH068 Boudi

New painting - Elder Vampire

Heresy Miniatures: UNDEAD004: Vampire in Manbat form

Time to get some Heresy on board, as well!

This figure had lain on my figure drawer on a semi-finished stage for a while. I had originally based it on my regular humanoid base, which is about 21mm across, but although it did fit nicely, the pose of the figure was so front-heavy that it was constantly on the brink of toppling forward.

Then, as I was fiddling with the Ruins & Ratmen statistics for the Vampire Duellist, Valerie Dupuis, and thought that she would need a worthy opponent to hunt for in the ruined city. Thus was born the concept of Nemeses, arch-enemies of the Independent figures, that have a chance to spawn to the game if and when Independent models are fielded.

Now that I had an incentive to finish the miniature, it happened quickly. I knew I had to alter the pose a bit, and took an easy way out as I saw a suitably sized barrel in the bit box. With a bit of bending the figure accepted the new pose, and all I had to do was to paint the barrel and add some highlights to the figure.

I'm glad I found use for this figure. It's quite good-looking (Marcus from the Underworld series comes to mind), but unfortunately the wings make it a bit awkward as a game piece. With the elevated pose, that problem is somewhat alleviated, and the figure looks more imposing, to boot.

New painting - Divine Champion

Reaper: Dark Heaven: 03364: Isabeau Laroche, Female Paladin

Here's another Reaper/Werner Klocke collaboration. A two-part figure, I had a bit of problem with the separate shield arm. Not because of bad fit or anything, but rather no matter how I tried to attach it, it did not look natural. Oh well, in the end I selected a pose that showed the shield the best.

Initielly, I was going to do some freehand on the shield, but after a try or two I gave up, and went the old school way, that is to say I printed the image on a BW laser printer, and glued it on the shield. All went well, although I was a bit surprised how thick a regular 80g/m2 office paper would look on a miniature. Fortunately, a bit of Green Stuff did the job of blending the paper. Maybe next time I'll try this technique I'll try to sandpaper the paper edges somewhat thinner.

New painting - Slavonian Huntress

Freebooter Miniatures: SOL 002 Female Hunter

Most of my Werner Klocke -figures are from Reaper lines, but this one is from his own Freebooter Miniatures -range. Although I like his Reaper sculpts very much, I generally find his own range of figures a bit too busy for my tastes, and they are for the most part multi-part figures, as well.

There are a couple I've set my eyes on, however, and this huntress was one of the first that caught my eye. It's wonderfully anachronistic figure, actually more suitable for a post-apoc game than anything else. For me, that was no deal breaker. Tho bodice might have been, but hey, if one would collect female figures with only sensible outfits, the collection would be small indeed. At least she's not wearing bare metal against her skin... Actually, my biggest complain about the figure is that as she's supposed to be a hunter, her spear shows an alarming lack of lugs.

Oh well, in Ruins & Ratmen she's going to get a role as a professional hunter of Were-creatures.

New painting - Mercenary Witch

Reaper Miniatures: Warlord: 14330 Gars Necka, Mercenaries Mage

Another recently finished Reaper miniature, this time from the Warlord range.

Once again, the pose sold this figure for me, simple yet effective. As a rule (actually, it's more of a guideline..) I like my figures as a one piece casts. Not because I don't like pinning or assembling, I probably would not do any conversions if I did not like that. It's more like I often see multi-part figures as 'needlessly complicated', something that could have perhaps been avoided with a slight change in a pose.  And I also see the ability to design the figure in such a way that it has both a dynamic pose and single-piece castability as an art form in itself.