Tuesday 28 January 2014

Nottingham Young Gamers

Chum James invited me to come along and help at one of his "Nottingham Young Gamers" events on Sunday and I was only to happy to oblige.
I was supposed to help at the inaugural one last year, but something or other prevented me.
These events are essentially the follow on to James' very successful school wargaming club (which featured in one of the wargame magazines (WSS?) last year). James set up and ran the club at his primary school and had a whole bunch of children of both genders playing with toy soldiers. When he changed jobs recently the club was left a bit up in the air, so rather than see it die James has decided to keep it going by staging occasional afternoons at a social club near the school where, for a small fee, the children can come along and play games and paint some figures. On this occasion the models were generously supplied by the top chaps at Warlord Games.
I agreed to run a small game of Bolt Action (which meant frantic re-reading of the rules on Sunday morning). James and Scrivs provided all the models and scenery, all I had to do was point the kids in the right direction and tell them how many dice to roll.

My simple scenario saw a building in the middle of the board, in which fleeing Germans had inadvertently left behind the blueprints to Hitler's toilet. As the plucky Tommies closed in on the plans for the Fuhrer's khazi, beastly Bosch were headed back to reclaim them for the Fatherland. Whoever ended up with troops closest to the building at the end of the game would be the winner.

And so we played through two games over the course of a couple of very pleasant hours. The children were unfailingly polite (even to my terrible jokes) and seemed to enjoy it - though I couldn't persuade any of them to declare "For you Tommy the war is over" before rolling dice.
Bolt Action worked very nicely and the models from Scrivs and Martin all looked very good.

I took a few pictures.

 Beastly huns hug the wall

Both sides close in on the house

 Tommies caught in the low sun

 Teacher James gives his half-time lecture

 Plucky Brits storm forward

 The Germans get to the perimeter

More Germans get to the house

James is intending to run another one later in the year, so hopefully I'll get to do it all over again.

Sunday 26 January 2014

Sigmar's Blood (8)

A test horse for the Reiksguard Knights.
Silver spray FTW. Then a bit of a wash with some Old Skool Citadel Armour Wash and then pick out some details and we're done.



Just noticed I've missed the band round his tail.

Saturday 25 January 2014

Sigmar's Blood (7)

Some more finished Dire Wolves.




I've had to stop work on these for a bit as they're such horrid models they make me do a bit of sick in my mouth.

Friday 24 January 2014

Painting Tribesmen for Darkest Africa

Someone over on TMP asked me how I painted my Tribesmen.
So here follows a step by step guide to painting Foundry tribesmen for Darkest Africa.
Well, careful what you wish for...

First undercoat with brown. In this case Plastikote Matt Chocolate Brown



Next overbrush all the flesh with GW Dark Flesh



After that paint everything else. Hair Chaos Black, loincloth Iyanden Darksun, spots Scorched Brown, spear tip Chainmail, torc Shining Gold belts and quivers Snakebite Leather and shaft (ooer!) Bestial Brown.
Then let it dry for a bit.



Bring forth the dip! This is my weapon of choice, chosen because it is cheap and water based, so I can thin it with water (and wash the brush out too).


I thin to this sort of consistency then paint it on with a brush.


Then you must leave to dry for 24 hours.
(At some point I sneakily painted the base Tausept Ochre)



Next we need a blast of gloss varnish - otherwise the water based matt varnish reacts with the water based dip and unpleasantness ensues. I also drybrushed the base with Desert Sand and Bleached bone around this time.




Then when that's had a good old dry, paint on some matt varnish - Vallejo in this case.



Unfortunately you'll see that somewhere along the line something went wrong with my varnish, and the models now look a little "murky". Grrr.
However I'd got this far with the step by step and wasn't about to start again.

Finally add static grass  to taste (I also painted the fletches on the arrows at this point as I'd forgotten!)







Aside from the slight damage wrought by the varnish I'm satisfied with these. Another ten or so are on the edge of the painting table as I type. I'll soon have enough to go Dino hunting...

Tuesday 21 January 2014

Sigmar's Blood (6)

Some progress.
The first 16 militia are now mostly finished.



Meanwhile I'm starting work on some Reiksguard knights. These horses have been undercoated black and now I've marked them up prior to spraying with some Plastikote silver I have lying around. The riders will get the same treatment in an attempt to speed the whole process up.



Apologies for the poor pictures. I'll do nice ones once they're properly finished.

Thursday 16 January 2014

Sigmar's Blood (5)

More slapdash paint application has moved things forward a bit.


I think tonight will be mostly about the washses

Tuesday 14 January 2014

Sigmar's Blood (4)

I find myself banished once more to the desolate wasteland that is Swindon.

I'm attempting to make fruitful use of my evenings by doing some more painting for the campaign.
I assembled and undercoated (Plastikote Chocolate Brown) seventeen or so militia before departure.
Some of these were originally assembled several years ago when I was planning a Middenheim militia (I think) armed with hammers. I've added a few more new ones with more varied weapons but have decided to paint them with blue and white amongst the browns. The unit in the campaign book are Stirlanders, but as the Empire army we're using is from Nordland Middenheim fits thematically with the provinces being adjacent.
So far all that's happened is liberal application of some browns, blue and white.

More work tonight!

Monday 13 January 2014

Sigmar's Blood (3)

As the painting progresses we were itching to get some gaming in. So my chum adapted the opening scenario a bit and we played that through to give us a bit of a taste for the forces.
I set up in the graveyard with my Necromancer on Corpse Cart and Wight together and two units of skellies and a unit of Zombies just outside. As long as I was in the graveyard any successful Vanhels spell would gain me an additional D6 dead things to add to my forces. In the far corner of the board some knights, swordsmen, flagellants and handgunners hove into view. Thier mission being to cut down the Necromancer before turn six was up. Any other result would see me triumphant.

 Lord of all the deadmen

There was little incentive for me to move, at least at first, so as the followers of Sigmar advanced I stood stock still in the graveyard and tried to cast Vanhels to bolster my meagre forces. Sadly the winds of magic largely deserted me and no more cold dead bodies rose to my aid.
 
 Sigmars knights

 Crazy madmen. And some flagellants
Meanwhile the knights were bearing down on me and the human infantry drew ever closer.

Stumble forward you maggot ridden menaces!

Eventually, despite failing to raise any additional followers I urged the zombies and skeletons to fall upon the knights, rather than be fallen on. The zombies made it, but the skellies tripped over their spears and failed to push home.

 Squelch!

Deprived of their charge the knights could only draw the initial combat, meanwhile the dead failed again to rise from their (obviously far too cosy) graves. The knights were spooked by the graveyard stink of the zombies and failed their fear test so rather more zombies hung around than expected. However the handgunners forswore to shoot and charged the Zombies in the flank. 

With rabid cries to Sigmar for protection the Flagellants fell upon the hated skeletons and began smashing skulls.
 Thwack!


As the Empire net began to close around me I maneuvered to try and buy the Necromancer more time. The Skeletons angled themselves to ensure that any overrun from the knights went off the board. Meanwhile the Wight sacrificed himself in front of the swordsmen to ensure they couldn’t get to the undead wizard. I also backed up the corpse cart to lengthen any future charges. Finally managing to get some spells off I boosted the Skeletons facing the knights with Hellish Vigour but still managed no raising.

 So that's three ranks a standard and....pop!


The flagellants duly battered their way through the remaining skeletons and lined themselves up to charge the corpse cart.

The Hellishly vigorous Skeletons did well against the knights, thinning them out a bit.


 Over the wall and SMASH HIM UP!!!


In the final empire turn the swordsmen failed to charge home but the flagellants crashed into the corpse cart and despite failing to wound the cart caused the Necromancer and his foul conveyance to crumble to dust, winning the game for the forces of Sigmar.

Game over in just over an hour meant we could swap sides, reset and go again.

 Trot, trot, trot.

In stark contrast to the first game the necromancer repeatedly cast Vanhels before I was able to close, making for a sizeable bunch of dead things to chew through.

 So the flagellants are going the long way are they sir...?

 Try getting through that little lot

The knights suffered at the hands, or at least the finger bones, of the skeletons and were seen off. My chances of getting to the Necromancer were looking vanishingly small.

However at this point fate intervened. The necromancer had been throwing caution to the winds and hurling six dice at his Vanhels attempts. Wth big units in place he chose only to use three dice, two of which duly came up as sixes. Inevitably he rolled low, and then was sucked off into the warp for his sins. Meaning I got a (undeserved) win.

However with not much fighting done we decided to just play on (though the moral high ground was all mine).

Despite some clever positioning of the handgunners preventing a second unit catching the swordsmen in the flank the Wight hurled himself into the fray and skilfully beheaded the Warrior Priest.
My flagellants eventually managed to charge the zombies and aquitted themselves well, thouh the handgunners were cut down by the skeleton warriors.

 Ah, a glorious end.

And with that te game ended with the Necromancer still very much alive and continue his reign of terror.
Two good fun games, and it was nice playing some smaller WFB using small units and lesser characters.

I learned a bit about the units and armies we’ll be using in the campaign and even manged to win a game (albeit as a result of a miscast)

Looking forward to the campaign proper even more now.