The Dark Templar

Malcontent on hiatus

2012-02-24T09:30:00.000Z

Yes, I've made the decision to take a break from the bases for a couple of months.

The reaction to the bases – Bamboo series especially – has been great in the main. I've come under some criticism for not having a pressure casting arrangement (seriously…in my kitchen?!) as well as not expanding the range quickly. This has been tempered by some great feedback from people who bought the bases and have used them.

The plan was always to expand the range – and still is – but the project has got to the point where I'm spending what little hobby time I have making bases for other people and not actually spending time on my own hobby. That was never the deal. In addition, after long hours at work and juggling domestic duties, etc. I spend my evenings packing and posting orders. Basically it has become a second job at a time when I don't have the time.

I'd like to say a big thank to you folks for buying the bases and all the interest shown in the Malcontent project generally. The response since New Year has been phenomenal and the bases I had in stock sold out in 3 weeks.

I will be taking the next couple of months – or so – away from the base selling. I will be expanding the range a little and casting up some new stock, then around Salute 2012 time – at the end of April-ish – I will post some more sales up on Ebay. Ideally I need to find a third party to cast up the bases in bulk and take that responsibility away from me so that I can concentrate on designing new stuff, but that is more of a long term goal.

Over the coming weeks you should see more general hobby posts, painting, etc on the blog. I will post any new base designs I've done and keep everyone up to speed on progress so stay tuned.

Kirai vs Rasputina

2012-02-22T09:31:00.001Z

After a week's break from gaming – I had taken some time off work – it was game time again. Fugs threw a curve ball into the mix by fielding Rasputina instead of his current mistress Lilith.

I had had plenty of thinking time (and time to buy more stuff) and decided to try a mix of new and old.

Strategies were flipped: I got Slaughter and took Bodyguard and Kill Protegee as Schemes; Fugs also flipped Slaughter and took Bodyguard and the Raspy mirror specific Scheme.

My crew consisted of Kirai, Lost Love, Canine Remains, Deperate Merc, Datsu-Ba, 2x Insidious Madness, 2x Seishin and 1x The Drowned.

Fugs took Rasputina, Essence of Power, 2x Silent Ones, 1x Gamin …and Taelor.

The game itself was intense and quite a blur to me now. It ebbed and flowed and it was impossible to predict who would win. I started with my usual shenanigans – taking the Merc and Dog down to one wound so Datsu could create Gaki, although I was hoping for Onryo with the trigger. Alas my starting hand was devoid of any crows which would hamper my opening activations.

By the end of turn one I had two Shikome on the board hunting the Gamin. They tried to cast Guaranteed Fate on him with no luck and tucked back into cover to avoid any reprisals. In turn two Datsu managed to create a Gaki and an Onryo and Kirai summoned a second Onryo. By the end of the turn I had 12 models on the board to Fugs' 6. It was still very cagey though – I was nervous about Taelor and all the magic spells facing me, Fugs wary of the sheer numbers facing him.

I threw out a couple of bait models and Taelor went for it, killing an Insidious Madness and leaving the Gamin and a Silent One unsupported. I moved The Drowned into a clearing in melee range of Taelor and the other Silent One and cast Drag Under successfully, moving Taelor 3" nearer to my awaiting troops. The Drowned was then killed, dealing 2 Damage to these nearby enemies.

A series of mistakes undermined my strike at this point. I swirled Dasu into melee with Taelor, having already activated her (doh!). There was a tiny slither of a Seishin base visible from behind cover which exposed Kirai, Lost Love, a Gaki and 2 Seishin to a December's Curse blast. Kirai and the Gaki managed to survive but this threw a spanner in the works. On the plus side the Onryo in base with Taelor manage to land 5 wounds in one hit which was something of a silver lining.

The following turn saw Taelor engage with Datsu, the old dear managing to frustrate her opponent by taking all three melee hits to die. I summoned Ikiryo who managed to NOT kill Taelor, the heavyweight Onryo finishing off the job he'd started earlier. Alongside all this Rasputina (and the EoP) was having a field day blasting the rest of my crew to pieces – even killing her own Silent One in order to polish off an Insidious Madness and Onryo out of LoS.

The game went to turn 6 and by the end I had wiped Rasputina and her crew off the board, but Fugs had killed over 50ss worth of my models!!… not bad for a 30ss game.

The final score was 6-4 to Raspy.

Post game thoughts were positive. I made some shocking mistakes – I blame the week's break – and I was far too cautious for the opening half of the game; when I was bold (especially with the Shikome) things started to die. Considering my Terrifying was negated by the opposing crew and I was facing all Magic attacks I was pleased with how things went overall. It was a good alternative to facing the Lilith melee crew, and even Fugs saw Raspy in a different light after being Sonnia's punchbag for such a long time.

More Inspiring Terrain

2012-02-09T09:39:00.000Z

I spotted this post on Rob Jedi's Miniatures Blog and just had to post it on in case you hadn't seen it. I have posted on great Wild West terrain before but this collection looks absolutely amazing.

As you can see from the photo they have used some Malifaux miniatures in there so it is perfectly sized. Rather than re-post all the pics here, go visit the original source…

Rob Jedi's Miniatures Blog

Game 4: Kira vs Lilith

2012-02-08T10:12:00.003Z

So last night was the long awaited next chapter in the Kirai vs Lilith war. There had been plenty of time to read up and research. I had pretty much made my mind up what I would take, but there's always time for a last minute change.

I flipped Distract for my Strategy and took Hold Out and Breakthrough. Fugs flipped Slaughter and took Bodyguard and Stake a Claim. I knew I needed to move fast.

My starting lineup consisted of Kirai, Lost Love, 3x Seishin, 2x Insidious Madness, Canine Remains, Desperate Merc and The Hanged.

Fugs took a compact but devastating crew of Lilith, Cherub, Mature Nephilim, Taelor and Lelitu. Half way through Turn 1 he realised that Lelitu takes wounds at the end of every turn Lelu is not on the board so would likely be dead by the end of Turn 3. Seeing as she had not activated yet we agreed a swap for a Doppelganger.

Turn 1 involved a lot of shuffling around. Kirai summoned Shikome and Onryo, Lost Love summoning a second Onryo. The Merc and Canine Remains killed each other producing two new Seishin and two Gaki. At the end of the turn I had 12 models on the table to Fugs' 5.

I spent Turn 2 moving up the board and setting up an alpha strike against Taelor who was pretty isolated in the middle of the board. Fugs crew were pretty much heads down in cover not committing to anything.

Shikome had chosen the Cherub as its Prey to try and disrupt Fugs' thinking and force him to hide his totem rather than being the linchpin behind all the Transposition tricks. Whilst this tied up one of my better models the mind tricks worked and the Chreub ran back to his deployment zone and hid behind the Mature Nephilim.

Turn 3 I launched my strike as Fugs' crew were still noncommittal. The Doppelganger had copied Taelor's Hammer and the Mature's Diving Attack and swept into the nearby Shikome. I had managed to construct a very good hand of cards by this time and stalled the attack with no damage inflicted.

I had thrown a Gaki forward (to swirl spirits) but Taelor stepped in and walloped him leaving nothing but a puddle of goo. I sent a Seishin forward then swirled in an Insidious Madness. Ikiryo was then summoned into melee with Taelor. The Lost Love stepped up and cast Chill of Death, Taelor already being on a negative WP flip. She failed the resist and everything was going to plan. The Hanged stepped up and blew away half of her Wounds in one fell swoop with an unresisted Beyond the Grave.

However, I had forgotten three things: the Ikiryo was Slow as he had just been summoned; Taelor has Hard to Wound as well as Hard to Kill.

Ikiryo pulled all nearby spirits closer (except Kirai who had failed her Into The Spirit World). He wasn't able to do a Focused Strike so had to do two normal ones. First attack Fugs flipped the Red Joker in defence. I couldn't match without blowing the Red Joker in my own hand so I passed – mistake. The second attack came in and only managed Moderate Damage, leaving Taelor on 2 wounds. This would mean she wouldn't die this turn. A nearby Onryo charged and did more damage – would have killed her except for Hard to Kill. I had nothing else in range.

Turn 4 would be our final turn. Lilith ran the length of the board to tag a piece of terrain near my Deployment Zone but hadn't gone far enough to be in the zone herself. Taelor did a Hammerstrike to push all the models (except the Insidious Madness) away then killed the Madness then Ikiryo. Shikome intercepted the Cherub and killed it before being charged by the Mature Nephilim and dying to the attacks. Something (can't remember what) took the last wound off Taelor, turning her into a Gaki.

With nothing else in range my remaining activations involved getting as many models into Fugs Deployment Zone as I could. End of Turn 4, end of the game.

A final assessment showed a 6-6 draw. A much more interesting (and close) game and a lot more to think about.

Whilst Fugs had taken the crew from hell it didn't actually do much; he later admitted to being rather intimidated by the size of my crew that was moving up the table en mass. I was very pleased with how the first half of the game had gone but again the alpha strike had fizzled and left me vulnerable to reprisals. Had Fugs come at me with his big hitters from Turn 1 I am convinced he would have wiped me out within a couple of turns.

The Hanged had finally delivered his payload, but didn't do much else except threaten from distance. Similarly Shikome didn't actually do much except chase the Cherub around and keep a 2pt model out of the game. The Gaki and Onryo helped fill out the numbers and do the grunt thing. I was quite impressed the with the Insidious Madness – both of them – as they seemed to fulfil their role well. Struggling to decide on a Man of the Match this time as nobody stood out.

Painting Beauty and the Beast

2012-02-07T10:11:00.002Z

More painting progress was made on Kirai over the weekend.

Some more washes were added to her dress and green scarf. This will need to be tidied up slightly where it has overspilled at some point. I also worked up her skin tones – I wanted something quite pale but she started to look ill so I pulled it back. Unfortunately the build up of paint layers on her face combined with her dark eyes makes her look rather like Amy Winehouse, but on the tabletop the effect is sufficient. I added basecoat colour to her hair to make her look a little more human for our game this week.

I also started work on Ikiryo, with the intention of painting her in a similar style to the master – Kirai gone bad if you will. Being that Ikiryo is a spirit I wanted to paint her up in slightly lighter tones than Kirai so that there was a visual difference on the tabletop.

The hope is that these two models can be finished over this coming weekend and I can then move on to the rest of the crew. The models chosen to be painted next will depend purely upon their performances on the battlefield – step up or stay white!

Blogshare: White Rabbit's Legendary Blog

2012-02-03T11:52:00.000Z

White Rabbit's Legendary Blog

Mike (aka WRabbit37) hails from the same part of the US and LFGS as Bill and Jay from the Gamers Lounge podcast and Dan from the Mongoose blog. As a regular on the aforementioned podcast he's quickly establishing himself as a key part of their celebrity in the online gaming community.

Aside from being an authority on Malifaux, in particular the Neverborn, his blog reveals that gaming is just a part of his DNA – boardgames, videogames, roleplaying, you name it – and he enjoys it all. He's a competitive gamer, likes to win and is pretty successful at it. He has a rule not to go to tournaments as he gets too competitive, which is a fantastic level of self-control for someone so "pretty much awesome all the time". On the odd occasion that he has broken this rule he often goes on to win the tournament. To round all this off he's a really nice guy and actually comes across as very modest, enjoying a challenge.

I can count myself quite privileged to have my own blog on Mike's reading list and he has chipped in with comments and advice on several occasions, often adding a bit of experience and common sense to my ramblings.

His latest post talks about his approach when selecting crews at the beginning of a game of Malifaux. It breaks down his thought process and highlights some good points that I hadn't appreciated, adding a bit of logic and clear thinking to something that is often rushed and not thought through properly, in our games at least. It's little gems of insight and experience such as these that makes the blog a great resource as a fellow Malifaux player.

Despite a particular leaning towards Malifaux, Mike's blog incorporates a lot of non-related posts, making it a great read generally. It's always light reading, often commenting on his current tv or dvd viewing – even sports results. Whenever I see a new post on WRLB I'll always stop what I'm doing and have a read – I suggest you do the same.

Kirai: painting and avatar building

2012-01-31T11:23:00.000Z

I set a decent amount of time aside at the weekend to paint – something I haven't done in a while. Like most of us I guess, I wanted to concentrate on my new master and get Kirai looking all pretty.

I'd decided some time ago to go with the colour scheme that is in the book – even bought some new paint before Christmas. I had sprayed all my spirits with white instead of the normal black (to get a more vibrant, light colour) but my first attempts to lay down some colour was very patchy. Maybe should have stuck to what I know.

I used various browns to start with, highlighting with Ochre/White until reaching a pure white. The colour wasn't very vibrant so I washed it several times with Golden Yellow and Gryphonne Sepia to add some depth.
Need to look at the highlights again and bring them back up to white.

Similarly with the green scarf (for want of a better word). I started with a Dark Green base colour, adding more and more Emerald, then adding White. At present it needs a wash to unify the layers and give it some depth.

While all the washes were drying I paid a little attention to Kirai's Avatar which has sat idle in my Mali-bag for a few months now. I had a 50mm Bamboo base completed and cast up in resin over Christmas and had superglued her in the new year. I set about drilling some holes from the underside into the metal to secure the model further.

It still needs a little more greenstuff to blend to model more with the base and then it'll be ready for painting.

We have a painting evening planned for later so with some luck there will be more photos in the next couple of days.

Rallying the Troops…

2012-01-27T10:01:00.004Z

So with a (contested) draw and two very heavy losses so far with Kirai there is a lot to think about. As you can imagine I have done a lot of researching and reading about the crew, what seems to work for people and what doesn't. Looking at my own experiences so far my conclusions are as follows.

Kirai herself is a great master on paper. Yes she is vulnerable when attacked in melee, but with a few Seishin to pass wounds onto or sacrifice, together with her swirling ability and Pitiful she can survive longer than expected – though I have managed to get her killed once already. Even with her extra (+1) Intinctual she has far too many cool abilities than I can use in a single turn. I was drawn to her (over the other Resurrectionist masters) for a reason. However, going from a pure Guild beginning, Kirai is like a brand new pair of shoes – it takes time to break them in and make them truly comfortable – but I am determined to get her to work for me.

The Lost Love is another great model, and at 2ss an absolute bargain. It's big trick of saving Kirai's life when she dies is amazing, however, I think this has held me back from using the model to it's full potential – using Magical Extension to cast things such as Chill of Death and summoning additional spirits. I can't think of a reason to not take this model, except to make the game more challenging.

Ikiryo – nothing much can be said about this spirit. It may take a second crow to summon it, which can be a pain, but it's a free model and has great utility. I haven't witnessed its awesome melee ability that I read about – it tends to inflict a couple of wounds then gets battered in the return – but it is one of the bigger hitters available to Kirai so it's not as if I'm NOT going to summon it at some point.

Datsu-Ba has some great utility skills and a fair few wounds, but I have found her next to useless in melee. Being able to give a spirit a free move, together with her healing and ability to summon Gaki have all been useful if not amazing. For a 7ss model I'm struggling to include her after her performances to date. I obviously don't quite understand her, but I don't want her to become another Francisco Ortega who even at 5ss never seems to be good enough for the first team.

Onryo are the grunts and they do as well as can be expected. I haven't managed to get off a Blind to Spirits or Denial of Sanzu – or even Haunt for that matter – which would lift their usefulness no end. I'm unlikely to include them in a starting lineup as they can be summoned (and regularly are) and I really need them to inflict a bit more pain, but I'm not ready to dismiss them yet.

Shikome is the one model that has almost lived up to expectations. I know for a fact that Fugs fears this model which is why he has been quite prejudiced in taking it down recently. I didn't use it very well in my last game – forgetting about her spell tricks – but if you can summon her into combat she can have fun with her new target. I have contemplated getting a second Shikome but am reluctant until I can get the rest of the crew working.

I've had a few brief glimpses of the Gaki in action. They haven't inflicted a lot of damage (a running theme with the crew so far) but they have scared the Terror Tots on a few occasions and as a 'free' model they are great simply as extra significant bodies on the table. For this reason I have no real expectations with them, so time will tell how useful they turn out to be.

The Hanged is a model with a lot of potential to me. Unfortunately he got blown off the table on his debut so couldn't contribute much. In the second game he attempted to cast Beyond the Grave several times against both Lilith and Taelor. Without any negative flip mechanic already in place he was never likely to actually get the spell off, but it did cause Fug to cheat and use soulstones to ensure such a devastating spell was prevented. Combined with his Terrifying, this model has become a threat yet to deliver on his potential, but the threat is there – it's only a matter of time and circumstance before he delivers.

Insidious Madness is a model that has not been fielded yet. He is pure utility and could either be a roaring success or a puddle of dead snot on the battlefield and a waste of 4ss. The combination of the negative WP flip aura and Terrifying could become very useful. Combined with the rest of the crew – The Hanged especially – there is the potential for a lot of hurt. He is currently a favourite for the next outing, to test some of the theory.

Other models that I have considered include:

Jack Daw, who combines some of the threat of The Hanged and Insidious Madness but who will also have a steep learning curve. He's expensive and has a few too many random abilities that could blow up in my face, making him unreliable (which is the point of the character, let's be honest).

Convict Gunslinger is an all-round solid model. Fugs knows his abilities having fielded him regularly for months so will fear him. I can turn him into a spirit for extra depth and survivability and he gives me some ranged options. He's not very in keeping with Kirai's spirit theme but may be a useful addition, for a while at least, giving me some breathing space to sort out the rest of the crew.

So, where to go from here?

I've decided to take a week off from gaming next week. One game a week is actually too few when you're trying to learn a new crew – you build up the excitement and theory all week then if you make a mistake or two and it blows up in your face you have to wait a whole other week until you can try again. Despite this, breaking the losing cycle can be as easily achieved by taking a rest as anything. I hope to get some models painted in this time so that I can take some more photos without being totally embarrassed and it will give time for the pre-game giddiness to subside and hopefully be replaced by a confident calmness and clear thinking.

It's a Knockout…

2012-01-25T09:52:00.005Z

…8 …9 …10 …YOU'RE OUT!

That is the sound of my patience with Kirai and her spirits leaving the building – haha!

Another thumping last night by Lilith, largely thanks to some bad decision making on my part and increasingly poor cards is making me wonder whether my gaming skills really are that two-dimensional and I should go back to the simplicity of the Guild.

Fugs and I both flipped Destroy the Evidence, so Fug suggested making it a Shared Strategy. This effectively added a seventh evidence token in the middle of the board worth an additional VP. We flipped for deployment and got corners, meaning we were both barely 12" from said central token.

I was distracted by the bright lights and decided I could summon Ikiryo on top of the central token and give myself a small headstart. Destroy the Evidence is a strategy that Kirai should breeze through with her movement tricks so getting an early lead would be a bonus. Problem is I forgot that summoned models are slow when they arrive, meaning Ikiryo didn't have enough general AP to interact. It also meant that (being H3) he was an easy target for Lilith's Transposition. That's exactly what happened – the Cherub stepped up and Transposition-ed Ikiryo with Lilith. Lilith then interacted with the token to claim it and moved off to the side. Ikiryo was battered by the new addition to Fug's crew – Taelor.

End of turn 1, I am down 1 VP already not to mention 4 wounds on Kirai and a handful of cards.

My semi-painted master

Things ebbed and flowed the following turn. I moved The Hanged over to a token on my left. He was charged by a Young Nephilim who was in turn charged by an Onryo who did 3 wounds. The Young was then swapped with Taelor thanks to another great Transposition move, supported by Lilith, and I was forced to swirl The Hanged back to Kirai for healing and sacrifice the wounded Onryo to regain some wounds and cards and prevent Taelor from killing more stuff.

The tempo of the game was such that Fugs could move around the board with little to no fear of any reprisals. I set an alpha strike in motion once Lilith had moved on to another token and left Taelor alone. She was having a field day against my spirits, killing them in a single hit. Her high WP meant I was struggling to do anything back.

Kirai summoned Ikiryo and Shikome into base contact with Taelor, forgoing a heal to cast her (0) action that would produce a Gaki should Taelor die. I had The Hanged waiting to cast Beyond the Grave and halve Taelor wounds before the big hitters went in. Up stepped the Lost Love to cast Chill of Death giving the target neg flips against spirits – the combination of these elements would be devastating. As expected he flipped poorly, I cheated to ensure I had the correct suit and soulstoned for a boost to take it out of Taelor's reach – I flipped a 1. That effectively meant that Taelor could defend everything that I threw at her by cheating (not that she needed it as Fugs has amazing flips with this crew). In return Taelor killed Shikome and Ikiryo (for the second time this game) and I had to give up the two remaining cards I had.

The game staggered on in the same vein for another turn. By this time Fug had 4 VP to my 0. I called the game mid turn 4 as the clock chimed 10pm.

The inevitable (weekly) post mortem got me analysing why this crew struggles so much and why it seems incapable of doing any damage – the number of wounds I have inflicted in 3 games can be counted on one hand.

My multi-coloured Seishin

With the Guild I could spend a couple of turns building up a decent set of cards in my hand. With Kirai, she uses any decent cards she has summoning her troops or entering the Spirit World. She is also so dependent on suits – masks and crows especially – that she has to hold onto these at all costs. If you get a poor hand of cards and has been the norm so far (my hand in turn four had no card higher than a four!) then I'm relying on soulstones to make things happen.

If the games had been a little closer, more contested, then I could be quite content that it was part of the learning curve. At present I'm providing no real challenge to Fugs who can move around the board at will with Transposition (which I don't seem able to stop as I have no decent cards in my hand to cheat, or need them for other things). As fast as I am summoning spirits he's killing them. With the introduction of Taelor (and soon the twins) who negates all of the advantages the spirits have, I'm losing models at a faster rate with even less ability to stop it.

The danger is that these beatings are so demoralising that I'm starting to lose enthusiasm for the game and for painting the models. I could go back to The Guild but that would be defeatist, plus I've invested too much money to put the Spirits all on ebay for half the price I paid for them. I could buy bigger models – Dead Rider, etc. – but that doesn't solve the inherent problem. So I've decided to take a week or two off from gaming, do some painting, and get back to the craft side of things that I enjoy and will feed my interest.

As much as I think playing a single game a week is not helping my development – the excitement builds all week for a game then you lose 8-0 with nothing new learned – I feel (as does my poor wife) that a break will be good. I don't want to field another unpainted crew, and that in turn should provide more eye candy for the blog.

The sting of the defeat is gone now but I'm not seeing any light at the end of the tunnel, or a way to turn things around; with things set to get more difficult when Fugs introduces the twins shortly I need to find a way to break them. Let the research begin…

How much terrain?

2012-01-19T09:45:00.001Z

This is a question that has been in my mind since starting Malifaux. With Necromunda back in the day you had the terrain provided for you and that was pretty much that. When we first started playing Malifaux we had very little appropriate scenery to use, so the early games were quite sparse and led to ranged experts such as the Convict Gunslinger ruling the roost.

As time has crept by and our terrain collection has expanded, we've seen the table get more and more crowded, to the point I'm wondering is there too much terrain on the table now? The photo of Tuesday night's game above is actually quite open by our standards.

Scouting around blogdom on a daily basis you see photos now and again of other people's games and gaming tables. Above is a photo from Bill's DeadTau Project blog, below a photo from Sholto's Incunabulog. Both tables have significantly less terrain than our own weekly layout, with some quite open spaces with nowhere to hide.

So I'm going to throw the question out to you viewing folks – how much terrain do you use?

We'll be back…

2012-01-18T10:16:00.010Z

So last night was the big rematch between Lilith and Kirai. I had tweaked my list from last time to the following:

Kirai; Lost Love; Datsu-Ba; The Hanged; 1x Desperate Merc; 4x Seishin

I was looking forward to unleashing The Hanged's abilities, the potential is amazing. I was also going to try the "Datsu kills Merc and replaces with Seishin and Gaki/Onryo" trick in turn 1 to gain an additional model immediately. However, this Ressers deck doesn't seem to like me much (must be all that time playing as The Guild – it can smell the starch) and my opening hand was pretty awful and devoid of any crows or masks.

Turn 1 was a bit of a shuffle and killing aforementioned Merc. Kirai summoned an Onryo who shot up the right flank, and a Shikome who shot across to the left flank to chase down my Grudge target – a Young Nephilim. The Hanged moved across to sit on the Line in the Sand token nearest the board edge, to prevent Fug's from interacting with it.

Can anyone guess what happened next?

Earthquake is what happened next! Fug's saw my error (or rather lack of intel, as I had missed the fact Lilith had the ability) and pushed both the Onryo and Hanged off the board, and almost took Datsu-Ba as well.

Gutted.

That sweet move put me well and truly on the back foot – 13ss worth of models gone in a single move – and set the tone of the rest of the game. Kirai swirled over to the Shikome, with most of her spirits following, but I was struggling with a lack of crows in my hand and couldn't summon Ikiryo. Even when I got my spirits into combat they seemed unable to do more than the odd wound or two. Fugs on the other hand could seemingly do no wrong and was battering my crew with little effort. By the end of turn 4 I had only the Shikome (on 5 wounds) and an untouched Onryo left. Kirai had been killed (having initially survived an absolute onslaught of attacks and swirled away to recover) and Lilith had only lost a single Young Nephilim.

I called it, Fugs winning 8-0, the ferociousness of the defeat making me feel bruised and battered for the rest of the evening. I'm not a good loser (at least not after such one-sided games) so of course the post mortem started within seconds of the game finishing and continues this morning.

I've done a lot of reading up on Lilith as this was obviously a flaw in my preparation; in my arrogance I thought I had the measure of her. I've learned a lot of things, such as she needs to discard a card when using (2) Whirling Death, gains a card when she damages a model (discarding a card if it isn't killed).

EDIT: Just read that when she uses Whirling Death, Lilith has to hit her own models too if they're within the 2" range.

I also have a lot of questions, such as Transposition – is LoS to the target models required? This doesn't usually matter as Lilith has Master of Malifaux and ignores terrain effectively. However, when her totem (who doesn't have MoM) is casting Transposition does it need LoS to the targets? This would have made a difference to the game last night.

EDIT: According to Spell Basics in the Rules Manual:
"Spells require LoS to their targets unless otherwise indicated in their description. Spells affecting more than one target do not affect targets outside the caster's LoS."

The knee-jerk reaction is buy more/bigger models (it is the 40k way) but I think I'll stick with what I have and concentrate on painting (they are desperate for colour as you can see above) and learning with them rather than concocting a new killer list.

I had to remind myself that I have played precisely 3 games with this crew and it is very different and more complicated than the Guild crews I'm used to, there are bound to be mistakes and a learning curve. Whilst Fugs has only played 1 or 2 games more with his new Lilith crew, it is a more straightforward crew and he has just reached the point where things are clicking into place. He played very well last night – possibly the best he's played so far – so there's no taking that away from him.

So there we are. Kirai goes back to the drawing board to rethink things. I still have a second Hanged model, plus Jack Daw and Insidious Madness (not forgetting Kirai's Avatar) to come on as subs at some point, but my thinking is to stick to a lineup for a few weeks and see if things turn around.

This must be what it's like to be a Premiership manager!?!

Upcoming game…

2012-01-16T13:17:00.001Z

I've learned a lot in the last couple of games with Kirai (apologies for those not into her Spiritness but it's going to be the theme for the coming weeks I'm afraid).

Hands down star of the show so far has been Shikome – fast movement, solid on offense with some nice tricks and triggers, plus manages to hold on when attacked (if not just summon a new one!).

Datsu-ba on the other hand is yet to find her place. I've read a lot of blogs/forums with people raving about her so I'm probably not seeing it yet. She has a lot of potential so I'm loathed to drop her from the starting lineup (plus I can't summon her in). After a few days of contemplation I've decided to try something a little different for her.

In the opening turn or two I've been activating and passing (usually) with my Seishin and totem to out activate Fug, and then summon all the big hitters in at the end of turn knowing there are no reprisals to come this turn. Datsu usually spends this time lounging around with not much to do, so I've decided to give her a job.

Based upon a trick for Sonnia Criid that I learned from Bill at Dead Tau Project – using Desperate Mecenaries in your starting lineup to then kill and summon more expensive Witchling Stalkers – I'm going to drop a Seishin from the starting list and replace with a Desperate Merc (same points cost).

On turn one Datsu goes to town on the Merc and finishes him off with her funky spell that (if it kills the target) turns them into a Gaki or even an Onryo with the trigger. Making sure this happens within 8" of Kirai means that I lose a Merc, gets turned into a Gaki with a corpse counter in the pocket, and Kirai gains Seishin number 5. This basically means I get two (low priced) models for the price of one and will take my crew count up to 10 before summoning Ikiryo or Shikome.

I also intend including The Hanged for the first time to see what he can do. I may take some photos this week, although I warn you now there are no painted models…yet.

Malifaux 2012: Game 1 – Kirai vs Lilith

2012-01-11T10:07:00.002Z

I was rather excited going into this game, after our taster battle on Sunday. We'd had a glimpse of the possibilities of Kirai and her spirits and I was expected Fugs to come back with a game plan.

As a caveat to this game it should be noted that we've decided to spice things up for 2012. Instead of defaulting to the same "easy" Schemes (Bodyguard/Hold Out) each week we've made a ruling. You're not allowed to take the a Scheme you've already had in a previous game until all the Schemes in the book have been attempted. This means you have to pick and choose your Schemes carefully.

We went for individual Strategies for this game. Fugs flipped Line in the Sand and took Steal Relic and Breakthrough as Schemes. I flipped Escape and Survive and took Stake a Claim and Breakthrough.

I took Kirai and her Lost Love, Datsu-Ba, two Onryo and five Seishin. I had the intention to roll up one flank, sitting on one of the Dynamite tokens to prevent Fugs getting 4 points, within arms reach of his deployment zone and my chosen target terrain piece.

Don't have photos or a full battle report, but will run through the highlights – it was a battle royale and a half.

Kirai first turn was a disaster due to a very poor hand of cards, nothing was summoned. Lilith attempted to switch an Onryo with a Tot, but didn't have the suit.

Lilith and the Mature Nephilim headed over in in my direction and I moved my entire crew to the other flank (to where Datsu-Ba was skulking). Lilith's response was to move full shift into my deployment zone just over 12" away from Kirai.

Despite my plan to not engage, I devised an alpha strike of sorts to deal with Lilith. Can't remember the details but it went something like this –

Lost Love moved up and used Magical Extension to cast Chill of Death on Lilith, giving her negative flips vs Spirits. Kirai summoned Ikiryo into melee with Lilith and then Shikome. They went to town on the Master inflicting quite a few wounds, and two poison tokens, but taking a lot of Black Blood damage in return. Datsu-Ba moved in too, but couldn't finish the job. All attacks were against Lilith's WP to avoid her Df trigger that ends combat.

The next turn (Kirai won initiative) Shikome finished off Lilith (Ikiryo died from the Black Blood wound) then charged the Mature Nephilim who was nearby. She did a couple of wounds on the big man. Kirai then swirled the Shikome with Datsu-Ba and healed the wounded bird for a couple of wounds.

The Mature attacked Datsu, but used Knock Aside on her and charged the Shikome, killing her. Next, the Seishin cast Empower Spirit (or whatever it's called) on the two Onryo in front of the Mature Nephilim and Kirai cast Spirit Food (meaning if killed the Mature would turn into a Gaki) before summoning the Shikome back. The Shikome killed the Mature in revenge, creating the Gaki and freeing up the Empowered Onryo. My crew was getting bigger.

Fugs had interacted with all but one of the Line in the Sand counters and I was still in my deployment zone. The game ebbed and flowed again up to the last turn.

Fugs had two Tots in Defensive Stance sitting on two of the four activated Dynamite tokens. Shikome sat on a third within spitting distance of the terrain piece I wanted to Stake a Claim with. I moved up a Seishin and Onryo in base with the two Tot-occupied counters then swirled in an Onryo and Ikiryo (as yet unactivated) with the intention of (2) Interact to defuse the bombs. However, I hadn't remembered that you can't interact if you're in melee with another model, which they both were with the respective Tots. Damn.

Shikome defused the other counter then used Nimble to try and get within base contact with my chosen terrain piece – half an inch short. Damn.

I used my remaining activations to get 8" beyond my deployment zone to achieve my Strategy. Only Kirai didn't make it but it meant that I didn't have 75% of my starting number safe so only scored 2 points not 4. Never has half an inch mattered so much, twice in one game. Damn.

Games ended 2-2 we concluded on the night, which was a fair result. However, upon a little investigation this morning I discovered that the Shikome only needed to be within 2" of the terrain piece, not in base contact, so technically should have scored 2 more points. Never mind.

Very exciting game, was absolutely knackered afterwards, and sets up the next game nicely.

Round 2 in a week's time, with the distinct possibility of new models on both sides (and maybe even some painted… and photos!).

Spirits in the Material World…

2012-01-09T09:14:00.001Z

Yesterday was noted by the first game of Malifaux of 2012. I did well, I think, to stick to my rule of only Guild in 2011 and held off playing my Kirai crew (that I've had for some time now).

It is 2011 no longer so I jumped straight in, throwing off my Guild allegiance and fielded Kirai's Ressurectionist spirits against Fug's fledgling Lilith crew.

All I can say is wow – you can do all the reading you like, but it doesn't prepare you for actually playing the crew in a game. It was always going to be a slow affair, and we had limited time, so the game lasted 4 turns.

Strategy was Shared Contain Power. Fugs chose a couple of Neverborn specific Schemes (including one that involved Blood Counters, before he realised that Spirits don't drop any kind of counter). I chose Grudge and Kill Protegee, on the Mature Nephilim and a Younger. My opening crew consisted of Kirai and her Totem, Datsu-Ba, Shikome and five Seishin.

I won't bore you all with details at this stage. I had a vague plan, but it didn't last long. I was amazed at how fast Kirai can be – I even allowed Lilith to switch her at one stage. She managed to fly around the board with ease. Kirai won the game 4-2 but it wasn't representative of the game – we both stumbled around the new crew and played to learn.

I had problems with card suits as, depending on which spell or ability you want to use, you can need any one of the 4 suits in a deck. My crew also didn't inflict a lot of damage but, aside from an Ikiryo, a couple of Seishin and later on Datsu-Ba, I didn't lose too many models either. I struggled with a lack of Seishin later on – which is a worry as we only played 4 turns – but this was largely due to Kirai being too far away from combat when things died, thus not generating any new ones.

I have to say though that, whilst yesterday felt like riding a train that wasn't quite on the tracks properly, the possibilities for this crew are very exciting. I already have some Hanged and Gaki waiting in the wings, with Insidious Madness and maybe even the Dead Rider on the wanted list.

With another game booked in for Tuesday this week I have a lot to think about. I was quite overwhelmed by the crew yesterday, so I may reduce the variety of model and abilities I have to remember in my opening few games.

Any Kirai veterans who want to throw any gems of experience into the ring please do share.

To be continued…

Flying out of the door…

2012-01-06T09:11:00.000Z

I have to admit it's been quite a whirlwind so far this year in regard to my Malcontent bases. Having only re-posted them on Ebay on New Year's Day, the 30mm Bamboo are already virtually sold out and the 50mm Bamboo are half way there too.

It has been obvious for some time that with Wyrd's Kirai crew models and the Bushido miniature range expanding that the Bamboo design was quickly becoming the most popular design I have.

With this in mind I've decided to expand the range sooner than originally planned. I'm currently planning to create an alternative set of five 30mm bases to compliment the current set, as well as adding three or so 40mm bases and possibly an alternative 50mm base.

In addition to this there will shortly be a 50mm Sewer base, with 40mm ones to follow.

I have to say that it's all very exciting, but at the end of the day this is not a business it's a hobby – I don't make any real money out of it – and everything has to fit around daily life. This does mean that things take longer than I would like, but from the feedback received so far people are appreciating the attention to detail and care taken with the bases. I'll keep making them as long as people are buying them and/or I still enjoy it.

Have a good weekend!

Goodbye 2011… Hello 2012

2012-01-05T09:08:00.001Z

Let's be honest, I've not managed to post anything of much value here for a couple of months. The main reason is my six-month cycle (I have a natural intense enthusiasm period for any interest that lasts about six months then naturally burns itself out no matter what I do). This happened with 40k a while back but didn't return, it happened with Malifaux back in October and is slowly coming back. The problem is I get so into a given game or project that it can only burn itself out over time – the candle that burns brightest and all that.

During this burnout period I have been playing a lot of Warcraft, the Deathwing raids especially, getting some very decent gear along the way. I've also purchased Starcraft 2 and started the campaign missions, like meeting an old friend you haven't seen in a while. There's also been a lot to occupy my mind in life generally over the last few months, that I won't go into, and jobs around the house in the run up to Christmas visitors, etc.

Despite a perceived lack of interest in wargaming in general, and Malifaux specifically, I have not been idle (recently at least). Fugs purchased the Lilith box set a month or so ago and we've had a couple of games with her as my main opponent, which came as a shock to the system after so many games against Rasputina. The first game I tabled Fugs in 4 turns, which is not unexpected as I was using a Perdita led crew that I know well whilst he was still learning about his new models. The next game I made a few changes and got tabled myself in 4 turns - oh how fickle the Fate deck can be, not a decent hand of cards all game whilst Fugs got the Red Joker at least three times (that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!).

So that's what's been happening. At the moment I am dipping my toe back into the gaming/painting water. After some great feedback and mounting enquiries about my Malcontent bases I have pulled my finger out and got a 50mm Bamboo base cast up. I had sold two before the mold was even dry, such was the interest!

I also have some ideas for new base designs, as well as 40mm and 50mm versions of current designs.

On top of that I have been painting! At present Papa Loco sits on the painting desk alone, but Avatar Sonnia will be undercoated today and I have an entire Kirai crew drying after a WHITE undercoat (something new for 2012, never used white before).

Whilst in no hurry to burnout my new found, if delicate, gaming mojo I have also embarked upon a bit of terrain. I bought the Citadel wood just before Christmas in answer to a lack of greenery on our gaming board. Not a very challenging build, I have devised a way to weigh down the trees so that they stop falling over every time you so much as look at them. I hope to add an additional wood with trees currently residing in a box in the attic. This should give us a decent balance between solid and obscuring cover during our games.

As for the rest of 2012, I have not distinct resolutions or plans. This year will be a big year one way or another on the domestic front, so games and hobbies –as important as they are– will have to be flexible. I would like to break the 6-month burnout cycle and 'plod' more throughout the year both with the hobby and the blog. I'd like to paint more miniatures this year; 2011 (April) started with a bang and then tailed off rather dramatically. I'm hoping to maintain the weekly gaming with Fug, supplemented by a few more games against Bull – been way too long. Being a stats geek I'd quite like to track painting and gaming progress, like Bill at Dead Tau Project. It would be nice to compare year on year stats.

Best wishes and luck to you all for the coming year, both in gaming and life in general… oh, and the impending end of the world (so I'm told).

Sunday Catchup & Clearout

2011-11-27T20:12:00.002Z

A lot has been going on since the last post of note, which I won't go into. Thought it was time to do a quick overview of the gaming-related highlights…

Fug had his first official Malifaux win this last week, Raspy beating Sonnia 6-4 in a highly contested Shared Deliver The Message strategy. He has since decided to take a break from Arcanists and has Lilith waiting in the wings, so Guild vs Neverborn action soon.

My Malcontent resin bases are officially available on Ebay now (link to the right). It's been slow going and I haven't had chance to add to the product line, or paint a single miniature in two months which has been frustrating. Hopefully things will improve, especially as I finish for Christmas on the 16th December!!

We've had mice in our attic at home during the last couple of months. I went full Defcon and the loft space was looking like a minefield, reaping several confirmed kills. Whilst this was a stressful time (My wife got stressed about the mice and I got earache to sort it as a consequence which was stressful), I did have to empty the attic of all the clutter. We are slowly sorting through it and I am in the process of getting things up on Ebay that will never see my gaming or painting table – several of which have been really difficult decisions.

To see what's on offer have a look on my Ebay page – the Shaggoth at the top of the post is one such item as well as some OOP Confrontation stuff. There will be more in a couple of weeks when Ebay do another free insertion fee weekend.

Other points of interest. Myself and the wife went up to London last night to watch Driving Miss Daisy at the Wyndham Theatre. It was a semi birthday present for her, but the main reason I bought the tickets – if I'm being brutally honest – was to see the legend that is James Earl Jones. He may be my idol for being the man behind THAT voice but the man is a genius and an actor of superb calibre.

I found out today of the death of Gary Speed, Everton FC legend and current manager of the Welsh national side. He was 42, and a footballing gentleman if ever there was one. It would appear he took his own life, which is very strange for someone who had the world at his feet and appeared to all – including close friends – to be very happy with life. I will be interested to see if anything develops from this. Needless to say I am stunned and quite gutted by this. R.I.P.

Blogshare: Painted Addiction

2011-11-15T11:50:00.003Z

I have lots of names in my "blogs I'm following" list, as I guess you have too. Some haven't posted in months, some I haven't visited in months. Some I visit almost every day or at least every time they post regardless of what the post is about.

This select few make up the core of my blog visiting routine in a morning and I wanted to share them with you (in no particular order) and say thank you to some talented individuals. Some already have a massive following, some just a handful of dedicated visitors but they all strike a chord with my own gaming… and maybe yours too.

First up is Painted Addiction

I'll be honest with you, I added this blog to my list when its author Rob started following my blog, by way of courtesy and support. I didn't really pay much attention at this point, just clicked to follow and that was that.

However, all credit to Rob – who is over in New Zealand – he has consistently posted things of interest. Great models, conversions, battle reports and not stuck with any one gaming system either.

He struck a chord when he started painting up some cowgirls for Legends of the Old West, a book I have on my own gaming shelf. He flagged up his research and thoughts prior to painting and showcased his models throughout. From here he moved on to Pirates (again female) and his fantastic pirate ship conversion. This sparked my interest to the point where I've actually ordered some of the same pirates for my own gaming.

In amongst these projects are posts about Gladiator, Warmachine, Infinity and a good game or two of Battletech – a system that I know nothing about but the posts have great in-game photos.

Painted Addiction is one of those blogs that wears its heart on its sleeve. It doesn't claim to be a source of all knowledge, it's just a guy sharing his gaming experiences and thoughts on his blog. It always has great photos, great models and I've really enjoyed reading it (and will continue to do so). Thank you.

Go visit Painted Addiction now!

All images on this post are the copyright of Painted Addiction.

11-11-11-11-11

2011-11-11T11:11:00.002Z

Never Forget

Crashing Back To Reality

2011-11-08T16:35:00.000Z

Like a good homing pigeon I have returned.
Today was the first day back at work after a fantastic week away and I'm struggling to remember the date or day!

We had a great time in the Lake District in an amazing little cottage. Weather was as expected in the Lakes in November, but if you embrace the rain you don't notice it. We also had some fantastic sunny mornings and lots of walks. We treated ourselves to a meal at the local Michelin star restaurant l'Enclume which was an amazing experience. However, you have to return to normal life sometime and so, finally, we have.

This month should see the Malcontent project finally coming to light which is exciting but still needs a lot of work.

I have also made the decision that I haven't been doing enough painting recently and so my gaming is feeling stagnated. I have TWO Avatar models to paint and a massive backlog of others to build, convert and paint so lots of hobby time coming up if I can maintain my enthusiasm, which is slipping.

I will also be clearing out the attic of gaming 'toys' as soon as I can. That means pretty much all of my 40k gear – I just don't see myself returning to it soon except to convert and build some more Dark Templars so why hang onto it! It does mean you folks will be able to pick up some bargains over the next couple of months on Ebay.

Hopefully we should see a game or two against McMourning soon as well as the return of Rasputina with some new additions and lots of new painted models!

Time to relax, and an update

2011-10-26T12:07:00.001+01:00

Things are winding down here on the blog for the next week or so.

We're away on holiday in the Lake District for a few days, but more importantly away from work, and life in general, which is burning me out. There will be no internet in our cottage there so for the first time in… ever, I will be cut off from the rest of the world. Just us, a corner shop, 5 pubs and a Michelin star restaurant in the village which will be great! There is a minor pit-stop in Wigan on the way to meet up with the family for lunch – this may or may not add to the stress level, we will see.

I've been desperate to get some painting time in but end up building something new instead for the blog or the Malcontent project. I was considering having a few posts on a scheduled publish but decided I didn't need the extra work – there's nothing ongoing that can't wait.

Had another game of Malifaux last night against Rasputina. I have been mixing up my Guild team for the last few weeks, introducing the Guardian who is causing Fugs a few problems. This week the construct teamed up with Sonnia, Sam and Nino plus a couple of Mercs and the totem. Raspy brought her new toy too – Snow Storm. We rolled Shared Distract which made for a lot of fun.

Highlights included the Convict Gunslinger getting multiples of Trigger Happy against Sam, causing a lot of wounds and finishing him off with a Red Joker – not sure there was much left after that. This was swiftly followed by Nino Headshotting Hans, and having just blown all his cards against Sam, Fugs had nothing to discard so Hans died.

Having charged into combat with the Guardian and Totem, Snow Storm (with a Gamin in tow) was having a field day but couldn't quite finish things off. Sonnia stepped in with her Runesword and killed the big man who exploded in great style taking out the Guardian, Totem and Gamin in one go – that's how to clear the room – only Sonnia left standing. In the final turn Rasputina had frozen Sonnia in place unable to get across the halfway mark of the board for her points and standing within a few inches of halfway herself. Unfortunately Fugs got a rush of blood to the head and had two shots at a nearby Witchling (which were both dispelled by Sonnia) only to realise that his final AP would only get him 3" nearer to my side of the table – 1" short!!…gutted.

We've got some time to go away and contemplate the outcome and conjure up new ideas.

Building Avatar Kirai: part 2

2011-10-22T16:52:00.001+01:00

Post number 150 on the-dark-templar blog continues the Avatar Kirai build.

Read Part 1 here

I drilled pin holes, and fitted pins, into the shoudlers of the monster, filling the excess to ensure it was a solid fit (above). I had also started to fill in the gaps where the monster and Kirai parts met – help give the illusion that the monster is coming out of Kirai.

I finished off grinding off the sleeve hems and drilled pin holes in the arms ready to attach. The pin was slightly out on one side so the monster's left arm was a little low. I added some additional greenstuff when I filled in the gaps and everything looked good.

I also drilled a pin hole and fitted a pin to Kirai's outstretched hand. Given the (relatively) tiny scale of the arm I had to be careful.

I attached her arm and started to add more greenstuff around the base of the monster. At this stage – aside for some greenstuff on Kirai's arm – the model istelf is complete.

The only thing left to do is attached the model to my custom Bamboo base and add details. As I've mentioned previously, I will be casting up the 50mm Bamboo master (once complete) not only to make it available as part of my Malcontent project but also to give a more solid base on which to pin this model, just like my Avatar Sonnia.

Critical Mass Games – Hiring Cheap Mercenaries!

2011-10-19T11:21:00.002+01:00

I've known the guys at Critical Mass Games for many years. They're based in my hometown of Wigan in the north west of England, but ironically I didn't meet them until I had moved 250 miles south to Kent. They have always been what I considered 'real gamers', the kind I spoke about in my Malifaux intro a few weeks back that don't get hung up on individual games or companies and will pretty much play anything if it looks like fun.

So it wasn't (much of) a surprise when I discovered that Craig and Dale had set up Critical Mass Games and were developing rules and figures for a 15mm sci-fi tabletop wargame. I have seen (from a distance) the company and game system develop and grow, visited them several times at the Salute show in London, and got sneak peeks and behind the scenes exclusives whenever I visited Wigan.

Being a graphic designer by trade I've been eager to help them out when I can. Whilst most of the groundwork was already being done by their artist Rob, I've managed to add my own thumbprint in there by helping to develop their logo and packaging and (eventually) the new all singing and dancing rulebook.

In addition to creating their own rules they have tied in with Robin Fitton's 15mm Gruntz skirmish rules system, which gives their fantastic miniatures even more application. I mean, how cool are some of these Mercenary miniatures?!

Talking of which, the Critical Mass Games website is running a 20% SALE on the entire Mercenary line of figures at the moment, so it is an ideal opportunity to pick up some of these cool minis. All bias aside, I am looking at the possibility of adding some unique looking totems to my Malifaux crews – you don't have to only use them for 15mm games!

You can find the CMG website at http://www.criticalmassgames.com

Their full line of Mercenaries can be found here, although I strongly recommend you browse the entire site; they have some great vehicles, building and terrain and I know for a fact that the casting quality of these models is fantastic! Just ask Doc Bungle!

SELWG 2011 – Bushido!!!

2011-10-16T21:00:00.034+01:00

Myself and Fugs made the trip over to Crystal Palace in South East London to the SELWG show. As I mentioned in a previous post, I used to be a member of this club and it was funny to see the same faces doing the same things (or not) as past events.

This was Fug's first ever wargaming show and I thought it would be a gentle introduction as it would be mostly historical stuff so he wouldn't get to full frothing factor until Salute next year. I was hoping there would be odd game of Malifaux and the opportunity to pick up some new bits. As for myself I was mostly looking out for terrain and some basing gear.

It was well and truly historically orientated, almost to the point of excluding everything else. There were bits of Games Workshop gear dotted around, but nothing comprehensive (I was looking for Citadel Woods to no avail). There was no Infinity to be found and a couple of traders with token Malifaux stock, no demo games. Even Warmachine/Hordes was difficult to find – this was definitely a historical event.

However, one trader stepped in to save the day for us and that was the Bushido guys! I wasn't expecting to see them, but it was great to see their stuff, watch a demo game and chat to them about upcoming bits. The painting on their stand was at a whole other level to the rest of the show, and I was sorely tempted to pick up some of their figures. Bushido is 32mm, so the same as Malifaux and they do have some lovely models in their ever expanding range.

One thing they did talk through with us was their prototype building. The intention is for it to be modular and reversible, so the same kit could create a small village of unique buildings. Very inspirational stuff.

Their demo board was also very inspirational (apologies for the blurred photography) and have given me lots of ideas for Kirai orientated terrain!!

Building Avatar Sonnia Criid: part 4

2011-10-15T20:55:00.001+01:00

Read Part 3 here

At the end of the last installment I had finally pinned Sonnia onto the dragon, now I had to make it look like she was breathing fire!

I added a long pin, glued in place at the resin fire end. The other end I rested on Sonnia's bottom lip and secure with a spot of glue. This gave me the frame on which to (re)build the flame spout.

I fleshed out the shape of the flames roughly in greenstuff, with the intention of adding more detailed sculpting later. I paid particular attention at this stage to make it look like the fire was coming out of Sonnia's mouth, and to cover all evidence of the long metal pin.

When I went back later I added small amounts of greenstuff at the lower parts of the new spout to add shape and some texture. At this point I decided to call it a day – model complete.

However, looking at the photos now it still looks a little awkward so I MAY add a little more greenstuff tomorrow to help define the shape of the flame spout more. Then again, once I've slept on it, I may not.

THE CONCLUSIONS

How do I feel about the model now it is built?

How do I feel the build went?

Is there anything I would do differently?

I think the model is fantastic. Now it is built I'm very eager to get it undercoated and painted – but that's a whole other set of blog posts. The beginning of the build (ie. the dragon) went together quite well. The individual pieces didn't match up exactly and a lot of greenstuff was needed but, to be honest, you have to expect some of that in a model this large and complex and cast in different materials.

Having said that, the model is fundamentally flawed in one area – there is no obvious or natural place for Sonnia to go. No peg or socket to indicate where the sculptor intended her to be positioned and this is something of a double-edged sword. For the advanced modeller it gives you a certain freedom to put her where you want to and go from there, however, for your average gamer this freedom will pose a problem and I know many who will be afraid of building this model as a consequence.

For me the problems started with the Sonnia figure from the get-go. The arms don't have an obvious way to go and I had to find reference images online to see what it should look like before I got it right. At the time I felt like an idiot but with hindsight this was inevitable without a lucky guess or reference. Similarly the position, angle and shape of the resin fire spout meant it was almost impossible to get Sonnia at this eventual angle without some major surgery – followers of this series of posts will have seen the traumas I went through to get her looking right.

At the end of the day, despite going 'around the houses' I am very happy about how this model turned out. All I would say to someone else looking to build it is learn from my mistakes. I would also reiterate that this model does allow you some freedom with positioning, so go with what feels right for you – you always have greenstuff to patch up the gaps!

SELWG show this Sunday!

2011-10-14T12:00:00.002+01:00

I discovered last night that it's the SELWG show this weekend.

I used to be a member of the South East London Wargames Group and attend this show as a staff member, usually on the Bring-and-Buy stall. This will be the first time I go as a punter!

This weekend's show is open from 10am to 4pm on Sunday and being held at the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre. See advert below or visit the SELWG website.

Building Avatar Sonnia Criid: part 3

2011-10-10T21:51:00.002+01:00

Read Part 2a here

I spent some time adding greenstuff…well, pretty much everywhere to be honest. The various pieces of the dragon were out by up to 2mm in some places so a lot of attention had to be paid to this. I also added greenstuff to Sonnia's shoulders, now her arms were on the right way!

I was struggling to find a satisfactory place to pin Sonnia so I tried a different tack. I removed the "cigar" pin I'd previously added to her mouth (slightly squashing her nose in the process – a trip to the plastic surgeon is now on the cards!) and simply tried to find a solid angle to pin her to the dragon's neck – I would worry about the fire spout later else I would never finish this model.

Looking at my reference image from the previous post I concluded that the only place that could hold a decent pin was the back of her head as it was snug against the dragon's neck. This was added and her ladyship was finally glued in place! I had trimmed a little off the dragon's chin to accommodate Sonnia's hand, and I added a little superglue here too.

I trimmed more of the fire spout away and drilled a hole in anticipation of the next – final – stage.

Read Part 4 here

Building Avatar Kirai: part 1

2011-10-08T19:31:00.003+01:00

I was canny enough to purchase Avatar Kirai during GenCon weekend. It was the only mini that I was interested in, available at that time, that would not go on general release until 2012 (according to the Wyrd forums).

Although I have no plans to game with my Kirai crew until the new year, I wanted to give this model a go after the lessons learned from building Avatar Sonnia Criid recently. This will be a slow burn, partly due to not needing it till next year, but also because I am still in the process of creating a 50mm Bamboo resin base for the model that matches the bases for the rest of my crew.

Using a reference photo from the net (above) to help me with positioning the various pieces I began. Taking the collapsed Kirai figure I glued the psycho Ikiryo into place. No pinning at this point. This gave me a footprint for creating my bamboo base, so I knew what space I had to play with, add detail, etc.

With the base underway I returned to the model. I clipped off the peg on the monster's neck and pinned the head into place. This would do for now.

I turned my attention to the arms. I don't know about you but the idea that the apparition has well-finished ends to the sleeves is silly. This thing is meant to be evil and highly unlikely (in my mind) to instill fear in a well-tailored garment.

I set to with the dremel, grinding off the hem of the sleeve. I will go back later and make the edges more ragged, but with the limited time I had today this will have to do for now.

Read Part 2 here

Building Avatar Sonnia Criid: part 2a

2011-10-06T10:00:00.005+01:00

Read Part 2 here

I know I said in the last post that, regarding Sonnia's arms being the wrong way round, "I don't think it really matters in this instance", but that wasn't true. I have a perfectionist streak in me and the whole arm situation was bugging me all of yesterday and last night. This morning I decided to do something about it before I left for work.

After double-checking my reference image (above) I re-positioned the arms to match.

As you can see the fit is now much better – which makes sense – and the model does sit better against the dragon. It means I can pin Sonnia against the resin neck of the dragon, which will ensure she is as secure as she can be.

There is a definitive guide for anyone building this in the future and coming across the same arm-related confusion – Coat cuffs pointing up and thumbs pointing down!

Being the perfectionist, I was quite annoyed at myself for taking three attempts to get this right – how hard can it be to stick arms on a model?! However, in my defence I have to say without a visual reference it was not very straightforward. Bottom line is it is now correct, I can chill out and carry on with the rest of the build.

Read Part 3 here

Building Avatar Sonnia Criid: part 2

2011-10-05T13:30:00.007+01:00

Read Part 1 here

At the end of part 1 I had all but completed the fire dragon – just the horns to add.

I'll hold my hand up now and say I was lazy. I decided not to pin them, just glue them into position. I filed the ends free of excess metal and opened up the holes on the head but they weren't a great fit. Deep down I'm convinced they will break off at some point, however when I tested them yesterday they seemed pretty solid, so what do I know.

On to Sonnia herself. She is a very delicate model to say the least – reminds me of some of Rackham's females from Confrontation with tiny, tiny feet. Her arms were separate and it's taking a while to work out which arm should be on which side. I have pinned them on twice and I've discovered this morning it's still wrong. The problem is that they are twisted and at an unnatural angle so don't look right either way. Bottom line is I don't think it really matters in this instance.

I trimmed the shoulder end of the arms flat and drilled a hole, then used the socket already in the shoulder as a starting point for the hole there. I did manage to drill through the arm on one side!… the drill bit re-appearing by her wrist (more greenstuff work). Neither arms had a good fit – see above photo – despite my best efforts and will need filling.

I positioned the Sonnia model against the fire dragon, trying lots of different angles to get her to sit comfortably and match up to the blast of fire she was meant to be breathing. I have no idea how the guys at Wyrd made up the original as the angle of the fire spout is too vertical to match their photo.

I decided the best way to anchor her to the base was via the fire spout so I drilled a hole into her mouth and added a pin like a huge cigar (or insert innuendo here for all the potty minds). This wouldn't be enough on its own to fix her to the base model securely, but it would provide the backbone and ensure it did look like she was breathing fire. A corresponding hole was drilled into the fire spout itself (which to be honest crumbled away – not convinced about the quality of the resin, too much filler maybe).

I was hoping to paint the Sonnia model separately from the dragon, but due to the tricky pinning and greenstuffing involved to ensure she doesn't fall off I've pretty much decided that I will have to build the complete model then paint it as best I can later.

The next stage is to decide where to add additional pins to secure Sonnia to the dragon, then the massive task of filling in gaps. I have to say that, despite how much I love the model and concept, I'm a little disappointed with the production quality of the piece. This has not been an easy build so far and I would fear for gamers with less pinning/building experience – this model would simply fall apart without the heavy pinning.

I must add to that – I'm reeeaaaallly looking forward to painting it!

Read Part 2a here

Birthday update

2011-09-29T18:04:00.002+01:00

So today I turned 39 (years young) and rather than spend my birthday money on new models, which is always the temptation, I will actually be using it to pay for the backlog of models currently sitting patiently on my painting tray (I must be getting old and far too sensible).

Amongst this ever-growing collection there is Sonnia Criid and her entire crew, not to mention 3 additional Witchlings and Sonnia Avatar.

However, the most exciting prospects are my two new proxy models. I purchased a couple of Warmachine solos to stand in as the Exorcist and Witchling Handler (to the left – one character I don't like the artwork for), the latter will require some work – my first Malifaux conversion!!

I have been very busy these last couple of weeks with work, etc. so I'm looking forward to getting back to painting some models again.

Elsewhere in hobbyland I have been developing some terrain elements for the Malcontent project. What is it? No, it's not some overused adult-rated toy. It is in fact an in-progress Ice Pillar which will suit Rasputina no end. The base diameter is 50mm and the pillar itself is just shy of 5" in height, so it is the real deal. We also used it as an Ancient Monument in a game recently and it was perfect. I'm currently contemplating whether to make it hollow or not when I get round to casting it up in resin – it's a big old lump and could end up being (relatively) expensive to make.

With the imminent release of the Rogue Necromancy, Bull brought up the fact that I don't currently have a 50mm Sewer base for him to use when it joins his McMourning crew in October. This also brought up the fact that I don't have a 50mm Bamboo base for my Kirai Avatar either, so more jobs got added to the list.

Hopefully there will be some fresh pics of actual painted models soon!

Building Avatar Sonnia Criid: part 1

2011-09-26T20:33:00.004+01:00

Along with my Book 3, Avatar Sonnia arrived a couple of weeks ago. Given that I am currently fielding Sonnia as my master-of-the-moment I'm very keen to get the avatar built (not least because it is an amazing model).

The model is mostly metal – including the weighty base piece – with a couple of bits in resin. I wanted something solid on which to put the base piece so rather than use a regular hollow plastic base I used a resin one I had. This gives me a solid foundation on which to pin the heavy bit of metal so there is almost no chance it will come off.

I filed the underside of the metal piece as flat as possible and superglued it onto the base. Once the glue was dry I drilled two holes from the underside of the resin base through into the metal. Pins were glued in place and clipped/filed flush with the resin so that the model doesn't wobble when on the table.

I decided that the resin 'swirl' didn't need to be pinned as it had a broad area and wasn't really exposed. This was simply filed and superglued in place. The neck on the otherhand needed to be strong, so I drilled pinning holes at the apex of the ball and socket joint already present. This was pinned and allowed to dry.

The dragon's head comes in two pieces and again needed to be pinned for strength. In the same way as the neck, I pinned at the apex of the ball and corresponding socket. Once this was thoroughly dry I then pinned the back of the head to the neck using the same ball/socket locations.

Needless to say the casting is out quite a bit in all join locations. Luckily with it being all flames it should not be a big deal to add some greenstuff to disguise the joins completely.

In the next part I will be adding the horns and looking at Sonnia herself.

Read Part 2 here

P.S. I noticed recently that I had passed 100 Followers so a big thank you to everyone on that list!!

Malcontent resin bases preview

2011-09-19T19:30:00.003+01:00

For those who may not know, my side project "Malcontent" is due to launch at the beginning of November. It is my answer to not being able to get hold of the gaming accessories I wanted when I started playing Malifaux – hence the name: Mal(ifaux) content – though naturally they will be useable with other games and miniatures. It will include not only resin bases but possibly counters, scenery and other bits and pieces further down the line.

The general idea is that I make things for my own models and games then cast extras for anyone else who would like them. There will only be a limited number and once the mold is finished there will be no more.

The launch will contain three sets of resin bases – Bamboo, Boardwalk and Sewer. These resin bases are purposefully plain (for the most part) in their original state; I'm fed up of resin base manufacturers creating over-the-top products that struggle to accommodate a model – the base is meant to complement the miniature, not the other way round. With a more plain starting point you can use it as it comes (which I think works a treat after using several already) or you have the scope and the space to add your own additional touches, skulls, foliage, etc and make them unique to you. By adding your own flourishes it also means you can use the same base several times and have each one look different.

By way of a preview to the launch, I have placed test casts of all three sets on Ebay. They vary in quality and some will have the odd bubble or two and/or flash round the edges but you now have an opportunity to get some of the white/ivory test pieces before the official launch of the grey resin in November.

Now for some links:

The-Dark-Templar Ebay page
This is where you will find the auctions

Malcontent Gallery page
Photo examples of the resin bases in use

Newbie Guide to Resin Bases
My recent post for anyone new to using resin bases

Again, thanks to Bull for his support, his painted examples and for being my hand model in the tutorial.

A Newbie Guide: Resin Bases

2011-09-18T10:47:00.004+01:00

I've decided to start a series of tutorials for newbies – not necessarily newbie gamers, just newbies to the topic under discussion. These tutorials will be written purely from my own gaming/modelling perspective and experience so may not be the best or most effective, but will hopefully explain things in a simple and digestible way.

I've recently noticed a handful of people, some who have been gaming for a quite a while, have avoided the use of resin bases for their models. I always thought this was due to just not liking them. However, I have since discovered it was because they didn't know how to use them or were afraid to try and end up wrecking them.

As some of you may know I have created a series of resin bases, specially themed and cast up for each of my Malifaux crews. These will shortly be on sale to the general public after I received several enquiries about their availability. This tutorial will show how I prepare these bases and the models, and the process of sticking model to base. My gaming buddy Bull was following my instructions while I photographed him, so this is actually all his work!

Before You Start
Please be mindful that resin dust can be very harmful. You should wear a dust mask whenever filing resin. You should also ideally wear gloves or certainly wash your hands before eating (or picking your nose). I would also advise not filing in the kitchen area or anywhere that food is prepared – this might be difficult if like me you live in a small house or flat, but the risks should not be ignored. I also like to wear safety goggles when drilling, just in case. You're going to struggle to continue with the hobby if you go blind from flying debris.

Continuing the "Safety First" perspective, please be careful. Drills and scalpels can slip and cut/stab fingers, allowing metal and resin under the skin – not nice! Don't rush things, take it nice and easy and you'll have no problems and no trips to A&E.

I would recommend washing the base in warm soapy water. Mould release agent is used when casting up resin bases and can leave a residue on the surface that may impede or affect gluing and/or painting, a quick wash with get rid of it.

Preparation: Bubbles
Because I don't have vacuum casting facilities at home there is an increased risk of bubbles in my bases. When you do find one there are a couple of options.

First of all you can fill them with greenstuff or, if really small, superglue. Once the filling material is dry, give the area a quick file to reshape accordingly.

The second option is to turn the bubble into damage, depending upon where it has appeared. In the case of the pictured base, I simply used a scalpel and file to reshape the bubble so that it looks like a bullet hole, axe damage, rotten wood or some other form of destruction.

Preparation: Underside and Edges
The bases are usually cast face down, so what will become the underside of your base may not be completely flat. As part of the preparation process I sand the underside of all my bases before sticking. I use a light circular motion over a piece of fine grade sandpaper and get the base truly flush with the work surface. I tend to do this outside as it can create a lot of dust. Keep a close eye on the base and make sure you don't sand the base down unevenly – you'll struggle to recover from that.

In addition it's also a good idea to whizz a file around the edges of the base to get rid of any unevenness or lines

Pinning
You should never just glue your model straight to the base without pinning – it's a complete waste of time for something that will be transported and handled as much as a gaming miniature; it will usually fall off the base with the slightest knock and ruin your lovely paint scheme. Again there are two options, both of which I use on a situational basis.

First option is a more traditional pin. I will clip the tab off the bottom of the model (if it has one) and file the underside of the 'feet' flat so that it will sit flush with the surface of the resin base (or as flush as possible). I will then try holding the model in different positions on the base till I find one that works the best. I then mark the feet positions on the base in pencil and file away any obtrusive resin elements so that the fit is as flush as possible.

Once this is done I use a hand-held hobby drill (pin vice) to drill into the model – I don't use an electric drill for this as the drill bits invariably break. I use a drill bit that is a tiny bit bigger than the brass rod or paper clip that will be used to actually pin the model. This allows a little bit of wiggle room when you're actually sticking the model in place if the holes don't quite match up. If the model has two feet (rather than a single large area) I will pin both feet to anchor the model completely.

In the example above, the Seshin model only has a single 'foot' so I only use one pin. Once done I glue a length of brass rod into the hole, leaving approximately 5mm or a quarter inch protruding. Now I can drill a corresponding hole into the resin base, going all the way through more often than not.

Dry fit the model onto the base to ensure a good match before adding any glue. Adjust if necessary and when happy apply superglue to the underside of the foot and into the hole in the resin base. Hold both model and base firmly for 10(ish) seconds then leave to one side to dry thoroughly. Take into account that, if you drilled all the way through the base, superglue is likely to drain out of the hole and you can end up gluing your base to your tray or table – beware.

An alternative option that I use when models have very narrow or fragile feet is to clip back the tab underneath the model until only a triangle remains under each foot. I file any sharp edges off these 'pegs' to aid fitting. I mark the position and size of the pegs onto the resin base in pencil and use an electric hobby drill (it's quicker than a hand-held) to cut out the required areas with a larger drill bit. Throughout the process I will constantly dry fit the model until it sits snuggly onto the base, with none of the peg showing.

Whichever route you choose, once glued into position and dry, greenstuff will often be used to fill any gaps and re-create any elements of the base that were cut away unnecessarily.

And that's it. If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask them. Similarly if you know of a better, or alternative way feel free to comment.

Want to know more about these bases?

I would like to thank Bull for being my hand-model and guinea pig for the day!

Euro Militaire show this weekend

2011-09-14T20:00:00.002+01:00

I discovered this week, quite by accident, that there is a military model show on this weekend in my own back yard. I'm hoping to squeeze a visit in myself, just to see what's there, but I've got a busy weekend planned already.

The Euro Militaire show is at the Leas Cliff Hall in Folkestone on this Saturday and Sunday – Adults £10 on the door or £14 for the weekend. For more information see the link below:

http://www.euromilitaire.co.uk/

New Malifaux Website!!

2011-09-13T21:08:00.000+01:00

It seems Wyrd have launched a brand new dedicated website for Malifaux. Haven't had chance to explore it fully myself but go look now!!

http://www.malifaux.com/

I won a competition!

2011-09-11T10:50:00.000+01:00

John Lambshead over at John's Toy Soldiers blog ran a caption competition last week.

I discovered yesterday afternoon, after returning from a family day at Leeds Castle, that I had in fact won said competition and the above prize "Into The Hinterlands" co-authored by John himself.

I would like to say a big thank you to John, and highly recommend a visit to his blog – not only does it plot his current gaming experiences and projects it also highlights beautiful places around Kent, which is my county of residence also!

A Newbie Guide: Malifaux – part 1

2011-09-09T15:05:00.006+01:00

I appreciate that not all the visitors to this blog play Malifaux. This post is aimed at those visitors who are intrigued by Malifaux but haven't taken that final step or don't know where to start – hence I'm keeping it purposefully simplistic. The Malifaux regulars can have a read too and see if you agree or not with my appraisal and jump in with the comments.

Maybe you've heard the name or seen some of the models. Maybe you've read a blog or two, maybe even seen a demo game. Bottom line is that your interest was peaked and you want to know more. What's all the fuss about? Let's start with the very basics.

Malifaux is a 32mm tabletop miniature skirmish game from Wyrd Miniatures. It's described as a Steamvictoriohorrorwestpunk genre, so make of that what you will.

The Background Story…
Not wanting to rob you of any reading pleasure I will keep this as brief as possible. Think alternate earth late 19th century; a group of power hungry magic practitioners manage to rip a hole in reality, creating a breach to another world. This reality is deserted, no signs of life but plenty of signs of former human inhabitants, not least in and around the city of Malifaux. Long story short, the influx into this new world begins as people go in search of their fortune. The natural, demonic, inhabitants of Malifaux are not happy at this increase in the living and the fighting begins. However, thanks to the increased natural magic in the air and naturally occurring 'soulstones', mere mortals can become powerful sorcerers once through the breach. This thirst for power, magic, soulstones and wealth is what underpins society in Malifaux as well as being the catalyst for all the conflict.

The Players…
The game comprises of five different factions to represent the various interested parties.

The Guild

They are the law, preferring quality to quantity in their crews and (for the most part) direct damage over spellcasting.

The Ressurectionists

The Ressers are all about the undead, summoning additional models to bolster their crew numbers.

The Arcanists

A faction full of fragile spellcasters, backed up by constructs and beasts.

The Neverborn

The monsters of Malifaux, they focus on speed, deception and willpower-based abilities.

The Outcasts

Mercenaries, groups and individuals who don't fit in with another faction.

The Models…
The miniatures are the thing that drew me into the game – Perdita Ortega and Lady Justice if I recall correctly. They are pretty unique and let me tell you, after years of churning out space marines, they are an absolute joy to paint. You will only need around 5 or 6 models to start a crew so you can spend the time and attention that their beauty demands.

Most of the crews within a given faction cross over well, so it won't be long before you expand. One attraction of this game is that a crew box set costs around £20-£25 so it's not a massive investment to expand your gaming experience. It is possible to collect an entire faction for as little as £250, which is amazing compared to other game systems, and will give you great flexibility and a massive pool of models to choose your crew from.

The Card Mechanic…
The Fate Deck. This is one aspect that makes Malifaux almost unique. After years of rolling handfuls of dice and cursing the gods of chance it was strange to be flipping a deck of cards to determine shooting and combat results.

The other unique aspect is the Control Hand which you deal yourself at the beginning of each turn. You can use these cards to alter the results of a flip from the fate deck that you don't like, be it combat, spells or willpower tests. This allows you the opportunity to, in effect, cheat and stack the result of a given situation. Then add to the mix the Red and Black Jokers – Red is very good, Black is very bad – so even the most carefully laid plans can go awry or knockout blows delivered from the most unexpected source. Be under no illusion, even with the ability to cheat fate, the gods of chance are equally fickle with cards!

How Does It Play?…
I'm sure there are more experienced and literate individuals who could explain it better than I can and coming from a GW-centric gaming background I have a limited pool of games to compare. This is the best way I can describe it.

Imagine playing a cross between Necromunda and Mordheim, with crews comprising of only special characters – some very powerful. You're playing on a 3x3ft table, using cards instead of dice and gems or counters to represent your soulstone pool. That doesn't come close to describing Malifaux in full but it puts you in the right ballpark. The big difference is it's not about killing your opponent's crew, it's about achieving Strategies and Schemes – nothing else matters. You can finish the game with no models left on the table and still win big. As a former GW (and occasional Warmachine) gamer this seemed a very alien concept to me, and the most difficult lesson to learn.

Learning the basics (the card mechanic, movement, combat, etc.) is quite easy and you can quickly play the game at a superficial level. However, more so than any other game I've experienced, Malifaux has a great depth that will take years to discover fully and master. The character and/or spell combinations alone open this game up to many levels of play. You only (usually) activate one model at a time before your opponent gets to go, so you have to carefully consider activation priority and your opponent's likely counter.

Another plus point is if you play 28-32mm wargames already you won't need to buy any specific terrain, the bits you already own will work a treat. Yes, you may want to build a unique wild west or swamp board at some point, but to get started you already have the bits needed – terrain, tape measure and counters (we even use dice for wound counters).

Who Plays This Game?…
I've noticed three distinct type of gamer drawn into the world of Malifaux.

First of all you have the general gamer who will have a go at pretty much everything and anything; the type of person who has an army/crew for all the games out there and is not hung up with any particular system, genre or company. They like variety and to try new things and the Malifaux system is pretty fresh thinking.

Then you have the gamers who have their main game, be it 40k, Fantasy or WarmaHordes. They play Malifaux as a secondary, as a way of taking a break from the big battles. They may get quite into the fluff and the nasty combos but nothing with draw them completely away from their first love. The complete change of scene and cheap entry cost seem to be the big draw here.

I've noticed a lot of gamers – myself included – who have discovered Malifaux at a crucial time in their gaming life, when they have become disillusioned by the rules/cost/development of the big, popular games and games companies. Malifaux takes them back to a place where the game and the gamers were important – the game itself is still in its infancy, relatively speaking, and has not been tarnished by the demands of big business. The community surrounding Malifaux is a big draw too and these individuals will often end up becoming champions for the cause, promoting Malifaux at every opportunity.

There is also a fourth group of individuals who have been attracted by Wyrd's flagship game and that is gamers' wives and girlfriends. Alas, my own wife balks at such thoughts, but stranger things have happened!

Generally speaking it appears to be the cheap entry level and beautiful miniatures that will initially appeal. The easy to learn rules system combined with the depth of play takes over once you start gaming. It won't be long before you want to buy another crew, then another. The relatively cheap cost of the crews means that you can do this, even alongside a massive 40k or Warmachine army.

The only negative that I've seen people mention, though it's not an issue to me, is the fact that you can't develop your own characters (yet) as they're all pre-defined.

Where To Start?…
I think it depends on what drew you in. I bought some models as that is what attracted me first. I also bought the original Malifaux Book 1 (pictured at the top of the blog) which was fantastic for background information and stats of all the initial characters. Alas, the rules section of this book has been superseded by The Rules Manual so if you're not into the fluff go straight for that instead.

If you're not ready to spend any cash just yet you can still glean information and background from the internet.

Your first stop should be the new Malifaux website.On there you will be able to see photos of all the models currently available – and order some if the fancy takes you. The community area – Wyrd Forums – is a fantastic resource, especially for newbie gamers, where you will find the answer to almost all your rules queries. I cannot praise Wyrd (and the gaming community) enough for this; people are friendly, helpful and supportive no matter what your playing/painting level.

Within the resources section of the Malifaux website you will find lots of interesting stuff, not least a cut-down PDF version of the Rules Manual and up to date versions of the Book 1 character cards. There is also a crew creator application on there to help you build your crews.

In addition to this fantastic resource you have the fan-made Malifaux Wiki – PullMyFinger – which has been an essential resources for playing (and writing this article!). You will find a lot of background and gaming information and advice there.

I'm going to leave it there for this entry. Please feel free to comment if you have any questions or indeed disagree with my thoughts, or have betters ways of describing the game.

Sonnia Criid Sighted

2011-09-07T20:17:00.002+01:00

As anyone who knows me will understand, I hate playing with unpainted models. I don't like playing with undercoated models much more, but some paint is better than none. I just don't understand why you would own these beautiful models and not want to put some colour on them.

So, when I decided to use (unpainted) Sonnia Criid in this week's game versus Fug's Cult of December crew you will appreciate how excited I was to get the third of my Guild masters onto the gaming table. Not only did she have no paint, her huge Runed Blade was sitting on the painting tray (to be added post-colour). I was really looking forward to the battle of the elements – Fire vs Ice.

No in-game photos this week – I would not do Sonnia the indignity of photographing her running around Malifaux streets effectively in the buff.

30 soulstones (definitely this time), the crews were as follows:

Rasputina
Essence of Power
2x Silent Ones
Ice Gamin
Sabretooth Cerberus

Sonnia Criid
Purifying Flame
Samael Hopkins
2x Witchling Stalkers*
2x Death Marshals

*My Sonnia box set contained two of the same Witchling and when pinning them to their bases the leg of one of the duplicates broke off, so he is currently in surgery. I have also ordered backups!

I flipped Plant Evidence and took Hold Out and Bodyguard (nice and easy!), Fug flipped Reconnoiter, re-flipped Contain Power and took only one Scheme (Bodyguard) for the extra stones. Diagonal Deployment.

I split my crew into two – Sonnia, totem and Sam to the right, Witchlings and Death Marshals to the left. Raspy and her crew shuffled around on the edge of her deployment whilst the Cerberus moved down the flank to my far left.

The game played out with Fug being quite cautious in the early turns and me making a few little mistakes throughout (the perils of a brand new master). As things progressed and my teams moved forward, Fug sent a Silent One to confront each team with Raspy, the totem and Gamin sitting centrally without committing to either side.

The Death Marshals got into some bother taking a lot of damage, Fug was trying out some Silent One spell combos – even giving one Marshal Frozen Heart and turning him to a statue – opening up lots of possibilities, even if for little gain. Spotting the danger from the encroaching Cerberus (who seemed consistently unable to cast his Leap) a Witchling charged him, inflicting 4 wounds and depriving him of his extra heads attacks. He then died in the return attack, exploding in the monster's face inflicting a further 2 wounds. The big cat was finally taken down by a Death Marshal who had staggered across the street on his final wound. Meanwhile, the frozen Death Marshal killed the Silent One, then the totem, before Raspy finished him off.

On the right flank, Sonnia's team got tied down by the other Silent One. Instead of taking decisive action to take her down quickly I only half committed and she came back from near death to kill the totem and Samael. Sonnia finished her off then took cover behind a wall and healed herself, with still less than half wounds remaining. She retained full line of sight to Rasputina (who had committed to this flank now) thanks to her Magic Seeker ability. Raspy sent the Gamin around the wall to face Sonnia in combat. He did no damage and was hit twice in return by her Runed Blade (forgetting to end her activation with his trigger Sub Zero after she hit him the first time!). Instead of doing damage I managed to trigger Deconstruct on both occasions and Fug decided to discard cards rather than let him die. Sonnia blasted the Gamin with her last AP, the Gamin was left with only 1 wound and Fug with no cards in his hand. Raspy chose to shoot the Gamin with a blast of December's Curse, which caught Sonnia and killed the Gamin. The exploding corpse inflicted additional wounds which were mostly avoided with a prevention flip.

With no cards of consequence in my Turn 6 hand and no soulstones left I was struggling to get my offensive magic off, despite being in a fantastic position. Instead Sonnia shuffled position slightly and cast the firewall to restrict Rasputina's movement. Miscalculation on my part left a marginal line of sight position open to Raspy and she took it. In desperation I discarded almost my entire hand to Counterspell her blasts.

End of Turn 6 my remaining Witchling and Marshal had tagged 3 pieces of terrain between them on the left flank (staggering around with only a wound left each), on the right Raspy was stood on one side of a wall with 7 wounds left, Sonnia on the other with 2. If the game went to Turn 7 activating first would make or break the result. It didn't – Fug flipping a 9 for the third game in a row – and Sonnia came away 6-2 winner.

Thoughts?
Fug has got quite a handle on his crew, especially the Silent Ones. Now he has two they are becoming an issue rather than an annoyance. The Cerberus had a rather anonymous start to his career, but this was largely due to the fact I knew his strengths and had contingencies to deal with him. His cautious start and positioning throughout meant he neither disrupted my plan nor stole in to prevent Hold Out late on. New-model syndrome for sure.

Talking of which, Sonnia missed out on lots of spell prevention tricks. I forgot that Advanced Counterspell includes friendly models within 3", so she could have prevented a lot of damage from the Silent One and stopped Sam from dying. She also needs a lot of soulstones, or hold on to ANY tome cards as she is very dependent on these. We also missed ending Sonnia's activation after hitting the Gamin late on – this too could've had quite a significant impact on the game.

The game certainly boiled down to a close final turn. Fug is really starting to enjoy the game now he's seeing some success with his crew. I now need to consider him a genuine opponent – no longer a padawan learner!

Parcel Arrived!

2011-09-06T18:48:00.001+01:00

A parcel was waiting for me when I got home from work today. I placed an order at the Wyrd online store just less than a month ago – I needed new v2 stat cards for some of my Ortegas as they had come with v1 and weren't up to date. Something else appeared to fall into the basket before I got to the checkout…

Perdita vs McMourning – Practice Run

2011-09-03T20:58:00.007+01:00

Today was the debut performance for Bull's Dr McMourning crew. This was very much a beginner's game as Bull hasn't played in a good six weeks and was fielding an unfamiliar crew to boot. Fair play he had done his research and had his opening sequence of hacking up dogs and slicing chihuahuas bullet-pointed on a piece of paper.

For whatever minor role they would play in this game we flipped for Strategies and chose Schemes. Perdita got Contain Power and so I chose Hold Out and Stake A Claim in support. Bull flipped Line in the Sand and chose Stake A Claim and a Ressers specific Scheme. For anyone interested the crew lineups were as follows:

Perdita
Enslaved Nephilim
Santiago
2x Witchlings Stalkers
2x Death Marshals

Dr McMourning
Zombie Chihuahua
Sebastian
Nurse (Miss Pack)
Convict Gunslinger
2x Rotten Belles
4x Canine Remains

Not much point going into details about the game as it ended up being more of a practice – there were several incidents where we could have, and should have, done one thing but ended up doing something else to see how a new model worked or the impact it would have on a given situation.

Some of the highlights included:

Perdita Obeying one of the Canines who turned on the Nurse and tore 5 wounds off her. To avoid any reprisals Perdita then shot the dog.

Mc Mourning finally managed to summon the Rogue Necromancy who was then shot to bits by Santiago. Hanging onto its last two wounds the Necro was jabbed by the Nurse with a Booster Shot so he would go nuts when attacking Perdita in melee – Perdita had the intention (and the cards) to Obey the boosted Necro to turn around charge McMourning or kill the Nurse. However, as mentioned, I decided not to do this so we could see how nasty the Necro was in combat.

Later on in the game the Belles were Luring people left, right and centre and McM got an amazing turn moving across the board, Slinging his Scalpel at a Death Marshal then moving in for the kill. The second Death Marshal was Obeyed into melee with McM in order to Pine Box him next turn – the doc escaping via another Lure from his Belles before the trap could be sprung.

We called the game at Turn 5 after I had won initiative and activated Perdita, Santiago and the Nephilim. Perdita killed McMourning and Santiago was Obeyed into a position with full LoS to the wounded Belles and Gunslinger. The balance had tipped in favour of The Guild. At this point I had managed to achieve my Strategy and one of my Schemes quite by accident and Bull had a Scheme (and had ignored the Line in the Sand, haha!). However, today wasn't about final scores.

Good game, it has to be said – despite the 4 hour timespan. Bull has got a bit more of a handle on his new crew and I got a glimpse of what they can do. We went back and practiced his opening turn with the Chihuahua and Doc so he got that right and bagged his 8 Body Parts. He seemed a lot happier and very excited at the prospects of his Ressers.

As for me, I got more practice in with my master-of-the-moment. Santiago didn't do much, though would have contributed more had the game continued. The Witchlings (my Sith Jedi) got into combat and managed to have a little more impact than Wednesday – though not much. I think it's because I haven't finished painting them yet.

Perdita vs Rasputina – Take 2

2011-09-01T08:23:00.011+01:00

So after Rasputina took down Miss Ortega a peg or two last week, anticipation had been building for this week's 30 soulstone rematch. Fug has acquired some new models and splashed some paint on his icy master. In response I had finished painting Perdita and had added a couple of undercoated Witchling Stalkers to the mix.

The Crews

Perdita
Enslaved Nephilim
The Judge
Santiago
2x Witchling Stalkers

Rasputina
Essence of Power
Silent One
December Acolyte
Ice Gamin
Hans

For Strategies Fug flipped Distract and decided to take (and announce) Hold Out and Bodyguard for his Schemes. I flipped Slaughter and took Hold Out and Breakthrough, similarly announcing them thanks to some sound advice from Wrabbit37 after last week's game.

Deployment was standard set up, Raspy had her crew central again with Hans to my right, supporting the infiltrating December Acolyte. I divided my crew into two teams – Perdita, Nephilim and The Judge to my right and Santiago and two Witchlings to the left.

The game did not quite pan out as expected – I think both Fug and I were not totally on our game and the whole thing felt like a bit of a slog, so I'll keep it short.

I decided to go for it from the off as I had to get my crew into Fug's deployment zone to prevent one of his Schemes and complete one of mine. Perdita ran full sprint to the right behind some rocks, out of sight of Hans but in full view of the Acolyte. I had managed to get both Jokers in my Control Hand so felt I had some influence over the situation. As anticipated, he attempted to fire his harpoon at Perdita to pull her into view but I got off my Quick Draw response, cheating the Red Joker and taking him out of the game with a total of 9 wounds inflicted. It was a bit of a bloody nose for Fug so early on and he struggled to rally from then on as indecision and lack of direction took over – he was mostly reacting to my game. Elsewhere the rest of my crew moved up whilst Hans moved back to the centre of the board to support Raspy.

Following turn same thing, I moved up and Raspy consolidated, exchanging a few shots here and there to little effect, except the loss of a Witchling who had bared his backside to test out Reflect Magic only to not achieve the trigger.

I then saw an opportunity to get Perdita into melee with Raspy, so I took it, charging in and slapping 4 wounds off her. The response was unsurprising but caught me off guard – having not thought through my actions completely – the Ice Gamin moved into melee and the Silent One move over to drop spells onto the growing crowd. I attempted to shoot Raspy in melee with Santiago but only managed to hit Perdita – TWICE! Luckily I managed to cheat the shots down but for two turns I was out of cards.

I had overstretched Perdita and the rest of the crew were struggling to get up in support. The game became all about Perdita surviving the incoming attacks and spells by any means possible. Healing flips only managed to negate a single wound and her damage see-sawed dangerously close to death. This would be an all or nothing game for both sides.

Eventually The Judge made it to melee in support, having avoided a Headshot from Hans, and Perdita took down Rasputina. The trick was now not to die to exploding Gamin/Silent Ones. She took the Gamin explosion on the chin – one wound left – and Obeyed the Silent One out of melee so that The Judge and Santiago could shoot it, cheating down the Disengaging Strike to make sure Perdita was well clear of any exploding corpses. With the Silent One having activated first she was no longer a threat should the shooting fail to kill her. It didn't and she exploded, missing Perdita's crew.

At the end of Turn 6 Fug only had Hans left, who had given a decent first performance in spite of awkward initial deployment. I had lost the two Witchlings but everyone else was pretty much in Fug's deployment zone. Rasputina hadn't really had the opportunity to get going. Aside from taking down a Witchling via Perfect Mirror and casting a set of Ice Pillars she had struggled.

Final score 8-0 to The Guild.

A harsh result on paper given how close it came but a lot of lessons to be learned on both sides. Perdita had taken out Raspy, Acolyte and a Gamin but MVP for the Guild crew was actually the Enslaved Nephilim, who had accompanied Santiago across the centre of the board, achieving Obey several times to give the big man extra movement and shots – although he did resist on one occasion with a Red Joker flip. Idiot!

Next up… McMourning's debut this Saturday.

Visit to the Doctor…

2011-08-28T19:53:00.002+01:00

Went up to Tunbridge Wells today to visit Bull, see how well his recovery is going first hand and check out his new Resurrectionist crew. He looks better than expected but still not his old self just yet – not surprising really. Lots more rest and relaxation and he'll be as good as new, however getting him to sit still for long may be more difficult than it sounds!

We had a good old natter about the game and our crews – the anticipation is building as Bull is getting quite desperate I think to field Dr McMourning for the first time and put some theories and tactics to the test.

It felt only right that we introduce (a recently completed) Perdita to the Doctor, plus totems, so they can get the measure of each other before next weekend's potential face off. However, I don't think McMourning's groupies were too impressed with the new visitor!

Resurrectionists Are Gathering

2011-08-26T20:45:00.000+01:00

More news has come to light about the Resurectionists gathering in Tunbridge Wells. Bull's crew has grown in size to include several Rotten Belles and "Miss Pack" (jammie git).

His prized possession however is the new (proxy) Rogue Necromancy that has surfaced – a very old Chaos Spawn model – to threaten The Guild and Arcanists.

Plans are being drawn up to face this hideous group in combat.

More news as we get it…

WIP: Perdita Ortega

2011-08-24T22:11:00.001+01:00

Hot on the heels of her brother Santiago comes Miss Ortega herself. She's already proved herself in the three or four games she's starred in so far, it was only fair I showed her some love.

As you can see she's not there yet, but coming along nicely – hope to have her finished by the weekend. Then I need to finish off Nino and the Austringer, which shouldn't take long. Then I guess I'm back to the poor old third Death Marshal who has been constantly passed over for paint.

I look forward to the day I no longer have to paint anything brown!

For those people wondering, the base is one of my Boardwalk resin bases with a metal skull added for effect.

The Ice Man Cometh

2011-08-21T18:43:00.004+01:00

Perdita faced off against Rasputina again last night, 25ss, but neither myself nor opponent Fug could have predicted the evening's events.

It was only Fug's third or fourth proper game of Malifaux and he was still getting to grips with his crew, especially given the recent additions – Essence of Power and a Silent One. He'd done his research before the game and discovered he could have several Ice Pillars in place during the game. This became the basis for his tactics.

Rasputina had a Silent One, an Ice Golem, Essence of Power and two Ice Gamin.

Perdita took Santiago, Enslaved Nephilim and three Death Marshals. I purposefully didn't take an Austringer as I wanted to prove he wasn't essential, plus I wanted to test out Obey as much as possible.

We rolled Strategies – Rasputina got Escape and Survive, Perdita Contain Power. This set up a very characterful situation, with all the emphasis on Perdita chasing and taking down Raspy. Fug chose Assassinate and Bodyguard for his Schemes, which further added to the story – in addition he announced them, something we never normally do. I decided upon Hold Out and Grudge on the Silent One. The deployment was standard set up.

I have to admit to being very confident at this stage.

Fug set up Raspy and the crew pretty central on his side of the board. He won initiative for turn 1 and shuffled everyone forward, the Silent One entering the ruined building towards the middle of the table, giving it great line of sight for Perfect Mirror. I had two Death Marshals on the right flank, Santiago and the third Death Marshal to the left and Perdita and totem in the middle. I moved Perdita to the left flank and moved Santiago more central.

Next turn Rasputina continued to move forward, to my right, in a very bold fashion – firing December's Curse at my two Death Marshals, hitting both with the blast (newbie error of mine positioning them too close together). One overpower trigger later both were dead. Ouch!!

I had moved Perdita further out to the left earlier on in the turn and she was looking very much out of the game. Santiago moved to the middle of the board beside a couple of Ice Pillars that had appeared. He was exposed but I was hoping he'd lose a handful of wounds to trigger his extra skills.

Things got nasty from here on in. The Silent One, now at the top of the ruined building, exchanged ranged shots/magic with Santiago – the Ortega getting the better of the exchanges thanks mainly to Perdita and the totem casting (or attempting to) Obey on him. She had now made it to the middle of the board to try and rescue things. A Gamin and Ice Golem had moved to the other side of the wall of Ice Pillars that now split the centre of the board in two, separating the Guild and Arcanist forces.

At the beginning of the next turn Perdita moved, shot out an Ice Pillar, then cast Obey on the Ice Golem who charged Rasputina. Unfortunately he only managed to inflict a single wound before moving back towards the centre of the board and blasting Santiago.

More Ice Pillars had filled the gap and going into turn 5 it was do or die time for Perdita. Santiago was down to three wounds so in full bonus mode. The lone Death Marshal shot out a pillar before Santiago opened up on the Golem lurking on the other side. He exploded, inflicting wounds on the Gamin stood behind him. Santiago then finished off the Gamin, leaving the door open for his younger sister. Perdita moved into the gap between the pillars and charged Rasputina, knocking 5 wounds off her – still 5 to go. Damage came back, taking Miss Ortega down to her last three wounds. The Silent One came out of the building, casting Ice Wind to heal Rasputina and take Perdita down to her last wound.

Turn 6 and everything was held by a thread. I fought tooth and nail, spending my last soulstone, to win initiative. At this point the game should have been in the bag. I activated Santiago and Perdita, then made a game losing mistake.

I moved Santiago around the corner just beyond melee range of Raspy and Perdita. He then laid into the Silent One with his paired guns taking it down and completing my Scheme. Unfortunately I had forgotten the Silent One also explodes upon death, hitting Perdita in the blast. I desperately looked for some way to avoid taking that last wound on my master but there was nothing left. Perdita died, handing Fug his Scheme. Rasputina, no longer in melee, blasted Santiago – dead – she then put up more Ice Pillars. The lone Death Marshal and Totem could do nothing but destroy a pillar on the off chance the game would continue.

Needing a 10 to go to turn seven Fug flipped a 9!

When the scores were added up we had both achieved our respective Schemes and both failed our Strategies. However, because he had announced his Schemes Fug won 4-2.

So, the ice man cometh – whether it's Fug and his icy Arcanist crew or Santiago and his MVP coolness under fire.

Fug announced shortly afterwards that this game summed up why, even as a newbie gamer, he much prefers Malifaux to 40k.
I think I agree!

Let there be paint

2011-08-18T09:30:00.001+01:00

I've been very conscious of the fact that I have done absolutely no painting for over a month now. I've spent a fair amount of time with my painting tray but it's been mostly building my sewer bases for Sonnia – had a whole weekend of that. I've also spent time building some new bits of terrain for my Malifaux board. I've even had a half dozen demo games of Malifaux. However, not a drop of paint has been seen, so I took it upon myself to grab a couple of hours last night to make some progress.

The focus of the evening was Santiago Ortega, who has been a stalwart in the last few demo games. Whilst his older brother Francisco has been flapping about under pressure and not really contributing much (except as a target for the enemy), Santiago has proved his worth with his amazing shooting skills – we've not even seen his increased abilities once at half wounds. So I set to work giving him some pride and making sure he would no longer run around the board 'naked'.

Whilst this was never going to be one of my best painted models, I need to just get some models painted as I'm developing a rather long backlog and my perfectionism is causing me to have to play with more and more unpainted models. Not acceptable.

I chose a slightly different brown scheme for his coat. Regular visitors will know that I have already painted a half dozen brown overcoats, so this time I wanted a change. Still needs a final highlight but I'm pleased so far. Same goes for his trousers. Strangely, he is the first model in my Malifaux collection that has required eyes painting, however, I've just noticed the right eye has been painted too central, so this will need correcting. The skin tones are based around Vermin brown, as is the hair.

Whilst waiting for paint to dry I also applied some initial colour to Perdita's totem – Enslaved Nephilim. I decided I want any Nephilim I paint to be devilish – very much of Khorne – so I'm using my a similar scheme to my Blood Angels. Only managed to get a couple of layers on this little fella but I am already pleased will how this will look when finished.

This little stint of painting has really invigorated me. Hopefully this will mean more posts about painting and more painted models. Bull's painting speed means that he never plays with unpainted models and I refuse to be the one with the bare metal.

Quick Malifaux update

2011-08-14T21:53:00.000+01:00

So given that it's been the best part of a week since the last post I thought I should share the progress over the last few days.

First of all last Tuesday a couple more games were logged against our new gamer, Fug. He's putting together a Rasputina crew and has the basics down. He's currently painting up the Cult of December and has new models it seems every time I speak to him. The two games we played were full rules, Strategies and Schemes which went well. He's starting to learn about the combinations and un-learning the desire to just kill stuff. Hope to have a few more games soon and maybe some photos of his crew.

Elsewhere a couple of the Ortegas were undercoated and the sewer base masters were completed and moulds made. Today I did a first round of resin casting, with mixed results. By the end of the session they were looking pretty good and this evening I started to base up my Sonia Criid crew on them (above). Unfortunately I discovered too late that Witchling legs are very fragile, so there is some greenstuff work to do to repair the damage – not least create a peg-leg for the poor chap whose entire limb snapped off!

In Need of a Doctor…?

2011-08-09T09:23:00.002+01:00

Some of you may have heard me mention my gaming buddy Bull. I joined his gaming group just over 10 years ago when I moved to Tunbridge Wells, just 5 minutes round the corner from him. Since then we've clocked up hours of gaming and even longer talking about gaming; we've been to tournaments and to gaming shows – the works. A couple of years ago I moved away to Folkestone and soon after got married. Bull did me the honour of being my best man for the day and utilised our rich gaming history as the linchpin of his best man's speech – many guests had never heard of the hobby let alone that I was involved in such seedy things. Since then, even though I live a good hour away, we get together a couple of times a month to log a few games of Malifaux.

He sent me an email last week to say he'd been under the weather a bit and hence not been in touch. I discovered that his 'under the weather' was in fact something much more serious, life threatening even, and that he had pulled through the immediate danger thanks to his positive nature and sheer willpower. Needless to say he's given a lot of people a bit of a scare – he's the type of guy who has more friends than Facebook could ever hope to cope with and he has been best man/godfather too many times to remember. A lot of people love this guy.

As part of his recuperation it was thought that a spot of miniature painting would help. Needless to say, in true Bull style brimming with enthusiasm, within a couple of days he has assembled and painted his new Malifaux crew – Dr McMourning and his sexy nurses – as if some twisted dream during his recent hospital stay had come to life. I have no doubt that I will be on the receiving end of the Doc's shenanigans very soon so I had better prepare myself.

So, here's to you Bull – Gentleman gamer, generosity and positivity incarnate. Get well soon sir.

More DIY Malifaux bases…

2011-08-07T21:30:00.002+01:00

Some of you may remember my previous post about my Malcontent project, creating bases and scenery for Malifaux. Two months has almost passed since that post and things have not been idle. I have been testing my resin casting process to erradicate (as much as possible) any bubbles given that I don't have the facilities or space to use a vacuum chamber of any kind. Things have now reached a point where I am happy with the process, more to come in a future post.

This post is to give a sneak peak at the next few bits in production. You saw the Boardwalk bases in the original post, this was swiftly followed by a set of Bamboo bases (pictured above right after the devastation of the mould-making process and below showing the first few test pieces) which were designed for my Kirai crew.

This weekend a new set has been added to the ever expanding range – Sewer bases for my new Sonnia Criid crew (below). The photo shows them as of 5 minutes ago where the bulk of the construction is complete, just a few bits of greenstuff required to finish them off.

Stay tuned for more info…

Want to read more about this project?

Wyrd Gencon Releases… My Perspective

2011-08-04T10:40:00.007+01:00

I have to hold my hands up and say yes, I was one of those geeks who kept checking the Wyrd website every 5 minutes yesterday to see if they'd added the Gencon releases to their online shop. Needless to say it happened at some point last night while I was out so only saw it in all its glory this morning – or I would have if the website wasn't sooooo slooooow. Not a good start to the weekend's madness if the website can't handle 400 visitors at once, while the bulk of the US was still asleep.

I got so swept up in all the pre-Gencon excitement and was going to order this, that and the next thing over the weekend until my sensible chip kicked in and I realised how daft (and expensive) the whole thing was for someone living in the UK. I've decided not to order anything and wait until the models are naturally released here. Let's be honest, I've barely played 10 games of Malifaux so I'm hardly up to using avatars.

I thought I would give a bit of a perspective on all the models available this weekend, or at least the ones of note, starting with the models that will impact me directly.

Lady Justice Avatar (pictured above)
I was very nervous about this model. The miniatures being shown on the forums were quite hit and miss and I was dreading Lady J being a duff. When it finally did come to light I have to say I was pretty pleased. The concept is fantastic; the ram and crow are ludicrous – too big and rather comical; Lady J's stance looks a bit odd but all in all a reasonable model. I will without doubt be purchasing this at some point although I may have to alter the crow and ram, scale them back a bit.

Lady Justice Alt
I have always liked the illustration in the front of the Rules Manual so it was quite pleasing that they used that as the basis for the new sculpt. I have to admit I don't like the paint scheme used to demonstrate the model – the original green that was leaked onto the forums looked good. It is highly likely that I will purchase this at some point but I love my original Lady J, so no rush.

Dead Justice
When the dead Lady J illustration appeared on the forums and the general consensus was that this was her avatar I was freaking out big time. The idea for this box set is fun but I never saw it seriously as a development of her character. The sculpts are very cartoon-like which makes for a great limited edition set, even if there is a whiff of Privateer Press about them. I will not be purchasing this.

Perdita Alt
This was the model that I was hanging on to see before ordering online or not. When I clapped eyes on it this morning I was pretty devastated – one of the worst models in the collection so far. Take into account Lady J and Perdita were the two miniatures that attracted me to Malifaux – they oozed sexy and dangerous in equal amounts, were delicate and vulnerable at the same time. This sculpt has lost everything I love about the original Gael Goumon Perdita sculpt. It's cartoon-like in a similar fashion to the LE box set; she's covered up all her bare skin; she's waving her pistols around like she's never used them in her life, or is completely pissed; she appears to have no neck and put on quite a few pounds from the delicate teenager of the original. So much could have been done with this model in terms of dynamic movement. Very very poor – absolutely gutted – I will not be purchasing this.

Sonnia Alt
As the third female in the list of Guild masters it was inevitable that I would purchase Sonnia at some point – currently on order. I'm not a fan of the original sculpt so the fact that this version comes from the illustration seen in the Rules Manual is great. My only concern is that in the above photo she looks a bit ugly but I'll reserve judgement till I purchase the model. Her avatar is fantastic, very iconic, and is definitely on the shopping list.

Other models I love
Many of the alt sculpts have come from Rules Manual illustrations it seems, which is great in theory as they are fantastic. The reality can sometimes be less impressive but with the Ramos and Rasputina alt sculpts I think Wyrd have hit home runs – cracking sculpts and whilst not on my shopping list per se, may end up on my painting table just for the experience.

Never a fan of the original Pandora – may be the sculpt may be the paint scheme – this alternative hits home big time. More dynamic, sexier, more intimidating. Love it.

The artwork for the Zoraida avatar was quite frankly stunning and a bit of a shock. I don't feel the final model quite matches up but it's by no means bad. Maybe if I ever get into Neverborn I would look at this more closely.

I also like the Seamus Avatar. The Mr Hyde concept is fantastic and very much in keeping with the Seamus character. Detest the alt sculpt as this has gone off on a tangent somewhere.

I noticed that the Kirai avatar is not now available at Gencon. I can only assume there were production issues. I love the concept in the illustration leaked so far so am looking forward to seeing this model in the flesh.

Now you're just being silly…
When I heard that the Nightmare release for this year's Gencon was Teddy I got quite excited. I don't play Neverborn but the original Teddy was so iconic that the concept of a nightmare version was very intriguing and filled with so much potential the mind boggled.

Unfortunately, what we got was…well, something akin to a rabid meercat …simples!

All the charm and cleverness of the original is gone – it doesn't even look like a teddy anymore!

This was definitely one instance where my reaction was "Really??!"

Following close behind this fatally missed opportunity is the Marcus alt and avatar – Really??!

Final thoughts
I have to say on the whole I'm rather disappointed so far. Don't get me wrong, I'm amazed at the volume of models being produced and Wyrd have a very healthy relationship and dialogue going on with their customers and fanbase. For that I applaud them. However, I do worry that in an attempt to outdo themselves they have actually taken a step backwards in terms of quality of sculpts. The models released with books 1 and 2 of Malifaux have been for the most part stunning and, whilst we've only seen a snapshot of the models for book 3, I do hope the quality for book 3 is as good. Maybe it's because the original sculpts were so good and so we're walking on hallowed ground – like George Lucas and the Star Wars Special Editions and Prequels. Let's hope things don't go all Jar Jar!

I would love to hear other people's perspectives, especially if you play Malifaux, and how these new models will (or not) impact your gaming.

Gaming Update: Malifaux & 40k

2011-08-02T09:36:00.009+01:00

July ended with a late flurry a gaming, which made a pleasant change from the painting and constructing.

A fortnight ago saw me play a couple of games of Malifaux against Bull's Viktoria crew. He's starting to get the hang of them and combos now infiltrate his tactics. The first game, against my Lady Justice, introduced Nino and the Austringer to the Guild ranks who both played their part if not stunningly so. Their ranged threat alone did most of the damage. The Guild moved across the board en masse in order to achieve their Stake a Claim strategy as well as sympathetic Schemes. A close call but Game 1 to The Guild.

Game 2 introduced Perdita in place of Lady J and also saw The Executioner in place of a couple of Death Marshals – not the best choice given a Strategy flip of Reconnoiter but it was more about fun and trying out new models. I didn't fancy my chances to be honest so decided to protect the objectives for the Vikki's Destroy the Evidence Strategy and frustrate them rather than go out to achieve my own Strategy from the off.

The first main talking point involved the Vikkis slingshot to get Sword Vikki in melee with Nino and The Judge. The cards were cheated to get the trigger so both Guild members would die in the same activation. Alas at the crucial moment Bull flipped the Black Joker for damage and the whole move fell apart – Nino survived by the skin of his teeth, Vikki was then dispatched immediately and the game had been turned upside down. The Guild started to move around the table to complete Reconnoiter and the game was on.

Next talking point involved Taelor charging Perdita but, thanks to her (0) Action, Miss Ortega got to shoot at the incoming hammer of death! A chance flip of the Red Joker for damage saw Taelor on her knees and only alive thanks to her Hard To Kill ability. Damage was avoided and Taelor was dropped soon after. Perdita managed to survive a late exchange of intense fire with the Convict Gunslinger (and no soulstones left) before the Outcasts were wiped out to the man. Game 2 to The Guild …but only thanks to the cards!

This last weekend saw my first game of Warhammer 40k in over a year and the first game fielding Chaos in 5th edition. I was facing a newbie Necron army, my opponent only having played half a dozen games ever. I took my Bezerkers supported by a couple of tanks and some Obliterators. We rolled Capture and Control and Dawn of War. The game ebbed and flowed and I felt under little to moderate threat given my experience versus that of my opponent. I knew my Chaos Codex was broken, however, what I hadn't anticipated was the fact that 5th edition is …awful. Add to that the fact that I am a little rusty and the game devolved into a war of attrition. I had purposefully ignored the Phase Out rule to make it more of a game but was slowly starting to pay the price.

Carefully manoeuvring my Armour 13 tanks when charged in combat only for the attackers to hit the rear armour (what a stupid rule**) left me vulnerable and undermined my strategy across the board. Despite some rather naive tactical mistakes my opponent was pushing me to the limit and I was convinced come turn 4 that I could not win outright. The latter couple of turns saw us beat each other to a pulp (tomb spiders…grrr) and I eventually stole in to defend my own objective. A quick calculation saw that the Necrons did indeed Phase Out and the game was won. Having less than half a dozen models left on the board didn't feel much like a win I have to say.

Contemplation in the aftermath of the game did nothing to improve my lack of enthusiasm for GW's flagship sci-fi game and the one-dimensional aspect of play (compared to the subtleties and combos of Malifaux) made the experience seem rather flat. No doubt the Chaos codex didn't help but it's just not doing it for me.

Having said that I have committed to play again as my new local opponent dips his toe in the water and expands his Necrons. I already have an alternative Chaos lineup in mind to try and improve things – I even got briefly excited at the prospect of resurrecting my Dark Templar project, but let's not be hasty, it soon passed. In return my opponent has purchased a Malifaux crew – Rasputina – and this coming Friday will be his first foray through the breach with a handful of demo games. He's quite excited at the prospect of only having to paint 5 models!

** I have to say there were two rules that really annoyed me whilst playing. The first, as mentioned above, was the fact that all close combat against vehicles now hit rear armour values. Anything other than Land Raiders and Monoliths are so vulnerable now and can no longer be used as blocking mechanisms which, for a close combat army, is quite key. The second rule of no use to anyone is the wound allocation – what a load of rubbish! If your missile launcher or melta gun guy bought it in a firefight surely one of his comrades would pick up the special weapon and effectively take his place. Not only that but it complicates and slows the game down no end. End of rant, guess I'll have to find a workaround.

To be continued…

Quick 40k/Malifaux Terrain: The Next Step

2011-07-30T14:49:00.001+01:00

If you haven't already had a read through my previous post about Quick 40k/Malifaux Terrain I suggest you do now. If you find that having read through said post you think the end product is a little boring, a bit bland, not a lot of character then this could be the post for you.

Taking the basic ideas and premise of the last post we're taking it a step further. The piece shown here I built for 40k some time ago (almost 8 years!) and it has proven it's worth more recently for Malifaux – if a little big and rather open.

To begin with, instead of using a triagular shaped base, we use a square/rectangle of hardboard on which to build our ruined warehouse/workshop/munitions factory. Taking the basic foamboard corner built in the previous post the process was modified by joining two together to create the entrance way and adjoining walls. A regular corner piece was used to represent the back corner of the building.

The main difference with this construction was the addition of thick card panels to the walls, inside and out, to give the building more support and more gravitas – a reinforced, armoured building of some importance. The card used was artists mounting board, again off-cuts and scrap – no need to spend money unnecessarily. A rough doorframe was constructed around the front of the building using the same material.

As before squares of paper or thin card were dotted around the interior to represent the workshop floor and chunks of torn polystyrene we shaped and glued to build up the volume of rubble inside. Small pieces of polystyrene, stones and then smaller grades of stones and sand were added around the entirity of the base, but not before characterful elements were added – the buried metal barrels, the vehicle wheel, scaffolding and other metallic structural elements.

As in our previous buildings, the whole thing was gien a liberal coat of masonary paint to blend all the elements together, avoiding anything not meant to be stonework or sometimes painting it anyway to add to the buried feeling.

Styrene roofing structure was added, melting the end with a lighter to imply the intense heat of the building destruction. On top of this off-cuts of corrugated craft card was added showing the remnance of the roof. I poked a hole in the 'roof' with a pencil to illustrate shrapnel damage.

At this point the building was painted using the grey tones of our previous buildings, the metallic elements were painted boltgun metal (as I recall) mixed with black, drybrushed with pure boltgun metal then inked to hell with raw black and chestnut inks.

And there you have it. Taking the simple idea illustrated in the previous post and taking it a step further to create a more characterful element for your battlefield. I admit this piece could also be considered generic maybe even a little bland but it shows that building like this are achieveable simply and for not much cost.

Where you go from here is up to you…

Quick 40k/Malifaux Terrain

2011-07-22T23:18:00.002+01:00

The above ruined building is one of a handful made several years ago late one Friday night with leftover bits in order to flesh out the battlefield for an upcoming game of 40k. They've been very useful over the years and have made great generic ruins for several different gaming systems, more recently Malifaux.

I decided to make some more smaller buildings, again to flesh out the gaming board for upcoming games. This time I thought I'd make a few notes and pass on the info –

You are going to need offcuts of foamboard. A couple of larger bits for the walls would be nice but you can make do with whatever you can find and tailor your project accordingly. I used hardboard offcuts for the base rather than cardboard as it lasts a lot longer and doesn't warp as much.

First of all I cut the base into a triangular shape of appropriate size – this will depend on how big you want your terrain to be and/or how much foamboard you have. Once done I rounded and sloped the edges a little to soften the step.

Next I took my two largest pieces of foamboard, cut them vaguely to size, ensuring there were at least two straight edges on each piece – one to sit on the base, the other to line up with the opposite wall. On these pieces I drew out a grid with squares of an inch wide. This gave an inch gap between the base and the ground floor windows and an inch between the corner of the building and the first vertical row of windows. It also meant that all the windows were an inch apart two. Have a look at the photos to better understand what I'm trying to describe here.

Next I made a 45 degree cut along the edges that would meet at the corner of the building, so they would stick together seamlessly. If it doesn't match up exactly you can mask the gaps as damage.

I used a glue gun to stick the walls together and then to the base. Pieces of foamboard were cut into rough trangles to represent the remnants of the various floors within the building. These were stuck into place, approximately 10mm above the top of the window of the floor below. Once this basic shape was done I carved out the damage on the walls, sloping edges and making the walls ragged.

Next comes the decoration. First off I added a strip of decorative wood that I had, halfway between the ground and first floor windows. I cut out squares of paper and glued them across each floor area as floor tiles of some kind. Then I added offcuts of foamboard, stones and finally sand to represent rubble at various sizes. You could add leftover bits from plastic kits – marine helmets, ammo, guns, etc. – but I kept my buildings quite plain as they would be used in different game systems.

Once this was done and completely dry, the whole thing got a couple of liberal coats of masonry paint – if you don't have any around pour some emulsion into a paint tray and mix some sand into it. This helps protect any exposed foam, blend all the elements and just gives a good all round stoney feeling to the job. The buildings were sprayed black at this point, paying close attention to the shadowed areas under floors, etc. The majority of the building was overbrushed with shades of grey, getting lighter and lighter – preferably before the previous coat is dry, leaving plenty of shadows and only highlighting the very exposed areas.

And that was it!
The final result is quite generic and very robust. You can expand on this approach to make more interesting buildings such as warehouses – I'm in that process and will report in due course.

You may want to check the height of your models in situ before doing any sticking as the height I've used isn't sympathetic with taller models, just adjust your grid accordingly.

Quick 40k/Malifaux Terrain: The Next Step

Inspiring Podcasts: Gamers Lounge

2011-07-21T10:56:00.003+01:00

I thought it was about time to share some more sources of my gaming inspiration after the last couple of posts about inspiring terrain links and inspiring terrain techniques.

Podcasts are a relatively new phenomenon in the gaming arena (for me at least). I don't have much time to listen so have to choose my sources carefully. After skimming through several I discovered The Gamers Lounge and my gaming life was changed.

The Gamers Lounge podcast is hosted by Bill (from Dead Tau Project) and Jay (from Blood & Blades). Both guys are very knowledgeable about the hobby in general and have very contrasting opinions and characters which makes the cast very entertaining as well as informative.

The thing that drew me in was the fact that they were, at the time, the only podcast with significant Malifaux content. Some very useful discussions with key Wyrd staff and community individuals makes for addictive listening and has contributed heavily to my own gaming experiences.

I've joined the list of listeners quite late on, episode 30 was probably my first experience, and I have had great fun going through the back catalogue of episodes. The earlier casts were very much 40k and Fantasy orientated and the focus has ebbed and flowed through Warmachine/Hordes and FoW to become very Malifaux-centric recently as Bill's passion has been very much centred around Wyd's flagship game. Members of their local gaming group make guest appearances periodically to share experiences and insights. The banter and camaraderie generated makes you feel a part of the crew and feel as if you know these guys – a great feeling to have for a podcast listener.

The Gamers Lounge can be listened to directly from the website, downloaded from the site or found on iTunes – which I personally find the most appealing as I just load up my iPod and listen back to back at work. The website gives a full breakdown of each episode so you can cherry pick the bits you're interested in.

So, I just wanted to publicly thank the guys for their contributions and strongly recommend you take a listen.

Blood Angels Relists…

2011-07-17T20:54:00.000+01:00

It happens now and again, as annoying and time wasting as it is – some muppet bids on your auctions, wins the auctions then disappears off the face of the planet despite invoices, emails and Ebay interventions. Another addition to my blocked bidder list!

Anyway the upshot of all this is that there are a couple of relists this week – Blood Angels.

As always the auctions can be found here.

Well, I Didn't See That Coming!

2011-07-15T11:51:00.001+01:00

Thought I'd just drop this quick post in to let you guys know that a rather unlikely thing has occurred.

I found out that there was a wargamer just round the corner from me – a friend of the family no less – and we got together for a gaming chat last weekend. He has just got into 40k and is learning to play with his Necron army (he likes a challenge I think) facing newbie Grey Knights so far (big, big challenge). As you know I am up to my eyeballs in Malifaux froth right now and painting like a madman (but still quite slowly) in order to feed the fever.

We chatted both games and I managed to convince him to look at Malifaux as a second game. The fluff and entry cost was really appealing to him, so that is exciting and we're going to have a demo game soon.

In return I decided to come out of my self-imposed 40k exile in order to offer him a different opponent to the Grey Knights he currently has to contend with, help him learn the rules and offer some of my tactical experience (albeit not much 5th Ed.).

So what does this mean in real terms and how does it affect the blog?

I will NOT be purchasing any new 40k models*. However, I will be dusting off my Iron Warriors and Bezerkers in the short term, maybe looking at my Nurgle in the near future should a space open up on the painting table.

(* the caveat here is that hey, this is me, odds are something will be purchased once I get a few games under my belt!)

You will see more 40k related posts start to creep into the blog, game reports and photos of any (re)painting I do. Baby steps at first as I still am not loving 40k, so this is initially as a favour for a friend and we'll go from there.

Inspiring Terrain Techniques

2011-07-11T13:47:00.001+01:00

So the last post highlighted some terrain projects that should inspire our own efforts.

Today's post goes a step further, highlighting an article on the Military Modelling website by Emmanuel Nouaillier that describes the processes involved in creating realistic scenery for WWII dioramas and displays.

Whilst the buildings may not be completely suitable for Malifaux or 40k the techniques are genius and can easily be adapted. It describes in some detail how scratch-built structures were created and then distressed.

The MM website can be found here and the two-part article can be found here.

Enjoy.

Malifaux Terrain: I saw this and thought of you

2011-07-06T14:38:00.000+01:00

After a bit of browsing the intermaweb this afternoon I came across a website that was showcasing another website that was showcasing this amazing Wild West gaming board. From what I can gather the thing is static, yet mobile. However, for anyone looking for inspiration for wild west Malifaux terrain this is great.

Stop what you're doing and go take a look now.
For a boatload more pics visit Dressing The Lines.

I'd also like to link Chicago Terrain Factory website, which is where I found the link.

Talking of inspiring terrain, I'd also like to draw your attention to an amazing website that has lots of Malifaux appropriate stuff on it.

TM Terrain will make bespoke one off pieces of terrain that look fantastic. To be inspired by more of their projects visit the gallery.

WIP: Painting

2011-07-05T10:15:00.000+01:00

As briefly mentioned yesterday, I managed to get some paint on Perdita, my second Malifaux master. Given that I was painting in quite poor light I think it's a pretty good start. I have the rest of the crew waiting in the queue but don't expect to see them anytime soon.

I also managed to get a second Death Marshal finished – again, not bad considering the poor lighting conditions at the end. I really, really want to get the third one finished but I have far more interesting models to paint so we will see how it goes.

Malifaux: Lady J vs Nicodem

2011-07-04T10:28:00.004+01:00

I'm finally home after 4 days away in Wigan in the North of England. The point of the trip was two-fold. First of all I was finishing up some DIY at my Mom's house that was started in April, which got done but these things are never really completed so more trips are planned.

Secondly I was going to visit Craig and Dale from Critical Mass Games to get some hands on experience planning and casting resin models. I've been friends with Craig for pretty much 10 years now and considering I grew up and lived in Wigan until my late 20's it's ironic that I should only meet him after I moved south to Kent. He was the first person I knew that played non-GW stuff (which seemed odd to me at the time) and introduced me to Warmachine and Flames of War.

I had heard through the grapevine that despite being up against it on a daily basis running Critical Mass Games he had bought and painted a Malifaux crew – Nicodem. I had taken my mobile board and we arranged a game or two at the Wigan Wargames Club on Friday evening. Having never played against anything except the Vikkis, and having had plenty of time to read Nicodem's rules, I was very cautious about squaring up to them. In addition we'd played less than 10 games of Malifaux between us (and I haven't played in a good three weeks) so it was never gong to be a fast riveting game.

We both rolled Destroy the Evidence so dispersed 1p and 2p coins as objectives. As the turns ticked by I found myself hanging back waiting to see Nicodem's tricks but aside from raising zombies and self-mutilating punks nothing much happened. I decided I wasn't going to learn anything unless I stuck my neck out there to see what would happen so went for it in the latter half of the game. Many of the anti-undead specific tricks that Lady J's crew has (and I've never had cause to use) finally came in useful and with some coordinated attacks I managed to thin out the zombie ranks and had Nicodem on the run. One combat of note involved Sebastian charging Lady J and inflicting a hit (which I decided not to cheat as he couldn't do that much damage). Craig then proceeded to flip the Red Joker for damage inflicting severe and then moderate wounds on my Master. It wasn't quite enough to kill her but left her staggering and forced a healing flip next turn.

By turn 6 Nicodem had no counters left and was running whilst my crew advanced en masse and achieved both schemes. The game ended 4-1 to The Guild.

We decided to swap crews for our second game so I got to try my hand at running a Rezzer crew. Having watched a few of Craig's tricks and reading the cards I decided to go for it with raising zombies and bog the Guild crew down with bodies. I had Sebastian Exhuming like a man possessed and throwing the counters out in front then casting his (0) action to activate Nicodem who would raise them and Reanimate a punk zombie to boot. In return the Guild just shot and hacked them down which didn't actually help me given we'd both rolled Slaughter for our Strategies.

Much fun was had and despite my best efforts I couldn't achieve my Schemes either and The Guild ran out 4-0 winners. The obvious conclusions from the game were that (1) Lady J is awesome against undead and (2) Craig needs some more choice when hiring his crew, another vulture and maybe some crooked men, convict gunslinger.

Aside from gaming I managed to get some more painting done – another Death Marshal finished and a couple of layers of paint on the last one. I also got the flesh painted on Perdita, so full steam ahead with the Ortegas.

WIP: Malifaux Terrain and… Blood Angels?!

2011-06-28T17:50:00.000+01:00

It's been a slow week on the painting front as I have spent any spare time getting the next stage of my Malifaux terrain complete.

I have however managed a little time to put the next few colours onto the Sanguinary Priest that was featured oh so long ago on this blog. His shoulders and left arm had been painted codex grey already so I spent some time laying down the white. I do intend to go back and add a little codex grey to add some shading but it's pretty solid at the moment. I also got the eagle feathers on his chest painted though this too needs a wash of yellow to add some depth. Hope to get him finished in the next few weeks so he can earn his keep on Ebay.

As for the Malifaux terrain, last post there was just the basic shell of my Guild HQ building. First job was to fill the gap by the front door with Polyfilla. I took the pieces cut out of the windows, stuck them together in twos and squared them off. I then cut out a curve (I drew around a plastic base for the shape) and used these pieces as supports for the floors. I do need to add a small arched wall on the ground floor but apart from that we're up to the decorating. I plan to design and build a basic window frame that I can cast up in resin (don't fancy scratch building 32 of them!). I will build the doors and door frames individually, then there is the decor on the outside, ladders, stairs.

I'm still contemplating a colour scheme at this point and am torn between doing something quite straightforward or going for a gritty "dead of night" feel and only add sparse highlights with an airbrush as if lit purely by streetlamps. We will see.

I could also do with creating some "easy win" buildings that aren't the mammoth construction project that this is turning out to be!

I am away in the North of England for the rest of the week doing DIY for my Mum and catching up with friends. I hope to get a game or two of Malifaux in so there may be a post later at the weekend. Aside from that it's going to be a slow week on the blog and I'll be back on Monday.

Blood Angel exodus begins…

2011-06-22T19:48:00.001+01:00

I've been threatening it for a while and now it's happened – the first round of my Blood Angel auctions have hit Ebay.

This week it's vehicles, so now's your chance to get hold of the vehicles you saw being built and painted on this blog (or not in the case of the Drop Pod!).

The auctions finish on the 2nd July and can all be found here.

The Executioner

2011-06-19T15:21:00.000+01:00

Finally got the next model in my crew complete – well almost – can anyone spot the deliberate mistake?
Now we just have to see how he performs in-game!

All hands on deck…

2011-06-18T16:23:00.000+01:00

I was having a look over the blog's stats last night and discovered that in the space of 48 hours this site has gone from averaging 400 hits a day to …12!

Ha, ha – I can only assume that my recent foray into Malifaux terrain has hit a bit of a bum note with the viewing public. I did notice (and fully expected) a drop in audience figures when I moved away from 40k several months ago – which is cool – however, at the moment the site's pulling in less viewers than when I had a hiatus for 6 months and didn't update the site at all, lol.

To my few remaining visitors I say a big thank you and there will be more eye candy soon as I'm close to completing my Executioner for Malifaux and will have a battle report or two in a couple of weeks after a visit north – I'm expecting Nicodem as my opponent which will be an eye-opener. Beyond that we have the ongoing Malifaux terrain (which should get more interesting from here on in) and more painted figures as I expand my Guild resources.

We also have the sale of my doomed Blood Angels later this week, so there will be more photos then. This will include the completed Rhino with Forgeworld doors as well as two Dreadnoughts – the Dred from the starter box set and a regular Dred with Lascannons. I also intend to finish the Sanguinary High Priest before he hits Ebay. More details when they go up.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend folks!

Malifaux Terrain: part 2

2011-06-16T21:41:00.001+01:00

Having done lots of research and sketches it was time to get real and get building.

Of all the building images I've collected I decided to use this one as the guide for my first piece of Malifaux terrain. The photograph is of a jewelers shop in Preston and whilst I like the overall shape and design, I will not be following it exactly.

The piece I want to build is a very tall office or residential block – maybe Guild headquarters/library or at least a building of some significance. Given that it will take up a whole quarter section of the available board space it needs to be impressive. It will have three floors plus the roof, with a lower roof section, outside ladders and large internal areas. I'm also contemplating building a small tower to go on the roof to make it even taller, but that will come much later.

Later down the line I want to adopt the bridge idea from the Bridge of Sighs image seen in part 1 of this series, make it as a separate piece that can be attached to a first or second storey window section and span across the street to an adjacent building. I'm really like the idea of high walkways as a shortcut (if somewhat risky) around the gaming board.

The first step was to finalise the design of my first building and get some viable measurements from which to work. The set of buildings, once complete, will have a smiliar look to them and be based upon the same grid. I jumped onto the computer and put some measurements in based upon the space available in a corner section of my Malifaux board, which roughly equated to a large triangle.

Having already cut out my triangular shaped base board I sketched out the footprint as a glue guide, and then went hunting for foamboard. I spent an evening measuring and drawing up my building design, making sure that measurements were as accurate as I could make them. Something always gives in the final build so the more accurate I could be now the easier life would be later down the line.

Once drawn up the initial pieces were cut out and stuck into position with PVA and some masking tape for stability. 24 hours later, once I could be sure the glue was dry I stuck down the two side pieces that I had drawn up and cut out in the meantime.

That was two days ago and as you can see we're looking in good shape. I have to choose my next step carefully as I don't want to enclose anything I will need to access later to paint, etc. I have my two models Nino and Austringer out there for scale comparisons.

You may have noticed the gap to the right of the front door. This was due to (1) a wonky 45 degree scalpel cut where I was concentrating more on the tv than the job in hand (not clever!) and (2) some mild warping of the foambard which had been stored badly. I'm not overly concerned as I can fill this at a later stage.

…to be continued.

Aspiring Champion: Tale Of A Tournament Gamer part 2

2011-06-14T18:57:00.006+01:00

Aspiring Champion: Tale Of A Tournament Gamer part 1

Putting the second part of the article into context this was the heyday of the Chaos codex, where you could custom build your Lord and turn him into a Daemon Prince. These were also the days before online FAQs and Errata were commonplace (or in some cases known to exist at all).

Day1: Saturday 6th March 2004

In the first game you always have a random opponent, and I had drawn Mark Coultas and his Black Templar. Great I thought, a combat army with very little shooting ability, on a table with decent terrain. And so it proved. My Bezerkers were in close combat on turn 1, and despite some heavy resistance, and the loss of my possessed Champion (sparking the premature appearance of the Bloodthirster), the result was a runaway 20 points to nil. A good start, but it gets more difficult from here on in.

In game two I had been drawn against Nick Simmerson and his Necrons (seen in White Dwarf 291), on a table with virtually no terrain. However, my initial reservations about this game were about to get a whole lot worse when Pete Haines approached me.

Whilst checking my army list he had noticed that my Daemon Prince had overspent by 25pts on Daemonic upgrades. It seems that Gifts of Khorne are classed as Daemonic upgrades not just wargear. I hasten to add that it doesn’t mention this anywhere in the codex (I’m quite the perfectionist, and check for things like this over and over). It is however mentioned in a random errata somewhere on the GW website, which I obviously hadn’t read, but the fact remained that I had an illegal Daemon Prince. The punishment was two-fold, and quite severe.

I had to remove the 25 points of Daemonic upgrades from my Lord (no big deal, and this was done with no real impact on his effectiveness – ironically the offending items had only been added to use up the points), but I also lost the 20 generalship points from my massacre in Game 1, the scores being reversed, leaving me with a score of zero. This also meant I had to fight my remaining games (ie. 5 out of 6) with a 1475 point army.

To say I was devastated is an understatement. I was absolutely distraught. I was embarrassed beyond belief, illegal armies should be unheard of at veteran level, and the effort and sacrifice ploughed into getting my army tournament-ready seemed to have been a complete waste. My head was all over the place, and the last thing I wanted to do was play 40k against a Necron army on a terrain-less table. But it’s in hopeless situations that heroes are born and little did I know how the story would conclude – silver linings seemed a million miles away.

In the past, having my back against the wall in a situation like this would have been enough to make me bail, be it literally pack up and go home, or mentally throw in the towel and gift the game to my opponent. This time things were as bad as they could be, or so it seemed. I thought about the coaching my fellow team members Sean, Lee and George had given me in the run up to this tournament and the fact it’s never over till it’s over – if the main objectives are out of reach, set yourself new goals. I decided to take out my frustration on the field of play – smack these Necrons about. However, the thing with Bezerker armies is that in Turns 1 through 3, you’re the one taking all the punishment while you try and get into combat, and so it was this time.

I had guys out on foot in no time getting shot to pieces. But when you’ve got a Bloodthirster with wings and a Daemon Prince who can charge 12 inches, things can soon change in Turns 4 to 6! Before I knew it the Necrons were running away, not enough for a big win, but a 13-7 score was a big mental victory for me.

The end of Saturday saw Game 3, and possibly the most enjoyable game of the weekend. My opponent was Tim Cerullo and his Black Templar. He just wanted a relaxed game, so we played at ease and had a great battle with many a story-worthy incident. My Predators had been exchanging fire with his hull-down Destructor, to little effect. He had two units of troops hiding behind it, but I charged a unit in, immobilising their transport on the way. The unit hit the rear of a Whirlwind, whilst the Champion attacked the side of the pesky Predator. The damage was limited on the Whirlwind, but the Destructor exploded in fine style, killing 7 out of the 10 Templar assault troops stood behind it - fantastic!

A massive fight ensued as the remnants of several units from both sides kicked-off where the tank had been. Little else was happening on the table, but the assault rumbled on, Templar power fists desperately trying to kill my Daemon Prince, and Bezerkers desperately trying to thin the Templar numbers. Eventually the Lord dropped, only to be replaced by the Bloodthirster. He dropped a couple of turns later, but by then my Bezerkers had mopped up. The last word was left for Tim however, as he managed (under Night Fighting conditions) to obliterate (penetrating 6) a Rhino full of Bezerkers with his Vindicator - ouch! It was enough to avoid a massacre, and my boys ran out 17-3 winners.

…to be continued.

Malifaux Terrain: part 1

2011-06-13T17:01:00.005+01:00

It's been a month or so now since my mobile Malifaux board was built. Bull and I have had half a dozen games on it and it has proven itself invaluable.

So far we've been using a random collection of former 40k terrain – primarily two ruined buildings and a wrecked warehouse, accompanied by lots of bits and barricades. I have to say it's worked well so far, but we're both starting to feel the need to add something more interesting and appropriate.

Necromunda was the game of choice for a long time here, not least because of the three-dimensional aspect of the game – racing to get the best vantage spot for your snipers, using bridges for shortcuts across the board, hiding underneath platforms ready to ambush. For the most part, so far, our games of Malifaux have been largely 2-D – partly to simplify and aid our learning process / partly due to the terrain.

With all this in mind, I've been doing heaps of research, measuring and sketching to try and come up with something that remains modular and portable but fits in with the new board and makes the game truly 3-D (and if it looks absolutely stunning I wouldn't be too upset either!).

As well as plenty of Victorian architecture to take on board, I found a couple of photos of buildings in Oxford – the Bridge of Sighs and the Radcliffe Camera – both of which looked ideal candidates for translation into Malifaux.

Next stage is the first draft scamps and marking up the foamboard.

To be continued…

Aspiring Champion: Tale Of A Tournament Gamer part 1

2011-06-12T14:53:00.006+01:00

To put his into context, this diary article was written by myself a good few years ago after my experiences at the 2004 40k GT Final at Warhammer World in Nottingham. I was probably at the peak of my tournament frothing days, where every game I played had to be won and new awesome army builds had to be discovered. Aside from reasonable individual and massive team successes at the Mayhem Tournaments in London, this was about as good as it got for me – before tournament burnout, the break up of our 'Jedi Council' team and the steady decline of my interest and support of all things GW. These were great days, so I thought it worthy of posting.

So what does it feel like preparing for, and participating in the Games Workshop 40k Grand Tournament Final in Nottingham, with the prospect of competing against 149 other hardcore gamers, all of whom had to qualify at the heat stage just to be there?
No pressure then.

Lions, Tigers, Bears, Oh My!
…DT takes his Bezerker Beastmen to war!

I do it every time! It seems no matter how many armies I have, or how little time till match day, I always feel the need to build a new army come tournament time. It doesn’t seem to matter which tournament either - local or national. This invariably results in a series of “x weeks to go” reminders in my diary, sleepless nights, and heaps of stress.

So it’s 29th September 2003, my 31st birthday and the Monday after the GT Heat 1. My Iron Warriors got me through to the final, in a respectable 33rd place. However, they just don’t seem as enjoyable in tournaments as they once were, so I decide a change is in order for the Final. Hey, I’ve got over five months till they’ll be needed, which leaves plenty of time to construct and paint a brand new army, maybe even give George (Dellapina) a run for his money in the Best Army competition.

By Christmas 2003, I have played many games with my proposed army list, but on the construction front there is nothing to be seen. However, there’s still a couple of months which should be sufficient, especially since during the holidays I build two units of Bezerkers, and the Lord model has had all of his converting done.

About a week after New Year I decide to go pure Khorne, and get my free aspiring champions. This now involves more construction as a third Bezerker unit is hastily thrown together. I still have a Bloodthirster, three Rhinos and three Predators to build.

Mid-January my freelance work has gone nuclear and I’m almost working full-time again, restricting the painting time considerably. I have undercoated all the Bezerkers and the Lord, and have begun the tedious task of painting marine armour. By the beginning of February, with a month to go, things are looking bad. Six tanks and a Bloodthirster to build and a whole lot of painting. It is about now that I take the executive decision to take time off work to complete my mammoth task - there is no way I’m bailing out on this one.

The second half of February saw a build and paint frenzy of heroic stature, but with a week and a half to go I still had six tanks to build, a Bloodthirster to paint, plus details to be painted on everything else. Not good, but I ploughed on regardless, ignoring the possibility that I wouldn’t finish in time.

We were leaving for Nottingham on the Friday morning, and I was staying at a friend's place on Thursday night, in addition to working on the Monday, so that meant I only had two and a half days during my final week. The Bezerkers were complete, and the Daemon Prince almost, things were looking up except for my six vehicles, which were built but not even undercoated. I managed to paint the Bloodthirster in a single dedicated day, which left two days for the tanks.

We arrived in Nottingham at George’s house at 3pm on Friday. He had kindly set up his painting table for me as I still had details to finish on my tanks, a minor miracle under the circumstances.

The best part of a tournament by far, in my humble opinion, is not the gaming during the day (no, that can be damned hard work sometimes, even unenjoyable on occasion). The best part of a gaming weekend is the times in between playing, when you’re chatting, joking, having a laugh with your mates, old and new. It’s the drinking beer on Saturday night and playing X-Box till 3am, knowing you’ve got a tough Day 2 ahead. Then, so long as you didn’t get slaughtered in the gaming, and you get home in one piece without crashing the car, you can look back over your weekend with a sense of satisfaction that it was worthwhile and you had a great time.

So did that happen for me this time?

Yes, but not for the reasons I expected…

Tale of a Tournament Gamer part 2

DIY Malifaux bases

2011-06-10T20:26:00.004+01:00

Like many Malifaux players, I've become quite obsessed with the bases upon which my crew are placed. Having used cobblestones from Fenris for my Lady Justice crew I felt in need of something entirely different for Perdita and the Ortegas, who are basically cowboys.

I couldn't find anything that really grabbed my attention. The bases available were either very plain or way too over the top, and none seemed particularly suitable for cowboys.

So I decided to make my own.

Not only that, I thought I'd make them for everyone else too.

I appreciate that resin base companies are a dime a dozen, with designs and production quality to match. My intention is simply this – as I make bespoke bases for my own Malifaux exploits I'll cast up extras for the rest of the community. I don't have some extensive business plan or projections, it's just a way to contribute to the worldwide gaming community and make a little extra cash on the side to pay for the next project. The idea will hopefully expand into gaming terrain, just bits and pieces that I want to build for myself and will make available to others.

So the first project has been 30mm cowboy bases, based upon the typical boardwalk in a wild west town. The boards are heavily weathered, giving the impression of decay or just downright poor craftsmanship of the locals. I decided upon 5 different designs giving a range of options – the plain boards could even be used for pirate miniatures on a decrepit old ship.

I have just completed my first set of test pieces – to see how the whole resin casting thing works. There's bubbles in them and some casts were all over the place, but it has been a fantastic learning experience. I have a meeting later in the month with the guys at Critical Mass Games who have their own resin facility, to pick their brains and get some advice, before getting quailty casts done to put up on Ebay.

I'll keep you all updated in future posts for anyone interested.

Malcontent is the name I've given to this project.

Why Malcontent?

Two reasons:

First of all the word malcontent means 'a person who is dissatisfied' and I wasn't very happy with the terrain options available out there for playing Malifaux. Nothing very interesting or exciting – I would have to make it all myself.

Secondly, it sums up the whole point of the project
– Content for Mal(ifaux) !

Want to read more about this project?

Backsides…

2011-06-08T18:41:00.000+01:00

As a makeshift part 2 to yesterday's image heavy post of Lady Justice and her crew – and also in response to Andy's comment about pics of different angles – I have some more shots of the finished models… including the leaping Death Marshal's face!

There isn't much to see at the back of The Judge so his extra shot was from the side.

And finally …

As you can see the face is nothing to shout about – I didn't spend too much time on it due to the fact that you can only see it if you lie the model on its back!

Post 100: Lady Justice & Her Crew

2011-06-07T21:48:00.000+01:00

I finally got my head down to some painting last week (in preparation for a game!) and whilst I didn't complete my crew I did break the back of it – for now.

As promised I've taken some pics of the completed models. I've stuck to the same brown recipe for the overcoats throughout for coherency. I also used the same denim mix for the two principle characters, whilst the Death Marshals get to wear black jeans.

Lady J's totem – The Scales of Justice – didn't get to wear jeans of any kind, ending up with rather grubby canvas pants.

As mentioned the crew got to travel up to Tunbridge Wells this last weekend and face off against Bull's Viktoria Outcasts. As you can see below the opposition had grown since our last game…

…but so had my Guild crew, with the addition of The Executioner! You wouldn't believe that I had put down approximately 20 watery thin layers of paint on his skin prior to the game, but the effect was so subtle you couldn't see it in normal daylight – back to the drawing board with that one.

Needless to say we had a couple of great games – Bull won the first game 6-0 without making a Strike of any kind and I got so frustrated with the lack of action I charged out in the final turn just to get a wound off Sword Vikki.

The second game involved me defending a Wagon (or rather a large Merc Warjack) on its journey to the centre of the board. There was never going to be a repeat of game one, with plenty of action and Lady J turning the game midway, only for Gun Vikki to destroy the Wagon with her final Action Point and deny me full points: 2-0 win for The Guild.

As you would expect, lots of movie magic moments during both games – not least the photo below. Post your captions in the comments section!

Next Post: A bit of an announcement…

OOP Forgeworld Cityfight Terrain

2011-06-01T19:36:00.002+01:00

Last time I was back at my Mom's place I (re)discovered a box FULL of old Forgeworld resin terrain – must be almost 10 years old! I'd bought it around the time the first Cityfight rulebook came out with fantastic ideas of constructing an amazing 40k board. These photos are just a few.

However, having bought the terrain it sat in my flat for months/years before making the solemn exodus North that indicates you've fallen out of favour and are going to the great big storage space in the sky – my Mom's attic.

Needless to say everything is for sale on Ebay – auctions end in ten days time – to aid the "I have bills to pay" cause. I hasten to add there will be a plethora of activity on my Ebay page in the coming weeks as first the Iron Warriors and Beastmen Bezerkers, swiftly followed by the Blood Angels, all make their way… somewhere else! Given the attention the Blood Angels have received on the blog I promise I will announce their departure in more detail nearer the time.

Here's the link to my ebay page!

Next time: Post number 100!…and photos of Lady Justice and her crew – including completed models!!

WIP: Scales of Justice

2011-05-29T18:14:00.000+01:00

Here's a quick sneak peak of the Scales of Justice – purely work in progress you understand – despite some more dodgy photography. Should have some better pictures of the crew to date at the end of the week.

Death Marshals: part 2

2011-05-21T11:26:00.002+01:00

Just a quickie post today to show you the finished Death Marshal number 1. He was completed last night whilst watching/listening to Deadwood season 1 in the background – the episode where Wild Bill gets shot! Again, apologies for the quality of the pics – I've lost my camera mojo it seems.

More work was done on Lady J also – only to discover in the cold light of morning that a minute amount of the stone grey on my mixing palette had somehow got into my skin mix and now she looks rather pale and undead. I'll have to fix her later today.

Death Marshals: part 1

2011-05-16T21:46:00.002+01:00

So you've seen the treatment given to The Judge in a previous post (albeit briefly) and I needed my Death Marshals to follow suit. I have managed to get a good look through a couple of the Miniature Mentor vids which have been very useful in opening my mind to new ways of painting. I had three Death Marshals in which to improve things, especially the overcoat – this is how things began.

I apologise for the photo quality. My spot lamp is being used at full strength so there's a harsh highlight in some of the pix.

The Marshal above is close to completion – he only needs his base and a few details finishing – though he doesn't like his photo taken it seems. The cloak was given a Beastial Brown basecoat then liberally washed in Devlan Mud as per the previous post. I wasn't particularly happy with where that was going so I gave it a watered down coat of Beastial Brown all over except the deep recesses. I then gradually added more and more Bleached Bone to the mix, maintaining a very watery consistency throughout, going over the coat again and again. The beauty of this approach is that you get get very subtle graduations and highlights/shadows without doing any actual blending. The result was a very light tan coloured coat which was a bit bright so I went back and gave the whole thing another watered down coat of Beastial Brown, re-coating until I was happy.

The second Death Marshal was started last night using the same technique. This time I watered down the paint even further and took the highlights lighter, without lightening the coat as a whole. It does need a little more work before knocking the whole thing back with the Beastial Brown.

When it comes time to do Death Marshal number 3 I shall try to get some step by step shots on the go to explain the procedure better.

In order to differentiate holsters and straps from the coat I used Scorched Earth as a starting point. The coffin featured in the opening picture used a mix of Beastial Brown and Snakebite Leather (50:50) as a starting point. Bleached Bone was added to highlight with a final highlight of Skull White.

To be continued…

The Opposition…

2011-05-16T13:40:00.002+01:00

I was away in Manchester last week, putting up then taking down a client's exhibition stand at GMEX (or whatever they call it nowadays) so had no access to my painting table. This weekend was also out as my wife had arranged a nice getaway in the country which was fantastic. However, this did mean that it's been almost a week since paint was applied to any part of my Malifaux crew.

I did manage to get a little time last night and I think I have moved up a rung (just one!) on the painting skill ladder. One thing that 3x Death Marshalls and The Judge will help with is the painting of long sweeping overcoats and, thanks to a few vids I've seen recently, I applied some fresh techniques (for me) with very nice results. More on that in a later post.

While I was away I received an email from my Malifaux opponent Bull containing a couple of pix of his expanded Viktoria crew. As you can see, having done a boat-load of reading, he has gone for some Ronin and a Convict Gunslinger. Not sure what that means exactly for my own crew but no doubt there are some nasty tactics/actions/triggers in there somewhere.

Seems I have more reading to do…

More Ebay auctions…

2011-05-09T06:49:00.000+01:00

This weekend saw more of my back catalogue hitting the shelves of Ebay – this time books.

There are a handful of 40k codecies available – Blood Angels, Space Wolves, Dark Angels, Daemons plus Planetstrike not to mention three Flames of War rulebooks, which I believe are quite difficult to get hold of these days.

Hidden amongst this little lot is an OOP Rackham gem – Rhazeem the Insane.

More coming over the next few weeks, but for now happy bidding!

The Dark Templar auctions at Ebay

As always if you're a visitor to this blog let me know after you've won the auction and I'll send you a revised invoice with a discount to p&p.

First Blood with Malifaux…

2011-05-07T19:14:00.004+01:00

So the beginning of this weekend was all about PLAYING Malifaux for the first time arther than just reading or talking about it.

The board was ready, we (myself and best man/gaming partner Bull) had dug out some semi-appropriate terrain from the massive 40k collection, models were painted – kind of – (actually my Scales of Justice wasn't even built properly and the Death Marshals were barely clothed, but who cares when you're out on your maiden voyage).

We actually got three games in over Friday evening and Saturday which has been a fantastic learning experience, if slow to start. I took some photos along the way, though they're not in any order they do show off the gaming board I think!

Game 1 on Friday night was a very slow affair (nearly 4 hours by my reckoning) and was full of mistakes on both sides, but fun none the less – the red wine helped. A good night's sleep and early morning bacon sarnie later and we were raring for Game 2 – infinitely faster, still contained mistakes but also had an element of strategy and tactics to our play. A fantastic lunch followed (thank you Mr. Bull) accompanied by gaming (and none-gaming) chat and we decide to squeeze in a Game 3 (outside in the sunshine!) before my trek back to the coast. Strategies and Schemes were decided and this became a very tactical affair and less of the pub-kicking seen in the previous games. Very few mistakes (we think), much better use of cheating fate and soulstones, though we're still in the learning curve.

So, outcomes and conclusions?

First of all we both agreed this is a fantastic game, and has so much potential for character/plot driven gaming it's all very exciting – I haven't had a gaming buzz like this in a very long time so thank you Wyrd! Virtually every member of your crew is an individual (certain in the case of the Viktorias' crew) so there's lots of individual rules to learn and remember, but the game is so much better for it.

The board and terrain worked exceptionally well. There have been plenty of creative chats over the last 24hrs about terrain moving forward and terrain-driven encounters, so that is exciting.

The crews worked well and provided plenty of entertainment, despite both being primarily melee orientated. I'm still trying to find a use for The Judge – he just didn't seem able to contribute much over the 3 games. Lady J is the absolute nuts in combat and I even had success with her pistols on occasion – she can be vulnerable in defence though so you have to pick your fights and not get outnumbered I think. Bull struggled a little with Bishop, although we both agreed the potential was there. We didn't see much of Johan and he was put on the sub's bench after the first game to give the Vikki's more soulstones. Taelor was rather fantastic and I think Lady J has built up a bit of a grudge against her thanks to the pain she's been over these games! Bull also took issue with the sword Vikki miniature and more specifically the hand joints which kept falling off they were so delicate.

Very eager now to get painting the rest of the crew – Lady J and even The Judge looked good but the rest looked awful on the table (hence few photos). I'm also keen to try new units but I won't make any fresh purchases until this little lot is complete.

Malifaux Board: part 4

2011-05-02T15:38:00.003+01:00

Malifaux Board: part 3
Malifaux Board: part 2
Malifaux Board: part 1

I had planned the layout of the board quite a few weeks ago.

The original idea behind the project was to have a Malifaux board that would represent the downtown or more built up areas of the city, as this is something that doesn't seem to have been covered much – people mainly sticking to wild west, bayou or outland terrain.

Why a big X? I wanted the board to be a crossroads of sorts – kind of like The Five Points district in Gangs of New York. In order to ensure the join between the two halves of the board didn't appear down the middle of one of the roads the "+" layout became a "x".

First thing I marked up the board with pencil lines and put down some brown/green to represent the areas for buildings/terrain. I then covered the road/pavement areas in a mid grey. Due to the volume of paint required I was using emulsion tester pots, mixed with a little gaming acrylic, rather than blow my entire paint collection.

With this done I cut a piece of foamboard to the required size and carved myself a stamp to represent the paving and edging. This involved marking the design on the foamboard, taking off the top layer of card (or some of it at least), and going at the design with a scalpel and a file. Once complete I covered the surface in light grey paint from a tester post and pressed onto the board – just like potato printing as a kid! The design was repeatable so that all the pavements could be printed seamlessly. I made an additional stamp for the corners where the roads met.

I gave this a half hour to dry while I carved out a stamp for the cobbles. This was done as a square so that the cobbles in the side roads would match the main road in orientation – with hindsight I might've decided not to do this. Using the same method as the pavements, the cobbles were printed using the new stamp.

And there we have it. I have to admit I like where it is going, and the potato printing technique worked out better than I thought it would. The distressed, graphic look of the paving is great and ideal for Malifaux. I have a couple of ruined buildings and a stack of terrain to fill the areas next to the roads – I intend to build a graveyard using GW trees soon specifically for this board.

A couple of things to note – the board is not finished, the grey paint used was a bit too light and is quite busy on the eye, so I want to go back in with my full paint set and give the board more depth, highlights/shadows, some washes and details. However, for the purposes of the game this weekend I am happy – my poor wife has had to put up with the boards dominating the kitchen area for a couple of weeks now, so if nothing else it's time to give her a break.

There are things I would do differently if I were to attempt this again, but nothing major. The next time you see this board should be a post game report and then again when I get round to adding more paint.

I hope you enjoyed this project (so far) as much as I have and if you try something yourself do let me know – I'd love to see how someone else tackled it.

Malifaux Board: part 3

2011-05-01T22:08:00.005+01:00

Malifaux Board: part 2
Malifaux Board: part 1

Things had been going pretty well with the boards this far so I shouldn't have been suprised when I had a bit of a 'mare when it came to the paint stage.

I had banked on my can of textured spray to give the boards a light coat that could be painted over. Unfortunately the nails I'd used were larger than necessary and insisted, in some cases, to sit proud of the playing surface which would not do at all. The can of textured spray made no impact on this issue and indeed failed to cover both boards with sufficient texture at all. My solution was to use some filler and a palette knife to disguise the protruding nails and add additional texture dotted around to hide the filled nails(!).

I then resorted to a tried and tested route of covering the whole board in some leftover emulsion paint (in this case "Toasted Almond") with some basing sand mixed in to add texture. This did a great job of covering both boards and unifying the filler. Only problem was there was now too much texture for a cobbled city street – would have been fantastic for a wild west environment – so I quickly sanded down the worst of it and got rid of any stones or large clumps of sand.

I then went to get some paint to start the dressing up of the boards – Craig and Rose's 1829 period colour range from B&Q "Clove Brown". Unfortunately the tester pot I'd bought wasn't really enough to cover the lighter beige underneath in one coat, leaving streaks.

Whilst I left the boards to dry I had a think and came up with the next stage of the painting plan. I took the remains of the Clove Brown paint and mixed it in a roller tray with some black artists' acrylic and a reasonable amount of water. I then coated the boards thoroughly in this dark wash to knock everything back and give me a decent basecoat from which to start painting the details. By pure chance it worked out quite well – if only I'd have thought more about it sooner I could have avoided unnecessary expense and effort.

Malifaux Board: part 4

Malifaux Board: part 2

2011-04-30T15:18:00.005+01:00

Malifaux Board: part 1

Nothing else got done after the last post before we went away for Easter.

First thing this morning I was out to get the remaining bits of wood needed to finish the second half of the board. I had ordered some 15mm magnets from Ebay that arrived this morning also, so it was full steam ahead. Unfortunately the wind had really picked up today, so there was sawdust blowing everywhere and dowling pegs being blown off the table into the gaps in the decking – grrr.

By early afternoon the two boards were complete including the magnets. I had concerns that the magnets would be too powerful and/or cause problems if the holes on either board didn't line up exactly. I need not have worried as the boards snap softly together and allow a little movement to align them exactly.

My woodworking skills are a little rusty since high school (some 20+ years ago) so at the moment the frames don't quite sit flat. A bit of sanding down will solve that but I'll wait till a less windy day. Similarly I had my can of texture spray paint ready for the next stage but it would be futile trying to spray in this weather.

Hopefully I can progress things a little more tomorrow – need to make sure all the nails are flush and then coat the boards with texture so I can begin painting on Monday – fingers crossed!

Malifaux Board: part 3

Malifaux Board: part 1

2011-04-20T22:30:00.002+01:00

Ok, I said I'd blog the progress on my Malifaux board, so here we go – not much to see yet.

I've cut my hardboard into two 3'x1.5' pieces – so when put together they make up a 3'x3' playing area. I managed to get a frame pinned under one board before it went dark, but the other one will have to wait.

I'm going to try and get that done tomorrow evening, however we'll be mad busy getting ready to go "up north" to visit the family first thing Friday – and the mother-in-law is round for dinner – so it's not looking good. Looking more likely to be done on Bank Holiday Monday in just over a week's time.

Going to experiment with some large magnets, glued into the frames, to get the two boards to 'snap' together.

Once that's done I have a tin of textured spray paint to cover the playing side – not too textured though – to help cover the nails and get a uniform surface to paint up. Got a template drawn up for some cobbled streets which will do.

Malifaux Board: part 2

Twosome…

2011-04-17T19:51:00.001+01:00

After an afternoon at Salute yesterday Lady Justice got a bit more attention, to the point she is almost complete. I want to redo her skin and add some more shadows to her hair. I also need to finish her sword handle and part of a holster I missed!

The Judge got some time last night too, plus a bit more today. I had to stop as I am struggling to identify a couple of bits on his weapon and boots – bit of picture searching later on to resolve that. His cloak came out quite well after a lot of work, and I managed to pull his hair round after it was in a real state. His jeans were painted to match Justice, as will the Death Marshals'. My attempt at nmm is improving, but I've decided to stick with it for a couple of reasons – 1. I'm stubborn and really want to crack it and 2. I think the comic book feel it adds is great and would be lost going back to metallic paint, though I nearly caved last night.

The Death Marshals have been waiting patiently for their turn under the spotlight, and they each got 5 minutes this afternoon as I added some layers to their cloaks. It's all looking a bit ropey at the moment, but I'm not worried as this is how The Judge's looked 24 hours ago.

I also have my first game(s) booked in the diary for the beginning of May so there is a deadline. Unfortunately I am away for two weeks between now and then, so I get a couple of evenings this week and a couple the week I get back before show time. If I can get the Judge and Justice finished and varnished I'll be happy – not too worried about the Marshals, and I don't want to rush them.

I also want to build a 3x3 gaming board for the game – just the board, no terrain – which will dent my painting time available. I have board cut to size, and I have a painting plan. If everything goes as I would like it should look pretty cool and I will of course blog all about it's construction.