Blood for the Blood Bowl God

I recently converted this figure up to repurpose him as a vampiric Blood Bowl player. He’s an old miniature from the characterful late eighties early nineties Citadel Night Horrors range. 

Snipped off his hand and replaced it with one from the modern GW human plastic spruce. Job Done.

Happy Halloween all ! 

Tale of Four Gamers Part 8: The Carrion Throng

For this month I decided to paint something a bit different and break up painting foot soldiers for a while. These models are great - although the undead birds all have the same basic body they are come with very different and marvellously sculpted heads to give them all a different feel.

I was missing a rider but luckily I was a backer in Diego Serrate's Pantheon of Chaos Kickstarter and the little hooded freebie dude with a scythe fits perfectly in both style and logistically - i.e he doesn't look too precarious sat on the back of his mount.

Enjoy!

Tale of Four Gamers Part 7 : The Burgeoning Cannibal Throng

So this month I knocked out another thirteen ghouls. I really enjoyed painting these carrion-eating wretches as I kept up quite a pace while doing so. There's a mixture of middlehammer Morley in here as well as some of the classic Night Horrors range.

Here they are mixed in with ghouls I painted back in month number one - which now feels a very long time ago!

Although collectively thirteen ghouls are 104 points my total so far in the challenge is 1074 which puts me well over the 1050 I needed by now. Just another 426 to go!

Tale of Four Gamers Nerves of Lead Part 5

So we're officially now half way through this challenge. So far Steve, Matthew and I have been level pegging it with the challenge so far and painting the required amount each month with Adam sadly having only completed one month's worth so far.

 News on the grapevine is Matthew won't be completing his minis this month and Adam will (hurrah!) so still all to play for in my book...

So this month is more skelly warriors with swords and shields, nine in all which come to 99 points between them. The absolutely classic screaming skull catapult adds another 60 so this months total is 159 points.

End of 2016 Sumup

 About time I did this before we get into 2018 right?  Well first up is those miniatures you didn't see but which I did paint up in 2016 but did not post because I was tired/lazy/unreliable (delete as appropriate).
  First up is a unit of Not-UNIT which will find themselves fighting off Daleks and Cybermen in a Doctor Who game soon. A pity a lot of Crooked Dice Miniatures' Not Doctor Who range is disappearing under the watchful eye of BBC lawyers, in the advent of the official Doctor Who game from Warlord (if it ever comes...)

Next up some miniatures needed for a Mordheim game at Warhammer World this weekend. Some for the random encounters table; the big guy for my own warband.

The ogre is from the Attack of the Ogre Horde Heroquest Expansion. Because the best thing about Heroquest is it's figures here he is with every other Heroquest figure I have that is painted (wizard not painted by me by the way)

I did have some Judge Dredd and a Sea Devil photographed too but I messed up the focus. Like I said   - unreliable.

127 models painted this year compared to 73 last year. Wowsers (yep I'm gonna use that word). I put it down to the challenges I put myself under. The Four Gamers and my own challenge to paint a Blood Axe warband certainly kept me going. I'm not particularly motivated by quantity - if I painted one fabulous Greater Spined Dragon all year I'd be happy - but it's a good measure of my painting speed and my commitment.

Gaming highlight of the year. This monster! - http://littleleadpeople.blogspot.co.uk/2016/08/bring-out-your-lead-epic-warhammer.html

OTT, slow, insane and all consuming - I needed to go home after it. But a mind blowing gaming spectacle I'm likely not to experience again anytime soon. Thanks to Snickit, Garth and everyone else's name who I have already forgot for the experience. Incidentally it was also my post with the highest views this year. Over 600.

Release of the year - Blood Bowl. Yes I know it's not a new game and really the tinsy number of changes GW have made to the league rules and Gutter Runners are over-powered or insignificant but it's back and thousands of people are playing  across the world who have never played it before.

It's a fantastic game (in my humble GW's best game) and it always has been and it's great to see that passion for it back among so many even if the core of the game has not changed one jot. And it means I can get games of it without travelling on a train to Rotherham or Doncaster which can only be a good thing.

On top of that I admin'ed the Oldhammer Facebook groups for a while which was hard and in the end too hard (started to feel like kinda like a job). They're great groups but as with that type of forum there's a lot of crap which is unrewarding that comes with it. Shout out to Warlord Paul, thansants, Steve Casey,  James Taylor, Steve Klatcheff, James Armstead and Chris Sabick for protecting the community from the spammers and monsters.

Image courtesy of Realm of Chaos 80s blog

Other highlights included finding an amiable bunch of gamers spread thin but wide around the North of England ( a few of which are Oldhammer admins or were at some point) but play like minded old games but sometimes D&D and sometimes less common fare like Pulp Alley.

2016 was a great year for gaming. Next year more GM'ing, more scenery, finish the Four Gamers challenge, more focus ( I have a project spreadsheet!) and a MASSIVE Doctor Who game in March co-GM'ed with thansants (more on that later). On top of that I'm getting married. Peace.

Tale of Four Gamers : Nerves of Lead Part 3

For this month's entry I decided to bite the bullet and actually get a substantial number of troopers done in earnest. I just love skellies. I don't know why but they are simple to paint if unarmored and the old Citadel ones are some of the best.  But this little lot is a whole hotch potch.

I don't know where the clumsier sculpts are from. They are preslotta - I suspect they're Ral Partha. There's a citadel one on the end from the C18 range. The grave guard and drummer are pure Middlehammer Citadel while the guys at the back are actually Foundry (under the alias Casting Room miniatures) and so quite modern but with a definite old school vibe about them.

Here's a close up of the back row in case you want a closer look.

I really like these sculpts and so I think I'll get more of them. I love that they have sculpted expressions on what (should be) static skulls.

This lot come to 130 points. However I overcompensated in month 1 by painting 172 points so with the grand total so far of 452 points I am somehow still on target.

So what's next for December? Well there will probably be more boney offerings but of quite a different ilk... Stay tuned for more on that.

Chaotic Villager - The Flasher

Over at the Oldhammer forum Axiom has been running a challenge to convert/paint a collection of models who form an imaginary C49 Chaotic Villagers range - a nice twisted parallel cousin to the classic Citadel C46 Villagers range (which followers of this blog would know I'm a big fan of).

I've ummed and ah'ed for months now about what I would contribute. Having nothing that could be used as it is, I knew I would have to convert something. I came up with a couple of ideas that were eventually dispensed with until I found a very plastic modelI got with a third party Blood Bowl vendor.

Originally this fella had a nappy where his mutation now sits. I shaved it off with a modelling knife and sculpted the eyeball on with greenstuff. After it set I then finished off by modelling his eyelid and tentacles.

 It was a doddle to paint although the model is lacking somewhat in detail.

There were are - Heinrich the villager flasher. Best avoid the bulge under his coat.

Tale of Four Gamers : Nerves of Lead Part 1

In time for this year's Bring Out Your Lead, four wise gamers decided to resurrect the Tale of Four Gamers challenge from yesteryear (now resurrected again as Tale of Four Warlords in the current White Dwarves).

The mission to paint 100 points of troops a month using the army lists from Third Edition Warhammer Fantasy Battle, blog about it and then beat the snot out of each other in a 1000 point ruck. It seems they had a wonderful time of it. Orlygg's fantastic account of the battle is here.

I prodded a few others to continue this fine tradition for BOYL 2017 and so thantsants , Matthew, Adam and yours truly struck a deal to continue this fine tradition. Matthew had the idea to make it 150 points a month for 10 months.

Warlord Paul agreed to adjudicate and call us to his office if we didn't do what we promised.

And so we four struck out on our quest in September : well apart from Adam.

Adam left his painting to the last minute and then got too hungover to start it. But that's another story.

I chose the undead.  I have had an (un)healthy obsession with walking corpses since my formative years and this challenge gave me a chance to let it free.

The necromancer Neil L Far-Aged comes to 60 points, the four ghouls come to 32 points together and the mummy another 80 points making a grand total of 172 points!

The ghouls were lovely to paint and despite being from different ranges they look great together.

It's nearing mid-October and I'm yet to get painting on the next 150 points so I'd best get to it pronto!

The Villager's Party grows

Some of you may remember I painted up Corabell from Terror of the Lichemaster some time ago. She also features as 'Libertine' in the excellent C46 Villager range from Citadel Miniatures.

I've finished her basing and now given her a couple of companions of questionable character!

 The old fella in the middle is the 'Pedlar' from the C46 Travelling Players range of 1987. It's my favourite of all the civilians so far. There's so many small details and hidden surprises in the miniature and it tells a real story. Obviously the guy is tired but still ever so keen to sell his wares - presumably he's pointing the feathers trying to claim they are from some exotic bird? It's a Copplestone sculpt - a great sculptor and a concept that really plays to his strengths.

The second fellow is far less wholesome - he's named 'Scragger Luke' and from the C04 Thieves range. Apparently designed by the Perry Twins but it does beg the question, which one of the brothers? Maybe not as clean a sculpt (the knife isn't well formed and the legs are bandy) but an interesting sculpt nonetheless. He seems to be defending his loot - maybe from the local law enforcement? Something about it shrieked Native American to me so even though such a nation never existed in the Warhammer World this is how I painted him.

I have more from these fascinating ranges sitting untouched in drawers at the moment and I'm really keen to paint some more once my busy painting schedule quietens down a bit!

 

Onwards and onwards...

  Bring Out Your Lead is an inspiring event and one that reminded me I really need to actually game more so with that flame being lit I've now committed to a number of projects and actually got a couple of things painted!
  I loved the idea of the Tale of Four Gamers resurrection performed by Paul, James, Chico and Steve so I've enrolled some like minded souls (Adam, Matthew and thantsants) to participate in the same challenge this year with Paul stewarding. 1000 points of Fantasy Chaos Slaanesh - 100 points a month. No problem (*cough*)

  I've also enrolled in Paul's 2nd ed 40K Genestealer Coven V Genestealer Coven bloodbath for next BOYL which sees one side try to cleanse the impure evolution of the other, much in the same ilk of a Dalek civil war. Test model for that coming soon!

My watchmen crew for the Batman Miniatures game has another addition (the Comedian). At the rate of one model every six months I might get a game in by the end of 2017.

   

The Comedian...

And 'pals'...

I've played some Dredd again recently and painted up this combat droid as a merc to accompany my mobsters. It's about time my Goliaths were retired as proxies for this game (I have a few unpainted minis hanging around for this game) so I'm resolved to get a proper gang.. and a non-PDF rulebook!

   

There's also the Freehammer event coming up this October at Warhammer World where I'm probably going to be playing a Mordheim scenario against Richard Irvine and some Rogue Trader versus Curtis. Quite fun putting together those unused and unloved models from my collection for the random encounters for Nordheim.

     The Facebook link to that event is here. It's an event where like minded people can play GW games from any era with Citadel miniatures with impunity and should be great fun.

And I still haven't talked at great length at the Oldhammer Night of the Living Dead event,  Warlord Paul's Blood Bath at Orc's Drift game (using Mordheim rules), my first stab at epic this winter, my ongoing Blood Bowl league or the Winter Chaos Blood Bowl tournament in November!

  Until next time...

  

Bring Out Your Lead - Epic Warhammer Fantasy Battle 3rd Edition 'Rise of Morcar'

Over at the Oldhammer forum some ambitious types had the idea of running a game based around the idea of a massive Warhammer Fantasy Battle 3rd edition battle based around on the attempt of the Forces of Evil to summon the Ultimate Dark Lord from Heroquest Morcar. The idea was for this to be the ultimate battle between Good and Evil with literally no limits to the types and number of troops.

   Ambitious? Maybe. Foolhardy? Definitely. Fun? Hell yes.

  Luckily we had weazil on hand to try and interject some kind of order into this chaos and set some objectives and GM this spectacle. One one side were the forces of Good (Men, Elfs (High and Wood) and Dwarves) and on the side of the forces of Evil were Chaos, Orcs, Goblins, Fimir, Undead, Skaven, Chaos Dwarfs.....I think almost all races from the Old World were represented although I'm not sure if there were any Dark Elves or Nippon (but I may be wrong!).

The game started with the Fimir force in the centre of the table with Bran the Blessed and the Wizards of Morcar at a standing stone attempting to summon the Dark Lord. Realising this the Forces of Good came onto one side of the table to thwart this while to rescue Evil came in on the other. Other  standing stones were there and were needed to be erected and used to power the ritual at the main one. It was Good's job to demolish them or stop them being erected.

The Fimir in the centre got torn apart by the invading forces while the Evil Hero Bran the Blessed fell. Two other standing stones eventually fell, the Elven forces managing to hold off the Chaos and Undead on one flank.

Meanwhile another stone had little chance due to the departure of the Orcs and the dastardly but inevitable treachery of the Skaven. (The Skaven general was heard to snicker 'We only got included in Advanced Heroquest ...' in the dying embers of the battle). Meanwhile dragons turned up to slay two of the Wizards of Morcar while the other two used to magic to fly away away from the main stone which was looking increasingly under threat as an Earth Elemental appeared to knock it down in the final moments of the battle which saw the death of Morcar's sorcerers. It still stood but as a testament to Evil's shocking defeat.


Sorry if it all sounds a bit vague it probably is but as you can imagine with a game that took 8 hours and approximately 5000 troops it was quite hard to keep track of the forces I was commanding let alone the bigger picture. But it was still a thing of outstanding spectacle ( "glorious chaos").

I'm on a mission to try and find all the pictures of this battle (of which these are just a taster) that there are and I have done a good job of collating a lot from Facebook and people's blogs. Would be great to hear from you if you have some!

 If I get enough and can discern went I may even set up a more detailed report and summary if possible but will certainly seek to find a way to publish them all!

On a parting note here were the objectives passed to me by weazil which made me chuckle. They ring true on some many levels ;)

  

Blood Axe Orks Big Mob

  Sorry that I've been away for away too long ...

  Pesky real life got in the way in the form of buying a house. While I have been painting the setup at the new place in only slowly getting less chaotic and so hindering me from blogging about them or actually finding them!

  Anyway to make up for this here is a whole unit I've painted which is part of a Blood Axe Ork Army I'm preparing.

Here's pics of the unit split out:

And now altogether:

The army list is being drawn up using the rules from 'Ere We Go which is a supplement to Rogue Trader, the very ever first incarnation of what would become to be known as Warhammer 40K.

Each Ork Clan gets it's own list (a clan has it's own cultural identity) and the untrustworthy, human mimicking Blood Axes can employ humans and Ogryns in their number which attracted me due to the variety this allows me.

The army is being prepared for a Rogue Trader 'tournament' at Bring Your Own Lead in August (from the 5th to the 7th) which is probably the biggest 'Oldhammer' event in the UK. Like minded individuals play the games and field the figures of Games Workshop's golden past - it's not to be missed if you can get there.

http://bringoutyourlead.co.uk/

Corabell from Terror of the Lichemaster

I recently acquired the miniature for Corabell from the Terror of the Lichemaster scenario (the flyer of which is pictured here - courtesy of Richard 'Orclord' Hale).

I had not particularly focused on this miniature to acquire it for it's history but because I am buying a small group of villagers for a scenario of my own and she definitely fitted what I had in mind. Like many figures of its time, it has floated between ranges and has also featured in Citadel's C46 Villagers range.

Let's admit it, it's not the best sculpted or prettiest of miniatures but it does have that indefinable but yet distinctive character that much of modern GW fare lacks.

What I didn't reckon on was how hard it would be to paint! It's not clear where some features start and some finish - part of her hair could be an earring or not, it's not clear where her top finishes and her hair begins and some parts of the sculpt are quite crude (for instance her outstretched hand). Using a wash only served to accentuate these imperfections in particular on her hair and so I had to repaint that part of her all over again.

All in all a miniature I was just glad to finish painting. Apologies for the lighting. Due to a recent hurried house move I don't have access to my normal daylight lamps. I hope you enjoy the pictures!

Zombies!

A quartet of shuffling undead horrors for your perusal.

The first two are Necromunda plague zombies and despite having a sci-fi purpose they looking perfectly fine for fantasy. I mistook the pipes in their hands for bones but I figured some screwy necromancer or other weirdo has grafted metal banding to them then what the hell?

  The second is from Harlequin miniatures and the last is a classic Citadel miniature from the long gone but not forgotten Fiend Factory range. I think the first three scale well against each other even if the last one is a bit 'blobby' - still lots of Oldschool charm though!