Grey Ghosts

Today is the first day of my post-Christmas holidays!  My wife and daughter  have plans for today so my plan is an all day paint-a-thon!

I've got TONS of gaming scheduled over the next 2 days (D&D Ravenloft, Warzone, Pulp City & This Is Not A Test) so my plan is to use all my free time today to paint!

The first of my two projects that were half done before the day started are my Grey Ghosts for Warzone.  I haven't checked out the updated rules yet but in the previous edition Grey Ghosts had 2 special rules that made them really good on the table top.  The first was a drastically increased chance of scoring critical hits and the second (which I thought was way cooler) was that any unit taking even a single wound from Grey Ghost shooting had  to take a morale test.

The figures themselves are pretty basic being intended to be low-key infiltrators so I went with some pretty basic flat colours and washed out the gun metal even more than I normally would.  My next 2 units for Warzone will inject a bit more colour into my Imperial Army.

If all goes according to plan today (does it ever?) this will be my first of 4 projects done today.

-Jay

Imperial Barracudas

My hobby ping-pong between Pulp City and Warzone continues.

Back to Warzone today for another unit of flying Imperial soldiers.  The Imperial Barracudas are the new version of the old Rams Air Cavalry.  When miniatures get updated or get re-done people's opinions can vary on whether the new version is an improvement or not, in this case there's not much of an issue.  The old Rams Air Cav were one of the most maligned sculpts in Heartbreaker's range.  The pilot was in a squatting pose with a look on his face that really sold the total image of  someone struggling on the toilet.  If that wasn't enough the rocket/jet pack was positioned like something that would crash Wil E Coyote into the side of a mountain.

As you can see the new version is dynamically posed and the equipment manages to hit a balance between fantastic and functional looking.

I've got one more unit to get done (Grey Ghosts) for my Warzone game at the end of the month and other than that my focus should (emphasis on 'should') be Pulp City for the next week or so.

-Jay

Storm Trenchers

Back to Warzone!

I'm getting ready to play some larger games of Warzone at the end of the month and to that end I have 3 new units to paint between now and the 30th of December.  First up I finished my Imperial Storm Trenchers today.

The Storm Trenchers are basically regular Trenchers geared up for close in fighting with shotguns and explosives who have jet packs to help them close the distance between themselves and their opponents quickly.  I think the models are really cool and original and I have to confess that if I'd been designing miniatures with the World War One British Expeditionary Force as their inspiration I don't think jet packs would have crossed my mind.

So that's jet packs....I think full-on flight packs will be next!

-Jay

Imperial reinforcements have arrived!

A little while back I painted an Imperial starter box for Warzone, since then I've been building the odd thing here and there and contemplating what to add to my small force.

After shooting a video with Ash for his channel Guerrilla Miniature Games Prodos decided to hook us up with more models to play with so it looks like instead of my scattershot "buy what I can" approach I'll be fielding an Imperial Regular Army force.

Big thanks to Prodos and I'm hoping to  be showing these off painted within the next 2 weeks.

-Jay

Back to the future for more Warzone!

During my lunch break today I built my next Warzone unit; the Imperial Special Forces.

Prodos makes a number of specific special forces units but they also produce this generic special forces box to represent all of their lesser known elite units.  The weird part of the experience for me with this box is that I found the trenchers from the starter box to fit together extremely well and these guys were a lot more fussy and were not at all easy to get together in spite of having the same basic fits and builds as the trenchers.

These guys will probably end up being a bit of a speed painting project as I really want to get past them and get to my unit of Blood Berets and Blood Beret themed Doomtroopers.

So now that I've built theses I have about 5 separate projects on my desk fighting for my attention.  I'm as curious as you all are to see what I actually put paint to next...

-Jay

First (of two) Imperial NCOs done!

My plan was to be checking in today and showing you two painted NCOs for the Imperial corporation....well one out of two ain't bad?

My second NCO is just as completed as this one but unfortunately also has a flag (not a banner, an actual flag) that is lagging behind the schedule.  For my first WarZone game (countdown, that's 6 days away) I need to complete that flag and then paint my universal carrier.

Tomorrow morning before work I'm going to try to get two more Broken Contract figures done, and then circle back to that flag after work.

-Jay

First two Imperial Trencher squads done!!

Of my first two time-sensitive projects from the start of the week the first one is now done!!

Ten Imperial Trenchers for WarZone.  Trenchers are the basic line infantry of the Imperial (British themed) mega-corporation.

Once I get the two Imperial NCOs and Universal Carrier I have done my buddy Ash and I will be giving the new beta playtest rules for WarZone a try.

The Trenchers were cool figures to paint although I have to admit I struggled a bit with their Imperial shoulder flashes.  Either those things used to big bigger on Heartbreaker's metal models for WarZone or in my old age (this is way more likely) I'm starting to really struggle with fine details.

I've got some daytime activities planned with Zoe and then hopefully I'll get my four Brahmin finished tonight.

-Jay

Did my absence make your hearts grow fonder?

Wow, a full week without a post...don't think I've done that before....

Last week was a bit of a write-off hobby-wise.  No dramatic problems just came down with a bit of the flu and ended up sacking out every night right after work.

Even though I didn't finish anything last week I figured I'd throw a post up here just to let everyone know I was still here and more hobby-goodness is on the way.

So until something actually gets finished enjoy a work-in-progress shot of my Capitol Free Marines.

-Jay

Some of Big Bob Watts' friends

 

Mitch Hunter

Today I painted up my second Capitol Doomtrooper; Mitch Hunter.  For most people who have a passing familiarity with the Mutant Chronicles universe Mitch Hunter is the main guy you tend to see on the cover of rulebooks and he has been a staple presence in every game (board, miniature, card, RPG) release.

The figure itself is very cool on it's own merits.  He has loads of gear and pouches so he is a bit more detailled than alot of Warzone figures of his original era but he isn't overdone (as special characters can sometimes be) to the extent that he doesn't fit in with the army he's meant to lead.

I'm very excited about finishing up some of the older Warzone figures I still had kicking around so I can dive whole-hog into the new stuff (which looks excellent) when it comes out.

-Jay

Doom Trooper/Sea Lion Officer Mitch Hunter

 

Another blast from the past.....the forgotten forces.....

To properly see the humour in this situation I hope you'll all indulge me in a longer than usual pre-amble to today's content.

As a veteran painter and gamer I found over the years that I make 2 distinct and separate types of hobby purchases; stuff I'm buying to paint and use in that game/tournament/con/league that is already scheduled, and stuff I'm buying because I think it's cool and even though I don't "need it" I'm sure I'll get around to it eventually (affectionately known by most gamers as their backlog).  And so my tale of confusion begins....
Around 20 years ago I was working in my FLGS when my boss informed me he wanted me to start pushing a new upstart game called WarZone.  WarZone was a 28mm sci-fi game set the dark future of the Mutant  Chronicles game universe.  As soon as I read the rulebook I was hooked!  It was like 40K meets the rapture with a cyberpunk ashetic laid over the whole thing.  I presented the book and promo materials to my in-store game groups and started taking orders, personally I was the most excited by the Imperial Army....unfortuantely....so was everyone else.  I realized the game was going to tank in our shop if we didn't showcase other forces and figures so I put aside the Imperial figures I had ordered for myself (knowing someday I would get back around to them) and instead painted up a Dark Legion (zombie, mutant, chaos-monsters) force so all my customers would have a force to play against.  The games were fun and I enjoyed my Dark Legion force (and got plenty of use out of it over the years) but I was still regretting not painting my Imperials.  After a couple of years I moved out west and found a new group of gamers who I hoped I could coral into WarZone....and they all wanted to play Imperial as well....so I painted a new Capitol Army and carried on.
Fast forward to last week.  While working on my Fallout project I cam across some remnants from my old Capitol army that I knew would be great for my friend Stan's NCR force, as I'm no longer at a place in my hobby-life where I have to get things done for a deadline I figured it was time to dig out my old Imperial Blood Berets and give them the paint jobs they'd waited so patiently for all theses years.  It took me about an hour to prep the figures

See, all ready to go!

 

 

 

Then I remembered I really should finish my Fallout mercs and that I would have plenty of time to paint my Blood Berets next week, so all I had to do was tuck these guys away in a figure case until I had time for them.  So, I dug out a figure case to put them and found this...

If it's unclear, that exactly what I just decided to do, only twice as much, already painted.

 

 

So not only have I already had this idea once, I had completely forgotten that I had done it.  On one hand I cursed my stupidity, on the other hand if I did paint the 7 guys I just assembled I would have a playable force almost right away.  I thought maybe instead though I should add some Golden Lions.  Just as I was about to start taking mold lines off a pristine fresh from the blister packs squad of Golden Lions I suddenly thought; "gee I wonder what else is in that figure case?"

Not completely finished but maybe another 2 hours worth of work.

 

So I guess the moral of my story is; if you've been doing this for 20+ years and you think a project would be cool....just double check and make sure it's the first time you're thinking that.

-Jay