Gav THOOOOOOORPE!

You've been the constant butt of my jokes whilst working at Games Workshop. In fact, I came close to writing a series of comics that revolved around you and the other UK designers and your fantastic shenanigans.

I thought the 3rd edition Eldar Codex was the worst thing in the world, and I think I had complaints about most everything you've written in the past as well. However, you're leaving GW and I'm not happy.

Looking back at your body of work, it doesn't look balanced, or competative, it looks fun. I had fun with most every one of your books (except Codex: Eldar you jerk!), and I'm very sad to see you go. I will shed a tear, and hope that you do something very interesting and exciting in the future. I just hope it's in miniatures/board/RPG gaming and not Video Games like Tuomas, and Andy.

Also, the 7th edition Vampire Counts book is the greatest codex/army book ever written. You left on a high note for sure!

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Working Title

So just what have I been working on? Well, my interests are so varied these days I seem to peck away at many different things, accomplishing nothing. This isn't really the way I want to go, and so I've decided to focus on my WARMACHINE Cygnar army right now.

This is very hard, because my Dark Age keeps staring me in the eye; I just bought Hybrid and the Nemesis expansion by Rackham and I'm dying to play that (only, I have to finish painting the models first); and today Strategies got in a pre-release copy of the new Vampire Counts book, which just fuels the fire. I now have to finish my High Elves in order to justify doing a new army.

Like that will happen. I predict myself, come March, jumping into the Vampire Counts so deep that I'll need a lifeguard to get me out.

Which brings me to a sort of a rant (not on lifeguards). Why the hell didn't they update all the High Elf models? To say that I'm a fan of the High Elves is an understatement. They're my first army for any wargame... Ever, and I've been waiting six years for that book (yes, that's right, from day one of the last book (which was god-awful)), and I have NO MOTIVATION to redo my High Elf army. Sure I'm using models that are 12 years old and were painted by my 10 year old self, but with hardly any new models I can't muster up any energy to do a new army. Whereas with the Vampire Counts, I'm dying to sink into those new skeletons.

I'm hoping that they get around to doing the High Elf models later. Here's what I want to see:

+New Archers
+New Silver Helms
+New Ellyrion Reavers
+New Swordmasters
+New White Lions
+Some good Shadow Warriors for a change

That's not THAT much...

Anyways I know I always post painting lists, and I rarely adhere to them, but I'm gonna do so again in hopes that I will streamline one to a point where it's stickable.

+WARMACHINE
+High Elves
+Vampire Counts
+Confrontation Cynwäll (yeah I'm using the old paintable ones!)/Hybrid models
+Flames of War
+Eldar
+Dark Age

I'm not happy with Dark Age and Eldar being that low, but I really need to finish some Flames of War, post-haste!

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P.S. I'm getting closer to actually doing some work on my wargame. I bought a ton of hex bases, and hex flying bases. That's right, I'm using hex bases in my wargame!

Hmm...

Well, I didn't post any pictures from my planned "Painting Bonanza" from yesterday. This is because I didn't paint anything yesterday. I got dragged (kicking and screaming, of course) to play Descent (one of my favorite boardgames) at a friend's house, then I went to work.

I'll get on that whole 'painting thing' later, honest.

In other news I finally got my AT-43 books, and have been pouring over them concocting crazy army lists and everything. So far, I have 1045 points of UNA stuff.

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AT-43 Repaints

For some reason I thought this deserved a seperate post.

I'm going to try and fit in the finishing touches to this one AT-43 UNA trooper that I've been toying with to find the right color scheme for my army. I realized I don't paint enough green and so I'm going to use a mixture of Citadel/Foundation paints and P3 paints to get this guy done. I'm almost finished. I'll post a picture of him tomorrow.

This picture business all depends on if I can get a hold of a digital camera tomorrow, which may be scarce. I'm hoping I can.

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PAINT DAY!

I'm so excited for tomorrow. I haven't had a chance to paint anything in over a week. I don't work until 6pm so I'm gonna try and get something done. I'm not gonna bother with my RPG miniatures (Barbarian for my D&D RPGA Living Greyhawk campaign (Rackham's Drac Mac Syro), or my Elf Paladin for my regular D&D campaign (a Reaper fig)) because our group's going through a transition right now.

I have these projects to choose from:

+Warhammer Dwarfs (still)
+Warhammer 40,000 Eldar (have to get these dudes done. I still have them from when I quit GW and I need to get them ready for the Apocolypse supplement)
+Dark Age Forsaken
+WARMACHINE Cygnar
+Confrontation Cynwall (no rush on these guys as I want to see the new list for the new Confrontation game before I go about redoing my army)
+AT-43 UNA (I hate prepaints and will actually paint these)
+Flames of War Americans
+Epic Blood Angels

I'm thinking I'll do some Dwarfing, followed by some Dark Age here and there. I only have 8 models to do for a 500 point force so you'd think I'd be able to get it done. Afterwards I wanna get my WARMACHINE done before I tackle the mammoth task that is doing over 3000 points of Eldar.

God I love painting!

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P.S. I'm working on my very own Miniatures Game using 28-30mm models. I'm still working on the rules, and I want to get it patented before I go further with it, but I'm pretty pumped. I've written countless rules systems over the course of my 11 years of gaming, but I've never settled on one I like. I'll be taking the best bits of all the rules I've done, and mooshing them into this one game. I'm hoping it'll actually be fun to play (which is key). Idealy I want to form my own games company and publish it, but those are lofty goals.

P.P.S. I'm also working on an essay-ish (well-formed) argument on pre-painted models, and why I think they're bad for the hobby. I'll post it here.

Dark Age Review

So I played my first game of Dark Age against a friend who's played for the first time as well. It was his Dragyri Ice Caste against my St. Mary Forsaken. I fielded two Clergy Ann; 1 Warwind; 2 Strikes; and three firestorm with leader. He had a Soul Warden; Ice Elemental; Death's Device; some spearslaves; some slingslaves; and... Some other... Type of slaves... Anyways it was 500 points.

I dropped his Soul Warden with spearslaves with a few turns of carefully placed shots from the Clergy Ann (the Soul Warden dropped in 1 turn!). My Strikes ate up a squad of spear slaves on the right flank only to get into combat with the Ice elemental and some more spearslaves. They managed to survive and even do a couple wounds to the elemental before my Warwind came in and dropped the Ice Elemental to one wound.

Before they could finish it off a Death's Device came in and minced the Strikes, and the Ice Elemental finished off the Warwind. Then, all that stuff made it over to the Clergy Ann-dominated left flank and ate them up. My Clergy Ann made the Death's Device roll alot of dice, but alas it only took one wound before slicing the Clergy Ann to ribbons.

And what of the Firestorm? Well... They killed one slingslave, then blew themselves up.

What I learned from the game is that Clergy Ann and Warwinds kick ass. Strikes are bad ass too, I'd like to have more of them, but at 70 points a pop they're something I'll invest in in a bigger points game. I have to say that I'm not at all happy with the Firestorm. I'm not saying I used them to their potential, or that my dice rolling for them wasn't the suck; but I'm gonna try my next few games with coils. Besides, the same amount of coils brings me to 495 points instead of the 486 that I was at with the Firestorm.

And the Dragyri? I found out their slaves are meat shields. I was worrying that my 8 man (or rather, woman, as I used all female sculpts) army would get done in my the slaves alone, but the only casualties I suffered (when they weren't from myself blowing up my Firestorm) were from his Death's Device, and Ice Elemental. Coincidentally the Ice Elemental's downright frightening, and the Death's Device is nothing to laugh at either. I thought I'd be able to kill it with it's paltry 3 HP but it's AR 20 is very hard to get by, even if you make him roll ridiculous amounts of dice.

All in all, I love this game. I've been playing everything GW put out for over ten years now, and lately I've been gaming nothing but non-GW games and I have to say how refreshing it is to try something new. I've played Warzone and Chronopia so some things about this system were familiar; but Dark Age is far superior in my books. I'm really looking forward to all my friends finishing their armies and us having bigger games, or just more games (don't want to bite off more than I can chew). And despite my horrible loss, I'm really impressed with how my St. Mary force performed ('cept those damned Firestorm); and am looking forward to testing my mettle in more games.

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Re: Citadel's Foundation Paints Part 2

So here's the pictures I promised from my Foundation Paint project. I finally got around to uploading them.


Primed Using Chaos Black Spray


Mechrite Red


Iyanden Darksun


Khemri Brown (pants)


Tallarn Flesh


Calthan Brown leather belts and such, Adeptus Battlegrey gun casing, Mordian Blue for those tube thingys in his... Um... Thing.


And here's all the colors I used for this project

So as you can see the model's not completely done. I still need to highlight all the colors; but at least I showed you what you can do with the Foundation paints. All the colors were painted straight over a black undercoat with one coat each. Like I said last post, these paints cover like a dream; and I've now integrated them into my regular painting routine. As for how the Foundation paints mix with the Citadel line, I'm afraid I don't have any pictures of that. Soon I'll post some of my cowboy models (we all know how soon "soon" is with me) which have all been painted with a Foundation/Citadel mix.

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Re: Citadel's Foundation Paints

At first I was skeptical about the Foundation line (as were a few other people). Mainly what I was skeptical about was the fact that these paints may be seen as redundant. I mean, for over two decades gamers have gotten by with the Citadel line; and other paint lines like it. Why would they need another paint line, especially one that's main function is to act as a basecoat?

I decided that for the Foundation paints I'd get right in and paint a model using ONLY the Foundation paints. Well... I'd have to use Citadel's metallic paints, as the Foundation line doesn't include any metallics; but everything else would be only Foundation.

What I found were the following:

+The Foundation paints cover extremely well. This shouldn't have been a surprise, as that's what the line was made to do, but goddamn those things covered like a charm. Even the yellow (Iyanden Darksun), and the red (Mechrite Red).

+They're not that thick. They aren't as thick as you'd think they'd be. I mean, they're still thicker than Citadel Paints, but hardly. The first time I tried them, I decided that I wouldn't add any water to them to think them. Blasphemy, I know; but I had to try. It went on like a dream without obscuring detail, or anything.

+They're dull colors. Probably due to the nature of the amount of pigment added (I have no clue, I'm no paint chemist... Guy...) the colors are more muted, and realistic. No Scorpion Greens here, the colors look like they'd be excellent for historical wargaming, or anyone wanting 'realistic colors' for their models.

+Adeptus Battlegrey looks like it'd be amazing for Non-Metal Metallics (NMM). I'm no NMM expert; indeed, I'm still trying to figure the damned technique out, but Adeptus Battlegrey looks like it'd be a great color to start with for NMM steel. Way better than Citadel's Shadow Grey (which is what I've always been told to start with for NMM steel).

All-in-all I'm super-impressed by these paints and if you consider these part of the full Citadel line (I don't know why you wouldn't) I'd say that it brings Citadel into a tying position with P3 for the best paintline on the market.

I'll post some pictures when I can get off my duff and take some.

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P.S. Coming soon is my review of Vallejo paints. A line I've been dying to try out for ages, but just haven't.

RE: Rackham Color

So, continuing on my 'try new paints' quest I finally tried the colors from my Rackham Color paint set I bought ages ago; and I have to say, I'm not liking them.

I like different paint lines, I think it keeps things interesting within the realm of painting and allows a broader range of colors to exist and wait to be used in combination with other paints from other ranges. However, I found Rackham Color to fall behind such paint lines as Citadel, or P3.

Rackham Color's paints are much thicker than any other paint line I've seen (even GW's Foundation line), which can usually be solved by adding water. What seemed like a bucket of water later, I had finally got the paint on my palatte to be of a fine consistancy only to see that it still goes on pretty streaky. Not to mention that when it dries it looks a bit dull. Now I'm not looking for a gloss, but the pigment just doesn't seem to stand out; and with fantasy and science-fiction models, that's what I want.

Unfortunately the paints are too vibrant for historical games, leaving Rackham Color in some sort of limbo, destined to never truly fit either genre. I thought I'd give the paint another shot, by adding less water (for whatever reason), and found that hardly anything changed. More water just made the paints, well, watery; and left me with some terrible coverage.

One thing I do like about these paints is the eye-dropper lids which can be removed from the pot should you not find eye-droppers to your liking (strange, but I've heard that complaint about Vallejo before). Personally, I think eye-droppers are brilliant and thus I don't remove the lids from the Rackham Paints. Yet, I even have a problem with the bottles, for they are in a cube shape and make for some awkward squeezing. I would have much rather preferred they keep the round design that Citadel used to use, and P3 does; or use the Vallejo skinny-bottle design (but keep those removable eye-dropper lids).

Overall, I'm not psyched about these paints, and would not recommend these to any painter. What would I recommend? P3, of course. P3 is my new favorite brand of paint, and I can't wait to flesh out my collection with the rest of the range they released. I'm pretty sure I did a P3 review somewhere on this blog, so check that out. Otherwise, I'm gone.

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P.S. I've bought and finished building, basing, and priming my Dark Age models and will start working on them on the 28th of June, after my Warhammer Dwarfs are completed. Strategies is having a huge Dwarf battle, where a fellow gamer and I will bring out a whopping 10,000+ points of Dwarfs, and take on all comers. I'm gonna be bringing out the White Dwarf, and hopefully get some pictures for this blog.

P.P.S. I'm also doing a cowboy gang for Warhammer Historicals Old West game, using Black Scorpion Miniatures (which are flipping fantastic). To paint them I'll be using a mix of Citadel and P3 paints, and I'll post pictures as they develop.

Dark Age

Check this out: Dark Age.

I've wanted to play this game since I first heard about it in 2002/2003 but a lack of players and a printed rules set turned me off. In 2005 they released a printed rules set but, again, a lack of players turned me off.

A week or so ago my boss E-Mails me out of the blue and asks if I've checked out this cool wargame called Dark Age, I told him I had, and needless to say we put our Warzone project to the side, and now we're working on our Dark Age forces. I'm doing Forsaken, St. Mark, force, and he's doing a Skaard force. I think these models are fantastic, the game's fantastic, and the artwork is fantastic (I'm a fan of Brom).

Anyways here's an updated list of current projects:
Warhammer - Dwarfs
Dark Age - St. Mary Forsaken
Warhammer Historical Old West - The Law (Black Scorpion Miniatures)
WARMACHINE - Cygnar
Warhammer 40,000 - Blood Angels
Confrontation - Cynwall
Flames of War - Americans

I hope to get those finished by August 10th when I go to Dragonflight 2007 (more on that con later), except the FoW Americans which I hope to get 600 points done by September. This'll be the summer of gaming. I have no inhibitions (work at a games shop... That's it), and nothing but time this summer.

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