Friday 20 May 2016

Long time no see

It's been one of those weeks

Not necessarily in a bad way, just one of those weeks.

So I've not posted for a while and that is because this week say me hit 35 years on this blue rock.  As such the weekend gone, and this weekend coming have been/are filled with lots of things to do, lots of people to see, and generally not time at all to write blog posts.  I have no issues with any of this, in fact I very much look forward to this weekend.

Of course there is a tinge of annoyance, as my car decided to mostly self destruct just before my birthday.  £400 worth of repairs is not a good birthday present.. especially when its me that has to pay.

However, this is a hobby blog, and while I resembled the grumpy remark on Monday I can at least claim I got some hobby done this week.  As you can see from the first picture I've been painting up guild ball models.  It's taking me a lot of time, I'm not as 100% into the painting mindset as I would like.  If anyone doesn't know, there are people who are mostly gamers and don't like painting, there are some painting enthusiasts who aren't big gamers, there are the rare few people who are just both at all times, and then there are people like me.  The ones who shift back and forth between the two points, and will have moments of just wanting to play the games, and others where painting is a blast and gets done really quickly.  I'm in a gaming mood right now, so the painting is on slow motion.  Still, the Alchemists are getting close to done, and then I will be looking at build a goal and painting up some commission work.

The Saturday gone was Vengeance, which sadly I didn't have a ticket for.  Something about only getting into Guild Ball after it was sold out, and not having finished painting models anyway.  Either way, with a few people I do know being there, and it being a 128 person tournament (the biggest GB tournament ever), I decided to go have a look.  At just over an hour away as well, its not a bad little drive when you have nothing to do.  I got there just as Game 3 was starting and I have to say it looked like one hell of a huge event.  How on earth the GBinformer guys kept themselves from having an anxiety attack while running the tournament I don't know.  It was really good to see everyone, and considering it was birthday weekend part 1 I decided to spend a bit of money.


Dark Age

So the first thing I picked up was the Dragyri Fire Caste starter set for Dark Age.  These are one of the Alien races for the Post Apocalyptic system.  As with many games these days it is a 32mm system, but these guys are huge.  There are only three models in the box set, but rather than being on 30mm bases, these three barely fit onto their 40mm bases.  Actually as it happened I got three 50mm bases and have had to email Cool Mini or Not to get some replacements (which they responded to very quickly and the new bases are on the way soon).

So first out of the box was the Volcanic Helot (the one without the shield).  She is a full metal model, which was fine, apart from the skirt, which came in two separate parts, which weren't quite shaped correctly and would not stay on the model.  I ended up creating two drill points to put a "shelf" of pins into place to tie everything down to at the back.  I'm going to have to fill them in later.  There was also a lot of use of pliers to push everything into the right shape.  Having said all that though, its a lovely, big, model.  A normal 32mm model next to her barely gets to waist height.

The Volcanic Phalanx (the other lady of the show) is an absolutely lovely Resin model.  The spear is a little bendy, but beyond that it was pretty simple to put together.  Don't quite know why the pose on the head doesn't quite seem to match the one in the picture, but other that that it really is very pretty.  the Resin looks good, feels slightly brittle perhaps, and there may be a couple of patches which aren't quite perfect, but its still really good.

The leader of the Pack is the Spirit Lord.  I love this model, but in equal measures it drove me insane as well.  The vast majority of the model goes together really well, but the "cloak" was in two pieces and again they didn't actually sit on the model at all correctly.  the small piece that goes over his shoulder wouldn't sit straight, and in trying to hot water bend it into place I ended up snapping it instead.  This means it now fits, but I'm going to have to paint it well to hide the problem.

Even with all that though, these models are lovely.  I'm going to want to spend a lot of time on them, because they are so big and because they have a lot of NMM work to do to make them look right.  If I'm in the right mood its the sort of challenge I'm going to enjoy.  Having done steel and gold NMM on my Alchemists, its going to be fun to work out Chrome and Bronze too.

I think Dark Age is on my list of really nice models that I might game with from time to time, but not often (I'll probably have to go down to Thetford for this one).

Bushido

I also picked up some Bushido, I really didn't like my bank account on this day.

All I got was the Ito Clan starter set, but I have to say I think I will pick up more of these and I certainly want to start getting this played locally, because its a nice game with quite a few unique quirks to make it interesting, while at the same time having enough of a similarity to Guild Ball and Malifaux that I think I know a few people that would like it.  Just wish there were more places to get tokens from.

Anyway, models (cus this is a hobby blog).  So lets start with Itsunagi Ito, who is the "leader" in the set.  I put that in quote marks because I haven't noticed any specifics about leaders in your war band.  In this case Itsunagi just costs more than anyone else.  Model wise he was really simple, though I had to do a bit of filing and cutting to get everything to fit.  The Daisho on his belt came as a separate piece that tucked in under some cloth wraps at his back.  The seating area for this had some major flash in it so I had to work on that to get it all in, but it wasn't too hard.  His right arm was fixed with a mold around his upper muscle, his left was a flat surface glue where there is a bit of cord around his arm.  This wasn't great because lining up the arm and getting the right orientation was beyond me.

The lovely lady with the hair fan is Sakura.  Nothing really to say with her, the right arm is a separate piece, and can easily be put on close to or away from the body.  I went with close to the body for the added contact surface. The hair fan is also another piece, but it caused no issues at all.  The model is really good, nice and simple in design and I quite like it.

Obviously there is a guy with a Snake head at the back.  Thats the big thing about Ito Clan, they are all "blessed" by the Snake Kami and some of them get gifts.  Akimoto is one such model that has gained snake features, and for him its his face that has changed first.  his Wakizashi on his belt was a simple small fit, and his left arm was separate.  I had a bit of gapping issues so I'm working on filling those in, but the model itself is still pretty good.

Possibly the most awkward models where the two Bushi.  The Male Bushi as a right arm piece that includes the blade being draw out of the scabbard, so there is a bit of effort in twisting the piece around so that it sits right on the scabbard on in the right hand sleeve.  The annoyance is on the scabbard itself, because the length of it is a separate piece as well (in both cases), without any indents to really get the things to sit straight or flat.  I'm eternally fearful of them just being knocked off.  They are so thin as well that there isn't really a good way to pin them, so its just hope (and I may magnetically transport these guys) that is going to keep it all together.  The female Bushi (who can also be used as a character) also has a separate pony tail.  I won't even being to comment on that.

I'm looking at painting these up using L5R Scorpion Clan colours (as both as the sneaky shady type clans in each respective game world), so there will lots of Red and Black going on.  Looking forward to actually gaming with these guys soon.

Games, Glorious Games

So my plan is to try and get some games in, certainly of Bushido and Guild Ball (Guild Ball models need to be finished first I admit, and that won't happen this weekend), and then Dark Age once the right bases arrive.  I've put my Bushido models into their bases already, and I'm going to base them up and then paint them on the bases, which is something I would normally not do.  That way I can play Bushido with the unpainted models and just do them when I have a bit of free time.  The same will apply to the Dark Age models.

So, Mr Hay, Mr Parker and Mr Straw... and anyone else interested.  Anyone fancy a game or two?

No comments:

Post a Comment