On the Workbench

I'm working on Hannah, and I've almost got her finished. I need to get her flesh, and her yellow/gold elements done, but I think for the most part she's done. I hate the gaps, but... I've got Vallejo's plastic putty to help with that in the future, but unfortunately Hannah isn't going to benefit from that. Templecon is coming in 13 days, and I've got Levi, 3 Hollow Waifs, and a Desolation Engine to finish up before then. Wish me luck!

Preparing for the Con Season to Start

So, I'm primarily a Resurrectionist player for Malifaux, and I feel like I've been missing some important support models from my stable of go-to models. Namely, Bête Noir, and Chiaki the Niece. Bête is the hidden punishment threat that make people reconsider who they want to kill and where, and Chiaki brings much needed condition removal and stable healing to the crew, plus (with a 1 pt upgrade) she's a source of slow for the opposing crew. AP management is king, and forcing a walk instead of a charge can mean the difference between life and death of a model. And I think you'll agree that Bête is also a fairly neat model. I wanted to limit the colors I used in the model to make it cleaner and more striking. I also used Privateer Press colors for the first time, though I didn't see any real difference between them and the Vallejo I usually use. Perhaps those who are better painters can point out the reason they're better.

Also, from the Sage Old Painters Advice Department: if you're not getting any thing to come from the dropper bottle of paint, clear the neck of the stopper. Do not do what I did, or else all your Vallejo Scorpion Green will explode onto your palette, your clothes, and everything else. That is not recommended.

Built a Rogue Necromancy the other day, and got it painted. I'm quite pleased with it, but it's huge. Like perhaps absurdly tall, even for a Height 3 model. I don't have a banana for scale, but perhaps these will do.

WIP Rail Crew

Good enough for the table, but still not finished.

Faced off against Zach again tonight with 'tina at 35ss. Reckoning, Line in the Sand and Vendetta for me, Vendetta and Bodyguard for him (on Killjoy. Ugh.)

We played with huge amounts of cover, which killed my LoS with Raspy, and it really hamstrung me. Most of the schemes flipped were counter to the main strat, and so I felt up against the wall from the get go. Turn three saw Vik of Blood in base contact with 'tina, and only a Golem and the Essence of Power were left.

At that point I conceded rather than waste both our times.

I can't wait for Snow Storm to be official, rules wise. He's superior to the golem in most aspects, and only one point more. January can't come fast enough.

Tried to do some OSL, and also finished a December Acolyte

I was somewhat stumped as how to paint Misaki and her crew, when it occurred to me that they are the midnight assassins of the Oyabun's forces in Malifaux. They strike from the the smoke and shadows, literally. So, I thought about painting them in the in a half lit hard shadowed OSL, something I've never attempted before. And it's obvious from my first attempt that I need some refinement.

It's good for table top quality, but I think I'll need more practice before I'm truly happy with it.

Moving onto firmer ground here, I also whipped up a more standard model, that of the December Acolyte. It's a great model, and I really wish there was an alternate of it, as I'd love to have two in the crew, and I don't want to have clones in my forces. That's why I spent so much time converting my Gaki. The December Acolyte, however, is far too mono-pose for someone of my meager talents to convert. I'll likely proxy the second one until they come out with a new plastic model.

Of course, I also need a Snow Storm model, a Blessed of December, and probably a Silent One, as the rules for those have just recently come out in the Wave 2 beta, and I don't think their models are in the pipe just yet.

Some models done and dusted

Seems I'm on a bit of an Archanist bent recently.

I really like how they all turned out. Thank you, every Hollywood movie poster/Battlefield cover for my color scheme for the Essence of Power. :) It might be tried and true, but it sure does pop.

I'm going to go back and do some more work on the bamboo on the bases of the Gamin/Golem, but for now, they're playable.

Speaking of Frozen Planets...

Yup. I had a plan coming back from Gencon that I was going to focus on getting Mei Feng ready, so I'd have two Ten Thunders crews ready to go. I'd ignore the Viks and Rasputina in order to get Mei ready and out the door.

Yeah, about that...

Heh. I couldn't resist opening up the other boxes. Sadly, the Hired Swords had a mispack, so now I have two Viktorias of the Blood, and no Taelor, so that's a no-go until Wyrd sends the replacement. And I love the new 'Tina models, soooo...

I just have the one Gamin painted, but I have bases for all of them done up. I'm going to be adding the Crushed Glass from Secret Weapon to add an ice feel to the base top.

Even More Progress

My vindicator now has a brother to attend battles with him.


Vindicator #2 has a green blood drop on him, indicating that it is from the 4th company's motor pool. According to the old background, the Flesh Tearers have only 4 companies left due to constant attrition, so this is from that last Company, as are all my Flesh Tearers. Of course, the green drop is the one for which GW doesn't make a transfer, so I have to hand paint all of mine. I wanted to weather the paint on both the Siege Shields, as I tend to make great use of them. These tanks get run through every stand of trees on the table, it seems. At some point, I'll have to weather the tanks as well.



Speaking of green blood drops, I've made a bit of progress on the Librarian Dread as well. I didn't like the highlights I did on him, so I glazed over them with some Red Ink mixed with a touch of Devlan Mud. It got me the right tone, but it left him too glossy for my liking. I'm hoping to find a decent matte sealer to tone him down.

Sanguinary Guard WIP

I'm going against the traditional* paint scheme to better match my Flesh Tearer painted Dante (who was my Seth before they had a Seth model/rules). They'll have black wings and shoulder pads, and golden death masks.

I don't know if I'll use the unit, but damn do these models look pretty**. This is my second layer of red over black. The total process is Mechrite->Scab Red->Red Gore->Blood Red->Baal Red.

The base on the model is one that I cast myself, and has a pin in it to give it the appearance of flying.



*Traditional, aka, invented by GW a few months ago.

**That's a compliment to the sculptors, not to my very much WIP paint job, mind you.

Hive of Activity (Works in Progress)

I've been getting things together for this week's Tournament @ Blob Park, and since it's a "paint optional" event, I don't have to get things together for it.

But it still feels better having a cohesive looking army on the board. To that end, I've been working on getting things painted if I can make the tourney.

You can click on any of the images, and it'll take you to the image's dakka page, where you can see it full sized, and even zoom in on things. Dakka's Gallery is free for members, and membership to Dakka is free. So, win.

These terminators are not fully highlighted, and are missing lens work on the two in the back. Plus, My Baal Red wash got all shiny. I'll have to dullcoat them at some point.



I need to work on the siege shield, the smoke stacks, and the cupola gun, but otherwise, we're done with this one. I still have to finish another one, though.



This is nowhere near done, paint job wise, but I like how the conversion came out.



All metal bodies + all plastic arms means I pinned each of them. There's nothing worse than hunting for missing body parts.



These High Priests are pretty much done, except for basing and a few touch ups.

Product review - Armory Spray Primer.

So, I usually use the Walmart brand Colorplace Flat Black, but I was at my local gaming store, and decided to pick up a black primer while I was there. My only gripe with the Colorplace spray is the fact that it isn't a true black; it's more of a dark grey.

They were selling the Armory spray at a very reasonable price for a specialized primer, and I picked it up.

I regret my purchase. My new vindicator is completely fuzzed, and I'm going to have to dip it to clear that gunk off of it. I did all the usual tricks: I shook it for a minute, sprayed a bit to get it going, and then used small sharp bursts. It worked for the GW primer back in the day, and it worked for Colorplace as well. It does not work for Armory at all.

The nozzle is now clogged with black gunk. It even had a ribbon of black pigment ooze out of the thing like one of those crappy black snake things you give to kids that you can't trust with sparklers.

So, in short, don't buy this product.