Update: Power Loss and super secret project!
So, long time viewers (all four of you) know that I live in Lansing, MI now, and that Lansing was recently wiped off the map by an ice storm. I lost power for 8 days. However, I was not idle in that time. BEHOLD! MY xmas present to my roommate Jen!
The Reik River Raiders are a bunch of Goblins from the foothills near the city of Reikland, bankrolled by the mad scientist Dr. Emmet Von Braun. Von Braun has them test his latest weapons and potions on the blood bowl pitch. In addition, the Goblins have bribed two river trolls from the Reik River to be their muscle. Von Braun hopes to use the profits from the Reik River Raiders to bankroll his further attempts to undermine reality through science!
Next: a battle report between me and Lexington of Dice Abide! Salamander Space Marines (6th ed) vs. Orks! No holds barred, no aircraft, no superheavies! Stay tuned!
On my plate: 10-31-13
Happy Halloween! Haven’t done an On my plate post in a while, so here’s what I’m working on.
Azure Flames: Top Secret Project. Status: In progress, expect updates soon! THIS IS TOTALLY LEGAL. I AM NOT KIDDING. WINK.
Necromunda: Delaque Gang. Status: almost done!
Necromunda: Escher Gang. Status: Gang collected, painting soon! They will be called Razor and the Scumettes, after the fictional band led by Razor the punk rock girl from the NES classic: Maniac Mansion. Perhaps their logo will be a hamster in a microwave…
Blood Bowl Grimfang Scrappaz Coach, Assistant Coaches, and Cheerleaders: On Hold but first in queue.
Battlefleet Gothic: Top Secret Project. Status: ON HOLD until other projects done. Wait, didn’t I say I was done with Gothic? Moo hoo ha ha.
Epic Armageddon: ON HOLD pending other projects.
WAAAAGH! Smartyskull!: On hold, pending the end of winter. I need warm temperatures to be able to dip them.
Saratogan 58th: ON HOLD.
Warmachine and Fantasy: ON HOLD PERMANENTLY until I need them for something.
Next: Probably more Delaques.
Starting a Blood Bowl team.
Today I ran a demo for Blood Bowl at Highland Library. I’m hoping I piqued enough interest to get people to start their own teams.
So, how does one start their own Blood Bowl team? With Games Workshop discontinuing all of Specialist Games, this has become harder, but not impossible or expensive, depending on what you want to do. First, have someone who knows Blood Bowl demo the game for you. Then, read the team lists and pick a team. Only then should you buy. You have four options.
1. Buy the Blood Bowl box set, preferably ordering through a local game store. This will get you an Orc team and a Human team. Sell one of the teams to a friend. This is the only way to buy direct from Games Workshop anymore. The box set was still sold on the website as of the posting of this article. Sadly, this is not an option for players who do not wish to play Orcs or Humans.
2. Camp on ebay. This is an easy way to get a team. However, there is no guarantee. The team you are looking for may have several auctions right now, or none. Just do a search every morning and wait. The biggest problem with this is variability. Some players getting rid of their team can let it go for a steal, and some people who have delusions of grandeur sell a poorly painted team with a $300 buy it now. Just be patient.
3. Use existing pewter, plastic, and Finecast minis from the Warhammer Fantasy and 40K lines to convert your own team. This is what I did with the Konquata Monitors and the Grimfang Scrappaz. It helps to have a small amount of putty sculpting skills as well. This works best with Chaos, Dwarf, Elf, Goblin, Human, Khemri, Lizardman, Ogre, Orc, and Skaven teams, but not so well with others. Choose a team, look at existing model lines and get ideas. Hopefully you’ll have a good one.
4. Go to a third party. Mantic Games makes amazing Blood Bowl teams, but I can’t find them on their website. They must have been forced to stop. Look around for other companies. Reaper makes good fantasy models that could be easily converted to a Blood Bowl team. Meiko minis has good elves, ogres, and Nurgle. Impact minis has a huge selection and great support models.
Check all of the above options before buying. I searched ebay while writing this, and found several auctions of full team at less than $50. Buying plastic either through bitz order or box sets could set you back $40-$80 depending on what you need.
Blood Bowl Konquata Monitors Coach: Lord Kroak
Lord Kroak, last of the First Generation of Slaan personally commissioned the creation of the Konquata Monitors Blood Bowl team after the Lizardmen re-conquered the mystical island of Albion (called Konquata by the Lizardmen) from the Dark Elves. To promote the superiority of the Lizardmen race, Kroak ordered the team be composed of members of the first spawnings from the newly formed spawning pools on Albion. Unwaveringly loyal to Kroak’s vision, the Monitors have become the hottest new team in Blood Bowl. Kroak himself has recently taken up the mantle of Coach, personally leading the Monitors from the sidelines. Eschewing his customary floating chair and gold death mask for a simple cap, Kroak is prepared to help the Monitors win to bring glory to the Lizardmen. Of course, his incredibly powerful magics would never be used during a match. That is, unless the inducement was right…
Interesting blog I found: Afterimagedan
As you can see to the right, there’s a new blog in the blogroll: a BFG centered blog by Afterimagedan. He’s a fantastic painter, a great tactician, and an entertaining blogger with good pictures. Check his blog out here:
http://afterimagedan.blogspot.com/
Epic Lost and the Damned Land Transporter
The above model is a Polish Suwalska Half-track APC from Brigade Models. I have spent years and lots of money buying bits to “chaos out” these generic looking models. It is only today that, completely by accident, I figured out the perfect thing to make the model more spiky: ordinary tack nails. I added eight ends of nails and two small links of chain. Now I only have to do that like 23 more times.
Still working on those Orks, I just had to do this because I was inspired by the shape of the nails. I want to finish these Orks before I move in two weeks or I might never finish.
Epic Lost and the Damned Daemon Prince and Chaos Altar
I’ve been a bit busy. Got some new stuff for my Lost and the Damned. Now you may ask, Bozeman, why all the Nurgle lately? Surely other Chaos gods need love too. My answer is that for the list I’m building, I need a big Nurgle blob squad tricked out and ready to summon daemons and hold an objective. Hence, the altar and Daemon Prince.
First, the altar uses old pewter Ork trakks. The body is a bit that I got in an auction a year ago and have no idea what it is. A normal non-slotta round base makes up the filth pool, with a plaguebearer cut in half. The plastic pustules are from the Tyranid Mawloc sting tail. The hose nozzle is from the old plastic Ork Mega Stompa. Chains were from a hobby store. Finally, two beasts of Nurgle tow the thing. I added a drop of putty to make it look all pus-filled.
The Daemon Prince was easy, I took an old Necromunda Milliasaur (not easy to find, or cheap) and added two Tyranid Mawloc mandibles. It makes him look like Duriel from Diablo II, which is what the army is visually based on, in part.
Next: painted Ork shootas, a Tzeentch Chaos Altar, and possibly more!
Epic Nurgle Plague Tower mod
I was bad a while ago. I bought a bunch of stuff for my Lost and the Damned Epic army. This included a Tzeentch Firelord and three Tzeentch Doomwings. It also included most of a Nurgle Plague Tower. This was my fault: I did not research what a Plague Tower should look like, and it was missing the Plague Mortar up top and the Nurgle symbol staff on the back.
So, I improvised. I used a handcannon from the Privateer Press Devil Dogs mercenaries up top, and embedded it in a pustule of putty. I added some drips to make it seem bursting with pus. I then added putty to the back and three more pustules in the Nurgle symbol. I used a pin vise in the top pustule when it was cured, put in a small piece of paperclip, and covered it with putty to make a spurt of goo.
Yeah, it’s not 100% authentic but it looks great and it’s way cheaper.
Next: Ork shootas! The last of the shootas, then on to sluggas.
Highland Library Gamers
Recently, I hung out with the gamers at the Highland Library. They play 40K and are currently involved in a campaign which is similar to a Games Workshop campaign. In this campaign you have an “Immortal” who starts with (crappy) randomly generated stats. Your Immortal levels up as you play until his stats are less pathetic and more godlike.
They meet monthly, and last month I visited them and played a game with Andrew, who plays Guard. This month I had something a little more… esoteric in mind.
Behold: a Battlefleet Gothic Addendum to to the Campaign! These rules allow people to paritcipate in Gothic games without feeling like “missing out” on the main campaign.
Above, in the image gallery, the first 3 pics are of Stephen’s Plague Marines. He has a really good texture scheme for plague pustules, etc.
Next, the two gentlemen in the battle picture are Ian (left, Dark Eldar and Eldar) and Jory (right, Space Marines)
The closeup of the Kroot Shaper with wings is the Immortal of Sean’s Kroot Army. He’s using an internet Kroot list OKd by Andrew, the campaign co-ordinator. Andrew made this model back when Kroot Armies were actually GW legal out of a Kroot Shaper, Lizardmen Terradon wings, and an Ork Slugga.
Andrew’s army is up next, the Guard on the right defending against Justin’s encroaching Eldar on the left.
The Battlefleet Gothic game is the first one played using my rules. I showed Michael (left, Imperials) and Dominik (right, Chaos) how to play. They loved it and are going to consider getting fleets.
Next, Stephen’s Nurgle forces engage Trevor’s Ultramarines.
For the last battle picture, Robert’s Farsight Enclave Tau go up against Jacobs Dark Angels.
The final two pictures are closeups of Dominik’s Space Marine Honour Guard. I like his scheme, it’s very dirty, like these Marines have been in the thick of it.
Next month, expect more pics and possibly a detailed battle report!
Warhammer Fantasy Island of Blood Unboxing
Last Christmas I received the Warhammer Fantasy Battles box set: Island of Blood. Part of my master scheme to be able to demo as many games as possible. I hadn’t even looked at the box twice until I got to my new place, but now I have some time, space and privacy. Here’s my takeaway:
-First I assembled the High Elves. Fantastic models. However the join points on some of the models are on a crossguard that is less than 1 mm thick. I ruined three getting them off the damn sprue. Two were salvageable, one will have to be rebuilt with putty. Models went together with ease, but there was a little confusion on the Lothern Sea Guard Musician. I got it eventually, but an assembly guide would have been nice.
-Next I got the Skaven together. Also fantastic minis. At first I thought that I was missing something with the Clan Rats, but some of the long knives look like short spears. Once I took stock, it made sense. With some creative allocation I made all the hand weapon Clan Rats have round shields and the spear rats have triangle shields except for the champion. Some of the clan rats and characters did not want to fit into the slotted base, and required some filing.
-Then I read the Island of Blood intro book thoroughly. I had ASSUMED that, like the 5th ed 40K box, Assault on Black Reach, actual RULES would be contained therein. No rules. This is not a deal breaker. I have the rulebook and I’m not afraid to read.
Here’s the deal breaker. No stats. No army list. No Special Rules. No nothing. You need to buy BOTH the Skaven and High Elf books to play with the Army of Blood box set. That’s not cool. It’s advertised as being able to play right out of the box. Truthfully you get 95% of the way there. But this isn’t chemistry class. A 95% isn’t a pass. If you only get 95% of the way to the moon, you’re stranded in space. That’s kind of how I feel about this box set.
EDIT: I got the last 5% of the way there! Check this link. This has all the missing stats. The link is NOWHERE in the box, and Google doesn’t put it on the first page, but my friend Andy read the above and remembered this existed. So, Thank You Andy. You got us to the moon.