Weekly Workbench 30 July 2017

Here we are for another Weekly Workbench update.  Lots of time building a terrain piece this week as seen below and knocking out a couple of miniatures.  Let us jump right into it and be sure to click on the pictures for a larger view!

Historical:

This is were the bulk of my time was spent this week, knocking out 4Ground's Norse Trader's Shop for my SAGA gaming.  This was my first time constructing a complete MDF building, I have only done MDF ruins before.  There were some very delicate pieces and I may have a broken door frame that had to be repaired.  Over all I enjoyed the build and look forward to expanding my Viking village and maybe building a Saxon one as well.

Sci-Fi:

Nothing in Sci-Fi this week, though I do have my Boromites staring me in the face begging to be finished, so maybe I will get a squad completed this coming week.

Fantasy:

Here is where all the miniature painting came.  Saturday I painted up Nick Eyre's North Star Military Figures' Frost Giant for Osprey Games' Frostgrave.  He just needs to be based and then he will be ready to crush some aspiring wizard and use the body for his next meal.  Or perhaps, my SAGA vikings will be confronted with a Jotunn that has stumbled into Midgard...  I will have a detailed painting tutorial for him after I finish the Escape from Goblin Town tutorials I am currently posting each Wednesday.

Speaking of Games Workshop's The Hobbit Strategy Battle Game, I re-primed two Fell Wargs with Army Painter's Uniform Grey and painted them up as Winter Wargs so I can share them between SBG and Frostgrave.

Last week's debacle of an attempt at Winter Wargs

This week's much better attempt at Winter Wargs

Here is a quick painting guide for those that are interested, all paints are The Army Painter brand:

Fur - Uniform Grey primer - (HL1) Stone Golem - (HL2) Brain-matter Beige 

Mouth - Abomination Gore

Teeth - Drake Tooth

Nose & Lips - Necromancer Cloak

Scar - Crusted Sore

Claws - Hardened Carapace

Eyes - Royal Cloak & Matt Black

Now just to base them as well.

I managed to get to Hobby Lobby and pick up some craft paints so I will probably work on dry brushing a bunch of walls this week for terrain for both games.  See you all next week and be sure to stop by Wednesday night for Gloin's painting tutorial! 

Painting Guide: Oin

As promised we are back with the Army Painter tutorials for Thorin’s Company from Games Workshop Strategy Battle Game's Escape from Goblin Town set.  Old, deaf Oin is next with his hearing horn and battlestaff.  He was the third dwarf I painted and has a fairly simple paint scheme as well, though some detail work is needed.     

0.  Ori starts out with a Matt Black undercoat.
1.   Paint the flesh using Tanned Flesh.

1a. Wash the skin with Red Tone to get the ruddier tone of the Dwarfs.

1b. Wash the skin again in Flesh Tone.

1c. Highlight using Barbarian Flesh.

2.   Paint the battle staff in Oak Brown.

2a. Hightlight with Leather Brown.

3.   Paint the trousers, strapping scarf & hood, and coat cuff & trim with Leather Brown.

3a. Do an initial highlight with Monster Brown.

3b. Add a second highlight of Monster Brown and Desert Yellow in a 2:1 ratio.

4.   Paint the coat in Chaotic Red.

4a. Wash with Dark Tone.

4b. There was some additional highlighting here but I have no idea what it was.

5.   Paint Oin’s gloves, fur, and beard with Uniform Grey.

5a. Highlight with Ash Grey.

5b. Highlight only the beard with White.

5c. Shade all with Dark Tone.

6.   Paint the boots with an Oak Brown/Black/Dragon Red mix in a 9:1:2 ratio (was completely messing around on the pallet there).

6a. Wash with Dark Tone.

7.   Paint Oin’s horn, chest armor, belt buckle, scabbard end, knife hilt & pommel, and staff tips with Plate Mail Metal.

7a. Wash with Dark Tone.

8.   Add the detail work to the scarf and hood trim with Black.

  

Some last notes:  

A. The eyes were painted between the Flesh Tone Wash and the Barbarian Flesh Highlight.  The eyes are done with a 5/0 brush.  First paint a horizontal white line and then place a black dot in the center.

B. AP Soft Tone is a good wash for flesh and other light colored items.

C. AP Strong Tone is a good general brown wash similar to Citadel's Agrax Earth Shade. 

D. AP Dark Tone is a good black wash similar to Citadel's Nuln Oil.

I based the miniature with coral beach sand for the rocky/sandy caves of Goblin Town and added some Highland Tufts and Meadow Tufts from The Army Painter Battlefields range.  I then painted the edge of the base in Monster Brown. 

Gimli’s dad rounds out this group of dwarfs next week!  And be sure to pop in Sunday night for the Weekly Workbench!

I must thank TALE OF TWO PAINTERS for the inspiration for these tutorials.  Unfortunately, I do not have step by step photos like they do as I found their site after I was a quarter of the way complete.  They painted the miniatures using Citadel paints.  I felt a guide using The Army Painter brand was warranted, especially as there is no readily available conversion chart for Citadel and AP brands like the other major miniature paint brands (Vallejo, P3, Reaper, etc.).  When I painted these miniatures I only had the 42 bottle 2015 Mega Paint Set II, so there was a lot of mixing of paints to get the right color. 

Weekly Workbench 24 July 2017

Finally back at it with the motivation from Historicon.  Decently busy this week, though the project that sucked up the majority of my day on Saturday was building a storage shelf to hold all my work in progress as I tend to have many different projects going at the same time.  Remember to click on the pictures for a bigger view.

Historical:

I completed the mortar team, but forgot to take a picture before bringing it into work so at some point I will have to bring it home and get a photo.  During the long break in between posts though I have been working on building a Normandy beach invasion scene using Battlefront's Flames of War 15mm miniatures.

The scene will include numerous beach obstacles, water for the landing craft to be floating in, and the shingle, sea wall, and concertina wire at the top beyond what you see here.  The miniatures include the LCVP from Old Glory Miniatures, an M4 Sherman DD tank from Battlefront, and a P38 Lightning aircraft (the only Allied aircraft not brought down by friendly fire participating in Operation Overlord). The infantry is from the 29th Infantry Division Assault Company box, which is no longer produced and I picked up from the Game Vault shortly before they closed their doors.  This is my first time painting 15mm which has definitely been a challenge!

I have begun work on my Norse Traders Shop from 4Ground for my SAGA game play.  I love working with the MDF but some of the parts are really delicate and you have to be careful when sliding things together.

I have also started putting together my plastic vikings, here are five bondi who can also double as thugs for Frostgrave, who have been glued and primed (today the humidity finally dropped just below 50% so I could prime the figures I had ready).

Sci-Fi:

No work on any Sci-Fi games this week but I am busy ready the first Beyond the Gates of Antares Anthology - Beyond Antares: Open Signal that I picked up at Historicon.  I will be getting back to my Boromites shortly.

Fantasy:

I tried to convert my Fell Wargs into winter wargs (so that I could share them between Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game and Frostgrave) with not much success as the black is too strong so I will likely strip them and re-prime them in a lighter color.

For Frostgrave I primed my Ice Giant, a gnoll, treasure tokens, and the wizard & apprentices for Young Elementalist, Sigalist, Thaumaturge, Chronomancer, Barbarian Wizard, and Enchanter (L2R, T2B).  The kids will now have a fairly decent choice to pick their own wizard (war bands may have to shared for a while).

I also found a really cool looking runic golem to use as a large construct monster (or golem) from Alternate Armies I would like to get at some point.

I also primed (need a couple of touch ups) all the wall segments I purchased from Stonehouse Miniatures and as soon as we get to Hobby Lobby for some craft paint they will be finished.

To close you out, as I never showed the final product, is my miniature I had custom made by Hero Forge.

Make sure to stop by next week for another update and check out the mid-week tutorial on painting Oin from Thorin's Company!

*All paints and washes are The Army Painter unless otherwise indicated.

Historicon 2017!

Three months since the last post, but Historicon 2017 has got me off my duff and moving.  In truth work has kept me quite busy but I have been working on a Normandy Beach invasion scene in 15mm using Battlefront’s Flames of War, more on that in a later post (they are coming back I promise), but for now a quick review of Historicon 2017!

(Remember to click on the pictures for full size images!)

This year I was there for two days of gaming and classes and returned on Sunday for a quick trip through the vendor hall to pick up some items I had forgotten to grab and take advantage of the deals that take place on Sunday with vendors who do not want to pack up and transport their wares back home.  Warlord Games provided the complementary figure again this year, with it being Kurt Knispel, Germany's top tank ace to go with the theme of 100 Years of Tanks.

After a quick trip through the vendor hall to see who was there I settled down for my first game: Osprey Publishing's Frostgrave!  I have had my eye on this game for a while and was excited to get a chance to play it finally.

The game is simple and straightforward and was easy to pick up play, though having half the players being experienced helped out a lot too.

Our particular game was played in a good vs evil set-up with four war-bands per side as opposed to the normal, every war band to themselves.

We also played on a much larger board than the usual three feet by three feet.  The board provided by host Jeffrey Hiley was absolutely gorgeous.

While you can’t see it in these pictures there were several lights throughout; a blue one on the tower in the harbor and two green ones in the crypt.

I played a Druid accompanied by his apprentice, a barbarian for the captain, an archer, four soldiers, and a summoned bear who took the place of one of my soldiers. 

By the end of the game I had secured a level 3 treasure (with a second one almost off the map), a level 2 treasure, and had killed three enemy soldiers, an enemy knight, an enemy apprentice, and an enemy wizard.  Our side ended up winning 185 points to 150 points.

I had some time before my Hobby University class so I checked out some of the other games.  Three of the boards really caught my attention (though overall, most of the boards were really well done this year).

  

The first board was for a pirate game and was a beautifully well
done lagoon with walk-in access to the center.

The board was very detailed and showed how well aquarium plants and terrain can be used to great effect.






The board included a river through a canyon, a church, a jungle temple, a town with a harbor, and a fort in addition to the numerous ships.

The next board that caught my eye was a French and Indian War board with Native Americans attacking Virginia Militia.  I did not catch the name of the game and it is not listed in the program but it was well presented and looked interesting.

The last board was a small Great War board of trench lines, no-man’s land, and early tanks.  Nicely done up with lots of attention to detail.

My Hobby University class for the day was Painting 15mm Infantry with John from What Would Patton Do? (WWPD).  Unfortunately, John did not make it so Lee Howard from Old Glory filled in.  Lee did an excellent job even with thunderstorms playing havoc with the lighting and having only old, dried out paints and used up brushed to paint with.  

 From this I learned some German camouflage techniques as well as some tips for knocking out many miniatures at once.  I also walked away with 15 x 15mm German soldiers for Flames of War.

Left Side of Board,
I start by the fuel tanks.

Right Side of Board.

Saturday, due to horrible traffic on the I-95S before 0800, I just barely made my game for Doctor Who Miniatures Game with host Jason Mirosavich.

Turn 2 - Moving on Objectives
with a Dalek in pursuit!

Turn 3 - Dalek getting behind my
Particle Gun.

We played the Lock, Stock, & Two Smoking Daleks scenario which is based on the Battle of Canary Warf from the Series 2 Episode Doomsday.

Turn 4 - Dalek Sec has arrived to
Inspect how the invasion is going!

Turn 5 - Daleks float up to attack!

I played the Torchwood faction and accomplished all my mission objectives (scanning three areas and capturing the Doctor).

 

Turn 6 - Dalek down!

Turn 8 - Cybermen surrounded!

 I was also the first player in over 10 games to manage to kill the Dalek, much to that player’s chagrin, and assisted the Preachers in killing the Cybermen, allowing the good factions to win the game.

Turn 9 - The last Cyberman falls!

Saturday’s Hobby University class was supposed to be a speed painting class according to the description but was actually a speed painting competition.  The majority of us opted to paint and chat while two participated in the competition.  Had I my own brushes I might have done the competition but the worn-out brushes provided just did not cut it.  I did walk away with two samurai from Wargames Factory (the same ones being used in Warlord Games Test of Honor game).

My speed painted Samurai and an extra.  Worn-out brushes led to a rough paint-job and a determination to bring my own brushes for any future classes.

I walked around checking out some of the other games after this and tried to catch the DC Hobbit League doing NOVA practice but could not find them (they were there I just kept missing them in between other things).  I did get to watch a Gondor vs. Umbar Naval Battle using The Hobbit Strategy Battle Game rules on Friday though which was interesting.  The Team Yankee and Flames of War National’s on Friday and Saturday respectively looked decently attended.  Unfortunately, I did not get any more pictures as my phone died. 

The first Beyond the Gates of Antares anthology
published by  Winged Hussar Publishing LLC

My haul this year was pretty extensive but this will be my major purchase for the year and focused around two games systems I can swap figures between (Frostgrave and SAGA (Historical gaming set in the years of the Viking Age and the Crusades), and diorama projects I have in the works.  I will provide more in depth breakdowns and reviews of some of the products in latter blog posts but here is the overall haul.

On the right is the program in free figures.  Also there are bare trees, a snake rail fence kit,, and shingle from Battlefield Terrain Concepts for various 15mm dioramas I am working on, which is what the Old Glory Corp Confederate Infantry are for.  On the right are more terrain pieces from Stonehouse Miniatures: a battle mat; a Temple Platform Modular Wall Kit; and small and medium Hewn Broken Walls packs for use with Frostgrave and SAGA.  Also are two cans of Army Painter Uniform Grey Primer from Your Hobby Place.

 Here are all my SAGA purchases which came from a combination of  Cotton Jim's Flags and Brigade Games and Hobby Supply, LLC.  I picked up a Viking 4pt plastic war-band, a Scots 4pt metal war-band, some plastic Dark Age Archers, decals for the shields, the core rule set and two expansions, the dice for each faction, a female viking warlord, and a Norse Traders Shop from 4Ground.

Brigade Games and Hobby Supply provided all my Frostgrave figures, which were purchased in mind for the kids to play and include a set of Gnolls, Small & Medium Constructs, a Frost Giant, Ice Toad & Snow Leopard, Wild Dogs, Treasure Tokens, Siglist, Beastcrafter, Elementalist, Female Elementalist, Enchanter, Chronomancer, Thaumaturge, and Barbarian Wizard.  I also got free Wizard Sheets for my purchases as well.

Harmony House Hobbies provided the 20 sided die for Frostgrave and Hot Wire Foam Factory provided me the Hot Wire foam cutting kit and accessories to help with my terrain and diorama building.

Thanks for checking out the post and I will be back with the remaining Army Painter paint guides for Thorin's Company and my normal Weekly Workbench posts next week! (Assuming my wife does not kill me when she reads that last section!)