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Ok, in that case, I'm the one who's sorry.

Marlene is not part of Aleph (as far as anyone knows ), she's the most famous news person of the humans sphere and not officially linked to any faction.
The function of her robot isn't clear, but for me it's only logical that it's a camera and broadcasting van all in one.
There are no rules for Gogo, so the miniature is just a collector's item.

Thamyris, the Aiodos, is a unit that was introduced in the recently released Campaign Paradiso book. He's a journalist who's part of the Assault Subsection, the greek sectorial army of Aleph. He's the one who tells all those glorious tales of how Aleph (i.e. its myrmidon armies) rescues humanity from the threat of the combined army.
His character is based on Thamyris from greek mythology:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thamyris

So they are both journalists and I dig the rules for Thamyris and nobody knows when he'll be released as a model, so I figured I'd go ahead and make Gogo usefull.

Ahh, thank you. I haven't read anything about the new Paradiso book yet. I haven't even finished reading the Human Sphere book yet. That's cool, he's like a cute little anime R2-D2 droid in a sense then

Hhm, that would be an idea for the paint scheme!

Don't how i missed this blog. Great job you two i'm really enjoying it now i've found it!

I'm a sucker for converted Infinity mini's so i'll be sticking around for the long term!

Welcome to the party then, Casey.

Great job on the conversion - looks a lot better now. Nice work on the tut too, sure they'll be a few peps out there who're grateful for the info

Thanks, monkey.

Just had my third real game of Infinity. Played against my buddy with his nomads again and this time it was much more balanced. I won again, but I didn't wipe the floor with him and had some losses.
One of my netrods dispersed 15" into his half of the table and it was his first order to destroy it.
My zayin rebot got killed in a tremendously stupid (move/move, move/move) order which granted him an aro with the model I wanted to kill. I thought being in cover everything would be ok, but his boarding shotgun made short work of my remote. I obviously should have stayed out of sight and spent another order to (move/shoot), then it would have been a FtF roll against my HMG.
And my Asura lost all her wounds, resisted three hacking attempts and killed the enemy Lt. only thanks to NWI.

Good game for both of us. We will have another one soon and maybe we'll even step up to 300p for that one.

In other news, I'm making very good progress on the Naga and I'm sure he'll be done before the weekend.

Sounds like a fun game Baiyuan. I hope to play myself soon, it sounds liek there are some unique nuances strategically speaking.

Your conversions are very smooth and the end result doesn't look converted (which is always the best result for conversions). It's very impressive.

dsteingass wrote:Sounds like a fun game Baiyuan. I hope to play myself soon, it sounds liek there are some unique nuances strategically speaking.

Unique, oh yes it is and that's even before playing those crazy new scenarios from C, that'll be a cinematic blast on top of the tactical wealth.

Hindenburg wrote:Your conversions are very smooth and the end result doesn't look converted (which is always the best result for conversions). It's very impressive.

Thanks, man! I agree, the best conversions don't show immediately, so I take that as a big compliment.

I thought I'd report on some of my recent Infinity-related activities.

Still painting that Naga.
Got distracted by the need to prepare/assemble/convert some more miniatures for yesterday's game, but I'll be back on it tonight/tomorrow.

battle report:
Like I said, I had a game just yesterday and after pondering over how to handle my opponents Szalamandra TAG (because I knew he would bring it), the game showed me how versatile and tactical it is.
I fielded plenty stuff that could crack the TAG under the right circumstances. I had a missile launcher, a light rocket launcher, an E/M grenade launcher etc..
In the end it only took me one smart move and I nailed the damn thing in my first turn. My Naga sneaked towards the TAG's position laying two of his monofilament mines to block some corridors, before I decided to be more offensive.
So I recamoed, slipped around the corner of the house where the TAG was lurking, layed down a mine so that it would go off as soon as his TAG would do anything. If you don't know, monofilament is scary gak. Treats any armor as 0 and if you fail to roll a 13 or higher, it kills outright regardless of wounds or strength.
So since his TAG couldn't do anything without triggering the mine, I figured before my buddy gets the chance to bring in his engineer to remove the mine/repair the TAG, I'd try my luck. So I spent my last 4 orders on putting one unopposed burst after the other into the damn thing.
In the end I managed to achieve a crit (direct wound) and he also failed one ARM roll, so it was down to one wound. (We forgot, that his TAG is manned and therefore has to take guts rolls, which, should he have failed one for any of those succesfull ARM rolls, would have forced him to move and thus set off the mine)

In my opponent's turn, he brought down two of his jump troops to aid the TAG and remove both the Naga and the mine. Unfortunately both failed to wound my heroic Naga (without cover!), who didn't return the favor and took them both out. Oppan naga style!
That's where we had to interrupt the game and decided to leave the board as it is and pick it up again at a later time. Even though we'll probably restart the game so that he gets a chance to actually use his death machine.

How do all...I'm affraid I'm gonna have to tap-out with this one...

Finding myself with less and less modelling time ATM and I don't feel its fair to do a joint blog with someone and never upload anything! Luckily Baiyuan's not pissed off with me Thanks dude!

Basically from my limited game experience so far I do really like the game play of Infinity, it's almost chess like, which is great for a tactical mind...but sadly its just not really sparking my creativity in terms of modelling/painting, I guess my brain is just too used to "grim dark". I've been really struggling to get a handle on my Aleph force since the start really...

Also I'm just not a fan of metal minis at all I know exactly where I am with plastic and what I can do to it to achieve what I want, using metal again was to be honest un-nerving for me.

However that said I will probably come back to these in the future/play a few games at home etc but with my current limited hobby time its back to 'Munda I go for now.

I will be watching though and look forward to the B man's awesome work!

Cheers All!

R

Hey Rob, like I said I can really relate to what you said.

You're right, it's a game for the tactical mind and only with reckless abandon one can create a niche for real creativity in it (besides just painting).
When I told the guy at my LGS I'm converting most of my infinity models, he looked at me like I'm a mad man.

I'll happily be following any kind of your artistic endeavors and I'm looking forward to your work.

PS: Will we get to see the status quo of your devabot anyway? I don't care if it's finished I'm just curious...

I came to a similar conclusion about infinity. I love the models, love anime to bits and the whole theme really appealed to me, the game is great too. But for some reason i just cant get into it, something about it doesnt make me tick. I have taken great pleasure at chopping some of my yu jing up for 40k though. Weird how the mind works sometimes.

Yes, indeed. Because I don't like anime (a few well done exceptions) and I'm not to fond of the style of many of the miniatures (others are hands down the best on the market of course), but the gameplay... I'm intoxicated!
There is so much you can do (once you learned the rules).
An example: FO, Sensor, HD+
Forward observer let's you mark targets in your LOF (for guided weaponry).
Sensor let's you discover all camo markers in your zone of control (8") without LOF or applying any malus.
In addition to that, if you have both skills you're allowed to mark already discovered targets without needing LOF. And you could even Discover and Mark in one order. Also a marked camo troop cannot recamo until the mark has worn off.
Hacking Device Plus on the other hand, grants you FO in your ZC as well, but doesn't let you discover without LOF. The upside is you can use any kind of repeater as a relay, thus enhancing the range of your LOFless marking.

Bloody complex? Yes, but sooo satisfying and engaging once you wrapped your head around it.

 Baiyuan wrote:
Hacking Device Plus on the other hand, grants you FO in your ZC as well, but doesn't let you discover without LOF. The upside is you can use any kind of repeater as a relay, thus enhancing the range of your LOFless marking...

Why I think I mentioned this one to you didn't I? Hehe

Yeah will do B, I'll pop a quick snap up later but it wont make for amazing viewing TBH as still only about half done.

R

Yes, you did and to be honest I failed to realize you could use a repeater, which is why I didn't fully appreciate it. Then again I think GML is a crutch, so I might try it for fun, but it will probably not become a common strategy for me.

Can't wait to see the bot anyway!

I was gonna use that exploit with my Zayin Rebot's EMP grendade launcher to take Speculative Shots on camo targets without those nasty 'to hit' penalties whilst still having it in a position to cover 'escape routes' with it's HMG...but again I'm not 100% sure of the ranges etc so GML might prove more useful tool for this but of course you'll have to get that Lamedh in the right place first too...(aw see I do love the tatics! Oh well)

R

But you cannot use the Asura's HD+ to mark a marker, that's only allowed via sensor/FO, unless of course you mean you are in the ZC AND have LOF, so that you can take advantage of your MSV3.

Yes there's a lot of 'what ifs' in the plan for sure but if you got your Azura up somewhere nice and high early in game and then ran a repeater in close to targets and pulled it off imadgein how smug you'd feel and how pissed off the other player would be that you'd just wiped their TO Camo troups off the board before they could even do anything or at least damaged all their gear/weapons with the emp blast haha genius!

R


Automatically Appended Next Post:
So then man-bots and fem-bots...

This is as far as I got with this chap. I loathe posting PIPs coz they always look a bit gak even if you can tell its broken down into work stages and I always go back over bits and add stuff etc afterwards. Anyways from his waist down was my final colour choice but obviously here he's lacking any battle damage, company markings or oil leaks...etc.

I was really looking forward to the turquoise OSL on the "eyes" but never got to that bit...I will finish him off one day I'm sure.


Cheers

R

PIP for sure, but I think it's easy to imagine what he'll look like (one day). Good work on the clean blacklining.
Hope you'll get the chance to finish it at some point.

Page 7 and he posts a picture!

You guys make Infinity sound pretty interesting, tactically speaking. Necromunda is a solid ruleset but it could use a serious overhaul and it's tempting to look to other rule systems sometimes. Although, like Ghostflame I can't get away from the grimdark asthetic.

It is, Brute. Being stuck on the 40k style is understandable (because it's great and we've grown so familiar with it over the years), but Infinity might be less different than you might expect.
First of all it's not all shiny new and squeeky clean and flowers and sunshine and gak.
In Infinity humanity is not surrounded by enemies and at the brink of destruction, but it's its own biggest enemy and unless it can be united it will be destroyed by its alien enemies even before it can destroy itself.

So basicly it's Terra before the Emperor's arrival. And it basically got all the grimdarkness of 40k hidden under a blanket of hightech and wealth.

There are power-hungry religious orders, anarchistic renegade scum, government assassins, plotting secret services, special police forces specialized in making people disappear, greedy drug trafficers, illegal genetic modifications, public gladiator battles, a disembodied unapproachable overmind etc.

The real difference is that the 40k universe is often portrayed/seen as black and white, which it actually shouldn't be.
CSM aren't just evil because they are possessed or misguided, they are flawed like all humans, no matter their physique and they make their own decisions based on human motives. How else could anyone sway a whole army to become renegades.

However the contrast in Infinity is lower, every faction can be looked at from two opposite perspectives.
Without Aleph the AI humanity would perish and it's Aleph's goal to help, unite and strengthen humanity, but it is also very dominant and could end up trying to usurp the throne.

Tyranids on the other hand are creatures without motives, only instinct. Even the hive mind seems to have no other goal than destruction. That's why despite those cool miniatures I never got into Tyranids. I understand and like the concept of an incomprehensibe foe without a face or feelings, but in the end they are just mindless antagonists to me and I wouldn't want to build an army of those.

All Inq28 and I-munda freaks will agree that being able to
actually relate to your miniatures and their motives is the part that makes it fun.

The closest thing to a one-sided faction in Infinity are the Morat, which are a little bit like Orks. They live in a military society, their only value is power and their only goal is to die in a good battle. Like orks their honour follows a certain warrior's codex, but they mainly crave destruction.
The huge difference is that the Morat's goals are negligable because they are actually just the EI's goons. They are part of the Combined Army and the EI just uses their power and battlelust to its own ends. Not unlike Eldar coercing Orks into testing or distracting their enemies, but as a fixed ally.

Anyway, if you read the fiction behind Infinity the game, you'll see it's not unlike 40k. But in contrast to it there aren't skulls on every surface...

I should add that the Morat definitely don't like being the EI's pawn. They like the violence, but they are still looking forward to the day they can strike back against the opressive machine.

It's in their fluff somewhere, I'll go find it later.

Hey Ghostflame! I love the Yellow! It's a wild contrast to what I'm used to seeing in Aleph and I know it's going to look bangin' when it's all said and done. Keep it up chief.

Aye up guys , Good stuff alround , Big B your conversions are as perfect as ever , your attention to detail , is complimented by the clean lines of the pretty lady reporter. nice basing too mate.

And Ghosty the wip is looking cool nice depth to that lemon yellow and just a hint of urban grittiness.

@ B really enjoyed reading your take on the fiction for Infinity. The boys are watching the new total recall and I can really appreciate that grimy cyberpunk aesthetic.. similar to deus ex actually , the contrast of the clean and the dirty underworld ala demolition man etc.. is what would attract me to model these ... although I think I would struggle with the details.

Thanks for the kind words, Neil!
Now that I'm done with the priority stuff, I'll be back to finally finish my Naga. Let's see what the night brings...

I just had a look through this entire blog and your 'Eye for Detail" blog (yes yes i know, work is very slow this week okay). i must say you are one of the best converters/scratch builders that i have seen. i wish i had the guts to attempt half the conversions you do, especially with my Ariadna.

Keep up the super-awesome and inspirational work!

nerm

Nerm86 wrote:
Keep up the super-awesome and inspirational work!nerm

Hey Nerm, sorry man, hadn't noticed you left a comment, otherwise I'd have thanked you earlier. So, well, thank you!

Update:

Do you remember that months ago I talked about a game called Infinity and that I considered buying some miniatures for it? Just kidding, but seriously after all this time I finally managed to finish the first model for my Aleph.

I'm not going to bore you (at least no more than I've already done during those months) with the loong and difficult story of its creation, but let me summarize some of the facts to give the model a little bit of context.

What you're about to see is the Naga operative for my Aleph force. If you're interested in the background of these specific agents of the AI, check out this exerpt from their fluff:

Due to the Naga's special function and equipment (slick body sleeve - oppan night ops style) his paint scheme will actually not be representative for the rest of the army, but I used the same white and grey (the one on the armor plates) as I plan to use for all my Aleph. So hopefully there will be a certain level of both distinction and coherence once he get's company in the cabinet.

I'm sure that I'll get mixed feedback for this miniature, because of the mix of styles I employed. There is fancy anime stuff like the OSL and the techy white weapon. On the other hand there is some realism in the limited palette with a slight nod towards night time camo and the weathering techniques more often seen in military modelling.
This mixup is half intentional, because I don't intend to go all clean and anime-like, but at the same time want to retain the impression of an army of hightech android operatives. So yes there is rust and mud in the Infinity-Universe (especially in the setting I've chosen for my army/board/bases, a deserted military compound in the jungles of Paradiso), if you don't like it I totally understand.

If you see a certain level of inconsistency beyond my beforementioned stylistic decisions, than that's probably because I started painting the Naga before I was even sure what my scheme would be, so he went through dozens of changes and by the time I was done with the suit, I had changed all other colors and didn't want to paint it over again. In addition to that I've been experimenting with a whole bunch of techniques, that I hadn't used before and in hindsight some of those shouldn't have been tried out on the same model.

There are one or two details I might revisit at a later date (troop markings once I decided how much of them I want on the whole force and maybe I decide that his lips could benefit from a little tint, but so far I feared he would look to organic or like a tranny).
Anyway I consider him done for now.

As always I've learned a lot and even though the matte varnish diminished some of the effects, while remaining a bit shiny (can't wait for my new varnish to arrive) and the photographing didn't work out as intended, I'm happy to have finished this one and I'm positive the next one will be more straight forward.

Without further ado:

How did you do that grey?

I must know! TELL ME!