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 Barzam wrote:
To be a proper beast master, I think that guy is going to need a couple of ferrets.

Ferrets. And John Amos.

While I dig through my boxes and bins for ferrets, human- birthing cows, giant bat stomach people, bondage monsters, and ferrets, here's how the Noh leader guy Kasaro To is coming along.



His ride is just about finished. Need to do the exhaust pipes on his engine block (probably with a brass casing) and maybe some panel lining. I need to fill in the energy banks on his underbelly as well.

The Noh Oni guy, Kasaro To has gotten most of his base colors finished. I need to work on his armor plates still, finish up his giant moon crescent back ornament, and then it's time for detailing the two of them. I actually got their base ready, I just haven't bothered gluing them down since I still need to do the robot's underbelly. I still think the supplied 80mm base is too small- the thing should really sit on a 100mm base, as just about every single limb hangs off the base in one way or another. I'd switch to one of my other bases, but then it wouldn't fit in with the rest of my Relic Knights stuff, which I've made sure have all kept their funky purple bases.

I do hope Soda Pop eventually comes back to the line. They seem way too focused on Super Dungeon these days, and I kind of feel that after the Kickstarter was fulfilled the game was basically left out to die.

I like the color I found for the cat thing. Reminds me of the color of ED-209- especially the toy my brother had as a kid (which in turns brings back the nostalgic smell of burnt caps, since the robot had a hammer mechanism in it to pop caps).

I think I'll use that same blue/grey color on my Rangers Project Salamander that I've had sitting on a shelf since I got it at that Minis swap.

that is a great color. What is it? I wouldn't mind using that on some of my mechs.

I'll let you know when I get home. I'm not really sure.

It honestly should be called 90s anime blue gray, because that's totally what it looks like.

It's such a mecha color.

While I finish up Kasaro To and his schweet ride, in the words of Monty Python...

"And now for something completely different."



ENTER THE MOUSLING PRINCESS.

What possessed me to purchase her? I don't know. Why did she feel the need to cut in line? Not sure.

Why is she hanging out with the grim reaper mushroom man? Beats me. Maybe he's a good conversationalist.

What's the rat man doing there? Maybe he just got friendzoned by her highness after being strung along for quite some time.

My Kriel are still in various stages of painting. My goal is to have at least half done by the weekend. I was supposed to go volunteer at the Japanese school on Saturday, but my wife said she'd cover it, which means more time for painting (after cleaning and chore stuff naturally).

Kasaro To looks very cool. Such a monstrous figure. And The Reaper, well, he just rocks.

Kasaro To is a cool figure. He's all done and just needs to be glued to his ride- except I ran out of super glue! Ugh. I know what I'll be hunting down this afternoon.

In between searching for glue somewhere in the house, the mousling princess had her erstwhile companions finished.



They may not be of the most scrupulous character, but when a job needs doing, these mice mean business.

Something about the princess looks off to me. She looks like a cross between a monkey and an ewok. The other two at least look like mice. Frustrated by the assassin one because I actually did paint the details on his face, they're just naturally obscured by his cloak, which I guess they should be, what with being a brooding assassin and all.

I'm totally buying more of these guys next time I'm at the hobby shop (which will probably be tomorrow).

So after painting up Kasaro To's mount, I decided to try using that same dark blue gray color (the official name of it at least) on some Retribution guys.

I keep picking up cheap Retribution guys from Warmachine. Not sure why. Elves aren't usually my thing. Maybe just for the chance to have something different to paint?

Behold the brethren of the pointing swords...



Obviously there's a lot more to do here, but I think it'll be an interesting armor choice for them. The Dawnguard really reminds me of a Masamune Shirou designed landmate mecha or something. I think it's the head and the overly large thigh armor.

I should have a few more interesting pieces showing up in the next week or two.

I also sucked it up and started painting my dragons don't share. My dragon ended up... pink. Should be fun.

Changed things up a little with the armor color.




Tinted it a bit greener, seems more "elfy" that way. Changed their cloaks to a more blue- green (but not turquoise!) so they were more in line with Thyron, the Sword of Truth, who I guess they'd be hanging out with if they actually were used in a game of Warmachine. They will most likely be making my next warband for Song of Blades and Heroes, as these guys are a lot smaller and more portable than lugging around 60mm based snakemen or giant Oni that I don't have containers large enough to carry them in.

Will probably go back in with a black ink to get all the crevices filled in.

Here are their buddies that will soon be requisitioned into the elf warband.


Funny thing is none of them match. At all. I think I used a different green on every one of them. On the other hand, they're all supposed to be fairly independent operators, so it shouldn't really matter if they aren't the most cohesive looking set of guys.

I'm also starting to think those Stormfall Archers I was going to sell or going to end up supporting these guys as well.

They're looking a bit less mech-y now that you've changed their shading. I didn't know you were planning to sell those archers. I'd be willing to swap you some chunky Dragyri for them.

I think the beta Advanced SOBH rules were supposed to be sent out sometime soon. We'll have to test yhem out. If you end up using these guys, I think they might wind up being your most normal army you've fielded.

Yeah, they did lose a bit of the mecha- ness in the tinting of their armor. Maybe if I pick up some more invictors down the line. Problem is finding a shading that I'm happy with. Believe it or not, those guys have gone through a few palette changes already- I just didn't photograph them.

You're right about these probably being my most "normal" warband so far. That will soon be rectified, don't you worry!

Elves ready to get blasted by a double dose of sealants this afternoon upon my arrival home.



Went back and did some highlighting with the original anime gray color I used on most of their armor. Finished up just about everybody, and flocked their bases. Will probably toss a few random rocks on their bases, because why not? May use a few more grasses as well.

Should be fun giving these guys stats. A fair warning to Barzam and Obstinate Baton (our cousin, if he's out there lurking), these guys are getting geared to shoot the crap out of your guys, and we won't be playing the poison game this time around. Of course Thyron will have to have him super swordsman abilities imported from Warmachine, so we'll be pulling some of the Advanced rules out for him, like using his sword for ranged defense.

Got about half of my Kriel bases and ready to go as well. Hope to have the rest done this weekend and have all this big stuff out of the way.

My plan after that is to work through some of my Bones pledge, and possibly some of the random Hell Dorado humans I've accumulated. I think if I stick with a simple paint scheme I can roll through them pretty quickly.

Looking very good.

We'll see how well they do. If we're expanding the rules, I'll be bringing explosives and combat stims to the party.

So I tried out that gloss primer we got on Saturday, and it wasn't as glossy as I had hoped or expected. Went to put a matte coat on top of that later, and I saw absolutely no difference. Probably didn't help that it was pretty much dark outside when I was doing that. Needless to say, we'll give those elves another blast today, as well as all the Noh that were hanging out with them in the back yard.




My Kriel are all finally glued up, tartan'ed, and detailed. About half of them have their bases done. Another half have all been inked as well. Ended up spending most of my evening cleaning and playing board games with the kids rather than get any painting done.


The plan is still to put these guys to work in a Kings of War Ogre army. The Kriel alone give me about 1000 points of ogres spread across 2 regiments or 1 regiment and 3 troops. I figure the caber guys should be their own unit and count the cabers as a two handed weapon for the crushing strength bonus.

Some day my Scattergunners will arrive, and that's at least another 2 regiments, or split them into smaller units as well.

One thing I want for my Ogre'd Troll army is some Siege Breakers. They're supposed to be heavily armored guys with shields and hammers. I thought, that sounds just like a Warder unit! Too bad I sold off my painted Warders. They were kind of cool too, since I did custom bases on all of them and my Champions. Oh well. I'll probably get more and put them on some of those CMON Micro Arts bases I've got sitting around.

Siege Breakers need a Siege Master though, a hero who's even more heavily armored, with an even bigger shield. Sounds like a job for a Troll Bouncer! I grabbed a metal one last weekend as I like the metal sculpt a lot more than the plastic. Plus, the metal is carrying a ham hock around like a Rackham figure. But then I thought, hey, I've got someone even better suited to being a Siege Master with a giant shield.!




Even has 3 fingers and a thumb like a good and proper trollkin. With the helmet on I don't need to worry too much about the difference in facial features- I do need to fix one of the missing tusks however. The skull on the shield is just about the same size as a gnarlhorn's head too. I've got a spare Bugbear that I'll be painting more appropriately later on.

The Kriel are finally out of the way. Everyone is painted, even the caber tossers. Just a few more in need of basing materials and I can put a checkmark next to that group needing to be finished.

So with them finished, it was time to start wrapping up a few other projects I had taking up space on my table.



I'd been using whatever leftover colors I had on these guys. That's my Avatars of War Orc Gladiator, a Warlords of Aegytpus To-Tanem Hero of some sort, and a Bones nature spirit I believe.

Very frustrating as I'm currently waiting on about 4 different orders to arrive at my house, and they're all MIA for the moment. No idea why either. Some are coming from California as well, so I don't get the hold up. Irritating. Then again, it's not like I don't have piles and piles of stuff to work on...

Yay! The weekend is finally over!

Saturday was Undoukai day, which is a Japanese sports/ track & field event day. Of course, it was supposed to rain, but that would deprive us poor parents from sitting out in the sun for a good six or seven hours, wouldn't it? Naturally it wouldn't be an old fashioned track event without having to drag the parents out repeatedly to participate.

So nope, no rain, just sun and no barbecues or alcohol allowed, which many of the other parents lamented with me, as it would have made the day much more enjoyable for us. In the end the kids all had a good time, and sadly the red team (our team) lost to the white team by one point, 493 vs 492. Sad. We won last year at least.

Sunday was spent cleaning. Just cleaning cleaning CLEANING. At least my house is presentable again. I'm not sure who's a bigger packrat, my wife or my daughter. Both perhaps?

I did manage to at least get my Orc Pit Fighter from Avatars of War pretty much finished up.



Just noticed that the ink seems to have congealed on his axe blade, so I'll have to fix that, and I accidentally painted some of his skin gold like his chainmail (which you can see more clearly from a rear view, which I didn't bother photographing obviously), but he's pretty much finished.
Whatever pit he's supposed to be fighting in must obviously have once belong to GW, as this guy's got skulls adorning him like they're going out of fashion. There's even more on his back! I'm thinking I'm going to make all the runes on his skulls seem like they're glowing. They all have different runes as well. I find it hard to believe he was supposed to fit on a 20 or 25mm base. He's actually on a 40mm one and his toes overextend in both directions.

So I got a large pile of Dystopian Wars stuff this week. It was mostly French and American units. I had planned on using the Americans as a gift, but decided I'd give up the French as well, which was hard considering I had two of those sweet mobile air fields. Oh well.
Ended up keeping the Russians, which wasn't such a bad deal as I had a landship, a few medium tanks, and some of the giant burrowing drill transports coming very soon.

Decided to try painting up a Kamchatka class medium tank.



Wasn't sure what I wanted to do with the bases, so I left it alone for now (it's not glued on yet). Maybe just straight flocking on them? Dunno.

I thought I did a decent job. Doesn't really show in the photo- I did all the individual rivets, some sweet wood paneling on the decks, painted in all the windows and port holes (which must be massive given the size of these machines compared to regular humans).

Here's the tank next to a Trollblood I've been working on these last few days, Horgle Ironstrike. God what a ridiculous name. Horgle.



I thought I did a decent job on his tartan- not that you can really see it in the photo.

The other thing I've been working on is some Zombiesmith figures from their War of Ashes line. Not sure what the skinny one on the end is called, but I know the furry kobold looking fellow is a Jaarl. I like 'em.



Those are Bones Mouslings and kobolds with them, on top of regular GW 20mm bases no less, to give you an idea of how big they are. Kind of surprised Barzam didn't go in for any Jaarls, as he's usually pretty keen on Romanesque regalia and these dudes have it in spades.

Their fur came out kind of similar in the picture, whereas skinny guy is a much more yellowish color in person.

Honestly, I'd never looked all that closely at the War of Ashes line too closely. The quality on them looks pretty good. I just don't need more fantasy stuff right now.

You know that Zombiesmith has a mouseling line, too, don't you?

Yeah, I saw Zombiesmith's mouslings when they were doing the Kickstarter. It was before I started reading Redwall to the kids however, resulting in them not really caring much at the time.

I hope to get the rest of the lot primed this weekend. I hand primed those guys up there with a brush, and it just seemed so ineffective compared to grabbing a can and blasting a huge batch of stuff all at once.

Plus I love how durable that Tamiya primer is too.

My hope for tonight is to keep working on that Minions Bugbear that I'm using as a troll.

So between repeatedly getting nagged all week on Ebay about a figure I was selling (that the nagger eventually decided to purchase, but has yet to pay for), I've been trying to work on my Bugbear/ Troll Bouncer guy. He had been painted with leftovers from when I was doing the Kriel Warriors, so now it's time for him to get some dedicated paint.



He's got all the armor parts base coated, most of the straps and bones, and at this point I just need to finish the ornamentation on his shoes and then it's time to start highlighting and detailing him.

As is par the course, I naturally found a bunch of spots that I didn't clean very thoroughly. After I'd already started painting it as well, of course. Not sure what color I'll end up painting his robe/ loincloth thing. I think I'll do it up like a Trollkin tartan to make him fit in better.



Speaking of things I'm unsure to paint, I've got this guy who's been sitting around for a bit. Unsure how to proceed with him. He's a vampire guy from Reaper with all kinds of crazy ornamentation on his armor. I'm thinking I'll do the fancy stuff in bronze, including the faceplate thing, but the actual armor I'm not sure. The armor also seems to have some sort of padding on the underside, so I'm unsure how to proceed with that too.

Absylonia behind him just arrived and her arms do not want to cooperate and stay attached. Stupid tiny contact points... ugh. I'll probably be doing her up like the rest of my dragon infused legion figures (a nice dark red). I still have a bunch of Everblight figures that aren't as messed up by the dragon that I'm unsure how to proceed with- the one ninja style warlock especially. Most of my legion stuff is all in gold. A ninja would look a little strange in gold I think...

I must have forgotten to comment on the Orc he looks very cool indeed, looks like a really fun mini to paint.

That vampire does look like a tricky mini to paint, theres just so much going on.

At this point for that vampire it's a toss up between black(ish) armor with red padding and highlights, or the opposite in red armor with black padding and highlights.

I finished up my EXTREME Troll Bouncer. Here he is with some friends.



Of course, the focal point of the photo ended up being Axis the Harmonic Enforcer instead. He was my test trial for an Army Painter primer I had wanted to try out (a plate mail primer), and other than glopping on too much spray in certain spots, he came out alright. The primer at least did. He still has a lot of work ahead of him. Hopefully I can get him done in the next few days. Once I finish the gold on his toes I'll go ahead and put him on a base, along with the requisitioned bugbear troll.

Blasted a bunch of Dystopian Wars stuff with that metallic plate mail color too. Shouldn't need a whole lot more painting on them to be tabletop ready.

I also had no idea what ever happened to my Epic Asphyxious that I ordered, along with a Retribution Myrmidon, so I took the plunge and picked up the Lich Lord at the local shop, considering it wasn't much more than the best of the internet prices anyways.

Turns out that this morning, the shipping information on that order which hasn't been updated in almost three weeks suddenly has arrived at my local post office. Now, the seller did mention they were going to swap out my order with something else, and it would be shipping out soon... maybe that's what it is? We'll see.

Also grabbed a bunch of CHEEEEEEEEAP Skorne guys on Saturday. Cheap enough that I could have turned around and just flipped them on ebay and easily made my money back and a fair amount on top of them. Maybe I'll head back on Wednesday and clear them out if Barzam hasn't already...

I have no intention of buying them. They're all yours, assuming nobody else beats you to them.

You're going to need to post some more angles on your "Trollkin" there.

Ask and ye shall receive.





With his buddy.




Started in on my Elven Kung Fu battle mage dude. Love this sculpt. Him and the House Thane actually look like they're about to go partake in a battle, what with all their kit and gear packed up on them.

Started up on his Phoenix myrmidon buddy but it isn't very exciting to look at currently.

Great stuff. That Minion Ogre/Troll looks especially good. Still spewing that I forgot the end date of that particular KS' relaunch.

I'm pleased by how my bugbear bouncer turned out.

I've started up on my second one which will be done up like my Reaper bugbears. His armor is starting to match up with the one vampire lord that I had primed a few days back.

Finished up my House Shyeel Magister. Of course most of the details are lost in the camera quality. He's ready to get his kung fu hustle on with the wannabe Tyranid hanging out behind him.



I picked that new Skorne beast up for a whopping 12 bucks, already painted. I've been doing some touch up work on it, but I can't complain about the price one bit. They had a bunch of painted Titans for about the same price, and teams of Basilisks as well. Naturally after I got rid of all my Skorne stuff.

Also had my Bearka show up in the mail yesterday. I wish the bear was a bit larger, but then it wouldn't fit on the 50mm base that all the mounted warcasters use. Would have been cool putting him on a huge monster of a bear on a 120mm base though. Maybe whenever the next version of Madrak Ironhide shows up he can be the super deluxe huge warlock.

Going to have to try and prime him tonight.

Here is a sloppy first photo of that vampire lord.



A lot to clean up and highlight obviously, but I think I've at least settled on the colors for his armor.

Dude just has a crazy ornate suit of armor.

The guy behind him is some random Saracen from the Hell Dorado line I got for a buck and decided to randomly paint.

So what should I do when I have entire cases full of half finished figures laying around?

Start another figure from scratch, of course!

In this case, I'd picked up version 2 of Makeda from Skorne last Saturday. Had her primed on Sunday, and she sat on my table the rest of the week. Late Thursday or Friday night I got the urge to start painting her.
Sunday morning she'd be inked, based, and sealed.



Also, a long awaited figure (by some). I actually sat down and got my Reznik painted up. He's just about finished at this point. Base coats are all done, time for highlighting and stuff.



Tried to take a better shot of that Vampire Lord as well. I started doing all the edges of his armor in bone white, but there's only certain parts that actually have edging on them. Tempted to do it all just for the hell of it, but that's a pretty tall order.



After working on these three I noticed they all have similar paint schemes, so I'm going to just say they're all BFFs and have them all work together as a unit. Started painting my other Bugbear from Minion in matching colors as well.

Also got this dude over the weekend (in addition to a bunch of other stuff).



Dude is a Pathfinder Orc. Kulagar, Orc Barbarian to be exact. I was informed by a fine young fellow at the game shop that this here orc is carrying a magical chainsaw. Fair enough. Said fellow also smelled quite magical to boot, as he regaled us with stories of his latest Pathfinder adventure fighting 4 armed female Predators armed with shock poles or some such nonsense we never asked about... it was quite an event!

Didn't realize until I got him that this figure has a rather large cavity on his back where something obviously needs to go. There was nothing in the package however, so I contacted Reaper. When I woke up this morning I got a message with a tracking number with them having already dispatched the missing piece.

The way the email read it sounds like they sent me a whole extra figure, so if that's the case I might dump this extra one on Barzam.

After finishing up Makeda the other day, I started thinking to myself, "You know what I should do since I just finished painting Makeda? Paint another Makeda."

So I did.



Started her last night and just plugged away at her. Forgot to do her eyes, now that I notice. Base will get done this afternoon.

Here she is with herself/ her clone/ evil sister/ whatever.



I think the only natural conclusion to what I worked on this week is to go and get the 3rd version of her- which actually happens to probably be my favorite design of her, with the big swirly battle skirt and the giant pole arm blade she's wielding. I guess I know my weekend plan!

Also sucked it up and tried to finish doing all the trim in bone on that vampire lord.



Arms and thighs are all done, and those thighs were a pain considering how the armor is designed. Only thing to do now is consider everything below the knees. Not sure if I should bother doing the edging on the boots and what little armor is on his feet, or just leave it as is. Suggestions?

Once these are all out of the way, I think I'll be moving on to a bunch of Legion of Everblight stuff that I finally decided on a paint scheme for. They won't match up with the Nephilim I've got, but oh well. Nephilim are supposed to be all elite and cool, so whatever.

I've got no idea what any of this Hordes stuff is, but it looks great. The Magister came up really nicely, I especially like how the details on his chestpiece came out.