Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Morgoth, while Qatar is in most respects the best airline I've ever flown with, it is still an Arab airline and you have to understand that there is simply no concept of accountability in this part of the world. God broke my models, not the airline's employees. God.

Considering how well you protected the models you do have to wonder, maybe God did break them... None of my completed collections had as much time and effort put into them as these, but for those one or two models that have and that got broke it is a very hard emotion to describe, seeing them destroyed for the first time and then wondering how the eff you're going to repair them.

I hope everything is going better and that your new digs don't suck too much.

awesome army man..

 bossfearless wrote:
Morgoth, while Qatar is in most respects the best airline I've ever flown with, it is still an Arab airline and you have to understand that there is simply no concept of accountability in this part of the world. God broke my models, not the airline's employees. God.

If there was ever a concept in this world that truly needed to be nuked from orbit, it's most definitely "In Shallah" Holy Feth, that one phrase alone cause so much gak to go sideways for us while in Iraq.

Ugh. Inshallah is the bane of our existence here. It's the ultimate cop out, an abdication of all personal responsibility and it's illegal to argue against it due to the stupid theocracy. Surgeon goes into the operating room drunk? He didn't kill your child, God did. Idiot joyrider street racing totals his fourth Ferrarri this week and paralyzes your brother? Nope, that was all God.


So, uh, a little micro update. Not so much an update but a general status report. I'm kind of on a break from 40k as a whole. The hobby, the fiction, all of it. I just can't seem to bring myself to care right now. I'm going to work on my novel and put my mental energy into this real estate project I'm spinning up, and maybe come back to finish my Tau in a few months. There's a chance that in a while I might get a couple more players out this way, so that would help. But for right now, I've just had the love of the hobby sucked out of me.

The one project I might take on is the big Wing Zero Custom model kit I picked up in Akihabara. That's going to need lights like a melon-fether, and I may go with some modifications to the whole thing because why the hell not.


Edit: melon-fether? Really?

Take your vacation from 40K, make crazy real estate money, buy GW, make everything awesome.

Also, novel?

 bossfearless wrote:
Ugh. Inshallah is the bane of our existence here. It's the ultimate cop out, an abdication of all personal responsibility and it's illegal to argue against it due to the stupid theocracy. Surgeon goes into the operating room drunk? He didn't kill your child, God did. Idiot joyrider street racing totals his fourth Ferrarri this week and paralyzes your brother? Nope, that was all God.

And that's why I'm an Atheist/Humanist. :3

 SisterSydney wrote:
Take your vacation from 40K, make crazy real estate money, buy GW, make everything awesome.

Also, novel?

Fantasy novel with a bit of steampunk flavor. Kind of Harry Potter meets American Pie. Apprentice wizards trying to make money and get laid, thief guild enforcers with flowcharts, brownies with and without nuts, poor sad pathetic Trevor, and a plate of sausages that ends the world.

Poor Trevor.

Hah, sounds like a lot of fun, actually; like a good D&D campaign! XD

Wait, isn't Trevor the toad that Neville Longbottom has?

No, Trevor is the poor dumb bastard who made fun of an old Riven (Gypsy equivalent) woman and got cursed to be forever teabagged by goblins.

Poor Trevor. That guy is an absolute wreck these days. He tried everything, but as curses go, his was perfect. Totally counterspell-proof. As soon as he isn't looking, BAM. Face full of slimy goblin wing-wong. They just appear out of nowhere, sweaty like they've been working in the field all day, and they run off before anyone can even get a good look at them, so nobody knows if they're local goblins or if they're being ported in from somewhere else. He once tried wearing an iron welding mask to keep the little bastards off of him, but that was the worst mistake he ever made. Little fether appeared inside his mask, and being stuffed into a dark, cramped place had him soiling himself aggressively on top of the usual bit.

So now, resigned to his terrible fate, Trevor just sits in the Flaming Red drinking himself stupid every night. Old Tom lets him drink for free out of pity, and because he's become something of a local tourist attraction, and the bar's ambiance isn't harmed by his occasional screams about balls.

What.

Also: awesome.

There's a lot of that sort of thing going around. Midget emperors, vampire pimps, ultra masculine pirates and tattooed magic bitches are all planned for the sequel, along with a gun that shoots bowie knives.

Consider dropping the 'knife' bit ...but leave Bowie in.

David Bowie.

Indeed....poor Trevor

Hope everything goes well with the writing and the real estate, and I hope the break from the 40k world (eventually) leaves you refreshed and willing to enter it once more.

Keep us posted of any progress you do make with the Wing Zero.

That honestly brings up a good question. Why did I never plan to include David Bowie in my Tau army? It seems like a no-brainer now.

I saw this model the other day and I don't know if you've seen it before but, it would certainly go well with the army.



BTY, the novel sounds hilarious, I hope that works out, I'd certainly read it.

 bossfearless wrote:
No, Trevor is the poor dumb bastard who made fun of an old Riven (Gypsy equivalent) woman and got cursed to be forever teabagged by goblins.

Poor Trevor. That guy is an absolute wreck these days. He tried everything, but as curses go, his was perfect. Totally counterspell-proof. As soon as he isn't looking, BAM. Face full of slimy goblin wing-wong. They just appear out of nowhere, sweaty like they've been working in the field all day, and they run off before anyone can even get a good look at them, so nobody knows if they're local goblins or if they're being ported in from somewhere else. He once tried wearing an iron welding mask to keep the little bastards off of him, but that was the worst mistake he ever made. Little fether appeared inside his mask, and being stuffed into a dark, cramped place had him soiling himself aggressively on top of the usual bit.

So now, resigned to his terrible fate, Trevor just sits in the Flaming Red drinking himself stupid every night. Old Tom lets him drink for free out of pity, and because he's become something of a local tourist attraction, and the bar's ambiance isn't harmed by his occasional screams about balls.

I need this book !

 bossfearless wrote:
That honestly brings up a good question. Why did I never plan to include David Bowie in my Tau army? It seems like a no-brainer now.

I'm looking for ways to get Bowie influences into my army, and I play Tyranids. Yeah, he's awesome.

SBG wrote:

 bossfearless wrote:
That honestly brings up a good question. Why did I never plan to include David Bowie in my Tau army? It seems like a no-brainer now.

I'm looking for ways to get Bowie influences into my army, and I play Tyranids. Yeah, he's awesome.

That's a no brainer. Hive Tyrant in a leotard with Labyrinth hair. Done.

Yeah, the world needs more books like yours Boss.

Small excerpt from an early chapter:

By early evening, the morning's rain had turned into one of those awful summer storms, the ones that dropped a lake's worth of hot rain and never let up. Most of the shops closed up early when these sort of things blew through rather than have their wares exposed to the heat and the wet and the wind. The only places still open for business were those that offered cold air and hot food, places like the Flaming Red. The sign above the door would have made me chuckle as always if it hadn't been raining too hard to see straight. Something about the relief carving of a novice mage combusting explosively tickled my funny bone. We are such a morbid bunch.
I had to turn sideways a bit to get my shoulders through the door without catching on anything. Someone once told me that I was the biggest novice to ever survive the Red phase, a thought that wormed its way into my mind while I absent mindedly shook the rain out of my umbrella and dropped it into the stand by the front door. Sometimes, I wondered if that were true, that I was some kind of a freak accident of survival. I'd met one or two mages taller than me, but nobody with quite so wide a set to their shoulders. The dry, cool air within the place hit me with a wave of pure refreshment after the stifling humidity outside, and I stood beneath the vent near the entrance for several long seconds just taking in the miracles provided by sweet, sweet frost magic.
There are a number of disparate social philosophies regarding novice students at the Academy, the Reds. While most types of schools encourage students to try and make friends with their classmates, the Academy's official stance is that Reds ought to avoid any sort of attachment to their fellows. The entire first session of classes revolves around learning basic control over energies a human body was never meant to channel. Almost a third of every starting class is lost to attrition through miscasts, botched spells whose energies are allowed to discharge violently through the body of the caster. Thus, it is rare to find a student beyond the first session who has not wound up covered in the smoking remains of a classmate or close friend. It is small wonder that many professors begin their lectures by donning a raincoat.
Over the years, there had been plenty of attempts made to curb the high mortality rate. During the deanship of Magus Dario Soon, a Kroen-born necromancer, "backups" were made of every new student so that when they died in a miscast, they would wake up in the medical vault and be slightly wiser. The thought was to reduce death to just another learning experience. What Magus Soon soon learned was that a student who miscast once was apt to do it again, that it was more a result of a lack of talent than just a lack of experience, and before long the Academy was nearly bankrupted by the cost of cloning so many inept pupils.
With all this in mind, an uninitiated person might think that the Flaming Red tavern was named in poor taste, and that the murals on the interior walls were especially scandalous. But the place was a mage bar, and thrived on the patronage of jaded ‘prentices who thought that scenes of exploding novices were absolutely hilarious. On a night like this, the Flaming Red was packed. Finals were done with at last, and by tradition drinks were on the house. There was food, sometimes, but mostly the patrons sought catharsis of the bottled variety. Faraday sat at the bar examining his fruity umbrella drink, as always wearing those ridiculous cowboy boots with the lifts in them, and Bloodgorger Seth looked miserable as always. I never understood why he was so morose with a name as awesome as “Bloodgorger.” Seated at a long table made from two smaller ones pushed together, a motley group of tired-looking teens caroused loudly beneath a mural depicting a Red who seemed to have misplaced himself from the waist up. A girl was the center of attention, though that hardly came as a surprise, given the circumstance. Her name was Alice, and her tits were out.

 bossfearless wrote:
.... Thus, it is rare to find a student beyond the first session who has not wound up covered in the smoking remains of a classmate or close friend. It is small wonder that many professors begin their lectures by donning a raincoat. ...

That's... .vivid.

You ever try channeling elemental fire through your soft, squishy body? Spoiler alert, you're going to be sponged off the ceiling lol. One of the main things i want to differentiate between my world and others is the danger involved with magic. Mages tend to be short lived, intense and have an infamously dark sense of humor. It's common wisdom to never accept a gift from a mage, as they tend to be worse than Jokey Smurf in that regard.

Are you secretly Terry Pratchett? I was reading the extract, enjoying it immensely, thinking, this is what Discworld used to be like before it got all formulaic, all's that is missing is a little overt sex and then I got to the last line and I literally laughed out loud, the dead-pan delivery was spot on.

I'm completely with you on magic being dangerous and if I may go back to Discworld, I recall Rincewind performing proper magic for the first time and he truly understands why the wizards do it, as the experience is extraordinary, better than sex as he says. However, it should involve huge danger where doing it wrong results in instantly fatal results most of the time, I think that makes it more 'real'.

Great stuff, I enjoyed it immensely.

Very enjoyable Boss, definitely something that I'll be reading once it's finished.

I suddenly get the picture of mages in your world not as bearded sages, brooding necromancers, or cocky apprentices , but as something like oil rig workers or deep sea divers: highly skilled, highly paid -- when they get paid -- but not highly respected or long-lived, with a grim, sarcastic camaraderie.

Thank you for the kind reviews. It's been slow going lately, with video games and other distractions stealing far too much of my time. I've got about 3/4 of a chapter left to tie together the second act, and most of that involves heavily armed hookers and zombies. Unfortunately that scene does not write itself as easily as the subject matter suggests.

 bossfearless wrote:
Unfortunately that scene does not write itself as easily as the subject matter suggests.

I half dread to think, I half want to pay you to make it happen...

It begins.....




Pics will be posted at various stages as i tackle this beast. Also, ever take a selfie that just looks too good to keep to yourself? This is what I've been doing while on hiatus from my Tau:



Recently reached my initial strength goal, 315 bench press, so now i start my first cutting cycle. Flexing intensifies.

Lastly, I finally managed to wrap up the second act of my novel after an exhausting action sequence. I spent hours last night imagining the sensations of being burned alive from the inside out, and trying to translate that into prose. Something like that can be emotionally draining. I've realized that I much prefer writing witty banter to action scenes. Good action is freaking tough to write!