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I've had a little too much fun today. My Citadel Skulls arrived in the mail today, so I'll be returning to working on my scratch built vindicator tanks:



I also went to what I believe is my closest FLGS for the first time today. I was given a gift certificate to it back in December and haven't gotten to go until today. I also had a gift card that can be used anywhere, so I went to town.

I bought "Waterdeep Dragon Heist". I think it came out this month, and I've heard very good things about it. I have no idea when I'll get to play it, as I'm not very far through "Lost Mines of Phandelver", but I hope I get to play it eventually.


I picked up some minis, and unless the D&D board games count, these are my first official D&D minis. As you know, I like to make most of my own stuff. I've been planning to make an owlbear, but have been worried that I might not do a good enough job. This owlbear has one of the best sculpts I've seen. I've also been trying to decided on good zombie minis. I have a lot from "Sedition Wars" but I worry that they're too gruesome for the kids in my D&D group. I like HeroQuest zombies, but 12 identical zombies with cleavers bothered me too, so these will be a nice addition. The booster box was just because I had some money left over on the cards (and probably because I watch too much Blandco). I also picked up some Blood for the Blood God paint (Thanks Cam!)

Contents of the booster box

I just saw that waterdeep heist supplement this week, yesterday I also saw for the first time a compilation of old D&D modules brought up to whatever the current edition is. It had the old Keep on the Borderlands cover on it. I remembered that one very fondly. I’ve also been eyeballing some of those primed figs including some rock elementals.

That's really great to hear that they have a compilation of old D&D modules in a book updated for 5E. I didn't see/notice that one, but I'm excited by your news. I have a bunch of old modules updated for 5E that I bought through humble bundle. I haven't played any of them, but they have been fun to read. Those elemental minis are nice looking, if I didn't already have minis that I'm going to use for elementals I admit I would have bought them just for how nice they look. Thanks for stopping by, I'm going to read the old Keep on the Borderlands, I haven't played or heard of it before, thanks for bringing it up

Seriously thinking about D&D, memory is fuzzy but all good. The figs look great.

Are you happy with the skulls?

Hi Cam, I am happy with the skulls. There's a great amount of variety, and I'm thinking of so many uses for them. Some of these horned skulls will be great to convert some sorcerers. I really like the huge variety of human skulls. I am confused by the daemon skulls, there are blood letter and plague bearer skulls. In 40k daemons are incorporeal and disappear back to the warp when defeated, so it doesn't make sense to me to have their skulls. I wonder if it's different in Fantasy/Age of Sigmar. I also like the bird skulls, which I didn't know about when ordering, they will be very useful if I make any Raven Guard.

As for D&D, first of all, I wish I could play with you. I hadn't really had anything to do with D&D since the AD&D days when I was in elementary school. I picked it back up last year with 5E and I have to admit that I am really enjoying it. I know you're already stretched pretty thin with your hobby time, but if you can find a group of people to play with, or if your family would like to play it with you, I would encourage you to try it out. It's a lot of fun, all of my players and I enjoy it more than computer/video games. I can certainly see you being an amazing crafting DM if that's the root you choose. Just don't make me look too bad

The new D&D figures are great. I just can justify to myself to buy any of them as I likey have a metal or bones version of it already. I had a rust monster in my hand and started walking to register with it before I recalled I already own two older models for it. For people with less extensive collections, the average price of $2.50 a model isn't bad at all.

@adamsouza: That's where me starting my collection from nothing last year has some advantages I would have trouble bringing myself to buy new minis for models I already have too. Heck, I have enough trouble buying minis I don't have but think I can sculpt well enough. This newest sculpts are beautiful though. Do you have any pics of your collection?

Speaking of D&D, I've been working on having 12 zombies for the starting campaign encounter. I'm happy that my strange collection of minis that I'm using as zombies are each unique to some extent.

I have two converted Azog minis an orc from Lord of the Rings Heroclix, I have two "infected", I think they were called, from sedition wars (one heavily converted), 3 undead from the Magic the gathering board game, and my two brand new official D&D zombies which are the best looking of the collection. I don't know how well the Azogs work, with how energetic their pose is, maybe it doesn't work for a zombie. I also plan to convert some peasant minis into zombies. I might need to throw in a HeroQuest zombie for good measure.

That's quite a varied collection of zombies! I'm sure a good paint scheme will help them all blend together

Scullz... that's not something I'd ever order. Shudder... It's great You already have so many uses for them, I remember myself always struggling withe these boney bits when building GW kits. Said Beasts of Chaos / the Beastmen player...

But these DnD monsters and characters are great! Too bad it costs a lung and a liver on the other side of the pond, :(

Good luck with them!

@Commander Cain: That's a good point, I will need to make sure to help tie them together since there's such a variety of brands. Scale doesn't seem to bad, more differing bulkiness of the sculpts which I think will be ok.

@Wirecat: Wow, you would have been working with a lot of horned skulls playing those factions. I'm sorry to hear how expensive it is to get D&D stuff where you live. If you can find enough time you could always jsut sculpt a better collection than can be bought

It felt a little like an early Christmas today. A cool custom piece of terrain arrived for me today courtesy of Fango, to add to my trench system (no pics yet, sorry). It fits very well with the other trench pieces. Also my order from em4 miniatures arrived (my other Blandco inspired moment of weakness). It arrived pretty quickly, but felt long because there was no tracking on the package.


Here are the dwarves I orders. 48 of them in three poses for $22 after shipping. I'm quite happy with that deal.


I also did some more work on the zombies I'm making.


On an unrelated note, I use the skills I learn from crafting for wargaming and D&D for other things, often for my classroom. I made this fake wooden tray to hold something in my classroom. My students were really surprised and impressed that it's made of foamcore.

You got wood!

Nice dwarf collection.

Nice bunch of dwarfs, and a steal at that price!

Thanks guys. It's been quite a while since I posted anything on my own blog. Work has left me too tired to feel like doing any crafting. I finally got back to work on my scratch built chaos vindicator tanks with my skull kit and adding some paint. One is getting close to done, I think.









Let me know what you think.

The scratchbuilds are really cool. Liking the chain between the exhausts, it adds a lot. Few more skulls it'll look even better and Khorne will be pleased!

The milk tanks are looking good. I like the graffiti-like scrawl, just like a crazed cultist would do!

Tanks are looking good! I don't think I would be brave enough to try and build a whole tank out of bits but you pulled it off really well. The freehand really pulls it all together as well, looks like it must have taken a while to paint!

Wow, thanks guys. It's flattering to see this much activity on my blog.

@Commander Cain: Thanks! I imagine chaos vehicles to constantly be getting changed both through the warp and constant field repairs, so it makes it a little less intimidating to me when I make mistakes (like how all three tanks of quite different heights). I'm glad you like the free hand, and yes they did take a while to paint, but I doubt they took even a fraction as long as your army in a month goal. Those the red paint did take an annoying number of coats to look decent.

@JoshInJapan: Thanks Josh. I don't do graffiti for my orks, like many talented crafters here on Dakka do. It doesn't quite fit my vision of orks. But what you said is exactly what I was going for with the grafitti-like scrawled symbols and text. I imagined cultists wanting to make the chaos gods happy by covering the vehicles with symbols of worship in a crazed manner.

@Tyranid Horde: Thanks, I'm glad you like them. Thanks for the advice on adding a few more skulls to the chained exhaust area, I was considering that and like having verification. I do want to please Khorne, and I think both you and Khorne will like what I did with one of the other tanks (2nd and 3rd picture).




Skulls for the skull throne!


view from the back

Excellent work, love the way the symbols come together over the 3 doser blades. Got a nice vibe to them.

Thanks Cam, I saw a chaos symbol stretching across three vindicators' dozer blades years ago and really liked how it looked. It stuck with me, so I wanted to copy it.

Not much progress to report, I've been adding chaos devotions to the central vindicator. I'm not sure if I'm sold on the line going through the center of the second chaos circle on top.

I think there's two things I would do, first I would shade that line down a bit and add a slightly straighter line over it, so the existing line looks like a shadow. Secondly add a perpendicular line across as well. Still looking great and realistic. They look like they have been done by a fanatic, so if that is what you were after perfect bud.

Thanks for the advice Cam, that curving line didn't look right, so I'm painting over with hopefully better luck. I'm also experimenting with chaos circles that are open in the middle to see if they look better. Let me know what you think (still very WIP), and I didn't realize it was blurry when I took the shot.




How's this looking Tyranid Horde? Thanks for the suggestion, I'm liking the look more.

I like your dozer blade decoration. I remember the vindicator lineup with the symbol like you did. I think it was back a few editions when they first started detachments and they did the line breaker detachment. It was either iron warriors or black legion.

Yep! I'd say that's a good amount of skulls! It looks good and it feels a bit more fleshed (or skulled) out.

Thanks Theophony, good memory. I looked up the line breaker formation and I'm pretty sure that is where I saw this idea originally.

Thanks Tyranid Horde

I've been sick and not feeling up to doing much, but I crafted for a few minutes today.


A Jack-o-lantern out of insulation foam


The beginnings of three scarecrows for D&D

A free Halloween one shot for D&D about a haunted scarecrow was released a few days ago, along with being in Waterdeep: Dragon Heist I wanted to make some scarecrows

Sorry you're not feeling well- glad you got some crafty-time in- these are great! (Now I have to view with suspicion _any_ packing peanuts; clearly they are all sentient, clearly they are align against the Reign of Man....always watching, waiting.....

Heh heh, thanks Meer_Cat: I'll have to see what other innocuous everyday objects I can turn to evil

I'm finally starting to feel better, and did a bit more crafting today because of it.


Primed the skulls on these two

And covered this vindicator in chaos graffiti:





I'm continuing to work on the scarecrows for D&D also.

Err... these tanks are coming a bit more rough than Your other stuff, but who can say these chaos followers are paying attention to details? Unfortunately, news from Near and Middle East provide plenty of examples of tons of crap being welded to almost working tanks and other vehicles. Just don't be cautious with dirt, sand and scorch marks and they will look just good enough!

But these evil pumpkins... they remind me what month it is and I will thing of something Oct 31 styled too. Thanks!

Good eye Wirecat, I am purposely doing the white paint in a sloppy manner to look like cultists did graffiti in a crazed manner. Do you think that's not coming across or being taken too far? Thanks for the advice on the weathering. I've never actually weathered any vehicles before, so this should be a learning experience.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you make themed to Halloween

Loving the crazy writing! My only suggestion would be to take a very fine detail brush and add some paint streaks underneath the words and chaos stars, something like this maybe?



Weathering is also super fun to do once you get the hang of it. I am particularly fond of using a sponge to dabble on spots of paint as it gives a nice random effect unlike a paintbrush. You can also grind up some coloured chalk, dilute it with water and add to any recesses to create a nice rust or mud spatter effect (or just buy the awesome weathering powders from FW).