Happy Halloween, Bone Bases, and Movember!

Happy Halloween, to those who celebrate it, Happy Wednesday to those that don't! My girls had a great time giving out treats and then collecting some from the great folks in our neighborhood. My wife and I will be good for chocolate for while now.

Amongst the wide variety of things I've been dabbling with over the last few weeks, I decided to start in on the cool Secret Weapon Miniatures bases I'll be using for my Lamenters. Here are a few I've finished (well, almost finished, just the gore and blood to add once the models are in place).

This one is the base for my Furioso Dreadnought. I'm pretty happy with how the dead Carcharadon turned out. I hope my nemesis Dave likes it too.

And here's the start of the base for my Storm Raven.

Finally, I just wanted to remind you all about our Guns Of April team for the great charity effort that is Movember! By supporting me growing a mustache, you are supporting both awareness about and research into a number of men's health issues, including testicular and prostate cancer.

Click HERE to get your donation on!

Cheers
Dave

Lamenter Update: 3rd Game Loss and Movember!

Two more Tactical Marines finished since my last update. I've been working away diligently on them, along with three other projects that will eventually see the light of day on this blog or another. I'm pretty happy with the consistency I've been able to keep with the yellows. I think once I'm finished with the squad I'll be able to go back in and wrap up the final shading with a glaze or three in the right spots.

There's a slight difference you might notice about these two guys, and it's the sword icon on their left shoulders. I decided when I was assembling the squad that five of the models would get this icon on their shoulders, and they'd form one of the demi-squads should I decide to use their "combat squad" option. To further enhance that look, this group will have their "4" in black.

And then I have another two underway. The Marine on the left is the demi-squad leader, denoted by the chalice on his backpack. The Plasma Canon Marine has been a lot of fun to work on, with such large areas of yellow needing to be shaded in some way.

My Third Game!

For my third game I played against seasoned veteran John Swann and his Space Wolves. Again I found myself outnumbered and outgunned as John ran: a Rune Priest, an 8-man Wolf Guard squad (all with different gear) in a Rhino, two 10-man Grey Hunter squads in Rhinos, and a Vindicator.

We played a game with multiple objectives scattered across the table and right from the start I was under heavy fire from John's Vindicator. After the first turn we found ourselves in a situation of each of us removing an entire squad at a time. First my Assault squad was gunned down, then my Death Company Tycho (to be renamed Janus) finished off a GH squad in combat (six models on the charge!), then the Vindicator took out my Death Company, then my Furioso wiped out his Wolf Guard in one turn (despite having lost a blood talon arm to snapfire on the way in). It was a frenzied display of blood-letting indeed. Sadly, my men could simply not hold on against the constant attacks from the Strength 10 large blast, and John won the day, although all casualties he caused were through shooting, so a moral victory in my books ; )

And finally...Movember

Please click on the link here to see our post about Movember on the Guns Of April blog. Obviously I'm going to ask that when you donate to the cause (and I know you'll do me proud) that you donate to my individual page here. In our team we have a side bet going on which side (Union or Confederate) will bring in more money, so I'll need your help as more of those damned Rebs are growing mustaches than we glorious Yankees.

Enjoy your gaming, and more about Lamenters, gaming, and embarrassing mustaches later!

Cheers
Dave

Lamenters Update: 2nd Game Victory!

Well I played my second game of 6th Edition tonight, and boy what a game! I was up against my friend Jordan and his Dark Angels (just before he packs up and moves his family across country). I took the same list as my first game (no sense in confusing myself) and I was a little disturbed to see that Jordan was fielding 36 Marines! A Chaplain, two 10-man Tactical squads, one 5-man Devastator squad, and one 10-man Assault squad (held in reserve).

We rolled up a Dawn of War deployment, and The Relic mission. Jordan deployed first, but my luck started early when I seized the initiative from him. By the second turn my Tactical squad had the relic surrounded, and my Assault Marines were tying up one of his Tactical squads. Things went kind of how I expected, with my combat specialists wearing down the Dark Angels until Tycho could get into combat and finish the job, and my static squad was thinning his gun line. I landed my Death Company behind his gun line, and he countered with his Assault squad dropping in to the side of my Dreadnought.

Man of the Match definitely goes to that Furioso Dread with Blood Talons. I survived Jordan's initial plasma pistol salvo, turned and charged into the fray. We checked all the special rules (my goodness there are a lot of them) to make sure we did the combat correctly, then my Dread proceeded to wipe out his entire squad in a single turn. It was a very strange series of rolls to watch, and it got a bit ridiculous around the sixth or seventh victim, but it certainly pushed the game completely in my favor. A turn later and I'd managed to bring down the last of Jordan's green-armored "super-humans". Jordan's response to the outcome? He asked the store staff member if he could exchange his Dark Angels for Blood Angels : )

I've also been chugging away on the modeling and painting for the Lamenters. At the top you can see the Man of the Match Dreadnought on his Bone Fields base with a Marine carcass beneath his left foot. I was originally planning on painting this model as a Space Shark (my nemesis is painting these for our Badab War action), but perhaps the corpse should represent a Dark Angels Assault Marine?

Above you can see the next two yellow models to roll off the bench, the sergeant and a trooper from my Tactical squad. The yellow is a little brighter than my test model, but I'm not too concerned about that.

Here's a look at their right shoulder pads. Initially I wanted them to be the 5th squad, but the "5" in this style of numbering looked a little too much like a "$", so I made them the 4th squad. I enjoy painting detailed numbers like these, it adds some great depth to the models.

Finally, here are the next two models on the block.

Have fun with you painting... AND gaming ; )

Cheers
Dave

Daemon Engines? Excellent choice!

A long time ago (or so it seems) I built this Stalk Tank to fight alongside my Blood Pact army. I've always had the desire to build another one, but have lacked the time required. There also wasn't really a pressing need or an easy way to integrate them into a "proper list".

But now 6th Edition has brought along Allies, and the Chaos Space Marine codex has brought some tasty new Daemon Engines. I think I might have to start bulking out the Blood Pact.

First up, I have a Mantis Tank to put together. It was sent to me by my friend Laurent of Blight Wheel Miniatures. It was designed by one of my favorite sculptors (and new addition to the Citadel stable), Morback! Obviously this saves me a great deal of hassle in building one myself, which means I can get stuck into the painting : )

If you are interested in picking up a Mantis Tank you can buy them online here.

Photos of Forgefiend and Maulerfiend from the GW website, used without permission.

I'm also loving the two new plastic Daemon Engines from today's GW releases. I think one of each of the Fiends will do nicely.

Photo of Blight Drone from the FW website, used without permission.

I have two Blight Drones from back in the day, one of which is already painted. This seems like a great time to get the other one painted up too.

Photo of Helbrute from the GW website, used without permission.

And finally, I now have two Helbrutes. Perhaps they'd do well supporting my Blood Pact infantry too?

Lots of great Daemon Engine fun on the way. It'll take some time, but hopefully it'll be worth the wait.

Cheers

Dave

PS. I have no idea if they'll actually be any good in the game, I don't have my Codex:CSM yet, but I'm sure I'll enjoy the building and painting part ; )

Puppet Wars In Plastic!

Last week (I think) I showed you all the plastic Malifaux that were sent to my door by the great folks at Wyrd Miniatures. Well, I had a few other sprues arrive with that box, and when I offered to send some of them on to a few of my friends who love Puppet Wars, I was offered, in return, a few cool bases.

That's right. This post was delayed while I waited on USPS to deliver the above pack of 'planky' bases from Chris Borer (and his Full Borer Miniatures line). These bases are ones he has made for the metal Puppets and weigh in at 23mm in diameter. They are very nicely detailed with wood grain and nail and screw heads. Check them out here.

Chris also sent me a prototype of his 30mm planky base designed to work well with the slightly larger plastic Puppets. Speaking of which, I clipped off and trimmed up three of my favorites from the sprue. I love the poses of each of these, and the detail in all of the models seems to be a step above the Malifaux plastics, putting them directly on a par with GW's plastics. The models vary in their number of pieces (the girl above was six if I recall correctly, while the creepy chap at the bottom was only two).

These models just look great, overflowing with malicious character. I'm sure they'll paint up quickly, and you could spend all evening on each one to really bring them to life.

Once again, well done Wyrd!

Cheers

Dave