A detailed account of my various commission/hobby projects.
Board Game – Galaxy Hunters is a giant robot game by IDW Games. The premiss is you play as a bounty hunting pilot working for a mega corporation collecting resources to gain fortune and fame.
I haven’t had a chance to play but the game looks really nice. High quality components, large scale models and a ton of cardboard in a nice box organizer make it look really nice.
Board Games – When I was a kid I owned Crossbows and Catapults, it was a cool game that had you shot hard plastic pucks at your opponent with rubber band powered siege engines. The look was very barbarian fantasy looking and the game was very fun. When I saw Catapult Kingdoms on Kickstarter it immediately brought back memories of that older game. The look is very cartoony and the components are vastly superior to the originals.
This project was the entire all-in package which has the core game, 2 expansions, a viking ship, and a volcano. I didn’t paint the individual castle components but focused on a simple paint job to bring the cartoony components to life. I’m happy with the end result and double sealed the parts to help stand up to the abuse they’ll get having rubber balls shot at them over and over.
Board Games – I used to be a huge fan of the Walking Dead, however once I cut the cable cord I lost touch with the AMC series. Painting this board game was a bit of nostalgia as the characters are from the early seasons of the show. While not the same quality as the other miniature games based on the property these sculpts are easily recognizable as the characters from the show.
I stuck with a pretty basic paint job to get these quickly painted to a tabletop standard. I decided to stick with a duplicate paint job on the duplicate sculpts in this box since they’re pretty basic looking.
Boardgames – Miniature games aren’t typically small and portable. Tiny Epic Pirates is the exception this cool little game comes with several plastic ships that break down and fit back in the little box. This project is pretty basic with a simple coat of contrast paint on the ships and sails to make them look a little better than the bare molded plastic.
Board Games – Marvel United is one of the more clever co-op games that has come around lately. The game is simple enough that anyone can quickly pick up on the mechanics of the game. Changing up the team of heroes makes the game very different, and each villain brings an entirely different challenge to the game.
I recently was able to track down one of the Kickstarter Exclusive sets for a reasonable price. Having an additional 52 models means I’ll be painting these little guys between my other projects for some time.
I’ve always been a fan of the Midnight Sons and more street level heroes so that’s what I started with on this batch.
Boardgames – The last of the expansions for Dark Rituals is the obligatory “viking” themed box. This has a variety of ice and river themed enemies as well as some barbarian heroes to add to the mix. As a big box expansions it has a bunch of extra box sections and components to add to the core game.
Boardgames – A staple of many miniature heavy boardgames are small box expansions. These small sets usually introduce a new character and a few monsters. It makes for a inexpensive means to add new content to a game and for a Kickstarted project it’s an easy add-on to bolster the funding.
These three sets for Dark Rituals introduce some new monsters and boss characters. Some of the sculpts are insanely creepy.
Boardgames – The great thing about Kickstarter games is you get a ton of expansions right out the gate. Where the traditional model is release a game if it sells well then release more content, kickstarted games typically have all their content at launch.
Witches Sabbath is one of the big box expansions for Dark Rituals. To me it looks like the “graveyard” level with ghosts and tombs and a giant monster.
Boardgames – Dark Rituals was very successful Kcikstarter and as such has a ton of extras that backers received as a benefit. This models are very cool and a nice bonus for backers.
Board Games – I love a good board game, add in a bunch of minis and it’s even better. Dark Rituals: Malleus Maleficarum was a Kickstarter game that funded in 2019. The amazing models and creeoy theme lead to the game funding in less than 50 min. The look and feel of the game reminds me a bit of Hell Dorado and Kingdom Death.
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Board Games – Monumental is a weird mix of miniatures. Samurai, Centurions, Egyptians and Einstein all in the same game?
This is a 4X game, Explore, Expand, Exploit and Exterminate. So the odd mix of heroes, troops, explorers etc. makes more sense (Kind of). In the non-deluxe version you get a bunch of different sized disks to represent your forces, those are replaced with different sized miniature in the deluxe version with colored disks to denote the player colors.
Board Games – Rise of the Necromancers bills itself as an area control game with character development. The game sounds pretty fun even though the “miniatures” are less than outstanding. Not to come off as harsh, for their purpose the minis work just fine and look like cool little tombstones with zombie hands and the Necromancer’s look wizardly enough.
The expansion Dawn of the Demons makes some pretty huge strides in mini quality. These large scale monsters are more in line with what most people think of when a game is billed as having miniatures. That’s not to say these are amazing miniatures by any stretch but they’re functional.
Since the detail on these isn’t amazing I used a pre-shading and contrast paint method to quickly paint up the 70+ miniatures. Player color is really important for these pieces and the game didn’t include the colored disks to denote player color, so that meant I needed to work the color into each batch of miniatures. I think my solution works and makes it easy to see which piece belongs to each player.
Marvel Crisis Protocol – A few years back skirmish games were popping up all over the place and I fell into chasing each new game hoping to find a replacement for my main game of Warhammer 40,000. Back then 40K was in a weird place and I just wasn’t enjoying it. Which seemed to be the case for many gamers as skirmish games were taking off with Malifaux, MERCS, Helldorado, Relic Knights Guildball, Deadzone, Batman The Miniatures game and a bunch of others snagging huge chunks of disenfranchised players. Of course Games Workshop course corrected with new editions of their core games and bringing back old favorites like Necromunda and Warhammer Quest, which seemed to the downfall of many of those start up skirmish games. I’ve noticed that skirmish games are coming back for a variety of reasons.
The most notable reason for the rise in skirmish games is the pandemic. Right now it’s not really safe to spend several hours in close contact with someone else in a cramped game store. In some states like Michigan it’s not even a viable option because most stores have their gaming areas closed off. Of course basement gaming is an option but there again spending hours in an enclosed space, even masked up increases your risk of possible exposure. Which means for many players getting a game of 40K isn’t happening.
In my group we were able to play variations of Necromunda over video conference for a while. With a skirmish game it works to a degree but it’d not ideal. So over the last year my primary gaming group consists of my wife and sons. The challenge there 40K, Necromunda and Killteam have to much information having to cross reference multiple books and investing a significant amount of time on the lore before you can really enjoy the games. (Because lets be honest, people love the 40K universe for the depth of story and modeling opportunities not the quality of gameplay).
So that’s a long way to go to get to the point. In order to enjoy a miniatures game with my young sons and wife I needed to find something that was already something they liked, that has concise consolidated rules that they don’t need to study ahead of time and is playable in under an hour or two. Which lead me to Marvel Crisis Protocol.
I had painted a few of the models for a client and knew that the game was pretty solid so I felt pretty safe in investing in it. Worst case scenario I’d have some nice minis to display from one of the family’s favorite universes. After receiving the core set for Christmas I had what I needed to get started. Of course other projects required my attention first but once I got to it I was hooked.
Atomic Mass has created a unique game that has all the flavor of the Marvel Universe as well as pretty balanced gameplay with all the rules you need to know printed on the cards or a quick reference sheet. (yea the full rulebook is online and way more extensive for competitive play but you don’t need to reference it much for fun games).
I have a few modern terrain board I had put together for Batman and MERCS so revisiting those projects to actually finish something is an exciting proposition. After a few games with my older son he’s caught on quick and really enjoys the game. I think this will be the gateway to other mini games or could possibly become my go to game. It plays quick and is tons of fun.
Board Games – When I think of Barbarian Hordes rampaging across the land worker placement isn’t the first thing that comes to mind. However in Tabula Games’ Barbarians: The Invasion they make it work.
Read MoreBoard Games – Some games just look amazing, when the art and minis match up with great graphic design you get a really great looking game. Vindication is one of those games. Thrown overboard and left for dead you awaken on a ruined island where you must forge a new fate.
Read MoreBoard Games – Space Battle games can range the from super complicated affairs like Twilight Imperium and Battlefleet Gothic to fairly simple like X-wing. Mothership is billed as being closer to the latter. Getting right into the heart of the battle is it’s primary selling point.
Read MoreBoard Games – I’ve previously painted up the expansions for this game so it was a nice surprise to see the core set make it’s way onto my painting table. As with the expansions I needed to keep the paint scheme super simple with the same colors as the molded plastic bits.
To make this work I started with a metallic silver base and then applied the appropriate contrast paint. The result is a nice hot rod metallic color that feels a bit nicer than the solid color plastic.
Board Games – Zombicide Black Plague has had a ridiculous amount of expansions, not only new gameplay mechanics, board and minis but also many “Special Guest” Boxes which bring in a guest artist to do a character design for the game.
Each box adds a few characters that could be enemies or heroes depending on the box. The designs range from pretty unique to pretty generic but if you’re a completist you’ll need to track these down.
Board Games – When I was a kid Post Apocalyptic always meant desert wastes and fighting over water/food/fuel after a nuclear war. Over time that scenario seems to have changed Water World had the ice caps melt, other films have had it be a plague zombie or more traditional and for a period of time the disaster of choice was a new Ice Age. Last Aurora follows along with the frozen wasteland theme caused by nuclear winter.
From the manufacturer:
“The radioactive dust of the Last War has frozen the northern countries. In the ice desert, the few survivors live in an icy hell as the resources of the "old world" are now exhausted, and travel to the south is too long and dangerous. But a radio message is rekindling hope: The last icebreaker ship, the Aurora, is cruising along the coast, looking for survivors. The winter is coming, and in a few days, those who cannot get on board will be doomed by the ice. It will be a race against time to arrive at the ship or surrender to despair: there's still the light of hope on the horizon, a light to grab before it's too late...
Last Aurora is a post-apocalyptic game for 1-4 players set in a frozen, desolate land. Each player has to manage their crew to gather resources, recruit survivors, improve their vehicle, and fight their enemies as they race to reach the ship before it's too late!”
Having a unique look to your miniatures is always a bonus for a game, sometimes you stumble upon a new look that creates a trend and other times your unique look makes you stand out from the crowd. The gas-masked little soldiers for this game are pretty unique looking and the other tokens do a good job representing what they are.
Board Games – Successful Kickstarter games can go bonkers with stretch goals. A great example of this is Dwellings of Eldervale, I mean seriously sound effect bases that have little to no value for gameplay but do push the “blinged out deluxe version” envelope. Apparently there are multiple versions of this game available with out all the extras that play exactly the same, which means if you didn’t back this you’ll likely be paying a premium if you want to track down the special version.
Anyway everything I’ve read and watch about this game is very positive. Not only are the super premium components great but the game also has a well developed story and solid mechanics.
Each of these minis can be represented with a cardboard standee in the basic version of the game but the miniatures are pretty solid and do come “pre-painted” in a weird color wash. It was easy enough to prime over that and paint these up to look pretty slick.
