A detailed account of my various commission/hobby projects.
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.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – Grey Knights seem to find their way to my table quite often. This batch of models is to go with a force I painted last year that was mostly Paladins. This time around a bunch of Inquisitor, troops and special weapons are joining the fight.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – This batch of models add a few more models to the substantial Dark Angel and Deathwatch force I’ve been painting off and on for sometime.
Included is the new Primaris Chaplain on BIke, this is probably my favorite model from the last batch of releases.
Warhammer 40,000 – I really like when a 40k force has elements from the games long history. Well actually, let me clarify that: I love when a force is painted cohesively and has elements from the history of the game.
This Iron Hands force I’ve been working on has many classic models mixed in with newer sculpts. Between the simple cohesive scheme I’ve been painting them in and the unique custom bases the force feels really cool.
Warhammer 40,000 – Painting Necrons seems to be a thing I do now. So far I think that this is my favorite scheme. The bone color reminds me of skeletons and feels a little less like the metallic killing machines the warriors design was “borrowed” from and more like skeletons in space. (I dunno, I guess I just prefer leaning into the ridiculous)
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Warhammer 40,000 – I’ve painted several Salamander armies, but most of them had some variation on the traditional color scheme. This time around the force is using the suggested colors of the chapter.
Starting with Nocturne Green as a base followed by a Vulkan Green highlight and a wash of BIel-Tan Green for the bulk of the armor. I then painted the shoulder pads and all metallic areas before applying a black wash to shade those areas. It’s a relatively simple scheme that looks pretty solid on the table. At some point these will receive raised emblems on the shoulders to finish off the model.
The firey portions start with a yellow base and neon orange highlight followed by a yellow wash. This helps to tie the flame colors together and a simple highlight after the wash dries makes everything pop.
Warhammer 40,000 – While the Necron line has a bunch of really amazing sculpts, it also has the Tomb Blades. This kit reminds me of the Sovern Pilots in Guardians of the Galaxy 2, with their faces buried in the TV screen they look like some strange VR arcade machine. That’s not to say I don’t like the kit, just that it’s very weird.
The traditional silver, black and green scheme ties these in with the rest of the force.
Warhammer 40,000 – The newest Abaddon sculpt is pretty amazing. So much so that I’ve painted it several times, and each time I enjoy painting it. At some point the Chaos Marine book should see an update along the same lines as the loyal marine book to bring the evil side up to the same power level as the loyalists.
Warhammer 40,000 – Sometimes I feel like the designers at Forgeworld watched way to much “Pimp My Ride.” (You know the 2000’s era MTV should that had car customizers put ridiculous upgrades on questionable vehicles.)
The Minotaur feels like one of those cars, hey we heard you like Basilisks so we put a Basilisk in your Basilisk. When my kids saw me painting it they were like, “Wow you can shoot the guns and go faster…” and now I can get that image out of my head.
Apart from the weird paths the vehicle design takes my mind, the kit is very cool. Death Korp are known for siege warfare so having this artillery piece join the rest of the force. The scheme is a pretty simple camo pattern that is easy to do with a bit of patience. When using painters tape on resin models I’ve found it’s important to give your paint a full 24 hours to cure between coats.
Dungeons and Dragons – Have you been wanting to try DnD but really wanted to be a dog or cat? If so then Steamforge Games has you covered. Last year they released Dungeon Doggies and they were such a hit that there’s now sets that feature cats as well as a starter box with some ready made adventures and characters.
This set seems like a perfect entry point for young or new gamers that want to see what a pen and paper game is all about. If the idea of playing as an intelligent animal seems fun you should check out Animal Adventures.
Age of Sigmar – Warhammer Underworlds is a really cool system, with each rotation the warbands get more and more impressive. I was happy to hear that cards would rotate out of the system over time, which was one of the biggest barriers of entry for new players. Of course that doesn’t change the need to but each new set to get all the cards so players that only pick up one set will still be fighting an uphill battle.
I just wrapped up the Orks, Lumineth, Daughters of Khaine and Slaanesh warbands. Each of these are really nice push fit models that go together easily. I’m really impressed with how far plastic push fit models have come.
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.
Warhammer 40,000 – Having super elite troops is one of the staples of playing an Adeptus Custodes army. The problem with having super elite troops walking across the table is one bad batch of dice rolls can mean they never make it across the table.
This transport brings some much needed additional mobility to the golden boys. Painting follows the more basic tabletop scheme I painted up a while back.
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.
Board Games – I’ve painted up a few of the expansions for Mythic Battles previously, mostly just extra monsters/heroes. This time around I painted up one of the core boxes for the game.
With 37 miniatures the core box is pretty packed with plastic. The figures range from large size gods and monsters to smaller scale heroes to slightly smaller troops. The scaling I assume helps to represent their importance on the board. As with the previous kits I’ve painted for this game the sculpts are very nice for a board game. Nothing ground breaking but nice.
The games sounds pretty cool Post-Apocalyptic Ancient Greece. Boardgamegeek has a pretty decent write-up detailing the game.
Warhammer 40,000 – Death Guard are gross. This project is adding some special characters, greater daemon, basic troops and blight haulers to an existing Black Legion/Death Guard force. The initial force was a bunch of terminators who were part of a very nasty list. This scheme is unique to allow flexibility with the other models in the range while keeping a consistent look across the force.
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Warhammer 40,000 – Black Legion is one of the more popular color schemes for Chaos Marines. It’s iconic and ties in with the big bad of the faction so most people who play Chaos Space Marines have at least toyed with the black and gold scheme.
This Vindicator and Maulerfiend are both part of a Black Legion force that I’ll probably be painting a little at a time. The scheme is the same as most of the other Black Legion models I’ve painted starting with a dark gray base and shading to get the black right with gold trim.
