2012: Year of Changey Changes

Wow, 2012 was really something, wasn't it? So much happened this year. The biggest changey change was obviously splitting this blog off into its own page. Smartest thing I ever did. Both pages are stronger for it and it allows me to better focus on developing the content. Win win.

Now it's party times!

Since the split, I broadened the base of topics I cover. I'm much happier writing a little about a lot of things than a lot about a few things. There's only so many posts you can make about Dwarfs. There will (probably) be less of those in the coming year. I'm also amazed and excited to have hit 50 followers. You're all awesome! Thanks for reading my ramblings.

I have endless amounts of miniatures laying around and keep getting caught up in trying new games. I blame Hubs partially, since he keeps picking up new game systems. But eventually it ends up that things don't get done very often. To keep things rolling, I thought I should make a list, both for reference and to help keep me honest about what I have going on.

General 2013 Goals:

• Finish converting my Space Wolves!
• Paint at least 50 models unrelated to my Space Wolf army
• Keep posting consistently. I have plenty of things to write about, but I'm not always on point about getting it out there.
• Attend more events than 2012 (I think I can do better than 2)
• Finish gathering the pirate Dwarfs for my WHF army (looking at you, Avatars of War)

Hell Dorado: I Don't Play Enough Games, Apparently

Hanukkah has come and gone, and in its wake I find myself with many new and delightful hobby goodies. Casey has fallen out of love with large scale gaming lately, so he's been picking up lots of smaller skirmish games to try. Hell Dorado was a natural choice since it has small model count.

 
 I got a Westerners starter pack as part of my Hanukkah loot. I got an old school box, it's all in French. Casey scored it on Ebay along with another starter set for a really good price. I wasn't sure which faction I wanted to play. The Demons didn't appeal to me athesthetically and Casey already called dibs on playing Saracens.Westerners seemed like a good choice.

Since I have so many projects going on right now, I haven't yet done anything more than open the box to check them out. But it turns out that Richard has decided to set a date to gather some folks and play some games. So in January I'll give it a shot. I won't have enough time to paint them, but I can certainly get them based and primed to play.

Have you played Hell Dorado? What are your thoughts about it?

2012 Daemonette Project

She's finally finished! I managed to sneak some hobby time in last night after a pretty busy weekend and got her based. I touched up her hair a bit to give it more contrast and cleaned up a few points where I'd been a little sloppy. 

The only major change I did was to her claw. I changed it to orange based on a Twitter suggestion. I really wasn't thrilled with the yellow.  The orange definitely does that something that the yellow didn't.

I probably spent more time on her than I did on an entire squad of ten of them originally. Soon I might be able to paint a whole squad up to this standard, but it takes me too long still. Painting slowly seems to be my curse.

The base came from the Stonehaven Miniatures kickstarter. The Dwarfs in that set came with some resin bases, but I didn't intend to base the Dwarfs with them. This was the perfect chance to use one. Unlike the GW slotted bases, the slot in this one doesn't go all the way through, so she didn't quite fit. I used my handy-dandy Dremel tool to drill the rest of it out.

Here's a comparison shot between 2012 and 2011:

Looking at them side to side really surprises me. I'm excited to do this again next year.

Hammer in the New Year Planning and Missions

So far, planning for running my tournament has been quite a learning experience. People came out of the woodwork to sign up, so I had to go back to my FLGS and see if I could scare up more table space. Fortunately, I was able to do so and now there are 20 spots instead of the original 12.

   
These new spots filled up almost immediately. Many came off the wait list, and a few others jumped in after. While I am surprised by the large response, I am very please to see so many people coming out to play 40k. Our store gets a bit of a bad rap for having only Fantasy players, but clearly that's not the case.

I worked out the missions and rules and posted them last night in the sign up forum:

Games will be won by scoring Game Points. Game Points can be earned in the following manner:

Scoring a Kill Point: 1 point each
Capturing a Quarter Objective: 2 points each
Capturing the Center Objective: 3 points
First Blood: 1 point
Slay the Warlord: 1 point
Linebreaker: 1 point

Game Points are used to determine your Battle Points.
If you have...
...half as many Game Points as opponent or less: 0 Battle Points
...3 fewer points than opponent: 2 points
...1 or 2 fewer points than opponent: 3 points
...tied opponent in points: 5 points
...1 or 2 more points than opponent: 7 points
...3 or more points than opponent: 8 points
...double or more points than opponent: 10 points

The person with the most Battle Points wins the game. Game Points will be used for tie-breaking purposes.

The Center Objective will be a Mysterious Objective, all the others will be normal. The Night Fighting special rule will be in effect for all rounds.

Deployment will vary for each round:
Round 1: Dawn of War
Round 2: Hammer & Anvil, Fast Attack can claim objectives
Round 3: Vanguard Strike, Heavy Support can claim objectives

Each game, you’ll rate the sportsmanship of your opponent on a scale of 1-5 and their army appearance on a scale of 1-10.

Awards:
Best Overall goes to the player with the most total points (Battle Points, Sportsmanship, and Painting).
Best General goes to the player with the most Battle Points (second highest if highest also wins Best Overall).
Best Painted goes to the player with the highest painting score. Each player will receive a paint score between 0-40. This score is calculated by adding up the points from each opponent, plus the score from the organizer (me). 

A couple of questions came up that I hadn't thought of ahead of time, but it's nice of everyone to keep me on my toes. The tournament is less than a month away now and I'm getting really excited for it to finally be here. Scores sheets have been made up and I think I'm really, truly finished tinkering with them.

Good luck to all that have signed up!

WIP Wednesday: Daemonette Project 2012

I've just about finished with the 2012 Daemonette. There's a little work I still want to do to her, and I still have to base her before she's complete. I've realized I'm rubbish about basing models, especially single figures like this one. I never seem to get around to it.

 
Aside from not being based, I'm not sure how I feel about the claw and her hair needs a little more work. I'm not totally satisfied yet, but I think she's coming along nicely.

I feel really good about how her skin came out. I've never done as smooth a job on skin as I have here. Unfortunately it happened sort of by accident and I don't know how well I'll be able to replicate it on other models in other colors.

Overall, though, unless I do something disastrous to her, I think she's the best thing I've painted to date. When 2012 is finished, I'll do a side by side shot of her with 2011. Just looking at them together makes me feel really good about how far my skills have progressed. It's nice to see concrete evidence of me getting better at painting.

I'll try to have her done in time to show off on Miniature Monday.

You can see the 2011 Daemonettte and read about the Daemonette project in the original post.

Stonehaven Kickstarter Minis Have Arrived

I was out of town this weekend, but when we arrived home last night, there was a package waiting for me- my first Kickstarter had arrived! I wasn't expecting them for about another week, but I am so happy they're here. The Kickstarter was done by Stonehaven Miniatures and it was a set of Dwarven Adventurers.

So many goodies!

I bought the whole set, which includes 20 figures, accessory bits, character cards, resin bases, and a nice die with their logo on it. I also threw in for the shirt they offered. It was only $10 and has a fabulous print of the art for the Fallen King on it. The package shipped just on time, so I am very pleased with this Kickstarter.

The miniatures are just fantastic. The have great detail and lots of personality. They also have several that you don't see too often- like a Necromancer, a Monk, and a Brewmaster. A full third of the characters are also female, which is nice to see. My favorite might be the Highwayman, the pose is really dynamic, or the Druid with her familiar. Both are really fabulous.

Unfortunately, they sent me two of the Rogue and no Blacksmith. But I contacted them about the mix up, they responded very promptly and a Blacksmith is now on her way to me. It was a very pleasant customer service experience. I can completely understand how that might happen when they're trying to fill over 1400 Kickstarter orders on time.

I'm not wild about the bases they came with, but I didn't intend on using them anyway. I'm going to select one of the models (not sure which one yet) for an upcoming RPG character, so I'll probably base them all a little more special than I would for Warhammer.

Stonehaven Miniatures is doing another Kickstarter soon, for Gnomes and Halflings. I probably won't jump in on that one because I have too many other hobby projects on the table right now. But I'm sure they will be just as awesome as these. My only regret with this one is that I didn't order the Troll that was optional. I wish I had, it's really cool.