The Roger Rogers are back

o/

Base rim colors denote the squad for now. 

Sure is a good thing that I bought more minis for a game that I've only ever played once, right? Right. Consider it a bit of seller's remorse, though that said my previous color scheme had some issues. Firstly, these frail little B1s don't do well when being drybrushed, secondly it took two layers of the pink flock to cover the base decently. Lastly, if I want to easily add some bulk B1 infantry to my army, bone colored B1s are a dime a dozen on eBay, rusty looking ones? Not so much. Droids are a horde army, I don't really have time or rather the will build a horde of these, so off to eBay's bargain auctions I went looking. 

The minis above were a couple of second hand lots bought for more or less 1/2 retail price. No cards which doesn't matter as that is all about to change, and with the advent of  just being able to print off a list with all upgrade on Tabletop Admiral, I don't see much use for those anyways. Eighty cards along the tableside & tokens galore following each unit around the table is a legacy of Fantasy Flight Games that should go away in my opinion.

A handful are unpainted such as this Super Tactical Droid who is the default Commander of this meager 360ish point force. I also have a box of CIS Specialists coming as well. 

These B1s look as though they were primed black, drybrushed in a bone color and then slathered or maybe just splattered with a sepia wash, depending on the individual mini (a few almost have a literal stripe of wash across the body). I am just drybrushing over again for a cleaner look (yes really), cleaning up the details and then will be calling it a day (20-30 minutes a model total including basing). With 36 B1s constituting just the core of the army, there's no realy need to get too detailed with them. Honestly I could probably leave 'em as is if I wanted to, but I have to tweak 'em at least a little bit.

Finished model is on the right, both of the blue squad.

Once I am good with the model, I'll rebase it with some purple sand (I have tons of the stuff) and then add tufts in the color of the unfinished models' rims. In the end the tuft colors will be used to tell the squads apart. I have them in blue, red, green & purple so that they will blend with the rim painted minis in the interim. The plan is to hopefully have all of these cleaned up by the time the new Legion 2.0 Starter forces arrive in stores. 

Trench Crusade

 o/

I put the playtest rules on a flashdrive and took it to my local UPS store and had a book made. Not having a tablet, it is much easier to use than being just one more thing to read online. 

So this is building up considerable steam here locally. When I first heard of the game in Tennessee, I read some of the fluff, the grimmer & darker than 40K hype, then read that the Black Grail is essentially Nurgle and was like WTF? With no future in it  for the foreseeable future up there that I could see, I just ignored it. 

My test paint job for a Yeoman with semi-automatic rifle. Grimmer & darker than my painted Iggy PHIGs. 

Heraldic lion emblem on the shoulder pauldron & the 'CI' (Christian Infantry) badge on the pack, c/o the DKK decal sheet of all things. 

That cross barely fit so will have to find something else. The 19th decal probably denotes a squad or platoon designation. After 300+ years or trench warfare against literal Hell, I doubt there is a 19th anything left above that unit level that can claim the number 19. 

The FLGS has the STLs and is selling minis. I like the New Antioch faction but will likely only need to buy some of the Mechanized Heavy Infantry models (which look awesome). As you have already guessed for the bulk of my warband, I've been siphoning off models from my currently unused and largely unpainted PHIGs army. 

Weapon & equipment swap with an old (and now discarded) Warzone/Prodos miniature that had been knocking around in my minis cases for years. 

With the ornate trench shield and rare SMG, I am thinking that this guy will be my Lieutenant.

Indeed, those models are being marketed on Etsy more for Trench Crusade than they are for 40k now. I took a painted PHIG model to the FLGS to compare its size to an official STL printed mini, and was told by several folks that they would be just fine with me using my PHIGs. I have some 40k bits coming of imperial agent hand axes, truncheons and a few DKK shovels to add for close combat weapons. 

Yeomen with grenade launcher & shotgun. 

Is this the Ardennes? Or the Low Country?

 o/

Well, like everywhere else in the American Southeast, we got a snow yesterday! From what I've been told, it has been 7 years since the last time it has snowed in Charleston. While the city itself is all but shut down, I work remotely and thus it was just another Wednesday. 

Still looks like paradise, just a cold one.

Nonetheless, I joined all of the other local geeks in taking pics of their toys out in the snow because why not? I mean, its not like I've never done the same in Tennessee right? So here ya go:

Patrolling the mulch bed next to my house. 

Followed by a sweep and clear of the neighbor's frigid flower beds.

There were some tight spots so had to call in the troops.

BAR gunner in the brush!

Even with the brown coats they blend decently. 

Looks like we're in the clear boys, that's a Victory for Uncle Sam!

Grim Harvest

 o/ 

Wow!

While playing Battletech at the FLGS there other day, there was another game in progress that I could not  resist taking pics of. One of the guys there is a 'professional pirate' he even has business cards!

 Seriously, he travels up and down the eastern seaboard visiting historic sites, museums and schools giving talks on the life of a pirate in full costume. He told us that he will even appear in a forthcoming episode of Expedition Unknown later this spring on the Discovery channel!

Adam Marrow, the game's creator himself. Note, all of the unit cards, instruction booklets, were full color and high quality prints. 

Anyway, Adam is developing his own miniature game called Grim Harvest and the game these photos came from was 'playtest #22'. All of the minis & terrain were 3D printed at the FLGS, and painted in the 'past month or two' (seriously, wtf?). Jake (who co-owns the FLGS) said their first playtest game about a month ago used boxes and a 'janky looking house print' for terrain. In that short span of time  Adam's creation has progressed to this! 

Jake at the shop said (quote) I can't believe I printed that, it certainly didn't look like that when he  picked it up from me!

The game itself is a fantasy, cooperative survival game of some sort. I don't know anything beyond that other than to say that visually it looks amazing!!!

No Ewoks, I checked.

I thought the castle was from Tabletop World, but it was also 3D printed.

Mordheim anyone?

I really wanted to take this home, not that I have a place for it.

No idea who was NPC and who was a player character (if any).

Another badass looking mini.

 I believe he is aiming for Kickstarter, so I will be sure to post about it when it goes live. May try to get in a playtest game or two as well!

Flower Pot-Bot

 o/

My niece Erin turns 7 today and this is what I sent her as a gift.  

Iden Versio & Imperial Comms Officer

 o/

Happy New Year folks! 

Damned near solid black minis photograph so well...

To kick things off for 2025, I have a few minis that were painted during the tail end of 2024. First up, Iden Versio of Inferno squad and her...uh...miniature Imperial Probe Droid? I'm not familiar with her backstory to be honest, but she's a decent Imperial command model from what I can gather.

Seriously, these were some of the quickest & easiest minis to paint.

I was tempted to have her without a helmet (which would then decorate some Rebel's base), but as you can see I opted to go with the TIE fighter pilot bobblehead look. The addition of Iden will now give my Empire forces a complete hand of command cards without having to have Din Djarin side with the Empire (because we all know he is a good guy). 

The front of his helm doubles as a cheese grater. 

I may need to go back and add a few lights to that comms-pack. 

I also picked up the Imperial Comms officer in an eBay lot of Legion dice & movement/measurement tools. He is painted similar to my Mud Troopers, though clearly he has not been out wallowing in the mud quite as much as they have. 

The token group photo. 

Looking forward to New Years going out with a...bazooka?

 o/

I hope everyone enjoyed their Christmas holiday (or at least those of you who celebrate it). We don't get Frankie back from his Dad until Saturday which is when we will be celebrating our Christmas. As such, yesterday and the day before were just odd, mid week days off for me. Nevertheless, I am sure that Neverness, as well as all of the other US Postal, Amazon, FEDEX, UPS & retail workers are thrilled to know that the hell of the holiday season has largely subsided for another year and will substantially be winding down in the next week or so.   

All that's left at this point is New Year's Eve which for us means that after drinking a bottle of my wife's favorite Veuve Clicquot champagne we'll be making 12:30-1am-ish, breakfast sandwiches while we're heavily buzzed. Frankie has never experienced this before so that ought to be a hoot. 

Finally! That Bazooka team that you came here looking for...

On the gaming front...

Originally, I would have already played a game of Bolt Action 3.0 by this point, but scheduling conflicts, and then the holidays, has meant that my first game of 3.0 won't happen till sometime in January. My opponent's army is fully painted, whereas mine will be only at least a third painted. But it is (slowly) getting there...

That's it, we're outta here!

2024 has been a roller coaster for us but we're hoping for a better 2025. Hopefully it will be for all of you as well!