An excerpt from the Tyranid Cookbook!

o/

lol, we were sorting thru some old recipes whilst rearranging the kitchen today (i.e.: moving the fridge from wall to another) and I found this in amongst recipe collection (yes, really!). The printed off email containing the recipe was sent to me by Neverness, and it is dated April 29th, 2002! It was too funny not to retype here:

'Baked Warlock Sticks'

Main Ingredient: Eldar Warlock (1)

'Baked Warlock Sticks' are a sought-after delicacy served in most Hive Fleets during the long voyage between star systems, although their expensive ingredients ensure that only Hive Tyrants and the like actually get to sample them on a regular basis.

Most Eldar are very stringy and require considerable preparation, so its often best to soften them up somehow. Take the Warlock and drop him in a high-speed mincer. While he's softening up, there's plenty of time to work on the rest of the dish. Ignore the mincing Warlock for now and come back to him later.

As with all Eldar, Warlocks are best served with cheese. In fact, Eldar are amongst the cheesiest snacks in either galaxy. If you've captured a Warlock alive, odds are you've had to advance through so much cheese you're probably thinking you've invaded a dairy world, so getting hold of some shouldn't be a problem.

Take the minced Warlock and roll him in the cheese, making sure you've picked out any fluff that may have crept into the mix. Cheesy Eldar and fluff don't go well together, even if its just background fluff. Mixing fluff with Eldar tends to lower the cheese content, so most Eldar avoid it.

Take the cheesy, minced Warlock and place him in an oven, setting temperature to 'MEDIUM'. Many cooks make the basic mistake of over-setting the oven. The result is that they are over-done, generally ending up as more 'burnt out' than the desired 'half-baked'.

Note to new chefs: you'll find that most Eldar can't take the heat, so be prepared for some unusual reactions. Some cry, some melt, many just fold up completely and just disappear. If he's really cheesy however, you'll find he's likely to start whining.

This really isn't a problem, as Eldar go well with most whines...as long as the whine isn't too overpowering, just sit back and enjoy it, savoring the taste and bouquet.

The half-baked, cheesy, minced Warlock, served with a good whine, is now ready to be carved into thin strips and served to the Hive Mind.

Enjoy!

created by:
Michael E. Major
www.Astronomi-con.com

...sigh... Where did my time go?

Seriously. I used to have tons of time to paint, but anymore...not so much.

lol, my girlfriend was amused by this model's armored bustier.

Oh well, I did get the hole drilled in the force field generator for my Grymn Shuttle's flight stand or rather my future father-in-law (no that's not official yet, but its inevitable) did via his drill press. The man is the master of precision, and he was perfect for that job! All I managed to do myself was to get two more Grymn painted.

Ugh! I had to go back and touch up her finger tip after taking that center pic!

So that's something at least....right?

Kicking it old school with Mutant Chronicles!

o/

Our friend Brad came over for dinner Friday evening, and brought an old, old copy of Mutant Chronicles with him. I used to play the old Warzone miniature game, but this game was the inspiration for that one. The minis for it are...well, to be honest, hideous. lol, at least the Doomtroopers (the good guys) are.  Most of the Dark Legion minis are as well, but the Necromutants and Legionaires are decent at least.

Cluster-fuck in progress on the stepped tile...

I was running the Dark Legion for this round and here you can see my Ezoghoul (or something like that) killing Wolfy's Mishima warrior named 'Yojimbo' (the way we were pronouncing that, he sounded like a Cajun-Japanese guy, lol).

Horrid models aside, it was a lot of fun and quite easy to learn. We started around 8pm, and were happily going along till Brad checked his phone and saw it was 1am!!! Thus we had to cut this night of gaming 'short'.

:-)

Grymn Flyer / Arvus Lighter

o/

Since everyone's having so much fun at my Grymn's expense, I figured I'd stick with them for another post. Some ways back, last spring, winter...somewhere in there, Bombshell Miniatures launched a Kickstarter for their retro-styled shuttle. I fell in love with it, got it, and its sat in the closet ever since. Honestly I had no idea what I was going to do with it.

Then, a little ways back when I was working on my Grymn gatling cannon, it popped into my mind that it would be perfect for my Grymn! Much like that antique pilfered from a museum for reuse on the battlefield, the beleaguered Grymn Army, desperate to hold the line, have started commandeering civilian shuttles. Retro-fitted with weapons, these ad-hoc combat craft are now tasked as assault shuttles and ground attack craft.

Not too many parts, and excellent casting quality (pay attention to that last bit there Forgeworld!).

Conveniently, 40k has a model that fits that description exactly: Forgeworld's Arvus Lighter. The main difference (aside from price), is that the Arvus is a flying brick, whereas the ISW-69F is an egg. Like everything I've done for the Grymn here lately, this project will be an amalgamation of products from various companies. The retro-fitted guns will be autocannons, taken from the Dakka Jet kit (as well as the base). The Bombshell shuttle's base is an acrylic square that's fit for holding maybe my X-Wing YT-1300, not a resin egg perched 4" above the table. That's probably why I've only seen built examples sitting on their landing gear.

Whilst the GW flight base is certainly big enough, there's still the issue of attaching the acrylic rod to it, and giving it some weight to counter balance the shuttle. For that task, I have a Secret Weapon Miniatures' force field generator I bought prior to the release of the limited run of GW's stronghold assault force field generator-kit-that-looks-like-ass. Once again, this one was a hellova lot cheaper and better looking than the GW version. I'll probably have a Grymn or two on the base as well.

:-)

The Grymn on yet another battlefield...

o/

As anyone that reads my blog knows, I've (here recently) been building my Grymn along the lines of 40k's Astra Militarum and Inquisition along with a token Assassin. However this weekend they took to the field as stand-ins in a skirmish game a buddy of mine is working on, with hopes of one day bringing it to Kickstarter.

My newest painted Grymn.

Whilst I was happy to see my Grymn on the table top, they fared rather poorly. Such is the plight of the vertically challenged on any given battlefield I suppose. The game was fun though, even though I thought a few things were a little unbalanced. Such is the nature of play-testing I guess. He was looking for feedback from us, though as it was only our first game I'm not sure how good our feedback was.

...shrugs...

We'll see I suppose.

HWK-290 repaint

Yet another busy, busy week...meaning a very quick post. So, despite having only a very little time for painting (about an hour or so) I did manage to repaint the HWK-290. I still need to seal it (I'm out of clear coat currently), but I'm happy with how it came out. Thus I present to you:  

The Dragonfly
 

The side images show the front-to-back fade of metallic blue-to-green the best.

I.R./Voril and Kushial are inbound for a 2v2 game (vs. myself and Wolfy) of X-Wing tonight, though this ship won't be partaking in the battle as we're both playing the Empire this time.

Starfighter Combat in the pegboard nebula...

o/

Well, after 2 super busy weeks, things are slowing back down to normal. Slow enough for us to make it to the FLGS for the first time in about a month! Showing up with X-Wing, 6 of us decided to all go in on an epic game but...nobody brought a star field of any sort to play on. Not even a tape measure to measure out a playing space (we're X-Wing players, we don't need tape measures!).

So, borrowing one from an Infinity player, I found a pegboard of the approximate size for a 'normal' game, pried it from the wall (velcro FTW!) and we used that. We probably should have used something larger but what the hell, everyone likes bumper cars right?

On the Imperial side was my GF with Vader, and 2 Interceptors which I dubbed 'The God Squad'. Imperial Recruitment/Archon Voril with a TIE Phantom, and several TIEs, and finally Screech with a TIE swarm which had Howl Runner and Dark Curse.

On the Rebellion side we had myself with Lando piloting the Scarlet Harlot, a HWK-290 and a Gold Squadron Y-Wing, the center was Bob with Luke, Biggs and Corran, and our right was Kushial with another Lando (someone was an impostor...) flying the Millennium Falcon, and a pair of Green Squadron A-Wings.

As per the norm, what follows is a bunch of lousy iPhone pics with a running commentary which will function as a half-assed battle report...

And this folks, is why they're the bad guys...

The lines collide quickly, except for the Y-Wing which heads off to support the center of our line.

Looks like the Y is about bite off more than it can chew...

That large base seems to have not been in the Imperial Academy's training book, resulting in a lot of bumping and grinding with the Falcon.

Still angry about a prior game where the HWK-290 all but escorted one of her TIEs off the board with its Ion cannon, my GF engages the HWK with extreme prejudice, resulting in the first kill of the game!

Biggs and Luke pop a TIE before heading off to tour the far side of the board...meanwhile the Y disintegrates under a overwhelming onslaught of fire!

A nice side-by-side view of the Harlot and the Falcon, both of whom were taking pot shots at Vader's TIE.

PULL UP!!! lol, the Harlot tries to avoid a Kamikazing TIE! Meanwhile Corran finishes off Vader!

Only to follow up that glorious kill with breaking up after clipping a TIE (a critical hit card caused this). Meanwhile Luke and Biggs decide to stop dicking around in the backfield and once again join the fight!

Not a good decision for Biggs, as he dies shortly after his return. That said, the TIEs have been noticeably thinned out.

The Harlot pops the last standard TIE, while the Millennium Falcon is on its last legs and Luke doesn't fare much better. 

Oh fuck! Yeah, fly into some asteroids...that'll show em! With those two, guns blazing and in close pursuit, along with the Harlot hitting every stupid rock along the way, the Empire cleared the board and carries the day!

Well, after the horde of ships that started out, only the Phantom and one Interceptor survived, both with a few dings of their own. Still it was fun, and I was pleased with the battlefield debut of the Scarlet Harlot as it took out a handful of TIEs before dying. I do need to alter its weapons loadout though as it was carrying about 9 points of useless stuff. Such is the learning curve of a new game...

The Grymndicare Assassin

Grymndicare assassins are above the Militarum, and are only deployed when a surgical strike is required against a difficult foe. When the ultimate sanction is to be called in, it is only by the highest ranks of the Grymnquisition. To recklessly use these peerless snipers against the endless masses of the enemy would be a pointless waste of his abilites! One which the heavily besieged Grymn Empire cannot afford to lose...

lol, don't let the clownish colors fool you! I'm quite certain that he's all but invisible when deployed into the red tinged environs of my Grymn's homeworld...

The Curious Constructs/Grymn Cannon is complete!

o/

Having trashed all of my previous fluff for the Grymn, I'm now planning on using them in 40k as the Grymn (Astra) Militarum, The Grymnquisition and I even have a Grymn Assassin. These properly proportioned little guys and gals (unlike the tubby little Ratlings and Squats) actually make Spess Mahreenz look like 'true-scale' marines. Whereas GW's marines only stand as tall as the average Cadian even when wearing their power armor...

Thus at some...distant point in the future, when we have $$$ is to spare, I'll pick up the needed codexes (a curious thing, as I don't want the 7th ed rulebook). It does make me wonder if I've crossed the line from  'gamer' to 'collector' though as 40k is suddenly at the bottom of my list of games I want to play. Yet I'm all to happy to paint my little Grymn whilst imagining their place in the 40k universe. I've even purchased a handful via the funds from the horde of 40k minis that have gone the way of ebay.

Listen up you worthless little cans! Your days of gardening and dishwashing is over!

 Anyways, as mentioned in my previous post on this project, rules aside-the Grymn are not faring well in the Grimdark of the 41st Millennium. Many armies fight via sheer numbers, something the diminutive Grymn lack and things are getting desperate!

More and more of lower classes of Grymn (male and female) are being forcibly drafted into the Militarum every day. Museums are being raided for antique weapons to be quickly refurbished and returned to battle, especially in the outer territories where off-world resupply is difficult. Worst of all, even the Aristocracy has been adversely effected by the horrors of war! Their menial house bots have been rounded up by the Militarum for use in both rear and front line support roles. This has left the Grymn's aristocrats with the horrid situation of having to actually do their own household chores and menial tasks!

lol, poor bastards.

They had to resort to untrained house bots after most of this cannon's Grymn crew were lost to an enemy ambush...

There are a few miscasts, mainly in the wheels of the cannon. An issue which no doubt was later remedied, but such are the travails of Kickstarter. It works for the 'antique' look though so I'm happy with it. As you can see, I've also taken a liking to GW's rust paint as well. Thus it looks fairly archaic next to the rest of my Grymn army.

The rest of my Grymn squads will be issued heavy stubbers rather than heavy bolters as this kind of weapon is simply to big for a Grymn weapons team to move. Hell, just swiveling the thing to adjust its aim will be a nightmarish task (even with an additional bot to provide a little bit of extra hydraulic power)!

And to finish this post off...

Here's the requisite 'Kiya in my light box' pic. This seems to happen every time, lol.