The underworld expands!

I ordered another set of caves and they arrived this past week. I just love these things and probably spent an hour or so just putting this layout together, assembling and reassembling so as to use every piece that I have. 

The full layout though as always, once disassembled the same layout will never again be made. 

15mm marines performing a sweep and clear. 

The marines consist of a Lt., and (3) 5-man tac squads of 'first born' bolter grunts. It's all straight up 40k with just their movement rates halved.

'Movement detected up ahead...'

...and then there is my Quarmy. Easily representing IG in 15mm, albeit with a few minor alterations.

Both forces clock in at 250pts., though for an almost kill team-esque option, the Quar split in half evenly enough to make two, 125pt forces. I mean let's face it: in tunnel fighting, marines are going to slaughter the IG.

Squad sgt. watching the Sentinel tank as it advances up the narrow passage way.

Company CO bellowing out orders via megaphone...it's no wonder the marines can here them!

It's called Zone Mor-what?!?

The Commissar ambling along in the rear, shooting any stragglers for his own amusement.

As always I want more, but am thinking I'll hold off on any more purchases till I get these painted up. Yeah I know, everybody says that...but this will more or less just be an exercise in dry brushing using a color palette reminiscent of the vastly larger Triceratops I painted some years back. 

I sent the layout pic to my GF, and almost immediately this meme is what I got back in return...lol.

15mm Datasheet WIP

o/

As another nightmare of a month grinds its way forward, I've had little time for painting or playing. Prettymuch the only thing I've been able to work on (mainly on lunch breaks and the rare down time at work) has been adapting more datasheets for 15mm units as a continuation of my last post. Anyways, here they are, and let me know what ya think. 

The first (and only) datasheet so far to have a mini that I painted on it (and I sold it...years ago, sigh...). Not sure If I'll buy another of these, but it was an expertly cast model and if this does take off it will be tempting to get another...

Rather than an addition to a player's army, this is more of a random 'environmental' effect.

I do have one of these minis, the infamous 'Taco' of Rogue Stars fame, however its not painted/photogenic. I got this pic from CMoN (giving it my vote of a '10'), and just removed the jetpack from the image. 

IG Veterans, the minis pictured are from Khurasan Miniatures and on my to get eventually list. 

These minis come from Clear Horizon Miniatures, a company I'd totally forgotten about until Waaargh Pug mentioned them in a comment on my last pos. Thanks buddy!

A Viper Mech, this sheet was made at the request of Hoss using a mini from another company I'd forgotten about: Rebel Minis (located right here in good ol' Tennessee).

****

Welp, that's it for this year. So I hope all of you folks have a merry Christmas and happy New Year!

15mm 40k

o/

We all know that nowadays I have a love/hate relationship with 40k. However 8th ed is an easy system to learn and readily available to most everyone. For awhile now I’ve wanted to try a 40k/kill team hybrid in 15mm (indeed, I’ve pondered this idea previously). 

Huzzah! These are FINALLY available!!

To start out (on the cheap) it’ll likely be Marines vs. Nids. On the Nids side I just need to pick up a single gargoyle to use as a flying Hive Tyrant, I have a genestealer which will fill in as a Carnifex, and I have 18 old Termagants which will work as Tyranid warriors. 

(no idea why the above paragraph won't justify like the rest...)

Primaris LTs.

For the marines I preordered a 32 man platoon of Khurasan's new earth doom reserves minis which I'll use as primaris marines in terms of stats. I want to ditch 40k's backstory/aesthetic/universe entirely and we can easily make up our own instead. I'm just calling them primaris here for familiarity's sake. 

Basically will just be using 40k rules with KT's initiative and the you go-I go, on a per unit/character basis in lieu of an individual model as per the KT rules (essentially), rather than the 40k one side annihilates the other turn method.  We can also leave out with bits we don't like (CPs and CP farming, the endless, mostly situational stratagems that slow game play to a crawl, oh and those fucking maelstrom cards that turn strategy into the luck of the draw would be my top picks for omission!). 

Okay wait-I'm getting ahead of myself. We're just trying to go super basic at the outset, to see if this is viable and/or if anyone is really interested (so far my buddies Scott and Hoss are). I have PDFs of all of the codexes and will pare them down to just what is needed. Am wanting to see if this works w/o having to write a whole new game. 

Intercessors Colonial Marines.

As for miniatures…if you really wanted the 40k aesthetic, Vanguard minis makes 15mm Orks, Marines and IG, Onslaught minis makes 15mm IG, SoBs, Chaos, Squats, Dark Eldar, and a sorta Kroot faction. The Ion Age has these space...umm...frogs? that ought to work well as Tau...maybe, as well as Space marines (male and female) of their own. And of course Zombiesmith makes HORDES of 15mm Quar which are easy analogs for the Imperial Guard (as aliens), or rather they did and will soon do so again. Currently they are retooling/resculpting the entire line. 

The above is just a small sampling though as there are TONS of 15mm mini gaming manufacturers/retailers out there!

Regardless, this endeavor will be MUCH CHEAPER than actual 40k though as the platoon I ordered clocked in @ $34, which is the price of just ONE fucking character model for 40k these days! Seriously, WTF?

A Rhino Hippo with a turret slapped on top at the
expense of 2 troops carried, kinda like real life AFVs

Conveniently, 40k points are structured so that you have to buy the weapons for the basic tank hull/trooper allowing you to essentially build the tanks and infantry with whatever you want, and ignoring the 40k aesthetic altogether. 

As you can see, my 'datasheets' just a few examples, with all of the rules*, points, and stats coming from the Space Marine codex. 

*Okay, I made up the Amphibious rule because tanks plowing thru water like its not even there is dumb. I also shortened the walking speed because these guys are little!

A Wet Willie and a rant...

As it turns out, it was a good thing that my game with Neverness had already been postponed, because I was yet again struck down by illness this past week resulting in a fairly unpleasant 4-day weekend. My beloved Wolfy and I have been sick more or less for the ENTIRE month of January it seems and we're all too happy to be done with this infernal month!

That said, stuck at home and all on my own on Thursday and Friday, I got a fair bit of hobbying in...well, in between the frequent 2ish hour naps, and all of the coughing, snotting and general malaise. Bereft of games to talk about this week due to the aforementioned illness, instead this week's 2 posts will be about what I did as I staved off death...

For the first project I finished was my Khurasan APC for my (as yet still unused) Gruntz army: The Buffet Assault Group. Armed only with a medium grenade launcher in the turret, this is really just an APC rather than an IFV. Still, it painted up nicely and I'm quite happy with it. With this model's completion, all I have left to paint for Gruntz is my Commander's mech, a mortar team, and the in-progress vending bot.

Sorry for the wicked glare. 

*****

Ah yes, their adoring fan base...

Also, whilst half dead, I made my weekly stop by the BoLS to see if they had anything of interest. As usual I was disappointed, but still I had to comment on their 3rd, carbon copy post in about 24 hours about the new Karate-Kid Wulfen. Seriously, it had nothing new at all offer over what the prior two near identical posts had! Its such a shame that what was once the premiere 40k/mini gaming blog is now just a 'click-bait' website.

Speaking of, how does one unfollow Spikey Bits's blog? When I log into blogger, my blog update feed shows:

Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits
Somebody actually has a post then more of:
Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits
Spikey Bits

Yes, it seems that not content to spam the living shit out of BoLS with his mindless garbage, his own page is even worse! (with the exception of Sundays it seems, I guess he's at church...) Yet looking on the page, I see the followers listed nowhere, keeping me from unfollowing the accursed thing!

This week's odds & ends

o/

Unfortunately I'll have to start this one off on a sad note. It seems that lost in the rugged and mountainous hinterlands somewhere between eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina, half frozen by the blizzard and no doubt starving to death (there were only so many grots to go round I guess...), WAAAAUGH Neverness has fallen casualty to last week's blizzard and as such our game this coming Friday has been postponed.

Despite the inclement there wasn't a whole lot of free time to paint this past weekend, but I did start work on my APC for The Buffet Assault Group. Its not too far along, but then again I'm no speed painter either. No worries though, the WIP pics below highlighted several flaws that need going over. Normally the camera doesn't show me those till after I declare a mini 'done'.

Gaaaah! So many flaws, so little time!

I'm still on track for the goal painting all of them before I get anymore. That's a feat that I've NEVER once accomplished in all of my gaming career!

A side-by-side with its stable mate. 

In other news, I heard an interesting tidbit from Admiral Drax. Apparently, he enjoyed painting my Tankbustas soooo much, that he's looking to get a job here in the good ol' US, presumably so that he'll be able to paint even more of my Orks! As such I wish him the best of luck in that job search!

lol!

Happy New Year folks!

o/

I took the tail end of 2015 off from blogging as the lead up into Christmas, along with visiting family (all within an approximately 3 hour radius) during Christmas was going to all but eliminate hobby-time all together...but then I got sick Christmas night. Resulting in cancelled plans all around, and now our previously planned 'quiet New Years' has gone all to hell with rescheduled visits. As such, we're most likely on the road today, meeting up with my Mom who's still in the region rather than back in Florida. But, you guys don't care about that so without further ado...

Here's my last paint job of 2015! A Sword class hovertank rom Khurasan for my Gruntz, Buffet Assault Group army.

The drybrushing caught the edge of the TBAGerz decal...but I guess that can be passed off as the edge of an added on name plate. 

This amount of grime is probably kicked up just from gliding over the average parking lot!

During my quarantine, I was able to get some painting in after passing thru the varying stages of 'god this sucks' (runny nose = no paint). I really enjoyed painting this, especially after painting so, soooo many GW tanks over the years. Yes I've painted tank from other manufacturers, but this model felt like a breath of fresh air!

That said, it is a bit of a memorial to an old friend who had passed on a few years back. Olen, and older guy at one of the (now defunct) FLGs's that I used to frequent, was known for (many things actually) his favorite battle cry of 'You'll die like bitches!' (followed by a cackling laugh) as he was rolling the dice! As you can see, I had a few decals saying that in my Fallout Hobbies order, and this is the first of them (all the same design) which has landed on the front glacis of this tank.

Sadly, this tank was powerless in its 1st battle (no, I haven't actually played Gruntz yet) vs. our kitty Neeka. She, like her sister Kiya don't understand why I keep putting my minis in what they think is their kitty cube (and not my light box). She actually tried to swat the tank aside which promptly (and quite unhappily for her) caused me to remove her from the cube (and for that injustice, I was given the cold shoulder for the rest of the night).

;-)

Khurasan Hovertank painting begins...

o/

Just a quick post tonight as I'm quite tired and I've only just started this project. This is a Sword class hovertank from Khurasan that I'll be using for my Buffet Assault Group army for Gruntz. The camo scheme, which is still in the base coating stage was inspired by a winter/urban camo scheme painted by Dwartist for one of Khurasan's other 15mm tanks (just scroll down a bit).

No paint aside from primer has been applied to the turret yet.

There will be a Buffet Assault Group decal on that rear panel!

From an aerial point of view, the camo does break up the silhouette nicely.

Looks good so far I think despite being as clean as it is, but have no fear-by the time I'm done it'll be dusty and filthy as a tank properly should be!

Another squad complete!

o/

Not a whole lot to report on the hobby front as Wolfy and I just returned from a very enjoyable 4-day weekend visiting friends and family in Georgia and South Carolina. As it was a 'short' week leading up to that, about the only thing I accomplished aside from assembling Captain OBGYN was to finish off painting my third infantry squad for my Gruntz army.

Most 40k armies are ebayed off before this many minis are painted...

All that remains to be painted now is a mortar team, the Vending bot, my Commander-mech, and the two hover tanks. At this rate, I'm liable to have a fully painted army before I even play my first game!

Painting minis in space...

My beloved Wolfy was stricken with a cold this weekend, and as such we skipped going to the FLGS in hopes of not passing Nurgle's blessings onto the rest of the gang. So, whilst she slept for most of the evening, I geeked out with a combination of miniature painting and EVE Online.

More commonly known as Spread Sheets in Space, I've done quite a bit of painting whilst in EVE as I'm not a spread sheet person. While shuttling ships around on auto-pilot I found anomalies galore in a neighboring system to my destination, and the fact that I had them all to myself! That's about as good as high-sec PvE gets. Sure all of the combat sites would have been more entertaining (and probably lucrative), but I opted for mining a bunch of rare ores instead. Its much easier to paint when you can play afk.

Ah yes, this is the life....

There was some excitement of a sort though I guess. I got into a discussion-turned-argument with my alt. character's corp execs about just how fucking boring the corp itself is. No, this wasn't the first time, but it got a bit more heated this go round, with one rage-logging off and myself eventually just closing the chat channel in disgust. They did mention a fun idea, but quickly killed/buried it in their typical over-abundance of caution, so much so that I likened it to wading thru government red tape. 

They were not amused.

That said, my in-corp character hasn't been given the boot, so I guess they'll get over it. Of course I said this was about painting in space and yes, amid the furious typing another infantry squad for The Buffet Assault Group as well as my HMG team managed to get painted, additionally my third infantry squad got a base coat too.

Blue Squad standing by...

The weapons team's armor is slightly different, hence the altered paint scheme.

A group shot of all of my painted Gruntz thus far.

Up close they're not much to look at (curse you zoom lens!), but all together and when they make it to the table top, I think they'll be looking pretty good.

Cleaning up resin minis' bad name...

o/

For years I've had a love/hate relationship with Forgeworld. Lots of us have...

Forgeworld produces some of the industry's most awesome models, but in general they're so horribly expensive that I actually referenced it in this blog's banner. Seemingly, in equal proportion to the high price is their piss-poor quality control of their products (one of my better rants in that link...lol). Air bubbles, miscasts, warped pieces (gun barrels especially),  Gates in the WORST places, gates that were so large and still attached that they broke the parts they were attached to in shipment, silicone mold release that won't come off no matter how many times you scrub the parts, the list goes on and on. Yes, FW has excellent customer service, and its not all bad (just 'mostly'), but I've just come to understand that resin is a nightmare product to work with.

With North American manufacturers, the story starts to differ a bit. With Heavy Gear I've had a near flawless tank, and a (pre-blog) walker that was on par with Forgeworld in all respects. My Grymn flyer and its base from Bombshell and Secret weapon miniatures were cleaned of the mold silicone, but they're simple models (though the flyer has some gate issues similar to the one linked above). Xmarx's CBT terrain was fine, but again, really simple in design. Zombiesmith...despite remaking molds before sending me replacements, considering all 3 resin vehicles (simple as they are), I still can't honestly recommend them for resin (just stick with their metal Quar!).

So, expecting the worst (as usual), I steeled myself for another resin nightmare when I received my new 15mm Khurasan tanks Thursday. However, that nightmare is not to be it seems...no, actually they're as close to flawless as I've ever seen in a resin model! Seriously, why can't other resin manufacturers, and Forgeworld specifically given the horrid prices deliver quality like this? (and god I hope this isn't just a fluke either)

Near flawless casts, silicone release already cleaned off, gates REMOVED and sanded flat, the guns/hatches are metal (and also flawless), and most importantly, the two tanks together cost $2 less than the typical 40k plastic character clamp pack (i.e.: $33). Check em out:

Note: these are sitting on a 1" grid.

I love em!

There it is, the worst of the 2 casts...otherwise known as the only flaws!

Sanded off gates, what a concept!

Uh yeah, buh-bye Forgeworld! There will be no more of your over-priced garbage for me! Although with 40k quickly falling towards the bottom of the list of my favorite games, that's probably little surprise right?

Comparing Apples and Oranges...

Okay, so figuring it out from the point of view of starting from scratch, here's a comaprison of what I've purchased for Gruntz vs. the 40k Spess mahreen equivalent (because lets face it, 90% of players start with marines.

Also I'm not going with the Dark Vengeance boxed set as (1) not everybody starts with it and (2) there's no Gruntz equivalent which more or less renders this whole exercise in comparing the two pointless. Especially as the forces contained in that set don't really compare well with what I bought for Gruntz. The DV box is also intended to be split by 2 new players (which is amusing as only veteran players who have pre-existing armies for the minis contained in the set tend to actually do that).

"He's the Orange!'

 This is a good size comparison photo (which tend to be surprisingly hard to find in google searches...

Anyways, first up buying the game rules:

Gruntz rulebook PDF and unit builder app: $14.00 (+$10 for printing out and spiral binding @ kinko's)

40k Big Rulebook and SM codex ebook: $145.99

A difference of: $121.99! (ouch!)

Next up, minis (all of which were purchased from Khurasan miniatures with the lone exception of the commander's mech which came from The Ion Age):

Gruntz:

(1) APC

(1) Tank

(20) Infantry

(3) specialist squads (similar to IG heavy weapon teams)

(1) commander's mech

Gruntz minis total: $79.42 and just short of 250 points as built. 

That point total could go higher if I beefed em up a bit but I've kept em simple to start with and that's a decently sized starter army anyways.

40k:

(1) Rhino

(1) Predator

(20) Tactical Marines

(5) devastator marines

(1) dreadnought

(nope, no GW links as y'all already know what those look like)

Minis total: $267.25, and about 750 points (give or take) which is also a good starter size.

Minis come to a difference in price of: $187.83 (again, ouch!) Actually it would be worse as the Gruntz also includes shipping costs, whereas the 40k doesn't. The 40k costs also don't involve sales tax, and since GW's NA HQ is in Memphis, buying from them online would involve sales tax just like buying their toys at the FLGS would.

Total Gruntz Start up cost: $103.25
Total 40k Start up cost: $413.15

For a difference of: $309.90 (triple ouch!)

Increasing the armies from there won't get any cheaper for the 40k player (assuming ebay isn't involved) but is debatable for the Gruntz player as I could redo the unit stats, increasing their skills and their point costs free of charge (I would have to buy more stuff though).

Now, obviously Gruntz is not the (gamers) household name that 40k is, and I've yet to get in a game to see just how much I'll like it in the long run either, but still...most games of 40k these days feel like a pay-to-win scenario which just plain sucks! Personally, 7th ed as whole hasn't been any fun in general, as it feels like it has far more cons than pros to it. Apparently I'm not alone (locally Infinity has all but replaced 40k at the FLGS' game night), so its not hard to see why GW is hemorrhaging players and having difficulty finding new ones with new army start up costs like that. Don't even get me started on the AoS debacle! What's the latest on that? $100 for SIX Khorne Blood Crushers...curiously with most every release, the WHFB cost too much excuse for AoS's existance seems hollower and hollower.

Oops, back on topic...

Speaking of hemorrhaging players, the Gruntz purchases listed above came out of my now depleted Plastic 30k Fund that I had built up. Mk IV tac marines isn't what I was hoping for and given GW's opaque marketing scheme of: just have a lot of money ready to impulse buy our releases with no forewarning of what they are or when they'll come out... 

Meh, why did I put up with their crap for so long? Honestly it feels like I've achieved escape velocity and I don't see any reason to look back (unless I'm looking waaaaaaaaaaaay back towards GorkaMorka, Mordheim and the goodies from GW's long since past 'Golden Age').

Pondering 15mm games...

...yes, because the Grymn aren't small enough already.

Actually I've been pondering 15mm games for close to a year now, and yesterday I took the plunge and bought a small (no pun intended) number of minis to try em out. Manufacturers and game systems come in myriad forms, and especially in terms of systems, its hard to know what is good and what isn't (add in subjective, opinionated reviews and it becomes a total mess). The minis themselves (infantry anyways) aren't anywhere near as detailed as their 28mm counterparts, but when they're that friggin' small, does it really matter?

I opted for the Gruntz rule list as the cover art as well as several illustrations inside were created by an artist I like: Jake Parker. Yeah, that's all it took...but, thus far from what I've read it looks kinda fun. There are also images from a wide range of mini companies contained within, which gives more ideas on who to buy from. There's fluff as well, I haven't gotten to that part yet, but that hasn't stopped me from already creating my own, lol. Please, don't tell me that surprises you?

For now I'll save that stuff for a later post.

There's an army/unit creator in the back of the book or if you'd like, there's a downloadable app for $5 that'll speed up the process considerably (and yes, its even Mac compatible, huzzah!). All forces will be built off of the same point values. Whilst that may sound kinda generic, just think of 40k's point system where it often seems like the so-called game designers are pulling numbers out of a hat (or worse yet, marketing is giving you free rules/units if you spend MOAR!!!). Then again there's the Age of Sigmeh designers who couldn't even be bothered with doing even that much, so I guess I ought not complain right?

Here's what I bought (unpainted of course):

Squad Sgts. x4 plus a casualty.

Basic Grunts x6 (even though 7 are pictured).

2 heavy weapon teams and a sniper.

Anyways, another selling point is cost. 15mm minis are significantly cheaper than 28mm ones. I got the 16 minis above from Khurasan miniatures for a mere $18.07! Hell, super heavy tanks run from $18 to $35! (those three anyways) I say that because, there is always an exception...yes the one below is $60, but its HUGE, just look:

lol, I'll wager that a few Tau players' gears will start grinding when they see this!

So anyways, that's my latest side project/folly. Current out of pocket expenses for the PDF ruleset and the minis come to a total of: $15.25. That sum would be a bit higher, but I sold off a half dozen CBT tanks that I never used. Still, even if I ignored that, how often could you realistically get your feet wet in a game system for under $30 (yes, besides X-Wing)?