Untold Treasures

No good adventure is complete without treasure. It's the reason most adventurers hit the road, killing everything in their path as they wander from one end of the realm to the other looking for that sweet, sweet loot.

Frostgrave, of course, centers around this bloody gold-lust. Needing treasure tokens for Frostgrave gave me a wonderful opportunity to find something wondrous and shiny for my wizards to compete for.

Looking around at various company's offerings, I set eyes upon Ristul's Extraordinary Market's Cursed Treasure set. Not only does it have some really magical looking treasture, but there was no way I could pass up that Conan-the-Barbarian-Atlantean-skeleton look-alike.

I haven't gotten to that piece yet, but since I am running demos for Frostgrave, I needed my tokens now. I chose six of the treasure piles and set to work. Here are the results:

These were a simple drybrush with metallics, then picking out the jewels, chests and weapons for detail. All in all they came out splendidly, and look great next to my warband.

Of course, I would be lying if these little beauties didn't find their way into D&D. They look especially good on my 3D dungeon terrain.

I have a couple of other things I want to work on first, but I can't wait to finish this set. That skeleton will also be perfect for all things dungeon crawl, so he needs to be finished ASAP. Until then, these treasure piles will be hauled about quite a bit, hopefully so wizards, thieves, clerics and warriors can retire and stop slaughtering every living creature they come across for their pocket change.

Goddamnit, there they go again.

Happy gaming!

Into The Ruins

To say the least, I have found the setting of Frostgrave to be inspiring. I've painted more things for this game than I can say for a lot of others. Each of my two main Warhammer armies has a single painted figure. I already have 2 for Frostgrave.

There is something about a magical, snow-bound city ruined by the sins of arcane excess, that captures my imagination. I imagine the city as a lost Atlantean ideal, powerful in its time but now crumbling and forgotten, and filled with all manner of demons, undead and weird beasts leftover from bygone days. With that in mind, I really want to start building on my terrain collection to suit that feel.

Most of my terrain is pretty generic, so I already have a few ruins, the odd wizard's tower and of course my dungeon terrain to draw from. Ambiance is everything though, so first I had to find a good backdrop for all that terrain. I settled on a 4'x4' Alpine F.A.T. mat from Frontline Gaming.

It's on the bigger side for Frostgrave but it has the perfect bleak, grey look for what I envision. It looks really snowbound and the rocks could be hidden streets. I love these mats. I have two others, one for X-Wing and I just picked up another for 40K. They are vivid, durable, non-slip and come with their own carrying case. A bit pricey, but worth every penny in the end.

While I was buying things, I also found this pair of beauties:

They are pre-painted pieces from War Torn Worlds, which makes their terrain out of recycled tires. They are flexible and durable, which is a big plus because I'm starting to have to stack terrain in my cabinet. The color scheme is little light, but they do the trick quite nicely.

Next I settled in to paint a piece that I figured I would ignore forever. I picked up the Dragons Don't Share set from Reaper's second Bones Kickstarter with the intent of never painting it but imagining doing do until the day I died. Howeve, the ruins were so perfect that I had to get some paint on them at least.

The color is just my dungeon blend on a larger scale. I learned the hard way that Bones doesn't take spray primer well, so the piece is a little tacky, even with a couple extra loads of paint on it

And the top comes off for convenient model placement:

The set also has a set of crumbling stairs made up of a couple pieces for modularity:

But the whole thing fits together if you want it to be one big piece:

I have two notes on this piece. First, you may notice a big gap in the above picture. That is because there is another piece of ruin that has a huge dragon perched on it. I could not bear to tear the dragon off, but it would also look weird with a live dragon always attached to it. If I had another copy of that piece though, I would add it in a heartbeat. Second, for some ungodly reason the top portion with the stairs came in two pieces, both of which were very warped. All of my best efforts with a heat gun were for naught, but I found a solution. I filled the crack with my new favorite basing material, Golden pumice gel. On a piece like this, you'd never know the difference and it came out perfect.

Finally, I wanted to add a little weird and ominous to my Frostgrave, so I set to scratch building. You see, a while back my wife found a little resin pond super cheap online and bought if for me on a whim. I think it was originally meant for fairy gardens or something, but it is a bit out of scale as a pond. It has been floating around for while, always waiting for a project, and I finally found one.

I stuck it to some foamcore, cutting out a place for it to sit down into to lower the height of the walls a tiny bit. Then I filled it with clay to get rid of dead space, plus some more clay around the edges to blend it into the base. Then I used a mix of skull piles from Ristul's Extraordinary Market and spare Games Workshop skeleton bits from ages ago to make it look stuffed to the brim with bones. An old vulture from a Tomb Kings screaming skull catapult completed the look, plus some texturing with the ol' magic pumice gel.

The idea is that it's an old well or decorative pond that has been filled to the brim with dead bodies, possibly from before the city froze. But maybe they are unlucky adventurers after all, and who (or what) put them there in the first place...?

That's all for now. I'm hoping to add some larger ruins at some point to give the table a little more height and choke things up a bit. For now, though, I think it's a good start.

Happy gaming!

Brother In Arms

I am a huge fan of Hasslefree Miniatures. Every one of their sculpts oozes character and charm. I also believe they produce some of the finest female forms in the business. I have painted their cultists for Strange Aeons (among other things) and little Hayden the slayer for dungeon crawling. 

This past Christmas I received a copy of their Sir Olwyn mini. I love the way he looks wise and devout, a perfect experienced mentor knight. Truly one of my favorite figures Hasslefree produces. I had plans on using him as a PC for Pathfinder and had primed him up, but then never got around to painting him. Then I found Frostgrave and realized I had a perfect templar ready to go.

Meet Hadrian Owlkey, elder brother to my wizard, Amuron Owlkey.

Hadrian protects his brother among the frozen ruins of Frostgrave, even having renounced his knightly order to follow him on his mysterious quest. Hadrian isn't privy to all of Amuron's secrets, but trusts his brother implicitly. Is his trust well placed? We shall see.

Templars are expensive, so they may not be the best choice starting out, but damn does he make for a pretty model on the table.

Of course my camera refuses to pick up the highlighting on the cloak but I assure you it is there. You can see that I've based him differently than my construct, having gone for a dead grass look that I think I favor over the green in the dead, frozen wasteland that is Frostgrave. I may go back and rebase the construct so he matches the rest of my warband going forward.

Speaking of frozen wasteland, I have decided that I will end up getting a Frostgrave specific mat at some point when I'm feeling rich. I want one of Frontline Gaming's Alpine mats because I think it looks perfect and I'm leaning toward 4'x4' for my games. Plus the size would ensure the mat gets used for things like 40K as well, so it's not to tied to one system.

In the interim, I went to the local fabric store and picked up a yard of white fleece to use as a 3'x3' mat.

It's a little stark, but it does the trick and was less than six bucks. Really a bargain you can't beat. I'm also starting to look into some extra ruins to bulk out my Frostgrave. I'd rather not have to cast Fog all the time, so having some extra places to hide would be great.

Anway, that's all for now. Happy gaming!

Bits & Bobs

I've had a bit of free time lately (read as "unemployed") and while I haven't done much in the way of big projects, I have had the chance to knock out a few mini-bits to enhance the games I play. I want to apologize for the photography here and in the last few months. The lighting in my new game room is atrocious and I'm trying to find a better way to do things. Right now these are taken in a small spot on my desk with my painting light.

The first thing I made up were a few treasure/magic item counters. Ostensibly they were made for use in Song of Blades & Heroes but they could also be used as generic objective tokens or to mark dropped equipment, or just as setting enhancers.

I had a lot of fun painting these up. The enchanted skull is may favorite and I think the freehand rune on top came out nicely. The shield is my least favorite because I really couldn't think of anything to make it seem really magical. I went with green, glowing eyes and another rune, but honestly it feels too subtle. Still, I'm happy with my work.

Next came a set of super-generic objective counters. It's just a set of scrolls based on pennies, and I didn't feel the need to spruce them up too much. They do the job though.

Finally, I wanted to add a couple of spell effect markers to my D&D adventures.

The ball of flame is a Reaper Bones orange translucent flame. It's going to be used to show the position of our gnome druid's flaming sphere spell, but it could also be used for a campfire or brazier in a pinch. Being orange already, I just drybrushed yellow, painted the base dungeon-y and called it finished.

The other marker is for my barbarian/cleric's spiritual weapon, and it is a scratch built piece. It consists of a Warhammer skeleton hand mounted on a paperclip. It got drybrushed for a ghostly effect and to give it some more character, I added a fallen branch to the base. The branch is a leftover Warhammer dryad arm. I'm really happy with how it came out and can't wait to use it to smite some foes!

And I will end things with an action shot...

Happy gaming!

Twisting Catacombs Kickstarter

As you all know, I am a huge dungeon crawl fan. This blog was originally conceived to follow my 3D dungeon project, which despite little-to-no progress of late, is still ongoing. I painted two very boring doors the other day. I still have to expan with a couple more rooms, but what a dungeon really needs is lots of furniture. Rooms are essentially a series of squares and rectangles, but furniture is what makes it look alive and lived in. Even a small table gives it a story. Is it a dining table? A card table for Three Dragon Ante? Someplace to lay bodies for experiments? It's all in how you use it.

I have some furniture, but most is dwarven styled and not very generic, because it comes frome Games Workshop's Mines of Moria set. I also have a couple random pieces from Reaper Bones and one table I made myself. So I was really excited to find a Kickstarter campaign for some extremely nice furniture at an incredibly reasonable price.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1207385459/twisting-catacombs-miniature-dungeon-scenery

Twisting Catacombs has a perfect array of basic dungeon furniture. My ideal, of course, is what was provided in the old HeroQuest board game and is the core of my own Deep Dark Dungeons rules where scenic features are concerned. So obviously I was drawn to the Classic Dungeon Dweller Pledge.

Great stuff, isn't it? And there's a ton of other items as well, including some very unique pieces. The only catch is that there are only 3 more days to get in on this! If you have a dungeon that needs dressing, Twisting Catacombs is the perfect way to dress it up. So check it out, pledge and then set up a miniature orc tea-party when it arrives.

Happy gaming!

Battle Report: Defend The Brew!

Lately I've been jonesing for a Song of Blades and Heroes skirmish, and in the name of expedience, decided to play a game with basic profiles from the book. This is something I rarely do outside of teaching games, since the warband calculator is so damn fun. The narrative I had chosen, though leant itself toward something basic.

You see, a dwarven community with a fantastic brewery had caught the attention of a band of hobgoblin raiders. A frosty dwarven brew would be just the thing to quench their thrist after a long day of pillaging and warfare! While the brewers and craftsmen locked themselves behind sturdy dwarf doors, a small band of dwarf heroes prepared to defend the town.

The Attackers:

Hobgoblin Heavy Infantry Leader and 2 Bugbear Warriors

3 Hobgoblin Warriors and 2 Hobgoblin Archers (Crossbowmen)

The Defenders:

Dwarf Orcslayer, Dwarf Commander, Dwarf Dragonslayer, Dwarf Elite Crossbowman and 2 Dwarf Warriors

The attackers were 3 points over the 300 point limit, and the defenders were from a previously made list, putting them at a slight disadvantage because the Orc and Dragon slayers would be paying for abilities they wouldn't be using. To that end, I chose to swap the Dragonslayer's Lethal to Big creatures for this game.

The two forces set up ready to do battle, the dwarves seeking to use buildings to anchor their line, while the hobgoblins seek to gain some high ground.

The hobgoblins gain the initiative, sending the bugbears out to soften up the dwarves as the archers take the hill. The dwarves react by sending the Dragonslayer out to meet the bugbears head on and taking cover behind a building, trusting her combat skills to wreak havoc while making the goblinoids come to them.

The tactic pays off, as the Dragonslayer fells a bugbear in a single blow. The Orcslayer rushes out to assist and gets smashed in the face for his troubles, stunning him.

Taking back the initiative, the bugbear smashes the stunned Orcslayer into the dirt while the hobgoblin line advances. The archers rain a few ineffectual arrows down on the dwarves, the sturdy dwarf mail easily turning their jagged points.

Screaming oaths of vengeance, the Dragonslayer launches herself at the last bugbear and severs its head cleanly in a single stroke. The horrific display breaks the hobgoblin line, punching a hole for the dwarf warriors to rush the leader. They quickly hack him to pieces, sending the hobgoblins literally running for the hills.

At last the dwarven brew was safe. Songs were sung of the Orcslayer's brave exploits and the heroes enjoyed copious amounts of the finest ale for leagues around. All on the house of course!

Grave Encounters

Thanks to one of my gaming resolutions, I have finished my first painted minis of the year. I haven't been quite reaching the 2 hours a week mark, but the resolution itself has at least inspired me to get off my ass, and I suppose that's really what resolutions are for.

The first thing I want to show off are some gravestones:

They aren't anything special, just extras from Games Workshop zombie sprues from almost a decade ago. I've had them forever and always wanted to do something with them. Strange Aeons calls for grave markers in some scenarios, so I figured I'd use these. They were basically free, plus one penny each for the bases. The pennies are great because they take up much less space than a 25mm base and are low to the ground, which is wonderful for small terrain pieces. Plus, you know, they cost a penny.

Of course, you can't have graves without something to come out of them:

I had 3 very creepy zombies from my Reaper Bones Kickstarter and it seemed like a perfect time to get them painted. I really love how Bones minis paint up and I didn't even bother to prime these. The undercoat went on like a dream and seems to be pretty tough on it's own. Not necessarily something I would do all the time but it's good to know for simple pieces like these.

The zombies I also painted up for Strange Aeons, but they have a hundred other obvious uses. I gave them blue glowing eyes to try for an arcane feel, rather than a virus or disease. These are zombies raised for purposeful mayhem, not a product of mere random chance.

You way notice the bases are a little different than my usual work:

On the left is the basing technique I have used for years. It's fine model train ballast held down with school glue and liberal layers of paint. It generally takes forever to dry but creates a nice, solid base with more texture than regular sand but not overwhelming chunkiness.

On the right I used The Army Painter's Brown Battleground Basing. I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, the bases get done in a single layer and no extra paint is needed. On the other, it's quite a bit chunkier than my usual basing and the color isn't 100% to my taste. The lack of a top layer of paint also makes it a little more fragile.

Here are the two materials side by side:

If you clicked the product link above, you may notice a big difference in the color. I was a little disappointed, as I was expecting a more even coloration that I could then drybrush with my chosen highlight. The way it is, the highlight is sort of included. Now, I could always add more paint but that sort of defeats the purpose in the first place. Still, for about 4 bucks it's an interesting alternative. It would be good for quick and dirty jobs, like the zombies, and I could keep the other basing for more detailed jobs. Of course my laziness may win out in the end and all my bases may end up covered in it.

So there you have it: gravestones, zombies and a mini basing review. That's all for now and happy gaming!

Courage In The Face Of Demons

I haven't posted in a while, and I have been feeling remiss. This is partly because I have been lazy, and partly because we acquired a new puppy. Meet Macon:

Hi.

So with a little free time today, I decided to play a quick game of Song of Blades and Heroes, documenting it for posterity. It is a classic tale of good versus evil, where stout men fend off the forces of Hell itself.

On the good side, we have the brave warriors of Gondor (or a Gondor-like equivalent). Lead by the brave Not-Boromir, these warriors have a tough road ahead of them.

This is an extremely basic warband, straight out of the rulebook. It consists of a Human Leader, 3 Human Warriors and 3 Human Elite Archers. Simple but organized and effective.

The vile forces of evil are a strike force of Fiends straight out of the depths of Hell. What is their purpose in the lands of men? Only darker powers know...

The Devils are a custom warband and consist of:

Major Fiend Commander Q3+ C4 Big, Evil, Flying, Leader, Shooter: Short
Bearded Devil Q3+ C4 Evil, Poison
2 Hell Hounds Q3+ C3 Animal, Evil, Long Move, Shooter: Short
2 Bladeling Mercenaries Q4+ C3 Evil, Savage

A paladin would have a field day with these gentlemen, but luckily there isn't one around to spoil their fun.

The scene for the battle is around the ruins of a skull-faced tower surrounded by trees in a dark forest.

Taking opposite sides of the field, Not-Boromir sends his archers to take the high ground, while his warriors move to close off the gap in the crumbling walls.

The Devils respond by moving around the tower, sheltering themselves from any stray arrows.

The hell hounds use their speed to break off and harass the archers...

While the warriors seal off the gap as the Fiends close in.

One of the hell hounds pays for its boldness with its life while the warriors surge through the gap to slay one of the bladelings and deal the bearded devil a stunning blow.

The remaining hell hound flees the archers and rushes join the fray near the tower as the major devil moves in to tilt the odds towards the forces of Hell.

With a powerful blow, the major devil smashes the warrior into a thin, red paste inside his armor...

The sight of which proves too much for Not-Boromir and he flees. 

Flapping his mighty wings, the Devil commander easily catches up and engages the terrified leader.

The archers move down to help the last warrior standing, one of the unleashing an arrow through the gap in the wall to fell the last hell hound.

The victory is short lived, however, as the major devil smashes Not-Boromir into the dirt with an audible crack of bones and armor. The humans scatter, losing heart at the horrible sight.

Rallying, the archers regroup, sending a hail of arrows at the major devil and driving him into the trees.

In a fit of rage, the fiend launches himself at the archers, hurling a fireball which barely misses one of them.

Blinded by his rage, the major devil ignores the archer to his left. This becomes a fatal mistake as the archer puts an arrow behind his ear, felling the beast in a crash of roars, blood and dust. The last bladeling flees and is cut down while the bearded devil makes for the trees, living to fight another day.

With the forces of evil vanquished, the human soldiers return home to honor their dead with ale and song. Huzzah!

So, there we have it. I must say I really enjoy playing the Gondorian warband. Human Elite Archers rock, even more so with good leadership. It is basic but it really, really works.

The Devils I have not had so much luck with. This is their second battle and they are currently 0 for 2. I will need more practice with them. I will need to work on not over-extending the Hell Hounds. Leader may not be the best choice for the Major Devil. His size makes him an easy target and also means he needs to get stuck in to work his best, which is a dangerous gamble for a leader.

And that's my battle report. Hope you enjoyed the show and happy gaming!