54mm!?

Sometimes the heavily caffeinated, squirrel on speed that lives in my head and drives about in this flesh-mech you all know as "Tim" makes some pretty poor decisions...

Like; "Hey, we should put together an entire maniple of imperial titans in regular 28mm 40k scale..."

Or, "Hey, we have imperial titans, so let's put together a super heavy detachment of ELDAR titans!!?"

Or, "I know we already HAVE THREE complete Imperial guard armies and a better part of a fourth... but let's buy ANOTHER complete army and a half!?"

Or "I know we have Kill Team and a dozen other skirmish games.. but let's go ALL IN for Necromunda and then track down five entire gangs worth of the old metal minis on eBay AND a pile of extra dudes for bad guys and hive scum and bounty hunters AND custom build a tonne of terrain..."

Or "hey wouldn't it be fun to make a bunch of minis out of wooden pegs?"

OR "better yet, let's individually SCULPT entire warbands of anthropomorphic critters for Burrows and Badgers!"

Or "I don't know if ONE Eldar super heavy detachment of TITANS will be enough... let's track down THREE of those old Tempest superheavy grav-tanks to make another Super Heavy Detachment of those!?!" Or look at these super cute and cheap chibi warriors - lets order a fuckload of those - I'm sure we'll figure out something to do with them, right!?"

Or "Um... do we have enough eldar...? I don't think so!" (to be fair, this last one did fill out a number of things I did need to make a viable 40K force of Eldar... AND I split it with Keira, who also was able to make good use of a number of these things... the extra 90 Guardians... well... they were just thrown in for free anyway...).

What have I always said?

"Why do things in JUST ONE SCALE when you can do them in two...?"

"or three...!?"

(Of course I'm usually being a bit facetious when saying that, mocking my own stupidity in having the same damned miniatures for the same period in two - or THREE - different scales...)

And that brings us to Inquisitor...

For those that aren't aware, Inquisitor was a low-level skirmish game published by Games Workshop - almost role-playing game-ish in scale small... but with a TOTALLY DIFFERENT FIGURE SCALE!? They produced a series of 54mm miniatures to go along with the game. I think it would have been WAY more popular - and they'd have sold way more miniatures - if they'd just produced all   those same sorts of new character minis in 28mm! I mean, there were Rogue Traders, Inquisitors, bounty Hunters, Imperial Workers, Mercenaries, Navis Nobilitai.... Sure SOME of those were available as part of regular 40K armies... but not some of the others.

I picked up this copy of the Inquisitor rulebook ages ago...  Maybe it was a game store bargain bin? SSO book and music sale? Maybe it was...? Nah, I don't even remember... It was used, dirt cheap, and I picked it up for the fluff and the artwork. No desire to play the game or ever pick up any of the miniatures...



Then I noticed a few remaining Inquisitor miniatures in the 50% Off Bargain Bin at my FLGS... I picked up the Rogue Trader mini last year one Boxing Day. The other two I picked up a couple of months ago... Still wasn't planning to actually PLAY the game... just thought they'd be fun to have and assemble and paint - just for giggles.



I started assembling them and... welll.. this is as far as I got, so far... But while I was doing this I got it in my head that these would be really fun for a demo game at a convention or something...? Maybe even ToonCon in the spring? But I'd need a few more miniatures - back up adepts, bad guys...



I had this box of 1/35 scale SAS in a box from years back others...



I tried assembling one - the guns looked PUNY by comparison to the ones from the 41st Millennium!



Here's 1/35 scale mini next to Inquisitor models....



Diggin around through boxes of random crap, I found these. Some cheap dollar store plastic soldiers I'd picked up - because they'd also looked like actual modern SAS guys - rather than the usual generic oddly posed weirdos with unidentifiable weapons. I started thinking with some creative paintwork (and maybe just a LITTLE bit of converting....) they could be made to look like Chaos Cultists of some sort.

 

They're pretty close in scale...

And then I started casting around the internet (well... eBay, mostly) to see what else was out there...



and I found some relatively inexpensive "54mm" models from Russia - they were even metal!



But WAAAAAY too big... Ah, well...



I did also find some AWESOME plastic model from Russia - These ones would make perfect Valhallan guardsmen.



Scale-wise, they are close enough to totally fit in...

And there were others that would make great Chaos Cultists and so much more...

And then I came to my senses...

I actually started writing this post months ago and then stopped when I shelved the project. I shelved it around the time I came up with the Q4 Plans - back at the beginning of October, and this post has been sitting in my drafts folder since then... I felt like I'd done all the work, might as well finish it off at some point. But I also felt maybe I should wait until I had enough distance from the project that finishing off the post wouldn't get me going on the idea again.

I still like the idea for some small demo game at a convention at some point... so it's on the back-burner... but like waaaaaaaay on the back burner... maybe not even on the burner at all... maybe it's in an airtight plastic container in the back of the freezer that I hope won't get all freezer burnt before I get around to doing something with at SOME point!!

For now, need to focus and get some OTHER stuff done: Hellboy, Necromunda, Blackstone Fortress.... all the other 40K stuff.... so much more... don't need to deal with ANTOHER scale (which would, of course, need it's own set of terrain... yeah, I really don't think these things through, do I...?)


Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Hellboy Miniatures!!!

Seriously.

Burrows and Badgers

Some time ago, Keira picked up Burrows and Badgers from Osprey Games - because cutesy, anthropomorphic critters! Who could resist!

Occasionally, she hints at wanting to play it.

I've had only the briefest of looks at the game - it is HER game, after all. I kind of expect that SHE should read the rules and teach ME!

I do have a PILE of Skaven that could be used as rats - and an assortment of other anthropomorphic animals that may or may not be of use. The problem is, most of the anthropomorphic critters we have are about the same size - "28mm-ish". The animals in the game, however, are supposed to vary in size - much like their real world counter parts. Oathsworn makes a bunch of really, very lovely miniatures for the game... but I think Amanda will likely execute me if I spent any more money on miniatures this year... but I did pick up those wooden pegs and got to wondering what I could do with them...

Well...



Conveniently Pegs come in a number of very different sizes! I have three so far 35mm, 42mm, and 55mm (I've also ordered a few that are 65mm and 75mm). I figured I could MAKE small war bands of animals using the various different sizes of pegs - 35mm for the small animals like mice and bats and small birds, 42mm for the medium sized animals like rabbits, cats, ferrets, and Toads, 55mm for the larger animals like foxes, hares, and hounds, and the 65mm pegs (when we get them) for the truly massive beasties (relatively speaking) such as badgers, beavers, large dogs, and large raptors.



I did some doodling in my sketch book. At first I thought I'd do them as "paint only" pegs...



And I tried starting with a highland rabbit



I don't know... I'm fairly pleased with how the tartan turned out....



but the ears aren't really working for me.

maybe if the eyes were a little lower and the ears started lower...



I started another one - this time with a Lochaber axe... but was feeling a little underwhelmed by it.

So I got to thinking...



What if I tried modelling on some slight detail with milliput...



I was thinking milliput because I knew my FLGS (Dragon's Den Games) had some and it was considerable less expensive than green stuff and, it's been a LONG time since I've used milliput, but I felt like it would adhere to wood as well as anything else... I'd kind of forgotten how... I'm not going to say "difficult milliput is to work with"... let's say "DIFFERENT milliput is to work with". It took some getting reacquainted with...



Some mice I started making with the small (35mm) pegs - trying out both types of milliput I picked up. (I has started on some feet with green stuff before I picked up the milliput).



Highland Bunnies! I am all about the bunnies (I blame Monty Python). This will probably be my main warband... if... y'know... I ever get around to FINISHING THEM (I started on these a few weeks ago, actually, but then had to put them away to concentrate on getting things ready for the Necromunda Weekend). These are done on the medium (42mm) pegs.

The one with the upright ears does have a wire armature underneath! - as do most of the critters with larger more extended tails!



I also started on a few larger (55mm) ones. A few of these I originally started as generic fantasy dungeon crawlers, but they're being converted into critters. I thought I might make a warband of foxes for Amanda to use - the Foxy Vixens!



Relative sizes... maybe not QUITE the size different between the actual real-world animals... but the foxes are bigger than the rabbits, and that rabbits are bigger than the mice, so...



Backsides - to show off their tails (and the pleats of the one kilt I've finished). Is that fox tail big enough? I didn't want to make it TOO HUGE...

Of course in practice, modelling on details (rather than just "paint-on" details) means that now each model will be an individual hand-sculpted master piece!? GAH!? Who has time for this!? Ah, well... I was having a LOT of fun doing this, and that's what this is all about, right? "Having fun"...?



Some wooden discs arrives in the mail yesterday - thought I might use these instead of the washers I've been gluing them on to so far... of course, these are not the same size as the washers... so I'll have figures on different sized bases which really tweaks my OCD...

Of course none of this was considered in THE PLAN, so, assuming I stick to it, I'm not sure when I'll get back to these... probably the next time Keira brings it up, I'll drop everything and start working on them again!

For some reason, one of my favourite lines from any movie ever comes to mind:

"You'll laugh at this one day. I'm laughing already..."


Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog:

A painting update of some sort.

Might be finishing off some Necromunda stuff, as planned...

Or maybe a band of surly Highland Bunnies (with their wee mouse friends)!

(good grief...)

So... I Had an Idea...

... and a weak moment on Amazon...

Because, you know, I didn't have enough projects on the go...



Coming Soon to Tim's Miantiure Wargaming Blog:

I just...

I can't even...