Playing with the Castle

Been playing around with my DwarvenForge Castle stuff. As you can see, it is for sale on the Dwarvenforge website.

This is the Count's Castle with the Watchtower on one corner and some other added parts.

Large corner tower on the cliff.

The hanging parapet on this corner is a cool item, in my opinion.

Model's eye view.
Looks impregnable to me...

The Mountains of Erinthor set allows me to raise the castle up, making it more imposing on the tabletop. I threw this set up together the other morning, so the cliffs aren't perfect. I had to use a lot of pieces under the castle to hold it up, including some stuff from my caverns set, but I made it work. Part of the fun of Dwarvenforge stuff is building and solving the puzzle of how to do what you imagine. It's a bit like Legos that way.

This week I bought a 4'x8' sheet of 2 inch insulation foam for a home improvement project. That will give me lots of 2 inch foam to use to make risers for beneath my builds. Once the foam is cut to some appropriate sizes and painted matte black, it will be perfect for building on. That will give me more pieces to use for the parts of a build that actually show.

Anyway, until next time, carry on!

Tiefling Sorcerer

Finished another Reaper model this week...

As with my other figures, he will be mounted onto a clear acrylic base once I've finished clear coating him.

That completes all the player minis for the two D&D 5e campaigns I currently participate in. Only took me 2 years, so not too bad. ; )

That's it for now. Until next time, carry on!

Another Wizard

I finished another Reaper Wizard model this week...

I've been trying to be more disciplined about painting figures, so I started a new challenge I heard about. I can't find the links, but it's a simple enough challenge: paint one miniature a week. That's it. Just one figure a week, each and every week, for one year. That seems doable to me. So this is my first week....

Anyway, that's it for today. Until next time, carry on!

Count's Castle

Last week I said I received my Dwarvenforge Castles Kickstarter. Here are some shots of the Count's Castle being assembled in all it's glory...

Gate House.
The lighted LED torches are a nice touch.

Everything is modular.
The corner towers can be broken out to be free standing with the add-on I bought.

It's a lot of parts.
It took me a while to figure out how it all goes together, which is part of the fun.

Getting there!

Voila! The Count's Castle.
This an amazing addition to my collection.

Drone view.
The details are superb. We will be having much fun with this stuff for years to come.

My daughter's Reaper Druid takes aim from the parapet!

Well, that's it for this week. Until next time, carry on!

Castle in a Box

I received my Dwarvenforge Castles Kickstarter stuff the other day.

Main pledge and add-ons.
Couldn't wait to haul it to the basement.
Had to start unboxing in the kitchen.

It's a pile of stuff and this isn't even all of it.

All the add-ons unboxed and spread on the table.

Suspended Parapets set.

Small Tower Batter Bases.

Small Tower Breakout set.
(Allows you to make a free standing tower from a castle corner tower.)

Ruined Walls set.

Stone Bridge set.

Ruined Large Tower set.

Larger Tower Batter Base.

Large Tower Transition set.
(Allows you to add a Large Tower to the corner of a castle.)

Of course that is just all the add-ons that allow me to have some variety in my castle layouts. My main pledge was the Count's Castle...

Count's Castle boxed.

Next week I'll show you what this looks like when it's all put together.

Until next time, carry on!

Hafling Rogue

Just a quick shot this week of another mini I finished painting. Still need to mount onto a clear acrylic base.

His feet got a little maimed when I cut him off his integral base.
Don't look too close. : )

This is my friend's son's halfling rogue for our D&D game. No great highs or lows, but I'm satisfied with a solid figure for gaming.

That's it for this week. Until next time, carry on!

The Toddler Has Game

This is my youngest, Liam. He is three years old.

Vanilla ice cream cones are one of his favorites.

This is his first game.

Candy Land, the game that has dominated the toddler gamer market for decades.

This is Liam on a recent rainy Saturday afternoon.

Double red! Nice move. I didn't see that coming.

Getting that in situ view of the Ginger Bread Man  mini.

Here he contemplates his next critical move.
In the end, he managed to draw the Ice Cream cone card, leap far ahead of his opponent, and win.

We all started somewhere, sometime, with some game. This proud daddy is pleased to be raising another gamer.

Until next time, carry on!

D&D Dwarfs WIP

Been working on D&D character minis. Here are two of my son's dwarf characters.

First up is Max Heal, the party's cleric...

I like the shade of red on his beard.
I should have made the gem on his helmet a different color though. (shrugs)
This is one of the best jobs I've ever done on a model's eyes.

His fur cloak turned out ok.
Still need to develop the technique to get more realistic looking animal fur.
The hammer and horns are pretty sweet.

The embossed shield.
I'm not sure which god it represents, but, as one friend said,
"that's a coat of arms I can get behind!"

Next up is Gardian, brother and protector to Max Heal...

I'm particularly proud of how his beard turned out.

The red scale mail was an experiment.
I think it turned out pretty good.

The white bases are just temporary for painting. I will mount them on clear acrylic bases, which is my standard base for D&D figures.

These guys accompany Vainglorian, the High Elf Paladin I posted a while back. The rest of the party consists of a male halfling rogue, a female human wizard, and a male tiefling sorcerer. You can just make them out in the fuzzy background of these photos. I will post finished pics of them soon.

Until next time, carry on!

Dads And Daughters D&D

Last weekend I hosted our Dads and Daughters D&D group in my new game space. I'm probably beating a dead horse hear, but allow me to say once more how much I LOVE my new house and game room!

As I think I've shared before, Dads and Daughters D&D started back in 2014 when, on a lark, I invited some of my old high school buddies to get together for a weekend and play the new 5th Edition D&D. We played through an adventure I had written, drank beer, relived the glory days, and had a fine weekend together. We enjoyed the game so much in fact, that we decided to do it again. Schedules being what they are and us living several hours drive apart meant that it was a few months before we could get together.

At our second gathering, one of my friends asked if he could bring his high school senior daughter along. Considering these friends are like family, we were glad to have her join the game and once again we had such fun we decided to set another date. For the 3rd gathering we decided we would all bring a daughter, step-daughter, or niece along and, BOOM, Dads and Daughters D&D was born.

It has been such a cool thing to introduce these young women to a game (and a gaming hobby) that typically includes only about 30% women and girls. In what is too often a sexist, misogynist gaming culture, we have taken great delight in empowering these young women to "take a place at the table", literally and figuratively, and enjoy the game as equals. It gets a little crazy with 9 (!) player characters, but it has been well worth the effort. It has been amazing to see these young people go from shy, sometimes skeptical, hesitant players to full on, sword wielding, spell casting, monster bashing, bad asses. We dads (and uncles) couldn't be more proud of how our "girls" have taken to the game.

One of the young adventurers went off to college this year. We expected her interest would decline, but she has consistently made arrangements to travel long hours by bus just to make it to the quarterly games. She's also started bringing a boyfriend (insert eye roll here). But, I have to admit, he's a great young man. After all, any guy willing to give up his weekend to play D&D with his girlfriend's father and his old high school buddies must be a stellar individual! Besides, he's pretty good at the game too...for a noob.

The college kids and their Yorkie-Poo familiar.
(that's my little dog, Charlotte. She was there for the snacks.)

Massive battle in the keep as the party is besieged.

Grognards and their offspring.

Thanks to my wife, you also get a shot of me, DMing at the head of the table.

So, the break-in game session in the new space was a complete success. A truly spectacular day was had by all. I'm so grateful for these friends, for the time and space to do this, and for you all for caring to read about it.

Until next time, carry on!

Bones Goblins

These are my first Reaper Bones models. I thought I would try them out since they are so inexpensive.

Bones Goblins, front

Bones Goblins, back

These photos are actually of my second attempt...

On my first try, after washing in soap and water, I painted directly onto the Bones material, as recommended. Initially they painted up fine using Reaper paints. I did a simple paint scheme and then thought I would wash with Army Painter Quickshade.

Big mistake. They never dried...stayed tacky for days afterwards. I let them sit for about a month and they were a little less tacky, but not much better. So I thought maybe a spray coat of matte finish would help.

Bigger mistake. They fogged and then, when handled, the finish and paint cracked right off. What a mess! I almost relegated them to my son's toy bin, but after a little reading on the forums I thought I'd try again. They went into a soak of Simple Green and I started over. The pics above are the result.

Once again I painted directly onto the Bones material, using Reaper paints. Then I gave them a wash of Vallejo sepia wash. Once this dried I went back and picked out a few simple highlights. Then I coated with Liquitex gloss varnish. After this dried, I coated again with Liquitex matte varnish. Et, voila! There they are.

These models are fine for basic troops and D&D monsters. The detail is not as good as their metal counterparts, but it is still serviceable. I've bought a few other Bones models and will paint them simply like these. They are a cheap way to flesh out your collection.

Anyway, here's a few action shots...

A High Elf paladin and Elf archer defend the bridge from goblin raiders.

Meanwhile, help is on the way in the form of a dwarf, a human paladin, and a wizard.

The battle rages on!

Until next time, carry on!

High Elf Paladin

Here is another Reaper mini I finished recently...

This time I didn't use spray finish. I don't think I will use spray finish for any character models again. It's fine for units of basic troops, but I hate to risk it with a model I've spent a lot of time on. Instead, I'm switching to using Liquitex matte varnish over a coat of their gloss varnish. Works well.

Clear coated and acrylic base added.

Sword looks HUGE at this angle...just a trick of the photo.

Here he is defending the Holy Elf Caves from an incursion of Bullywugs.

Until next time, carry on!