Works in Progress

  My Imperial Guard army for Warhammer 40,000 is trundling along.  Currently I'm working on a few things.  Hopefully by posting them here, it'll motivate me to keep at them and get them done quickly.  Commissar Yarrick is being added, he was an impulse purchase at a hobby shop back in 1998 or so.  He is finally getting to the painting block.  Good for him.  Also in progress are a regular commissar that someone over at bartertown.com gave me for free, and a sentinel walker, sort of a light vehicle for Warhammer 40k.  The sentinel is being painted in winter camo colors.  Now that I have had some thoroughly fun experiences with yellow, I'm moving on to the second hardest paint, which is white.  I was skeptical of Games Workshop's decision to (yet again)  redo their line of paints, but the new ones really are a joy to work with.  Getting bright tones has never been easier.  Painting the red bits on the commissars has got me excited to do a big red project in the future.  Once these things are all done, I'll do 1-2 units of winter camo stuff to sort of round out that segment of my army, add another hero or something, and then the Imperial Guard will be at 2,000 points, which seems like a good place to stop and take a break and move on to another army for awhile.

  I don't really get into tactics too much with my miniature gaming, but in recent games against my old wargaming buddy LAD, I noticed I had almost as many men lose their nerve and flee as get wounded.  So, I'm going to try combining squads into bigger units (don't be scared, there's safety in numbers boys!) and painting a few extra commissars and other heroes to lead them on better.  Also, I need some kind of fast moving reserves to counter units that can do annoying things like parachute in behind my lines, hence the sentinel.  Its probably not ideal for the purpose, but I've always liked the model, so I'm adding one to my army.  Other than strict legal requirements of my army list, I always pick all my units based on what I feel like painting, rarely on tactics.  I figure this does two things.  It simulates the fact that no army in history ever has precisely the stuff the commander would wish for, and it keeps me from accumulating stuff that I neither want nor need.  No one NEEDS any of this stuff, so if I don't want a particular model in and of itself, I'm not going to paint it just to gain an advantage in a pretend game that takes place on a well decorated kitchen table. 

Civil War stuff...

So, I do (American) Civil War re-enacting.  Its sort of down on my list of hobbies, doesn't take a top priority in terms of new projects and so on, so it won't make many appearances on this blag.  However, this week I finally got around to adding 5th corps markings to my uniform, ie a red Maltese cross  which my wife sewed to the top of my hat.  Also, I have begun practicing the bugle.  My plan is to practice until I can "figure out" some of the 19th century bugle commands by ear.  So far, all I've figured out is, my cats hate bugle calls.

The Cult in Yellow

     So in the last post, I showed off my yellow uniformed Imperial Guard.  These were actually part of a big push I've been making to get myself more comfortable painting things in yellow.  As those who are well versed in the dork arts will know, yellow is a very annoying paint.  It rarely turns out how you want it to, and it often requires lots more time and effort than other colors.  The other yellow project I have completed was initiated before the guardsmen.  It is a Mordheim warband, a Cult of the Possessed to be specific.  These (and the yellow Imperial Guard) were painted before the recent revamping of Citadel Color.  Nowadays, with the neat new paints they released, yellow is a bit easier to get to look right.  Anyways, this warband was loosely based off of a series of short stories called The King in Yellow, published in 1895.  The warband wears yellow robes, and I went out of my way to include a lot more warriors with shields than I am inclined towards for tactical purposes so that they would have a place to display The Yellow Sign.  I made them out of very old metal figures: this warband contains actual lead.  They painted with a white undercoat, then a layer of dark tan to establish the color of the robes.  A dark shading wash was added, then lots of drybrushing, starting with a mix of mostly dark tan with a dab of yellow, then 50/50 tan and yellow, then mostly yellow, then all yellow, then a final highlight of yellow mixed with white.  It was rather time consuming but I'm pleased with how they turned out. 

   The warband roster, such as it is, consists of 4 heroes and 4 henchmen groups.  They are made of old 1980's chaos wizards, 1990's undead and beastmen, a 1980's paladin and a modified flagellant from c. 2001. 

  My cult is led by a magister with no weapons.  The other heroes consist of a hideous mutant with sword and shield, a mutant with cloven hooves and a great weapon, and a possessed cultist with no mutations.  Next thing to do is paint up spare heroes to replace casualties in campaigns.  For henchmen groups there are 2 cult brethren with sword and shields, a cult brethren with a bow, a darksoul with a greatweapon, and 3 beastmen with swords and shields.  I'd like to expand this so that each group has 3 members.  More will be posted on these when I get up the gumption to paint more of them.            

Warhammer 40k, Imperial Guard

Welcome, my nerdlings...

 Lately, I have been working on the geekiest project of them all!  A new army for Warhammer 40,000 which is painted up in homage to my old high school marching band.  Awesome, right?  So, our colors were brown and gold, we were shuttled to and from the games in classic black and yellow school buses, and we were led by our fearless leader, a band director who we called "Commissar" because she wore a black trenchcoat.  I was painting them in quite a rush.  My old 40k buddy from back in the day was coming up for a visit, and I wanted to use them in some small games last week.  I succeeded in getting a platoon of them ready, along with two black and yellow tanks, and a female commissar to lead them.  She was originally a Games Day promo figure from the very late 90's or early 2000's I believe.  The marching band itself is made from Mordian Iron Guard guys which I had lying around, plus some extras from Bartertown. The lascannon is painted up like a bass drum.  Now that these guys are done, my Imperial Guard army is up to about 1500 points, since I still have a platoon of old pewter Catachans and old tanks.  I figure I'll get this army painted up to 2,000 and take a break from them for awhile.  Not much left to paint to get there.  I've got some old heroes and vehicles rattling around in my storage boxes which should just about do it.  

Hello,
I'm the gaming cargo cult leader, and this is my blag full of hobby projects.  I'd say, of all the associated hobbies which are popular in the US, I'm into those which most lend themselves to visual arts: tabletop miniatures games and historical reenacting.  Alas, I have no interest in anything mainstream and half-ways normal, so you won't see much reference to any of it here.  This very important website will be used to document my various projects pertaining to said hobbies.  There will be a gradual uploading of old projects, then when the internet monument to my previous activities is complete, current projects will be added.  Read on, if you dare!