Tuesday Nights at the LGS

I'm one of the fortunate players who has a fairly thriving WarmaHordes community in the area. Not just that, but within a 2 hour driving radius, there are at least 3 game stores that have table areas and hold tournaments. My favorite and closest LGS not only holds monthly tournaments, it has an active press ganger who organizes Tuesday Warmachine gaming. Normally I have trouble making it to Tuesday Warmachine night, but since this was a vacation week, I was able to swing in for a couple games.

Before I cover a quick battle reprot, I have to give our PG (Ray) a shout out. This guy is great for a number of reason, but here's a couple things I really appreciated this week:
* He was purposefully organizing games, putting himself at the bottom of the wait queue for a game.
* He takes the time to know who all the players are, and suggests match-ups for players so that they get a good gaming experience.
* He strikes just the right balance of being polite and delivering some friendly smack talk.
* He's quite a sharp player and makes a very worthy opponent.

Ok, now for a quick battle report. I got 2 games in, which I'll try to recount with extreme brevity...

Game 1:
Me: Absylonia, Scythean, Carnivean, Raek, Stinger, Shredder, Forsaken
Wing: pVlad, Beast 09, Destroyer, IFP, Manhunter
Outcome: Victory!
Summary: I hadn't played against pVlad in MK2 yet (amazingly) so this was a bit of a learning experience. During his first strike he laid out good damage on both my heavies, but since he didn't kill them, Absylonia feated and it put me in a strong position. My counter-strike cut Beast 09 down to 3 boxes left and slaughtered half the IFP. From there it was a grind match that ended up with pVlad alone against Absylonia, a Stinger and a Shredder. Under Blood of Kings he is a tough customer, but I managed to pull out the win with a Stinger poison charge in the back.

Game 2:
Me: Absylonia, Scythean, Carnivean, Seraph, Stinger, Shredder, Forsaken, Deathstalker, Sorceress
Ray: Grim, Blitzer, Impaler, 5 Scouts, 10 Burrowers, 2 Fell Callers, Chronicler, 6 Nyss Hunters
Outcome: Victory!
Summary: This was a serious knock down drag out fight. I managed to swing around to Grim's flank with most of my army and started pushing towards him while using the Sorceress to put a temporary hold in the middle of the board with her wind ravager ability. I got a the drop on the Blitzer and took it out, but the burrowers with bonuses from the Fell Caller were just overwhelming, taking down heavy beasts pretty quickly. Absylonia and Grim were toe-to-toe for 3 turns in a row before Grim finally went down. In the end Absylonia was only left with her Scythean while the trolls still had at least 15 guys on the board still. However the early slaying of both troll beasts put Grim in a rough position such that he couldn't generate enough fury. This was a tough battle but very fun and a great learning experience.

Madelyn Corbeau

Yes, yes, I know. She's all "American" style. The color scheme was half accident, half on-purpose. I wanted to try out the color scheme, and Ms Corbeau seemed like as good a subject as any. I'm not going to belabor this post too much. It's mainly nice to have one more unpainted merc done. Just 2 more to go!

What went well:
* The reds turned out pretty well I feel. Despite all the bad press about red as a color, I seem to have a knack for it. Either that or I've got some sort of color blindness.
* Overall composition of this model is not too shabby. I feel that the concentration of lighter colors (combined with the shape of the sculpt) draws the eye up to her face nicely.

What could have been better:
* The flesh is pretty weak for some reason. I've never had good luck with flesh. I need to just take more time on it I suspect.
* The whites appear somewhat dirty, but not on purpose.

Ok, time to see if I can squeeze out one more model before the new year.

Ravagores

There are times when I paint a model just for the bliss of that model's sculpt. There are times when I paint a model because I desperately want to field it in my army and I strive to paint everything I field, even if the model is a complete eyesore. And then there are times when a great sculpt and great stats come together. The Ravagores are one such example for me. So much so that I bought 2 of them after proxying them only once. I can't exactly pin down what it is, but the "Carnivean chassis" for Legion beasts has always been fun to paint despite its size. Getting these guys done was more than just fun though. This solidly relieves my feeling of being such a whore for fielding two of them with eLylyth. In tribute to this accomplishment, I'm going to return to my old-style analysis entry...

What went well:
* Painting both at once - I had debated doing them individually. There were merits to both. I actually like having variations between my Legion beasts, but doing them together provides a certain economy of scale that's hard to argue with.
* Alternate chitin - When I first started going with the red chitin on the one Ravagore, I had my doubts. However the end result turned out quite striking I think. It gives each of them a distinct feel, makes them identifiable from each other, but they still seem to fit in theme.
* Slight pose alterations - The "red" Ravagore got a bit of a pose alteration so that he was a bit more straightened out and accentuating the breath attack. I didn't like the original angles of the pose, so making a shift was needed. I think the way these two worked out was nice yet subtle.

What could have been better:
* Flames - I'm not entirely happy with them. Ironically, they look better in the pictures than in person. There was something just not right about them. However I did them last, and by that point I was ready to be done. Putting more time into them was unlikely to yield significantly better results so I just called it completed so I could move on.
* Little mistakes - After sealing them, I found a couple more little places where skin base coat had gotten on the chitin. They aren't obvious, but spotting them ticks me off. I need a better process for the final inspection of models before I seal them.

Well, that's it for tonight. My painting desk is now finally rather clear from several months ago where I was feeling overwhelmed.

Absylonia, Terror of Everblight

My painting pace seems downright terrible these days. All things considered I feel like I'm making good progress considering my circumstances (work/baby), but I'm still having trouble getting things completed. However, I managed to get Absylonia here finished out tonight. My photo setup is still in desperate need of tuning, so the photos are pretty badly off from the real life viewing. However I'm happily trading time away from fixing my photos to just get painting done.

Nothing really special to report about this model. Pretty standard techniques for my Legion stuff. I tried to spend a little extra time on her, but honestly my skills (read as: patience) have slid off a bit and it's nothing really special to talk about in my opinion. I'm in the midst of the 2 Ravagores at the same time so it was hard to stay focused on this model while the two big beasties were staring at me from across the paint table. Speaking of which...

From the Desk: Displaying Models

There's plenty of discussion out there about how to transport models, but displaying them at home is a whole different ballgame. Perhaps I'm slightly insane, but I like to have all my painted models in a display case. Whether it's pride or an obsessive compulsive streak, I actually enjoy unpacking my models from the toolbox and placing them back on glass display shelves. For those of you looking for such options, I'm going to review two such cases that I've had first hand experience with.

First is the Detolf case from Ikea. I really liked this display case a lot. It's remarkably study for being 4 sheets of glass. A while ago I posted about adding shelves to that case as well, which worked great. The upsides of the Detolf:
* It's relatively cheap
* It looks nice
* It doesn't require lights in order to get good views of models (especially with glass on all sides)
The downsides:
* It's glass all around (making it rather unsafe for toddlers)
* It has distinct gaps on either side of the door that let in a fair amount of dust

The second case, which is the one I have now, is the Bjursta (also from Ikea). There are two reasons that I "upgraded" to this display case. The first is that I simply ran out of space in the Detolf. The second reason is that I have a new son, and I needed something a little safer. I actually blocked out the glass on the lower doors with cardboard for the time being. The upsides of the Bjursta:
* It holds way more models, probably 5 times as much shelf space as an unmodified Detolf
* It's easier to make toddler-safe
* It has a convenient drawer in the middle to hold cards, dice, books, tokens, etc
* The shelf heights are adjustable
The downsides:
* It needs lighting added
* It's definitely more expensive, especially when adding in the cost of lighting
* It has a larger floor footprint, approximately twice that of the Detolf
* Reduced viewing angles of models inside

There are plenty of other options out there. When you look for a case, there are a few key things to keep in mind:
* Model height: Determine what your largest model is, then make sure the case has plenty of height for that model.
* Maneuvering space: Again, in regard to shelf heights, make sure you have plenty of space to get your hands in and move models around safely without knocking things over.
* Capacity: Make sure whatever you get has plenty of space for everything you want to display, with room to expand as well.

And now a quick picture. This is the top half of my own Bjursta case. It has all of my Protectorate, Legion, Cryx, and Malifaux models, with room to spare still. I added the led display lights to it with a switch on top of the case to activate them all. So far I've been extremely happy with this case.

Harriers

I can't believe I sealed these guys a week ago and just wasn't able to get pics posted until now. Work has been a serious nightmarish black hole of my time. However I have finally carved out enough time to get this post done. It's the last of the partially-painted stuff that's been on my desk for the last couple months. I'm sort of back to a zero reset with just primed stuff.

These models weren't especially entertaining to paint. They have lots of little tiny bits of chitin all over them, and it was hard to use my normal washing techniques to speed the process. Instead I had to spend a fair amount of meticulous time painting the little details. And even then, I sort of feel like it wasn't a great paint job for the amount of time it took. However, they are done, and it lets me move on to the Ravagores next.