A mousterious package arrives...

So this package landed on my doorstep. Or in my mailbox, but you get the meaning.

Nice little Thank you sticker inside the lid, and lots of bubble wrap! Weeee!

It turned out to be that Oathsworn Burrows and Badgers kickstarter I backed. Oathsworn did a royal screw-up and delivered all the stuff one month before the planned completion date. Those guys must be amateurs. (Real pros like Flying Frog Production let their customers wait more than three years for their stuff.)

But what's inside?

The Plague Brethren

... or Stink bros?

I couldn't resist this "limited" boxed set with three more plague marines. I love the new plague marines, and despite knowing that a proper plastic boxed set is on the horizon, and despite having about 50 old and semi-old metal plague marines, these were a must buy. Prize-wise they are 25 quid (or 300 Swedish Krona) for three ordinary plastic figures which is a bit steep. But who cares, money will be worthless when the Trumpocalypse comes anyway.

They come in this snazzy box. Can I please have this as a giant poster, pretty please with sugar on top?

The first thing you see when you open the box is a booklet with the same illustration on.

There are actually two booklets. One is the designer's notes and the other is the building instructions.

...underneath the booklets is a flap that lifts up to reveal some art cards.

All feature art by John Blance, but none is actually of any of the models in this box.

Ok, a quick break here, I have to get something off my chest. I'm a big fan of John Blanche's visions and style, but some of his art is actually very bad. I like the plague marine and the pox walker on the art cards above, they are quite evocative and disturbing. If you look closer though, you realise John's method of colouring his art is just drawing some swathes of water colours in the general area he wants colour, hoping most of it will be inside the lines he drew. One is actually of Mortarion, the great Death Guard primarch, but you couldn't tell if the picture didn't have the caption. I stared at the picture for like five minutes without being able to tell where his head is. I suppose it's a case of the Emperor's new clothes syndrome, nobody dares criticise John Blanche at GW and just prints whatever he produces.

Back to the box though, are there actually any minis inside?

Back To Basics: Wargames Foundry Home Guard

(Warning: a small rant ahead. Pictures of models after the break, if you want to skip ahead.)

So I've sort of hit painter's block... I do paint... but I seem to take ages, not finish stuff other than the occasional odd miniature here and there. I buy stuff, build them, start paint a couple and then... I loose interest. It's just not the Wargamer's Attention Deficit Disorder, otherwise known as the Magpie or "OOh shiny" syndrome. Oh I got that too, but this is something else.

I was thinking back to when I started in the hobby. You bought a thing. Built it. Painted it. Played with it within a week or so. Sometimes you had a big project (like that Tamiya 1:35 Möbelwagen). If you didn't have the correct paint you used another, or mixed a couple of paints to a rough estimate of the box cover art. Things were simpler back then, I thought.

No this isn't a "Things were better before" post.

But no... things weren't simpler, my methods were. Now we have 200 or somewhere abouts paints in the GW range, many of them technical paints, some are dry, some are layer paints, some are washes and some are glazes, some are base paints. Back then you had paints, and inks. You could thin the paints to make washes, use the inks for pin washes or glazes, and you could wipe all of your paint from the brush for drybrushing. You drybrushed or highlighted, washed or pin washed, and that was it.

Don't get me wrong, all the new techniques, all the new kinds of paints are fantastic. You can do some amazing things. But they also lead to overcomplication. Do I need to paint every model like it could belong in the 'Eavy Metal section of White Dwarf? No, but I try to. It's partially because the models have become better and more detailed so they lure you into a complicated paint job. Back then the models often had unadorned armour, maybe the odd spike or symbol somewhere. If you wanted to you could freehand something or put a decal on it. Nowadays the armours are sculpted with lots of details and 3d insignia that beckons to be painted, highlighted, washed, weathered and then some git are doing them in non-metallic metallics. (Don't get me started about that... the Emperor's new paint scheme I call it.) But I'm setting my ambitions too high. It's not that I can't paint that fine, I can. But I don't need to, and it takes too long time.

My stash of Home Guard. Also includes some Crusader and Warlord figures in the top rows.

So I dug up a bunch of Wargames Foundry British Home Guard that I have had in my stash for a while, and decided to go back to the basics with them.

The Adventures of the Dice Bag Lady in the land of the Vikings.

So Baggy of Bad Squiddo Games decided to have a holiday adventure in Sweden. Of course dice bags are not allowed out of the UK without their herders, so Annie had to come as well. Actually it was Annie who needed a well deserved vacation and decided to pester her customers visit some random internet dudes friends she met online.

For one reason or another almost everyone dropped out, except for the Scandinavian Lardies (that's me, Jocke, Thomas and Koen) -- from now on known as Annie's four Swedesketeers.

Annie Arriving at Stockholm Arlanda Airport.

Return of Ghosts of Gaia AND a giveaway.

I just want to give a heads-up about Annie's latest kickstarter Ghosts of Gaia II.

The miniatures depict post-apokalyptic female warriors with mostly breathing masks and various protective gear. A couple of young kids , an ogre (ogress?), beast with handlers and a cyborg will also be included.

I've gone for the 90 pounds pledge but opted for some add-ons as well.

Personally I'm planning on using them as Feral Freeborn for Gates of Antares, and perhaps also as Steel Legion militia for the new edition of 40k. They will fit well in with the regular steel legion troopers that also has breathing masks.

If you are more attracted to furry subjects there's also weaponized bunnies as well as human-guinea pig crossover... I think... not sure exactly what it is.

Anyway, there's 46 hours left and we have already reached several stretch goals, so there's no worry of failing. But I like Annie and her work and want the campaign to succeed even more. So did anyone say giveaway?

Well, I got an extra "Raging Annie" -- unpainted -- that Kevin White sculpted for Annie using her as a reference. I will be giving it away to one random follower who promotes the kickstarter on their blog.

All you have to do is promote the kickstarter on your blog (before it ends, you have 46 hours, go go go) and leave a link in the comments. If you have already done so, please do it again if you want the mini.

Good luck!

Bases and blisters

This blog post feels like it has been a thousand years in the making...

 A couple of days weeks months ago I reviewed the Age of Sigmar Hero Bases, and now the time has come to take a look at the Warhammer 40k Hero Bases. I bought them shortly after the AoS ones, now that the 8th edition of 40k is looming around the corner I was reminded about these bases and dug up the photos I took back then.

The first sprue with some large pieces on it. Is that a Leman Russ turret? (Yes it is...)

The second sprue also has a bunch of large stuff on it, although not as large as the first.

Unlike the AoS set there are no single piece bases in this set. There are also only eight bases compared to the eleven in the AoS set.

All your base are belong to... swine?

I was not much impressed by the scenic bases GW had released before christmas, but the hero bases recently released piqued my interest. As my FLGS was out of the 40k one I bought the Fantasy version to review.

(Note: the sprues are really the same size, some sort of trickery with the photographs have ensued.)

The first sprue. Some interesting stuff, lots of skulls.

Second sprue. The giant sarcophagus lid on the right was what drew my eye originally.

Fun with magnets!

I'm becoming more and more fond of converting stuff with magnets. It's partly because I can't make my mind up about the various options available, and with magnets you can swap around parts between games.

I do realise this increases the list or army building time since if I just build stuff to a fixed specification I can't change my force between games that much. On the other hand my games are few and far between so I usually don't remember how my figures are kitted out, this way I can do the army list first and then change the figures to suit.

Oota-goota Santa?

My hobby life naturally took a hit last year when I had most of my stuff in storage. Still, I did manage to paint a couple of things. The last thing I completed in 2016 was a figure for our local Secret Santa. I have held off showing it since I wanted to be sure the recipient had received it, however the obligatory "Thank you Santa"-post didn't materialise so I was a bit worried. A couple of eBay buys had gone missing just before Christmas and for a moment I suspected a dishonest postal worker had decided to nick my packages.

In the end I flat out asked if it had arrived, and yes it had. (My eBay buys were refunded by the seller too, so all is well that ends well, as the bard wrote.) But what was it, I hear you ask? Well, the title is a clue, as the figure was Greedo for Imperial Assault.

Oota-Goota Solo?

I'm still alive...

...at least I think so.

This will be a short update. Having recently divorced and moved house I have now finally gotten around to installing an internet connection. Which means I can update the blog again! I didn't want to do it through the phone because of the clunky blogger app or from work because hey, it's work and I'm not supposed to be blogging.

Hobbywise the last year has been a bit brutal. I have been living at my mom's extra apartment, separated from most of my miniatures and paints. It didn't keep me from buying more though, but I didn't want to start any big new projects because I would have to pack them up again. I still have to unpack all my other stuff, I wonder if I find something I've forgotten about?

Anyway, I'm back, so expect hobby related stuff and the occassional rant now and then.
Happy gaming!