What if WW2 had Facebook

Saw this on another blog and had to share....while I hate Facebook and will never have an account this is just a scream!

Robotech Kickstarter: Backer choices ends on the 31st, choices to make....

Well, I am still sticking with the $260 Showdown deal as it is just a stupid amount of miniatures for the price. You just can't beat it!

This leads me to what to perhaps pick up, I know I can talk the wife into another $20, doubt more than that so hat would have to come out of my hobby funding of Ebay and Bartertown. Aug. 31st is the last day so I just need to figure out what I can scrape together to get a few last minute goodies.

This is going to be a first pick, just for the price and the fact the product is doubled up for the Kickstarter makes it a no brainer. It didn't make it into the backer rewards oddly while other weird choices did.

The VEF-1 has some rather unique abilities that could bolster their side and is appealing, still $30 for two unique mecha in 3 modes isn't bad, but I just wonder the value of the VEF-1 compared to other things. The 1D is just a mecha that can shoot more due to two pilots.

Ah, the beast and I am in love. Pushing $60 would be selling ice cream in hell at this point. Unless some good Ebay or Bartertown Sales kick in!

At first I was not going to consider this, now it has moved up into the running. The thing is a flying tank with more weapons. The only problem I can see is that is limited as to which units as a Glaug eldare can be added only to a unit that does not have a Glaug. Most Zentradi units do. Powerful and temping but just hard to find a good spot for it.

Love em! The only problem here is for a unit you need two boxes to get 12 and 12 to make full units! They can support other units but i feel at that point they limit what units they are attached to as that unit will have to be limited by the unit it is with. Again, I could sack everything and get two boxes and double up if i make some decent cash.

What do you think? $180 I could get everything, but i think that isn't going to  happen and i have to stick more to reason! Odds are I will go the Armored VT kit, then either the MAC (just because it is cool) or the Recon VEF-1 pack....otherwise unless I get more spare cash the Zentradi Infantry is out of the question.

Order Dice Holders Done!

I finally touched these holders up to keep my wound markers and orders dice in place next to units to make tracking easy for the board. They was rather easy to build, just too the one small and the slightly larger square base from the GW line (make sure these are the ones with nothing on the bottom at leasst for the small ones), flipped the smaller one over and glued it to the slightly larger one. I tend used a bit of caulk around the edge to fill in the gaps. Add some sand and a quick primer and paint. Add some static grass and done!

In total I have 5 double sided for multi-wound based units and 12 single die holders. I feel enough for me to use in most average games!

The Finished Product!

Examples of the Holders in use!

Getting Organized for Gaming

I figure this would be a good opportunity to show you how I organize myself for gaming and my latest find on how to keep every nice and organized!

Here is a shot of my gaming box....it carries everything for the most part. Dice, pens, pencils, calculator, spare paper pads, templates and more! I picked this up at Target, I think it was $10 or $11 when I bought mine. What I liked about it was it locked and had compartments that you could take out to be able to access things. This has severed me well over the years and I am always looking for new ways to keep it better organized.

A general overview.

Every gamer should have one!

Of late while at the Dollar General I spied this Pencil Box in the back to school. At first I wanted it to carry brushes when I would be painting away from home but that wasn't very often so I started to try various things and found that my dice fit like a glove! I just needed another one. What is nice about this is it fits into one of my slots in my gaming box and will stack up with no issues and hold all my dice keeping everything together.

This is the pencil boxes I bought for a buck. They fit in that upper right compartment!

Both cases opened on both sides to show what I can store there!

In the past I would dump them into a box, I would have to dig out dice that I would want if I wanted to use a specific color. This is now a thing of the past. I open the box, pull the dice I want and done!

Super System 3: New figures painted, old ones touched up and my first Reaper Bones painted!

Well, got a majority of my figures done up for now, I do plan to add some stuff to the bases later like some garbage and newspaper to add some depth to the figures character. Here is what we got so far!

Figure: Reaper Bones Clay Golem

Character Name: Unknown (considering Brawn, Bicep or Slaughterhouse)

Team: Unknown (Villain)

Comments: Well, the Hulk has bee a majority of the colors I wanted to use, so I said the hell with it I went with a mix of Foundry Mauve and purple wash to bring out the figure Some of the detail was lacking in the face and the photo didn't capture the green paints that contrasts against the purple. To me he looks like a huge grape!  If you can't guess his powers, super strength and tough!

Figure: Reaper Bones Ghost/Banshee

Character Name: Unknown

Team: unknown (Villain more than likely)

Comments: This was me playing around with the Vallejo Jade Green, some washes and some light drybrushing.  Overall it turned out well and I intend to use her as some type of gas based bad guy (or girl in this case)

Figure: Reaper Bones Stone Golem

Character Name: Unknown

Team: Unknown at this time

Comments: I really liked this figure and wanted to try to work him into one of my teams, who I am not sure as of yet. I figure his background is his spirit was put into a golem to act as a guardian for an artifact and it was taken by someone and he is questing to try to find it (or perhaps it was destroyed and he no longer has a focus in life). I kept the color pallet simple with two greys, a black wash and a light middle gold tone.

Figure: Reaper Earth Elemental (Large)

Character Name: Bedrock

Team: Journeymen

Comments: Bedrock was fun to paint. His background is that he is perhaps one of the last survivors from his planet. When it was clear that his planet was doomed they launched several asteroids into space to seed other worlds so his race would survive. When his meteor hit Earth the rock started to meld with the ground around him allowing him to mature into a life form that used the natural elements of the planet as building blocks. Bedrock is huge, perhaps the largest of the heroes on the planet, not very agile and gentle as well as an alien you would not want to piss off as he is able to crush anything with his alien strength due to the gravity shift from his home world. What was most interesting is there is some dinosaur bones above his right shoulder and in the fluff this is more or less a tattoo in his culture as what they absorb around them makes each of them unique.

Figure: Crossover Miniatures Whiskers

Character Name: Larceny

Team: Fellowship of Evil

Comments: This was a simple head swap which is always one of my favorite aspects about Crossover Miniatures is being able to add unique personality traits with a simple swap of a head. Oddly, someone else on their site also had the same idea as me changing out the head of another of their figures Fury. She was a blast to paint and one of the first supers I finished. Her powers include invisibility and mind control. She is a professional thief and tends to avoid combat when possible.

Figure: Crossover Miniatures RamJam

Character Name: Onslaught

Team: Delirium

Comments: Another fun figure to paint and one of the early villains I started with. Onslaught has a fairly simple background as a one time pro wrestler that was banned after he was caught using steroids. He always played the persona of the bad guy and after his wife threatened to leave him he went into a rage that lead him to kill her and several police officers before he was subdued. He was later in route for his trial when a scientist broke him out of the prisoner convoy and needed him as a test subject in a super soldier experiment. The scientist sought to avoid following standard procedure on testing his new serum and needed to prove instant results to avoid loosing funding for his project. To his surprise, it worked also too well when the serum mixed with the steroids and other drugs in his system mixed turning him into a psychotic killing machine. He murdered the scientist and his assistant going on a rampage again until he was captured and sent to a mental asylum for treatment. It was then he managed to escape with some other inmates and formed a super team of insane lunatics!

Figure: Superfigs Tarantula

Character Name: Backstab

Team: Fellowship of Evil

Comments: Backstab is a close quarters assassin. He tends to use his powers of darkness to generate a field around him and his target allowing him to get close and use his touch based powers to finish off his target. He isn't one for direct confrontation and prefers to not fight fair.

Figure: Crossover Miniatures Super Soldier

Character Name: Camouflage

Team: SORTIE (US Military Super Team)

Comments: Camouflage is able to turn invisible, uses high caliber guns and uses his training as an Army Ranger to achieve his goals on a mission. He often acts as the team leader despite his independent nature.

Figure: Black Cat Bases Water Elemental

Character Name: Undertow

Team: SORTIE

Comments: Undertow is of course from the Navy as part of the SORTIE team that uses superhumans from various military branches.  She was serving on a submarine when the compartment flooded and she was exposed to radiation that turned her into a water based metahuman.

Figure:  Reaper Chornoscope Zenith

Character Name: Swift (working name for now)

Team: Unknown

Comments: Another of  my early figures that will end up as a long line of super speedster figures. I rather likes his dynamic pose of running.

Figure: Crossover Miniatures Ka-Pow

Character Name: Crackshot

Team: Fellowship of Evil

Comments: Pretty much a Deadshot ripoff more than anything but still a fun figure to paint and add to the lineup!

Figure: Reaper Chronoscope Sandwoman

Character Name: Terra

Team: Unknown

Comments: I decided to go with a simple look for her of her entire body made of sand instead of her costume or other parts of her body having some flesh tones. Overall I like how she turned out, now to figure out where to put her.

Figure: Superfigs Cat

Character Name: Copycat (ironic name for their figure)

Team: Rougestar

Comments: Copycat copies powers of other metahumans and uses them to bolster her team to achieve their goals. She is a renown mimic and is known to copy other peoples personality traits as well being rather unoriginal in her own personality.

Figure: Superfigs

Character Name: MinMax

Team: Rougestar

Comments: This was a rather fun figure to paint up as it wasn't just a single figure but three! I always loved Henry Pym from the Avengers and this was one of the first figures I had to get to add to the collection.

I plan to buy a new batch of figures soon and finish off the current lot of figures as well. Plus I do have a Crossover Miniatures Kickstarter wave of figs also to arrive in August. In the future I will add more figs, stats for Supersystem 3 and more info about the teams in my universe. Stay tuned true belivers!

Ze French have arrived!

Today I got my shipment of Black Tree Design French to bolster my French Army up in anticipation of the French/Allied book for Bolt Action. So far, my French started as a great deal around Christmas when a website I order from at times had a stunning clearance sale which included some French Crusader WW2 figures. Among the deal was a command blister and a starter set of French with two full squads of twelve at half the price of the boxed set. Hard to say no to a deal like that.

I was disappointed by the PDF that Warlord put out as the "get you by French list" for Bolt Action as it lacked any nation rules which was really bad when the Belgians, Japanese and other PDF was getting their own nation rules and cooler options for their lists. My intel of late about the new book has bolstered my spirits and I am ready to throw myself back into the French army and kick some kraut ass!

I snagged a few French when Black Tree offered a 35% off sale, not a bad deal...still I was annoyed to see a 50% the next week! ARG!

So, let's see what I got!

The French primered black are from the Crusader line, the unprimered are the new Black Tree Design Figures. Overall they seem to blend well.

Just a shot of the first four I started to clear some mold lines and glue them to bases to get them ready.

A back shot to show you the variety of those with packs and those without. I liked the variety and may get more of the ones without the backpacks. I would have to go back and study both models further but it looks like BTD has more detail on their packs at a glance.

Another batch of 4.

The last batch. I added two to Fantascape bases to try them out...not sure if I will keep them or swap them out for something else. I think I will as while I do like the Fantascape line, this is something that needs to be consistent with basing for the entire army (at least for infantry).

Well, overall the one pack of each was a great success. With the Warlord French squad in route, I should have about 48 French Infantry including 3 pistols, 1 VB launcher and 3 LMGs. I think enough to get a good start. I do want to grab a few more packs perhaps for more figs without backpacks. Less crap to paint!



Building my French Army for Bolt Action

Well, we are just a few months away from the French and Allied book launch by Warlord Games. A few months back during Christmas there was a huge sale at one of the online gaming retailers I shop with and I picked up some French miniatures dirt cheap (less than half price) from the Great Escape Games line. A full box of 24 French (two squads of 12) and a blister with another 4 officers/command made the loot pile. I based them and started some work but put them aside to focus on other projects until the French book comes out.

Now the PDF is a useful guide and I hope the book really expands them to make the French even more interesting to game with!

That said I am organizing up a small shopping list from various retailers as Warlord does not make everything and I want to be ready!

My concept is simple; I wanted to have about a 1k list with a little room to adjust this or that to add some variety to the list but also not breaking the bank!

Headquarters:

My first item is to have an officer and one other with rifles, I will have to convert these as my current figures have only pistols and there are no officer options with SMGs or rifles. All other French figures I could find all have officers with pistols. Unless I opt for them to wear a coat like the rest of the troops which from what I see they wore their officer uniform with pride.

I am also quickly making a Medic to fill the role if I need that “cheap dice”. This was a simple upgrade with some bits I had laying around and using an officer uniform for the medic.

The last HQ is going to be a spotter. I gave him binoculars but that may change if I get the blister with the phone operator and carrier pigeon soldier…while they are WW1 era they should work well enough.

Troops:

I will have about 36 Regular (or inexperienced) with 3 LMGs, 3 pistols and a load of rifles. I also plan to grab a unit of 10 Alpine Chasseurs (1 LMG and 9 rifles) and a 10 main GIA Groupe Franc French Paratroopers (2 LMGs, 4 SMGs, 2 pistols and 2 rifles, I may have to convert the pistols, we will wait and see). There is also a unit of 12 Senegalese Troops that I will add (12 rifles and knifes) as an assault based unit.

Rounding out the rest of the army will be a light mortar (Grenade rifleman), medium Mortar Team, Sniper Team and Anti-Tank Rifle Team.

Artillery and Armor:

For Artillery support I have opted to get the 75mm light howitzer for a cheap dice and some decent unit killing power.

For a tank I struggled hard to figure out what is best. Let’s be frank, the French tanks are not the best in Warlord rules so I have to figure what is best for me within those rules. I was going to use a Char 1B but after finding I could get a 75mm and a lighter tank for the same price (actually saving some points, adding an extra draw dice it didn’t make the call too hard). So, unless things change I will use the Renault R40. It has a small profile, light anti-tank gun (paying for the upgrade), armored all around and is a medium tank despite the light tank status.

I am also using the Panhard APC in place of the AMC SCHNEIDER P16 HALF TRACK. It’s just too damm ugly and I think the Panhard is going to be a better vehicle once the French book hits the shelf. So until then, it will be a “counts as”.

Last thoughts:
I have been hearing some rumor rumbles about the French as the book was perhaps on preview at Historicon! Been hearing bits like grenade rifles, changes to tanks and such...nothing yet about specific rules but apparently the Resistance rules are VERY interesting from what I hear.

Warlord Dice Debacle

Well, time to hit up Warlord Customer Service again! I bought some dice with my prize from the Darkside Tournament and was excited to finally have some order dice. I picked out the light blue as they was both fitting for the Germans and French, plus easy to see!

After I got home that night, I took them out of the blister and put them aside as I was tired. It wasn't until Tuesday that I sat down and I was cleaning up my gaming box to organize it again as it was getting very cluttered and disorganized. It was then I discovered one had a crack/warped dice and several had chips of white showing and some of the blue had spilled over onto the white letter.

Warlord responded promptly within 24 hours and asked for photos that I offered. I know they care about quality and customer service and I am willing to help with that!

Here are a few shots of the dice...

Warp/Cracked

Chipped

More Chips..just need dip now...

More chips

hairline crack

Cracking/chipping

Chipping

Chipping (not a good shot)

Warped edge (upper right)

Notice the cracks in the lines? Unfilled space.

See the hole in the line at the top? Another unfilled spot.

It appears simply, I got a bad batch of dice.....I hope customer service can help sort this out. Last time they jacked up an order I was taken care of very well. I hope this time again I fare well....sometimes bad luck is good luck!

Supersystem 3 Poll: Which figure do you like?

I will post up all the Reaper Bones that I will be using for Supersystem 3 at a later time, but I figure I would have some fun and let you the readers vote on your favorite figure for one of my supers.

The concept is a Druid style character with magical powers.....

Contests 1 and 2

1 has a nice staff and a nice robe.

2 has a very elegant robe and has a regal look.

3 is the only male that was decent. Has a nice action pose.

4 and 5 are my last two both with staves.

One has long flowing robes and the other is a bit more personable.

Vote away to which one you think I should use!

Reaper Bones Boner!

Well, my shipment arrived Monday. I had a chance to open and unbag them and start sorting them out some. Sadly, due to a plumbing issue Patrick's Plumbing (aka me) had to fix the issue of a damaged water pipe thanks to my wife and neighbor deciding it is ok to clean the garage and no tell me tossing out some of my stuff without consulting me. Major cardinal sin in my book, I don't ask for much except to communicate with me not just do it and hope I don't get upset. After having to take a day off work it was finally fixed and I was back on track today going over my Reaper Bones pile.

Overall, I got everything except one miniature and ended up with some extra figs including a spare archer I like and a duplicate set of Nova Corp figures. So, I just shot off an email to Reaper to resolve the issue once the finish shipping out all the shipments.

The quality is a mixed bag, some was great and others was meh. There is a great deal of bent stuff I will have to straighten up when I get to them. No huge issue. There was also a few hidden  gems inside the box that I really was surprised by the quality.

So, here are some shots of my unboxing and such....

The box, 8.3 pounds of plastic joy!

The opening!

The worksheet and promo guide to sell you paints and such!

The Vampire Box

The figure case. Very nice, wish I had gotten another.

The case and the trays.

The Vampire Box packed tightly with goodies!

Cthulhu!

My friend's Red Dragon. Nice.

All my Bones laid out!

Cthulhu (note the mini next to him)

He is not glued or cleaned up, this was just a quick assembly.

Side shot 1

Glamour pose number 2!