Mutants!

These two crew members are both converted from Warhammer Gnoblars. I've seen the chainsword conversion before, though I don't remember who had done it.

The big shield on the right mutant is supposed to be some kind of portable shield generator to protect him from shooting while he shambles over to slay with his long-handled chainsword.

The guy on the left is supposed to be some kind of cybernetically-enhanced tracker with a cybernetic third-eye. He has an appropriately dainty laspistol and a pretty sketchy-looking cybernetic claw hand.

Pirate crewman (hairy mutant!)

This pirate crewman is a work in progress, but I don't plan to add many more parts, if any. He's built from a Flagellant head, Beastman Ungor upper torso and arms, and an Imperial Guard bolt pistol. The Beastman arms and torso are really muscular, so  I thought this guy would make a good 'brute' character.

I picked the smallest bolt pistol I could find to try to make the figure look as big as possible. Not too many left-hand bolt pistol bits in my collection!

He is a hairy beast. I'm torn between smoothing it all down or adding more hair to his chest and belly to even it out. It works on a beastman, but with so much hair on this guys head and face, the pattern doesn't quite work. I like the idea that he's super-hairy though. Maybe he's a mutant?

The mace in his right hand actually extends down below the level of his foot, so I'll have to make a little ledge for him to stand on. That'll look cool anyway :)

Old Spacer and Servitors

All three of these figures are pretty old, as far as projects go. I started them a few years ago and am just now getting around to finishing them. They don't even necessarily go together, but I had originally envisioned this guy as some kind of Inquisitor who was really in to Xeno tech

This guy is an old spacefarer. He was originally going to be some kind of Inquisitor, but I liked the stripped-down look of his armor so much that I couldn't bear to bling it up. His head came from the Mordheim sprue...but had a huge hat on, which I removed. To cover up the crude surgery I gave him a kind of soft cap (I imagined it sort of like what an astronaut might wear inside his helmet). 

His armor is just Space Marine power armor, but with all the repaired areas and vents covered up, and all the bling removed. I rounded out the legs a bit as well, to give him a more sleek look. The power fist is from an old close-combat sprue, modified somewhat.

The backpack is a cut-down and kitbashed Space Marine backpack and some parts from a few tank kits and an helicopter control panel. It needs a little finishing work on top, but I'm mostly satisfied with it. His plasma pistol is huge, and has a pretty obvious cable connection underneath (it's the same one I used on the pirate Captain). I'll have to work out some way to connect that to his pack.

I think I had originally planned to try to make this sword look like it was some kind of Chaos relic, which was why he needed a Power Fist to hold it, but I like the idea that he's just wielding a ginormous two-handed weapon in one giant mitt.

These are some kind of servitors. They're built from Skaven/Empire parts from the Mordheim boxed set, some old Space Marine arms (and backpack bits), and an Ork plasma gun. The heads are distributor caps from car models. I think these need about 300x as many cables and rivets and ports on them to really look like servitors though.

Space Pirates!

I have been putting together a bunch of miniatures intended for some kind of space pirate crew. These would probably work as a Rogue Trader and his crew as well, but I like to think of them as straight-up pirates.

The one on the left is holding a Space Marine Auspex. I figure he's the one with the 'treasure map' and knows where to go. The head is from a Warhammer Flagellant, the torso is from the Mordheim boxed set. Cape from a Skaven from the Mordheim set as well. Arms and legs come from Imperial Guard bits. Pouches and holsters are a mix of Mordheim, Imperial Guard, and 1:35 scale pouches.

The middle figure is the captain. The body comes from a Reaper Bones figure. I replaced his bendy and kind of crappy sword with one from some Undead skeleton kit (Mantic maybe?) and some plastic bits. The hilt probably needs a bit more work, and maybe some more detail on the "powered sword" wire that runs down the blade. The servo-skull is basically unmodified, it's just glued on to his shoulder. I added an extra cable made from guitar string for a little more strength in the connection with his shoulder. I think I may have to paint the skull bright colors, like it's a parrot on his shoulder. :)

The captain's hand has been replaced with one that I had left over from a 2nd Edition / Space Crusade Space Marine Scout. The I added a guitar-string cable from the pistol to a canister on his back. No idea where the canister is from. I had removed a poorly detail pistol from his waist, and replaced it with...whatever that thing is from the original beaky Space Marine kits. It looks like some kind of tricorder or something, so I added a seal to it to appease its machine spirit. The dagger is from one of the greatcoat troops from Wargames factory. More 1:35 scale pouches on the back (one anyway).

The beastman crewman is made from some Ungor legs (same source as the IG beastmen from my last post), combined with a torso and arms from the Mordheim sprue. Sword and hand is from a Space Marine scout kit, and the bolter is a super-chunky one from years past. I wanted him to look like he was holding the biggest, loudest gun he could find. I added a big pouch on to his back from the beaky Space Marine kit to cover up his bare cheeks and fill the gap where the coat is open. I think he needs some more stuff and details, but I'm not sure what yet. Maybe some details on his coat to dress it up a little. He does have a grenade attached to his belt/loincloth though.

The bases are kind of an experiment. I made a rubber mold of some old OOP bases and a few from Secret Weapon (I think) months ago, and had done some questionable resin casts with them. The resin was old and maybe not mixed correctly, so they came out kind of gummy. These are not those bases. These are made with the same molds but cast using Durhams Rock Hard Water Putty. They're a little bubbly, and will require some cleanup, but they'll do just fine for a bunch of dirty space pirates. 

Beastmen Imperial Guard

Time flies when you're not updating your hobby blog :)

I have a bunch of stuff I want to document, so I'll start with one of my latest projects. I've seen some great Beastman troopers for the Imperial Guard in 40k, and wanted some of my own. It's not an original idea, but I really like the look...and I'm happy with how mine turned out.

I made a squad of 5 guardsmen using arms and torsos from Imperial Guard kits, with legs cut from the bodies of Warhammer Fantasy Ungors. I cut the Ungors right across the tops of their belts, level with the ground. I ended up trimming a fair amount of the detail off the beastman belts, and covered up the somewhat rough beltline (and doubling up on actual belts).

Here's how the Sergeant turned out:

And a pair of troopers armed with lasguns:

And finally there are two heavy support weapons to round out the squad:

These should be fun to paint :)

Space Crusade Scouts

In an effort to get back on the hobby-blog wagon, here's some new stuff.

These are some old Space Crusade -era Space Marine scouts. Got these on eBay and stripped 'em down to bare metal. The detail is nice...they look 10x better with no paint on them than they did with the crappy paintjob they started with!

I think these guys will be part of my Relictors chapter of Space Marines.

Mordheim building, details

Got some more work done on the Mordheim building this weekend. Rubble and some dremel-detail for the base.

Mordheim building continued

I have completed the major structural parts of the upper-story of the building and have started to apply wood framing and shingles.

I used up all the balsa-wood strips I had and I still have a lot of trim to add. I think I'd like to add some kind of crest or other emblem over the door. Perhaps add some beams coming out that I can hang a sign on or something to give the building some more character.

 I need to detail the floors in both the second and ground floors. I'm not sure if I'm going to go with actual planks or whether to fake something. If I can find some cheap wood to use as boards I'll probably glue down individual boards. Maybe those coffee stir-sticks?

I need some cool little statues to fit in these niches!

Mordheim building base

I started the base of this building using Hirst Arts building block molds. I should have paid more attention to how closely they were fitting side-to-side (I have some decent-sized gaps), but overall I'm thrilled with how well this came out.

 

You can see the beginnings of the upper story in the background.

A simple to-scale plan made this easy to keep straight as I was building it.

First FUDGE dungeon-crawl

I gamemastered my first game of FUDGE today, and had a great time. Four players and I played through the first part of a dungeon crawl in a creepy crypt. I stocked a dungeon map by Dyson Logos (players, don't go looking!) with stuff I thought made sense and guessed on stats for some monsters (the descriptive nature of FUDGE really helped here).

I didn't get any pictures while we were playing, but I set up the tiles again afterward. The tiles are D&D tiles that I got as a Christmas gift, and I really like them. I need a better way to organize them in the box because I spent way too much time trying to find the ones I needed. The miniatures are from my collection (mostly old Warhammer miniatures, but some D&D and Ral Partha too), and the giant centipedes are from the dollar store.

Here's the chunk of the dungeon they managed to explore, as it was before they entered. When we were playing I added areas as they were revealed by opening doors, etc.

The first thing they faced were a swarm of giant centipede things that had been nesting in and feeding on the corpses in wall-niches (marked with red dots). The adventurers tried to hold the door shut, but the angry worms pushed their way in and attacked.

The party took care of the bugs, but their ex-blacksmith tank character had taken a wound. Lucky for him he had a high tolerance for pain so it didn't slow him down.

They were more careful about barging in after that, and walked past a room with some armored guardians lurking motionless in the corners and explored more of the crypt. They found a statue with a suspicious amulet, but the danger sense of one of the party warned them before they caused problems by actually touching the amulet :)

Unable to resist the room with the guardians and the altar that they could see on the far side of the room, they attempted to get at it without entering the room using a fishing rod and hook. Seriously. Due to a character who was an expert fisherman and some good dice rolls they managed to hook the altar...but then knocked it over awakening the guardians.

The party managed to hold one of the double-doors closed so they only had to fight one of the guardians at a time and they were eventually victorious.

I had a great time running the game, and I think the players enjoyed it too. Fudge is an interesting system, and I like how the mechanics made the game feel. We definitely have some learning to do, and I need to figure out  how best to handle simultaneous combat rounds and combat with multiple characters and monsters.

Fudge cries out to have broader games than just dungeon-crawling played with it though. The players had made characters that had flaws and gifts that were not very relevant to combat situations. Or skills for that matter. I suspect that would even out over multiple sessions, even in a dungeon-crawl kind of game, but it didn't in the short session we ran through here.

6mm skirmish on hex grid

To keep from having to do a lot measuring and precise placement of miniatures, I decided to try out a hex-grid. I think it's going to work quite well. This works out to 0.5" from center to center of each hex.

I think it's a good idea. I can measure distances by counting hexes (and not be too far off), and I like the slight 'uncertainty' about a figures actual position that it adds. Line of sight should be pretty easy to figure out as well.

It looks like about 3 figures can fit in any given hex, which sounds about right. I guess you'd have to let figures in neighboring hexes fight in close combat as well as figures in the same hex. Perhaps only allow friendly figures to share hexes?

Magnetized Epic-scale building ruins (and Squats!)

I magnetized a bunch of ruins for the 6mm skirmish set. This is really starting to come together. A little one-sided in that it's all ruined walls, but I think a few more solid pieces will round out the set nicely.

I'm also happy to have scored some Squats on eBay, so I have another (of my favorites!) retinue for ItEN.