Currently on the painting table

On the painting table: Batman Miniature Game!

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Work on the West Continues

Hey y'all how goes it? Well I'm back after 10 days in Disney and back to working on my WWX board. I was in the basement yesterday hacking away at foam and got a bunch started. I have a few WiP photos so lets get to it eh?


I decided to hack out a few more freestanding mesas. I think this bottom one may be my favorite so far.
 
If you recall my initial design for the 4x4 table was to have four 2x2 sections and one of them was going to be a cave hideout/mine. I forgot to cut the mine entrance when I made the large wall section and I have been struggling trying to decide the best course of action from here on out. I have decided to scrap the cave section for the current time as I feel it will be too limiting for game play. I also decided to man up and just cut in the cave entrance the best I could and see what happened.
 
Lug checks out the proposed entrance
 
I threw caution to the wind and went at the wall with a wire cutter and a utility blade. Here you can see the result. I didn't want to go all the way through the wall. You can see the back of it but I am hoping with the right paint it will just look like a dark mine shaft.
 
"Little tight boss"
 
"I fit fine"
 
 
Here I have the wall place on the demo section and few freestanding mesas. looks like with a little scatter terrain I should have a decent amount of cover for all parties involved. Next move will be to frame out the cave with some support beams and make a mine cart track. Once that is done I'll put some sand on the wall, painting it all up, and attach it to the base.
 

After I made my decision on the mine wall I had to think up what to do with the adjoining board section. I am going to do another wall section but not as big as the mine wall. This one with me tiered and allow for models to climb it. I roughed out the initial design for the wall with a wire cutter.




Once of the pieces I cut for the bottom section was warped for some reason which is why I had to go heavier with the liquid nails as you can see here. Hopefully once this fully dries it will sit flush and will still carve nicely.
Here you can see the how the top section with meet up. I left plenty of over hand so that after I hack in the mesa texture the should line up fairly well.
 
Ok that's all for now. I need to hit the hobby store for some supplies before they close. I hope to get some more work done in the next few days and have the demo section finished up. I ordered some supplies online and the township section will be seeing work once they arrive.

 

Thursday, November 21, 2013

Knocking the Rust Off

Hey y'all. Its been too long since I have posted anything. I really have been in a bit of a rut in the hobby department but trying to get back into the swing of things. I haven't really painted anything in a while. The only painting I did was a few weeks back when I attended a painting seminar in Toronto taught by Meg Maples but I will do a post on that later.

I have been working on my WWX demo board a little so here are some wips of my first attempts at a real board:

Here is a 2x2 section of MDF. DieselDM covered this section with a spray on texture something or other as an experiment to try and avoid having to glue sand over the entire section. I have to say I am happy with the experiment and he is currently texturing three more sections for me :)






Here are three sections of mesas based on the tutorial from Rob Hawkins blog. They need to have some static grass and shrubbery added to break up the brown a little but that will be added once I get the particle board bases from Diesel.

Here is a couple crappy shots of the board with the mesas sitting on the board. I still have the big wall section of rock to work on but it is on hold until I can figure out a good way to cut in the mine shaft which I forgot to do during assemble (dumbass).
 
So there you have it the wips on my first table. I have to say so far so good and I have really been enjoying the process. I got a package yesterday from http://www.burnindesigns.net/ which will be the beginning of my township section of the board but I'll do a post on them once I get a chance to play around with them some. OK off to bed for this guy have a great day y'all.

Friday, October 11, 2013

Kickstarters Do Come True!

Those of you that follow along know I went a little off the deep end with kickstarters at the end of last year/beginning of this year. Some of the projects have been on a pretty major delay (looking at you Relic Knights) but the other day when I was napping I received a glorious package from the FedEx guy.

 
 
 According to my FedEx tracking email here is 13lbs of gaming good just waiting to be opened.

First item out of the box is Zombicide: Toxic City Mall (TCM). This requires a copy of season one or season two. This set has the new zombivor version of the original character as well ad four new character with their zombivor versions. This set introduces the new toxic zombie to the game!

Item number two is Zombicide Season 2: Prison Break. This is a stand alone game but can mix with TCM as mentioned above. This comes with six new characters and their zombivor versions and introduces the berserk zombies to play!

Here is set #2 of kickstarter exclusive characters and zombivors. I missed out on set #1 from the first kickstarter and I am really bummed about that. Despited being bummed about set #1 I am pretty excited to have my hands on set #2! At initial glance there are some really cool characters in the set. the characters are Brad (Dirty Harry), Thaissa, Kirk, Aunt Rose, and Ralph. I think on my first initial scan Brad and Rose are my favorites but not quite Nick (current favorite).

Here are four additional characters I added to my kickstarter.

Zombie Dogz! At three actions a turn and last on the ranged priority list these little fellows are SCARY!

Mans best friend. New companions for your characters. Looking forward to trying these out.
 
Gotta get some cool extra dice right?!?
 
The entire haul.....for now :) This was just wave one of shipments. I have an additional 10 (I think) characters coming with wave 2!
 
It is currently a work week so no gaming at this time but I am hoping to have a game or two next week with a buddy. I will breakdown the sets at a later time and give y'all my take on the new mechanics/characters after I get a little table time in. OK time for this guy to head to bed have a great day all. 

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Poll Closed WWX Faction Selected

Hey all. Well September started off with a bang I was having some really productive hobby (terrain) time and blogging consistently and then the wheels fell off. Life has a way of getting in the way of hobby time and while nothing bad happened I just had no time to get back to the hobby world. Despite the fact that I didn't post after the 19th I had the most views in a single month so thanks y'all for looking in and checking out my lil world.

The poll for my first WWX faction has closed and Sitting Bull and the Warrior Nation won by a nose. I have been tinkering with list for all three factions I was considering playing and I just "borrowed" this list from one of the members of Outlaw Miniatures. Here is the list I will be painting once my kickstarter arrives:

  • Boss:
    • Sitting Bull $200
  • Underboss:
    • Sky Spirit $145
 
  • Sidekick:
    • Walks Looking $80 
  • Hired Hands:
    • Scalper Close Combat $35
    • Scalper Close Combat $35
    • Scalper Close Combat $35
    • Scalper Close Combat $35
    • Brave Close Combat $25
These are the scalper hired hands (wave 2). Any of the 5 models with headdress' are CC minis



Random CC brave hired hand but probably my favorite.
  • Lights Support:
    • Energy Beast $80
    • Energy Beast $80



Total $750
Influence: 7

I'm going to try and do some new things with these minis such as glow effects around the eyes of Sitting Bull, Sky Spirit, and the Energy Beasts. I am also going to try the airbrush power weapon technique seen on multiple youtube painting videos for Sitting Bull's and Walks Looking's blades.

Outlaw miniatures just informed us backers that the cargo freighter from China has hit the high seas and is chugging its way across the Pacific (they actually gave us a site where we can track the progress of the boat). If all goes well on the ocean, and then customs, and then packaging I should hopefully have these minis in hand by the end of the month. So with that in mind I better get back to working on that demo board. Thanks again to all that voted on my poll and for stopping by the Cave.
 

 

 

 

 

 

Thursday, September 19, 2013

Wild West Continues (More WiPs)

I was able to get a little time today to work on my WWX demo board. I wasn't overly happy with my current utility knife so I headed out to Hobby Lobby to see what they had and also to Home Depot. I found what I was looking for at hobby Lobby in the large selection of X-acto products they had. I have decided I want to base the mesa sections I have done so far so I headed over to Home Depot of a piece of hardboard to use as basing.

Hardboard for bases. DieselDM has a jigsaw and is going to help me cut these out.

 

I headed into the basemen with the intention of getting all the pieces for the burned building removed from their boards. I found this to be far more laborious than I intended and lost interest part way through. here is where the building stands. I decided it was time to sack up and get to carving out the rock wall section of my demo board. I headed to the back recesses of the cave and began to hack away at some foam. Here are those results:



I may need to play around with the top some or it may be just right once covered with sand. I don't know yet.


"Couple, two, tree" close ups for ya
 
 
One possible layout. Since I intend for the pieces to be modular I should have some flexibility here. The game seems to be pretty terrain intensive so I think it should be ok like this


 Some of my beloved Trollbloods swing by the wild west to take a peak
 

Despite my initial trepidation in tackling this wall I am very happy with the results (other than the massive blister I gave myself). The more I look at it the move I feel I have to cut in the mine shaft so this is my new worry. I need to figure out the best approach as my hot wire foam cutter isn't wide enough to tackle the thickness of this section. I still have a ways to go but I am happy with the progress. I need to put some sand/ballast and rocks over this section before it will get its basecoat of bloodstone. I am not sure if I will have time to work on this board at all tomorrow (today as it is 1am now) but progress is happening so I'm pleased.

Monday, September 16, 2013

Accessories for Terrain Project

When I woke up from my nap today I had a package waiting for me downstairs. I ordered a few items from Tectonic Craft Studios for my WWX table experiment. Here are just a few shots as I took the items out of the back.

Everything nicely packaged


 Thought a burned out building could be fitting for the mine section of the table

 Maybe a little sign
 
Back of the sign piece you can see the perforations
 
Couple sets of small fences can never hurt to get in the way of those pesky outlaws, right?

 The back of the fences.....hmmmm no perforations (?)
 

Ok I just wanted to take some quick unboxing photos. I have literally only had these out of the box for 15min so I will withhold judgment/opinions until I take some real time handling them. I can say I was very happy with the turnaround time on the order as I received my pack within one week of placing my order. Next pots I should have some photos of the pieces either full assemble or partially assembled and more thoughts on the items themselves.