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. 

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.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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.

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.

The Law Comes to Town/Table Progress

Yesterday while I was napping I received a box from Outlaw miniature. These minis are minis that have been pre-release before the KS ships. I ordered two sets of Sheriff Ironclad and Marshall McClain one for me and one for DieselDM. These minis are both underbosses for the lawmen faction (Diesel's intended primary faction). A FYI for those that have not been following WWX the mini Mic Ironclad was a model Outlaw made to honor the support of one of the KS backers. He was really active during the KS campaign and they surprised him and the community with this mini. Marshall McClain was a special early release for Gencon.

Ok on to the 2x2 demo table. The other day I showed y'all my first section of mesa rocks. I was pretty happy with it so I decided to test out the paint I had made at Home Depot. After gluing some sand and rock to the mesa it was time to paint.

  I primed it via the airbrush with Vallejo surface primer

After the primer dried I slapped on some of the Home Depot bloodstone clone. Obviously there were some missed sections at that time but they have been filled in since. This was really just a test to see how the color "felt". I'm happy with the base color next step will be drybrushing.

 

Last evening prior to work I jumped in the car and headed over to meet Diesel to give him his new minis and to grab a piece of 2" foam he had sitting around to try and do some tall thin columns for stone. I had already started a new section of mesa rock and was eyeballing the perfect spot for it. I took a couple minutes to rough up the column prior to work and took a quick photo.

 

 

Here is the new column. while I am happy with the mesa texture on it by and large I am not happy with the size/shape for what I was going for. I have since snapped it in ~half and reshaped the top but I am still not in love with it on this piece so will most likely become a stand alone rock. As you can see I have glued down some sand and rocks in preparation for primer. I may make a second attempt at a smaller column for I may just sand over that entire section.

 

 

I took a second to throw what I currently have onto one of the "2x2" boards to get an idea of the landscape. I say 2x2 cause upon further measurement none of the six is actually 2x2. The label at Home Depot said they were 4x2 so I had the gentleman cut them in half and figured we were good to go. It turns out the original pieces were not exactly 4x2 so all the squares were a touch bigger. I gave two of the squares to Diesel and he was going to trim them up for me. As you can see I have two section mostly "mesa'd up"and another stack awaiting the mesa treatment. After that it may be time to hit up the big rock facing to the cave section. I think the table will have enough cover after that but will not know for sure until I try out some games in a month or so. Please remember to vote on the poll at the top right. Thanks

 

Mesa Sytled Rocks First Attempt (kinda)

Last night (this morning actually) I decided to take my first stab at the mesa styled rocks for my demo WWX board. I was doing some laundry and catching up on Dexter when I got a little impatient and said those rocks should be dry enough where's my knife? My first attempt was an epic fail and got thrown out immediately the second attempt was better.

 Here is my "first" attempt

 

 The "good" side

 

 The "not as good" side

 

The little rock section above was all I did last evening. I was feeling pretty OK with the results and decided to play around with a little more today. The plan was to have the section above go on top of a larger flat piece to have a two stepped mesa. After the boy had their first skate lesson I headed to the basement and started carving up the bottom section:

 

Once again had some "good" sections and some "not so good" section but I am OK with the result to try and press on. These are in fact learning pieces so once/if I really get this down this item can go to the FLGS terrain bin or just get relegated to the sidelines.

 Stacked up in their "final" configuration

An enlightened hire hand stops by to check out the progress.

 

I need to glue these section together and lay down some sand and stones to get a final idea on this mesa. As I said this is just a learning process but all in all I'd say an OK first go at terrain. I really want to make sure I feel comfortable with the process and my ability to replicate my results before I start hacking away at the rock facing for the cave wall.  

Venture Into Uncharted Waters

As you may be aware I have been pretty excited about Wild West Exodus and the upcoming delivery of my kickstarter pledge. Seeing as I still have to wait at least a month until my shipment I have decided to try my hand at something completely foreign to me.....a table. Those of you that follow this blog know I am a really big fan of Rob Hawkins' work and have commissioned him for projects on several occasions. I would love to have him build me a custom table but until I win the Powerball that will have to remain a dream. I have decided however to attempt to build the table myself. the inspiration I am using for my table will be this:

Let me get this out of the way right now I have no delusion of grandeur and I am full away that the above photo is the dream outcome not the expected outcome. My plan right now is to do a 2'x2' demo board which can then be used as a section of a 4'x4' table. Here are my concept sketches:

I am still not 100% sure about the interior cave section but I can make that call later on down the road. If I decide to scrap that idea I will rotate the cave wall section of the demo board to an outside edge. If the demo section goes well the next section will be the township and I will be using building from Burn In Designs' welcome to Rock Ridge which can be seen here:  http://www.burnindesigns.net/2012/10/welcome-to-rock-ridge.html I have been in touch with Lathan the owner of Burn In Designs with some question and possibilities of modifications. More on the buildings as more info become available to me.

Ok with my plans bubbling in my head I decided to strike while the iron was hot and headed out to Home Depot.

MDF and foam

Tools and supplies

I had sample size latex paint matched to P3 bloodstone, moldy ochre, and 'jack bone. These color follow Rob's tutorial on his mine table above.

Hot wire cutter

 

When I got a free sec I stuck outside to play around with the wire cutter for the very first time. I cut a few pieces of foam to make the cave wall section of the demo board. I was pleasantly surprised with how easy smoothly this went for me as I have never played around with foam or a wire cutter and wasn't sure if there was a "trick" to it. After the sections were cut I glues them together with liquid nails and sandwiched them between boards of MDF with tools and weights stacked on top to allow the foam to dry appropriately (I hope). I plan to give it wall section at least 24 hours to dry before attempting to carve the face into the mesa styled rocks. Fingers crossed this next step will be as smooth.