Almost Done

The Sons of Bragg are nearly finished requiring maybe an hour to pollish off the finishing work. Here they are the brothers as they currrently stand:

All three brothers Bragg nearly ready to fight the foes of the Kriels. I need to highlight the green tartan sections on all three brothers. All three brothers also need to have thier eyes blackend in.

Wrathar needs the most work to be considered done. I need to paint the flame sections on his torch still. I forgot to paint the wood on his torches when I was doing the keg so I have to do that section as well. Wrathar also has a rope necklace needing attention.

 

The individual thing Tor needs to have done is the wrapping on his sword. I am thinking red.

Rhudd needs to have his rope necklace painted and some clean up work as well.

While I was working on highlighting the skin for the Sons of Bragg I also worked on the skin for the champion grunt I started for week 20 of the 'scrum challenge before I realized the challenge was over. Oh by the way I didn't win the battle engine :( Thats ok I have the one Dave bought me and Rob assembled. If I won I was going to use it for the FADD army so it is ok I didn't win. Here is grunt number three. When I do the green on the sons I will also do the green on this grunt. After that he needs his hair and chin nubs painted and he will be done too.

I have to head into work tonight for a little four hours shift but hope to get back to the cave this evening to finish these guys up before I head out for that concert tomorrow. Hopefully I will have final pics to show off in the am.

Back on Target

After missing a couple targets I finally hit one. Rok just wouldn't be denied. I was planning on doing a few more highlights on his flesh but when I put him next to my other finished 'beasts he fit right in so I am calling him done. Maybe at some point down the road I put a layer or two of highlights on all of the 'beasts but lets try and get to fully painted first. I will get a few more angles of Rok later on but here he is:

I should be finishing up the Sons of Bragg in the next day or so. I want to get them done before Saturday as I am going to be heading out of town with some buddy to catch a concert.

Late Night Action in the Cave

Last night after the Yankee game ended and the boys fell asleep I grabbed my iPod and headed down to the cave to try and make up for some lost time. I put on a little Goldfinger and started to work. I put in a good chunk of time working between the Sons of Bragg, Rok, the last champion grunt, and a few other odds and ends. Here is were everything stands as of this am:

 Group shot

Tor 

 Rhudd

Wrathar 

All the brothers had some work done on their skins, leathers, and tartan sections. Tor and Wrathar had their kegs painted and washed. As you can see I finally attached them to their actual bases in preparation for finishing touches. They all need more highlights on their skin as well as highlights on the green tartan sections. After those two things are done it will be down to finishing touches and doing the bases.

I brought the hands back up to match the rest of the body. I also basecoated and washed the darker leather sections (I missed one and will have to go back later). I also did a little work on the axe handle. I'd like to do another layer or two of highlights but looking at the beasts I have finished already his skin matches them better now so I might just call it here. Next up will be teeth, nails, and skulls.

 With the left over blue on the palette I started to basecoat some of the long rider's skin

Lastly I broke out the airbrush and primed my second unit of runshapers and two minis for the FADD army.

My night ended with me climbing into bed around 4am. I know I am going to regret this (already am a little) but I am happy with the progression. I didn't paint the entire time as I watched a couple episodes of Dexter season  off on demand while washes were drying and such. I'd like to get both Rok and the SoB finished tomorrow. This months target for PtT is a warbeast/warjack and submissions are due to Gday my midnight tomorrow. I'd also like to get the SoB finished up grab a couple glamour shots and send those photos off as well. We will see how much I can get done during the day today but I think I should be able to get it done......time will tell.

Partial Return to Normalcy

Well my world has been a little on end the last few days. I was about one hour into my sleep Thursday afternoon when my four year old son was waking me up. Those of you with kids might say that doesn't seem that bizarre but the problem is we have a gate at the bottom of the stair and he should be upstairs. This set off my spider senses so I headed downstairs.

After all was said and done my wife spent two days in the hospital with a GI bleed. Luckily she is doing well and back home. Needless to say I haven't done any work on any of my projects and have only thought about WM/H occasionally as a quick mental distraction.

With things trending back to normal I hope to get back into the cave in the not to distant future. I was hoping to have the Sons of Bragg finished by now so I could send something to Northblade. I also wanted to get Rok finished for submission for this months PtT. We'll see what can get done over then next few days.

List Building With the New Toys

I am smack dab in the middle of my work week so I have had minimal progression on the painting front. I hope to grab a solid hour or two today to try and finsih up the Sons of Bragg. I have been playing with my iBodger app non-stop over the last few days building lists to use the Sons of Bragg, Horthol, long riders, and war wagon. I was pleased with the Sons on Saturday's ACM tourney and really want to keep putting them out there to truly get a feel for them. Saturday's tourney also reminded my how much I enjoy playing games with Jarl......so with that in mind I built a list jamming in all of the minis I could fit

Jarl Skuld, Devil Of Thornwood (*6pts)
* Troll Impaler (5pts)
* Dire Troll Bomber (10pts)
* Trollkin Runebearer (2pts)
Sons of Bragg (6pts)
Trollkin Long Riders (Leader and 4 Grunts) (11pts)
Horthol, Long Rider Hero (5pts)

The low model count is a little worrisome for me but I think (despite never playing the LR/Horthol) it has the potential to play well. I anticipate putting quicken on the long riders putting them up to SPD 9 DEF 14 and putting weald secrets on the Sons of Bragg to help mitigate terrain and give them a little DEF if I can get them proper cover/concealment. I have a hard time playing Jarl w/o the runebearer cause of all the upkeeps and wanting to get as many uses of magic bullet as possible. The bomber/impaler combo goes together like peanut butter and jelly and I have a hard time not taking them whenever I play Jarl. I suppose I should try out some other beat combos but really like this one with him.

As you can see this list leaves me 2pts left to play with for a solo of my choice. I am going back and forth on model selection right now and it is between

Alten Ashley (2pts)
Stone Scribe Chronicler (2pts)

I am torn on which way to go here. I love Alten even if I am not playing a Hordes faction. Since I play with the impaler putting far strike on him gives me a MAT 8 RNG 18 POW 12 sniper for picking off solos and targets of choice and if my opponent is playing a Hordes faction even better time to go beast hunting. The SSC, on the other hand, has some really nice synergy with this list. The ability to give one unit concealment allows me to get the quickened long riders up to DEF 16 on the approach and if I choose to put his buff on the weald secreted SoB they will be looking at a +4 DEF bonus no matter where they are on the battlefield and potentially +6 DEF if I can get behind a wall.

The second list I have been toying around with is a Calandra list. This list is definitely a little goofy but I am curious how it will play. This is what I am looking at:

Caladra Truthsayer, Oracle of the Glimerwood (*5pts)
* Troll Impaler (5pts)
* Dire Troll Bomber (10pts)
Kriel Warriors (Leader and 5 Grunts) (4pts)
*Kriel Caber Thrower (1pt) x2
*Kriel Warrior Standard Bearer and Piper (2pts)
Sons of Bragg (6pts)
Trollkin Runeshapers (4pts)
Trollkin Runeshapers (4pts)
Janissa Stonetide (3pts)

I built this list for two reasons. First I have been wanting to play some more Calandra but avoid the dygs of doom because even though I love them my opponents don't always love them. The second reason is to use the runeshapers. I bought the extra runeshapers right after getting back from the Conquest Toronto trip to play the pDoomie theme for but since Flanzer just won LnL masters with that list I don't want to feel like I am just jumping on the band wagon. Seeing ast the minis are damn expensive better find another use for them. This list gives me a ton of AOEs which have the potential to be pretty scary on the feat turn and the re-roll have a better chance of netting me those crit KDs.

I hope to get out to the FLGS next week to get a game or two in and I hope to try out these two lists. I need to get the long riders and Horthol far enough along that I can finish the assembly process so I might not have them ready but we will see. I have two different 50pt lists in mind for the war wagon but this has gotten long so I will babble about that another time.

Lovin' the Airbrush

In the the What's in the box III post I mentioned that I have a bunch of wip to show and here they are. These wip span about 4 different days as you can see from the time stamps. I used the airbrush to prime all these mini and to start laying down the basecoats as well. First mini for show and tell will be the war wagon. I was attempting to get this bad boy ready to play in a Borka family reunion list for the ACM but wasn't able to get far enough along in the 24 hours I had.

All of the components were primed black and then base coated with Vallejo Model Air (VMA) steel.

I then broke out the Vallejo Model color brass and started to paint all the trim on the wagon. It isn't all finished but I got a pretty good start on the trim. I am not sure what will be the best way to lay down my shade wash when the time comes. I have seen some online videos where people use the airbrush to apply their wash but for some reason this scares me.

 Next up we have Horthol and the boys. Once again all the minis were primed black. As you can see the riders were left separate from the bison since I intended to spray the two section with different colors and this would help eliminated over spray.

The bison for the long riders were basecoated with a coat of thinned down P3 beast hide. I then mixed up some P3 battlefield brown and basecoated the fur sections.

After the browns were applied I took out the large drybrush and drybrushed the fur in a four color progression from P3 bootstrap leather, beast hide, jack bone, Menoth white base. Here on out the bison will be painted with the brush and my standard layering but I think this is a pretty good start.

Horthol's bison, dismounted Horthol, and all the riders were basecoated with VMA steel. I have to work on my ratios with the steel as it gunks up my airbrush more than any other color.

Lastly I basecoated the blizter. He was sprayed with my standard trollblood skin mix.

Not a bad start with 34pts of models getting started in a three/four day span. The blizter will be the last of the lot to get finished but once I finish the Sons of Bragg I really want to try and push out the war wagon, long riders and Horthol for an eBloodsong list I have been dying to try.

Oh What's in the Box?!? Part III

This post is a few days late but there was a reason. Package number three from Jersey was all basic assembly jobs but ones I have been dying to get on the table for some time. The delivery confirmation and tracking said I would have it with my Friday mail delivery (~1500) but I was hoping to get one of the items on the table for Saturday's ACM tourney so that wasn't going to do. I headed to the post office right when the lobby opened to see if I could get the package prior to it getting put on the truck. Low and behold I was able to grab it and get my new shinnies six hours early so could head into the cave to paint...but I am getting ahead of myself. Lets see what was in the box.

 The anticipation of opening is always so much fun. Like Christmas morning all over again.

 Lets go right to the big present shall we. BOOM! A war wagon

 What's that sound? Is it thunder in the distance? Fifth Street rolling into the FLGS? No! That my friends is the sound of Horthol and a Long Riders coming to get some.

Last but not least is a classic blizter to round out my stable of trollblood heavies. He was the last I didn't own and has a slot waiting for him in a Gunnbjorn list.

All of these new toys have already begun the painting process and some of them are nicely along. I was not able to get the war wagon far enough along Friday to be played on Saturday but he will be rolling into Comix Zone in the not too distant future to see some action. All these toys have distracted me a little from the Sons of Bragg but they too have seen some more work. I will have wip photos of the SoB and all the new whats in the box minis in my next post. tonight starts a work week for me so my painting time will be at a minimum but the SoB are the number one priority for the week. If I can get through them probably the wagon and long riders are next. Exciting reinforcements for the Kriels!!