Napoleonic progress

So, it's been a while but bear with I'll catch you up.

So, still in lockdown here in the UK as most of you will know, but I do have international readers. Still working at home, only going to the shop once a week if that. I'm going a bit stir crazy if I'm honest, but hey I'm sure we all are. Working at home has taken its toll, not having been prepared for this, I've been working at the dining table on a solid dining chair. Fine for sitting eating your dinner, or painting for a few hours in the evening, but not really suitable for all day working. One day working all day, then an online Pathfinder roleplay session, followed by a couple of hours painting and I worked out I spent around 16 hours sat in the same spot. Needless to say, my knees gave in. A couple of days later I had what looked like two filled water balloons in the middle of my legs.
Not being able to do your hobby when you are stuck indoors under lockdown makes it even less fun, but at least I could catch up on some of my Netflix list. A weeks rest however and work to the rescue with a more suitable work chair safely delivered and I am back up and about.

Before my stupid self inflicted injury, I did however get quite a bit of painting done including some things for my on going Napoleonic project.

A while ago I treated myself to some character models to paint in between rank and files models. I actually didn't paint this until after the other items I am showing below as a completion treat. I find sticking a character between the repetitive painting tasks helps motivate.

Wellington and Copenhagen fron Front Rank

I've been toying with the following idea now for a while and I finally got the parts required. For my Napoleonic rules I wanted to create models to represent a Zombie French regiment. I ordered some standard zombie sprues from Mantic games and then raided my bits box (and had some donations from the Illustrious Opponent as he has a French force). There are parts from Perry and Victrix I believe. I thought I would show you photos in progress to show how much of a mix of parts the models were.

regiment bases are your friend when making zombies

I'm sure a couple of them look like they are trying a dance routine

I'm particularly proud of this one dragging his drum

Next up I've completed some Prussian infantry, I managed to get a good system going painting them on strips with blu-tak to get some good speed painting going. I've got a couple of boxes of these to paint so I'm not going for super-detail, they just need to look good when there are in ranks on the table.

Perry Prussian infantry

All bayonets currently still intact (I'm sure that won't last with my clumsiness)

Prussian Jaegers from Perry

The last show I went to ( when was that? I've lost all sense of time, was it a couple of months, a couple of years?) I picked up the following as part of a pair. His bowler hat wearing friend is still on my painting table. I'm not going to use them for their intended purpose however. I think he will make a great brawler in the Old West. He is 28mm scale but actually represents more like 7"

Henchman from Crooked Dice

Next up are a couple more character miniatures from Front Rank. They are listed as civilians but I shall certainly not be using them as standard civilians. Note one is dressed slightly more flamboyantly than the other? Yes, may I introduce to you, Jonathon Strange and Mr Norrell.

Wellingtons own practising magicians

I made an order recently to Black Hat miniatures to fill out some gaps in my paint pallette. It's a paint range I have used for many years, picking it up at shows from various traders but I've never bought direct from the owner. My paint purchasing I must admit is not very organised, when I go to a show I forget to take note what I need and just make random choices (I'm never going to run out of red) or I get lazy and if I need one colour, I work in town, so I do admit, it is easy to pop to the local GW at lunch time and pick up that one pot (shh, don't tell anyone, I hate myself.) so this is the first time in a while I have made a concerted effort to spend a good chunk of change and sort out my paints. (and throw out all the dried out ones.)

Well, I was intrigued by a product on their site for shading. I have often used inks and washes but never an all over shade. So, I added the below to my order to give it a go. I've used it on most of the models I've shown in this post. You just paint your model in block colours then paint the whole model with the shade. I'm probably teaching you all to suck eggs, but I've got to say I love it. I'd probably not use it for special characters (I didn't use it for the whole of the Wellington model or the final model of my blog below.) but for quick repetitive painting, it's the bees knees. It's called dark brown, but I find it gives more of a brown/grey shade to the model. It has almost a gelatinous texture and goes on like a wash but somehow has a semi-transluscence that means it matches the colour it sits on. They do a lighter one too if you like your models a bit brighter.

And finally...

Illustrious Opponent and I and our regular Pathfinder group are trying something new. We are embarking on a new adventure with new characters starting at level 4. My previous character being a dwarf bezerker, I wanted to try something completely new. Our crew are to be employed in the local Navy so I volunteered to be the ships wizard. Meet Zachariah the Great.

Zachariah is available for Life Day celebrations and Coming of Age Ceremonies

Now I know what you are thinking, we aren't actually meeting up, don't panic. The sessions are still being played via Zoom. I just found building and painting a model really helped to "create" my character. Some people can draw and have done so. My drawing skills are limited to stick figures and tracing, so actually getting to make Zachariah really helped me imagine him ready for our first session.
He is mostly made up of bits from the Frostgrave Wizards sprue with a tricorne from a Warlords AWI militia sprue. Then his staff has been given a burning sphere I had in my bits box that I believe was from a GW wizard and so was the swirling mist he is stood upon. Needless to say his favourite spell will be Glitterdust.

Anyway, that's all for now. Stay safe, keep painting and please feel free to comment below.

Rattle dem bones

Why do you have so many dice?

One thing that all us gamers have in common is our dice. Yes there are games systems that use cards, (Kobolds and Cobblestones from Osprey use poker style rules to resolve combat.) I have taken part in a roleplaying session where players took a piece from a Jenga tower every time their character did something risky, but most modern wargaming systems use dice to introduce that random factor into games.

It wasnt always this way, Little Wars involved cannons firing wooden dowels and close combat was resolved by comparing the numbers in each opposing side. These days though, most wargaming tables have a pile of dice cluttering up one corner (or the whole table sometimes.)

I must pre warn you, the following image may be upsetting to fellow gamers...


Brace yourself


It isnt pretty...


here it is...

This is what happens when your offspring gets into your carefully organised dice collection.  My youngest loves to play with the dice, I really don't mind, it really has helped him with counting. I remember to this day using wooden counting cubes in school, I'm just giving him a head start.

We all have different dice for different uses, not just the obvious differently sided dice. We use tiny dice as to indicate how many hits a character has taken, giant wooden dice to indicate what turn we are currently on. I know some people that have a different set of D6 (six sided dice) for different armies they have, green dice for their Orcs, red dice for their Napoleonic British. 

I have lots of dice for another reason, dice hogs. Yep, you know who you are  people. Somehow every time these players need to roll a dice, they reach for the furthest dice they can find on the table. (no matter how large the table) The result of which means all the dice gravitate towards them as the day goes on. My own personal solution to this problem is just more dice. If there are enough dice on the table, then there is always suitable dice within reach.

So, I can confidently say my collection of dice has a practical reason, but I can wholely understand why some people just like to collect them. The tactile nature of them, just holding a handful of dice before rolling them is fun. Its no coincidence that people use Gem dice when playing D&D, its almost a physical representation of the treasure their characters are on a quest to retrieve. Some people take it further and collect dice purely as a hobby. I briefly joined a Facebook group of these people out of curiosity and I can confidently say I love their enthusiasm. Like stamp or coin collecting, any new design (or a rare miscast) is desired for their collection. One wonderful soul has even designed a categorisation system that I applaud for its wonderful attention to detail. (visit his amazing website here ) I eventually only left the group in a fit of self preservation as I slowly began to find myself more and more tempted to start buying dice by the pound. (That is not an exaggeration, you can buy by the pound.)

(I don't apologise for use of the meme, it was too good to not include. Credit: Dungeons and Dragons Memes page on Fbook.)

There are the players who claim to always roll badly (my Pathfinder character regularly rolls at least three 1's a session.) I've seen players throw dice across the room in disgust at the number of failed rolls they've made, I've seen youtube videos of dice being "punished" with hammers for somehow being responsible for the death of a beloved D&D character, I've seen players swap out their dice to try and restore some luck. The truth of the matter is, we all roll badly, we all roll well. I'm not going to suggest all dice are perfectly balanced, (there are ways to test that involving saltwater) but don't blame the die, blame the GM.

I don't have the space where I live to have a massive gaming table, once a year I have a cull of my models to clear space for the inevitable new purchases but I can never have too many dice.  Although remind me of this post when you catch me swimming in dice Scrooge McDuck style...

Researching Grenadier

I love a good charity shop/car boot find.

That feeling when you find a box of second hand toy soldiers is a joy for us all. I once was at a carboot and spied the ugliest cardboard box I have ever seen. Covered in kittens, (my wife made me dispose of the box as soon as possible, it was creepy, seriously creepy.) something about the box made me open the lid. Inside it was jammed full of warhammer dwarves and orcs. I didnt even delve, just bought the lot for a couple of quid and had the joy of going through it all at home.

I also love researching and identifying items I find.  My latest bagfull I will admit wasn't found by myself but by a friend, then passed on as they had no use for it. So, challenge accepted, let the research begin!

Most of the models I discovered were from Grenadier (the capital G on the slotta on some was my first clue.) These first ones are Troopers with Heavy Weapons, from 2015, I'm keeping these and painting them up for Rogue Stars.

A pair of Cyberpunk Nomads from 1995. That bike has difficult to base written all over it. I do like the design though, somebody was watching Akira when they sculpted that.

Orcs with Field crossbow, more Grenadier from 1987, sadly one of the Orcs has some knife damage. I have seen this set for sale from Campaign Game Miniatures, I'm guessing they have bought the molds.

An assortment of adventurers from Grenadier in the 90's. These will be painted up for Heroquest or Pathfinder.

Not sure on the first of these two, some kind of Ogre or Troll, maybe? Both are a good 40 to 45mm tall, the one on the right is the Lord of Death from Grenadiers Fantasy Lords range.

These chaps are interesting and I have yet to properly identify them. They are Grenadier, coded underneath from A653 to A657. They seem to be dressed in fantasy/medieval gear and are armed with what look like one shot black powder weapons or fireworks? Any help identifying these would be gratefully received.

A motley crew of I am guessing post apocalyptic survivers. I know nothing about these other than they are Grenadier, no date, no identifying codes.

 Finally, the only non-Grenadier models, two oldhammer Games Workshop models. On the left,  Lord of Battle in Unicorn Helm and then Stro Knor MaceKiller, from 1987.  For some reason people lap up old school Warhammer, so I might have to part with these.

I must admit, at first glance I thought a lot of this was going to the Father in Law to melt down for re-casting, but actually there are a couple of nice models here. More to add to the to do pile then!