dem bones dem bones

ok everyone knows the physics defying scythe wielding skeletons. for me the nostalgia kicks in when I see these. they are stupid. but look great all the same. and in fact I cant be arsed writing anymore cuz im not sure anyone even reads any of this crap. so ill just give you the picture instead.

crap picture, covered in dusty shit on not very good painted models...but painted none the less.

four silhouettes stepped from the shadows.

well. actually only one for now.

"Let me present Zanrath, High Mage of Sarako. An ancient bearded man wearing a pointed hat and carrying a staff topped with a crescent moon."

so for me. this guy is a bad guy. but looks more like a stereotypical hero wizard, Gandalf's little brother!, generic empire grand mage. whatever, he doesn't fit the mold for me personally
I was fairly happy with this paint job until I took pictures of it. my dreaded poor photography skills blighting me once again! the colours aren't quite showing as they do to the human eye.
I've chosen for the none generic figures that I wouldn't go with the dip method in order to help them stand out. weather or not that is a stand out in a bad way or not ill leave for when im finished hehe.

also I cant paint metallic to save my life. I want to try my hand and NMM. but fear itll end up looking even worse. maybe I should just concentrate on finding a better technique for taking pictures and then maybe I might just be half the way there.
again any help on the picture front would be most appreciated.

Chaos sorcerer

the witch lord proxy, skeletor, chaos sorcerer call him whatever you want. I've always loved this model. its a kind of a quintessential chaos bad guy look. I've seen some great conversions of this as well as various skeletor repaints, but for me I went with the classic look on the box.

I didn't do a bad job on this. not great, but not bad. id originally painted this with enamel paint back in the day. and painted this sometime last year before learning of the wonders of Dettol paint removal. but regardless its another figure chalked off.

Zombies

ok these ones are the only so far out of the minions that I haven't dipped in army painter. at all. I did these a while ago but recently rebased them. I always thought these looked good. they look a lot better in front of me than they do on my pictures. I think I'm still having issues taking photos and all peoples pictures seem to be flawless in comparison to mine. its kind of frustrating and a little disheartening considering my skills are limited at best to see my creations knocked down a peg even further with my poor ability to take decent pictures. but any way ill stop feeling sorry for myself now and give you a look.

you may see I've used anti shine again and also fallen foul of the dreaded dust monster. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong here as I've tried various methods to prevent this, but my results are a little torn between two extremes. that dust isn't visible to the naked eye either which frustrates me even more with digital cameras he he (I'm still feeling sorry for myself aren't I?)
here's a closer glimpse too

DUSTY!!!!!!!

regardless of my results im getting closer and closer to finally finishing something I started as a wee little nipper more than 20 odd years ago with a few tins of enamel paints. maybe by the time im 60 I will actually achieve what I always planned to do. and that is to create my own deluxe edition encased within its own treasure chest!

here come the green skins!

so I've finally managed to of succeeded in a quest that's took since the release of Heroquest.
and that's painting all of the monsters (still need to paint the heroes and wizards of morcar and also will be posting up the other bad guys over the next week or so)
but my approach was simple...since seeing army painters dip methods I knew this was the only thing that would honestly gee me up enough to get off my lazy ass and finally finish them. so all of the monsters and henchmen I've posted up so far have predominantly been given a dipping. and that suite follows here with all of the greenskins (ok fimir don't count, but still they are green so who cares right?)

anyways again the paint jobs aren't anything special. they were given their base coats and simply just dipped with army painter. I then rusted up some of the weapons later on. but really it was that simple.
results wise. they aren't going to be even getting a 5 on CMON. but what they do do is look tidy enough to be sitting prettily on the game board during any session. no longer will I have the solid coloured plastics sitting on my board. I now have these babies!!

 Goblins

 again im not really happy with my pictures...way too much glare. and I hate it when a picture shows up all the sloppiness (yes I admit my guilt,,, it happens...get over it :))

but again heroquest goblins are a bench mark. classic models, classic look, awful paint jobs hehe.

but like I say..finally painted! so the quality level doesn't matter.

 

Orcs

same method here applied. as you can see. this army painter stuff works. it gives an adequate level of quality with minimal time spent. I do have a little problem with the anti shine spray that army painter provide. I'm now on my second can of this stuff. and my second can I am getting results i'm not very happy with. all of these models were given a second coat of watered down matt acrylic varnish.. why you say? after spray these over they are coated with a fine white dust that you cant see with the human eye...... that is until you throw a digital camera in front of them. you may see some left over of this on the bases of the orcs. but at the end of the day ive had to spend a lot more time fixing these up due to this fine dust than I would of hoped for. because my first can I never had this problem at all.

I may be doing something wrong, giving too many coats. im just not sure. I spray them in layers until no shine is left on the models. so I don't know. if anyone has any info on this id be happy to know any ones else's results as ill be doing an article soon with a step by step of using army painters products that I use.

 

Fimir

I've never known what to think of these, they are kind of extinct I believe in games workshops line these days. they are a little comical. but the one thing you know when your playing heroquest is you don't want one of these creeping up as a wandering monster whilst searching that dark corridor.

they deal damage! but look odd in a way I cant describe.

it wasn't until I took this picture that I realised id completely missed the ankle bands on their left legs...oh well. im sure they will survive . Bad me again!

 



men at arms

not the greatest models around. but who can ever knock the clip on weapons of these little guys?
sent into rooms before the heroes as complete cannon fodder! haha
anyways the colour scheme for these I decided to base on my favourite football team (which will remain anonymous out of embarrassing performances of late)
again nothing too special. army painter strong tone dipped then I just touched up the eyes afterwards.
simple methods for simple figures, im resigning any real time and effort for the character models. so all of the monsters and fodder like these guys get the strong tone treatment.
Heck ive had this game over 20 years and only now decided to paint them up. a half decent lick of paint is better than none!

 

 

also id like to add. and it must be pretty evident even after only a few posts. I am awful at taking pictures. I do my best to get a good focused shot. but colours getting brighter and basically mushing out of colour from the original is a big problem. and glare is also another massive problem. no matter what I try on my budget setup I just cant seem to get pictures that im happy with. so if anyone has any tips that would be greatly appreciated. as id love to be able to post pictures that look exactly how I see them to my own naked eye. and don't feel once ive been able to do that.

its pretty frustrating. im no expert on taking snaps and don't claim to be. but surely there has to be a few bullet points I can follow to get better pictures.

please HELP!

Heroquest Mummies

MUMMRAAAAAAA!!!!

er whatever!

OK here's 6 of my HQ mummies. I originally painted these up very simply,
using bleached bone and then washing over with my own magic "dirt mix" ill explain this later on is anyone is concerned if I actually throw dirt onto a model!
I highlighted again with bleached bone. and then painted the skin up with a mixture of green and a flesh colour with a few highlights. I then gave it the army painter dip. and this really set these models off. giving them a dark shaded murky look. my previous wash also adding a nice element of depth to the bandage colour as if left in a dark damp place for years.

they are simple and basic. but fit the mould perfectly for a dungeon lurking bandage wrapped badass....not sure how these ever actually caught people.. but hey. that's the charm and magic!

HeroQuest - Chaos Warriors

most people always say HQ models are awful. I've heard the phrase "mono-pose" "old crappy models" blah blah. but for me this game is where it all started. I know I don't speak for myself either. I feel sorry for anyone that started with anything later than this because for me this was games workshops golden era, adverts on TV?? when have you seen a GW advert on TV? never right?
but say what you want about the figures in Heroquest. because for me this was when the sculpts were crammed full of character! these days its all about levels of detail and how well cast something is. I never cared about that when I was 12. I just wanted cool looking figures. 20 odd years later. after originally painting these with enamel paints (urghh cmon didn't we all think that was the right paint at first?)
I repainted them!

ok these aren't crammed full of character like I mentioned previously. but still they have character! for me and for many this is what a chaos warrior should look like. kind of like if you ask someone to draw something or describe something, they always describe in a stereotypical manner.
these are your stereotypical chaos warriors. and the fact that they set such a bench mark must say something for the design and the quality of them right?
They possess charm which is something I see a lot less these days, even if technically and detail wise todays counterparts are more superior I guess ill always hold a strong nostalgic bond to my roots with this hobby. and Heroquest on a whole, are my roots!

anyways the 2 on the left I painted using the dip method using "army painter deep tone" which I will soon be doing a little review and a step by step of to give my thought and hopefully give others some insight on it as a product. the 2 on the right I painted in a bold cartoony sort of look.
none of them are ground breaking. but they are no longer covered in enamel paint.and are colourful and bold on the game board......that's all you need right?

also the purple one I converted at about the age of 12 and glued lots of spike on him...why I don't know, but I thought it looked cool. so I kept them on there.:)

that's it for now. will hopefully run through some more over the next few days

peace

DESCENT into crappy models!!!

Ok! lets get this straight. I like this game a lot. my family likes this game a lot. but on a whole. the models that come with Descent journeys in the dark 2nd edition. are to say the least...bloody awful.

size wise id say they are about 20mm scale maybe. so they are quite a bit smaller. they lack character beyond belief. and the material they are made out of I think is also used to make car tires..it is barely plastic and feels cheap and flimsy. out of the box I had a total of 3 broken figures and pretty much 80% of them were warped and out of shape. This was fixed by dipping them in hot water for a few seconds. warping back to correct shape, then dunking them into cold water. this worked for the best part. but sadly the models are still crappy.

Rant aside. this is a great game. it ISN'T a dungeon crawler. I've seen many describe it as that. but quite simply. IT IS NOT!

-there is no exploration.

-very little searching of pre plotted search markers.

That to me are two major point of what makes a dungeon crawler. "Lurking through the hidden depths of the unknown, finding an old boot in the dark dank corner of a room, finding a glowing ancient gem that radiates with an unknown glow, as from behind looms an ogre ready to slam his club into the back of the heroes skull."

This sadly will never happen in Descent 2nd edition.

What you do get is a very tightly packed strategic set of plots that feed together as an excellent and fun campaign.

Each quest is set out in a provided quest book and play out, leading into the next quest that can be determined with advantages to the heroes or the overlord (GM) based on who won the previous quest.

this is a great way to string together the quests and give purpose to winning the set quests the heroes enthral!

also quests get chosen in a series based on who won, to give many different and varied ways to play out the featured campaign. kind of like the old lone wolf/choose your own adventure books that I loved in the 80's. for me personally this is an excellent format that not only gives nostalgia to those books but helps the players forge the campaign as they go. take note designers...ill have me some more of that!

so in a nutshell what is descent?

-strategic quest themed board game.

-lots of killing.

-lots of arguments about what move to make (as mentioned its a tight strategic game so 1 mistake could lose you the quest)

-great campaign play.

-nice simple element for travelling to the next quest.

Would I recommend this game?? hell yes its great fun.

what would Improve?? - the god damn awful figures of course! hehe

anyways here's a few shots of some of my painted up figures (they are not fun to paint either, take note of the unfinished bases!! I simply got bored and stopped)

Ashrian & Avric Albright

Tomble Burrowell & Jain Fairwood

Merriod's (don't know the plural)

and hope you enjoyed my first little blog!
hope I wasn't too harsh on the game, but I like to give a varied opinion. slate where it needs slating and praise where its due!
and feel I gave both. if you disagree. let me know your thought please!

peace!!

now go buy the game!! hehe