Saturday 29 August 2015

Hobby Update

I've been a bit quiet recently, but I've been working away on the hobby side of things. This will be a bit of a general update on what's been happening.

Working out how some of my armies need to adapt for Kings of War has been an interesting process. Some of my armies are really not where I would want them to be - for instance my Dwarfs, who simply don't have the right unit sizes in the right places, and currently have no models to use for Brock Riders or Earth Elementals. Clearly they need some work, but I've already earmarked them for attention during Duelling Paintbrushes, so I guess steps are already being taken there. 

My Orcs, Elves and Empire are in better shape, thanks mainly to the size of the armies. They cover most potential short-comings through sheer weight of numbers. There are still things that need to be addressed, however. The main problem for my Empire is the Horde unit size for missile troops. I didn't have a single coherent regiment of 40 Crossbowmen, Handgunners or Archers. This is not really surprising, given it's a completely impractical unit in Warhammer. Too many of the models in such a unit wouldn't get to shoot. Anyway, it's an option I now want. So I set about increasing one of my Handgunner units to a 10x4 formation.
40 Handgunners, complete with a 15-man unit filler.
A slightly more overhead view.
Pretty sure the guy standing in front drew the short straw during deployment.
The unit filler is another of my wagons. For this one they have dropped the side of the wagon and mounted a Helblaster Volley Gun on some sort of swively base. The cloth (flag?) next to it suggests that the thing was concealed until shortly before it was needed.
The master gunner and the ammo dude. Presumably the latter is kept very busy, given all the trays of ammunition all around him.
The back side of the model. It's pretty simple in terms of detail, and adds little colour to the unit. This time it doesn't even have a horse attached. I figure you probably wouldn't want a horse hooked up when you opened fire with the Volley Gun. And that helped keep the footprint down a little.
A few weeks ago we had a couple of friends from Germany staying with us, and one of them expressed interest in what was involved in painting all these models. It happened to be painting night, so she sat down and had a go at painting a Dwarf to match one of my existing schemes. In hindsight this was probably a really tough introduction to painting models, rather than just going with whatever colours and approaches she felt comfortable with. I'm used to all my 3-layer highlighting methods and potentially fiddly approaches, but it was difficult to explain some of them on the fly. Ultimately she did very well.
The guy on the right was what she was aiming for. I've seen a lot worse first attempts at painting a model. Well done, Tina! Next time I'll find you a scheme that uses more washes...
Whilst she was working away on the Dwarf (he took her a few hours to complete) I agreed to tackle something a bit larger, so knocked out an old Citadel Dragon. I have plans to get 5 or 6 of these little older Dragons together with riders to serve as a Horde of Drakon Riders. I guess the rider bit will come later.
A creature of the 1980s - the Dragon Master dragon. That's a 50mm base, so he's not tiny even if he is a bit small compared to a modern plastic version.
Speaking of modern plastic Dragons, do you think he bears more than a passing resemblance to the current plastic High Elf Dragon model?
Except this guy has more "dental attitude" than the more modern equivalent.
In truth I've found some of these older Dragons slightly difficult to paint. They often lack clear detail or obvious places to change colours. Whatever; he's perfectly serviceable for a 3 hour paint job.
In other news, Axemaster is coming up on the 12th and 13th of September. It had been declared to be an Age of Sigmar event when the new game appeared, however a lack of attendees has prompted a mad scramble to change it back to 8th edition. The change saw over 20 people confirmed in a rush of about 48 hours. It's unlikely to be a big event, but at least it didn't have to be cancelled (which is what would have had to happen if it stayed with AoS, it seems). So now I have about a week to work out what I am going to use.

19 comments:

  1. That unit filler is genius nice work!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cheers. Although a friend had almost the exact same idea, so I think declaring it genius might be slightly generous. :)

      Delete
  2. I like the organ gun - though the obsessive compulsive side of me wants to move it to the middle of the unit, and the front row (so you wouldn't blow the head off the guy in the front the first turn (or have the three guys in front of it kneeling).

    Even with it bothering me by not being centered it is a beautiful piece.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I could always relocate it to a more practical location. My general habit of placing any fillers further back to maintain a normal front rank won through when I was setting them up for the photos.

      Delete
  3. All hail the glorious green dragon!
    So the masters of axes have abandoned AoS then? I guess this means we will not be seeing my planned mighty army of 30 generic Goblins being crushed utterly at the tourney...
    Obviously, you should take an army containing every dragon you have access to. Yes. All of them. No matter how illegal that is in 8th ed.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Excellent volley gun wagon (reminds me of The Outlaw Josey Wales).

    With your knack for unit fillers, I can see lots of potential in a KoW army - would you be tempted to go for a full 20/40/60 base diorama?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I doubt it, unless something in particular inspired me. Everything I work on will ideally be usable in both Warhammer and Kings of War. A full diorama unit would only really work in Warhammer if it was then swallowed up in an even larger unit to allow some shifts in formation, removal of casualties etc.

      Of course, if anyone was ever going to be stupid enough to drop a unit of 200 Halberdiers on the table (with a mere 60 stuck on a single base) it would probably be me...

      Delete
  5. Disappointing that your friend's first attempt looks better than my average fayre

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hahaha she was very diligent in going back and trying things again when she showed me something and I looked uncertain. I think I am a dreadful taskmaster.

      Delete
  6. So, when do we get to see a Kings of War battle report here? Soon, I hope?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, soon. I am somewhat delayed by my rulebook not having arrived yet. Oh, and having had another knee reconstruction. So I am slow in general at the moment.

      Delete
  7. Bring on 8th Axemaster (both myself and a mate are now attending).

    #8th4lyf

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, it will be fun. Now I just need to try to decide what to use.

      Delete
    2. Something that won't nuke a vampire lord on a dragon ;).

      Delete
  8. Wow, fantastic paint job, the organ gun is awesome, beautiful work sir...and blog!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Where did the cart for the Hellblaster come from?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's 3D printed. I put together a model using Sketchup and then a friend with a basic 3D printer made it up for me. I've now made 4 wagons using the same model, just varying how I assemble and arrange it. Have a look here: http://hoodlinghole.blogspot.com.au/2012/12/print-your-wagon.html#more

      Delete
  10. Hi...what do you think about 9th Age Warhammer Fb? Sorry for offtop, but how about seeing your army by using swede rules? http://www.the-ninth-age.com/index.php?simple-page/

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I haven't bothered to look at 9th Age in detail. It's only really relevant if people start running tournaments using the rules. If I'm not planning on entering a Warhammer tournament, 8th edition works well enough and I already have all the material I need. Whether I will attend 8th ed, 9th Age or Kings of War tournaments going forward, that remains to be seen.

      Delete