2013 Round-Up (just 19 days late...)

Hi guys - I've been meaning to write this post for a couple of weeks now but I have only just gotten around to it! A quick recap of what I got upto in 2013 and my next post will cover my current projects and my plans going forward...

The most important part of 2013 (with regards to my blog) is that GAMES ARE BEING PLAYED! It's difficult to underestimate how good this is - I've been "back in the hobby" for 5 or so years now, but even before my break in wargaming, I rarely played (once or less a year, despite having multiple armies!). In the latter half of 2013 I played multiple games of Flying Lead and Songs of Blades and Heroes - I've been planning out games and settings for years and it was a great feeling to see my painted miniatures and terrain on the table! I even got a couple of my non-wargaming friends to start playing (my housemate and another of my best friends) and, most importantly, they kept asking for more battles!

I've actually gotten a really decent amount of figures completed this year for various different projects and I got stuck into my zomb-apoc stuff during October with Zomtober 2013 - here are a few examples of things completed this year:

Michonne and her two "camoflage" zombies - I'm very fond of her paintjob - she was a gift to myself when I'd finished half of my Studio Miniatures plastic zombie horde! Painted as part of Zomtober 2013

Chosen Space Marines of The Desolation - In The Emperor's Name

Goblins from The Hobbit - this was a lovely plastic kit! Lots of variety too. They're to be used as devolved humans in Necromunda/Space Hulk/post-apoc

Some Private Military Contractors from Empress Miniatures (sold as SAS, mine have a couple of headswaps) - these are for zomb-apoc

Wasteland Sniper - this guy is intended as a scout/herald for a new (Caesar's Legion-inspired) faction in my post-apoc. Warmachine/Hordes

Misc Studio Miniatures plastic zombies - I did enjoy painting the ones in the prison jumpsuits and the Drive-inspired one in the front! Painted as part of Zomtober 2013

A biker survivor (em4 Miniatures) and misc feral ghouls (Mantic Games plastic zombies). Painted as part of Zomtober 2013

Missing from the round-up are various different figures, an orc and goblin warband (Celtos miniatures, for my fantasy skirmish setting), 19 pirate scum (40k Chaos Cultists), 30 or so plaguebearers (plastics and kitbashes!), more zombies... A good painting year in general!

Xenos Mercs - Guard-Pack pt.2

The rest of the Kraanites, following the scent of their pack-brothers...

The Kraanite pack found in the slums of Araskh is estimated to number between 30-50 hounds, plus their allies - various xenos species are known to work alongside the hounds to provide support. The group is then divided into Hunt-Packs or Guard-Packs depending upon the task assigned to them. Pictured above is the rest of the hounds of the Guard-Pack assigned to protect a number of corporate assets around the sprawling settlement of Groundfall.

Kraanite hounds are tenacious fighters, fiercely loyal to their employers and consumnate scavengers - their weaponry and equipment is often taken from their defeated enemies. This approach works well for the Guard-Pack stationed in Groundfall, as fresh supplies to the settlement are often limited.

These are from the old Cobalt-1 range, now sold here: Ar-Men from Black Hat Miniatures. I have a bunch of other figures from this range - lots of really cool stuff - nice aliens to add to your 40k skirmishes.

Xenos Mercs - Guard-Pack pt.1

Part of the pack, picking up the scent of their target.

The dog-soldiers of the Kraan Cluster are a mercenary formation operating on the frontier worlds of the Eastern Fringe. From time to time, Rogue Traders have been observed hiring Kraanite Hounds for the added protection a pack can provide on-world. Whilst in the greater Imperium, a citizen found to be conversing or living alongside xenos could expect a swift punishment, things are a little more lenient out of sight of the Ecclesiarchy or Arbites...

On the turbulent planet of Araskh, a Kraanite pack has operated as guards for various merchant interests over the past several years. Through use of translator tech built into their harnesses they are able to communicate with the various races that make up the shantytowns bordering the worlds major settlements.

These are from the old Cobalt-1 range, now sold here: Ar-Men from Black Hat Miniatures. They're lovely sculpts by Bob Naismith, with a real Rogue Trader feel. I left these stock - I couldn't think of anything I wanted to add to them. These will be joined by another three and a heavy hitter, as mercenaries in my wasteland setting.

Expanding the Shanty

These "Refugee Huts" from GameCraft Miniatures look brilliant! Almost like they've been constructed from leftover parts of a spaceship (I think that's probably the idea). I'd love to get a couple to add to my terrain collection. Maybes as a gift to myself in the future?

Has anyone tried these out yet?

Wasteland Town - Shack 4

The last of the shanty buildings - this one uses one part of the recycled cardboard packaging that you can see on this entry on Terrain From Junk (the other blog I write for) as well as one of the camper vans reclaimed in this article.

I added various parts, including plastic tubing, plasticard scraps and corrugated card and turned the remains of the camper into an extension of the building.

The side of the building, with waste pipe - I should really add some sort of gunk to it...

I plan on adding a bunch of posters to these pieces. Posters for wasteland circuses, propaganda, wanted posters etc. - I think they'll add a lot to the lived-in feel and really dress up some of the more boring sides...

Wasteland Town - Shack 3

I've shown this shanty previously - it's a refuelling station for the most common sort of vehicles and machinery in my post-apocalyptic world.

The last pictures didn't show the sign, or the various little bits of graffiti covering the building.

Water tanks at the side, as well as some fuel drums.

Ladders round the back, leading upto the roof of the shack...

The "chill-out area" hidden behind the shanty sign. Beers, socialist propaganda and a pack of smokes!

The building has been patched together with all sorts of junk - I love these roadsigns I got in a kids playset!

Wasteland Town - Camper

Better pictures of the campervan from the wasteland town - showing off the slightly different colours of the blue-ish grey on both sides of the van.

Also showing one of my favourite miniatures - a crotch-grabbing punk from the Mad Puppet Miniatures range. Used alongside my Escher gang.

Wasteland Town - Shack 2

Another of the recently finished shanty buildings - this one is based around an abandoned/damaged armoured personnel carrier that has been converted into an extension for the dwelling...

I'd been given a busted up Rhino from a forum friend a while back - he'd done quite a bit on the Rhino, rebuilding the sides with cardboard (he'd bought it very cheap second hand, minus the sides and tracks...) and I finished it off by adding various bits. I'd decided straight away that I wanted to use it for terrain rather than in my Space Marine army.

I combined the Rhino with some packing cardboard, adding some props from foamboard, various other gubbins and a door from corrugated card and coffee stirrers...

The chimney stacks on the roof are plastic tubing and rectangles of scrap plasticard and the window is another side sponson hatch from a Predator kit.

Pretty happy with this one! Lets hope the Marines don't come and ask for it back...

Wasteland Town - Shack 1

 

I finished the last few shanty buildings the other night - this was the first that I built and remains my favourite.

It's a foamboard shell covered in various textures of card (mainly corrugated) with some fairly solid packing card for the roof. The front door is from the GW Cities of Death kit (cut down yet still massive!) and the dilapidated couch out front is from Black Cat Bases. I-beam has been used in various points around the building as supports.

The rear shows a ladder to the roof (a Hexplatformer piece) and a roadsign (from a kids construction set I picked up for the vehicle). 

Odds and ends from various sources have been used - the window on the side is from a Rhino kit, there is a random toy robotic claw and a claw from a "Kryptonite Capture" (or something along those lines) Superman toy covered in chained down tarps. The theme behind the shack was that it was home to a robotics engineer.

There's another roadsign on the other side, plus a component from a Leman Russ kit.


I've also taken some better pictures of the two shanties I completed earlier - I'll post about them in the near future.

Thug Life.

Ganger and hired scum hanging around the entrance of a wasteland shack...


I've recently finished off the painting-in-progress shanty terrain I had been working on and managed to take some quite nice photos - these will be appearing over the next few days, with some battle reports planned at some point!

Shanty Camper

Finished another piece of terrain - the most simple of the additions to the shanty - a dilapidated van that has been turned into one gentleman's humble abode.

This is one of the recycled camper vans that I salvaged and made various amendments to - I covered all of the windows and tyre hubs in to create a more "lived in" and less "been abandoned for a while" feell.

The camper was undercoated black, then a sponge was used to basecoat it. From there I did various weathering (again using the sponge) and washed a crappy orangey/brown rust into various crevices. I was extremely pleased with the speed I could paint it with the sponge - took me about an hour to get it mostly finished. I still want to add graffiti - I'm planning on doing this for the 5 pieces of shanty terrain together.

Rubble Piles

If there's one thing I don't like on a post-apocalyptic terrain board, it's lack of rubble. Where's all the crap leftover from the war gone? Has the post-apoc revolutionary clean-up committee been around to hoover up all the rubble, to make the wastes nice and tidy?

That being said, too much rubble and it's difficult to get miniatures to stay upright. This is my solution for my terrain collection - piles of rubble that will fit nicely in one of the earlier ruined buildings. I'd made these around the same time, but they got put to one side until I started on the jungle again - I came across them whilst searching for odds and ends for the new terrain. They're also partly inspired by The Last of Us, a PS3 game that was previewed at the recent E3. Loved the swampy/overgrown post-apoc city, thought I'd add some greenery to these!

Welcome to the Jungle: Redux

I finally got around to working on some more jungle terrain for my collection! I recently found the laser-cut terrain templates from East Riding Miniatures whilst trawling the net and loved the idea! The main thing about putting out a load of these was actually carving up their bases (tedious without a fretsaw, plus rather messy!) so these are great.

These are the "Medium" bases - I was a bit worried that they were rather small when I first opened up the package on Friday, but I'm really happy with them!

The bases used above are the "Small" bases - I had the same worry with these, that they were a bit too small to be used, but they've worked out really well when cluttered with stuff. For all of the new bases I've used some combination of natural cork, aquarium plants, lotus seed heads plus a bunch of rocks that I picked up in my grandma's garden a few years ago. Feels kinda cool to use them here!

These are some rubble piles I created a while back as a sort of "insert" for the ruins I made earlier - I do intend to go back to the ruins and finish my plan to build another 6 or so. The idea behind these is for flexibility and to avoid the whole "Hey guys, someone ruddy cleaned up the whole wasteland after bombing the shite out of it!"-look that you can sometimes see...

I've been adding plaster to these, to cover up the hot glue used - I've also just finished adding gravel and sand to all of the 12 new bases

Radio Ga Ga

I found this little radio whilst digging through some boxes of gubbinz over the weekend - I added it to the shanty before painting! The shanty roof now seems like a pretty nice place to hang out!

Terrain Detailing

I had a suggestion from a forum user recently - to add some empty cans around the sofa atop one of the shanty town buildings I'd made - I liked this idea very much and managed to find soda cans and street litter from Black Cat Bases bits and pieces range. Pictured is the cans and other bits added to the dilapidated sofa! They were rather fiddly to clean up, but I reckon they look rather nice!

Justice Department Strike Team complete!

 In my quickest purchase-to-painted turnaround in ages, I have finished my Justice Department Strike Team!

Judge Dredd.

Judge Woodward.

Judge Newcombe.

Med-Judge Len.

Tek-Judge Ashford.

Cadet-Judge Aspen.

Comments most welcome! These will be thrown against my post-apoc raiders and scavengers, as well as various Necromunda gangs (Orlocks and Eschers). They'll be fighting in the Cursed Earth or on a frontier world. I'm rather happy with them - I received them last Tuesday (22nd May) and they were finished last night, which is a very good turnaround for me!

I'm now working on the shanty terrain I built a few weeks back - I want to get them and my terrain mat pretty much done on my next rotation off!

Justice Department - Painting In Progress

My Justice Department team are coming along nicely - this is after they received a spray of Dullcote earlier tonight (Agrax Earthshade, the new version of Devlan Mud from Citadel, left them rather glossy). All that's left is final highlights and basing and I'm done - I received the majority of these last Tuesday, so I'm pretty happy with the turnaround!