Halloweekend 2016 pics

The weekend before Halloween I had some friends over for a bit of historical/horror Mordheim. Warbands from all over Europe had been pursuing witches and vampires, and all the monsters had converged on a remote Carpathian town for unknown, but presumably dire, purpose. The hunters formed a makeshift alliance, and assaulted the village from all directions to cleanse the evil gathered within.

Sorry, no hobby content in this one

The most powerful military in the world, not to mention any number of intelligence agencies and other federal resources, will soon be under the command of a gibbering fascist. Perhaps I will cease to post here, as I divert my time and money to activism and protest. Perhaps my posting rate will increase markedly, as I delve into escapism to insulate myself from the suffering and misery of my fellow Americans (and, frankly, the rest of humanity). I don't know.

But just in case: been nice knowing you! Thanks for all the views and comments!

Painted peasants

Two more units to go...

easing back into historicals...

You can never have too many peasants! At least, not if you're look to recreate the Khmelnitsky rebellion. Here's a quick shot of some peasants prior to painting. These minis are all Gripping Beast Dark Age Warriors, with only a few Gripping Beast Arab bits mixed in. And also some greenstuff obviously. Note the agricultural flails made of spear hafts and jewelry chain.

Mystery Project: demystified!

It's a new Guildball team!

Sorry to disappoint anyone hoping for more historicals, I'm working on some stuff, but it's all pretty much stalled until I can get ahold of some proper spraypaint.This is harder than sounds, because it's illegal to sell spraypaint in the City of Chicago, and the game store I sometimes go to outside the city doesn't stock it, and the art supply store they directed me to only had spraypaint in some weird expensive formulation that smells a little better then normal spraypaint but also clogs faster than any other brand I've ever seen. Soon, though, hopefully!

So, here they are, the Candlestick Makers Guild.

Some backstory: The team is inspired by a dumb joke I couldn't get out of my head. When I started working on the Butchers team, I mentioned that I was looking forward to the release of the Bakers and Candlestick Makers, a reference to the nursery rhyme Rub-a-dub-dub. In addition to creating this team, I also have plans to convert a Brewers Guild team into a Bakers Guild Team, mostly just by adding chef's hats and converting weapons.

Now, Guildball is a very carefully balanced game, with lots of synergies and trade-offs built into each team's options. It would take a huge amount of work to actually design a new guild team that would integrate into the existing game without being over- or under-powered. So, both of my "new" teams are just going to use existing rules. The Bakers are just going to use the Brewers rules along with their models.

But I had to get more creative with the Candlestick Makers. The existing team that has the most to do with smoke and fire and metal is the Alchemists, but their miniatures didn't look at all what I had in mind, way too steampunk. So I'm using Alchemist rules, but converting Reaper Fantasy minis to represent the players. I tried to make each Candlestick Maker at least a little bit reminiscent of the Alchemist whose rules they use, both in appearance and name (though the naming is still a work in progress for some of them).

Here is the "starter set" of fire guy, season one captain, and other lady. Their alchemist counterparts are Mercury, Midas and Calculus, so I want to call them Menorah, Tarnish and Candelabra, but the way the conversions and rules worked out don't really support those names. In practice, I'm probably going to call that middle dude Jean Valjean because it totally looks like he's just stealing that candlestick...

These are Vigil (based off Venin, a skinny spooky guy), Draco (Naja, a mascot cobra), and Girandole (Vitriol, a lady with a big thwacking stick). I may remove Draco's wings, since Naja can't fly, but overall I am quite pleased with how these three turned out. I suppose this is a good time to point out that a bunch of these conversions use pieces from the "Treasure and Candleabra" Reaper mini pack.

Here is Kirion (Katalyst, big muscular guy), Snuff (Smoke, same model), and Alloy (Compound, big fat guy). Snuff is the only actual Guildball model on the whole team. She's a great one-piece mini, only converted by adding a snuffer to her left hand. The original mini is releasing smoke from an alchemical flask, I wanted to suggest that this one is generating smoke from a snuffed candle. Even her cowl/hood thing matches the aesthetic that the rest of this team seems to have.

I haven't decided on a color scheme for sure, but I think white and yellow would look neat. No one else in my group has a team colored like that, and yellow is an obvious color for a team associated with candles, and when researching different styles and traditions of candle-holding devices, a lot of pictures also had religious vestments in those colors. So actually, I guess I pretty much have decided on a color scheme...

Last of the Butchers

(at least until Vet Brisket is released)

Sorry about the terrible picture quality. My phone is on its last legs...

Mini Mystery Project

I have successfully moved, and am making good progress on unpacking. I need a few more furniture items before I can properly get my hobby affairs sorted, but that didn't stop me from picking up some figures for a new mystery project...