Fraternite

Hail, my fellow wargamers.

I once again wish to avail you of my wargaming news.

The Brotherhood (Sci-fi, Warpath Rebel - an upcoming - Faction )

Today (well, yesterday), my box of Victrix french arrived.



Its a big box of miniatures.

These models will be used to represent the regiments/contingents of the nation of Parisia, from the planet of Albia, who fight with their brothers in the Brotherhood beside and for the forge-fathers, in mantic's new game Warpath.

Parisia, Albia, and the Brotherhood are all my creations. I originally created the brotherhood as a way to use my Adeptus mechanicus army from 40k in Warpath, but it has since become so much more.

This is where the Napoleonic's come in. I needed a relatively cheap way to get masses and masses of troops onto the battlefield. Being a longtime history buff of all ages and era's, I came up with an idea when I saw Victrix release their Austrians. It sparked my memory to remind me that historical miniatures for the period exist.

For the longest time I had thought of Napoleonic, and indeed the early history of black powder warfare, as idiotic and foppish with all the garish iconography, colors, and massed blocks of troops shooting at each other. All this chaged around 1 and a half years ago.

I have also been a massive fan of military organization. Around that time I found out while doing research that the corps organization and above really came about during the period of intense conflict known as the Napoleonic age. For some reason that little nugget of information was the thing that sparked a year and a half of research, reading, and exploration into the period and that directly preceding it.

With rediscovering all the miniatures from companies like Victrix, Foundry, Perry, Warlord, and yes even Wargames factory (the War of the Spanish Succession mini's) and seeing how dirt cheap they were comparatively with, say, imperial guardsmen from Games Workshop I decided that this was the way to get my troops.

As such I have been working on the back-story for the brotherhood, as well as its composite armies for a long time. The actual foundations of the background have been changed, fine tuned, and flipped about several times, but I have now come up (with the help of good friends like a certain Robert Alexander) something that I think my needs and my tastes. I am also writing a book that explores the earliest days of my new order.

Moving on from my tangent on background (sorry about that)I would like to show what greeted me upon removal of the packaging:



Quite a lot of plastic is in that pile. 8 sprues amounting to 60 figures, plus extra arms and such. Quite a good value for money at $30 American.

However, there is always a problem. The one that cropped up here is good and bad.

In short, I ran out of bases.

However I was able to get six built, including: A company commander, a staff sergeant, Drummer (Who i affectionatly named Pierre, he's making a "My hat is bigger than yours" look with his moustache), standard bearer, and 2 grenadiers.



And there you have it. Join me tomorrow (hopefully) As I start work on some Mantic Revenant knights.

technical difficulties

i.e. I'm way too sleepy to type. We will return tommorow (if possible, but probably) with a post entitled "Fraternite"

I'll just let you make of that what you will... ;)

Max

The 101rst

Hello once again readers,

Today, I wanted to blog about my local gaming group, and what i will be slowly doing over the next couple of weeks/months as a side project.

The 101st historical gaming division operates from the Titusville campus of Brevard Community College in Brevard County, Florida. This semester, we began by making Flames of War, a game by Battlefront, and one of our core or "staple" games.

Of course, we left the rest of the thousand myriad game systems out there available to be played, provided the membership wishes it so. Basically this allows any game to be played during our Thursday meetings, but if it is not a core game we can't vouch for you past closing of the campus and such.

At our biweekly/monthly Monday meetings, where official club business is discussed, members are welcome to speak about games they like and if they wish to make them a staple game. They must present a logical reason to making the game a core system for the club, and then the suggestion is put to a vote of the membership. This all sounds terribly drab and boring, but in effect, we are college students. We have fun with it.

As Secretary, it is my job to write down these official proceedings. From now on I will also endeavor to take pictures and post our goings on as "field reports from the 101st" on this blog. Consider it a "segment" like on a TV show.

Anywho, due to my suggestion, we have taken up Dark heresy, the 40k role playing game as one of our staples. I happen to own a copy of the core rule book, so setup was easier. However, we are still all learning the system, and developing our characters.

Despite this, the sessions we have had have been engaging, fun, and humor-filled. there have been close calls, bludgeonings by half-naked thugs, and many cries of "FOR THE EMPRAH!"

Over the course of the next few weeks, I will post about what happened during our adventures that week, and a short summary about 1 of the characters in our party.

Over the next couple of months, I will be making several variations on my personal characters model for use during combat "encounters" as well as provide background in the form of journal scribblings and other assorted fluff.

Till then though, I must bid you Adieu.

As a parting shot, please spread word about this blog to all the gamers in your community. The efforts I undertake are all meant to garner some sort of feedback, whether good or bad.

Hello There Wargamers!

Hello everyone,

Over the past few years I have tried to start a wargaming blog several times. Each of those times what I did didn't didn't feel right to me. This august, having started college, I began work on studying what exactly I wanted to do with a blog.

Namely the Blog had to be scale, genre, and army impartial. I wanted to have a broad focus so I can show all my works instead of just one part. To that end all model posts will have their genre in bold beside them.

This is the fruit of that small labor. Hopefully I'll have a good time, and you will enjoy it too!


Skeleton bowmen (Fantasy)
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These models are a conversion of the following kits:

Mantic Games Skeleton Warriors

Wargames Factory Persian Infantry

The only Item taken from the Wargames Factory kit was the quiver with bow/arrows. This relatively simple conversion makes interesting skeleton models into a feasible looking missile troop.

This was also my first experience with the dipping technique. Dipping involves basecoating your model, then using a "dip" to provide definition. I used Minwax Polyshades Antique Walnut. This stain is usually used to finish carpentry projects and contains polyurethane.

The polyurethane provides the "glossy" finish you see. This is easily fixed with a Matte varnish, which at this time has not been applied. Polyurethane also provides a primary layer of protection for the paint, making it very hard for said paint to chip off when fully varnished.

Problems dipping with this type of shade, specifically one normally used for wood finishing, is that wood stains are normally oil based. Polyshades is a water based product, which makes it easy to get off your hands if you mess up as well as not covering your models in an oily sheen.

The finished models will be shown in a later post, but for now here is a picture of the unbased and unvarnished miniatures (The human wizard shown is part of the living section of my undead army. An Oxymoron which will be explained later):