+ inload: IVth legion infantry revival +

+ The air is hazy with fallout. When his autosenses kick back in, his hood fizzes and pops with white dots. For a moment, he has the clearest memory of his childhood; snowfall on Olympia. +

+ He shakes his head. The killsight is simply picking up irradiated dust kicked up by the explosion.+

+ The explosion. It has killed him. There is no pain, but his organs – birth-organs and gift-organs alike – have been flash-cooked. +

+ He reaches out hesitantly with his unpinned hand. Both he and the other Astartes, prone beside him, are corpse-white with marble dust; identical in hue. The remaining fingertips of his de-powered gauntlet tremble. They touch the other's plate, the textured nub-ends of his fingers haltingly clearing rivulets of dust. +

+ It reveals both his dark iron colours and the rich yellow heraldry of his companion. The other shudders, like an engine turning over. There is a bitter edge to the action. The reaching out is not an act of solidarity in death; not of forgiveness, nor a plea for mercy. +

+ With his fingers touching the others' plate, the micro-vibrations of his voice will be transmitted even through depowered armour. It is the only way he can get the other to hear. +

+ Will he offer a benediction? A eulogy? An attempt to explain? +

+ No. +

'You and I are earth.'

+ More Iron Warriors infantry – built from a variety of parts. +

+ The Siegebreaker is on the left here. +

+ inload: PBI +

+ Poor Bloody Infantry: Return of the Officia Monstrosa +

+ The past couple of months has been a fallow period for my hobbying, with very little time at my desk. Yesterday saw a free green shoots of creativity, as I got carried away assembling more models for my Iron Warriors army:

+ Pictured here are a number of Tactical/Despoiler marines. I've also got five more bodies that are either going to bulk out the multimelta squad – will I be the first person with a ten-melta Heavy Support squad? – or will be scattered about as Rapier crewmen, additional Tacticals, and similar 'filling' roles. +

+ At the front is a chap with a vulture on his arm. I think he's destined to be a Siege Breaker... +

+ Tallowlands Invitational III +

+ The season so far +

+ It's been an exciting start to the season, with four matches played and a number of touchdowns. More importantly, lots of casualties! + 

+ If you don't want to hear the results, then look away now. +

+ Zamstak's matches +

• [3] Ulfheim Undjedhi (H) v Slough Wyrms [1]
• [0] Chanterwick Unathletic (H) v Miami Dauphins [2]

+ Sonntak's matches +

• [1] Slough Wyrms (H) v Chanterwick Unathletic [2]
• [0] Cripple Peak Stranglers (H) v Ulfheim Undjedhi [2]

+++

+ The Invitational kicked off with a strong victory for Ulfheim Undjedhi, whose valiant opponents – the Slough Wyrms – ensured this was a crowdpleaser, with four touchdowns scored. The match was characterised by some brutal head-first tackles, resulting in a startling number of players knocking both themselves and their opponents out. +

+ The team of necromantic horrors proved surprisingly versatile, with new signing Annakin Gravewalker turning a desperate defence into a with a long and successful – not to mention surprising! – pass. Gravewalker is clearly one to watch, with a perfect record of three completions in three attempts. +

+++

+ The other match on Zamstak, played at Chanterwick's Quadrangle stadium, saw the home team unable to hold against the Dauphin's solid play. A slow, grinding match, the two human teams – one a touring Bretonnian mob – were evenly matched for much of the game, until Dan Marineaux of the Dauphins recovered the ball near his own try line and began blitzing his way up the entire length of the pitch to score. +

+ One touchdown behind at halftime, and with the home team receiving, Unathletic came out aggressively; but the Dauphin's defence proved too sturdy for the Chanterwick boys. A series of increasingly desperate attempts to clear space were stymied, with Jimmy Turnpike left holding the ball deep in his own half. With Bretonnian players closing in, Turnpike eventually fumbled the throw and was taken down. The Miami Dauphins quickly capitalised to end the game with a solid 2–0 victory. +

+ Sonntak saw a turnaround for Chanterwick Unathletic, with a narrow 2–1 win during their first away match against the Wyrms. The Slough Wyrms, still tired from the game earlier in the weekend and missing a player (owing to fatality), proved injury-prone, with five players remaining on the pitch at the end of the game. Nevertheless, they held Unathletic to an impressively close score. +

+ Tallowlands Invitational II +

+ Kick-off +

+ The past weekend saw the opening matches of the Tallowlands Allcomers Invitational; where the PCRC's Blood Bowl teams compete for the coveted Six Species cup. +

Omricon's Ulfheim Undjedhi take on Lord Bolod the Hungry's Slough Wyrms in the opening match.

+ Last inload saw the first couple of pages of the pack; here's the first bit of meat. I'll continue uploading the rest of the pack over the next couple of inloads, so please do feel free to play along – I'd love to hear how y ou find the rules. +

+ We've got a nice mix of teams involved, including Humans, Bretonnian, Necromantic Horrors, Dwarfs, Lizardmen and Skaven – some great opportunities for grudge matches here. + 

+ A couple of highlights from the opening match – results will be updated at some point this week. +

+ inload: Hut-hut-hike! +

+ Blood Bowl! +

+ You are invited to watch the inaugural Tallowlands Allcomers Invitational; also known as the Six Species Cup +

+ An exciting linked series of Blood Bowl matches, kicking off Pflugzeit 317 (February 2017), and preceding Exhibition Matches. +

+ For today, an [exload] of the first couple of pages of the pack. Click for EMBIGGENING +

+ inload: Throng of Nog +

+ Throng of Nog +

The dramatis personae of the Hall of Nog – Left to right: the Runesmith Tremblestave; Thane Nurnanog and his scyldbearers; the Weartling Cwichelm; and Kazasturn, Gesith of the Cyng.

+ A marching to war +

+ Played a game of Warhammer 9th edition Age of Sigmar last night; a 600pt skirmish that pitted the dwarfs of Nogthrong against the unquiet dead of the barrows. The points limit was largely down to 'what have you got vaguely painted' more than anything else – so apologies for the rather basic paint job on some of my dwarfs! +

+ While I had played a (rather cool) scenario, this was my first foray into commanding more than one unit, and in a traditional clash of opposing forces. We played a scenario from the General's Handbook that revolved around capturing points on the table. + 

+ I don't have many pictures from the game, but here's a picture of the Wight King in combat with a unit of Longbeards. For future reference, it turns out to be a fairly poor idea to send troops to take out Wight Kings, as they regain wounds when they kill enemy models – much better to send likely-looking heroes to duel them! +

+ The Thane of Nog, bashing some skeletons heads in, slightly ashamed of the unfinished nature of his troops. +

+ A unit of Longbeards on the left flank proved vital in holding the battleline steady, and preventing the skeletons from pushing on to the ill-defended (but valuable) home objective. +

+ My first impressions are positive. The game was smooth, I felt that I had some interesting decisions to make, and the dynamics of the game remained immediate, revolving around order of combat each turn, rather than in army list generation and early-game manoeuvring at the cost of late-game interaction. For this reason, the game remained tense right up to the end. +

+ Of course, perhaps this was due to the fact that dwarfs and skeletons are amongst my favourite fantasy tropes, and a clash of infantry lines (rather than the general 'Kaiju-fight' of certain game) is right up my street. I'm keen to give the game another go, perhaps at around 1000pts. +

+ inload: ...to the new+

+ ...to the new +

+ I was the happy recipient of a copy of Burning of Prospero (BoP) at Christmas, and last night saw me digging it out to start building. I had toyed with the idea of converting the set using the 'true scale' method, but eventually decided that I'd prefer to save the time and just enjoy having a stand-alone boardgame – I enjoyed Battle for Calth (BaC), but cannibalised a lot of the pieces for my truescale marines, and so it's sitting there a little forlorn. In any case, the models are fantastic straight out of the box. +

+ In addition, there are quite a few other Thousand Son/Space Wolf forces in my gaming group, the PCRC. By building them straight off the sprue, I'll be able to field them alongside the others for a properly apocalyptic game with no wonky sizing issues at some point in the future. +

+ Here is one of ten enlarged test pieces (a Space Wolf, in this example), and the only one to receive paint. I very much like the dark chromatic grey paintscheme I worked out, and will definitely be using that on the Vlka Fenryka for the game. It's essentially a glaze of thinned Charadon Granite over a grey-primed figure, which is then partially removed using a clean cloth or finger while still wet. This creates a very natural gradient. +

+ Models for the game +

+ While the models in BoP are lovely – it was a genuine pleasure to sit down and simply build stuff straight off the sprue – I couldn't resist adding a few personal touches to my set. Having lots of bits left over from BaC, I decided that these figures would combine parts from BoP and BaC, alongside a few parts from my bits box, in order to make the two opposing forces in the game visually distinct. +

+ Members of the Rout. To my mind, the Vlka Fenryka are pragmatic above all else, so I'm not really concerned with uniformity. Instead, I am aiming for a more visually brutal, dynamic look for the VIth Legion, mostly based around the Mark III set, but with suitably parts swapped in to suggest the slightly archaic look of the Legion. While these are the Loyalists, they're only nominally goodies. I wanted to play on that slight dichotomy and give them a look similar to Chaos marines in 40k. +

+ I definitely want to have a light touch with any 'wolf' parts. The crests here are a good example of what I think feels right to me, though I may add a pelt or charm or two. It's the difference between using a feather, and using a chicken. +

+ In contrast, I've built the arrogant warrior-sages of the XVth with a much cleaner, more uniform look. As befitting their studious (some would argue war-shy) nature and open, civilised culture, I've opted for the most advanced armour broadly available to the Legions: Mark IV 'Maximus' armour. In order to introduce some variety, I've kitbashed extensively with the Mark III armour from BoP and Mark IV from BaC, but have heavily favoured Mark IV helms and backpacks to contrast with the grilles and pipes of the Mark III I'm using on the Wolves. +

+ You'll spot a few Forgeworld pieces – the lighter greys – scattered here and there, particularly on the Sergeant. These are included for variety of pose as much as anything else. +

+ A close-up of the sergeant and a couple of others. +

+ inload: From the old +

[exload subroutine: GOODCHEER – date spindle MMXVII]

+ From the Old... +

+ Hope everyone had an enjoyable break over Christmas, and we're all raring to go. The start of a new year is a good time to stop and take stock of things, and this applies as much to hobbies as the more fundamental parts of life. +

+ Backburner projects can niggle. This has been the case for me with both my Warhammer Dwarfs and my Warmachine forces in general. Stepping over that initial hurdle and just getting started with them has been a bit of a hurdle – it's always easier to go with an existing project, as there's less thought required in terms of techniques, painting methods and so forth. As a result, the models remain in storage, unpainted, unprimed, or even unbuilt. No glorious battles for those poor souls. +

+ Fortunately, the same things that dissuade you from the first steps of a project prove to be the things that are most rewarding when you do get started. The challenge becomes rewarding, and your enthusiasm is rekindled. The start of 2017 proved the perfect chance to get another unit for the Throng of Nog built. +

+ I've left the shoulder pads off these fellows, as it opens up the fairly limited poses a little more. Aside from a few trims here and there to alter angles and weapons, these are straight out of the box – the aesthetic of these models is pure poetry; just what I picture for the dwarfs of the Warhammer world. +

+ I also continued putting some paint onto the Protectorate. I'm working in fairly small chunks, and aiming to get a game or two in as a staging marker/deadline. Pictured here are two solos nearing completion (the vassals at the front right), plus a light warjack and the ubiquitous choir. +

+ I believe the men of the choir are some of the oldest sculpts that Privateer Press still produces, but they've a perfect example of a solid concept executed decently. They're not great sculpts from a technical point of view (the fabric of the tabards around the waist is very angular, for example – I initially mistook it for unusual hip plates!), but they portray a really strong image and are full of character. For me, they represent a style of miniature – hand sculpted and cast in metal – that has great nostalgic value for me. Such figures share much the same appeal as the Oldhammer movement. +

+ Digging these figures out and getting them one stage further to their finished state was fun and gave me an odd sense of relief. I realised that I'd been feeling misplaced pressure from my hobby; which is silly, really. I'm sure some of you will have felt a similar misplaced sense of expectation, so I'd encourage you to use the new year as a reminder that none of this really matters – for me, it was exactly the thing to relieve my end of year hobby malaise and get me enjoying myself again. +

+ What have you got on the backburner? Consider this a little encouragement to engage with your hobby and start the year off on a productive note; with no sense of pressure or expectation. Good luck! +

+ inload: CCC – Warmachine, Blood Bowl and Inquisimunda, oh my +

+ Post 300 tick [CONFIRM]+
+ audio-exload: [FANFARE] +
+ Resume standard +

+ Transmission restored +

+ A brief period of hobby malaise and generally being busy has left this blog a bit fallow, but I had the chance to sit down and do a bit of painting last night. 2017 is shaping up to be a good one [APPEND/ADDENDUM: famous last words, 2016] at least in terms of our hobby. +

+ I don't think my predictions of what I'll be working on have ever proven quite correct, but it's always nice to have a vague plan, so when I inevitably go off-piste and am stuck for inspiration I have a record of what I could do. With that borne in mind, I'm planning to get some stuff painted for games that I've not played in a while – specifically, Protectorate of Menoth for Warmachine; a Blood Bowl team for the Tallowland Invitational that I'll be running come February [more info in an upcoming inload], and – should that Christmas Elf decide I've been good this year – some of the VIth and XVth Legions for Battle for Prospero. +

+ Sticking with Warmachine for the moment, I was working on a Sanctifier – a heavy Warjack – last night. It's still WIP, but coming on nicely:

+ The inspiration for the scheme was a cross between the warm reds and yellows seen in the Eastern Orthodox Church (the background for this army draws upon the pseduo-Russian Khador and the desert-based Protectorate of Menoth) and construction equipment. +

+ Yellow symbolises both divinity and corruption in Christian tradition, which fits with the odd dynamic the Protectorate of Menoth have with their Warjacks – namely that they're a bit suspicious of using magic, and thus the men and women who build and maintain to their warjacks are seen a 'necessary evil'. As I understand things, the Warjacks themselves are seen with similar ambivalence – valued for their power, but not whole-heartedly embraced. There's a bit of doublethink inherent in the faction which rather appeals to me. +

+ The scheme is looking a bit muted and mustardy at the moment – it's a base of Averland Sunset with Dark Flesh used for shading, and the addition of Dheneb Stone and Vallejo white for highlights. I'll be adding some layers of yellow ink to add some vibrancy, and likely be introducing a little red or green as it looks a little 'Imperial Fisty' at the moment. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but I'd like to use the opportunity the Protectorate offers for something a bit different. +

+ The boiler on the back was fun to paint – a mix of Boltgun Metal and brown was used, then sepia ink and Nuln Oil washes. The glow (again unfinished) is simply Vallejo Scarlet added wet-in-wet. +

+ The Menofix (the Sanctifier's main weapon) has been painted with a slight marble effect. I didn't want it to draw too much attention from the body of the machine, as I felt this would detract from the impression of bulk and mass. As a result, it's painted in dark, fairly muted turquoises. + 

+ inload: Storage and display +

+ I think miniature figures look best within some sort of larger setting, diorama or large base that makes them look ornamental, such as bell jar displays, which make them look appealingly like Victoriana. As a result, while I'm proud of the figures I paint, they're not necessarily the first thing I want on display.+

+ Most of my figures are thus packed (fairly) neatly in storage or otherwise away from sight. Mostly, they lurk in the excellent Kaiser Rushforth [+noospheric inloadlink embedded+] cases I own, which stack up in a cupboard and keep things safe. +

+ This was also useful when I was renting, as they're sturdy enough for transport. Now I'm a bit more settled down, my thoughts have turned to having something rather more decorative in which to store my figures. In any case, my Court of the Sun King project, being a lot more 'arty' than my usual stuff, offered a perfect excuse for a small, elegant box. As a result, I've been looking around for a writing slope. Yesterday, it arrived: 

+ Gaze in wonder at the pink polka dot wallpaper the previous owner put in the spare room +

+ It's walnut and brass, and is decorative enough that I'm happy to have it out on display, as I think it's a beautiful thing in and of itself. It's not purely form over function, however... + 

+ The cotton wool things are explosion markers +

+ The top storage is usually upside-down when the slope is in box form, so I don't want to store figures there. However, it's ideal for all those bits that I always used to lose – measuring tape, templates, dice etc. It'll also store objective markers, rulebooks, army lists and other bits that don't mind being bumped about a bit. This is invaluable for me; I've got a terrible habit of turning up at my mates' house with an army, but missing the rest of the stuff I need to play! +

+ The other end is the business end. Here, figures can be stored – I'll be cutting a small amount of foam to shape in order to keep them a bit more secure and snug during travel. Note that there's also space for brushes, paints and pencils, so it'll double-up as a portable paint station. There's not a huge amount of space for storing figures, so it wouldn't work for a big 40k-scale army, but it's ideal for the smaller number of figures that the Court of the Sun King project will include. +

+ Quite aside from transport and storage, I'm hoping this box will be practical during gaming, by offering somewhere to place rulebooks, dice etc. and generally keep the table itself clear of clutter. +

+ I like to think it's the sort of thing that Inquisitor Veck would have; and so it's a fun little pseudo-'in universe' prop, too. Little details like this all help to add to the atmosphere, and remind us that we're exploring imaginatively, not just rolling dice. +