What's on my plate

I'm thinking about making this a regular Friday post, something that will help me keep my projects in order and on track and maybe actually finish one or two of them before the end of the year. A couple of these do have real deadlines so that might help me stay on target. I'm going to sort of list these in a priority order, of course that is subject to change without notice.

1) RPG characters, finish. These are for my every other Saturday game. There are only six of them, you would think this was a slam dunk kind of thing. 1 Female Gnome Battlemage, 1 Male Dwarf Barbarian, 1 Male Dwarf Cleric (NPC, currently being played by someone interested in joining the group), 1 Female Human Rogue, 1 Male Human Cleric and 1 Male Elf Paladin. These only have to be tabletop paint jobs and are likely to see rough use. I would like to have these done for the next game so I have a week at this point.

2) SAGA Norman army, get started. These are the Perry Miniatures which are all prepped and just need to be mounted for painting and primed. I want to enter these in the army painting competition for Genghis Con XXXIV in February of 2013. So they are to get my best efforts. There are 87 miniatures here so I do need to get moving. I think rather than my normal assembly painting style I'm going to paint these up by SAGA points which should let me concentrate on just a small set of figures at a time. So 4 mounted Knights, 8 armored Spearmen, 8 Crossbows, 12 Archers or a single character. For the characters I plan on mounted and dismounted versions of the warlord plus a couple of small character vignettes.

3) SAGA Norman army, repair and touch-up. These are the Gripping Beast Miniatures which make a fine wargame army. Unfortunately some repair is necessary after they were returned to me. I have some new steel lances on the way to replace the cast pewter ones so those will become more survivable (and slight more dangerous to your opponent since they are actually quite sharp). I found some Gripping Beast crossbows to replace the two missing ones and I'm going to take a shot at sculpting a couple of tails to replace the missing ones on the horses (I think there are two missing tables). A little touch-up work after that and this will be an army to be proud of on the battlefield.

4) 15mm British Napoleonics, re-base and paint.  After initially being very enthused about the LaSalle rules my group has kind of soured on them. Although others may disagree they just don't have the right "feel" to them. It has nothing to do with the weird turn sequence either (I have several games I enjoy that have weird turn sequences), its like the armies are just to generic and don't really seem to behave the way you expect them to behave. I can't really explain it better than that. So I'm mounting these up for Napoleon at War. This will let me use them for Napoleon's battles as well. The bases are a bit larger than Napoleon's Battles but pretty close. I have remounted one infantry unit (74th Highlanders, non-kilted) and started another last night (88th Connaught Rangers). These are mounted on six stands of four for a total of 24 figures which means I have 8 figures left over from each LaSalle unit I rebase. I'll have a bunch of extra center company infantry after I'm done so I guess my British infantry force is going to get a significant expansion which means I'll need more command, grenadier and light infantry minis to fill them out. Of the six stands one is grenadier, one is light, one is command (2 flags, an officer and a drummer, this counts as center company) and three center company stands. Each unit also gets two little skirmisher stands. These will be filled out mostly with regular light infantry but I'll do a proportion of them as rifles as well. Hopefully this will be the kickstart I need to actually get the artillery and cavalry done as well.

5) 15mm ACW, finish. I just need to get the union cavalry done for this army. Its never been a high priority since the union side rarely has cavalry and I have some older stuff that can be subbed in.

6) 28mm WWI USMC next unit. This has always been a side project so I'll fill it in a unit at a time as I feel like it. I have everything I need for this army now, including a couple of little FT-17s for support.

7) LoTR Helmingas finish. Originally this was going to be a display/tournament army that would have taken place last month. Unfortunately that tournament was cancelled when the organizer moved to the other side of the state for work. I have almost all the pieces for this one, the infantry component has been started and I think I have most of the cavalry component now. I'm missing two characters Eomer and Erkenbrand to finish off the army. I do intend to finish this army as I enjoy the game. There will probably be re-newed enthusiasm once the Hobbit is released.

8) Legion of the Damned 40K, acquire. This is a truly long term project and again is meant to be more of a display army than anything else. I have slowly been acquiring Legion of the Damned miniatures, both older and newer models to create an army. Now of course its not legal as an army but I'm not letting that stop me since I don't actually intend to play 40K with them. This will be a highly converted army and some of the ideas are still gelling while I acquire the various components (the cheaper the better!).

9) Genghis Con XXXIV entries. Its never to early to start on competition entries. I have all the components for my diorama and construction and painting can commence anytime now. I haven't decided on which individual piece I'll do, but I'm determined to have at least two entries in the competition this year.

10) Danish TYW in progress. Another display army for me, currently no one is playing so I don't feel rushed to get it done. My enthusiasm waxes and wanes on this one, however, I do want to get some work done on it to see my painting style mixes with the oil-wipe technique.

11) ATSF "the Patch" general work. Although construction proceeds at a snails pace it does slowly move forward as I work on rolling stock, motive power and the occasional building. The first priority there is to finish the brick freight house that I started. I found the clerestory windows that I misplaced that I need for the roof so I can get back to construction on that.

I think that's a reasonable accurate list at the moment. Of course its going to change on a whim, as other miniatures surface. I'm pretty sure that I have pirates and cowboys hidden away in drawers that would like to get painted. I'll probably add those to the list after I get my ships from the Laser Dreamworks Kickstarter and I get a look at the buildings from Battle Flag and Sarissa Precision.

So what's on your plate?

Saga Normans - Take 2 - Perry - Cleaning Phase 2

I finished cleaning the mold lines and flash from the remaining cavalry. I have also started buffing them with steel wool. So why did I do that? Ordinarily if these were going to just be gaming miniatures I would have skipped this step. Since my intent is for these to be a painting competition army first they need this extra step. During the cleaning process, whether you are using files or knives or other implements of destruction you are indeed removing mold lines and other excess bits of metal. However, all of these various implements leave their own mark on the miniature, typically tiny scratches from files (especially diamond files) or gouges from knives. Buffing the miniature afterwards with steel wool will reduce and in a lot of cases (especially if you have a light touch with the file) completely remove the marks. You must exercise caution since you can  completely eradicate detail with a really vigorous buffing. So here are some before and after shots of the buffing step. Its usually not needed for gaming figures because we can depend on our primer coat to cover the vast majority of these marks. I only use this process on competition figures that are going to be picked up and closely examined. I don't want any stray marks that a judge might see and mark me down for.

And while I'm up and close and personal to all of these Perry Miniatures I have a few thoughts to throw out there. First up, I love the detail on these guys. There are six miniatures in an infantry box and they are in six different poses with different faces. The same is true for the cavalry although there are only three different horses overall, but the riders are all different. So 9/10 for poses and detail! Love it.

The cleanup though was tough. Mold lines aren't bad but a fair number of them go right across the left side of the face, so it took it little extra work to not totally obliterate that side of the face with the file. The one part that really started to get to me though was found on the crossbow and spearmen. A number of them (probably 4 out of 6) in each box are striding forward with the point of the scabbard from the left side coming back almost all the way to the right foot. The space in between had a huge chunk of metal in it. That just took a lot of extra time with a knife to clean up. A number of the spearmen had a quite a bit of very thin flashing between the head and the right arm (which was raised up to at least the top of the head if not higher). The archers are really good and cleaned up very quickly as did the knights. The horses are going to take a little work to get back into the proper position as a fair number of their bases are bent. So extra work on the prep step is probably 6/10.

I spent a lot more time cleaning these up than the ones from Gripping Beast. However, the level of detail is so much better. Granted I spent extra time cleaning up (not including the buffing) but overall I consider that time well spent, I really like these castings.

In the meantime I pulled out the existing Gripping Beast Norman army. I'll get started fixing them up and trying to find a buyer. And no I won't sell the Perry army, I have already bled all over those several times now. They should do well in the competition since they have drawn blood.

For SAGA, I should be able to put together a pretty flexible force. There are 8 points worth of troops here.
12 Archers - 1pt
8 Crossbows (x2) - 1pt each
8 Spearmen (x2) - 1 pt each
4 Hearthguard (x3) - 1 pt each
Add the Warlord into that and I have 9 points worth of troops to experiment with.

I have enough command and left over figures to put together some pretty nice display bases for the Warlord both mounted and dis-mounted. I may even be able to do a couple of different Warlords. I'm looking forward to that.

I'm not really sure you can see the differences in the pictures from one to another, you forget how small those scratches really are. So I'll take my best shot here:

These are the Knights from the CU-1 pack. All the mold lines have been removed either with a knife or a file. I'm afraid you can't really see the marks though.

These are the same knights and horses after I have buffed them.

 I think the buffing is more obvious on this one, the shield is smoother and shinier

Sometimes this is the best tool

Didn't manage to get much done last night. One of my son's friends brought over an airbrush that wasn't working to see if I could fix it. This was a Master Airbrush G22, which I believe is from China, a cheap and dirty knock off of an Iwata airbrush. She useses it on cakes so I'm not actually sure what they shoot through it, I'm guessing food coloring of some kind. She just warned me not to use paint in it. I spend an hour taking it apart only to discover that it actually can't be fixed. Someone had managed to squeeze down to hard on a piece that the needle goes through that only air could get through it. So that was an hour wasted. Afterwards I found out that its like a $30 airbrush. The difference between this one and an Iwata is pretty minor but the flaw is that a piece that is removable in the Iwata is actually part of the body of the G22 and can't be replaced like it can in my Iwata. I think it wouldn't be a bad airbrush to use it just takes a little TLC during cleaning to make sure that the o-ring up front doesn't deform. The Iwata doesn't need this o-ring.

Anyway that followed with some work on Perry Miniature Normans, but I only managed to get another two boxes (12 miniatures) cleaned up last night. That would be one SAGA point of Archers, which are ineffective enough that I'm not sure I would even use them.

So my best tool on the workbench last night was my 12 year old bottle of Macallan Scotch that at least let me ignore the cuts and jabs on my fingers.

SAGA Normans - Take 2 - Perry Miniatures

Earlier this year I finally had a chance to paint up a batch of Normans for SAGA. I've always wanted to paint up some Normans and a commission (which backfired in the end) let me paint them without adding them to my collection. Since I enjoyed it so much I went ahead and ordered a Norman Army made up from the Perry Miniatures 1st Crusade Line. Intending to pay for that from my commission proceeds I went ahead and ordered what I needed from Architects of War (Awesome service by the way). Fortunately they were out of stock of just about everything (at which point they just asked for my list and made sure that it was in addition to their re-stocking order) and by the time they arrived I had the money saved up that I needed. So tonight I was able to sit down in my new workroom and start the tedious chore of getting them ready to paint. I really hate this stage of the process. I'm about a third of the way through them after tonight and I think I miss ordered some of the cavalry, it should still work out in the end though and I should be able to make up a couple of cool command stands as well. Since its a relatively small army I have decided to paint it up for the army painting competition in February at Genghis Con XXXIV. So this one is going to move along even slower than I normally go. I'll intersperse some other miniatures just to keep from getting to discouraged with them. Here are the results from tonight's work:

Saturday Delivery - Little Black Boxes

I know, most of us get far more excited about little black books (you were thinking 1st edition Traveller weren't you?) than little black boxes, although I think women are pretty keen on little black boxes at times. This was a care package from Architects of War and contained a bunch of small black boxes and for a historical miniature gamer that can only mean one thing; Perry Miniatures!

Yes, yes, my personal Norman SAGA army has arrived packed neatly into those wonderful little black boxes. I started getting them all cleaned up and ready for primer during my regular D&D game on Saturday night. I can't wait to get started on these.

SAGA Normans need a home

The 6 points of SAGA Normans that I painted up for a client have come home. Client decided he didn't like the game (although I'm not sure how that is possible) and in combination with losing his job gave them back to me. Really nobody is at fault here. There are a few little repairs to do, a pair of crossbows have gone missing, one bow is broken and two horses have lost their tails (I'm not sure I can do anything about that). A couple of riders have been unhorsed and have lost their weapons (at least I have the weapons). So maybe an hour or two of work to get them back to pristine condition.

If you are interested in owning this SAGA Norman army let me know and we can discuss the details. I would keep it myself but this was supposed to fund a couple of other projects that are now on hold.
Spearmen - 1pt

 Crossbows - 1 pt

 Hearthguard - 1 pt

 Hearthguard - 1pt

 Hearthguard - 1pt

 Levy - 1 pt

 The Warlord

Norman SAGA Commission - Finished - Six Points

Well, this bunch is finally finished. Thanks to everyone for sticking with me on this little project. Last night I got all the weapons glued in place only to discover that two crossbows were missing. I have no idea if I lost them or if they were actually missing from the blister. Either way a replacement pack is on the way from which I will swipe two crossbows. The rest will probably go into the ReaperCon Melt bucket.

Today was touch up and basing today. Touch ups always take way to long and I'm sure I still managed to miss a few spots here and there but overall I'm pretty happy with the entire army. I used a new (for me) technique to add static grass to the bases and get it to stand up straight. I used my Grass Tech II static grass dispenser. this is a powered unit that charges the fibers as they come through a wire mesh and gets them to stand straight (more or less) up. I apply my favorite glue (matte medium and water) attach a wire that goes back the Grass Tech II , hit the power button and shake. Creates a huge mess on miniatures because its designed for large area applications. It also had an interesting side affect. Let me introduce the Norman Chia Pets:

Any way I now have static grass all over the place. Its bad as shipping peanuts. Here are a few shots from last night, they are starting to look like real warriors now that they actually have something to fight with.

That's also about as neat as you will ever see my painting area. It only looks like that way because I pulled out the airbrush to work on my ReaperCon competition miniature after I was done. That requires a certain level of neatness to be able to work relatively efficiently. Also I wanted to see if I could keep my highlights more or less intact by airbrushing on an acrylic matte coat. Overall I would say it worked out pretty well, although my airbrush didn't like it very much. Here are the knights ready to be sprayed:

And finally the finished product:
1 Saga Point - 12 Norman Levy

1 Saga Point - 8 Norman Crossbowmen

1 Saga Point - 8 Norman Spearmen

1 Saga Point - 4 Norman Hearthguard (Mtd Knights) - Note all the shields were painted by hand. I did use the Little Big Man Studios site as a reference. If you don't want to go to the effort of painting shields (almost any kind of shield) I highly recommend them. You can find his website here: LBMS

1 Saga Point - 4 Norman Hearthguard (Mtd Knights)

1 Saga Point - 4 Norman Hearthguard (Mtd Knights)

 Free! - 1 Norman Warlord

So that's it, finally finished. Oh and for the sharp eyed among you, I did forget to edge the bases for the knights, however, I did get that taken care of.