Happy Birthday and New Beginnings

Well, the blog is four years old!  Wow.  I never thought I'd keep it going for so long.  There have been times when I have struggled, and when the posts have been infrequent, those are the times when I felt like giving up.

Everything's better with cake!!

There have been good times too.  Posts that proved popular (and not just to foreign 'bots), comments, it all helps.

I suppose I should do a run down of what seems to be working?

It's hard to say for sure what makes a popular post.  Generally, if I am enthused about something, be it a new game, or a new range of minis or a new (to me at leat) technique, people seem to like it.  Two of my most popular posts, and ones I'm pretty proud of, are the home made GMs screen and the flying stands.  Of course, it helps that when I make something I think works well, I share it on various social media.  Tutorials generally do well, partly for the sharing reason.  I rarely do reviews or unboxings, partly as I genuinely find it difficult to say negative things in print (here at least).  Even if I don't like something, the creator has (usually) worked hard on the product, and it can become a personal thing.  I have done some posts about new stuff though, such as Terrain Crate and various games (the Magic the Gathering post is oddly popular), maybe I should do more of these?
The least popular posts seem to be the 'hey I just heard about this' type.  Perhaps because they don't really say much, and certainly don't require a second read.  They aren't something I share links to either.  I've always thought of them as a sort of service to my readers, so I'll keep doing them, I just won't expect anything much from them.
If I look at the referring sites, the majority are from Facebook backing up my suggestion that when I link to a post it gets more hits.  Pretty obvious really, but I'd like to get to the stage of having regular readers who check the blog for new posts, or even follow it so they get notification.  It might help if I could get organised enough to have a regular release schedule, rather than just posting when I think of something.

It's fair to say that the blog could be renamed 'the Blog of Unfinished Projects', and that is one reason why I started it.  I make no apologies, however; the 'oo shiny' aspect of the hobby is one of the things that appeals to me.  I'm trying to get better (see my posts on the five box system for instance, and I did run a balance of bought vs painted minis a while back).  However I'll take a moment to remember the projects that never got anywhere.  Chief among these must be the 18mm Barsoom project with which I started the blog.  I still have the (unpainted) minis and may go back to it some day, but I'll probably use a different system.

Finally an announcement!  Recently I posted quite a bit around the wrap-up of my long running D&D campaign.  The series has been pretty well received and I enjoyed looking back and analysing the games.  I don't think it quite belongs on a painting and modelling blog though, so I have made the decision to start another blog focusing on the roleplaying aspect of my hobby.  The Periodic Gaming Table will have (I suspect) fewer posts, and they will almost certainly be rambling posts.  I'll use it as a forum to wrestle with ideas and try and come up with some sort of understanding of what works and what doesn't in the adventures I design and run.  If you are primarily interested in painting, modeling and crafting, it might not be for you.  If you enjoying running or playing role-playing games I hope you find something of interest.  In any case, you are all welcome to check it out here.

All Good Things - Dungeons & Debriefings

(Thanks to T'Other One for the catchy title)

Well we've had a final meetup to discuss the campaign with drinks, buffet and (slightly late) Twelfth Night Cake.  There was lots of discussion about the campaign and what went right and what could have been better.

One particularly interesting thing, I thought, was where the players roughed out what they thought their characters would be going on to do.  I talked about some of the things that were going on behind the scenes, as it were, and ran through some of the plot threads that were still dangling.  It's safe to say that there was the potential for plenty more play, if time and circumstances had allowed.  Much of the future plans involved smaller groups of the heroes though, so I think it's safe to say that was the end of the Heroes of Dymrak as an adventuring party.  I'm sure they regularly met up in the Crock and Bottle in Eltan's Spring for a pint of Eltan's Ale and a pipe of Windchime's Winter Special.

Now we've got over the end of the campaign, and I've given a brief rundown of what happened and some insight into my thoughts and design process, it's time for a few words to sum up.

The campaign went on for a long time, possibly too long.  We usually got a bit under two hours actual play once a week or less, while that's a long time over all, there's a lot of recap and things get forgotten between sessions.  It was rare for us to finish an encounter in one week, (given the nature of the system at high levels, that's not that surprising) but some big encounters stretched over three or four sessions. Since the game relies on pretty exact positioning of minis and terrain I find my phone tends to fill up with photos of minis on battlemats or similar.
This meant that progress sometimes seemed a bit slow.  Towards the end of the campaign I deliberately steered things away from long scenes with little action.  Whilst it might be said that the game is a game of action anyway, these slower scenes give a break to the players, and varying the pace is good.  We still got through a lot though; if you look back at the write-ups of each tier you'll see that there was a pretty extensive storyline.

I'll run through a few random thoughts about the campaign.
Firstly, it's fair to say that the campaign was never really planned.  It just sort of happened.  Whilst I hope that it came across as a coherent story from the other side of the DM's screen, from my side it sometimes seemed a bit hazy. 
I was very fortunate to have a group of players who liked to experiment with the world around them.  Some proved inventive with their use of items, seeing the 4E action system as a guide not a straight-jacket far sooner than I did.  Some wanted to make their mark on the world, whether it was founding a business empire or starting a school that trained young wizards to combat threats to the world.  One built upon his faith in a very literal way and another wanted to look beyond the limits of the current campaign and try and set up links to a future campaign.
They also proved remarkably sensible in situations such as hostages and negotiation.  Reading DM's complaints on t'interweb you might get the impression that all players are bloodthirsty louts with no thought of collateral damage, and a belief that the ends always justify the means.  My lot were quite happy to negotiate if they thought it would bring about a result, and on more than one occasion walked away in order to get a hostage released.  It probably helped that they were awarded with full XP in these situations.

I also experimented with theming monsters.  In Heroic Tier I did this on a macro level by choosing a theme such as shadow, undead, or fey and choosing monsters for an adventure mostly from that list.  On a smaller scale, encounters would feature mostly creatures of a specific type, which helped to emphasise a mood.  I continued this throughout Paragon Tier, and started deliberately planning rosters of monsters which the heroes could encounter repeatedly.  It was rewarding to everyone when the players gradually learnt to defeat various tricky monsters and develop tactics against them.

Regrets?  A few of course.  It's a huge chunk of my life, and there were situations I wish I had handled differently, suggestions I wish I had listened to, and occasions where I thought I sold the players short.  To be fair, there were also times when I struggled to feel I provided a challenge and from my side of the screen the game seemed to be grinding to a halt.
One of the biggest issues, and one that became more of a problem as the campaign went on, was the choice of game system.  It increasingly became obvious that 4E has many strengths, but they weren't for the sort of game we wanted to play.  It has a very robust combat system, very granular, that rewards tactical thinking.  It does become much less balanced at higher levels, and encounter building that provides a real challenge is difficult.  I don't have a problem with varying the difficulty level of encounters, but the players genuinely prefered the more challenging ones.  As time went on, the easier melees were seen often as a bit of a waste of time.

In fairness to 4E if you play to its strengths (which we often didn't) and design a particular kind of game, it can be great fun.  I could run a campaign topping out at level 10 with Essentials build characters and based on short two to five encounter dungeons and I think it would be great fun, but that's not what the majority of us wanted.

What did I do wrong and what lessons have I learned?  I could say I kept the campaign going too long using a non optimal game system, but that would be doing a dis service.  I did, however, make a few mistakes, that I later corrected, or wish I had the opportunity to put right. 
I ditched experience points.  About fourth level I decided I knew how I wanted the campaign, or at least Heroic Tier, to go, and at what level I wanted the various adventures to be.  (Of course, the
players immediately decided to investigate the Eyes of Traldar in a different order, but I managed that).  It seemed sensible to level up the heroes at the end of important adventures and I kept that up for the whole of Paragon Tier as well.  It does reduce bookkeeping, but it also robs the players of a way of excelling.  The point I raised above about them being rewarded for out thinking the foe rather than out fighting?  That is much harder to do when there is no obvious reward.  I reintroduced experience for encounters at the start of Epic, but by then we had all got out of the habit of tracking it and it did seem a chore.
I ignored the book for encounter building.  As a very old school DM, I know it all; you can't teach me anything about balancing and building encounters.  Wrong of course, but I learned the hard way that there is a lot more subtlety around using monster roles in 4E than I was used to in previous editions.  Once I started considering this I think my encounters became more challenging and fun.  I'm trying to think more along these lines when I design encounters in 5E, monster roles seem to be missing from 5E, but look a bit harder and you can find them; sometimes you might need to tweek the monster stats (often little more than altering equipment).  It's more about how you use the monsters than having half a dozen different stat blocks for one encounter.

What next?  Well I'm running Call of Cthulhu for some of the Monday night group, and I'm continuing the Thursday night 5E adventure going through the starter set Lost Mine of Phandelver (which is nearly finished).
Looking forward I might try a variety of starter sets and introductory games for different systems for the Monday night gamers, or perhaps move to more tabletop gaming?  We'll have a think once we are finished in Arkham, probably in March.  The Thursday group will need something too, but I have a yearning to create something from scratch.  I think I'll develop some ideas I've had for a new campaign world.  There's a lot of water and islands, and its probably not inspired by what you might think.

Kings of War/Vanguard Naiads 1

I've got some paint on the Naiads I showed here.  They are currently mostly basecoated.
As I mentioned, I am using these four as test models for paint schemes; they will also be part of a Trident Realms Vanguard force (or Forces of Nature, I suppose).  I had some ideas for colours before I started.  I wanted very light coloured armour (the official Mantic Naiads have this, and I think it works).  I didn't want the same skin colour though, something more alien perhaps?
Also, given that I have loads of these to paint if I am going to have a decent sized army, I was looking for a colour scheme that would be quick to paint; that means something that will look good with just a wash on top of a base coat, with possibly one highlight for heroes (I can always go to town on single minis later).

In order to test this without painting loads of minis I used the remains of the sprue. I undercoated  several arms and tried combinations of various pale colours such as bone for the armour, and varieties of greens and blues for the flesh.  In the end I chose the colour scheme shown below.  It's VGC Glacier Blue for the armour and Army painter Turquoise for the flesh.  With a coat of AP Soft Tone wash it gives a result I am happy with.  The blue tint to the armour, when washed, takes it away from the bone look that a lot of my trails gave, and I like the turquoise skin, with the wash it has a greyish tone which reminds me of sea creatures.  If I want a bit more definition I can always give it a highlight before washing.

Here are the four test minis, with the base coats pretty much done.  All that's left are the quivers on the Heartpiercers and various bits of belt and strapping.  I've painted the 'hair' and the nets the same colour at the moment.  I imagine the nets to be made of a tough seaweed, and I'll give them a browner tint with washes and lighten the green with a highlight.  the 'hair' will be washed to move it more to a bluer tone.  Metal is bronze or gold, steel would be useless for sea dwelling creatures.  I may go over some of the shell decorations on the armour in silver though, to give a difference between minis and eventually units.

I have to decide if I give the armour and flesh a highlight before washing.  Given that these are for Vanguard, and are likely to be looked at more closely, I probably will.  I may well skip this step when I am painting full units though.

The flash emphasises the blue-ness of the colours, it's not quite that extreme in real life.

And talking of full units, here are nine Ensnarers, built and undercoated.  This will make a troop.  I will do them in troops, its easy to put two together for a regiment (and I'll miss the command off troops intended for the backs of regiments), and easier for assembling on the base as well, though since I am building the base separately, that's not quite as big an issue as it was  with my orcs.

Empty Box!

I've just realised that I have an empty box!  The square box actually got emptied a while ago when I finished the mine and cave tiles.  I'd used it to clear stuff away into prior to the Christmas season, but it is for my purposes empty.

This means Trident Realms have a box.  I'm going to get a handful of the Naiads assembled, both as Heartpiercers and the Ensnarers.  I'll use them as experiments for colour scheme prior to starting my Kings of War regiments.  The single minis will do for Vanguard.  I'll need a Centurian as well, but I'll wait until I have a colour scheme I like first.
At the moment I am thinking of an off white for the armour, as I picture it as enchanted shell, and a turquoise for the flesh.  Metals should be bronze or copper or gold, so as not to rust in the water, some verdigris might look good though (and give a green for spot colours, though this might be too close to the flesh tones I will experiment with)
But first, assembly.

Four Naiads, assembled with wire pegs added so they can be pinned to bases, adn to make them easier to handle.  This is more important when I'm doing a unit with a separately built base.

Vanguard Again

Another game of Vanguard, again against Merlin. This time he travelled down to mine and the intention was to play a couple of games of Vanguard, and use the results to inform a Kings of War battle in spring.  Since we had played the first scenario last time we opted for 2 and 3, 'light the beacon' and 'rescue the princess'.  In fact we spent so long chatting and took so long to play, that that princess never got on the table, let alone rescued.

Elves lurk in the woods, eyes peeled for returning orcs.

The elves 'volunteered' to guard the beacon.  Clearly everyone else took a step back.

The bulk of the orc force.

Orcs sneaking through the bizarre foliage.

The orcs attempting to surprise the elves by swinging wide behind the huts.

The elven spears are joined by their prince, ready to take on the troll, hopefully just out of charge range.

The Gore Rider scrap, the fence hindered me here, but ultimately the addition of two Greataxes and an Ax equalled the subtraction of two elves.  (Who says Orcs can't do maths?)

In the end, despite the orcs trouncing most of the elves, they were unable to light the beacon in time.  At the end of turn five, with only a couple of elves left we rolled for a further turn.  Sadly the game was over, and the elf wizard had positioned herself next to the beacon, preventing the orcs lighting it.

The up and coming battle would be that much harder as some of the orc forces would be delayed.

A highlight for me was the elf prince shooting with his longbow from just outside the troll's charge range, only for the Godspeaker to use Green Rage to move the troll forward into range, who was then activated and charged the poor prince.  The small party of Ax and Skulk on my right flank kept several elves occupied for the first half of the battle.  Merlin, however, showed a greater focus on the objective and kept at least one elf in contact with the beacon at all times so I never got the opportunity to even try and light it.  

Another fun game, though we are still getting to grips with the fine details.  Last game Merlin had much better dice luck than me, this time I more than made up for it, at one point getting seven hits from an initial roll of 3D8!

I'm looking forward to playing the KoW battle after this, Merlin can delay some of my units as they didn't get the message in time.

Kings of War Historical Greeks

I've mentioned a few times that I painted some Greeks last year.  It's long past time I showed them off.
I started with some old Chariot (now Magister Militum) Greeks left over from my 15mm Warhammer Ancient Battles days.  I used to have what seemed a sizable army for that system, but interest declined (partly due to the second edition, which neither myself or my opponent liked).
I bought Kings of War Historical when it came out but did nothing with it, but when I got on to my 15mm KoW League of Rhordia, I started wondering about KoWH in 15mm.  As you know, this became quite a thing, including working with Merlin to produce Clash!, our small scale KoWH system, and getting in quite a few battles before the interest fairy flitted elsewhere.

Anyway, enough waffle, suffice it to say I got more of the Magister Militum Greeks, especially the Hoplites, as they rank up nicely into phalanx formation, and I tried out some of the newer Forged In Battle light troops from Westwind.  These are great, lots of variety and character.  I'll replace my older single pose light troops with more of these over time.

 Forged in Battle slingers and javelins flanking some older Chariot/Magister Militum (Cretan) archers.

Two hoplite phalanxes with hero.

The whole army so far including a troop of cavalry and various single miniatures to use as objectives or heroes.

When I look at the army set out like that, I've probably got more than I had for WAB.  They are certainly better painted, and nicer looking as an army as well.  I had a mixture of different minis, including some poorly detailed (but cheap) hoplites.  I can't remember the manufacturer, and if I could, I wouldn't inflict them on anyone else.

I've got some more hoplites, including a couple of phalanxes of light hoplites, still to paint, and I'd like to get some more light troops and maybe some more cavalry.  As I said, the inspiration fairy has moved on for now, but I'm sure I'll be expanding this army before the year is out.

Oh, and this is my 250th post.  Not much compared to some blogs, but I'm pleased to have kept it going for so long.  Now all I need is a few more followers.

Happy Hogswatch 2019 Resolutions, Targets and Goals

Happy Hogswatch.  Given the parallels with a Roundworld festival, its perhaps surprising that Hogswatch is at the start of January (or Ick) rather than a week earlier.

Anyway, as is traditional, it's time to set some goals hobby-wise for the coming year.

Firstly, I plan on sticking to the five box system.  It's working really well for me at the moment, and I think it has both helped me to organise myself and be more productive.
That means that any new projects will have to wait until I've cleared a box of an old project.  Fortunately, I've tried not to fill the boxes too full, so I can see the end of a project and work towards it, rather than there just being a huge pile of stuff to paint.

If you want to know what's in the boxes at the moment, its still pretty much as I wrote about here.  The Frostgrave stuff is pretty much complete though, so that looks like its going to be the first empty box.  I've already got plans for it, my Trident Realm of Neritica.  Rather than throw everything in the box (see above) I have worked out a 500 point force to begin with, and I am looking at a Vanguard warband too, so I can practice paint schemes on the individual models.

My Vanguard box has the beginnings of three more warbands (undead, dwarves and goblins) as well as three orcs to finish off.  This is too much really, my excuse is that the box was a convenient place to stick stuff in the pre Christmas tidy up.  I do want to do some terrain for the game though, probably starting with objectives since I didn't get the ones with the Kickstarter.
I aim to get more dungeon tiles done, and possibly a better version of the cave tiles I made recently.  This is intended to go alongside my new 5th Edition D&D campaign, as we have nearly finished the current one (Lost Mine of Phandelver).  I think I have enough tiles to start with, but I'll build some special tiles and keep on making furnishings as well as painting Terrain Crate.  I'll probably need more monsters for the game as well, so probably more Bones painting.

I have a couple of small demo armies for KoW, Dwarves and Undead, that don't quite make 500 points.  A few additions (17 minis total) will make these nicely playable.  I'd like to have a box that can be handed to interested people that contains the two armies, a rulebook and perhaps even scenery.  It's not a top priority project, but I would like to have something to help spread the word about KoW.

Given the focus in Clash of Kings 2019 on siege games, I suppose I'd better get a castle built as well.  I have a toy one that should easily convert, but again, I think this is a long term project.
As with last year, I'll state that I'd like to get the minis for Dungeon Saga and Star Saga painted.  The later particularly as some of the new ones will fit in really well with my Deadzone Rebs.  A Dreadball team or two would be nice too, it's not as if I'm short of teams to paint.
I'll try and keep up with the one table top game a month.  I'm pleased with last year's efforts, but it would be great if I could get even more games in.

The end of the Monday night D&D game will help; I doubt we will be doing a table top game every week, but we will probably intersperse much shorter series of RPGs (Call of Cthulhu first I think) with tabletop games.  Vanguard will be featuring quite heavily at first I'm sure.  I'd better get the last three orcs done, and perhaps move onto the Trident Realm pretty quickly.

I'm also hoping to be a bit more up to speed with this blog.  I'm aware that there are quite a few projects that I've finished that haven't been showcased on here, such as my 15mm Greeks and the dungeon tiles.  I'll try and get these covered in the next few weeks.
And on the subject of blogs and similar, I am starting a Facebook group to help people keep track of new army/warband/striketeam etc projects.  The idea is that we can all encourage each other and show off what we have done.  You can find it here.

A few final words about RPG.  This blog is intended to be mostly a crafting and painting blog, though the gaming obviously informs what I make and paint.  I currently only have a 5E campaign going, and that is close to its end now.  I have some Call of Cthulhu planned for a few weeks play, but the Monday night group might revert to table top games.  I have wondered about trying a series of different games, perhaps using various starter or quickstart rulesets.  I don't generally like new things, but I do sometimes succumb to temptation, especially if there is some sort of nostalgic connection.  A roundabout way of saying I just got the new Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 4th Edition starter set.  It looks very good, but I suspect I will read it rather than run it.