January Update: Anne's Miniature Assembly Challenge Results

I joined Anne's 2026 Miniature Assembly Challenge near the beginning of January with the aim of building enough Frostgrave gnolls for the second mission, converting some MESBG Rangers of Gondor into Dunedain, and possibly building a couple more minis. 

How did I do?

Assemble miniatures, gnolls, a ranger, and two different rangers

Well I managed ten more gnolls, more than enough, but it finished off the sprues. 

I also built an extra Ranger, nominally for T'Other One to use when we tackle the second mission.

Dunedain

The Dunedain were less successful; I finished two, but they were more work than I anticipated. 

Two converted Dunedain

both with backpacks

I wanted them to look sufficiently different to the Rangers of Gondor, so I decided to do away with any masks, shift the quiver to the hip, remove the sort of tabard thing and add extra equipment.  This was inspired by the official miniatures from GW. 

Alas I didn't take any pictures of them prior to converting them, but you can find plenty of pictures online if you're interested. 

The masked head on the firing ranger was removed with a razor saw and replaced with a bare head from (I think) the Frostgrave Soldiers sprue. I used quivers from the Oathmark Human Infantry sprue and concealed the mess made by removing the back quivers with Frostgrave backpacks etc.

I filled in the gaps with a 50-50 greenstuff and milliput mix, and made some attempt at showing the straps, but it's not perfect. 

I didn't complete the required nine Dunedain, and never started on the Dark Emissary I'll need for Boðvoc's Dark Shadows campaign, but even so I'm pleased.  I've got plenty to paint in February for Dave Stone's Paint What You Got Challenge. 

I missed the target for several reasons.  The Rangers were far trickier than anticipated (and I realised that I was short of four minis anyway). I've also been busy playing a lot of music, which has been glorious (Renaissance town bands and verse anthems among others), but hasn't helped assemble anything. 

If Anne runs the challenge again next year,  I certainly want to take part. 

And a Show

I did manage to get to York Wargames Society's Vapnatak on 1st February.  

My haul was modest, but useful. 

Vapnatak haul

I picked up five more Rangers of Gondor, so that's one excuse gone (see above). Seven monotone Skaven,  in case I ever get around to Vengeance of the Lichemaster (the seller threw in a skeleton missing it's slotta base,  but that's not a problem. 

I also got a selection of the old WotC prepainted Star Wars minis. 

Apart from the second hand stuff I got some more d10 dice for games of Warlords of Erehwon. 

Recon 25 - The End of an Era (again, perhaps)

Well last year I reported on what was supposed to be the last Recon Wargaming Show at Pudsey Civic Hall.  It's still there this year, either the proposed council sale is taking longer, or Wargamers are just hard to shift.

Pudsey Civic Hall, the venue

The Games 

I didn't get a good look at all the demo and participation games,  but here's a selection of the ones that caught my eye. 

If anyone cares to leave more details in the comments,  please do. I was making notes, but I've lost them. 

A relatively new set of rules, but quite old school looking

It felt like I was back at BOYL again, it very much looked like an old school game of Warhammer. But it was a much newer game system. 

Awesome set up, though I can't remember what game was being played.*

Snoopy vs the Red Baron. This looked fun, but I didn't get a chance to try

Mantic's Armada and Kings of War

A grand view of the main hall

I think this one was called Xeno plants or something

Recon still run a Hordes of the Things tournament,  here's a game in progress

The Haul
I do like to look at the stalls and pick up stuff for the next year's hobbying. I didn't have much of a list this time,  though I was on the lookout for anything that might fit in my Oldhammer collections. 
I did see some lovely painted Oldhammer,  but it was appropriately priced for the painting,  and I'd be wanting to repaint it.

In the end, my slender haul was a base of MESBG scenery pieces,  they'll get individually based,  possibly as part of a Weathertop build.

Three Pro Arte Kolinski Sable brushes from A Brushes. I got one of these last time, and I'm impressed.  It may not be the equal of Artis Opus, but it's quite good enough for me,  and a huge step up from what I'm used to. 

A tub with six painted Frostgrave gnolls.  I've got plenty of unpainted plastic gnolls,  but two of these are the metal heroes,  including an Apothecary,  which I'll use as a Shaman in the next Rangers of Shadow Deep mission. 

Finally,  not pictured,  I placed an order for the new forth edition Kings of War rules from The Pit Wargaming. 

Meagre, but useful booty

Quiet at the Bring and Buy - the calm before the storm

The, rather empty looking, Bring and Buy. It filled up quite a bit later, and I got both the terrain and the gnolls here. 

Lead Me Not Into Temptation 

There were quite a few bits that I almost bought. 

There were several new Epic Encounters sets (large boxes containing themed minis, maps and an encounter). These look superb,  the minis are excellent. 

Blotz were selling some packs of plastic minis from Fortress Figures.  These are monopose and look to be the same sort of plastic that Mantic used for Star Saga etc.  They are located in the US, and their website s currently inactive, so I wonder if this was old stock being sold off?

The goblins looked fun, rather Kev Adams in style,  but the other races seem a bit large to fit in with my old school stuff.

The Mantic Advent calendars look great fun. Perhaps next year? And they'd make good presents.

North Star's Oathmark Human Heavy Infantry were available,  and they'd fit in with my Kingdoms of Men.  I'll get back to this army once I know how the new rules work (and if I switch; there seems to be a bit of push back against the new edition).

So that was Recon 25. Great fun, as always. 

I also met up withT'Other One and also Bodvoc and a couple of his SAD gamers. 

I wonder where Recon 26 will be?

*EDIT; Bodvoc informs me that this is for Baron's War.

**EDIT 2; Bodvoc (who is clearly more up to date than me) also says that The Pit have announced the same venue for 2026!

Bring Out Your Lead 2025

Last year was my first BOYL and I enjoyed it so much that I was back for more this year. 

Still just a day visitor,  maybe one day I'll pluck up the courage to join in something. 

There seemed to be more games running this time, and a greater variety too.

There was a lovely looking game of Man 'o War, a favourite of mine back in the 1980s. 

I was particularly impressed by the islands and the seascape,  and the fleets were very nicely painted. 

I must get my copy out sometime. 

The fleets assemble

The dwarf fleet, complete with aerial support 

Chaos dwarves, with funnels to match their hats, and orcs

The Empire 

There were also games of Heroquest, with a marvellous 3D board; Talisman 3rd Edition; Necromunda; Armagedon; Mordheim; Bomerz Over Da Sulpha River, and even a game of Hordes of the Things.

Necromunda, I think they were even using the original card terrain

Warhammer Fantasy Battles 

Unsurprisingly,  there were many games of Warhammer Fantasy Battle and Warhammer 40K.  

Classic style Warhammer board just before the battle starts

High Elves vs Orcs and Goblins 

This was even a game of second edition WFB (my favourite edition). A battle from the classic Tragedy of McDeath scenario pack

This table (previous two pictures) was great for playing 'spot the building'. There are versions of buildings from Orc's Drift and Terror of the Lichemaster. Even the Monastery of La Maisontaal.

The main marquee had two huge tables. One featured this awesome mega battle. There was an amazing mix of stuff, including whole regiments of repurposed Lord of the Rings minis, giants, Empire and allies and the fantastic airship 

The other large table was shared by this ruined city, which I think was Praag? and the Bomberz game (the sandy coloured bit at the back)

Warhammer 40 000

There were nearly as many games of 40K going on, with a good mix of armies and styles of terrain. I missed getting photos of the great looking Tyranid terrain on one table.

I think this was a game using the original Rogue Trader rules, though it includes some more modern minis 

Proper 40K spikey cacti 

An impromptu game set up on one of the tables in the courtyard. Great Battlewagon.

There was more, but I didn't get pictures of everything. Apologies if I missed your game here, but I certainly enjoyed everything I saw.

Next time I'll show you what I got, along with some photos of the cabinets.

RECON 2024 End of an Era?

Saturday saw the last RECON show at Pudsey Civic Hall. It's always been one of my favourite shows, and I went to one of the first ones in a church hall in Leeds. The first shows featured a Hordes of the Things tournament, and I was pleased to see that there was still one being played today.

I met up with both Bodvoc and the Settle and District Gamers and T'Other One and had a good browse.

I didn't take any more pictures as my phone was just about out of battery, but there were some great demo games, including a stunning Starship Troopers siege and some large scale 40K stuff. One table was set up as a lovely English village, it even boasted of being the winner of the Britain in Bloom competition, I have the feeling that something nasty was about to happen though.

The Goodies

My haul was pretty limited; a new brush, some non-metallic paint agitators, some pipettes and syringes for adding sealant to textures and some d10s for Warlords of Erehwon.

Minis wise I restricted myself to just some Frostgrave Soldiers and Wizards, in both cases the newer sets. I'm going to be using these for Rangers of Shadow Deep, amongst other games, and I'm already planning how to kitbash Besaria.

I hope RECON continues at another venue, there do seem to be fewer games shows in my area these days. At least Chillcon should be back in Sheffield next year.

Recon Haul

I had a fun look round Recon, the early December Wargaming show in Pudsey. Previously it was run by the Wakefield and District Wargames Club. Now The Pit Gaming Shop runs it. I'm not sure what difference this makes, though I noticed that some of the regular traders were absent.

I went with a very clear list of wants; 6mm scenery for my Fantastic Battles dwarves to fight over, the latest Clash of Kings book, and a pack (or two) of Reaper Bones ghouls/ghasts for my D&D collection.

Well, best laid plans and all that. Still, I came away with some nice Oldhammer stuff, something for the 10mm Fantastic Battles in Middle Earth collection and my son got a great piece of roleplaying scenery.

The classic Citadel Skullchucker, it even includes the pile of skulls, an often lost component

Beast of Nurgle, sadly missing one leg

The Eagles are coming!  10mm 3D prints from Explode the minis

Lovely stagecoach for D&D, and also ideal as an objective for many skirmish games

It was also great to catch up with various gaming friends, and I admired some great looking games.  This Aliens game was probably the best looking, complete with dropship!

In all, a great show, and I had lots of fun.  I bought a realistic amount of stuff for painting, and got some nice out of production minis.

Final regrets?  A couple.  I could have got a classic dwarf organ gun, though it was missing a couple of parts.  It was more expensive than the Skullchucker, and I already have a war machine for Team Good in my Oldhammer project, albeit for elves.  There was also a pack of Black Tree Design orc boar riders, quite Oldhammer in style, but these are not hard to get hold of, and it was the Beast of Nurgle or them.

Chillcon 23

I got to Chillcon 23 this last weekend.  It's a lovely show in Sheffield, with plenty of room, and much better lighting than I remember at FIASCO!

I was relatively restrained with my purchases, picking up the jig from the Slice and Slot Kickstarter that I backed.  I also got a sample pack of the printed doors, arches and windows, just so I can have a go while I wait for some to be printed*.  I've been playing around with these and I'll make up some ruins that will be ideal for my Middle Earth terrain.  These particular prints were from MTG Terrain.

I also got some 3D printed crabs which will make a great Tidal Swarm for my Trident Realm from Iron Gate Scenery.  They have plenty of nice normal animals alongside some great looking fantasy stuff.  I was tempted by a Bolt Thrower for my Kingdoms of Men, but it is quite a bit too big for the 50mm base required.  The crabs, however, look just right for a Tidal Swarm regiment.

Just as a sample I got three minis from The Lion's Tower who had a lucky dip, £5 for 3 minis!  I've not heard of this company before, but I'm very impressed.  Looking at their catalogue later I particularly like the ghouls, great for roleplaying.  I think the minis I 'dipped' are a skeleton corpse, a human female monk with flail and a chap I haven't IDed, but I think he'd make a nice druid.

Finally I picked up three packs from Ramshackle Games.  These seem to be prototypes for a new range of folklore style goblins.  Think Brian Froud rather than Games Workshop or Tolkien.  I was particularly impressed by both the enthusiasm of the young man we talked to, and the odd nature of some of the sculpts.  I understand that he plans to Kickstart the range soon.  I got a robed goblin with a cleaver and wearing some sort of mask (it could just as well be a rebreather for a SciFi setting), a lovely female goblin with a slightly 'hedgehog' face and different options for arms, and a pie and tea service - ideal objectives.

I also spent an enjoyable half hour talking about Early Medieval music with the re-enactors.  A couple of them have a  band, Elven Dale, and it's just my sort of thing, Early Medieval and new tunes in the the same style.

*I know I don't have a 3D printer, nor am I ever likely to get one, but I have friends who do.

Chillcon 2022, and MDF Generators

I recently went to Chillcon in Sheffield. It's a great show, and it was good to see it back after several years absence.

I got Clash of Kings 2022 (Mantic's annual update and re-jig for King's of War, notable this year for the brand new army lists for Halflings and Riftforged, lightning themed orcs).  I'm certainly not looking for a new army at the moment (I've still got those Trident Realm minis to paint, for one thing) but it's always nice to see the game growing.

Otherwise I got little else apart from some MDF terrain from Blotz.  A pack of 28mm Generators and a 28mm Turbine/10mm Shield Generator.  I'm planning on using both sets for several games.  They will make great terrain/objectives in the 10mm Sci Fi games and also in Star Wars skirmishes.  They do rather resemble a certain Shield Generator on Hoth.  They may even look good on a Deadzone table or in a Firefight battle.

In the past I've been disappointed with some MDF terrain.  It can be a bit flat looking; blocky and lacking in depth and detail.  Well the generators certainly don't look flat.  They are simple to build (the instructions are on the website) and they've made the most of the materials to give a nice chunky piece that certainly doesn't look like sheet materials.

They've also been designed so that none of the little tabs left from where pieces attach to the frame are on surfaces that show.  They can easily be removed with a light sanding, but it's a nice touch all the same.

The finished generators 

147mm x 197mm of Generator goodness

I couldn't find my Gorilla Woodworking glue, but Strong Craft glue seems to have done the trick.  I used clips to hold the various sub-assemblies together while the glue dried, and I found that I could work on the fin section while the arch section was drying.  If I get another set I'll work on all four at once, indeed, I built the last two together, which saved a lot on drying time.

Painting wise I mostly copied the suggestion in the instructions, black undercoat, heavy drybrush of Vallejo Game Color Gunmetal Metal, followed by highlights of VGC Chainmail Silver.  I picked out details with, and painted the various 'power' bits with Vallejo Model Color Dark Prussian Blue highlighted with Vallejo Game Color Magic Blue and finally VGC Glacier Blue.  I added a little drybrush of a mix of the Magic blue and Glacier Blue around the vents to look like a glow from the power coils, or whatever they are.

The examples on the website have gold or bronze to accent the fins and other raised details, I chose red for this, simply VGC Red Gore with a highlight of VGC Blood Red and just a touch of VGC Fiery Orange.

I'm sure that many other colour schemes would look good; Hoth style white for instance, and I may get another pack and experiment.

Next to a 28mm Star Wars mini...

...and with some 10mm Sci Fi minis.

I think they work well for both scales, and, although I didn't have any to hand, I'm confident that the 20mm Star Wars minis will look good too.

Building and painting these was a pleasure, I recommend these for very useful Sci Fi scatter terrain.  Excellent value, and all round nice pieces of scenery.

EDIT; you can see these terrain pieces with some 20mm minis here.

Orctober - Mantic Marauder Ripper Suits Progress

With my Ripper Suits assembled and primed its on to painting.  I've done my research and watched a good number of YouTube videos and there are lots of ways I could approach the Ripper Suits.

I'm particularly taken with Sonic Sledgehammer's Grizzly Suit. The result is subtle, but looks very different to a Space Marine or similar, and I want to avoid that. I've based my painting on this, though with my own palette, and lots more fiddly details.

When it comes to colours, I wanted to avoid the 40K orc black or red with checks look; Marauders are much more militarily sophisticated, though they are happy to trade on the 'dumb brute' stereotype.  I didn't want an 'army green', with green skins there isn't much contrast.  I'm also avoiding grey, I might look at that sort of colour for my GCPS.  My previous Marauders (here) were a sort of vague Afrika Corps colour scheme (or any modernish desert unit), which looked good with the green flesh, so I went for a yellow/brown palette, conveniently close to the German Green Brown primer; you'd almost think I planned this.

The Vallejo Surface Primer was given a wash of Army Painter Strong Tone. Already I liked the results.

 

Primed and washed Ripper Suits

Once everything was dry I used Sonic Sledgehammer's foam stippling technique with Vallejo Extra Opaque Heavy Khaki. It gives a good effect, though I think I need to practice a bit to reach his levels of quality. I highlighted with a mix of the VEO Khaki and Vallejo Game Color Khaki with a final highlight of straight Khaki. 

I then went on to the details. Orc skin in two different shades of green, gunmetal for most of the metal pieces and VEO Heavy Charcoal for the pipes and tubes. 

There are a lot of little details on the models, pipes, straps etc, and there's a temptation to add a lot of colour here.  However, these are military combat suits built for effective use; none of this 'red to go faster'.  Real life military rarely go for lots of brightly coloured equipment, that said, a little bit of spot colour will lift the mini and give interest to the eye.

So the final stage will be to add some detailing, but not lots.  Family stuff has taken up a lot of October (plus the opportunity to have a day playing the music of Josquin de Prez), so I'll be finishing these in November.  After that, maybe I'll get the rest of a Marauder Striek Force done, as I now have Deadzone 3, and these Ripper Suits need some friends.

I also got to go to FIASCO today, Leeds Wargames Club's annual show.  It's been a while since I've been to this show, but it looks like the only one I'll get to this year, and the first one since Recon 2019.

I didn't get much, some cheap brushes and a couple of Reaper Bones minis, but it was great to get to a show again and meet T'Other One and Bodvoc, along with his SAD Wargamers (Settle and District).  Bodvoc has done a better write up of the show (with pictures!), I struggled with the dim lighting that the show is cursed with, so didn't do much more than just gaze in wonder.  One participation game that stood out for me was a Mandalorian themed skirmish.  The 3D printed minis were excellently done, and made me think I need to investigate this more for both my 28mm and 20 mm Star Wars games.

A Bit of Stuff

Just a quick mention of Recon, Wakefield and district Wargamers annual show at Pudsey Leisure Centre.  It's usually a good show, and I hope to be there tomorrow (7th December).

I don't often recommend things, especially outside of the hobby, but I've recently been enjoying The Case of Charles Dexter Ward podcast.  a well done reimagining of the classic Lovecraft tale set in the present day.  Not all reimaginings work for me (War of the Worlds, I'm looking at you), but this is outstanding, and I'm listening to it as I paint ogres and marines (not the marines you are probably thinking of). 
This series came out a while ago, and there is a new story, The Whisperer in the Darkness, that I'm looking forward to.  Makes me think about running Call of Cthulhu or Delta Green again.

Chillcon Haul

Yesterday it was Chillcon, one of my favourite wargames shows.  I'll admit I don't cope well with crowds, so the bigger shows, like Vapnartak, are not for me.

Anyway, what was the show like, and what did I get to add to my MABLE*?

The show was great, it was clearly busy, but not too crowded as the space available was ample.
I went with a list, both for myself and for Merlin.  Alas, I couldn't find anything from his list, and my list was only partially filled.

Thud and Blunder, since Merlin got this I was determined to track it down.  It uses essentially the same engine as In her Majesty's Name and Blood Eagle, but is far more geared to a traditional fantasy game (there are pages of spells for instance, and there are sample characters to make up an adventuring party).  I hope this will give me the opportunity to play games with pretty much any fantasy minis I have.  I certainly have no real complaints with the Blood Eagle games I played a while ago, though I suspect on a much larger scale the granularity of the game might slow it down somewhat.

I theory, I shouldn't need to paint anything up for this as I have stuff for Vanguard, plus loads of D&D minis of various sorts.  I'm sure I will do a dedicated warband though.

Dwarven MDF cut terrain from Lasercut Architect. I've seen these two dwarven buildings on the internet before, in real life they were good enough for me to buy.  There is a third, slightly larger, building and a bridge in the same style.  If cottage 1 (on the left) looks slightly familiar, it is based loosely on a card model of a dwarven brewery that was available in a scenario pack many years ago.  I liked the original and always planned to build one of my own.  Now I don't have to.  The designer was interested to hear that there could be a market for similar buildings in 15mm.  

I have a terrain project planned for the near future, so these will come in useful.

Oathsworn under their 'Sensible Shoes' label.  I've not noticed these before, but they are nice minis for RPG characters (and a few monsters).  My new D&D campaign features Dragonborn as an important PC/NPC race, so I was pleased to add to my currently small collection.  

Tieflings this time.  My son likes these, so I picked up what we could find.

I needed some good sized tufts to finish of some bases (then I can show the handgunners).  I can pick up Army painter stuff quite easily in my FLGS, but these were a little more out of the ordinary.

Mantic were selling packs of the Star Saga scenery at a very reasonable price, so I got a pack to use as extra stuff for Deadzone.  I understand that interactive scenery will be a thing in DZ soon.

There were many impressive display games; Mantic's Vanguard was particularly appealing, but for sheer nostalgia this was awesome. 

This is Dark Ops' 3D Heroquest board.  I'm sure this boardgame (released in the 1980s, don't you feel old now?) is responsible for more people joining the hobby than pretty much anything else.

What didn't I get?  Well I wanted some bases from Warbases, but I didn't think to order them in advance.  I'll put in a postal order.  I was also after a few odd minis; a plastic GW archer to complete my kingdoms of Men archer regiment, and some old school minis for another mini project i have coming up.  

It didn't matter though, I'm more than happy with what I got, and when it comes down to adding to the lead pile, there are only two new minis for me (plus a bit of terrain admittedly).

*Miniatures Acquired Beyond Life Expectancy