Baron Samedi

Baron Samedi

The Baron here was bought and painted for use as a zombie master in a variety of games.  The figure will also do well as a wyrd (psyker) for my Necromunda Goliath gang should I ever need one.

The paint job isnt great, a little like the assassin that I painted around the same time.  I am still getting back on the proverbial horse regarding my painting, which has suffered somewhat after the big slump that I had for the latter half of 2011.

More upbeat than one might expect.

Anyway, in the interest of getting my productivity back up I painted the figure to the standard shown, got frustrated with various elements and decided to leave it as shown.  Its ok, but could be better.  Story of my life.

Figures that facilitate mid-game Live and Let Die quotes > figures that dont facilitate mid-game Live and Let Die quotes in my experience.

Judge Fear

Judge Fear

Like Judge Mortis last time, Fear is a Dark Judge.  Of all of the Dark Judges he sports perhaps the most preposterous outfit, which in the context of the Dark Judges is really saying something.

Fear has the ability to throw big man-traps that immobilise and/or injure targets.  Im not sure where the traps come from, but they tie in thematically with his costume at least.

Fears never ending Mantrap projectile ability is in addition to the standard suite of Dark Judge powers (immortality, fatal touch, extreme zombie-like resistance to physical attacks, trans-dimensional transport technology, telepathic link with other Dark Judges, the ability while in gaseous form to telepathically control susceptible psychics: common or garden spooky stuff) Fear also has another unique form of dispensing “Justiccce!”.

Fears face is capable of causing fatal effects in onlookers via his creepy gaze.  Fear usually controls the effect by opening the gate/portcullis like faceplate on his hilarious looking helmet.  Barring one or two exceptions Fears spooky visage has not been shown in the strip.

Like most things in the Judge Dredd strip, the interpretations of the Dark Judges uniforms have varied and changed over the years.  I picked the bits that I liked the most from the images that I had looked through and went with scheme shown.

Fears cloak is usually shown as black.  I decided to go with a brown similar to that shown on his cloak and the bat wings on his helmet in the image above as I thought that it would make for a more interesting miniature visually and give him more identity in the context of his colleagues.

While all other Dark Judges play second fiddle to their leader Judge Death (coming in a later installment) Fear in particular never gets any respect.

A lot of this stems from the very first time that Dredd confronted Fear.  Fear had been employing his creepy fizzog to bump off numerous residents of Billy Carter block .  Fear tried it on Dredd, spouting “Gaze into the face of Fear!”.  The rest is a little bit of comic book history, as shown below.

That pattern has become something of a theme.  Judge Dredd + Judge Fear = Fears head gets mangled or severed.

I never understood why in these cases Judge Fears helmet appears to have the durability of a Digestive biscuit, but who cares.

The image above is noteworthy as it shows Fears face (although I imagine that Fears face is indescribable and probably in the eye of the beholder, rather than just a creepy eyeballed thing).

Also of note is that the image is actually a pair of panels from a Dredd “fantasy gaming strip” (a “choose your own adventure” or “you are the hero” sort of affair) called House of Death.  It appeared in a 2000AD spin-off called Diceman in the eighties.

Jangly

While Judges Death, Fire and Mortis are metal figures manufactured by Foundry, irritatingly Foundry never sold a metal Judge Fear (although there is one on Kevin Dallimores site that never saw production as far as I know.  Boo!).

Handily enough the sculptor of 90% of the Foundry 2000AD range (Tim Prow who I presume sculpted that Kevin Dallimore painted Fear figure as well as the other Dark Judges) was hired on the back of his work sculpting 2000AD Heroclix.  Conveniently, he had sculpted a Fear for Indy Clix, which is where this figure comes from.

I had trouble stripping paint from the ‘clix and some of the detail was a bit blobby and indistinct, which made Fear something of a chore to paint.  Another reason why my Dark Judge project stalled for so long I think.

Like my painting on the other Dark Judges many shortcuts were taken while getting Fear finished.  As I had got so bogged down on these guys I simply had to do the minimum to get them done and put them to one side, which had a negative effect on the quality of the paint job.  Unfortunately Fear is the low point of my Dark Judge sub-project.  Ho hum.  I may return to the figure at some point in the future, but its not likely any time soon.

Judge Fire and a group shot of the four Dark Judges finally go up tomorrow.

 

40K Assassin

 

Rogue Trader era Assassin

Assassins have been part of the WH40K universe since the original “Rogue Trader” edition.

In the numerous background sources produced since then many of the various elements that made up the Assassin as described in that original rulebook were split up into six aspects of the Officio Assassinorum.  This gave rise to six different assassin “temples” or “clades”, each with their own equipment and techniques.  To date corresponding miniatures have been made for four of the six temples.

Before all of that however Jes Goodwin sculpted this more generic assassin figure to fit with the background in Rogue Trader.

It is to my mind a stone cold classic GW figure.  Elements of the design of this model were carried forward to each of the miniatures for the four assassin temples.  While those later assassin models are largely pretty good, none of them have the charm of this figure.

Assassins are pretty much invariably painted black, ninja style.  I have painted a lot of black on miniatures recently so I wanted to steer clear of that on this one.

I came across a photo of the figure painted in a light blue scheme somewhere online (I cant remember where) and while the blue was great, what really caught my eye was the white socks.

Apart from what I have picked up from trash like Power Rangers over the years I know very little about samurai and ninja fashions and styles, but to me the white socks were evocative and pretty cool.  So I loosely copied the colour scheme that I saw online, with a few minor changes that suited me.

Lastly, this figure was painted after a long break in painting which shows in a few places.  When I look at it I vaguely remember a comment about “the lack confidence in the brushstrokes” that I remember an old college tutor making.  I think that that applies to this figure: it would have benefited from more precision painting.

On the plus side, I think that the figure looks cool anyway, even if some of the highlighting is a bit clunky.

I am considering picking up the four figures from each of the various Officio Assassinorum temples and making a team, each painted in a tonally dark but brightly hued colour, Power Rangers style.  It might even happen too, as it would be a pretty quick project plus I have wanted something to serve as Power Rangers in miniature for a while now.

Judge Death

Judge Death

Judge Death is the leader of the Dark Judges and the archenemy of Judge Dredd and/or Judge Anderson.

"The crime isss life, the sssentencce is death."

Visible above is Deaths shtick.  As a trans-dimensional, undead super-fiend, Death dishes out his form of justice up close and personal, usually via the plunging of  his semi-ethereal hands into victims chests.  He then “squeeezzessss” with fatal results.

Apparently Judge Death was conceived as a recurring nemesis for Dredd largely because he couldnt be killed.  Dredd tended to bump off his adversaries in short order, so Judge Death sidestepped that problem for the writers by being undead and tricky to capture or hold.

Deaths Pterodactyl Shoulder Pad

Deaths all-life-is-committed-by-the-living-therefore-all-life-is-crime standpoint is even more draconian than Dredds law and order views.  This provides obvious parallels with Dredds own pretty black and white standpoint.  The two-sides-of-the-same-coin thing is particularly apparent for these comic book foes.

Death sporting quite a green complexion.

As time went on Deaths origin story was explored.  As often happens when the mysterious or creepy is explained its impact is lessened.  This in addition to a few ill-advised comic turns taken by Judge Death during that era turned him into more of a comical character than the creepy ghoul he had started out as.

There have been efforts to make Judge Death creepy all over again since, some of which have worked quite well to emphasise his otherworldly serial killer-like zealotry.  Regardless I think that for readers of my era for whom Judgement on Gotham was a big deal, Judge Death will always tend to be a little more comical than scary.

As you can see from the various takes on Deaths look shown in this post, the colours used for the various parts of his uniform and his flesh vary from artist to artist. When painting my take on the character I had to pick and choose which colours I thought would work the best on the figure in isolation and also in conjunction with the bright primaries of my Mega City Judges.

Like my other Dark Judges, I found Death to be a stumbling block for my toy soldier painting productivity.  As a result the painting on some areas is far superior to that on other areas as I finally rushed to get the figure finished.

Another Dark Judge next time.

Judge Mortis

Judge Mortis

The Dark Judges are foes of Judge Dredd that hail from “Deadworld”, an Earth like planet located in another dimension.  Like Dredd they are law enforcers but the Dark Judges laws are even more draconian than Mega City Ones famously strict codes: the Dark Judges eradicate all life in order to eradicate all crime.

In order to achieve this goal, the Dark Judges are dead.  Their ectoplasmic forms inhabit corpses.  If the corpses are destroyed their gaseous forms escape until another suitable host is prepared.  ”You cannot killll what doessss not live!” is a pretty common soundbite from these guys.

More agile than one might expect.

So technically the Dark Judges are liches or something, possibly wights.  I am still adding the “zombie” tag to this post though.

"Hol(e)y Judge Mortis Batman!"

There are four Dark Judges (although two other female characters did feature in their ranks for a while, plus another character from comics joined the Dark Judges for a story once, but more on that at a later date).  Each Dark Judge has his own shtick: Mortis here cause decay and putrefaction in anyone or thing that he comes into contact with.

"You cannot killll what doessss not liivvvee!" etc

The Dark Judges robes of office are each a thematically different parody of the Mega City One Judges uniform.  A pretty funny parody in my opinion, with pterodactyls in place of eagles and skulls, bones and body parts featuring heavily.  Fashion restraint is not a desirable quality in a Dark Judge.

Pterodactyl Skeleton Shoulder Pad

Various artistic interpretations of the Dark Judges have coloured different uniform elements in various ways.  I decided to go with a mix of influences from different artists to give each Dark Judge a visual identity while keeping them thematically linked.

Mortis features more bones in his uniform than the other Dark Judges.  Considering that he sports a cows skull for a head and has a bony tail he is pretty easily distinguished from his colleagues.

I did have to represent the bony armour differently to the bony head and tail, which in turn has to be similar but different to the rest of Mortis body, which is covered in stinking meat.

Bovine

I hit a painting slump in mid-August part of the way through painting my Dark Judges.  They have been sitting on my painting table since then in an unfinished state, while I have been unable to get anything else painted.

I finally got the enthusiasm up to do some painting in December and decided that I would finish the Dark Judges one way or another.  As a result I took a few shortcuts and there are a couple of areas on each of these figures that really could have done with some more careful painting.  In the interests of clearing the decks for new projects I decided to grit my teeth and do a basic job on the remaining areas.

Hopefully those areas dont let the miniatures down too badly, as there are still some bits on the Dark Judges that are quite nice in my opinion.

Another Dark Judge up next time.  Comments and criticisms on Mortis are more than welcome.

Mancave Upgrade Complete

I finally got my hobby room tidied up and functional again on Xmas eve.  It was driving me nuts because of the state of it for the last couple of months.

The room now looks like this:

Many if the items on the shelves need to be rearranged a little, into some sort of order but that can wait.  For now at least the room is operational again.

A knock on effect of this de-cluttering was that some actual miniature painting was completed over my Xmas break.  This was somewhat satisfying as I havent managed to finish painting a figure since last August.

Assuming that I get a half decent chance to take a few photos over the next while I will be able to start regularly posting here again.  The posts are all written, I just need to get the photos sorted.

My Name in Lights

I recently got credit as a playtester in a couple of miniature games rules produced by Ganesha Games.

This was a first for me.  While it isnt a massive deal (I know a guy who works full time writing role-playing game sourcebooks for example), getting a credit in a gaming rulebook is a nice thing to tick off my bucket list.

Image from Ganesha Games

The first ruleset was Flashing Steel written by Andrew at shichitenhakki.  Flashing Steel is a swashbuckling variation on the Ganesha game engine, designed for games featuring dashing, moustache twirling, chandelier swinging, roguish types.

During playtests I played using Star Wars stuff.  It turns out that France in the 1600s bears a lot of similarity to a galaxy far, far away when it comes to the mechanics of tales of derring do.  I had fun testing Flashing Steel out, as the emphasis was squarely on cinematic, story driven action, rather than sterile slaughterfests.

Image from Ganesha Games

The second game that I got a playtest credit for is Mighty Monsters.  Another variant on the Ganesha Games engine, this one is about kaiju (with a little bit of mecha thrown in).

I have a lot of interest in pretty much anything that involves giant monsters or robots hitting each other or blowing things up, so I was glad to be involved a bit in its production, even though I wasnt a very big contributor to it.

Mighty Monsters rather well titled sister game “Samurai Robot Battle Royale” is coming up soon.  I might try to get involved in the development of that if I can squeeze it into my rather spartan gaming schedule.

Mancave Upgrade

My spare time for the last week or so has been occupied with putting up shelves and the like.  When I am finished the place should look pretty decent, but right now it looks like this…

 

Having that room in such a mess means that I haven’t been able to get much actual hobby stuff (rather than hobby related stuff) done.  This state of limbo will likely continue for the next week or two, which is a a pain.

At least it will mean that my major work space will be prepped and ready to go for during my Xmas holidays and into 2012.

Hopefully I will have something more interesting finished and photographed to put up next week.

In The Emperors Name

After playing our game of JDMG (covered last week) MT, PB and I decided to give In the Emperors Name a go on the same terrain set-up.

As a bunch of gamers who have played their fair share of 40k in the past, cant stomach it now but still read some of the fiction and paint the occasional 40k figure, we really wanted this ruleset to work out.

The first hurdle was picking the forces, which was very finicky.  PB had even prepared a spreadsheet to help to make this step as hassle free as possible, but it was still a drudge.  Having to prepare a spreadsheet should have been our first warning I suppose, but as ItEN is a free, fan written set we were prepared to put in a little more effort to get it to work.

I never played orks in 40k but as I have painted up a few over 2011 I decided to go with them for this game.  They proved to play quite differently in comparison with the elite forces that MT and PB chose.

MT painted up his Harlequins a couple of years ago, primarily for use with Space Hulk.  A small elite group of elven ninja cabaret struck him as perfect for use in a 40k skirmish setting.

PB dug out a Librarian and Tactical squad of his “Dark Souls” chapter out of storage.  It was fun to see those guys again as I faced them across many miniature battlefields over the years.

The three forces set up equidistant from a Maguffin (the suspicious looking pink thing on the road in the bottom left of the picture above) and we spent the game converging on that.

As it happened our three forces each engaged both opposing forces in some fashion or another as the game progressed.  This was very much a first game of the system where we tried to get a handle on how the rules work while playing, so some silly oversights and mistakes cropped up, as was expected.

Due to the ineffectiveness of their ranged weaponry the orks ended up in close combat with the Dark Souls a little earlier than I liked.  MT capitalised on this with a well timed psychic attack from his Warlock that put my Boss at a disadvantage.

That allowed the Dark Souls to get an edge in the combat and prolong it for long enough to allow the Harlequins to escape with the objective.

—————

In the Emperors Name is available for free download here.

ItEN is an unofficial fan made rule set for playing skirmish games set in the Warhammer 40000 universe.   Considering how many people get into the hobby via 40k who enjoy the setting but get disillusioned by the relentlessly poor quality of the official rulesets, I think that there is a lot or room for a system that covers this area.

The rules have obviously been written by players enthusiastic about the setting and miniatures.  This shows in the large number of interesting and sometimes satisfyingly obscure warbands and retinues available.

Unfortunately though, the system didnt appeal to my group once we played it.  It probably deserves another go but with so many possible rulesets vying for my limited gaming time, I cant imagine ItEN getting another tryout.

The rules felt restrictive compared with other sets that we have played recently.  While it is quite possible that we missed some of the subtleties of the system (we did only play one game after all) in many respects ItEN reminded me of the negative elements of playing small games using the official 40k rules.

Basically the game seemed largely preordained.  Manoeuvering wasnt really much of an option and the timing and location of the big dice rolls could be predicted with certainty before the game even started.

A number of factors contributed to this, not least the scenario.  But the predictability is just too severe for our tastes.

We had a couple of other problems too, but I wont bother going into those.  I dont particularly enjoy ripping into a fan based free ruleset, particularly when the guys who put it together have put so much time into it and so obviously have affection for the source material.

Despite early promise it proved to be a damp squib for us

Judge Dredd in the Cursed Earth

PB and MT visited a few weeks back for a gaming weekend.  In addition to the boardgames that we had planned we also wanted to get a game or two of the Judge Dredd Miniatures Game and In the Emperors Name played.

We set up the post apocalyptic shanty town of Standard Falls as shown above.  This was the first game to use most of the scenery shown, as I put the majority of it together earlier this year.   I got a kick out of simply setting it up to be honest.  Standard Falls isnt finished just yet (more stuff in the pipeline) but it is satisfying to have got it even this far.

L to R: Psi Judge Geller, Riot Judge Barrabus, Street Judge Giant, Med Judge Trapper and Rookie Street Judge Lacey

A lot of factions were added in the most recent JDMG update.  I have suitable minatures to field many of them, but as I have most recently been working on Mega City One Judges, I wanted to use some of them again (above).  I was sorely tempted to use a zombie or robot force, but the Judges won out in the end.

As there were three players we decided to keep things simple and go for a game with two sides, rather than three.

Both MT and PB wanted to play using zombie forces so they each chose a force using half the points of the Judge force.  Above is PBs force of sickos led by Patient Zero (the Zombie Master) plus his henchman the horribly mutated Hoo Hoo and five former humans.

MTs force of rather gorier cadavers was led by the kinematically redundant, cybernetic demonoid, Adam.  MT had sunk a chunk of his points into Adams formidable psychic arsenal.

The scenario was set to be the assassination of the opponents leader(s).  Street Judge Giant was the most senior on the Department side.  In turn the judges had to apprehend or failing that execute both Patient Zero and Adam.

The Judge force proceeded Northward while each undead force attempted to flank them.  Which is kind of tough seeing that as yet, the only zombies sighted in Judge Dredds world have been the traditional slow variety.

Patient Zero psychically impels his rotten rogues down the abandoned street.

Riot Judge Barrabus has dealt with the walking dead before (or at least has seen a lot of old Horror tri-vids) and knows that standard projectiles have reduced effect on the living impaired.

Riot Foam on the other hand is just as effective on the dead as on the living.  With a jet from from his foam gun Barrabus locks Hoo Hoo and one of the zombies in place, still gnashing their teeth but completely incapacitated.  Patient Zero starts to get nervous.

The Judge force proceeds with the refused flank (not that difficult against shuffling undead) and concentrates the attack on Patient Zeros forces.  Spotting the danger Adam begins the slow redeployment of his force.

After another devastating display of Justice Department riot foam drill, Barrabus tops the zombies forces “Most Wanted” list.  Anticipating this, Med Judge Trapper moves close enough to administer stimm packs when Barrabus is dropped by a psychic assault.  Giant and Geller provide Hi-Ex covering fire.

Barrabus backs around the corner to regain his breath while Trappers selfless heroism is rewarded with a psychic blast that causes his brains to run out of his nose.

Giant remains close enough to tempt the zombie masters into stalling their retreat.

The view from the Southern edge.  Note the Rookie (bottom right) who has been helping to hold Adams forces in indecision on the West side of the large building.

With the sort of efficiency that one would expect from a totalitarian police state, the zombie rising of 2143 is crushed in its early stages.

—————————–

Not a particularly tactical game, but I enjoyed it.  I did get to thoroughly lambaste two gaming buddies simultaneously with my newly painted miniatures over my newly built and painted terrain though, so that helped.

What was interesting was that some of the rules that were used had been modified since our previous JDMG session, in part due to feedback that we supplied on the Mongose forum.  Power to the people indeed.  Dredd would crush that sort of feedback under his reinforced heel.

JDMG is proving to be one of my favourite miniature gaming systems yet.  I am not sure exactly what it is about the system that I like (although I have a number of  theories that I wont blather on about here) but the whole seems to be greater than the sum of its parts.  Its pretty “clean” as systems go too, which is important.

And of course the fact that a system that is working as well as this for our group is officially based in the Judge Dredd licence is completely fantastic as far as I am concerned.

We also played a game of In the Emperors Name on the same terrain following this game.  I will report on that soon.