Fred's 2012 Painting Diary

[fred.]

The recent request for Lizardmen photos made me realise how little I have updated this thread in the last few months. And it is due to laziness, not lack of gaming and painting.

Most recently I have been playing Kings of War, by Mantic, which while generally 28mm rules, seems to work well with 10mm. We are currently playing with standard distances and one Warmaster unit equals a regiment in KoW. This does reduce the frontage of units compared to standard but seems to play OK.

The army lists for KoW add a few extra units that aren't in Warmaster but are probably in WHFB, which has meant adding a few units to my Elven horde.  These are mainly woodland sprits and walking trees.

I'm enjoying how KoW plays, it's quick to play. There needs to be quite a lot of thought, as movement is fairly strict so you need to be thinking ahead a turn or two.

[fred.]

Christmas

Most years for Christmas I have a good selection of books and CDs that I have collected on my Amazon wish list over the year - but not this year. So I put together a little list of gaming stuff which my family were good enough to get me. I received the following

Pendraken German Paras - an army pack with some extra heavy weapons, this will give me a couple of battalions for BKC. I even sorted these into bases last night while Downton Abby was on!

Roman Fort from the Baggage Train - a very nice resin model, which has an impressive length of walls.

A Citadel Modular Hill - to provide the extra 2 quarters to make a very big hill with the other parts I got with the BoFA set some time ago

Lots of 6mm WWII aircraft from Heroics and Ros - I've decided that I want my aircraft a size down - and this means you can get lots for the money - these haven't arrived yet, but will hopefully be with me in the next few days.

[fred.]

Sylvan Kin for Kings of War

I've Kings of War a few times in the last couple of weeks - using 10mm Warmaster Armies - and the KoW army list has a few units in it that don't feature in WM, so I've been doing a bit of shopping. The first unit up is the Sylvan Kin, who are described as "Spirits and faery folk of the forest realms ... humanoid elementals of nature, fighting with the fury of the Great Wild"



There are some Pendraken spirits, the tree dryads are Splintered light 15mm, the small fairies are 6mm from Micro World Games, and the other humanoids and dogs are Eureka. I'm quite pleased with how these came out - as when I had the different figures on painting sticks it was all looking a bit odd. I have a few Centaurs coming from Pendraken to finish off the other stands, and am going to try to make some flying fairies as well.

[fred.]

Warmaster High Elf Dragon Princes

Managed to pick up a couple of these very rare Warmaster units of eBay just before Christmas - for a fraction of the normal £100 a unit they go for. They weren't listed under their correct name, but did have a clear photo - so not sure why other people didn't spot them, perhaps because they undercoated, they don't appeal to collectors?

They have painted up nicely - I particularly like the red unit



Both these units may well get an outing on the table tomorrow.

[petercooman]

Looking great!

It's a real shame what those older models go for ately!

I play epic 40k and am sometimes amazed at what prices they dare to ask for such small models. The top of the ladder being an imperator titan that will cost You over 100£ on the bay, and it ain't even metal, it's freaking plastic!

[fred.]

Warmaster High Elves

Had a the gaming table out, so took the chance to sort through my High Elves, which are now up to 3 boxes, and take some photos. This army is now over 7000 pts in Warmaster terms - there are even half-a-dozen Pendraken units in the army now.

[Steve J]

They look like a real labour of love Fred .

[fred.]

Or perhaps an obsession....

[Techno]

Looks fabulous Fred.....
But try and paint a bit faster would you ? .....We need to see at least twice as many !
Cheers - Phil.

[petercooman]

Looks fabulous Fred.....
But try and paint a bit faster would you ? .....We need to see at least twice as many !
Cheers - Phil.

Preferably another race,so we see some variation...

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

Is this thread ending at midnight tomorrow ?

IanS 

[fred.]

I think it might. It started on 1/1/12, so it would seem appropriate to end this one and start a new thread.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Superb Elfes sire!   

[nikharwood]

Pointy-ears...thousands of 'em...

Very nice Forbes, very nice - great to see your progress this year & look forward to seeing your efforts in 2013

[fred.]

Thanks all - glad to see you like the elveses - the army just seems to keep increasing its size.

[fred.]

2012 Review

Looking back through this thread has shown me how much stuff I have done through the year, even though I haven't recorded everything on it. At the start of the year there was a lot of detail, which thinned down through the spring and summer, autumn was a void for updates (even though quite a bit of painting was done), and the end of the year has seen a bunch of updates.

Looking back to the first posts I mentioned Orcs, WWI French and WWII Tanks as long term projects that are lingering in drawers. The first two have seen no change this year - although the French have been moved to a new home in my new Bisley 15 drawer cabinet. The Tanks have seen some progress, a good number of British tanks were finished off the for the painting comp, and I based 50+ german tanks late in the year.

The big volumes of painting have been in the following
28mm Saga - I think I have 8 pts of Anglo Danes now, these started from zero, as they were a present last Christmas
WM Empire - major progress with this army, now up to 4k points, which more than doubles what was previously painted. Still need to do a couple of halberd and crossbow units to make the 4k minimums. New painted figures, 7 Knights, 2 Pistoleers, 4 halberdiers, 2 crossbows, 6 canons, war altar, steam tank. 
WM Araby - lots of progress here, lots of infantry painted, need to finish off the knights, camels and horse archers to get this army to 4k as well. Painted this year, 6 spearmen, 6 archers, 1 camels, 3 horse archers, 2 flying carpets, 1 unit of elephants.
WM High Elves - as mentioned above this army seems to have grown without any direct effort. Recently purchased new figures for KoW. New figures are a mix of painted ones from eBay as well as ones I have painted from scratch, but overall 8 knights, 3 Reavers, 10 Infantry, 5 Archers, 2 Eagles and a Dragon.
WM Dogs of War - added 6 units of Minotaurs as Ogres and converted some figures to be Birdmen
WSS - big increase in this era, from half a British force to having good sized French and British forces available - these are Pendraken armies
28mm WoTR - some progress on these figures, including additions of the new Perry cavalry and pikes, and sorting out crossbows from my old (very old) lead figures.

Rules
I've played a variety of games this year:
Saga - has been ongoing throughout the year, always provides a good game.
Hail Caesar (Fantasy) - early in the year continued its popularity from 2011, but faded from favour by the early summer
Maurice - had a period of popularity over the summer, but we lost interest mainly due to the problems of small forces getting left out of the game
Warmaster - always a staple of our gaming group
Warhammer - only played one game - and it doesn't appeal
Muskets and Tomahawks - played a few games, but the games feel too random
Blitzkrieg Commander - only 1 game but reminded my how much I like WWII as a period - but not certain on rules.
Kings of War - the current favourite - played a good few games over the last month and really rather liking it.

Purchases and Presents
What new stuff has come in
Lizardmen - purchased a good sized Pendraken army in the summer - but have only painted a handful of units. Really should get on with these.
Araby - added cavalry reinforcements from TB Line, but these need assembling and painting.
WSS - added various bits to my armies - most of these painted up
LoA - bought a fairly decent sized infantry force - no progress on these
KoW - various bits to added a few extras to existing armies, already have gamed with some of these, even though they were only bought in December.
Roman Fort - a Xmas pressie, this looks really good, just need some decent weather to get out and get this base coated.
6mm WWII aircraft, another Xmas Pressie, still waiting for them to be delivered though.
WWII German Paras (Pendraken) - another Xmas Pressie, have got these sorted into units but need to do some clean up and then get them sprayed.

Still in the lead mountain
Late Era Romans - have made next to no progress on these, despite really liking the figures - might have to get them out as a KoW army to provide some impetus - and now they have a nice fort to defend too.
Orcs - lots, still sitting in a drawer, probably for another year.

Not certain what my priority will be for the coming year. I feel I should get the Araby army finished, as there isn't too much more to do, but I am finding the figures hard work to paint, perhaps because they are very detailed, and I feel they need a lot of effort to do them justice. Then there are the new shiney things that came for Xmas. Choices, choices...

[OldenBUA]

And while it's not the longest thread on the forum, it does put some other attempts to shame. 

[Steve J]

An interesting read on your projects, rules and games etc.

[fred.]

Thanks Steve and OldenBAU - glad my ramblings and photos are of interest.

Roman Fort
I had chance to spray paint this yesterday, and have started painting half the pieces


The whole fort, in splendid brown, along with a few houses that I purchased previously


Front view, with some of those Elves again for scale


Half the pieces, with detailing painted in.

The next step is to flock the banks - but I can't decide how much of the banks should be grassy? I want at least a few mm of flock at the front, and perhaps a bit more at the back. But I don't know if the banks would be grassed over to increase stability, or they would be kept clear? Thoughts chaps?

[petercooman]

Nice fort! What manufacturer is it from?

I think it depends on what you want it to be. If it is a fort that has been in place for a while, it would be normal the banks are very grassy. If you want it to be a newly raised fort it would be quite plain and just a bunch of plain dirt.

Now if it where my fort, i would add thornbushes to tha banks, to repell invaders