The Hobby Sloth, Draig's Modelling Miscellany

So it's almost 2011. Where did 2010 go? I have no zoggin idea either. Around January last year I was in full Warhammer mode, and made a resolution to model and paint Da Ghostz, my all mounted Warhammer Campaign army, by the end of the year. I started well. By Feburary I had just finished off this unit of Spiders, and had over 1,000 points completely assembled:



Then I kind of stopped, and haven't been back to it since.

Lots of stuff got in the way if I'm honest. Playing games for one. Also regrettably I was sick for a lot of the year, and was in hospital twice, getting out just in time for Christmas (and Christmas flu). Also 8th Edition hit and I put Da Ghostz on hold until it was out to see if they needed changing for the new composition rules. I'm glad I did, as they needed a lot of changing! Then I decided to put them on hold again until the new Orc book comes out, as frankly I think they are going to need changing again.

Combined with that list of pitiful failure, I've not been feeling the Warhammer vibe as much recently. I've been playing a lot of Malifaux and Blood Bowl, and hope to add some Dystopian Wars and Flames of War to that list this year. So what's a git to do? New Year demands resolutions dammit!

Well this year I'm going to do it differently. Lots of smaller resolutions, which I think will suit my magpie nature better. I'll consider 2011 a sucess if I can achieve 7/10 of these targets.

Draig's Resolutions

1) Help run a sucessful fifth Animosity Campaign.
2) Finish Modelling and then Paint my Blood Bowl Orc Team.
3) Play at least 15 games of Blood Bowl!
4) Paint the Starter fleet for my Dystopian Wars Prussians.
5) Play with said fleet at least three times!
6) Paint at least 2 Malifaux Crews - Lilith and the Dreamer.
7) Improve my Game of Thrones LCG play. This means staying abreast of new expansions, playing more games, and getting some Melee going!
8) Play at least 15 different game systems in 2011.
9) Play 5 new games this year.
10) Play at least one game in my collection I haven't played for a year.

It's a varied list, so this is going to be part modelling and hobby blog, part repository for my mad ramblings, and part gaming diary as I try and achieve as many of those things as possible and have some fun along the way.

Finally (and I'm not making this a resolution, just a goal) I am keeping a tally of models bought vs models painted this year. I want to paint more than I buy for the first time ever.

Let's see how we go.

I'm looking forward to it Draig, but if you start slacking I will send the feared black orc strippers to your house.

Cheers,
G

... get some inspiration indeed!
Must be some view that black orc stripper...

Good luck and I hope to see progress!

Wazoo

You better don't ask, or she will show up in your house to

Cheers,
G

You better don't ask, or she will show up in your house to

Cheers,
G

Ha!
If it / she is coming, then tonight while we have a Sylvester-party!

cheers,

Kees

WGG, you are a sick, sick man.

So, off with the crack of the whip. I received a Hooded Rider for Christmas and finally recovered enough from the flu to put him together. Went for a Scribor ancient ruins base to lift him up substancially. Also ditched the cloak which I think looks a bit naff. Otherwise it's a fairly stock build. Monsterous amount of mold lines that needed flining off. Think I got them all, but it was frustrating.



Hardest bit of this model for anyone thinking of getting one, is the horse's head. Each snake is an individual piece, and I found I needed to drill the guide holes in the horses head to enlarge them, as pinning just isn't a possibility. Once the glue was dry, each snake had to be carefully supported at the joint while it was bent into shape. Not the easiest thing in the world, but I got there.



He's large with that big 'ol base. Size comparison to Limited Lord Chompy Bits, who stands 9cms tall!



So. That's it so far. I'm also ordering a sheet of plasticard 54" x 26". See if you can guess what it's for! I'll give you a clue...

40mm squares.

This post has been edited by Draig on Jan 1 2011, 02:25 AM

That is one weird looking horse , it is a nice model. Good to see you are making progress. I'm looking forward to the painted result.

Cheers,
G

Whoa! Cool! I have to say that the fact that each snake in the horses mane is individual is pretty odd. But hey it looks great... It is a cool model and I really like the way you based him it ought to look great! I have to say I am not a huge fan of the anime size sword but hey, as the Swedes say: small potatoes...

By the way I am hugely happy to see someone else use the word naff, I was begining to think it was only my family... Hazards of being an ex-pat I suppose...

Wazoo

Alrighty. Some of you may remember my Blood Bowl team. I decided it was time to finish the blighters off.

Blitzer 1





Blitzer 2





Blitzer 3





Blitzer 4



After finishing the fourth Blitzer I decided I set to with the green stuff. After about three hours worth of Greenstuff work they look, well, they look almost exactly the same! What you couldn't see in the original photos was the massive gaps caused by such drastic repositioning and the holes left by removing 40k imagary. I covered these up and added strapping for the pads and equipment to make them appear a little more Blood Bowl than 40k Nobz. This will give you an idea what I'm talking about:



So here's the finished models:





Eagle eyed viewers will notice one base (#8) is higher than the rest. That's a test model. Each base has a lead baseweight under it (I like the feel of heavy metal models, even when they are plastic). Each weight has a circular hole drilled in for a magnet to hold the ball, which is also magnetized.



However, that all looks a bit ugly when the player is knocked down, so to prettify them, and to reduce wear and tear on my custom board (more about that later) I am going to add a circle of felt to the base of each model like a chess piece. That test felt is a little too thick so I'm going to switch to 1mm felt in future.

Anyway that's it for now. More Blood Bowl incoming shortly, as the Troll, Throwers and most of the Star Players are also done.

Awesome!

Can't wait to see these guys done! What colour strip are they having?

Those orc blood bowl players look great, keep up the great work.

Cheers,
G

Awesome!

Can't wait to see these guys done! What colour strip are they having?

Likely the classic red and white. Easy to paint and goes well with Green skin. Yellow and Black is the other alternative.

Lovely! They look very, um... tough... Also i like the idea of felting the bases...

Wazoo

More progress! I'm fairly flying this year, and long may it continue.

Those of you with long memories may remember my previous attempt at a Troll.



I was never really happy with it, as it looked to skinny for the rest of the team, particularly next to the Black Orcs.



When the new GW River Trolls came out, I knew i had to have one. They look pretty good right out of the box, I just added in a shoulder pad to make it a bit more Blood Bowl.





I'm finally happy with how he looks, though its another large model it's more in keeping with the rest of the team.

So, on to Special Players. I wanted to build models for each Special Player I could field on this team, with the exception of Morg. He's not going in because he's not Green. So that left me Ugroth Bolgrot, Bomber Dribblesnot, Varag Ghoul Chewer, Scrappa Sorehead and Ripper the Troll.

Now Bomber is one of my favourite all time GW sculpts, and the first Blood Bowl model I ever bought after the Third edition Box. So a lot of memories there, and he could not be getting a conversion as a result.

Similarly Varag Ghoul Chewer has a wonderful new(ish) sculpt by GW and I decided to use that as well



Everyone else was getting converted.

I started with Scrappa. I decided a goblin on a pogostick, while very Blood Bowl, did not really fit the brutal feel of this team. Instead, I used something equally as bouncy but a lot more chompy - Gobbla the Squig, from the Warhammer Skarsnik set.





I know strictly speaking Squigs aren't strength 2, but to bounce that high it needs to be pretty light. If he gets punctured, I imagine him fizzing around like a released baloon!

Next up was Ugroth, the chainsaw wielding Orc. I decided to use an old 40k metal Nob model for this, as it was about the right size relative to the rest of my team. I wanted him to be smaller than the Blitzers after all. Chainsaw came from the 40k Ork range too.



Then I just festooned it with shoulder pads like I usually do. It still needs a handle on the Chainsaw, but I'll get to that soon.

Finally, Rippa. Now I had a problem. Rippa is usually a Stone Troll, and as I'd discovered, Stone Trolls are skinny beasts, and look a bit weedy next to the rest of my team. I'd already used the River Troll model, and I wanted Rippa to stand out a bit. Dude is strength 6 after all.

So I started scouting the 40k range to find something. I had a vauge idea of a huge Robot Troll. Fail THAT regen roll I wsaid to myself. I was thinking of using a Killa Kan, but that just didn't seem right. Then I remembered something I bought at Salute! 2010... The Forge World Runt Bot Model. Essentially it's a giant Robot Orc, with a tiny Goblin on his shoulder using a Remote Control and cackling maniacally. This seemed perfect. It was humourous and yet also in character with the rest of the team. It was also large, but not off puttingly so, as the height comes from a raised arm, not sideways bulk.





So there we have it. A full compliment of Star Players joins the team. Definately going to need that 40mm pitch now!