Pelgwis Ambletrek

    The Ambletrek family name is a bit of an oddity for gnome culture, known for their wanderlust. Seeking adventure and living a nomadic life instead of becoming recluses in a community of relatives. Pelgwis, or Pel as some of his close friends call him, devoted his late teenage years to The Valor of the Serpent's Path. Members of the guild journey to far off lands to root out corruption and injustice.  During his travels, the small statute of the halfling was receptive of ridicule, followed immediately by gut busting laugher. A gnome? That if going to take on a group of bandits single handedly, how absurd! It was only after the pint sized paladin whooped all sorts of wicked butt, that the mockery would stop. Pelgwis needed a new image, something that would make him the visage of justice. Though he didn't follow in normal gnomish tendencies, Pel had talent in the workshop. Tinkering with machines when he had time to spare in the next city he visited. After months of tweaking and testing, his fine mastery of gadgetry was now ready to be revealed. 

Pelgwis Ambletrek

Ready to defend the weak

    A fearsome lizard, one tyrant of all lizards, would show the vile cretons of the realm to think twice about their actions.

    This is my first entry in the Character of the Month Challenge that the_goodground has issued for anyone to join. The challenge is to paint one miniature a month that would fit into a D&D 5th edition party, any race and class combination. Use the hashtag #paintanadventuringparty on Instagram. This is a great idea! I have an addiction to Wizkids/ Reaper Bones miniatures what better way to get them painted for the table. This model was part of the resent Reaper Bones kickstarter that I received last year, it will be nice to choose a new model, one that I am inspired to paint in that moment. 

    I browsed my collection and what I don't have, or at least very little of, are miniatures of any of the shorter races. Before any gnome, halfling or dwarf lovers out there get upset and start typing out nasty comments on my blog, I figured I would have a round about way of adding more races, okay, so it's a bit of a cop out.

    

    This challenge doesn't specify alignment, would be fun to have 6 models as a "hero party" and 6 models as a "villain party". Doubt that I'll work a narrative around all of the characters actually being in a party together, but could live in the same world. 

   

Next on the Hobby Desk

    The Corpsewrack Mausoleum is getting to be very close to done, hopefully I will be able to show it off soon. Another challenge I heard about is Fembruary, which is focusing on strong female characters. This challenge was specific to painting, which might be a good time to paint up my Don't Look Back - Final Girls Expansion. 

Looking into 2022

    Now, 2022, after a year of maternity leave for Rachel, she will go back to work. This will begin my paternity leave for 6 months. This will be a good time to go out for family vacations for the summer. Rachel is already planning a trip to Prince Albert National Park to pick up some seeds that she wants to plant in our backyard. That won't be the only park we visit this summer. Grasslands National Park, Candle Lake, Narrow Hills Provincal park, Sask landing and Great blue Heron were on Rachel's short list of places she wanted to experience as well as old favourites, Riding Mountain, Echo, and Douglas.  I know Rosalind will be ready to explore nature by then!

    Rachel also mentioned making a point of playing 2 board games a month, a mix of revisiting old board games and learning rules (or relearning in some cases) for new games. We made up a list of games to play

Rachel's New picks

Mice and Mystics - haven't gotten passed the second chapter, I usually teach the first chapter as it gives a good feel to the game.

Root Underworld Expansion - haven't played the Corvid Conspiracy factions

Everdell - played less then a handful of times.

Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig - this was a last year? Christmas gift, got out maybe 2 times

Rachel's Old picks

Lords of Waterdeep

 Dinosaur Island (aka Rachel's OHS nightmare of a park)

Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle - Finished main game once, haven't played The Monster Box of Monsters Expansion

Pandemic - have been playing that for a year and a half, am I right? 

Takenoko

Scythe (hope to play the expansions with more players, one which is a legacy game)

Castles of Mad King Ludwig

Machi Koro

    All of Rachel's picks I am game for, she picked out these from memory, this list will get longer as we actually look through our collection together. 

    As for me, I have a few games for solo play, because, let's face it, at some point I might not have people in my house this year. On a less somber note, is that most of these games I could show off to others after fumbling with the rules on my own. Also I am adding skirmish games, if you don't like it, make your own list.

Jon's New List

Reign in Hell - Models agnostic skirmish game, one of the reasons I picked up the Dreamblade models last year. 

Super Mission Force - Repainting and purchasing old heroclix for this, I have 12 repaints done. I wouldn't say anything solid for a team, so that will be one of my goals.

Shadows of Brimstone - With the core set mostly done, I hope to get this on the table soon! I even picked up a Doctor/ Nurse hero to entice Rachel a bit more to play.

Mage Knight - I hear it's a good solo game with some crunch, doubt I will try playing it with others.

Rising Sun

Robinson Crusoe - great solo game, even has a fan made expansion that has you trying to capture King Kong!

Don't Look Back! - Cooperative slasher flick, might be awhile before this gets on the table... painted anyways.

7 Wonders Cities - never played the expansion yet

Formula D - Played beginner, would like to try an advanced game, with 10 players!?

Five Leagues from the Borderlands - solo grimdark fantasy solo game with a focus on narrative play.

PrimEVO - prehistoric tribal survival game, has solo play too. Might not get to all the indie skirmish games, but would be nice to try each out.

Jon's Old List

Lord of the Ring's LCG - Rachel bought this like 5 or 6 years ago, and I found another copy used to make the game 4 players. I want to try getting a full group for this game, I enjoyed playing it before.

Memoir 44 - Light wargame that isn't too hard to teach.

Star Wars Imperial Assault/ Descent - Another two games that could be solo or with other players.

    I am sure I could convince Rachel to play some of the skirmish games on my list She also wants to do more regular paint nights and get me to assemble to metal Onna Bugeisha or Female martial arts practitioners from Test of Honor. 

    As for goals, I have some loose goals that I would like to see happen.

One Character a Month - Over at Dead Dick's Tavern, the Angry Piper runs a challenge for himself, and anyone who wants to join in on the fun, to paint up one character a month using different classes from Dungeons and Dragons. What a great opportunity to clear out some of my Reaper Bones models from the pile of creativity. I haven't decided if I will also create backstories (or character sheets) for these miniatures or if I will stick to just fantasy models. We shall see how invested I get with the models.

RPG try outs - Last year I picked up the Alien RPG starter set, which gives you all you need to play a cinematic version of Alien. After all, if you aren't a higher up in one of the main factions, you are expendable. Rachel also had some interest in playing the Root RPG, we got the quick start rules at an RPG day, but haven't dug into them. Another RPG I would be interested in running is Slasher Flick, a 80s campy horror film that puts you in the shoes of the teenages (usually each player plays two) that are making all the wrong cliché decisions. Go ahead and tease the killer, go skinny dipping with that hunky boy, it's your funeral!

Painting Goals - A bunch of the skirmish games listed on my New list aren't painted, so if I want to show them off on the blog, I better get my brush onto plastic! Finishing off Shadows of Brimstone core set, is definitely an easy win, only 3 models left! Painting up all the expansions, roughly 21 models, might be a more reasonable goal, especial when we start playing and enjoying that game. 

Don't Look Back is a bit more involved, 10 heroes, 1 killer, and 3 MDF terrain pieces plus scatter terrain. I guess only 4 heroes and a killer are required, who wants a plain looking board though?

Terrain/ Board creation - I have talked about custom rules for Space Hulk a few times, adding in Dark Eldar or Orks would be fun and making a 3D board for 40mm Terminators. Heck, add in other Tyranid bugs, even go as far as using genestealer cults for xenos that have taken over dead crew. Exciting stuff! I will also need to make a playing area for DLB and Super Mission Force, a generic grass field one or urban streets. 

That's all my goals for now! 2022 is a moving target, if I get through half my goals I would be pretty pleased. 

Next on the Hobby Desk!

My brothers and I played some Mice and Mystics, I will have a few things finished on the paint desk to show off.

Regifting 2021

     Some of the painting that I finished over the last quarter of the year fell by the way side. So I present to you my rewrap up of 2021, painting edition. 

    First off, honourable mentions. The Goliath big baddie was almost done, which would have finished off the enemies in the core set (still two more heroes to paint).  The gender swap drifter is from a character expansion pack, a more respectable character then the "Saloon Girl" that is in the base set. I do enjoy that Flying Frog Productions has made the effort to create alternate genders for all their heroes. Even if you don't want to buy them all, they still have character sheets of them that can be printed off. 

    Did anyone ask for more Heroclix repaints? Well too bad, that's what I got. Mostly X-men, with a random gorilla minion thrown in, which will go good with the Gorilla Grodd I just picked up, along with several more mono pose monkeys.

    Next we have the Shadows of Brimstone monsters, I had some heroes pictures from the front, but I must have deleted them from the phone due to poor lighting. Ooops! Oh well, there will be a group shot of them all soon.

Just your regular spiders

with sharp teeth!

Stranglers

Night Terrors

Time for some dynamite!

    Looking at my painted vs purchased is not very good this year. I have painted 105 figures, against the 476 I had bought! Yikes! Definitely going to cut back on those old model lots that I find. 

Next on the Hobby Desk

    Alright, 2021, is official over on this blog, let's welcome 2022!

Wrap up of 2021

     Where does the time go? Already another year in the bank, cashed by our elected officials at the expense of our frontline workers. I feel for all workers that needed support for someone to be on their side, instead of heaping on more of a burden onto our flimsy healthcare system. Blah! ANYWAYS!

    This year was a lot of changes for Rachel and I, one of the individuals that I supported at work passed away, Rachel's mom was diagnosed with cancer, we had a baby (9 months and counting), and moved into a house that we bought with money and signatures. Yes, what a year it was! Hopefully we don't need to do anymore of that in 2022!

    So what did I accomplish hobby wise? Well, I did finish off a lot of the Slaanesh in my "less crazy plan of 2021", the only thing that didn't get finished off were the 3 Fiends. I did paint up the Lord of Pain in the Shadows and Pain box. Maybe this Slaanuary I will continue start on the Hellstriders or Daemonettes that came in that box? Not going to lie, those new models in the Christmas battleforce are tempting.

    PrimEVO models were also on the desk, painting up game for the tribes to hunt. Space Wolves Kill Team was created with the 2018 rules, might work in the new rules, but I doubt I will pick them up. Picking up Shadows of Brimstone later in the year, I have almost finished the Core Set, just haven't posted the results (was hoping to completely finish it, but house moving makes it hard to hobby). Oh and then there was the Heroclix, that I rebased for Super Mission Force.  

    As for terrain, I didn't get as much as I would have liked to get done, only finishing off a 3D printed house and some scatter terrain for Rangers of Shadowdeep. 

    I did a bit of rule reading, but it was about new systems. Like Song of Blades and Heroes, Advanced Heroquest? I know, probably not going to commit on that one, but sometimes I do look at the simple models and want to buy or print some of the original ones. Why? Not sure, I have only played the game once, and long after it came out. Super Mission Force, and Homebrew rules for Space Hulk. Look, I said read stuff, I went for quantity instead of quality. For Space Hulk, I would like to make 3D junk made terrain, boards that would actually fit a standard 40mm Terminator. With less ability to play in person these days, I am gravitating towards solo play games and low cost rule sets, not that I really have had any time to play these days.

    This seems like a lot of buying all at once. I mean don't get me wrong it was, this was exchanged in the summer and I traded for my space marine half of the dark imperium. Wasn't really into the Primaris Space Marines, instead, I found my original love, Dark Eldar circa early 2000s. The army that got me into the hobby.

    

    So they aren't all old models, but the vast majority are. Break down as follows.

• 10 x Kabalite Warriors
• 26 x 2nd edition Kabalite Warriors
• 2 x Incubi
• 5 x Metal Incubi
• 7 x plastic Wyches
• 1 x Metal Archon
• 1 x Raider
• 4 x Jetbikes

    The Raider and Jetbikes will most likely form some sort of patrol detachment, the bikes are newer and I have a set of three to add to them. Might be a fun project for later. Some of the aged models I will be reposing for Space Hulk, fingers crossed I can make it work in that rule set.

    Oh, I did buy a PDF copy and physical copy of Reign in Hell. A collaboration project between Uncle Atom and Vince Venturella that was released earlier this year. Which got me to buy....

     Just a couple of miniatures from ebay for converting, a lot of the design of these characters are dark (looking at you scarecrow the hanging baby) and would make for good demons with a fresh coat of paint. Call of Cthulhu comes to mind for the bug like creatures. But what about the house? Or the Lion Rampant? Can't say at the moment. I removed the duplicates for better up close pictures. 

      I ordered these back in October, must get better at upkeep on the blog. I know one of my new years goals. 

    The last of the minis I bought was setup back in November when we were moving houses, so I asked to postpone dropping them off till we were actually settled in the house. And that, is.... more Heroclix!

The whole gang!

    

    Someone locally was selling off a giant collection and had most of what I wanted. When I had some down time in the fall I would look through HCrealms to find the sculpts I enjoyed. I would also focus on getting teams and themes together. Super Mission Force has rules for Paragon heroes, the equivalent of Superman, counting as 2 and a 1/2 Standard heroes, might work for the Sentinels, making it a bit unbalanced with 2 of them being 5 standard heroes. In that case, why not use 5 standard heroes. SMF recommends 4 standard heroes as it's balanced teams for both sides. Alternatively, they could be constructs, to run them as standard heroes. I digress, should break down hero building in another post. 

Original X-men

X-men Animated Series

Oops all Thors!

DC Heroclix

    There that's basically all for this year, and like every year, I am never on time for my wrap up, waiting till a week into the year to start a post about it. Oh well, some year, I will post before the year is done.

Next on the Hobby Desk

    Logically, I will be doing a look forward to 2022. Slaanuary will definitely be one of the first projects I will be doing. Rachel and I have been forming a list of games we would like to play old and new, as well as getting them out onto the table twice a month, instead of the normal zero. Check what games we will be trying out for the new year on the next post!