Terrain and Rangers (companions)

     Already half way through February, where does the time go? For a birthday present to myself, I took holidays for the coldest week in February. *Knock on wood* The plan for this week was to get a lot of painting done and reading for the graphic novel book club I am part of. In reality, it was an excuse to not have to leave the house and relax. 

    And that was mission accomplished, had a relaxing week, painted some fantasy terrain as well as models. Besides driving Rachel to work and back, I didn't really leave the house besides doing a boost for one of my friends. Am I ready to go back to work tomorrow? aww man, it's tomorrow?! Ugh! That's alright, the key to a good week is to have a good routine on Sunday, warm bath, Cobra Kai, read before bed, and be glad that it's not -45°C for the week to come!

    Most of the terrain I have in my collection is 40k, with the exception of the Corpsewrack Mausoleum, I don't have much in the form of plastic fantasy kits. I ordered some MDF off of amazon a week ago, not paying attention to the thickness before purchasing it. The MDF was to be used as a base for the metal Colossal Skeleton from reaper miniatures. Once it showed up it, was way to thin to support the heavy metal colossal. With several sheets of the MDF kicking around, this would be perfect for the rivers. They turned out alright, but there was a lot of curling from the PVA glue. Using more MDF on the bottom helped to straighten it out. 

Modular River, curves and forks to come

    Rachel made a comment that the small island in the middle of the river looked like a large piece of poop, wanting to save face I told her that there actually was a giant upstream that was relieving himself. It's not happy little mistakes, it's world building! I do tend to agree as I don't think I cut the insulation form down enough, and it was dark brown at the time. 

    Each scenario in Rangers of Shadowdeep provides you with miniatures list for the adventure. The first one requires 6+ zombies, 3+ Giant Rats, 6+ Giant Spiders, and 3+ Survivors. Scouring my Castle Ravenloft Board Game I was able to find 3 Giant Spiders, 3 Zombies and 3 swarms of rats which is close enough. Undead Encounters comes with 7 zombies and oh hey! a skeleton rat maybe it will be one of the giant rats (if I can find them)

Two companions and one survivor

All Reaper Miniatures, I left the companions off bases as I would like to find some lipped bases for the PCs as that's what I used for my Frostgrave Wizards. I really enjoy painting up metal character models, quick to paint and they look great afterwards. The crossbowman has been kicking around as a metal thug for my D&D sessions for sometime, glad he finally will be on the table. As for the Ranger, you know, the leader of this intrepid band of heroes, she is a witch hunter from hasselfree miniatures. Like normal Jon fashion, I put the cart before the horse.

The wolves will be used for the second adventure.

3 Wolves from Ravenloft

    Four zombies finished, the two flanking ones are from the cultist set. The kit gives you an excess of bits, proving an abundance of variety for all your misguided sects. These two must of went a bit too deep into the forbidden magic.

Scatter terrain and 3D printed ruined house

Stand off in the tavern

"You shall not pass, unless you are 19"

Rachel and I also played another round of Root: The Underground Expansion. This time I was the Underground Duchy and Rachel had the Marquise de Cat. I felt like I was playing keep up most of the game. In true Rachel fashion, the dice didn't like her, rolling double zeros on attacks that should have been a sure thing, twice! I finished the game with 30 to 17, at the mid point of the game I started  cutting hard into Rachel's resources, making it extremely hard to come back from. Root is much quicker to play now that we had it on the table a few times. 

Next on the Hobby Desk

After playing Warhammer Underworlds this past week, it's gotten me excited to finish off the Dread Padgeant. Next weekend is also the release of all the new Slaanesh models and battletome. Debating if I NEED to get the battletome right now,  would be nice to see the new rules and lore but that all could wait for when I am actually playing AOS.

2021 Paint Vs. Purchased

The goal for 2021 is to focus on my current stock, only dipping into new models when I finish off previously purchased items from the same game. Finish off that Escher Gang (hopefully convincing Rachel to play as they are at least girls to play as) before moving on to the new shiny the Van Saar Gangers.

Painted

Foot Troops 

Q1

• 1 x Chaos Sorceress
• 1 x Masque of Slaanesh
• 3 x Ranger of Shadowdeep Characters
• 4 x Dread Pageant
• 20 x Daemonettes
• 4 x Zombies
• 3 x Ravenloft wolves

Q2

• 1 x Lord of Pain

Mounted Cavalry

Q1

• 10 x Seekers of Slaanesh

Monsters/ Vehicles

Q1

• 1 x Chaos Warshrine
• 1 x Bladebringer, Exalted Chariot

Behemoth

Terrain

Markers/Endless Spells

Q1

• 1 x Darkfire Daemonrift
• 1 x Eightfold Doom-Sigil
• 1 x Realmscourge Rupture

Small Ruins

Q1

• 2 x Rivers

Large Ruins

Total: 53 (36 troop, 10 cavalry, 2 Monsters/Vehicles 3 endless spell, 2 small ruins)

Purchased

Foot Troop

Q1

• 10 x Daemonettes
• 2 x Wizkids Orc Druid
• 1 x Lord of Pain
• 20 x Daemonettes
• 10 x Van Saar Gangers

Q2

• 58 x Rising Sun miniatures

Mounted Cavalry

Q1

• 10 x Hellstriders

Monsters/ Vehicles

Q1

Behemoth

Terrain

Q1

16 x Library Terrain

Markers

Small Ruins

Large Ruins

Total: 127 (101 troop, 10 cavalry, 16 terrain)

Gifts

Foot Troops

Q1

• 7 x Clan Wren
• 7 x Inferno Squad

Jon's Birthday Festivities

    Yesterday being my birthday, Rachel treated me to all sorts of fun things! She made a breakfast of pancakes, I didn't take pictures, but she also made a delicious homemade chocolate peanut butter cake for after supper. We actually went out to Caraway Grill for a birthday supper, and despite the weekday, cold weather and pandemic, the four open tables there were full. This place is a bit of a hole in the wall, tucked away on the opposite side of the casino. Without Covid restrictions, it would have about 9 tables of 4 which would be PACKED with a 20 to 45 min wait if you wanted to dine in. If you are in Regina, it is thee place for east Indian cuisine. 

    Enough of my obsession with Caraway grill... (I believe I've had like 5 birthdays there). Back to Feb. 10th, along with the treats Rachel picked up some reinFORCEments for my Star Wars Legion. Myboth brother, Shawn, also picked up the Inferno Squad. When I was opening his gift I thought they might've both picked up the same boxes for me. Luckily that wasn't the case. 

    I still have two sets of the core Rebels to paint up, was planning to do some quick contrast paint scheme for them, but haven't figured which one to choose! I think most of the reason Rachel picked up Clan Wren is due to finishing The Mandalorian back in December. What do I paint them up as? A ragtag group of mandalorian resistance fighters all from different clans or a uniform clan? The latter is appealing for me as that's how I have painted most of my armies, but I like the idea of  7 rainbow of bounty hunters, a magnificent seven if you will.

    But the true gift was getting Rachel to play Warhammer Underworlds with me. Rachel got tried of remembering all the different seasons of Underworlds in which I used to refer to the game so she started to call it Shadowfax. I don't think any season had fax or shadow in it, but GW does have the license for Lord of the Rings so maybe next season?

Start of the game

Lots of sun glare, sorry, deceiving sun

Magore's F(r)iends close up.

Her duffus opponent trying to crouch into the picture

Whelp! Guess Rachel is going first.

    Rachel rolled 3 criticals and one "eyebrow" or support, which is the second symbol used to determine ties if both players have the same amount of criticals. Very strong opening dice roll which unfortunate for Rachel didn't carry over into the actual game...at least not at first.

    I didn't take many pictures of this game, being a very aggressive warband, the Khorne fighters were able to get into range quickly. It also didn't help that Rachel placed a lethal hex right beside one of her objectives. Zharkus or Ghartok? drew first blood, taking out Ahnslaine.... pushing her into the pit with a drawn back move.The rules, at least when I glanced over them, didn't state that if lethal hex kills would give glory. What I saw was when out of action, reward glory. If this is incorrect, I might have to apologize to Rachel for being a cheater on my birthday.  

In the 2nd round.

   

    One of the objectives in my hand from the start of the game was to defeat a leader with Riptooth, looking at the picture above, I believe Zharkus pushed Ylthari into the pit for 1 damage. Ylthari also took 1 one damage from casting a spell and getting two critical hits, this was a new rule for me, it's called a backlash. Her spell triggered her reaction, letting her heal one wound, which then inspired her. But as she tryed to climb back out of the pit, Riptooth was there to push her back in or at least that's how I saw it. How many tree people can fit in one pit?

Answer: 3

    By the end of the second round, Rachel only had one friendly Gallanghann left on the board. His Glaive made it easy for Rachel to pick off wounded Bloodreavers from afar. 

Rachel pouting, poor rolls and one fighter on the board.

Gallanghann, the last shining beacon for the Ylthari Guardians.

By turn three Rachel had only Gallanghann and a spell that targeted a friendly Gallanghann or a friendly fighter adjacent to a friendly Gallanghann. She found the wording on Healing Amphora a bit funny but it did heal the friendly Gallanghann, inspiring him. With the distance and being able to deal additional damage from her reaction on critical hits on defense dice, Rachel was taking out most of the wounded Fiends. 

Friendly Gallanghann using the very bottom of the glaive to reach over the pit.

Two crits on defense, this tree was a lot tougher to push into the pit.

By the end of round three, Gallanghann had trapped Riptooth in a corner, picked off Zharkus or Ghartok? And had landed a few hits on Magore himself. He was definitely the MVP of the match. With all said and done, the score was 5-2, Rachel had some disagreements with dice rolls.

Next on the Hobby Desk

Even though I have seen several tauntauns running about outside, I haven't been painting all that much. To some success, I have been making terrain for Rangers of Shadowdeep. Hope to post more on that once I finish off a couple pieces.

Seekers of Delight

    Behold! The labours of the month of Slaanuary! Slaanesh daemons are ready to entice you, slipping your body away into your wildest fantasies. Hopefully your fetishes include crustacean pincers and avian legs. (Ooo so slender) Feel their tongues around your ears as they give you the most exotic wet Willie's you have ever had. These beautiful ladies will make your life a pleasure before flaying your skin or maybe it's as they pleasure you?

10 Seekers, 20 Daemonettes and a Masque

Still have 5 more, maybe for a Chariot?

The Masque, might need a seeker to keep up with the rest of the group

    I bought 10 daemonettes and the masque a couple years ago, I liked the paint scheme on them so I just touched up a few areas and did some colour matching (or close enough). The other 10 were from the Shadow and Pain box. A Hedonite army woud look something like this.

Leader

• The Masque - 120 pts

Battleline

• 10 Daemonettes - 110 pts
• 10 Daemonettes - 110 pts

Other

• 10 Seekers - 240 pts

Total: 580 pts

    This would give me the battleline tax for building up the army to 1k. All Slaanesh daemons would get a battle trait of  Euphoric Killers - gaining an additional attack on unmodified hits of 6's and 2 additional hits when the unit is 20 or more.

     It would be pretty safe to assume that more daemonettes will eventually grace my table... once I buy some...but that is for another time. In my pile there are still fiends, the rest of the Shadow and Pain box, Exalted chariot, a resin Keeper of Secrets, OH and the Dread Pageant from Direchasm. If I am really... REALLY still looking for more to paint after that I have a Greater Daemon of Slaanesh from the daemon lot from last year. 

    Hmmm with all that painting, I don't think one month is enough for Slaanesh. 2021 will be the year of Slaanesh! No, all years after! More! I need more time to devote to Slaanesh!

Next on the Hobby Desk

Is she/he gone? Okay, just between us, February is going to be used to paint up some Rangers of Shadowdeep models. Rachel has picked out her mice, and named her ranger. I found a hasselfree miniature in my pile that will be fun to paint up, as well as some thugs that will make for some good companions. Rangers isn't a big game to run, only 2.5' by 2.5', however, my terrain is limited. Between the odd Slaanesh and Rangers model, terrain will be built for mixing up the board a bit throughout the campaign.

Slaves to Darkness Progress #3

     I didn't quite finish what I had planned for last year's goal, okay, I kinda gave myself a bit of an out with painting up 1000 points of Slaves to Darkness instead of finishing off the Premium Battleforce. A Chaos Lord/Sorceror on Manitore and 10 Chaos Knights still reside in the box, both of which might turn out worshipping Slaanesh with how this month is going on my hobby desk.

    That battleforce came out in 2018, I am bit disappointed that I didn't get it finished last year. This is a common problem in the hobby for most people, that it's much easier to look at the new shiny releases and put down money. This year I am trying to hold myself a bit accountable for this, can't cloth a baby with Warhammer. It's all about taking inventory, you want a new Vaan Sar's gang? Well, you have a Escher Gang that would look lovely painted. Oh man that Legion of Nagash Warcry box looks sweet! Didn't you want a Daughters of Khaine warband last year, you have it mostly done even!? And what about the Blackstone Fortress Expansions...

    My point is that all the sets of models you picked up, be it 5 years ago or a month ago sparked joy in your hobby brain. Could be you want to paint it up because look how sweet it is in grey plastic (or metal if it's really been awhile), just think of what paint could do to it. What about this character you bought, he/she/they have such a sweet backstory it would be great to make them come to live on the battlefield. I don't like the head on this model, but really like the body, I could switch the head and arms make this model my own. The miniatures that we spend time and money on excite us, give us joy and fulfillment. Why not relive that moment of joy and paint up some miniatures that have been sitting in the hobby room for their turn, now is always the best time.

    Back to the progress on Slaves to Darkness! I have finished off my 1000 points list they are a colourful bunch soon to have every deity in the mortal realm represented... well, not Tzeentch he is always changing his mind if he will show up or not, god that guy is a flake.

    Let's start with the new entries.... the Chaos Warshrine is up first.

    The design for the ogres carrying the shrine weren't great, either you had the back one floating off the ground or it had a bit of a slant, that's alright, I doubt a shrine carried by two ogres would be all that stable.

Next is the Darkfire Daemonrift, a tear in the fabric of the Realm pouring out raw daemonic magic. This Endless Spell gets more powerful with Wizards and Endless Spells around it. This might convince me to make the Chaos Sorceror on Manitore instead of the Lord.

And the last one, Morathi, now a generic Chaos Sorceress, she is a bit out of place with all these behemoths around her.

A Slaanesh Chaos Sorceress

    With all the new additions, we have an army on our hands. Which looks like...

Leader

• Chaos Sorceress Lord - 110 pts

Battleline

• 20 Chaos Marauders - 160 pts
• 20 Chaos Warriors - 360 pts
• Chaos Chariot - 120 pts

Behemoth

• Chaos Warshrine - 170 pts

Endless Spell

• Darkfire Daemonrift - 80pts

Total: 1000 pts

For matched play at least, Narrative and Open play.... well that's a different story, add some Khorne and don't get me started on the Nurgle I could add! 

Leader

• Chaos Sorceress Lord - 110 pts

Battleline

• 20 Chaos Marauders - 160 pts
• 20 Chaos Warriors - 360 pts
• 10 Bloodletters- 110 pts

Behemoth

• Chaos Warshrine - 170 pts

Other

• Chaos Chariot - 120 pts
• Bloodcrushers - 120 pts
• Flesh Hounds - 100 pts
• Karanak - 140 pts

Endless Spell

• Darkfire Daemonrift - 80pts

Total: 1200 pts

I am sure the Nurgle I have painted up would add another few hundreds, maybe I'll figure that out later.

Next on the Hobby Desk

Well, the girls are taking their time to get ready this month. Gotta sharpen their claws, and apply their make up. You know how hard that is with crab hands!? I have added more then just seekers to the desk now, hope I can get them done by the end of the month.

    

Aspirations for 2021

     With everything changing on the fly these days, I will make these more loose goals? hopes? DREAMS!? then anything set in stone. I will be most likely focusing on a lot of painting throughout the year, getting ready for the days to come where Prairie Game Expo or Toon Con are a live event where we can gather safely and enjoy the company of like minded individuals.

    SO... what can I do to work towards this goal? This year is going to be about preparing, preparing the models, preparing the terrain, and preparing the knowledge.

Preparing the Models

    The great temptress has whispered in my ears her sweet nothings, the barbed tongue tickled on the way out. I have started painting some Slaanesh Seekers to kick off SLAANUARY! Just like the god(dess) of excess I will strive to paint all my debaucherous hedonites of She Who Thirsts. This is the list so far.....

Leader - The Masque

            - Bladebringer (got it used, might be a seeker Chariot, I'll need to check this)

            - Exalted Greater Daemon of Slaanesh

Battleline - 10 Daemonettes

Other - 3 Fiends

          - 10 Seekers (maybe more if I can't build Bladebringer)

But...... I did order a Shadow and Pain box off of Meeple Mart.... which includes a Lord of Pain, 10 more daemonettes, Hellflayer (or one of the other chariots of deadly blades), 10 Hellstriders. This whole Slaanuary is getting a wee bit out of hand already and as much as I would like to throw caution (and common sense) to the wind, embracing my obsessive tendencies, I might start with the basics for the moment. Which will look something like this. 

Jon's less crazy plan

Leader - The Masque

             - Bladebringer

Battleline - 2 groups of 10 daemonettes

Other - Fiends

           - 10 Seekers (maybe 5 seekers, 5 hellstriders)

    This will give me enough to field close to a 1k army of Slaanesh or add in allies into Age of Sigmar, or a Warcry Warband or or or a Warhammer 40k army! This is the best part of being a worshipper of Chaos! mwhahaha Oh! I guess I should also throw in the Direchasm's Dread Pageant, which might actually get bumped up in the painting queue as Rachel might be interested in playing Underworlds sooner then later.Also side note, I don't think I am fast enough to paint all this in Slaanuary, so it might bleed over to Slaanbruary or Marnesh? 

    At least that's the "plan", who knows maybe I will get fixated on smaller games like Warcry or Necromunda?

Preparing the Terrain

    A good blog needs battlefields that will dazzle and impress their readers, several thousands of dollars worth of plastic gothic architecture that will make my wallet weep for the length of the pandemic. Well, not quite, I do have a Corpsewrack Mausoleum that needs finishing and some Sector Imperialis ruins that are mostly finished. From work, I get several bottles of various sizes, great for DIY projects for 40k terrain. These projects might get fitted in between painting up miniatures (probably of the slaanesh variety.) I hope to be able to fill up a table of terrain, 40k and AOS, maybe find a gaming mat in the future.

Preparing the Knowledge

Being able to teach others to play games is an essential part of the hobby, especially with a partner that doesn't like to take short cuts. We will look it up later doesn't usually fly with Rachel. This year I will be reading up on board game and tabletop games to cement my knowledge in the hobby. This will probably include learning games like Rangers of Shadowdeep, a cooperative fantasy skirmish game that is miniature agnostic for when lockdown gets tight. Probably use Rachel's mice, once they are based, for a warband. Ronin/ Dragon Rampart, mostly Ronin as Rachel has some beautiful Test of Honor lady Samurai that we picked up a few years ago in Calgary. I haven't played either, it's much easier to BUY more rules then to actually learn ones you already have. I would also like to keep up with Necromunda, as I didn't know about the Book of Perils adding in Venators, basically the ability to add a bounty hunter gang.

I would also like to get more organized on this blog, updating painting/purchasing, keeping track of games that type of stuff. I started to use Board Game Geek for keeping track of the two games Rachel and I played. We have a hard time moving games along, one being Dominion. Rachel wanted to play it on January 1st and we enjoyed it, but my thought was that we have several other deck building games that add so much then vanilla Dominion. Star Realms and Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle add in cooperative game play with the former extending it's gameplay with solo play as well. Both of which we play more then Dominion. We also played Power Grid for the first time, definitely a game made in the 2000s, more monopoly inspired money management type games.

    But I digress, with lockdown, board game play might just be Rachel and I. However, when things open up, Rachel really wants to start a Scythe: Rise of Fenris Campaign, this would be up to 5 players, the same players for each session. For Christmas, Rachel was gifted  Root: The Underworld Expansion from my brother, Shawn. This adds an additional 2 players to the base game's 4 players. Look forward to seeing that on the table, covid willing. Memoir 44 might also make an appearance in the future, as you can see, I am not really putting a fixed value on what I play this year. We will see what April brings.....

    Speaking of April, things will be getting a bit more busy for the two of us in April. As that's when Rachel is due to have our baby girl. Yes, I have kept the biggest and best kept secret for last. We are excited and anxious about our new offspring, child? The Child? Grogu? If she ends up with green scaly skin that might become her name.

Next on the Hobby Desk

    Yes, time to prepare, lots of reading for this dad to be. On the work bench side of things, I should be wrapping up 1K of Slaves to Darkness... just need to find my gloss varnish on this desk somewhere....

Wrap Up to 2020

 What can you say about 2020 that hasn't already been said? Good riddance! Hope the door hits you on the way out! 

    It hasn't all been that bad, at the start of the year Rachel and I were able to participate in the Toon Con 2020. Which now looking back at it could have easily been one of the super spreader events that started off the pandemic. Instead, it was an amazing last weekend of socializing with new passionate gamers, learning new games that were taught by dedicated ambassadors and all around enjoying the hobby that I have come to enjoy. I really liked the live auction, hopefully an online auction happens in 2021?

    Another positive outcome of Toon Con, is that Tim invited me into the Wrath & Glory campaign that has been running with a bunch of his friends that are now spread out across Canada (oh and the USA). This has been transforming into a RPG variety night on Saturdays. It's always a fun time and good for a laugh. 

    Roll 20 has been a great addition to the social distance tool box, I have also been DMing 5th Edition's Dragon Heist  for a group of my high school friends. Nobody wanted to start in the summer when people can have fun outside and socialize with mosquitoes, eww, who does that these days?? We started late November and had 3 sessions so far. My friend Jared had to suggest a name change to one of the guilds they were chancing around as both had Z names. The Zanathar guild are now the Apple Dumpling guild and they no longer have eye tattoos (to represent their beholder leader), they have apple tattoos. This also shows how high ranked they are, you better watch out for those Ambrosia guild members that have little apple slice tears!

    The idea of supporting local business (more so now then before) has started to become more important as supply chains from other countries are strained. I wanted to support my local sculptors, creators and game designers right here in my backyard. Lucky for me Must Contain Minis already had the same idea and compiled a nice list of Canadian companies that have a wide range of miniatures, STL designs, terrain, etc. It might not be something for a GW games but there is a lot of nice work getting done on niche miniatures, like mounties. I haven't bought anything from them yet, but plan to make an order in the future.

Painting wise, I have finished off my crusade portion of Sisters of Battle as well as the Skitarii, but what is finished? I have a few more additions, Mr. Cawl, Ironstrider, Dunecrawler to name a few. I mean are armies ever really finished? God I hope that's all!

Slaves to Darkness is close to 1k, but I did say I would finish off the Battleforce box from last Christmas? Two Christmas ago!? Ugh! Okay, so I have a Chaos Warshrine as well as a Chaos Sorceress on my desk, I just need to take some pictures and make it blog official. With those two that would take my current painted total to 920, I was going to paint up a Darkfire Daemonrift to get to 1k. That said, I could ally in 200 points of Khorne Daemons that I painted this year too, so I did get more then 1k finished this year.

Next on the Hobby Desk

I'll be taking a hard look at 2021 and seeing what will be a feasible goal for my hobby moving forward.