Ni!

Knights.

You've gotta love 'em, right?

Ni!

I know it's something of a cliché, but like a lot of little boys (and I don't doubt a lot of little girls) I've always been fascinated by stories of knights. When I was a kid, I had lots of knight related toys. I had heaps of toy knights, ranging from Lego to Britains model knights (remember those?). I had a cool scratch built wooden castle (that I think was made by a local dollhouse maker) and I had a wooden sword my dad made for me (which I may have used to terrorise my sisters...).

I remember these being much, much better

When I was getting into this hobby, I was instantly drawn to the Bretonnians, being the Medieval Knight heavy army. I can remember well, when I was still very knew to the whole thing - I'd played Heroquest and D&D, and bought one issue of White Dwarf the year before - I got ill. Chest infection. I was off school for ages, and en route to the doctor, my mum said I could buy a magazine. I was going to get a comic, but then I saw White Dwarf and thought...why not? I spent the wait in the doctor's flicking through the magazine, and what should be inside? Why, a whole heap of Bretonnian models. (I think it was issue 136, but it was hard to find a decent index of issues)

I was hooked.

It so happened I was also reading TH White's "Once and Future King", as well as a Robin Hood novel, so all those Knights were well seared on my juvenile imagination.

It's been a while...wonder if it'll hold up to a reread?

As it happened though, I was also mad-keen on sci-fi, and my burgeoning group of gamers were more drawn to 40K, so I never took up Warhammer until years later, when working at GW. And despite having had several armies, I never went for Bretonnia: mainly because of the job. See, one of the things about working in a Games Workshop store is that you have to paint a lot of minis. I mean A LOT. Especially when a new boxed game comes out. And while I was at GW, Warhammer 5th Edition came out. And it had a lot of knights.

That's a lot of knights!

Strangely, painting all those sets never put me off Lizardmen, but it sure put me off Bretonnians (an issue still afflicting Baz, I know!).

But I think I'm finally past all that. When I started this blog I mentioned that Bretonnian's "could wait" as they were "fiddly to paint". 

True enough, but the time I feel, is now.

See, Andy Lawhammer is in the process of sprucing up Mighty Empires to function as a Warhammer campaign system, and I'm very excited at the prospect. What's more, I've hit that army painting slump with my orcs. I like the models, I want to paint them, but I've painted so many it's getting tedious. Plus, I'm at the stage of bulking out extant units...doubly tedious.

What's more, as well as keeping up with Game of Thrones (a rewatch before Season 3 was needed in order to convert my wife to the show...), I also watched the 90s BBC Ivanhoe series. A whole lot of jousting fun!

Brian De Bois-Gilbert from the Ivanhoe series (an almost unrecognisable Ciaran Hinds!)

The Knight of the Flowers. He's so pretty, oh so pretty...

So I've decided to get a wee Bretonnian army on the side. They'll be fun to paint, to break the monotony of the Orcs. They'll also be very different to play. And if the worst comes to the worst, and I never actually get to play with them? No biggy, I'm sure I'll find them a home on eBay. ;) So, that being the case, I picked up a Battalion today.

Bretonnian Battalion - good value for £60 I'd say!

I was briefly tempted by the very good Fireforge Teutonic/Templar Knights (you can see them here on their very hard to navigate and overall pretty poor website). They look pretty ace, and they're cheaper than GW. And they're plastic. They're also a bit smaller than GW, so I'd need to commit to 100% Fire Forge, and also to my army looking weeny on the table. So I popped into town, caught up with Baz, and bought the battalion.

I plan to paint them up in small batches, and I intend to make them as characterful as I can. That doesn't necessarily mean masses of conversions, but each Knight is a lord, and I intend to name them all, and try to make up their complex genealogy. 

But of course I need to think about my general. They always say in the Warhammer rulebook that your general represents you on the battlefield, so I've decided to take that (almost) literally. Step forward Andre De Lisque, Bretonnian Knight! 

This is the Leask coat of arms. I may not use it on my Men at Arms' shields! 

I'll use the Leask coat of arms for my general and his family. I may chicken out of doing my men at arms' shields with that heraldry though, as I don't have transfers for stars/diamonds, unless anyone knows any good places? 

I decided to do the general first, on a horse initially (though I may do him on a Royal Pegasus, or even a Hippogriff in the future - all my enemies seem to have DRAGONS!). I fiddled with the horse's base to make him rearing slightly, and put on a knight without a helmet, so you could see his face. I clipped the hilt away from the scabbarded sword, as he had a drawn sword in his other hand and also put a helmet on a chain hanging from his belt. I considered adding a lance to his back, but it looked naff so I took it off. 

But it was missing something. This is supposed to be the general, the leader. It's supposed to be me! What's it missing? Well I couldn't give it glasses or a big belly, but I could give him a beard. To the greenstuff!

Andre De Lisque

I'm pleased with the beard, especially the moustache. When I'd done the beard, I realised I needed to bulk out the hair a bit too, so I did. 

Close up of the beard. That'll do pig!

Looks a bit wonky straight on, but the angle's not helping.

And from the other side, with more detail of the hair extensions. 

Now I'm no sculptor, nor do I possess Andy Lawhammer's artistic gifts, but I'm really pleased with how he's turned out. Now I just need to paint them damn thing!

VBB

Breaking rocks in the hot sun...

I fought the Laws and...one Law won, I fought the Laws and...the other lost. ;)

[/Clash]

So, inaugural matches for the Marienburg Stealers last night, and a lot of fun was had. Touchdowns were scored, skills were earned, players were killed, and laughs were...er, laughed.

First up, I played +Lindsay Law's human team, including Bert the Ogre! Eek!

The game began well, with a quick score from the Stealers; man, Skaven are fast. +Lindsay's team put a real hurting on the rats, though, killing two linerats outright, and keeping 1 to 3 players knocked out throughout the game.

Despite being outnumbered (and facing an Ogre!) the rats were just too damned fast and too damned nippy (Gutter runners proving to be the real stars of the team, despite their paltry strength of 2), and while the Humans were able to score a touchdown of their own, the Stealers also managed to sneak in another. Another three!

In true rat form, after scoring the spectacular final touchdown, I set up for the single remaining human turn in a classic "cowardly lion" formation:

Stealers to the left of the picture: minimum 3 linerats in the line of scrimmage,
the rest of the team out of blitzing range!

 So, final score 4-1: a solid win, but having lost two players, my team value barely went up, despite gaining a fan factor and buying an apothecary. Two of my Gutter Runners gained skills, too: Skreekit took Guard (rolled a double!) and Snikt took block. Nice.  I rounded out my depleted numbers with a Journeyman linerat to take my numbers up to 11, to play against +Andrew's high elf team.

These weren't all painted yet, indeed the catchers are still sporting stumps instead of mitts, but the conversions look great. The game initially went all my way: I got lucky with armour and injury rolls, killing an Elf early on, as well as knocking others out. I took an early lead in the points, and was accruing SPPs: Krikt, a Blitzer, killed an Elf and scored a touchdown, meaning he was going to get a skill roll, and in a foolish demonstration of hubris, I gave him the nickname "Elfkilla".

Of course, next restart, having just scored (taking it to 2-1), the Kick Off Table result lead to a giant rock being dropped on his head, killing him. "No worries," says I, "that's what the apothecary is for." I reroll and...of course...he's still dead. Nuts.

As the game went on, it grew closer and closer. Both teams were below 11 players now, and we took turns being a man down (well, an elf/rat down). The second turn, in particular, degenerated into farce, as the ball seemed to be coated in butter: nobody could pick the damned thing up, or pass it worth a damn.

We ended up in a swirling melee in the centre, with all bar two players in base to base contact. It was 2-2, in the bottom of the second half. The next score was almost guaranteed to win. +Andrew executed an excellent an excellent manoeuvre, and needed a 2+ to go for it to score...and rolled a 1! With no rerolls, the ball bounced loose: turnover! I ran a gutter runner in, against the odds, he picked up the ball, and successfully passed it into the melee...only for the receiver (ironically, by only remaining thrower!) to fail the catch.

The ball bounces all over the place: Andy has some poor luck, as do I; nobody can do anything with the ball! I try an audacious plan, blocking Andy's players to shove mine closer to the end zone...but fail the dodge out. Andy shoves one of my gutter runners around, needing 4 separate 2 dice blocks before he finally knocked him over, freeing the ball. A gutsy pass and the pointy-ears scored, taking the final score to  3-2 defeat for the stealers.

Great fun, classic Blood Bowl! :)

The Stealers, newly colour coded

One thing that became apparent during the games, was that it was hard to tell my players apart. I found the gutter runners easy enough to spot, being black, but my opponents struggled, possibly because from the front the brown skin is more visible. The throwers were the real issue for me though: from the rear they really were just linerats, as the ball they were carrying was tucked in their waist.

Unfortunately, I don't really have the time (or the patience!) to do a more ambitious conversion, to give them raised throwing arms, but a discussion of 2nd ed BB led to the answer: colour coding. It would feel wrong to to that to a Warhammer army, but Blood Bowl is much more of a board game, so colouring in the sides of the bases to indicate a player's class was a simple solution.

So now Blitzers are red, Gutter Runners black, Throwers brown, and Linerats green: hopefully that will help them be more clearly identified.

We did the post match stuff: Skreekit got another roll (having scored again) and rolled a double 5, meaning he had the choice of a skill from any table, or +1MA/+1AV. As tempting as extra armour was, a Gutter Runner with MA10 was just too tempting, so that's what I took.

Skreekit! Skreekit! Skreekit!

I lack the funds to replace my fallen Blitzer, so I'll probably round out the numbers with Journeymen Linerats in the meantime, keeping the value down and hopefully getting some inducements. Or I could get a 4th Gutter Runner...

;)

VBB

Skaven Blood Bowl Team: finished (kind of...)

Done.

:)

I finished my first bunch of Skaven, i.e. my starting team. I probably won't actually field all of them at once, needing to spend some pennies on reroll/fan-factor, but it's good to have options. I may regret not investing in a rat ogre though, as apparently +Lindsay Law will have an ogre tomorrow. Eek!

Anyhoo, back to the rats: namely my final 4 linerats:

I coulda been somebody, I coulda been a gutter runner!

This one is probably my favourite. I love the hood, and the humps sticking through holes, as if he's mutated and burst through it, hulk like. :)

Linerat #12

 This one's pretty standard, nothing exciting to note on him, except that I decided to skip #13. I figured, as it's the Horned Rat's sacred number, I'd leave that space on the roster empty (or save it for a star player... ;) ).

#14 & #15 - slaves

 A number of the Skaven models have chains and collars on, fitting the race's use of slaves. I quite like the idea of some of the Skaven team being "professionals", in it for the warp tokens, and others being slaves, owned by the manager. Very gladiatorial.

But I was left with a problem with these two: they're topless. I could put their numbers on their loincloths, but all the rest are on back or head coverings. What to do, what to do...

I know! Brand 'em!

HISS...Squeak squeak!

Ouchy. Now, I'm not actually very happy with how the "branding" worked out. I tried to replicate images of branded cattle I found online (charred round the edges, slightly lighter skin tone in the middle), but it didn't quite work, and I may well revisit later.

The Marienburg Stealers

And here they are in all their glory. The Marienburg Stealers. Overall, I'm quite happy with them, considering they're so hastily converted and painted.

Now, to see how they fair on the field...

VBB

New balls please!

Just a quick update today, with some more of my converted Skaven blood bowl team.

Today I have a couple of linemen, and my throwers.

As I mentioned before, I wasn't happy with the thrower conversions, and I remain unsatisfied. I may have another go in the future (when I either secure some new balls - ooer, fnar fnar, etc. - or try making some in green stuff), but they'll do for now.

So here's the first one, lucky number 7:

#7 - looks fine from this angle

Hmm, are you sure that ball is regulation standard?

Definitely not an orc skull? You promise? OK. 

So finding a hand in the throwing position was beyond my limited means: I tried using a spare orc shaman hand I had, but it was too big, and too awkward. So I opted for simply having the ball tucked under the thrower's arm. It's a symbolic ball, anyway. But as I lacked balls - ooer redux - I used what I had to hand. In this instance, an orc skull.

It's vaguely ball shaped: I thought I'd get away with it, and initially painted it red. But it was obviously a skull, so I repainted it skull coloured. What the hell, Skaven probably would play using orc skulls. Or even cheat by bringing on their own balls...

He looks pretty fierce from this angle.

About the size of your ball, sir...

For thrower the second - #8 - I used an undead helmet I had left over from the bitz Andrew gave me. It actually looks pretty good, as one of the plastic balls in the game has metal spikes/collar like that. If you look too closely, of course, it becomes apparent that it's too small, and the wrong shape, but I refer you to my earlier "skaven cheat" point. (Or point behind you and yell "Saulot!". That's for you +Lindsay Law ;)  )

My linemen - linerats? - are pretty dull, though I have a few interesting ones next time, For now, here are the first two, bog standard ones.

 Do you only have one eye?
Who said that?

Block-block!

Nothing much to say about these, but I think they look OK.

The final 4 linemen are more than half done, so should have the starting team done in a couple of days, which is handy as I should be trying them out this Friday...

Gutter Runner

Couldn't resist. :)

Anyhoo, the reason for today's post is I have another 4 players painted: gutter runners this time. The sneaky, shifty assassin-types of the Skaven army, these have long been some of my favourites in the Skaven army, both on the tabletop and in the roleplaying game (I have fond memories of +Lindsay and I chasing some through the streets of Nuln in +Andrew's WFRP campaign...).

Photos below: same drill as with the Blitzers, I picked body/heads that were naturally appropriate (i.e. hooded/robed), then enhanced where I could. The first two I armed with punch-daggers, but clipped the blades off, leaving them with some nasty looking (but wholly Blood Bowl-legal) brass knuckles.

Sneak-sneak!

Punch-punch!

Then I made this fella. I had a spare cloak from my wolf rider conversions, so I slapped that on. As I was perusing the hands on offer, I noticed one with a sneaky dagger hidden along the forearm, As these are my sneakiest players, it just felt right. :)

Me? The #6 Gutter Runner for the Marienburg Stealers?
With a knife under my cloak? With MY reputation? 

Then the final one...I spotted another dagger wielding arm, and remembering that the Skaven's attempts at subtlety don't always work as intended, I threw caution to the wind, carefully concealing this dagger with...well, with nothing. 

Stab-stab! 

Not subtle, but it appealed to my sense of whimsy! 

So that's 6 players down, and the team are looking like this so far: 

The Marienburg Stealers WIP

I'm chuffed with how quickly they're coming along. They're not well painted by any standard, but they'll do, dammit!

Incidentally, I was going to crop the top of that photo, but my out of focus fire in the background looks uncannily as if the Horned Rat himself is watching the team being assembled eagerly, so I left it in.

A few days off the blog now, but I'll be back in a week or so with some more players.

VBB
PS - I got the Blade Runner font from FontMeme

The Marienburg Stealers

As I sit here, sipping a homemade cappucino, I'm feeling pretty pleased with myself. While days spent lolling on the couch or playing on the PS3 for 8 hours straight are all well and good, there is an undeniable satisfaction in achieving something on holiday.

OK, all I achieved was to make my mind up and paint some models, but still. Baby steps.

So, my chum Andy Lawhammer's been making a top-ten of GW games (speaking of which +Andrew, where's number 4?...) and at number 5, he placed Blood Bowl. Cue much reminiscing, a brief encounter with Google, and he's bought a copy. And given how much I love the game, it's no surprise I  wanted in on the action.

But what team to pick? Initially I planned to buy my own copy of the game and convert the plastic humans to become a Bretonnian team (like this chap on Warseer), and indeed I may well do that in time (as if nothing else it'll give me an excuse to buy and paint some Knights. And I do like knights.)

But for now I plumped for those nefarious ratmen, the Skaven. Now, the GW Skaven Team are fine (you can see them here), but they're 30 quid, there's only 12 of them, and they're in metal. No thanks. Instead, I picked up a plastic box of clan rats from +Baz Morrison's shop and set to converting. They're all converted now, and I'll paint them up over the next week or two. Some I'm pleased with. Some, like the throwers, are not brilliant, but they're OK for now.

So, without further gilding the lily and with no more ado, I give you the first two players of the Marienburg Stealers.

Blitzer 1 - Krikt

Blitzer 2 - Vurk

On the whole, I'm quite pleased with them.

I picked more armoured heads/torsos, to fit the blitzer look, and I added a couple of spare savage orc "plumes" (hairsquigs?) to make them stand out from the linemen. A couple of other random orky bitz went on too, to give them shoulder pads (which the linemen will be lacking...).

They're not well painted, nor are they thoughtfully converted, but you know what? They'll do.

I haven't put numbers on yet, and I'll probably flock the bases eventually. The name, Marienburg Stealers, is obviously derived from Pittsburgh Steelers. I was going to do them in black, but it didn't look right and I have a lot of green paint. :)

Speaking of green, I also had time to finish off the first of my new Orc units for WFB (a bigger post on my Waaagh in a week or two): my sister in law +Gillian Bruce got me some Savage Orc Boar Boyz for my birthday (ta!) and here's the first of them: the standard bearer.

Oink!

I was relieved that my ability to speed-paint orcs hasn't diminished in the 6 months or so since I last had time to wield a brush. The boar I'm especially pleased with. The photo doesn't do them justice (I really do need to work on my photography, I know: an iPhone camera in a softly-lit living room is not a photogenic environment!).

Ride the Pig...bash some skulls...

 I was really pleased with the boar's face. This time, I highlighted it all the same: skin, tusks, et al. Gorthor Brown, Tallarn Sand, Ushabti Bone, touch of White Scar on the tips of the tusks. Then I applied an Agrax Earthshade wash, but only to  the skin, not the tusks, and the effect is great.

Yeah, I'm wielding this huge banner like a sword, what of it?

It worked so well, I did the same thing on the rider's leather/wood/bone bits. It's not quite as effective there, but it's so very, very quick I'm going to stick with it.

So there you go. A productive day, by the standards of school holidays, any way.

Coffee & Recycling

So on Monday, while out searching for garden furniture (among other things) I decided to treat myself. Not to the awesome garden rocking chair/recliner (though I'll be getting that in due course, believe me), but to a coffee machine.

If you know me, you know I love my coffee.

In the past I've owned many different coffee machines; most recently I had an excellent pump espresso machine that made delicious coffee, but it died during the house move the other year so I've been making do with instant (generally just when my dad's visiting) and cafetiere (mostly at work). Indeed, I use one of these bad boys at work:

Cafetiere mug - the de facto badge of the English teacher

But the fact is, it's a faff to make coffee that way. It takes time and effort - both of which are in short supply these days - and I've discovered that unless you rinse really, really carefully, coffee grounds get EVERYWHERE in the dishwasher. Less than ideal.

So when I saw Tesco had a special offer on a Tassimo machine, I couldn't resist.

Is the coffee quite as nice as grinding your own beans and making it from scratch? No. Is it close though? Yes. And is it less faff? Hell yes, to the power of 3.

The only nagging concern I was left with was the wastage. I'm an environmentally concerned chap, and of course the box etc. was all getting recycled. But I wasn't sure what to do with the little pod things (t-discs, apparently). Were they recyclable? Would I have to open them up and scrape out the grounds, thus negating the whole no-faff thing?

Mercifully, no.

My Google-fu revealed this excellent site: Terracycle.

They specialise in recycling (or upcycling) hard to recycle products, including... Tassimo t-discs. What's more, doing so also earns money for charity. Even better, the energy monitor Scottish Gas installed recently shows that the Tassimo machine uses a lot less power than boiling the kettle.

So...good coffee, less energy used, fully recyclable packaging that earns money for charity? Don't mind if I do.

Anyone fancy a coffee?

VBB

Postscript: when typing in the (factually accurate if uninspired) title of this post, a certain Blur song came to mind. If you're suffering the same affliction, enjoy. :)

Ch-ch-changes...

Wow.

It's been a while, huh?

Painting has had to take a back seat to work (boo!) as, indeed, has gaming (double boo!). So I neglected the blog too (triple...well, you get the idea). In the interim, Cyanide have released an RPG called 'Of Orcs and Men' and it looks like The Lawhammers and I will be playing Bloodbowl in the not too distant, so a name change seemed in order, hence: VonBlogbath.

More to follow anon.

VBB