The Uplifted Army of the Aquan League

Uplift -The development or transformation of animals into an intelligent race by other, already-intelligent beings.

On a planet of oceans, deep water lakes, wide coastal estuaries, and swamps, a hyper intelligent species came with 'The Gift'. The Others brought their gift and left untold millennia ago, leaving only their arcane temples and the modified genetic code for the Uplifted.

The Uplifted races of the Aquan League number fifteen. While the enigmatic Whales and Great Jellies dominate the thought, planning, and balance of the planet, the warrior species of the Karks, the Lamphreys, and the Orcind, dominate the armies of the league and the off-planet space navies and gunboat diplomacy that seems to dominate the League's actions. It is the warrior races that most who have encountered the league have seen, and cowered under their wrath.

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Having finished the Numancia Dragoons, I need a change of pace. 15mm sci fi should fit the bill. First up, the the life aquatic of the Aquan League. A confederation of Uplifted aquatic species, the League has fifteen uplifted aquatic species with a highly regimented caste system. Whales and Great Jellies are the big thinkers, Karks, Lamphreys, and Orca are the warriors. Other species fill in other societal roles. I spent my would be painting time this weekend scraping, assembling, and getting on paint sticks the various troops of my Aquan forces.

I have the Khurasan Karks, Lamphreys and Orca ready to go. I have crab walkers, and manta drones and spider drones from GZG, and the one eyed fat suit guys from Micropanzer, as well as a couple of Micropanzer's old 32mm line that will be used as Mechs. Still not sure of the vehicles yet. Nothing has really struck me, but I have a bunch of options. So expect to see some 5mm SciFi for Gruntz coming soon.

Karks from Khurusan(pic from their website)

Lamphreys by Khurusan(pic from their website)

Orca from Khurusan(pic from their website)

Little fat dudes from Micropanzer(I call them water ticks)

Old battle walkers from Micropanzer that I think are owned by Rebel now. The version with claws looks great, but man what a pain these and the other walkers are to put together. 15mm figs come up to their knee.

Happy painting.

LA

Quick Update 4-27-12

I am going to be painting at lunch today, so I hope to get the belts, and shakos done on my Gurads units. That would be awesome. Then it is just facings and collars and muskets. We'll see.

And a quick interwebs note: Jon at Khurusan just keeps the hits coming. HE just relaesed the NEo-Soviet Power Armor walkers(more AT-43 power armor walker, and MaK Power Armor, than GW Space Marine). Love it. And now, once his scout cars and air support(think if a Hind and Harrier had a baby) are completed, he will have a killer full line of Neo-Soviets: Medium Tank, IFV, infantry support walker drones, full infantry with commands, heavy weapons, high command, scout cars, VTOL Gunship/Troop Carrier, and Power Armor. I am buying a full army of them in one fell swoop when they are ready. Its like the CoDominium from the Pournelle books in miniature. Awesome.

Quick Update 4-13-12

First off its Friday the thirteenth, and I stopped by for a rare breakfast on the way in to work. And my breakfast cost $6.66. So off to a good start! I wonder when the back cat will cross my path? and I need to find a ladder to walk under.

Second, The Kansas City Royals Home Opener is today. I grew up with the Royals and their amazing teams from the 70's and 80's. George Brett, Frank White, Willie Wilson, Fred Patek, Dan Quisenberry, Al Hroboski, Paul Splitorf, UL Washington, and the list goes on and on. Hope springs eternal, and spring is a time of rebirth. Let's hope the boys in blue can contend like the old guys did evey year.

Next, played an amazingly fun game of a new variant of the Baron's Fistful of Lead rules for the horse and musket era. It was a blast we were playtesting some new ideas and all of it will make it to the rules one way or another. Hat's go off to Bill, who's legionairres valiantly held the doorway to protect their prisoner, until one final blow ended the FFL's last hopes in Mexico. Good show. I am sur ethe Baron is doing a write up sometime today. http://baronvonj.blogspot.com/

Next, I dropped off  a couple of units for Jaye and Scott to paint for the Pennisular games that we are hopefully going to have for Black Powder. They are gonna get a few units painted of the french so I can get a jump on them when I finish the British. I also hope that maybe I can paint some extra units of British, and trade them with my Brother in Law for some French he painted, or will paint. If so, we could be in business in no time.

Next, Khurusan is coming through, adding bits and pieces to their lines as promised. I hope that the Jasmine throne Batallions are coming. Pleeeeease.http://theminiaturespage.com/news/?id=1037848092

Finally, as mentioned here before, our buddy Chris, master of great convention games, has FINALLY!, started his own blog. Welcome to the end of the 20th century Chris! You should all bookmark his site. He was a feature on the A-Game blog for his great French and Indian game at Recruits. Expect much more from master Chris. http://cluckamok.blogspot.com/

Have a great weekend! Its supposed to rain all weekend, so I am going to try to paint a unit of BRitish Royal and Guards Infantry, or at least get started.

And remember, just paint.

Interwebs Notes, News and Praise

Couple of quick nots from the internets this AM:

Khurusan is hinting at a series of longa awaited releases these next few weeks. Story on Dropship Horizon:
http://dropshiphorizon.blogspot.com/2012/04/khurasan-releases-caiman-apc.html

One of my favorite and most prolific rules writers, Scott Pyle of the Goalsystem(Supersystem, Blasters & Bulkheads, Labor of the Gods, Robofire, etc) has announced a long awaited Goalsystem game for Dungeon Bashing, with character advancement and some light roleplaying. Glad to see this moving forward. Hopefully the BAsement Generals will be in the slot for playtesting again. I do have all those dungeon tiles. Maybe I can paint some dungeon parties at lunch. Story on Scotts blog: http://four-color-figures.blogspot.com/2012/04/announcing-goalsystem-dungeon-delve.html

And at some point coming up, our favorite 15mm artist, SpaceJacker is packing up and moving to Australia. So that means, a little bit before he gets back in the groove blogging and painting. Lets hope not too long. So enjoy his work before he scoots off. Note his workshop pics on the sidebar. If I actually was a prolific phot taker, this would be great. Thanks for the glimpse of whats on your table jacker!:
http://tinysolitarysoldiers.blogspot.com/

Just a slight toot for myself. I have revamped the Roll 2 Hit! site. Its my RPG blog that died off last april as I got focused on my mini work. I have a real hankering to RPG lately. So I thought I would reboot, add some tabs and use it as an idea journal for games I want to run. Not much on there now, but stop by if you have an interest in old TSR games (BAsic D&D, Star Frontiers, Gamma World, Villains and Vigilantes(not TSR I know)) or the retro clones(Labyrinth Lord, Mutant Future) or new games, some based on older mechanics, some just new(Stars Without Number, Icons). http://roll2hit.blogspot.com/

And although I am sure you all know, I thought I would give props to the 4 work horses in the Miniature Gaming World. These 4 site I look at multiple times a day, and so do hundreds of gamers and painters and hobbyists around the world. If you want to know something or reach out to the gaming community, you better reach out here. If you don't follow these blogs or sites, what are looking at?:
The Miniatures Page: http://theminiaturespage.com/
Miniature Review: http://www.miniaturereview.blogspot.com/
Tabletop Gaming News: http://www.tabletopgamingnews.com/
Lead Adventure Forum: http://www.lead-adventure.de/index.php

And a guilty pleasure of sorts. The Mech Dude's blog is one man's quest to get Macross gaming to the table for everyone. I applaud this and many a saturday afternoon was spent by Ze Baron and myself playig the Robotech RPG by palladium, and trying to scavenge anything Macross related. So I would love to see him succeed in breaking through the Harmony Gold mess and getting Valkyries, Tomahawks, Regults, and Zentradei to our tabletops. I would buy a whole bunch if he did.: http://www.mechdudesblog.blogspot.com/

A post script to the Jasmine Throne Foreign Batallion

It just hit me that this force from GZG is an incredible fit for the JTFB for vehicles and armor. I have a full compliment of thses for my human Quick Reaction Force, but I may have to buy another set, cause I can't imagine how cool these would look painted white with some blue markings.

A notice, a smile, and a frown

All of you know of my love for Khurusan Miniatures. A simply amazing range of 15mm miniatures that are a must have for 15mm Sci Fi/Post Apoc/Horror/Fantasy gaming. Well hold onto your socks, Jon has just released a huge amount of models for the taking. the story on TMP: http://theminiaturespage.com/news/?id=760283544

and as you all know of my love for his Post Apoc range that ties so beautifully into my Fallout sweetspot, he finally has powered armor and a new Mutant Warboss. This is one sexy fig:

Painted by my favorite 15mm painter out there, Space Jacker, this guy is definately going in my forces.
Nice job Jacker! http://tinysolitarysoldiers.blogspot.com/

The smile? Well that's for all the love that Khurusan has unleased on us. For some reason the Apocalypse makes me feel better.

The frown? Well that's for the Jasmine Throne Foreign Battalion troops that just seem to be lost in Jump Space. Why does that give me a frown? Well this should make you frown, knowing that these wonderful figs are not released yet:











First two pics painted by Space Jacker, rest of the photos are painted by Steve Dean.

And he even did the Not-Harkolons:



Not-Harks painted by Space Jacker.

Now you know why the frown.

This is the most anticipated 15mm sci fi relaese ever, and I am sure Jon will be buried when he releases them (i will get two of each set).

Good day for 15mm gaming.

Guess I'll keep saving my birthday money.

Quick Update 2-20-12

I finished up the first phase of the monsters for my dungeon project over the weekend.

I have added:

Human cultists of the undead
Undead Necromancer
Necromancers Bodyguard
An orange skinned Ogre

I will do a couple of adventurer warbands to help develop rules for.

Pics tomorrow.

I got  serious hankering to do some Black Powder and to finish one of my great loves, my 28mm Peninsular British Army. I have joked about Nappy Fever before on this blog. What this really means is once I start painting Napoleonics, I usually get obsessed about it and it takes me a while to get it out of my system. So right now, that feels ok. I don't have anything that's driving me to paint it right now other than the Nappies, and while I am ruminating on getting a bunch of new Khurasan figs to continue my collection for Post Apoc and Sci Fi, this is a good time to concentrate.

So I think the Spring/Summer 2012 list looks something like this:

28mm British Peninsular
28mm French Peninsular
15mm Dungeon Crawl
15mm Sci Fi/Post Apoc

A potential new contender may be a group project for Dystopian Wars. We shall see.

I'll be posting progress pics of the Brits as I go along.

Thought I would throw up some pics of the progress pf the Army as it sits now.

Infantry Units. I will be adding 2 stands to each of these so I can have a 24 man 6 stand unit for Black Powder

Brigade Commander

Hvy Dragoons

Royal Artillery

Commanders

New 15mm dungeon Pics

New Pics of 3 new rooms, and some new monsters. Zombies, Skeletons, Wights, Undead Wolves, Rat Swarms, and Giant Lizards.



New water pit tile. For spawning monsters, drinking, or hiding things in.



Throne Room tile. Cehckerboard tiles and Dais.



zombies emerge form the spawning pool



Zombies!



Emerging for brains!



close ups



more close ups



one more close up



zombie wolves



close up



Close up



Wights



Skeleton Horde




closeup




rat swarm




close up




Giant Lizards.

 All figs from the great Khurusan, excpet the lizards which are GW.

15mm Dungeon Denizens I

OK, so as promised, here are some pics of the first dungeon denizens.

All of these were primered white(i don't know why) so I decided to use a technique my Bro-In-Law used to use with great effect. All washes. all bases colors are washes on white primer so the wash actually highlights and shadows all in one coat. Its quick and effective if done right. That's a big IF. So I like some of the results. I have always been a fan of fluid dynamics and the random realism it provides. Sometimes it just gets muddy or isnt intense enough. I am certain to go back to my old black primer, english triad system, but you always gotta flex the muscles.

Old School D&D long-nosed Trolls:

GW (really)giant rats from WHQuest:

GW (really, really) giant bats WHQuest:

And a bunch of action shots:

And the next batch of dungeon denizens on the table.

An old rat swarm and an ogre who will be getting a black undercoat:

Demonworld Thain Werewolves: 

GW lizard swarm becoming giant lizards:

Demonworld Minotaurs:

And my new Khurasan skeletons. Man these are deleicate and well sculpted:

After these I will do the zombies, zombie wolves, vampire, and an old liche. I may sculpt a couple of ghosts as well. I need some ghouls to add some power to the zombies. And some skelton archers(which I have).

After that, a warband of heroes. After that, who knows. let's hope I get that far.

Happy Painting.
Ken