Update 1-15-12

Well, things have been a little slow in the workshop as of late. Many little things to do and trying to spend some time getting into shape. So its all cutting into my workshop time. And the xmas holiday was a little less productive than I had hoped. But we soldier on.

I got this bit of wonderfulness in the mail last week:

A nice hefty box of Khurusan goodness.

I have been looking for monsters and such to fill in my collection for the 15mm  Dungeon project, and low and behold, Jon had a whole slew of things I had either forgotten about, or he had added and not told anyone(which he does from time to time).

So my lovely package contained a great littel collection of undead:

And a nice selection of things that live in the creepy crawly depths of the earth:

All of these will go great with the Dungeon project. Great figs as usual Jon!

So I have been thinking of how to game the Dungeon(nothing like building an entire project without a game in mind). I have several thoughts. There was an old PC game called Dugeon Keeper that had the player running the dungeon, and the adventurers were the enemy, trying to invade and you had to stop them. So thinking on that. We (the Basement Generals) have multi player games (6-8) each time, so its kinda like running a mini convention game each week. I was trying to come up with a version that was competitive, and that had players playing both good and evil sides. More on that as it develops. I can always do a simple dungeon crawl, ala Warhammer Quest, with random layout, loot mnd monster decks. And that is the simplest easiest solution. And one me and the boys could do together.  

I also couldn't resist the Post Apoc line. I picked up a few of the original selection, but now I am all in:

I added a few things from the Sci Fi lines and man what a great start in Post Apoc. I am burried in the stuff in 28mm as you have all seen, but I really like the thought of painting and playing on a 2x2 board. The scenery possibilities are almost endless. And the homage he is playing to Fallout the video game( a personal favorite of mine) in the characters, the supermutants, the crabman, etc. is fantastic.

I think these will definately be based as singles, and we will use Fistful of Lead:Warriors of the Wasteland. Since each pack is essentially a premade gang, its really easy to see it come out that way. I'm pumped. For me the Apocalypse is always a breath of fresh air(stale and rotten and full of rads) that gets me going.

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I have gotten a few things painted. I will get some pics tomorrow. A nice grab bag of giant bats, giant rats, rat swarms, old school long nosed trolls, minotaurs, brown bears, and lizards and slamanders for the 15mm dungeon. And exploring some old techniques for me. White primer, all inks. Mixed results. Pics tomorrow.

Game More!!!

Ken

15mm Dungeon Followup with Pics

The whole tile set,  71 tiles plus 3 big rooms, I am finishing the big rooms. I missed 1 tile in the set and need to finish it. And I need to add about 8 more corridors and 4 more corners to help fill in the gaps.

Hey everybody, used the wife's camera to get some pics in of the 15mm Dungeon. Not used to her camera so I apologize for the clarity. I think they are a bit shaky.

Dungeon Throne Room  - Our intrepid Adventurers meet the great Orc Shaman and his giant spider minions

Another  shot of the throne room

The three premade rooms. The Throne Room, The Pool, and The Crossroads. Just starting to paint these. I will post them once finished.  These are 6"X6".

Half the tiles

blow up of tiles

blow up of tiles

blow up of floor, corridor and corner tiles

The other half of the tiles

Blow up of tiles

T-intersections, 4-Way Intersections, etc.

The dungeon entry tile

A quick dungeon layout using all the tiles

Blowup of the layout

Blow up of the catacombs section

Attacked!

Giant watery foes emerge from the pool.

An ogre assaults the adventurers in the catacombs

I love the way that mixing 15mm figs(the adventurers) with 28mm figs(an old GW/MB Ogre) really starts to add to the monstrous scale difference and makes monsters much more menacing. Dragons are finally  frighteningly to scale when you do this. It looks awesome.

The final room!

Easy pack up and storage. 10 minutes to set up, 5 minutes to pick up and store. All thats needed is 2 shoeboxes for all 71 normal tiles. Rooms will go in their own box.

Now on to dungeon fixtures, fuirniture, and denizens. Again, using some 28mm scale stuff will work, but not all.

When I get some more figs, monster and furnishings done, I will post some more pics.

15mm dungeon project

Inspired by my favorite blog, Tiny Solitary Soldiers, I have been working on a dungeon tile project in 15mm.

My phone is not taking photos right now, so no pics today, but I will describe the project and my progress.

I have a ton of 3" mdf bases so I have been looking for a project for them for a while. The TSS blog had a project he did for zombies on some terrain tiles that used glass tile from a DIY store, and left over junk.

I found some great cheap tile at home depot, I can get a four by four grid of tiles on a 3" base. I decided to do a full on dungeon tile system with the tiles. So I am using pink foam for walls and I score and cut all the blocks for the wall texture with an xacto.

I decided on the tile types(corridors, angles, corners, full floors) then just added glass tile or walls as needed. I have made 72 tiles, plus 3 6" x 6" full rooms.

I used Xmas break to paint, high light, and seal the dungeon tiles. After some touch up, I will be ready to start on the dungeon adventurers and denizens.

I have an embarrassment of 15mm fantasy figs, so I will have no problem having enough selection to go around. Now to figure out how to play in this maze. Hope to get some picks up soon. Thanks for reading.

Xmas haul 2012

It was a good Xmas here at the House of Doom. Hope all my friends and readers had a great holiday season.

Time for a run down of the haul for the holidays.

To help fill in some gaps for playing Tomorrow's War, Gruntz, and FAD with 28mm GW minis. I have scads of the evil empires minis, but will never play the rules. But I still love the non-skull laden armies, and evn have a soft spot for the big dumb ole space marines.

Any way, I got a couple of Tau piranha to go with my existing size able forces, and some Orkney jump pack troops and heavy weapons.

And my favorite, I received from my lovely wife a great starter army of Coplestone 15mm fantasy barbarians. Classic Conan stuff. I think he sculpts 15's better than 28's. And that's saying something. I will be adding more when he releases the archers that are supposed to be coming at e beginning of the year. They will be going with my commands and colors fantasy armies, and for my 15mm dungeon.

I also got a great post apoc shooter for Xbox called Rage, and Space Marine, which I highly recommend for pure carnage.

Hope you all have a great new year.

Vietnam In HD

History is showing its next incredible series, VIETNAM in HD this week. http://www.history.com/shows/vietnam-in-hd It started on the 8th. Its six hours of documentary with interviews and footage, most never before seen, that lays out the war, and all its difficulties, harsh realities, heorism, courage, and haunting surrealism. Its really a story of the people involved, and as History really knows how to do, delivers a very human side to the very difficlut task of understanding America's most confusing war. I watched 4 hours of it last night, and only wept 3 times. Not bad considering. It is real and raw and haunting listening to the stories of the Vets who did their duty with honor, and courage and pride, in a war with no real objective besides body count, and no real front to battle over. Thank you for all that served in this war that so changed America, and the sacrifice that only your Afghan/Iraq counterparts would understand.

Some facts I learned last night:

At its high point in May of 1969, (and this is after Tet) the US had over 500,000 troops serving in country in Vietnam.

In WWII the US soldier saw an average of 10 days of actual combat per year. In Vietnam, the US soldier saw 240 of 365 days of combat. (the average work days in a year with 2 weeks vacation is 250). This is a haunting stat. The constant combat stress, and sheer volume of combat is incredible. No wonder these guys had a hard time coming back to civilian life. How do we think we are going to do with the Afghan/Iraq vets?

After suffering several hundred casualities to take Hamburger Hill, the US abandoned it 16 days later. 4 days later the Viet Cong and NVA took the hill back by simply walking to the top of it, without a shot fired.

During the siege of Khe San, US C130 pilots were LANDING on the airstrip that was zeroed in with artillery and mortar fire so they could deliver supplies and evac casualties. When this came impossible they did slow speed passes dropping supplies from 600 feet. It was one of the most hazardous duties in the entire war. They saved the lives of untold men because of these supply drops.

The Tet Offensive was incredibly well coordinated on the first night of the attack. Over 130 Towns/Cities/Bases were attacked simulataneously. Tet enemy strength for the attack was estimated to be at 84,000 troops.

After Tet, due to overall casualties and command and control casualties, the VC ceased to function as an effective fighting force, although they did continue hit and run tactics throughout the remainder of the war.

The US High Command decided, mostly because of GEn. Moore's sucess in Ia Drang in 1965, that a body count would be used to determine our sucess in the war. Our kills to there's.

I know this is a gaming blog, so here's some of my thoughts/struggles with gaming Vietnam:

-It seems very personal and real to me. Maybe not something I should be playing a game over and having fun.

-There is a lot of room for amazing and beautiful terrain, figs, vehicles, etc.

-There are some great rule sets out there.

-I wonder what a Vet would think about me playing a game about the experience he went through. I would hope he wouldn't find it disrespectful.

-I don't think I could run a Vietnam game at a Con, for the above reason.

I have wanted to do the period for a very long time. In fact, I already did it once half-assed in 20mm. I have about 15 plastic models, and a bunch of VC and US from TAG waiting for paint. I already have a pretty good vilage that I built for Vietnam, but use mostly with Samurai. I have oredered Ambush Alley's Vietnam Sourcebook for Ambush Alley. I may be adding this to the list to do this Winter.

The List - 2011 Fall 2012 winter Projects

OK so here we go:

1. EPIC - Well I muct say, painting some ultramarine on a sprue of original beaky Space Marines has been pretty fun and nostalgic. And the last few releases of models are just gorgeous. I had forgotten that. So I am gonna pick off EPIC as I go into the long night, to hopefully emerge from the shadows with a painted Space Marine, Orc and Eldar force. Imperial Guard may be too much to ask, but I have a bunch of it too. And that Damn Chaos and Squat stuff. Focus...Focus.

2. VIKINGS - I love my new collection of Vikings. I need to add some odds and ends to it, but its in really good shape. I will add some trolls (I have a nice selection of assorted old GW Trolls just for the job) Dire Wolves (I have a bunch of Plastics from GW kits), Valkyrie Leader (Maybe convert one of my unbuilt Bretonnian Pegasus Rider mounts), Hill Giant (Again GW plastic, beautiful), then probably figure out how to do some goblins, and press some Orcs into service as more trolls, ogres, and giant kin. Really going for a more Ragnaok-y kinda thing here.

3. SAMURAI - Love my sammies. Not painted great. From my old days when I was learning, but they look good together. and look even better now on group bases. Going to play Commands and Colors and Commands and Colors Fantasy and Hail Caesar with them. Need to do ground work, flock, static grass, etc. Then decide if I want to paint more of my Old Glory and L5R sammies, or go for it and do the Perry's stuff and stay historical. I am leaing toward the Perry's. I also have a nice selection of the L5R Goblins to add to the mix, so they are perfect for C&CF, beautifully sculpted too. And if you can get the Bob Ollie samurai orcs and goblins sculpts then you have added a pretty colorful army to the collection.

4. 15mm FANTASY - This is the ongoing project. Really need to do basing and flock for these guys to get them finished. Undead are on paint sticks already, and I have a great selection of Thain from Demonworld, so kinda anxious to get them painted as well.

5. 15mm NAPOLEONICS - A rebasing project. They look good rebased. And since I will never use them the way they are based, they need to be converted. Once rebased I can play Commands & Colors Napoleonics and Black Powder. This is a big project, just because of the sheer vilume of my exsting collection. But it will look good when done.

Gonna keep the list to 5 this time. But you all know me. I will certainly add to it. I am pretty sure I will come back to Post Aocalyptic when I am suffering some general malaise, I always do. And I have all my 15mm Sci Fi to do as well. And I have been thinking about doing some 15mm scale 2'x2' game boards for me and the boys to play on. Be fun to have some pull out boards to skirmish on in 15mm. Now I can get back to painting. Finally. 

I feel a Fall 11/Winter 12 List Coming On

I feel a new list coming on.

I got some of my stuff done on the summer list. Not a lot, but some. I spent most of the summer, when I could paint, getting ready for Recruits in Sept, and assembling and priming stuff that I can just pull out and paint for the winter. Kinda like a squirrel burying some nuts.


So I have a bunch of 15mm stuff ready to go, tons of stuff to get basing done on, and numerous ways to go for the fall and winter.


Initial thoughts are:


I have gotten the Epic bug again, and I will be painting this stuff off and on. I have massive unpainted aries for this that have sat for ages. I started painting some Ultramarines just to get the juices flowing and I forgot how fun painting these little guys is. So they are on the list.


I have to get my 28mm Samurai and 15mm Fantasy basing done. they both have languished too long without being completed.

I acquired a beautiful collection of Vikings over the summer, and would like to fill them out with some characters, Carls, and some archers. and of course some Ice Trolls a Giant, and Dire Wolves. then add some Goblinoids for them to fight, maybe throw in some Norse Dwarves. Maybe a bunch of snow terrain. Hmmm....

I have my 15mm Sci Fi legions to do and they are ready. As is the rebasing for my 15mm Nappy collection.

And I have my 28mm Fantasy Skirmish figs to do as well.

It really is an embarassment of choices and it should be a bountiful fall and winter.

I'll post a list when its complete. It would be nice to complete one. Never done that.