Well, the ‘rona has really undone me and whilst stand-downs, reduced hours and furloughing has been the order of the day elsewhere, I’ve been lucky enough to keep my RL employment, but to say it has been busy would be an understatement. I’m not sure what happened in the intervening three months since my last post but it feels like a year has elapsed and the world has gone crazy. That said, whilst I haven’t been posting here regularly, my hobby and gaming has been marching on as best possible.
I thought I’d start with a dump of all the hobby I’ve completed over the course of the year, noting that I haven’t been keeping as diligent record of it all as in prior years so I feel like there’s some incidental things I’ve completed that I’ve missed. Regardless, I’ve gotten a fair bit done and am pretty happy with my progress.
Frostgrave Immersion Tour
I’m not sure these haven’t been presented before, but a few items were painted in January for the trip (which feels like it happened a lifetime ago). Nothing as major or exciting as previously, but hobby progress nonetheless.
This bog provided an interesting lesson for me, as when I added the water effect, it reactivated the PVA glue I’d used for the foliage, sending it a terrible cloudy white. I was able to address some of it by cutting the poster board base to let air in, but I think next time I’ll skip fixing the foliage down and just pour water effect over it!
Marvel Crisis Protocol
This has been my main hobby focus so far this year. After being a little lukewarm on the game initially, I’ve grown to really enjoy it and can see some depth that wasn’t initially apparent but more on that in future. I’ve completed painting all the characters from the core set except for Captain Marvel (I made an error when assembling her which wasn’t apparent until I started painting, so there’s some green stuff work required I haven’t had the impetus to complete), as well as most of the other releases up to Guardians. I find the models a little hit and miss, they lack some of the dynamacism I’d like (Hulk is a very boring pose), but have been a relative breeze to paint, especially with use of some Citadel Contrast paints in places. Looking forward to knocking over the balance of the ones I’ve acquired.
Operation Last Train
As a fan of just about all wargaming products Joe McCullough puts out (note to self: must buy Oathmark), I immediately donated and downloaded Operation Last Train when it was released. It then sat on my hard drive gathering virtual dust. I thought I’d have a little more gaming time during the lockdowns, so I painted up some models I’d bought from Eureka Miniatures as well as a box of GW Tyranids. I’d always wanted to own and paint some of the Tyranid gribblies but had never really felt like committing to an army of them, luckily this seemed a perfect opportunity. I’ve also assembled and painted a drop ship, but it’s awaiting some oil paints and pigments to finish it off. Of course, I have yet to actually play a game but am looking forward to touching down and rescuing some civilians in the future!
Miscellaneous
I painted this mode of Lakshmi Bai as an anniversary gift for my Special Lady Friend, a badass mother for a badass mother so-to-speak. I’m pretty happy with how it came out, the vibrancy of the colours were a nice change of pace from my usual sedate painting style!
I picked up this Captain Flint model from North Star Miniatures after seeing it in Miniature Wargames (I think) as part of a Ghost Archipelago scenario. This led me to watch the Black Sails TV show which I thoroughly enjoyed and am now resisting investigating Age of Sail games as I’m sure that’s a rabbit hole I’ll disappear down!
Here’s a random selection of fantasy knights, which will likely end up forming part of the reinvention of my Frostgrave summoner warband. The two on the outside are form Mierce Miniatures, who I highly recommend albeit their website is ridiculously hard to navigate.
I picked up these Chronohounds from North Star as they felt like something I couldn’t easily proxy for the Perilous Dark mission they relate to, and I was ordering some other models regardless. I procrastinated a lot on painting them as I couldn’t decide how best to execute them, but eventually I just picked a handful of colours and laid them down. I think they look pretty good and the bits where coverage is a little light sort of look like the hounds fading out of the current time in my mind so pretty happy with how it came out.
Lastly, this badass ranger model was received alongside my Rangers of Shadow Deep deluxe edition. Another North Star model, it is designed to look similar to the cover art picture, I had intended to add a severed head to his left hand to make it match more, but got carried away with painting and forgot!
Conclusion
So I’ve had a relative productive year to-date and have many more projects awaiting my attention (my Hard City Kickstarter arrived recently, which I’m very keen to paint and get to the table). Hopefully the worst of the lockdowns are past here and we can gradually get back to some semblance of normality. Stay safe and well wherever you are.
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