More Infinity Painted Models! Moderators From Bakunin.

Got more painting finished up last week. This time, the Moderators From Bakunin! Hope you dig 'em. And with the minis painted from this and the last post here on Blogger, I could justify buying the other Nomad starter pack. Got those assembled and primed yesterday and the goal is to have them done before my online order comes in.

So I Got Into This One Game With Lots Of Shooting

Almost two weeks ago, I bought the Nomads, Bakunin Jurisdiction starter set for the game Infinity. I'm going to try something with this game. I can only purchase new things for my Nomads when everything that I previously bought has been assembled and painted. So far it's working. My checking account approves of this move too. Here are the first three models that I've finished. I just want them looking decent and ready to play, so I won't be going nutso with shading and highlights. It's also going to be the game where I only play with painted models.

The Reverend Moiras with Multi Rifle was the first to get some acrylic love.





Sin-Eater Observant sporting an MK12 Rifle got some attention next.





And a Zero with Combi-Rifle and E-Mauler.





Little group shot.



So I hope that I stick with the paint before playing and buying new stuff rules that I've set for myself. I'm going with a very bright color palette from what I'm use to since it's a game that has a heavy anime influence in its art direction. Actually that was also how I settled on the Nomads. I liked something from pretty much every faction which made deciding on an army difficult. The Nomads in my opinion had the heaviest anime visuals so I settled on them.

Superman Heroclix Paint Jobs

Painted up the Man of Steel, Supergirl and Cyborg Superman to use in a tournament last Sunday.

Some Heroclix Paint Jobs

So I recently got into Heroclix. Ironically, the thing that appealed to me about the game was the fact that I would require no build and paint time whatsoever. Alas, the bug hit me and I decided to do some quick paint jobs on some Clix. I believe that because of how they come, I don't feel any pressure to try and paint these things to a high standard since anything I do would be an improvement to the assembly line paint jobs from some factory in China. But that reasoning is flawed since my metal minis don't have any paint on them, so wouldn't that mean anything I do to them is an improvement too? Regardless here they are!
Happy gaming!!!

Great, Just What I Need...Another Game

I'll be honest, for the longest time I viewed the bad to mediocre pre-paints and the gamble of buying blind boosters rather unappealing when it came to buying plastic minis such as D&D (under the old format), Heroclix, Mage Knight, etc. Top it off, I'm sure there was also a partial snobbish attitude pointed at it. "What? You play with those crappy looking things?" and then feel bad cuz a mini is leaning over funny or has bendy weapons.
Can't say that anymore because I've bought into Heroclix due to the recent release of Street Fighter. Heroclix has also been the easiest and quickest game for me to round up friends to play. Much lower price point to get into it and they don't have to paint or put anything together. Toss in some neat licenses and you can usually tickle someone's fancy.
I do have some gamer OCD kicking in and have already started doing some simple repaints but oh well, nice to know that I don't have to until I get around to doing it.
Happy gaming folks!

Mini Gaga Seals the Deal

So last Sunday, I swung by my local comics and games store to play a long overdue game of Hordes. As we moved our toy monsters and soldiers around, shot the breeze, I began talking to my buddy Jason about the game Anima Tactics. Showed him the rulebook and he began looking at the gorgeous art but was still on the fence about jumping in but he did want to pick up something new. Then I pointed out a character and made the comparison to her looking a lot like Lady Gaga. "SOLD!" He bought a Dark Faction starter set then and there. The next day, we both pooled an online order to split the freight cost and he's also brought his brother on board. I'm looking forward to throwing down soon as this game is the closest I've seen to make me think that I'd be playing Final Fantasy on the tabletop.

The funny thing is, this excitement for Anima Tactics has put a huge surge on my time spent working on miniatures. You'd think I'd be prepping my Anima Tactics: Wissenchaft models but nooooo,I've been painting up my Hordes: Legion of Eveblight models and giving them all the love. This week has seen the most time spent at the hobby table than the last two-three months combined. :S

My gaming this weekend brings a one-shot Call of Cthulhu game and then a Hordes beat down. I'll let you know how it goes.

An Army Of Metal?

So I was thinking of how I might get my Legion of Everblight models painted as quickly as possible without making them look like they were just dipped or like something from the pre-painted miniature department a la D&D or Heroclix. I'm thinking of painting my models to be metallic pieces as in gold, copper, bronze and silver. To me it'd be something I can achieve pretty quickly and at the same time have them look very distinct. There'd still some distinctions between skin, armour, etc.

I'm guessing that if I went this route, the deployment zone would look like a fancy chess set or a trophy cabinet.

What do you think?

The Paper Behind Paper Legends

How Paper Legends started off...

The idea of trying my hand at DMing was slowly brewing on the inside of me and the trigger; being able to get two friends of mine whom I had grown up with to play it. Since my return to the comics and games shop in adulthood a couple of years ago, it had always been one of those somewhat segregated things where these hobbies stayed at home and with the friends I had made from Warp 1. Most of my friends who knew about my interest in comics, gaming (board games, table top war games, card games) and anime were respective and supportive of it but it was never a topic that I would really talk about with them aside from if they saw a copy of _____(insert graphic novel, game expansion supplement book, etc) laying on the coffee table and they'd ask what it was. I'd give a six sentence description, they might flip through it to look at the pictures and give a "Oh that's pretty cool" type statement and back on the table it went and we carried on doing whatever we were doing.

Anyway, one day my friend Josh and I stopped by Warp 1. I wanted to say hi to some of the staff and it was a great way to get free parking while we walked Whyte Avenue to smoke cigars. While we were in there, the DM for the Eberron campaign that I'm playing in showed up and then we all went BSing about D&D, what stupid things we saw people do at work that week, etc. Josh and I left the store to go smoke cigars. While we were walking around enjoying our tobacco, he made a statement along the lines of "they're normal fun guys who happen to really like things with wizards and lasers". Yaddiyadda and he looked like he was interested. Later on I asked if he'd want to play Dungeons & Dragons if I was to start a campaign and he said yes. I called up Alex whom I had known since 5th grade and he was game too. This sealed the deal and it was set, I had to start up my own D&D campaign.

I've always enjoyed being able to do creative things. Through Paper Legends I'd be able to create a world and invite my friends over to play in it while beating the crap out of bad guys at the same time. What's not to love? But the story and game element wouldn't be enough for me. When I got into Eberron I had made gaming tiles. For this I'd really need something to give it that Mr. Kok stamp that would look different from other people's D&D group.

Whenever I think about RPG's in general outside of D&D, my brain generally defaults to anime looking guys from video game. Final Fantasy VII, IX, Shining Force, Tales of Symphonia, etc. I decided that I would make the character minis/markers in a chibi anime style. We'll go into a little more detail about the different drafts of art styles in a future post.