We Struck Soulstone!

So in my continued quest to churn out Malifaux terrain I have completed a dual use terrain piece - the Soulstone Vein/Magic Nexus. So far most all of my Malifaux terrain has been designed with two games in mind... Malifaux, for obvious reasons, and my other favorite game Legends of the Old West. This is my first piece that can't be used for either game and I'm ok with that. I think its simple but effective. However, I did discover a great way to make my ground crack for when I am doing parched desert or "dead zone" terrain pieces. Here are the pictures of the new terrain and you'll see how much more cracked the ground looks than my previous terrain.

So I had used an old batch of my "ground" mix what I was calling porridge before and it was several months old and dried out. I poured some water in the container and stirred it up and applied it to my CD as a base. When I woke up the next morning it was cracked like this. At first I was thinking it was ruined but then I realized I could add some desert life around the stones and it would look if not magical, life giving at least. Which played in to both of the aspects of the terrain piece well. But, I was stumped for a while as to why it cracked like that.

While I was drybrushing the piece some small chunks fell out (I'm a heavy handed painter), which is the only downside to the dried cracked look. But it hit me the reason it cracked was because I had thrown off the water to glue ratio or at least that is my theory. I'm planning to test that out on some future terrain. Probably something more desert-like with cacti and such. Anyway, I'll be planning another terrain piece in the next few days and I'll try to do a more step-by-step entry for it. Thanks for stopping by.

Return To The Blog And More Malifaux Terrain

So haven't had a lot of miniature activity of late but a visit with my friend Paul has lit the miniature bug fire under my butt. So the first order of business is to get some terrain so I can teach some of my friends this great game Malifaux. So, I made a list of specific Malifaux terrain pieces and I'll be working on them as time allows. This entry is for the Campsite which I tried to keep simple while still making it obvious what it is. So enjoy...

I am particularly fond of how the fire pit turned out! I actually repainted it at the suggestion of my Fiancee.

Next up is my Magic Nexus/Soulstone Vein terrain piece which I am pretty excited to get together. Then I'll be working on a few hills and should be ready to work on a few models after that. I am really looking forward to working on my Red Chapel Gang!

Malifaux Terrain Progress Part III

I finished up a few more terrain pieces over the last few days. They did not end up quite as I originally planned them for a couple reasons. First, I had initially decided to do the Magic Nexus, Dead Zone and Hazardous Terrain in different colored flocking. I even went so far as to make two of the colors I planned to use - purple and a orange/copper color. I liked them although I need to (cough, cough) "filter" the saw dust a little better. There was to many little tiny twigs in them which I can pick out but it will still be a bit of a pain. The odd thing was until I started mixing the saw dust with the color it was almost invisible to the eye.

My first batch of homemade flocking!

A lifetime supply of purple flocking. You can really see the bits of twigs mixed in.

The copper colored flock

You can see it broken up here and I look forward to when I start working on my western terrain.

So after giving it some thought I decided to cover the remaining three terrain pieces with my normal mixed flocking. They turned out really good but then of course I needed to come up with some other ideas for the pieces i had intended to make - Magic Nexus, Dead Zone and Hazardous Terrain.

I love this piece. I do think i might want to use one more highlight color along the trail.

This piece is going to look great on the table.

This was originally going to be the Magic Nexus but I like it like this a lot more.

All of the pieces together. Just imagine all of the charge lanes these block!

When I was on my hike I found some really nice quartz crystals and I think they would make a great accent for the Magic Nexus/Soulstone Vein terrain piece. I plan to use the purple flocking to finish that piece off as well. I have set the Hazardous Terrain (Toxic Pool) aside for now but I saw a piece another person had done that looks great and I want to replicate that at some point. You can see the piece I have in mind here. Its the fifth picture down. I also really like the Campsite and Scrap Pile they did as well. I think they look great and i hope mine turn out even half as nice. Finally I decided I want to make my dead zone a cracked desert and I have an idea of how I want to accomplish that but I talk about that more in another post.

Crystal Quartz... but I see Soulstones.

The other piece I am working on is the Ancient Monument. I have the basic pillar done and I do have a miniature I want to use for the top but I have to dig it out still. so here is the basic pillar to tide you over. My friend Josh glued this together and he used an exacto to scratch up the surface. I think it will look magnificant once its all painted up. Here is a preview.

I'm actually very excited to see how this turns out.

Malifaux Terrain Progress Part II

I made some progress on my terrain pieces recently. I got the mid-tone and highlight applied to all six pieces and I'm very pleased with the results. The next day my girlfriend and I went for a hike and found some very nice rocks for making terrain pieces with. I was really pleased with how the boulder pieces turned out but I decided that I wanted to make more of them to use with Legends of the Old West. I want to make them look a bit more like desert terrain and I even have two of those Woodland Scenic desert terrain sets. They have about fifteen or so plastic cacti in them. All I have to do to finish the last three terrain pieces is to mix up the batch of colored flocking I want to use. There are actually three colors - grey for the dead zone, purple for the magic nexus and orange for the hazardous terrain. I'm going to use the Rubbishinrubbishout method and I'll put up a post afterward. In the mean time... pictures!

four down two to go!

All done with the highlights!

The boulder pieces are flocked! I plan to do three more with a desert scheme.

Malifaux Terrain Progress Part I

I wanted to just do a quick update on my activities this last month. It might appear that I have not really done anything, however I have been busy with another hobby. I use to DM several 2nd  and 3rd edition D&D games and I recently found several of my binders of campaign notes. I decided to type them up and get them into an electronic format. i just finished two nights ago having finished the last of five campaign worlds. I'll probably dedicate an entire update to those worlds at some point but for now suffice to say i am quite pleased to have them all finished.

I have also taken some updated pictures of the terrain pieces I had been working on now that I have reapplied the basing material. I think they look much better and will be working on them over the next few nights to get them finished up. Mostly I just need to apply the highlight colors. The flocking is a different matter as I need to actually make the flocking in the colors I want. I have all the supplies I need to do that though.

A mixture of fine sand, kitty litter, watered down glue and my base color and viola!

Five more to go. The hardest part is getting between the rocks.

Now they are ready for my mid-tone and highlight colors.

Back in the saddle...

Well, it has been quite a while since my last post, which is ironic since in my last post I had said I was going to try to start making regular posts again. I moved  shortly after my last post and ever since I have been working on getting my space set up for my hobbies.

As it happens I have been working on several projects. For starters I finished the second unit of Orc Warriors for my Orc Warmaster army. I have also gotten the third unit about half finished. I have all the base colors applied and I only have to get through the highlights.

I recently decided to set aside the Warmaster project on account that there are no players in my area. However, my girlfriend and my friend Josh both have expressed interest in Malifaux which is a game I use to play before moving. I have a bunch of figures for it most of which need to be assembled and painted... big surprise I know. So, after giving it some thought Josh and I started work on some Malifaux terrain pieces.

We started by looking at the terrain pieces used in the first rulebook and settled on several specific pieces as well as a few generic ones. Below is the list of pieces we have started.

Dead Zone
Hazardous Terrain
Magic Nexus
Mysterious Effigies x3
Ancient Monument
Boulder Piles x3

I am using old cds as the bases for these and I just started by gluing down the rocks. I then used water down glue and sprinkled sand mixture, however I realized just yesterday that I should have made my porridge mixture and applied that instead, it looks much better. I plan to mix some up on Wednesday and finish them up.

I also found a great video on youtube to making colored flocking and here is the link. I'm going to make some this week as well. Rubbishinrubbishout has some great videos and I highly recommend you take a look at what he has to offer.

My Daunting List of Unpainted Lead

So I promised earlier that I would make a list of all that I needed to accomplish before I got caught up. Like I said before... I have a problem. That problem is collecting new things and then getting them just to the point where I can get them on the field at the local store, or at someones house that has a board and terrain. Typically this is getting them assembled and maybe so far as primed. I have decided that is not going to cut it any longer if I am going to remain sane. So that being said, I'm the kind of person that is more successful if I have a list of things to do, especially when I get to mark stuff off said list. So here in no particular order is my Gamer to do list.

Paint Warmaster Orc & Goblin army
Paint Warmaster Empire army
Paint Warmaster Dwarf army
Strip and re-paint Warmaster Choas army
Make 10mm Warmaster terrain pieces
Paint Alien Squad Leader (ASQL) "Stargate System Lord" army
Assemble and paint ASQL Alien Grays army
Assemble and paint ASQL "Harkonnen" army
Make 15mm ASQL Scifi terrain pieces
Paint Full Trust Kra'vak fleet
Paint Full Thrust Phalon fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust FSE fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust ORC fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust USNC fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust Civilian craft
Make Full Thrust play mat and terrain (ie planets, astroids, etc)
Assemble and paint Crossfire American Company
Assemble and paint Crossfire German Company
Assemble and paint Crossfire Russian Comapny
Assemble and paint Crossfire US Marine Comapny
Assemble and paint Crossfire Japanese Company
Make 15mm Crossfire terrain (European and Pacific)
Paint 30mm Legends of the Old West (LotOW) Outlaw Posse
Paint 30mm LotOW Lawman Posse
Paint 30mm LotOW Cowboy Posse
Paint 30mm LotOW Native American Posse
Make 30mm Old West terrain pieces
Paint 30mm Malifaux Neverborn Crew
Paint 30mm Malifaux Resurrectionist Crew
Paint 30mm Malifaux Archanist Crew
Build Macro Photography Light Box
Build generic game boards
Build gaming table

and finally... a special project I am working with my Father on. A series of game boards we are dubbing "From Normandy to Berlin". Which we know will take a while to finish but the hope is that we will be able to follow the allies as they advance across Europe. We are starting with the Operation Overlord basically recreating Dog Green Sector of Omaha Beach. We of course understand that we might have to sacrifice some realism to gain some playability but we are looking forward to the challenge. I will dedicate a post solely to this subject in the near future and hopefully you will read along!

I have quite the to do list don't I. This doesn't even include all the games I want to play. Such as Ambush Alley in 15mm, Battletech (the table-top version), All Things Zombies and my newest acquisition... Warmaster Ancients! I picked up Warmaster Ancients and Warmaster Ancient Armies up from Ebay for a song! Both books for $41 including shipping. Since they have been out of print for a while I could not pass on these even thought I am not yet ready to dive in. I also plan to get into 15mm ACW but have not yet decided on a ruleset to use. I'm still looking around and reading reviews and such. No rush since I have so much on my plate at the moment anyway. But the objective is to get my hobby to the point where I am working on the newest hotness instead of being eight games behind. And these are just my miniature related projects. I am also working on expanding the TRO data for a Battletech to Epic conversion (The original can be found here), Card Designs for "War of the States" and "Mobsters" (the rules can be found here), as well as designs for one of my own card games and soon enough playtesting and design work  for a miniature game designed by one of my close friends.