TARGE 2015 Wargames Show Report

I finally managed to get to a Wargames Show (the first one this year)! Having missed four shows that I had hoped to get to (Salute, Carronade, Claymore and the cancelled SKELP), I was determined to get to the final show of the year, TARGE in Kirriemuir. The weather was not looking favourable, as when I got up on Saturday morning there was a scattering of snow on the ground, but the forecast looked reasonable for the day so we set out. 

I will add, I also have been suffering with an annoying cold this weekend, and that might have put me off if my show visits had been a little more successful this year.

My plan for the show was to put quite a lot of stuff in to the Bring and Buy sale and enter three items into the painting competition (two of which were the Warbear and the Stag Rider from the current Dead Earth Games Kickstarter). Beyond that, I just wanted to absorb the ambiance of attending a show, chat to a few people and hopefully get into a participation game with my sons. All of this was achieved, so all in all it was a successful day.

I didn't go with any great purchasing plans, other than possibly picking up a box of Fireforge Miniatures Templar Knights, which I need to complete my planned retinue for Lion Rampant.

The display of wonderful tables was up to it's usual standard and I have tried to capture most of them here (apologies to the owners of the North West Frontier game, my photos all turned out blurry and had to be abandoned).

Excuse my ignorance on the subject of some of these games. Trying to keep my two boys interested for the day generally meant I didn't get time to linger at that many tables to get details:-

Commands and Colours Ancients.

A nice WW2 game.

This Bolt Action game looked great, with a nice mix of laser cut buildings and a scattering of palm trees.

I was very impressed with this Piquet game, Not my period, but very attractive!

This was the best photo I could salvage of Old Meldrum Wargames Club's Quatre Bras game.

Another attractive Napoleonic game, this time with a winter theme. Very well done!

I shall be using this one for inspiration for my own Ronin game. I would be more than happy to have to table set up at home!

This Renaissance naval game was gloriously colourful and the sea table worked really well!

 Laser cut terrain certainly is featuring on a lot of tables now. As much as this table looks spectacular, I think i would like to see a little more work in making these buildings more "lived in".

I struggle to get enthusiastic about WW1 games, but this table certainly looked interesting.

A more modern naval game this time, and just as successful as the the other one.

Finally we have the Glasgow Gaming Group's A Picnic in  Jurassic Park  game. Based on a very slimmed down version of Saurian Safari. My sons had a go at this one and thoroughly enjoyed it, one bagging a pack of raptors and a stegosaurus with a flame thrower, and the other taking down a charging T-Rex!

I did OK in the painting competition, getting a 3rd place for my Celtos bust. Unfortunately the Dead Earth Warbear and Stag Rider didn't win anything, but they were attracting a fair bit of attention, so hopefully that will get people looking at the Kickstarter...

As for my purchases of the day, this was based on how well my stuff sold at the Bring and Buy. As it happens I did very well and made enough profit to fund my pre-ordering 7TV second edition as well as the Army Starter cast from Crooked Dice. I also picked up their new Otherworldly Invader and The Weed (which is huge...).

I also got a box of the Fireforge Templar Knights.

My prize for 3rd place in the painting competition was a £15 voucher to use with Reiver Castings. Spending this proved a little tricky, as they don't produce any periods that I have gamed in before. However, I was very taken with their Border Reivers range, and ending getting some of them. So I guess I have moved into a new period (a chance to use my Peel Tower...).

Finally, I also had a small win on the raffle.

All in all a good day out and great to break my wargames show fast...

Warbears and Stagriders - Painting a couple of new Minis (Part 06) - Finished!

Part 01, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5

Finishing off the two Warbears and Stag Riders Kickstarter figures.

To finish off the basing of the two figures I wanted to add some interesting scenic work.

At the base of the rocks on the Stag Riders base I felt it would add a nice bit of depth to have some pools of water. suggesting either a stream or melted snow.

The first step was to paint the areas a very dark green. I also glued some tall grass at the pool edges.

The grass I used was Woodland Scenics, Field Grass, Light green.  Why this colour, this is the only colour I have at the moment.

Once that had set I applied some Z-Poxy epoxy adhesive. This dries clear (at least if you have fresh bottles - see my Frostgrave scenery post for the consequences of using old epoxy), and is a nice fast alternative for such small pools...

Once the epoxy had set (5 minutes) I move on to the plant life. In these photos you can see the different scatter materials that I used. For most of the bases I covered them with a dark scatter from Gale Force Nine. I used a slightly different one for the area in front of the pools on the Stag Rider's base, as I wanted it to look a little swampy there. The Woodland Scenics bushes were used to break up the flat ground a little. The pot of orange coloured scatter (Gale Force Nine) was used to add  a bit of variety to the bushes, aswas the grey colour, which I hoped would give a hint of dying foliage or even frost.

In these two photos, the effect is starting to come together.

To add some dead leaves I resorted to the kitchen herb rack. I find that a nice dead leaf effect can be achieved with some old marjoram.

At this stage I wanted to add some areas of soft, melting, snow. I was fairly pleased with the effect on the bases so far so I went at this stage with some trepidation. Adding big blobs of white modelling paste to the bases could have ruined the whole thing...

I used the modelling paste as I planned to use Woodland Scenics Soft Flake Snow and I have found in previous projects that it needs a white mass underneath it to add depth and bring out the snow effect.

The final task was to add some gloss varnish to the area in front of the water pools. this soaked into the scatter material and gave a nice swampy effect.

Following are some photos of the finished pieces. My photography is not perfect, but I hope they give an idea of the final look of the figures...

Warbears and Stagriders - Painting a couple of new Minis (Part 05)

Part 01, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4

I have finished painting the stag rider now.

I have added some tonal work across the figure and tidied up a few little slips.

I have painted the cork on the base. Dry brushing a mid grey.The rest of the base got a coat of the same brown as that used on the base of the warbear.

I will be working on the bases a lot more over the next week.

Frostgrave Random Encounters

As I plan my Frostgrave campaign I have to plan the figures I will need. As well as a warband I will need a collection of creatures to represent those in the Random Encounter Table. This is quite an extensive list.

To give me everything on the list I will need the following:-

Skeleton x 2*

Armoured Skeleton  x 3*

Zombies  x 2*

Ghouls  x 2*

Bear

Giant Rats  x 4*

Ice Spider  x 2*

Snow Leopard*

Wild Dogs  x 2*

Wolves  x 2*

Small Construct

Imp*

Ice Toad x 2

Wraith*

White Gorilla

Medium Construct

Minor Demon*

Snow Troll x 2*

Worm*

Werewolf*

Vampire*

Large Construct

Frost Giant

I am sure people who invested in the Reaper Bones Kickstarters are loving this, as they will have everything they need... however I did not go down that route. I do have a large collection of minis and I should be able to find most of the ones I need.

I have asterisked the ones that I am fairly certain I can find straightaway. Over the next few weeks i will be looking out these minis and posting my thoughts on them.

Warbears and Stagriders - Painting a couple of new Minis (Part 04)

Part 01, Part 2, Part 3

More detailing work on the two Warbears and Stag Riders Kickstarter figures.

Starting with the Stag rider, I like the pennant on the spear, but I felt that it looked a little plain with just the black colour. I was tempted to do each piece a different colour (black and purple), but decided to do a purple stripe down each one instead. This was certainly not the easy option, as maintaining a steady line along the two wavy legs was not easy. I had to break out a new Kolinsky sable brush especially for this job...

I also worked in some more detail on the figure, tidying things up and getting a bit of contrast to bring out the detail.

The skin tones on the rider also got a lot more detail and tonal work. Once I have finished these figures, I will get some better photos that don't bleach the paler colours.

I am happy with the finish on the warbear now. The colour scheme on the rider is simple, but the tonal work brings it out quite well.

Now that the figure is finished I have moved on to detailing the base. I painted the earth a darker shade and have also dry brushed the slate to bring out some of the detail.

Warbears and Stagriders - Painting a couple of new Minis (Part 03)

Part 01, Part 2

It's been a week, very little hobby time at all. No work on my Frostgrave project or anything else. Last I finally got a chance to do some painting.
As the Warbears and Stag Riders Kickstarter has started now I really need to get these figures finished off!

I did manage to do a bit of research this week, and get a better idea of the colour scheme for the stag.
I found THIS article about Mongolian nomads that ride reindeer.

So I have lightened up my stag a little and I am happy with the body colour now.

 I still need to work on the antlers some more and darken them down quite a bit.

 The rider, obviously need quite a bit more work.

As for the warbear, I have added a lot more shading to the underside of the bear.

I have also finished off the mouth and taken most of the red away, adding the dark grey/black skin colour mouth and nose. I am really pleased with the result.

 The rider and saddle have also received some attention. I have finished adding the base colours to all the areas on it now and I am starting to work up the tones.

 

The cloak looks particularly rough at the moment, but should improve with some more work.

My wife is on night shift for the next two nights, so once the boys are in bed I am hoping to move these forward quite a lot.