This week will be short and sweet. Since budget is one of the bigger concerns for a gamer, finding ways to stretch the gaming dollar is very important. For me, one of the best is to not waste anything, and the used bitz market. For the first part, it is as simple as saving offcuts and clipping extra parts off sprue and saving them for later use.
The second part is trickier, as many game shops don't have used minis for sale. This is not such a big deal, however, as if you look around, many players have extra parts, and are willing to sell you them for cheap.
I recommend trying to organize a day for players to get together and sell used minis and bitz they don't want.
like I said, short and sweet.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Sunday, January 22, 2012
More Zday!
Hello very few readers!
Today we played some of Descrii's Zday Scenarios. Unfortunately, the camera's batteries died after game one :( .
So the only game we got to pics of was my Neo-Terran Capital army, 250pts
The team consists
of
4 Fusiliers, Lt. Carretero is the Lt., Spc. Mactaggart is a hacker, with Pvt. Wilkins and Flanders finishing the team.
2 Auxilia, Cpl. Whitley with his bot Rhino
and PV2 Reyna and her bot Mr. Studly
2 Bulleteers, Merry and Pippin
Janus the Sierra bot
and Agent Candy the Hexa Sniper.
Setup: The 6 wheel is the main objective, Merry watches the approach from the forest, with Janus right behind him. Whitley and his pet Rhino watching the area in the fore ground with Reyna and Mr. Studly watching the opposite side. The Fusi link team are position next to the 6 wheel, opposite of Janus. with Pippin guarding ahead of the team. Agent Candy is in camo on top of the white conex in the background (it's in the deployment).
Turn 1:
The Zombies roll in force the first turn with 12 marching on the board, Candy in her expert position, appears and crits a poor zombie sod with the first shot. She continues to lay on the hits dropping four more in the first turn, but no other crits from her this turn. no other valid targets for the defense team to ARO.
Defenders half: some minor manuvering and Candy bags another crit, and drops 2 more Zeds. 4 Civvies arrive on the board and make a dash for the transport.
Turn 2: Another Wave of zeds this time 15 with 8 getting back up. 2 start to climb the conex stack to candy and she misses! repeatedly! the zombies play a hilarious game of climbing half way, falling, passing arm saves, and climbing again, all the while Candy misses with every ARO! A pack of zombies rush Pippin. Pippin wiffs his Heavy Shotgun ARO, and the zombies mob him, the Fusi Squad attempt to shot them off, dropping 2 of the 6 on him. the Zombies attack pippin, he blocks with e-pulse, and tazers 2, but gets scrapped by one of the other 2. another pack move in on Whitley and Rhino. Rhino flambes a group of 3, and Whitley drops 1, and 2 make it to Rhino, who promptly get tazered.
Defender half: with 9 orders, Candy spends five killing 2 zombies!
The Fusi squad "godfather" the last of the pippin killing zombie mob, and Rhino and Whitley back up and gun down the tazered zombies. the other 2 are barely make it to the fortification lines.
and Janus manuvers to assist the fusi squad to compensate for the loss of pippin.
4 more civs appear and book towards the transport. 2 of the civs in the first turn make it to the Apc, and hopefully safety.
Turn 3: a trickle of zombies this turn, 7, shamble in from the tree line, and 1 takes a headshot from Merry, who is still enraged from the loss of Pippen.
A large mob of zombies move up from behind the civilians, and Agent Candy, Crits 2 with AROs. Apparently, she can hit things over 24", but up close... not so much. Reyna and Mr. Studly shot and burn the rest. With more zeds closing in on the opposite side, Whitley and Rhino reposition to receive them.
Turn 4: with 5 in the APC, and 4 on route, and 26 ambulatory closing in, time to pull in closer to the transport. Agent Candy once again shows the Hexadron's wisdom of sending her here to assist the soldiers here, by pulling 3 more headshots on the final turn for 7 crits in one game. Janus finally joins the fray mowing 6 zombies with his Hmg.
On the end of the defenders turn the commander of the convoy rolls a 3 on his will test, with Lt. Carretero rolling a 20, ending the game.
Results: 6 civs saved, 1 drone lost, lost the shouting match with the convoy leader.
all and all a good game...
now to remember to bring extra batteries next time....
Questions, comments, death threats? Get in line.
Today we played some of Descrii's Zday Scenarios. Unfortunately, the camera's batteries died after game one :( .
So the only game we got to pics of was my Neo-Terran Capital army, 250pts
 |
| My Urban Protection Squad |
of
4 Fusiliers, Lt. Carretero is the Lt., Spc. Mactaggart is a hacker, with Pvt. Wilkins and Flanders finishing the team.
2 Auxilia, Cpl. Whitley with his bot Rhino
and PV2 Reyna and her bot Mr. Studly
2 Bulleteers, Merry and Pippin
Janus the Sierra bot
and Agent Candy the Hexa Sniper.
Turn 1:
The Zombies roll in force the first turn with 12 marching on the board, Candy in her expert position, appears and crits a poor zombie sod with the first shot. She continues to lay on the hits dropping four more in the first turn, but no other crits from her this turn. no other valid targets for the defense team to ARO.
Defenders half: some minor manuvering and Candy bags another crit, and drops 2 more Zeds. 4 Civvies arrive on the board and make a dash for the transport.
 |
| Agent Candy's Handywork |
Turn 2: Another Wave of zeds this time 15 with 8 getting back up. 2 start to climb the conex stack to candy and she misses! repeatedly! the zombies play a hilarious game of climbing half way, falling, passing arm saves, and climbing again, all the while Candy misses with every ARO! A pack of zombies rush Pippin. Pippin wiffs his Heavy Shotgun ARO, and the zombies mob him, the Fusi Squad attempt to shot them off, dropping 2 of the 6 on him. the Zombies attack pippin, he blocks with e-pulse, and tazers 2, but gets scrapped by one of the other 2. another pack move in on Whitley and Rhino. Rhino flambes a group of 3, and Whitley drops 1, and 2 make it to Rhino, who promptly get tazered.
 |
| The result of five orders! |
The Fusi squad "godfather" the last of the pippin killing zombie mob, and Rhino and Whitley back up and gun down the tazered zombies. the other 2 are barely make it to the fortification lines.
and Janus manuvers to assist the fusi squad to compensate for the loss of pippin.
4 more civs appear and book towards the transport. 2 of the civs in the first turn make it to the Apc, and hopefully safety.
 |
| The mad dash for safety! |
A large mob of zombies move up from behind the civilians, and Agent Candy, Crits 2 with AROs. Apparently, she can hit things over 24", but up close... not so much. Reyna and Mr. Studly shot and burn the rest. With more zeds closing in on the opposite side, Whitley and Rhino reposition to receive them.
 |
| Mowing the lawn, NTC Style! |
Turn 4: with 5 in the APC, and 4 on route, and 26 ambulatory closing in, time to pull in closer to the transport. Agent Candy once again shows the Hexadron's wisdom of sending her here to assist the soldiers here, by pulling 3 more headshots on the final turn for 7 crits in one game. Janus finally joins the fray mowing 6 zombies with his Hmg.
On the end of the defenders turn the commander of the convoy rolls a 3 on his will test, with Lt. Carretero rolling a 20, ending the game.
 |
| One last look before cloaking to find the next team to support. |
Results: 6 civs saved, 1 drone lost, lost the shouting match with the convoy leader.
all and all a good game...
now to remember to bring extra batteries next time....
Questions, comments, death threats? Get in line.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Quick sharing of info for AZ infinity players.
Thanks to the efforts of Geraldcore on the infinity forums, A new subforum at :http://www.wargameraz.com/forums/index.php dedicated to Infinity will be going up shortly, a saturday infinity night has been arranged at the battlefoam saloon ( thank you Romeo) if you play infinity in central az, or have the time to come out here from elsewhere you can find games by following the link, or contacting one of us here at the reaper through the infinity forum. Thanks again to Geraldcore, Romeo and the people at Battlefoam.
Down and dirty hobby tips.
This week's down and dirty will focus on the side of hobby work away from the bench: Design.
What I mean is not rules crafting, nor is it list building, but the process by which a project may move from being an abstract idea in your head, to being a finished model stomping it's way through the enemy.
I use an iterative design process, which is to say that I will make improvements to my designs when I see them being possible/necessary.
Another thing I do is make many sketches of a project before I start to build. You do not need to be good at drawing for this, as it is more to get a visual representation of what you want the model to look like, and have notes for what goes where.
This is also where finding reference materials is handy, especially if you are stuck for inspiration.
While making my grot tanks, I have gone through three generations of my design, the first being scrapped entirely due to being too large. This has meant that when I finish my project, I will have 18 of the most awesome little grot tanks I could make, and for a fraction of the cost to build them myself.
What I mean is not rules crafting, nor is it list building, but the process by which a project may move from being an abstract idea in your head, to being a finished model stomping it's way through the enemy.
I use an iterative design process, which is to say that I will make improvements to my designs when I see them being possible/necessary.
Another thing I do is make many sketches of a project before I start to build. You do not need to be good at drawing for this, as it is more to get a visual representation of what you want the model to look like, and have notes for what goes where.
This is also where finding reference materials is handy, especially if you are stuck for inspiration.
While making my grot tanks, I have gone through three generations of my design, the first being scrapped entirely due to being too large. This has meant that when I finish my project, I will have 18 of the most awesome little grot tanks I could make, and for a fraction of the cost to build them myself.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Stuff Geeks like
Monday, January 16, 2012
Rumor control.
As I am sure any 40k players reading this know, we are up for an edition shift this summer. you also know about the "leaked" rulebook. I am not going to say anything either way regarding the authenticity, as that is a subject that can start many arguments, but I will say one thing: We need to stay calm about it. As it is not verified either way, and is as likely to be a hoax as not, it is best for us to stay calm until we either verify that it is real, or failing that, we see the new rulebook when it goes into print.
Personally, the insanity/whining/ paranoid rants that new rulebooks/codices cause is why I am glad that GW has instituted the policy of keeping a lid on things. I think the net effect is to prevent their product from generating even more trolling/bullying online. As I say on the forums, " It's just new rules, not the end of the world. Calm down and we will all be happier."
Personally, the insanity/whining/ paranoid rants that new rulebooks/codices cause is why I am glad that GW has instituted the policy of keeping a lid on things. I think the net effect is to prevent their product from generating even more trolling/bullying online. As I say on the forums, " It's just new rules, not the end of the world. Calm down and we will all be happier."
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Down and dirty hobby tips.
This week in Down and Dirty, i will discuss a few things that I do to make conversions.
One thing I do is not throw much out, usually when I am finished making a kit, i either retain the sprue the parts came on if there are a lot of parts remaining, or i cut all the remaining parts off. When an experiment in converting does not work as well as I wanted, I don't throw out the model, but carefully strip it down to components for reuse. This habit has meant that in the past, I have been able to give friends starting warhammer 40k a 1500-1750 point army made from my leftovers. These were not armies that looked like they came from someone's bitzbox either, but ones that got compliments, and gained more after those complimenting found out that they were mostly spare parts.
When you scratch build, you can find that you have an odd amount of material left after a cut, this is a more valuable resource than it appears.
Often, I have found that sometimes, components do now want to mate right, or that the base model has holes that need filling, or you want to add some small details, those off cut pieces of plasti-card work well for these situations and more.
For example, when you want to give your Ork battle wagon some extra flair, take the plasticard and cut it into irregular diamond shapes, add to a plow blade from an imperial tank, and you have a reinforced ram that is also a waaaugh mouth.
Other times, you have a good idea, and the scratch build comes out flat. Take some strips of offcut, trim them to uniform sizes and lengths, and add them as reinforcing bands, then add rivets using your preferred method, and you have a quick and dirty way to mask the scratch built parts of your model. this is enhanced if you add reinforcing bands to the base model too.
If you want to make a new vehicle entirely, having spare track, wheels, and " engine gubbins" will help immensely, especially when you have the main components built, but are stuck on details to add.
Well, that's about it for this week. Thanks to all of you reading our blog, please tell your friends about us, give suggestions for improvement/ things you want to see, etc.
One thing I do is not throw much out, usually when I am finished making a kit, i either retain the sprue the parts came on if there are a lot of parts remaining, or i cut all the remaining parts off. When an experiment in converting does not work as well as I wanted, I don't throw out the model, but carefully strip it down to components for reuse. This habit has meant that in the past, I have been able to give friends starting warhammer 40k a 1500-1750 point army made from my leftovers. These were not armies that looked like they came from someone's bitzbox either, but ones that got compliments, and gained more after those complimenting found out that they were mostly spare parts.
When you scratch build, you can find that you have an odd amount of material left after a cut, this is a more valuable resource than it appears.
Often, I have found that sometimes, components do now want to mate right, or that the base model has holes that need filling, or you want to add some small details, those off cut pieces of plasti-card work well for these situations and more.
For example, when you want to give your Ork battle wagon some extra flair, take the plasticard and cut it into irregular diamond shapes, add to a plow blade from an imperial tank, and you have a reinforced ram that is also a waaaugh mouth.
Other times, you have a good idea, and the scratch build comes out flat. Take some strips of offcut, trim them to uniform sizes and lengths, and add them as reinforcing bands, then add rivets using your preferred method, and you have a quick and dirty way to mask the scratch built parts of your model. this is enhanced if you add reinforcing bands to the base model too.
If you want to make a new vehicle entirely, having spare track, wheels, and " engine gubbins" will help immensely, especially when you have the main components built, but are stuck on details to add.
Well, that's about it for this week. Thanks to all of you reading our blog, please tell your friends about us, give suggestions for improvement/ things you want to see, etc.
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Down and dirty hobby tips.
This week in Down and dirty, I will be discussing more on tools, and one of the most important resources for the hobbyist.
After tools for scratch builds and " cut and paste conversions,' there are those for sculpting. Obviously the first tool you need is the sculpting medium, there is green stuff, brown stuff and grey stuff. All are a two part kneadable epoxy that is used for sculpting details or filling gaps in models.
Green stuff is the most common and familiar. it is used by taking equal parts blue and yellow halves of the epoxy and kneading them together until it turns green, hence the name. Of the three, green stuff sets the most flexible, and is better for organic sculpts, as it does not take to sanding/filing as well as the other two.
Brown stuff is used the same as green stuff, but it is harder when set, making it good for harder, curved sculpts, as it sands/files well.
Grey stuff is in the middle, but is the stiffest to work with, making it better for when you want to square off a sculpt, such as when you are transitioning a join between scratch built components on a vehicle and the base model.
There are other sculpting media available, but I prefer green stuff and it's variants.
Then we get to the sculpting tools themselves. For most, a set of tools that look a lot like dentist's tools are all you need, as they provide a variety of shapes for working your medium. My set was made by Gale Force Nine, and came with a cloth case. It includes the standard sculpting tool wit ha blade end and a small " spoon" shaped end, it has a wide spoon, an awl shaped tool, narrow, bent tools, and others.
Then there are custom built tools, most of which are used for one specific purpose, such as taking the standard tool and placing a small notch in the spoon end, which is then used for creating weld lines. Another common custom tool is taking a wood dowel and inserting a needle into it for superfine sculpting, such as inset letters, hair, and eyes.
Now we get to the subject of one of the most important resources a hobbyist can have: A local hobby shop. When I say this, I absolutely do not mean your FLGS. They do not carry the stock of sheet styrene or tools you need to do high quality conversion work. They also do not move enough of what they do carry to sell it at a price point that makes your work viable for your budget.
What I am talking about is a hobby shop that is either a specialist in models or model trains.
The one I go to is Roy's train world. It is in Mesa, AZ, just north of Southern Avenue on Country Club Drive.When I go there, the staff is very friendly, I am able to get my sheet styrene at about a quarter of the overall cost, I can get the exact dimensions I want, I can get just about any texture I want, they have shop cats, and they have a selection that can't be beat. Did I mention that they have shop cats? Another advantage of shops like Roy's train world is that they usually carry reference materials, not only for the subject you are modelling, but also those covering various techniques for modelling and painting your models to make them look as good as possible.
After tools for scratch builds and " cut and paste conversions,' there are those for sculpting. Obviously the first tool you need is the sculpting medium, there is green stuff, brown stuff and grey stuff. All are a two part kneadable epoxy that is used for sculpting details or filling gaps in models.
Green stuff is the most common and familiar. it is used by taking equal parts blue and yellow halves of the epoxy and kneading them together until it turns green, hence the name. Of the three, green stuff sets the most flexible, and is better for organic sculpts, as it does not take to sanding/filing as well as the other two.
Brown stuff is used the same as green stuff, but it is harder when set, making it good for harder, curved sculpts, as it sands/files well.
Grey stuff is in the middle, but is the stiffest to work with, making it better for when you want to square off a sculpt, such as when you are transitioning a join between scratch built components on a vehicle and the base model.
There are other sculpting media available, but I prefer green stuff and it's variants.
Then we get to the sculpting tools themselves. For most, a set of tools that look a lot like dentist's tools are all you need, as they provide a variety of shapes for working your medium. My set was made by Gale Force Nine, and came with a cloth case. It includes the standard sculpting tool wit ha blade end and a small " spoon" shaped end, it has a wide spoon, an awl shaped tool, narrow, bent tools, and others.
Then there are custom built tools, most of which are used for one specific purpose, such as taking the standard tool and placing a small notch in the spoon end, which is then used for creating weld lines. Another common custom tool is taking a wood dowel and inserting a needle into it for superfine sculpting, such as inset letters, hair, and eyes.
Now we get to the subject of one of the most important resources a hobbyist can have: A local hobby shop. When I say this, I absolutely do not mean your FLGS. They do not carry the stock of sheet styrene or tools you need to do high quality conversion work. They also do not move enough of what they do carry to sell it at a price point that makes your work viable for your budget.
What I am talking about is a hobby shop that is either a specialist in models or model trains.
The one I go to is Roy's train world. It is in Mesa, AZ, just north of Southern Avenue on Country Club Drive.When I go there, the staff is very friendly, I am able to get my sheet styrene at about a quarter of the overall cost, I can get the exact dimensions I want, I can get just about any texture I want, they have shop cats, and they have a selection that can't be beat. Did I mention that they have shop cats? Another advantage of shops like Roy's train world is that they usually carry reference materials, not only for the subject you are modelling, but also those covering various techniques for modelling and painting your models to make them look as good as possible.
Monday, January 2, 2012
Quick Update
http://penny-arcade.com/resources/an-update1.html : here is an update to the situation I reported previously. It looks like the power of the internet has been used for good.
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