Last Minute.com

So here's the extra High Elves I've gotten painted up for BOYL2015. I had planned to do a nice unit if Reaver Knights/Shore Riders but then, as I was digging through the many boxes of unpainted Elves, something else caught my eye........................ Phoenix Guard!

I've loved these figures for a while but never really got on with painting them, which is weird, they have awesome weapon skill, a point higher strength and can have a 5+ armour save.

I also got a second Mage painted up.

Here they are together.

Now just to finish off my extra two Escher Gangers before leaving for the Foundry in the morning.

Tick tock.

Because a Warlord can never have enough Clanrats

I've been nowhere near as prolific as I was in the build up to last years BOYL when I repainted my Plague Monks and painted 6 or so Plague Censer Bearers, a unit of Giant Rats, a unit of hand weapon armed Slaves, 2 Warpfire Thrower Teams, 2 Rat Ogres, 4 or 5 Pack Masters, 6 Storm Vermin and 5 or 6 Gutter Runners. I can't remember how many exactly I painted but I do remember as was exceedingly time consuming because I was in a lot of trouble for ignoring Mrs. Snickit! That said, we soon made it up because a couple of months later we found out Little Snickit was on the way..................................

It's due to the arrival of Little Snickit that I've not gotten much done this year. After returning from dropping "her indoors" off at her parents last weekend I got back on Sunday with desire to get something done, after all one can not allow for the passing of a BOYL without removing something from the lead pile and adding it to the painted stash!

Here's my first batch of painted figs for BOYL2015, nothing too amazing, 7 more Skaven Clanrats with spears, 3 of which are 24_Cigarettes' favourite Skaven mini - don't hate me 24, I'm not really showing off (I've got a lot more of this mini already painted up after all).

I'm hoping to get two Escher Gangers, a unit of High Elves plus a High Elf Character done before Friday when myself and "Quick Ben" will be heading up to the Foundry with an eye on getting there at around about midday to meat up with Dear Brother Erny, the other OGRES and all the other Oldhammerers.

I'm hoping to get at least one more post in before then but of not then I look forward to seeing some of you there, come say "Hi".

Right, now I just need to try and remember where the jungle meat kebabs were sold...........................

Opppppppsssssss

I've got ages until BOYL2015, it's fine.

Sorry, what's that you say? Two weeks? AHHHHHHHHHHHH SHI.............................

OK, I've taken my eye off the ball, looking after Lil' Snickit (my first born) distracted me from doing anything gaming since he's been born.

I've actually spent a fair bit of time reading Dreamwave Transformers comics on my iPad and then that lead me to the Regenerain One stuff they did which brought me full circle to re-reading the U.S. orginal comics. When I was a kid I was obsessed with Transformers and bought the U.K. comic regularly and have enjoyed seeing how the U.K. stories worked themselves into the much smaller U.S. output. Basically the U.K. comic was weekly as opposed to the monthly U.S. version so they had to write a lot of extra stories but had to try and make these fit with the U.S. continuity. Sometimes this worked, sometimes not so much with characters still walking around in the U.K. continuity that were dead in the U.S. version.

Anyhow, that was a distraction - see, I even got distracted writing my blog by going off at a tangent talking about it!

So, I have about two weeks to get something, anything, new done. To be fair I did plan for this eventuality. I managed to pump out a stupidly huge amount of painted minis in early 2015 so I can't grumble too much, I probably painted more in those few weeks than I've painted in a year previously. I don't think I'm going to manage anything this week or next but the week after (the build up to the event) the other half is taking Lil' Snickit away to see his Grandparents. So, in the week before I want to add something to my speed painted High Elves and maybe an extra Escher or two. I'd dearly love to finally get my Skaven's shields into a respectable state but I've needed to do this for the last few years and not managed it, time to cross my whiskers and hope..........................

Lil' Snickit - The Launch

I've not been very active on the gaming/blog front recently as I've been busy preping for something a little different and it arrived today. Perfect in every way, no need for an update ever, a game I'll be playing for keeps. All involved in it's production are tired but otherwise in good condition.

 

An additional photo that my Girlfriend took this morning in hospital that made me smile.

When Daddy isn't around Spidey watches over me to help Mummy out.

I Believe In Miracles

Today Snickit is doing a little of this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7GWWgcEmKE

Why?

Because Mrs. Snickit's Cousin is pregnant.

Why is this good news?

She's the one that WAS getting married later this year at the beginning of August.

What does this mean?

It means there's now no wedding.

Why is this a good thing?

Because it means Snickit is going to BOYL 2015 - WHOOP WHOOP!!!!!!!!

Now I just have to figure out what games I'm gonna play.............................

Painting Progress in 2015

I've never been the most productive painter going, I tended to manage a new army/project every two to three years.

Then I started having a game probably two or three times a year at most which got my painting concentrated. The build up to a game got me into the painting groove and in the two weeks before I got myself into a painting frenzy. I painted an entire Chaos Army of over 3000pts for the Storm of Chaos where I got a few games in with Erny's Cambridge gaming club culminating in a huge siege game. This was the way my painting continued for a good few years, the promise of a game finally getting me motivated to paint something new but games were few and far between.

Two years ago Erny got me involved in the Oldhammer movement. The first BOYL event in 2013 was my baptism with the movement and since then I've made some great friends through attending gatherings and in recent months I've averaged a game of some sort closer to every one to two months. This is also helped by dragging my best mate Alan back into the hobby. For those of you who game once or twice a week that may not sound a lot of games but for me this is the most regularly I've gamed for over 15 years!

This increase in games has helped my painting productivity too.

So far this year I've painted this lot (minus the Spearmen who were started at the end of 2014)

I've added this lot to begin some Empire stuff, I posted photos of my Crossbowmen and Grey Wizard before but I've also done 5 Norland Pistoliers and 8 Reiksguard.

The Crossbowmen were speed painted to add some extra troops to Al's Talabheim army.

These Pistoliers were painted as Nordland to be part of my eventual Nordland army (if I ever get around to it)

The banner and horn pennant need work, at present they're just a blank canvases.

I then had a game of Rogue Trader with Erny and Whiskey Priest which got the sci-fi juices flowing helped out by watching the Guardians of the Galaxy movie, it's classic sci-fi in a 70's/80's stylie. This led to Erny calling a Necromunda Campaign which resulted in my painting up two gangs, firstly my Cawdor

and then my Escher Gang

Al is also using Escher in the Ogre Sump Sector Campaign, he painted his very similar to the GW Studio ones on the box but he said it was nice to see I'd gone with something different, I think it was meant as a compliment =)

and finished off with some hired guns.

At some point I also painted 8 more Clan Pestilens Plague Monks that are somewhere in the loft so I'm not going hunting for them to take photo's but here's an old picture of my Plague Monks from BOYL 2014, they stood at 20 then, now they clock in at 28 strong!

So that means in 2015 I've painted:

1 High Elf General
1 High Elf Wizard
1 High Elf Champion (for the Spearmen)
13 Sword Masters
6 Silverhelms
10 High Elf Archers
2 Repeater Bolt Throwers
4 Repeater Bolt Thrower Crew
2 Great Eagles
10 Talabheim Crossbowmen
1 Grey Wizard
8 Reiksguard
5 Nordland Pistoliers
8 Cawdor
13 Escher
4 Hired Guns
8 Plague Monks

WOW! That's 97 mini's painted in 2015 so far, for me that's a record!

Now I have to turn my attentions to painting of a different sort. As previously mentioned on the blog there is a Lil' Snickit on the way and time is getting on, with 2 and a half months to go I really need to turn my attentions to getting work done around the house. If I don't get anything else done 97 figures painted is still going to be a great year's painting but, if I can squeeze the time in, I may just slip in a few more as 100 models painted would sound even better.......................................

All Girls Love A Bit 'a Leopard Print.................................

So here's the promised closer look at my Escher Gang - The Cleaning Crew.

Lead by the enigmatic "Rosie Lee" and supported by the heavy stubber of Dakkara they're a bunch of hired guns and assassins that will clean up any mess you may of gotten yourself into for any a good price.

After I settled upon the turquoise and purple colour scheme there was something missing and in the end I worked it out - leopard print! It's my first attempt at such a pattern and it took me a while to figure it out, the brown splodge within the black splodge was the key. It's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination but it looks good for a first attempt. The bases also need to be finished off but for now I'm happy with them. I hope you like them too.

Rosie Lee herself

Dakkara

Ayisha

Taloola

Candice

Mariko

Trix

as yet no name as yet to join the gang

Petula

Jade

Can't remember this Gal's name but got sold into slavery by Erny!

Ester

Hasn't yet joined the Crew so no name

Leaking Pipe, a Rat Skin Scout Hired Gun who works for the Crew

The next few pics are some hired guns ready for anyone to take, I haven't hired them myself yet but I may do at a later date.

Pit Slave for Hire

Another Pit Slave for Hire

Bounty Hunter looking for a job