A look back: The miniatures of 2016

With 2016 coming to a close, we thought that it would be fun to take some time to consider what miniatures were released this year, and comment on our favorites. Anyone who has followed the site for awhile will know that we largely focus on Games Workshop models, though we have tried to give mention to quality releases from other ranges. This year, however, nearly all of our time was spent with Games Workshop models, with nothing beyond that spectrum really capturing our attention. Feel free to let us know in the comments what other companies we overlooked in 2016, however.

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 14: Blood Bowl Returns!

Blood Bowl is back!

We start the episode by touching on the success of Adam Poots’ new Kingdom Death kickstarter campaign. We spend the rest of the episode talking about Games Workshop’s new releases, with a focus on the new Thousand Sons’ models and the reenvisioned Blood Bowl.  We talk at length about each of the new Thousand Sons’ kits, including Magnus the Red and the fantastic new Ahriman.  We then move to discussing the component quality of Blood Bowl, and our general excitement to be playing the game again after many years!

Blood Bowl: Unboxing

Blood Bowl is back!

When there were first rumors that Games Workshop was going to re-release their classic fantasy football game, Blood Bowl, I was a little skeptical.  After all, the game has had a very strong following for years, despite a lack of official support.  Would GW really do enough to make it worthwhile?  As the months progressed, and more pictures leaked, it became increasingly clear that they would live up to the legend.  Their use of classic Wayne England artwork along with newer pieces from Karl Kopinski, and a fantastic cover by Filipe Pagliuso, was one element that really sold me on the whole endeavor, reassuring me that they were not cutting corners.  We were fortunate enough to pick up a copy of the game during the opening weekend, and wanted to do an unboxing, taking some time to go over the components!

Outgard: A Vermilion Revenant

A Vermilion Wanderer 

Not to rust in murky depths

A lone spark long forgotten

Rejecting  a tomb of a thousand lakes

A revenant stalks the moors

From Blighted Isles to jagged peaks

A spirit wills It. 

Curse of the Alabaster: Finale

No One Deserves Happiness. 

Having covered the events of the first two Alabaster games, we practically had to show you what happened in the final game!  This one involved all of the factions from the other two games, as well as a host of NPC characters, including some from the luminary Thistle, as well as the talented Eli Parsons from the Dragons of Phaeton.  To play the game, the two boards from the first game were combined (thanks to the ingenious modular design that Shibboleth devised), making one massive board.  The complexity of the board and the sheer number of players and models involved, make it virtually impossible to detail everything that happened, but we will endeavor to cover the events as comprehensively as possible!

Curse of the Alabaster: Game 1B - Secure the Alabaster

The Alabaster still has more lives to take.

While the Cursed Isle game for the Curse of the Alabaster event was taking place, another game was being played at the main, larger table, called Secure the Alabaster.  This game included the Arbites that Adam built and painted!

Like the first game, Shibboleth wrote some background to set the scene:

It's been 47 days since the Alabaster emerged into realspace within the Tarantus Hive, unleashing devastation in its wake. Distress calls have been received far & wide, and with it, the vultures seeking to profit and benefit from the rare anomaly.

Forces descend into the lowest reaches of the industrial hivespire hoping to gain an upperhand all while dealing with the madness of the local populace. 

Curse of the Alabaster: Arbites compete!

The sentence is DEATH.

Although the Curse of the Alabaster event has come and gone, we feel that we would be remiss if we did not show you the last two models from the Adeptus Arbites squad, alongside the entire group! I am pretty thrilled to have finally finished the group, the five models taking longer to paint than I anticipated. The last two Arbites in the squad to be painted were Jian Zhou, the squad’s technical specialist, and Ada Fortescue, the unit’s sniper.

Curse of the Alabaster: Game 1A - The Cursed Isle

52 days after the Alabaster Incident...

Anyone who has visited this site in the past two months or so will know that we were invited to participate in a narrative-focused Nercomunda/Inquismunda event in Los Angeles, curated by Shibboleth. Adam built a small group of Adeptus Arbites that had been sent into the chaotic Tarantus Hive to quell the psychic maelstrom around the wrecked Alabaster vessel. Furthermore, Eric built the psychic dinosaur Dreadwhisper to rampage through the hive.

The event took place this past weekend, and we are excited to describe many of the great gaming moments that took place over its course. The event consisted of two simultaneous games following different occurrences taking place in the devastated hive, followed by one larger game that brought everyone together for one climactic battle. We plan to have a series of posts documenting these games, starting with one of the smaller games, "Fate of a Family/Library of the Damned."

Curse of the Alabaster: Arbites warband rules

Justice has a price. The price is freedom.

With the Alabaster event only days away, we decided that now is a good time to reveal the rules that we designed for them.  They were created using Migsula’s “Dozens” system, with the Necromunda ruleset.  In addition to the rules themselves, we also included the warband’s basic objectives for the games as a whole.  Let us know what you think!

Curse of the Alabaster: More Arbites enter the field

To be just, our law must be cruel.

With the Alabaster event less than a week away, I figured it time I share a few more of the Arbites that I painted for it.  The first is the only male in the group, Marion Helm, the group’s medic.  The second, Valentina Radonovich, is the team’s demolition specialist.  Both were painted like first, with drab earthy hues, covered in dirt and grime, befitting the long operation into the cursed hive.  Rather than drone on, I will let the pictures speak for themselves!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 12: The Burning of Prospero is upon us, with Blood Bowl soon to follow!

We spend this episode discussing the upcoming Burning of Prospero box game.  We speculate on how it will differ from the earlier Betrayal at Calth Horus Heresy game, as well as comment on the quality of the new models.  In the second half of the episode we switch to talking about the rerelease of Blood Bowl, and decide whether or not we want to start playing it again.  Finally, we talk about our current hobby projects, where Greg and Eric reveal that they are starting to paint models for the first time in many years!

Curse of the Alabaster: Dreadwhisper

Dreadwhisper hungers for human FLESH!

Broad Spectra Signum-station Omicron Nu 647 orbited the dead planet of Angstrom I, named after the Angstrom planetary system that is perilously close to the cosmic blight known as the Maelstrom. Erected by the Mechanicum from the forge world located in the system, the viewing station monitored Warp and astropathic anomalies in that volatile region of space.  Its proximity to the Warp rift, coupled with the Warp storm’s relative stability (when compared to other Warp Rifts such as the Eye of Terror), made it an ideal platform for the Mechanicum to study Warp-related phenomenon such as the effects of warp exposure on organic matter.  While active scientific research is often forbidden in the dogmatic and superstitious Imperium, the Mechanicum was given sanction to conduct its experiments when the Ordo Chronos recognized its benefit to their studies into Warp travel and the passage of time. 

Guest Article: Beneath Terra - Act X

Last month we wrote about a project that the Observer, over at the Bolter and Chainsword forum, has been working on that involves our Church of the Red Athenæum. His Inquismunda project Beneath Terra is doing a fantastic job of exploring the background behind one of the lost Space Marine Legions. If you have not read our first post about his project, go and read it promptly and more on the Bolter and Chainsword. Here we wanted to share his background for Logarach, a gigantic mutant who has ties with the Church of the Red Athenæum.

Curse of the Alabaster: First Arbite painted

The Emperor's work is never done.

While it has been a long time in coming, I am happy to say that the first of my converted Arbites is painted! I started trying to paint three of them at once and when I got to highlighting their jackets I had to stop and paint them one at a time; otherwise I feared that the quality of the painting might suffer.

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 11: The Genestealer Cult and the split between Fantasy Flight Games and Games Workshop

The episode begins with us talking about the new Genestealer Cult models and how Games Workshop expanded the line introduced in the Deathwatch: Overkill game.  We delve into the quality of the sculpts and also the potential for conversions, particularly in the light of Inq28.  We then transition into the main topic of the episode, which is the split between the boardgame company Fantasy Flight Games (FFG) and Games Workshop.  We discuss the possible reasons for the decision, as well as the ramifications for Games Workshop and FFG.

Curse of the Alabaster: Arbites assemble!

Into the breach...

Having finished assembling the first two arbites with shotguns, I was excited to start building a few more for the Alabaster project.  For the others, I wanted to create some different weapons suitable for long-term operations, while maintaining the compact nature seen with the shotguns. Additionally, I was interested in exploring the idea of giving the different team members unique specializations; after all, the team was formed from members of Adeptus Arbites precincts all over the planet.

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 10: The Deathwatch and the potential of the 13th Black Crusade!

Burn! Kill! Maim!

We begin the episode talking about Games Workshop’s new Deathwatch models, as well as discussing the strengths and shortcomings of the new codex book.  We then move into the main subject of the episode, which is discussing the ramifications of the new Traitor’s Hate supplement being labeled as a part of the 13th Black Crusade.  We talk about how they explored the crusade over ten years earlier with the Eye of Terror codex, and how this would be a way to modify that background and advance the storyline of Warhammer 40k, which has been stagnant for many years.

Curse of the Alabaster: the Beginning

I am the Law!

We are excited to announce that we will be taking part in an Inquisimunda event in Los Angeles later this year called “Curse of the Alabaster!”  The event is being run by the talented Shibboleth, from the Sumptown Chronicles fame, with a host of notable participants including Migsula (Iron Sleet) and Weirding Way.  The premise of the game is that the geller fields of a Black Ship, filled with psykers, failed during warp transit, leading to the ship disastrously materializing within a hive spire on the planet Tarantus, leading to utter chaos and death on a unparalleled scale.  Although there has already been quite a lot of activity and excitement over the project on the official thread over on the ammobunker, we wanted to introduce the premise of our warband here, an elite group of hardened Arbitrators from the Adeptus Arbites.

Guest Article: Beneath Terra - Act I

We are very excited to feature some of the work of the Observer, a very talented hobbyist from the Bolter and Chainsword forum.  He is deeply committed to an Inquisimunda project called Beneath Terra, exploring the lost Space Marine legion, Legion XI.  While working on this project exploring Terra, he contacted us to ask if he could involve our Church of the Red Athenæum.  After reading through his incredibly evocative storytelling for the project, we were convinced that the Red Church had a place within his grim tale.  He had a great character in mind, making it easy to help him find a suitable role within the Church. And after exchanging a few emails, Logarach of the Enduring Sacrifice was born.  Before showing you Logarach, however, we thought it would be better to start at the beginning.  And what better way than to post the first act of the Beneath Terra project here?  You can continue to follow the project on his thread on the Bolter and Chainsword!

Kingdom Death: Percival

The Black Knight towers over Percival.

After being in the works for years, nearly all of the Kingdom Death Kickstarter releases have been produced, and Adam Poots is working towards introducing new things to the game. For one thing, he has started to produce plastic versions of some of the older, limited resin kits.  While many of these are seedy pin-ups, one that stood out to me was a fully armored female knight, reminiscent to the Black Knight that I assembled earlier this year.  Along with being in plastic for the first time, this knight, Percival, came with a few cards to use her in Kingdom Death: Monster.  With these things in mind, I decided to purchase the model and put it together and wanted to let you all know what I think of her!

The Pilgrym: An Exchange of Hands - the final moments of the Daylight Wall Anomaly

Immediately after finishing the Pilgrym Game,  I knew that I want to write a short story describing the final events of game from the perspective from one of our main characters, Roland Arnesen.  He is one of our more interesting characters. a headless mercenary from the Ordo Machinum, who infiltrated the Church of the Red Athenaeum to help locate the Pilgrym.  What's more, he even has a cyber-owl companion named Bronwen!  Roland and his feathered friend played a small, but important part in the Pilgrym game, and I felt writing about it might help provide some additional context to event, and highlight one of the many plot lines threading through the game.

The story was posted earlier on Iron Sleet, but I wanted to post it here, as well. As an addition, the ever talented Aletheia Atzinger wrote some parts in Bronwen's perspective which have been added! I hope you like it! 

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 9: The Pilgrym

The Pilgrym group assembles!

Eschewing the normal structure of our podcasts, this entire episode is focussed on recounting the events of the Pilgrym event held in Nottingham.  We describe the scope of the event, both in terms of the storyline, rules used, the people involved, as well as talk about the events leading up to the game, and Warhammer World in general.

The Pilgrym: Told in pictures

Secrets and Lies.

The dust has finally settled from the massive undertaking that was the Pilgrym event.  It is difficult to convey how awesome it all was, from playing the game to meeting all of the talented individuals that took part in it.  My brothers and I took a whole host of pictures during the event, and have endeavored to show a selection of them with descriptive captions to help convey the story of the event, and reveal the fate of the elusive Pilgrym!

The Pilgrym: Rules for the Church of the Red Athenæum

The Hunt begins.

After 7 furious months of work, the Pilgrym game has finally been played and we are back in the United States.  The event was a fantastic success, truly culminating everyone’s hard work and passion.  Over the next few weeks we are going to be creating a few posts detailing the event.  To start things off, we wanted to share the rules that we devised for our warband, the Church of the Red Athenæum.  The game was played using a modified version of the Necromunda ruleset, with a focus on narrative elements rather than strict adherence to any particular book.  For the Church, we wanted to take special effort to convey that most of its members are not fighters; they are civilians that are missing limbs and other body parts, further separating them from any sort of fighting elite.  They are, however, extremely devoted to their cause and due to their lives of suffering, able to withstand a lot of pain.  The only exception to this are the members of their military arm, the Order of the Crimson Hour, which are trained for combat and therefore have firearms, and Roland Arnesen, a sleeper agent of the Ordo Machinum.

The Pilgrym: Roland Arnesen Missionary of Church of the Red Athenaeum

Roland Arnesen and his vox-owl companion Bronwen.

Although I find it difficult to believe, after 6 months of tireless work, our warband for the Pilgrym Project is finished!  The very last model is finally painted, Roland Arnesen, missionary of the Church and sleeper agent of the Ordo Machinum.  He was the first model I built way back in January, and I am thrilled to finally have paint on him!  I hope you like him; he did quite well in the actual event, something we will detail in a future post, so check back soon!

The Pilgrym: Aseneth Levedescu, Cardinal of the Church of the Red Athenæum Finished!

The group is almost ready for Nottingham!

The penultimate model for the Church of the Red Athenæum is now finished!  As the largest model I created for the Church, Cardinal Aseneth Levedescu took considerably longer to paint than the others, but I am happy with the result.  And to go along with the pictures, my brothers and I wrote some background material for her, we hope you enjoy!

The Pilgrym: Kirill Blokhin finished!

The Red Hour is nigh.  The Church assembles.

Today I wanted to share the completed versions of Kirill Blokhin, the Church’s Acirgeon!

The Pilgrym: Vasili Abramovitch, Congregation member of the Church of the Red Athenæum

There will be blood.

In our continuing effort to showcase all of the members of our Pilgrym group, we wanted to show you the finished, painted form of the most obvious mutant that we created, Vasili Abramovitch!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 8: Container boxes and Games Workshop’s entry in boardgaming!

Aerial combat has never been this exciting?

This episode is focused on Games Workshop’s recent venture into the boardgaming, a hobby that has been popularized by companies like Fantasy Flight Games.  We talk about the increasing number of small games that GW has released, seemingly only to sell models, as opposed to creating compelling games.  In the same vein, we talk about their more promising attempts at game creation, like the newly released Warhammer Quest: Silver Tower.

The Pilgrym: Ehret Filipovic, Chief Bibliognost of the Church of the Red Athenæum

The Chief Bibliognost and the Chronicler of the Church of the Red Athenæum

With less than a month before the Pilgrym event, I wanted to start showing some of the final few members of the Church of the Red Athenæum that will be going to Nottingham.  Today, I will focus on the leader of the Church’s Librarian Guild, the organization within the Church that tends to all the scholarly pursuits of the Church and cares for all of its holy relics.  I present to you Ehret Filipovic, Chief Bibliognost.

The Pilgrym: Aseneth Levedescu, (3rd) Cardinal of the Church of the Red Athenæum

Aseneth Levedescu, Cardinal of the Church of the Red Athenæum, in all of her somber magesty! 

When first devising the Church of the Red Athenæum, a fanatical splinter of the Imperial Cult fixated on the Emperor’s physical sacrifices, I imagined a hierarchy that was visible based on their self-inflicted wounds. Initiates might only be missing a hand, while the older members of the congregation would have accrued more wounds as a sign of their increased devotion. I envisioned that the head of the Church, the Cardinal, would be so mutilated that they could not even walk, limbs missing, spine severed, riding atop an ambulatory throne. A crude mimic of the Emperor on His Golden Throne. Not sure of how to realize this vision, I set the character aside, and worked on the rest of the Church. With 9 other models built for the Church, I finally set out to build the last model for the immediate future. I present to you: Aseneth Levedescu, Cardinal of the Church of the Red Athenæum (3rd).

The Pilgrym: A few more members of the Church

The Church of the Red Athenæum is almost complete!

With less than two months until the Pilgrym event, I am finally wrapping up the last few models for the Church.  Other than the Cardinal who leads the congregation, these are the last two members that will be a part of the models that go to England.  The first is to represent the librarian/historian for the Church; one who has devoted much of their studies to uncovering the details about the Great Crusade and final days of the Heresy. I decided to base him on one of the other Missionary models Brian Nelson sculpted for the Sister of Battle line years ago. He is already lacking an arm and one of his eyes, so he is right up the Church’s alley.  The model looks right at home with the conversion for Samael too.

The Pilgrym: Kirill Blokhin, Acirgeon of the Church of the Red Athenæum

Rip and tear.

The Pilgrym event is getting closer and closer to a reality, and I have been trying desperately to finish converting the last few members of the Church.  Today, I wanted to share with you one of these models, a character that my brothers and I have been working on for a while, both in concept and model execution.  The entire design process was sparked by rediscovering a classic piece of John Blanche’s art from the Confrontation era.  The central figure in the piece, a sanctioned bounty hunter, always held our imagination, a crazed ganger, reminding me of one of the Droogs from Clockwork Orange.  The creepy frowning mask, the clean tunic and pants, the axe at his belt, the machine pistol in hand, and the noose around his neck, all make for a compelling character.  We set out and create a character in his image, and Kirill Blokhin, the Church’s Acirgeon was born.

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 7: Orruks in Age of Sigmar and Warhammer Quest!

Orcs/orks/orruks are back!

This episode is focused on the orcs arrival in  Age of Sigmar, in the form of the Orruk Ironjawz.  We talk about the new Ironjaw models, and discuss how the image of the orcs has changed over the years in Games Workshop products. Special mention is given to Brian Nelson’s key role in defining how they look today.  We also speak briefly about the newly revealed Warhammer Quest boxed game, marveling at the surprising diversity in the models included in the box.

Index Astartes Apocrypha: Impressions

Index Astartes: Apocrypha

To help celebrate 30 years of Space Marines, alongside releasing the Imperial Space Marine model, Games Workshop also released a hardcover book, collecting a range of early Space Marine material called Index Astartes: Apocrypha.  I was fortunate enough to get a copy of the book, despite its limited print run (it is available in a digital format on the Black Library, however), and figured I would let you know what I think of it via pictures!

Orruk Megaboss: Unboxing and assembly impressions

This beakie looks outclassed...

In my mind, the orcs/orks/orruks really came into perfect form when Brian Nelson started to sculpt them, starting with a few Warhammer Fantasy models, then moving to Gorkamorka (Mad Max-style gang warfare game), before finally sculpting the majority of the 3rd edition Warhammer 40,000 range.  He was able to take the somewhat comical humanoid designs of Rogue Trader and 2nd edition Warhammer 40k and completely revitalize them.  He turned the orcs/orks into more simian-like creatures with long arms corded with muscle and hunched postures.  Beyond the orcs’ frame, Nelson gave them a very distinctive facial structure, with a flattened nose, small beady eyes and a pronounced lower jaw.  A lot of these features were already part of the orc aesthetic, but Nelson was able to combine those elements into something very distinctive and unique for Games Workshop. Brian Nelson made me love the orcs.  A number of other sculptors have handled orcs for Games Workshop since Nelson’s reimaging, but none ever fully captured their essence like he did.  The last few Warhammer 40,000 orc releases seem more like imitations of Nelson’s greatness, never quite reaching the same heights (despite being very good).  I had long hoped for the day that Nelson would return to sculpting orcs, and when I saw images of the new Orruk models for Age of Sigmar, my heart lept.  After seeing the expressive faces on the models, and the careful attention to scale, I knew that Brian Nelson must have had a serious role in their creation.  As it turns out, Nelson’s first sculpt for the Orruk range was the imposing Orruk Megaboss. Such was my excitement about the model that I was at my local hobby shop to get it the day it was released.

The Pilgrym: Bronwen vox-owl

Burn the Witch.

While I am still hard at work creating more members for the Church of the Red Athenæum, I realized that I never posted any finished pictures of Roland's owl companion, Bronwen.  I painted Bronwen to look like a Great Horned Owl due to his pronounced ears/horns.  What do you think?

Imperial Space Marine 2016: Unboxing

And they shall know no fear.

Last weekend, Games Workshop celebrated 30 years of Space Marines by releasing a promotional model reenvisioning of the very first Space Marine model.  Although they only had a limited number of the models, selling out within a few hours, I was fortunate enough to be able to get one.  I wasted no time assembling the marine and wanted to share my thoughts about it!

Kingdom Death Multi-part kit challenge: Bigbossredskullz Amazon

Amazon by Bigbossredskullz 

At the end of last year, we started the Kingdom Death Multi-part Kit Challenge to see what other hobbyists could do with the wealth of plastic pieces from the Kingdom Death boxed game. We were not overly impressed with the multi-part kits, but were confident that something special could come out of them given the proper talent. So, after building a single model from the kits, we sent them away.

The Pilgrym: First Congregation Member of the Church of the Red Athenæum

The only cure is dying.

Having painted Samael the Church’s Chronicler, and the first two members of the Order of the Crimson Hour, I decided that it was time to paint one of the regular members of the congregation (which happens to be the only one that I have built thus far).  I wanted the regular members to fit naturally beside the ranking officials and the fighting order of the Church, but I also wanted them to be more subdued and impoverished looking,  with a focus on drab earthy colors.  And so, Matthias Stillman was born.

The Pilgrym: The Order of the Crimson Hour Painted

Blood Simple.

Progress continues steadily with the Church of the Red Athenæum. The two Order of the Crimson Hour battle sisters are now complete. They mark the first time that I painted two models simultaneously in years! And while they took much longer than I was anticipating, I am happy with how they turned out.

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 6: Talking about Path to Glory with Alexander Winberg

The Great Beast Chargul Doldrekk, Acolyte of Torment

In this episode, we are joined by the talented Alexander Winberg.  We begin the episode by talking about the new Khorne character models for Age of Sigmar, and the new 30th Anniversary Imperial Space Marine model.  Afterwards, we transition into talking with Alex about how he got into the the miniature wargaming hobby.  We talk at length about his involvement in the Path to Glory campaign with Jeff Vader, Nordic, and Krautscientist.  We close out the episode discussing some of the hobby projects that Alex is working on, and talk a little about the progress that we have made with our Pilgrym Project warband.

The Pilgrym: Congregation Member of the Church of the Red Athenæum

In an hour of Darkness a blind man is the best guide.

In the past few weeks I have been very busy painting many of the models that I have built for the Church of the Red Athenæum.  With all of the painting going on, I have neglected to post any pictures of the first regular congregation member that I built.  I have plans to make a few more, exploring the different holy wounds that Church members inflict upon themselves.

The Pilgrym: Samael Urkston, Lord of Bones Complete!

Pain is an illusion of the senses, despair an illusion of the mind.

Having finished building quite a few members of the Church of the Red Athenæum, I realized that I need to start painting some of them, lest the summer arrive and they are all still grey plastic and green stuff.  Looking over the models that I built, Samael Urkston, the Church’s Chronicler, seemed like a good place to start.  The Wayne England tribute is one of my favorite models that I have ever created, and it seemed a good place to start painting, and experimenting with a suitable color scheme for the Church as a whole.  The model ended up taking quite a long time to paint, but I think the effort was well worth it, both to establish the Church’s image going forward and to honor the irreplaceable Wayne England.

Horus Heresy Betrayal at Calth: Game Impressions

'They are dead, they will not live; they are shades, they will not arise; to that end you have visited them with destruction and wiped out all remembrance of them .’

When Games Workshop released The Horus Heresy: Betrayal at Calth last year, there was a lot of excitement surrounding the set.  This was largely because it provided plastic versions of many miniatures that had previously only been available in resin from Forge World.  And this enthusiasm was warranted, since the set is significantly cheaper than buying the resin equivalents and most of the models are superior to the resin versions.  But, we talked about much of this before, discussing the the tactical marines and the terminators in previous blog posts.  Instead, today I wanted to talk about the actual game included in the set.  A longtime friend, and fellow Warhammer 40k player, recently purchased the game, and we played a few of the missions last weekend.  I wanted to let people know what I think of it based on those games.

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 5: Deep Wars, the state of GW and supplements, and the decline in Malifaux model quality

Deep Wars is back!

Kingdom Death: Assembling the Black Knight and Flower Knight

The Forest wants what it wants.

Just as I was coming to terms with (and assemble!) all of the models and rules included with Kingdom Death: Monster, its creator Adam Poots started to ship out the game’s many expansions, each including a new monster along with the cards and rules necessary for using them in your ongoing campaigns!  Honestly, the Kickstarter was so long ago that I had forgotten what expansions that I had selected, but was pleasantly surprised to receive: the Flower Knight, Slenderman, the Dragon King, and the Dung Beetle Knight.  And while I have slowly been filming unboxing videos of each of these expansions, I thought that I would do a post talking about the assembly of the Flower Knight.  And for good measure, since I had been working on it at the time, I will show you the resin Black Knight too!

Wrath of Kings: Orsund Cavalier unboxing and assembly impressions

Terror from the Deep!

We are always excited to work with models from miniature companies other than Games Workshop.  It is particularly neat to see what sort of innovations they bring to the hobby.  The market is virtually flooded with new games, so it can be difficult to keep track of everything.  We were excited to see that one of the blogs that we follow, Screwed Up Dice, was beginning an ambitious and collaborative hobby project centered around Cool Mini or Not’s Wrath of Kings.  The project, called A Tale of Wrath, is a spiritual successor to the seminal run of articles in White Dwarf back in 1998, called A Tale of Four Gamers.  This series chronicled four hobbyists’ efforts to start and continue building a new Warhammer Fantasy army over the course of six months, playing games throughout the process, and culminating in a tournament.  Screwed Up Dice is putting a new spin on this idea by changing the game system to Wrath of Kings (a non-GW game), and opening the project up to the entire world, encouraging anyone to signup and start building an army.  Although we realized that we would not have the time to participate in the project properly (the Pilgrym Project is occupying our time almost completely), it was hard not to get caught up in Screwed Up Dice’s enthusiasm, so we decided we should get a few Wrath of Kings models and let everyone know what we think!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 4: Space Marines and Genestealers, man’s best friend

The Genestealer Cultists are back!

The Pilgrym: Order of the Crimson Hour

Vivere est Pati.

As we continued to expand the Church of the Red Athenæum, we decided that it should really have its own fighting force.  We decided that we wanted to have this military organization mimic the Sisters of Battle.  After some brainstorming, we devised the Order of the Crimson Hour.