From ByronM - Western Town from Northern Lights Terrain (220 Points)

It's really been a bit of a slow year for me this painting challenge, and I am sorry about that.  With the end of the challenge coming up oh so quickly, I really wanted to get a project done that I have needed to complete for the better part of a decade!!  When I started laser cutting terrain it was 2014 and one of the first sets I launched was a line of western buildings which was finished and for sale by early 2015.  Since then, they have sat unpainted in a bin, getting pulled out to play with (unpainted) but otherwise untouched.

The biggest issue was that I didn't really know what I wanted to do with them.  I thought about just painting the signs and leaving the rest wood, or painting them all but not really sure how to go about doing an aged wood look, so they just sat.

Well, I resolved to get them done this year, and since I had such a slow painting year, I decided I needed to bang out something big for the end of the challenge, and this happened to be it.  You can find my whole line of western buildings for sale over at Northern Lights Terrain.

I ended up deciding on a worn wood look, but wasn't sure how to pull it off without spending a ton of time.  I figured going with a brown base, dry brushing grey and then various washes over it would work but wasn't 100% sure.  So I used a lifeline and called Curt to discuss options.  He had pretty much the same idea / colours in mind but suggested that I start with grey to skip the brown undercoat and then proceed to washes of browns, greys and maybe some greens.

I wasn't too sure, so tried it out on the outhouse first, and was really happy with the results.  I think it looks great and was relatively fast as well!  I used a medium grey as a base, washed generously with a dark brown (burnt umber ink from Liquitex, but you could use Agrax Earthshade), then dry brushed back a bit of the medium grey, then a light grey, both trying to be rough dry brushes and following / creating what would be the grain of the wood.  I then went back over it with a thin brush randomly creating darker runs of the ink and then with a lighter brown ink, and then lastly added some green for rot or moss in the corners and the odd area.

I then went about painting the fronts of the buildings in some various bright colours, and cut some lettering for the signs.  I kept all the trim on the buildings a bright white to make it pop.

The gallows was painted the same as all the building just without any bright coloured details, as were all the boardwalk sections that tie the town together so that the "ladies" don't have to walk in the muddy roads.

Last up was the church, which I painted in a traditional white and black colour scheme.

While I am unhappy that I had a slow painting year this year (due to way to many various reasons over the winter), I am thrilled to have these buildings painted and we have already fought several games of "What a Cowboy" over them. The only building in the line that I did not get done as I couldn't find the assembled one I have (having just moved in the fall) was the barn.  Now I have a few more buildings to design though!!!  As we felt we need some old sheds for non town fights, a Bank as an objective building, a stable and blacksmith, and maybe even a train station!  So maybe I will be back next year with some more western buildings.

As for points, each of the regular buildings are about 7" x 5" x 5.5" so I am going to call each one a 20 point cube of terrain as I feel it's close enough.  There are 6 of those, so 120 points so far.  The gallows is slightly smaller, but if I add the board walk sections and outhouse to it, that should be another cube, so up to 140.  Then the church is bigger at about 1.5 cubes and the saloon is a massive building at 9x8.5x8.5 so over 2.5 cubes, so adding these together should be 4 cubes or 80 points for a grand total of 220 points.  I am ok with more or less as the judges decide. I am just happy they are all done!  I might be back with a few more odds and ends before the end of the challenge, but if not, awesome work everyone!

***

Well, our "free fire" submission period will not commence until Saturday, technically speaking, but Byron is a friend and so I am abusing my powers as a minion to welcome his post into our final round of Wednesday submissions. Welcome Byron!

And what a fine submission it is! I will always make cracks about painting terrain, mainly as a weak way deflect from the fact that I am just dreadful at ever getting it painted. But this submission is a clear demonstration of the value that excellent terrain designers such as Northern Lights bring to our hobby. The kits are great, and they are fabulous once painted up! I think your approach to painting the wood has absolutely achieved the right "look".  This is totally a wonderful table set up, and I can already picture a variety of Hatfield-and-McCoy disputes being settled with pistols and rifles! 220 points well earned!

GregB  

From ByronM - More Rooty Goodness [50 Points]

This past week progress has been slow with painting as I have gotten a little sidetracked with finishing my new shop build to house Northern Lights Terrain.  However, I did have time to finish up two more units for my Turnip28 force, the Rabid Radishes. 

First up are a unit of Brutes, these are made up of the melee oriented malcontents of the Radishes, including one midget who has convinced one of the larger lads to carry him around while brandishing his diminutive rifle.

These models are all 3D printed, and had to be scaled down a bit or they towered over the rest of the force.  In the end they could have been a slightly bit bigger to match their name as brutes, but I didn't like the idea of them towering over everyone else.

I kept with a basic paint scheme of red and white to match their holy root vegetable of choice.

Next up is a Stump Gun and crew, made up literally from a stump...  What could go wrong when firing a cannon ball out of a wood stump??  At least they made a metal barrel to improve their inaccuracy, but I have visions of misfires and explosions dancing in my head as the back end inevitably blows off backwards taking the crew with it.  Only time will tell if my vision is accurate (but with the way this 

game is played, it probably is!!).

I again kept with a simple red based theme to the uniform, and a grimy look to the gun, as it has been well used.

Overall this should count for 8x 28mm men plus the cannon at 5 points each for a total of 45 points. Not a huge haul, but a few more units off my painting table. 

We seem to have remarkably less of a root infestation than during the last Challenge, but I am very glad that you keep holding up the flag here, Byron! Some gorgeous models and some lovely painting too. The brutes are truly great, but I really like the gun and its crew with their impressive bearskins. And nice to see them wearing red for a change! I'm sure they will be absolutely fine firing their infernal implement, wreaking havoc among the ranks. Those of the enemy, preferably. Now I admire your modesty, but the gun does count as a gun or crew served weapon, so that's 10 points. 50 points added to your tally.

From ByronM - Northern Lights Terrain (50 Points)

Here are three terrain pieces I designed for my MDF terrain company (Northern Lights Terrain) a while ago and then never actually got around to painting them up.  In fact I realized I designed the first two of them over 2 years ago, and only ever actually put the power plant up for sale, I never even listed the garbage bins for sale - DOH!

Anyway, here is the power plant that I designed, that is meant for use with Warhammer 40k and meant to be used as a large line of sight blocker, it is actually big enough to hide a Knight behind.  It measures in at a bit over 10" wide x 9" tall x 7" deep.

I painted it up in a green meant to match the power and telephone junction boxes that was all see scattered around cities in North America, and meant to look very industrial.  I could have gone with a standard concrete grey, but I have too much grey terrain kicking around already.

Next up is the industrial garbage bins that I did up that I am going to sell in 2 packs.  These are meant to be large bins seen at construction sites, and while a bit over sized scale wise, I did that on purpose to help block LOS in games like Spectre and Infinity. Each one is about 4"x 2"x 2".

Lastly, I have a custom piece that I made for myself for the "Chariot" racing game that I have been working on for the last few years.  Ever since seeing the new Ork 40k vehicles I wanted a reason to use them in something, and the Curt told me about a game called Charioteer that could be used for some fun racing scenarios.  That got me started on the project and I finally finished off the board for it this year.

It is meant to look like a broken up highway, and each car (Chariot) ends up in 1st through 4th place and in the inner, middle, or outer lane.  It's a very nice system that I will be adapting to fit a bit more vehicle based combat, but we have already played a few games with the rules as written and it's super fun and very cool looking with the board and cars on it.  Hope you guys like it!  It is about 18" long and 12" wide, therefore it would fold up to create a perfect 6"cube so I am claiming 1 cubes worth of points for it.

Overall I am going to call this 2.5 terrain cubes and therefore 50 points.  Feel free to adjust as you feel fits.

 

That's some great terrain, Byron! And a rather cheeky points claim for the "road" piece, but I'll go with it.

Tamsin

From Curt: Two Units of Fodder for Turnip28 (120 points)

Hi All!

I'm back to my Turnip28 project, carrying on from the 'Snobs' to the next formation type: two units of rank-and-file troops, or in T28 parlance: 'The Fodder'. 

In the game, Fodder come in groups of 12 figures, and while they're pretty lousy on the whole, they do benefit from being able to put out a decent curtain of (inaccurate) fire, and can soak up a lot of punishment. Just like what you'd expect from a troop type sporting such a dubious nom de guerre.

The figures are 3d prints from Knucklebone Miniatures. These are fantastic one-piece models which I highly recommend - I printed a duplicate set in a mirror image in order to provide some variation within the units. I also added some chopped-up tufts, coming out of collars and cuffs, along with a few clusters of mushrooms for colour. 

I really like how characterful these figures are, so wonderfully miserable and downtrodden. When grouped together they give a wonderful impression of a shambling mob of dolorous mooks, sadly trudging to their inescapable doom. 

I did-up one unit with red facings as part of my 'Rutabaga Rifles', and another in yellow turnbacks for the 'Fighting Fennel Fusiliers'. I used an airbrush for laying down the base colours and then went in with a brush for some of the details.

I had a bit of fun doing up a rutabaga on one of the standards - not something I thought I'd be painting as a flag device, but when in the Turnip-World you do silly turnip things.

For their yellow opposition, instead of the usual banner, I gave them a spooky Mari Lywd as their standard. For the uninitiated (meaning me until I read up on it), the Mari Lywd was a Welsh wassailing custom, apparently to celebrate nature's growth and renewal. 

It entailed mounting a horses skull on pole, with the person holding it hidden under a sackcloth.  The Mari Lywd and its attendants would go around to local homes, singing and carousing to get free food and drinks. Yes, the Welsh are a wonderfully weird lot. Anyway, I thought it would make an interesting standard for a unit of creepy root vegetable infantry.

Byron was kind enough to make up some sabot bases for me that are similar in design to those I use for my Malta project. 

I had a bit of fun pimping them out with a dice socket (to track panic in the game), along with gratuitous blood spatters in the empty troop sockets to signify when the poor Fodder take a dirt nap. Fun!

These 24 infantry will give me 120 points for the roster, a few for the airbrush duel, and a nice escalatory bump in our Turnip28 clash of vegetables.

The vegetable patch to-date.

Thanks for dropping in folks and have a terrific weekend!

- Curt

Friday Minion - Aha, trudging in dolefully on the heels of the toffs and toadies, the fodder have arrived! Delightful, miserable, bonkers nonsense here Curt. I confess to liking the grimy, grim aesthetic of Turnip28 (I really should get back to my abortive attempts), but your jaunty twist has its appeal too. 

I love the Mari Lywd as standard, quite coincidentally, shortly before Christmas I spent an hour or so in a wikipedia rabbithole of Welsh and other bizarre festive traditions (looking at you, Finland), and recent attempts at Mari Lywd revival movements, despite seemingly noone knowing where or whence the tradition comes from, let alone why. 

120 points to the Snowlord! 

From ScottC: Middle Eastern Apartment Buildings (220 points)

 This is by far the fastest I have ever received, assembled, primed and painted - terrain especially, and likely any hobby product ever. 

These are the new Middle Eastern apartment blocks designed by Byron @ Northern Lights Terrain.

I believe I easily have an 8x4's worth of terrain now and am very much looking forward to using these pieces in a game. I absolutely love dynamic terrain pieces that add height and variability to games.

And the ruined add on versions. 2 full ruined bases and 2 second story conversion add ons. I added some warlord rubble and playground sand, threw in a wash and drybrush. Very happy with how they turned out.

All in all:

11 - 6 inch cubes worth of terrain = 220

(8 for the 3 story apartments) + (~3 for the ruins)

From ScottC: Medieval Houses & Gribblies - Larder Chamber submission (158 points)

 

My adventurers have a brief respite as they come across not one, but TWO medieval fantasy buildings in the Larder Chamber.

Let's see what they can peak at through the windows...

Taking a couple of steps back!

(Zombie for scale)

First up is the two story shop:

I drew heavily from the Prancing Pony for inspiration on these two, and this larger one in particular. I was very unsure of a tudor wood house coloring and wasn't too keen on painting it white. I ended up with a german camo beige / bonewhite combination that I believe fits both historically and fantastically.

Next up is the single story:

These two fantasy medieval buildings can be found at Northern Lights Terrain medieval fantasy line. They were an absolute joy to paint once I stopped fussing about colours. Admittedly my airbrushes have made painting terrain infinitely more approachable. The style of building is very accessible to a variety of game systems and I have no doubt will get a lot of table time.

And now for the gribblies! (Colonal Veronin for scale)

About half of these gribblies are from the recent mantic terrain crate 2 kickstarter, and the wine cases/cubbies and larger table are 3d printed. The rats are reaper miniatures 28mm in scale.

As for points... here is my educated guess:

Single story: 5" x 5" = 20 points

Two-Story: 6" x 6" x 9"tall = ~40 points?

Gribblies: pointed as per ~ 28mm figure: 40 ponts

Wine + Potion cabinets: pointed as per ~40mm figures: 28 points

Rats: 10 points 

Chamber of Challenge submission: 20 points 

Total: ~ 158