From: SanderS - Guess what? Right, more Heroquest... (155 Points and 10 for Arthur)

Yea yes, I know; I should be painting 1:72 Napoleonics by now but today I had a special pre-Holiday Quest at school using a custom Quest "Mound of the Beastmen"and I didn't own any beastmen so had to start from scratch.

First up I need to say that my mission to spread the hobby-joy is succeeding, since two of my pupils now own a HQ boxed game as well. Since their miniatures are unpainted and therefore rather unsatisfying, I have started painting them up for them in between other projects and these 5 will go to Collins set soon.

Next up are some more Greenies. I have managed to paint up some of the WHQ Goblin archers and spear-men. The archers apparently are a sort of prototype night-goblin but their hats make them look silly to me.

For the custom quest I needed Beastmen and a Chaoshound. Ebay proved to be my friend and I was able to score some metal OOP figures as characters. The first of which I present here: the Chaoshound, Shaman and the Beastlord, some others are still in cue.

Through a FB trading page I obtained a sprue of plastic beastmen and made and painted 10, yes there are only 9 of them in the picture because I stupidly forgot one at school today. The pictures are not the best and sadly the blue of the bases is not shown in it's actual hue but it's really dark and has a really nice light blue highlight. I am almost happier with the bases then the figures themselves.

To top today is another figure Arthur has painted, I gave him an old Ex Illis mounted figure to paint in order to practice for the metal riders he has planned for later on in the Challenge. I know his palette to be a little limited but he was adamant that this is how the knight should look. Since it was a trial in dry-brushing for him I did not press the matter.

Specially for Lady Sarah: I have put your suggestion of painting a female adventurer before him and he's not convinced. I got him to accept that Girls can, in theory, be cool and badass yet he does not actually want to paint one at this moment. I'll keep on it ;-)

So for me that would be 31 foot figures in 28mm making 155 points and Arthur has a mounted 28m for 10 if I am correct.

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Wow, Sander, you are absolutely on fire with painting your (and your students'!) Heroquest collections! You must be one of the most popular teachers in your school. 

I love seeing these old Beastman castings as they were one of my early Warhammer Fantasy armies (I remember them being a very nasty lot in 4th edition). I agree with you, your stone bases on these fellows look very fine - that blue highlight is a great touch. Please let Arthur know that I think his knight looks excellent. I especially like the horse's barding, the heraldry on the shield and the neat marbling effect on the base. The lad has talent! (Sarah is confident that he will come around to liking the ladies.)

So that's 155 points you and another 10 for Arthur. Well done boys!

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From VictorC: Four More 10mm Spanish Battalions Arrive for Battle! (224 points)

Over the last week and half I was able to finish 4 more Spanish battalions. Please give a nice warm hand to the Guadalajara, de la Armada, Cordova battalions and the Valladolid Grenadier battalion.  They have made hard journey to the battlefield and they will not be denied their right to fight!

Again all of the flags are speculative and taken from what I could piece together from various sources. 

The de la Armada battalion

The Cordova battalion

The Guadalajara battalion

The Valladolid Grenadier battalion

I have 9 more Spanish infantry battalions to complete for my Battle of Almanza project.

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What a terrific group of battalions, Victor. I like the punchy bold colours you've used for these fellows, with my favourites being the chaps in yellow from the De la Armada and Guadalajara battalions. I'm curious: what rules will you be using for this Almanza project once it's done? One thing for sure, it's all going to look spectacular, especially with what you've shown us to date.

224 points for your march up the points roster Victor. Excellent work!

From MilesR: Sons of Anubis (217 Points)

This weeks submission is 31 painted Anubis Jackal Warriors.  These will be added to the growing ranks of NPC opponents for my upcoming Historicon participation game "DAK & Dragons 2.0" - I think these miniatures are from the Eureka "Chaos Egyptians" line.  I'm not totally sure as these were purchased second hand.  More on their acquisition at the end of this post...

Thirty warriors and a leader that make up this pack.  All of the figures are in some form of motion and most only have one foot on the ground which is a bit of an issue for stability.  I'll need to add some weight to the back of most of the bases to keep these fellows from toppling over.

The shields are really basic for now but will suffice.  I'm trying to track down more of these figures so I can have a few different unit running around causing mayhem (as is their nature).

The Eureka website classifies these as 28's but they're rather large mini's as compared to two future opponents - a Perry Plastic SAS figure (DAK & Dragons) and a Empress US Ranger (SOCOM & Sorcery).  I tried to normalize base heights to get a fair representation.

These figures are not quite 40mm but way over 28mm.  I'll leave it to our fair and just Challenge Overlord to determine how to judge these humble servants of Anubis.  I also feel obligated to mention that Curt is a very snappy dresser and is both erudite and charming.  Obviously, since these are statements of fact, they can not be misconstrued as an attempt to sway his opinion.

Many people may also say that bonus points are in order for my possessing a ruler with the blasphemous metric system on it.  It's just another proof point that I am a citizen of the world and regard all of people-kind with the same level magnanimity.  There really are only two types of people in this world - highly evolved miniature painters and Morlocks.

The way I purchased these figures is a funny story and also shows how generous and thoughtful our gaming community can be.  While running a DAK & Dragons game last year at Historicon (I think was my 6th iteration of the game) a gentleman came up to me and said he really liked the game and had some minis on his flea market table that, rather than sell, he wanted to give to me - it was a box with these minis.  I was blown away by the generosity but did insist on paying his listed price.  The box also had a much larger Jackal Warrior, who you might see in a future bonus round.

I think we should always bear in mind that the vast majority of people in this hobby are both kind and generous, especially if one chooses not to delve in the darker internet corners of the hobby like the TMP forum.

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What a cool batch of figures Miles. Maybe it's me being such a dog lover, but I've always found the whole anubis thing very creepy - whenever I've come across them I often have a hard time meeting my dogs eyes for a few hours. Nonetheless, I've always enjoyed the sculpts coming out of Eureka - they always seem very characterful and well thought out. I also really liked your feel-good story about the generous fellow at Historicon. Trolls and troglodytes aside, there are so many amazing people to be found in this hobby, many of which, I am proud to say, are participants of this humble event.

217 Points for these dog-faced boys, well done!

Somewhat Harried, but Friday's Here!

Happy Friday Everyone!

I've been on the road for work today, travelling back and forth between cities for meetings, so please bear with me as my updates may be a little choppy.

Also, please remember, if you haven't already, to make your selections for the 'Music / Musician' theme round. The results of the voting will be announced this Sunday.

Have a great day!

Curt

From Anthony O - More Empire of Dust - 196 Points

My challenge within a challenge is to submit each week and so far so good. This week I have continued with my Empire of Dust using GW miniatures. It is a big one this time with a regiment of warriors and a regiment of cavalry.

These are my third and forth units of this army and it really seems to be gaining momentum.

All up there are 19 warriors and 10 cavalry giving me a total of 195 points.

I have really appreciated the feedback and nice comments about this army, it has really motivated me so thanks everyone.

Ah, yet more undead eye candy..... errrrr.... I can say that can't I?  Anyway, let's move on....

Very nice indeed, the colours still zing and there's something very satisfying about that last picture with the units all ranked up into the army.  Excellent work on getting a post in each and every week and that army shot really does show how quickly these things we leave languishing on the shelves can come together with regular painting time scheduled!

196 points in total, the extra pip coming for the blingin' banner on the horses.

From StephenS: Carthaginian Spearmen (50 points)

10 plastic Carthaginian/Libyan spearmen from Victrix based up for Impetus. As usual, I spent too long painting the trim on the cuirasses and highlighting all the flaps on their pteruges (the leather flappy skirts - yes, I had to look that up). Only to realise that you can't see any of it from the front when I was taking the photos...

The transfers on the shields are from Little Big Man Studios and were a nightmare to put on. All the sticky layers have fused together, probably from lying around in a spare bedroom for a couple of stinking hot summers here in the land Down Under. It took plenty of false starts to be able to wriggle the hobby knife between the sticker and the plastic covering on enough of them (I know Dux, this is what I get for not painting my shields...). A few of the shields will need to be touched up down the road.

10 x 28 mm figures is 50 points.

Cheers,

Steve

Wow, these are bloomin' lovely!  I'm very firmly in the "decals are good" side of the hobby schism that flares up from time to time - given the amount of time you spent on the ptu ptoo pti flappy skirts I reckon you were due a time saving technique.  It's a shame it didn't end up saving much time, but the end result is well worth it, very nicely done.

In any case, the tunics, metals and shields combine for a cracking effect, 50 points well earned indeed.

From DavidB - FOOTBALL TIME (325 points)

(Minion note: The international dateline did for us last week and whilst David posted this on Thursday in North American time, I didn't get the message until Friday UK time when I woke up.  Ever the gentleman, David was happy for me to post this week instead.  I only note this as he refer to some things that happened last weekend in the future tense but I didn't want to start changing all that or for you to wonder if you'd accidentally driven to work in the Delorian this morning!)



It's been a bit of a moment. I've been ripping through training as unexpected activities have erupted for military and civilian jobs. My girls are winding down basketball with the next few days involving tournaments. I've been either at work or in the land of no wifi(and no civilisation) Work has decided that blogger is a risk and my smart phone can no longer access it while at site, it is also blocked from calls and messages, so it only tells me the temperature, news, time, but I do get to read the emails.

I have been following there and will be soon visiting each entry and seeing more as I have vacation for the Superbowl. Besides Wrestling (not WWE) Football is a big sport and this is a holiday of sorts at my house. Ive been a fan of the Dolphins since I could walk while my wife is a die hard Chicago Bears fan. We don't talk about that New England team as a certain player took some time off to  enjoy recreational drugs and contributed somewhat to Dan Marino not getting a Superbowl ring. That player who will not be named did contribute to New England getting a Superbowl victory when he returned. Brady is the GOAT (greatest-of-all-time), but Marino just needed one Superbowl to clench his spot.

Because the NFL won't place an ad for American vets #pleasestand(divisive) they also allocated money for breast cancer and veterans to SJW issues. Since those who kneel cannot tell me anything about the 54th Massachusetts, the 369th Infantry Regiment, or the 332nd Fighter Group, I won't be watching.

Instead we are having a Blood bowl championship, with all the Superbowl munchies and the kid's new blood bowl game. My three girls are all born around Christmas, so Santa brought them the mini game as a birthday present. My son wasn't born near Christmas, so he will be using an older team reconditioned.

First though, I was going to enter the Bad Moon Terror cruiser and the Goff Kill cruiser in the flight round, but they were buried by orks and trucks and were not quite ready in time.

They were both assembled and primed after I seen the bonus round themes. The kill cruiser was missing a battery of guns which was replaced by a set from the plastic Imperial Cruisers...It looks very orky now.

The Terror ship is an assault carrier with the large ramp protruding from the prow. the kill cruiser has more guns than a battleship, but with orks gunning, it isn't too accurate!

They came out pretty close to the escorts I painted maybe 5 years ago? I found them in original packaging at Adepticon for a very good price. I'll be looking for more this year.

When the kids and I assembled the orcs, they seemed to be scary accurate to Oakland Raider tailgaters. We agreed pretty quick that they would be very appropriate for the Chicago Bears. So Here is Da Bears. They are an animate bunch of minis and probably my favourite out of all the teams to paint.

The blackorc blocker just oozes power. the detail does go wonky in some places, but there is so much detail, I can forgive GW for that.

The Blitzer is probably my favourite with the skull helmet and animation. Somebody is getting hit!

I love how the orcs have serious cankles!

I found an old human team that was painted black and yellow. They are now fresh in their new colours of Miami.... Dolph's Finns!

A blitzer and blocker from the first edition(1988) star players. They will both be blitzers as humans don't have blockers anymore.

They do have a couple of old school ogres to fill that role though. They sport dolphin colors in what uniform they were given.

I wanted to paint the new team as black and red Falcons, but my kids insisted the Eagles. They are their models, so the Imperial Eagles took Philadelphia's colors.

They are very fine sculpts with no soft detail areas, but the sculptor did not have as much fun with these as they did with Orks. the humans are rather rigid and not as animated.

The white is really a white blue(p-3 underbelly blue) it looks white with the grey and green. My white just wouldn't cover even over a pale grey.

The Skaven are "The Stealers"  who have stolen their colors from the Pittsburgh Steelers. They are just as dynamic as the orcs.

A skaven blitzer with a thrower and gutter runner behind him. They do have a lot of nice details and the tails are great, but the soft spots in detail are all over them, I ended up using the box they came in just to make sure what a particular area was supposed to be. They look fine from a distance but are really bad models if tipped over. I was constantly going back and hitting areas again as I realised I missed a patch of fur, armour, cloth....

I do like the thrower model, all the teams eyes are green from warpstone.

The current edition with some of the first edition models. Better sculpts this time and the new orks are molded in green!

I miss the old metal ratmen. Ratsa tailspike is my only rat left over. I gave the team to a brother who didn't want to paint, but liked the game. He was a big Dallas Cowboy fan and actually played for Tulane University. He went to Afghanistan a few years after 9-11 and will always be younger than I.

The newer orc and skaven surrounded by my old Chaos team. I couldn't find the wood elves in the man cave, but these poor painted models do show how far I've come!

51 28mm football players-255
2 space ships-10
and 30 counters-60
I figured the ships as 28mm and the counters at 15mm with a total of 325

https://youtu.be/tMlKmELIhgY

cant have football without some angry rock!

Saliva- Ladies and Gentlemen

https://youtu.be/BIQK4-9YFW0

Fivefinger death punch....this one will get you in the feels and is entirely for those who fell for my flag and those who fell for YOUR flag no matter of country. I'll tip a glass on Sunday for them all.

 

Just wow.  Now then, where do I start...... I absolutely love the meander through the various eras of bloodbowl, some of those early figures were awesome and I remember reading the Whte Dwarf when they were introduced.  I always thought that Ogre had the right mix of menace and fun to encapsulate all that was right about Bloodbowl.  I'm also a huge fan of the two star players you press-gang in as blitzers, they've come a long way from their rules cards being printed on the back cover of White Dwarf so you could use them!

 

I like the way you've used real teams to inform your colours for all the new teams, it's a great way to get things done effectively and start a BB league under your own roof!  I do like the new human team, but I think you're right in that the new Orc one puts it in the shade somewhat as those figures absolutely fizz with life and personality.

 

The BFG ships are also very nice, so I agree with your points and 325 it is!