My Hobby and Blog in December 2016

Current Wyrd Kickstarter for a large scale war game sharing the same setting as the Malifaux skirmish game.

Around this time last year, I set some goals on how much miniatures I wanted to finish painting for 2016. I am so far off from what I wanted to accomplish! Though I started on many different projects, I have only completely painted 13 miniatures. I did completed transcribing my handwritten note before starting this blog. Now I have to just transcribe those handwritten notes I made after starting this blog. Anyways, I am hoping for more wonderful things in 2017 and that I will be more productive next year!

[Games] Way of the Fighter - Technique Packs

Preview of Chi Style Yang Technique Pack from the Kickstarter

Last Updated on 1/31/2018: Updated this entry with technique grids. In Way of the Fighters, you have the ability to adjust how your character plays through selection of 4 Technique Packs. Each character select Technique Packs based on the Style requirements listed on their Character cards. The 30 Technique Packs are divided into 5 Styles: Chi, Fluid, Hard, Soft, and Wrestle. Listed after each action is the type of action and its priority value in parenthesis.

[Games] Way of the Fighter - Fighter Deck Overview

Last Updated on 12/24/2017..Ninja Division's Way of the Fighter is a tabletop game that pays tribute to 2D fighting games. This game was designed by Benjamin Yamada and came to fruition through Kickstarter. The aesthetic and game mechanics should be familiar to anyone that play fighting games in the arcades or on consoles.  There is also a sense of skill/level advancement during the match through the use of Mode action cards.

My Hobby and Blog in November 2016

DC and Marvel characters collide in Knight Models' Super Hero Universe Miniature Game.

For the month of November, I have spent most of my hobby time on Malifaux, clipping the plastic parts off from the sprues. The rest of this post are comments on some of the games and miniatures of interest to me.

My Hobby and Blog in October 2016

Rollo from Relic Knights placed among a pile of stamped terrain bases.

The last two months I have collected and invested into many different games and miniature lines such as Guild Ball and Shadows of Brimstone. I also did a lot of work on various projects, but so far I have not completed anyone of those items I worked on. I know I am spreading myself thin, but it is my hobby that I do on my spare time and I am enjoying working on different things. If it means things will not get completed as fast, so be it! As stated in my previous monthly post, I want to paint at least one miniature for each game system and miniature line. To get that going, I started a new Projects page to organize the various planned projects. Even if the projects will not be worked on for a while, it gives me at least a starting page to plan things out.

[Log] Dungeons & Dragons Wrath of Ashardalon - Part 2, Heroes Overview

First layer of paint applied on these adventurers.

In this update, I go over my plans for each of the five heroes in Wrath of Ashardalon. So far, I have given a base coat to all five heroes. There  seems to be a scale issue with the heroes, especially with Vistra and Keyleth. Proportionally, Vistra the Dwarf is much larger than both the Dwarf hero in Castle Ravenloft and the Duregars in Ashardalon. For me, the scale of Vistra seens more suitable as a stout human and I think I will use the model as a human rather than a dwarf fighter. The elven Keyleth, on the other hand, is rather petitite compare to the other heroes. Anyways, here is the paint scheme I plan to paint these miniatures, Below is the paint scheme I plan to go for each one:

[Log] Dragon Tides - Overview

To be very honest, I did not have much interest in the Dragon Tides game. I specifically purchase this game to get the Bruce Lee figure for Yashima. Since I have the Yashima cards for Bruce Lee, I thought I might as well get the figure for him instead of using the cardboard token. Like Yashima, the figures are larger than most of the 28-35 mm scale miniatures I have. Strangely, the Dragon Tides figures are slightly smaller than the Yashima miniatures. I do have some interest to get the henchmen models (not made yet from what I can tell) to replace the tokens, but seeing how the kickstarter of this project is not running too well, I am leaning toward not collecting any more models for this game. It all depends on whether my family enjoys playing this game or not. There is a total of 8 figures (4 dragons, 2 mini-bosses, and 2 bosses based on the scripts in the game) in the core box game:

Unlike Yashima in the green colored plastic, the Dragon Tides model are slightly smaller in scale and in a white color.

My Hobby and Blog in September 2016

When I started collecting miniatures, I was truly a "Games Workshop hobbyist." As mentioned on their website, the "Games Workshop hobby is collecting, building, painting and playing games with Citadel miniatures." Replace Games Workshop with miniature gaming and cross out Citadel in the above phrase and that would describe how I feel I want my hobby to be about now. It is the end of September, and I decided to focus these monthly posts emphasizing on the collecting, building, painting, and playing aspects of the miniature hobby.

Immeril posing on top of a work in progress modular terrain tile

[Log] Yashima: Legend of the Kami Masters - Overview

Yashima: Legend of the Kami Masters, made by Green Brier Games, is a card-based board game with an east Asian fantasy theme. To be honest, I decided to purchase this product for the miniatures, thinking that they would fit well with my other miniature collection of 25-35 mm scale. Not only could I use them in the Yashima game, but also for role playing and skirmish games. Unfortunately, these miniatures are a lot larger than the miniatures in my collection. On Green Brier Games website, the Yashima products were tagged as being 30 mm in size. The bases are indeed 30 mm wide; however, the miniatures are approximately 10 mm larger than those in my collection (50 mm from bottom of base to top of head). So these miniatures won't be used outside of the game for me! My own mistake for not researching on the miniatures more carefully. Reading through the rules and looking at the cards, it looks to be a game that me and my family would enjoy. So here is the start of a log for the models in this game.

8 masters from the core game and first two expansions (Deep Woods and Icy Peaks).

[Log] Battle Masters Chaos and Destruction - Part 5

Work in Progress of the Orc Warriors

Now that I am returning logs back to being an overview of progress, here is what I have left to do with these old Battle Masters miniatures.

[Workshop] Casting Molds

This post is to compile information related to casting molds. I am using the casting molds made from Hirst Arts (Castlemolds) and from Happy Seppuku (Your Board System). Like the texture stamps post, this is currently just a list of the casting molds I have. I will in the future update this post as I gain more experience with using these molds.

Castlemolds from Hirst Arts (top) and
Your Board System from Happy Seppuku (bottom)

My Hobby and Blog in August 2016

A lot of rats at the adventurers' feet...

I started this blog on August 2015 which makes this blog to be one year old now! Painting the 15 "classic" Warhammer Fantasy armies was the original reason for making this blog. Fantasy armies are still one of my goals, but the blog now encompasses a lot more, such as miniatures used in board games. Overall, I want to use this blog for organization of multiple projects and as a record of the work I have done so far.

[Log] Dungeons & Dragons Castle Ravenloft Monsters & Villains - Part 2

Rat Swarms done! next up Wolves and Spiders

The Rat Swarm models were completed within the first week of August. That makes 8 models in the Castle Ravenloft game completed and 35 more to go! Next up on the painting table will be either the Wolves or the Spiders. For the three wolves, I want to paint each one of them with a different fur coat color. For the spiders, I am leaning toward a black base and each of one of them having a different design on the back of their abdomen. The next updates will contain background research on both wolf fur coat and spider markings.

Previous Log Entry: [Log] Dungeons & Dragons Castle Ravenloft Monsters & Villains - Part 1
Next Log Entry: N/A

[Archives] Empire Captain with Hammer and Pistol

Empire Captain with Hammer and Pistol, Empire Duelist with Sword, Empire Duelist with Brace of Pistols, and Empire Captain with Sword and Orc Head are the last batch of miniatures I painted before starting this blog in 2015. These four metal miniatures were painted to be used as part of a Reikland mercenary warband for the Mordheim skirmish game. This model was used both as a Reikland Captain in Mordheim and as an Empire general/captain for Warhammer Fantasy Battle. The giant hammer, cloak, ornate armor. plus the grizzled bearded face gives the impression of a high ranking veteran soldier. A perfect model for leading an Empire army.

Notes: The original binders notes are on page 39. The record for the work I did on both this model and the Empire Captain with Sword and Orc Head were poorly kept as I was preoccupied finding a new place to live at that time. Like all the other models I painted for an Empire army, I kept the red and white color theme as the main emphasis on the model. I did not paint in his eyes, but with how the helmet gives a natural shadow over the eyes, it does not look too bad; however, looking it up close...painting eyes will be one of my main areas I want to improve on.

[Archives] Empire Captain with Sword and Orc Head

Empire Captain with Sword and Orc Head, Empire Duelist with Sword, Empire Duelist with Brace of Pistols, and Empire Captain with Hammer and Pistol are the last batch of miniatures I painted before starting this blog in 2015. These four metal miniatures were painted to be used as part of a Reikland mercenary warband for the Mordheim skirmish game. Not only was he used as a Reikland Champion, he was also used as a Empire Captain in Warhammer Fantasy. Except for the sculpted blood, I really liked this characterful model. I think it is that pose of him wiping his blade after lopping off the head of an Orc!

Notes: The original binders notes are on page 38.  The record for the work I did on both this model and the Empire Captain with Hammer and Pistol were poorly kept as I was preoccupied finding a new place to live at that time. For the model, I tried to keep the red and white color theme of the Empire that I had started with the Battle Master Empire infantry; however, since he is going to be a captain in the army, I wanted to give him some unique color to separate him from the regular troops. This turn out to be a light brown boots and hat compared to the deeper brown boots of the regular troops. I stained the sword's "Sigmar" engraving with a red wash, not entirely sure if I wanted it to be either a magic sword with a slightly red shine or blood soaked inside the engravings. Even though I did not paint the eyes, the shading seems to be good enough to give the impression of his eyes looking downward at his sword.

[Archives] Empire Duelist with Brace of Pistols

Empire Duelist with Brace of Pistols, Empire Duelist with Sword, Empire Captain with Hammer and Pistol, and Empire Captain with Sword and Orc Head are the last batch of miniatures I painted before starting this blog in 2015. These four metal miniatures were painted to be used as part of a Reikland mercenary warband for the Mordheim skirmish game. This model was used to represent a Reikland Youngblood, This model and the Empire Duelist with Sword are part of an Empire Collector's Miniature series from Games Workshop. Like the Duelist with Sword, the Duelist with Brace of Pistols looks more like a person in gear for a fight, but not necessarily equipped for war.

[Archives] Empire Duelist with Sword

Empire Duelist with Sword, Empire Duelist with Brace of Pistols, Empire Captain with Hammer and Pistol, and Empire Captain with Sword and Orc Head are the last batch of miniatures I painted before starting this blog in 2015. These four Empire metal miniatures were painted to be used as part of a Reikland mercenary warband for the Mordheim skirmish game. This model was used as a Reikland Youngblood. Nowadays, the difference in the level of detail between plastic and metal models is fairly low; however 5 years ago painting this miniature, the difference is quite huge especially when compared to the 1990s plastic models I had been painting. I also noticed how the the model can still look pretty good due to the detail of the model offsetting my rather simple paint job! Unlike the previous fantasy Empire models that I painted which are more soldier-centric in theme, the duelist looks more like a noble that is in gear for a fight, but not heavily armored for war. This makes it fit well for role playing games and as a mercenary in Mordheim.

[Archives] Hills, Citadel Modular

The Citadel Modular Hills are out of production terrain pieces from Games Workshop.

Four separate pieces combined into one large hill terrain.

Notes: The work on the Citadel Modular Hills were done simultaneously with the Citadel Hills. For both hill types, I wanted it be a medium green color with patches of other grass colors. Having 4 pieces of 2 unique sculpts, there are multiple configurations that I can use the versatile modular hill pieces. They can be used as table corner pieces, combined two together for table edge pieces, or combine 4 pieces together for one large hill. The original binder notes were on page 29.

[Archives] Hills, Citadel

The Citadel Hills are out of production terrain pieces from Games Workshop.

Te four heroes stands on top of  one of the two Citadel Hills (left)

Notes: The work on the Citadel Hills were done simultaneously with the Citadel Modular Hills. For both hill types, I wanted it be a medium green color with patches of other grass colors. The Citadel Hills are larger than each Citadel Modular Hill; however, when you combine all 4 Citadel Modular Hills together, the regular Hills are smaller. The original binder notes were on page 29.

[Archives] Warhammer Fortress

Painted Version

I remember looking at the Warhammer fortress 20 years ago, thinking how great it would be as a centerpiece for a fantasy game setting. Now, the castle looks rather simple compare to what is available today. I still like the castle for its modularity and that I can used it for both miniature war games and role playing games. The fortress is part of a project to create an adventure site that includes a town with at least 20 buildings.

Notes: The modular Warhammer Fortress can be set up in many different configurations. It can be made into one very long wall, half a castle, or even a small fully enclosed fortress. The gate can be opened and closed and there are 4 door accessories to represent additional entryways to the the towers. The paint scheme for the terrain pieces I worked on in 2010-2011 are very simple, but effective in my opinion. At the moment, the terrain pieces are not sealed with any varnish. The original binder notes for the work done to the Warhammer Fortress is on page 28.

My Hobby and Blog in July 2016

Wrath of Ashardalon adventurers and Castle Ravenloft Rat Swarms

The Four Heroes Workshop

Anything related to my projects, modelling, painting, etc.

Work in Progress

For the month of July, I have gotten back into painting miniatures. However, I only made progress for 1 of the 4 projects that I was working on in March. I hoped to get some more painting done for the Battle Masters miniatures in August.

[Log] Dungeons & Dragons Castle Ravenloft Monsters & Villains - Part 1

37 Monsters and Villains from Castle Ravenloft Board Game

This series of log entries list my plans and references to help me complete my painting of the remaining miniatures in the Dungeons & Dragons Castle Ravenloft board game. Last year, I finished painting the 5 heroes. What remains to be painted are the monsters and villains.

[Log] Dungeons & Dragons Wrath of Ashardalon - Part 1, Overview

Wrath of Ashardalon miniatures

This series of log entries list my plans and references that will help me complete my painting of the miniatures in the Dungeons & Dragons Wrath of Ashardalon board game. This is the second board game in the cooperative Dungeons & Dragons adventure game system. There is a total of 42 miniatures in the box set: 5 heroes, 7 villains, and 30 monsters (10 types, 3 of each).

My Hobby and Blog - May to July 2016

I have not updated this blog in a while! I was spending the time I usually put into the hobby to playing games and painting with my nephews and nieces. We have been playing Dominion card game and Dungeons & Dragons Wrath of Ashardalon board game. I am starting back posting in this blog as I work on painting the five DnD heroes from the s game. I still have quite a bit of miniatures on the painting bench (Orcs, Goblins, etc) that needs to be completed and lots of archiving to add to the blog. So here's hope I get back on track, though I doubt I will reach my target goal now.

My Hobby and Blog in April 2016

For the month of April, I accomplished very little and saw my hobby streak finally ended at 93 days. I spent the month mostly despruing plastic parts from miniature kits and following Kickstarters, specifically Rail Raiders Infinite and Rum & Bones Second Tide. The little I did worked on miniatures was adding shield emblems to ten Orc Warriors from Battle Masters. Lastly, I received the new rubber texture stamp line from Happy Seppuku, I am currently trying them out with different putties.

[Workshop] Texture Stamps

Updated on April 19, 2018. This post will be used to compile information on the use of stamps to create texture for bases and terrain pieces. Specifically, I have been using Happy Seppuku texture stamps. Their website have useful advice on how to use their stamps. Right now, this post is just a list of the stamps I have. I will update this post in the future on my experience with using them.

Rubber Stamp, 3" x 3" (left) and a Polyurethane Stamp 3" x 5" (right)

My Hobby and Blog in March 2016 #4

Working on 4 different projects simultaneously...

A quick post for the end of March.

The Four Heroes Workshop

Anything related to my projects, modelling, painting, etc.

Since the Last Update...

I started working on multiple projects at the same time...for better or worse! Most likely I will paint one or a group of figures together while planning out how to paint or to model the other groups of figures.

[Workshop] Magnets

Last Updated: December 4, 2017. I attached magnets underneath the bases of miniatures for the purpose of storage and transport of miniatures. I plan to make trays and shelves with a metal surface - 28 gauge galvanized steel sheet. Here is just a list of the different type of magnets I used.

My Hobby and Blog in March 2016 #3

The Four Heroes Workshop

Anything related to my projects, modelling, painting, etc.

Trying different skin color for Orcs and Goblins

Since the Last Update...

I touched up on Alain and Oriana. These have not been worked on as much since nephews and nieces have not been around.

I finished preparing all the Battle Masters Chaos Army infantry for painting. All infantry bases were painted and those models with eyes had them painted. I started work on the orcs and goblins skin, trying out three different green base coats. I think the light yellowish green color might be too light and different from the other skin colors. I likely will go with a darker green shade to those yellow-green skin orcs and goblins.

[Archives] King's Wall

The King's Walls from Warhammer Fantasy Battle 7th Edition starter box: Battle for Skull Pass Set were the first plastic items I painted that were not from the games I played as a child (Battle Masters and HeroQuest). Since I had more than one fence, I decided to experiment with them to see if I can identify differences between painting miniatures with a white or black undercoat. With the way I was painting back then--opaque paint coverage rather than a semi-transparent paint coverage--I really don't see much of a difference. It was a fun and fairly simple terrain piece to paint. I used the painted version of the King's Walls from the box front and back cover as a template for my paint scheme.

My Hobby and Blog in March 2016 #2

The Four Heroes Workshop

Anything related to my projects, modelling, painting, etc.

Preparation of Battle Masters Chaos Army for painting

Blog

I have decided on changing how I organize my blog again. I will use Logs posts for broader project updates rather than for just mundane updates. I will use the "My Hobby and Blog" posts for the smaller updates.

[Archives] Trees, Woodland Scenics

Last Updated on August 13. 2016 - Trees...lots of trees! I completed 14 trees and have 26 more trees that is near completion. I just have to complete their bases. The trees. however, are currently in a storage box until I have more game room space. The original purpose for these trees was to use them as modular difficult and very difficult terrain pieces for Warhammer Fantasy Battle. Now, I plan to use them as individual terrain pieces for skirmish games such as Infinity. Back then, I decided on a general theme for my game terrains--a battlefield stomped around by troops. So overall, the ground will be patchy with grass. The original idea was that the tree terrains will have slightly more grass than the other terrain pieces as armies would not trampled forest area as much as they would in open terrain.

My Hobby and Blog in March 2016 #1

Hello! The format of the "My Hobby and Blog" monthly posts will be slightly different. I currently like how I write small passages that do not warrant an individual blog post for each one and gathering them up into one post on a monthly basis. Instead of being just monthly posts now, I plan to post these on a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly basis depending on how many small passages I have written. In addition, these collection of small passages posts are compartmentalized into two general categories: "The Four Heroes Workshop" and "The World of Games and Miniatures".

[Log] Alain and Oriana - Part 2

February 1st, 2016 to February 15, 2016 - Here is quick update to what I have done on Alain and Oriana. Work on these was temporarily halted as I put the time into completing the Battle Masters Chaos Archers. Going to take the time to finish these two models now. Base coast was painted onto most of the different parts of the miniatures.

Front View...

[Archives] Hill, Homemade

I have collected miniatures and play games with them since the early 1990s. The late 2000s is when I started building, modeling, and painting game pieces. The very first thing I built for miniature gaming was this cardboard hill terrain. When I first made this terrain piece, I was quite happy with how it turned out. Since then, I have better terrain pieces to represent hills. In the future, I would like to go back to this terrain piece and convert it into some type of special terrain.

My Hobby and Blog in February 2016

Going to get this posted just before the end of February 2016! I want this blog to chronicle everything I have done, so that I can see my own progress and review my hobby work. It has been moving slowly and I am still playing catch-up on bringing my blog to what I want it to be. As of right now I have over 50 drafts of blog posts. Some of these blog posts contain notes for other sections that have not been added to the blog's main tabs: narrative, projects, and games. My immediate goal is to transcribe my handwritten notes from my hobby journal onto this blog. So by the end of March, I hope to have all the archive pages for Pre-2015 completed figures and terrains.

[Log] Battle Masters Chaos and Destruction - Part 4

February 20th, 2016 to February 25th, 2016 - This past weekend I finished painting the remaining Chaos Archers--the champion and 4 individuals each wearing attire showing their devotion or infinity to different Chaos Gods. With the first batch of archers, I varied skin color with mostly brown to yellow flesh tones. This second batch, I tried varying skin color with mostly reddish skin tones. Overall, I am pretty happy with how the figures turned out. I had ten identical figures and was able to make each one a little bit different through sculpting and paint scheme. I definitely see many areas I can try to improve on,  Two of these areas I will paid extra attention to is: 1) Have more patience and pay attention to details when sculpting putty onto a figure; 2) Work on greater details on the face, for example. better eyes and adding eyebrows.

Finished painting!

[Log] Battle Masters Chaos and Destruction - Part 3

February 1, 2016 to February 19, 2016 - Since the last update, I have added shading and highlights to all the chaos archers' attire. I then focused on each archer's skin and hair individually, completing the skin of 5 archers. Having so much of their skin exposed, the archers allowed me to better study and practice painting a wide range of skin color.

Archers placed from dark skin color to light skin color

Quantifying Lethality in Age of Sigmar - Initial Thoughts

Two to three months ago, I wrote about different categories to compare a subject's strength in AoS--Durability, Lethality, and Maneuverability  I list here my initial thoughts about measuring a subject's lethality-the potential of a subject to inflict damage. The basic stats pertinent to lethality are the number of Attacks, To Hit chance, To Wound chance, and Damage potential. Rend stats are also pertinent to quantifying lethality; however, the true value of this parameter depends on the Save value of the target being attacked. My thoughts on Rend in quantifying lethality will be made in a subsequent post. I have considered attack Range as part of the quantification of lethality; however, in the end I feel it is better for lethality ratings to be independent of attack Range values. I feel that it is a better fit to consider attack Range values as part of the subject's maneuverability rating since attack Range determines whether their is greater or less flexibility of the subject's positioning to realize the subject's full lethality and/or durability potential.

[Log] Alain and Oriana - Part 1

January 19, 2016 to January 31. 2016 - Oriana and Alain are Reaper Miniatures specifically made for Pathfinder. These are my gifts to my nephew and niece and not part of my collection. I let them pick a miniature from the online store and I am now going step-by-step with them the entire process.

[Log] Battle Masters Chaos and Destruction - Part 2

January 4, 2016 to January 31. 2016 - Since the first log entry on these archers, I have added magnet strips underneath the base, sculpted more fur on the Champion's cloak, undercoated them with black gesso and applied the first layer of paint on the miniatures. Except for the hair, everything have a base coat. In addition, the eyes were painted. Painting the eyes was when I decided to get new brushes.

My Hobby and Blog in January 2016

New brushes in their own containers!

For the month of January, I worked on the 10 Chaos Archers from Battle Masters box set and 2 Pathfinder miniatures--Alain and Oriana--from Reaper. The latter are gifts for my nephew and niece and are not part of my collection. Comparing these figures to the Chaos Archers there is quite a dramatic size difference. This is not just due to them being made from different companies, but appears to be a general trend of miniatures at the 25-28 mm scale getting larger. I am not so worried about the size discrepancy since normally there is a range of different heights between people. As I worked on these miniatures, I went out and expanded the tools and materials I used.

[Infinity] A Survey of the Generic Armies' Troop Types

Last updated on January 29. 2016 - I am really excited about Infinity--both the Corvus Belli's skirmish game and the upcoming Modiphius' RPG. For me, the miniatures are aesthetically pleasing and the setting is rather refreshing compared to other science fiction settings. I have been browsing the web to learn more about Infinity's background. This led me to the Human Sphere section on Corvus Belli Infinity's webpage where background for each of the 8 factions are given with a characteristic rating chart. There seems to be some discrepancy between these ratings with what is currently available for each faction. As someone who likes to survey and organize information, I decided to analyze and make comparisons between the 8 generic armies for the skirmish game.

[Log] Battle Masters Chaos and Destruction - Part 1

October 21, 2015 to January 3. 2016 - Now that I have finished painting the miniatures for the Battle Master's Imperial army, it is time for me to start the log for the Chaos side. The Battle Masters' Chaos Army have 60 miniatures. The models can be used for 4 different Warhammer Fantasy armies or for 2 Grand Alliances in Age of Sigmar--Chaos and Destruction. I will be working on the Chaos Archers first.  A theme for these Chaos Archers is that the unit consists of men from all different parts of the world.