Teniente of the Armada, Matón – Complete!

Another night, another model finished.

With this pistol-rich lass, my Freebooter’s Fate starter crew is complete!  I would like to say it only took a week, like the Ortegas, but I cannot do so.  The last two did only take a couple of days, so if I had actually worked at it, I think I could have done it.

Here’s what took to get her done:

• Head: Midlund Flesh skin, Rucksack Tan hair, all with an Ogryn Flesh wash (I forgot that I used a Beast Hide base for the Arquebusiers hair…but that’s okay, she’s just a little blonder than them)
• Coat: Meredius Blue (originally my own Trollblood Highlight/Cygnar Blue Highlight mix, but when I had to do touch-ups, I used Meredius, and just repainted the whole thing) with an Asurmen Blue wash; Arcane Blue in the shoulder puff crevasses
• Dress: Greatcoat Greywith a Badab Black wash; Khardic Flesh tassels with a Baal Red wash (shirt got this as well)
• Leathers: Gun Corps Brown with anOgryn Fleshwash
• Pistols & Sword: Bloodtracker Brown handles; Pig Iron barrel and blade; Rucksack Tan other bits, waiting for some gold shine
• Base: Bootstrap Leather base and highlight, Devlan Mud wash (I may or may not add the pistol case)

And voila!

Again, she is tabletop standard, like the rest of the crew.  Like the rest of the models I paint.  Up close they leave much to be desired, but on the table they look great.  At least I think so.  And that’s what matters! …although it would be nice if you guys told me they look good, too, you know.

And with that, I can move on to something else.  Stormsmiths? WHFB Empire? Lilith’s Brood? Old West buildings?  All of the above?

Find out…tomorrow!

Thanks for reading.

Capitan Alonso Garcia – Complete!

My third Freebooter’s Fate miniature is complete.  I present to you, Imperial Armada starter crew’s leader, Capitan Alonso Garcia:

Again, I followed the stock colouring, but did make a few changes, mostly due to paints I have.  Speaking of which:

• Cape: Trollblood Highlight underside, Underbelly Blue and Asurmen Blue wash topside
• Uniform: Some sort of accidental mix of Trollblood Highlight and Cygnar Blue Highlight, with Rucksack Tan trim (going for a NMM here, as I don’t have a good gold paint); also some Trollblood Highlight and Frostbite in there
• Leathers: Gun Corps Brown with an Ogryn Flesh wash
• Base: Bootstrap Leather with Devlan Mud wash; Cryx Bane Base cannonballs in a Bloodtracker Brown/Devlan Mud case.
• Head: Midlund Flesh with Ogryn Flesh wash, Greatcoat Grey hair and moustache

I think he looks cool.  He’s definitely also at the tabletop quality level, looking good from not-too-close-up, and not looking to win any awards.  So I’m happy with him.

I still haven’t done anything with the eyes, as I don’t like painted eyes on models.  I might have to give that area another wash.  On the Arquebusiers too.  And as for the ‘gold’ trim, as soon as I get some better gold paint, I’ll shine those up.

I have two incentives for finishing the Capitan, and then the Teniente as soon as possible:

1. I get to play with a painted crew next Tuesday when we learn the game, and
2. The sooner I finish a handful of models that I’m working on, the sooner I can pick up a Dark Age starter box!

Yeah, I have just enough will-power to wait until I’ve painted a few more models before buying more.  Of course it’s completely self-imposed, this restriction, but I’ll be proud of myself if I can keep to it.  With a desire for Urban War Junkers (and Viridians, so I can demo the game when I join the League), and Hell Dorado Westerners if Loy is up for it, I’ll need to get the Dragyri from DA done as soon as possible, too.

And the plans continue, evermore.

Thanks for reading.

Arquebusiers Finished!

Woohoo! w00t! Hurrah!

Yes…I really am that happy about it.

So, last night I was really lucky that my wife fell asleep at the same time as the baby (to avoid embarrassing her, I won’t tell you what time that was), so I got extra, extra hobby time.  I did spend some of it playing Call of Duty (after about two months of not playing it – thanks to Skylanders – I’m still pretty darn good!) and scouring youtube and hobby sites and blogs.

But I sat down and painted, painted, painted. 

I know…more crappy pictures.  I promise I’ll find a way to take good ones soon!

In the end, they didn’t turn out as good as the Ortegas did, even though they took a lot longer.  But in my opinion they are great at tabletop distance, and I learned a lot about how to do more if I end up wanting more.  Hopefully a week from Tuesday (stoopid Valentine’s Day) we’ll get to try Freebooter’s Fate out for the first time.  If I do end up buying more, I will do a stage-by-stage tutorial of sorts.

But until then, and because I need to remember it myself, here are all the paints I used on the different parts of the models:

• Skin: Midlund Flesh, Ogryn Flesh wash
• Hair: Beast Hide base, Rucksack Tan highlight, Ogryn Flesh wash
• Uniform: Meredius Blue base, Arcane Blue inside shoulder puffs, Asurmen Blue wash; Greatcoat Grey lapel; Trollblood Highlight waistwrap; Frostbite shirt
• Leathers: Gun Corps Brown straps, belts, boots, Ogryn Flesh wash
• Rifle: Bloodtracker Brown wood, Ogryn Flesh wash; Pig Iron metals, Badab Black wash
• Details: Cryx Bane Base shot cannisters/tubes; Molten Bronze buckles/buttons (I didn’t like this, will change next time)
• Base: Umbral Umber base, Bootstrap Leather highlight; Trollblood Highlight rocks, Badab Black wash

And there you have it!  15 paints, 3 washes…I think 6 different brushes?  And too many hours for two deckhand models.  Grunts just shouldn’t take so long!

So, yeah, I’m not completely done.  I still need to add some grass to the bases, but I’ve never done it before, so I’m going to practice on some WHFB models first.  But these two are tabletop ready, so they’re pretty much finished in my books.  I also found some bits I need to re-re-touch-up while looking at the pictures I took, so a few more minutes of that as well.

Before I move on to the main characters from the Imperial Armada starter set, I’m going to go distract myself with some other models first.  Because I do that sort of thing.

Thanks for reading.

Arquebusiers Coming Along

So now that Andrew has picked up some Amazons, and Loy has picked up some Brotherhood, I have more motivation to work on my Imperial Armada starter.

While I’ve lost the painting energy I had last month, I’m plugging away at these guys.  Last night I did a touch more work on the Arquebusiers. 

Still nothing special, but I’ve got most of the basecoats down, including the hair.  I just need to work on a few more areas, get the details done, and do some touch-ups.  Then I’m ready for shading and highlights   Oi!

As you can see, the female’s rifle broke off.  Normally I’d be a little upset, but this will help me get to those hard-to-reach areas better, so I don’t have to struggle so much.  I might rip off the dude’s rifle so I can do the same

Sorry the blog has been sort of boring lately.  Hopefully I can get something more exciting up soon.

Thanks for reading.

Workbench Update – Freebooter’s Fate, Warhammer Fantasy

We’re going to ignore the last Workbench Update and pretend like it never happened.  Instead, this is the Workbench Update that you need to pay attention to!

Freebooter’s Fate

So like I said the other day, going is slow on these Imperial Armadians (?).  I haven’t spent a lot of time at night this past week doing hobby stuff, as my son has caught a cold and I keep having to go and help him get back to sleep.  It’s hard to sit down and paint when that’s the case.  But I have done a touch of work, and right now I’m focusing on the Arquebusiers.

I should probably list the colours I used, so I don’t forget them.  Just in case I ever buy more and want to match them:

• White prime
• Midlund Flesh skin
• Pig Iron metals
• Gun Corps Brown boots, belts, pouch
• Trollblood  Highlight buttoned shirt
• Frostbite undershirt
• Meredius Blue uniform

Hopefully as soon as the kid’s cold is done, he’ll sleep better again and I can get cracking on these guys.  I want to get back to the good painting flow I had a few weeks ago.

Warhammer Fantasy

Well, we’re finally getting Warhammer Fantasy back on the table this Tuesday.  Can’t wait.  I’ll be playing a 500pt Empire army against Andrew’s Lizards or Daemons, if he can finish building them by then.  Who knows?  Maybe Loy will want to bring out some Dark Elves or Bretonnians at 500pts, and we can get two games in.  That would be nice.

Anyway, between getting pumped for WHFB and Andrew’s fire-painting tutorial-like post on Tale of Gamers, I had an urge to get my Empire Fire Wizard painted. 

He’s nearly there, actually.  Most of the base colours are down, so I really just need to finish some details, do highlights, clean up and finish the base!  Heh, that’s all.

And for completeness:

• Khador Red robes
• Baal Red wash
• Midlund Flesh skin
• Bloodstone hair
• Cygnus Yellow embroidery/fire
• Quick Silver sword/staff

I do apologize for the cruddy pictures.  My desk is once again in a crazy-messy state.  I figured I’d rather have the pics to post than tidy up at the moment.  I’ll get it done tonight.  Hopefully while I’m waiting for various paints to dry.

Thanks for reading.

 

Imperial Armada…Slow Going, But Going

While my painting time hasn’t petered out totally, the last few nights I’ve had less time to work on hobby stuff than earlier in the new year.  I was able to get the Ortega crew finished in a week.  The Imperial Armada set that I picked up on Sunday, is not early done.  Of course, it is quite possible that I will find the time over the next few nights to get them finished, but it’s doubtful.  They might be a “Crew in a Week and a Bit.”

I’ll give a better review of the models at a later date, but for now I will say that I am most impressed with these miniatures by Freebooter’s Fate.  Absolutly no flash, and only very, very minimal mold lines to clear.  Aside from only a single bit of skew on one of the faces, I can say that these look great out of the box, with very easy assembly.

While I’m not certain about the square bases for a skirmish game (but don’t quote me, as I haven’t played the game yet), I do like that they come with an insert already.  This saves me from having to make my own or use a bought one (even though I do love Dragon Forge stuff). 

So, in metal and primed, they look good. And as you start to lay down some paint, they get looking even better.

I’ve only managed to get the skin and some clothing down, but already I’m seeing how cool these models might look.  I just want to do a good job, and will be highlighting these guys more than I did the Ortega crew, just to see how I like the more “GW-style” look over the ”realistic/historical” look that I usually go for (like Loy said).

You might be able to tell, but for the clothing I’m going with turqoise.  Not what I was originally intending to do, but after mixing blue and grey to make the leader’s clothes, I ended up with a turqoise.  Then I figured I’d just use the premade one (Meredius Blue by Privateer), and so now I’m going with that.  Easy. 

I’ll explain more later, when I’ve got more to show.  But it’s a game night tonight, and hopefully my next post will be all about the awesome games I played.  Many, awesome games.

Thanks for reading.

Miniature Temptations – Freebooter’s Fate

Another game that calls to me.  “Buy me.  Own me.  Play me!”  But with a pirate accent.

When this game first came out I was instantly interested because a) it’s about pirates, and b) there’s a deck of cards.  At the time I was heavily into Malifaux, and so I felt I already had a cards-instead-of-dice game going.

Well, Freebooter’s Fate seems to be rising in popularity these days, what with the new Amazon faction and expansion book, reviews up at Frontline Gamer, and even some local minis players are picking it up (they get into a lot of games, and I don’t usually play with them, but I’ve been thinking about joining them recently, especially now that I can come out a touch more regularly).  I’m not normally one to jump on bandwagons, but I’m always up for buying into a new game, even though I really shouldn’t.  Really shouldn’t.  But Meeplemart is now carrying it, and that’s never good for my willpower.  I did some looking around the last few days, and after reading Frontline Gamer’s posts, the older week-long look at the game at Miniature Musings of a Bear, and scoping out various other sites (if you go to the “Reviews” section of the Freebooter’s Fate website, there are even more links to reviews and videos and stuff (a.k.a. more enablers for my ‘problem’)). 

And now I’m pretty sure I’m going to be getting into it.  In fact, I am heading to Meeplemart shortly, and I’m probably going to order the Imperial Armada starter box:

*

*Image from Freebooter’s Fate website.

Well, I guess I’m skipping to the verdict a little early, then!  The verdict?  Yes to Freebooter’s Fate.

This is actually a pretty impulsive decision, especially since I was planning on ordering a Junker’s starter for Urban War.  But it looks like Freebooter’s Fate is winning the ‘next buy’ spot, and Urban War (among others) will have to wait another month or two.  Or less.  Because I have that ‘problem,’ remember.

If I go through with it, you can expect some Freebooter’s Fate posts in the coming weeks.  The low model count means that I might have another “Crew in a Week” challenge for myself.  I think I might put even more effort into these guys than I did with the Ortegas, but no promises. 

I’ll let you know tonight if I pulled the trigger.

Thanks for reading.