Good News Everyone!

I got my Lady justice set back and its awsome, need to get the December one out sooner or later but ADD strikes again.

In Mississippi (where I live) 99.9% of miniature gaming is GW. Lately I have discovered players of other systems and I am estatic!

First up, Flames of War! I have 2 fully painted armies for it and I love the system, due to its increasing popularity, 2 guys recently sold their 40k stuff and bought in.

Not sure what I want to add to right now, beside the new Vietnam stuff.

Next was another game I used to play, Warmachine. A couple of guys moved to MS in my area that play. I bought some Cygnar and some Circle for Hordes.

Still have a FOG army Im working with a guy I hear from every now and then..

My 40k guy will do my Warmachine/Hordes, will look around for FOW. The only other thing I want done is my 15mm Sci-Fi.

My Pan-O

They are almost done.They are painted by Legacy40k on Bartertown, a nice gentleman from Canada.

Interesting

Plasmablast games is cutting out the middle man. You can buy painted versions of their figures direct form them for 3X the cost of the mini.

They have a nice 6mm sci-fi line.

Secret Weapon introduces discount for commission painters

Secret Weapon Miniatures is offering a discount on orders from commission painters.

From their announcement:

Secret Weapon Miniatures is happy to announce a 10% discount for commission painters. This discount applies to all purchases made but cannot be combined with other promotional discounts. There is no minimum purchase and the discount will be applied automatically on all of your future purchases.

Visit our website for more information on how to sign up.

My Valks are done

More
http://picasaweb.google.com/BKArmyPainting/AdamCImperialGuard2?authkey=Gv1sRgCJGMzefykvaWcA&feat=directlink#

I am really liking this service

Decisions

I am looking to get some things painted, but cant make up my mind.

I need:

Heavy Gear/Battletech Thats 2 five man HG squads and 100 battlemechs.

2 Malifaux starters, cult of december and lady justice

15mm sci-fi

I also want to buy into WWII skirmish.

Thoughts?

Arcane Legions

http://www.arcanelegions.com/
is a psuedo pre-painted minis, psuedo CMG. It is now available in stores.

I have had the demo unit for it for awhile but havent played it.

It looks like instead of skirmish, they went for a army-type game.

Miniature Building Authority

I discovered this company at GameCon: Memphis.

They sell terrain from many genres/years/scales and have excellent 15mm, WWII terrain. This is the best choice for Flames of War.

The quality is fantastic and the buildings "broke apart" to be damaged, with detailed interiors.

All pre-painted. They are a bit pricey, but worth it.

They are available at discount from Noble Night Games. I got my Heavy Gear from them. They are also availble from thewarstore.

Paintedfigs.com now offering Dipping

Paintedfigs.com are now offering a dipping service and are having a contest with a Battle of Skull Pass set for the winner.

From their announcement:

A small contest: can you guess which, and how many, of these six minis have been dipped, and which haven’t? Guess right and there’s something in it for you (see end of article).

As you may have just realized, we’re now offering dipped miniature painting, which come in at half the cost of our standard painting rates. Painting starts as low as 99 cents per figure. You can check out our dipped pricing here on our prices page: http://www.paintedfigs.com/prices.html

One of our clients asked us to look into dipping as a way of offering painted Wargames Factory historicals at low rates. Assemble, basecoat, dip in Army Painter or Minwax, treat with matte varnish, and voila. In our search for the 99 cent Roman, we found first that we could do night goblins, gretchin and gnoblars for 99 cents, and most other infantry for $1.65.

GameCon: Memphis

I am back from GameCon: Memphis. It was my first time at this con. It was nice, heavy on boardgames.

FOW pre-paints

Flames of War is probably the fastest growing miniature game out right now. It really stuck a chord with gamers as an easy "historical" game.

The only problem for alot of people is the scale. Most gamers are used to 25mm or so. FOW is 15mm. Small, detailed guys that are hard to paint. Some guys get around it by just playing armor.

Alot of painting services have started doing the system. I think I paid around $1.25 per figure to get mine done. Now I have seen them as low as $2 a stand.

A few companies have started painting ready to go forces and selling them. Once such service is GAJO.

I fisrt heard of him when he bought another painting service that specialized in WWII stuff.

Looking at his pricing, he is charging $2.50 for Battlefront figures and $1.50 for other companies.

They look nice, but you can get the same quality for less.

Space Hulk

Played it last night, loved it. The minis are fantastic, but I have no use for a squad of Blood Angel terminators.



Im going to have to get a shitload of bits together to cover over the stupid blood drops. Whoever gets the this commision will probably need some green stuff expertise.

Something like this:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/231743

ECW Commission done

I got my final pics from igwarg minis

My most expensive commission to date at $7 a piece, but I like it. I think Im going to get him to do my Romans.

GW Painting Scores

Bell of Lost Souls posted an interesting article yesterday. Do soft scores belong in 40k tournaments? I wanted to comment on that. I will struggle to not editorialize on GW tournaments and stick to the subject.

One of the "soft scores" is painting.

Does it belong in scoring? I have to say since GW promotes a "hobby" and not a game, yes. I find their notion of a "hobby" stupid, however. You are not allowed to use other companies minis, bits or even paint. It should be called, "the GW way of life". Thou shall have no other companies before me.

I told you it would be a struggle.

Do the players think it belongs? That seems to be a different story. More and more people just want to play the game and not fool with the hassle of painting. In the last tournament I played in about 2-3 armies were completely painted, counting mine. Some had no painted figures at all.

With GW slowing backing out of the tournament scene its going to be left up to the indys. Right now they are still towing the old party line but with enough pressure that could change.

More and more people are doing the same thing I do, paying others. You are even seeing this at the Golden Demon level. Why people would pay hundreds for paintjob just to win an award is beyond me.

I think in the future things will change. I really see GW doing pre-paints sooner or later. Many companies are already offering them.

thewarstore pre-paints

thewarstore.net has offered a small selection of pre-paints for awhile now

http://www.thewarstore.com/PAINTEDMiniatures.html

Looking at the GW section they have a nice selection and have all you need for starting out. The price is really good. For $50 you get a painted tac squad. I pay that much plus I have to buy the models.

The uncharted seas stuff is reasonable too. I wish I had just bought mine painted like this.

The Privateer Press stuff is expensive, but so are the models.

I used to have the webpage of the company that supplies these, if I find it I will post it later.

Its a good idea and good quality but my only problem is you cant request anything. You can only buy up to a point then its up to you to match the paintjob.

However there are whispers in winds:

I'n the next couple months we should have some new & exciting hotness in the way of painted stuff... Stay tuned!!!

(And if this stuff works out, expect to see a LOT more variety in our pre-painted products going in to 2010)

- from thewarstore forum

Cromwell

My ECW Parliamentarians are almost done. I got this example photo from
http://igwargminis.com/



They look good. This was an expensive commission, probably my most expensive to date, at $7 a figure.

render unto caesar

Wargames factory had a great sale the other day. $9.99 for a box of Caesars legions.

So, naturally I picked up 3 after another local guy did. Our interest? Fields of Glory.


Box includes:
48 multi-part hard plastic figures
3 Centurions
3 Optios
3 Signifers
3 Cornicens
12 Standing Legionaries
12 Stabbing Legionaries
12 Throwing Legionaries
48 full-color rub-on shield transfers!

So thats 144 Romans I have en route.

I want to try for about 7 BGs of legionaries.

4 bases each BG

4 troops on each base.

= 112 figures

Depending on the job I may go with the guy doing my ECW stuff to do them, it would run about $7 a figure. With that many though, I think I would rather look for $5.

Battle Colours selling Sphere Wars and Alkemy painted sets

Battle Colours will soon be taking orders for painted Sphere Wars and Alkemy miniatures.

From their announcement:

Battle Colours have recently teamed up with the wonderful Tor Gaming company with a view to allowing gamers a chance to obtain miniatures for two fantastic fantasy skirmish games – painted.

The first will be the very new Sphere Wars miniatures. This game is in it’s infancy and we shall be able to give you the opportunity to purchase the miniatures painted by us here in the studio.

The second being the renowned Alkemy gaming miniatures from Kraken, again available through Tor Gaming or through us, and we will be offering these superb miniatures painted!

Painting orders can be taken from Saturday, 12th September 2009. Contact Battle Colours via their website www.battlecolours.com or by email battlecolours@blueyonder.co.uk

Sucks that its UK< but both games are more popular over there. I'm telling you quality pre-paints are the wave of the future! One day painting/converting will just be seen as "quaint".

The Great Battletech Project

My largest pile of unpainted lead is made up of Battletech mechs.
http://www.classicbattletech.com/

I aim to get all of these painted. This will be a project that will probably take 6 months at least as they number about 100.

Primarily they are inner sphere mechs, that I wanted painted like this:
http://www.camospecs.com/Unit.asp?ID=29
Primarily green, boltgun and yellow.

I feel like the scheme is easy and that the mechs are not that detailed. I will auto-reject any bids in the $10 each range.

I will get them done in lances. 2-3 at a time.

I am debating on doing half of them as Draconis Combine.

Yesterday my slide transfers from Fighting Pirannha Graphics arrived.

I will probably look for a service first of next week.

Better Update

That last one was from my phone, where I had spotty service. I was in North Carolina over the weekend. I was whitewater rafting for the most part but did manage to get in some fly fishing. I thought my tens of readers might be worried about my lack of updates. =)

I highly recomend noc.com for all your appalachian needs.

See all the fun things you have time to do when you dont paint? =)

I am here: noc.com

Pre-painted historicals

This is an interesting trend that has started recently.

Traditionaly historical gamers are a bit hidebound. They would never dream of fielding an unpainted miniature, much less one painted by someone else. I guess there is a new generation of historical gamers.

Old Glory started it all.


I do not own any, yet, but they appear to be of good quality, painted well. They only problem is with the Old Glory sculpts themselves. They arent the best you can buy in historicals, not that they are bad, just not the best you could get.

Old Glory choose specificly the most tedious army items for pre-paints, the line infantry. This way you could fill out your army quickly and detail your special units.

They are a good value too. Looking at these Union Soldiers you get 20 of them for $70, thats $3.50 a piece, thats really good considering that includes the cost of the miniature. They can be even cheaper with Old Glory's Army. You get 40% off that way.

They are great for skirmish gaming or Warhammer Ancients

Incoming!

So BFG has kicked off in my area. (I got a call) I have had a small imperial fleet for a while, but I think I put together 2-4 them wrong and they have most of the antenna broken off in storage, plus I painted them.





So.. a quick trip to bartertown netted me:

$50 shipped for the Chaos.

12 Imperial Cruisers, painted to a good standard
•27 Imperial Starhawk Bombers, primed and based

plus this tau fleet:

1 Explorer Class
•1 Merchant Class starship
•2 Hero Class Starship
•6 Defender Class Escorts
•4 Messenger Class Starship
•4 OOP Nicassar Dhows Escorts

I also have a marine fleet, with a battlebarge and 2 strike cruisers that I will need painted.

20mm Moderns

I got a message from the guy doing my 20mm moderns. He sent pictures:

They have not been sealed, waiting my approval. I like the figures, the paintjob and the price.

They were done by a new painting service, Dictator Games
http://www.dictatorgames.webs.com/

He was unable to meet the origianl deadline so gave me a nice discount.

AT-43

As you can imagine, for someone who pays others to paint, pre-painted minis are a godsend. It all started with CMGs, but AT-43 is the current king.

Ive been into this game since launch. The company has had its problems, but lets talk paint job.

"Good for pre-paints" doesnt do this line justice. They are painted really well. The lines are clean and the armor is detailed with camo and battle damage. The vehicles and armored suits are absolutely perfect. The only thing is, the faces of the infantry are not detailed. They are highlighted but have no eyeballs or anything.

Lets be honest, most people cannot paint at this level. Most armies you see on the table are unpainted, half painted or look like shit. Every club has 2-3 painting masters, past that it doesnt hit the AT-43 level often.

Choosing a painter

Once you post your ad, odds are you will recieve a handfull of responses to choose from. I will list the most likely:

New Guy: this is the guy who is thinking about painting for money. He maybe a good painter, maybe not. Odds are he has no idea what to charge for anything and thinks a little too highly of his own work. However it could work out with cheap good work, but dont count on it.

New Service: and individual or group that has just started and needs work to display to potential clients. Website may be up or in the process of going up. Usually these guys are a good deal, they are probably working bellow market and will give 110% just to have word of mouth and nice pictures on their webpage.

Established Individual: this guy has probably been painting for moeny for a while and knows his stuff. He should have examples of his work somwhere online. Price will be a factor in your decision as well as knowledge of genre.

Established Service: they are kind of the most boring responses to get. Its more "look at my website for quotes and examples" unless they need the business and then expect a better market rate.

Dont choose anyone without an example of their work either painted by them or a picture.

Incoming!

There is the beginings of a new army in this picture, can you see it?

My Painter

The main guy I use goes by Gubnutz on Bartertown. I found him a while ago when I wanted some 40k stuff painted. He was interested in starting his own painting biz, but I think I keep him too busy.

He does great work, converting and magnatizing when I need it, slide transfers you name it.

Since people have asked, here is some examples of his work:
(I need to dust some of them)

Cadians

I chose BK Armies for my Cadians.
http://www.bkarmypainting.com/

I got an email today with pictures of the army.

Im ironing out some details before final approval. I think I am going to have him do 2 Valkyries and an HQ immediately.

Incoming!

I just got the email confirmation from thewarstore that my Malifaux order has shipped.


http://wyrd-games.net/index.php

I was interested in it because of the following:

32mm heroic scale

wierd west setting

skirmish

no dice, uses cards

It looked really cool and was a big hit at GenCon

My FLGS can't get it at the moment. So I will be playing it at home until he can and I can do a demo.

Anyway, expect to see it here sooner or later..

Ambush Z

I got interested in Ambush Z when a friend said he was playing Ambush Alley.

http://www.ambushalleygames.com/

I knew Rebel Minis had a nice starter set available.

http://www.rebelminis.com/15amzstbox.html

I actually had a hard time finding someone to paint these. Most services did not paint 15mm figures on a regular basis.

I decided to take a chance on an established service that I had not used before. We agreed on a price of $1 a figure. That is less than I have paid for Flames of War figures.

http://www.middlepillarpathpainting.net/

This is the finished result:

Zombies ahead!

I think he did a great job. I'm not that crazy about the Rebel Minis sculpts but the price was right. MPPP was a quick service that I will use again in the future. They did a good job with a scale and genre they hadnt done before.

Posting an ad.

After you have decided on a place to look for a painter, you need to post an ad.

Before i get to that, I did want to say that game specific forums are another good place to look for a painter. Most have a painting/hobby section, either at the companies forum or a fan forum.

That being said, when you post an ad you need to be as descriptive as possible.

What you need painted

What condition its in

Any special instructions

Does location matter?

What you need painted is pretty self explanatory. IE: "I have a Space Marine tac squad I need painted"

What condition its in. This is important because alot of companies charge for assembly, basecoating, basing, ect. I usually get things done on the sprue, sometimes I have things that are assembled or primed. I have yet to run into a service who is willing to strip the minis of paint. So you may have extra work to do.

Any special instructions? You need to tell them what kind of painting scheme you have in mind and also you need to tell them ahead of time about any conversions, big or small. My Cadians I am having done, I wanted a simple 2 tone desert scheme with desert basing. I did need 2 demo charges converted and paid for it. You can usually request an example figure either mailed to you or photos before its over.

Does location matter? All of my posts are tagged with "US only please". There are MANY painting services all over the world and alot of US posts attract Canadian painters. I generally find the customs to be too much of a hastle to fool with outside painters.

I advise against putting "I am wanting to pay XXX amount of dollars" on your post. You want to treat like an auction, with the winning bid being chosen by you. There are several factors you should look for in a bid and I will cover those later.

Warhammer ECW

Warhammer: English Civil War is somethign I've been meaning to do for several years. I've had the book since it came out but I have delayed getting into it because all metal armies are expensive.
http://www.warhammer-historical.com/acatalog/English_Civil_War.html

The time period is facinating. It was the emergence of the "new model army". Swords and the like were being fazed out and gunpowder was being fazed in. Which left the army looking odd. Masses of pike flanked by massed muskets.Pike and shotte, which is a whole gaming genre.I also like the romanticism of the period. Royalists versus rebels.

Warlord Games has made it afordable:

.http://shop.warlordgames.co.uk/28mm-pike-and-shotte-158-c.asp
40 multipart plastics for $30.

I got a few bites on Bartertown, all from people who had never painted the period before I got an email from IGWARG MINIS.
http://igwargminis.com/photo3_3.html

He quoted me $7 for infantry and $14 for cavalry. Cannon counting as 1 infantry figure. Sounded good to me, especially as he only paints at one level. So I sent him the box and a Saker cannon blister.

I will let you know how it goes.

Starting

Alot of people are curious about getting things painted and ask me where to start. The first step is a budget.

Whatever you spend on gaming a month, halve it. Stop adding to an increasing pile of unpainted miniatures and dedicate half that money to getting things painted.

You need about $50 to start, so set that aside either in your hand or in the bank.

The next step is finding a painter. I dont recomend using anyone you know or game with, that only leads to problems. Painting alot of minis can be tedius and humans by nature are procrastinators. You will have much better results with professionals.

Where do you find those? I use two places.

The first place I go is the painting services section of Bartertown.
http://www.bartertown.com/trading/viewforum.php?f=21&sid=f762c283bce49915042f111b16185c73

The next place I would go is the painting services of The Miniatures Page
http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/topics.mv?id=34

I prefer Bartertown because the painters can PM you, on TMP you need to post your email address for them to contact you. However, if you are getting anything historical done, you need knowledgable people, odds are they are on TMP.

Heavy Gear: Northern Recon Squad

After a couple of conversations with my friend Sheldon, mostly about DP9s Jovian Chronicles, I picked up the current rulebook for Heavy Gear.

All i knew about it was it was a Battletech Clone that appeared in the mid 90s. I have never played it and only seen people playing it a few times, mostly at Coast Con.

This rulebook represents the 4th edition of the rules.

Background? Blah blah, you are talking to the wrong person for background. I will say its similar to battletech only the "gears/mechs" are alot smaller. Instead of towering mechs 3-5 stories high, these are only 2-3 times the height of a man. The pilots legs are in the chest of them.

Its also true combined arms. Most armies are not made up of all gears, most use tanks, infantry and field guns. You can even field all tank/infantry armies and be fine against gears.

The rules seem well thought out and detailed but not overly so.

I really like how you chose a force. It goes by point cost, called "threat value". The average seems to be between 750 to 1500 TV for the game. You also have a "priority level" that governs what you can field. 1-4 with the higher the level the "cooler" units you get to field.

To put it in 40k terms, for a priority level 4 game, you could take more terminators than you could at level 1. The only thing is, you get more objectives. If you take a priority level 4 force and I take a level 1, you have alot more you have to acomplish and harder objectives in order to win.

You can also buy support options, such as artillery and airstrikes.

Record keeping is minnimal, this really got my attention as it differs greatly from battletech. You can use small card size sheets for damage or you can just use the dice system they sell. Unlike battlech damage is not area specific, depending on what type it is, you get affected.

The rulebook also includes background and info for league and campaigns.

It has all the "Adam's Hallmarks of a Good Game"

1. point cost
2. initative (no IGOUGO)
3. premeasure at any time
4. varried movement rate
5. "to hit" modifers

Also the game is 1/144 scale (15mm)

I picked up 2/3's of the sample Northern army in the rulebook and went to same painter that did my Uncharted Seas, NGArt studios.
http://www.ngartstudios.com/



I was a bit shocked at the quote I recieved back. $10 a fig. I went ahead and did it. This is what I recieved in return:

They look good, detailed and clean. The models were multi-part and bagged individualy with parts. No problems there.

I did not argue the price, but I dont think I will go back. I am used to paying $5 per 28mm figure so a smaller one for twice the price, irks me a little. Especially with no slide transfers or conversions.

After they got their website up and running I see that $10 is their base cost. I got a bid from them on another project at that amount and I asked them about $5. They said they would only do a basecoat and ink for that amount.

I have no problems at all with the job, just the price. I have been getting things painted for about 10 years now and nobody charges that much anymore.

New game, new service

I was interested in the new(er) game Uncharted Seas.
http://www.spartangames.co.uk/uncharted.htm

It is unavailable at my local shop so I purchased a couple of fleets and a rulebook from the warstore.
http://www.thewarstore.com/

It sat around for a while, me losing the cards to one fleet and chipping the resin of another before I looked for a painter on bartertown.
http://www.bartertown.com/trading/

The "winning bid" came from service who was just starting out.
http://www.ngartstudios.com/

I was extremely pleased with the price, the work and turnaround time. I wanted a good "tabletop" level as the minis where not very detailed.

For about $30 I got:

Dwarf fleet:














Orc fleet:
















Great lines and shading, wonderful job. They even did the axes like I asked on the Orcs. I thought I had found a new service, but we will get to that later.