Monday, February 6, 2023

Artillery for Turnip28

Hi Folks!

So, now that I have the officers, rank-and-file and skirmishers done, let's move on to some stuff that makes a big bang on the table. Yes indeed, it's the artillery! In Turnip28 artillery are as prone to blow up their crews as they are to harm the enemy. But with grave risks comes great rewards, right? 

Stump Guns are the garden variety artillery in Turnip28 (heh, see what I did there). Think of them being similar to the artillery used in the late medieval period, but even more capricious and undependable. 


For a bit of fun and colour, I played around giving a verdigris patina to the guns using a variation I found on a YouTube tutorial (so handy for ideas). 

Next are two Rocket launchers. Again, quite dangerous contraptions, but they have the siren's sweet promise of wreaking havoc amongst your foes. If your dice are lucky. Maybe. Otherwise, well, at least the crew will get to see some sights as they enter the atmosphere.

Finally we have The Grand Bombard. This beast can be rather rude to the enemy, and in a pinch, its crew can even 'invite' Snob officers to serve as makeshift ammunition. So when the gunner says, 'We'll shoot you to the head of the column, Guv'nor', he's really not fibbing.



All of these whacky pieces of ordinance need to be crewed, so we have a half-dozen fanatical gunners, along with a brace of ammunition carts for them to gather around during their smoke break.

The rocket batteries, Grand Bombard and crew are from Knucklebones Miniatures, whereas the Stump Guns are from StoneAxe Miniatures and the carts from Mammoth Factory.

Thanks for visiting. I hope you all have a great week ahead.

- Curt


Wednesday, February 1, 2023

10mm Wood Elf Archers and Warhawk Riders

Hey there!

For a little change of pace this week I decided to add a few more units to my 10mm Wood Elf army which I laid the foundations for last year.

Included today are four units of archers along with a unit of warhawk riders.

It seems thematic that there should be scads of archers in an Elf army, especially elf archers nestled within a treeline - so here you go.


The pine trees are 3d prints. I like how they're a little chunky and abstract. I try to incorporate a bit of terrain with my bases as, in addition to adding a little visual interest, they also serve as a way for players to easily pick them up.

I had fun working on the feathers of the warhawks. I tried to keep it simple and relatively high-contrast.


Again, the tree-handle may help in their contact with Peter's over-enthusiastic digits. We'll see. :)

The figures here are all 3d prints from the very talented 'Forest Dragon'.

I'll be using these with M2, which is a clever fantasy variant of 'To The Strongest'. 

And to close, here's a pic of the collection as it stands. Other than a couple more command stands, I think I may have enough for an actual game - hooray!

Thanks for dropping in for a look and have a terrific day!

- Curt


Thursday, January 26, 2023

'Chaff' Light Infantry for Turnip28

Hellooo,

So, another small post from me for my T28 project. Moving on from the rank-and-file of the 'Fodder', we now consider the much-abused 'Chaff'.

As you can imagine from their name, Chaff are the light infantry of Turnip28. They're typically tasked to screen other units, nip around the battlefield to seize objectives, and generally be an annoyance. Similar to skirmishers from other systems, Chaff benefit from being able to deploy in a loose formation, making them harder to hit, and, as they sometimes clean their begrimed, rusted muskets, they are marginally less horrible shots than their comrades.

Here are two units of Chaff for my forces. One for the 'Rutabaga Brigade' 

...and the other serving 'The Fighting Fennel Fusiliers'. 

I wanted them to have a slightly different look than the Fodder, so, pulling from the artwork in the rules, I gave them each a pavise to lug around the battlefied (makes perfect sense, right?).  I had a bit of fun freehanding some unit heraldry on the shields. Granted, its pretty rustic, but I figure it fits with the overall setting of weirdness, decay and dissolution of Turnip28.





Next up for T28 will be the 'Brutes', or maybe the cavalry... or perhaps the artillery. No clue really. It'll sort itself out. 

Thanks for popping in for a look! 

- Curt


Saturday, January 21, 2023

Adventurers for Mork Borg/Forbidden Psalm

Hi there!

In addition to all things root vegetable and vehicular, I've also been bitten by the Mork Borg / Forbidden Psalm bug, and so have here five hapless and homely mooks to fit that setting.

For those not in the know, Mork Borg is a Swedish designed RPG set in a comically grim, world circling-the-drain, Scandinavian death metal world (in fact, there is a mechanic in the rules to count down the game sessions to its doomsday). The small format hardcover is a real treat, whose cutting edge design and layout has allowed it to scoop up eight Ennies this past year.

The Mork Borg mechanics are VERY minimalistic (only 4 stat lines for characters, and probably less than 10 pages of core rules) and as such are a doodle to get into. Character generation only takes a few minutes (which is a good as they usually get chopped up and/or eaten in fairly short order), and if you're too lazy to put in the time, you can simply use their online character generator (aptly titled, 'ScumBirther') to do the heavy lifting for you. At its core, Mork Borg is an open system, where the GM and players are encouraged to fill in the narrative with their own creativity.

Another great aspect to the rules is that their licensing is very permissive. The creators actively encourage adaptations and spin-offs of their core system. This generous licensing approach has created several creative spinoffs already, including 'Cy-Borg' (cyberpunk), 'The Last War' (Great War horror) and 'Forbidden Psalm' (Mork Borg tactical).  

Both 'The Last War' and 'Forbidden Psalm' are not true RPGs, but rather figure-based wargame-adventure systems similar to 'Rangers of Shadow Deep' and the ever-popular 'Frostgrave'. These Mork Borg spinoffs are great rules for a light, but frenetic night of gaming (and a low figure-count of only 5 in a party/faction). I've been running an online Mork Borg RPG campaign for some out-of-town friends, and hope to get some Forbidden Psalm games in with our local group soon. With this in mind, here is a faction for FS - five misbegotten adventurers, all destined, I'm sure, to come to a quick, nasty and sticky end. 

Nick the Pick



Witnail the Flail


Gavin the Glaive


Wesley the Weaver



and, Ishmael the Pickerel 



Knucklebones Miniatures has done a terrific job in capturing the oddball, comical and weirdly grotesque nature of the Mork Borg universe. In the setting, the 'heroes' are typically homely (if not hideous), but in an interesting way, and it gets even 'better' when you come across the baddies. Hopefully I'll have more Mork Borginess over the coming months.


Have a great weekend, folks!

- Curt

Thursday, January 19, 2023

Kushite Warriors and Pets

 

Our 'World Cinema' location in the Painting Challenge asks for something that is 'elsewhere from where you live'. Well, as I look at our snow covered environs I can think of nothing more 'elsewhere' than a bunch of half-naked desert dwellers, a lion, and a passel of African baboons capering around Egypt.

Lady Sarah on the pier overlooking Regina's (frozen) Wascana Lake.

Yep, here we have a group of fierce Kushite warriors, along with their even fiercer house pets. I saw these on the Footsore Miniature website and had to get a set. 

I understand that the warriors of Kush would wear animal hides and paint their bodies with vermillion and white ash - now, really, how much more fashion-forward can you get? Seriously though, I quite like the high-contrast effect of the white alongside the red. I think I may need more of these...

I don't know how the whole half-starved-lion-on-a-leash-thing worked, but I have a hunch that it probably resulted in a lot of OH&S paperwork from partially eaten handlers. 

Apparently the Kushites used baboons like guard dogs. Recalling my recent viewing of 'Planet of the Apes', I'm thinking, 'What could possibly go wrong?'  For a bit more colour, I decided to do these three up as Mandrills with their distinctive red and blue faces (though they are on the wrong side of Africa to be entirely correct, but let's not get hung up on specifics). 


Thanks for stopping by and have a great rest of your week!

- Curt