Monthly Archives: April 2013

What’s On My Workbench – Right Now

Hey all.  It seems like I have a lot of stuff “in progress” at the moment.  Some of that is because I’m waiting on 30mm bases from Litko.net for my GZG Spider Drones, so I decided to move on to something else while I wait – some Khurasan and GZG minis I had waiting for paint.

all_in_progress

In the front are Khurasan’s Little Green Imperialist Warriors.  I painted them last night, dullcote’ed them this morning before I went to work, and tonight I started the basing process.  I use vinyl wall spackle mixed with water, sand and very small rocks (more like big sand).  As you can see, it’s still wet.  If it’s dry enough before I go to bed, I’ll get a coat of paint on it.  Then a nice wash, and maybe I’ll glue some sand on.

 

left_side

On the left in the back are what’s left of GZG’s Ravagers pack A – their brothers and sisters are already done.  In front of them are 3 of Khurasan’s Scientists.  The 4th is a dead scientist, and I’m not really interested in him, so he’s in a box somewhere.

Finally, in the front, is Khurasan’s Cyborg Supercop.

 

right_side

Last, but not least, are the 12 GZG Spider Drones.  As you can see, 8 of them are painted, waiting for their bases, and the other 4 are partially painted.

 

Well, that’s where I’m at today.  I’ll feature each of these models in more detail when they are complete.  The  Little Green Imperialist Warriors should be up tomorrow or Friday.

 

Happy painting!

Eclipse Phase – “Transhuman: The Eclipse Phase Player’s Guide” kickstarter now up and running

Transhuman: The Eclipse Phase Player’s Guide kickstarter is now up.  I first found out about Eclipse Phase just last week. It’s a Sci-Fi roleplaying game that is licensed under the Creative Commons.  I’m a huge open source supporter, in software and in the arts.  I’m in a rock band, The Experiments, and all our music is Creative Commons licensed.  So, it’s a no brainer that a Creative Commons Sci-Fi RPG is going to get my support. 🙂

Just yesterday, my Eclipse Phase hard copy rulebook arrived, and it’s just gorgeous.  Hardback, thick paper, vivid colors, built in ribbon bookmark – it’s the most beautiful rulebook I’ve ever seen.

So, I’ve supported this kickstarter, and I urge you to do so, as well.

Alien Plants

Continuing on with porting my older Imgur articles to this new blog:

I followed this tutorial on the excellent TerraGenesis site and made some alien plants from plastic drinking straws.

alien_plants_w_yellow_900_web

I painted them green, and washed them with black.  Then I based them on some wood rectangles I got at the local craft store.  I glued some sand on the bases and I was done.  Or so I thought.  They looked a bit drab, so I added the yellow to the ends and it really made them pop.

If I was to do them again (and I will, I plan to make a bunch more) I would wash them with brown.

It was a really quick and easy terrain project.

Identifying Squads with Magnet Attached Flags

Before I started this blog, I used Imgur.com to post my projects – pictures with brief captions.  There are several albums over there that I’ll be “porting” over to this blog, a kind of catching up when I don’t have a current project to report.

Right now I’m in the middle of painting 12 of GZG’s Spider Drones, and it’s taking a bit longer than I thought, plus the bases for them are on order, so it will probably be another week before I can show you the results of that.  In the meantime, here’s “Magnet Flags” :

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One of the things I love about 15mm Sci-Fi wargames is how generic everything is.  This means my figures have multiple uses.  Not only can I use them for multiple rulesets, but I can split my force in two for a smaller battle with just my own figures, or use the whole army against someone else’s army, or use them for RPGs like Traveller or Eclipse Phase.

Because of this, I need to keep my forces flexible.  In a game like Gruntz, it’s convenient to identify the squad leader, and, by extension, the squad. In one game, a particular figure might be a squad leader, in another, just a grunt.  To facilitate this flexibility, I use magnets on the base of certain figures to attach a flag that identifies the squad.

package

I bought a magnet starter kit. It comes with 50 magnets and the drill bit for $8.99 at TheWarStore.com

 

base

I added the magnet to the mini’s base. I drilled out the plaster part of the base and super-glued the magnet in. Make sure you have the same polarity on all your bases.

 

flag

Then I glued a magnet to a toothpick flagpole. I used epoxy to glue the magnet, because the superglue didn’t hold. Make sure you have the right polarity, or the magnet will not stick to the base magnet.

 

flag_on_base

And here’s the result.

 

strength

It’s a pretty strong hold.  As you can see, you can pick the mini up by the flag with no problem.

 

flags

Here’s the flags in progress.  I have black and green flags for when I want to divide my minis into two forces.

Thanks for reading!

GZG’s 15mm Fuel Drums

I painted up GZG’s 15mm fuel drums (type A) the other day.  They were easy to paint.  I primed them black, dry brushed on some gray, then a smaller dry brush of red-brown for rust.

I based them on some small wood rectangles, then glued some sand on the bases.  Then I washed the sand a sepia color, then dry brushed the sand with a tan.  When that was all dry, I brushed on some very thin PVA glue-water mix to hold it all together a bit more permanently. The I dry brushed some more tan, as I felt it needed a bit more.

GZG Fuel Drums GZG 15mm Fuel Drums

 

That makes for some cheap and easy terrain. 🙂

In the past, I had assembled a card stock “print-and-fold” barrel, and it took a lot of time to cut the small bits out, and gluing such a small thing was tricky.  I think these metal barrels we easier, quicker, and much more durable.