Slowly, Slowly, Catchy Something

The title has a dual meaning. I've been working sick for a week (too much going on to take time off, and can't for another two weeks at least). I've also gotten nothing gaming done, including the stuff in my previous post.

I have, however, latched on to something else. (The curse of being easily distractable.) Exhaustion has led to a lot of reading, among which has been Games Workshop's The War of the Ring, a "mass battle" version of their skirmish LOTR game, and Warmaster, the mass battle version of Warhammer Fantasy and a forerunner to Black Powder.

I have the old Mines of Moria starter set somewhere and have always dreamed of using it at work. Given its literary inspirations, I could probably get away with it easier than other wargames. War of the Ring would have to be done at home, and the intent would be to do it with Paperboys. The catch is the base sizes, which are drastically different, and also differ between infantry and cavalry. Hits are managed by removing figures, though the cardboard counters I've been making would work as well.

The other option is Warmaster, which I've found uses the same base sizes as Paperboys, 20x40mm. Handy! There is also an Ancients version, which would enable me to use Roman, Greek, elephants, etc. that Peter Dennis has made - his fantasy figures are, thus far, limited. So far I'm leaning toward Warmaster.

Of course there's also Dragon Rampant, which would be a LOT simpler to use. Except that units come in sets of six or twelve. This is useful for cavalry, but maybe not infantry, unless I make stands of three or four... or just get around to buying and painting plastic, of course!

Whichever way I turn, I've printed several sheets of Paperboys Fantasy and will be cutting them to relax. It's been a long week, and I have a surprise three-day weekend before five days of work. I'll need it.

Slap Chop Termagants

Inspired by the "slap chop" method used by many Warhammer Youtubers, I tried it with these Termagants from the Space Marine board game.

Progressively drybrushed from black to grey to white, using Chaos Black spray and Army Painter Castle Grey, Ash Grey, and Matt White:

The "zenithal" method left the underside and claws black,
so I added a little more white.

The end result, painted with Flesh Tearers Red, Skeleton Horde, and on one figure I did the claws in Black Templar. Basing it loosely on Hive Fleet Kraken:

Sorry for the poor photo, left my phone at work.

Quite aside from the poor paint job (my fault for doing it in bad light), I'm not particularly impressed by the results; not especially bright, and the Skeleton Horde in particular is much browner than I expected. Perhaps I should have thinned it down. Or drybrushed much more heavily, more likely.

I think I will try the more conventional method next of undercoating in cream - but having already undercoated in black that may not work with this lot. In general it's okay, it just doesn't "pop" as much as I hoped. The regular method may be preferable for programming. Ah well, it was worth a try at least!

Stuff I'm not getting done

Alan of the Duchy of Tradgardland has been discussing the "Black Dog," a euphemism for hobby depression. Hadn't heard the expression before, but it's caught my interest as I've got the same thing - exhausted after work, I haven't been doing anything at all despite at least three tentative projects to work on. A little reading, a little watching of Youtube painting videos in a desperate effort to inspire me to paint something of my own. In between going to work, I've been imitating my sleepy cats! Haven't even eaten much, which at least has lost me a little weight. So in an effort to get past that, I'm listing my projects here.

I've taken most of the week off due to having to "use or lose" some of my leave hours. Let's see if I can achieve anything at all...

• Building and painting some Warlord Games French partisans, for my vague Very British Civil War project. Bought on the spur of the moment, these were fairly expensive so I really do need to do something with them, but have never painted anything civilian or WWII-ish so am not sure how to color them. Suggestions welcomed.

A squad of rifles, a couple heavy weapon teams, and a
"French 75" with crew.

• Trying another round of either Charge! or the One Hour Wargame variation by Grid-Based Wargaming. Both would use eight-wound elements, so I've made a handful of cardboard counters also inspired by GBW. I should probably use another scenario of Programmed Wargames Scenarios, as I've only tried the first so far. I'd like to go through them all in progression, but really should settle on a ruleset first.

20mm a side, these will denote casualties or hit points.

• Testing "slap chop" painting, that is progressively lighter drybrushing before using Contrast paints. This makes them very quick to show impressive results, which would make for a useful painting program at work, and luckily I have nineteen of the new plastic Termagants to work with. I need to try one to start with to see how it looks, and have collected bone, red and black Contrast paints to try with. If it works out, I'll pre-drybrush the rest, take them to work next week, and use them in my effort to restart a weekly gaming program for teens. I'm also considering recording a painting video in the same vein as Games Workshop ones, using the electronic gizmos in Youmedia to promote the teen space and interest kids in my own programming.

Painted black - mostly.

Will I actually achieve anything? Time will tell.