Goblin Order Received! Let the Games Begin!

Just another quick update on my Battlelore Upgrade Project.

I received my Splintered Light Goblins Order yesterday. It was packaged well and the sculpts were crisp and look like they will paint up a treat. I’m particularly pleased with the Terror Birds and Hill Giant which are especially great sculpts.

This evening I sat down and glued them all to washers in preperation to be based and undercoated.

Click on the photo to enlarge it.

So I certainly have my work cut out for me over the next few weeks!

I also got some samples from their Splintered Lands Dwarf Range. Seriously, these are some of the best Dwarf sculpts going around (I was going to limit that to 15mm, but I think they are that good.)

They are the same height as the Battlelore Dwarfs, but are a bit bulkier in places and smaller in others. SLM have minis to replace all the Dwaf units in the game except Bagpipers, Cowriders and Spearmen. So I can only hope Splintered Light have some spearmen and riders in the making. If they have riders, I can sub in some either Buffalo or Horkuns for their mounts. I know some people (probably most notably Jim) would think that subbing the Dwarf Bagpipe players for Dwarf Hornblowers would be sacralidge, but that may be an option also.

Here is a photo of the scale of the Dwarf minis.

I also placed my Hexon II order yesterday and so they will be on their way over as well. Its all getting very exciting now.

If anyone has any recommendations for 15mm Humans that will serve as replacements for the Human Battlelore figures, please let me know.

I intend on replacing the Troll figure with either the new Troll figure from Splintered Light Minis

or the Troll figure from Otherworld Minis.

The Giant Spider will be hopefully replaced by Ebob’s Giant Spider.

No idea on the Earth Elemental yet…

I’ll hopefully update later in the week with some painting.

- Ben.

One Down… Lots to Go!

This is just a very small update really. But I wanted to share it anyway.

I finally had some time free today to sit down and paint. I was able to knock out my first Upgraded Battlelore unit – the Goblin Slingers.

Click on the photo for a High Resolution photo

I just need to touch up the banner a bit, not sure on what sort of paint scheme to go with that, but the Slingers as a unit are done.

I’m really happy with how they came out. They were very enjoyable to paint and took no time at all really.

The way I am going to approach this is one unit at a time. My goal is to complete at least two units a week.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed these guys, thanks for looking!

- Ben.

PS. These little slingers also have their first Song of Blades and Heroes outing next week, so wish them luck

Weasel Clan Goblin Slingers Step by Step

With the 15mm Splintered Light Weasel Clan Goblin Slingers undercoated and ready to go, I needed to devise a colour scheme that I’d be happy with.

I have several Splintered Light Goblins (mainly Bat Clan) around the place that are painted in a Shadow Grey/Blue sort of scheme. I love these guys and was really happy with the scheme, but for my Battlelore set, I wanted to go a little bit more traditional. I’m not sure why, just a feeling. Below you will find a step by step of how I painted my test model and which colours I used. I hope you find it interesting.

• STEP 1: Heavily Drybrush the base Khemri Brown (GW) using a largish brush. I began with the base, so that if I accidently painted over the goblin’s feet, I could touch it up easily. I also gave the body a basecoat using Light Green (Vallejo) using a size 1 brush. I painted the eyes Deep Sky Blue (Vallejo) using a 5/0 brush. After allowing the paint to dry, I gave it a Thraka Green (GW) wash.

• STEP 2: I lightly drybrushed the base with Dheneb Stone (GW) and then, using a 2/0 brush, I painted Scorpion Gree (GW) highlights on the raised parts of the body.

• STEP 3: I cleaned up the eye a little bit and then painted the shin straps, sling and loincloth Khemri Brown (GW).

• STEP 4: Using Dheneb Stone (GW), I highlighted the shin straps, sling and loincloth. I also painted the belt and rock in the sling Charadon Granite (GW)

• STEP 5: Spinning the model around, I began to work on the shield. The shield itself has a raised “hub” in the centre of it which makes it difficult to accurately paint the Battlelore Goblin shield logo onto it. So I improvised and made a slight change (making the raised part the yellow moon) The arc at the bottom of the shield is Gory Red (Vallejo) and the “hub” is Tausept Ochre (GW).

• STEP 6: I highlighted the “hub” using Golden Yellow (GW) and the arc with Bloody Red (Vallejo). I also painted a small star using White (Vallejo)

• STEP 7: I then highlighted the belt and the rock with Khemri Brown (GW) and painted the Weasel cloak with Tausept Ochre (GW), here is the front and back so far.

• STEP 8: Was simply a matter of giving the cloak a wash of Devlan Mud (GW) and lightly flocking the base. It will now get two coats of Matte Varnish and will be ready for play.

CONCLUSION: I’m really happy with how he came out and will be sticking with this paint scheme for all my goblin slingers. The shields will stay the same for all Goblin models, as will the skin colours. All in all, he didn’t take long to paint (especially for a test model). A little over half an hour. For me, on a test model, this is a pretty fast time. To paint the rest of these little guys it won’t take as long as I will employ batch painting techniques. This bascially has you lining up a number of models (in my case probably 8 models) and then completing one section on all the models before moving to the next section. For example, I would start with the skin base colour Light Green (Vallejo) and paint all the models using that and then do the wash on all the models etc…

I hope you have found this interesting/useful. I would love to hear your thoughts or comments/suggestions, so feel free to post here, at TMP or at BGG.

- Ben.

Some Musings and a Start on the Battlelore Upgrade

MUSINGS

I sat down last night and went through all the miniatures that I needed to get for my Battlelore Upgrade… its alot…

…210 of those miniatures are humans… So I thought that in the spirit of not getting burnt out, I would pace myself. The first miniatures to tackle would be the goblins. I already had a pack of the Splintered Light Weasel Slingers and a couple of others, so I went and ordered a bunch more to complete my Goblin Hoard. David was very accomadating in letting me substitute some riders for the Komodo Dragons and Terror Birds.

In fact, it was suggested to substitute the Light Infantry Bat rider models for use with the Terror Birds – great suggestion.

WHAT YOU NEED FOR GOBLINS

So if you are wanting to attempt this as well, you will need the following (all from Splintered Light Miniatures:

1x Goblin Archer pack (Hobgoblin Archers)

1x Goblin Medium Cavalry on Wolves pack (Hyena Riders)

1x Goblin Wolf Clan Warriors (to use as Red Banner Hobgoblins)

1x Goblin Warriors 1 (Green Banner Infantry)

1x Goblin Warriors 2 (Blue Banner Infantry)

1x Goblin Spears (Goblin Spears)

1x Komodo Dragons (with 6 medium goblin mounts) (Lizard Riders)

1x Terror Birds (with 6 light bat rider goblin mounts) (Ostrich Riders)

1 x Weasel Clan Slingers

Then you need to sort out the Drummers and Band Leader figures. For these I was thinking of using the Goblin Drummers from the Command pack as the regular drummers and then using the Dancing Shaman model as the band leader. I was going to sculpt a large drum that the Shaman can dance on as the Drum leader. When I’ve done this, I’ll be sure to include pics

MAKING A START

I already had a packet of Weasel Clan Slingers, so got started by basing them.

• I simply cleaned up the model (which took no time as they are great casts) and then super glued it to a 20mm round washer.
• PVA glued some fine ballast down
• Undercoated black
• My next step is to paint them!

Here is a photo of what they look like before undercoating.

A GOOD “BASE-IS” IS IMPORTANT

I quickly whipped up some more bases this morning to get ready for my incoming Goblinoid hordes. I have shown some steps below.

• First, rule up the base from corner to corner and down the middle. Place the 20mm washers in a pleasing arrangement, leaving enough space between them to be cut. Mark the centre of the washers with a pen. This will be the same size as the drill bit (for the hole saws I’m using) You will also need to mark where you want to place your flag.

• Next, drill the holes using your hole saw. I clamp the base down to my bench and then drill the holes. I don’t go right through in one go. I drill about halfway down and then flip the base and finish from the other side. I’ve found that this helps to cut down on splintering or cracking the wood.

• Give the inside of the holes a quick sand to smooth off any rough edges and then glue to a solid base. Use hand clamps at each end to secure them solidly.

• After about half and hour you can take the clamps off and tidy up any excess glue with a stanly knife or matchstick (for in the holes). Use a small drill bit and drill a hole for the flag right through both pieces of wood. Then you can decorate the base however you like. I chose to glue ballast down, undercoat black and then paint and flock, but you can do this however you like.

TESTING THE SIZE OF THE BASE AGAINST THE SIZE OF THE HEXES

I printed off a test hex the size of a Hexon II hex shape and placed the bases over it to gauge how effective it would look. I’m quite happy with it to be honest.

Since being happy with the sizing, I have enquired with Kallistra the cost to order 1 box of Light Brown Hexon II boards and a number of individual hexes. To make up a basic Battlelore board, you need the following:

• 1 box of Hexon II boards (21 boards of which you need 18)
• 5 Individual Hexes

Then of course you need hexes for woods, hills etc… but they can be made easily other ways.

WHAT MINIS FOR THE HUMANS?

The human miniatures are going to be actually more difficult to replace than I first thought. I need 15mm minis for the following:

• Mounted Knights with Sword
• Mounted Swordsmen
• Foot Knights with sword
• Swordsmen on Foot
• Light Infantry on Foot w/swords
• Archers
• Mounted Knights with lance
• Arbalestiers (maybe crossbowmen will be alright for these)
• Spearmen
• Halberdiers
• Hornblowers

If I can’t find some of these (like the hornblowers for example) I can simply cut the existing Battlelore mini off its base and rebase it like so:

This is of course a last resort as I do want to replace them with metal minis, but it will do until I find suitable replacements.

So there you have it, tune in for more progress over the next couple of days.

- Ben.

Upgrading Battlelore

Battlelore is a game I have enjoyed from the day it was released. A simple, yet deep, tactical battle game.

I currently own all the expansions to it (even the dodgy Troll one… don’t even ask) and have played many great games with them. If you take a gander over at the Battlelore section on Board Game Geek, you will see a plethora of fantastically painted miniatures that people have done over the years. It certainly is a great feat to complete the painting of all your Battlelore minis. I myself have attempted to paint them over the years – rather unsuccessfully. To be honest, I have about 15 units painted up and based with a system that I thought would work for me.

You see, one of Battlelore’s greatest criticisms, is that it takes ages to set up. So alot of people have designed basing systems that allow the models to be stored in units. Jim over at Board Game Geek comes to mind straight away – he has a complete painted set which is fully based – congratulations mate – fantasic job!

I know I’m rambling a bit at the moment, but I’m trying to get to the fact that I don’t really like the style of Battlelore miniatures… I LOVE the game, but the miniatures are for me, not the greatest. I find the bendy plastic a pain to paint and the sculpts themselves are a little plain for my liking. Call me crazy, but recently I started a massive project that I know will take me a long time. A project to upgrade Battlelore.

Upgrading Battlelore needs to be for more than aesthetic reasons though (even if they are the primary concern ), so I needed to make a list of priorities which the project would follow:

• The miniatures need to look great
• The board needs to look great
• The miniatures need to based in a way that is easy to store and speeds up setup
• The miniatues need to based in a way that I can reuse them for other games
• The bases need to be created in a way that I can use them for other games
• The board needs to be capable of fitting the new basing system effectively

So with these ideas in mind, I set off in search of the holy grail.

My first find was the Hexon II Terrain boards which are distributed by Kallistra… these things are AWESOME and are exactly what I need. They have a flat depth of 100mm which also gives me a guide for my basing requirements. I can buy the Hexon II Terrain boards unflocked so that I can match my basing to the board and they sell single hexes so that I can make the terrain hexes present in Battlelore. I will need to find out how much of the stuff I need before ordering as it is fairly pricing with shipping to Australia. Depending on the cost, I can buy enough for an Epic board as well… maybe that’s pie in the sky stuff though

The next stop was to find some miniatures that fit the part to replace the Battlelore ones. 15mm miniatures are the rough sizing I am after. There is a multitude of excellent miniatures in this scale to cover pretty much everything released so far. My only  concerns were for the Lizard riding Goblins, the Ostrich Riding Goblins and the Cattle Riding Dwarfs…

BUT! Splintered Light Miniatures has two out of these three covered! If you click on the Miscellaneous models section of the site, you will come across both Komodo Dragon mounts and Terror Birds! Simply add in some light mounted goblins from their Goblinoid range and hey presto! Some excellent models. The Cattleriders could be a problem, but since I’m sticking with a similar scale, I can simply rebase those minis onto 25mm washers. Easy.

So far I have two rather large orders from Splintered Light Miniatures and Kallistra in the making… its just the bases I need now… what to do…

THIS!

The basing simply follows on from my previous basing article except it uses 80mm x 40mm bases with a very small hole drilled in the middle of the back of the base for the flag to sit in. All the infantry models are based on 20mm washers.

For cavalry models, the bases are 80mm x 60mm and the cavalry are based on 25mm washers.

I can also reuse these bases for HOTT or MA and with the flag being removable, I could create a banner for the unit to show what type it is (for example a Blade unit might have blades, Spear unit might have Spears etc…)

Needless to say I’m very excited about this project and I hope to keep you up to date on how its travelling in the near future.
Any comments or suggestions are more than welcome! Thanks for reading.

- Ben.

Special Birthday Cake and Photos of Models in New Basing

G’day, just a brief update today.

I recently had my 27th birthday. I celebrated with a few close friends and caught up with family. They all know that I’ve been working on Song of Fur and Buttons, which is based on the Teddy Bear models produced by Eureka Miniatures. Little did I expect my mum to bake a cake quite like the following.

Needless to say I was wrapped! So a big thanks to my mum for not only taking an interest in what I’m doing, but to follow through with such an awesome cake! Thanks mum. xoxo

I also just thought I’d post some photos of how the new bases look with a variety of models sitting in them. You can click on them to view them at a larger size.

ERM15 Frogfolk

Unreleased Rebel Minis Swamp Dwellers

Splintered Light Miniatures Bat Goblin Clan Bat Riders

Splintered Light Miniatures Bat Goblin Clan General and Shaman Bases

(Notice the removable tree to help with creating interesting scenes on the bases – this can also be applied to capturing enemy flags, heroes etc…)

Well, hopefully soon I can give you some more updates on Song of Fur and Buttons, Dusk and Mighty Armies Invasion, which are all going quite well.

- Ben.

Multipurpose Basing Done the Right Way!

Time to pop in for another blog update I thought to myself this morning.

I had been looking at the new Splintered Light Druid’s Children minis recently and thinking – man I really want these guys. They conjure up images of Redwall and Mouse Guard, but I was even more excited when I heard about a supplement being written for Song of Blades and Heroes specifically for these models – awesome!

I also thought how cool would they be in Mighty Armies, HOTT or Fantasy Rules! This brought me back to multi purpose basing again. My last attempt at it was ok, but too time consuming. I also found that the putty I used began to flake with the constant removing and replacing of models. They weren’t practical for longevity.

So I went down to the local Mitre 10 and asked around. After about a total of 6 minutes, I was walking out with some holesaws of various sizes. Now these weren’t the cheapest things I’ve ever bought, but well worth it if you’re going to be doing a lot of multibase stuff. A 20mm was perfect for the washers I use for basing my 15mm stuff. The 25mm one will be perfect for both basing 28mm models and 15mm cavalry. I intend to get a 40mm one for monsters as well – the system works that well that I intend to make bases for my 28mm stuff too.

Next, I grabbed a base and marked out some circles using spare washers that I use for basing 15mm. You could put as many as you want on – being sure to leave some space between so you don’t split the wood. I have tried this on 80mmx40mm bases and 80mmx80mm bases.

The demonstration is on 80mmx80mm bases simply because I liked how this one came out

Next, I attached the drill bit and used a work station to drill the holes halfway through the wood. Then I flipped and drilled through the rest. Its easy to keep your place because the bit shown above actually screws onto an actual drill bit, so you have the small hole in the middle to guide you. I did it this way after several bases came out with quite a bit of splintering around the edge. Doing it this way helps to stop this.

After some quick sanding (all of 5 seconds on each hole), I spread some PVA glue on the underside (not too much) and place it on top of another undrilled base. I made sure that the grains went in opposite directions to avoid warping. Then I just chucked some cheap hand clamps on each edge and left it for 30 mins. I had a set of 8 clamps, so I have two bases going at once and I just did some over the course of the day.

After half an hour, I just take the clamps off and use a stanley knife to trim the excess glue from around the edge of the base. The extra glue in the base holes can be removed with a toothpick or other small implement and will take all of 20 seconds for the whole base.

The next step was to paint them black and the flock them. It sounds like a long process, but in reality its quite quick. You just set a few up and come back to them later in the day. I have been able to whip up quite a number in very short time. The great thing is that you can drill the holes wherever you want to provide an interesting display for your models rather than packing them in on a base. I prefer this new method, but I know your milage may vary. If you do try this, please let me know how it goes – I’d love to see how your bases come out!

Remember, you can click on any of the images to view them at a larger size!

- Ben.

Nuthin’ But Net Free Expansion Booklet 2 Released!

This free expansion booklet introduces several new aspects to Nuthin’ But Net as well as a new team (Kobolds) and a Team Sheet to keep track of how your team is going during the season.

Whether you have already bought Nuthin’ But Net or are interested in finding out more, this is a download worth your time.

A big thank you to Jim Hartman of One Monk Miniatures who let me modify his outstanding Kobold graphics to create the Earth Splitters Kobold players. The first six Kobolds to ever play the game!

Download the second free expansion booklet by clicking here.

All the rules are optional of course and you must agree with your opponent before using them in a game.

Make sure you leave a comment letting me know if you enjoyed this expansion or not.

- Ben.

Making Your Own Nuthin’ But Net Court

I’ve had a couple of people message me in regards to some more detail on how I made the Nuthin But Net 3D court. Right about now I’m thinking – “Why didn’t I take more photos!”

Oh well – too late for that…

PS. Sorry about my Hobbit-like feet being inthe photo – I had to stand on the table to get a good shot of the whole board as its dark here at the moment.

The reason my court is a full court is that it lets me demo/run two games at once and also allows for a possible future full court expansion.

I’ll try and write down step by step how I made the board – it was VERY easy to do – the only slow bit was the marking of the hexes on the court.

I have a feeling I’ll be doing some team themed half courts in the near future, but for now – here we go.

MATERIALS

600mm x 800mm x 20mm MDF board

450mm x 600mm x 12mm Blue High Density Polystyrene

Hex template with 20mm sides (simply drawn on a graphics program, printed on card and cut out)

Ball point pen

Skewers

Cork

40mm x 30mm x 3mm Wooden base

Acrylic paints

Large paintbrush

PVA Glue

Wood Putty

Flock

Instructions

The first thing I did was to find the centre of the MDF board. This was easy and only involved ruling a line from corner to opposite corner.

I then placed the HD Poly foam so that each corner was in line with the diagonal lines. This helped me to place the foam centrally on the board. I also double checked by measuring the distance from the edge of the MDF and the HD Foam on each side.

I marked out where this sat, but did NOT glue it down yet. This is important.

Next I found the halfway line on the court and marked it lightly with the pen. I also marked the centre of the court vertically as well. This gave me a guide for laying out the hexes. I worked from the center hex to the outside ones, tracing each using the hex template. This sounds pretty innaccurate and to be honest it wasn’t the most accurate way to do it, but its really close enough for what I wanted.

When I was happy with the placement of the hexes, I used the ball point pen to score the foam.
I did this by pressing harder whilst holding the pen on a 45 degree angle. This gave a nice indent to the outside of each hex.

If you need to trim the edges after laying out and scoring the hexes, do so now. Then use the marks you left on the MDF before to find the center again and use PVA glue to glue it down. I drew a border around the edge of the foam and then criss-crossed using the PVA. To help the adhesion, I pressed down on the foam until the PVA spewed out the edges. I then used my finger to wipe this PVA up the sides of the foam. This will help seal it.

I left this to dry overnight basically – you want to make sure this is really dry before moving on.

I got a pot of black acrylic paint from Riot Art – very cheap as its only your undercoat. Get your paintbrush and dip it in the paint and then lightly in some water. Use this method to get the paint semi-runny so that it flows into the indents in the foam. You want it completely covered for when you seal it later. If its not covered, when you seal it, it will melt the polystyrene.

Once this is dry, you can sculpt the ground around the court using wood putty. You could really use anything you would normally texture stuff with (spack filler, rocks, sand etc…)

Leave it to dry and then undercoat with black as well.

I used textured paint on the court and then used a thin brush to paint on the Arc, foul line and half court line.I used a two different sample pots of paint (two colours that are close) to paint the terrain and then decorated with flock. I also added some small bits of flock to some of the hexes to break up the brown.

The basketball rings were really simple to make.

The base was simply a small piece of HD Polystyrene foam. A skewer was cut to an good looking size and stuck in slightly diagonally to the base. This was then glued down.

The backboard is an old base I had lying around, but could just as easily be a strong piece of card. It is 40mm x 30mm and was handpainted. 1/3 of a cork needs to be cut off carefully and glued to the back of the board. Once dry, skewer the skewer into the cork on the backboard so that it sits flush with the court. Glue it in place.

The basket is simply a piece of card rolled into a circle and glued to the board.

So there you have it – a simple and fun way to make your own 3D court for Nuthin’ But Net! The paper one provided with the game is excellent, but there is nothing quite like playing on a fully customised court like this. It really makes it special.

Thanks for reading.

Ben.

10mm Lizardmen

10mm Lizardmen Photos

Just a quick post to upload some photos of my 10mm Lizardmen I’ve been painting. They can be used for Warmaster, or with the help of my magnetic basing trays that I made, can be used for Mighty Armies or HOTT. Versatility is always good!

Song of Fur and Buttons

The final playtest copy has been finished. It is 12 scenarios following the exploits of three adventurous bears – Sir Maurice Fursworth, Sir William Cuddlesbury and Sir Uppity Paws. It has been a great deal of fun to write and I look forward to releasing it with Andrea in the future. More news as it comes to hand

Nuthin But Net

Three teams are in playtest – Plantmen, Skeletons and Kobolds.

If you are interested in helping playtest any of these teams, feel free to leave a comment on this thread. I would need a minimum of 5 games with the team you want to playtest. Those 5 games should be against different teams to ensure a good spread.

The teams will be in the next supplement, along with a play sheet to keep track of your players achievements and a few other ideas to use in your games.