Kingdom Death Screaming Antelope

Painting these Kingdom Death monsters has been interesting, because they don't seem to have an official color scheme. There is some artwork of the monsters in the rulebook and on some of the cards, but I don't look through all of them because I don't want to spoil anything before fighting the monsters. And even so, the artwork seems to vary, especially with regards to colors. So I'm left to come up with my own ideas on how to paint them, which can be a bit of a struggle for me as someone without much artistic aptitude.

To me, the screaming antelope miniature appears to be sculpted as it if has exposed muscles on its lower half. None of the artwork I saw of the screaming antelope supported this interpretation, but I went with it anyway. The model just seems to have been done that way intentionally, even if the artwork doesn't match. And it could explain why the antelope is screaming so much. I would be screaming too if I was missing most of my skin. Have a look below for some pictures and a description of how I painted my screaming antelope.

Warhammer Quest Beastmen

I've completed another entry on the level 1 monster table in Wahammer Quest. This time it was 8 Beastmen with spears. The models are extremely old single-piece plastics. They also have halberds instead of spears, but close enough for my use. The painting was pretty simple. I gave them each a different color of cloth to give some variety. I also gave some of them brown leather and the rest black, and some white metal emblems and the rest yellow metal. Hopefully this helps them look a little less homogeneous even though they are all the same model. I didn't vary the skin or fur colors at all. I'm sure that would have helped, but I didn't want to spend a the extra time on it. I had some trouble getting the hooves to look convincing at first, but I'm pretty happy with how they turned out in the end.

Kingdom Death Survivor Magnetizing Tutorial

I've had a lot of interest in and questions about how I magnetized my Kingdom Death: Monster survivors, based on my previous post. So while I worked on magnetizing the leather armor kit, I took some pictures and created a step-by-step tutorial to show the entire process. This should help out anyone else intending to magnetize there survivors, as there are quite a few tricky parts where you can hopefully benefit from my experience and prior mistakes. If you intend to do some magnetizing with your survivors in order to get the most utility out of them, have a look below to see how I went about it. And if you've discovered any tips or tricks of your own, please leave a comment and let me know!

I talked in my previous post about why I went with the approach I did. Magnetizing the models at the shoulder looks terrible, and also there aren't enough arms for you to have all of the weapon options available. There are way more weapons than arms. So magnetizing at the wrist, though trickier, allows for all the options to be available, and allows for you to fill in the gaps at the shoulder joins, which looks a lot better. Magnetizing the heads allows you to use the same head for different armor sets, so you can use the same head for your character as their armor and weapons change in the course of the campaign.

I considered magnetizing at the waist, but didn't think it would be worth the effort. The armor sets have full set bonuses, so normally you will be trying to have a survivor with armor all of one set. It seemed unlikely that I'd want to have a survivor with chest and hand armor from one set, but waist and leg armor from another. Plus, it seemed like some of the body/leg combinations of different sets of armor might look pretty strange together. So it didn't seem worth the extra effort. I just use the body that most closely matches the armor the survivor has, which usually will be at least a few pieces from the same set. If you are looking to do yours the same way, just follow the steps below.

Black Powder - Glory, Hallelujah! review

Since the release of Black Powder by Warlord Games, I've been using it to play games set in the American Civil War without difficulty. Still, I was looking forward to the release of their American Civil War supplement book, "Glory, Hallelujah!". I was interested to see how they suggested handling some of the defining aspects of the war that aren't particularly reflected in the main rules. These aspects include the different role of cavalry, presence of river gunboats, susceptibility of brigade and even division commanders to falling casualty, and varying sizes of artillery batteries (some 4 guns, some 6) and infantry regiments (which could vary greatly in size). Also, having more scenarios never hurts, though I already have plenty of scenarios I haven't played yet from other sources.

Kingdom Death Monster - Olympus Year 3

Zeus, Ares, Athena, and Aphrodite set out to hunt another white lion. This would be Aphrodite's first time out of the settlement. She and Ares, Zeus's children, are given full sets of rawhide armor for protection, and Ares is armed with the bone axe. Zeus carries the newly created king spear, which has the advantage of extended reach.

On the trail of their prey, the survivors encounter refugees of a destroyed settlement. Zeus offers them his cloth covering to aid them in the journey ahead. In gratitude, the refugees tell the survivors about the monster who besieged their settlement. (As a result, at the start of the showdown the first 5 AI cards would be revealed, and could then be returned to the top of the AI deck in any order). Armed with knowledge of the beast's methods and weaknesses, the group quickly locates the white lion they have been tracking.

Little Wars 2016

This year, for the first time, I attended the Historical Miniatures Gaming Society (HMGS) Midwest Little Wars convention. This year it was held at the Westin Lombard Yorktown Center in Lombard, Illinois. The convention runs for three days, all day Friday through Sunday, but I was only there for about the first half of Saturday. I played in one game Saturday morning, a game of Black Powder set in the American War of Independence. It followed the Bemis Heights scenario from the Rebellion supplement. I had a lot of fun playing, and met a few people in the area who might be interested in getting together some time to get in a game of Black Powder, so hopefully something comes of that.

After the game I wandered around the gaming room a bit having a look at the other games. There was a huge variety in the games I saw being played, so it seems like there must have been something for everyone. Then I checked out the vendor area, located in a separate room, which also had a great variety represented. The afternoon game I wanted to play in was filled up before I got a ticket, so I ended up leaving early in the afternoon. But I had a good time, and hopefully I'll be able to make it again next year. See below for some pictures of the game I played in, and some others that looked particularly interesting.

Kingdom Death Monster - Olympus Year 2

Having built themselves a settlement, now known as Olympus, the survivors start to run low on food and other resources. They realize they will have to go back out into the darkness to explore, and hunt the monsters that dwell there for precious resources. Original survivors of the first white lion encounter, Hera and Dionysus, head out with Ares, the son of Hera and Zeus, along with another woman from the settlement, known as Athena. Hera and Ares wear the rawhide armor the settlement crafted, with Hera wielding the Bone Axe. Together the four of them set out into the wilderness in search of another white lion, with the survival of their fledgling settlement at stake.