Hocus Focus

The center sections where designed to use the GW hill as a bridge to change the new table up, yes,that hill needs reflocked to match.

No one is more aware that the content here has been sluggish of late, more so than I- but no apologies.The  absence of Warhammer from my gaming calendar clearly leaves a big hole in my blogging pursuits, mainly because like it or not I found myself being a pundit about the machinations of Games Workshop, nearly as much as I talked about my own gaming experiences. While I am still quite of The Lord of the Rings SBG, and its due for its biggest year of releases (or might that be year after next?? as the films are 12. 2012 and 12. 2013) so I am sure I will be drug back into to conversations about how GW made some great models and ruined the game or totally killed metal for resin,etc. Regardless that day is a good ways off So I want to refocus on what I am currently doing which has always the bulk of hobby for me which is painting miniatures and building terrain. I've been working on a bit of both of late, as well fleshing out the most ambitious project I've been working on to date.




"My Skirmish Dungeon keeps growing, I do want to add another square foot to it..but at that point with replacement pieces being plasters it no longer portable. It will reach multi configurations soon enough."

I've had numerous things going on since I had any type of real gaming update in early November. Mainly getting 10 tables of terrain ready for Adepticon 2012 and my Legends of the High Seas event. The majority of is pretty much there, with exception of the tallest order finishing at least one probably two large Pirate Ships, these are big projects that will run me right up to Adepticon I am sure and I am not even getting started until next month.In last month, I have been tweaking older pieces, build a couple of new boards, and got a slew of figures based up and ready for paint for Hail Caesar, Lord of the Rings, Legends of the High Seas, and generic Fantasy miniatures for Skirmish gaming.



The new 4x4 boards are coming along, that river is going to be redone a proper shade and give some liquid resin for realism...I am using all woodland scenics products at this point.



Hail Caesar- No secret I love this rule set, the support warlord is giving it and its suprising depth in its simplicity My Saxon Army is huge, I keep buying models for it trying to configure a force that can deliver against Cavalry. Its really no surprise that English lost at Hastings...they would have needed a 1000 of Prince Harry's Longbows to have stood a chance but that was almost 400 years off. Anyway the great unpainted horde is looking strong (mainly thanks to some quasi historical but totally legal Mercenary units  but I am going to dig into some heavy painting soon as we (the club) are going to be doing Hail Caesar demo games Saturday night a Adepticon and while this huge of an army wont be done by any stretch..I hope to keep it from being too embarrassing. HC's been my groups main focus since early summer and the current campaign is going very well (although Rich and his Arabs are pounding us all into rubble) talk of moving to the medieval period (HYW, WotR) is probably going to become a reality at some point.



recent skirmish shot, pre resin.

Lord of the Rings- Too many projects might be fun, but its not your friend when you're trying to commit to a game system and play competitively ( the main reason Warmachine isnt taking off for me other than very casually, is that it requires a huge committment) My plan was too do awhole new army by Adepticon for the Championships and while only 40 models it has Cavarly, alot of Freehand and need of cool display. So I felt its better suited for next year BBB in the fall. Coming off the Best Appearance award has some pressure to put out ( with three GD winners as regular participants in the Championships yearly) so running my Orcs again is a necessity but I have swapped out around 20 of the crummy plastic troopers for old citadel metals that are just killer and will be a pleasure to paint and will really pop..I've switched up the list to make a bit tougher as those crappy Warg Riders just needed to go..so I need to put about two weeks into this army to get ready for the Championships this year and I am excited to how V.2 turns out.




I recently did this Reaper model as Red Sonja for my daughter whose taken a keen interest in my Skirmish solo play. When I showed her some Comic Covers of Red Sonja..she said Oooo, I want to be her for Halloween...I said better now than when you're 16...

Legends of the High Seas- There is alot of good detail going on for this event , enough to merit alot of talk between now and then.which is better off as a series of itds own posts which should start very soon as finish off the Shipwreck board, and move on the large galleon and finishing the Brig. Skirmish Gaming- Quite alot going on here. I have tweaking several of the older board mainly used for Pirates. like the Dungeon. Finishing the details adding the Water Cavern which will soon have resin water and better looking rocks that those cork boards.  I've mentioned I like making everything I can to be multipurpose so my new 4x4's for Skirmish Gaming are also my new 4 X8 for large army gaming. 2 4x4 sections that can flip around to different configs..with river running down the middle. We've been using it for HC and it working out great with lots of spots for specific terrain rules depending on how we set it up.

 The more interesting thing on the Skirmish gaming front is I've been "hobbyist" game writer for many years, pages and pages of unplaytest ideas, games, campaigns or just general ramblings. late last year, I got the 15mm Sci Fi "bug" as they say mainly from all the great new miniatures being released and going through my old stuff, the RPG game Traveller and its companion Skirmish game Snapshot..trying to update Snapshots early 80's rules for the kind of game I wanted to play in 2011 led to one thing , then another, then some playtesting, then some changes, then more playtesting, then new concepts. Pretty soon it wasnt remotely like Snapshot anymore, but I was really liking it, Then I bump it back up to 28mm and built the Warehouse Hulk to test out the concepts and the ride stopped there. (Although considering the use the Hulk is getting ( i.e NONE), I am considering put it up for sale..so if the guy that offered me close to 4 figures for it last year is still out there hit me up!- or anyone else but serious inquires only..you're talking a 100+ hour project here.) Along the way I started thinking about how the concepts of my little game translated to Fantasy Skirmish, and while the Sci Fi version still had some big holes still to fill due to the complex nature of the genre. Bringing it home to Fantasy fits like a glove, its also a very playable as a solo game which is very cool, in fact I've done a dozen or so playtests solo and its been very addicting (a good sign) I dare say it has some unique mechanics and I look forward to some 1 vs 1 with one of the guys soon. Anyway given that and the way our current campaign is playing out..I want to formulize these things and look into some Indie self publishing. I am not going to share any more details at moment other than to say, I look forward to exploring this alot more in the next year and see if its worth the effort, if only for my own satifisfaction.




Skirmish solo play shots from "The Game" whose actual moniker will remain a secret for the time being.


My point here is of course, getting refocused, new year, new directions and all that The games may change  but my basic loves are all still there. Its just you won't see me telling you how "Storm of Magic" or "Blood in Badlands" are pure marketing scams from GW that only further push old players away and fool new players or the more gullible old ones into buying way more models than they need to play a whole alot of other better games and at double the prices! I wont do this because I havent read these books and dont plan too. ..I just dont care..let someone else do it.  So look for alot more hobby content and lot less caring about what GW is or isnt doing . There will surely be some of that again eventually, but with all of the above plus .a Flames of War day in Jan, a pal trying to get me to play some Uncharted Seas...and the current Chicago Warmachine craze..why bother?




This didnt end well for the good guys.


........Next up The Dark Ages Campaign, Round 5!