Oldhammer Weekend USA - Battle at the Farm

Hi All,

Here's the comic book report for the Battle at the Farm scenario that Brian Kirkell ran on the Saturday of Oldhammer Weekend at Huzzah Hobbies. As usual Brian ran with it and made it his own. Right click on the images to open them in their own tab or window to see them embiggened.

Who knows what will actually be next on the blog, but the next report will be "The road to Marienburg."

Thank for looking.

Quick Update - New Podcast and other stuff

Hi All,

  Just a quick update before I head off to work. I'm in the middle of putting together my Battle at the Farm report form Oldhammer weekend and should have about 4 reports all told from the event, not including the overview. I also realized last night that i forgot to write up the Man O'War game from last July.

  Andrew Dyer of Acceptable Radiation turned me on to a new wargaming podcast. It's called The Veteran Wargamer and the first two episodes have talked about Oldhammer a bit already. The host, Jay Arnold, cut his teeth on Rogue Trader so you can get an idea of where he's coming from.

  So check him out and see what you think.

  I'm also planning on taking one of my reports and trying to do a complimentary video report. This is something that Hengist, House of Hengist Comics, has done to great effect and I thought I'd give it a try. He seems to be doing most of his stuff on facebook now, but the blog links you there.

  I also have yet to inquire on The Miniatures Page to get a survey of how people travel with minis. Most comments I received back are partial to foam. I'm not un-partial to it, I just wanted to try another solution.

  Lastly, go check out Broken Paintbrush. Lots of great hobby and blogging articles. I enjoy the newsletter, as it brings things to my attention that I may have missed. I haven't been able to keep up lately as I've had all this training to do. But I'll try to catch up this weekend.

Bye for now,

Sean

Oldhammer Weekend USA 2016 - An overview.

Hi All,

Another comic report, this time giving an overview of some of the things that happened last weekend. Right click on images to open them in their full glory.

I forgot to credit the tw photos on the last page. Left, Andrew Dyer. Right Chris Sabick. More battle reports coming soon.

My magnetic transport system needs some work

Hi All,

Well I've been to Oldhammer Weekend and back. I've finally finished processing the pictures and am in the process of doing some reports. I've been meaning to share my experience with travelling with minis again, I've just been busy. I wish I could tell you I was as successful as when I went to Brian's birthday in July, but alas no.

It started when I got there and opened up my case. I had failed to secure my two trolls and they became wrecking balls in the tray they were in. The Clukkatrix and Abdul Goldberg had paint chipped, the plastic black orc had his axe broken, the mother crushers banner pole got slightly bent and the Bad Axe Boyz banner pole was bent back 90 degrees over the bearers head. Not good.

I thought I had sorted things out for the trip back, but I had the handle slip from my hand on the jetway as I deplaned in Phoenix and below was the result when I unpacked. (It is quite possible that the Flight Attendant plying me with drink may have contributed. Two Gin and Tonics will do you right.)

So nothing for it but to sort through the figures and see who was damaged.

What's interesting is that almost all of the original 90's figures were undamaged. GW paints straight from the pot, no varnish. The Trolls for instance didn't take a scratch. In the picture above I'm not even certain that the green flocked orc is dinged. He looks unblemished now that I look at him again.

The army banner bearer has had his arms come unglued. They're held on by tension at the moment, I'm not sure how to fix him.

Lessons learned:

1. Only bring the figures you need.
2. At least 2 magnets on larger metal figures. Better yet wrap them up in clothes or bubble wrap.
3. Space is your enemy. Tightly pack side to side and consider how to fill gaps in every dimension.
4. Consider which ways your miniatures will tilt. Put weight towards bottom and back.

I haven't totally given up on this, but I'll need to do more to make sure it's not blind luck getting my minis to the event unscathed.

If you have any tips I'd love to hear them, and yes I do know that they make foam cases. I prefer to take my figures carry on and I haven't seen a foam system that meets the carry on size restrictions. None the less, I'd like to hear what works for you, however you do it.

Progress on Space Chickens

Just trying to keep my Mojo up and you all abreast of the situation. (Ha, ha, abreast).

This is where I left off last night. I've gotten a little more done on them today, but I have to run so I'll do more later.

I feel like the Clukkatrix is done. Just needs a coat of varnish.

I also got in the second run of T-shirts and will be calculating shipping and messaging people with the total in the morning.

I had to go to some training on using the Epipen this morning. A word of advice. If your kid has a potentially life threatening condition you may want to make sure that all of the school staff are aware of it. I'm just a lowly duty aide, but if I know your kid could go into anaphylaxis, diabetic coma etc, I could save his/her life.

Have a good one.

Oh and welcome to London in Flames. I don't see your blog listed. Let me know and I'll post a link to it.

Paint Table Saturday 150 - Odds and Sods

Hi All,

Sorry for the infrequent posting. I'm beavering away but don't have much in the way of progress.

So I've primed the Halflings and "Beastmen" (in the background right) and have started slopping on base color. The Chukk (Space Chickens) are for Dustin's Rogue Trader scenario, but i need to stat them out. I'm beginning to suspect that there will not be enough hours in the day to play all the games I desire. Chukk from Alternative Armies, Halflings: Effin Cool, Beastmen: Eureka.

In keeping with the "theme" for Oldhammer Weekends open battles, I acquired some chests etc from Castle Kits. These are nice little Hirst molds objects. Barrels sacks and the like. I intend to put some together into stowage for some scratch built carts for the Muffin caravan that is trying to get to Marienburg. Just an FYI, pay attention to the materials your stuff is made out of. These are plaster, which I discovered after tossing one of the packs into a tub of soapy water. I don't think I ruined them, but I got very worried that I scrubbed off some of the detail.

The merchant Lotho McStuffins, Burgher of the Moot and former Mayor of Sauerapfel. We'll see if I can get all this done.

I was also kindly reminded that I sort of agreed to paint a minion for The Bazaar of Crooked Wonders on Facebook. I found I have more Goblin Fanatics so I'll try that.

I'm also hoping to get these Beastmen and maybe even Chaos Centaurs painted for Herohammer and include them as allies in my Oldhammer Weekend. Some say I'm being meta, but I say I'm giving myself a reason to paint this stuff and have some fun trying different things with my army. Nobody wants to play the exact same army over and over again. Well maybe some do, but I like adding new fun things from time to time.

Welcome to Andrew Dyer, I know him from Oldhammer and as the primary organizer of this year's event. A very talented painter, he has been dragged kicking and screaming into the bloggisphere by the demise of Warseer. His blog is Acceptable Radiation. Join myself and Asslessman in being cool kids and follow his blog. I also think you should follow Anthony B's blog, The Lead Collector, he has far too few followers.

Well, as you can see, I've got my work cut out for me. See you soon.

Revisiting basing

Hi All,

  I couldn't remember if I'd done a post on basing before. Apparently I've had several talking about it but none giving the step by step. A couple of years ago I talked about my method here.

  On to today's version. Mostly the same with a few refinements.

So this is how I base almost everything except for my Sci Fi (40K) stuff. The only thing I didn't picture is the Air Dry clay (Amaco, 10Lbs for $10 at a craft store.) You also need glue (PVA), texture gel, some kind of grit and, for 2.0, varnish. I then use a couple of sculpting tools and a cheap Testors brush that I abuse the hell out of.

Since the air dry clay comes in a gigantic block that you can never use quickly enough I chip off chunks that I need and keep them in a smaller container. The good, and bad, thing about this clay is that you can make it workable by getting it wet. So I wet a paper towel and seal it in a plastic bag with the main brick and do the same in the plastic container with the chunks I'm using. Sort of like a humidor.

After you've cleaned up your figure and glued it to the base, spread diluted pva over the surface you intend to cover with your clay. If you're using greenstuff you probably don't need the pva.

Use your sculpting tool of choice to push around your putty (clay). I like to put as thin a layer as i can get away with. Be careful about the gaps in slotta bases. You don't want to waste product by filling the  gap, just try to skim over it as best you can. Some clay will accumulate inside. When using clay the thinner the layer, the more susceptible it is to cracking. Thus the next step.

Slather on some texture gel. I use Liquitex Natural Sand. It  has the dual benefit of sealing the clay and giving a fine grit texture to the surface. I tend to wet my brush to help it spread, one could probably use a sculpting tool or palette knife, but it's hard to work around the model and not get gel on it.

Then scatter a pinch of grit on top of the wet gel. Mine is just some green aquarium sand that i bought 20 years ago that I'll probably never use up. Now you could just prime it here, but the grit may flake off during painting or even priming, especially if you use a brush. I tried spreading more dilute pva on top to seal it, but wet paint can reliquify pva. So you're back to square one.

In 2.0 I'm trying a spot of varnish to seal down the grit. I use a dropper bottle, put a drop on a couple of corners and daub around with a brush.

Getting some lads ready for Oldhammer weekend.

Have a tried and true method for basing you want to share? Have any questions about how I do it? Comments and critiques welcome.

See you later.