92/100 - Rebirth Batgirl

I have been trying to improve my painting skill over the last year.  I am happy with how I paint right now, but it has not evolved during the last decade (well, maybe it is a bit cleaner now).  So I have branched out and have started to try new techniques.  I finally picked up an airbrush earlier in the year and have began to dabble with that.  I experimented with some of Scale 75 Inktense paint and tried staining.  Now I am trying some glazing and paying attention to light sources.

The thing that has helped me when try something new is having a wealth of knowledge in my local hobby community.   We have so many great painters locally, each with their own distinctive style.  I like looking in the display cases at Lords of War and being able to tell who painted what based on techniques used.  If I want to know how a colour on a specific model was accomplished, all I have to do is ask, and the painter is more then happy to walk me through it.

This past week I was able to sit down with Dai Viet and he walked me through thinking about light sources and glazing.  Dai Viet worked together at GW a very long time ago.  If you are near Lords of War in Oakville drop in and check out a few of his armies, you will not be disappointed! We sat down for a few hours and finished painting most of Rebirth Batgirl.  The lesson started with the airbrush to apply a white zenithel highlight over the black basecoat.  We then went on to blocking out the colours.  We then applied some built up highlights with very watered down white, then started the glaze layers.  Finally we went back in with a dark colour to add some more shadows to the recesses and creases. 

The tip that Dai Viet gave that I had never considered before was the direction of the brushstroke.  When applying the layer you want to move the brush from the lighter to darker area.  Start out with small strokes and work your way back.  Just that one tip made a big difference for me.  The session was a great help, and I am very thankful for it. 

The final result was OK.  With any new technique there is bound to be some growing pains (I still hate painting yellow!).  I am looking forward to practicing this method and cleaning up my brush control on future projects. 

I finished painting my Rebirth Batgirl in the same week that my old Batgirl got a resin re-release and a rules bump.  Both versions of Batgirl have near identical stat lines, with the only exceptions being that the original Batgirl now has defense 5.  Their Batlings are the same (but the original Batgirl has an extra ammo).  They also both have the following skills; Batclaw, Batcape, Combo Unarmed, Informer, and Stealth. 

Their different skills are: Rebirth Batgirl has Reinforced Gloves (unarmed attacks deal 2 Stun) and Tracking (end of the turn move D6 inches).  While the original one has Martial Artist (Cant be outnumbered in combat) and Sneak Attack (attacks cant be blocked if Batgirl could not have been seen at the start of her activation). 

I like the combo with the reinforced gloves on Rebirth Batgirl, but I would really have to pick my battles.  Without Martial Artist and only Defense 4 she can go down really quick if she gets outnumbered.  I think that the original one will be a good objective grabber.  Not having her Defense drop when outnumbered due to Martial Artist and a Defense of 5 makes her very tough to drop.  She can get to an objective and just sit on it (maybe throw a Batling or two). 

Both would be great in the new Bat-family Team list.  With everyone having Teamwork 1 (All), Batgirl becomes a action counter battery for the heavy hitters in the crew!

I think I will have to use both a few times before I am sold on either one. 

Kevin

91/100 - Rick "The One-Man-Machine Gun Nest" Flag

The final member of my movie Suicide Squad is done, Col Rick Flag.  This model came together fairly quickly.  It helps that he is mostly black, grey and khaki.  I got him finished just in time for Knight Models re-release of him in resin with a rules bump. 

With the new card, his stats and traits stay the same.  He does loose his "Knife" close combat weapon.  However his "Automatic Gun" increased its rate of fire from 2 to 3 and gained the Light special rule (A model can fire this weapons even when it is in contact with an enemy model).  I love this change.  Now for 2 attack counters I take 3 shots, dealing a blood and a stun with each (much better then 2 attacks with the knife dealing one blood each).  This also can combine with his Multifire trait (+2 RoF for 2 special counters).  So while engaged in combat, for 2 Attack Counters and 2 Special Counters, he can take 5 shots dealing a total of 5 blood and 5 stun damage.

Rick Flag does have a high funding at $500, but he can put out a lot of damage.  I am thinking of a list with him and Nightmare Batman.  Just a bunch of machine guns and blood damage.

I did get a chance to use Rick Flag (and the other members of the Suicide Squad) in a game of DCU over the weekend.  We played 60 levels and my opponent played the Crime Syndicate.  The scenario was Rifts.  It was a great game and very close, the Crime Syndicate managed to pull off a win in the last round by Owlman closing a open rift and Powerman killing Katana.  The final score was 18-16.  Rick Flag was fairly good in the DCU.  He does not do a lot of damage but he has a solid stat line for his level cost.  Stamina 9 with Soldier was very useful in this scenario.  His Leadership skill is nice too (if I had remembered to use it!)

The real MVP for me though was Slipnot.  He closed somewhere around 5 rifts himself and kept passing his endurance checks once he was hurt. 

Every time I use the Suicide Squad in DCU I am impressed with how well they preform.  While it was true that the only member that was not removed as a causality in the game was Captain Boomerang, I did manage to get every member of the Crime Syndicate (except Powerman) into the Light Blue or the Dark Blue (plus I only lost by 2 points in the end!). 

I am going to be switching back to the Justice League for my next two projects, Rebirth Batgirl and Nightmare Batman).

Kevin

90/100 - I Put a Spell on You

I finally got back to painting some actual miniatures this week instead of terrain.  Since we are playing some DCU at Lords of War right now, I decided to work on Enchantress for my Suicide Squad team.  I also wanted to paint up a magic user for BMG to finally try out the magic rules.

Enchantress adds some magic and supernatural attacks for my DCU team.  With her resistance and ability to heal I am hoping she will also be able to take a hit (which most of the Suicide Squad cant do).

The model was odd for me to paint.  It is not busy but there is a lot of smaller details.  However she is mainly 3 colours (skin, hair, gold), which gives her a plain finish.  I added the tattoos and blood to the base to help give some more contrast, although I am not fully satisfied with either.

The gold  net sleeves on the arms were the trickiest to paint.  It look a lot of time and touch ups to finish them.  I over highlighted the hair with a light grey, so used some diluted black ink bring it back down, I think it ended up washing out the highlights.  I might go back and work the hair back up a bit.

I had also run out of the resin cobblestone bases that I used on my other Suicide Squad members, and my local store was also out.  So I made some using one of the rollers from Green Stuff World.  Jay at Lords of War gave me some tips on how to make the results cleaner.  It worked out well in the end.  The cobbles are not exactly the same size as the original ones but I think it works, you don't really notice it to much unless you are looking for it.

I am working on the last member of the Suicide Squad film cast members now, the one-man-machine gun nest Rick Flag.

Kevin

Sword and Brush in Review

The mad terrain-building frenzy is now over.  We had the Sword and Brush event this past weekend.  It was my first time attending the event, and I was very impressed.  I have not been to a convention or hobby show like this since the last Canadian Games Day (about a decade ago?).  There was a lot of people, great games, amazing prizes and incredible painters (I have now reached my adjective quota for the day). 

We had a lower turn out for the BMG tournament then I hoped.  However the players that did participate were great.  They brought fun competitive lists and beautifully painted crews.  In the past I have played everyone who attended, so I can say from experience that they are some of the best sportsmen. 

My favorite moment from the tournament was from a Riddler vs Militia game.  The two crews must have been from mirror universes.  They had different leaders but mostly the same henchmen and they both had Deathstoke.  On one corner of the table all of Riddlers henchmen ganged up on the Militias High Security Henchman, while in the exact opposite corner the Militia henchmen where giving a beating to Riddlers High Security Henchmen.  While all of this was going on, Militia Deathstoke (With helmet) fought Riddlers Deathstoke (no helmet) on top of the buildings in the center of the board.  The Militia Deathstoke prevailed in the end (although he did have some help from the Arkham Knight Sniper).

A big part of the Sword and Brush is the painting contest.  I had not originally considered entering anything.  I changed my mind the night before the event however.  I figured I was already going to be there, why not enter (nothing ventured, nothing gained).  The Suicide Squad Joker crew that I had recently finished is probably my best work.  So I quickly threw together a display board for them, going for an abandoned amusement park feel.   

I did not expect to win anything.  I have been trying to improve my painting over the last year and I figured this would be a great opportunity to see how I have done and learn about areas that I could improve.  I got some great advice from one of the judges and I am going to pick his brain again at a latter time.

In the end I walked away with a Silver metal in the Wargame Unit category.  I am now even more eager to continue to work and improve!  I have a paint lesson lined up with a fantastic (OK one more adjective) local painter in the next few weeks.

I now have a year to prepare for next years Sword and Brush.

Kevin

140/100 - A Pile of Garbage

Man...what a week.  I had this great idea for some scatter terrain for my Batman tables at The Sword and Brush.  I was really pumped about it, planned it thoroughly, felt it was coming together...and I end up with a pile of garbage...which was exactly what I was going for!

Awhile back I made some test mini-garbage bags out of pieces of real garbage bags.  I found them again as I was packing up the terrain.  I had some extra time before the event (thanks to my wife for helping burn through the buildings and trees!).  I "assembly-lined" a whole heap of mini garbage bags (I never did a total but I am confident it is somewhere between 100-120).

I also had some extra wooden stir sticks that I had painted up to cover the windows on the buildings.  So I put them to use by splitting them and buildings some wooden pallets.

The real trick was trying to figure out how to attach the garbage bags to a base.  I had originally tried PVA glue and super glue.  Neither of which worked.  I then tried plastic cement.  No effect.  I then tried a hot glue gun, and it worked very well (except all the spider web-like-strands I had to pull off).  

I tried putting them on some old square monster bases from GW (I have so many I am just trying to find a project for them now!).  It did not look quite right, too uniformed for a pile of trash I think.  In the end I used some randomly cut shapes out of a sheet of plastic card.  

I took some of the terrain I made and put together a test table that will be used at the tournament, it doesn't look too bad.  

 

For the amount of work and the cost of the material, this was a very effective terrain project.  But I am now done for terrain for awhile.  I am already for the BMG tournament at the Sword and Brush this Saturday!

Kevin