Gaming with the Kids 1: Goblin Quest

My oldest son is turning five this summer and lately we've been talking a lot about gaming with "daddy's toys". He's been wanting to play on a "real table" with terrain and everything, so this past Saturday we went down to the club for our first proper miniatures game together.

I had found some very simple rules, that still looked like a lot of fun, devised by a dad in a similar situation as myself. They're called Goblin Quest, and it seems they've since developed into something a bit more involved. However, the basic rules were more than enough for my needs at this point.

The game is played on grids, such as you get on dungeon floor plans, but as he wanted to play with regular terrain I substituted the random, grid-based movement with measuring sticks for movement and shooting. I also decided to move the setting from a dungeon to a mystical forest.

I had some Foundry knights in my lead pile, originally released by Citadel in the 80s, that I painted up to use as the heroes. I don't want to sound like a nostalgic old grognard, but these are really nice Perry sculpts that have stood the test of time admirably.

For the enemies, I wanted some classic but not too scary monsters and goblins fit the bill perfectly. Luckily, I had some extra goblin minis from the Dungeon Saga kickstarter that were pressed into service. Unfortunately, I didn't have the time to paint these up but they worked fine unpainted (gasp!). I knocked their strength down from 1D6 to 1D4 to speed things up a bit.

I started the game by telling him he was a knight in service of the king, and now the king had asked him to go to the mystical forest and collect some magical crystals. However, he'd better beware as the crystals were guarded by some evil goblins. He then got to chose which of the knight models to use in the game and he chose the red one.

The table set up.

As this was his introduction to gaming, I thought it was important that the objectives were very clear and all treasures and enemies visible from the start. The table was set up with paths/corridors leading to clearings/rooms where the crystals were placed (I used some red playing gems to represent these) together with the goblins. In the final room I placed the "boss" – the goblin chief in the form of the first mini my son has painted all by himself, a Reaper Bones bugbear. He was incredibly proud of this contribution to the game, and it made this feel more like a joint project between us.

Another foe defeated.

The brave knight faces off against the brutal goblin chief.

The game was a big hit, and he proceeded through the forest, the knight knocking down goblins and collecting crystals, all the while cheering when he won and taking his (few) setbacks in stride. In the end, the knight faced off against the huge goblin chief, which he managed to defeat and thus collecting the final crystal for the king. Victory for the hero!

The game was pretty much perfectly timed in terms of length: collecting four crystals took about 15–20 minutes, which was about as much time as he could concentrate for.

With the goblins all defeated, the knight
can collect the final crystal. Victory for our hero!

We've already talked about playing again. While I'm keeping the general setup, this time I'm thinking about using some other monsters like skeletons, just to make it a bit more interesting. I'm also looking to substitute the Mantic goblins with some Citadel ones, as I'm not a fan of the formers aesthetics.

Thanks for reading!

Project F: Early Medieval Soldiers 1

Well, 2015 certainly turned out to be the year of changed plans. Not only did I have to adjust my planning for the Operation Winter Storm project to something more manageable, now there is also something big cooking that has forced me to reconsider some of my earlier plans. Originally I was going to spend the better part of December painting the remaining models for my long neglected Italian Wars project. But then I was drafted into this major and still secret project, master-minded by my good mate Dalauppror and those plans went out the window.

There are still some things to iron out before we can reveal more about this new project, but keep a close eye on our blogs and you will get all the details eventually.

For now, however, I can offer you a sneak peak at the first of my models to be finished for this project. The period is obviously early medieval, as is evident from the models but, as I said, the details of where and when will have to remain under wraps for a while yet ...

The models were kindly donated by Dalauppror and to return the favour I cruelly used them as guinea pigs for trying out some new ideas for painting techniques. I was mainly trying to find out how to cut down on painting time and still keep up a decent standard I can be happy with. As test-pieces go, I think they turned out alright.

The foot soldier is a Foundry model, originally released by Citadel in the early 80s. I really like these old Perry sculpts, they have heaps of character and are a joy to paint.

The cavalry model is from an unknown manufacturer. Anyone recognise it? It has lots of fine details, the casting is very impressive in some parts – eg the reins under the horse's head are separate, which is something I haven't seen before – but unfortunately one of the horse's eyes was slightly miscast.

For the past couple of weeks or so, I have been furiously painting my first proper batch and I'm just putting the finishing touches to these models, which means they'll probably – hopefully! – make the 2015 deadline. More in the next update!

Italian Wars French 5 – Reisläufers 5

After a long involuntary break, I'm finally back with some painted miniatures. During the later parts of January and for most of February, the family's been plagued with various colds, flus and other ailments leaving me precious little time for the hobby. What little time I could scrape together has been focused on painting rather than blogging. But now, spring most definitely is in the air here in Stockholm, and the dreaded "sick period" seems to be behind us, which hopefully means more time for both painting and blogging.

To kick things off, here are the last miniatures to be finished for my two Swiss mercenaries pike blocks to be used in my Italian Wars French army: fashionably late, it's the commanders.

The models are all from Foundry, lovely sculpts with lots of character.

With these miniatures I made the conscious effort to go for bolder "steps" and increase the contrasts on the highlights, as I have become increasingly frustrated with my painting style lately, feeling it doesn't "pop" enough on the gaming table. I'm very happy with how these efforts payed off, and this is a direction I will try to strive towards in the future.

The flags are painted by me and based on designs I found on the Internet, more specifically on the excellent blog Camisado. A highly recommended blog, especially if you're into the wars in Italy during the 16th century. The flags represent the cantons of Bern (the bear) and Uri (the bull) respectively.

The flags are removable, for easier storage and for when I want to swap them – in the event I'm fielding these as Landsknechts they obviously can't have Swiss flags!

Here are some pictures of the two complete pike blocks.

Of course I now want to add another 3 bases to each block, for a truly massive amount of pikes. But this will have to wait until I finish some gendarmes and artillery pieces.

Thank you very much for reading!

Italian Wars French 4 – Reisläufers 4

Sometime in late November (I think?) last year, I finished another two bases of mercenary pikemen for my Italian Wars project. Today, I finally took the time to photograph them.

Like the last two bases finished, these are in an attacking pose with leveled pikes – very unpractical for storing and playing but they certainly do look the part.

The miniatures are once again from Foundry's lovely Renaissance range, sculpted by Michael Perry way back.

Unfortunately the matt varnish seems to have killed some of the brightest highlights, making them look a bit flat. I have never had any problems with this varnish before (Windsor&Newton Galleria Matt Varnish), and I've been using it exclusively for the past three or four years. It seems I may have gotten a bad pot, and I've since bought a new one that seems to work as it should. When I get around to it, hopefully another coat (the third) will restore at least some of original highlights.

Finally, I couldn't resist taking a picture of an almost finished unit. Lots of pikes here!

I'm working on the command bases now, and then these two units will finally be finished. It's been a bit of a slog to be honest, but I think the result will be worth it.

As always, thanks for reading!

Tales of Darkwood – Ragnar Blodsärk and His Men

And now for something completely different.

As I mentioned in another post I lost a bit of my painting mojo over the summer. I don't know if it was the slow progress of the Italian Wars project or just general painting fatigue. However, after some serious surfing on various blogs and particularly the fantastic Lead Adventure forum, I found my inspiration slowly being reinvigorated: I was going to do a fantasy skirmish project.

You see, I'm a bit of a fantasy buff. Ever since I laid eyes on that fantastic map in The Hobbit, I've been hooked on imaginary worlds and made up languages. It's a genre with lots (and lots!) of crap for sure, but in the hands of say a LeGuin, a Tolkien or a Leiber there's nothing quite like it.

I already have some experience with the excellent Song of Blades and Heroes rules from Ganesha Games, and they fit this project perfectly. A standard war band numbers some 8–12 models, which meant I could paint it up pretty fast and still spend some time on conversions etc without it getting overwhelming.

As for the background and setting, the "fluff" if you like, I was very inspired by the newly released Swedish pen-and-paper RPG Symbaroum, which centers around a vast brooding forest, harboring strange remnants of a former empire. So shamelessly stole this idea and adapted it to a (short) campaign: various groups searching a spooky forest for strange artifacts and clashing with each other and the mysterious guardians of the woods. And so "Tales of Darkwood" was born – the name of the forest obviously being an homage to the old Fighting Fantasy book "Forest of Doom".

After presenting the idea to my mate Dalauppror, he immediately responded: "So when do we play?" He was keen to use one of his war bands from an older project, which would fit perfectly for what I had in mind. He also had some custom built terrain we could use.

My own idea for a war band was a tribe of "barbarians" that's been living on the brink of the forest, but never venturing into it because of old taboos. Now however, with the arrival of explorers and missionaries from a southern kingdom, they are desperate to find ways to battle the newcomers and thus enters the forbidden woods in search of something to help them in their fight.

The models are a mix of Ancient Germans from Foundry (the riders) and Black Tree Design, together with an old Citadel wizard. I did some simple conversions on some of the riders. I sculpted fur cloaks over the regular cloaks on two of them, and the leader got an imposing spiked mace from a GW Chaos Marauder. The wizard/shaman I left as he was, as it's such a fantastic model full of that old school charm I'm so fond of. I really dig these old Citadel miniatures, and after finishing my first proper "Oldhammer" miniature I certainly have an itch to do more of them!

As the leader got a red shirt I decided to name him Ragnar Blodsärk ("Blood shirt"). Simple and straight forward, just like Ragnar himself I imagine.

I choose to use some Pagan Rus shield transfers I had laying around. In part to give the models a bit of a different "non-western dark ages"-look, but also to add some colour to the miniatures.

For the bases I wanted to try some new toys and experiment with a new look. I went for the thick moss of the forest floor, together with thick underbrushes with a slightly alien feel. I think the red leaves work particularly well against all the green on the bases, and the slightly muted colours of the miniatures.

And no, the irony is not lost on me – even when I decide to do a fantasy project all my miniatures look like they belong in the Dark Ages ... Sigh.

I'm now in the process of finishing some terrain pieces for this project, and of course I'm looking at doing another war band or two! These projects have a habit of getting out of control once you start.

Hopefully I'll be able to get a game or two with Ragnar and his men before the new baby arrives.

As always – thanks for reading and I hope you'll all have a great weekend!

Italian Wars French 3 – Reisläufers 3

Hot on the heels of the last update, here are another two bases of mercenaries for my French army for the Italian Wars. As before, these represent either Landsknechts or Reisläufers (Swiss mercenaries).

The models are yet again from Foundry's classic renaissance line. Some lovely sculpts by Alan Perry that certainly have held up well over time.

These are in a more attacking pose, and will form the front line of the pike blocks. Originally I had planned to do the second line in standing poses, and the first line in advancing, but after reading about the very aggressive tactics of the Swiss mercenaries – they would often recklessly charge across the battlefield before smashing into the enemy – I decided to forgo all standing poses for a more dynamic look of the units.

Here is an almost finished unit, just the command stand left to do. There's really nothing quite like the sight of a pike block on the wargaming table!

After this it's another two attacking bases, and then two command stands and my pike blocks are finally finished. It's been a bit of a chore so far, but the end result will be well worth I think.

Thanks for reading – I hope you'll have a great week!

Italian Wars French 2 – Reisläufers 2

Here are the next two bases of pike armed mercenaries for my French army for the Italian Wars. They are either Landsknechts or their Swiss counterpart Reisläufers.

I actually finished these earlier in the summer, but I just now took the time to finally photograph them.

The miniatures are from Foundry, the classic sculpts by Alan Perry, and I have to say I like them a lot. The models looked a bit dodgy in the bare metal, so I wasn't too sure about them, but they painted up really, really nice. In my opinion they certainly hold up well against the much more recent Pro Gloria.

After posting up the first batch, I got some comments on the basing – more specifically some people thought they looked too regular and ranked up, and lacking that "push of pike" feeling. In hindsight, I do agree and for these new bases I tried to position them in a more irregular manner. I think they look much better for this.

As you may remember, I had some problems with the first bunch I painted using the straight Foundry triad system. For the new models I reverted back to my standard method, relying more on washes and sharper highlights. As a result, I'm much more happy with the look of these. The problem now is of course they have a slightly different look than the first bases – a bit darker or dirtier and with more contrasts between the layers. I haven't yet decided if the difference is too noticeable or if I can pass them off OK.

Here are some shots of the finished bases to date. You can clearly see the difference in painting styles.

Lots of pointy stuff.

I will not field the pike block like this, but nevertheless it's nice to get a feel for the finished unit.

As always, thanks for reading and I hope you'll have a great week!

A start

Well, you have to start somewhere ...