Ape Attack!

My shipment from Reaper Miniatures' Bones 4 Kickstarter arrived on Saturday, and digging through my new goodies I quickly felt the rising urge to get some painting in.  I decided on the "Ape Attack!" set - two ferocious-looking gorillas and one dressed in armor and carrying a sword. 

Not having yet painted any "White Gorillas" for my Frostgrave bestiary, I decided they would serve admirably.  I originally thought I'd do all three in different shades of "white" but ultimately ended up with the two feral gorillas having blue-white fur and a warmer, brown-shaded fur on the gladiator-ape.  Seeing as the Frostgrave apes are magical snow gorillas, the blue-shaded fur struck me as perfectly appropriate. 

Bare skin was picked out in Reaper's "Golden Skin Triad," the gums and inner mouths based in "Old West Rose" followed by a wash of Reikland Flesh Shade, and the teeth picked out in "Stained Ivory." Eyes were painted "Viper Green" just to do something different. 

Just bases left to be painted and I can get some varnish on them.  I'm definitely feeling a serious hankering for some Frostgrave action again some time soon. 

Pantheon of Chaos Kickstarter Shout-Out

Just wanted to do a quick post shouting out a Kickstarter I'm backing, Knightmare Games' "Pantheon of Chaos 3: Rise of the Beastmen" to produce more Oldhammer-appropriate beastmen and Chaos Thug-types for their on-going "Pantheon of Chaos" line.  It's a week out from completion and the next stretch-goal is a free bonus Chaos Warrior for everyone backing at the 50-euro mark or higher. 

I recently ordered a handful of Knightmare's Chaos figures to get a sense of them in terms of size and casting, and I love them.  Very crisp casts, unique and imaginative sculpts.  The figures I received have a mix of tabbed and untabbed feet, and because consumers have a variety of needs regarding bases, so Diego at Knightmare does not include bases with his figures.  I've got some on order, the four-armed Chaos Raider Champion is actually too big for any of the slotta-bases I had handy. 

I'm so taken with these, and with the new sculpts from the Kickstarter, that I've made the decision to replace all the Age of Sigmar-era plastic figures in my Dragon Rampant Chaos warband with metal figures, primarily from Knightmare, with the goal of having every figure in the warband be a unique sculpt.  With the breadth of Knightmare's expanding "Pantheon of Chaos" line, I think it's going to be easily done. 

Arnulf's Black Fire Dogs

I promised better photos of the Averlanders I'd painted up for Mordheim, and here they are, the first seven at any rate.  I've got some swordsmen, handgunners and halberdiers to paint up in the near future:

Captain Arnulf von Grenzstadt.  The shield is actually from Wargames Foundry.

Sergeant Martin rallies the troops. The flag is simply painted paper glued around the flagpole.

Franz and Sturm, a pair of rangers pressganged into the Averland Army as "Bergjaegers."

Big Top, Chicken Wing, and Fat Jimmy - the Halfling Brigade.  Fat Jimmy has actually died
and will not be appearing in future games.  A Rat Ogre stepped on him.

Adventuring in the City of the Damned

My local Warhammer store (not to be confused with Just Games, my usual gaming haunt) has begun hosting, surprisingly, Mordheim, even though Games Workshop no longer supports the game. 

Mordheim, for those unfamiliar, was and is a skirmish game set in the Warhammer Fantasy universe.  The City of Mordheim was destroyed by a comet-strike, which scattered the landscape of the ruined city with a valuable magical mineral called Wyrdstone.  Various gangs and factions descended on the ruins, fighting among themselves for possession of the Wyrdstone.  In a lot of ways, Frostgrave is a spiritual successor to Mordheim. 

The store's rule is that we can use their space for Mordheim as long as we use primarily GW figures.  So, wanting in, I sourced a bunch of older metal Empire figures off eBay and started assembling a warband for the province of Averland - in large part because I'm bored with painting red and blue armies, and Averland's colors are black and yellow. 

I've played two games so far, and while I was forced to go to my first game with bare metal (owing to the weather not cooperating for priming and my fiance being sick), I did get them painted up for my second game, this past weekend, though the bases still need flocking and I need to make a flag for my sergeant.  My hobbits have developed a nasty habit of dying, though, and I've got some more melee-oriented figures on my project bench. 

Here's a group shot of what I've painted so far, individual pictures to come:

Front Row, Left to Right: the Halflings "Chickenwing," "Fat Timmy" and "Big Top."
Back Row, Left to Right: Captain Arnulf von Grenzstadt, Sergeant Martin, and the Bergjaeger, Sturm and Franz