The Road to More Terrain

 A couple of packages arrived today, both furthering my goals to play more samurai games. 

First, a resin house, a well, and some accessory odds and ends picked up from Oshiro Model Terrain. I did a lot of thinking and weighing options for Feudal Japanese terrain, and I decided that, at least for smaller buildings, I like the Oshiro Japanese houses best, plus they've got the best line of accessory bits. 

 The roof comes off the house and it has a plain, though accessible, interior. I'll be adding a base to it, much like I did with the MDF temple kit. The plan, such as it is, is to ultimately add a few more of these houses to my collection over time so I can put a small village, or at least the outskirts of one, on the table. 

The other thing that arrived today is a 3D print of Itto Ogami and his son Daigoro, the titular characters of the "Lone Wolf and Cub" franchise. Lone Wolf and Cub ran as a manga series from 1970 to 1976, and has been adapted to television, film and even the stage, the story following Itto, the shogun's official executioner, as he is framed and disgraced, forced to become an assassin with his young son in tow, and ultimately strives for vengeance (consistently described as "The Road to Hell" in the manga) on those who framed him. More recently, Disney's "The Mandalorian" is basically a retread of this with a Star Wars gloss applied. 

 The print came from a vendor I found on eBay, and came in three pieces - Itto Ogami himself, the baby cart, and little Daigoro. I've had a lot of disappointment from 3D prints this year to the point where I'd basically written off the entire medium, but I took a chance on this and was really pleasantly surprised. It's a really nice, crisp print, it was delivered to me almost totally free of any supports or excess bits of material, and without any odor. This last one's been a big deal for me! Almost every other 3D printed figure I've gotten this year has been inproperly cured, resulting in a powerful resin stink and in some cases the figure still being sticky. 

 Scale-wise, it's about on par with my Bad Squiddo samurai for size, and a little smaller than my Clan Wars figures. Once painted and on the table I don't think it'll be too noticeable.  

 The resin house has already been accounted for in my tracker, but I'll add the Lone Wolf and Cub, counting them and the baby carriage as three figures.

 

Miniatures Acquired: 207

Miniatures Painted: 210

Terrain Acquired: 3

Terrain Painted: 9

Scatter Acquired: 8

Scatter Painted: 12

 

Lion Clan Samurai and the Start of a Temple

 One of my local gaming stores has quite a bit of old stock left over from a previous owner; some of the Reaper miniatures and paints on the rack are very old, some of the paint colors having been retired more than a decade ago. The current owners have some of them marked down to get them cleared out, and I grabbed probably 8 or so blister packs of "Clan Wars" miniatures from the period circa 2003 when Reaper Miniatures had the license. 

"Clan Wars" was a rank and flank miniatures game of fantasy samurai, set in the world of Rokugan, made popular by the "Legend of the Five Rings" collectible card game, roleplaying game and associated novels. The Reaper figures in 2003 were my first introduction to the setting, though I never had any at the time. I fumbled through playing the card game a bit in college and have enjoyed some of the novels, though I still haven't made my way into playing any edition of the RPG. 

Here are the first couple I've painted. On the left, with the two swords, is "Lion's Pride female samurai" while on the right with the naginata is "Lion Clan Heavy Elite Infantry." Both members of Rokugan's Lion Clan, the most militant and valor-minded of the seven clans. The middle figure is an unaligned "Samurai with Polearm" but painted in Lion colors.

 I've also begun work on the last piece of samurai terrain I currently have, the Temple kit from Things From the Basement. I've got it built up into sub-assemblies for spray painting, hopefully tomorrow. I also opened up a pack of 12" MDF squares I'd bought a while back with an eye towards seeing if I could cut a base for the temple. 

Well, when I opened it up, I discovered that it's not MDF like I'm used to, these squares are more like really dense, 1/8th inch thick cardboard. I marked out the size of the base I wanted with a pencil and used a saw to cut it, though next time I might be able to just score my way through it with a box cutter. Then I used a file to chamfer the edges. It's not a perfect rectangle but it's good enough for my purposes and I'm pleased that I put the work into it myself.

 The second pictures gives you a bit of an idea of what it's going to look like, minus the roof tiles, railings and the timber frames on the building. I think I might make a gravel path leading up to the front steps, plus add some bushes and the like during the flocking process. 

In other news, I still haven't been able to pick up the Wargames Factory zombies my friend Dave found in his pile of shame and set aside for me - he got a case of Con Crud from going to Gen-Con, and so the usual Monday night get togethers he usually hosts have been on hold. I'm hoping for this coming Monday - I'd like to be able to get some assembled and painted in time for Wargames Among the Warplanes! 

I did add some more figures to the leadpile, but I'm still in the green - some figures I'd ordered a while ago from Heresy Miniatures finally arrived, along with a Reaper "Bones USA" ogre mage I intend to paint up as a second oni for more fantastical samurai gaming. 

I've also placed a small order for some Japanese terrain from Oshiro Models. I've decided I'm going to go with James' resin-cast pieces for as much as I can going forward - it's a bit pricier but I think it's worthwhile. 

 

So let's get the tracker updated:

 

Miniatures Acquired: 191

Miniatures Painted: 198

Terrain Acquired: 3

Terrain Painted: 8

Scatter Acquired: 8

Scatter Painted: 12

 

Urgent Care - You're Gonna Need It!

 While I still have furniture to paint and glue into place, I've completed the building itself for this Urgent Care center from Atomic Laser Cut Designs - making this my fifth building, and sixth kit overall, from them. As always, I've done a little customization and decoration to make it feel a little more alive.

 The exterior walls have gotten some graffiti, courtesy some GreenStuffWorld decals, as well as some lost dog signs and a "no littering" sign I pulled off Google Image Search and resized before taking to my local office supply store to print out. The windows (including the window separating the receptionist's area from the waiting room) have "glass" cut from overhead projector acetate sheets and glued into place.

 The floors are likewise printed paper, from a set of floor patterns I got from Sarissa Precision. There was a lot of careful measuring, re-measuring and cutting, believe me! 

 Inside, we've got more signs in the waiting room (including one on the receptionist's window reminding patrons to be polite, based on ones I've actually seen in waiting rooms post-pandemic), and a bulletin board in the receptionist's office. 

The one piece of furniture I've painted and glued into place so far is an air conditioning vent from OshiroModelTerrain. Most of the rest of the furniture I've got to paint is also from Oshiro, save for a pair of bench seats for the waiting room from GreenStuffWorld.

 I had some nerves going into this kit - it's one of the most complex Atomic Laser Cut Designs offers, with multiple interior rooms, and I knew I wanted to split the flooring between wood and tile. And yeah, I snapped a piece while I was test-fitting. But other than that, I just took my time and did a lot of test-fitting and sanding and cutting and ultimately it was less stressful a process than I feared it would be. 

In others news... while I'm not keen on zombie movies or TV shows much any more (post-pandemic they feel a little too close), I've gotten the bug to try out one of the solo zombie apocalypse wargames on the market - specifically, Zombie RV, which I know my friend Mike over at Lead Legionaries has spent some time playing. Thing of it is - I don't have any zombies! So an order was placed, and I fall well behind on my painted vs acquired tracker! At least they should be fairly fast and easy to paint up...

 

Miniatures Acquired: 173

Miniatures Painted: 129

Terrain Acquired: 4

Terrain Painted: 7

Scatter Acquired: 0

Scatter Painted: 9

 

Fat Dragon Self-Service Ramen

 Last night, after I finished posting about yesterday's game, I put the finishing touches on another building kit from Atomic Lasercut Designs. This was a blank storefront that I bought a month ago with an eye towards turning it into an automat-style self service restaurant. 

The sign out front (and interior art) is all just stuff I grabbed off Google Image Search and mocked up in MSPaint, printed out on the laser printer at my local copy shop. The graffiti decals are from an EBay seller, and the furnishings on the interior are mostly from Oshiro Models, with the booths and arcade cabinet from Miniature Building Authority. 

And here's a better look at the drinks cabinet - I used UV resin to give it a "glass" front.

What's next? Well, a buddy of mine is setting me up with some 3D printed modern buildings and street scatter, I have the three gangs of Mafiosos to paint up, and I picked up a set of Mantic street scatter at my local hobby shop yesterday:

I also found out that Harlequin is hosting their next Demo Day event on June 14th...one week after my game at Wargames Among the Warplanes! So it sounds like I should maybe not bother unpacking my car after I get back from WATW...

Figures Purchased in 2025: 58

Figures Painted in 2025: 70

Welcome to EZ Pawn

 I took yesterday, March 31st, as a day off work, and used some of that free time to finish* off the EZ Pawn Shop I've been working on. I got the front doors and the surrounding frame glued on, the sign on the roof assembled and weathered, some signage in the windows, and a few pieces of art on the walls. 

So why the asterisk? 

Because there's still a few things I want to add. 

I've got an air conditioner from Oshiro Model Terrain that I'm getting into the priming box today so that I can paint it up and glue it in next to the back door. 

There's some furniture to paint up and add in - I've got a cashiers' counter and a couple shelving units to paint up, and there's a safe and a gun locker that's on its way from Miniature Building Authority. There will probably be various other odds and ends added going forward. 

But!

It's finished enough to where I'd be fine with having it on the table during a game and not feel like it's unfinished. 

Pawn Shop Progress, Continued

 I've gotten a good amount of work done on the MDF pawn shop I posted about last time since Friday, and have probably one or two more sessions to go to finish the building proper; resin and MDF furniture will be another session or two on top of that, in all likelihood. 

The original red spray paint I bought to do the doors, window frames and signage in ended up being a weird neon red-orange that wasn't what I was looking for, so I painted over all that with ordinary red craft paint. Everything was given a light drybrush of a pale tan to weather and dull down the brightness of the red. I've glued in the back door, it's frame, and the window frames, plus used pieces of acetate sheet to make window panes; I've glued them in because I want to varnish over them, which will make them frost and look dingy and unwashed. The front door frame is test-fit and sanded, but not yet glued into place. The furniture inside has been assembled, but is not glued down because I'm going to hit it all with a can of black spray paint and then just give it a little drybrush to help the edges pop. There's a few resin bits and bobs I'm waiting to come in the mail as well. 

Around the side of the building, I've applied a graffiti decal - I bought a couple sheets of these off a seller on ebay; they're designed for model railroaders to add realistic graffiti to train cars, but O-Scale is close enough to 28mm for my purposes. This one worked really well; I was nervous about it tearing during application but it went on like a breeze. I've got a dozen more designs, and I'm anticipating using maybe one per building at most as I grow my modern terrain collection. 

The colors are really crisp and bright; I'll probably apply a very light drybrush of the tan over it to weather it and tie it into the wall behind it a little more. 

In addition to this, I started doing a little bit of work on my next building. One thing I regret not doing more of with the pawn shop is sanding down the lugs on the pieces; the fit on everything is exceptionally tight and once you add a skin of paint over it, almost impossible to get the lugs into their slots. So for the next building - a blank storefront that I'm building as the "Fat Dragon Self-Service Ramen Eatery" - I'm starting off by sanding all the lugs down! 

The furnishings are from OSHIRO Model Terrain - there are two noodle vending machines, a drinks vending machine, recycling bin and (not super visible by the front door) an ATM. I'm waiting on a set of booth seats from Miniature Building Authority to finish off the furniture collection for this one. The exterior is going to be the same color as the pawn shop, but I'm thinking a light blue for the interior walls. Flooring is going to be the same wooden plank pattern I used for the pawn shop. 

I'm debating if I want to do some flower pots on the sidewalk under the window and next to the front door. 

I'm hoping, given the lessons learned on the pawn shop, that the ramen eatery goes even faster!