Secret Santa Mini Exchange

Back in about 2004 when I was living in Japan, a friend of mine invited me to participate in a Christmas mini exchange. There were a bunch of bases nearby with a surprising number of fellow gamers, so the idea was that we would exchange addresses with someone on an online forum, & we would exchange painted minis with some of the other soldiers, sailors (and some civilians) around the Pacific. I ended up exchanging a Thousand Sons rubric marine for a Dark Elf shade painted by a guy in Australia. 

Fast forward to 2013. I decided to bring that little tradition to my hometown in Oregon. I proposed the idea to our local gaming group, & some jumped at it. We had about a half-dozen participants, and we made sure that each of the miniatures that were exchanged were ones that could be used in the recipient's army. I ended up painting Ulrick the Slayer for a friend of mine who played Space Wolves, and I received a Raven Guard assault sergeant from another friend.

This year a buddy suggested we do it again, and we had a lot more participants. I ended up with a friend that I'd already painted a mini for in the past. You may remember the Mega Nob from this year's Mini Madness. This time I decided to paint up a Killer Kan for him. 

I managed to snag a Kan from Yorrick and started right away. Yorrick had already started painting it, but I didn't have time to strip it, so I used the Krylon Zenith painting technique that I used on my Khador warjacks a while back. 

It worked pretty well, and I was rather pleased with the results. I know I have a rather "clean" painting style, so it was nice to practice Orks again. I think I've gotten better over the years,and I've been able to use more weathering and shading techniques that give a dirtier, oily look. Here's the result.

Sunday the various painters met at a local pizza place to exchange minis. Some folks weren't able to make it due to the holiday weekend, but the bulk of us were able to get there. 

After a little pizza we exchanged our miniatures. We'd pass each one around the table after it was opened so we could get a good look at the gift. There were a number of impressive paint jobs. Yorrick your received a Red Corsair miniature from a Betrayal at Cath mini, there were a few Daemon minis, a Dark Eldar, a few Orks, & a host of Inquisition minis (all painted by Yorrick). I made out like a bandit, since I received a Exalted Flamer of Tzeentch on Flaming chariot, plus it came with the extra Herald, both magnetized so they could be switched easily. This are the minis that were opened at the exchange.

If you've got a good group of gamers I'd recommend you do an exchange of your own. I imagine we'll do this again next year too.

~Muninn

New Eldar Codex releases

There's been some new and exciting information circulating around the net regarding the June Eldar release. Not the least of which being the reveal of the enormous Wraith Knight construct.

First off is the Codex cover. Unsurprisingly, it's awesome. 

 I don't expect to buy this book, but it sure is pretty.

The other big pic is the Wraith Knight himself. 

It's big & badass.  I really look forward to seeing how people will pint it. Also, just look at it compared to the Riptide. Here's a shot I found comparing them side by side. It looks to be about 30% taller which means it'd be around 9-10".

I'll be interested to see its stats, and its price tag. Given the size I'd wager it'll cost about the same as Baneblade.

~Muninn

Painting Competition: All Kroot All the Time

So the results of the last painting competition are in.  Yorrik's Kaptin Badrukk took first place, & my Greater Knarloc came in second. A really crisp Trazyn the Infinite mini rounded out third place. (Thanks to the early arrival of the twins I never ended up completing, or even priming, my Ahriman mini. The store owner let me submit the Greater Knarloc instead.)

Now that that's over, time to prepare for the next one.

My FLGS owner is a Kroot fanatic. I'm not sure why, but he loves the quasi-avian alien mercenaries. He likes them so much that I bought him a Games Day Angkor Prok mini for his grand re-opening years ago.

He's been waiting for a new Tau Codex for years in hopes of a Kroot HQ, just so he could field an all-kroot army (other than the Forge World one that is).Now that there are rumors of an April Tau release that might just come to pass.

Anyhoo, given his predisposition for the xenos he decided that the newest painting competition would use them as a unifying theme. the entry fee for the store's painting competition is to buy a mini (usually the one you paint, but it's negotiable). This time, you just have to buy *anything* and he gives you an unpainted kroot mini. He gives you the option of taking one that's already built & primed, or just taking bits.

Painting kroot is pretty easy. I can knock out a pretty good one in under 2 hours.

I'm a glutton for punishment though, so there's no way I'm just going to submit an unmodified mini. Instead I'm converting myself a grizzled mercenary who's bargained with a Dark Eldar Haemonculus for a pair of wings. I have a diorama in mind too, so this thing will be kinda elaborate.

Here's what I've blu-tacked together so far:

You can see I've carved away a bit of his back to add some DA Scourge bits. I was going to attempt a chest swap, but it turns out those evil space-elves have tiny bodies. Instead I'll be attempting to GS some armor.

The next big thing will be to fashion a pair of arms that will be swinging it's hunting rifle as a melee weapon. That'll be a task in & of itself, but I hope to have the GSing done by Friday. The deadline at the moment is April 6th, so I hope I'm giving myself enough time.

More when I get a bit further along.

~Muninn

Death from the Skies cover

Loraziel over at Dakka Dakka posted this shot of the rumored Death from the Skies flier compendium.

There are some conflicting rumors (surprise surprise) about this release.

 initial rumor was that there would be a number of new fliers including
A new Tau flier
A new Eldar flier
The Dark Eldar Voidraven Bomber
and a new Tyranid unit called the Harpy.

meanwhile there's another rumor saying that this is just an update that brings all the current fliers in line with 6th edition rules (plus adding the DE Bomber).  I'd obviously see some new fliers, but only time will tell.

~Muninn

Commission: Lelith Hesparex

A friend wanted to give a fun present to a DE player friend, and commissioned me to paint up Lelith Hesperax. The player's color scheme is black & purple, but I've taken a little liberty with Lelith's hair & makeup.
People often ask me how long it takes to paint a single mini. I usually shrug and say "hours" because I start, stop, take breaks, move on to other minis, and get distracted by shiny objects.

 Now that I'm doing commissions I figured it'd be helpful to know for certain, so while painting Lelith I used a stopwatch to figure out exactly how long it takes me to finish a figure. Once completed I discovered that it took me about 5 hours & 30 minutes to knock her out. I set my commission price before knowing this though, so it turns out I charged him less than minimum wage for the mini. Not a bad deal for him.

~Muninn