Spell Research

Last night, Our Heroes got off much more lightly than they should have because of our collective ignorance about how some of their spells actually worked.

Today, I've been reading through the spells in the PHB to clarify matters for the future.

My players may come to regret making me do my own rules-learning, because I'm getting lots of ideas. Oh yes. LOTS.

[Insert maniacal Evil-Overlord laugh here]

Not a Bulette™, Honest It's Not

Next up on the painting table from Reaper's Kickstarter II is this critter, which they call 77372: Burrowing Horror and I will go out on a limb to call a Bulette.

Badger 105 Patriot - review

I took an opportunity to get myself another airbrush from Chicago Airbrush Supply (no longer in business, alas), an airbrush I've wanted for a while now, the Badger 105 Patriot. It was on special at CAS, and thanks to one of their periodic holiday vouchers I got it even cheaper. So, score! It got here very promptly too — just five days from ordering to appearing on my doorstep here in New Zealand.

The stand doesn't come with the airbrush. That's a soldering-iron stand.

 It's a double-action gravity feed brush with an integral paint cup. It also comes with a plastic push-on cap for the paint cup, for those who are likely to be moving the brush around a lot while they're painting, though that's not likely to be much of an issue for me.

It's roughly equivalent to the Paasche Talon I bought a while ago, but so far I'm finding it superior in almost every way. The machining of the components is excellent, the action of the trigger is smooth and easy, and the open tip makes it easy to get in very close without back-scattering air and paint from the painted surface into the tip cup. The Talon uses a skeleton tip shroud to achieve the same thing, and that does work OK, but I still found myself having to be very careful about the amount of air and paint I put through in close-up work. The cup of the Badger has a lower profile than that of the Paasche, so it interferes less with one's sight-line while working in close — for my purposes, it could be even lower. The weight and balance in the hand is very nice, and the skeleton back-cap gives instant access to the needle for pre-set paint flow adjustments and the like. Plus, for maintenance, you can dismount the needle without having to disassemble the whole brush, which is a bonus.

I've added a converter to this airbrush's valve stem so that I can use it on my Paasche hose.

Speaking of the Badger's open tip, here it is right here. And this is one place where one has to be a bit cautious: the needle stands proud of the tip, and like all airbrush needles it's a delicate thing, easily damaged. You do need to take care not to ram it into your paint surface, or inadvertently drag it across your sleeve or anything. It is often possible to re-straighten a bent needle tip, but it's not all that easy.

When not in use, the tip is protected by a spring-fit metal cap, which you can see in the first photo. It goes on and off very smoothly, and stays on firmly. It's nice.

Badger claim this as a "universal" brush, that will paint a line from pencil-thin to broad, heavy coverage without the need for changing tips and needles. That seems to be true, up to a point. It will certainly paint a nice fine line, but I find the spray pattern to be a bit more granular than that of the 150 or 200 with XF (extra-fine) tips and needles mounted.

Overall, I like this airbrush a lot. It's very flexible, and it's easy to clean and maintain, which I appreciate a lot. I think it'll be my go-to airbrush for just about everything bar ultra-fine or super-broad painting.

Hail Hydra!

This is yet another of Reaper's Bones plastic figures, 77191 Hydra by Sandra Garrity. I like Garrity's work, and this is no exception, though I feel that it would be more useful as a gaming miniature if its pose were more compact, more curled around on itself. That would probably require that it be moulded with one or two more pieces, but it's already a multi-piece model so that wouldn't be a big problem — at least, not from the end-user's point of view.

A Tin Full Of Tanks

Top left — KV85, Top-middle — ISU-152, top right — T34-76D

Bottom left — SU-85 (or SU-100), bottom right — T34-76A.

I glue little rare-earth magnets to the bottom of all my micro-armour so that I can store and transport them like this, in little shallow tins. This particular tin is one that a set of 10 Caran D'Ache crayons came in, and it's an ideal depth. Old tobacco tins are good too, though they're getting to be a bit expensive.

It's a little crowded at the moment, and I should probably transfer some of these to another one.

MicroSoviets

I've got a whole bunch of 1:285 scale late-WWII Soviet armour that I got ultra-cheap as a job-lot a while ago, and it all needs painting. It's not actually an army I have all that much interest in fielding, but what the hell. There are a couple of manufacturers present; one is definitely C-in-C, but the other I'm unsure about — possibly Scotia.

I've been flailing about trying to find the ideal paint shade and processes to make my life as easy as possible. Fortunately the Soviets didn't go as much for markings as other combatants, so that at least will help.

T34-76

These are some of a bunch of early T-34s I bought quite a few years ago when C-in-C were doing a cut-price deal — 10 tanks from each of Russia, Japan, Germany and America. They're painted in a dark Tamiya green of some sort — NATO Green, I think — and dry-brushed with Tamiya Buff. The colour would be roughly equivalent to Vallejo Russian Green I suppose, and it's pretty much the dark colour I used to think all Russian armour was painted. These days I prefer something more in the olive green line.

ISU-152

This (and the SU-85 or -100 below) was painted in a base of Vallejo's Parched Grass surface primer, and washed with Citadel Athonian Camoshade, which is a sort of olive khaki. Dry-brushed with Vallejo Buff. It's not too bad, but it's just a little bit too bright for what I want.

SU-85 (or SU-100)

One good thing about Soviet armour of this era is that the guns are simple tubes, without much in the way of sleeves or muzzle-brakes. That makes them a breeze to replace with stiff steel pins, which are much less susceptible to damage than the cast-on soft white-metal barrels. It's a little bit of a drag drilling and pinning hundreds of models, but doing them just a few at a time as I paint, it doesn't take long at all.

I'm not sure whether these are SU-85s or SU-100s — I'm not au fait enough with Soviet armour to be able to tell the difference at a glance. the SU-100 would have a much longer barrel of course, but otherwise they're near enough in basic shape that I'll happily use the models for either, as I require.

KV-85

These KV-85s have been painted in Vallejo Russian Uniform and washed with Citadel Agrax Earthshade, dry-brushed with Vallejo Buff. They're a shade or two down from the ISU-152 and SU-85, (though the camera doesn't really show that very well) and I think that this will be my basic colour for all the rest.

I replaced the barrels with lengths of 0.7mm steel wire.

---

These are the T-34 Model 1942/43 from the Mystery Manufacturer. Having looked at them a bit more closely, I begin to doubt my theory that they came from Scotia — the other models I've had from them have been considerably less detailed, more like stuff from Heroics & Ros (of whom I'm quite fond, incidentally). The standard of detail is almost like some older GHQ stuff, but the quality of casting isn't as good as I've had from them. It remains a mystery.

I've replaced the barrel on the one on the left with a .55mm brass rod. It's slightly over-scale, but it looks right on the table. I'd have preferred to do it with steel, being stiffer, but even brass is a substantial improvement on white metal.

Gorgon

This is Reaper Bones 77256: Brass Bull, from their Bones II Kickstarter. It's not in their store as yet, apparently it's due for release in June.

I wanted a Gorgon, not a Brass Bull, so I painted it in rusty iron colours.

Note, that's a D&D Gorgon, not a mythological Gorgon.

Clichéa

 Redditor called Sarithus has created a map of Clichéa, “a map based on fantasy tropes that also pokes a little fun at unoriginal map makers.”

Now, although this is intended as a parody of many, many (so many) fantasy worlds, I think it would also be very useful as an introductory campaign world. The tropes are all familiar enough that new players could feel right at home, and that familiarity would allow them to come up with their own character and adventure ideas without first having to figure out what game the GM is playing.

As I've said before, clichés become clichés because they work.

Mashaaf - finished at last

I finally finished painting old maggot-breath, Reaper's Bones 77375: Mashaaf. It's a big figure, which made it a bit tricky to handle while painting.

In the first photo, I've included a figure of your friendly neighbourhood psycho-killer and vivisectionist for scale.

Just in case you haven't already seen it, I kept a work-in-progress blog here.