2018 review....

Hello and welcome back to my blog. 

Well another year comes to a end and it is traditional to look back at my hobby year. This year I want to keep it brief. It has been a interesting year and I have learnt a few new hobby related things. I met a few people and hopefully made a new friend or two. It has also been challenging in some ways as I had the never ending viral infection in the first half of the year, my wife’s health hasn’t been great, technology problems and I have had a host of vehicle health issues including crashing my motorbike on a diesel spill (don’t overfill your cars, vans and trucks folks).

Although I didn’t get as many figures painted in 2018 as I hoped looking back it is actually more than I thought it was. It was a good mix of figures from Necromunda 2017, Copplestone, Warlord’s 2000AD Strontium Dogs and Ramshackle games lines with the odd figure from here and there thrown in for good measure.

The big thing for me this year was the BYOL 2018 oldhammer show. Curtis of Ramshackle games invited me to join him in setting up the Helsreach table on which the original Necromunda rules were going to be played. The idea was that I was going to supply the town buildings. I trundled on down there with my wife in tow, two cases of figures and three plastic crates of models. 

If you are looking at the pictures my terrain was anything covered in graffiti or posters where as Curtis’ models tended to be larger and had heavy weathering. I also supplied a great number of the citizens to be shot at or aggressively romanced by the space bastards marines. For good measure I took along three gangs. The Warriors (Orlock), Fatal Floozies (Eshers) and my old Gothrats - OOP Shockforce mutant rat man. 

Take a peek at the tables and Helsreach action here:

https://mattblackgodsworld.blogspot.com/2018/08/helsreach-and-other-byol-tables.html

https://mattblackgodsworld.blogspot.com/2018/08/helsreach-pt-2-action.html

I had a fun couple of days gaming Helsreach. Thank you Curtis for inviting me, GMing and the fresh inspiration. 

The Helsreach gaming inspired me to arrange a Post Apocalyptic Wargames meet up for next year. So far the plans have fallen flat trying to find a suitable location to host it. Things may have to go on hold on that front as my wife may be starting dialysis by then. As you can imagine it will be a busy life changing year for us both. 

The post apocalyptic Wargames forum reached 10 years in the wastelands of the internet. I commissioned a figure to celebrate. Eventually I took delivery of the 10 figure from the casters after a few teething troubles. 

BTW - I have plenty of these figures still for grabs. You only have to pay P&P. Email me on mattblackgod@gmail.com if you are interested.

My own homebrew rules Radlands got a quick play test this year. They seem to play okay. My debate is to release the main rules for play test or to finish them before I let the wastelanders get their mitts on them. Batrep here:

https://mattblackgodsworld.blogspot.com/search/label/Radlands

That pretty much sums up my 2018 hobby wise. I hope to be more productive next year. I have some ideas and plans which I hope to explore in next years blog posts. 

So my lovely wasteland wanderers, thank you for reading and putting up with the sporadic blog posts this year. Have a happy New Year’s Eve. Stay safe out there and have fun. See you next year.

Merry Apocmass.

Seasons Greetings, merry apocmass or what ever you choose to call the season. Have a great time. 

Don’t drink too much of the hooch the warboys have been brewing all year. 

Have a wonderful time and stay safe out there.

Blubber

Hello and welcome back to my blog. 

It must be Christmas, two blog posts at one. 

The Blubber gang rule Trashford. It is a square mile of territory in the Blasted Ruins. The main centre is a ancient shopping mall which is the town. Nearby is a old stadium in which Blubber runs gladiatorial shows usually using captives vs his best warriors or savage beasts.

Blubber is a Max Bubba from 2000AD Strontium Dogs line by Warlord Games. 

The Blubber gang trades and raids across the wasteland. They have also given Brittannia a head ache by taking on their troops as they try to control the Blasted ruins. Blubber and his boys may just hang on to their grip on Trashford as long as Brittannia don’t roll out the big guns. The gang’s grip is helped by a pristine weapons cache looted from a lost military bunker in the blasted ruins.

So that takes my figure total up to 28 painted. Some 72 short. I tried to get more done but real life kept getting in the way. That’s going to be my lot for this year. I always pack the brushes away over the silly season. 

I will try to post before the big day, but just in case. Have a very merry Christmas, Yule or whatever you call it. 

That’s all folks, be careful out there and Seasons Greetings. 

Post apocalyptic vehicles.

Hello and welcome back to my blog. 

And now for the Xmas eve eve blog post...

Now for some 28mm vehicles. The wastelands are home to all manner of vehicles. Many are cobbled junk heaps together barely recognisable from the vehicle it started out as. Here or there the old vehicle makes it out of the production units of Utopia or Britannia cities. Some vehicles where built near the end but stayed locked away unused in a bunker only see the light of day decades later. Others where built from bits of many other vehicles and wrecks. These are products of the builders twisted imagination and ability to adapt anything to their purpose. Often they mix utility with the bizarre.

This is Mayor Bustrd’s favourite ride. To blow off steam he races it around the wastelands around Rubbleborg. It is his pride and joy. I may have this as a game objective. Steal the car. The car is a Gigapig resin model from Antenocitis workshop. It is a super detailed model.

There are a number of vehicles in Rubbleborg, many of which are built in it’s workshops from the many items the scavengers and salvage teams. 

Many vehicles are armoured up trucks which the locals use to haul loot from various locations in the wastelands. The trucks are handy for moving trade items from place to place. This is a Badger by Ramshackle Games. I have been wanting one since Ramshackle first started casting models. Now it’s mine....all mine...ha ha hhhaaaa. 

The  Badger has a skull hood Ornament that I sculpted from putty. 

There are a few smaller vehicles used as escorts or for scouting. This is a Ram Stoat by Ramshackle Games. 

Everyone has heard of the legend of Max, the Road Warrior (also known as the man with no name, the raggity man and blood bag amoung other names) and his mighty ride, the Interceptor. This car is a 1/43 scale model by Autoart. I dirtied it up with some dry brushing. I did try to copy the movie car but the dirt on it was too heavy to look realistic on a car of this size.

Bandits use various vehicles and this car is a typical bandit ride. 

The car is the chase car from the opening scene of Mad Max 2 the Roadwarrior. This car is a 1/43 scale model by Autoart. I dirtied it up with some dry brushing. I got them both as a set. Luckily I managed to get them for the prices they where before Fury Road came out. Auto Art also made some dirty cars but they are even more expensive and look like they have been in a mud wumping competition rather than racing across the wastelands. The dirt is painted on too heavily for my tastes.

I will be including the vehicles in my paint totals...

Figures painted: 27....73 short.

Thanks for looking, take care out there.

Amera Plastic Craters

Hello and welcome to my blog. 

For many years I have been a fan of the vac formed models made by Amera Plastic models. I must admit at first I was concerned that the plastic would too thin but I soon discovered that they happily take 28mm metal figures without any issues. Over time I have added quite a few of their models to my collection.

Recently Amera began a competition on social media on the run up to Christmas to win one of their new crater models. I was lucky enough to win one. It arrived in the post over the weekend.

The model should fit the three scales I game (28mm, 20mm and 15mm) nicely. The craters are nicely detailed. Now I just have to find the time to paint it. 

The competition is still going so give it a go, you never know you may get lucky.

They can be found on Facebook 

https://m.facebook.com/AmeraMoulding/

Twitter: @AmeraMouldings 

Instagram: 

https://instagram.com/ameramouldings

Thanks for looking. Take care out there.

Wasteland Wondering

Hello and welcome back to another Wasteland Wondering.

It has been a couple of weeks since my last post. Yes I am still alive and kicking. Apologies for the lack of posts. Real lIfe has been busy.

On the workbench waiting for pictures are a few finished 28mm vehicles. These will be counted in my figure count. Now all I need to do is get pictures of them.

On top of our usual Halloween celebrations we have had a horde of vehicle issues. My black thumb has really let standards slip. Every time he had fixed the car another issue would raise its ugly head. He should be thankful that we don’t live in a post apocalyptic wasteland as he would meet a sticky end with that level of incompetence. 

To rub salt into the wounds my back up transportation, the bike decided to stop firing up. Typically just after getting the car sorted the fault was traced and fixed. The new splitfire spark plugs I had fitted back in June had decided to stop working. 

Hobby wise things have been interesting. 

The post apocalyptic Wargames forum is having issues loading pages and pictures won’t display. The whole thing is annoying and is forcing users away from the forum. Apparently many of the forums Tapatalk grabbed are suffering in a similar fashion. 

The only way to fix it is to get a backup of the forum from Tapatalk and rehost it elsewhere. The problem is Tapatalk want to charge me for the privilege of getting a backup of a forum that I set up and ten years worth of peoples work, ideas and hobby fun which was free to set up in the first place. This is yet another example of greedy corporate types looking for ways to fleece poor old hobbyists like myself. If anyone from Tapatalk is reading this, get a grip and get it sorted.

I backed a kickstarter called Goregasm which is a post apocalyptic combat arena game. I liked the look of it and we need to support small hobby firms. My only gripe is that the scale of the figures is a bit larger than my usual 28mm. However every wasteland needs its supermutant types. I am looking forward to seeing the game when it arrives. Of course there will be a full review when it arrives. 

The new GW 40K Speedfreaks looked interesting. I have always like Orks. I must admit that my finger hovered over the buy button. What held it back was the fact that I only like one of the vehicles. The vehicles would have been used as post apocalyptic run abouts. Another thing preventing me from buying is that I don’t want another boxed game that I won’t get to play or be drawn into the whole drop feed of models, rules and other stuff that GW likes. 

One of the better bits of hobby news is that my teenage niece has asked if I can show her how to paint figures. I have to say that I am thrilled and look forward to sharing some hobby tips with her. The hobby needs fresh blood and many more of the female of the species taking part. I hope she enjoys miniature painting as much as I do. All I have to do is get it organised. 

Another interesting twist is that my good lady announced that she would like to try Dungeons and Dragons (I have Big Bang Theory to thank for that). Now while I am not a big fan of fantasy I do like RPGs. I played D&D 1st ed back in mists of time. As memory recalls I didn’t really gel with the rules, preferring the Warhammer Fantasy RPG instead. 

Still this didn’t stop me buying the 5e starter box set. There will be some issues. We will be playing one on one (ooh err) rather than the usual adventure party size of four to six. So the starter game will need some tailoring. DMing isn’t a problem as I have done it a few times with other games.

To be honest googling resources for DnD was quite astounding. It was like peering through a door to a new world. The amount of official and fan material out is amazing. Everything from stat sheets through to character generators, name generators, mapping tools and more. I could not see GW allowing such unlicensed materials for it’s games. It is refreshing to see this approach. 

As my better half is a rookie in Geekdom I have decided to create a unique RPG for her as a introduction. Something which I hope will appeal to her interests and sense of humour. I must admit that I am having a lot of fun creating the story, maps and sketches for the game. I can see why William McAusland, creator of the Mutant Epoch RPG has turned out so much stuff for his game. It is seriously addictive. 

Don’t worry wastelanders, I won’t be joining the dark ranks of fantasy fans full time. Fantasy doesn’t push my buttons like post apoc or sci fi backgrounds. 

Soon I will be packing my hobby up for the silly season. It won’t wholly stop. The Rad Light rules will be getting some more work. Hopefully I will make some progress the great terrain refresh.

That is all for now.  Thank you for reading. Be safe out there. 

Town signs

One of my many side projects was to make up some signs for the fortress walls. I wanted a sign with the town name on them. The problem is there are a couple of townships on mattblackgod’s world the fortress walls could be used for. Wastetopia in the ruins of the mattblack mega city and Rubbleborg in what is known as the Brittannia wastelands. In addition I didn’t want to paint a chosen name on in case another township pops up. 

So I opted on removable signs I could mount on the walls. I have a stock of gift cards. I chopped them up to make two signs. Using brass picture frame wire I made two mounting ropes for each sign. These just hook over the rebar and other junk on the walls. 

No sign

Rubbleborg 

Wastetopia

Each sign was painted brown and then had various shades of brown to orange added. When happy the town name was painted on in white. 

A simple easy bit of work which helps reuse my old fortress walls in many settings. 

Thanks for looking. Stay safe out there.

Terrain refresh pt 1. The Fortress gates.

Hello and welcome back,

Yikes a month since my last post. My social life has stepped up a gear . In addition to this illness, a trading course, a visit to watch the rugby league grand final, vehicle issues and my wife’s health not being great has kept me from getting any serious hobby time in. I have gotten a little bit in here and there. Mainly vehicles and the terrain update. More on the vehicles in another post. 

In this post I am going to focus on the first model in my terrain refresh. Inspired by Curtis of Ramshackle games model’s from Helsreach table we did together at this year’s Oldhammer event, I decided the fort gate would be the first thing to work on. 

Before: 

After:

Some battle damage was added with the tip of a Philips head screwdriver. The cheap  artists acrylic white paint was dry brushed onto the model. This stuff goes almost translucent when it is painted on. It took the shade of the concrete up a few tones making it feel more like old concrete. It also made the graffiti look like it was old and faded. This was the longest part of the job as I did several heavy dry brushes. 

I picked up some dropper bottles and paint mixing kit from amazon. Using more cheap artists acrylic paint I mixed up batches of wash. This was in 1 part paint to 5 parts water. The colours I mixed was dark brown, brown, brown/orange (rust brown), orange and green. 

The walls started with the darker brown washes and I worked up. Rust brown and orange washes where applied to the the metal parts and gate. The dropper bottles allowed me to put runs of brown and orange from the bits of rusty metal down the walls. The top parts of the wall got a dark brown wash to simulate the black algae buildup concrete can get. 

That’s it cheap and cheerful. The other fortress wall sections will get the same treatment in the fullness of time. They may also get some new details and ramshackle repairs. 

Thanks for looking. 

Take care out there. 

Mutants, beasts and scatter - Oh My!

Hello wastelanders, welcome back to my hobby blog,

It has been a couple of weeks since my last hobby update due to a couple of busy week ends. I have been hobbying away in the background. 

Out in the Blasted ruins lies the township of TrashFord. It is controlled by the bandit Max Blubber. With his gang Blubber runs Trashford. Here we have Impedance Jones, one of Max Blubber’s gang. 

The figure is Impetigo Jones from Warlord Games’ 2000AD Strontium Dogs line.

The Blubber gang have sent Brittannia away with a flea in their ear. Luckily the Brittannia’s currently do not have enough man power to take over the Blasted ruins. Blubber’s boys have a ace up their sleeve when the day comes that the Red Coats try their luck with Trashford. They are in possession of a number of high tech plasma rifles looted from an old military bunker within the Blasted Ruins. 

Out in the wastelands there is many hazards. Some of the hazards are vicious mutant animals who see you as a passing meal. 

The Panda is a Bear by Ramshackle Games. I painted it as a Panda due to an idea from the JJ Shurte novel, Days too dark. 

 

Of course there are other critters out there to beware...like the RAD PANDA!

 The Rad Panda is a Bear by Ramshackle Games. I thought I would paint it a little differently. I really enjoyed painting these bears. They are fun to paint.

Many wasteland communities in the wastelands of mattblackgod’s world use bio vats. They contain microbes that convert biological material into plastics, rubber, oil, booze and fuel. These microbes are a standard for many frontier or remote worlds. Here is my take on it.

This vat idea came from some fluff in the Nuclear Renaissance rule book (by Ramshackle Games). I plan to use it as scatter scenery. This was part of a unmarked set of SF barrels and containers my Wife got me last Christmas. I have no idea who the manufacturer is.

The Mayor of Rubbleborg loves his mushroom tea. So it seemed fitting to make a consignment for the table.

I plan to use this as scatter scenery or as a objective. Again this was part of the same unmarked set of SF barrels and containers my Wife got me last Christmas (she is a real keeper). 

So how am I doing for my 100 minis  challenge? The totals so far are 22 painted and 78 to go. Yes I am including the barrels and boxes.

I have the rest of the Strontium Dogs figures to paint, a small pile of Ramshackle bits to work on, three vehicles, some reinforcements for the Warriors and Fatal Floozies gangs  and that is before I start work on the great terrain refresh I am planning. 

That’s all for this week. Thanks for looking. Take care out there.

Scouts, Wanderers and Bounty Hunters.

Hello and welcome back to my blog.

Time for the weekly hobby update. Yet more figures painted for my Rubbleborg setting.

Firstly there is Roland De Rat

The figure is a old GW Necromunda Ratskin.

Roland De Rat is Mayor B’sturd’s go to man when he needs a location in the wastelands scouting out. Roland always returns with reliable information. He has been a wastelanders and scout since the day he learnt to walk. Rumour says he was abandoned by his parents when he started talking and they couldn’t shut him up. Do not make the mistake of asking Roland about his Rat Skin cloak. He will launch into his tail of running into the rat in the ruins when he was a lad. Three hours later of the blow by blow account you have lost the will to live.

The Wanderer.

 The wanderer is another one of those strange crazies who roam the wastelands alone, usually on foot. But don’t be fooled, this old man and his two pet ravens. He is wise and has much ancient knowledge. He is also a savage and dangerous warrior. The Wanderer is known for his berserk rages and is joyful in combat. He has never ran from battle. But that is only one side of the Wanderer. Stories tell of him rescuing and saving lone bandits or wanderers out in the wastes. Some tales speak of him arriving at a settlement with desperately needed supplies. He never arrives if looked for or expected. The Wanderer always arrives unlooked for. When in town he is worth speaking too. If he judges you worthy he may tell of the location of loot or give advice. 

The Wanderer is a Odin the Allfather figure by Footsore Miniatures. 

To help control the population of criminals and bandits attracted to Brittannia city, the Crown ordered a bounty hunter agency to be formed in the outer city (aka the slums). The company was called the Search and Destroy agency. The agency hires “Agents” and equips them. Brittannia put a price on Mayor B’sturd’s head, when the Rubbleborg sheriff arrested the Bounty Hunter and discovered this, B’sturd sent a runner to the SD office putting a bounty on the head of the Queen and each of the Lords of Brittannia. For some reason the bounty on B’sturd has been dropped.

These are three of the most famous agents. Left to Right Wulf Sternhammer (a warrior), Gronk (a weak hearted mutant and ace medic) and the legendary Johnny Alpha. The figures are by Warlord Miniatures from their recent Strontium Dogs game release.

That is all for this week. The totals so far are.... 17 finished and another 83 to go. 

Thanks for looking and stay safe out there.