Happy Easter and some hobby progress

Hello and Welcome back,

It’s April already and Easter is upon us. Happy Easter everyone. 

Hobbywise I have been a bit of a butterfly so far this year flitting between projects and finishing very few. Maybe I need to focus more but then hobby time gets regular catterference.

Here we see Dixie reminding me that I exist for his comfort after a few attempts to steal my paint brushes. It often feels like my moggies work shifts to prevent me getting anything finished.

Recently I got this Grauncher vehicle finished by Ramshackle Games. After assembly the Grauncher was primed and then put a side for a while. It was then painted brown with some grey patches to represent primer. Some orange splodges were added too for that harder rust. 

The Grauncher then had Vallejo chipping fluid painted on. Once dry the Grauncher was sprayed yellow with Army Painter primer. The chipping fluid was then scraped off giving this chipped look. One issue I had was the chipping guild took off the paint some places right down to the resin which had to be

I think in future I will be trying sponging on resin vehicles and keep the chipping fluid for plastic models. The Grauncher then got the details finished off and a brown wash or two. 

The Grauncher would suit hauling scrap across the wastelands or sat on a space port dockside waiting to move cargo. 

In addition to the Grauncher I made a crate from old robogear terrain set pieces. I painted it in a dark rust and sponged grey over it. Some contents marking were added. 

Some a bit more sinister than the others (well it is Easter!).

Looks like a certain mechanoid from a popular television show has been past at some point. Obviously just after he broke his programming as I can’t see him taking up graffiti normally. 

That’s all for now, thanks for looking.

Happy Easter and stay safe out there.

Cyborgs, motorbikes and dreadnoughts

Hello and welcome back.

No it’s not the title of a heavy metal album but a hobby update! March already eh? Where did the time go? Anyway, on with the madness. 

Four days march North-East of the Last City lies the Howling Hills. Deep in the hills lies the Giggles Valley home to the feared bunch weirdos known as the Giggles clan. The valley has many caves and abandoned mines in which the Giggles clan survived the end of Mattblackgod’s world. The Clan emerged and have continued to survive the harsh world by becoming cyborgs. These days most of them are more machine than human.

The most feared of the Giggles Clan in the huge Gilgamesh. Very little of the original man is left, just his skull of a man who should have been long dead can be seen. The power claw and cannons make the huge cyborg a fearsome opponent. 

Gilgamesh is a figure from the Nuclear Renaissance line by Ramshackle games. I also think this figure would make a great hazard in the ruins looming menacingly over your scavengers. Is the machine dead or alive? Noooo don’t push the button marked “START”!

The wastelands are a dangerous place on foot, it probably isn’t much safer for those lunatics who like to speed about on motorbikes. They are handy for reconnaissance work, fast attack or vehicle escorts. These two riders offer their services to convoys going out of Last City. 

Dag likes to get out on his dirt bike. He doesn’t trust the swirling toxic clouds and carries plenty of oxy cylinders to keep him alive. Dag’s weapon of choice is a meat cleaver which he uses to brain mutants and bandits that cross his path.

Spiker likes the classic chopper type bikes. Unlike others Spiker likes to camp out in the Wastelands mainly because he doesn’t like people or civilisation (or what passes for civilisation on Mattblackgod’s world). He likes to use a Lance on his bike to skewer mutants and bandits.

The Dag and Spiker bikers are from the Nuclear Renaissance line by Ramshackle games.

The Blackguard got a light combat mech recently known as a Dreadnought. This “dread” was found in a bunker on the edge of the Toxicity ruins that lie six days march due East of the Last city. Members of the 2nd Stalker Company found the relic mech and reported the machine to the commander of Patton Guard company stationed at Base Camp Skull (a salvagers camp that feeds Last City scrap and relics). The mech was hauled back to the base camp before being transported to the Last City.

The mech sports a pair of bolters and power fist on one arm, with a combination weapon featuring a twin laser cannons and missile launchers on the other side. The Dread mech can take a lot of damage and is used to back up the power armoured troops of the Black Guard. It provides capability to take out armoured vehicles, defences and those bigger mutant critters that sometimes wander into the Last City from the Wastelands. 

I picked up this old 40K Rogue Trader era Dreadnought on ebay. All I had to do was touch the paint up to fit in with the Black Guard and finish the base. 

I kept the 2000AD ABC warriors graffiti. 

Thanks for looking, stay safe out there.

Hobby Progress

Hello and Welcome back, 

It’s getting close to the end of what feels like the longest month of the year. It feels like an age since New Year. Things have been moving slowly on the hobby front but I have been trying to fit a little hobby time most days. I thought a little progress report would be in order.

One of my plans for the upcoming year is to create a pirate faction for my Wild Galaxy setting known as the Bloody 40, inspired by a story I found in a local history book. As a faction they will operate in two ways with a pirate crew with a vessel (the Bloody Vengeance) and a second group that operate as a high jackers operating within the ships they target. This lot is assembled will be the crew of the Bloody Vengeance. They might even be handy as a crew for Stargrave too. 

These figures are a mix of Northstar Rogue Stars and Antediluvian miniatures figures. I got them assembled, cleaned and primed ready for me to throw the paint about. 

I got a DnD fantasy magic robot Titan from a friend for Christmas. It needed to be shootier. So I clipped off an arm with a battle hammer which is easy with these rubber figures and grafted an old Robogear cannon. It wasn’t doing it for me so I moved the magazine and added a barrel to make a autocannon. The main weapon was reworked into some form of energy cannon using a cap off a tube of ointment. Cables or hoses made from greenstuff have been added. It’s basecoated ready for washes and detail.

The plan for this is to be some sort of dormant war machine in the ruins or to be a Behemoth class Immucyte for the Zone Raiders setting. 

I started this Gilgamesh figure by Ramshackle Games last year so I have been finishing him off. He doesn’t need much more. I plan on him being a derelict post apocalyptic cyborg or to be the head of my post apocalyptic cyborg clan. 

These two bikers by Ramshackle games are also in mid paint. I love all the cargo on the Lancer rider. It reminds me of going on camping trips or holidays on my motorbike (Lance not included!). 

Hopefully I will have some finished stuff to show in a couple of weeks. 

Thanks for looking

Take Care out there. 

Old Kosmik

Hello Wanderer, welcome back.

“Hey, wanna get out your skull and heal your bonce? Come visit Kosmik’s Sweatlodge”

Introducing Kosmik. Kosmik runs a sweatlodge claiming he is a genuine Shaman who can bring you spiritual healing. While slow steam cooking his customers Kosmik drops hallucinogenic herbs into the water feeds. If the dark, heat and steam doesn’t get you hallucinating then the psychotropic steam will. For a deeper experience Shamanic drumming music can be provided for extra by Kosmik’s sidekick Spike playing some bongo drums. Not quite a genuine experience but close enough to Kosmik’s mind. When Kosmik and Spike are feeling mischievous they provide God, Demon or Spirit voices through a pipe just to see what entertainment their customers can provide. 

Kosmik dresses to impress his customers by trying to appear what he thinks a tribal shaman would look like. He likes to appear colourful as possible hence his name. While the locals speculate that he dyed the furs, they came from a mutant critter deep in the hills a hunter claimed was called a “Muppet”. 

The Kosmik figure is a Hexadrex resin figure by Ramshackle games. I found it fun to paint especially with the colourful paint work. The idea about the figure came from the recent Kosmik’s sweatlodge model that I painted up recently. Sometimes one idea leads to another in this hobby. 

Thanks for looking. Take care out there. 

Grumbling Gopher

Hello and welcome back.

I have a new transport vehicle for the wastelands or those frontier world space ports. The Grumbling Gopher.

This started life as a Gopher transport from Ramshackle games which has double axel at the rear. As it happens when it arrived I had been routing through my bits box and discovered some miscasts from an older now OOP Ramshackle kit. Back in the day Curtis from Ramshackle did boxes of miscast parts for cheap. It didn’t take long for the cogs to start whirring and for me to convert the Gopher into a halftrack. 

The Grumbling Gopher got a nice yellow paint job as is fitting to a service vehicle.

Thanks for looking 

Take care out there.

My big wheel buggy thingy…

Welcome back, it’s been too long. 

I am going to be showing you a little vehicle rework I have been working on. 

The Ramshackle Ramstoat as it should be.

So I was returning to Last City from a scouting run in the Ram Stoat when I heard a nasty crack noise. Before I could say “What the Spaff was that?” the ‘Stoat skidded wildly losing power. As I wrestled the controls one of my wheels went rolling past. There I was stranded at least six days march from home with a severely busted rig and low supplies. Looking at the Stoat the rear wheels had been ripped off. Often the metal quality is often poor unlike those vehicles of the ancients. 

As I tried to salvage what I could from the rig to start the long walk home a huge steam powered rig roared towards me. Fearing scavengers I prepared for a fight as a hatch opened and a face appeared. It was the fabled Mad Dan from the scrapyard. He cackled and yelled “stuck huh, let’s get you fixed up!”. 

He hauled the Ram Stoat into his fortified scrapyard and ran off into the piles of junk cackling while these huge mutant hounds stared at me growling. I retreated up some piles of junk to put some distance between me and the mutant mutts. In the distance between the junk piles I could hear clanking and crashing with Mad Dan muttering or cackling. Eventually I fell asleep and when I woke up he had fitted this huge wheel to the stoat. I managed to drive back to Last City, Mad Dan only asked for a “future favour” for the repair. I dread what the old loon will ask me to do in return.

The Ram Stoat is a resin vehicle for Nuclear Renaissance by Ramshackle Games. Sadly some rough handling of the model has resulted in the rear wheels spanning off.  I like this model too much to throw it out so a repair mission was launched. Initially the plan was to drill out the old spigots and refit new wheels but as it turned out there wasn’t enough meat on the model to do this.

Option 2 was to fit a new axel and wheels under the bottom of the chassis. This would have given the Ramstoat a more aggressive jacked up back end hotrod stance ala Fury Road. Except the front wheels and ram appeared to be digging into the ground as the model is low. Digging though my capacious bits box I ran into a rear wheel and swing arm off a 1/12 scale Yamaha Virago motorbike kit that had lain there for 25 years. The modeller maker’s mantra of never throw anything out has yet again paid off. Alas the shock absorbers from the kit have long since vanished. They would have made a nice bit of detail. With a bit of filing and sanding the swing arm and wheel fitted perfectly. Some sprue made up supports and the brake operating arm was made from some plastic rod. Gift cards made up some side panels. A couple of Orc Jerry cans were added for extra detail. 

Looking at the Jerry Cans they look a bit too large, I may replace them with 28mm scaled items at some point in the future. 

Thanks for looking. Stay safe out there. 

The Pumpking

Hello and welcome back, 

And now for something completely different.....and just a bit of fun.

Back in the first release of Ramshackle Game’s Nuclear Renaissance game, there was some background fluff about a character called “The Pumpking”. This bit of fluff amused me no end. Eventually he migrated to Matt Black God’s world. So let me introduce The Pumpking. 

The Pumpking started life as a Last City scavenger. While wandering the wastelands he discovered these strange orange vegetables. He hadn’t eaten for days and decided to risk eating one of the strange looking things.  Thankfully the pumpkin didn’t kill him and to his surprise wasn’t back to eat. He collected the seeds and other pumpkins and returned to Last City.

The Pumpking started a farm and found that the veggies grew very well. They also proved popular with the other residents of the Last City. The Pumpking grew wealthy and was even able to afford a pieced together ramshackle suit of power armour, complete with a stylised pumpkin helmet. He needed the armour to protect his farm and wealth. 

The Pumpking is a EM4 Space Ranger (yes, those again). I was after a bitza looking set of armour, looking like it had been built from different patterns of armour. It had the arms removed and some 40K Space Wolf arms & backpack added. The pumpkin head is a resin head but I cannot recall which company supplied it. Some GW skulls were also added to it, just to Halloween the figure up a bit. 

I have noticed a couple of errors I made during painting. I missed them, maybe I need new glasses. 

In the future, when Curtis has the Ramshackle Games site back up to speed I may convert  one of his figures to make an alternate Pumpking. I should maybe think about creating some cronies for him. 

Stay safe out there and beware the Pumpking! 

The Last City Market Place

Hello and welcome back, it’s time to visit the Last City market place.

I have had this little lot sat on my worktable half finished for too long. So I tried to get them finished.  These sets are by Ramshackle Games. They are made from resin and make great scenic scatter. There are some beer barrels some place too. I should get them finished for the Glowing Lamb Bar. 

Here we see the produce section of the market. Much of it is brought in by gatherers. There are crates of Sprouts (strange tough green vegetables that causes extreme gas), Mooty Froot (a nutritious mutant fruit that grows in clusters across the wastelands), Spice (a narcotic brewed one a secret location by the Spice Girls gang), Spudz (a well known root vegetable), Shrooms (mushrooms are grown by many wastelands and the excess is often traded) and Old Spice (a stronger version of the drug spice). 

Moving on there are loads of barrels. Behind is a wall of ore containers. These can be used in a single level for cover or stacked to make a impromptu wall. They stack really well. 

Then there is the cases. There are Guns, tools, junk, ammo and cases that belong to people called Dunk and Moxie. 

Thinking about it I may use more of these painted brightly as objective markers or suspicious activity of hotspot markers for various games. 

Thanks for reading, take care out there.

Sand Worms!

Hello and welcome back. 

The ground starts to shake. The wastelanders think that there is another earth tremor. Suddenly the ground erupts and the sand worms burst forth. Men are snatched and swallowed whole. Men screams and shout. Weapons start firing on the terrifying creatures. 

The sand worms are by Ramshackle games. Great fun to paint. 

Thanks for looking and remember if the ground shakes head to hard ground. Take care out there. 

Green Valley Hooligans

Hello and Welcome back to my blog. This is my 500th post. I can’t believe I made it so far.  So sit back and enjoy next bunch of post apocalyptic miniature goodness. 

The Hooligans started life as a wandering band of bandits. After a decade of wandering the gang discovered a wonderful green valley, unspoilt like a ghost from the distant past. They sent scouts into the valley and learnt that besides the mutant bears and wolves, there appeared to be a group of what appeared to be peaceful tribals. 

Deciding that this could be a great opportunity to settle down. Moving forward into the valley the Hooligans discovered that another bandit clan had attacked the tribals. A small band of the tribals where fighting back with the limited weapons at their disposal. Arriving at the village the Hooligans offered their services on condition that they could settle in the valley. The peaceful villagers had mixed feelings but then having a strong ally who could protect them had it’s advantages. The tribals had problems for years with the bandits. Many of them had been killed and a few women molested. 

The Hooligans moved out and hit the bandits hard, who where expecting badly armed poorly trained tribals not battle hardened bandits. The Hooligans wiped the other bandits out with ease, allowing the abused villagers a chance to execute some captive bandits.

A generation later the Hooligans live side by side with the tribals peacefully and have intermingled with them (and providing a much needed genetic variety to the tribals). The Hooligans are regarded as the warlike element of the tribe. Bandit raids have now become a thing of the past. In addition to patrols and war parties the Hooligans escort trade convoys in and out of the valley. 

Critchlow & Klara 

Critchlow is the Hooligans leader. His calm and ruthless attitude has kept him war party leader and green valley safe. Klara is the gangs second in command. She commands respect and is a fierce opponent. Many of the Hooligans including Critchlow wish was their squeeze but Klara has made it clear she is not interested, backed up by bouts of deadly violence. 

Critchlow and Klara are from Emporium Miniatures. These guys are obviously inspired by the art work of Carl Critchlow in the old GW Dark Future rule book. I decided to name the leader after the artist. 

Mad Dave & Karl

Mad Dave is one of the Hooligan’s close combat specialists probably because he has anger issues. He favours an old rotary cutter which is also handy for cutting into ruins and wrecks for loot, or those rare occasions where an escape is needed. Karl is the Hooligan’s technomancer. He carries a old energy pistol and an energy field generator which is handy for when the gang comes under fire. The field usually allows Mad Dave to take is anger out at whoever is shooting at them. 

Mad Dave and Karl are from the Mini Gangs - Key Chain Mohawks by Ramshackle games. Karl lost his sword tip in a cat invasion of the paint table.

Maz and Broose

Maz is a skilled medic and hacker, skills he learnt from books he found in the library of a school in Green Valley. During a bandit raid Maz was wounded and his arm had to be amputated (by Mad Dave who seemed to enjoy performing the operation). In the weeks that followed Maz grafted an arm from a robot to his shoulder. Although he graft was successful it took him months to train himself to use it. Now Maz’ arm is fully functional plus he can punch through a wall. Broose is the war parties gun man. He keeps enemies pinned with automatic fire while the rest of the gang get close. In battle his trade mark battle cry of “Yippe-ki-ee” can be heard of the rattle of his assault rifle.

Maz and Broose are from the Mini Gangs - Key Chain Mohawks by Ramshackle games. 

Masher

Masher is the Hooligans big un and like Mad Dave like to get up close & personal with enemies. His extra bulk and strength allows him to overcome most wasteland psychos easily and even the bears that prowl the Green Valley. In addition to a large hammer Masher carries an modified industrial rotary cutter inspired by Mad Dave who he idolises. 

 

The figure is Chicken by Ramshackle Games. It lost it’s sword in the same cat related incident as Karl. One of the downsides of resin figures is that they can be fragile and not cat bum resistant. I have lost a couple of other resin figures to those cats. The blade was replaced by a 40K Space Ork weapon. The cutter fits nicely on the hilt of he sword. 

The Hooligans are slightly inspired by the gangs of the Taiga forest in the Metro Exodus computer game. 

That’s all for now. I hope 500th post has entertained. Here’s to the next 500! Thank you for following and reading my posts over the years. 

Take care out there and lookout for post 501.