The identity of the official guard figure has been found!

For nearly 30 years this figure has represented the guards of the City-State of the Invincible Overlord My group and I call them the Official Guard Figure.

Off to kick some PC ass!

Who is this mysterious figure who has been slain by the hundred by PCs who refuse to kneel before Zod the Overlord? Who in turn slaughtered dozens of PCs with their dreaded Knight-Killer Crossbows?

Well it turns out he is Ral-Parth Chaos War #50-023 Sea Elf Spearman I, in reserve. 

With a certain plume shaved off along with a spear missing. You can recruit him at Iron Wind Metals. The company also has a kickstarter to bring back more of the old Ral Partha Chaos War miniatures.

Here some Swords and Wizardry/Majestic Wilderlands stats for this guard along with the rules for the Knight Killer Crossbow

City Guard
Medium Footman, 1st Level Fighter
Init +1; AC 4[15]; HP 6; Save 14; Move 90’; CL/XP 1/15;
Attacks (x1)
Spear, 1H; HTB +3/+2, DMG 1d6+1, RoF 1, RNG 20 ft;
Large Dagger; HTB +3, DMG 1d4+1; or
Knight Killer Crossbow; HTB +2, DMG 4d5, ACC +4, Reload 6, RNG 100 ft;
Attributes
Str 12 (+1); Dex 11 (+0); Con 10 (+0);
 Int 10 (+0); Wis 10 (+0); Cha 10 (+0);
Abilities
Athletics +2, Intimidation +1, Strategy +1;
Possessions
Scale Armor, Medium Shield, 1H Spear, Large Dagger, Knight Killer Crossbow, 1 day ration, 15d.

Crossbow, Knight Killer 46d/ea. 6.0/lbs.
Damage: 5d4 (Bolts), Accuracy: +4, Reload: 6. Range: 100 ft/yds.
This is the largest crossbow capable be carried on a regular basis by fighters. It uses either a windlass or a cranequin to cock the weapon for use. This takes a considerable amount of time, 36 seconds or 6 combat rounds. The result is a weapon capable taking out a heavily armored opponent in a single shot.

Note: 1d = 1 silver piece. Accuracy equal accuracy bonus to the to-hit roll. Reload action, the number of combat rounds it takes to reload this weapon. Abilities, a lite skill system used in the Majestic Wilderlands supplement.

Storing Props and Miniatures for your tabletop RPG session.

In this post, I talked about how I am storing  my Dwarven Forge pieces using Storage Boxes and Storage Totes.

The next step was to figure out a better way of dealing with my miniatures. For years I been using plastic storage bins used for beads and handicrafts.

While compact, it does involve packing three or four metal minis in each compartment (lined with foam). They don't chip too badly but they do acquire dings and bent parts over two decades of hard use.  So I resolved to finally invest into foam that allowed storing each mini by itself.

The problem of course is it is expensive compared to bead storage especially if I want to tote a lot of them. I shopped around and decided on US Battlefoam.

I was going to order five individual trays to see which fits the Sterlite containers. But when I went to check out I noticed free pick up in Arizona! Further checking found that they were in Gilbert Arizona and within driving distance of where my family will be staying at over the Christmas Holidays.

So I bought a container from a Phoenix area Target, took it over to Battlefoam and tried out some foam trays.

The one that worked was their economy storage line. I bought two forty figure trays, one tall figure tray and one large figure tray. When I got home I organized all my metal miniatures and figure out how much I had to buy to fit them all. Luckily they have a five pack deal that made it slightly more affordable.

As for the plastic miniatures I own, I took two stacks of smaller sterlite bins (for six total), bought some cheap plastic storage compartment liner. Cut the plastic apart into section that fit the four bins that didn't come with storage compartments. Then organized my plastic minis into them.

For my larger miniatures I had one large Sterlite left over. I put some of them in there and the rest into two portable tool storage bins. One of them I had earlier and since it was only $20 at Home Deport I got another one.

The result was this.

I still used four plastic bead storage boxes. I found rather than buying more sterlite snap togethers that those four plus the six small sterlites fit nicely into a wood crate.

This makes it handy to bring some miniatures when I don't want to bring everything. And it is so much lighter.

And that pretty much closes out what I am going to do for storage. I don't expect to buy more metal miniatures but I have a few compartments open if I get one or two more. I do expect to get plastics minis more often and made allowances for adding more.

I wouldn't say it is economical. For that go with foam lined bead storage boxes and long wooden milk crates. But it is more economical then buying purpose built tote bags.

Load Outs

Full Monty Loadout
Three Storage Bins

1: Dwarven Forge Dungeon
2: Dwarven Forge Caverns and Props
3: Miniatures

Lite Loadout

Two wooden milk crates

1: Miniatures
2: Props and a small selection of Dwarven Forge.

Where should all the Dwarven Forge go?

Between using Virtual Tabletop for gaming on Monday Night, conventions, the game store campaign, and friends now scattered across the United States, I haven't done much gaming at my house for a long time.

For games outside of Roll20 or Fantasy Grounds, this meant I had to find a way of transporting my game room with me. Or more specifically all my miniatures, props, and dwarven forge.

In the past two years I acquired a collection of Dwarven Forge Dungeon , Medieval building set, and most recently Dwarven Forge Cavern. It used to be all I needed was my two milk crates of miniatures and my rolling laptop bag. But now I need to transport my Dwarven Forge as well.

Yeah I know I could run a game without all that claptrap. But this is for when you DO want to run with all that claptrap. Like when you put on a spectacle of a City State erupting in flames.

The calm before the storm

The riot in full swing

The dead

For a while I been relying on a hodgepodge of storage. A combination of a really nice wooden box that my friend +Dwayne Gillingham let me use for a set of dwarven forge style dungeon pieces he made. Along with some of the original DF boxes reinforced with duct table placed in a rolling toolbox I bought. And some other toolboxes I picked up as well.



The Dwarven Forge Cavern pieces were the final straw. I asked Kelly Anne, my wife, to get something the next time she was in Erie. She does hairsticks and other handmade jewelry so she is always in stores that have storage stuff. And she found me these. She got me two sets for four total.

And they are great, ultimately with six of them I was able to store all Three sets of Cavern pieces and addons I bought. Now I wanted more for my existing Dungeon Pieces.

I took advantage this weekend to stop at Target and see what they had.

I found this

And after looking around I found this as well.

After fiddling around I found that the Storage will fit eight of the big Stack and Carry bins in two stacks of four each. I also Found that two of the small Stack and Carry turn sideways is roughly equal in area to a stack of two of the large Stack and Carry. I opted to buy the tote, six large stack and carry, and two small sets of Stack and Carry (three each).

When nested properly it looks like this.

When I got home I found I was able to get all my Dwarven Forge Dungeon pieces in there. In addition I have plastic baggies of what I call my horde miniatures. I lucked out one time when my friend +Daniel McEntee got somebody's collection of plastic DnD miniature in a trade for MtG cards.

In exchange for helping him sort it out, he let me have some of the miniatures he didn't want. This included two dozen twisted demon looking things, two dozen hobgoblin zombies, and two dozen thin undead things. I designated these as my hordes miniature to use when I need to put out a lot of something. They were in a small cardbox box from a Power supply I bought but now they went into one of the small Stack and Carries.

I may buy another set like above and some foam trays  and try to get everything into two storage totes.

The pricing on this from Target was

$10 for the Storage Tote
$20 for the two Small Stack and Carry with three each
$30 for the three Large Stack and Carry with two each.

$60 + tax for all them.

Treasure for my Birthday and Dwarven Forge Notes

My wonderful wife, Kelly Anne got me the Ancient Treasure set from Dwarven Forge.

It is pretty cool and will come in handy along side the original Treasure Set it bought a couple of years back.

Also for all those you missed the kickstarter Dwarven Forge has started selling their game tiles both painted and unpainted. One set is $85 painted and $55 unpainted. 

If you think that the game tiles will be too unwieldy you may want to look at just some of the add ons like the Door Pack, Stairs, or Furnishing. Just use your dry erase as normal or you Dungeon Tiles and place them on top.

Finally even if you don't want any of the above. I suggest looking at their paints and brushes. They are top quality even for regular miniatures. 

Reaper Boiling Water Fix

I know I have been lax about posting. Between regular life stuff and working on Raggi's English Civil War setting I have not been getting around to updating the blog.

With that being said, my friend Dan and I got our Reaper Miniatures and divided them up. I will have a later post with pictures.

Because of this I been reading various Google+ posts and blog posts on other people getting their Reapers. There been issue with bent miniatures, using my Google-fu I found this handy video on how to use boiling water/ice bath to fix the problem.

Making Christmas Gifts out of Hirst Arts molds

Most of my hobby time right now is spent writing up the English Civil War hexcrawl for James Raggi Lamentation of the Flame Princess. But with the holidays coming up I decided to put my Hirst Arts mold to good use. Especially after seeing what Dwayne of Gamers Closet did with his molds.

My sister lives in the US Southwest in the desert and I decided it would be cool to make her a little furnished adobe hut.

 The roof is a removable lid

And you can see the stuff inside much of it from a new mold that Hirst Arts had released.

A picture shot through the door.

Another door shot

A picture through the window.

Prior to building this I download the fireplace plans from Hirst Arts and built it. Took an afternoon to make and paint.

Now with the Christmas shopping and gift making complete it is back to writing out about Cavaliers and Roundheads.

Making my own stuff with Hirst

For a long time I known about Hirst Arts and their molds. By using plaster and other substances once could cast bricks, doors, and other parts to make your own dwarven forge style props for your miniatures. Even complete buildings could be made if you wanted too.

About two years ago Kelly Anne, my wife, got me an inexpensive mold kit, from the science section of a craft store,  that allow me to make plaster rocks. Which was useful as props for outdoor encounters in my game. I found I liked doing it but still didn't rush out and get the Hirst Molds as they were expensive ($35 to $45 per) and wasn't sure how durable everything would be.

But then out of the blue, my friend Dwayne of Gamers Closet, got several. I went over to his house to see him casting and came away very impressed.  The molds are built to last being made out of a heavy silicone rubber.  Definitely worth the premium one paid for them.

So when Kelly Anne was looking for a gift for me this years, I asked for one of the Hirst Arts Molds. I picked #85 Cavern Accessory mold (scroll down to find) as I rarely used the Dwarven Forge props I have (other than the doors) but use the numerous furniture and item props I own a lot.

They take paypal and soon I had my mold in hand. It comes dusted with powder to keep it in good condition when shipping, so per instructions I cleaned it and prepared my first cast. Got some parts out of it but many of the pieces with thin walls broke. Eventually following the excellent tutorials and instructions on the Hirst Art Site. I was able start casting good parts reliably although I still working on getting rid of all the air bubbles.

My brother-in-law is a dental supply technician so I decided to bite the bullet and ordered a box of Die-Keen dental plaster from him. The stuff is like wow, mixes very thin and sets (hardens) very quickly. Plus it is twice as strong as any of the plasters found in the store. Parts still can break but very chip resistant. Air Bubble are still a problem but I am working on that.

I am probably going to pick up #250 Small Brick Mold next so I can build fireplaces and other small stone miniature props.

The above show some of the pieces painted. In this case the sacks of grain/stuff/etc. along with some crates and chests. The pieces up at the top has only been primed but it illustrates that you are not just limited to the obvious choices in the molds. Many of the pieces are in halves or sections so you can combine in interesting ways. Here I glued the stone doors together along with two of the small pillar halves and the lion face to make a shrine to Mitra, the lion goddess of honor and justice.

If the molds have one disadvantage is that the brick molds require a lot of castings to get enough to build even the simplistic projects.  Many of the most avid users of Hirst Molds get multiple molds of the same type to speed up production. While other set aside a short period of time daily to setup a casting . After a few days they have enough for their project.

Last you find that you have extra parts that you don't plan on using which makes for a nice surprise gift to you fellow gamers that also use miniatures.

Miniatures or Not?

After years debating miniatures vs not, my conclusion is that simply different methods work for different people. That the best approach is to use a variety of techniques tailored for the situation, yourself, and the group at hand.

The method that doesn't work is blindly assume that your "way" is the way that going to work all the time. It simply not going to too. You need to pay attention to the players and learn what works best for that particular group.

I use generally miniatures because they allow me to effectively describe scenes in the shortest amount of time. The key trick I found is describe things as you placing stuff on the map. This minimize the time needed for any verbal followup. If a group likes detailed tactical combat I will accommodate them and take a little longer in setting up. If the group is more verbal oriented I will set up just what I think I need get the description across and just estimate range and movement. For wandering through towns I just use a large player map and counters and verbally describe things as they walk through.




I judge each of the technique simply whether it is effective in conveying needed information for the players to roleplay their characters as if they were there. If it doesn't, then I change it. Sometime I have an idea that doesn't work. Or I need to change because it a different approach works better for that group.

So I view this niniatures versus not miniatures as silly. Both sides are too dogmatic. The fact is BOTH work. Instead develop the wisdom to see which methods work and when they don't. Also remember what works best with your skills as a referee is important.

The Seven Dwarves

That time I posted about my miniatures I was in the midst of painting my props stuff and orcs. I finished those and now started on new batch. This time I picked to paint all my unpainted dwarves. I just finished my first batch of seven.

The flash didn't light up things enough so here is some close ups.

One with a wicked looking pick axe thing. The sky blue of the shield means he is a paladin of High Lord, the soul forger of the dwarves.

A dwarven Border Warden  with an axe. The traditional helment gear of the Warden has a red tassle to honor Rosmerta the Battle Maiden and the Sky Blue band shows their allegiance to the High Lord.

One of my original Grenadier Miniatures. These days I use this guy for a Dwarven Runecaster or Ironmaster. He has one long beard.  The green stone is a powerstone designed to store viz so that his runes and charms last longer. He smokes a meerscham pipe tinted golden brown from heavy use.

Tin can Dwarf Lord. In 3rd Edition GURPS his PD and defense was beyond belief. Probably because of  Tin Can Orc. The golden mask is a dwarven war mask designed to strike terror into the hearts of the mountain orcs.

Dwarven Thief outfitted in the latest fashion from City-State. He wears a green feather plucked from a successful cockatrice kill. I think he is an original Grenadier figure.

Dwarven Cleric with a broken off Mace. I just say it is a holy symbol or something like that. The Red robes means he is a cleric of Rosmerta the Battle Maiden, the dwarven avatar of Mitra. The sky blue bonnet pays respect the to the High Lord the head of the Dwarven Pantheon.

A Dwarven Adventurer armed with a Knight Killer Crossbow. With a +4 to hit accuracy bonus and 5d4 damage don't mess with him! To bad it takes nearly 6 rounds to reload.

As you can see I like to come up with little stories about why the figures are what they are. They help me figure out which colors to use. The hardest thing was trying to figure out their hair color. I don't know why but I got a mental block when it came time to pick. The next batch of seven will be mostly original Grenadiers that been waiting to get painted since 1980. That will take care of the dwarves leaving the unpainted halflings and gnomes. There are two interesting figures in that bunch. One a Gnome King with his throne a tree stump and one that is two halflings with one standing on the shoulders of the other.

One new technique I used was a pin dipped in a color to do things like their eyes and spots.

The world's crappiest orc miniature painted

I been methodically painting the remaining unpainted miniatures in my collection. Shamed by the nice dwarven forge miniatures I got a few months ago (thanks to a gift certificate from Jerry of Gold Star Anime), I been began painting miniatures again. At first I focused on the resin props and now going into some of the unpainted monster figures. I am starting with the orcs. I got all the generic orc figures done and now I am tackling my unique figures.

For a long time I had this "thing", some misshapen lead blog representing a orc, hobgoblin or something holding a bow. So after priming everything I decided to tackle it first just to see how much better it would look.



I am pleased with the results now you can tell it is something orcish. Although I am now wondering if it is some weird vampire orc from Tekumel.

Next I decided to tackle one of my simpler unique orcs. Basically a big brute wielding a club.



In case you are wondering what I am using for the orc skin color it is Italian Sage.

Then I painted the mule figure I had. I need to paint the base and then glue it to a wider base. It gotten to be known as the narcoleptic mule from all the time it fell over.



The baggage on top was painted with a color called linen. Sort of a brownish white which makes a nice cloth color. All the paints I got are acrylic paints from Wal-Mart or Jo-Ann Fabrics. I protect the completed miniature with a coating of matte Mod-podge.

Update
Thanks to Scottsz I have a screen shot of the Orc



He mentions that it came from a Heritage Model set called the Crypt of the Sorcerer. I still have the map somewhere. Who ever has this model has a worse one than mine as the area between the legs is filled in with metal. On mine it is free of metal.

There is going to be a feast tonight!

A least for a bunch of miniatures.



These were originally plaster castings that I had for nearly two decades. It took me a couple of weeks to complete these as I only have two or three hours to do this. Some of the hardest part was figuring out what the various blobs of plaster were. Plus how to paint food in the first place.

Overall I am pleased with the result. One trick that worked was dry brushing some brown onto the bread and the turkey/chicken. I painted the cheese a base yellow then brushed on some dark yellow to make it look well.. more cheesy. The hardest part was figuring out how to paint the roast/ham. What I settled on was painting it flesh, then some blood red dry brushing, followed by dark brown dry brushing. For the blobs on the roast platter I figure they were onions so I painted them ivory and dry brushed some more brown onto them.

Playing hokey from my writing. Painting Miniatures.

When I got my Dwarven Dungeon Accessories I went wow my other stuff kinda of sucks now. Then Chicago Wizard had a bunch of posts on him painting miniatures. Luckily for me I still had most of my original Grenadier along the boxes are long gone. I think some of the foam I use to line my storage cases is still vintage.

This is basically what I used for the last 25 years for dungeon props. A long time ago I picked up a bunch of resin and plaster furniture and used them ever since.

So it time to break out the paint brush after a twenty year hiatus. Amazingly about 2/3rd of the paints I had stored were still good enough to use. Although all my metallics are were done for. Thanks to the ongoing craft fad Jo-ann and Wal-mart had a variety of inexpensive acrylics to stock up with. I also snagged a set of generic brushes from Wal-mart and some nice detail brushes from a model/art store in my town.

Then it was down to business. I focused on the stuff I used the most figuring it give me the most bang for what little time I can spend doing this.

First I painted up a bar set I had forever. Note that the tables are from Mage Knight. If you ever run across these get them. They are durable and look good. I uploaded the full resolution picture so you can see the details.

And would you know it the flash revealed some areas I missed behind the barrels. I also painted a resin fireplace. Once neat think was the detail on the flames which I had to be careful with. Painting flames was a challenge as I never done it before. I started with a layer of red. Then a thin layer of orange letting it pool and finally a dry brushing with yellow.

The desk on the left is more recent. I think needed to use a more yellowish white for the paper. The text was done by painting thin lines across the page and then putting two or three small gaps with white. I didn't try to totally white out the line. The smudged remains of the black enhanced the illusion of text.

Next I did some of my "official orcs". At one point I got over a dozen similar orc figures and they became my generic orc horde. Now they are getting some color. Later I pulled out all my plaster firepits and p
A closeup of the orcs. I guess I nailed the skin color as a lot of the gamers at the last Gold Star Anime session were complimenting on how orcish they looked. I used a drab light green mixed with a small amount of brown. Of course my campaign being the Majestic Wilderlands and the City-State these guys had to be from the Purple Claws.

The first figures I did was three of my "official peasants" figures. I got nearly two dozen peasants in storage. One the table are three plaster barrel things. Never figured out what they were supposed to be. So I painted them brown, gave them a rock gray base, and a brass rim. Over on the left is a brazier I painted. I actually started it in the late 80s but never completed it. Now it is tone. Finally I painted the five resin full beds. I debated what to do with the folded blankets. Then I remember the blanks the Happy Whisk gave to my boys two years ago and made them double sided quilts. I took the top color and added white to form the second shade. The bed on the left was a bit of a challenge as it had straw from it's mattress sticking out all over the place. Finally there were the three chests I painted. Two are plaster and the last is a metal miniature from somewhere.

In all this took about eight sessions about three hours each. With a session a week. Right now I finished prepping the remaining "official orcs" and two more tables with food modeled on the top.

As for my writing, I been somewhat more regular. Not as fast as I like but getting a solid three hour session a week in. The painting has been surprisingly enjoyable and I plane to continue with it.

Could use any tips you got so feel free to comment.