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Last Updated: January 29, 2012

"The Table" has been very busy this week with a lot happening. So, rather than trying to squeeze all of that work into a small corner of this page, I decided to break from convention and open up the whole page to my work-in-progress this week. But, just so I don't completely cover my front page with unfinished models, I've opted to leave my 500-point Hung army up for yet another week.

After a long absence from the Army Collector's Tournament, the addition of LOTR Khand archers to my finished collection resulted in my Hung army reaching completion for the 500-point tournament games. As I point out on the Army Collector's page, a typical Hung army would be mostly Fast Cavalry with dozens of units of mounted archers encircling your army. However, because of the unpredictable nature of tournaments (where the defense of a castle or bridge could come up), it is safer to field about 50% infantry to deal with the unpredictable nature of these games. In a campaign, however, a fully mounted army will get around the map a lot faster than one toting infantry.

First up are the Dixon Ashigaru Archers. To recap, these models were painted over 20 years ago before I had the skill to do highlighting or shading. Rather than a full repaint, I chose to dip them into Army Builder Quickshade Medium. The results speak for themselves. I'm now a believer that this product can take an average paint job and make it pop with little effort. Originally I planned touching them up, but now I've decided to leave them as they are since the random splotching makes them look dirty- befitting for warriors of their lowly stature. To see the "before" unit, go to my Nippon Showcase page here and scroll down to the Core Units. All that remains for these models is (magnetic) basing and a coat or two of Matt Finish.

Next up are the peasants. These are a mix of old Ral Partha models and Perry Miniatures. Tim Murray did the base coating, I have since added the weapons. As these are the first humans I used Quickshade on, I was more careful to dab off the excess with a paper towel to prevent large blotches of ink from gathering around their armpits and where their weapons connected to their bodies.

As the Nippon units are about to clear the table, prep work has begun on the skeletons. Above are the new models just purchased from Mantic Games. These skeleton warriors require assembly, but make nice dynamic poses. They cost half the GW price. For example, the 10 models to the left cost $12,50 after the currency conversion from the British Pound Sterling while 10 GW skeletons runs you $24.75. The archers, to the right, I am less happy with. Although they still look good, they give you the basic skeleton box and some badly molded metal tops to put on them. Although the sculpts are good, they did not fit well onto the lower plastic bodies. As a result I had to do some creative cutting and hid the most serious sins beneath a random shield, head or other bit. I'm also not so sure I like the idea of putting a metal top on a fragile, plastic bottom. They come with nice bases already but will probably be diverted to magnetic bases just to keep them standing upright. Never the less, if you have some larger units to build out, visiting Mantic Games with worth the trip.

Finally are the skeleton spearmen. To the left are the Mantic models (I bought 1 set of 10 to fill out my two units from 20 to 25). To the right are the old GW models that I began assembling to make up the rest of the unit. My concern with these is that I already based them (on magnetic bases) and they can't be effectively dipped in a pot of Quickshade this way. So, the regiment bases will probably be separated again so I can mix so Mantic (dressed) skeletons into the unit so that they don't look out of place with naked skeletons in the front and dressed ones filling in the rear.

Projects Underway:

Beastmen 500-point collector's army
Araby Unofficial Army Book (the last installment of the Unofficial Army Book series).

On the Table:

[Above] are the Japanese peasants as they came base coated from Tim Murray. This is the "before" picture of the peasants shown above.

While Tim Murray was working on the peasants, he also found 10 more Chaos Dwarf Blunderbuss' on EBay that I had him pick up and paint for me. The addition of these guys to my army allows me to field 2 units of 15 blunderbuss. This is Tim's original paint scheme for the army I bought from him almost a decade ago. These models have since been based up and have joined the rest of my Chaos Dwarf army.

As I'm beginning to "top out" my armies, I decided I don't want my Beastmen army sharing Chaos Hounds with my Chaos Warriors (both tournament armies need 10 since they are throw-away units). Therefore, I needed a few more to add to the Beastmen. The 3-headed dog is an old Ral Partha model (I already have 3 enlisted in the Chaos Warrior army) and the Hound in the middle is a Reaper Miniature. The conversation piece is the Displacer Beast by Black Tree Design. Although it's not a Hound, I already have plenty of Spawn models and I wanted to put this model into one of my armies (I currently own it for Dungeons & Dragons purposes). So, it is getting paint to join the Chaos Hounds in the Beastmen army.

Fantasy figures painted (so far) for 2012: 22

Final Fantasy figure count for 2011: 271

Update list:

01.15.12 Posted the Hung army on the Army collector's page.

01.02.12 Posted the Vampire Counts Bloodlines supplement to the Allies & Dogs of War page.

10.23 Turn One of the Orc, Goblin & Chaos Warrior mega-battle is posted.

10.16 The Norse army book put back up on the website.

10.05 The Norse army book taken down for rework.

10.02 Deployment for the Orc & Goblin vs. Chaos mega-battle added to the Battle reports page.

09.25 The Norse army book posted to the Unofficial Army books page.

08.14 The Kislev Army book posted to the Unofficial Army books page. Boris & Tzarina the Ice Queen are already on the Special Characters page.

07.10 Posted the Mourngol Army book to the Unofficial Army Book section. Added Ghazak Khan and Oglah Khan to the Special Characters section.

06.26 Posted revised Hung army book to Unofficial Army Book page.

06.19 The Hung (Steppe Nomads of the East) Army book posted to the Unofficial Army Book page.

05.15 Dogs of War book added to the Unofficial Army Book page.

05.08 Nippon army added to Collector's page.

05.01 New pics added to Skaven Showcase. Fire Arrow launcher added to the Cathay Unofficial Army Book.

04.21 Daemons of Chaos Escalation League army posted.

04.17 Scenarios page and 500-point Battle Reports page added. First Battle report between Dark Elves & Skaven also added.

04.10 Dogs of War Special Characters added to Special Characters page.

04.03 Fantasy Roman Army book added to Unofficial Army Book page.

03.13 Summoned Monsters added to Dogs of War page.

03.06 Chaos Dwarfs added to the Army Collector page.

02.25 Chaos Warriors added to the Army Collector page.

02.21 Lore of Chaos Dwarfs spell list added to Unofficial Army Book page. Orc & Goblin Collectors Army adjusted for 7th Edition.

02.06 Nippon Army book added to Unofficial Army Book page.

01.30 Orcs & Goblins added to Army Collector page.

01.09 Warhammer 7.5 rules added to web site (click on Warhammer logo below).

01.03.11 Chaos Dwarfs added to the Unofficial Army Book page.

Warhammer Fantasy 7.5

Warhammer Fantasy Solitaire:

Draft 11.08

Bluffs Scenery Building Project [PDF]

Click on the pic for the Underempire.net!