Five Leagues From the Borderlands (part 8) – Ambushed!

Before I begin, I just want to quickly say that I probably played this game over a year ago, and so my memory of it isn’t perfect. I’m also not sure why I didn’t post a bat-rep at the time – but since I recently stumbled upon my notes (and found a few pictures on my hard drive) I thought it would be a good time to share them – especially since I’m thinking of restarting the game (or doing something similar with the newer ‘Deep Below’ spin-off).

Anyway, we left off with our little band of orcs acquiring a ‘contract’ – which involved visiting the Orc Outpost, the Uruk Hold, and the Loot Exchange settlements within 5 turns, and making an 8+ speech test in at least two of them.

I had interpreted this as having to re-establish connections between some of the orc groups that had taken up abode in the various halls of the dwarven complex… and, as such, had decided to return ‘home’ this turn (back to the Orc Outpost) – and gained a ‘friend’ along the way.

CAMPAIGN TURN 4

Town Events: Wandering healer

Hard Times: 2 upkeep (I used 1 ration to offset this)

Activities: Performed a successful speech test (with a +1 ‘friend’ bonus), recruited another follower, and visited the blacksmith to repair Muzlug’s spear.

Research: No result

Trade: Sold 'jars' for 2 gold.

My interpretation:

It turned out that Bagna (the sniveling wretch that befriended the group on their return journey) had the ear of Grob (the settlement's leader), and was able to get Lagashi an audience with him within a few days.

In the meantime, Muzlug was able to exchange some of the loot that they had found for a new spear shaft, and Pushdug convinced him that he probably knew a couple of good lads that might also want in on their escapades.

However, as it turned out, only one of these ‘lads’ was still alive… an axe wielding orc by the name of Dinshat – who was currently being patched up by a healer of sorts.

And since the rest of his band were currently missing (being the heavily armed patrol that had failed to return) he was easily convinced to slink away and join Muzlug’s Mob when no-one was looking.

Later, when Lagashi eventually got her audience with the great orc Grob, he was quick to agree that messengers should be sent down to the ‘Uruk Hold’ on the level below - as whispers had reached his ears of it falling back into Dwarven hands. And, even though he doubted those rumours to be true, he was no fool, and knew it to be wise to be seen to do ‘something’ (sending someone to check for example) …even if only to stave off challenges from those that were all to eager to take his place.

Therefore, Lagashi was quick to relay this news to Muzlug - resulting in the pair gathering their small warband, and heading off in short order.

 

TRAVEL ROLL: Waylaid by foes (petty robbers)

It was already late when the warband moved out – and so it wasn’t overly long before the group set up camp in an empty room at the end of a grand (but ruinous) hall. They even lit a small fire (against Pushdug’s advice) as they settled down – not fearing much due to the fact that they hadn't travelled all that far from the outpost.

Then, during Snagluk’s watch, the quiet, but unmistakable sound of booted feet echoed out in the main hall… and sneaking a look (with eyes well accustomed to the dark) he espied the unmistakable shapes of dwarven figures approaching their position. They had seen the light of the campfire perhaps… and were creeping closer and closer with each passing heartbeat.

THE BATTLE

Now I’m fairly sure I had some comprehensive notes to accompany these photo’s – but all I can seem to find are half a dozen bullet points – so maybe I had intended to write up this bat-rep straight away instead of relying on my notes (as I do remember the whole thing being fairly short and sweet).

Anyway, the set-up looked like this:

And, at the start, the dwarves moved in using the ‘infiltration’ rules (for a defensive battle), before eventually being spotted by Snagluk – who was the only one to act in the quick phase of the first round… but in his panic his shot was well wide of the mark.

During the next few rounds, the two opposing forces rushed to meet each other – but the main dwarven contingent were temporarily halted as tendrils of dark magic swirled around them – making their limbs heavy, and their boots feel like lead (i.e. Lagashi cast ‘bind’).

After dispatching a couple of the filthy longbeards, two of their number turned tail and fled like the cowards that they are – leaving their leader alone to face the consequences of their actions.

Needless to say, it didn’t go well for the lone dwarf… and (acting in the quick phase) Pushdug charged in and cut the fool down with a single blow!

RESOLUTION

Even though this was a travel battle, I think I still treat this like a regular battle – and need to do all the usual ‘resolution stage’ stuff… so:

1. No adventure points gained.

2. No injuries.

3. Advancements... 

• Muzlug 2 XP
• Lagashi 2 XP
• Pushdug 3XP (+1 for killing their leader) he also gains +1 combat skill at lvl 1
• Golb – nothing gained
• Snagluk – gains the pathwise skill.
• Dinshat – gains the battlewise skill.

4. Loot – found a delvers kit.

5. Unusual find – found the remains of a victim (I need to return a token to a random settlement)

6. Settle in – reached the ‘Uruk Hold' settlement.

7. News Travels – Rangers have been scouting the area (+2AP)

My interpretation:

With the echoing footsteps of the fleeing dwarves fading into the depths, the warband took stock. None of them had been injured (other than a few scratches and bruises), and so counted themselves lucky.

Pushdug gloated over the fact that he had warned them about lighting a fire… and this time Lagashi was inclined to agree. However, Muzlug berated the group for letting two of the dwarves escape – stating that the group would now need to move with haste themselves – before the bearded cowards could return with more of their filthy kin.

Despite this, they did a quick search of the bodies, and looted a few supplies/tools of sturdy dwarven make – and also discovered the decapitated head of a large orc brute tied up in a sack.

Dinshat, the newest member of the warband, confirmed that this was Rutgot – the leader of the missing patrol… and stated that news of this should probably be taken back to the outpost.

(note that I used a Story Point to change the location that this needed to be returned to – having it be the Outpost that they had just left – as I thought that fit the story better)

Despite this, Muzlug ordered the group on… and to make it ‘double quick’ since he believed that the dwarves were on to them (as he didn’t want to face a larger force of the beardlings with his own meagre band).

And yet, they arrived at the outskirts of the Uruk Hold (an orc camp that could rival the populace of a small town) without further event, and fell in (and exchanged news) with a group of returning scouts, as they made their way past the outer barricades...

Building a Dwarf Army Pt.4

As I mentioned in my previous ‘building a dwarf army post’ – my (revised) plan was to try and get this entire army done within the space of a month… and I almost did it.

At the end of the last post I shared a picture of all the core troops done… so all that was left was the various command models.

Well, here they are:

The two guys on the left are conversions (using the EM4 miniatures as the base model), and the two guys on the right are metal models from Black Tree Design (though both were originally holding hammers, so the spear guy is another conversion).

However, that does leave one more mini to go before I can call the army complete… and that’s this fella:

...and I’ve been putting off painting it as I’m not sure how to tackle the banner.

Some thoughts I had were to simply ‘quarter it’ and call it done (this is supposed to be a quickly painted project after all), or I could buy some decals (though that makes it more expensive), or I could try to sculpt something onto the banner itself (a large rune for example) in greenstuff (as that would probably be a bit easier for me to achieve than trying to freehand a design).

But I’m still not 100% sure about what to do yet – so I’ve put him to one side for now.

That being said, I’ve still been splashing a bit of paint around… as I want to paint up some orcs next. However, the plan for these is to take one sprue of the various orc and goblin kits that have a vaguely Tolkienesque look about them…

(Oathmark orcs and goblins, Wargames Atlantic goblins, and Warlord Games orcs)

...and see what kind of warband I can make with them.

This will also give me A LOT of spare heads when I’m done – so the plan is to see if I can use some of those to convert some of the EM4 orcs that I have as well.

But, as you can see, I’ve not assembled any of these yet, and what I’ve been doing instead is having a go at painting some of the existing (mostly metal) models that I have in my collection – to see if I can work out a colour scheme that I like (mainly for the skin tones).

So, with that in mind, here’s the first two tests on some old Ral Partha orcs…

...which don’t look too bad – but not 100% how I want them (though the guy on the left isn’t too far off).

I’m also considering using these ‘test models’ as a little warband in their own right for a couple of games of Deep Below (a Five Leagues from the Borderlands spin-off) – as I’m probably going to do a few more test models before I’m done… and it would be good to have something in mind for the models (other than them being just tests).

Anyway, as far as the dwarves go, they’re pretty much done (save for the banner bearer)… and it did take around a month to finish them (the first primer was applied on the 22nd September, and the last varnish went on on the 21st October) – and I even had days (almost a week at one point) where I didn’t do anything at all.

So, all in all, I think that’s pretty good going for someone like me :)

Building a Dwarf Army Pt.3

The last time I posted my progress on my small dwarf army, I explained how I was splitting the models up into a few different groups – so that I could paint all the models with blond beards first, then do a second batch of greybeards, and so on.

And while I haven’t had as much time to spend on these as when I first started the project… progress has been made:

So, as you can see in the above picture… I’ve finished all the grey-bearded models on the left, the brown-bearded models on the right, and I’ve also squeezed in a few ginger guys as well.

However, it would be a pretty short blog post if I left it there, so I thought I would show exactly how I’m painting these – with a few pictures showing all of the steps I’m using to get them done in a reasonably quick and easy manner… so here goes!

First the models are undercoated…

...and, as you can see, I’m using a brush on grey primer for this.

Next I paint all of the silver areas…

...and I’m not to careful with this – I just get it in on as quickly as possible.

After that I paint in the skin (note that unless otherwise stated, when two paint bottles are shown, I’m using one drop of each to get the desired colour)…

...and again, I’m only careful on the areas close to the metal… and I don’t worry too much if it gets on the beard etc.

Then I paint the beard itself…

...which, in this case is a ginger colour (and this is the only colour I change on the various minis).

And then I paint in any red(ish) cloth…

...which isn’t a lot on this guy.

Next it’s the green trim around the armour…

...as this complements the red quite nicely.

Then it’s time for a few browns…

...first for the boots, gloves, pouches, etc.

And then a darker colour for the wood and weapon handles:

(note that when there is a white rim on the bottles – these are the Model Colour range… not my main Game Colour paints)

Next is any gold trim etc…

...so the metal plates on the arms, dagger hilts, extra armour plates, and so on.

And finally I tidy up any areas where I might have made a bit of a mess…

...but, generally speaking, it’s usually just dotting the little metal studs.

Once that’s had a few minutes to dry I then apply a wash of 2 parts Fleshshade to one part Wash medium to the face and beard…

...though the beard wash changes depending on it’s colour.

Then the rest of the model gets covered in marine juice/sonic tonic…

...which, if you’re not familiar with, the Sonic Sledgehammer youtube channel has a video HERE.

And when that’s dry (and has also darkened everything down a bit), I add a few highlights with the same original colours – though this isn’t anything too crazy – just a bit of tidying up really...

 ...and, this is when I paint the base too (as you can see I was actually working on two models at the same time when taking these pic’s).

These are then left overnight before I varnish and base them…

...as I also use a brush on varnish – so I like to make sure the paint has had plenty of time to dry/set. Plus, as you can see, I’m just using some ‘geek gaming’ base-ready stuff on the bases – as I think that’s one of the quickest ways of getting them done.

So, that’s all I’m doing with these guys – but if I group them all together...

...they don’t look too bad at all (nothing to shout about – but perfectly good enough for gaming purposes).

And, while I still have a handful more to paint (mostly the ‘command’ types), I think I’m still on track for getting them all done within the space of a month.

So, with any luck, I’ll have them all done when I post the next update (fingers crossed).

Falling Block Traps

It’s been a while (or, at least, it seems that way) since I last released a regular ‘print & paste’ terrain video – because if I ignore the giveaway stuff, the 2D tiles & cards, and the dungeon box (as all of these are kinda their own separate thing)…

 ...I have to go back 4 months to find the last piece of scatter terrain… or five months if I’m just including ‘dungeon’ stuff.

So, it’s been good to get back to more dungeon related scatter terrain (as that seems to be the core content for the channel)… and coincidentally, it’s turned out to be not too dissimilar to the last one I did:

However, despite having an encounter in mind for these (just like the previous ‘traps’ episode), I’ve not included it in the video this time – as I haven’t got it to the table myself yet, and I don’t want to give away the solution just yet (though, to be fair, it’s not super complicated).

Anyway, as usual, you can find the (pay-what-you-want) pdf file over on DriveThruRPG… and I hope that you can get some good use out of them!

Building a Dwarf Army pt.2

In my last 'army building' post, I ran through the models I'd bought, some conversions I'd done, and basically just cleaned everything up to get it ready to paint.

I also mentioned that I wasn't 100% sure how I was going to split them up into smaller batches (i.e. whether I should paint a unit at a time, or split them up into smaller points value forces, and so on) - but in the end I thought I'd probably get them done quicker if I did all the dwarves with the same beard colour at the same time (as I plan on having 3 or 4 different colors).

As such, I decided to do all the blond(ish) guys first, and picked out several models from each unit to get the ball rolling...

 ...and spent pretty much all of Monday evening priming them (I used a brush on primer), and getting their base coats down.

Tuesday night was spent adding some washes (a flesh wash on the skin & beards, and 'sonic tonic' over everything else...

 ...and, as you can see, I also got the shields glued on as well (these where painted and washed separately, and had their backs drilled out where they needed to fit over a 'nub' or a hand) - plus, I also got the next batch primed while waiting for the washes to dry.

On Wednesday I spent a couple of hours tidying/highlighting with the original colours (as washes tend to darken everything down and/or leave tidemarks in some places) - and since I squirted out a bit too much silver paint (well a lot too much really), I also got the silver done on batch 2. 

Now, I did (briefly) consider doing a few more highlight layers to make them look a bit better - but I quickly talked myself out of that... as I am supposed to painting this army quickly after all :)

Anyway, on Thursday evening it was just a matter of varnishing them (again, I'm using brush-on varnish), gluing on the basing material, and then sealing in the basing material with some watered down PVA.

And, as you can probably guess, this did mean that there was a certain amount of drying time between each of these steps... so I also splashed on a few more colours on batch 2 (the ones that are going to have grey beards).

Now, as you can see in the following picture...

...they're not going to win any awards - but I think they look more than good enough considering they're just regular troops in a 'regiments' style of game... and I'm pretty happy with how they've turned out.

However, they've still took a bit longer to finish than I would like - but the second batch should be quicker... since I've already got some paint on them. That being said, I don't think I'm going to have as much time to paint next week... so we'll have to see how it goes :)

Building a Dwarf Army pt.1

For a while now I've been toying with the idea of painting up a few (fantasy) armies as quickly as I can (well, I say 'quickly' ...it'll still probably take me a while as I'm not a fast painter - but quicker than I normally do :) ).

As such, I didn't really want to spend a ton of money on an expensive army for, what is essentially, an experiment - plus I also wanted to see how cheaply I could do something like this, and turn it into a kind of 'war gaming on a budget' series of blog posts too.

So, for the rule system, I'll be using the various 'age of fantasy' games by One Page Rules - as the core rules are free (and it doesn't get much cheaper than that). It would also allow me to build up forces/armies for several of their games (the 'skirmish' and 'regiments' variations for example) - plus I could probably also repurpose what I have for other games too (Oathmark, or even The Old World, for example).

Anyway, for cheap miniatures, the obvious choice was to grab a bunch of those cheap orcs and dwarves that are available over on the EM4 Miniatures website...

...as a pack of 48 models will only set you back £14.99 - and if you buy both sets (i.e. the orcs and the dwarfs pictured above), and buy at least one pack of shields as well (£1.99 for 25) that will mean that your order qualifies for free postage too. Nice!

However, the one thing I would like to point out to folks that aren't familiar with these models - is that they do have a slightly annoying nub on the back of each model...

 ...which you'll have to deal with in one way or the other.

For my dwarf army, I'm only going to tidy up the back of the spearmen (and any special models) - as I'll simply add shields to the back of the guys with axes and crossbows... as that will cover them up ;)

Anyway, seeing as how these dwarves only come in three different poses (one with a spear, one with a 2-handed axe, and one with a crossbow), I wanted to add a bit of variety to my army... which has lead to a bit of conversion work on a couple of the models.

The first of these is a simple weapon swap...

 ...just by cutting off the top of the axe and replacing it with some hammers from my bits-box.

I also did a couple of weapon swaps with the spear guys (note that the banner is from an old space marine kit)...

 ...which involved drilling out the spear to replace it with the toothpick and hammer that you can see above - though the axe guy took a bit more work as I swapped out his entire arm and head - which required a bit of cutting and re-sculpting to make it work.

And, as for the crossbows, I've only done the one conversion so far...

 ...which again, was another head-swap (note that both of these heads are leftovers from Northstar/Oathmark kits).

Now, the original plan was to only use the EM4 Miniatures for this army - but I also found a couple of metal dwarves from Black Tree Design (or EOE Orbis as it's now known) in my pile of shame...

...and these particular ones are a pretty good match (with regard to size and style) for the EM4 dwarves - and so I thought I'd use them for my heroes/champions (and sacrificed a couple of the plastic guys to get them on matching bases).

So, that's pretty much all I did with regard to conversion work - though that, combined with cleaning up the models (getting rid of the mouldlines and 'nub's for example) probably took the best part of a weekend.

THE PLAN GOING FORWARD

The next job is, of course, to start slapping some paint on them - and I had thought to split them up into several batches.

The first would be a 150 point force for the 'skirmish' version of the game...

 

...which would feature a champion, a ranger, two 'hammer elites' and one group (of 3) mountain warriors.

After those are done, I could expand that to a 250 point force...

 ...which includes a champion, two marksmen, two hammer elites, and three groups (of 3) mountain warriors (one of which has a banner).

From there, I could then expand on these - bringing them up to full unit size for the 'regiments' version of the game (perhaps completing one unit at a time))...

...until I get up to a full 750 point (starter) army (note that I'm thinking of painting the shields separately - which is why they're not shown here).

However, I'm not sure if it will be faster to just batch paint one complete unit at a time -OR- separate them out into four random piles (as I'll be using 4 different beard colours)... and do that instead (i.e. batch paint all the blond guys first, then the guys with brown beards, and so on).

Whatever I decide, I'm hoping to get started on them this week... and see if I can get them done by the end of the month (though the end of next month... or even the end of the year, is much more likely :) ).

25,000 Subscribers!!!

As of today the YouTube channel has surpassed the 25k subscribers mark… which might not be much when compared to the big channels out there – but it’s a pretty huge milestone for someone like me :) :) :)

So, as you’d expect, I’ve made a short video to acknowledge that fact…

...and in that video I also announce another giveaway.

Now, the giveaway isn’t anything special (mainly just a $100 gift certificate for DriveThruRPG)… but it’s a small token of my appreciation nonetheless.

I’ve also used this as an opportunity to (re)release the ‘modifications & requests’ pdf…

...as I removed that from google drive a while back – due to the fact that (apparently) my exclusive deal with DriveThruRPG means I shouldn’t really be sharing modified versions of the files in other places. As such, it’s now available over on DriveThru instead (though I did spend a bit of time making it look a bit more presentable before doing so – hence the delay ;) ).

Anyway, I’ll finish this post by saying thank you to everyone for their support over the years (it really is appreciated), and here’s hoping you’ve managed to get some good use out of some of this nonsense of mine :)