A Derelict Citiplex part five, and a Kill Team

With the painting of the first quarter of the Multiverse Gaming Vault Builder Megaton Set, it's time to start building on the second quarter.
With this I'm really going off-piste, pushing the modification of the mdf even further, making a double-length wall, and severely modifying a column and one of the floor boards, so I can start integrating lighting:

 The modified column, with the additional PVC tubing, which will have EL-wire wrapped around it.

The core in situ, still without the top.

To make sure I have a place to put wiring and the powerpack for the EL-wire, I've mounted magnets in the bottom of the column and in one of the floor tiles.

 As this will leave a hole in the floor (still to be drilled in this picture) when the column isn't in use, I've magnetized a spare part to cover it:

 And I had to do a quick test-wrap with the EL-wire to test the effect:

 And in glorious motion-vision:

This weekend, I've been painting a few old metal figures to use for Kill Team:

  

 The colour scheme, although mine are darker in tone, is this piece from the old Witch Hunters Codex:

They aren't done, hopefully I can manage that next weekend.
After that, I guess I will need to continue building the Vault terrain and start fiddling about with LEDS, wiring and soldering irons...

See you next time!

A Derelict Citiplex, part four

Well, the painting part of the first quarter of my Vault Builder Megaton Bundle is done. All that's left to do is varnish the thing and add posters and proclamations (which I still need to have printed, so that will delay things a bit).

I spent the weekend cutting a few custom airbrush stencils, and combined with a few commercial ones, added some interest to the floor tiles:

After which I destroyed parts of it again:

I'm really pleased with how the weathered and worn floor looks.

Once that was done, and having yesterday and today off, I could turn my attention to the walls, giving them an all-over wash, then drybrushing wear and tear, painting in details and dirt and finally stippling on wear and rust. (For some reason, I don't know why, despite having the same hairspray treatment, the walls and columns refused to chip. So back to hand-painted chipping I was).

Resulting in this:

Some model's eye views and close-ups (as well as some Goliath Gangers in deep trouble!):

Once I add loose scatter terrain and perhaps some patches of detritus/rough groumd, this will look rather nice indeed... :D

Oh, in the intervening weeks I also built some goodies for a duo of youtubers, but I'm not showing those until they've seen it themselves. 
And most of my needed gear for integrating lights in the next set of Vault Builder terrain has arrived... Now to see if I can finangle it into these little, thin walls!

Also, friends and I have been getting more and more serious about gaming Kill Team, so this terrain should see use soon. :)  Everyone is building Kill Teams, but I've got an Ork army, I can pick a ready to go Kill Team from. But still, the frenzy of building and collecting is infectious, so I'm looking at making an entirely new team as well. I've got several options, but at this moment Sisters of Battle (using the Astartes rules for now) and a converted Ork Freeboota Kill Team seem to be leading the pack as far as enthusiasm goes. I'm limiting myself to building just one team at a time, so I'll just have to see who wins the poll!

See you next time!

A derelict Citiplex, part three

And progress continues on the Citiplex...
I've airbrushed the rust and grime basecoat on the floors and walls, then hairsprayed them (to enable chipping at a later stage, should I want to).   I managed to get the floors painted after the hairspray had dried. All this I managed to do in an afternoon off from work.

This weekend, I didn't quite get as much time as I'd liked to, but at least I managed to do the basecoat/shading for the walls and columns.
One side of each wall I painted in a tan/dirty white colour, with other side a faded, dark green.

I divided the columns in equal numbers, half getting the tan, the other half getting sprayed in green.

Now I need to decide if I want to add some coloured striping or other markings before I start the chipping process. Hopefully I can do this next weekend.

I've also, bit by bit, started receiving the EL-wire, battery packs and LEDs I need to start building the sections I want to incorporate lighting in. Frustratingly, the components that seem to take the longest to arrive are the spools of wire that I need to actually connect things together...

After years of not doing so, I'm really enjoying building scenery again and the airbrush just makes painting it once finished so much faster and more fun!

See you next time!

A derelict Citiplex, part two

Today, I did the second pass of detailing on  Multiverse Gaming's Vault Builder set.
As I said before, this is only a quarter of the total amount of terrain I bought from them. I bought two Vault Builder Kiloton bundles, each containing two sets each of Vault Builder Sector Alpha and Beta.
I didn't end up adding as much as I'd thought on this second pass, for two reasons:

-One: I was afraid I'd overclutter the terrain (an odd thought seeing the new Kill Team and other terrain coming from Games Workshop, but as I said, this is supposed to be a set of multi-genre terrain).
-Two: I got impatient, I want to primer this stuff and paint it up! Having just these two sets finished has gotten me excited about the final table.

Here's how it looks before I covered it all in black primer:

I did some things differently from the instructions given, so let's recap these. I'll also include some tips an thought on my approach:

-I replaced the cardboard inserts with 15mm diameter ribbed tubing from the local hardware store. Just slide these in, mark where to cut and glue them in once cut. Tip: Cut in the recessed parts of the ribbing and clean up your cuts so everything looks as neat as possible. When drying, wrap the columns in rubber bands so the tubing gets compressed into place. (I'll see if I can get some step by step pictures the next time I build a few more columns)

-I cut the tabs off the wall bases, so the components all stay modular.  If you built them according to the instructions, unless I'm mistaken, either everything locks together permanently, or you end up with walls standing on top of separate bases. All the items in the above picture can be separated. I did it for this set, but for the next set(s) I build I'm considering making a few double width walls. In the end I may end up building a few tiles with columns and /or walls permantly attached, in order to integrate lighting and hide the battery pack under the floors.
Tip: The tabs I cut off from the wall bases, I glued one of them onto the top of each door. This makes them easier to grab and pull out of their frames.

-I added Green Stuff (modelling putty) details. I made these by taking impressions from interesting details/elements from various unbuilt/semi-build sci-fi kits I own. (Mostly GW terrain and models, these walls have details glued on them taken from, among others, the new Mechanicus terrain, classic Necromunda bulkheads, even a Space Marine drop pod.) For the molds I used Oyumaru (a thermoplastic re-useable mold material), but you could also use Green Stuff to make the impression, just make sure you lubricate the surface enough, so the mold will come loose once cured!

-Extra details were added with parts from my scratch-building stockpile: plastic rod and guitar string pipes and cables. The retainer clips for these were cut from metal sauce/puree tubes (cut them open, wash them thorougly and flatten them out.), as was a patch panel on one of the columns. If you have a sturdy enough paper/card corrugator tool, you can also use the sturdier puree tube metal to make corrugated roofing panels.

-On one of the panels (fourth picture, lower right corner, 2 squares left from the space marine) you can just make out a large white panel. This isn't plasticcard but steel tape. The plan to add such panels here and there so I can attach setting-specific items to the walls with magnets or magnetic tape.  I've yet to build any add-ons but I'm thinking of a gothic shrine for 40K/Necromunda, a laser-cut billboard or sign for Cyberpunk, and maybe a framed poster or something for Post-Apocalypse games.
Here's a close up of the steel tape, as well as some sryrene tubing:

If you are ready to start priming your MDF terrain, just get a cheap can of matt black spray paint from the local DIY or hobby store. MDF soaks up a LOT of paint, and it would be a shame to use an expensive can of hobby primer for that!
TIP: When building the walls, have a spare lenght of MDF (from the frame the walls came from) on hand to "wiggle" the side walls to the right distance throught the connector slots. Otherwise you might find that the connectors don't quite fit into the slots, as the sides of the wall are too close together. Once again, maybe this is clearer when I take some pictures during the next assembly session.

As to why I chose Multiverse Terrain's offerings over other brands of Necromunda compatible walls? One is price, you get a lot of terrain for your money, especially considering that other companies don't offer the floorboards as part of their sets. The second is the sparsity of detail, as this means I have lots of room to add my own details and to modify the appearance of the walls. This is important to me, as I am at heart a scratch-builder, I want things to look thoroughly my own. The Multiverse walls allow me to do this without significant modification of the parts/building sequence.
Future purchase plans include the connector clips, as I forgot to order those this time around, as well as an extra 30x30cm of floorboards, to give me enough tiles to fill a complete 90x90cm/3'x3' Necromunda gaming table. Plus, Multiverse Gaming has announced more walls, sets and other items for the Vault Builder range, so I expect to get a few of those as well.

Currently the primer is curing in the garage, hopefully I can fire up the airbrush and at least do the basecoats next weekend...

See you next time!

A derelict Citiplex (for various games)

About two weeks ago, I  received my double set of Multiverse Gaming's Vault Builder set.
While the past weeks have been busy, I did manage to assemble the core structure...of one half of one of the two sets. There is a lot in there!

I already knew I wasn't going to build them as intended by its designer(s). Originally because I would be using it for Necromunda Zone Mortalis games, meaning I would 40K it up. But, with the trailer of Cyberpunk 2077 being released, Osprey's Cyberpunk skirmish rules on the horizon and a general interest in post-apocalyptic gaming. the plan morphed into something a bit more multi-genre.
So now my challenge has become to build it in a way that is sufficiently generic, but also has enough setting-specific detailing to be useable and visually pleasing in several genres, without being too visually jarring in any of them...
I do like to make it easy on myself. :D

One of the things I wanted to differently are the pillars that come in the set. Originally, these have cardboard inserts that you have to bend into a curve to fit into the pillars. The way these are lasercut, and grain of the cardboard means these do not bend cleanly enough for my liking.
But I think I've found a solution by replacing them with ribbed plastic tubing.
I have a second idea for making one of the pillars, but I need to get some longer length of wire:

Today, I spent some time on the first pass of greebling them up. I made some oyumaru molds of some interesting details from various (GW) vehicle and terrain kits. Earlier this week, I made some casts from them. Which I started glueing into place today:
 

See you all next time!

The Void Crows re-emerge

Well, I have the first day of the new job under my belt. It's still just in-house training, and will be for the next couple of weeks, but so far I'm liking it.

But that's not what you're here for, this is (mainly) a wargaming blog after all...
In the days between knowing I got the job and actually starting it, I decided to break out the brushes again. I didn't quite get the minis finished, but hey, that's what weekends are for.
So, what did I paint?
Those who have been following this blog for a longer time, or saw them back when =I=Munda first hit the stage on Dakkadakka, know that I've built a small salvage crew for it, and have been slowly working on expanding it.
Today I finished the last three additions:

Like the rest of crew, they don't have fixed names (yet), but I've been referring to them as "Sassy Girl", "Old Savant" and "Big Brute". If you look closely, you can nicely see the difference in sizes I managed to build into these models; Sassy Girl is just a bit smaller and more slender that the rest of the crew (done by shaving down the waist and shoulders, as well as the arms by a tiny bit), Old Savant is of standard unmodified size, where Big Brute is just a smidge bigger in all directions, thanks to .5mm shims in strategic places. It's not really noticeable on the table, but it does help in giving them the appearance and character I want them to have.
Here's a few more views:

As you can see in the pictures, these three are somewhat less combat-oriented than the original group, with Sassy Girl mainly being armed with a Boarding Gaff and a lumen-wand, with only a pair of throwing knives as a back-up. She's the youngest in the crew, and a bit of a mascot because of that. Her main task is to assist the Old Savant and haul cargo, but she has a fiery temper and a nose for trouble...
Old Savant wears a stubpistol because the rest of the crew forces him to. But being an information addict due to a meme-virus he contacted as a child, for the rest he just carries as much information with him as he can, as well as his favorite auto-quill. As he is an old man, and not of a physical bent, his void-suit has been retrofitted with a brass augmetic frame the crew salvaged a while back. Before he had it, he would need two of the crew to carry him around and prop him up somewhere to oversee salvage operations. His suit is also fitted with a shoulder-mounted Lux-caster. The crew couldn't do without the crotchety old man and his uncanny knack for finding the best pieces of loot.
Big Brute is most heavily armed of this group, carrying a stubpistol, large combat knife as well as his trusty huge crowbar... Like Sassy Girl, he will mainly be hauling salvage, as well as making sure that anything the crew needs loose or open gets that way very quickly!
Except for the Old Savant, they're wearing a lighter pattern of void suit than the rest of the crew as well. The reason is that these figures will be part of the "second wave" of salvagers, coming in after the clearing crew to select and haul the items and parts of the ships to be salvaged. They shouldn't be engaged in front-line combat, but you can never, ever, consider any derelict ship to be "safe".

Here's the crew exploring a derelict ship, with Old Savant pointing out a data-alcove that may still be functional:

And finally a proper look at the crew as it stands now:

What's still in store for this crew? I've got a few extra crewmembers planned or in progress; There will be a duo of lux-servoskulls, to help light their way, a servitor that can be equipped to either assist in hauling cargo or to cut open doors and locks with a plasmacutter. These are all primered and ready for paint. (But they've been in that state for ages, so don't expect this means you'll see them soon!)
I'm also building a small grav-sled to haul larger pieces of loot with.
And finally there are the last three members of the crew: 2 cargo haulers, that are also equipped with slab-shields. They will do dual duty hauling and securing cargo on their slab-shields or pushing forward to clear rooms where there's a bit more opposition... And the captain of the crew (the crewboss with shotcaster and chainsword is in charge of boarding operations, but occasionally the big boss himself will join the crew, if there are especially rich pickings to be found). He will be wearing a more luxury and flamboyant style of void suit.
I'm still not entirely decided on how I want to handle the slab-shields. I want them to be utilitarian, equally useful as a shield and as a sled or gurney to haul cargo on, and disposable, as they will also be used to quickly seal any inadvertent hull breaches the crew encounters, so they also need to look cheap and easily replaced.

There's also a void-suited itinerant Preacher in the works, but he isn't part of the crew proper.
If the new job and the new hobby/passion (woodworking) will leave enough time and energy, I'd really like to keep going on my small 40K narrative warbands, maybe even make an attempt at continuing my Space Hulk terrain. I got a real kick out of seeing all of it in the table again, especially now that enough time has passed that I can look at them with fresh eyes, without remembering the building process and the flaws I knew were there.

See you next time!

Scenario Complications: Religious festivals

I've just finished re-reading the first Shira Calpurnia novel and the way the large religious festival featured in the book played merry hell with her Arbites investigation had me thinking. Wouldn't it be a great theme for a game of Inquisitor (and all it's variant flavours...), Necromunda or any other skirmish set in the 40K Universe to have the edicts of a local religious festival interfere with the actions of your warbands?

So I thought up some possible (Imperium) religious observances and the effect they could have on a game:

This week's activities

I played the game with my son I mentioned last post. I didn't have the time to rework IHMN/ItEN as I had planned. Instead I grabbed the Movie Marines rules (from an old White Dwarf), selected the Sergeant as my son's character and chose a corresponding amout of point's worth of Orks.
I then used whatever of the 40K rules I could remember... ;-P

Here is the set up:

Our brave Space Marine started on the little grey square on the left (right below the red cup).
His mission was to reach the large square with the checkers and Imperial Aquila, where he would be extracted by allied Imperial assets. In his way were two small squads of Orks, each led by a Nob.
They were in dispersed formation as they were searching the area for him...

Pretty soon he ran into the first Nob:

Who proved to be a fairly minor delay (Movie Marines are absolute monsters!)

Shortly after, the Orks had set up a firing line in ambush:

My son did the proper Space Marine thing, and charged right into the nearest Orks.
By charging from one gaggle to the other, he managed to systematically dismember the various greenskins.
He was nearing the extraction point, he only needed to get past the last two Orks and the second Nob. That second Nob however, had a Power Claw. This would be interesting.

The final combat was tense and fairly close fought over two or three turns. The Nob managed to knock a single wound off the Marine, before perishing himself. (Did I mention Movie Marines are very, very tough?)
Injured but undeterred the brave Marine stepped onto the landing pad for extraction.
My son won. But more importantly, we both had a lot of fun!

I've also been painting every moment I could, trying to get the Meganobs out of refurbishment for the game tomorrow. I didn't manage to get paint on the newly built ones, but I did get the three older ones finished:

Sadly I forgot to take pics of them pre-refurbishment for contrast...
But before upgrades they still had old-fashioned Goblin Green with green woodflock basing, they lacked banner poles (or in the case of the rightmost one: a trophy pile), and they were a lot less yellow. In fact, you had to look closely to see they were Bad Moons at all! The only yellow they had was on their shoulders plates, and maybe a stray armour plate elsewhere. They also only had a single shoulderpad each. Plus, during rebasing I've put 1mm plasticard shims under their feet to make them match a bit more, size-wise, to the new plastic Meganobs.
They were clearly the result of the 40K 3rd edition image of Orks, when they were mostly bare-metal scrapheap dwellers in appearance.
Since them I've come to appreciate a more colourful Ork, largely due to my growing appreciation of the old Rogue Trader and second edition Ork background and worldview. I still find the current all-yellow Meganobs, as shown in the most recent Codex, too gaudy though.
It makes them look too toylike, takes out the menace. Plus, it just seems like lazy painting to me ("Oh, Bad Moons? Just paint everything yellow, slap some black flames on.") I believe Ork models deserve a bit more thought and realism (and less uniformity!) than that.
Hence a large part of my Meganobs remains bare, dirty metal and I tried to make sure each had different armour plates picked out in yellow.
Additionally, by not going all yellow, I retain the option to make, say, my Warboss or a MegaMek stand out by using more yellow still.

Oh, and one thing I really miss on GW's recent paintjobs is the use of Orky Glyphs, apart from picking out the random ones that are molded in. I always try to add a few on each model, that express how that particular Ork sees the world or himself. For example, the middle one has the glyphs "Unki" and "Dur" on his shoulder, meaning "strong or big" and (in this context) "armour". Clearly this Ork revels in the size, power and resilience of his armour.
In contrast the rightmost one has his upper arm plate marked with the runes "Rukk" (attack. charge) and "Nar"(command, crew). He clearly values his elite shocktrooper status and elevated position in the chain of command.
Finally the leftmost one has a "Mor"( wild, feral, ancient) glyph as a banner, showing his pride in his veteran status and his viciousness. He has seen the need to paint a "Flash" (flag, banner) glyph on it, to show he is one of the Warlord's bannermen, his inner circle.
Now, who said Orks are thoughtless, uncomplicated creatures? ;-D

Here are a few more views:

So, now to sit down and finish reading the new edition of the rules for tomorrows game...

Decisions, decisions...

So, where am I at, hobbywise?

Before my vacation, I was cheerfully focused on my Orks. During my vacation I had fun painting a character for the Iron Kingdoms RPG. A nice little palate-cleanser before returning to work on my Orks, right?  .... Wrong.
I've been back for over a week now, and my interests are so over the place, I'm getting nothing done...
The fire to work on my Orks has died down to embers. I'm looking at my stash of IKRPG-suitable figures, because I had so much fun on the one, I'd like to do more of them. And because they share a setting, I've been looking at my Khador stuff as well.
I got Space Marine last week on a Steam Sale (I've been eyeing that game since it was released but it was never for sale at a price I found acceptable. Until now.) My son saw a bit of me playing it, and thought it was very cool. But he can't play the game yet. So I am contemplating if I can throw together a tabletop skirmish game of Space Marine with him before the end of his summer holidays (So, effectively, sometime the coming week.)
Which means I'm looking at my notes for a IHMN/ItEN mash-up again. And, because of the game's graphics and character design, I've done some more on my True-scale Space Marine test model. Which is part of my Inq28/=I=Munda project. But for the marine, I need parts from my box of marines for my 40K/Space Hulk Howling Griffons. So those have been dragged out as well.
And to top it off, next weekend I've committed to a game of 40K. For which I need several miniatures I pulled apart for refurbishing before my vacation. So I really should be finishing those. Oh, and read the latest edition of the rules, as it will be my first game of 40K in over 4 years...
Aaargh!

The sane, sensible thing to do, would be to ignore the distractions and knuckle down on those refurbishment mini's and start reading the rules.
But with all the ideas and various enthusiasms floating through my brain, I can't find the focus.
Such a fun, relaxing pastime, this hobby of ours... ;-P

See you soon, hopefully with some progress to report.

Scenario Servitor online ... +++Processing+++

So, time to try something new...
Every now and then I get some idea for a scenario that won't let me go. As I may have mentioned before I don't get to game often, either because the few people I game with don't often have time to meet up, or I can't find someone to share/get my particular gaming interest. So the idea stays unused, maybe gets noted down somewhere, and then is forgotten.
Which I think is a shame. So from now on, when I have such an idea, I'll try to note it down properly and post it here. That way, the idea gets retained in a way that I can retrieve them more easily. And maybe someone else may get a use out of them too?
I'll put them under the "Scenario Servitor" label to make them easier to find.
So, let's fire this thing up, shall we?

+Scenario Servitor A5P4R4GU-5 Theta activated...+
+Processing request+

+<Verbalise: "Which file do you wish to retrieve, my lord?"+
+Awaiting response+
...

Rules-mashing continues!

I could have responded in the comments, but I'd rather put this in a new post, seeing as it sheds some light on my reasoning and what I want to achieve with this IHMN/ItEN mashup.

Seems I've attracted someones attention...  ;)



Hi Craig!
Thank you for making such a wonderful set of rules! Twice!

I know the 40K you wanted to replicate! I just missed it (having only found 40K in 2nd edition), but veteran friends showed me the "good old stuff"...
I loved the wildness and madness of it. Still do, and I miss it in the current iterations of the game.
The way I see it, ItEN and IHMN do have that sense of excitement and freedom I seek.

Thank you for the encouragement!

I'm not too worried about balancing, I firmly believe one shouldn't let balance get in the way of a good game, or story. :D
Come to think of it, I think that IHMN being set in (and optimised for) an alternate 1890s, is actually a bonus. With the Victorian era being a transitional period from (often centuries old) traditional methods to modern industrial means (even moreso with VSF "weird tech" and Mysticism), means that it should be able to stretch the rules in both directions towards future  and past. In addition to VSF I could use them for Feudal/Questing games, moderns, as well as Sci-Fi/40k.
Heck, if I get things right, I might even be able to pull all three off in the same, single game! ;D
That's why my goal isn't to replace the gear and stats from IHMN with 40K content, but instead add them to it, and allow the possibility for interaction between them.
I'm not making it easy on myself, am I?

In the Majestic Emperor's Name!

Or something like that...

Anyway, what I'm getting at is mashing up two similar rulesets, so I can use the setting of one, but with the rules of the other...

In previous post, I mentioned In the Emperor's Name, a 40K skirmish ruleset, and In Her Majesty's Name, a VSF branch of the same rule-tree.
IHMN is, in my eyes, the more polished and flexible ruleset, so I'd prefer using that, as I can also use it for a lot of my other gaming interests. So porting the 40K style of ItEN to IMHN should be effortless, no? Well, ItEN is d6 based, and IHMN d10 based, so a lot of values are skewed by this.

The last couple of days I've been comparing stats (weapons and figures mainly), trying to find parallels and extrapolating the rest.

Below is what I've got so far. There are still a lot of blanks, especially in the troops segment, as I need to compare and guesstimate them one by one... To be honest, I'm currently prioritizing the troops that I have a personal interest in, and those that are easiest to translate. The rest will follow later.
I'm not certain at all if all my stats are accurate because of two simple reasons: They aren't yet tested, this is just a first draft. And, I'm not precisely fluent in IHMN (or ItEN) yet, I've yet to get some games in. I should start looking for victi..., no, oppon..., no....,erm, fellow gamers, so I can finally give it a go.
So, if you have any comments, feedback or suggestions, please let me know!

Anyway, here's the crunch:
(Update: Added the points cost where I had enough data to calculate them.)