Tyranid Zoats

So it was time to paint me some Zoats... What can I say about the Zoats? I guess they are kind of a strange race, but I guess most of the Rogue Trader stuff is kind of strange, so they fit in fine with the setting. I have been wanting some Zoats for some time and this year I decided to do something about it and so I managed to get 5 Zoats fairly cheap from Ebay.

In the Rogue Trader days the Zoats were a Tyranid slave race created for war. Apparently they usually would roam around in groups of 4 sporting weapons like bolters and heavy bolters. But since they were allowed same equipment and weapons as Tyranids, they could also wear power armour, use gravitons, conversion beamers or whatever stuff you can think of from the Rogue Trader days.

When GW made some Zoat models I guess Tyranids were already becoming something else and so the models were equipped with more bio engineered weapons, but the fleshborers still kind of looked like bolters, the missile launcher looked pretty funky and the leader was equipped with power glove and a flamer which looked like a mix of the fleshborers and an imperial flamer.

My combined Tyranid forces so far!

So when I painted my Zoats I decided to give them a look of semi bio enginered and tech equipment. It will not really work perfect with the never Tyranid background, but I think it will work fine with Rogue Trader weirdness and still be fine with my Hunter-Slayers. So the weapons was painted red, to look semi organic and tie the Zoats in with my Hunter-Slayers and I still decided to paint some metal parts on the flamer, missile launcher, power glove and armour. I also decided to do the hazard stripes on the flamer, it might be kind of silly, but I think it ended up looking good and when the organic weapons already looked a bit like bolters and flamers then why wouldn't they also mimic the hazard stripes?

Ready to go to war.

I am not planning to do a complete Tyranid force for later 40K gaming, but I have acquired 8 more Hunter-Slayers which I will paint and I have a bunch of the old plastic Tyranid Warriors, which I will probably paint at some point, so I guess that some day I might have enough Tyranids for more than just small skirmish games.

I don't really count the Genestealers as part of the Tyranid army, but if needed I have 24 painted Genestealers and a Patriarch, so they could reinforce an army too. So that almost concludes my Tyranid adentures...

I just got one more thing to hunt down! I would REALLY like to have the Proto Tyranid to lead my forces, but so far I have not managed to get one.

What a beast!

Arashikage Ninjas (G.I. Joe Project)

I guess it was just a matter of time before I would start a G.I. Joe project. As a kid my favourite toys was always G.I. Joe (or Action Force, as it was called in Denmark to begin with). I still love G.I. Joe and I still have a pretty large collection of the toys and I have bought the re-released comic books.

The most exciting characters for me was and is the ninjas and during the original run of the comic they kind of took over a lot of the stories. So it was natural for me to start there and I have had some ninjas lying around for a couple of years now.

So to start off I painted some Perry Miniatures ninjas as Arashikage ninjas. The red mercenary ninjas which most of the time work for Cobra, sometimes through Storm Shadown, other times through Firefly and so forth.

Perry Ninjas painted as Arashikage.

I converted one of them to have an uzi, since they are modern ninjas and often are seen pictured with uzi throughout the stories they participate in.

Scarlet, Jinx and Snake Eyes encounter the red ninjas.

The first time they appear is in the classic silent story, where they work for Storm Shadow. But up against Snake Eyes they don't stand a chance.

That is all the models I have for now, but hopefully I will get some more for Christmas or else I will buy some more next year.

So far I have plans for Firefly. Originally he was not a ninja, but in the later stories he turns out to be the Faceless Master, an outsider who was allowed to study the arts with the Arashikage clan.

I think the RAFM USX Modern Ronin is perfect for Firefly. I have seen others use him too and since that model has an uzi too it fits well with the saboteur past of Firefly.

RAFM USX Modern Ronin

Then I will need a Storm Shadow. I don't know yet what side he will be on, but the classic set up would make him a Cobra ninja. Which of course is not really correct all the time, but I guess that is what most people think of him.

I think the Reaper Dragon Clan Ninja will be a good Storm Shadow. But I guess almost any ninja painted white would do fine. But I consider painting him in one of his later camo ninja suits.

  

Another ninja I will need is Kim Arashikage, code name Jinx. She is most famously pictured as a red ninja and it would fit well with her Arashikage heritage.

 

I had a kind of hard time finding a female ninja with the hood on, but eventually I decided that Oko from Hasslefree would be great for the job.

Hasslefree Oko

I will probably try and sculpt a bit on the hood, to make it pointy like in the comic book. And i might consider painting her white, since that is how she looks the first time we meet her or I could go with the bold Tiger Force green and orange.

Of course I will also need a Snake Eyes, but so far I have not found a model I like. I know about the Reaper one, but he is no good for me.

I would really want the old classic looks.

I guess it should be possible to find a model, but no luck so far, so I am open to suggestions.

Horisont V (Danish Con. For Alternative Miniature Games)

Last weekend I was attending this years Horisont (The 5th so far). The only open Danish convention dedicated to alternative miniature games. The previous four years I have been exhibiting different games, but this year I only came as attendant.

In Denmark there is not really a big following of alternative games and almost anything not related to Warhammer Fantasy/Warhammer 40.000 and Games Workshop can be considered alternative and niche. That is of course not 100% true, but even games like Warmachine and Hordes seems to be struggeling at times.

On top of this it seems like the people who actually do play alternative games tend to stay in their own gaming groups and are satisfied by that. I guess there is nothing wrong with that, but it makes it hard for the Warhammer people to find out that there actually is any alternatives.

Well enough of that and back to Horisont. This year saw a couple of changes from previous years, new people had taken over the practical stuff and the convention had moved to a different town. Fewer people attended (about 50), but it seemed like the usual suspects had made their way and the mood was great all the weekend, and as far as I am concerned, I don't think the convention suffered for the new location or the fewer attendants.

I only managed to take a few photos and play a few games, but for me lot of the charm of these conventions is also socializing with likeminded gamers, getting a few beers and ranting all night about how everything was better in the Rogue Trader days and such.

One of the games I managed to take a few photos of was Infinity:

A great looking Infinity table!

More Infinity.

I didn't manage to play the Infinity game, but it sure looked really good! I have tried out Infinity once before and it seems like a pretty good tactical skirmish game. I hope I will get a chance to try it out again at some point, but right now I don't think I will end up buying into it just yet. I already have too many projects and considering the price of those models I just think I will end up playing too little or probably just having the miniatures lying around in the closet for years. But who knows?

Another great looking game was this Lego 40K mod:

The table is bristling with Lego!

More Lego (Well actually Lego clones I guess)!

This game seemed kind of borderline, since 40K can't really be considered alternative and all the Lego models come prepainted. But it is gaming with Lego and that is not really something you see every day. The game looked great and I think it worked out pretty good too, even though it seemed like there might have been a bit too many models. But then again, with such a great collection I think it was too hard to leave anything out. So hopefully we will see more of this in the future.

And on to a game I actually managed to play on the second day of the convention:

Dread Streets - Fantasy skirmish.

More Dread Streets.

I think this game is supposed to be an alternative to Mordheim, but I am only guessing since I never played Mordheim or read the rules. But, again guessing, I think the setting might be more compareable to Mordheim than the actual rules.

In Dread Streets each player control a small warband of 10 models. You have one leading hero, four main heroes and each hero has a helping henchman. Along the way the henchmen are giving bonus' to their heroes, as long as they stay standing up and eventually they can also be sacrificed to save a heroes life. So you actually control five heroes and the henchmen are more like visual aid for your bonus', wound counters or such, but it works out really good.

I can't really put a finger on the system, it seems like it has been playtested well and worked out in all the situations we encountered. I guess it might be possible for power gamers to destroy the game, but for people like those at Horisont it was perfect.

What we were shown was a trimmed down version of the actual rules. But as I understood, the further stuff was more objectives, missions and a campaign system (with the latter still in the works).

If you want to know more about Dread Streets I encourage you to visit betatester.dk and take a look around. (The blog is in Danish though, but it should be possible to get an idea of the project with the help of Google Translate or by contacting the people behind the game).

 A few more games I didn't get to play this time:

A city destroyed by Super System.

I tried out Super System this summer and it seems to be a really great system for over the top super hero gaming. I have a few super heroes, villains and henchmen in my painting queue, so I guess I will be trying out this system again in the not too distant future.

Adventurers find an ancient UFO in Pulp Alley.

Pulp Alley just seem to be an awesome system for convention games. I think it is perfect for games which have an ongoing story to tell and a bit more adventure than just hard on battle. This game was presented by Thorbjørn of Dr. The Viking's Miniature Games Hell, I guess he is the best known or infamous Danish celebrity of alternative gaming.

Of course a lot of other great games took place over the weekend, but I didn't manage to get more photos taken this time.

Besides Dread Streets I tried out Zombicide, which seems to be the big thing right now, and it turned out to be a pretty good game. The models are not the most interesting, but the system seem to work and even though I never tried it before the rules came very easy. I think we were seven players, but still it was really fast and there was not much waiting time or anything.

I also tried out a couple of small card based games called Coup and The Resistance. Both was really fun and fast and made for good entertainment late at night with some beer.

The food was good, the people were all friendly, some German friends made their way too. So over all it was a really good convention and I am already planning what games to bring next year.

The Current Status of My Phagon Spacelords Army

So I finally managed to collect and paint all of the Phagon Beastmen, the Battle-Beasts and the PSI-Wolves. I still need to collect and paint the last of the Battleclones and Walkers, but I guess I will get there in time.

Here I documented the army so far and hopefully I will at some point be able to complete my Phagon collection and put them to use on the battlefield.

Phagon Beastmen Commanders: 3245A-B-C-D

Phagon Beastmen w/ Heavy Flamers: 3244A-B-C-D

Phagon Beastmen w/ Combat-Needlers: 3243A-B-C-D-E

Phagon Beastmen w/ Laser Rifles: 3242A-B-C-D-E

Phagon Beastmen w/ Needlers: 3241A-B-C-D-E

Phagon Battle-Beast: Running Ripper C3284A

Phagon Battle-Beast: Running Ripper C3284A

Phagon Battle-Beast: Stingwhipper C3283A

Phagon Battle-Beast: Stingwhipper C3283A

Phagon Battle-Beast: Hammerhead C3282A

Phagon Battle-Beast: Hammerhead C3282A

Phagon Battle-Beasts

Phagon Bioids: Suma PSI-Wolf C3281A-B

Phagon Bioids: Suma PSI-Wolf C3281B-A

Scale Shot

Phagon Battleclones WIP

Phagon Walkers

Battleclone, Robot and Hammerhead

The Phagon Beastmen and a few of the Battleclones are available at EM4 Miniatures. Hopefully the complete Spacelords range will be available again at some point, but it has been quite some time since any new models was re-released.

Right now I am trying to complete the collection of Phagon Battleclones and I am still missing 2 out of 4 of the Walkers. Also I would love to get more of the Bioids and Battle-Beasts. So if anyone has models they want to sell or trade just send me a message. I have extras of Battleclones and Beastmen to trade and also models from the other Spacelords factions.