A Giant Painting Contest!

Oh snap, how on earth did I ever miss this one? I just now read about the 2014 Year of the Giants painting contest over on the Reaper forums. It was posted way back in February, so I managed to overlook this one for about 9 months. Sweet.

Anyhow, all is not lost. I have about 6 weeks to complete at least one giant mini and enter it in the contest. If I'm feeling really ambitious, I'll complete two entries, one for the Reaper category and one for the non-Reaper category. I'm not going to even think about the Diorama category.

This is just what I needed to light a fire under me and apply some paint to some lead on my favorite category of minis!

D&D 5E, and back to blogging

Wow, where have the past four plus months gone??? For a variety of personal reasons, I took the summer off from all things gaming, painting, and writing. Now that summer has morphed into fall, I have decided to re-engage my hobby brain and get back to work, so to speak.

In my last post, I mentioned that I had taken possession of the 5E Starter Set and that I would give it a review. Well, I'm going to have to dust off my notes and give it another quick read so I can deliver a proper writeup. And to add to my 5E workload, I also now have the PH, MM, and Hoard of the Dragon Queen adventure. Looks like The Rise of Tiamat will be here shortly, while the DMG will be out in early December.

On the lead front, not much happened over the summer, just a few random things: a Superior Models eagle, an old DragonTooth baggie of P6 Superhero and Superheroine, some Heritage Air Power planes, a couple Imrie Risley 54mm models from A Christmas Carol, and more recently some Reaper DHL minis that were too cheap to pass up! I remain a sucker for a good bargain, and for a good joke setup: a Fire Giant, a Demon, and a Cloaker walk in to a bar...and cost me less than $21! Thank you, thank you, you're all too kind. Pics to follow. At some point.

If you are reading this, thanks for sticking around. I hope this is the first of many entries as I try to have some fun again.

D&D Starter Set!

Thanks to the industrious mailing gnomes at Amazon, my long-awaited pre-order of the 5E/D&D Next Starter Set showed up in the mail today! I have done absolutely zero painting, blogging, or anything gaming related for quite a spell now. I'm going to give it all a good reading this weekend, so look for a follow-up post in the hopefully near future. My gaming buddies can rest assured that I'm not going to attempt to get us to switch over to 5E - I simply want to get my hands on the new rules for my own collection and curiosity.

I've Got a Fever...And The Only Cure Is More Football!!!

That's right, World Cup 2014 has kicked off and I'm once again knee deep in the beautiful game. It's been fun to watch so far, because you never quite know what is going to happen on any given day (like the Netherland's 5-1 dismantling of Spain or Germany's 4-0 pummeling of Portugal).

Last night started off great for the US with hometown hero (Seattle Sounders) Clint Dempsey scoring in less than 30 seconds. Then things get somewhat dicey as we endure a couple of injuries and a relentless Ghana attack that is less than technical until they tie the score in the 82nd minute. And then magic:

John Brooks comes on and powers in a header off a corner in the 86th minute and the US holds off Ghana for a 2-1 victory!!! I'm a happy camper, for sure. Now we face a reeling Portugal and then the German machine. Hoping for the best in the next two matches.

Last day of school for my little dragons is tomorrow, so I will have a lot more time for painting, posting, and perhaps even finally listing some of my excess lead on eBay. Unless I just sit around and watch the World Cup for the next several weeks...one never knows.

Outstanding Customer Service (gasp!) and a Liebster nomination

Not too long ago, my son Mr. Frodo received a copy of GW's Azog mounted & on foot. He was quite pleased, and dove into working on his minis right away. Well, he somehow managed to break off the tip of mounted Azog's mace, and to make matters worse, lose it! Double crap.

I spent close to an hour scouring my desk and the surrounding floor in a fruitless search. My best guess is that it ended up on the floor and got sucked by the soulless automaton that is our vacuum cleaner.

So I fired off an email to GW customer service to see if they could send me or sell me a replacement. I was very pleased to get a reply email within an hour, asking me to call them. I called back and after providing the GW rep with the necessary info, was told a replacement was going to be sent out the next day. Sure enough, a couple of days later a small packet from GW shows up in the mail. But they didn't simply send me a replacement bit in the mail, they sent me a complete kit! I did not see that one coming.

A lot of people love to talk shit about GW. I'm not saying they are the best miniatures company in the world, but this excellent bit of customer service goes a long ways towards proving to me that the folks behind the scenes (namely the CS reps) do what they can to make customers happy.

I'm happy, Mr. Frodo is happy, and soon mounted Azog will be happy to have his mace back.

Well played, Games Workshop!

David over at Dear Tony Blair was kind enough to nominate me for a Liebster award. I'm flattered, but after thinking about it for a bit, I'm going to pass for now. I'm feeling less than motivated at the moment, and honestly, I'd rather spend the time slapping some paint on my pile of neglected lead. Curse you, apathy!!!

Catalogs, Rulebooks, and Posters, Oh My!

The latest additions to my non-lead collection of mini-related ephemera make me happy both from a collecting standpoint (great artwork) as well as my bottom line (most were downright bargains, if not very affordable).

First up is a copy of the 1980 DragonTooth catalog. OK, so it is more of a pamphlet or flyer, really, given that it is digest size and consists of two folded pieces of paper for 8 pages total. Still, the black & white illustrations are lovely (most are by Mike Gilbert) and it does list available models and prices, so a catalog it is.

Next up is a Ral Partha poster featuring the artwork of Dean Morrissey. You might recognize the image from the Best of Ral Partha boxed sets (10-300 through 10-303). It measures about 25 x 22, nearly square. Too bad it was stored folded, but it is in great shape, creases aside. I read that having it linen-backed might help deal with the creases, so I'll have to take a closer look at that method. And I received two of them, so I have a copy to spare if you are interested. Looking for other mini posters or Superior Models catalogs, among other things.

Erol Otus is one of my favorite fantasy artists, like many gamers who grew up with his work burned into our retinas by hour upon hour of reading and re-reading various D&D books. So when I saw this Alma Mater poster I had to have it! It was only $3.50, so I couldn't say no at that price. It measures 22 x 17. You can read an Alma Mater review on RPG.net and an entry on Grognardia.

And rounding out the quartet is this smashing copy of Naval Battle Group by Superior Models. This was the most expensive acquisition of the four at $25, but I haven't seen it move for less than around $50 or so, which is too much for me.

The booklet is in outstanding shape - great color on the covers, no staple rust, no writing inside, and all the inserts and sheets are present. It is only 12 pages of text (16 total including covers) so it looks to be a fairly simple set of rules. I need to sit down and give it a thorough read one of these evenings. Now I just need to find myself a copy of Starfleet Wars that isn't grossly overpriced...and yes, I realize it is available from Monday Knight Productions as Galactic Knights.

Painting & Papers

Before I left on a family vacation to Vancouver, B.C. (Deep Cove was very nice) I actually made some time to sit down and paint. It was only the second time this year I've painted, and I hope to squeeze in another session and get something finished - it has been way too long!

I haven't added much to the lead pile recently, but I have picked up some some analog pieces in this digital age. When I get back from California, I'll snap some pics and share my latest acquisitions.

There's also a special project I'm in the middle of, but I can't talk about it now. Loose lips sink ships!