2021: Year of Diversions

 ...

Or, I have a problem sticking to one thing.

Progress on the Africans continues well, but there is nothing finished to show today.  However any number of other things have either been started or finished - sometimes it's hard to differentiate between the two.

so, a couple of pieces of graveyard themed terrain got kinda out of hand:

The Realm of the Dead

Yeah, I ended up doing an entire table's worth of terrain; well to be fair, enough for two tables at least.  A solid mix of GW terrain sets, parts from Reaper and Mantic, 3D prints and scratchbuilt parts; plus a terrain cloth of similarly coloured faux-suede.  Good fun and other than railings and roses (and interminable skulls) easy to do.

a Reaper Miniatures graveyard walls set, plus lots of bits

Just part of a GW graveyard set

All this is leading somewhere surely?  Well of course, by a process of leftovers from commissions and financial spendthriftery I've ended up with a pair of 2,000 point Age of Sigmar armies.  At least I've made a good crack at one of them so far; the Nighthaunts, a.k.a. Spooooky Ghosts!

Crawlocke the Jailor

30 Chainrasps

There's a few more bits done, making so far for 44 models - about half the army, but mostly of the cheapest unit cost models, so a good 1,500 points to go.  And just as GW announce another edition of their chuffing rules (these of course could be passed over in favour of Dragon Rampant, given my past opinions on Age of Sigmar!)

As to the other force, it predictably is Stormcast Eternals, as they are so common you can pick them up cheap all over the place at present.  I've done a couple of test models, but that is all so far:

It was for a painting challenge however!

So I pushed out the stops...

I also turned some eBay money last year into Blackstone Fortress, mainly for painting.  I've done a few of the models so far, but this is the best:

UR-025

I'll continue to pick at these, but one of the models in the game reminded me of the Eldar I used to own (and love) and made me wish I could dabble in those again.  Well, 40K Killteams promised to scratch that itch, and soon I was working on some Exodite warriors as yet another side project:

Guardians of a Maiden World

Some ancient monoliths

Of course, they're Aeldari(TM) these days, but who's quibbling.

It's all a bit fantasy and Games Workshoppy by my past standards here.  And true, but of late GW figures are getting as good as their prices imply (sometimes!) and certainly get the painting motivation going.  Still one more 'fantasy' project kicked off and has no GW models in it, just an old-school aesthetic influence.

Turnip28* is a weird alternate history game based on a stagnated Napoleonic society infected by poisonous root vegetables, fungi and cultists.  The look is as if John Blanche was the Duke of Wellington's war artist and medieval armour was in vogue for trench warfare.  It's wild!  The Creator began with the world first, and then backfilled rules, the explicit initial intention being to kitbash models from the ranges of historical miniatures already on the market, which to gamers raised on a diet of GW and other fantasy miniatures' ranges, seem ludicrously cheap, encouraging experimentation.

Copyright: Max FitzGerald

Well, what do I have literally tonnes of bits lying around spare of?  It was a no-brainer to at least have a go:

Some Chaff

But history buffs, fear not; I still have hundreds of good proper Napoleonics to get to in time.  And as of yesterday, another historical project has been proposed, something perhaps with a more biblical bent...

I hope I can finish a few of these this year; and as the UK finally crawls out from under its COVID rock, play a few games with them too!

.*(scroll down for the free basic rules) 

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