Battle Report: The Lord of the Rings: The Long Night

A small band of men and their dwarf allies desperately defend a their village against rampaging orcs.  Will they hold out long enough for help to arrive, or will their children and womenfolk be left to the mercy of bloodthirsty orcs?

Balrog: Part 4

Primed. I'm considering painting the flames using the technique I've never tried before. This worries me a little bit, but nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Balrog: Part 3

Did the assembly and some gap filling.

Balrog: Part 2

Finished the assembly of the miniatures themselves, next step is to fill in all the joins with green stuff. Did some looking for a base to mount them on, and wasn't all that happy with what was available. I'll be looking for something more suitable at the hobby store later this week if I can make it down there.

Balrog: Part 1

I had originally posted this on my defunct fantasy blog.  Since I'm getting back into finishing this project, I figured I'd post my updates here instead, but that means a repost or two until I catch up to where I left off...

I received my first miniatures commission recently. Well, sort of. It's more a favor for a friend, who promised to do it for another friend, but doesn't have the time (she has a good excuse--she's leaving for the Peace Corps soon). Lest you think I'm doing this solely out of the kindness of my heart, since my friend will be out of country for a few years, she kindly sent me all of her paints, plus some stray miniatures that she's had in storage.

Thoughts on the State of Gaming, Part 3

I think GW has a workable business model with The Lord of the Rings line, provided they marketed it right.  The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game is a perfectly workable skirmish game--easy enough for a new player to get into with a relative minimum of effort.  Once they become a veteran and want to play games with huge armies, then they can "graduate" into playing War of the Ring, and purchase the additional loads of miniatures.  If The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game was marketed as the "entry-level" game, it might attract new players.  As it is now, it seems to be presented as a sub-game to War of the Ring.


It seems to me that there are three levels of games that could be tapped in a logical progression for each genre.  

1. A fast paced "board" game.  This could consist of interlocking board pieces like Space Hulk or Warhammer Quest, and a few miniatures that act as game pieces.  The game should have simple enough rules to appeal to players who are not gamers (the genre itself should keep the veterans interested).  The game should be something that you could play with your children or disinterested SO.  An example is the Settlers of Catan, which is arguably has some fantasy elements and yet is popular outside of traditional gaming circles.
2. An intermediate level "skirmish" wargame.  This should contain more miniatures than the previous level, while not being huge battles, either.
3. A wargame.  This is the level of the current games of Warhammer, Warhammer 40k, and War of the Ring.

The key to a marketing strategy like this is to ensure that the games should be as compatible as with each other as possible, at least in terms of the miniatures.  That ensures that a new player will "add on" to his army as he progresses up the chain, rather than feel like he has to "start over" each time.  

For each of the three main lines that GW has, I can envision the following tiers:

Warhammer:
    Tier One: Warhammer Quest.  A handful of characters doing a dungeon crawl to accomplish a quest.  
    Tier Two:  Mordheim, or something similar.  Basically warbands fighting each other for whatever reason.
    Tier Three:  Warhammer itself.

Warhammer 40k:
    Tier One:  A Warhammer Quest analogue, perhaps a Rogue Trader or Inquisitorial Retinue on a mission on board a space hulk to accomplish a quest, like retrieve an artifact and then escape.
    Tier Two:  A skirmish game, perhaps more like Necromunda, the original Rogue Trader version of the game, or something along the lines of the Kill Team rules from 6th edition 40k.  A disadvantage of Necromunda itself was that you couldn’t use the miniatures in Warhammer 40k, and, as far as I know, the vice versa.  Suffice it to say, it should a be a squad level game where each player has maybe a dozen miniatures.
    Tier Three:  Warhammer 40k.

The Lord of the Rings
    Tier One:  A game called something like “Escape from Moria”, where the Fellowship (or a small band of other heros), has to escape the mines of Moria before they are captured or killed by its evil denizens.  This is a different concept from the boxed set The Mines of Moria, which is the starter set to The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game.  Rather, this game would have the interlocking game pieces like Warhammer Quest or Space Hulk, which creates Moria as the players explore it, searching for an exit.  
    Tier Two:  The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game, albeit marketed at the skirmish level like it was originally envisioned.
    Tier Three:  War of the Ring.  

Having a tiered structure like this I think would attract more gamers.  As it is, many new players jump in and get hooked for life, while others start to get involved, build an army, get frustrated at the escalating costs or codex creep or whatever, and then and sell everything on ebay and leave permanently.  Those that are lost are going to tell others about their experiences, and potentially drive others away.  However, with more gaming options available, someone who gets frustrated might instead take a break from the Tier Three game and slide back down to Tier Two or One, and still have fun.  Even if their never go back up to Tier Three, they’re still playing games within the company, and even if they spend way less money than they used to, less is better than none at all.

Thoughts on the State of Gaming, Part 2

Another point of the Specialist Game Rant the I mentioned in Part 1 is that the purpose of the "side games" was to draw in new blood with the side games, in the hopes of hooking them into playing the more expensive flagship games.  What GW supposedly found was that the veteran players were being pulled away by the specialist games rather than new players being hooked into the hobby by them.


On the other hand, I know several people who are gamers but not miniatures gamers, who stay away from GW stuff simply because they don't want to invest the time and money required to buy and paint an army (this is also a primary reason I don't play MMORPGs).  In such a situation, a smaller game like Battlefleet Gothic would be much more palatable to them, as spending less than $100 can get you a decent fleet that won't even take very long to paint--even though many of the miniatures are still expensive metal. 


But it's a maxim of the business industry that it costs ten times more to attract a new customer than to keep a current one.  Every veteran of Warhammer or Warhammer 40k is going to get burned out eventually, and want to play something else, if only for a while.  If the specialist games exist, the veteran will likely go to those.  Even if the veteran never comes back--they're still playing within the company.  If the specialist games aren't available, then the veteran might just leave the company and play another company's game, like Warmachine.  And then they might like that game better...and never come back.


I find myself in that position right now--after not playing Warhammer 40k for a while, I'm looking at Warhammer a little bit, but it'll be a long time before I can build up a workable army, so my motivation is low.  In such a situation, I'd be interested in checking out some of the other games, for example Warhammer Quest, Man O'War, Mordheim, Necromunda, who knows?  But none of them are readily available. 


The main one that is right now, Battlefleet Gothic, is great, and in fact that's the last game I played.  Many of the people who have read my battle reports have said that they've enjoyed that I've incorporated Battlefleet Gothic games into my 40k mini-campaigns.  With GW support of other games, I could potentially do the same thing with them... (for example, a Mordheim or Man O’ War game incorporated with Warhammer.  How can that not be cool?).  GW would do well to have more cross over campaigns and battle reports.  The intermingling of fans of both games can only serve to increase the popularity of both.

Thoughts on the State of Gaming, Part 1

It's been almost three months since I bought anything GW-related. The reasons are many--but boil down to distractions and discipline, pretty much in that order. As can happen with many hobbies, it's become a situation where I want to get back into it, and even feel a little guilty about not being more into it, but I'm not motivated enough to dive in it yet. Possibly this is related to the fact that I haven't even played a game since early June.



My White Dwarf subscription is nearing expiration, and for a while I was seriously considering not renewing (eventually I think I'll crack).  The battle reports in White Dwarf were the original reason I got into doing up my own battle reports, and were by far the most interesting articles to me. Nowadays, even though their battle reports are little more than showcases for their army of the month, I still find them interesting reads, if only to read about the new armies and what has changed.  Sure, I can probably get more news and battle reports than I know what to do with on the internet, but there's still something about having the magazine in hand that is appealing (much in the same way that holding an actual miniature can in ways be more appealing than just looking at a video game character).


Despite the fact that I haven’t played the games all that much recently, nor have a I painted very diligently recently, I’ve spent plenty of time thinking about it, both the games and the hobby.  What I like about it, what I don’t like, and what I think is missing.  The benefit of being out of the loop is...perspective.


I found an interesting link while surfing recently: It's some generic rants about the state of GW games and the company's marketing practices, and even though they are 5-6 years old, much of it still rings true.


One of the rants in particular talks about the demise of the Specialist Games, which I think is a real tragedy. The short of the story is this: Back in the old days GW had its two flagship games, Warhammer Fantasy Battle and Warhammer 40,000, but also released rules and miniatures for many other games. These other games, while popular with dedicated fanbases, didn't attract quite the same audience as the two main ones. As such, GW has essentially discontinued the specialist games in favor of their "primary" games.


This seems antithetical to the original purpose of Games Workshop. I don't purport to know what GW's original "mission statement" was, if it even had one, but a company that has a name like "Games Workshop" seems to have an implied purpose. Namely, creating games. Creating two games and then sticking with them (albeit with new editions) doesn't fit that title very well. Back in the 90s when there were a dozen games running around, many with their own dedicated miniatures lines, with new games being developed all the time...that when was Games Workshop actually lived up to its name. Even though I'm not interested in playing all of the games available then, I still wish some of them were still around.


One of the major problems I think is maintaining the multiple miniatures lines. With the move to mostly plastic miniatures, I would think that separate miniatures lines would be easier to maintain. I think the market still exists for Epic 40k and Battlefleet Gothic, and probably a smaller market exists on the fantasy side (Warmaster and Man O'War (the latter despite being discontinued)).  The online communities that remain for these games are a testament to this.


The example set by Gorkamorka was a bad move in my opinion.  while the miniatures themselves were cool and usable in 40k, why the switch to different bases? The only reason I can think of to do it is to provide some distance from 40k and emphasize the game’s differences.  But why would you want to do that?  Perhaps the fear was that people would think the game was essentially the same as 40k, and so there was no reason to get it.  But it’s well known that many players buy the various boxed games because they just want the miniatures.  By having a different basing style, it’s an immediate turn off.


The current method of revitalizing The Lord of the Rings line by making The War of the Ring game is a better approach. Yes, The War of the Ring uses additional bases, but you don't have to re-base the existing models you have--you just plop them into the new, large bases. 



Space Hulk is an anomaly--which makes me think it was an experiment to test the waters.  From the beginning GW said it was a one-shot deal-- (although this has generated no end of skepticism by the cynical, who assumed that it was just a marketing ploy, and that it would remain in production indefinitely).  As a one-shot, the fact that most of the miniatures can’t be used in 40k without modification to their bases isn’t as much of a problem.  But still...I’m hoping that Space Hulk was just a “one shot” in that it they won’t support it beyond the initial release, and not that it was the only “old school” game that they ever intend to re-release.

Miniatures Queue Update

Since I've added the Abandon All Hope blog, I've made some changes to the Miniatures Queue, to reflect the addition of fantasy miniatures that I've added to my task list.

I've split up the Miniatures Queue into subdivisions: 40k, Warhammer, LotR, Battlefleet Gothic, and Space Hulk.  I've left out Epic (for now), because that would truly make things scary.

The queue will probably spike several times in the near future as I get more organized and identify more miniatures I want to paint (and possibly make some ill-advised impulse purchases).

I've removed projects such as terrain projects and other scratchbuilt ideas from the queue.  I do have lots of ideas, but they frequently change.  As the queue is supposed to be a measure of mountain of miniatures I'm trying to reduce, scratchbuilt/terrain projects don't really apply here.

So here's the new queue, as of today:

Warhammer 40k:	185
Lord of the Rings:	147
Warhammer:	80
Space Hulk:	38
Battlefleet Gothic:	3
Total:	453

Lord of the Rings Orc Army

Finally, I completed my Mordor Orc Army for The Lord of the Rings. I didn't build this army with any concern for the army list--rather, I just picked a bunch of models I liked, put them together, and came up with a company-sized warband.

The leader of the company is named Shargror, a particularly mean and surprisingly intelligent uruk, hailing from Barad-Dur itself. Several of his subordinate Black Guard followed him from his last command and now form his command group.

A selection of the core of the company, composed of Mordor Orcs and Morannon Orcs.

The Morgul Stalkers are a strange breed even among orcs--these guys provide some scouting and infiltration duties for the company before the battles, and do some assassination-style killing during the fighting.

The Orcs, frankly, don't know what to think about the two Castellans. They are regarded with a mix of respect and trepidation by the orcs--they are fearsome in battle. Shargror himself isn't sure if they were provided to him as extra punch for his company, or if they're spies for his commanders, making sure he doesn't overstep his bounds. Frankly, he doesn't care which. They take his orders, and that's enough.

And finally, the heavy hitters of the army, the three war trolls. These guys are dangerous enough on their own, but when supported by the rest of the company, they're terrifying.

Project Overload

My Miniatures Queue has dipped below the 400 mark, which is a good sign. How long it will stay there, especially now that the new Blood Angels are coming out, is another matter.

The past few weeks have been absolutely insane at work, but (I think), the worst is over, and I can get back to painting miniatures. The problem is, I've got tons of different things to work on.

• Space Marines...including Raven Guard, Brazen Claw, Salamanders, and eventually some Blood Angels.
  
• Orks...lots of 'em! Mainly a few Deff Koptas and some infantry.
  
• Ork Mystery Project
  
• Tau Crisis Suit Conversion
  
• Complete my LotR Orc Army (I'm very close...)
  

I think the key to finishing this is to work on whatever project I feel like, switching between them as the notion strikes me. If instead I just line them all up and try to power through them, I'll just get bogged down and start to lose enthusiasm. By not giving myself a specific deadline and working on whatever miniature interests me at the time will ensure that I'll get it all done eventually, and have fun doing it.

Working on a lot of different things at once...

I haven't had that much time to paint recently (usually on the weekends), but I've managed to finish a few sundry miniatures. To keep things fresh I've been working on a variety of miniatures.

First is my first Salamander ever. I think he came out pretty decently. And after enough bad experiences with trying to get decals on curved shoulder pads, I was resigned to freehanding the chapter symbol, which came out pretty well I think.


Next is a pair of Middle-Earth Rangers.


And then a selection of three marines from three different chapters: Brazen Claw, Salamander, and Raven Guard.


Next is my first Deffkopta. Boy, do those things have a lot of details! Anyway, after painting this one up, I've decided that my Deffkopta Skwadron will be known as the "Tusky Airboyz".


And finally, some Middle-Earth Orc Black Guard. They'll form part of the command group for my Orc Army, which is rapidly nearing completion.

Warhammer Townscape

Twenty-one years ago, back in 1988, GW released "Warhammer Townscape", a collection of thirty-nine card buildings. They were pretty simple, but of decent quality, especially for the day. Back then I assembled some of the simpler buildings, as I didn't want to tackle the more complicated ones. Some of my creations did not survive the years, but many of them did.
Just recently (as in, last week), I decided to tackle the rest of the buildings and construct them. They're just card buildings, so I didn't treat them with the utmost loving care, but assembled them using mostly Scotch tape and some white glue for reinforcement.

In the various boxed editions of Warhammer Fantasy Battle, GW also released some more card buildings, some on stronger stock, which I've also assembled.

Now I've amassed quite a little town. But it's not limited to Warhammer Fantasy--these can be used in Lord of the Rings games as well as Warhammer 40k, representing a town on a low-tech Imperial world.

In fact, that's where you're going to see them first, in a battle report that will be appearing at some point in the future...

Lots of Painting

Thus far I've been spending the majority of my vacation painting. Unfortunately, as yet none of it has been 40k related, and only a little of it has been miniature painting!

First I painted my bathroom.

Then the kitchen.

Then the living room.

And finally I got to working on some LotR Orcs I've had for a while and started working on a while ago. I had been batch painting them, and as such most of them were pretty close to completion. So I was able to complete the lot of them in one day. 49 of them, in fact. These guys have been hanging over my head for a while now, so I'm glad to finally finish them!

Mini Photo Studio

In the past I took photos of my miniatures by placing them on a large piece of white posterboard, shining a desk lamp on them in an attempt to get some light from a different angle, and then taking flash photos, and trying to make them look good using Photoshop. It got the job done, but was far from ideal...

No more! For Christmas my wife got me a "Mini Photo Studio" from thinkgeek.com. I'd seen it online a while back and thought "hey, that's neat", but I never thought about actually buying it. Now I have it!

Here are my first test photos. I think they came out pretty well compared to my old method!

Back in Action

After about a month of sickness and other things competing for my attention, I finally was able to do some painting last night, completing three Lotr Orcs. The picture doesn't really do them justice, but that's ok. Hopefully I'll have some more time in the near future to keep up with the painting!

One more thing I thought I would mention is that one thing I started about two years ago is painting the completion date of my minatures on the bottom of their bases. That way I can just look at the base and see how old the miniature is, and also compare old ones to newer ones to see if my painting skills have improved (or gotten worse!)

Busy busy busy...

Sorry about the lack of updates over the past few weeks--a bunch of things have been competing for my attention, for example...

The little one has been keeping my hands full:
I also had to put up with trillions upon trillions of these things, which kept me out of commission for about a week:

Still and all, I've managed to work on a few things, including this Shas'ui for my Ethereal's Bodyguard unit:

I've also been working on some LotR miniatures, but I don't have any pictures of those right yet.

I've also begun migrating my battle reports from being hosted on comcast directly into the blog. So far I've only done about a dozen or so, and it's been relatively easy since they are simple--just some text and pictures. Once I get up to battle report 33, however, things are going to get significantly more complicated...right now I'm not sure how I'm going to handle it.

More updates once I have something worthy of reporting...

Fantasy Miniatures

Just as a slight diversion from the 40k stuff, here's a selection of the some of the fantasy miniatures I've painted, from Warhammer and the Lord of the Rings.