Project Fimir-Support

As any fan of the old Fimir models know, they are moderately scarce and at times command ridiculously expensive prices.  It can be financially daunting if your trying to assemble a unit let alone a army!  There are a few alternative models out there but not many and not as closed in design to the originals as I would like.  One option is to do something similar to Mr Saturday’s Fimir Project and create some models through kit basing and sculpting/producing my own heads.  I would really like to take that route but let’s be honest, I’ve had these figures for well over 6-8 years so if I wait to do that this army will never get done.  Another option is some allies to bulk out the army.  One of my thoughts was that a unit of lizardmen would be a great fit.  The Fimir are bog/swamp dwellers so what better choice than some fellow swamp denizens: alligators!

Enter the great Sebeki by Crocodile Games from their Aegyptus game system.

I picked up a few of these over the last couple of years.  Chris Fitzpatrick’s sculpts are fantastic and I’ve really liked these since I first laid eyes on them.  This turns out to be a great way to utilize them without having to get into a new system.  They do have a bit more Egyptian feel/iconography than I would like so I will have to decide if can remove most of that and remodel them or just live with it.  These are not as ready for paint as I originally thought.  The one fellow needs his weapon glued, a few need a little “green stuffing” around seams and joints, and I need to evaluate the basing.

The 25mm’s seem a bit small and as you can see from the size comparison the line troops are almost as big as the Fimir which are on 40mm’s.

The Beloved of Sobek figure is actually very large and is definitely appropriate for a 40mm.  They also didn’t rank up well at all on the smaller bases.  I’m not planning on painting these until 2^nd quarter or later so I have some time to get the base issues figured out. The Fimir and their allies should see paint in the near future!

Project Fimir-Trooper and Color Test

This is the last figure of the Fimir unit that I've been posting about recently.  This fellow has the distinction of being the only non-converted figure in the group.  And for good reason, he is the only figure that isn’t a knock off re-cast.  As I mentioned in my starting post this whole project sprung out of my frustration with an ebay purchase that turned out to be re-cast figures.  I had originally purchased the very same head/body/tail combination of warlord with axe and mace with a Head 1 and Tail 1 back in the day when they were still in production.  

So in honor of his authenticity I decided to leave him unmodified.  This is the original pose that all the other models are based off of.  I did an initial color test on this lad to see if I liked a blue skinned look and to be honest I don’t know that I care for it. 

Now truth be told I haven’t given it any washes or additional work in years.  That might improve it to my eye, but I'm still not sure I'll go this route. 

I’m going to do some more research on line and specifically study the wonderful WD spread that has painted models in it and see what I have in the paint rack to match.

 I’m thinking, as bog dwellers that they probably would have evolved with earth tones like brown or tan or light green.  I welcome any input! 

More Kicking Butt!

I received a weighty package in the mail the other day.  It came from España and I realized my long and arduous wait was over, my miniatures from Diego’s Space Raiders 2 Kickstarter had arrived!  

The wait was arduous only because I kept seeing all these posts from other supporters who had received their deliveries and I was turning green with envy.  My order was pretty large which meant I had to wait for all the figures to be produced before it could ship.  It is quite a mountain of lead!

I got a little bit of everything in this motley crew of space riffraff.  I picked up some of the wonderful Picsean/Fishmen-in-Space figures along with the Space Minotaurs, Space Orks, Zoat like figures, and Space Fimir!

I’m looking forward to switching gears and getting into some Sci-Fi themed miniatures by  painting up some mercenaries and war bands.  My only concern is that most of them lack a slota-base tab.  I don't have much experience in pin/basing miniatures so I'll be developing some new skills.  Good news is that it opens up some new options for more detailed bases.  I'll be doing a more in depth review of the figures once I get them ready to paint. 

Kicking Butt!

Unfortunately for my wallet I stumbled upon Kickstarter back in early 2016.  It has a been a great source of "new old" mins and a real boon for my miniature collection.  It has also motivated me and kicked my painting back into gear.  While I’ve been somewhat idle blogging wise over the last month I haven’t just been sitting around!  Here are some WIP's of the mins from my first foray into Kickstarter from Diehard Miniatures’ first campaign.  

I saw some posts of Tim and company’s miniatures on a couple of different sites and simply had to have some.  I have always been a fan of WHFB Slann and the background of a star empire fallen into more savage times.  I picked up a couple of their frogs-in-space Eru-Kin.

My goal was to paint them up in a NASA white and orange space suit color scheme with a Yellow-Banded Poison Dart Frog pattern.

I don’t know that I stuck to the plan very well and I feel like the color palette got a bit larger than I wanted.  I'm also concerned that if I do the black banding on the exposed skin I'll loose some of the detail.  At this point they will only have a yellow skin tone.

I tried to pull it back and paint over some areas instead of stripping and repainting them.  I’m okay with their progress.

I’m struggling with getting the white to look the way I want.  I’m going to try and do some black lining and see how it turns out.  These guys are far from done but I hope to wrap them up well before the figures from the Diehard Kickstarter 2 arrive!

Name Change!

Happy New Year!  Last blog of 2016 set up some goals for 2017, the last of which was to re-name the blog.  Full disclosure, that was a cheap softball goal given I had already done most of the work!  My wonderful wife often accuses me of having adult ADD so I chalk my entry into the blogosphere to this!  I got inspired by several of the Oldhammer blogs and jumped in with both feet.  I’m sure that we all what to have a witty, impressive blog title and I got busy brainstorming names but many great ones were already claimed: Realm of Chaos 80’s, Leadplague, Oldhammer in Toronto (if I was in the Great White North), Eldritch Epistles (not even sure what that means but Steve already laid claim to it!), etc…. I quickly devolved into writers block and came up with the wonderfully lackluster and underwhelming Miniature Assault.  Best I could come up with at the moment.  After a year I still hadn’t come up with much until I came across an article with a great quote and Wham there it was, the name I had been looking for.

Who was it that provided the new title?  None other than one of the greatest Roman military leaders and politicians, Julius Caesar.  What better person to grab a quote from.  Especially one that has a gaming link.  According to historians Suetonius and Frances Titchener, the Roman patrician pronouncement as he crossed the River Rubicon back into Roman territory "Alea iacta est" ("The die is cast") in reference to his future as he sought to become dictator.  Caesar was said to have borrowed the phrase from Meander, his favourite Greek writer of comedy; the phrase appears in “Ἀρρηφόρος” (Arrephoros,) (or possibly “The Flute-Girl”).  Regardless of where it came from I thought it would be a great blogg title.  So now it is so!  Well that is if I can figure out how to get the name changed on Blogger!  1 down 51 posts to go!