Adventurers from Reaper Bones

 This evening I finished off some figures. I am pleased with them. They are from my big box of Reaper Bones miniatures that I picked up in the 2012 and 2013 Kickstarters. I have barely even made a dent in them to be honest.

This is a figure that I let my five year old have a go at painting. He was largely green, and his base looked like the sky with clouds on it. In fact, I feel like you can still see some flecks of blue on the base. I painted over his greenishness with various khakis, leather colours and browns. I attempted point of light highlights on his arm, but don't think it really worked out.

I took inspiration from Diablo III for this monk. My first character on that game, well the first one I finished the game with was a kick-ass monk. I mean, this guy looks nothing like him, but I like to think they maybe know each other. The one thing I have forgotten to do is to highlight the blade with a blue. I wanted it to have a mystical air to it, like Sting from Lord of the Rings.

I am incredibly happy with my hireling. He has been getting splashes of paint added now and then for a while now, but a couple of nights ago I just went for it and filled in all of the gaps. I have, however forgotten to paint the flames in his lantern. 

While painting these, I also put flesh colour on a few other figures, and painted green flesh onto four large orcs. I intend to get those finished and play Song of Blades and Heroes again, although I can't find any of my terrain for it.

Song of Blades and Heroes - first game ever

So I have owned these rules for ages and never played them. Maybe I should have gotten some 6mm fantasy miniatures and I could have been playing this loads, although I would probably have bought Dungeon Scum for this...and might as yet buy it. All of these miniatures are from the very first Reaper Bones kickstarter that I backed in 2012 and received in 2013. Seven years in the making this game then...

Anyway: the two opposing forces.

Our adventurers. Out to investigate an old ruin on the outskirts. Rumours of strange goings on brought these three together.

The strange goings on. Someone, or something has been reanimating ancient warriors.

 The ruin in the middle. Our adventurers are advancing.

So each time you activate you can choose to roll against your figure's quality to make up to three actions. Here Barb the Barbarian passed two so can make two actions. Beware! If you fail two of those rolls then initiative passes to the enemy. Behold my measuring stick that is three medium lengths long.

Darren the Dwarf fails all three. He needed 3+. Initiative passes over to the skeletons and my archer and Darren both get to do nothing.

Simon Skeleton advances up twice, even though he could have taken three actions. Oops.

 All the skeletons manage to advance up.

With all the skeletons activated, initiative passes over to the adventurers and all manage to advance. They all roll for three actions and pass either all three or at least two.

Skeleton archers take up flanking positions. Sam advances up to engage Barb. Simon fails to do anything.

Barb and Sam start swinging at each other. Sam rolls 2, adds his combat score of 2 getting 4. Barb rolls 3 and adds combat score of 3 (6). He wins the combat. His total does not double Sam, so Sam is not dead. BUT because the number on the D6 is odd, Sam is forced back a base length.

Barb uses an activation to close the gap and then attacks again. More than doubling Sam's score. Sam is dead. Again? Or was he really alive again? Either way, Sam is gone.

Sally looses a few arrows at Barb but misses wildly. Sam's "range" is Medium and Barb is 3x Medium away so Sally is shooting at -4. 

Same goes for Sarah. She at least manages to hit with a draw, but it does nothing, so may as well be a miss. Maybe it is?

Simon engages Darren in melee, but used all actions to get there. Darren tries to activate and fails utterly. Initiative back to the skeletons.

Simon swings at Darren. Darren gets the better of the exchange, knocking Simon down (even number on D6).

 Sarah manages to convince Barb to recoil back with some pretty close arrows.

Sally looses some arrows at Darren, but does nothing.

Andrea Archer gets herself into an utterly disappointing, pointless archery duel with Sarah. They both waste pretty much the rest of the battle fighting each other. Ranged attacks get -2 against skeletons, as they have the Undead ability. Why did she even bother coming?

Darren and Simon have at it. 

Simon gets beaten back and decides to withdraw a little to force Darren to advance through Sally's hail of arrows.

Sarah getting the better of the boring archery exchange right now.

Barb runs over to Simon and Sally in order to end things.

Darren runs over also and attempts to attack Sally. However, she manages to knock him down with her longbow. 

Sally has a blade...hidden in her... pocket? She manages to slip it between the folds of Darren's armour, wounding him badly. He is out of the fight.

I mean, I made up the wounded part, just in case these characters have legs and I want to do anything else with them. Sally doubled Darren's score so he is out of game. She got a +2 against him as well because he is a fallen enemy and she is in melee combat not ranged.

 Barb full on beserks Simon and Sally, re-killing them both. He rolled three successful actions. Kill, move, kill. It was beautiful.

Between the previous photo and this one there have been about six rounds of failed activations because I kept rolling three each. However Barb and Andrea advance on Sarah and send her back to the grave. 

It was looking dicey when Darren went down, and when it seemed like Andrea was dead weight with that -2 against her enemies. However, in melee her combat score is equal to her archery score so she is fine in melee. Although that seems odd to me. I might need to house rule it.

Fun game though. It was quick. Annoying about archery vs skeletons. But fun. I can see myself playing this more. My 5 year old showed interest in playing with my miniatures so I might teach her it, or something simpler.

Some painted Reaper Bones Miniatures

So tonight I will be playing a game of Song of Blades and Heroes as I have managed to finish off my dwarf. Along with the dwarf I have managed to paint up a bunch of miniatures that have been hanging around in various boxes under my bed for a few years now. I now have a few with which to make some warbands. Who knows...I might even have a look at that Frostgrave game that everyone loved a few years back.

Project 1: Turn my £2.50 aquarium decoration into something slightly better.

Oh okay. I just had to glue a bunch of clump foliage in various places. Job done.

 For scale with a 28mm figure.

This is my Salute 2013 figure. So what, seven years ago? I painted him and used Armypainter Quickshade on him. He has been sat in a craft box now for at least five years needing nothing but a finished base and maybe some highlights. Job done now. 

This dwarf had been pretty much base coated, then sat around for years slowly having the paint chip off. Done now. He was tough. I used a red wash on his red bits and then Agrax Earthshade on the rest of him. Highlights of silver for the metal parts, light brown on his beard and the bags on his back, then my desert yellow colour which is my generic highlight colour.

Also I have had these grass tufts sitting around for years but never used them until now. I felt they looked wrong on 20mm and obviously I wasn't going to waste them on 6mm.

The Sorceress. I used a green wash on her robe, and then Agragarx Earthshade for the non green parts. Then highlights - a light green and a light brown. I really like how she has turned out. Probably my favourite.

My Rogue - Female. Or Demon Hunter if I want to play Diablo III with miniatures. I found her quite tough with many colours on her before washing. Again a green wash on the cloak and then a general Agrathigax Earthshade over the rest. Green highlights, then a general desert yellow very light highlight over the rest of her.

The crusader. She has a few base coats and some steel. For her I just went with Agritix Earthshade all over for a wash, then silver highlights, and the general desert yellow. I need to think more about my highlights.

 Another long haired archer - I think meant to be an elf, but I can't see the ears. Tricky but worth it. Although the hood keeps chipping, which frustrates me no end.

I am not super happy with the highlights, I mean they make it look dirty I guess, but still. I might have another bash at this one.

 Another shot of my Salute figure. I attended Salute 2014 but missed out on the bag of goodies.

 These are the skeletons who will be fighting my adventurers tonight.

 Here are the adventurers.

Group shot.

Song of Blades and Heroes measuring sticks

I own Flying Lead and Songs of Blades and Heroes. Flying Lead I have played twice, the latter i have played zero times. I have had the idea to create measuring sticks for some time now but never got round to it. Tonight I finally finished them off. The smaller set is for smaller scales, so I will likely use them for 6mm. The larger set is for my 28mm fantasy miniatures and 20mm WW2, which I won't realistically use for some time.

Over the Easter break I had big plans on many different hobby fronts. Starcraft 2 ladder games to get promoted to Platinum league, which went well for the first few days, but I haven't played much in the past week. Play Northgard, which I haven't done. I started a new XCOM campaign, which I sort of regret doing, because it took over Starcraft time. My wife and I also watched the first season of Knightfall, which to be honest was pretty lame. I did not enjoy it much. Only in the past two evenings have I done any miniature hobbying: making the measuring sticks and putting together some motorway sections. Once those are finished I will post them, probably this weekend.