Lots of resin scenic pieces.

And there are quite a few, all 28mm scale pieces. Scroll down to see them all. The first one is from Bad Squiddo, the priest is just for scale);

The rest are all from Fenris Games. Once again, figures are just for scale;

The photo above features that almost-famous archaeologist Prof. Idaho Smith, who is also in the next picture, wondering why that strange altar appears to be glowing green in the centre.

I love this next one. It is a triangular obelisk covered in inscriptions in three unknown languages, like a kind of Eldritch Horror Rosetta Stone. It is probably best not to try and read any of the texts out loud.

This next one includes a bit of scenic scratch-building to put the strange stone head into context;

So, I am really pleased with all of these. I've had them for quite a while and I wanted to get them painted up. I've still got some more stuff to paint with MORE TENTACLES!

The backdrops are, as usual from the excellent series of books by Jon Hodgson at Handiwork Games.

Hopefully, these will get some use in pulp games and for various eldritch horror purposes.

A Big Dragon

 This is from Dungeons and Lasers. I bought the kit ages ago from Annie at Bad Squiddo.

It's taken me a long time to paint this because I didn't want to mess it up. The kit is called Durkar the Sovereign Serpent. It isn't a difficult kit to assemble but you do have to take care that all the parts fit together. I ended up using some liquid Green Stuff to cover a couple of the joints. It's wingspan is 23cm and it stands 12cm tall.

I undercoated it initially in Army Painter Brainmatter Beige and then did another spray from behind/above in AP Greenskin. After that, it was all about softening the rather raw green primer with Army Painter Warpaints Army Green and then washes of Citadel Mortarion Grime and Agrax Earthshade, followed by a lot of drybrushing with progressively lighter shades of green and a couple of stone and bone shades on the underside of the wings and body. The mouth was done with Army Painter Barbarian Flesh and a wash of diluted red paint.

The base has a moulded dungeon floor with piles of coins and treasure. I glued it onto a larger MDF base for added stability and built up the edge with aquarium crushed shell ballast and lots of PVA glue. Then I painted it to bring out the treasure etc, washed it in Peat Brown drawing ink and added flock and Gamer's Grass tufts.

I'm pretty happy with the way the dragon has turned out. A bit of a scary project at first, but after a lot of thinking and planning, it has become a pretty good piece. The backdrop is from one of the excellent Jon Hodgson Handiwork Games books.

Not sure what I'll use it for, though.

A warrior Queen and her comitatus

There are six figures in all. First of all, the Queen herself and her trusted councillor, a wizard.

Next, the four members of her comitatus. First, two trusted bodyguards;

and finally, her Champion and her Herald;

These are all 28mm metal Oathmark Humans from North Star. I really like these metal leaders and champions. They have a solid and businesslike feel to them and are nice to paint. There are several more sets of these metal figures,  mostly on foot but also some mounted ones, all of them holding lots of possibilities for use in many settings, including D&D and Frostgrave. 

These ones are very heavily-armoured, with mail and long leather jerkins with sewn-on metal plates which I've chosen to paint in bronze rather than iron, because I think it gives them a rather "barbarian kingdom" feel to them. They definitely look like serious business rather than flowers of chivalry, which I think suits a lot of small scale fantasy games.
 

Some more fantasy adventurers

 These have all been made from the North Star Frostgrave Soldiers II box;

Above are three figures who could be a Fighter, A Wizard and a Ranger, although I did gave a D&D Sorcerer in mind when I assembled the figure with the spear and lantern.

Below are a Rogue/Thief, a Cleric or maybe another Fighter  and a Fighter or Barbarian.

Of course, these could be used for all manner of different rulesets, so they are quite versatile as to their roles. They could even fit into a Frostgrave warband quite happily.

The backdrop is a, by now standard John Hodgson one.

I am reasonably happy with these, but I think that the Cleric is possibly the one I like least. I'm not sure if I'll keep them. I might put them up for sale at the club's annual Tabletop Sale in May.

Another addition to my Roman auxilia

 I've had this guy around for a while but I only finished him yesterday.

He is a mounted vexillarius based upon the mounted centurion figure from the Victrix Roman generals set with a head and animal skin cloak from the Early Imperial  Auxilia set's command sprue and an army from the Early Imperial cavalry set. The SPQR vexilla transfer is from one of the LBMS Late Roman transfer sets. The backdrop is another Jon Hodgson one.

I think that he's come out OK and I'll probably use him in my planned Principate Roman auxiliary army for Midgard and other things too, maybe Infamy, Infamy if people I know start playing those rules again.

Back to the 18th century and a return to my imagi-nations

It is quite a long time since I painted any troops for Syldavia and Borduria, but I've been painting Grenadiers. First, two groups of grenadiers for the Freikorps Schtroumpf;

A couple of groups of grenadiers had been in my plans for a very long time, a decade in fact, but I'd not done anything about them until now. I'd always planned for them to have the white and blue Schtroumpf uniform colours, but with red facings. The figures are from Essex Miniatures and are actually Prussian Von Schony grenadiers. I've added in an officer, NCO and Drummer. The drummer in the front group is there for colour, but is treated as a man with a musket for Sharp Practice purposes.

Next are two groups of Syldavian grenadiers, once again from Essex Miniatures' SYW Austrian range;

As I already have one group of 8 grenadiers from the Istow Regiment, I decided to paint two groups from other regiments, so I could have a Combined Grenadier formation for Sharp Practice. The front group  with green facings is from the Lippzshutt regiment and the group behind with black facings is from the Motörkopf regiment. Again, I have added a couple of officers, a drummer, an NCO and an ensign with a standard, showing the famous Black Pelican of Syldavia.

These chaps will be getting their tabletop debuts at Winter Wonderlard VI at BIG in Bristol on SAturday 7th February.

Bob Weir - his Long Strange Trip is over.

This isn't a gaming post. It is to commemorate Bob Weir, founder member of the Grateful Dead, who has died, aged 78.

The Grateful Dead have been a constant fixture in my life for as long as I've been listening to music as a teenager. Now, all the original band members, apart from drummer Bill Kreutzmann have left us. All we have left is the remarkable body of music that they created over three decades of recording and touring.

Bobby was theoretically the rhythm guitarist and second main singer, but he was a very unorthodox rhythm player. He didn't just play the chords and keep things together. He went off and did all sorts of stuff behind the melody, riffing and weaving in and around what Phil and Jerry were doing. You couldn't imagine the Dead with no Bobby.

Apart from his work with the Dead, Bob made three solo records, notably the 1972 release, Ace, which was a Grateful Dead album in all but name. It contained music that would become regular pieces of the live GD set for the rest of the band's existence.

Here is the band in 1970, in a photo taken by Herb Greene for Billboard.

Ron McKernan, a.k.a. Pigpen (second left) was the first to go, in 1973, followed by Jerry Garcia (front) in 1995 and Phil Lesh (far right) in 2024. Various keyboards players have passed away between 1970 and today, They were Keith Godchaux, Brent Mydland and Vince Welnick, along with Dead songwriters Robert Hunter and John Perry Barlow. plus vocalist Donna Godchaux, who died in November last year. Now Bobby (centre behind Jerry) is gone. The only people left alive in that picture are the Rhythm Devils Bill Kreutzmann (far left) and Mickey Hart (second right), the second drummer who joined the band in 1967. 

It is hard to explain what this actually means to me. The music has been so important in my life that it is something that is a part of me, but the Dead also represented something outside the music. They were a huge symbol of a way of being and doing that influenced millions of people, including me. The fact that they existed made the world a better place. That world seems to be disappearing before our eyes, and not just because we don't have Bob Weir and the rest of them any more. "The Music Never Stopped", as written by Bob Weir and John Perry Barlow for the Blues For Allah album kind of sums things up. The version in the link about is a live one, though.

So, Bob Weir (16/10/1947-10/01/2026) RIP.