New Year New...?

2023 ended not with a bang, but a whimper. But over the last week of the old year and the first week or so of the new year, I did get a little painting time in. 

I did some more painting and basing of "unaligned chaos daemons." I've been thinking about that idea since I received the Drachenfels figure a few years ago. It/he has long since been painted, and I even (finally) finished the novel! Lately my mind has turned back to the idea of chaos as chaotic, like in old Moorcock novels & early fantasy gaming. Not a bunch of organized, uniform creatures.

This will be a slow, ongoing project. I'll just keep adding any odd figures that seem like they belong as I continue to work on other projects.

Since I started this entry a week or so ago, I've added some more. Most are actually for a potential D&D campaign, but I feel they will fit the chaos vibe. The undead gnoll things I just got because I thought they looked cool. :)

The ochre jelly is homemade from some wire and melted hot glue, similar to some I did previously with different paint. The flameskull is just a plastic skull with some crudely sculpted flames. I liked the floating skull thing I did the same with a Bones cow skull painted blue. The rest are soft plastic D&D figurses

I also finally painted a pair of figures to represent our current two dogs. I had one but had been searching for the other for over a year before painting. On the left is Moji-Tater, our Corgi-Sheltie mix. He's the youngest. In the center is Cookie, a shelter rescue dog who we think may be a mix of Boxer & Border Collie. On the right is Sasha aka "Muffin Butt", another shelter dog who passed away almost 10 years ago. She was a German Shepherd-Husky mix. Cookie was the tough one to find, but since I was recently looking at D&D figures I found a pack of three dogs, one was a pointer with a pretty close body & head shape, but I had to cut off the ears and re-sculpt them to fit the real thing.

I've also painted a few sci-fi figures of mixed quality & complexity. The first is an Eru-Kin and jagual figure from Knightmare Games. I will be using Eru-Kin for K'Erin in Five Parsecs From Home. You can almost rearrange the the letters to shift between teh two names. Maybe the apostrophe is for the "u"? This one will be a member of my crew. 

I also finished the space goblins/Malig from Alternative Army's Ion Age range, which will serve as pirates in Five Parsecs. I painted a test figure earlier in 2023, but never got any further until December. One more faction down, and another month of "Five Months From Painted Factions" under my belt!

Lastly, my slacker painting from this week. First is Orbus, a sentient sphere of what appears to be some sort of plasma like matter. No one knows for sure. Orbus is literally a pearlescent bead on a stick. I didn't even paint it. Just drill a hole, make a base, and glue it on the stick. Next to that is the second of the two D&D nothics that came in the pack. One is for D&D, the other I thought would make a good sci-fi alien or mutant. Super quick paint job, mostly just abase coat, wash, then a few details. I almost want a whole squad of them now.

Squad Challenge, Deadcember Pt. 1, and OWAC5 Intro

After the mid-year slack, I'm back. It seems.

 

 

For as long as I've been participating in the Old World Army Challenge (since the second one) I have also participated in a smaller challenge at the end of the year. I'm not sure of the origin. A warm-up for the January start of the OWAC? Something to keep our skills honed in the "off season"? A chance to fill in a small gap from the challenge army? Paint a small group that isn't large enough to fit the full army challenge? Not sure. I suppose I could just ask.

At any rate, the Squad Challenge is a challenge to get a squad/regiment/team of 10 figures painted in two months. Last year I painted dwarfs. I don't even remember if I completed the challenge. The year before it was half-orcs since it coincided with Orctober. This year I painted a group of sci-fi "supporting characters" in hope of further building my pool of figures for some Five Parsecs and/or other gaming. (Hopefully soon.)

These are my ten challenge figures, plus two wurms that got added along the way.

Four miscellaneous characters, three bots, two spaven, and on Fimm-In-Spaaaaace. And the space wurms.

Additionally, I painted two super simple/fast groups of antagonists. Spiders From Mars (cheap and easy until I get some actual alien "bugs") and Astro-Zombies. The former want to break up the band, while the latter want to exterminate the whole human race. ;)

A good bit of progress after a few slow months!

 

Overlapping the Squad Challenge is Deadcember -- The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. The Astro-Zombies sort of fit that theme. 

 

On to the deadicated Deadcember painting, however, I painted these wraiths that I had intended to work on last December. They're Reaper Bones figures with most of the bendy-weapons replaced.

 

I also just painted my first test figure for a potential sidequest project I've been thinking about -- Althammer skirmishes in the New World. If I can muster the patience to assemble the remaining five skeletons from Warlord, I will paint those and the big bad guy (figure from Lucid Eye.)

Looking forward to 2022, I will once again be participating in the Old World Army Challenge! For OWAV5 I will be painting.... more undead! My Introduction Post is up on the site, with more details and photos.

Spoiler: I painted the Overlord Offering for Iannick. :)