Swords of the Noldor!

Turgon, son of Fingolfin and High King of the Noldor, said to his brother in-law Eol, “I will not debate with you Dark Elf. By the swords of the Noldor alone are your sunless woods defended. Your freedom to wander there wild you owe to my kin and but for them long since you would have laboured in thraldom in the pits of Angband. And here I am King and whether you will it or will it not my doom is law. This choice is given to you: abide here or to die here and so also for your son.”

My Elven host took the field last week as allies of Cyborg's Elves. We went to throw the Swamp Horde of Bad Daddy and and the Kid's Mercenaries back into the fetid swamp where they belong. The battle was as even as we've ever seen. All of us had units destroyed or driven from the field, but many of them were miraculously refielded through powerful magics or brilliant leadership. I must say that my Elven hero, Mithelpiffelel (that is the effeminate name the He-who-must-not-be-named uses for nancy Elves... and Mithelpiffelel is a good name because the hero wears white tights) did kill two Turtle heroes and a Salamander shaman twice... Yes, Bad Daddy resurrected him.

The most important development is that the guys want to create a Facebook page to display their armies. I'm a big fan of anonymity regarding this hobby of mine, to wit, I call myself Boaz. True, the Elven knights on winged tigers deserve a pic or two... I admit, flying tigers and white pants (especially after Labor Day!) are not representative of true Noldor. But as Cyborg likes to point out, there aren't really any true minis that do exactly replicate Tolkien's concept of tall, graceful Elves in lofty helms... The minis out there have too many feathers and too much overall poofiness. (I might have just invented a word.)

Sincerely, Boaz

p.s. Mythological Romans are my next project.

I came. I saw. I painted.

I am painting Elves, but I have a few other future ideas in mind. I envision a fantasy Roman army based upon the wolf myth and priests looking for portents. It would feature Republican infantry with lots velites in wolf skins. I can also see allied Gallic or Numidian cavalry... and Romano-British cav riding giant wolves. The Copplestone 28mm huskies might work out well for this purpose. The army would also have Roman priests, priestesses, and Sybil.

The other army I am contemplating is a Khalasar. It's is the name of a Dothraki horde in ASOIAF. HBO does a good job of representing the Dothraki. At most, their warriors wear leather jerkins while many of them ride bare chested into battle. One slight problem to painting a Khalasar is that no 15mm manufacturer makes appropriate figs. Asiatic horse archers, such as... Huns, Mongols, Alans, Parthians, Arabs, Khurasanians, Tuaregs, and Turks are produced by a plethora of companies. I've also seen Sioux, Dakota, Apache, and Comanche mounted archers. But all of these, except for the occasional Plains Indian, have shirts, helmets, and various pieces of armor. My best bet might be to find some break waist riders and replace the upper bodies with unarmored Gauls or Britons.

By the way, The Kid suggested I change the name of the blog to Paint Is Thicker Than Water. Mayhaps, I might use the title of this post as the new name... Veni. Vidi. Picti.

I must figure out how to do photos. This blog needs them.... immediately, if not sooner.

Sincerely, Boaz

Edit: So the button to publish this post does not seem to be working... I'll try it again...

Dragnet.

Ladies and gentlemen, the post you are about to read is true. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Sooooooo..... I have finished multiple units of Elves and some characters over the last few days... All figs are from Demonworld and Mighty Armies lines. When I only have the MA minis on the table they don't look half bad. But when they are set down next to Demonworld... Oh, boy. Multiple units of Spearmen from Chariot and archers from AD&D Battlesytem are also primed and ready for paint. And I'm waiting for Ral Partha Europe to send me more Demonworld Elves. The reason I'm painting Elves, after only one game with my Kong army, is that our next home cooked Fantasy Piquet battle will be before the year's end. And my partner for the upcoming disaster... uh, battle, Cyborg, will be bringing his noble and puissant elves. Cyborg, does not call them Vanyar, but that is who they are. If you are reading this and you don't know who the Vanyar are, then turn in your nerd card immediately if not sooner. In Professor Tolkien's stories, the Vanyar are the High Elves. They are rarely mentioned even in The Silmarillion. I do not have time to discuss the authorship and the canoniciy (I sure hope that's a word) of The Silmarillion. Anyway, this is Cyborg's favorite army. He painted it decades ago. He's a better painter than me. So we'll field Elves against whichever armies Bad Daddy and The Kid bring. Bad Daddy has everything... I mean almost every army you can think of in 15mm fantasy. Frogs, Lizards, Hindus, Undead, Orcs, Goblins, Centaurs, Fairies, Dwarves, Elves, Demons, Teknowmancers (sic), Ogres, Zulus, Da Vinci, Medievals, and Romans, plus a smattering of every conceivable miscellaneous troop type ever made. Bad Daddy may coordinate with The Kid to give us a themed opponent... and then again maybe not. The Kid will either bring fairies or Dwarves. But he might pull out the Dragonkings or the Atlanteans. But he won't bring the Ratmen because they are undergoing an overhaul.

For the record, I should state that Cyborg, Bad Daddy, The Kid, Azael, and He-who-must-not-be-named are not actually the names that their parents gave them. Mayhaps I should also note that Bad Daddy and The Kid are not related... but paint is thicker than water.

I really hope this post does not appear as one giant paragraph as the last one.

Namarie, Boaz

Hey, Hey! We're the Monkees!

Well... It's been a while. You know how enthusiasm waxes and wanes. I kept waiting to figure out how to set the parameters of photos... but I failed. Perhaps I'll give the task to my niece. She's twelve and should not have any problems.

On a positive note, I have managed to get in five or six games of my friends home rules which are based off of the Piquet system. The latest of which was just last Saturday. All of us painted many new units for the battle... And of course they performed miserably. My newest troops represent a Kong/Lost Jungle army. They consist of six units of Zulu Spearmen (including a unit led by Belit and Conan), two units of Numidian Javelinmen, three units of Pygmy Skirmishers, a unit of Lions, an Ape unit with Tarzan, a unit of wolves featuring Mowgli, and finally three monstrous Gorillas... Kong, Son of Kong, and Joe.

Sincerely, Boaz

Edit: I wonder why the text blended into one big paragraph... How irritating!

Chinese take second! Elves finish next to last...

He-who-must-not-be-named and I fought a battle a few days ago. He brought his Night Elves up against Jack Burton's friends. The mighty Imperial Army features cannons, rocket batteries, imperial guards on giant pandas, and then the ubiquitous rabble.... Those aberrations of humanity, those purple skinned demons had trained lizards, dragonlings, and sorcerers galore. They are truly evil to align themselves with dragons. Had the Emperor's advisors told him of these accursed lizard lovers, then he'd have invited his allies from the land of the Rising Sun and their grav board riding Samurai to deal with all those pesky fliers. I mean to get rid of the traitorous eunuchs at court and provide more learned scholars to assist His Imperial Majesty in the future. Then we can regain our lost lands...

Once again, we used the Fantasy Cards system. It works. It's quick. It keeps my anxiety level high. We're still figuring out certain card combinations and unit abilities in situations... but it seems that fliers might be underpriced and overpowered. One Chinese Wind Spirit was no match for the multiple Elven Dragonriders... they attacked at will and kept my artillery continually shaken. Yes, that's a part of the game, but next time I'll take three fliers, then he'll take four, then I'll take five... and we'll have an escalating fantasy Cold War all over again. In fact, if I take over half of my force in fliers, then it'll be almost impossible for he-who-may-never-be-named to win! I'm sure we can break this system if we work hard enough, but so far it's been fun.

One small gripe... I downloaded the game system for free and I bought the cards separately and downloaded them. Now to protect their cards from being stoeln in the free download of the rules, the cards are not mentioned nor are their terms defined anywhere in the basic rules... nor is there a list of definitions that comes with the cards. I've found all the answers that I need, but sometimes I've had to read through the rules, read the faq, the reference sheet, and then read through the cards themselves to resolve an issue... and that's slightly tedious. For example, units that are shaken or out of action cannot have actions nor situations played upon them, but what about confused units? During our game, we had to stop and read the rules, the faq, the reference sheet, and finally the card with the confusion situation on it in order to figure out that an action can be played upon a confused unit... but a situation can not.

True Confessions

If nerdcrush is not a word in the gaming lexicon, then I'm officially creating it.

nerdcrush: noun: an infatuation by a gamer upon the quality of work by another gamer.

The object of my nerdcrush is Spacejacker. His blog, Tiny Solitary Soldiers, is dedicated towards 15mm tabletop gaming... mostly sci-fi. I just love his painting ability... especially since I've started photographing my own 15's.

As soon as I figure out how to figure out the parameters of the pics allowed on this blog and then how to crop my pics, I'll post them here. I really want to show them to my fellow posters over on the GRRM forum of The Chronicles Network. If you've read my entry, Pardon me, what was I saying?, then you already know of my existing nerdcrush upon George Martin.

[For Pete's sake! This guy is now linking his own stuff. What an ego!]

Boaz

Azeal... HotDAMN!!!

Well, I started the draft for the last post and walked away from the computer for seven hours to eat, watch The Tudors, paint Blood Bowl figs, and to talk to He-who-will-not-post. So I just typed a few words and clicked "Publish Post". Imagine my surprise upon seeing Azeal's post. HotDAMN!!!

Okay, so my battle with Azeal was a lot of fun. My mythological Greeks versus Azeal's Chaos Demons. Azeal commanded the middle hill and we both ended up putting the bulk of our troops on the opposite sides of the table from where each of us were sitting... I was staring straight into the eyes of my brave Achaeans. Each of us quickly dealt with the lone stragglers separated from our armies. Azeal's large Demon and Giant Spider frightened my Centaurs off the field and then proceeded to chase my Elephants across the field. Suffice it to say, that the Demons were butchering the Greeks until the Spider and the Demon found themselves overextended and in range of my bolt thrower. Both the Spider and the Demon were forced off the table due to sheer firepower. Technically the Greeks won, but only one of the Demons' five units off the field were actually defeated in combat... the others were forced or frightened off. On the flip side, of the Greeks' five units off the board, only one was frightened away... the others were slaughtered upon the field.

A few more victories like that and I'll win Worst General of the Year.

Sincerely, Boaz