2 x 2 foot Terrain Boards

I made some terrain boards for 15mm Song of Blades and Heroes. The first was made on a 2 foot x 2 foot 1/4 inch mdf board covered with 5mm foamcore. I used the foamcore in order to give me a height offset for my river banks and to make the cobblestone road match the height of the surrounding land. The foamcore was cut into 4 sections with a river running between half the board and a road made from the Hirst Arts cobblestone mold running from the other direction. The grass is from a vinyl model RR grass mat. I made several modular terrain pieces to add to the basic board and ended up with enough for 2 boards. There's a bridge from an old Christmas Village set, a couple of hills, a couple of forest pieces, a field made from a boot cleaner, and an orchard from some model RR apple trees, some fences made from cork coasters, rocks from model RR molds, trees stumps from Zuzzy terrain, a ruin made from Hirst Art molds, a small tower made from Hirst Arts, some WorldWorks Games components; the "Deadly Encounters Portal" and a graveyard made from the Wildwood Grove set in 15mm with some model RR gravestones. I also included a few of the classic green pot scrubber hedges for authenticity :). The second 2x2 foot set was made really quickly with four 12 inch square vinyl floor tiles covered with more of the vinyl model RR grass mats cut down to size. Just sprayed the tiles with 3M spray adhesive and applied the grass mat pieces. You can see some of the Eureka 18mm Fantasy minis on the board near the bridge, Dwarves vs. Orcs.

I love being able to play a complete game on a 2x2 foot board. Takes up a lot less space than the 4 x 6 foot boards I'm used to. Here's some more pics.






Here's some pics of the quickie boards.








I was really pleased with how well the boards came out, especially since thye represent very little time or money investment. Thanks for looking.

Luckyjoe

15mm Orc Warband for SBH

Here's some pics of my 300 point Orc Warband for Song of Blades and Heroes. The Orcs are Eureka 18mm minis from their Orc and Man-Orc lines. I really like these Eureka minis, great detail and very characterful sculpts. The Ogre is from Rebel minis but I think it is made by Splintered Light minis. I really liked the Ogre. He was fun to paint and I'm very pleased with how he came out. The decals on the shields of the Orcs are old GW Dark Elf shield decals.









In the pipeline is a Human Warband from Rebel Minis, a Wood Elf Warband from Eureka Minis, a Lizardman Warband from Khurasan and a few others. Thanks for looking.

Luckyjoe

15mm Hirst Arts Dungeon for Ganesha Games Song of Gold and Darkness

Got a few pics up of a little dungeon made from Hirst Arts molds. Molds used were the Flagstone floor mold #260 and the Fieldstone wall mold #70, some tiles from the Gothic Floor Tiles Mold #205. I'm using the dungeon for solo games of Song of Gold and Darkness, but I'm thinking it will be good for games of Fear and Faith, as well as D&D. You can see some Eureka minis (the blue and white Elves in the hallway) and some paper One Monk minis for monsters in the dungeons.





I like the way the blue floor in one of the rooms came out but I need to do some more work on the yellow room. The black base board the dungeon is resting upon has been painted with magnetic paint, but I haven't needed to add magnets to the bottom of the dungeon pieces yet, the pieces have soft foam bottoms and and are heavy enough that they don't slide on the baseboard. I do have some neodynium magnets to add if I need them.

High Elf Leader

Finally got around to painting up my High Elf Warband Leader. He's an 18mm Eureka Mini "Elf Lord of the Lofty Spire". For Song of Blades and Heroes he is a combat monster at 100 points with a Quality of 2 and Combat 5. I did a solo mission with Song of Gold and Darkness (Ganesha Games' dungeoncrawl rules) wherein his warband had to rescue him from captors in order to add him to the roster. Once I got him in the warband, he started tearing stuff up.

Mark's Dice Tower

My son Mark made his first dice tower for us to use for our tabletop wargaming. He used some Hirst Arts molds and hydrostone. It's based on mdf. I think it came out pretty well. Mark is actually an experienced Hirst Arts veteran, even though this is only his second build. His first build was a large ruined castle he built for his 5th grade art project from school. I showed him how to cast the bricks and plan his build, taught him how to use washes and drybrushing. He did all the work, though. His castle won best in show at a 12 school k through 8th grade meet. We were very proud of him, and now he's done us proud again. :)

Tomorrow we'll be playing some more Song of Blades and Heroes and we'll get a chance to use the dice tower. Wish us luck.

15mm Song of Blades and Heroes

I have been doing some work on some 15mm Warbands for SBH. I searched for good 15mm fantasy minis and so far have gone with Rebel Minis, Khurasan minis, Eureka 18mm Minis and Splintered Light minis. These all seem to size up pretty well with each other and there are some excellent sculpts. So far I've painted the Eureka Elves (Elves of the Lofty Spire), Eureka 18mm Dwarves, an Undead Warband with a mixture of Rebel minis Cultists and Skeletons, and Splintered Light minis Ghouls (the Ghouls were already painted a while back for use as Zombies in 15mm All Things Zombie gaming). I have pics of those further down the page. I have a growing 15mm Lead Mountain with some more excellent Eureka 18mm Orcs and Man-orcs (partially painted). And a whole bunch of Khurasan and Rebel Minis.

Khurasan: the newly released Khurasan Orcs (these are just beautiful and I can't wait to paint them), Khurasan Lizardmen (they're a little smaller than I expected) Khurasan Wights (very nice Skeletons), Khurasan Vampires (bat-form vamp is outstanding), Khurasan Reaper (my Liche for my Undead) and a pack of "The Accursed Getinmahbeli" female Cannibals, (I'm thinking female human barbarians).

Rebel Minis: Barbarian Warriors and Archers from their Mighty Armies line to use in Human Warbands, and a Wolf Clan Goblin Army box on it's way.

And there is a butt-load more I want to add :): Splintered Light Kobolds, Ratmen and Hyena men, especially.

I plan on making a series of posts covering each warband. Here's a few pics of what I have so far:
Eureka 18mm Dwarves: I love these sculpts















Undead Warband Rebel mini cultist with reb robe, 2 Rebel mini Skeletons, and 5 Splintered Light Minis Ghouls




























Eureka 18mm Elf Warband

And so a Minotaur Warband for SBH was born

We discovered we didn't have a minotaur yesterday when we were playing Song of Blades and Heroes. We had to use a proxy with an old GW Chaos warrior wearing a horned helmet. My son Bob thought it would be cool to convert a mini to a minotaur. I remembered I had some ERTL Longhorn cattle so I thought I'd see what I could come up with.









The longhorn's head is a little too big but we don't mind. I cut off the longhorn's head and transplanted it to the Chaos warrior. A little contour putty around the join. Change the weapon to match the SBH Roster description. I cut off the chain of the flail from the shaft and pinned a piece of small wooden dowel to the shaft of the flail to create a maul. Spray with black primer. Voila - minotaur.












How about a Minotaur Warband? Plenty of longhorns and old chaos warriors laying around.




Next step: Paint the minotaurs.

Song of Blades and Heroes Game Weekend

We've lately been playing Song of Blades and Heroes. I have to divide my week between my apartment in the city where I work and at home with the family for Friday through Sunday. So I play Song of Blades and Heroes solo in 15mm at the apartment and with the kids in 28mm when I'm home. This was a really good weekend with multiple games of Song of Blades and Heroes. Last weekend we had sorted out all of our 28mm minis for use in SBH, and I had painted a 3' x 3' Zuzzy Terrain mat. This weekend we got to use them. I even had time to work on a Hirst Arts fieldstone dungeon for 15mm Song of Gold and Darkness solo dungeon gaming, but more on that later.

Players: David, Mark, Stephen, Robert and Dad. (4 of my seven sons :) One reason I go by "Luckyjoe") All warbands were 300 points.

Game 1: Stephen's Dwarves vs. Dad's High Elves. This was a short but fun game. Stephen beat me, down to 2 elves I conceded.

Game 2: Stephen's mixed Human, Elf, Dwarf warband vs. Dad's Undead Warband. Another short fun game which gave Stephen 2 wins in a row.

Game 3: Mark's Orcs vs. David's Undead. Close game that took almost an hour. Finally ended in a win for Mark.

Game 4: Stephen's mixed warband with an Air Elemental and Assassin vs. my Human WB. My first win. I had a lot of lucky rolls and and poor Stephen had a lot of poor rolls. Quick but fun.

Game 5: Bob's first game. His Human WB vs, Stephen's Mixed elf, dwarf and human WB. Win for Bob.

Game 6: 4 way game with Bob's Evil Humans and David's Undead against Mark's Orcs and Stephen's Evil Dwarves. A decisive win for Mark and Stephen, but it was a long game that was pretty close for most of the time.

Game 7: David's Dwarves vs. Mark's Orcs. This was a very close game that came down to 1 Orc against 1 dwarf. The dwarves came out on top in the end.

All in all, it was great fun. The boys just picked right up on this game and were having great fun. Sorry for the sparse nature of the reports. A lot was going on :). I'll try to put together a nice Battle report newt weekend.

Pics from Mark & David's last game.

Blue Moon 15mm Pirate Brigantine

Hi, folks. This weekend I got my Blue Moon 15mm Pirate Brigantine. It had taken a while because my order had been misplaced. I finally sent them an e-mail this Thursday after waiting about 3 weeks to check my order status. Normally my Blue Moon orders come pretty fast so I was afraid the order was lost in the mail. I was told they'd get the order in the mail that day. I didn't expect to get it the next day, (Friday). I think that was great service. Okay, they made a mistke and the order was misplaced, but then they overnighted it to me. That was outstanding and a very pleasant surprise. I'd have been content to wait for regular mail. Thanks, Blue Moon. I'm a very happy customer. :)

Now about the ship. It's beautifully detailed and is an excellent bargain. You get a beutifully detailed, sturdy, resin ship, plus 10 cannon and carriages, along with 4 half cannon barrels (dummy cannons) for ports in the solid part of the hull. You also get dowels for the masts and yards and 6 metal accessories for the masts, a railing for the poop deck, and a nice ship's wheel. All this for only $25.00. You can pay almost that much for just the metal accessories that come with the ship.

The quality of the cating is very good. There were several small air bubbles, but nothing that can't fixed with putty.

The size of the ship is very appropriate for 15mm scale and my Blue Moon Pirate line minis fit right in with it. Actual ship dimensions are:
Length: 31.5 cm long (about 12 1/2 inches) A good 2 inches of the lenght is a bowsprit with a nice female figurehead.
Width: 63mm wide (about 2 1/2 inches wide)
Height: 52mm tall at the highest point of the hull at the stern. (About 2 inches tall).

Here's some pics:
There are 26 15mm minis onboard in this pic. I think this ship could easily hold 40 minis.