We Built This City - Test Paint

Just a quick update today.

I've done the test paint on one of the terrain tiles, take a look:

 I'm really happy with the way it turned out, I was a little worried at first as when undercoating the ghost of the circular pieces that are on the reverse of the tile came through the paint, but after I started the highlight coats that went away.

The yellow lines are more vibrant IRL, but other than that the colours in the picture are pretty much what you see.  Although I'm trying to keep it as simple a paint job as possible I decided I wanted the tiles to look a little "lived in".  The yellow lines were achieved with masking tape, masking fluid and an airbrush and came out really well I think.  The dirt on the sides of the roads was achieved using weathering powders (my first attempt at using them), it took me a little longer that I wanted to get the effect I was looking for, but now I know how to do it the rest of the tiles should be a breeze.

One final pic today, proving I was right about the Batman minis fitting the scale of the tiles better, Harley and Mr J were kind enough to help me test the theory:

I still have to varnish it, but it's practically done, just another 23 to go...

I hope you like it, C&C always welcome.

'Til next time, take care

J

We Built This City - Prelude pt. 2 [Secret Weapons Miniatures Tablescape Tiles]

A little later than intended, sorry.

On Wednesday 21st January a rather large parcel was delivered and as mentioned in my last blog post I thought I'd do a light review/first thoughts post.

So, here's how it looks once out of the shipping box:

28mm figure for size comparison...there's one there I promise

In the words of Brad Pitt: "What's in the box?!"

What it looks like when you first open the box.

Each of the 24 tiles are in individual plastic bags and the smaller bag to the left of the tiles contains the connectors for holding tiles together whilst gaming.

Each tile is one foot square (12 inches/30 cm) and certainly seem durable.

Here's a closer look at a couple of the straight sections:

the 2 types of straight.

With a 28mm mini for scale

two 1:43 scale vehicles for scale

 As far as connecting the tile together it couldn't be easier

note the "loops" in the corners

the two types of connector

simply a question of pushing the connectors into place

 The connectors seem to hold the tiles well enough to withstand the usual gaming knocks, but don't hold it so strongly that it's impossible to remove them.

So, my thoughts.  

First the cons:

1 - Let's just talk about the honking great elephant in the room straight away, these suckers weren't cheap.

I ordered them during SWM's pre-christmas sale, but they were still $224.99 (£149.32), then you add the shipping charges. SWM pay the first $25 but that still left $64.08 (£42.60) and finally once they were in the UK I had to pay customs charges of £46.11 before they could be delivered.  Which gives us a grand total of £238.03 (still only a little more expensive than GWs basic Sector Imperialis set though and for my purposes a lot more practical).

So, not a purchase to make if they're only going to see action once in a blue moon.  But as I mentioned in my first post of the year I have at least 5 games I intend to play that I will use them for, and quite frankly the cost just makes me want to get my money's worth out of them.

2 - The road texture on some of the tiles (the 3 straights that have manholes on them, left hand tile in the comparison pic above, and the 2 individual straights) is a quite a bit lighter than the rest of the road sections.

3 - Scale wise the tiles feel aimed more toward the "heroic" side of the miniatures industry.  By that I mean everything on them feels a little larger than life and the Hasslefree mini I used for scale seems a little dwarfed by it all, whereas I think the Batman Miniatures Game minis will fit quite nicely.  Part of the issue is the pavement area, I think the massive slabs give an illusion of dwarfing a normal 28mm mini that if they'd gone with a paving stones texture wouldn't have been there, also the drop from the top of the pavement to the road is about 5mm and some of the ironworks are proud of the surface by a good 2mm (a blatant health & safety issue if I ever saw one).

Now don't get me wrong, this isn't a massive problem for me, once there's more terrain and mini's on the board it won't be as noticeable and if the paving slabs bothered me that much an hour with a scriber and metal ruler would be all it would take to sort it out. Like I said this is just my initial reaction to seeing the tiles in the flesh for the first time.

Now the Pros:

1 - As I said, the tiles feel like they will put up with a lot of wear & tear and the connectors are a nice addition that remind me a little of the old Worldworks games Terrainlinx pieces which gives me quite a lot of confidence in them.

2 - I could never build tiles that look this good, believe me I've tied.  I'm unlikely to use them as a full 6'x4' board and the fact that I can build 2 or 3 smaller boards and have them all be different will make playing/demoing games like Pulp City and Pulp Alley at the club easier as I'll be able to have more games running at a time on decent looking terrain which IMO always helps.

3 - I can see a lot of potential layouts for them, some only coming to me after I saw them all in "the flesh" as it were.  The non-road tiles in particular have sparked a number of ideas that I think would make interesting gaming areas and that's something that really makes me like these tiles a lot.

So, overall I really like them, I may have a few gripes, but they're minor and nothing a little tinkering won't fix if it really bugs me.  I'm also hoping that the extra space that is in the box means they'll do some expansions down the road, or at least release smaller sets of tiles, as there are a few ideas I've got that may need more of a certain type.

Since arriving I've managed to undercoat all the tiles and I'm currently in the process of test painting one of the straights to figure out how I want them to look, I'm hoping to have something to show you on that front in a few days.

So, until then, take care.

J

We Built This City - Prelude

So, with the imminent arrival of my terrain tiles from Secret Weapons miniatures I thought I'd make a progress blog about getting it painted up and making scenery to go with it, I'll do a first impressions post when the tiles actually get here (hopefully tomorrow) but for now here's some of the bits I started putting together last year.

Road signs are made from brass rod, styrene sheet and the printouts from Worldworks Games, the streetlamps are from Fenris games.  The Billboard is the same as the road signs except the billboard itself is made using foamed PVC.  The first two buildings are from Worldworks' original Streets of Mayhem range resized to a 6" footprint (originally it was 7") and pasted onto a foamcore shell, the final building is from WWG's Swiftscenics range and didn't need any resizing.

My inspiration for some of the buildings is the Saints Row games (3 & 4 in particular) so I'll be doing some more stores from Steelport before I'm finished, I also have a fair few Stoelzel's Structures buildings I'm planning to put together as well so there's plenty more to come.

Until next time, take care.

J

Coming Soon

First up, I'd like to welcome my newest follower Dark Templar, who's blog has rekindled my desire to get my Malifaux mini's painted up in the near future and actually get a game in.

Next up, I've had a bit of time off from mini's for a little while after the 7TV day last week to recover a little, mainly because the week before the day I'd been printing, cutting and gluing Worldworks terrain in case we needed an extra table, today was the first time I actually put all the stuff together and these are the results:


The full 4'x4' layout.

Warehouse.

Garage & train station.

Police station.

Inside the warehouse.

Police Station, ground floor.

Police Station, 1st floor.

The warehouse and police station still need internal props, and I want to add some external bits to the police station as well and there are a few other places that need props as well on the board, but I finally have a modern 4'x4' playing area that I've wanted for a while now and I'm really pleased with the results so far.

I've been doing a little painting this weekend, though nothing has been completed just yet I have got some work done on Dr Red, for Pulp City:



And made a start on the first 7 zombies from Last Night on Earth:




7TV hasn't completely left my head yet either, Rich J is running a Dr. Who 7TV episode on Tuesday that I'm looking forward to participating in and I'm putting together ideas for my 3 shows that I mentioned last week.

So first out of the 7TV archives is:


Cast:

(Goodies)
Lance Hardwood as Agent Larry Drebin
Kylie Dodds as Lady Tara Rigg
&
Montague Chambers as Professor Hans Sturgeon

(Baddies)
Orson Willis as Tolivar Badman
Madeline Kane as Lucrecia
Henry Nails as Karl Masterson

Agents of A.U.N.T.I.E. follows the daring exploits of former New York detective "Filthy" Larry Derbin, booted out of the force on trumped up charges of illegal dealings whilst investigating international millionaire businessman Tolivar Badman.

Drebin is approached by the shadowy Mr. E, head of A.U.N.T.I.E. (Allied United Nations Tactical Intelligence Experts), and recruited into their ranks to battle Badman and his sinister group, Badman's Anarchistic Soldiers of Tyranny Against Right and Decency (B.A.S.T.A.R.D.) and stop the man from bringing the world into chaos.

To help him in his efforts Drebin is teamed with tough talking, gun toting English socialite Lady Tara Rigg and Swiss inventor Professor Hans Sturgeon and together they are the first line of defense against B.A.S.T.A.R.D.s evil schemes.


The A.U.N.T.I.E. cast awaiting hair, makeup and wardrobe.

It will probably be a little while yet before any of the casts are done, but the idea is fun (basically the mutant offspring of The Avengers, Man From UNCLE and Dempsey & Makepeace...if you can imagine that)

As you can see I've got the heroes sorted and I want to add more Hasslefree figures to back them up in games (looking at the human faction adventures with SMGs at the moment), but as HF is shut whilst they get themselves sorted out I'll leave t till they re-open before I pick any up.

Not sure what I want to do about the villains cast yet, but Artizan Designs may provide me with the figures I need, I'll see.

Well, that's all for now, I will hopefully have more for you next week, I'll see how my week progresses.

So until then, take care everyone.

J