Hello all,

The slashers are one of two types of medium monsters and actually very difficult to kill. We've had three of these turn up and they are very hard opponents. The idea behind them - a sort of mix between locusts, beetles and something entirely weird - is also cool.


Unfortunately, the models are sort of flat and without details. Perhaps ahd I had an air brush these would be fun but in my case I had more or less given up getting nice results and had settled for quick results. Hence the lack of detail. But, hey, they look great from a distance :-).


And Josh really likes his new pets - just look at him parading them around :-)




All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
Another set of Hungry Dead from Shadows of Brimstone.
These ladies apparently used be saloon girls and as such they are a pretty fun, and somewhat different, idea.



Apart from their faces these are actually quite fun and an opportunity to add a splash of colour to the monster line-up. Unfortuately their faces are lacking, I was quite confused as to whether to paint them as skeletons or zombies, but considering their hair is still firmly attached I choose the zombie style. But the mouth and eyes seems more skeleton-like than zombie.


Their dresses were actually quite fun to paint - despite weird details such as the under-dress disappearing in places - and had I been more positive at the time I might have gone to town on their clothes. As it was, having spent far too long trying to figure out what to do with their faces, I went for a few simple white stripes. I may return and clean these up a bit and add a few more, but for now they will work fine.


The red dress in particular could use a few highlights/shades, but I really like how the purple turned out. I've decided to paint the show girl in the same tones, just to add an in-game grim reminder what will happen to that hero should she fail her mission :-).

All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
One of the most numerous enemies in the boardgame Shadows of Brimstone are the Hungry Dead. They come in three different types; an old miner, a dancing girl, and a generic walking dead. They are also the worst minis of the lot! Crappy proportions, bad details and weird faces.

These are the Old Miner type - not bad from a distance, with the old pickaxe being a nice touch.


Up close and personal they are just terrible.
Needless to say, these were painted very quickly.


But they will work and just look how good Josh is at getting his trained zombies to dance for us!

All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
Another day, another set of monsters - this time it is the nasty little Void Spiders:

Josh discovers he is intensely arachnofobic

My son insist on calling them "face-huggers" and they do resemble those very much. Arachnid, no eyes but a huge, gaping maw underneath.


All twelve are exactly the same, so I tried to add a little variety thourgh which parts were painted pink/light green and by having two sets - one coloured as the Tentacles and the Goliath, and one as the Hell Bats.


The greatest detail of these are the mouth, and as this is hidden by the stance of the critter, it would have been nice to have one poised on the hind legs or similar. In hindsight I should have converted a few to just this, but that is something for next month, next year, or the next life :-).


All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
Another monster painted for Shadows of Brimstone - and this time it is a real monster!
Towering over Josh is his new best friend, a Goliath:


It is a beast to photograph as well - couldn't get the entire beast focused nor in the frame.


As with the other monsters from Shadows of Brimstone there are very few details on this beast, apart from the face. I choose a deep purple to hide this fact and to tie it in with the Tentacles.


Also, note how the two parts that make up the head are put together so that there is a very annoying gap in the central eye. Why would anyone do this?


Despite these facts, the Goliath looks imposing and from a certain distance quite good :-).

All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
So, on with the pictures! While I may have been a bit harsh in my comments on the previously shown models from Shadows of Brimstone, these tentacles are actually quite good. But then again, how could they not be? They are just tentacles.
Anyways, they were fun to paint and took less time than it has taken to write this and upload the pictures :-).

Josh: So, how many tickles does it take to make an octopus laugh? Ten-tickles!

 They turned ot to be somewhat larger than I had expected, but the detail is ok. Not super-razor-sharp but sufficient. They could see action in quite a lot of different games.

I told my friend that an Octopus has Tentacles. He said "I thought they only had eight"

One thing that does somewhat annoy me is the rocks at their base. These rocks are quite badly sculpted - few details and looks more like foam than rocks. Also why no small sand or similar? I'll add some once I get around tot basing these tentacles, but it does seem like the sculptor had forgotten about the base and then whipped something together in a few minutes of frentic sculpting just before deadline.

I feel sorry for Paul the psychic octopus. All that hard work and now he's being made to retire. It must be like a big kick in the tentacles.

So, more painted stuff for Brimstone coming up, and sorry for Josh's bad jokes.

All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
Another of the basic monster type groups for Shadows of Brimstone. This time it is the "Slashers". Medium strength and nasty in numbers.


The models are actually alright - the huge, gaping maw in the middle is quite nice and they look nasty. But again, very soft details. The teeth and claws are more or less a guess as to where they begin and where they end. And the tentacles on the back are so ill-fitting that if you wanted to remove all traces of the problem you would have to use a pound of Green Stuff. But, hey, once the game is underway noone will be looking at such small details :-).


A note on the bases, or lack thereof; I'll be doing these in large batches after all the minis are done. At the moment I am inclined to just do dark sand - but it would be nice to find a ton of old cowboy stuff to put on these (broken wheels, hats, etc.). Perhaps I should raid the kids' playboxes :-).


All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
So, considering the mob of monsters that I got from the Shadows of Brimstone Kickstarter, and the relatively poor level of detail on the smaller monsters, I came tot he conclusion that the best thing to do would be to get the bulk of them painted as soon as possible.
This meant that in a flurry of activity I got all the Night Terrors, Tentacles, Slashers and the Goliath painted yesterday. They were all painted in true "speed-paint" style; block of colours, layers of wash and drybrush and then a few details picked out afterwards. I think it worked al-right.
The first group of monsters are the "large" sized Night Terrors:


To show their size we have one of my favourite monster-hunters from Zombicide. So, Josh, how do you like these blue monsters? Josh: "I want my mommyyyyyyyyy!"
Guess Josh doesn't like monsters faster than he is :-).
The faces of these monsters are actually okay, but that is alsi more or less all the details that you get on these. Lots of mold lines, and ill-fitting backs is just a freebie...


 Cookie-Monsters!?!


 So, with only half the mold lines removed, and a quick paint-job they are ready for the first game. A gaggle (?) of Tentacles will follow shortly.


All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
So the game itself (as unboxed here) appears to be top quality - I even tried the first mission in a quick little solo-adventure and the rules seems (for the most part) to beeasily understandable and it was quite fun.
How about the minis?
Well my initial impression was very good. The character minis are very well-detailed and looks like they will be great fun to paint.

Half the characters - Cowboy, Saloon Girl, Bandidos, and a Marshall.

So too the largest monsters:

The Harbringer - looks absolutely brilliant. Here without the wings - never going to paint it with those on it!

 But after several hours and a large portion of super glue, I have come to the conclusion that the average monster is somewhat lacking in detail. Both as in they are a bit flat but also in that the detail that has been sculpted on to them is often blurred by the manufacturing process.

A Bandit caught between a couple of Hellbats and a Slasher

I've painted a few handfuls already and these have confirmed my 'fears' - these are minis made for drybrushing and to get any type of hyper-detail onto them you will need to be a brillliant freehand-painter. at least much better than I am.


A few shots of the horde may reveal the issue, although it is difficult to see unless you have the minis up close.

These Hungry Dead (zombies) are brilliant - I especially like the old miner still waving his pick axe

Another shot of the Harbringer - quite scary...

On the right are some of the numerous Tentacles

The other large monster - a Goliath - great face, but apart from this and the tentacles, there are no details whatsoever.

Anyways, they are 'just' minis for a boardgame so I am not really complaining. I'll give them a quick paint job and be ready for the first game with the majority of the monsters, and show them on this blog as soon as possible. Hopefully :-).
All the best,
Kasper

Hello all,
Good thing I am almost done with the Warband for Warhammer and the zombies for Zombicide, because Shadows of Brimstone finally arrived.


In case you don't know, Shadows of Brimstone was a Flying Frog Kickstarted boardgame. Kind of a mixture of Heroquest, Deadlands, and Call of Cthulhu. What is not to like? And it came with a plethora of miniatures and was launched back when I had money, I naturally went along and supported the kickstarter. And a great kickstarter - nice freebies and delivered on time (more or less). Well done, FF!
So a quick unboxing of the contents will follow here, while I'll look closer at the minis tomorrow.

Now that is a Big Box!
 Warning: Contains Monsters!


In addition to the two basic boxes, there was also this kickstarter extra character. Apparently most of the "special" miniatures will be arriving in the next wave, December?


And a signed print. Have no idea what to do with this, but hey, might be worth a billion in ten years (or not :-)).


So the first box looks like this with its guts spilled:

Very nice quality products all the way - very nice cutouts, characters, etc. For some reason there is also a soundtrack. To set the mood I guess? Looking forward to listening to it.


A ton of cards and die.
 An example of the characters and monster cards. Again, very nice quality and should survive quite a few gaming sessions.

The rulebook is beautiful - tons of illustrations and looks like it is well structured.


 The game is played on these boards (think Space Hulk or Advanced Heroquest) - all of which are of great quality (I feel like I am repeating myself here :-)).



 Just a quick look at the minis - not as many as I had thought (but the next shipment will be more or less only minis) but the sculpts are of higher quality than feared - crisp, hard details and very few 'mold'-lines.