I've been at work this morning on the first of the kits I received on Saturday from Japan. I've started with one of the smallest and by contrast, the largest to give you an idea of the scope for my fleet project. Here you see one of two escort carriers and then the behemoth which will be both my fleet carrier and flagship, with a dozen squadrons of fighters and devastating defensive batteries. Both kits are Bandai 'Space Battleship Yamato 2199' models, although I am a lover of generic 70s and 80s starships as depicted by Chris Foss in his artwork. These will do just nicely. More pics, soon. TTFN

In a weekend which I thought was pretty good already -  having been in the front row of the 'Fish' gig last night and shook hands with an artist who was a great influence during my youth as front man of prog rockers 'Marillion' (and who also heckled me from the stage) - I was pleasantly surprised to be able to purchase more 80s Chaos Dwarves for a reasonable 3-figure sum an hour ago... Admittedly I already have 5 of the bazooka teams but two more won't hurt will they? Anyway, here's pics of my purchases: TTFN

A knock is heard... At the door stands a postman with a box from Japan. 'Great!' I think... 'Darren has found a cheap way to come home.'  But in point of fact it is a package of very nice models from Darren Ashmore who, is a Professor over in the Land Of The Rising Sun and whom I should be seeing for the first time in a few years. I have known Darren for over 3 decades now and  as youths we gamed and gamed and gamed as often as we could along with a raucous and motley band of similarly fanatical youths. I met Darren in what could have been dodgy circumstances had I not just been released from 3 weeks of house arrest after I split with a schoolyard girlfriend. She had given me an ultimatum of 'It's me or Runequest...' I had done the maths and reckoned that I could get another girlfriend - being a handsome if quirky youth - but that I had invested some serious money in my Runequest stuff. A no-brainer, frankly. She spoke to my Mum, and what did for...

WHEW... After a head down couple of weeks, I have finally finished for the year, 5 days earlier than expected. Better still, I have managed to get a full crew for Malifaux finished, thanks to the kindness of one of my clients. I'm really pleased with the results as I have worked on a white base coat which is so rare for me to be worth mention. Here's a quick pic of Ophelia's Gremlin Crew. I will try to take more pics over the Xmas holidays, but I confess that having taken delivery of 5 x Chaos Dwarf Bazookas, 1 x Swivel Gun and a Mortar this week, I may be head down on those over the festive season. TTFN

I was discussing my choice of Chaos Dwarves for a retro army recently and it was (correctly) pointed out that there are no Chaos Dwarf army lists in the earlier Warhammer rule sets. Now, this would mean that I could have a problem as I play 1st, 2nd and 3rd edition rules, all of which are quite different. 3rd ed sees the introduction of the Chaos Dwarves proper, with the weird and wonderful bazookas, swivel guns and mortars, so there is no problem there. The later editions give the CD army a neo-Babylonian makeover which I really, really do not like, and thus the later additions of even more weirdness just don't need to given a second thought. So, back to the earlier editions and the fact that no specific lists exist. When one, actually reads the flavour text for the Dwarven army list in the Forces Of Fantasy expansion  to the 1st ed, it notes that whilst Dwarves are generally considered to be of a neutral alignment, there are in the more out of the way mountainous areas of...

I think that I finally have my mojo back... As you'll have read previously, I had, thanks to my dreadful year involving Sheffield Wargames Society and the opinion of one member that I was the most destructive thing to happen to them in 40 years (quite an achievement when compared to other things I could think of). Metaphorically, my WRG rules have been torn asunder and my average dice ground to dust. Champagne corks have popped across the city and cheers raised as the Great Satan of the gaming table has been cast down. Oh the feel of power as they calculated  the die modifiers for that one... Not surprisingly, I lost my drive for the historical guff and in fact for most of the hobby as a whole. So I am very surprised that I have re-found my love of the older fantasy games again and a new passion for the modern board games. The other week I picked up a job lot of old Dwarves from the 80s and as the price was £1.07 per piece I reckoned that I could cherry pick a few bits that w...