Lockdown, A Change Of Figures & Hobgoblins
It's an odd world we live in at present. Or is it?
I've noticed that there are many things which remind me strongly of the 70s and 80s, and as you may imagine, I've embraced that feeling and run with it.
As I have joked, I spent a lot of my teenage years on lockdown, due to my Mum grounding me for some ludicrous infractions. Home late for tea, would get me a 7 day stretch, whilst being in at 21:10 instead of 21:00 would get me a 14 stretch. If I argued I would get a 28 days at Her Majesty's Displeasure.
I've covered this at length in my book together with the mechanisms I developed for getting 'sprung'.
My compadre, Roger and I have really got our mojo on for the ECW again, as have my wife and indeed my younger brother. This was something we did a lot of in the 80s when I was not doing time or hanging around the figure bar at Games Workshop.
We've been real martinets about it too. You see, we used to just base stuff for WRG, then we sort of went to WRG meets element basing, and now that we've got back together, we've sort of thrown hard and fast basing sizes out of the window, in favour of scenic and narrative bases. It's about the aesthetic.
But, of course that has had to have an agreed formula that we feel looks right. Base width has been set at 50mm for a shot element with two elements forming an 8 man sleeve of shot. If you go to 12 men, then two 75mm wide bases works well. Depth has been sort of agreed at 50mm which allows some nice space for positioning.Pike blocks are based exactly as that, and we are using 100x100 bases with the entire block on it. We are big boys and girls with 40 years of gaming experience... We can handle it!
Cavalry was the pain in the ass for me. In the end 100 wide by 80 deep seems to work well with 3 or 4 figures. 3 bases make up a unit, and of course you can use 4 bases at 75mm wide and still cover the same frontage. Simple right? It took us a couple of weeks of sometimes quite waspish emails to agree that.
Field artillery has to be on big fucking bases and it's going nowhere once you place it, according to roger. I couldn't agree more.
I bought £1100 worth of Bicorne ECW, but to be honest, I found the castings to look as if they'd been very quickly spun with metal not quite hot enough. They were a little rounded and certainly not worth the price tag. So, my wife bought the lot at a bargain price and now has her Royalists sorted.
I have bought Warlord plastics for the horse, and Warlord metals for the Dragoons, Cuirassier and Foot. The artillery and baggage is a mix of Perry and Foundry (£48 for three guns & crew? REALLY?) and I couldn't resist a flock of sheep, which a cheeky wag known to me as Roger, quipped 'Is the only unit I have that will stand up to a Royalist cavalry charge!' - Cheeky sod.
I've also been really getting into old school post apocalyptic gaming and ordered the original Metamorphosis Alpha as well as the entire range for the new retro-inspired Mutant Crawl Classics. Alas, I can't read the rules because I could not get a set outside the U.S with the lockdown supply chains cut. Then I found a UK book store via Alibris who had a copy and apparently they shipped it the same day... But they LIED and it was ordered from the U.S which, I could have fucking done myself, so I'll not be ordering from GreatBookPrices because in my opinion they are a bunch of tossers who don't do what it says on the tin...
In other news, my latest Kickstarter for old school styled Hobgoblins is going stellar. With 14 days left on the campaign, its over 200% funded.
Take a look here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/satanicpanic/old-school-multi-part-28mm-hobgoblins-by-satanic-panic?ref=user_menu
I also just received a new sculpt from Martin Buck, who has totally outdone himself with a reimagining of a classic Hobgoblin, with mutations.
Here's the pics that Martin sent me:
According to Martin (who I think, I may have broken) it's the spikiest figure he's ever sculpted. I can honestly say that I just don't have the superlatives to hand which can really convey how pleased I am with this sculpt. He is perfectly styled and Martin has gone to amazing lengths to produce a stunningly detailed model which simply oozes old school atmosphere and class.
You can preorder Tokygurini here:
http://satanicpanic.co.uk/shop/4593110927/pre--order-tokygurini-the-throttler---mutated-hobgoblin-war-chief-of-the-black-legion/11449140
Well, I better go and do a days work,
TTFN
I've noticed that there are many things which remind me strongly of the 70s and 80s, and as you may imagine, I've embraced that feeling and run with it.
As I have joked, I spent a lot of my teenage years on lockdown, due to my Mum grounding me for some ludicrous infractions. Home late for tea, would get me a 7 day stretch, whilst being in at 21:10 instead of 21:00 would get me a 14 stretch. If I argued I would get a 28 days at Her Majesty's Displeasure.
I've covered this at length in my book together with the mechanisms I developed for getting 'sprung'.
My compadre, Roger and I have really got our mojo on for the ECW again, as have my wife and indeed my younger brother. This was something we did a lot of in the 80s when I was not doing time or hanging around the figure bar at Games Workshop.
We've been real martinets about it too. You see, we used to just base stuff for WRG, then we sort of went to WRG meets element basing, and now that we've got back together, we've sort of thrown hard and fast basing sizes out of the window, in favour of scenic and narrative bases. It's about the aesthetic.
But, of course that has had to have an agreed formula that we feel looks right. Base width has been set at 50mm for a shot element with two elements forming an 8 man sleeve of shot. If you go to 12 men, then two 75mm wide bases works well. Depth has been sort of agreed at 50mm which allows some nice space for positioning.Pike blocks are based exactly as that, and we are using 100x100 bases with the entire block on it. We are big boys and girls with 40 years of gaming experience... We can handle it!
Cavalry was the pain in the ass for me. In the end 100 wide by 80 deep seems to work well with 3 or 4 figures. 3 bases make up a unit, and of course you can use 4 bases at 75mm wide and still cover the same frontage. Simple right? It took us a couple of weeks of sometimes quite waspish emails to agree that.
Field artillery has to be on big fucking bases and it's going nowhere once you place it, according to roger. I couldn't agree more.
I bought £1100 worth of Bicorne ECW, but to be honest, I found the castings to look as if they'd been very quickly spun with metal not quite hot enough. They were a little rounded and certainly not worth the price tag. So, my wife bought the lot at a bargain price and now has her Royalists sorted.
I have bought Warlord plastics for the horse, and Warlord metals for the Dragoons, Cuirassier and Foot. The artillery and baggage is a mix of Perry and Foundry (£48 for three guns & crew? REALLY?) and I couldn't resist a flock of sheep, which a cheeky wag known to me as Roger, quipped 'Is the only unit I have that will stand up to a Royalist cavalry charge!' - Cheeky sod.
I've also been really getting into old school post apocalyptic gaming and ordered the original Metamorphosis Alpha as well as the entire range for the new retro-inspired Mutant Crawl Classics. Alas, I can't read the rules because I could not get a set outside the U.S with the lockdown supply chains cut. Then I found a UK book store via Alibris who had a copy and apparently they shipped it the same day... But they LIED and it was ordered from the U.S which, I could have fucking done myself, so I'll not be ordering from GreatBookPrices because in my opinion they are a bunch of tossers who don't do what it says on the tin...
In other news, my latest Kickstarter for old school styled Hobgoblins is going stellar. With 14 days left on the campaign, its over 200% funded.
Take a look here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/satanicpanic/old-school-multi-part-28mm-hobgoblins-by-satanic-panic?ref=user_menu
I also just received a new sculpt from Martin Buck, who has totally outdone himself with a reimagining of a classic Hobgoblin, with mutations.
Here's the pics that Martin sent me:
According to Martin (who I think, I may have broken) it's the spikiest figure he's ever sculpted. I can honestly say that I just don't have the superlatives to hand which can really convey how pleased I am with this sculpt. He is perfectly styled and Martin has gone to amazing lengths to produce a stunningly detailed model which simply oozes old school atmosphere and class.
You can preorder Tokygurini here:
http://satanicpanic.co.uk/shop/4593110927/pre--order-tokygurini-the-throttler---mutated-hobgoblin-war-chief-of-the-black-legion/11449140
Well, I better go and do a days work,
TTFN
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