Tale of OG Gamers - High Elves

[fatolaf]

Love it Matt, simply breath taking work there son....

Box 17 please!

[Draig]

just when I thought this plog couldn't get much stranger! 

box 13 please

Seconded on both counts! Had me chuckling mate, I like!

[Nick]

Well Halloween's coming up, so 13 for me too please.

[cunningmatt]

Also do you work for GWs rules department, because I'm fully expecting half of those to appear in the next few books released!

Don't know what you mean these are genuine Games Workshop rules!

BLATANT PLUG ALERT

Can I just take this opportunity to put in a massive plug for my new show, which actually started tonight at 5pm, in my usual fun place. Please watch especially if you have a BARB box, I need a second series to get comissioned to pay for my next army.  Plus you may get to see me looking like a right idiot as an extra on the show, what more could you want?

Apologies for that inexcusable plug! Normal service to resume soon.

[cunningmatt]

Sunday 31st October

This is going to come as a shock to many of you but in last week's blog entry the models I showed you and claimed I painted, well I hadn't, I lied. I'm very sorry. I didn't have anytime to do any painting as I was very busy at work, it's not clever, it's not funny and I'm not proud. My apologies. However in the words of Melissa from the Apprentice "carmically they will be retributed, the universe speaks louder than I do" (note those words aren't real, she was talking bollocks), but that happened to me as sadly John & Edward were struck down and taken from me by high winds.



I know, a sad ending to a happy Halloween, but it has encouraged me not to lie and do some more painting. But before we get to This Week in Pictures and the exciting results of What's In The Box? I thought I'd show you how I go about Mixing Paints, I promised this ages ago so it's about time I delivered. Before I start I should point out that mixing paints is extremely messy, and I recommend you do it in a kitchen or bathroom somewhere easy to clean with access to running water. I know, what you're thinking "It will be fine" "what are the chances of me making a mess?" I do this all the time, but on this occasion you are wrong. Trust me. Halloween can only be made more scary by a loved one/relative/flatmate finding you've spilt a tonne of paint all over the table/carpet/cat/children etc.

Since Games Workshop in their infinite wisdom stopped selling the empty paint pot (fools), you'll have to make your own empty paint pots, by emptying a paint pot – hope I'm not getting too technical for you. Ideally this should be a colour that is one of the colours you intend to mix, as it saves you having to clean too hard. Invariably there will be some manky residue left behind as shown here:



This residue is the second hardest substance known to man, just behind Weetabix remnants that have been left in an unwashed bowl for a few days, seriously that stuff could be used to glue railway bridges together. However help is at hand with an old toothbrush, if like me you don't have an old toothbrush you can buy cheap ones from your local supermarket.



This toothbrush came in a pack of two for 10p at Sainsbury's – 5 pence a toothbrush, that is madness. How can you make a toothbrush so cheap? How? I don't understand, it can't be possible, best be on the safe side though and not put it in my mouth (even before cleaning the paint out)



Some Fairy washing liquid and hot water, your old toothbrush and the ever useful Sculpting Tool (I used this to help me defrost the freezer earlier today) can be used to get yourself a pretty clean empty paint pot.

With your pot empty you'll need a couple of extra tools:



An old paint brush, this is a seriously old paintbrush (the red handles were out during 4th edition of Warhammer), and you'll need some kind of tiny pot for pouring the paint. I've used the cap from a sun cream bottle (you won't be needing any in the UK for a while). If you want to mix specific quantities of paint e.g. 2:1 of two different colours, then it will be helpful to have a mark on the pot to measure to – I find some sticky tape round the outside does this well (though you won't be able to see it in the picture) as it will survive repeated washing.

I'm making up a highlight for Shining Gold, which will be 5:1 Shining Gold : Mithril Silver (I find it takes very little Mithril Silver to lighten metallics before they go very grey). Firstly I pour out Mithril Silver to the level on the suncream top.



Using the old paint brush, scrape out all the paint into the empty pot, and then thoroughly wash out the pot. This is particularly messy, so only a fool would have an expensive digital camera around when they're doing this – oops. I then repeated this 5 times with Shining Gold (can be worth washing out between each set of Shining Gold so you can see the mark on the side of the pot). Once this has done you'll be left with a delightful Jackson Pollock-esque paint pot:



Give it a good mix with your old paint brush, being careful to scrape round the edges until you get a consistent colour (I feel a bit like Delia Smith now, giving you these tips – though I should assure you no one is taking revealing shots of my breasts as I lick the cream off a spoon – in case you were wondering). And here's what it should look like when you take it out of the oven:



Always worth putting a label on your new paint pot – in case you forget what you mixed up:



And in true Blue Peter style (no I didn't rig the vote to name the cat), but here are some I made earlier...



And you can see I've cleverly labelled one pot 1:1 Fortress Grey : Skull White, when it actually contains 1:1 Astronomican Grey : Skull White – this is because I am a fool.

There you go that is how you mix paints, in a guide so simple that even Katie Price could understand it.

Whilst we're talking about paints, I should mention my secret supply of contraband paints – don't tell anyone but I have paints that you aren't allowed to have any more. Here are some of them:



This selection has a street value of about four million pounds, and you'll often find people in Camden High Street offering you Tentacle Pink, if you know where to go. Hush, hush, nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

Anyone seen the new style Games Workshop paint pots? Here's the first one I picked up recently:



Now I like the new paint pots, and I like the old paint pots, but which is better? There's only one way to find out... FIGHT!! No actually that's not true. I do like the new paint pots for their full transparency so you can see what colour you've got from any angle (though annoyingly the Foundation Paints and Washes don't have this feature). But annoyingly they don't stack. Anyone else got this problem? I like to stack my paints to make space on my painting table, here's what I can do with the old paint pots:



And here's the same feat attempted with the new style pots:



Hmmmmmmmmmm, not helpful, make them stackable!!!!!

Any way after that rant it must be time for This Week in Pictures, everyone's favourite photographic story telling section – bar the photo love stories you get in women's magazines, I always like them!

Thursday

About a thousand years ago, when I last had a free night to come to an OG Games night, I picked up a selection of goodies from Ol (I know Ol I still have the High Elf cards to collect, I will return at some point when I escape hibernation). Getting a bag of goodies from Ol always reminds me of Ready Steady Cook, not sure why?



Anyway here's the goodies in the bag, I tried to make a delicious meal for four from them, but that was less successful.



This week I only used the Stippling Brush, though I'm sure the rest will enter this blog at some point. This was used to do some stippling (funnily enough) on my Ellyrian Reavers, not sure how well this went – I'll leave you to judge.

Friday

Not sure if I mentioned this but my new show, definitely worth watching! Plug! Plug! Plug! Plug! You may even see me in it if you look closely! Please watch, I am literally begging!

Saturday

Lines closed on this month's exciting What's In the Box? with slightly more votes cast than in the X Factor this week, there was lots to play for. So far the board stands as follows:



With Box Number 3 open there was still 35 boxes to choose from, what would be in the chosen box? Would it be good, would it be bad? There was only one way to find out. Cheryl oversaw the draw as always, unperturbed by the recent death of John & Edward, as number 25 was drawn – well done Dave.



All eyes on Box No. 25...



Ooooooo...



And I can exclusively reveal it is a Warriors of Chaos box.



The box contains a mixture of unpainted models and some of my poorly painted early attempts (oh the shame).



Here's an early attempt to paint a classic Chaos Sorcerer, as you can see I made it Tzeentch, simply by using blue – and that was the extent of my themeing. This model was one of a succession of Chaos sorcerers that came supplied with a familiar model. What are we supposed to do with them? Do magic item familiars need to be modelled? Invariably they don't fit in the unit. Or maybe they should be used as markers for your sorcerer, or maybe you just shouldn't bother and chuck them in your bits box to never be seen again, or maybe you should just hurl them out the window at annoying small children? – better suggestions on a postcard please to the usual address.



Here are some really badly painted old Chaos Warriors, these, you may remember, were the first ever multi-part plastic box set and boy weren't they shite? They look utter crap. My painting scheme fitted this style entirely I drybrushed them Mithril silver, painted the bones Bleached Bone and the base Goblin Green and that was it – at the time I felt clever.



Some of my favourite classic Chaos models were these Chaos Knights, loved them. They came from a time when you couldn't have a Chaos Knight musician (as there was no model for them), though as musicians did practically nothing and cost twice the points of a regular model you'd need 160 points to get an old Chaos Warrior Knight musician – ouch!!



I loved them so much I even had a second Standard Bearer. I may even paint these up for my Warriors army soon.



Here's a pile of various bits of other Chaos Knights, including parts from the multipart Chaos Knight set, which was only marginally less crap than the Warriors box set.



And lastly a Nurgle Chaos Lord, a very old model here, that rode a Palanquin carried by Nurglings – which might be in one of the other boxes, you'll have to hope you pick it out next month if you want to see it!

And that's it – a slightly less varied box this month, but who knows what you'll get in next month's What's In the Box?

Sunday

Despite serious jet lag setting in after changing the clock on the oven in the morning (why does that always happen it's only a bloody hour?!) and seriously what time is it now. I mean really, is it really an hour ago, an hour before, or next Tuesday? Why do I feel so confused?

Anyway the good news is I finished this month's painting. Horray! Horray! Not sure how, but I did, but I did. Here's some group shots of the finished stuff:

Ellyrian Reavers:



And the Shadow Warriors:


For those of you excited by how I got there, here's all the usual details:

Stage 4 – Ellyrian Reavers





Base: Drybrush Bleached Bone, add Static Grass.
Skulls (on base): Layer 1:1 Bleached Bone : Skull White
Rocks (on base): Drybrush Fortress Grey
Hooves: Highlight Codex Gray
Mane/Tail: *NO CHANGE*
Horse Skin: Stippled 1:1 Adeptus Battlegrey : Fortress Grey, restippled with increasing amounts of Fortress Grey until one final layer of Fortress Grey
Barding Cloak Outside/Rider Cloth: Skull White on centremost parts
Barding Cloak Inside/Feathers: *NO CHANGE*
Barding Metal Trim/Arrow Flights/Trim: Highlight Bad Moon Yellow
Silver Metal: *NO CHANGE*
Gold Metal: Highlight 5:1 Shining Gold : Mithril Silver
Wood: *NO CHANGE*
Leather: *NO CHANGE*
Flesh: Highlight Bleached Bone
Hair: Vomit Brown – highlighted with Bleached Bone. Dheneb Stone – highlighted with Skull White. Calthan Brown – highlighted with Bubonic Brown

Stage 4 – Raven's Shadow Warriors




Base: Drybrush Bleached Bone, add Static Grass.
Leather: *NO CHANGE*
Silver Metal: *NO CHANGE*
Gold Metal: Highlight 5:1 Shining Gold : Mithril Silver
Cloth: Skull White on centremost parts
Cloak: *NO CHANGE*
Metal Trim/Arrow Flights: Highlight Bad Moon Yellow
Wood: *NO CHANGE*
Flesh: Highlight Bleached Bone
Hair: Vomit Brown – highlighted with Bleached Bone. Dheneb Stone – highlighted with Skull White. Calthan Brown – highlighted with Bubonic Brown

Just a few points here to note, I can now directly compare my new High Elves to my old ones, as I've painted the Shadow Warriors before:



The one on the left is the newer one, and whilst it's quite difficult to tell the difference in the photo I think the White, Yellow and Wood look much better with better layering. The face of the new one is a little dark – too much Ogryn Flesh I think, but not too pale like the older one. So fingers crossed the new army will look better than the new ones. Sorry this isn't an amazing detailed comparison but I've written about 8 pages of this drivel now and need sleep, it will have to do!

Here's the details from the Ellyrian Reavers:



The musician conversion, looks reasonably good if I say so myself. I think it looks like part of the original model, which is all you can hope for



And the standard bearer came out well to, even added a quick runic design to the banner, which was fairly straight forward. It's the Elven rune for "I'd like my Shakeaway to be a large please" which felt appropriate.

So at the end of Month 2 the High Elf Army looks like this:



All good, not quite legal yet but Month 3 will solve that, and finish off the Shadow Warriors.

Before I go just time to bring to your attention a puzzle I've been wondering about. What does this 20% mean?



I'm slightly worried it represents my brain slowly downloading onto the OG site, and how much crazier will this blog get should up to 50% of my brain download? Hmmm. Oh well, more to come next week – might even be funny (sorry very tired no jokes left) – don't hold your breath though.

Happy painting!

[Mike]

John & Edward were struck down and taken from me by high winds.

NNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

[Mike]

Before I go just time to bring to your attention a puzzle I've been wondering about. What does this 20% mean?

Its a unit of measurement.

Basically its used to assess Awesomeness.
I am 80% Awesome.  The lost 20% is on account of the gingerness.

[fatolaf]

Before I go just time to bring to your attention a puzzle I've been wondering about. What does this 20% mean?

It is your % of posts you have done, 100% meamns you earn a shiny new badge proclaiming you as an 'Old One'

Great update buddy, very sad to hear of your loss.....

[maelzch]

another great update mate, congrats for being the first to finish you October stuff for the tale!

[cunningmatt]

It is your % of posts you have done, 100% meamns you earn a shiny new badge proclaiming you as an 'Old One'

So the more posts you do, the more you bar tops up? Can I get bonus points for ridiculously long posts?

Basically its used to assess Awesomeness.
I am 80% Awesome.

So you're suggesting I'm only 20% awesome? 

NNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I propose a minute's dysentery as a mark of respect.