A Handful of Heroclix Repaints

I’m always repainting clix in between my other projects, since I know eventually I will use them for Supersystem 3. Here are a few I’ve done recently.

First up, Daredevil and Elektra. This Elektra model is from the first Infinity Challenge set, and TBH I like it the best out of all the Elektra sculpts that have come since. While painting her costume I was once again struck by how ridiculous it is. It would take her an hour just to wrap those stupid scarves and sashes around her arms and legs, but hey…I guess it looks cool.

The Daredevil figure is also my favorite clix version of him. These miniatures were very easy to repaint…I just added shading and highlighting to what was already on the miniature. Red is an easy color to work with. I think Daredevil took me about a half hour. Elektra took longer (stupid costume).

Some loser villains, L-R: The Grey Gargoyle, Blastaar, the Wizard, and Batroc “zee Leepair”! I’ll need the first three soon for SS3 games, but I couldn’t resist repainting Batroc just for laughs. He may be one of the most ridiculous villains ever, which is perfect for a fun game of SS3. Apparently, a stray brush strand adhered to Grey Gargoyle and I only just noticed it while messing with the picture. Let’s hear it for hi-res cameras! This assortment of miniatures is a good example of how I repaint batches of miniatures with similar color schemes all at once, even if I won’t be using them anytime soon.

Lastly, a repaint of The Mad Thinker and his Awesome Android! Definitely crying out to be used in a series of linked scenarios. I’ll get on that soon…

Classic Grenadier Wizards

This boxed set was the second set of miniatures I ever bought, the first being the well-known “Tomb of Spells”. I bought them when I was in 6th grade. Like all of the miniatures I painted back then, I covered them in Testors gloss enamels and thought I did a swell job. Many years later, when I discovered things like acrylic paints and shading, I realized they looked truly horrendous and stripped them with the intent of repainting them later. Years passed and they languished. Then came Warhammer, and all my painting time was taken getting my armies ready for the table. I wanted to paint them last year for WizarDecember, but couldn’t find the time. Now, at age 43, they have finally been repainted.

I painted these first five to resemble the Istari, the five wizards of Middle-Earth. From l-r: Pallando, Radagast, Gandalf, Saruman, and Alatar. Who are Alatar and Pallando, you ask? Well, they are the Blue Wizards, referred to by Tolkien as “lesser” wizards, of which little is known other than their names. After their arrival in Middle-Earth, they quickly “passed into the East”, where nothing was ever heard from them again.

Of course, Iron Crown Enterprises, who once held the license for the Middle Earth RPG and the Middle Earth: The Wizards CCG, did much to expand (i.e. create) the lore of these two wizards. In the CCG, players take the role of one of the wizards. Pallando is portrayed as a diviner/seer, and many of his card effects allow some sort of precognitive ability. Alatar is a very martial wizard who can dish out some heavy damage. So I chose the Illusionist miniature for Pallando and the Druid (with shield and sword) for Alatar. The others were also fairly easy choices: Radagast is a “Druid with dart”; Gandalf (Enchanter)has the big floppy hat, and Saruman (Sorceror) is holding a crystal ball (a palantir?).

I don’t normally rebase these old classics, but I decided to make an exception with this set. I considered adding a sword to Gandalf to represent Glamdring, but chose to leave him unmodified.

The remainder of the set is above. From L-R: Wizard, Cleric, Archmage with spell, Magician, and Warlock. The wizard was my least favorite miniature to paint because his detail is somewhat ambiguous; there are times I didn’t know what I was supposed to be painting. His “familiar” on his shoulder is horribly sculpted as well. I have no idea what it’s supposed to be. The Archmage comes with two “spells”; the hand shown above and the head of something so poorly sculpted it also defies description. I chose the hand. The Cleric and Magician models are my favorite miniatures in the set, and to this day when I think of a wizard or cleric these guys come to mind. Last is the Warlock; not one of my favorites but I did what I could with him. I decided to paint him as a Bright Wizard; someone who can fling a fireball or two. I hate painting orange, but I think he turned out ok.

Painting old school miniatures like this is always fun. I think I’ll paint another Grenadier boxed set soon.

Red Dragon

I don’t often paint large models, but I’ve had this fellow on my painting table in various states of assembly and painting for a couple of years now. It’s a red dragon from Grenadier’s Julie Guthrie’s Dragons line, circa late ’80’s-early 90’s.

Of course, nothing says I had to paint it as a red dragon. In fact, I was considering painting it a greenish-black and using it as a swamp dragon. I even went so far as to basecoat it green, but then changed my mind and went with the red scheme. I used mostly Vallejo colors (Red Black, Rusty Red, Gold Yellow) and Citadel paints (Stegadon Scale Green, Sotek Green, Scorpion Green).

Compared to some of the dragon miniatures available today (i.e. Reaper), this one is pretty small, but is perfect for representing a young dragon rather than an ancient wyrm.

I have a love for Grenadier miniatures, as together with Ral Partha they were pretty much the only game in town for Fantasy miniatures when I was young. These dragons could be a pain in the ass to assemble, and this one was no exception, requiring copious amounts of green stuff to fill the gaps where the wings join the body. Nowadays it would probably be cast from plastic, or at least the wings would be, which would make it easier to assemble as the weight of the wings wouldn’t require pinning.

For the base, I added an axe along with a bit from an Army Painter accessory pack (the helmet with the snake). I smoothed out the contours with green stuff and added sand, tufts and static grass.

Riddle me this…

A few weeks back I decided to repaint and rebase a Heroclix Mr. Freeze for Supersystem 3, and the Batman bug has bitten me again. This time I decided to put a little extra effort into one of Batman’s “Big Four”: The Riddler!

Here’s what Riddler looks like on the dial. This is one of the original ‘clix from the first DC Hypertime set. Riddle me this…when does a Heroclix miniature look like it was painted with craft paint? Answer: far too often.

Clearly, this would not stand.

Much like the smoke on my Mr. Freeze conversion, I took the pedestal with the question mark from another Heroclix model: The Question. As soon as I saw this figure I knew I was using the question mark for something else. Anyone familiar with the Batman: Arkham series of video games will recognize that this looks exactly like one of the Riddler trophies video game completists like me spend hours trying to collect. I could have painted it green to be more in-line with the game, and I still might. But for now I’m fine with the red.

Here’s a WIP shot. I knew I wanted to include a riddle on the base, so I planned out how much space I would need. Turns out a 60mm base did the trick. This conversion was becoming more and more like a diorama! I used a Dremel engraving tip to sculpt the flagstone pattern before painting the riddle in white. I picked a fairly easy riddle that everyone should know the answer to…or do they? One can never tell with the King of Conundrums!

I painted the riddle bright green and cleaned up some of the mess I made trying to freehand it. The base was looking a bit empty, so I decided to add some moneybags from the Bank of Gotham. I sculpted them out of green stuff, which was surprisingly easy as there’s very little detail to sculpt on a sack. I considered giving Riddler a pistol, but in the end I left him as is.

I was originally going to just paint the stereotypical dollar signs on the bags, but it looked crappy. I decided to label them with the bank name instead. It looks slightly less crappy.

I’ve never been a stickler for base size, but 60mm is pretty big. I may have to do another version of the Riddler if I find his base is getting in the way of terrain and such. But for now I’m happy with him. Since I love Batman’s villains, I think I’ll put extra effort into every member of Batman’s rogue’s gallery to really make them stand out.

The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants

My next big Supersystem 3 game is going to be based on The Breeder Bombs, the classic (if not-so-great) TSR Marvel Superheroes adventure from the mid-80’s. Last time, I rebased and repainted the Uncanny X-Men team of my youth. Now, I bring you…The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants!!!

From left-right: Blob, Toad, Magneto, and his wayward offspring Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch. All have been repainted and rebased from their original dials. I decided since Magneto is such a badass, he should have a unique base. I used this large junk base from Taban miniatures. He has a pretty solid bottom which was easy to drill and pin, making it look (IMO) better than a Heroclix flight dial. Quicksilver was extensively repainted in his original “evil” green costume and rebased on an Armorcast urban base. The Scarlet Witch is rebased on a Micro Arts Studio tech base.

The Breeder Bombs features robot doubles of the Brotherhood rather than the actual mutants themselves, which I find really dumb. It takes nothing away from the plot of the module to simply use the Brotherhood rather than robots (and it makes more sense). You might think that aside from Magneto, these guys are a bunch of second-stringers, and you could be right. But remember: “NOTHING-NUH-NUH-NOTHING-NUH-NOTHING MOO-MOVES THE BL-BLO-BLOB!!!!” (Kudos to anyone who gets that referential joke.)

A view from the back. And now, in the immortal words of Magneto: “X-MEN…WELCOME…TO DIE!!!!!”

The Uncanny X-Men

I’m gearing up to run the next Supersystem 3 game based on the old Marvel Super Heroes RPG by TSR. Up next is MSH-1, The Breeder Bombs, so I’ve been busy repainting and rebasing the X-Men. This time I remembered to take a picture of the heroclix before and after my efforts.

Above, L-R, Kitty Pryde (Shadowcat), Wolverine, Colossus, Professor X, Cyclops and Storm. These are the X-Men of my youth (early to mid-eighties), so in selecting my clix I went for authenticity and made sure I had a mohawk-sporting Storm. Kitty Pryde was known as Ariel back then, and she wore a completely different costume. So did Wolverine.

So here are the repaints, sandwiched between Nightcrawler and Rogue, who round out the post-Dark Phoenix Saga/ Secret Wars era team. I couldn’t find a Heroclix Nightcrawler that I liked (and many are expensive), and I couldn’t find a Rogue miniature that was time-specific, so I had to use these old TSR metal miniatures from the Marvel Super Heroes RPG line. They scale pretty well with the clix.

As you can see, Wolverine is resplendent in his Autumn ensemble (i.e. brown costume). I don’t remember Cyclops ever beings so light blue, so it was easy enough to darken his costume up. Rogue’s costume has changed about a dozen times over the years, and unfortunately the TSR model shows her in her “orange tunic/legwarmers” look. Although I can’t imagine using Professor X much in Supersystem 3 (he’s way too powerful), I decided to include him for completeness. I changed his suit color and wheelchair and gave him a nice plaid blanket to keep his legs warm. I did the least with Storm, who only really needed some minor highlighting and rebasing to fit right in.

I had to change Wolverine and Ariel’s costumes completely from the original Heroclix models. I’m pretty happy with the results (although Ariel’s face could be better.) Kitty’s costume isn’t 100% accurate (she had a bigger collar and no shoulder pads), but I like it. No Lockheed the Dragon, sadly.

Here are the closeups of the TSR models. Nightcrawler isn’t too bad, but the Rogue miniature is really not all that great. Her pose is mystifying and like most of these TSR models, the facial sculpt is awful. I did what I could with her. I don’t know what kind of alloy TSR used in their miniatures line, but it really doesn’t hold paint well, even when primed. Paint rubs off easily, even just handling them during the painting process.

Now I just need to paint a certain Master of Magnetism and his cronies and we can play!

Mr. Freeze

Mr. Freeze has long been one of my favorite bat-villains, due in large part to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s brilliant, iconic performance in the 1997 film Batman & Robin.

OK, maybe not.

But I really do love Mr. Freeze. Especially any episode of the Batman Animated Series in which he is featured (voiced by the late, great Michael Ansara). He is also really cool (pardon the pun) in the Batman: Arkham City video game, as well as the Arkham Origins downloadable content “Cold, Cold Heart.”

I’ve been rebasing and repainting a lot of Heroclix lately, but they’ve mostly been Marvel clix. I’ve been sadly neglecting the DC line. I decided to have some fun with this one and make a really nice conversion I can base a scenario or two around.

Anyway, here’s what a Heroclix Mr. Freeze looks like out of the box. That’s a stock photo, not the actual model I used. I really need to remember to photograph these clix before I repaint them, but this kind of happened as a side project.

The Mr. Freeze model has a removable helmet and shoulder piece, which is good since the helmet is so opaque it obscures the face almost entirely.

From Wikipedia: Mr. Freeze (Victor Fries) is a scientist who must wear a cryogenic suit in order to survive, and bases his crimes around a “cold” or “ice” theme, complete with a “freeze gun” that freezes its targets solid. In the most common variation of his origin story, he is a former cryogenics expert who suffered an industrial accident while attempting to cure his terminally ill wife Nora Fries.

I like him because he’s actually a bad guy you can feel sorry for. Freeze does some bad. bad things, but it’s all for love of his wife.

Here are a couple of better shots that show him without the helmet. I considered adding a bit of snow to his gun barrel and the tanks on his back to simulate frost, but decided against it. The smoke is from a this Marvel Ultron clix model:

I also used the Ultron model for Mr. Freeze’s wife, Nora. I painted her a frosty blue and based her on a dime, which, coincidentally, is exactly the right diameter to use if you want to place her in this spiffy bio-tank, made by RAFM.

The other miscellaneous sci-fi machinery was made by TMP’s Russell95403, I think it goes well as lab decor. For the ice piles, I used Chris Palmer’s method described here, using sea glass. I think they look great and I’ll be making more ice soon.

So now I have Mr. and Mrs. Freeze ready to go for a nice Supersystem 3 scenario.

And that-dare I say it?- is pretty damn cool.

Armorcast and Laser Cut Card: 2 Company Reviews

If you’re anything like me, you probably have a not-so-small heap of unfinished terrain projects laying about your workspace. Last month I decided to incorporate building and painting terrain into my normal painting routine (when I have a routine) so the heap will, in theory, reduce over time. So, since I just finished up Imperial Assault, I thought I’d get cracking on some of the modern terrain I ordered for my Supers and Zombie games.

Much of my modern terrain comes from Armorcast. I also recently purchased a couple of things from Laser Cut Card. What follows is a review of both companies and the products I bought.

First up is Armorcast. I already own a fair amount of Armorcast products, and there’s a couple of good reasons why. First, they look great when they’re painted up and on the table. I’ve had the mausoleums above for about 6 years and never played a game with them (because I haven’t made a graveyard yet). I posed them with a Wargames Factory zombie vixen to show how cool the terrain looks in context. You might recognize the dumpsters from the many After Action Reports on this blog. I pretty much use them in any city-based game.

Second, Armorcast resin products are generally pretty durable, especially the chunkier pieces. My recent order consisted of these “roof-toppers” and a billboard 3-pack (which I’ll get to in a minute). These are designed to affix to Armorcast’s line of resin buildings to make the removal of rooftops easier. I don’t use Armorcast buildings, and I like a bit of freedom when it comes to my scenery so I won’t be attaching anything permanently.

All Armorcast stuff is easy to prime and paint. I’ve never had anything rub off once it’s been sealed.

Unfortunately, Armorcast products require a lot of cleanup. This is less true of the big, blocky pieces like those above, but look at these billboards and soda machines.There’s an awful lot of resin flash and bubbles in the casting that will need to be sanded or filled. I was least happy with the billboards, as they required a lot of flash removal. Remember when I said that Armorcast resin is generally durable? It is, but in smaller pieces like this it’s actually brittle. I broke a few of the billboard supports removing flash with some nippy cutters. You can see the broken ones in the top picture (the two middle supports).

Even then, there was enough flash left that I needed to use a Dremel to get it smoothed down, which is not really something you want to do as resin dust is quite toxic. Also, I assumed that once the billboards were assembled they would stand on their own, but they don’t. Whether this is because I broke the supports or not I don’t know, but I’m pretty sure it’s because the billboard is heavier than the supports, so it falls on its face if not anchored to something. If you plan on gluing it to a building, you’ll have no problem. But if you’re like me, you’ll have to take the extra step of basing it on something so you can use it wherever you want.

This water tower is from Laser Cut Card, a South African company that seems to have greatly expanded their product line recently. I ordered this about a year ago along with some Ork glyphs and finally got around to assembling and painting it. It’s made of uncoated cardboard, a bit stiffer than your average cereal box. LCC claims that coated cardboard (like Plastcraft stuff) would melt if cut with a laser, so they leave it uncoated. This is not as much of a problem as you’d think, as it’s surprisingly strong and sturdy once assembled.

When I first got this, I bitched and whined that there was no instruction sheet included with it. When I finally got around to assembling it, I had no problems figuring it out just by looking at the picture on the box. Anyone with modeling experience should have no problem, but just for the hell of it I went on LCCs website and found that they have instructions right there, so my grumbling was premature. They don’t include them to save on shipping costs (more on that below). Assembly took about an hour (without the benefit of instructions).

The cardboard takes paint ok, not great. As you can see, not having a coating on it just means the paint soaks into the card a little more than you may like. I spray-primed this tower black before painting it with craft paint and you can judge the results for yourself.

Incidentally, if you’re wondering about the graffiti decals, they’re made by a company called Microscale and carried by Armorcast. The sheet I have says it’s HO scale, but as you can see they seem to fit right in on 28mm scale scenery. I think they really make the water tower look cool and help cover up some of the paint issues.

So those are the products. What about the prices and shipping?

Armorcast isn’t cheap, especially their bigger pieces. However, they have extensive product lines across many genres. If you’re looking for something in particular, chances are they have it, whether you’re playing fantasy, sci-fi or modern games. Most of it looks terrific and is generally durable enough to stand up to the rigors of gaming, although as stated above, you may need to do some work on it first.

Armorcast asks that customers allow one month for shipping, and that’s exactly how long I waited for my most recent order. Not lightning fast, but everything is cast to order, so I have no complaints. Over the years I’ve had a couple of interactions with Armorcast. One order shipped missing an item, and when I called them they took care of it right away. I also talked to their rep at Gen Con in 2012 and he couldn’t have been a nicer guy. So customer service is good, too.

Laser Cut Card has a greatly expanded product line that includes Sci-Fi and Modern terrain at insanely low prices. (That cardboard water tower retails for $6.50; Armorcast has a resin one for $12.00). Of course, you will need to spend some time assembling it first. It’s surprisingly strong and I’m optimistic that my next attempt at painting it will enjoy better success.

LCC’s shipping times and costs are unbelievable. This water tower and a package of ork glyphs shipped in a standard mailing envelope for ONE DOLLAR, and it made the trip from South Africa to Southeastern Massachusetts in a week!!! I haven’t had any need to contact LCC for customer service, but they seem like nice enough guys and, like Armorcast, I’m sure I’ll be ordering from them again.

Huge Downsizing Sale

In April, 2013, I posted My Pile of Insanity, which detailed how much unpainted lead (and plastic) I had at the time and my plan to dig myself out of it.

I failed miserably to excavate myself and I have only accumulated more stuff since then. Projects I will never begin, let alone finish. Therefore I need to part with some of this stuff, no matter how painful it may be.

The following stuff is for sale. Buyer to pay shipping. I will, of course, combine shipping on multiple items to ensure the cheapest rate. Prices are indicated below.

With the exception of the Hordes/Warmachine stuff, I want to sell these as lots and I’m not really interested in splitting them up.

Don’t like my prices? Make me a reasonable offer and perhaps I can be moved.

I might consider trades on some of the smaller lots, but my list of trade wants is small and specific (since I’m trying to get rid of stuff, not accumulate more). See the list at the end for what I will consider.

Email me at Angrypiper@angrypiper.com OR PM me on The Miniatures Page to make an offer.

First up: I have a huge American Civil War/Napoleonics lot, roughly 10mm-15mm. I’m asking $100 for all of it, roughly 300 figures including personalities and cannon. For lots more info on that, check out this link. There are tons of other pictures over there too.

Avalon Hill Stalingrad (1976) $50

Complete, Unpunched. About as good as you’ll find outside of shrinkwrap.

Victory Games James Bond 007 Assault! $50

Still in shrinkwrap, can be used with or without the old James Bond RPG.

Warhammer Fantasy Battle:

High Elf Lot (All unpainted, unassembled) $260.00

Cavalry Patrol Box Set: 1 mounted hero, 1 Ellyrian Reaver Champion, 4 Ellyrian Reavers, 5 Silver Helms, 1 Tiranoc Chariot and 1 Waystone (scenic item).

High Elf Battalion: 8 Silver Helms, 16 Elf Warriors, 16 Archers, 1 Bolt thrower Still in shrinkwrap.

High Elf Warriors Regiment (16 Warriors). Still shrinkwrapped.

High Elf Silver Helms Regiment (8 Silver Helms). Still shrinkwrapped.

The General on Griffon from Isle of Blood (assembled, unpainted. Lance broken but fixable). (loose) (for some reason I forgot to put him in the picture. If you want a picture let me know.)

Some extra Ellyrian Reavers (I think 2-3)

High Elf Mages blister (1 mounted, on afoot). MIB

Total: 27 + Cavalry, 48 infantry, 1 general on griffon, 2 mages (1 mounted), 2 bolt throwers, 1 Chariot and 1 Waystone.

Lizardmen Lot: $50.00

Warlord Kroq-gar on Carnosaur (still shrinkwrapped)

50 old style skinks with bows (1 painted)

8 Saurus riders on Cold Ones ( assembled, some partially painted).

Saurus sprues to complete the riders

Dreadball (the original) $45

Orc Miniatures primed black and minimally painted, otherwise MIB

It Came From Beyond the Still Lot $60

ICFBTS Rulebook and ICFBTS: Somethin in the Sauce expansion

Blobs Faction (5 unpainted resin blobs)

2 Rusty Rail Stills (unassembled, unpainted and MIB)

Z-Man Games Ninjato $40

Complete, unpunched

Warmachine/Hordes

Croe’s Cutthroats (6) box set: $35

( NIB, all unassembled, unpainted)

Legion of Everblight Thagrosh: Messiah of Everblight $30

(NIB, unassembled, unpainted)

Malifaux Lot $45

Collodi the Puppeteer Box set (Old version, Shrinkwrapped)

Ten Thunders Archers (on sprue)

Kirai Ankoku (old style), MIB

Vor: the Maelstrom Boxed Set $45.00

(all scenery and miniatures unpainted/unassembled, includes an extra Growler Bull)

MINIATURES RULEBOOKS

Gutshot $15

A Fistful of Kung Fu $12

TSR’s Battlesystem 2^nd Edition $10

Fantasy Flight Games Warhammer 40K Rogue Trader RPG $35

Near Mint. Retail $60

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Companion Rules (OOP) :$30

GDW Twilight: 2000 original boxed set + extra. $20

Box has some wear, but all books are NM and present. Also includes US Army Vehicle Guide book (not NM)

Knight Models Batman Miniatures Lot $20

Frank Miller Batman (Dark Knight Returns) (MIB)

Joker (Heath Ledger version) (MIB)

Do You Worship Cthulhu? $8

Card Game NIB

Rackham Confrontation Lot $15

Chaplain of the Temple MIB

Velrys the Impure MIB

Limited Edition Baba Yagob MIB

Anima Tactics

Alessa Raincross MIB $5 (Not Pictured)

Rattrap Productions Fantastic Worlds

The Pit Beast MIB $8

WFB Empire:

Valten: Loose, unpainted. $3

Warhammer 40K

30^th anniversary Rogue Trader marine: (broken banner pole, unpainted, resin $3

Bronze Age/Tin Man Mars Miniatures Lot $18

BA Wasteland Mutants 3 and 12, MIB

Tin Man “Incubator” terrain piece

Northstar Ronin $25

(9 figures, unassembled, unpainted without box)

Old Glory Pirates $25

(14 Miniatures, 13 unpainted, one primed black and partially painted). From the Old Glory Army set.

WHAT I WILL CONSIDER IN TRADE:

40K OOP Mordian Iron Guardsmen. I do not want heavy or special weapons. Just Guardsmen with lasguns.

OOP Sentinels (the old style) Like THIS

The long OOP Thunderbolt Mountain “Death’s Door” diorama, by Tom Meier.

Certain Imperial Assault or X-Wing miniatures

I’m also looking to replace some long OOP Middle Earth: The Wizards cards from the ICE Collectible Card Game. If anyone has any of those, I have a short list.

Once again, email me at angrypiper@angrypiper.com if you’re interested in any of this stuff. Or PM me on The Miniatures Page (The Angry Piper).

Thanks for looking!

Imperial Assault Finally Finished! (Sort of…)

I started painting Fantasy Flight Games’ Imperial Assault last year in May. One would think I would have finished this project long ago, but my PADD (Painting Attention Deficit Disorder) constantly worked against me and I found myself juggling many projects at once, none of which were (or are) close to complete. Well, after my last post a couple months back, I decided to buckle down and finish Imperial Assault before doing anything else. My friends were exasperated with me for insisting on playing with painted miniatures, but at long last, the core set and several expansions are done.

Before we dive in, I would like to plug Sorastro’s Painting, a Youtube Channel that details the painting of most of these figures below. For the most part, I followed Sorastro’s method with only minor departures. In addition to Imperial Assault, Sorastro also has tutorials for Zombicide and Descent miniatures. He’s a very good painter with a lot of helpful tips, and the production standards of his tutorial videos are really amazing. Check him out!

First up, the rest of the Imperial Faction. Above are the Nexu, some kind of nasty beastie that I think only appeared in Attack of the Clones. I seem to remember one of them from the arena scene even though I only saw that abysmal movie once. They’re pretty cool sculpts and to be honest, without Sorastro as a guide, my Nexu would have likely looked like crap. I like them now, though.

Up next are the Trandoshan Hunters. Sorastro wanted one of the veterans to be Bossk, and I liked that idea too. (Of course, now there’s a special Bossk expansion figure in the Bespin expansion, but whatever). I chose basic solid colors for the fatigues as I didn’t want to paint camouflage. All in all, I found these guys to be the least fun figures to paint in the core set, but YMMV.

The AT-ST was one of the easiest miniatures to paint, and once again, Sorastro gets the nod as he used a very effective method of washing and wiping to achieve the end colors. He also introduced me to my new favorite paint, GW’s “Typhus Corrosion”. I probably wouldn’t have bought this on my own, but I love the grimy effects it creates. The AT-ST was the only core miniature that I decided to base decoratively, because I thought it would look crappy on a plain gray base.

Our first Expansion Pack, General Weiss. Painted pretty much the same as the AT-ST above. General Weiss is a guy who likes his guns, obviously. Probably that’s because he’s got a bit of a Napoleon complex due to his unfortunate size. His body is so out of scale with the other humanoid figures that I considered building the modified AT-ST and leaving him off it, but in the end I decided to include him. Once again, I put some effort into the base because of the model’s size.

The next Expansion Pack is the bounty hunter, IG-88. Although he’s a popular character, I would have thought Fantasy Flight would have released Boba Fett in the first wave of expansions rather than IG-88. Still, he’s cool and fun and easy to paint, and he looks a lot cooler than using the cardboard token included in the core game.

Finally, the Dark Lord himself. Vader is technically another “Expansion Pack”, but he comes in the core set along with Luke Skywalker. FF probably does this to tempt you into replacing those tokens with actual miniatures (it works.) When painting this miniature, I departed from Sorastro’s tutorial significantly. Not because I didn’t like his result, but because it was too time consuming for me and also a bit daunting. Sorastro highlighted his Vader to death and added some cool lighting effects from the lightsaber, neither of which I wanted to do in order to save time. ( I had already taken enough time to paint this game!!!) His results are much better than mine, but I’m perfectly content with my Darth Vader.

Finally, the Rebel Scum!! From top to bottom, L-R: Mas Esh’karey, Gideon Argus, Jyn Odan, Ghaarkan, Fenn Signis, and Diala Passil. I found Fenn Signis to be the most fun to paint, and Diala the least. Once again, I departed from Sorastro on the lightsaber effects (i.e. I chose not to include them).

Some familiar faces: Luke Skywalker (included in the core game), Chewbacca and Han Solo. Chewbacca was a blast to paint and all three of these miniatures are terrific representations of these iconic characters.

Lastly, some generic Rebel Troopers. These were the last miniatures I painted and they took very little time. Sorastro hasn’t posted a tutorial for them yet, but they were easy to paint based on source material (i.e. Google).

The only wave one miniatures expansions I haven’t bought or painted yet are the Rebel Saboteurs and the Emperor’s Guard Champion, but they can wait. I’ve decided I probably won’t be buying any of the game expansions (like Hoth or Bespin), but I may buy some of the miniatures expansions (like Boba Fett and R2 and 3PO) just to paint them, or perhaps to use in skirmish play.

Now I can finally play the game!

Dead Dick's Tavern and Temporary Lodging

The Angry Piper's miniatures and gaming blog.