Bearded Weirdos Week

It seems like the theme of my blog this week is dudes with beards. Weird. Not the weirdest thing I've ever seen, but not expected. First on deck is my general for the Kharadon Overlord force that is slowly growing on my painting table. This guy is called Brock Manchowder or some such thing - I've forgotten the real name and can't be bothered to use the internet at the moment. He came in a bazillion pieces, but was a lot of fun to paint!

I really dig this wacky cat. I'm not entirely sold on the chainsword,
as that gets a little to 40k for me, but the rest is a lot of fun. 

I painted him in a bunch of subassemblies for ease. I'm not sure
it made much difference, though. I did use him as an excuse to design
and print out some transfers for the runes on his sword and
dirigible. 

I also made sure to ditch the clear plastic stand and replace
it with some heavy gauge wire because hahahaha, you've fooled me
in the past flying stands and I'm not up for THAT kind of bullshit
anymore! Seriously, when someone designs a flying stand for
infantry that doesn't break off, call me.

I also finished up the first unit of Arab spearmen for a new Crusades era army I'm building for Lion Rampant or Crescent and Cross or some other system played in dimly halls that smell of cigars, shattered dreams and pine oil.  These guys were built using Gripping Beast's new plastic set and I'm a little on the fence on this one. Since the poses are supposed to work for archers or spearmen, the poses feel a little wonky to me. Still, the shear amount of guys you get in a box makes it worthwhile I'd venture.

I still need to add some insignia or flair to their shields, but for now they are ready to rock and or roll. 

Finally, a new game popped into my lap at the end of the week called SMOG: The Rise of Moloch by Cool Mini or Not. A friend had backed the Kickstarter and just didn't have the time to paint the set and I had a keen interest in scooping it up. I was a huge fan of the SMOG models when SmartMax introduced them - but being in a much larger scale (75mm if I recall) and being pretty pricey to get my hands on in the States, I had to give them a pass. CMoN has done a really great job of translating the original sculpts to board game pieces, and its a really nice way to get some of a SMOG fix without trying to hunt down the (sadly) out of production original models. 

"Major Disaster, at your service!" The whole SMOG line has a wonderful
wacky Victorian London feel and I'm super jazzed about painting the set up.

Obviously, the detail is less crisp than a metal or resin casting, but I'm
really surprised at how nice these are. 

"What, what; Old Bean?! Steady on!"