The Halfmen of Westfalia!

"For the Shire!.. err... wait! For the Moot!... eh.. that's not right... For Snacks and Comfies! That's better."

Geez, it looks like four years ago I backed a small Kickstarter for some 28mm Halfling miniatures from Westfalia Miniatures. When I got my tiny pledge (literally - I only ordered a unit or two) I was a bit crestfallen because I hadn't realized they would be resin casts instead of metal. I put them on the back burner of my project list and when I discovered a friend had also backed the KS, I "gifted" mine to him in a clever ploy to get them the hell off my desk. But he realized that he'd never get around to them in his queue and the scallywag turned around and gave me mine back along with his! Dastardly.

Well, I guess I finally got a wild hair up my ass to paint them so I've put together a small army of them. I plan on using them for Dragon Rampant or as proxies in Warhammer Age of Sigmar. The sculpts were very obviously inspired by the old Warhammer Imperial Halflings of the Moot, so I like to imagine a little piece of the Old World spun off during the apocalypse and now the chubby little fellas are furiously defending themselves in a new nightmare reality.

The General, Philip "The Black" Wooltoes.
"Dost Thou Wish to Live Deliciously?!" is his battle-cry.

Cassandra Gentlebosom, seer and diviner, adds some
magical punch to the army.

The Knights of The Third Order of Breakfast  are the greatest of all time.

The Shirewardens patrol the edges of the Halfling lands, ready to battle intruders at a moment's notice!

The flashing blades of the swordmen of the Jack Rabbit Company are deadly to both foes and dinner parties.

The stalwart halberdiers of the Brotherhood of the Last Leg will fight until the end of any battle. Or until supper. Whichever comes first.

Robert the Hood and his Rapacious Rapscallions stand ready to waylay any un-guarded baggage trains they find. 

Professor of Gunology, Schmendrake Thistlebottom, guides the army's
artillery train.

A Heckblaster Volleygun is ready to send any marauding chaos worshippers straight
to the Hot Place!

In order to finish these guys as an Age of Sigmar Army, I've got to paint up an Endless Spell for them and they'll be around 1000 points. Everything in here is a proxy for Freeguild units ( Freeguild General, Battlemage, Gunmaster, 2 units of Guard, Archers, Helblaster Volleygun, Knights of Order, and Outriders), so it'll all port over easily. This has been a fun little army (EH?! GET IT?!?!?!) to knock out, and I'm pretty pleased with them. I'm sure they will get murdered in games, but that's kinda the point I guess. 

Cheers!

Armored Might!

"2019 is the year I get serious about adding some armor." I sent that text to a buddy that I play the Horus Heresy against a while back and now it seems like I'm trying to make good on that promise. This week, I built and painted a Sicaran Battle Tank to add to my Imperial Fists. I've always liked the look of the Sicaran - it hits a lot of the design beats of the Land Raider, while maintaining a sleek, predatory look all its own. And it'll add a ton of firepower to the army.

A Tactical Squad Sergeant gives some idea of the scale of the Sicaran.

The kit was a pretty easy build. The only real issues I had was some of the resin where the massive feed gates on the tracks were cut off left two areas that weren't totally cured. I simply cut some plasticard and covered over these areas - easy peasy. Otherwise, the rest of the kit was a dream. Very little warping to correct, and reasonably tight fits otherwise. 

I tried to keep the tank pretty simple - its very easy to go nuts with weathering and chipping. I wanted to still have a nice bright yellow visible at the end.

After initial assembly - leaving the turret as a separate piece until the end - I undercoated the whole thing with Model Master's Afrika Mustard spray. Then I did a few coats of thinned down GW Yriel Yellow sprayed through an airbrush.

The longest part of the paint job was having to put several thin layers of black over the areas I wanted to cover. I usually don't mind 2 thin coats, but to get a really solid black over yellow it took at least 4 to 5 coats. Which was tedious as hell.

I really can't wait to get this thing on the battlefield. 

Next on deck is a pair of Rhino APCs to give me some mobility. I'll be approaching them the same way and can't wait to have a real armored element available for my army.

Cheers!

Big and Tall and Short and Plump

I missed updating last week, but this week has seen some good progress on my painting desk. I've got a bunch of diverse stuff I'm chewing my way through - Adeptus Titanicus stuff, a copy of Blackstone Fortress, a fantasy Halfling army, more High Elves and some other odds and ends that need doing. First on deck is a second Warlord Titan for my War Griffons Legion.

The complete force.

The second Warlord amps up the total game size I can play, and brings some much needed diversity to the weapons systems I can deploy. I've still got a second plasma cannon arm to paint, but I will probably do that in colors for my Legio Mortis force so they have some more options.

Clamor Aquilae - The Eagle's Cry - brings its massive firepower to the battlefield.

View of the plasma cannon and carapace lasers.

The other arm has a mighty power fist, ready to crush the foes of the Emperor.

If you follow me on Twitter (@Cwalton73), you've probably been watching me chip away at a bunch of Halfling models from Westfalia Miniatures for last week or two. These sculpts are just full of tons of character - which helps because the amount of air bubbles, mould shift and tear out on these resin casts is atrocious. Nevertheless, I'm hell-bent on getting a little army of them done. I figure I can use them as Freeguild (once known as The Empire) in Warhammer: Age of Sigmar or just stat them out for Lion/Dragon Rampant. I still needed to purchase a few figures to complete the army, but according to their site Westfalia can take up to sixty days to complete an order. So, who knows when I'll be seeing those models? In the meantime, here's an army shot of where I'm at so far. 

For the Shire! Or the Moot! Or what-ever!

With the titan done and the Halflings a bit stalled, I'm probably going to focus on knocking out the Blackstone Fortess box set this week. 

Cheers!