Gallery – Page 36 – An Archive For The Steinberg Shed Space Blog

Scenery, Storage And The Thought I Might Have Too Much Stuff.

I have been photographing lots of new miniatures lately for the Steam Wars game we have been developing. Those miniatures have been arrayed on the new scenery I have currently set up in the shed.

It is a very large and beautiful 3 foot by 4 foot table of rivers and cliff faces. Rope bridges are used to traverse the various canyons and are made from string and matchsticks. Trapdoors and tunnels are to be found all over the table and can be used with minimal house ruling to traverse the battlefield.

A labour of love from another gamer so I cannot claim any credit for this wonderful set. I can however, gain great joy from using it. I will get a lot of use from this set and just need to get it stored away safely as it is more fragile than my own creations. This set is made from fragile Oasis (flower arranging foam) and painted with spray and paints that, although creating a hard crust to the foam, do leave it easily damaged.

At this time my second shed (yes I have two sheds) is being tidied so that racking can be made up for these pieces to be boxed and stored on.

Not only did I manage to get the river board from this seller, but he also had a cavernous table that needed a new home. This one is more prescriptive in the way it can be played and is likely to need some minor changes and additions to allow easy, more flexible use. It is however, an example of what a very creative mind can achieve with only simple materials and some effort… A mind more creative than mine.

Steam Wars – Game On, A Win And The New Scenery.

So with the Navy almost finished we decided to get our next Steam Wars playtest done. After a number of stalled attempts to get together we managed to meet up in the shed for a game and a catch up. Coronasan was all setup with an army list for each of us (written when I had only one unit painted up so supplemented with his new redcoated marines). It was the first time he fielded his own Prussian Scrunts so we were both trying new things.

I had just picked up some new scenery from a talented terrain builder on eBay, who was selling off his old games collections and down sizing. I managed to fill the back of my car with about 8 boxes of scenery and other bits for a very modest sum (I suspect he just wanted them to go to a good home). More on the scenery later though…

I set up on the left of the cliff sides and took the high ground for my large cannon (no tractor was needed or likely to be any use in such tight terrain…) My mixed ratings and marines arrayed ready to provide a firing line against any opposing troopers.

The Scrunt elites – flying assault troopers (I think they should be called FAT boys) were set to rush me from just outside my firing range. This they achieved, killing all but one man, before moving on to their next target. My men on the lower levels went on overwatch to get a few shots in on them as they sped by.

As one flank weakened my other flank pushed forward. Roller bots teetered on the cliff edges as they moved to fire on the Prussian heavy troopers and armoured walker. My Marines prepared to advance as well as they would have to cross 2 rivers to move towards the plain in the centre of the battlefield.

As the advance continued the Prussian FAT boys moved to neutralise my cannon as it had had a run of very effective fire and whittled down 2 of the Prussian units.

Whilst all this was happening the Prussian command unit was stealthily creeping along the blind cliffs to later appear on my flank.

Once they appeared they set about shooting from their elevated position down on my ratings and marines.

Thankfully though, my marines held their nerve and prepared to fire a number of volleys back at them finally finishing them off as the remaining troopers were being dealt with on the other flank.

All in all the fire power of the navy troopers list worked better than the more close combat oriented Prussian list on this table.

A good game and a great chance to iron out a few wrinkles in the rules. These rules are now a four page, simple, fast play set that allows a lot of flexibility in army choice and game style.

We trialled a simple, card based, mission deck during this game. It is designed to generate multiple objectives to be achieved throughout the game and those objectives change as others are completed. As I develop this mission deck it will be enlarged from its current 26 cards to a more varied 40 or so cards. These are designed to be fairly universal and should be usable with any game with only minor deck changes. More on that later…

Steam Wars – A Flexible Little Force

So with the first of the infantry finished, and a couple of guns and robots also done, I have a quite versatile force now ready for small games.

I need to finish a few more crew members so that the guns have enough men to haul them about. In the sort term though, I can field the guns with the sergeant or officer to sit in as spare crewmen if I need to add a few more bodies.

Although I have no vehicles as such, a couple of the boats, that were kindly donated to the force by Veganman, will do nicely if we play on a beach head or plan to play a river fight. If I do want to take my naval force onto the land, I will need to work some more vehicles into the force (somewhat difficult for a naval force). I do, however, have some cunning plans to make my boats more usable in land based fights. So watch this space…

The one true vehicle in the force is my artillery tractor and its tows. Currently it remains uncrewed, but it should be fully manned within the next few days…

Steam Wars – Infantry Is Almost All Done

Only one of the Black Pyramid infantry units is left to paint, and to add a bit of interest I am painting up some random character types too.

The last unit are getting normal rifles and an aether weapon support. The characters are what looks like a stern naval sergeant by the hard set jaw and stance. The officer type is an old chap with lots of experience and confidence visible in that upright posture.

All done, and arrayed in their dress uniforms, they look very clean. Not my usual painting style, but it is a nice change for me to paint something without then washing everything in ink.

Next up some more from Black Pyramid. This time their large artillery gun and tractor. This should get some paint on it (battleship Grey) next time I find time to hide in the shed. I suspect that this will get a heavy ink wash to make up for all the clean lines I’ve had to put up with:-)

Steam Wars – Testing Is Over And The Painting Starts In Ernest.

With the test model now supported by his 4 friends it is time to roll out the same paint job to some other units. For my first batch of figures I have a second infantry unit (this time with normal rifles) a small carriage gun, with more crew than it probably needs, and 2 rollerball robots.

I have decided, as a naval force, they would be likely to have plenty of Battleship Grey paint to hand. Therefore, all their vehicles will be painted in this colour, to contrast nicely with the white of the infantry.

The tall mechanical roller robots are Lead Adventure Predator Steam Robots.

The field gun and crew are from Tiger Miniatures Balkan Wars range.

The Infantry are all Black Pyramid Tea Wars miniatures.

Its a small force to start with but we hope to get a game in very soon to try them out. I think Coronasan’s Navy Marines may be deployed in support to add some more man power to the first force.

The basing helps to blend the robots and gun in with the rest of the force but I may need to get some beach scenery done too or they will look like they still have sand on their boots while walking in green fields…

Steam Wars – First Unit.

First unit now done and the basing has grown on me. Not only because it is so quick and easy but also because the colour matches the deck of a couple of boats I have sitting ready for use in our Steam Wars games.

I am using 5 man units in Steam Wars as it is a small unit game not needing huge units. One specialist and four rifles (automatic rifles in this case).

Black pyramid sells Aether weapons packs for a couple of quid that serve as any number of rayguns or high calibre launchers.

These proved quite quick to paint up as the undercoat is the base colour… Only 3 more units to go in this batch then on to the new range when it arrives.

Naval Steam Wars Test Model.

I have started a test piece for the new Steam Wars force I have been planning. White uniforms are my plan, with simple contrasting details. I have used simple sand (think golden beaches) for the base. This will be used across the army to allow the basing to help bring the force together, and look more like a planned collection.

I used a light grey wash to get some texture on the white uniform. I almost always paint in dark colours as this is more forgiving than lighter, brighter tones. I don’t think it is needed though as the wash is almost invisible when finished.

The contrast of battleship grey, and a couple of tans and browns, helps to add interest without being too much. A dash of light blue is also a nice addition.

The basing is very plain, so when I get a couple done I will review the overall look and decide what else I need to do.

All in all, I am happy so far… Next up a completed unit.

Frostgrave Round Three

Even though I have started a new painting project, I still want to get a few games in. The Frostgrave table has now been setup for a couple of weeks and we have played it a fair bit. One thing about the game that I cannot complement enough is the potential to roam everywhere on the game board or table. Roof tops and walls are all fair game.

So, as I cannot yet field a table of ruins and multi level terrain, we tried to get things more mobile by taking the roof of each building and adding a few walkways between them.

It looks a bit odd at first but if I ever get to paint the walkways (perhaps a quick shade of ink would do to weather them) they will fit in more with the remainder of the board.

The addition of the walkways makes a game move upwards as treasure then gets placed everywhere and anywhere.

A couple of the walkways are steep slopes so some balsa strips to allow bases to hold their position fixes the issue of tumbling miniatures when the table gets a gentle knock.

As usual in Frostgrave, I lost my Apprentice to a foolish charge into combat. Again, I rolled a 1 in the post game recovery phase, meaning he was dead and I would need to spend another 300+ gold to get my self a replacement crew member…

To commemorate one of Veganman’s barbarians completing a truly glorious rampage through my crew, I rewarded him with a new coat of paint.

The figure killed off 3 or 4 of my folks whilst unpainted. Who knows how this new paintjob will affect his prowess.

What Is On The Workbench.

So, the desk has been a bit untidy lately. With so many small jobs to do it was time for a tidy up and to inventory my on-going projects. Small warband, skirmish style, games have been popular lately and provide quick and easy projects that can be completed quickly. With most of these now finished it is time to move on to larger jobs.

My Steam Wars army is ready for undercoating and in need of a bit of my time or I will never get started on it. I want to keep it simple as a paint job so dress uniforms in white should be effective and quick to complete.

I have decided to try basing them after painting, as I normally base before undercoating. We will see how well that comes out later I guess. Most of the infantry is Black Pyramid Naval ratings. They have some new naval ranges out soon so I will pick some up to bulk out the force with other differing poses later.

The guns and vehicles will break up the painting process a little as I plan to do an infantry unit and then either a vehicle or gun at each sitting to vary things a bit. Just in case I get a bit negative about painting so many little men in all the same colours.

The last of the Frostgrave bits to get finished, before the navy marathon starts, were these dinosaurs. All I did was base them as their paint job was already better than anything I could ever hope to achieve…

Yes Coronasan, your gentle prompting to get the navy stuff on the table has worked well…

Frostgrave Round Two

Photographing games has become rather erratic lately, due to so many new rule sets (and older ones which we are relearning). I did get game two of Frostgrave on film though.

We trialled the Mausoleum mission for this game, as the inclusion of wandering monsters would be a fun addition to the basic rules.

Its a simple treasure hunt, with the added problem of skeletons popping up every so often to protect the central building.

But as we didn’t have any skeletons some dinosaurs would have to do as stand in models. We used skeleton stats and rules but these rather nice children’s toys (available from Toys R Us) based up for some war gaming fun.

The monsters added an interesting aspect that affected the game to a larger degree than expected. Instead of focusing on attacking each other, we spent a lot of the game avoiding the monsters and trying to get the treasure off the table. Meaning we did not have so many crewmen killed during the game.

One admission though. Although I have said in the past that the game is balanced, if we don’t rush in, but plan our attacks.

Sadly (or foolishly) I have had my apprentice killed in every game that I have played so far… And in the post game injury rolls he has never recovered… I am on my 4th apprentice so far…

Maybe I will learn (unlikely).