Brethern of the Belt: Growing Crew.

Well I finished three of Axel's Lads tonight. These are minis for my "Brethren of the Belt" space pirate army project. These guys are fron the crew of the "Bloodborn" like Vinnie's Duct Rats I did earlier.

These minis were kitbashed from various GW parts. The one in the center has; the head of a Chaos Marauder Horseman, Torso and Backpack of a Tau Firewarrior, Legs from a Catacan Jungle Guard, arms from the Empire Militia set, and a Dark Eldar rifle.

Here they are standing in with "Vinnie's Duct Rats" who are all from the Urban War militia box. The Urban War minis are slightly smaller scale but that's ok because Vinnie's guys represent younger new recruits and Axel's lads represent regular crew.

New Ships for the Spaceport!

Well I picked up a couple more ships for my "Spaceport 69" project. The red one is another Marauder Attack Fighter from "The Corps" line of toys. I used the same toy to create "The Skip Tracker" last year. I've been able to find these fairly consistently at Wal-Mart. They cost about $7.00 making them cheaper than some standard 28mm miniatures.

The blue ship is "Argost's Jet" from "The Secret Saturdays" toy line by Matel. I assume it is from a cartoon since it has the Cartoon Network logo. I picked this one up on clearance for $11.00 but I think it was originally about $16.00.


I'm basically going to use the same method to convert the Marauder Attack Fighter that I used on the Skip Tracker so I'm not going to go into that here. As you can see there are no landing gear on the Argost Jet. This is the typical problem when dealing with toy space ships and jets.

For some unknown reason there is an odd shaped hole in the back of the starboard side engine. I can't figure out why since there is not extra piece in the box that would fit there and it doesn't look like anything would attach to the ship here either. I'm just going to have to fill it in or cover it up or put something back there that will look logical. Fortunately the ship has an asymmetrical design so that should help make it look better.

As you can see the figures that came with the ship are basically in the 28mm scale range. With those big cannons on the front this ship will be a heavy attack fighter with a crew of 2-3. I'm thinking of adding it to my space pirate force because it looks kinda menacing but my daughter likes it a lot so I may let here use it for her own character in the setting.

Axel's Lads

Well it's been two years since I made any progress on my space pirate army but I'm finally starting to get some more things done for it. Axel's Lads here are more of your regular pirate crew type miniatures. I made these guys entirely out of Games Workshop plastic kits. I think there are parts from the; Catacan Jungle Guard, Caidian Shock Troops, Empire Militia, Knights of the White Wolf sprue, Tau Firewarriors, Dark Eldar, Eldar weapon sprue, Chaos Marauder Horseman, and Caidian heavy weapons sprue.

I'm pretty happy with the way they are turning out considering they were made from left over kits. Keep watching this space for more progress.

"Resident Evil Hunters" Episode 3 "Unfettered"

July 24th 1998 Raccoon City. Anya Fields and Meredith Hartwick of “Hartwick and Fields Investigations” are at their downtown office. It's mid morning when a woman walks in. She introduces herself as Victoria Sanchez a reporter from the “Raccoon City Times”. Sanchez explains that she had received a package from Eddy Williams about dangerous and illegal experiments being conducted by the Umbrella Corporation. She also says that Eddy told here than the investigators had helped him get the information. Unfortunately her editor wanted more if he were going to risk going up against Umbrella. Miss Sanchez found another lead. An Umbrella employee who claimed to have solid information about seriously illegal activities by Umbrella. His name was Tyler Norton and he was hiding in a family hunting cabin in the Arklay Mountains. Miss Sanchez offers the investigators $3000.00 if they will help her find Norton's cabin and get the information. Hartwick and Fields agree.

After a flat tire and making a few wrong turns Hartwick, Fields, and Sanchez finally find the cabin. Unfortunately it took much longer to find than expected and it's almost nightfall when they arrive. They cautiously approach the small cabin.

Sanchez knocks on the door and a young man with an automatic rifle opens it. The man looks frightened. “Are you Sanchez?” the man ask. Sanchez introduces herself as well as the investigators. The man introduces himself as Tyler Norton an employee of the Umbrella Corporation. Norton explains that he was hired by Umbrella as a dog handler. He took the job thinking he would be doing security work but after signing a non disclosure agreement he found out it was for another reason. Umbrella began experimenting on dogs by administering them something called the T-virus which cause the dogs to mutate into larger killing machines. They called these creatures MA-39 Cerberus. Norton was frightened by this work but more frightened of what would happen to him if he tried to quit his job after seeing what he had see. He had also heard rumors that Umbrella has experimented on humans with the virus which turned them into mindless “zombies”. A few weeks ago the Umbrella Corporation managed to secure a timber wolf from Alaska. They named the wolf Fenrir and it was their intention to infect it with the t-virus and turn it into a super Cerberus. Norton decided he had to do something. He gathered all the information he could about the Cerberus project and broke Fenrir out of the kennels and hid him at the cabin.
Norton continues to explain that last night the cabin was attacked by “zombies”. Fenrir broke his chains and attacked them. Though he killed several it appeared he became infected. Fenrir attacked the cabin but ran off after hearing some howling coming from the surrounding hills. Norton fears the zombies and Fenrir might come back at any time.
Sanchez looks over the evidence that Norton recovered from the Umbrella labs. She's excited that it look like good evidence.

The group prepares to leave the cabin but when they look outside they see several groups of individuals who appear to be stumbling towards the cabin. Norton says "Damn they are back. Kill them!".

The creatures approach the cabin in four group from several different directions. One group seems to be cutting the humans off from their car. Everyone inside the cabin readies their weapons and takes up positions at the windows. After dealing with the creatures at the farm and Kruger's lab Hartwick and Fields have packed a formidable arsenal. Fields readies her AK-47, Hartwick loads her 12 gauge pump action shotgun with slugs, Norton takes up a position with his rifle and even Sanchez is given a Colt 1911.

Hartwick takes up a position at the door. Fields and Norton take up positions at the window. Everyone starts shooting at the creatures.

Several of the creatures fall but other simply shrug off the shots. Fields seems to be having the most luck with her AK.

Despite several creatures being shot down the rest stumble on oblivious of the fates of the others. Sanchez gets into the fight shooting out the back window at a group of zombies but her shots are wild and untrained so she has no luck.

Eventually some of the creatures reach the cabins front door and back window. Hartwick tries to fend them off with her shotgun but finds it harder to hit with the creatures clawing and biting at her. The creatures at the back window attack Sanchez but have a hard time reaching her through the window.

Fields and Norton manage to take out the rest of the creatures converging on the cabin with well placed rifle shots. Hartwick at Sanchez manage to avoid injury fighting off the creatures but do little damage themselves.

A maddening howl is heard even above the gunfire and fighting. It seems Fenrir has found his way back to the cabin. Fenrir charges towards the cabin and unlike the creatures he is very fast.

With the help of Norton and Fields, Hartwick managed to kill several of the creatures attacking her.

Fenrir charges past Sanchez's car and into the open. Norton and Fields pour fire into the infected wolf and score some impressive hits but the beast just keep coming.

Fenrir closes the distance between the car and the cabin with astounding speed but just as it looks like he will make it Fields hits the beast right between his eyes nearly blowing it's head clean off. The massive wolf falls just one leap from the window that Fields and Norton had been shooting from.

With Fenrir destroyed Hartwick, Fields, and Norton manage to clean up the rest of the creatures attacking the cabin in short order. Sanchez runs over and starts taking pictures of the dead wolf.

After finishing off the last zombie Fields is the last to emmerge from the cabin her AK smoking from the barrel and foregrip with a nearly empty magazine.

With all the creatures dead the survivors are able to get to Sanchez's car safely. Sanchez is confident that her editors will finally let here write a story exposing Umbrella's illegal activities.

Note: This was the third episode of my Resident Evil campaign usign the Savage Worlds rules.

Family Zombie Painting

The family that paints zombies together stays together. We decided to get some zombies painted over the holiday break.

My daughter is really getting into the spirit of things.

While we were painting I heard a weird noise outside. I went out and found a sheet of 3/4 inch styrofoam insulation laying in the front yard. Aparantly the gods were pleased with out painting and decided to gift us with terrain making materials. I let it set for about an hour then decided to put it in the garrage.

And here is out little zombie hoard. Just a small group so far to add to what we already have for our Resident Evil campaign. Four of these are from RAFM's modern Cuthulu line and three of them are from Reaper's Chronoscope line.

Spaceport 69 Depo 5

Well I'm finally getting a start on my Spaceport 69 project. I've collected several plastic meat trays because of their interesting shape. I've seen people try and make terrain out of similar plastic packages but they often try and use the package for the main part of the sturcture. That's not alway a bad thing when it's well pulled off but a lot of the time it just ends up looking like a painted bit of packaging on the table. I've decided to use them as roofs for the older more industrial buildings in the spaceport.

I'm building the buildings out of foam core. I'm trying to make all the buildings in this project as playable as possible so I'm making interiors for them. The best way to make interiors for buildings is to plan them out first.

After I finished the basic floor plan I picked out a few miniatures to see how they fit in the floor plan. I wanted to make sure I could get at least one figure on an average size base in every room.

After finishing the floor plans I planned out the front, back, and sides. This took a while but planning makes construction easier.

Of course it's always good to check with the experts. My son was giving me advice the whole time.

After I got the outside walls cut out I put the structure together using sticky tack. Sticky tack works great for this but don't leave it on too long or it could get harder to remove.

After I got everything cut out I used sticky tack again to put the entire building together. Of course there is a lot of detailing to do and painting before I can put the building together.

Here is a shot of the interior with a few minis inside. I left the inside walls a bit shorter so I could get to the minis in each room easier.

Next the detailing and painting.

Ol' Roy of the V.F.U.W.

Hey I'm working on a Biker Gang for my Resident Evil campiagn. I'm using Hotwheels bikes and plastic GW minis for the bikers. I'm mostly using Catachan Jungle Fighters and other GW bits for the bikers. Each biker will have a mounted and dismounted version and if everything turns out like I plan I'll be able to remove the mounted bikers from the bikes so I can use the parked bikes as scenery. My curent plan is to just put the riders on the bikes with a little bit of sticky tack so they can be easily mounted and dismounted as the game progresses.

First up is Ol' Roy a frankenmini of GW bits. His body and legs are from the Catachan Jungle Fighter box. His head is from the White Wolves head sprue from the Empire fantasy army. His arms are both from the Militia boxed set for the Empire fantasy army. His right hand and SMG is from the Necromundia boxed set. His left hand mounted version is also from the Empire Militia set.

The way the legs worked out on the mounted version makes it look like he is standing on the bikes pegs which is good because these Hotwheels bikes are way overscale but easy to come by so I'm using them. Honestly they arn't any bigger than the various GW bikes so they don't look that bad with GW figs in my opinion.

Ol' Roy here is part of the V.F.U.W. biker gang or Veterans of Fucked Up Wars. They will be used primarily in my Resident Evil "Hunters" campaign.