A Song of Oaks and Axes

Next Sunday, May 31st, is Little Wars Melbourne, held in picturesque Moorabin Town Hall, home of the gently colour-shifting clock and the mighty car-park mural of might and red-ness.
And at said picturesque Moorabin Town Hall, I shall be running A Song of Oaks and Axes, a participation campaign run using Andrea Sfiligoi's 'A Song of Blades and Heroes' skirmish rules. This is most of the reason the blog has stood idle for so long - I've been hammering away at the terrain and minis required for this noble endeavour. Also, I've been writing up the process for The Campaigner, so it felt a bit like cheating to also include the stuff here. However, once the articles have been published and the event is over, I will revisit the making of elf houses, and very probably make some more Goblin stuff as well. In the mean time, here are some inspirational photographs to inspire you:

The foul goblins of the Flatulent Mountain tribe pour over the river, intent on mischief and lumberjackery!

Here we see the dreaded Goblin missile units, also that I have forgotten to paint the ends of the river sections... curse.

Stalwart Elf warriors defend the sacred pool from Bzak Butt-Scratcher and his scabrous crew.

And here we see my might giant, made from a $2 shop action figure. I have another two similar figures, and will be doing an MFH on the process at some point.

Just a vintage citadel ogre... sharped eyed readers with feet to match will notice he has a modern Ogre club - I bought him on eBay and the seller had removed his classic weapon to use him in Blood Bowl.

Little Wars is the end product of herculean efforts by mighty mortals. You can go and read about their struggles here.
You can discover other events being run by my sinister associates here.

TFH @ LITTLE WARS

This Sunday is Little Wars at Moorabin town hall. Not only will HGC be represented by the might and power of Man Sized Warhammer (12,000 points per side - the game of fantasy battles as played by REAL MEN!), but TFH will also be there with a demo table and to talk about commissions.
According to the map produced by cunning cartographers, I should be right in between the enterences to the main area.

Ishoo Ninty-Wun: Floating Rock Forests

I am reliably informed that the internet's finest creepsters will be gathering for The Dwellers Below's Face/Off tournament on the 24th and 25th. I am also reliably informed that I am making the top table, and that the terrain will be raffled off.

And why should you miss out, simply because you are not enough of a creepster (I'm not sure if this is a good or bad thing to be honest...) to go the Face/Off and win a raffle? Why should you not be able to enjoy the pleassures of floating rock forests in the comfort of your own home? What the hell is a floating rock forest, I hear you cry...

Well, it's a made from an alloy of awesome and win, and it's easy enough for the traditional hippo to make, and it looks the business. What more can you ask?

Cue the Grotletter (because he was dissapointed when the poll came out in favour of SF Generators)!

Note: My Nan does not actually look or talk like this.

And there you have it, hippo fans! Part of a mighty table depicting a landscape rent asunder by powerful magics! A landscape which YOU could win by entering a tournament for internet creepsters (I still don't know if this is a good thing, but I like typing it) and then getting lucky on a raffle! Or you know, make your own.

Anyways, not only will this lot be at Face/Off, but so will I! Not as a player (as noted before, I am Melbourne's reigning supreme champion of Warhammeric incompetence) but to display certain magnificent stuffs, and deliver comission work, and talk to people about them giving me huge amounts of money in return for small things made from insulation materials.

Also Little Wars come to that.

Until next time, hippo fans - remember to ring your mother more often, and commit at least one act of sickening awesome per day.

Little Wars 2013 - Pretty Pictures and Random Ramblings.

     Well, Little Wars is over for another year, and the first participation game I've ever run at a convention is also over.

Hrond! This is before the Matt arrived, so I have my two warbands on display along with a few other things.

     Matt and I ended up running Fanticide twice during the day. The first time I played using the Hagwood Witches while Matt assisted my colleague, Justin, who has never played anything in his life, to lead the Puppets. The second time round, part-time HGC member Aaron (of whom more later) led the Puppets against a nice chap named Ross, and won simply on total souls killed while cheerfully ignoring the scenario objectives.
All the players seemed to enjoy the game, and we got positive comments about the ease of play and fun factor.

Matt doesn't like tipping casualties over, so we used milk bottles and jelly beans for corpses. The idea was to eat them when a unit with the Vice of Hunger ate the bodies, but we didn't end up using any units with that vice.

     We also got positive comments about the terrain, and I even met the designer of the Martian Cephalopod figure I use as the Lord of Rapacity who leads my other warband, the Insatiable.

The Hot Hag and Scarecrow Reapers pour down the bridge of Hrond. That Jellybean was a puppet skirmisher. Now it's a toad thanks to the Hag's spells.

     As to the rest of the convention -
     I didn't get to join in any of the other games. There was one I was very interested in, but they folded it for lack of players while we were running our first Fanticide game... Fortunately it was being run by part-time HGC member Aaron and once-in-every-five-years HGC member Jan, so they've decided to bring it down to HGC and run it there.
     What I did manage to get into was a short Pathfinder RPG demo. Unfortunately, Matt had to leave soon to tend to his sick son, so we adopted a very gung-ho, kick in the door style of play which was at odds with the scenario, and our limited abilities as starter players. I was quickly stabbed into unconsciousness while trying to demonstrate the error of his ways to a drunken sailor (I was playing a female cleric as an evangelist extreme fundamentalist missionary...)
    There were rather a lot of games going on, but I didn't take any photos. Likewise there was many a trader, but I had only limited finances, so I didn't go nuts. That and there was nothing much of the bring and buy table that really got my attention. I did buy some empire state troops (to turn into Skaven Slaves!) a Malifaux Crew, the X-Wing Miniatures Game starter box because it looked insanely cool, and the In Her Magesty's Name steampunk skirmish rulebook.

    Oh - and don't got forgetting to vote in the next people's choice poll. Democracy only works when you participate.

Ishoo Atey Free: The Levitating Islands of Hrond (Part Two)

Welcome back Hippo fans!

Last Ishoo we built the Levitating Islands of Hrond. Now it's time to build a way for your homicidal warbands onto them - the stairs of Hrond!

And as usual, here's Grot to show you how...

 And there you have it Hippo fans! If you want to see how the whole lot looks when you put it together... you'll just have to go to Little Wars!
That or wait for the inevitable convention report.
Don't forget to vote on the ishoo atey-for reader's choic poll at the top of the page. Unless you are some sort of tragically behind the times person reading this in the distant future, in which case, why couldn't you have invented flying cars faster?