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Wargears - the race is on!

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Finishing Scraptember with a bang, here are a couple of shots from one of our recent playtests of Wargears , the wacky racing game set in the grim darkenss of the war-torn future. This time we played a simple, single lap, four vehicle race.  The photo above, taken during the first bound of the race, shows Tiny Dancer out in front. Tiny Dancer is a wargear with the walker, rapid fire guns and Texas Tea mods. Big Boy ,  the green tank, has the heavy chassis, tracked and turret mods, while White-out , about to accelerate away from the start line, is hovering and has the Beep-beep turbo booster and Go Fasta stripes mods. Poor old Cheesus had already stalled and was struggling to restart his engine despite having the fusion reactor, Velocity Injected Nitro (V.I.N.) Deisel, and stasis bomb mods. As Tiny Dancer and Big Boy exchanged shots, Cheesus finally got his act together, accellerated and carried out a hard turn to sneak through on the inside. Meanwhile, White-out was way out ...

Scraptember - interactive terrain (and other bits and bobs)

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For the final terrain post of Scraptember we have various interactive terrain elements for Wargears , and other assorted odds and ends. The ramp/jump is mostly a 3D design by Gypsydanger , available on Thingiverse. However, wanting to incorporate more ancient remains, I amended the .stl to include the head of a Severan lady (probably the Roman empress Julia Mamaea) created with photogrametry from a statue in the small museum at Nemea in Greece. The tank trap is from Martin's 3D Studio . These pieces of terrain are actually two phases of the same piece of on-track ephemera for Wargears . Starting as a stack of boxes (designed by  Mkbasas01 , available on Thingiverse), if a wargear collides with it, it turns into a spead of rough track - here depicted with cut up parts of the same animal box with giant rad-coons ( Warp Miniatures racoons) escaping from them. Various explosive bits and bobs: on the left are some explosive barrels designed by SableBadger ; top right are some 'spa...

90s nostalgia - Inquisitor Immaculata's recon platoon for 2nd ed 40K

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I've recently been pottering away in the background, fleshing out my (mostly) 2nd edition Warhammer 40K Space Marine scouts. I now have a 1,000 point reconnaissance platoon consisting of three scout squads, a chaplain, and a wee inquisitorial team - almost a multiverse version of Jaq Draco, Grim and Meh'Lindi. Inquisitor Brigid Immaculata, with her Callidus Assassin-consort who's name shall remain unspoken, and their pet ratling sniper, Thumper McMuckstart. The inquisitor herself is a 1998 Sisters of Battle cannoness with a rocking gesture of benediction hand-swap. I bought her thinking she was 2nd ed., but of course she is actually early 3rd edition (by which stage I had stopped playing 40k). As a 90s miniature, she still fits the bill for my wee platoon. The Imperial Gueard special character, Thumper (Mc)Muckstart is a 1989 Rogue Trader ratling. I already have this mini, converted into a shotgunner for my Flores Minor Rangers Corps , but this time I left him whole and un...

Scraptember - scatter terrain 3

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This Scraptember post showcases more scatter terrain - this time it's all barricades baby! These are both by SableBadger , available on Thingiverse. These are both by SableBadger , available on Thingiverse. The concrete barriers are by SableBadger , available on Thingiverse. The tank trap blocks are free downloads from Martin's 3D Studio . 

Scaptember - scatter terrain 2

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Scraptember continues with more scatter terrain for Scraptown - this time its billboards and shipping containters. The two billbords were designed by koinsatx , adapted from originals by SableBadger , both of which are available on Thingiverse.  Like the posters, the billboard advertisements were just knocked together quickly at home. One is obviously just Irregular Wars propaganda, while the other was done up using Photoshop and photos of some of the vehicles I've already created for Wargears . The original shipping comntainer above was created by SableBadger , while the damaged version below was adapted by Iroschek . Both are available on Thingiverse. The wee crab featured in the posters and the grafitti is Cribilo. He's the player-character of an 8-bit platform game being created by my son as part of his Duke of Edinburgh award, so he's rather a big deal in our household!

Song of Shadows and Dust: Kymmes is on the Case

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Join Mark as he returns to Pattayavium for another episode of Song of Shadows and Dust . There is a problem with pickpockets in the streets of Pattayavium. It wouldn’t matter too much if it affected only the lower orders, but some prominent citizens have found themselves unexpectedly without cash at embarrassing moments, and they and some of the traders and merchants have petitioned the Prefect for more effective enforcement action. The thief-taker Kymmes and his underlings have been ordered to initiate a crackdown. Pattayavium loves a crackdown. Still does. Here they are (Photo #1). L to R: Kymmes Q3 C3; Determined, Disarm, Leader, Stealth. Luke & Solon Q4 C3; Bellicose. In fact, unknown to almost everyone, most of the crime is attributable to Sulpicious and his gang of professionals. But it seems they are becoming too successful. Kymmes gets a tip-off that Helios Street would be a good place to stake out, around the Ides of the month when a religious festival will bring even more...

Scaptember - scatter terrain 1

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Continuing with Scraptember, we have the first batch of scatter terrain. These originated in a collection of barrels and crates scaled to 15mm ranges that were given to me by my good mate, Andrew, quite a few years ago when I was exploring a 15mm sci-fi project. However, a box is a box, and a canister is a canister, so they have all made there way into my 28mm terrain. The smaller 'wooden' boxes are resin, the other crates and barrels etc are all metal. I'm afraid I've no idea who manufactured them. This centrepiece is built around a print of a 3D scan of some 19th century statue fragments that we have in Ballycastle Museum. Here I wanted to give the impression that Scraptown was built over the ruins of something much, much older and it's something that carries through various other terrain pieces in the collection as well.  The posters are from a batch that I made up to try and make the town seem lived in. Again, they repeat across various bits and pieces to help b...

Scraptember - Scraptown buildings

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In the process of designing Wargears , the wacky racing game set in the grim darkness of a war-torn future, I have accumulated a nice little collection of post-apocalyptic/sci-fi terrain which has long been over due. Most of the pieces have been 3d printed from freely available .stl files found on Thingiverse, and so the financial investment has been reletively minor. Over the course of the month, I'd like to showcase some of it, and give a shout out to the awesome creators out there. First up we thave the buildings. This 'orky building' was designed by  Terrain4Print , available on Thingiverse. Given it's robust structure, size and the battlements, I like to think that maybe it's the guard house or sheriff's station in Scraptown. The 'Shack' was designed by ThunderChrome , available on Thingiverse. When ptinting this one I missed one of the files that come with it which includes extra side panels and a chimney, so it all looked a bit strangely open and ...