Redesigning a Chubby armoured unicorn.

Past few days my mind has fixated ons omething that's bothered me for quite a while now.

Redesigning & re-arming the Rhino.

Ummm... not this one.

Whose game are you playing?

A thing that occurred to me while I was working one one set of rules or another (I forget which one exactly... probably Legions)



Whose game are you playing?

Probably not this one...

It may sound an odd question, but the core of it is, to me:

If you didn't write the rules then you're playing the game (whichever setting it may be Sci-Fi,Fantasy or Historical etc) how somebody else envisages it

 Which, if you are happy with how it's playing is no bad thing.

After all, there's no right or wrong way to enjoy the hobby, despite what some people/companies say. It's not like the Inquisition (Spanish or otherwise) are going to turn up to haul you away to somewhere unpleasant( Like.... say... Leeds...) if you don't play the "right" way..

Honest...

Anyway........ Moving on...

And that, is primarily why I ended up going down the rabbit hole of writing my own rules. I've got a stack of "commercial" rules, ranging back to the 80's, and to me - every single one has a varying level of "Things I don't like about it".

As you've seen, if you read my old blog:

Here, Here, Here, Here, Here, Here, Here, Here aaaaand Here. 

I had opinions back then, and tried to fit them in with the ruleset(s) we were playing then.
It kinda worked, but each change ended up needing more tweaking, which led into more tweaking, which ... well... you end up eating your own tail in the end.

Eventually we just went from scratch - that way I'd be playing what I want to play, or more accurately how I wanted to play and how I saw things working in the settings and force lists.

I mean, the very first set of rules that I remember writing was something i called "Oilwar" - Memory is fuzzy, as I was only just in double digits, and this year I hit a half century but, looking back through the mists of time 

Not just misty, but probably rose-tinted as well

 

it was a simple square based board game about capturing oil wells... I think :)

 Nowadays -  there's several. I'm just not sure if I'm going to put them online or not - having had some 3d stuff I posted a while back pinched and claimed as their own.. I'll admit - I'm a bit reticent to share again.

But at the same time - If I share it, it may give others ideas for their own games.

It's certainly a quandry.

In any case - if you're happy with what you're playing don't let anyone tell you otherwise. At the same time, never be afraid to try new things - some things might be more "what you want to play" than others, and unless you're playing in tournaments - remember:
Backgrounds are not rule specific. You can play whatever ruleset you want with whatever back ground and figure (or even counters) you want.

Or more accurately - Play your game. Regardless of the form it takes, and remember - Have fun.

15mm Sons of Horus colours

 SO, back on the old blog, one of the resurrected posts I did before moving over here was about choosing colour schemes for 15mm Horus Heresy Legions.

 At the time, I couldn't decide on a colour for the Sons of Horus, so ended up deciding to go with/settle for my second choice - The Death Guard.

 

However... my brain Decided to hyper-focus on the Sons of Horus. The joy of Adhd!

Yeah... It's kinda like this sometimes

I tried a different xpress/quick turquoise - In this case AK Quick Gen Turquoise Green.

A similar to-but-slightly-more-intense, and a little more grey (only it's... not) colour than Xpress Heretic Turquoise

(And... I've realised.... I am terrible at spelling turquoise! thanks gods for spell check)

Didn't quite work. but it did give me an idea for a different legion.

A bit more researched suggested I was going the wrong way - the Sons of Horus Green to my eyes, is more of a grey-green with a hint of turquoise.

"Sons Of Horus Green Colour Swatch"

 

Green.

Turquoise.

 

Well... I dunno about your eyes... but I'm seeing 3 different colours here.

So. in the end I went sod it. It's described as sons of Horus GREEN, described in the novels as pale GREEN, and the artwork is older then the mini and the paint colour any how (And yes.. I know the amount of retconning in the setting is a bit bonkers but still.....)

I'm going for a greenish, aiming to match the artwork.

Oddly, it only took an evening... and a fair few test models - I tend, at the moment to use some 15mm Vietnam-era marines from 3d breed: as paint test dummies as they have a lot of texture, and I'm replacing them with a stronger resin.

And a few mixes:

Paint!

Incidentally - the palette I use is actually a fidget toy... but being silicone the paint doesn't stick and peels off easily when you pop it out after it's dried.

Eventually, I settled on a mix that I liked. And yeah.. i know this aint the best photo... and a couple of the bits of sepia over the gold studs were still wet... but eh...

Tiny Test Heretic!

Its a little greener in the flesh (crap white balance on my phone) so to speak, but it's good compromise in any case.

I think the key thing was realising it's actually a grey-green, which is handy, as WW2 German uniforms were a greyish-green, which Vallejo do in xpress as Landser Grey. But.. that wasn't quite grey enough.

However, it's ALL XPress paints - which was one of the main aims of the exercise.
The recipe being:


    6:2:1:1 Space Grey : Landser Grey: Black Lotus : Heretic Turquoise


 

6 parts this

2 parts this

1 part this

1 part this

And bosh. you've got the colours for a very naughty legion indeed using just Vallejo Xpress that I'll be using for 15 & 6mm.

I mean.. this covers both Horus and Lorgar really....

New Blog, New (re)start

 Well. New blog, newish start.

Only not so much - it's more a reinvention of my old blog given the way things have changed with my older Blog  Life in a warped reality

The idea is going to be more about what I'm doing with painting, modelling and gaming, rules discussions, theories and scenarios.

I'm also sill up in the air as to whether or not I want to put the rulesets I've written / am writing on here or somewhere like wargame vault...

But my thoughts on that are probably good fuel for a future post.


In a way, this is good timing a recent game has managed to inject new life into our gaming, and again... the reasons behind that may be the subject for a post in & of itself.


Still, I'm off to get some modelling done for our 15mm Horus Heresy project.


Watch this space - I'll be updating various links and favorites shortly.