Which is Your Stripper of Choice?

Good evening followers of Papa Nurgle and thank you for joining me once again in our little corner of disease and rot. Recently I have found myself in possession of a few models which are in good condition but I would much rather paint them myself to tie in with their friends.

Now normally I have been using original Dettol as my weapon of choice with it doing me proud in the past, and Simple Green which seems so popular across the pond is not widely available here in the UK. However while on my trip out to pick up a bottle ( never a dull moment ) I remembered an article written by Karitas over on Excommunicate Tratoris ( which if you haven't paid a visit to I highly recommend you do ).

The article was about a couple of plastic dreadnoughts he had stripped back to the primer using Fairy Power Spray ( a kitchen degreaser ) and how it was quick, effective and more importantly didn't make the paint transform into sticky ooze.
So to give it a try with as little risk as possible I threw in a metal model. Originally it was going to be my Tomb King model I will use represent my Tomb Prince but decided on my reaper Finari model I picked up last year for a spot of Warhammer Quest which died out quickly when our DM got bored, though hopefully in the next few weeks a new DM is planning to take up the challenge.

She hasn't turned out bad for a test subject

This model was originally primed and painted but not sealed with any kind of varnish. Within an hour I could see spots of bare metal though I gave it 24 hours time in a jar and started clean up by running it under the tap. Surprisingly this took care of the paint which was exposed and only required minimum work to clean out the nooks and crannies. Within a few minutes I had her back to a cleaner standard than I have achieved with Dettol and wasn't covered in ooze or had any nasty reactions.
 
On a serious note I did strip a large biscuit tins worth of marines two years ago using neat Dettol without wearing gloves and for six weeks after my hands peeled every time they got wet . This was not a pleasant experience and did cause them to be uncomfortable for this time, so please make sure you always take precautions when working with any type of chemical, even ones you have used for years as a cleaner and think are harmless.  

Overall I am happy with the ease in which I was able to get these results and I have since throw in a couple of heavy painted models which seemed to be stripping nicely with a little stir now and then.

So my question to you is "Which is your stripper of choice and why?"

O'Shashar

Hello, I'mmmmmm back! (Re-cap of my last two weeks).

Salutations fellow plague spawn of Papa Nurgle. I apologise for the lack of posts from myself the last 2 weeks. As I last said I was away on holiday for 9 days. Now obviously I haven't done much on my Orc and Goblin horde for my tale of three gamers. Being away was one reason and the second was getting hold of the awesome game Space Marine, which has taken up all my time. I should get back to painting the Orcs soon as they are giving me nasty looks shouting "C'mon 'umie we darez ya to paint uz!"


Anyway, as I have mentioned one reason why I do not have a further update on my Orc and Goblin horde is that I have just completed Space Marine. I am thoroughly pleased I pre-ordered it as it is a really good game, but the ending unfortunately is a complete anti climax. Again if you haven't seen my review of the demo then I would suggest having a read if you are in two minds. I will add to my review that the full game itself is fantastic, their are all sorts of fluff and actual models making their way into the game. The Cities of Death terrain, Cadian Imperial guards Ork and Space Marine models. There is even Forgeworld's Nurgle Blight Drone. The weapons feel and sound like they should do. Your armoury is quite impressive, it would make any Space Marine Master of the Armoury jealous! I am tempted to make a full review including multiplayer.



Now onto GW's latest news today. I don't like jumping on the band wagon, but I don't see many blogs out their mentioning this so I thought I would give it a plug. I would be surprised if none of you have heard the rumours flying around the web already, but I am sure many of you have seen and heard hints to what GW was going to announce today. For those that have been in stasis it is a new one time board game that has been released. Now I haven't been around long enough (correct me is I'm wrong), but this appears to be a re-make of Man O' War. The game is for two or more players and it is a fight of good against evil. As well as fighting each other the box seems to come with terrain and sea monsters to avoid. It appears you get plenty of models in the set and it does look really nice (It should do for £70!). I am weighing up on weather to order it with it being a one time release (I know Dorn's Arrow has already ordered his). It seems it is only available direct from GW. I picked mine up from the FLGS so doesn't look like it is GW only - O'Shashar


As promised as you can see above are the 5 Orcs I didn't show on my previous post. Some of you may recognise them as the Orks from Assault on Black Reach. I have basically put them on square bases. I have also done a few head swaps and used some of the spare accessories in the Orc Boyz box to help them fit in with the proper Orc Boyz. I also clipped off the Sluggas and used green stuff to tidy the area up. Some of you may realise that they are not in rank and file this because of how the models have their weapon arms, they stick out too much. I am going to work the rest of the Orc Boyz around these.

Unfortunately that is all I have for you today our faithful followers. Until next time may the Plague Father bless you in all that you do.

Where Do You Get Your Gaming Fix? Or How I Found My First Visit to a Gaming Club.

Good evening children of the Plague Father and welcome once again to our corner of the garden. Today I would like to take a break from the Tale of Three Gamers to talk about where you get your gaming fix. I wanted to post this up sooner but had a long weekend planned with my wife and wouldn't appreciate using time off together to blog so you lucky Nurglings get it tonight.

Until last week I had only played my games of 40k ( along with a sprinkle of Blood Bowl & Necromunda ) at the homes of friends. After seeing a post on the work boards asking any war gamers to try out the local club  we thought why not?. Plans were made to go down for when it opened at six which gave us a five hour limit on the game, which was more than enough for a 1750 each game.

Now aside from my trip to Maelstrom earlier in the year this is the first time I have attended a gaming club and to be honest I'm not sure it is for me. Don't get me wrong it had some good points and bad but over all I found it less enjoyable than our usual set up.

So in the interest of fairness firstly I will start with the good points;

Terrain - The terrain selection available while not the best selection was very good considering there was terrain for different game systems and scale. Along with it being a good mix of home made and bought terrain it was all painted ( with simple schemes but was still all painted ). The only downside I saw with this was a lot of the terrain had a very small foot print on the table. This made me feel a bit guilty taking enough to make a decent tables worth of terrain.

Game Systems -  Looking around the room it was nice to see people playing a fairly wide selection of games including 40k, Fantasy, Mordheim, Flames of War and a funky looking game which seemed to be based on aerial dog fights called Wings of War.

Variety of Opponents - This is the most interesting part of a gaming club to me as I currently game with around 8 different players depending who is available to squeeze a game in with which does give me a variety of armies to face, with most having at least two armies to use.

Not always the best role model for personal hygiene in a confined space

Now on to the bad points;

Organisation - Lets face it when I think of a club that is on a set day between a set time in a set place I don't think it is unreasonable to expect to turn up and be able to get inside the building and not have to wait nearly 15 minutes for someone to unlock the door. Once inside we were told to just get a board and set up a table any where we liked as people get them out as needed rather than set them all up, which seemed fair to me.

With the lay out of the room we went on the end leaving more than enough room between us and the next table for another 4' x 6' board if needed. We did this more for the location of where we could put the board rather than not wanting to be right next to other players and to leave room for people to get in an out without going to the end of the row.
However about 30 minutes in to our game the club captain asked us to move our whole board down so that there wasn't a gap and another board could be put where ours was. I suggested that rather than move a game in progress he could just put another board in the gap which I didn't think was unreasonable, sadly this was not to be and it was insisted that they knew best. I still have not decided if this really was just a failure to grasp that just putting a board in the gap was easier or trying to show who was top dog.

Venue - The club is running out of the function room of a working men's club which had no natural light or windows that could be opened, no air conditioning and two doors to go through to the outside which were required to be kept shut so no air flow there. Sadly this made the room very hot and gave a nice mix of sweat and the lovely aroma of a pub carpet that has seen its prime which smoking indoors used to cover up.

Members - Now this was my first time there so I was bound to be an outsider there and this I was fine with though had a couple of gents come over and have a chat with most of them seeming fine if not a little shy. Though there was two that stuck out to me who realistically were making everyone else look bad.

First up was a lad I would say was in his twenties giving it the big talk about how he had been barred at a pub for telling the barmaid to get her tits out and make him a sandwich. Now I am happy to believe this might be true but really isn't something to be proud of and just reminds me of school boys bragging about their conquests while if they had a real woman wouldn't know what to do with her.

Secondly was an older gent ( 40ish or a hard paper round ) who was trying to teach someone the finer points of fantasy, an admirable task I am sure you all agree. The trouble was on more than one occasion over the noise of the room ( loud enough to make me have to shout over the table what I was rolling for ) I heard him bellowing how he was doing it wrong.

40k Armies Present - This is something I was looking forward as I hoped to see most armies represented so while waited I had a word with one of the lads who informed me that most people were playing Space Wolves & Imperial Guard with a few on Blood Angels, Grey Knights and Dark Eldar picking up support quickly and one person on the older armies if I was lucky. Now this was a bit of a disappointment but I tried to cover it up with a joke about them chasing the new armies which got the young lad very defensive saying how they needed to change book "to stay competitive".

I do love dusting off my Necrons, this guy isn't one of mine though.

Unfortunately this was the final nail in the coffin for me as while I do like to win when the chance shows itself I wouldn't sacrifice my T'au for a brand new army and think I will go back to games at mine or friends houses.

Overall it had some good points but I was a little underwhelmed with the whole experience and think I will give it a miss unless times become desperate enough to give it another go with my collection of 4th edition armies.

Now the question I want to put to you people out in the warp is a simple one "Where do you get your gaming fix?" and to a lesser extent is this your first choice or a necessary evil to play the games you love?

O'Shashar

Tale of Three Gamers Skaven 1000 point Army List and Update

Hi to all you pestilent folk! So following on from O'Shashar and MightySimo's 1000 point lists and progress reports I thought it was about time I posted my list. I have also been taking advice from the members on dakkadakka.com and have read more of the rule book than the other guys, but also have never played a game of Warhammer Fantasy Battles so there are many lessons to be learned, but here is my list:

Heroes:

Chieftain with Halberd, Shield and Tail Weapon = 57

Chieftain with Battle Standard, Shield and Foul Pendant = 102

Warlock Engineer with Level 1 Wizard and Warplock Pistol = 73

Core:

39 Clanrats with spears and shields and full command = 215

40 Slaves with musician = 82

19 Stormvermin with shields and full command = 177

Special:

2 Rat Ogres and Pack Master = 88

5 Poisoned Wind Globadiers with attached Poisoned Wind Mortar = 115

Rare:

1 Warp Lightning Cannon = 90

TOTAL = 999 Points

My basic plan is to use the large blocks of infantry to benefit from my Strength In Numbers special rule and keep me in the fight against the more fightier units. My one worry is the lack of magic in my army list, but I'm hoping my Artillery will make up for that.

As for my progress, well my last post showed the start of my army in a nice fancy light box which I borrowed from MightySimo... Unfortunately I don't own one of those so the following pictures wont be anywhere near as pretty but oh well... I have 35 Clanrats finished, including the command group for my spear group, and I will be starting the other 5 hand weapon rats this week. Below is a picture of the standard bearer for my Clanrat regiment.


And today I finished painting my 1st Rat Ogre (which was a really nice change from all the little critters). Oh and theres a few pus filled boils on there just to please Nurgle himself :)


Due to the fact I will be mixing in my hand weapon rats as part of my slaves unit (and hoping people don't look at the shields) I tally my currently painted total at around 170 points... seems quite small for the number of models I've painted so it should look great on the battlefield once the full horde is painted up.

Well, until next time my decaying friends...

Tale of Three Gamers Orcs and Goblins 1000 point Army List and Update

Hello again followers of the All Father. Today I offer you my 1000 point Orc and Goblin army list and a couple of pictures of my current progress through my greenskin horde. Now similar of O'Shashar I have not fully read the rule book, but I have skimmed through and read alot of posts and ideas at DakkaDakka to try and get an idea of what to field in my army. I don't want to make it fully competitive, I want to use it as a base to increase my greeenskins to 2000+ points and to learn the game. So without further delay here is my list:

HQ

Heroes

Orc Big Boss with Great Weapon (General)
Orc Big Boss with Great Weapon, Gamblers Armour (Battle Standard Bearer)
Night Goblin Shamen Level 2 Core 20 Orc Boyz with Full Command, Hand Weapon and Shield 20 Orc Boyz with Full Command, Two Hand Weapons 20 Night Goblins with Full Command, Spear and Shield, 1 Fanatic 20 Night Goblins with Musician, Short bows 5 Goblin Spider Riders with Musician 5 Goblin Spider Riders with Musician Special Orc Boar Chariot

OK, as I have said I know its not the best list, as ideally I should have 40 Orc Boyz with dual hand weapons, 40 Night Gobbos with Spears and Shields and instead of the Boar Chariot take a Wolf Chariot or two. The reason I haven't done this is after this army is painted up I am going to increase the 3 blocks of infantry by 20. I will look at adding some war machines for ranged support and an Orc Shaman for more magic. I think the list I've done is the best I could have done with what I had and will help me learn to play the game pretty well. It will also mean that despite Orcs and Goblins being quite a slow army the 3 small blocks of infantry should be able out flank O'shashar as I outnumber him in men and units. This should hopefully apply with Dorn's Arrow, but I have seen his list on Dakka and he has a horde of Skaven Slaves...not good.

As promised I have below a picture of 5 Orc Boyz I have finished painting. I do have another 5 but they are currently undergoing being sprayed by matt varnish so they weren't ready but I will post a picture of them when I'm back. The Orcs I painted with 3 different shades of browns, a dirty white cloth and black leather to represent them scavenging the clothes from where ever they can find. The spot colour I have used it the red. This is because they are from Da' Red Skullz tribe that I decided to make up.


Below are 10 of my Night Goblins with spears. Rather then go for the normal black robes, I plumbed for a dark purple. Then around the faces white triangles, as this helps frame the faces. I kept with the traditional bright yellow moons on the shields as I felt this contrasted well with the purple. I haven't decided on a name for this tribe yet so I am open to suggestions.


Anyway I will be leaving the blog with my trusted colleagues as of tomorrow I'm of to sunny (hopefully) Cleethorpes for a week. Until next time my fellow brethren of the Plague Father.