Animal tokens

For a long time I have been wanting to do some animal tokens. Now I finally had the time to do some.

The basic idea is to have a number of "empty" bases that accompany my normal miniatures. Obviously, they have to be the same bases as usual so they are, as always, from Fenris Games:

• 25mm DS round Innsmouth Cobblestones (Fenris Games)
• 25mm round Deep Recess (Fenris Games)

Over the years I have collected a number of animals. These are the ones I used:

• Chicken flock (Black Cat Bases)
• Cats (promotional miniatures from Black Cat Bases)
• Animal set (Stronghold Terrain)

So what to do with these bases? In a number of scenarios that we play, the characters can move across the board unseen. Sometimes they hide as civilians, sometimes they move as shadows or street animals. For each of my pirate crew members I have one respective character marker on a 25mm round plywood base. These markers are secretly placed under Civilian models or under these new animal tokens.

Character markers for my pirate crew members

Dead Man's Hand - German Edition from Stronghold-Terrain

Stronghold-Terrain have released the German edition of the Wild West skirmish game Dead Man's Hand and I take a look at the rulebook.



The Wild West skirmish game Dead Man's Hand was originally released by Great Escape Games and later on translated into French by Studio Tomahawk. Now Stronghold-Terrain have released a German version of the rulebook which includes the latest updates and optional rules introduced by Studio Tomahawk.

Tactica 2016

The annual Tactica tabletop convention took place on February 27-28 in Hamburg. As in the previous years before I went on Saturday and had a great time.

Again lots of great tables and participation games could be enjoyed. A table that particularly impressed me was this Frostgrave board. What I like about it is that it contains many of the Tabletop World buildings that I also have except that these were modified to turn them into ruins. Very cool!

Probably the most impressive table was this 16th/17th century Japanese castle by Frank. You can read more about it on his blog here (and part 2 and part 3).

Another highlight was this board from Freebooter Miniatures to promote their rules for playing with ships. I am already used to Freebooter bringing very cool gaming boards to Tactica but I liked this one especially because it is so unusual and effective despite its relative simplicity.

My 'preview highlight' of the show were these miniatures for a field bakery at the Black Hussar Miniatures booth. These Prussians from the Seven Years' War range are very cool looking unique civilians and I can very well imagine using them for my pirate games. They will be released in about a month and made available as several packs.

Another teaser was this crane at the Thomarillion booth. It would be a great alternative for my current crane and I don't think you can have too many cranes around the docks.

The Game

We managed to play one participation game of Jugula. My friend Jens was very interested in these gladiator rules from Studio Tomahawk so we took the opportunity to learn more about the game. It was indeed a quite enjoyable game and I can see how you can have a lot of fun mastering all the tactical possibilities. It would make for a very nice side project as you need very few miniatures and you can can build a great arena table if you like.

Treasure Hunter

I had a very specific shopping list this year. Firstly, I wanted to stack up on my pirate figures collection. In my opinion, Foundry still has the best range of pirates (aside from Black Scorpion, but the two don't mix that well). In addition, I chose to go with North Star Figure's Blackbeard model as a captain for this new crew. It really is a shame that their sets are so expensive (23 GBP for 8 models, compare with 12 GBP for Foundry's sets of also 8 models)

Then I picked up the rulebooks for Frostgrave and En Garde!. With Frostgrave being all the craze these days I wanted to take a closer look at the rules. I might even end up making a small warband. Or I guess I could use my existing gang of gypsies.

I have been a big fan of wagons and coaches since I first used a Stage Coach in Mordheim. So when I saw the coach from Schilling Figuren it was another immediate must-have. I already have a lot of unpainted wagons and coaches from West Wind's Empire of the Dead: Requiem kickstarter and the Berlin Carriage from Warlord Games but I just had to add this to the lot.

Finally, my most important haul: Elmar Fischer aka Elladan of Stronghold Terrain made these custom casts of his beautiful building fronts for me. I talked to him about my Port of Gierburg project and how I plan to have a huge facade on one side. He was so amazingly helpful to make these pieces from his out-of-production houses and fronts so that I can build a big facade from them.

In conclusion, the Tactica has been another fantastic event. I am especially happy about my purchases and super grateful for Elmar's help and support. I already look forward to next year.

Tavern from Stronghold Terrain

The Tavern by Stronghold-Terrain is the latest addition to my collection of 28mm houses. Let's take a look!

The contents of the Tavern kit

I already painted up a couple of buildings from Stronghold-Terrain's range of medieval terrain: the Townhouse, the Guild House and the now out of production Facades. The Tavern now is the last building from their range (except for the Stables, which I am not interested in for now).

Like their other houses the majority of the pieces is made from hard plaster, except for the roof, the base and a few extra bits, which are all cast from resin.

Gone Fronting

A review of Stronghold Terrain's medieval/fantasy townhouse fronts, enriched with some mild eye candy and finished off with a plea for using fronts and facades in your tabletop games.

At the 2012 Tactica convention I bought a set of townhouse fronts from Stronghold Terrain for my Gierburg gaming board. Soon after I completed the collection with the other two remaining pieces from the range: the Tavern front and the Warehouse front. Unfortunately though, all three products are currently OOP and no longer available from the Stronghold webshop. For kicks and nostalgia, you can see the products below as they were originally shown on the Stronghold Terrain website.

The Townhouse fronts, Tavern front and Warehouse front set as they were depicted at Stronghold Terrain's webshop


As you can see on the photos these models are not just facades like e.g. those from Geboom's wonderful Amsterdam project. The fronts are ca. 3,5 cm deep (or "thick") and are equally nicely detailed on the sides as they are on the fronts. This means that they are more like "half" houses, or Third of a House. But let's look at them in detail...

The Townhouse Fronts

The Townhouse Fronts set is a set of three resin model fronts. Each front consists of three parts: a first floor, a second floor and an attic/roof piece. Plus there's a stonework piece with stairs intended for the front in the middle (see photo above). Roof windows and chimneys are separate. In addition there's a very nice cobblestone pavement base consisting of three bases (one for each house) and two end sections. Here's a photo of the lot:

Contents of the Townhouse fronts boxed set by Stronghold Terrain

The Townhouse fronts set up in one of many possible combinations

What is really cool about this set is its flexibility. With each front comprising of three pieces, all sharing the same width and depth, you can freely arrange them to create your personal favorite setup. In the picture above e.g. you can see a completely different setup than is shown in the studio photos by Stronghold (which is the one I went with myself in the end - for no particular reason though, other than a subliminal wish for conformity on my side, I'm afraid). This means that you can buy two or even three of these sets and mix components to create a long street wih house fronts and each one looks different, yet at the same time they all share a common style so that each combination looks "complete", like it was meant to be. This is pretty damn cool in my eyes.

Townhouse front with half-hipped roof
and bardgeboard

I would like to specifically mention the roof section of the "third" front as this is my favourite one. You don't often see half-hipped roofs on tabletop fantasy buildings, let alone with bargeboards. The result is a complex looking structure with looks detailed and simply beautiful. I find this to be the highlight of this set.

The careful reader might notice some similarity with the Tavern House I finished recently. Indeed, the lower part - the window counter section - is the same. In fact, various parts of these fronts can be found in their complete houses as well. The door of the middle front e.g. is the same as in their Guild House as are the bay windows (of course! I'd do the same). I don't find this to be a problem - to the contrary: it gives the buildings a consistent look. There's still enough going on to give each an individual look. And the paint jobs can also do a lot to set the pieces apart.

Speacking of paint jobs, below you can see all three fronts painted. I tried to give the middle front the effect of color that is peeling off. I don't know about that... it somehow just looks wrong, so I might repaint that part at some point.

As you can see I did not put the cobblestone bases there. I have prepared them, glued them together (without the end pieces though) and now I am waiting for the gaming board itself to take shape because the bases will be part of that.

The Warehouse Front

The Warehouse front is very similar to those from the Townhouse set. It is a three part piece that comes with a nice cobblestone base.

Contents of the Warehouse front boxed set by Stronghold Terrain

If you wanted to mix parts of the Townhouse fronts set then you could easily insert one or two of these for additional variety. Since my Gierburg table will have a huge port section (pirate games!) this model fits in nicely. I could indeed imagine two of these fronts standing right next to each other at the port. Painted slightly different this would look just right.

The painted warehouse front

The Tavern Front

Last but certainly not least we have the Tavern front. This is a more solid piece consisting of a single piece for the main part and a small stonework section with two steps for additional height and detail. A separate chimney and a tavern sign are also included. Again there is a cobblestone base which connects with the others from the range.

Contents of the tavern front boxed set by Stronghold Terrain

The Tavern building
from Stronghold Terrain

This front is very reminiscent of their Tavern building, yet not quite identical. The door, window and basic stonework is the same. But while this one is full of stonework in the ground level, the tavern model has plastering covering the full stonework. The tavern signs are the same though.

I didn't want to use the original tavern sign because it reads "Zum durstigen Mönch" (roughly meaning "The thirsty monk" in German), which I was not so fond of since Gierburg features neither monks nor German language. So I went with the keg symbol sign from the Thomarillion set of Tavern signs. I had used the 'anvil sign' for my Blacksmith's Forge from ForgeWorld (which is now OOP and I sold mine) so now I have the 'knight sign' left, which due to a severe absence of knights in Gierburg will be about as useful as the monk sign.

Verdict

All products from Stronghold Terrain's fronts range are highly detailed models with a lot of character. Each piece has its unique features while still integrating perfectly into the overall style. Due to the modular nature of the items you can even buy multiple sets and rearrange them differently to get even more fronts. The cobblestone bases are made so that they can be connected freely so you can line up the fronts in whichever way you like.

The casting quality is good. There were minor defects (on a few windows) that could be easily repaired with modelling putty. If you're used to working with resin models (buildings, ships or whatever) then this is common work.

I have to say that before I bought these models I did wonder whether they are worth it. Stronghold themself described them with a display purpose for cabinets. But I am working towards a gaming board! I then realised something. You can either have your gaming board just end, leading into the void. Or you can mark the end of your board with fronts and facades. The latter creates an enormously stronger atmosphere. Not only because the gaming table now it not a mere presentation of buildings on a silver platter, but a live cut-out of a larger world. If you have fronts like these on one side of your streets and full houses on the other (which you'd have anyways), then the streets of your city are fully surrounded by buildings. This is a completely different feeling of delving into your board. It also has some gaming value because now you can set up proper "ends" of your board: A street leading off the table between the fronts. Or, with that amount of doors available, you can assign entrances and exits to the board to certain doors and/or windows. Therefore I believe that finishing off your gaming board with building fronts and facades both adds a lot of depth to your visual experience as well as opening up new possibilities for the gaming side of things.

All five fronts lined up: the Tavern, the Warehouse and the Townhouse set of Three

Town House from Stronghold Terrain

The Town House is the second Stronghold Terrain building after the Guild House out of the lot I bought at the Tactica convention earlier this year.

What you get (the kit)

Let's start with a photo of the contents of the kit:

The contents of the box

The set consists of resin parts - two roof pieces, a window, two chimney pieces and a base - and plaster walls for the house itself. The plaster is good enough with few air bubbles. The walls of the ground floor fit together nicely; I used a bit of modelling putty to fill a few gaps (after painting the walls first, though!).

Note the modelled shingles and
matchstick panel

The window and chimney which are both glued on the roof looked a bit too "stacked on" for my taste, so I used modelling putty (ProCreate, to be precise) to fill the gaps between them and the roof. You can see the same on the sample photos of the Stronghold Terrain website. This was easy enough for the chimney but for the window I modelled extra shingles and hid the gap with matchsticks - an extra twenty minutes well spent I believe.

Painting & Extras

I wasn't quite happy with how the stonework of the Guild House turned out so I had to try something different this time. Using a tutorial by Elmar Fischer at elladan I used pigments this time: A mix of MIG Concrete, MIG Dry Mud and water applied on the black undercoat. After drying the pigments' colour was removed from the raised surfaces of the stones with a wet tissue. Then I applied the usual mix of drybrushing various greys and browns and watered down greys, browns and green. I am very satisfied with the result as I like the realistic look.

For the rust on the doors and windows I also used pigments by MIG Productions, following the Rust and Soot/Dust tutorial at Senji Studios*. Basically it's just three layers of first Vietnam Earth, followed by Standard Rust and finally some Light Rust. However, since I misplaced my MIG Pigment Fixer which I had bought years ago I had to mix the pigments with water and apply that.

This is also the first time I used Revell's Color Stop medium to achieve the effect of paint that is peeling off of the door. I will have to do some more experiments with it but for now I think it turned out okay. It's definately something that you need to get used to working with as it's a thick rubbery compound that is applied on top of the painted area. Then you paint everything with another colour (green in this case) and afterwards you can peel the compound off to show the underlying layer (brown/greyish wood in this case).

One of the things I like most about the house is the main entrance. With the arch and what looks like a window counter this house has a lot of character. I decided to emphasis on the shop appearance and make it a proper old shoppe. Finally I could put one of the etched brass signs to use that I bought as Dolls House supplies. I put the sign on an over-sized matchstick and glued it to a resin bag which I got for free from the nice guys of Strongold Terrain when I purchased the building at the Tactica. Thus I have a signpost that can stand on its own with no need to glue it on the base.

The signpost made of a matchstick and an etched brass sign

The fish crate is from Ainsty Castings (the exact product is 'Trade Goods D Boxed Products'). I wanted to make this 'Ye Olde Fishe Shoppe', home of Hazel, the Fishwife.

Photos

Now for some photos of the finished piece:

Update: Three more pictures in better quality:

Resumé

The Town House is a very nice small building which should be a great addition to any medieval city board. Granted, it won't be the centrepiece of your gaming table, but it will definately be a great addition that fits in well with your other high quality buildings. The only disadvantage is the lack of interior detail (for the windows most notably). While it does have a first floor to place your skirmishers on you may want to get a trapdoor and ladder to make it fully useable on the inside.
All in all it gets a high recommendation from me.


*[April14/2013: It seems that the Senji Studios website has fallen victim to some malware virus attack. Norton and Google report the site as dangerous. Therefore the links to Senji Studios have been removed to prevent the reader]

Work in Progress: Townhouse by Stronghold Terrain

Currently I am painting the Townhouse from Stronghold Terrain. After the Guild House, where I was very unhappy with the stonework, things are better this time. In fact, I think these are the best stones I have done so far. These walls paint up really nicely. More coming soon.

Guild House from Stronghold Terrrain

Again it's been quite a while since my last post. However, this time with photos of my newest addition to the everlasting Gierburg project: I finally finished the Guild House by Stronghold Terrain which I bought at this year's Tactica show.

Firstly, the contents of the kit:

Except for the resin roof and base all pieces are made of hard stone plaster. I'm not a fan of plaster in general but this one's of good quality. Except for the weight which you just can't help with this material the structure is good, no bubbles or defects.

The walls have a nice system of fit-together-edges which makes assembling the model really easy. However, the pieces don't fit together 100% percent so require a bit of filing (which doesn't work too good on plaster, at least not like resin). The few gaps can be easily filled with modelling putty - if they even bother you enough to do so. I didn't mind them enough to become active there.

Here are some photos of the finished house. I am not very happy with the stonework. It looks slightly better in reality - not as prosy as in the pictures -  but not nearly as great as the sample photos on Stronghold Terrain's studio paint job. I will probably revisit the model at some point and try adding some pigments.

Here are two comparison shots with the Blue Wolf Inn and Tabletop World's Medieval Inn from my cabinet.

All in all I am quite happy with the model. The stairs, separate door and little shed make the house look interesting - without these additions it would look a bit dull. Personally the stonework's structure didn't really suit my painting skills, but that's a totally personal issue. The roof and woodwork is really nice and detailed. The size is good for 28mm models (see comparison shots above).

Now I'm really looking forward to painting the Stronghold Terrain Townhouse as well.