Basic Rolepaying (BRP) with miniatures - part 4 - Ekckhhardth ("the Cremator"), Human Cleric

In earlier posts I showed off three of the four (actually there's five, but more on that in the future) player character miniatures I have been painting for my roleplaying group. You can see the previous character here. Time now to introduce the fourth character of the group. Please meet Ekckhhardth, aka "the Cremator".

Perhaps NOW is a good time to run!

Apart from having a nearly unpronounceable name, Ekckhhardth is the Cleric of the group. A priest of an as yet to be disclosed deity of the Warhammer Old World, Ekckhhardth is a young acolyte training for the priesthood of his faith.

Ekckhhardth the Cleric

As part of his training for priestly duties, he was placed in charge of preparations for burial of the recently deceased from his local congregation. Unfortunately for Ekckhhardth a lack of oversight from his immediate superior (something to do with too much Altdorf brandy) ended up in Ekckhhardth hitting upon the novel and expedient idea of cremating several bodies rather than embalming then according to the time honored traditions of his faith. This one event earned Ekckhhardth the moniker of "the Cremator" by his rather intoxicated superior.

Er, I wonder if Burning Hands will be of any used right now?

Not surprisingly this caused a bit of a backlash from both that congregation and the chief priest. In order to prevent more "novel ideas", and a potential lynch mob, Ekckhhardth was immediately transferred to a frontier church on the border of Kislev.

Hang on! Where did it go?

There he was encouraged to gain a little more worldly experience for a year by going on a personal pilgrimage to assist the Empire's people in that wild land. You know, the kinds of merchant caravans, mercenary bands and adventurers who are always getting in to trouble and in need of medical assistance. The more dangerous the experience, the better. And if he didn't come back after that year's pilgrimage due to some unforeseen tragedy, oh well, such is life.

This miniature is another of Reaper Miniatures (reference is 60063, Mystic Theurge). This miniature is very nicely detailed and in metal. The mini is basically hovering but I've based this with flock so as to hide this little fact.

So that's the last formal player character of the group. However, I do have one more to show off in a future post. A final member of the team who keeps popping up from time to time.

But more on that another time...

ACTA Starfleet - Federation Nebula Class

Recently I purchased three Furuta Star Trek Nebula class ships off eBay. They are a decently detailed model and, being plastic, are not too heavy when it comes to sitting them on a flight stand.

The original model is on the right, my painted one on the left.

The basic paintwork on the model is good enough, but I wanted to play around with the colours a little and also see if I could also make the saucer section detachable.

In painting the model I dry brushed it in a medium gray paint being careful not to paint over the registry number on both the upper and lower decks of the saucer section of the ship.

Then I inked it in black ink. Once dry I then gave it another dry brush in a lighter gray paint before picking out details and doing highlights along the lines and edges of the model.

I did a two step painting process for the warp glow of the nacelles buy using a darker red or blue followed by a lighter red or blue. The yellow was a golden yellow colour. The reflector dish was done with the same darker blue, highlighted by a light blue and then white dry brush.

When I constructed the model, I cut the pegs that are used to hold the saucer section to the secondary hull. I then glued a rare earth magnet to the secondary hull and one to the saucer section.

Top side of saucer section detached from secondary hull

Bottom of saucer section.

The rare earth magnets hold the saucer section nicely but I stuffed it a little by not aligning where the two magnets should go exactly. So if you look closely you will notice that the saucer is on a slight angle. Its not noticeable on the whole, so I didn't kick myself too much. But it is something to be careful of if you do this yourself.

There is a nice niche that can be exploited if your magnets are the right size. These niches are due to the holes where the lugs attach when you construct the model. I used 3mm round x 1mm thick rare earth magnets and the one on the secondary hull fitted almost exactly into the hole present there. But the magnet on the saucer section pushed the saucer downwards slightly on an angle. As a result it also means that the saucer can sit slightly to the left or right of the center line of the secondary hull. So just be aware of this.

So in the end this little experiment worked out nicely enough. The size of the model is a good match for both MicroMachine and Attack Wing / Hero Clix Star Trek miniatures, though they are bigger than the Nebula class ships of those two product lines. So this model may not be to the desired size for your games.

ACTA Star Fleet - another Constellation Class Starship finished

The second repainted Constellation Class

Way back I posted on how I had a MicroMachines USS Stargazer miniature that I decided to paint up for ACTA Star Fleet. I was pretty happy with that result and so decided to troll eBay and buy a few more. In between painting the characters for our RPG group, I decided to quickly paint up the second of my Constellations.

I prefer the scale of the MicroMachines miniature to the Attack Wing version as I personally feel it is in the right proportions to the rest of my ACTA Federation fleet miniatures. Personally I feel the Attack Wing version to be too small and therefore out of scale.

From what I understand, the Constellations were a general workhorse ship designated as a light cruiser and were basically a replacement for the aging Constitution class vessels. Designed as an "all rounder" they were used in both deep space exploration and defensive patrol duties between 2285 and 2360's. By the 2360's these ships were being mothballed and slowly decommissioned. They were noted to be "overworked and underpowered" vessels, part of the weakness of being a jack-of-all-trades.

They did play a role in border conflicts with the Ferengi, Kzinti and Cardassians, seeing extensive action in particularly against the Cardassian during their war with the Federation. This puts this make of vessel in to a must have for any Federation fleet that goes up against the Cardassians in a replay of that conflict. So, naturally, I had to have more than just one.

With this one, I purposely left the identification number and name visible when I drybrushed to hull in White Scar. I also left the outer ring of windows unpainted in order to provide a differentiated colour scheme to the first ship of this class that I painted. So the two are easily discernible on the table top. The painting scheme is otherwise identical to the first one I painted.

I also did a highlight in White Scar around the top main hull in order to highlight the concentric circles of the deck plating on the upper hull. This provided a much nicer final effect in my opinion that my first attempt at this type of vessel.

I have two more left unpainted and I intend to only paint one more, leaving the other in its original yellowish colouring. I'll use that yellow version as a specialist Scout version of the Constellation and the other three as the workhorse version. Now, back to my other projects!

Basic Rolepaying (BRP) with miniatures - part 3 - Liara Kartaran, Dark Elf Sorceress

I've posted twice now about the roleplaying project I have been working on for my RPG group. So far I've introduced two of the four character. For this post meet the third member of the party, Liara Kartaran.

Like Meraung introduced previously, Liara also is a dark elf.

From an early age, she was sold off to a sorcerer as domestic help. Over time she learnt the basics of the trade from her owner.

When she was old enough her owner took an interest in her that was not to her liking. Not long afterwards she killed her owner in his sleep, stole some supplies, gold and a few magic items and escaped to a port where she hired herself on to a corsair ship and sailed eastwards to the Old World.

From there she jumped ship during a coastal raid and joined the refugees escaping inland to hide from the raiders. Thereon after, she claimed she was a High Elf Sorceress and has been selling her skills as a mercenary.

This miniature is also from Reaper Miniatures (reference 03193 Carinth, Dark Elf Sorceress). Again its another really nice metal miniature. A few more images below have been included to give you an idea of the full miniature.

Liara has a dark secret that manifests itself wherever she is about to die (and which is a source of great amusement for the other players). But better save that for a future post.

Basic Rolepaying (BRP) with miniatures - part 2 - Meraung the Elf Rogue

In the last post I mentioned that I have been painting the main characters for my roleplaying group's player characters. The first one finished was "Bullseye" Berry, the human ranger.

Meraung skulking in the shadows

This post is for the second player character, Meraung the Elf Rogue.

Meraung, rogue, at your service!

In truth, Meraung is an escaped Dark Elf.

Having been in servitude back in his homeland since childhood, Meraung managed to flee his master and make a life for himself on the streets, eventually making his way to the Old World. From the day he arrived in the Old World to this day, he has been mistaken for a High Elf and Meraung is keeping it that way.

Spying out the enemy lines, Meraung earns his keep..

Leaving his life as a cut purse behind, Meraung has taken to selling his services as a mercenary for hire, often finding himself hired on as a guardsman to many a merchant caravan. Its in this capacity that he began his life as an adventurer.

Dangerous work! Still, it beats life where he was born. And in the Old World there is little chance of him running in to anyone he knew in his former life.

This miniature is another from Reaper Miniatures called Elladan, Elf (product 02543). Another nicely detailed mini from Reaper.

Not sure if you can see it, but even managed to paint his eye's yellow! Below are some final shots with different contrasts. Only two more (actually three more) to go!

Yellow eyes... creepy....