Thumb and Nail from Rise of Moloch

Everything is not 3D-printing now, even though that does take quite a bit of time.

Here’s the latest mini, Thumb and Nail from Smog: Rise of Moloch boardgame.

 

Another amazing, and unsettling, mini from that game.

I tried to paint them with inspiration from the card-art.

3D-Printing Review: Dungeon architect - Build a dungeon in a day

I was kindly sent a bunch of review-files from the Dungeon architect - Build a dungeon in a day kickstarter.

If you read the 3D-crowdfunding watch on this campaign a while ago, you know I found this to be good idea, and having tried it out I’m more than happy with the results.

The idea here is to 3D-print your rollers or stamps and then imprint their design into a suitable medium.

I printed the roller using PLA, layer hight 0.02 mm, Infill 50% (to get it really rigid). Print time was less than four hours and I used filament for around €1.50.

XPS (extruded polystyre) foam is the recommended candidate for walls and floors.
I first tried to work on pink foam, which is high-density. That turned out to be too compact, as the stamp I tried on it just couldn’t make a good impression. So, no pink foam, which is a pity as I got loads of that.

Next was EPS, that is the ordinary expanded polystyrene, you know the very cheap, white sheets (or packaging material) built from small beads that get everywhere if you try to cut it with a blunt blade. I’ve got loads of those sheets, too.

The roller and stamp worked great on this. Okay, you see contours of the beads, but there can simply be no cheaper way to get a dungeon up and running in minutes.

If you want a really cheap dungeon made in no time, and are not so focused on the aesthetics then this is a decent candidate.

Finally, I tried to get hold of the blue XPS foam (one brand is sold as Styrofoam), which is a bit lighter in density compared to pink foam. I tried several craft shops and builders shops. It seemed impossible to get hold of thin sheets of this, so I ended with a big 5 cm thick slab. From that I carved (with a very sharp blade) centimetre wide strips and finally I imprinted these.

It took me a couple of minutes to imprint two walls and one floor-piece. A minute or two with a glue-gun to stick them together. Another couple of minutes to paint them and probably two minutes to drybrush. A sizeable piece of dungeon corridor in ten minutes or so. You can hardly beat that!

I will continue to play with this, as I also got a brick-roller, a couple of more stamps, a cutter for door-arches and a printable door. You will see a couple of builds with this, that is for sure.

Absolutely recommended if you ever need a dungeon in a hurry. Great stuff!

My gamer-son said it all when I showed the rollers and stamps to him: 

“This is just so smart!"

I do hope these will be for sale in some form after the Kickstarter. I'll keep you informed on that issue.

But don't worry, there is still time to pledge on the kickstarter, as it closes on October 17.

Prusa 3D-printer – up and running!

Monday last week I got a really big box.

Oh, a black box. You usually don't know what's inside one of those, just what goes in and what goes out. This time I knew.

In it was the long awaited 3D-printer, a Prusa i3 MK3.

Yay!

I got it up and running immediately, as I had ordered an assembled printer. Well, mostly running actually, as there are always some glitches in the beginning.

For me it was initially one of the fans that didn’t work, resulting in failed prints. When I figured out what was actually the problem with the prints I blew through the fan with compressed air, and that seem to have removed whatever was in there. One less problem.

Up and running the first print

After that one of the prints, a wall-section of my Printable Scenery Rampage Open Lock stuff I build dungeons off, got loose during a print. That turned out to be really messy as the printer gladly continued to print into thin air, resulting in a bundle of thin filament. A large bundle.

First object to print was this statue, the same I used to play around with on my old printer to get the settings right.

That was fixed with added brims, to those prints with small foot-prints, in the PrusaControl software I use to produce print-files from the STL-files.

All this while I was fiddling with layer-heights and infill to get a feeling of how it all affected the end-result.

A mystery print for a friend. Can you figure out what it is, Koen?

So now I’m printing away, happily. Everything seem to work as it should.

Next mystery print coming from a kickstarter that will go live on tuesday. Expect a review.

I’m printing a lot of modular dungeon at the moment, to be used in next weekends’ D&D game, and also review-stuff from two kickstarters. More on that soon.

James, a nurse and September Tally

The final two minis finished during September were James from Zombicide: Black Plague and a nurse from Shadows of Brimstone.

James in the art does look a lot like Sean Connery from The Name of the Rose, and that might explain his name.

The nurse is a hero specializing in healing and taking samples from monsters and whatnot, hence her green bottle.

A summary of September:

Painted:

Total: 19

Bought:

2 pulp characters from Bad Squiddo Games and a 1/48 car-kit.

Total: 3

2018:

Bought:         194

Painted:         -116

Sold:              -180

Total:            - 102

Abigail from Rise of Moloch and an ordinary ghost

White… I always dread white. It’s bloody difficult to look convincingly white.

So I started with the ghost from Reaper. A white primer, Dark Tone wash and then heavy drybrushing with white.

It actually didn’t look too bad. Maybe white isn’t so difficult.

When I was half convinced that I could do a reasonable white I starter with Abigail Sutherland, one of the heroes of The World of SMOG: Rise of Moloch. She’s another stunning model, they all are.

I removed her from her internal base, cleaned up some mould-lines and repeated the ghost treatment and added colour here and there.

Ready for gaming with a ghost as a bonus.

original art from her card

Female Witch Doctor

The first tribe member for my Paleo Diet: Eat or be Eaten campaign. I got her from the Female Forest Tribe kickstarter. Delivery is unfortunately way behind schedule, and I’m still waiting for some spear-women and riders, but the resin-minis are really very good. Well worth the wait!

I think of her as the Chieftain of the hunting party, and probably a Shaman, Thinker or Healer.

Now I just have to finish three more females and I will have enough figures to start gaming.

If you like the looks of this, or the other figures from the kickstarter, then they will probably soon be available at Heroes of the Dark Age.

Wheels for my 28mm heroes

I’ve been looking for vehicles for my games, both pulp, 70’s and modern.

I found the Mini Cooper (1/43 scale) and the truck (about 1/50 scale I guess) at a gigantic flea market the other week. They will come in handy with our up-coming zombie-game (Hjärnor/Brains) set in Sweden.

The 1953 Cadillac (also 1/43 scale) was bought in a shop months ago and will be useful for both 70’s and modern. I think I have to paint up some Raggare to cruise the neighbourhood and bash some zombie-heads.

I will re-paint the truck into a park management vehicle or something like that. The other two look good as they are.

The 1/43 vehicles are obviously a bit big compared to the 28mm minis, but they will have to do.