Eldar Alaitoc Wave Serpent (Mottled)

A few years ago I finished my Wave Serpent for my Alaitoc Eldar force.  The army is not close to being fully painted, but this is one of the few models that is.  I used a mottling technique using a sea sponge.  I went into my gaming storage this morning and the sun was out, so grabbed my camera to test out a few photos with different lighting techniques (flash, sunlight, etc.) and background colors.

Relic Knights - Cerci Speed Circuit

I recently finished a number of Cerci Speed Circuit models for Relic Knights by Soda Pop Miniatures.  Again, I used the dipping method, using Minwax PolyShade.

Emerald City Comicon 2016

Yesterday my daughter and I took a trip into Seattle to attend Emerald City Comicon.  It was our first visit and I can only compare it to other large conventions I have attended, such as PAX Prime or Gencon.  The vendor hall was huge and interesting, and it was certainly the convention with the highest percentage of people in costume.  I'm used to seeing Deadpool cosplay at conventions, but this time he was almost overtaken by Rey from Star Wars as the most cosplayed character.

Some other thoughts and highlights:

• We attended a panel hosted by Ashley Eckstein, the voice of Ahsoka Tano from Star Wars: Rebels.  She was promoting her new book publishing company, Her Universe Press.  Afterwards, we waited in the autographing area to met Ashley, who is friendly and was interested that my daughter has been a huge fan of her character, Ahsoka, for many years.  She is one of the most authentic celebrities I've met - its obvious she loves her job, and Star Wars and its fans.
• In Artist Alley, my daughter was drawn to the booth of Camilla D'Errico, an artist from nearby Vancouver, B.C.  I'd describe her art as a mix of manga and fantasy - she has fun, colorful, and unique designs that are full of mood. We picked up a print of her work, Neo New York.  Camilla was easy to talk with and really engaged my daughter, which was great.
• There were a few limited gaming exhibits and I picked up some sheets of PennyGems from ImprobableObjects.  The founder demonstrated the product to me last year at ETX.  The PennyGems are stickers that you fix to both sides of a penny to create a high-quality gaming token.
• I caught a glance at a number of celebrities at the signing booths:
• Sean Patrick Astin (Samwise Gamgee from Lord of the Rings),
• Norman Reedus (Darryl from The Walking Dead), and
• many others, such as the Foggy from Daredevil and even the Weasley twins from the Harry Potter movies!

While standing in line to meet Ashley Eikstein, we heard a huge cheer erupt throughout the hall. Puzzled, I shot a questioning glance at another person in line.  She just replied... "Nathan Fillion...".

 

Children of the Hydra's Teeth

One of my favorite movies is still Jason and the Argonauts, released way back in 1963.  And my favorite scene of course is the climax of the movie featuring the Ray Harryhausen stop-motion skeletons.  A few years ago I bought some Wargames Factory Skeletons to try and replicate the skeletons from that scene.  Assembling these models was a painful experience.  Even once assembled, they are extremely fragile.  However, I think they are the best-looking skeletons on the market.  I dipped them a few weeks ago and bought some Peddinghaus Decals 1/72 Greek Shield Emblems EP1168 for the Greek shields.  I finished them up with flock two weeks ago.

Star Wars: Rebellion

This morning Strom came over for a morning game session to try out our first game of Star Wars: Rebellion from Fantasy Flight Games.  I was the Empire and Strom was the Rebellion.  We used the Quick Start rules to quickly jump into the game.

Strategy - My strategy was to split the map in half and have one large force on each side of the map capable of destroying the Rebel Base, once located.  I would concentrate on running through the Probe Droid deck to try and quickly locate the Rebel Base.

Early Game - General Rieekan had been captured and frozen in carbonite on Mandalore.  We both recruited leaders and slowly built up our forces.  Strom never got Obi-Wan during the game and only received Han and Chewie just before mid-game.

Mid Game - There was a failed attempt by the Rebels to blow up the first Death Star.  Luke was completing his Jedi training with Yoda on Dagobah, while far overhead the planet Moff Jerjerrod was overseeing the building of the second Death Star.  Chewbacca was captured after completing a mission on Malastare, but did not succumb to my attempt at turning him to Dark Side....

End Game - With the second Death Star completed, I now had two armed and fully operational Death Stars.  I had winnowed down the possible locations of the Rebel Base to one of three systems:  Dantooine (in lower left section of the board), Tatooine, or Ryloth (which were both in the upper right section of the board).  I only needed to send my forces to find the Rebel Base and destroy it.  Meanwhile, the Rebel forces were assembling at Naboo, while my large Imperial fleet at Dagobah prepared for an attack on the Rebel fleet.

Dantooine was taken... only to find no Rebel activity on the planet!  The Rebel Base was on Tatooine or Ryloth.  However, it was too late - the Rebel forces and their expert diplomacy has taken their toll. The game ended, the Rebellion successful at persuading the galaxy that the time of the Empire was at its end.

Summary - In all, we had a fun time.  Setup took about a half-hour, but the game itself was almost four hours to complete.  We found that combat really slowed down the game, especially the Tactics cards, which seemed a little fiddly.  However, the game is cinematic, fun, and oozes theme, (Star Wars music playing in the background is a must).  I look forward to re-reading the rules and seeing what I missed for our next session.

Moff Jerjerrod oversaw the construction of a second Death Star over Dagobah.

General Rieekan was captured early in the game on Mandalore, and later frozen in Carbonite.

Wedge bested Admiral Piett over Geonosis.

General Veers versus "General... Madine" on Ord Mantell.  Veers won this one.

I captured Chewbacca after his sabotage mission, but failed to turn him to the Dark Side....

Both fleets prepared for a great battle that never ended up happening.

I took Dantooine, but found no Rebel Base!

End game - the Rebel Base ended up being on Ryloth - in the upper right of the map....