Hobby Blog
Something Wicked…. Gaming in the Land of Oz
Dorothy & Pals... Off to see the Wizard! For those of a certain age, Christmas would not be Christmas without a seasonal viewing of 'The Wizard of Oz'. Over the years the magic has been rekindled and introduced to new generations with new tales set in Oz, 'The...
Reuse & Recycle – Pulp Alley D&D Dungeon Crawl
If you've not come across Pulp Alley yet, let me explain. Although the cover and title of the book might suggest that it is a rule set for gaming in the Pulp era of the 1920's to 40's, that is not the full story. It does of course excel at Pulp era gaming, but in...
Of Mice and Men, The Kingdom of the Musculites in Wars of Ozz
A few countries have no army, but only one army has no country -- the Musculites. The diminutive Musculites have no permanent home, no borders –no recognized territory at all. They are a completely migratory people. The mice haul everything they own in carts that...
Rivers & Bridges
This is my third article about gaming / collecting / painting / printing the range of 90mm Across Flats, modular terrain tiles from Hexhog Tabletops. Last month I spent my printing & painting time printing the lovely rolling, craggy landscape that Hexhog offer as...
Midshipman Hornblower & The Barberry Pirates:1
Part 1: The Ship As a long time gamer and a long time Hornblower fan, for many years I have wanted to bring the two together with some 28mm scale skirmish gaming based on our Naval hero. Over the last year or so we have been working on the initial releases for doing...
Campfire Chaos
A month or so ago I came across a terrain system for 3D printing in MyMini Factory called Hexhog Tabletops. The system is made up of roughly 3" across the flats hexagonal tiles that are clipped together with OpenLock clips to make up very detailed model landscapes....
Pulp Alley Gaming Day, September 2024
Last Saturday, twelve of us got together for a day of Pulp Alley gaming at Geek Retreat, Harrogate. It was the first time that we had put on a Pulp Alley gaming day. I think that everyone had a lot of fun! Six different scenarios were available to be played, on very...
Blood on the Sands – Let the games begin!
A month or so ago, Frank Sultana kindly sent me the current play test version of Blood on the Sands. I'm a big fan of all things Roman and have tried out a few Gladiator rule sets over the years. My son, Lewis came over to visit at the start of this week, and he also...
Damn Dirty Apes!
I've always wanted to do some table-top skirmish and RPG gaming inspired by the 1963 Planet of the Apes original novel by Pierre Bouelle which sees French Cosmonauts visit a planet orbiting the star Betelgeuse, in which great apes are the dominant...
Hexhog Tabletops 3D Printed modular terrain
I came across Hexhog Tabletops completely by random a couple of weeks ago, on My Mini Factory, while doing some work on my own store. I certainly was not looking for another terrain system. Sally 4th sells game mats and Terra-Former kits for making 12" square terrain...
Blood on the Sands
Last week I came across an excellent set of Gladiator skirmish rules called 'Blood on the Sand'. The introductory set of rules are free to download on the authors Facebook page. The rules contain counters, a map board, tokens and play sheets. The rules remind me of...
Critter Bits – Anthropomorphic Conversions!
I love the miniatures hobby including gaming, painting and collecting miniatures, which is just as well as I have been doing all of those things for at least 45 years now. One of the aspects that I enjoy most about the hobby is converting or kit-bashing miniatures to...
The Adventures of Midshipman Hornblower
Iain Lovecraft and myself have been working on a very special project for the last year or so. We are both huge fan’s of C.S.Foster’s works and can see no end of tabletop gaming potential. Our initial release covers Napoleonic Royal Navy, French Navy and Barbary...
Warlord Games Epic Punic Wars: Week 4 Republican Roman Division Complete
Four weeks in to my Epic Punic Wars project and I feel that I have hit a bit of a milestone. The models in these photographs are the complete contents of the Republican Roman Division Box . I am very pleased with how these have turned out. They can be used as a...
Warlord Games Epic Punic Wars – Week 2 Painting
This week I have painted up my first unit of cavalry, 15 Spanish cavalry from the Allied Troops Division. The same three bases in line. I really like the ratio of frontage to depth that you get using these miniatures on 60mm x 20mm bases. I also painted up a unit of...
A Street off the Aventine
Updated 16th July 2024 This is my hobby blog detailing my work on developing a detailed First Century Rome terrain set for playing Gangs of Rome, Pulp Alley , Songs of Shadows & Dust and Cohors Cthulthu. Miniatures from Sally 4th Might of Rome / A Street of the...
Warlord Games Epic Punic Wars – Roman Infantry Painting Guide
Last week I was lucky enough to be sent a preview / demo set of the new Epic Punic Wars miniatures from Warlord Games. Even although I already have armies for Punic Wars using 28mm metal miniatures from Wargames Foundry, I am very excited by the possibilities offered...
Warlord Games – Epic Punic Wars – Week 1: A start to painting
At the weekend I made a start on painting the first few units for the new Epic Punic Wars game from Warlord Games. I decided to make a start with the Allied Division Division. The four sprues in this box make up: 6 bases of Celtiberian warriors (20 soldiers each) 6...
My Carnevale / Venice Table
I've been a huge fan of Carnevale for many years. Last year my good friend Iain Lovecraft designed some fantastic Venice inspired wargames terrain and miniatures. This terrain is designed with gaming in mind, lots of flat or slightly angled roofs that miniatures can...
Warlord Games – Epic Punic Wars – The Adventure Begins!
Today I received a very exciting parcel from the postie. Warlord Games have very kindly sent me a preview set of there new epic punic wars set to paint, demo and blog about. Anybody who knows, me will know that I am very excited about Roman history in general and...
WaterSpire 2.0
WaterSpire 2 is a Kickstarter project for 3D printable terrain and miniatures designed by Iain Lovecraft. WaterSpire is great for games set in a city filled with waterways, such as Venice, or any number of imaginary cities in fantasy worlds. The campaign includes...
Painting Ozz: Cuniculus (Rabbit) Infantry
This morning I started painting a new unit for Wars of Ozz, the Black Powder Mass Fantasy Battle game designed by Buck Surdu with miniatures from Old Glory (US) available in UK & Europe from Sally 4th. I decided to star putting together some step by step painting...
Pulpam Angiportum: Sepulcrum Serpentis – Eventus II
The Thing in the Well.... concerning events on the edge of a dark and forbidding forest, somewhere in Northern Gaul where Tertius and has companions have been drawn by a disturbing dream foretelling the power of a dark God from the Province of Aegyptus growing and...
Pulpam Angiportum: Sepulcrum Serpentis – Eventus I
It all started with a comment from my son Lewis, about The Ancient Pyramids in Egypt being as ancient to Cleopatra as Cleopatra is to us. As a long term Pulp Alley fan having a huge interest in all things Roman (real and fictional) It occurred to me that it could be a...
Rebasing / Movement Trays for Warhammer The Old World
Warhammer Fantasy Battle is returning with a 9th edition called 'The Old World' One of the changes that has happened is that the bases sizes that had pretty much stayed the same from 1st to 8th edition have been altered for the new release. Heavy, shock cavalry have...
Dungeon Saga Origins
Back in March I backed Mantic Games, Dungeon Saga Origin campaign. I had backed there original Dungeon Saga and had really enjoyed it. It's my favourite dungeon crawl board game! At the weekend the new version arrived in the post. I was very, very impressed with the...
Storing a huge number of figures in an IKEA Kallax Unit
This is a Kallax unit from IKEA. It’s a great product, It’s good value, light and strong and comes in lots of different sizes. Lots of gamers have them already for storing hobby stuff. They are great for books, board games and terrain. At Sally 4th, we’ve been making...
Early Imperial Romans vs Germans with WooD
Yesterday my good friend Mike came around to put the new Sally 4th Early Imperial Romans through there paces. The Legionaries are part of a large range of models in the pipeline covering Rome's wars and her enemies. The models are 28mm metal miniatures, designed by...
Quick, Easy & Great Looking Random Battlefields
Sally 4th has been offering a series of great looking game mats / cloths for some while and over the last six months or so we have been working on a system of terrain overlays for woods, marshes, settlements, rivers tracks and roads. Some times we have a scenario in...
Pulp Alley: Rome vs Cthulhu
Over the last year I have been working on a number of Rome themed gaming projects. We are at the moment running a Kickstarter campaign, For the Glory of Rome that includes some fantastic Early Imperial Legionaries and civilians sculpted by Iain Lovecraft. They are the...
Rigging the 28mm Xebec from Iain Lovecraft
A xebec was a Mediterranean sailing ship that was used mostly for trading. Xebecs had a long overhanging bowsprit and aft-set mizzen mast. Xebecs were ships similar to galleys primarily used by Barbary pirates, which have both lateen sails and oars for propulsion....
Pulp Alley Wars of Ozz ‘A quartet of witches in the fog’
Dave Phipps, Pulp Alley author and altogether good guy has been busy working on a Magic Supplement for Pulp Alley. I was very excited to hear about this, I can see loads of potential for skirmish / semi rpg based games with D&D characters, Frostgrave style...
Speed-painting Rob Roy Highlanders
I thought it would be useful to put a quick article together to show how I paint my Highlanders' quickly to table-top gaming standard. I am definitely more of a gamer than a painter, so when I paint I am interested in the effect from three to four foot away, as this...
Speed-painting Souk Props
Over the years Ann and I have enjoyed several trips to Morocco and have always been captivated by the sights, sounds and smells of the Souk's or markets, often located in the beautiful old Medinas. For me two of the most distinguishing signs of a North African...
Rob Roy 28mm Miniatures
Ever since I saw the Rob Roy movie back in 1995, I have always thought that the plot has a lot of skirmish gaming potential. The very talented Iain Lovecraft has designed a set of miniatures and terrain and David Phipps from Pulp Alley is developing some scenarios to...
Paint my Wagon: 28mm Old West Wagons
I've been a big fan of the Dead Man's Hand plastic gunfighters ever since they were first released because of the versatility you have to put together some miniatures armed and equipped exactly how you want them. I was therefore very excited to hear that they were...
Perilous Planets: Starfleet needs a new crew
Yesterday I was sitting at my desk, thinking that I would very much like to start a new Star Trek inspired Pulp Alley campaign. We have played many Star Trek themed games in the past, it is one of my favourite genres, so it made sense to me to have a new crew for a...
Paint 4 Table: Breton Style Fantasy Archer Regiment
Twenty or so years ago, when I ran a games store I had at least a small, playable army for each army list in Games Workshops Warhammer Fantasy Battle and WH40K game, how ever my 'personal' army, and very much my favourite was always the Bretonnians. I guess I was a...
What A Cultist – Horror effects in What A Cowboy
Last Friday (21st July), John and I got together for another game of 'What A Cowboy', the Old West skirmish game from Too Fat Lardies. John, Doug and I have been playing a lot of the game recently, first learning the rules and then starting a campaign. The game works...
What A Cowboy… What A Cultist!
Over the last couple of months, Doug, John and I have been really enjoying learning Too Fat Lardies, What A Cowboy Western Skirmish rules. We have played some great games set in the Old West. The mechanisms work well and are a lot of fun. I've started thinking about...
Some new soldier conversions for Frostgrave
On Sunday I painted up six of the fantastic new Magi figures from Iain Lovecraft's Frost:2 Kickstarter, (click here for a read of the hobby blog I wrote about painting them). On Monday I got to thinking how much I'd like to use them for a league in Frostgrave, how...
Frost 2: Painting the Magi
Sunday morning, I had three hours to spare while Ann was working and as on Saturday the postie had delivered some 3D prints of these lovely six Magi from Iain Lovecraft's Frost 2 Kickstarter campaign, I decided that I would have a go at painting them up, quickly, to...
Frost 2: Painting Oldkeep Barracks
Over the last few weeks, I have had the privilege to be able to test print and paint some of the beautiful models from my good friend, Iain Lovecraft's new terrain and miniatures Kickstarter, Frost 2. This lovely plaster and timber building with a wood tiled roof...
Wars of Ozz / Pulp Alley Skirmish
On Friday Doug, John and I got together to play a Wars of Ozz skirmish game using Pulp Alley. The game was set in a semi submerged area of post apocalyptic ruins, where rumour had it that there was an ancient treasure hidden, waiting to be claimed by who ever could...
Tears of a Clown – Painting 28mm WaterSpire Clown with Speedpaints
With a few days left to run on the WaterSpire Kickstarter which completes on Friday 19th, I am trying to put together a quick and easy painting guide to get 'gaming quality' miniatures on the table in double quick time. This morning I have painted 'The Clown'. After...
Painting WaterSpire Cthulhu Deep Ones
The Deep Ones are one of the most iconic HP Lovecraft adversaries so I was delighted that Iain Lovecraft agreed to sculpt a set of them for the WaterSpire Kickstarter. The WaterSpire campaign contains buildings, canals, gondolas, statues, bridges, and scatter terrain...
Venice 1943 – 02 Hundred Hours
I am a huge fan of 02 Hundred Hours, the game of night time raids in WW2. The games innovative mechanisms do a great job at representing the difficult choices and risks associated with creeping around at night in close proximity to the enemy. It was a lucky...
Bond in Venice
Recovering the plans had been complicated. Special Agent Hinks had not expected the British Agent, Bond to at the Cathedral rendezvous. They had been compromised. That is when the fun really started. A fast Carlson was in position, keys in the ignition to take them to...
Painting Venetian Brick & Stone
For the last five or six months a significant amount of my hobby time has been spent painting model buildings inspired by the architecture of Venice, the floating city. It all started around a year ago. I was talking with my good friend, Iain Lovecraft about how I...
Dr Who and the Venetian Sea Devils
This morning Mike and I have been enjoying an excellent game of 7TV on the Venetian inspired WaterSpire 3D Printed terrain. Our game is inspired by Dr Who and uses 30 point casts. My cast is based around The Dr (Unearthly Traveller), his plucky assistant (Plucky...