April 16, 2014

New Warsenal Pillbox

Warsenal has just come out with a new budget-friendly bunker for your table top battles.



The USAriadna "Comanche" Colonial Defensive Post is a great-looking terrain piece with a fully playable interior, and retails for only $12 - or two for $20! A very inexpensive way to fill up a table quickly, especially for a terrain-intensive game like Infinity. And if you're hosting a tournament and need LOTS of terrain - it's a great deal.



The Comanche bunker reminds me of the Atlantic Wall emplacements, and it matches the style of the Warsenal Command Bunker.



They are super easy to assemble - each one took only about 15 minutes to put together.  I painted these four quickly in an afternoon.



I base-coated with VMC Pale Bluegrey, then shaded this with VMC Blue Green, VGC Turquoise, then P3 Coal Black. I then highlighted by re-applying some Pale Bluegrey, and finally white. Orange areas are GW Blazing Orange highlighted with Golden Yellow and shaded with Skorne Red (I applied that over a base of GW Macharius Solar Orange, since it covers in a single coat). Weathering was added with P3 Bloodstone and VMC Orange Brown, and paint chips applied with some blister foam and P3 Umbral Umber.



You'll notice that there are two different shapes - mirror images of each other. I am super happy with how good these look, especially for the price, and how quick they were to assemble and paint.  I can't wait to see what's next in this particular line.





April 15, 2014

Zoom-Zoom!

Painted up another of Antenociti's excellent "Future Cars" to liven up my Infinity tables.


I used GW Paints (the old kind that they used for 20-odd years) for the reds, and they airbrushed really nicely. A Blood Red base coat highlighted with Blazing Orange and Golden Yellow, Shaded with Red Gore and then some P3 Sanguine Base.


Before painting the Red, though, I painted the whole length of the car with fully shaded and highlighted white, then taped down two racing stripes, so that once I had painted the red over the tape, I could peel it up and have two racing stripes.


I wanted one thick stripe and one thin... but I should have made the thicker one even broader.  The tape looked right, but once I peeled and saw it in white, I knew I wanted the thick stripe even thicker. Oh well - it's only terrain, right?


I have three more vehicles left - another Future Car with a hotrod engine, a future car police car version, and a larger, military, Future Humvee-style truck.


Windows were based with P3 Exile Blue, highlighted by adding P3 Frostbite and then white. Shadows were done with P3 Coal Black.

April 14, 2014

Holo-Barricades

I picked these up at Adepticon last weekend. I thought they were pretty cool scatter terrain that I could add to my growing collection of Infinity terrain.


They are by a company called "Brush4Hire" which sounds more like a painting service than a terrain company... but I guess they do a little bit of everything. There was no packaging or name for the product - so I have dubbed them "Holo-Barricades."


The set comes with 4 small barricades and 4 long, as well as one set of translucent acrylic hex-patterned inserts. Since I could not decide between orange or blue, they allowed me to get a second set of acrylics for a very reasonable up-charge. Don't glue in the screens, and you can swap them out as needed - the slot is deep enough for a sturdy fit.


It's a pretty simple three-layer construction, however, it fits together too loosely. The "foot" pieces that run perpendicular to the walls float about inside their slots, so it glues to the outside or the inside, to the left or the right... but not all around.

Somewhere between the looseness of this fit, and the stubborn tightness of the Micro Art Studio kits, the truth lies.

Still in all, easy to assemble, fast to paint, and reasonably priced. I'm glad I picked them up on impulse. And the dudes working he booth were super-nice.


Searching their site, I don't actually see this incarnation of these barricades. I think this must be an "Early For Adepticon" version of an improved design. It was not only less expensive at Adepticon, but also it is a better design than what they have currently available.


The painting was done quickly and easily - less than an hour for the whole set. 

Over black primer I base-coated VMC Neutral Gray.  The MDF was super-thirsty so at this point I sealed with some Krylon Matte Finish. Then I highlighted with Neutral Grey + White, then just White (through an airbrush, including absorption, it never comes off pure white). I shaded with Black. Then I used thinned White to add edge highlights with a brush.

A little airbrushed weathering with VMC Orange-Brown and then P3 Thornwod Green, and they were all set!

April 11, 2014

Tom's Tohaa Take Titles!

I went to Adepticon last weekend, and played in a couple of Infinity events with the Tohaa that I've been painting.  Then I turned around and entered those same Tohaa in the Crystal Brush painting competition.

I wasn't even supposed to play, or enter the contest (I just threw in some gaming pieces at the last minute), because I was supposed to be working.  But after quitting last Monday, I headed out there on my own to see all my old friends, hang out with more recent friends, and make more new friends.

Turns out, I won the two tournaments I played in. Neat, huh?


Then those Tohaa won a gold for sci-fi squad in the Crystal Brush! Also neat.


I also won a bronze Crystal Brush for the Asuka Kisaragi I painted for Bill at Warsenal.  I wasn't even going to enter anything until Bill brow-beated me into it, so I hope that he is happy to own an award-wining model!


And in a little networking, a little drinking, and some Captain America, and it was one heck of a weekend. Exhausting, but totally worth it.






April 10, 2014

Tohaa: Kumotail Bioengineer

The Kumotail are both Engineer and Doctor, necessary for repairing the bio-tech of the symbiont armors of the Tohaa. With a WIP 14, they are a solid Specialist for objectives as well.




And a family portrait of the progress so far:


The great thing about Infinity - this is almost an entire army list. Less models than a single squad of Orks, and my army is already nearing completion. Chew on that next time you're ready to pull your hair out over painting your 158th identical Imperial Guardsman.

April 9, 2014

Gao Rael with Spitfire

The Gao Rael have a Multispectral Visor (Lvl 2), which makes them a great addition to a Tohaa Triad that expects to face Camo or smoke.  They are still inexpensive enough (points) so that the fire vulnerability of their Symbiont Armor is not so terrible.





April 8, 2014

Hatail Aelis Keesan

Aelis Keesan is a character Hatail Spec-Ops of the Tohaa from the Dire Foes boxes.  At the time of this writing, she is one of two models in the game with K1 Ammunition, a new type of ammo for the game that negates its opponents' armor.  Alternately, she can carry a Viral combo-rifle.  She's also carries a defensive hacking device - rare for the Tohaa.




And a family photo of the progress so far: