Iron Painter Standouts for Round One - Pretty in Pink

I plan on sharing some pictures of my entry for round one of this year's Iron Painter event. Before I do that, I wanted to share some of the entries that stood out to me. I was originally looking at sharing thirty some odd entries, but decided that was too many.

The Cycle Rolls Over

I do not make New Year's resolutions. I have considered them, but the way I figure, if there is something I was not going to do then I was unlikely to do it merely because the date changed.

I tend not to perform a focused reflection on the past year either. I am constantly looking back at my life. It's just not normally in a compartmentalized way such as placing events in boxes marked by years. In fact, I rarely put the past away at all. I simply leave it open like a festering wound to watch it turn green over time as I focus on it and seldom address the past in a meaningful way other than to permit it to depress me and attribute to my inaction in the future. Maybe this is something I should try.

Bones II Unboxing

It is not that often I do an unboxing. My package from the Reaper Bones II Kickstarter arrived last week. I was busy so set the models aside initially while I pulled out the paints and DVDs to go over. I backed the first Reaper Bones Kickstarter as well and am happy with both purchases. This one was delayed due to unforseen extensions on transit times, getting stuck in customs for a few months, and then landing in California during the dock worker strikes. This delay was the one thing I think could possibly even be considered a negative during the kickstarter for me, and it was more a minor nuisance or inconvenience than an actual problem for me.

Paint Brands for Miniature Painting

Acrylic paints are the most common type of paint used in miniature painting. Other paints not only work for miniatures, but are better at some things when it comes to miniature painting. That said, this article will focus on acrylic paints.

Acrylic paint is a coloured pigment suspended in a liquid polymer medium. This make acrylic paint more resistant to constant handling than some other types of paint yet it does not stain things the way a dye would. Wet acrylic paint can be both thinned and cleaned using nothing but water. Dry acrylic paint may be scraped off or cleaned using a degreaser. Acrylic paint dries faster than many other types of paint. There are additives one can purchase to extend the drying time, but this article is not about additives.

The brand most people in the hobby are familiar with is Games Workshop. The paint is available practically anywhere one can buy a Games Workshop model. They are good paints, but expensive. They are easy to work with, come in a wide variety of colours, and dry more quickly than some other brands. It is a solid choice for a primary paint line and for some it is their only option if they do not want to buy all their paint online. The two areas where Games Workshop paints excel compared to other brands is their metallic paint and washes. You can make washes using inks, medium, and water, but this is a much easier solution.

Craft paint is probably the other paint that is easiest to get in the USA. Apple Barrel is the craft paint I have the most experience with. There are many brands out there, but the ones I have used are all fairly similar. Craft paints normally have a lower pigment density than the paints formulated for the miniature painting hobby. They can and do work for miniature painting. They do require extra coaxing however. It takes more passes than other brands of paint to get a smooth transition as the pigment spreads out a lot so can be a little chalky.

These terminators were painted with an Apple Barrel paint as the mid tone for the blues. I have since updated the scheme to use Games Workshop paints as it makes painting the models easier, but if your only option is craft paint then it is possible with extra time and effort.

Coat d'Arms is produced by the same manufacturers as the old Citadel (Games Workshop) paints. They still use the white flip top lid with the old pot. The paint is very similar to the newer Games Workshop lines that came after the contract ended, but does not dry as quickly. This is a great option if you are wanting an out of print paint or ink that Games Workshop no longer carries. For most people Coat d'Arms is an online purchase only, although I hear there are some locations that carry their paint locally. Some of the colours are great, and others not so good. I think a lot of the talk about how reds and yellows are hard to paint are holdovers from when this company was manufacturing the Games Workshop line. Their yellows in particular are extremely streaky and oily. Then again, that can work for you. An old leather formula I used was to streak the yellow over black then wash the area in chestnut ink. I think their inks are a great product.

Rumour is that the same manufacturers of Coat d'Arms also makes Privateer Press' P3 paint line. I do not know if that is true or not, but I have heard it from a few different sources. The pots appear to be made by the same company at least, but the formulas are quite different. P3 consists of a liquid pigment mixed with a liquid medium where most other acrylic paints use a dry pigment suspended in a liquid medium. This means P3 paint is less likely to separate and is easier to mix together when it does. P3 has a longer drying time than most other hobby paints. The most influential individual on how miniatures are painted in the USA (Mike McVey. He was basically the lead on how both Games Workshop and Privateer Press painted their studio models and has written books on the subject) helped develop this line of paints with two brush blending in mind. I love the P3 line. If you are wanting to experiment with two brush blending then it is the easiest line to start with aside from metalic paints which tend to work well no matter the brand. The line is great for blending of any sort really and is slowly becoming my main brand. The paints are also moderately priced for the amount you get. I know some people do not care for their metallic paint. It does go on a little thin, but once you get a few coats built up it is some of the best looking metallic paint out there.

My experience with Vallejo is rather limited. Most of my time spent is with the Game Colour line. I am not the biggest fan of Game Colour. It chalks up more easily than other brands in my experience. The paint is highly resistant to wear after drying however. I hear that Model Colour is a better line of paint for the hobbyist, but is slightly less resistance to wear and tear. I have yet to try Model Colour as Vallejo is not a brand readily available in my area. Both lines are sometimes referred to as a dry paint. They also have a Model Air line. These are paints intended for use with an airbrush straight out of the bottle. The metallics in particular are interesting even if painting with a brush as they tend to use a smaller metallic flake than other metallic paints.

Reaper makes an interesting line of paints. I have more experience with their Master Series Paint HD line than their regular MSP line. I love the MSP HD line. The price is low and there is a lot of pigment in the paints. The MSP line tends to have more additives than other paint lines. The MSP series is exceptional for layering paint and is practically tailor made for doing so. There are some products they carry such as brown liner which are good products that are hard to find an equivalent in other brands. One interesting note is a lot of the MSP line comes in triads. This means you have three colours that are known to work together for shading, mid tones, and highlights. I have heard that the triads are great for those that are colourblind and want to paint their own models. There are colourblind model painters that do exceptional work using the triads. Nobody would know they were colourblind just by looking at their models.

While not an acrylic paint line, Secret Weapon Miniatures makes a line of washes with a lot of versatility. If you want to use a lot of different washes but do not care to make your own then Secret Weapon washes are a great option. Even colours you never thought of using such as Baby Poop have a lot of utility. Secret Weapon Miniatures made me rethink what colours make for workable washes. Secret Weapon washes have stronger pigment than Games Workshop washes and can be thinned if needed.

There are a lot of brands out there aimed at traditional artists. Most of these are much thicker than the paints sold specifically for miniature painting. Many miniature painters work with acrylics thinned almost to the consistency of watercolours. You will need thinning mediums to get most artist's acrylic to a point where it does not clog details on miniatures and not separate entirely. There are a variety of thinners and mediums out there to use. I know Liquitex makes quite a few and you can get a lot for cheap. Golden makes a line of fluid acrylics. You will likely want to still thin it down depending on paint technique being used. I do not recommend artist acrylics for new miniature painters unless that is your only option. It is possible to use artist acrylics, but they tend to require extra prep work where the brands formulated for miniature painting does some of the work for you. Additionally, many acrylic paints are non-toxic. I do not advise it, but if you spend much time in the hobby you may obsrver someone licking their brushes. Artist Acrylics may contain toxic materials for use as a pigment. Between that and the possibility of using other types of paint at some point it is probably not the best idea to add brush licking to your muscle memory while painting.

I think that covers the easiest brands to obtain in the USA. I can not speak on access to paint lines in other countries. I did not cover Andrea Colour as I have no experience with it. I hear good things about the line. They also have some really interesting sets that I keep wanting to try but have yet to do so. For instance, the NMM and Black sets both intrigue me.

First Look Into Deadzone

I was a backer for the Deadzone miniatures game. I had no previous experience with Mantic games other than seeing pictures of their models online. The reasons I backed the Deadzone project is they had delivered Dreadball by the date they promised on that kickstarter and I wanted the terrain. I figured that even if the terrain did not work on its own at the price they were asking for it I could use the panels to decorate foamcore or cardboard buildings.

This post will be a first impression. I have spent some time reading the rules as well as cleaning terrain and models. I have yet to actually paint a model or play a game. These are my opinions on the product I have received as of this writing and are subject to change as I familiarize myself more with the game.

The Models

First thing I would like to cover is the models. The infantry pieces are made of a substance some in the community like to call restic. It is a resin plastic with different properties from those released by Forge World or the GW Finecast line, yet is not polystyrene which is what most people in the hobby tend to refer to as plastic even though both types of material are in fact plastics. The pieces are pretty soft, but not as soft as board game pieces one might find in a Fantasy Flight game for instance.

There was a lot of flashing and mold lines. I was dreading the clean up when I first saw the material as the models seem to be made of a similar, yet slightly softer, material to the Privateer Press plastic models. There was also the issue with some pieces where a multi-part mold was used so I was playing hunt the mold lines on a couple of pieces.

I was surprised by how much easier the Mantic plastic was to work with than the Privateer Press plastic. The mold lines were pretty obvious because of all of the flash so hunting was kept to a minimum and were removed simply and fairly cleanly. Do not get me wrong, these plastic models are nowhere near the quality of the Games Workshop plastic models nor the Finecast line, but Mantic is not charging Games Workshop prices. There was loss of detail due to the material being used. I get this with the Privateer Press plastic models as well.

The difference for me is that Privateer Press models are harder to clean than the Mantic models, and retail for $5+ a model for the vast majority of their plastic kits with multiple models where Games Workshop tends to charge $3 a model in many kits with extra parts. Even GW’s most expensive standard infantry kits work out to $6 a model with extra bits. I greatly prefer the GW plastics to pretty much every other plastic kit I have tried in the hobby up to this point, but Mantic is not terrible outside of the loss of some details. Mantic is working on a “hard” plastic and it will be interesting to see the quality and price. You get what you pay for with these few Mantic models I have been working with. The quality is much better than I was expecting. I wish they had gone with a similar process to GW, but the models are not bad for what they are.

The Setting

Miranda

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Oh, you want more?

There is very little background material at this point. Mantic is working on rectifying this with a series of stories. Essentially the story is there are times when the ruling body decides they need to quarantine sections of space from the rest. Those sections disappear from star maps and no communication gets in or out. From the outside it seems like these sections of space simply cease to be there. This might last for decades or even centuries where the billions of people in the sector are left to fend for themselves against not only the threat at hand, but soldiers they thought would protect them as well.

The threat can vary. One example is the Plague. The Plague is an alien life form that transmits similar to a virus and transforms other living beings into creatures collectively referred to as the Plague. The Plague are one of the six factions which makes up the game. The others are the Enforcers who are sent into an area to clean up whatever mess is being contained, Marauders which are Space Orx (very original), and Rebs who are people that found themselves trapped in the containment zone. The Enforcers have the best equipment on their basic troops including armour with thick plates where the Rebs could be painted up as Space Cowboys without the hats if one wants as there are a lot of dusters to be found. The other two factions are coming with wave two. All I know about them is they are Space Dwarves and Space Elves with the Elf faction actually consisting of one elf and a bunch of robots that assist the Elf.

The Rules

I will not say much as of yet. All I have done is read the rules and watched some videos at this point so anybody reading this might want a mountain of salt.

I like what I have read so far. There is some ambiguity, but it seems like they have plans for another book already. At first the rulebook reads clearly, but there had been a couple of points already I had questions on and was not able to find an answer in the book itself. One example was the Frag special rule. In the rules themselves it does not tell if this is done as a Shoot or Blaze Away action. Blaze Away is an action which targets a cube where Shoot targets a single model. The question on which to use is made clear by every model with the rule can only target a single model with a weapon with Frag at this point, but it would have been nice to have it clarified in the rules themselves.

Aspects I like the idea of so far are the small play area, the dice mechanic, and campaign play even if it is on the light side. The cards seem interesting and a supplement rather than a core mechanic. At this point I think I will pick up the expansion when it is released unless I end up hating the game after playing it some.

The Terrain

The terrain is the primary reason I bought into the game. I have two core sets and one landing pad set. Well, half a landing pad set as I was only sent half of the sprues. The terrain is made of a hard plastic. It feels like polystyrene, but I have yet to try anything that reacts chemically with polystyrene to know for certain.

The tiles look good. They look better than the miniatures actually. The plastic is pretty thick and the details are not fine so I do not know if the same machines and material could work with the actual miniatures or not, but they work fine for the terrain.

The connectors sometimes work. The tiles themselves have mold lines inside the holes where the connectors go. I have used a needle file to clean up the mold lines inside the holes with mixed results. Different connectors will work differently in the same hole on the tiles where they are supposed to be all the same size. The buildings will work with some glue. I am thinking about not filing my second set of core terrain as even with the filing on the first set some connectors are still tight and some are loose. At this point I think I am going to end up gluing the models together instead of keeping the individual tiles modular.

The Verdict (for now)

Overall, I am happy with my purchase at this point. I still have another faction and the AI deck to come along with two missing pieces and some terrain sprues. Even if the game itself turns out not to be all that much fun I now have a 2’ x 2’ mouse pad along with terrain that I can use for games of Necromunda or even in 40K. While I wish the models were of a better quality, I do not hate the models and think they are pretty good for the price point Mantic will likely sell them for.