Huh, somehow it’s June. Odd that.

March saw the big Old World Day, April was Salute, and then May has been a lot of real-life stuff (those who know my day job can probably guess what’s going on with that). One of the downsides to being hyper inspired after Salute is that at the end of the day, I am still constrained by the day job, which can sometimes be less than ideal. However, looking through my photos, I actually got a chunk of things well on their way.

In my head, the focus of the blog is still Ultramoderns, and I’ve been having a good time getting stuff printed off. The last few Combat Octopus releases have been absolute bangers (both the Russian SSO and the new female operators), and I’ve already got some on my desk to paint. The other part of my Ultramodern collection that I need to take a look at is my Black Powder Red Earth figures. There have been a few people talking about getting into the game, and I’d like them to be able to do it with a full set of painted figures (as well as the correct-sized mat for the larger Phaseline games, which I have just ordered). I have also been working on something that I’m not quite ready to share (in part because it’s got an embargo on it) but it’s been very interesting to look at something new for moderns (and fun chatting to a sculptor about their stuff before they are in the general public). More details soon from that particular project.

However, the big thing is I’m continuing to build up Ultramodern terrain. Having FINALLY sold off my last MDF at Partisan, I now have several large boxes waiting to be refilled. However, this time they will be using Urban Scatter Gaming’s rather wonderful MENA range. I’ve printed a big chunk of buildings from the modular apartment blocks up to the larger main buildings. So far, I’ve found USG’s staff to be very printable even on my Neptune 4, ideal for building up a large area quickly. I still have a few more pieces to print, but I should also start getting this set together..

Speaking of moderns, there has also been a lot of stuff behind the scenes getting ready with blog posts. Project Elements is continuing work, including writing up a prototype playthrough of it that is coming soon for the Patreon. This has been a fun article to write up, and I’m happy with where the mechanics are going – there were a few moments as I was writing through a concept and suddenly realised it needed more testing and major tweaks before finishing the post. However, as it stands, it’s looking like it will hit the goals I have for – something with a lot of flexibility for list construction without it being overwhelming and gameplay which incentivises the right sort of tactics. It is however still in very early stages – it’s going to need a lot of testing.

In terms of painting, I’ve not been too focused on getting figures to the tabletop. There have been quite a lot of Monday night hobby sessions (which are still continuing) where I’ve had to be working on blog posts or non-painting projects instead (including one I’m looking forward to). However, I have had a lot of fun ignoring my actual plans and painting up random fantasy figures instead. The two figures up there on the left are GW pieces but with some tweaks to make them something different (mostly involving trimming off the various hammers). As someone who writes for fun (and not just the blog), I really enjoy fantasy as it’s an almost blank canvas for coming up with fun concepts and strong ideas. It’s also usually fun to just paint as you’re not painting things like camo, and I’m clever enough to not do something like “painting black and yellow checked patterns on figures”. I still have a lot of fantasy pieces waiting to be painted (despite my best efforts to get rid of some) and so expect to see a lot of random things pop up.

Getting back into FBOS this quarter was also fun – the ruleset is a really good toolbox for building up all sorts of fantasy encounters and with plenty of existing rules to be repurposed for other things. Playing it against the Creative Regular Opponent and his Normans was a great start, but this weekend I’ll be hitting the table again with a return to gaming with The Sister.

There was also a lot of boxed games being played this month, with games of both Halo Flashpoint (against my old housemate/delque wrangler) and also an introduction to Fallout Wasteland Warfare over in York. Both of these games were great, a chance to play stuff I don’t usually and also take a look at mechanics I don’t use too much. It’s also cool to see proper boxed games – the Ultramodern space doesn’t really have an opening for it (apart from BPRE28) while even the wider historicals only have the occasional box, usually from Wargames Atlantic or Warlord. In the meantime, though I shall continue enjoying my brief games outside of the Ultramodern space.

So the final thing to talk about is Necromunda. As I’m writing, I was supposed to have spent Saturday hard at work with my Spyers cleaning up the riff raff of the underhive. Unfortunately, a vision problem decided to evolve into two two-day migraine, and so my painting, planning and gaming time turned into lying in bed wishing for death.

However, I have also been hard at work printing more of the Dragon Rest Sector Fatalis to get myself up to a full 4′ x 4′ table. This has included a metric ton of walls, and my Neptune has been getting its backside kicked (and I’ve been discovering some messed-up problems you can get when a reel of filament isn’t wound properly). But hopefully soon I’ll actually be able to host games of Necromunda for the latest campaign with the proper terrain.

Once I finish painting my models.

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