Man O'War: Pirate Fleet

These are the basic wargalleys you get from the base Man O'War game. Once again, they are sans sails. They painted up pretty fast (I had them done 2 weeks ago), but I tried something different with the bases. I plan to use them as Pirate auxiliaries for the various fleets. If anyone ever makes some Empire Wolfships I could 3d print, I might expand them into a small fleet (3 Lone Wolfs and 6 Wargalleys is around 500 points iirc).

The bases are painted to match the Dreadfleet seascape fabric, and they blend in pretty darn good when you place them on it. I took tissue paper and soaked it in glue and made mounds on top, then took a second tissue paper and placed it so it covered the entire base and coated it with a generous helping of white glue (and some water so it soaked throughout). Painting wise, I tried to match the old white dwarf guide (found in issue 382 ... which you can find pdf's of online ... mine was lost when I basement flooded awhile back). So I painted it cornflower semi-gloss blue, wash of Naggaroth Night, drybrush of Caledor Sky, Wash of Biel-Tan, Drybrush of Caledor Sky, drybrush of Lothern Blue, drybrush of white, Wash of Guilliman Blue, and a final drybrush of white.  That sounds like a lot but it goes pretty quick (although it added a week onto the time). I'm a little worried that the ships might not be attached as well, since it's not a completely flat bond, but so far I haven't seen an issue.

 

Man O'War: Merchant Vessels

Sails Ho!

The first set of Man O'War vessels that actually have sails. In case you don't recognize them, these are GW ships, just not Man O'War ships. They are tokens from the old Mighty Empires game. I have another 6 of these, but for some reason I don't have the masts/sails. There are 11 (unfortunately, since MoW groups things by 3), and I painted the sails so that they can be used in 3 groups of 3 (red/green/blue) with 2 extras (white/black). I'll use them as treasure ships that the fleets can fight over. I tried using post-it-notes to stencil the lines on the sails, but that proofed too fiddly so ended up free-handing most of them.

I like these, they were easy to paint and the sails came out pretty good.

 

August 2020 Totals

I have totally veered off my TODO list, but seem to be picking up painting speed. This month was mostly 2 Man O'War fleets, a project that wasn't even on my radar when I made the list.

I also got a game of Man O'War in with the Boy. He crushed my Dwarf fleet with his Skaven. Highlight of the game for me was my Monitor who only had 1 crew left and kept getting boarded, winning and counter boarding until he left a string of abandoned Deathburners and Warprunners behind him (the crew finally died when the Bell rolled double 5's and killed one crew on every enemy ship within range).

Last but not least, me and the Kids finished Shadows over Hammerhal. I got the final kill of the game, with my trusty Grudgeraker auto-shotgun! It was close, the Gryphhound almost sniped the kill again (like he did with the Gaunt Summoner) but couldn't seal the deal leaving the Chaos Sorcerer on one wound. I picked up Blackstone Fortress and so that's on my paint table now too (although I'm saddened by the fact that you can't get all of the expansions anymore...)

Totals for August 2020

• Skaven Man O'War fleet
• 2 Doombringers
• 9 Deathburners
• 15 Warprunners
• Chaos Dwarf Man O'War fleet
• 2 Great Leveller Battle Barges
• 2 Thunderfire Battle Barges
• 3 Thunder Rollers
• 6 Hull Destroyers
• 1 Great Taurus Rider

Total for August: 40!

Total for 2020: 115

Man O'War: Chaos Dwarf Fleet

Another Man O'War fleet. This time it's the dreaded Chaos Dwarfs.

In the Old World, Chaos Dwarfs are Dwarfs who've succumbed to the lure of Chaos (namely the God of Darkness Hashut ... who may or may not be an actual Chaos God).

These were an odd inclusion in Man O'War given that the Chaos Dwarfs are about as landlocked as you can get. They had a river that stretched the length of a continent that they needed to travel down to even get to the closest sea (across Orc and Goblin lands), then sail 1,000's of miles down and around and back up the Southlands, just to make it anywhere near the Old World where most of the action in the game happens. After doing all of that (in barges no less), their ships had a tendency to explode when they fired their main guns. But look at the size of those main guns! They are the shootiest faction in the game!

It was a fun fleet to paint! Lots of oranges and warm colors. The giant squid thing is from Dreadfleet.

 

Man O' War: Skaven Fleet

Hide the round pastries! The Pie-Rats are coming!

It's a Skaven fleet for Man O'War. These are all (except the dead fish thingy) 3d printed using files found on Thingiverse (credit to Nathan Hunt at https://www.thingiverse.com/barnebiss2/designs).

I have a PLC extrusion printer (~ $100), which is not the ideal type for printing things at this scale. I hear resin printers are better (and more expensive and slightly more difficult to operate). I hit some consistent flaws in the prints. Namely the bells on the Doombringers and the wrecking balls on the Deathburners. Anything with significant overhang. This is more due to my incompetence than the designs, but where my 3d printing inexperience failed me, my conversion experience came to the rescue. They were not too difficult to fix. I used some left-over morning star bits from my Chaos Beastmen (for the wrecking balls) and/or greenstuff (for the bells). I also never got a good print of a mast, so I made my own using thread and some polystyrene rods. As with the Dwarves from before, I still don't have access to a color printer to print out the sails/banners, so these are currently banner-less. Overall, it's about 1200 pts (not including the dead fish ship from Dreadfleet ... which should probably be about a 300 pt ship ... so 1500 total).

Color-wise I put the base colors down and hit the whole thing with an agrax wash (i.e. liquid skill), then hit each areas with specific highlights. The colors: Wyldwood Contrast sides (highlighted with Deathclaw), Blood Angel Red Contrast roofs (highlighted with dragon fire red), Guillamen Flesh Contrast light wood/ropes (w/spot highlights of ushabti bone), Runefang Steel metal (highlighted back up to Runefang Steel), Retributor Armor gold (w/spot highlights of Mithril Silver). I based them all using Flames of War Medium Bases spray painted with a satin blue (Cornflower).

I think they came out pretty good for 3d prints, and should look even better once I add the banners.

 

July 2020 Totals

Still mostly staying home. Still not being quite as productive as usual.

This month saw me finish off the Sylvaneth Endless Spells and finish a Man O' War Dwarf Fleet. We'll probably see more Man O' War before that bit of inspiration finishes.

Onto Totals:

• 1 Sylvaneth Gladewyrm
• 1 Man O' War Dwarf Dreadnought
• 3 Man O' War Dwarf Ironclads
• 6 Man O' War Dwarf Monitors
• 3 Man O' War Dwarf Nautlilus
• 3 Man O' War Dwarf Gyrocopters
• 3 Man O' War Dwarf War Balloons

Total for July: 20 miniatures

Total for 2020: 75 miniatures

Man O' War: Dwarf Fleet

All hands to Battle Stations!

These aren't on my master list. Quarantine has caused me to veer off into old projects and try to get them finished. Here is a dwarf fleet for the old (25+ years ... late 80's to early 90's) GW game Man O' War. I think Man O' War was only supported for about 2-3 years by GW, so some of these fleets are kinda hard to find.

The color scheme is light gray with a teal spot color. I think they came out okay, but maybe a brighter blue might have made them pop more. I thought that would be a bit too close to the old 80's color schemes GW used to use.

I used the turquoise contrast paint and had to highlight it through with sotek green and temple guard blue for the spot color. The light gray base is Grey Seer, followed by a 1:1 diluted wash of Contrast Basicilica Grey and then a dry brush of Grey Seer again.

Pictured in the group picture is the Dwarf Dreadfleet vessel (some type of Battle Carrier). I painted him a while back.

I will probably put these on blue bases at some point, I need to find some I like. My favorite were blank plastic bases for Flames of War, but I don't think they make them anymore. I've gone back and forth several times on the best way to base these up and store them.