(Lead) Mountain Musings - "Star Trek" September 2016

Imperial & Dysonian Fleet WIPs - Four primed Perry Class Frigates and ten Blitzspear Corvettes

Having been sat surrounded by ever-increasing mountains of metal, plastic and resin miniatures for far too long, I’ve finally decided to try and reduce my horrific horde by dedicating the following few months to a particular genre, manufacturer or scale. As a result I have filled up twelve plastic drawers with all manner of gaming goodies (the mere tip of my collection’s iceberg I’m afraid), and intend dedicating myself to painting up a random selection of figures from these compartments every four weeks or so. Such an unsystematic methodology should not only keep me motivated, as I do like to ‘flit’ subject matter from time to time, but slowly allow me to eat into a seemingly overwhelming amount of soldiers, vehicles, vessels and scenery. In addition it’ll also allow me to better dedicate each calendar month to a specific topic and perhaps progress some ‘old’ projects I’ve shelved; something I have already been trying to do recently without that much success.

For September however, I have slightly changed tact in that I have already purposely chosen the drawer in order to allow me to start painting a number of not “Star Trek” starships produced by “Irregular Miniatures”. These marvellous 6mm scaled space vessels have been sat gathering dust in my painting queue for a few weeks now. But having become increasing motivated to ‘get cracking’ on them by Jez’s wonderfully innovative recent self-made spaceship post [https://carrioncrowsbuffet.wordpress.com/2016/08/27/s-is-for/] and my recent acquisition of the “Star Trek: Attack Wing” miniatures game by “Wizkids”, I’m now determined to get enough finished in order to create a classic ‘original series’ confrontation between the Federation and some Romulan Raiders.

Nurgle Host WIPs - Plaguebearer Icon Bearer, a Rotbringers Sorcerer and the Lord of Plagues

In order to get this project moving I have therefore been busy assembling, prepping and priming a handful of Imperial (Federation) Perry Class Frigates, a couple of Oberon Class Destroyers and a load of Dysonian (Romulan) Blitzspear Class Corvettes from “Irregular Miniatures” New Spaceship range. These metal vessels will hopefully be the start of a much larger “Star Trek” inspired project, which eventually should allow me to field some considerable-sized fleets. For now though, I simply want to have enough spacecraft painted in order for me to game a reasonably small Romulan raiding action, and make a bit of a dent in my assortment of sci-fi miniatures.

Such a ‘sudden’ obsession for all-things Gene Roddenberry doesn’t mean though that I’ve been neglecting my Host of Nurgle for “Age of Sigmar”, and I’ve every intention to keep adding to this plague-infested ‘Force of Chaos’ all the time; albeit in bite-sized chunks. For now though I still need to apply some finishing brushwork to my warband’s initial units, which, as far as my Plaguebearers’ Icon Bearer is concerned, means having his pimples ‘picked out’ with a combination of “Vallejo” Heavy Ochre and “Citadel” Reikland Fleshshade.

Guild Ball Engineer's Team WIPs - (Season II's) Hoist and Mainspring

With my “Tallymen of Nurgle” almost complete, I have also found the time to get some additional work done on my Lord of Plagues. This impressive multi-part plastic model, quite possibly my favourite of the entire “Games Workshop” range, has proved a little fiddly in places on account of the terrific amount of detail his sculpt entails. But having now finished all his chainmail, heavy plated leg armour and sacrificial skull adornments, not to mention his gigantic plague-ridden Great Blade, I’m reasonably confident I can have my Nurgle Hero (and my initial General) finished within a few days.

Alongside my Lord of Plagues, I have managed to make a little headway on a Rotbringers Sorcerer. This is actually my first experience preparing and painting one of the manufacturer’s much-maligned “Finecast” models, and my initial impression of the actual sculpt were very favourable. The detail was both crisp and stunning, and I was certainly looking forward to painting what initially looked set to be a straightforward black, brown and green paint-job. Sadly however, things have not worked out that way at all, and despite having spent some considerable time cutting away all the excess resin from this model, I have consistently found myself having to ‘bring back the blade’ in order to remove something I initially thought was detail but whilst painting realised was actually flash…

"STAR TREK: ATTACK WING" - The U.S.S. Enterprise-D battles the I.K.S. Maht-H'A

Lastly the recent completion of my “Guild Ball” striker Velocity has somewhat spurred me on to give a couple of her Engineer Guild team-mates some much-needed attention. I must confess to not being a particularly great fan of the actual fantasy football ruleset by “Steamforged Games Ltd”, or their rather ‘pin-reliant’ miniatures such as Hoist and Mainspring. But I do like the aesthetics of wooden automatons with metallic joints and bronze fastenings.