Browsing Tag

dreadball

Dreadball Human Shading

Posted on January 8, 2013

I wanted to do these guys relatively quickly, and I started the project with no idea what colours to use, so I really can’t be to weirded out that I still have no idea what colours to use, and that they aren’t “the best models I’ve ever painted”. 😛

The shading technique requires some care to be used, which I did not use. I slapped paint on all over the place!

After the Goblin Green incident of last post, I took Dark Angels Green and watered the hell out of it and applied a layer. Then, feeling whimsical, I took Lich Purple and watered the hell out of it and applied a layer. That was weird. Then, feeling less whimsical, I did the Dark Angels layer again, which removed all traces of the Purple. I was kind of hoping that they would blend in some way, but I guess that’s not what I did. I had a fever. Paint happened.

After that, I took my newly purchased Caliban Green (my DA was pretty dry…) and mixed it with a more water and Rhinox Hide to shade down in the crevasses. Lastly, I mixed the Caliban with some Ushabti Bone and shaded up a bit.

I think these last two were an attempt at solving the problem I’d constructed with my slap-dash – somewhat blotchy paint. It didn’t work out great, but you live and learn. I think after the bases dry, I’m going to dullcoat these bad-boys and see if it solves some of the problems, and creates new problems. Worked out fine for the vehicle weathering…

Secondary-freaking-colour

So now I need a secondary colour. TO MUCH GREEN. I was hoping to copy the green dudes from the book, but that’s to much green too. I’m going to paint some Ushabti stripes on them in places, but I feel like they need a big solid chest-piece-changing colour on them.

I was also thinking of painting their helmets.

Chest? Helmets? I don’t think I can pick two more colours, so just one. And putting the same colour on the chest and helmets is overkill. So maybe just the chests. Maybe just Ushapti. And some stripes.

When you really need a black…

Don’t call P3. They have a colour called Thamar Black. They should have called it “when you need a shade that’s close to black, but still has streaks of the underlying colour after 2 coats”, but I guess they didn’t have room on the bottle. Base black provided by GW and 1 coat. BOOM.

Later!

Work-in-progress

Dreadball Base Coats

Posted on January 4, 2013

As no one provided any suggestions on what colours to use on my two Dreadball teams, I decided that bright green and bright blue were the right choices.

DONE.

Kidding. (Although I would have loved some feedback…sometimes a guy just wants to know that people are reading!) Mr. Wappel writes about how he does his basecoat in really bright colours, because he shades the colour down afterwards. I thought I’d try that on these models. So I primed them all white, and then did an airbrushed basecoat of Goblin Green and Meredius Blue.

I’m planning on focusing on the human team first. Think I’ll water down the Dark Angels Green and see where I end up. Nice thing about these models – they are all armor. No silly straps or faces to get in the way.

Work-in-progress

Dreadball Team Colours

Posted on December 28, 2012

A quick post to ask a quick question —

What colours should I paint my two teams?

I’m drawing a blank. I don’t want to do the box team colours, although red for the Orx/Goblins (aka, Marauders) could be good. I don’t like the shiny silver for the human team. I was contemplating a white. I bought a new airbrush to replace my broken one, and I primed them white, so bright colours should be relatively easy.

Give me your opinions.

Work-in-progress

Dreadball Models

Posted on December 25, 2012

Mantic isn’t blowing me away with the quality of their sculpts. Most of them are alright, some of them are just plain strange. Here’s a play-by-play.

The humans are much smaller than you would have expected, if you play certain other games. There are 3 poses total. The game comes with 10 models – 4 strikers, 2 guards and 4 jacks. The strikers have slightly different poses because their right arm is either behind their backs or behind and to the side (the latter shown here). I think the strikers look pretty bad ass.

The orx (yes…) are identical torsos, but interestingly have two different arm/head positions which serve to make it look like there is actually two poses. These guys are mean and brutish looking, which is their job, but I’m not certain about the face helmet thing. You get 4 of them in the box.

The goblins have two different poses and you get 6 of them in the box. The arms from the different poses do fit on each other, but be careful – the guy leaning back (on the left) will fall over if you give him the right arm from the other guy. On my models, their attached-bases were warped a bit, so I had to cut it to glue them flat to the clear acrylic.

Wildcard is an MVP that comes free if you buy the box from a store. The concept art is sexy as hell, but the model is a little strange. Both arms stretched out and one leg crooked backwards. She’s kicking something? She’s…running at something? She’s throwing something? It’s not a kicking game, that I know of… I think I like her, but that’s despite the strange pose. She’s apparently a “season 2” MVP, so her rules aren’t finalized yet.

Lastly the refbot and ball. The refbot is a robot that has a face on both sides of the head. The ball is a ball.

The models were relatively easy to assemble. Very little flash/mold lines (I saw one post that had 3mm deep of it). Each model is at least 3 parts – usually a torso, arm and head. Some models have two arm pieces. From this set, there doesn’t feel like a lot of conversion opportunity.

Despite the “meh” sculpting, I took a look around the Mantic site and saw some pretty damn cool models. I’ll have to head back there for potential conversion ideas…

Work-in-progress

Dreadball!

Posted on December 19, 2012

No photos right now, it’s late, but I wanted to write.

I picked up Dreadball last night from Strategies Games. When I first saw the Kickstarter, I wasn’t that impressed. Models looked “ok”, I didn’t need another game to back that I was going to ignore. On the last day of the KS, I saw someone raving about it and decided to drop $10 on a PDF of the rules. $10 is nothing, and I like the idea of KS, so…there I was.

Weeks later I’m freaking stoked about this game. I have to say it, and I’m sorry that I have to say it. I love Blood Bowl. Love it. And while this game isn’t Blood Bowl, it’s close enough that I’m mentally comparing it anyway.

And let me tell you, that this game reads like it’s going to be awesome.

I assembled the models tonight. The ads claim you can pull the models out and be playing in 10 minutes. I have a little chart for you to compare “market speak” against reality in this regard:

You don’t care about mold lines, heads or arms. 10 minutes. Yes, it can be done. The models have legs and torsos and bases as a single piece. No sprue, no cutting. Pull them out of the box, open the bag, organize them and go.
You don’t care about mold lines. Probably 30 minutes.
You care about it all. Took me 2 hours, both teams including the included Wildcard MVP.

I’m going to finish reading the rules on the bus tomorrow and try to convince someone to play with me tomorrow night.

So stoked!

(now I need team names and colours…:D…and a new airbrush since I broke mine a few weeks ago…and time to post photos of the stegadon in progress…and to wrap presents…oy…)

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