Author: wilbur

Nurgle V Nurgle, 90s Blood Bowl Minis, & a WilyKit Costume

wilbur

Photo dump incoming. Seeing as I am talking about my hobby progress for the next Tabletop Miniature Hobby Podcast episode, it feels long overdue. Where to start.

I suppose with these £1 wooden mushroom decorations I found in The Works.

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I thought they’d make for handy fungi forest terrain features which would work at any scale.

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I used some cheap air drying modelling clay from Amazon to make the bases.

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Then Vallejo ground texture for the basing.

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They’re now primed and ready to paint up.

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Elsewhere, and I’d been looking to add these guys to my Real Movchaos Blood Bowl team. I owned them in the 90s but they got lost somewhere. I still have all the beastmen. Big shout out to Stuart on the Discord for finding the Chaos Warrior players on Ebay (there’s another one, not pictured). When I got them through the post, it was evident they weren’t in the best condition. But I’ve cleaned them up as best I can and they’re now primed up, ready to paint.

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I also dug out my old 90s Blood Bowl plastics to see if I had enough for a couple more teams. Dettol bath time for the painted ones. I had exactly 11 orcs and 10 humans. Who could make up the numbers?

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What about this Foundry Pict?

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Yup, he’ll do.

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All primed up, alongside another one of the 90s Blood Bowl Chaos Warrior players.

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Meanwhile, I played half a mini-campaign of Song of Blades & Heroes with The Good Doctor Spork.

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The “Rivaly of Rot” was a story of two rival Nurgle warbands. We’ll have more on this in an upcoming episode of the podcast.

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We used my nurgle miniatures. The Doctor brought terrain he’d made with his wee one during a recent Royal Orc session in the Discord.

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Now for a jarring transition, Nurgle skirmish wargaming to Thundercats cosplay…

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When I showed my daughter the DVDs recently, I didn’t expect her to be that into it. Suddenly, she was asking for a WilyKit costume. We did our best…

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Whether or not I need to dress up as Snarf remains to be seen.

Anyway, back to toy soldiers, and here are some WIP 15mm beastmen from Ral Partha.

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They’re the very last thing I need to do to complete my chaos army.

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I recently finished these shield maidens from North Star Military Figures.

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And these mounted chaos knights from Ral Partha.

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A couple of 28mm scale guys in the bag, too. Harkel the Mad (left) is from Knightmare, and the Ettin was a generous gift from Warbases.

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A couple of crackers from Bring Out Your Lead, the hive vampire was the official BOYL25 gift, and the daemonette was a generous present from David in the Discord, who made the pilgrimage over from the USA.

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I finished up these Oathsworn miniatures a while ago, but I hadn’t posted a picture of them on the site yet.

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I guess I have now.

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And finally, a big raven mage guy, also from Oathsworn.

That’s all for now, no shortage of stuff to be getting on with.

But what are you upto right now? Send in a voice clip of your hobby progress and I’ll play it on next episode of the podcast!

DIY Blood Bowl Markers

wilbur

In Blood Bowl, I really don’t like the aesthetics of turning players to face the other way to mark the fact that they’ve taken a turn. I had a huge bag of 40mm round bases in my collection, so I decided to paint them up green to act as markers.

Both teams start with the markers under every player and then remove them as each player activates. It’s a simple but effective way of keeping track of everything.

I also painted up some of the round bases red to represent prone players, and left some of their original black colour to put underneath stunned players.

And I had a larger round MDF base, which I turned into a ball carrier marker. This has been a lot better than fiddling about with the tiny ball model on its own.

Nothing groundbreaking about any of this, I know. But it has definitely improved my Blood Bowl play experience!

Bring Out Your Lead 2025: An Audio Tour

wilbur

The world’s most iconic Oldhammer event, Bring Out Your Lead, took place at the Foundry from Friday, August 8th, to Sunday, August 10th.

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I caught up with Mike Hutchinson (Hobgoblin, Gaslands, A Billion Suns), Owen Staton (Crown of Command, Time Between Times Storytelling), Lewis (Oldhammer Fiction Podcast), Jordan (Jordan Sorcery), Evelina (Jimmy the Brush), Jason (Bedroom Battlefields Community), and David (5th Hammer) to hear about their first impressions, plans, and experiences.

Other BOYL25 Accounts

Some other reports from folks that were there, along with tonnes of brilliant photos.

Hobby Time as Family Time, With Ronnie Renton of Mantic

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Ronnie Renton, the founder of Mantic Games, joins the podcast to discuss the world of tabletop miniatures, game design, and the company’s evolution.

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Ronnie shares his journey from working at Games Workshop to starting his own company, his thoughts on the state of the hobby, and how Mantic has carved its own niche with games like Kings of War, Dungeon Saga, and their latest licensed projects, including Halo.

We discuss the challenges of creating accessible wargames, the importance of growing the hobby, and how Mantic is embracing new technologies like 3D printing. Plus, Ronnie teases some exciting upcoming releases!

He also took a moment to deny a claim made in White Dwarf 122:

“A man famous for winning a GW fancy dress competition by entering as a twelve-sided dice.”

Fake news, apparently!

Topics Covered:

  • Ronnie’s background in wargaming and his early days at Games Workshop
  • The founding of Mantic Games and its vision for accessible, fun wargames
  • The balance between hobby-focused and casual-friendly games
  • The role of licensed games like The Walking Dead, Hellboy, and Halo
  • How Mantic’s approach to miniatures and game design has evolved over the years
  • The rise of 3D printing and its impact on the industry
  • Upcoming releases, including Kings of War: Champions, new Halo content, and more!
Seemed like a good excuse to flex and show my fully painted Dungeon Saga set…

A massive thanks to Ronnie for taking time out of his busy schedule for a chat!

The Fundamentals of Tabletop Miniatures Game Design

wilbur

On the latest episode of the podcast, Glenn Ford and Mike Hutchinson discuss their new book, The Fundamentals of Tabletop Miniatures Game Design: A Designer’s Handbook.

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The duo needs little introduction in our corner of the hobby, and their show, The Rule of Carnage, was frequently mentioned in our episode last year about the best hobby content channels on the web.

Mike was also on the show last year, talking about some of his games, including Gaslands, A Billion Suns, Chess 28, and Hobgoblin. The latter is one that I recently got hold of and played for the first time, too – it’s a cracker.

The Fundamentals of Tabletop Miniatures Game Design: A Designer's Handbook

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Petite Pestilent Plaguebearers

wilbur

When I started collecting in 15mm I told myself I’d be happy with two armies (good guys and bad guys), but there’s a real temptation to build out a Nurgle-Chaos force now.

My two almost completed armies are humans/dwarfs and orcs and goblins. The greenskins have some Chaos Warrior allies, and I now have a unit of 15mm plaguebearers in my collection.

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I bought these on Etsy shortly after a member of our Discord community (thanks Dave!) very kindly offered to sell me a classic Great Unclean One miniature at a very generous price. I’d mentioned on the podcast that this was my all-time sought-after miniature, and after getting him through the post, it became apparent he’d work really well in 15mm scale.

So back to the 15mm plaguebearers, and these are fantastic little models printed to a very good quality. I’m no expert on 3D printing, but they don’t feel very fragile or breakable, either.

I had a rogue movement tray from Warbases because, in my infinite wisdom, I’d given them the wrong measurements on a past custom order. I also had some MDF hex bases I’d been using to playtest a little pen-and-paper game.

Glueing the plaguebearers to the hex bases worked well, enabling me to get 11 of them in a unit, and giving them more of a “mob” aesthetic, rather than being ranked up.

Continuing on the “no uniformity” theme, I used as many different contrast paints as I could on them.

Then, I used my ground texture to fill in the edges of the movement tray.

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So there you are, my petite plaguebearers. I’m pretty chuffed with how they turned out, given that I didn’t really do that much to them. I suppose that’s a benefit of choosing Nurgle miniatures, and maybe a big reason why I might be in the market for more in this scale!

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Space Rangers for £1 Each. Stargrave Scavengers

wilbur

I’ve been looking to up my collection of plastic sci-fi miniatures for games of Star Squabble. As much as plastic isn’t my favourite medium for miniatures, I certainly feel a lot more relaxed when playing with them. Paint on plastic is virtually unchippable.

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My first purchase was a squad of classic Space Rangers, sold by eM4 Miniatures for the incredible price of £4.99.

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My pal had a few of these when we were younger, and I remember they integrated into our games of Space Hulk and 2nd ed 40k seamlessly. They’re a little soft on details compared to what’s out there nowadays, but for less than a fiver, who’s going to complain?

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I also got myself some Stargrave Scavengers from North Star.

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As I said, I’m not usually a big fan of plastics, and clipping sprues isn’t an aspect of the hobby that ranks high on my list, but this was a great kit to work with. There was just enough variety without it becoming fiddly and annoying.

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At £22, these models aren’t too far off a pound a piece either – you can build 20 of them with the contents of the box.

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So these guys, combined with my Aliens xenomorphs, give me lots of options for fully plastic games, and my precious metal guys can watch on from the safety of the display cabinet.

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By the way, if you’d like to try the aforementioned Star Squabble, I’ve made a fledgling rules sheet available. I appreciate all and any feedback on your playing experience, as well as any tips and suggestions for streamlining and improving the game!

Miniature display cabinet alternative – the digital photo frame!

wilbur

We bought a Frameo digital photo frame recently for family photo purposes, and it’s doing a grand job on that front. However, I couldn’t help but think how something like this could become a nice hobby showcase – maybe even an alternative to a display cabinet if space is at a premium.

This model costs about £50/$70 at the time of writing. It has 32GB memory, which means, depending on the resolution and compression of your images, you can store between 5000 and 30,000 photos.

It has a pixel resolution of 1280 x 800 and a screen size of 8.5″ x 5.5″. You can customise the length of time each photo displays and the order they appear (newest vs shuffle). It plays video, too, for what it’s worth.

Anyway, I just wanted to throw that out there as an option. As for mine, I doubt I’ll get away with photos of goblins and plaguebearers popping up amongst baby and holiday snaps, but maybe I’ll pick up a dedicated hobby version in the future…

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