White Dwarf: October 09

Glee! And not the crappy Network Ten show either!

The new issue of White Dwarf came in the mail today, which I am happy about. The September one arrived quite late last month, so I am glad that this issue has been promptly delivered on the 29th.

As per usual, Warhammer content is thin on the ground. The bulk of the issue is dedicated to the Space Wolves, Games Workshops latest punch at the almighty Space Marine dollar. There is even a guy riding a massive wolf. Yes. A guy riding a massive wolf. 40k is now Warcraft!

The only real Warhammer article is called Mighty Heroes, Mighty Deeds, and just appears to be a thinly veiled attempt to pimp the Azhag the Slaughterer model. So basically, business as usual.

Where things really start to get interesting is in the article Master Modellers. A couple of pages into the piece, this interesting page makes an appearence.

Honestly, I got a little tingle up my spine. Doubly so when I made it to the back page.

While I now have to wait a whole month, at least there is a small sliver of light in the complete blackout that is new skaven information.

If you aren’t a skaven fan, then I don’t think this issue of White Dwarf has much to offer the Warhammer players. There are a couple of interesting scenery ideas, but nothing so useful that it is worth the AUS$12 price tag. I only recommend picking this up if you are madly skaven obsessed, like myself. In the very least, if the army book is terrible and ruins skaven forever, at least you will have the magazine as proof that you were there at the beginning of the end.

White Dwarf: August 09 Issue

Doing two publication reviews in a row is something I was trying to avoid. Fate has dictated otherwise, though.

White Dwarfs August issue 356 came the other days, and I have spent the last few days trudging through it’s content. The majority of the issue is 40k-centric, which is no surprise. Along with their Planet Strike 40k supplement released last month, not this month they have Planetary Empires. It is basically a Mighty Empires rip off, with a selection of moulded plastic hexes to use as a campaign map.

The single Warhammer offering is a tactics article titled ‘The Machines of War’. Of course. In an issue where they focus on 40k tanks and stuff, they decided to focus on Warhammer war machines as well. Really though, it is not a bad article. It isn’t written just for new Warhammer players, in fact, it seems to be aimed at the more seasoned to veteran players. You know you have a well written, engaging article when there is more text than glossy pictures of new miniatures in it.

Also of interest is the article on painting faces. Usually White Dwarf just rehashes the same old painting tips and tricks, but I found this article an interesting read. Faces are an important part of the miniature, and knowing different techniques to make them come alive is really handy. I hope they continue on this path and don’t slip back into adverts for washes and paint brushes disguised as painting articles.

Lastly, the back of the magazine proclaims next month to be the month of Azhag the Slaughterer. I have no idea what this means. Hopefully it isn’t a disastrous pile of tripe.

White Dwarf – April 2009

The new White Dwarf arrived yesterday. It’s alright. Certainly not  the worst they have ever done, but nowhere near the best.

Most of the content seems to be about The Empire, obviously to support their new Empire models. There is an interesting article called Modelling Workshop: Empire. It contains a lot of converted Empire troops and characters using different plastic kits. Not a bad article. It is interesting to see what parts from the various boxes other people like to use, and what kinds of looks they can construct from them. This is certainly one of the most interesting articles I have read in many issues, which is saying something.

There is also your stock standard look at the Empire. Largely unnecessary, I think, it is basically one of those army overviews you see recently when a new army comes out. A couple of paragraphs on the background, a couple on the troops, a couple on the models and an exploded look at the new Steam Tank frame. The steam tank looks interesting, especially given it is now totally in plastic, but hardly seems worth its AUS$96 price tag.

Last Warhammer article in there is another on the Empire, this one a series of linked battle between the Empire and Warriors of Chaos. So far I have been unable to penetrate this hefty article, my eyes just glazing over at the sight of the maps, large droplist numbers and illustrated army boxes. It may be an interesting read, but I just haven’t mustered the willpower to attack it yet.

The rest of the magazine is the usual banal Lord of the Rings and 40k tripe.

While we are talking about publications, Skavenblight Gazette has been doing well in it’s three days since issue 6 came out. The most attention seems to be directed at the painting article, which is fair enough, really. It is an extremely good painting article, and I am surprised I managed to fool the author into contributing. I’m hoping he decides to contribute some more in future.

Another month rolls in

Only small, mostly insignificant stuff happened today. I filled in the gaps on the Ratling Gun team, and used some of the left over Milliput to fill in gaps on the other Skaven miniatures. Then I wasted time watching Ricky Jervais bits on YouTube.

The new White Dwarf came in a couple of days ago. What is going on? It is basically 50/50 40k and Lord of the Rings. Sure there’s an article on putting the plastic multipart Empire general on a Pegasus, but that’s one whole page. And come to think of it, didn’t they have an article months ago about putting the plastic multipart Empire general onto a Griffin? What the hell White Dwarf editorial staff!? Has the well of inspiration dried up?

A new episode of Podhammer came out today too. Yes, it does suck what Jeff has gone through, but I stand by my comments on the Twitter sham. Suck it up and talk Warhammer, buddy.

I’ll bone you good

Cleared off my painting and modelling desk today. Not that big a deal, but I should certainly have less cat hair clinging to my brushes and models now.

At least, for the moment.

Started gluing my Damsel/Man From The Mountain model together today. I was a bit up in the air about what I was going to put in his right hand. But when I was cleaning up and cutting some pieces from sprues and putting them into the bits box, I came across a zombie hand holding a large bone. Somehow, that seemed appropriate.

The glue is drying at the moment, and then I’ll go fill in the gaps. I also need to sculpt a little extra robe onto him, as I have glued the left arm slightly forward which left a small space up near his shoulder. After that, I’ll add a few little details, perhaps the dead bird in a pouch from the Men-at-arms sprue, or something like that.

The new White Dwarf came today too. While there are some good pictures of the cool new Ork Stompa in it, largely it seems to be uninteresting. Come on White Dwarf, you were looking so good there for a while. Pick up your game!

Questing for an end to the rant

Apparently it’s been the hottest last couple of days since 1939, so in order to get the painting back on track, I’ve moved some of my stuff out to the dining table. Where it is much, much cooler.

I’ve managed to get a layer of Chain Mail onto my Questing Knights now, and I am half way through painting all their straps and wristbands and whatnot. After that, I’ll move on to a coat of flesh colour (most likely Bronzed Flesh), and then the blue areas. It’s slow going at the moment as, even in the coolest room of the house, the paint is still drying up alarmingly quickly.

If I knew anything about chemicals and paint pigmentation, I would totally get onto developing a model paint for use in hotter environments. Unfortunately, I know nothing, and so it remains but an unachievable hurdle. It’s a shame, with this economic crisis, what I really needed was a sure fire get-rich-quick scheme.

The new issue of White Dwarf arrived yesterday (my long suffering girlfriend got me a subscription as a birthday present), and it contains a lengthy article on the new Lizardmen. I gotta say, the new plastic Stegadon is amazing. I mean, almost worth collecting a Lizardman army over. Almost.

The developer interview about the army is interesting, but it contains that phrase that I have come to dread in new army releases at the moment.

“We have made X unit a lot harder”.

I realise that as the army books are developed each army will ‘get harder’ until the point where everyone kind of evens out. My only gripe is, the game seemed really well balanced before. I mean, they had changed the rules an edition ago to make everything a lot clearer, and had gone back through the armies and released books that seemed well thought out and balanced. And it all worked together.

Tweaking the armies, fixing mistakes and rearranging the structure is one thing, and I support that. But, I don’t know, a lot of these new books seem to follow the same bastardisation of the source. Which mostly is, make a bunch of guys harder, and add in Special Characters. And like I said, it will all probably even out once all the books are out, but at the moment there are a bunch of us who are stuck in this strange limbo land. And it isn’t pleasant.

While I’m ranting on like this (it must be the heat), about those Special Characters. I realise that they have always been there, and that all they have done is add them to the list to make them ‘legal’, but this whole exercise reeks of some kind of knee jerk reaction to outside forces. Mostly, it seems like some kind of desperate bid to fight off Privateer Press, who apparently are chipping away at Games Workshops primary market.

You could point to things like the Troll King in the Warriors of Chaos book and say that Special Characters are being used to expand the army options, but the same effect could easily be achieved with a generic choice who for fills the same role. This is what irks me about Privateer Press, and now by extension Game Workshop, that Special Characters are now some kind of requirement. I realise that these are supposed to be powerful and legendary personalities, but forcing them into mundane armies means they effectively pop up all over the world without rhyme or reason. Surely this diminishes the setting as a whole, having a set of individuals who are shoe horned into everything, be it of note or otherwise.