arrrrgh the heat

It is ridiculously hot in my part of the world this week - 40+ degrees Celsius for every day this week, and being in the plant nursery business it is even hotter in the green houses the plants are in.

 One of the green houses has reached 50 Celsius today, and as we don't have automatic watering for the nursery I get to enter this heat to water the plants every few hours or so. 

 In between fighting off heat exhaustion I have been going over some of my rules and minis and deciding what I want to do with the lead pile.



 WW2 Dogfights

I have two sets of WW2 plane combat games: CY6! and Bag the Hun, and a good handful of  1/600 planes to go with them.  I intend to keep both sets of rules and slowly work up the number of planes to what I want.

At the moment I have enough planes to play small games with a bit of variation on the plane types, but I would like to get some more to allow for a lot of variation.

 I intend to focus more on Bag the Hun, as I think I can come up with a simple solo variation on the game that wont involve me having to plot the enemy movement.

 If I can do this, I will post my idea on the blog for others to try out.

 Expect a photo of my planes soonish.



 On the Net
I also revisited a site I learnt about a few weeks ago called MiniWars.  This site has a map showing players from around the world that have registered with the site and what games they play.

 I was taking another look at it today, and either there is a glitch in the map, or a number of people have deleted their profile from the site.  A week ago there were about eight+ Aussies registered on the site, now there are only two, including myself.

I don't even live the part of Australia the number indicates!

 For some reason Europe is only showing four players, and not from anywhere else in the world. I am hoping it is a glitch.

For those interested in checking out the site, you can follow this link: Wargame Player Finder


Items for Sale

I have some Defiance games Marines and Bugs for sale if anyone is interested. The price is $60AUD plus postage for both - given that one box is $40AUD from the only place I can find selling them, I figure this is a reasonable price for figures that are almost New In Box:

 I have started making one bug, but didn't finish it, and the marines haven't been touched at all - all neatly packed in the box the way they arrived.
 I did get some extras as well that will be include in any sale.

If anyone is interested in them please let me know - I am happy to accept paypal for payment or even some swaps if you have something I am after.

More items up for sale soon...

SAGA - my first Viking

I had been thinking about getting SAGA for a long time now, but the price vs my budget was just out of the should I / shouldn't I area.

 In October (I think) someone offered an unopened / unused copy of SAGA for sale here in Australia, so I took advantage of it to buy the rules.

 Whilst waiting for the rules I purchased a Viking Warlord figure, knowing that I could use it for the game and not go wrong with the purchase; i.e. I wouldn't be buying a figure the game didn't use.

This was my first attempt at painting a Dark Ages figure, and I am rather pleased with the results:

I also purchased some blank dice from EM4 so that I could make two sets of SAGA dice needed (but not 100% needed) to play the game:


I know I want a Viking army, but I am umming and ahing about either a Saxon or Norman army to go with it.  I am leaning towards the Saxons, as I think I can get more use form them scenario wise.

I intend to start out with a smallish Viking army and then add to it as time goes by.

The Gripping Beast Viking Hirdmen box should (from what I have read) allow me to build a basic army without the need to buy too much else.

 I do want a unit of archers, so I will need to buy those sometime.

 Ultimately I am thinking of having a unit of Berserkers (four figures), a unit of Hearthguard (eight figures),  two units of warriors (2 x eight figures) and a unit of levies (12 x figures).  This will be a six point army in total.

 This of course is option to change depending on how well my intended army works out for me.


Gripping beast also make a box of Saxons, so the two boxes would let me have two opposing armies:

As one or two of my blog readers might not know too much about SAGA, I have included a youtube video that helped inform myself a great deal about the game:

 This video is part one - if you watch the video through youtube you can get the links to the other parts should you be interested enough.



As I intend to fund this project via sale of my lead pile I am not sure how soon I will have it up and running.

 In the mean time I will me playing the game using unit bases to represent my armies so I can learn the rules.

What will 2014 bring?

Long time no post - the last few months of 2013 were hectic for me, but hopefully I will get in to a routine that will allow me to balance family, work and hobbies a lot better this year.

One thing I intend to do this year is not buy in to any new projects.

 If something new and shiny comes along then I wont be getting any thing to do with it.

 I can only buy things for current projects I have, and only then once I have painted up all the items I already own before I do so... although this rules may be bent for items being sold on special.

 I intend to sort out my lead/plastic pile and hopefully sell off anything I don't use, won't use or can't realistically continue a project for.

 I will also attempt to sell off rule sets I won't be playing too.

 Any funds raised will be for the projects I will be working on.

 Towards the end of 2013 I purchased a mint second hand copy of SAGA, so this will be one of the projects I will be selling things off to fund. By purchasing the Gripping Beast plastic box sets I should be able to get a couple of armies for the game relatively cheaply, which I can then supplement with some lead.

 I already have my Viking Warlord painted up waiting for a coat of varnish, so my SAGA project will fit in with the rules for 2014.

 What projects will I be keeping?

 Off the top of my head: WW2 zombies,  1920's Gangsters, Strange Aeons, Vietnam, WW2 Naval, WW2 & Modern dog fight games, and of course, my modern Zombie game.

 Once I start sorting the lead pile, this list will grow a little.