William, Bert, Tom and WFB 8th edition

Meet my first 3 Stone Trolls. As the Hobbit is one of my favorite books i decided these three should be named for the trolls in the story. Moving from left to right in the Photo we have Tom, William and Bert. Currently they are acting as my generals bodyguard, which also helps to prevent them from failing their stupidity rolls quite so often. Its quite a nice symbiotic relationship.

After half a dozen recent games of Warhammer Fantasy I'd say that overall I like 8Th edition. There are a few points I'm not so fond of, such as the rules that will nearly always allow High Elves to strike first and re roll misses. This also applies to the Primal Fury for rule for beastmen which is nearly as bad. The rules for maneuvering and charging seem a little too forgiving but they seem to clean up problems with playability. Overall my least liked issues are failure to win points for a unit not completely destroyed. (3 guys left out of 20 gives no victory points for example)and the Terrain rules. Simply stated the new rules for terrain are terrible. The new rules generate way to much terrain, and far to much of that is either mystical or magical in some way. As long as my opponent is of a like mind I prefer just plain terrain and not too much of it either.

Thoughts on the Goblin a Day plan. 10 months later.

The Goblin a Day plan has gone quite well. Lately I'm not producing one figure per day, so I have fallen off the pump wagon in all honesty but I am still painting Night Goblins fairly regularly. When I'm not working on the Gobbos I'm painting Stone Trolls, squigs, and a few other things to add to their army. These extras have kept my production of pure Night Goblins a bit behind but that's OK, since I had about 220 Goblins already when my started to work on these supplementary units.

I highly encourage people to try a similar plan especially if, like me, you think of yourself as a slow painter. Make a goal for yourself. It does not need to be 1 figure a day. Perhaps 3 a week would be better for you. Keep the immediate focus small and plan to work on the overall project for a few months at least but dont worry about the big picture at first. Just tell yourself you have to do 3 a week (or whatever) and in no time you'll find a pleasing amount of painted figures accumulating on your desk. Another thing that might help is to tell friends about your goal. If nothing else they might say, "Hey, how are those figures coming?" when you see them. You'll be proud when you tell them how much progress you've made!

Here we are again...

Well, its been about another 3 months without a post. Im happy to say Ive been pretty busy these last two months putting the finishing touches on units that had been painted for months and actually playing some games of Warhammer Fantasy Battles with those figures.
When the new edition of Warhammer was released I joined an escalation league at Grimfoe Games, a new local game store. Since then Ive played 6 games which is probably more games than I played of 7th edition in total. The goblins have won 2 and lost 4 for me. Most importantly I've had a great time playing with the army.
Like I said back when I began this blog, I didnt start a Night Goblin army in order to win at WFB. Im painting these guys for the fun of it all, and it has been a blast.

Here are a few pics of what is complete right now. I have 4 more infantry units waiting to have their bases finished. In total I think I have about 260 goblins done.

Holy Underwear!

I can't believe it has been 3 months since my last blog update. The Goblin a Day painting plan is still on track, and Im closing in on 200 Night Goblins as a result.
I found myself a bit distracted when nicer weather set in, but now its almost too warm outside most days so Im hoping to get the final touches of static grass on about 5 units soon. In the interim here is my Goblin boss. Looking at the photos I noticed the highlights on the skin tone are too subtle so I think I'll touch that up a bit.

Don't Always Believe What You Read

In everything you will commonly encounter, goblins have a pretty bad reputation. Night Goblins are no exception. Dwarf propaganda is the leading cause of this problem. The Dwarfs would have you believe their cities were sacked by hordes of 'evil' Night Goblins, and indeed due to their access to printing technology this untruth has spread far and wide. Behold a glimpse of the hidden truth....

First and most important is the fact that when the Dwarfs began to build their undermountain cities, the Night Goblins had already lived peacefully on these lands for ages. During their "Golden Age" the Dwarfs ruthlessly forced the Night Goblins from their ancestral homes. Is it no wonder the hatred that exists for the Dwarfs?



Secondly, the Dwarfs have no regard for nature and all its beauty. Texts speak of the Great Dwarf Cities carved beneath the mountains. Once again the truth is obscured. The Night Goblins live in harmony with the land, and revere the natural wonders of their dark homes. It is easy for one to look upon what the dwarfs have carved and be in awe, but look at what the great caverns were like before and see what destruction they have wrought.

Beyond 100

I can't believe it's been over a month since I last updated Year Of The Goblin. A few milestones have passed in the interim. I reached my 100Th Goblin about a week ago and I meant to put a post up then but although I have been on track getting them painted, most are not flocked. I hope to remedy this in the coming week so I can share a nice pic of the growing horde! In the mean time enjoy the musings of my next post. I have found that when you paint this many Night Goblins you start to think like them a bit...

My painting coach

Here is a nice photo of my painting coach and very close friend, Sunshine, in action.
She frequently keeps me cat bound in my chair and makes sure I finish my daily Night Goblin.

The Serious Squig Color Conundrum

First let me say that I take my painting way too seriously. For as long as I have thought about a Night Goblin army I have always vowed I wouldn't paint the squigs red. I imagined painting them perhaps an earthy color like gray or a brown to reflect their natural habitat. I actually did paint some Warmaster goblins a few years ago and I painted their squigs gray, but it lacked a certain something. When it came to painting my first 'test' squig for my Goblin A Day project, I pretty much ruled out gray from the start. I considered purple, imagining them to look a bit like giant grapes. Next I thought about orange. Orange would make them look a bit like pumpkins. I like big pumpkins. My twisted mind imagined orange squigs squatting and hiding, eyes closed, in pumpkin patches across the farmlands of the Old World waiting for some poor farmer to check on or harvest his crop. This, of course, made me gravitate towards orange, but I saw a photo of some orange squigs and once again they lacked that certain whatzit. They lacked impact. After deliberations I caved in and decided to at least try a red squig. I didn't go fire engine screaming red, but rather a darker blood red. I'm actually pretty happy with my red squig although my wife says it needs some spots or something on its spine and tail. The red gives a nice color contrast to the green and black of the Night Goblins. I'm still tempted to try a dark orange one, though.

Finally Flocked

It's been a while since I started Year of the Goblin and although I have been on schedule with my painting of goblins, I finally finished basing (flocking) a unit. For some reason I hate basing and it took me a while to decide how to base these guys. I used to always go right for the Woodland Scenics mixed turf but I have wanted to start using more realistic looking methods for some time. I'm pretty happy with the results although I probably could have gone a shade lighter for the final drybrush on the bases.



As I said previously I am right on schedule, having completed a Goblin a day since I started the project on December 16Th. Prior to that date I had completed 12 Goblins. Today I have 65 goblins done. Here is a photo of the first 28 goblin unit. I have another whole unit complete and then some but haven't finished flocking them yet. As for the unit size I have read that I probably will want to go larger, but I plan to paint the goblins in a unified scheme throughout the army to facilitate converging units if needed.

a Good Omen

The high shaman has called attention to tonights ''Blue Moon"'. There is no doubt that this is a good omen for the clan in the year to come as this figure illustrates.