Prepping For Trumpeter Salute Convention for April '14

[Mr. Peabody]

Lookin' good Sturm!

Have to say the playtests have been cool; very chaotic and with action in every corner of the table.

Clever decision to emphasise the colour ID of each faction so strongly as right from the start each player will have foes on two and even three sides of him.

[carlos13th]

Looks great so far, cant wait to see how this progresses.

[Sturmpioneer]

Well, some progress was made this past week.  Got a bit more colour onto the figures though they are definitely still WIP.  I've used Citadel's base yellow and am debating whether to add a brighter layer on.  Lots more to do on them such the metallics, wood and highlights plus the clean up as I have managed to muck up some of the reds with my fat fingers.

Also had another round of play-testing the table layout and predisposition concepts.  That was successful and I hope to post some pics of the actual battle once I get my hands on them.

The upcoming week may be a bit weak on progress as I have an out of town business trip to do.  We'll see.

[Sturmpioneer]

Well last week was tough as I was out of town but when I got back I set to and pretty well completed Jiro's forces.  Once the weather warms up a bit I will gloss and matt spray the figures to seal them.  I may paint gloss on parts of the armour.  Again, we'll have to see how my schedule looks.  So these are the latest pics:































I got my Ronin metal masters in.  I will begin painting those and the rest of Hidetora's forces.  I'll try and take pics tonight and post them.

[carlos13th]

I really like the Twin Sashimo. Is there any historical significance for them? As in did they mean anything? or were they just an aesthetic choice.

[Sturmpioneer]

The sashimono was a clever design choice by the movie's director.  The eldest brother has one band, the second eldest two bands and you guessed it, the third brother has three bands.  For a non Japanese audience (or non-samurai loving audience) the strong colour choices and the easy to decipher banners make the flow of the story simpler to follow.

I haven't replicated it here but the clan's banner has both a moon and a sun emblem.  This is reflected in the father's personal banners.  Taro uses the sun emblem, Jiro the moon and I think Saburo's is a rising moon emblem.

I'm in a bit of quandary as I get ready to do the father's forces.  His colours are black and yellow.  Well, I've used yellow already and black is a bit drab.  The third brother (Saburo) has a pale blue theme.  I may use that for the bases.  We'll see.

[carlos13th]

Sorry I didnt mean the bands on the Sashimono. I meant that some of the models have Two Sashimo instead of a single one. I am just wondering if they mean anything or are just an aesthetic choice.

Still thats very intresting about the bands on the sashimono though, good idea by the director as you said.

[Sturmpioneer]

Hi Carlos,
There wasn't any meaning behind the twin sashimono, though I purposefully did not use them for Taro's forces because I felt the twin sashimono and second brother theme might work better for Jiro's forces.

The following pics will be my guide for Hidetora's paint scheme.  I'll apply what I've learned so far and if time allows go back to the previous paint jobs.

[Sturmpioneer]

Here are the figs I've selected.  Some of them are masters from the upcoming sets and are not yet commercially available.























These pieces are from Foundry but I think they'll make great shields for this scenario.

[Mr. Peabody]

Wow.

Those are some very striking sculpts.

Looking forward to our next game!

[Axtklinge]

Those are great sculpts, congrats!

[carlos13th]

New sculpts look great. For those who have painted both am I right in thinking kings fords samurai are easier to paint than Perrys? They look like paint ability was taken into account when sculpting.

[Sturmpioneer]

Sorry for the late update but there was an important personal issue for me to deal with.

There's been some progress on custom chits for the game, unfortunately I can't figure out a good way to show them you at the moment.    As soon as the first batches get made I'll get some photos put up.  They look the biz at this time!

I haven't received any photos of the terrain being nuilt yet.  I'll have to pester the builder for some in progress shots.

I took a few pics of the  built, primed and first dashes of paint on the father's forces (Hidetora).  

[Bravo Six]

Dave, LOVE the new sculpts. Particularly the Ronin and the fella with the peasant hat.

-Todd

[Sturmpioneer]

Thanks for the kind words on those new sculpts.  I can see a Ronin pack 2 might be in order.  I need to sit down and add the new Ninja's to our WIP page too.  They are up on the Yahoo! Newsletter we run at  https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/kingsfordminiaturesnewsletter/info

When we sculpt the figures we've decided to overemphasize some of the details in order for them to be seen and paintable.  If they were done to scale with the rest of the figure they would just disappear IMO.  Things like the round elbow guard or the the extra armour pieces on the forearm (incidentally sometimes these  were hinged boxes used for holding items like tobacco!).