The return of the Malifaux Painting Mojo

In a world of lockdown painting in which I'd already done a 28mm Ancients army (the Assyrians), a 10mm French Napoleonic army and also a 15mm Medieval Hungarian, I suddenly found myself in need of some additional variety

This was not because the other three were in any way similar topics, or uniforms - it was more about trying to paint individual figures rather than painting up and finishing a full army, with a 'full army' on table mass effect.

Prompted in the Lockdown Podcast to remember that I did have some Malifaux figures on the painting pile (although rather hidden in a cupboard) I dug them out and was pleasantly surprised to remember that there were more than I thought - I had forgotten buying Envy, from the Crossroads Seven, from eBay to add to the box-completing extras for the new Kaeris crew, Sparks (my first Gremlin) to go with Mei Feng and finally Neil Henry just to do some old fashioned beating

There are loads of pictures on the website, but here are a few tasters:

The Lockdown Specials - Part 14

The Lockdown Specials - Part 14 is now out as we reach 99 days into the UK Lockdown and our tsunami of mixed-quality painting continues to roll on and on across seven different desks spread far and wide across the Southern half of England, and yet again this is your chance to share that experience in full stereophonic audio quality.

In this week's episode there is a vague attempt made to answer the questions posed in this exact same block of text last week but which last week's podcast failed to even mention, the many questions that the subject of badgers always throws up are debated in probably the most thorough way ever seen on any wargaming-specific podcast, the Later Ottoman army gets picked apart in both it's Serbian and non-Serbian incarnations, and Andy's Quiz returns yet again.

Other topics given a 99-day airing include what the best paint schemes are for burger bars, whether Napoleon ever got irritated with the Austrians always suing for peace after he beat them, which blue is best for painting denim, what is the correct way to pronounce your own name in a Swiss bowling alley, is there a way out of existential Janissary angst, what's the correct payment-in-kind for a 3 hour truck ride across Alabama, just how big is Steve from LBMS' house, and whether Ancient British baggage now needs to include an underground bypass for your own personal 15mm A303.

A kinda, sorta, virtual match report ...

Before you ask, I am slowly working through the match reports from March this year from Cold Wars. Unfortunately the lighting in the venue on the first day was rather poor so the pictures are taking a while to fix up which has been slowing me down - but in the meantime I have managed to record a game of ADLG online played with Tabletop Simulator software, and cobble it together into a sort of video match report.

I've sped up the game and posted it online in this video on the Madaxeman Youtube Channel so you don't have to sit through the whole thing - the end result is compressed into a smidge over 10 minutes. I also then dubbed in my own commentary on what I was hoping to achieve, and what actually happened.

The battle featured me using Alexanders army (rather rustily it must be said) vs an Achaemenid Persian force commanded from Barcelona. Somewhat irritatingly the software I was using to record the game had a setting which stopped the recording at the 2-hour mark, just short of the (really exciting!) last couple of bounds, but you still get most of the whole game in around 10 minutes.

Tabletop Simulator is a "physics engine" (so, no rules, just moveable pieces) that you can buy in Steam. The armies and tables are (sort of) downloadable content that you can get in the Steam Workshop from Helveticus and Massimo, and then use to build and import an army list and tabletop into the game.  

Podcats #12 and #13

If you're already a subscriber via iTunes, Podbean, RSS, or on Spotify or (now) Youtube you'll know tha there have now been 13 episodes of the Lockdown Podcast series, but if you just read the front page of Madaxeman.com (and never glance at the sidebar) you may accidentally have missed the news that episodes #12 and #13 are already out there in the wild. 

At the moment the Podcast is consistently drawing something like 150 listeners per week, which is kinda staggering, so why not give it a go and listen in as background banter for your weekend of lockdown painting.

Ottoman-Balcan Yaya in 15mm

The Ottoman-Balcan Yaya from Baueda are some of the oddest figures out there, armed with un;it incendiary javelins - so with the imminent closure of Vexillia I of course needed to help Martin out by buying a packet of them from him to help fund his retirement! 

.I made these up as a 6-figure Spear unit and a 2-figure LF javelinmen unit. You can still get them from Baueda directly if you so wish. 

Hungarian infantry & Archers

Having finished the Hungarian cavalry (and some of the foot) a week or so ago, the rest of the army pack has crept to the top of the painting pile. 

These are the two types of spearmen, as well as some bowmen:

This is EMED41 Hungarian 1300-1450: Heavy Spearmen. They have a squared-off shield that is slightly V-shaped in profile, making it very easy to print off a rectangular image and use it as a shield design. I based these in a defensive block as a visual counterpoint to the other spear figures. 

These are EMED40 Hungarian 1300-1450: Heavy Spearman, with an odd-looking notch out of the bottom corner of the shield. This meant picking a design where that bit of the shield could be missing!

All of these are printed out on normal paper, glued on with PVA, cut down to size with a new scalpel blade (very important when trimming these as otherwise the paper can fray), gloss varnished then matt varnished. 

Here's the two formations next to each other 

And all three units of the 'bastion' deployed spearmen

EMED42 Hungarian 1300-1450: Archers - rather an eclectic mix of figures in this pack, and I ended up painting the padded jackets in brown with sandy stripes to give an impression of the banded padding. 

The rest of the uniforms are mostly in classic Hungarian Green and Red. 

The rest of the army is online at https://www.madaxeman.com/main/15mm_Hungarians.php 

Medieval Hungarians - an army from Essex !

After finishing the 10mm French and the 28mm Assyrians, the next Lockdown project has been a 15mm Essex Ready Made Medieval Hungarian army. 

It was sold as a FoGAM army, but with a bit of a squint has more than enough troops to give me all the options and more for both a Feudal and Medieval Hungarian ADLG list. 

With extra time in Lockdown I also took this as an opportunity to take more time than I usually do in painting the army, and especially to try and do the horses properly, in a process which is fully explained on the website (and is very simple). 

I also experimented with a new, higher resolution printer we now have at home, and found a load of images for shields on the web, printed them out onto normal paper and glued them onto the shields of the figures to make them a lot better than I could ever hope to paint.

I also upcycled some old figures and added new shield graphics to them as well. In the absence of LBMS transfers for this army it seemed to go OK. I've posted the WiP and lots of photos of the finished figures on a couple of pages on Madaxeman.com, including a link to download a PDF of some of the shield graphics I used

There's still a few more spearmen to come, but the bulk of the army is now online.

Lockdown Podcast #11

In another surprisingly lengthy podcast the full team celebrate being back together with a conversation that covers all bases, as well as a few associated basing materials.   

Topics addressed in almost painstaking detail include;

• whether ink is just watered down paint with a better PR, 
• if starting a new period by painting the terrain before the figures is a crime against nature, 
• whether if ArmyPainter is good enough for goblins does that mean it's also good enough for the legions of Rome, 
• how long can anyone talk about an army who's uniforms are all white, 
• definitive proof that Eddy Izzard is actually talented at that comedy malarkey, 
• is the choice to paint horses or riders first the wargamers equivalent of the age-old "clotted cream / jam" debate, 
• how invading Egypt might be the ideal way to take a war to the British, 

...and - of course, a timely reminder of the poetic genius of Eric Morcecambe. 

There is also a discussion about that perennial under-achieving arab army, the Fatimid Egyptians in ADLG, another set of questions in Andy's Quiz, and the second triumphant week of Teaching Timmy about Napoleon.

As usual the Podcast is published on Podbean, and is syndicated to all of your favourite Podcast platforms