A rare bit of Malifaux

I'm currently  playing Malifaux every couple of weeks at Bad Moon Cafe in London, and whilst I've done pretty well in resisting the urge to buy some of the "new" models which Wyrd Games have brought out in the last couple of years there are just a handful which I felt I really did need to pick up.

The most expensive purchase has been the Arcanist "Starter" set of Harrison Frodsham, Harris J-5 and the two super-schemers, The Gearlings. 

As you can see these all have a really cool Steampunk aesthetic, which makes them interesting to paint and fits in with the "not historicals" itch-scratching that keeps me picking away at Malifaux from time to time.  

This is Frodsham and Harris J-5. When I bought the set these two felt like they might be the make-weights in this box set, as they are quite expensive in game terms and I didn't really have a feel for how effective they could be in-game compared to models I already owned and was familiar with using. 

The Gearlings however were the "I sort of need them to play" models, as the Crew I've been using most recently doesn't have any fast, survivable little models that can scoot down the edges of the table and do "stuff" to achieve the (non-killy) objectives that make Malifaux such an interesting  game to play. 

Gearlings are absolutely ace at this sort of thing - which I guess is why Wyrd brought then out as part of a £30 set of 4 models! 

Having seen the errata for all four of these models (which came out after the box set had been printed and manufactured it appears), and having put them on table for a spin I can now see that this is a very potent half-crew that can achieve a lot together! 

As usual I added some watch parts to the bases of these mechanical gearling models to reinforce the steampunk vibe.

 

They were all done with black undercoat, then drybrushing on top to be consistent with many of my other Malifaux models. 

I also bought from Etsy a Wind Golem proxy, as picking up the solo model isn't really possible (and this was really cheap by comparison).

As you can see, one of the challenges of buying 3D prints from Etsy of non-historical models is that the actual size of the thing is very hard to gauge ... this is stood next to two Wind Gamin Wyrd models!

And here he is next to the Fire & Ice Golems for a better comparison.

Aesthetically it fits really well I think, but I really hope he doesn't topple over in-game as he coudl easily crush my opponents models in the process!

Through the Breach We Go! 
 

Hoffman the new Arcanist

Malifaux M3E has shuffled some of the Masters around, and the Arcanists now gain Hoffman and his menagerie of mechanical monsters.

That resulted in an eBay purchase of a based and black-undercoated Hoffman crew which I hastily drybrushed and fininshed off to add a master to the roster to replace the now-retired Ramos and his spiders.

Here they are:

I'm particularly pleased how an ink-wash has created a leathery look to the mechanical Watcher's wings in this shot

I also had a bash at the "light spillage" effect on this Mechanical Attendant by extending the dayglor green to around the 'eye' - it's a bit messy but is starting to get there ...

There's alsoa Guardian as well. 

Hoffman is a metal M1E version figure that I picked up when I was first dabbling in Malifaux as a solo figure, expecting him to be an Arcanist (with all the mechanical stuff on his back). 

Turns out I was right in the end !

Welcome to Croydon

In yet another impressive addition to my globetrotting gaming career, Croydon is added to the roll call of infamy in a 4-round fixed master Malifaux tournament.

Being in too much of a hurry to try and play the game to manage to remember to take a full set of photos, there are nevertheless some vaguely amusing captions here, and the beginnings of some analysis as well. A first for everything...

See how the Spider Man did in the reports

Look! I built a Town!

Picking ridiculous projects and then almost finishing them is a classic wargamers curse, and the process of building a whole Malifaux faux-gothic-steampunk town almost from scratch instead of just coughing up for some pre-built buildings is a pretty good way of ticking that particular "curse" box, as I can now demonstrate with the following series of photos and construction hints and tips.

Learn how this came to pass here on my website

Gertfaux - a Malifaux Competition!

After almost 5 games ever, Mei Feng and her Rail Crew take to the competitive table at Gertfaux in Bristol!

It's all on the turn of a card as Giant Robots take on resurrected Irish Labourers, Little Green Men try to avoid falling into an industrial threshing machine, and a 4-legged man wearing a dress tries to avoid being run down by a big a metal horse with it's own colony of self-detaching sub-zero temperature haemorrhoids with bad attitudes.

There is also Steampunk Hannibal, and some silly captions. As if they were needed...

Mei the force be with you - Malifaux Battle Report

In the 2nd ever Malifaux report on this site, Evil Steampunk-magic-using Marxist Drug-runner Mei Feng takes on a man on a horse and his big fat Edward Scissorhands best friend in a strange urban cowboy landscape as two players struggle again to get to grips with what the hell they are up to ..

There is kung-fu, there are dogs and eagles, there is a Sikh with a machine gun and there is a lawyer (sending guns and money..?).

Who knows what it all means - but as long as everything gets set on fire, it will surely all be good in the end!

My first ever game of Malifaux

There's a vague possibility that there are lots of DBx-based historical miniatures/Malifaux crossover gamers out there, but for those of you who aren't in that (probably small) demographic, I've posted a match report from my first ever game of Malifaux on this website.

Malifaux is a Steampunk Gothic Horror skirmish game with card-driven mechanics and some rather nice models. It appears to be a lot of fun, which is a great relief after having bough the rules and the figures and then spent plenty of time painting and basing them up.

For my (and my opponents) first game we set up an over-ambitious Mei Feng vs Sonnia Criid 50 SS matchup that we managed to get through in about 5 hours, which is not too bad given neither of us had ever played before - some of the combos were rather complex.

A brand new "Steampunk Hannibal" makes an appearance as well as the usual poor jokes and irrelevant video interludes.

But this time there's also a clunking great robot who's almost a train and who hits people with an enormous metal bar as well.

What's not to like?!