Posts on Jeffrey D. Gordon

Post Personal Apocalypse Update

Sun, 04 Aug 2024 13:44:46 -0500

For 4 weeks I was admitted as an inpatient at MD Anderson for my “last chance” fight against my colon cancer. I have memory problems of the actual day-by-day challenges, so I’ll be posting below copies of my wife’s Facebook posts. One thing we did learn is that I don’t deal well with long term hospital care. I lost my hair again - not a big deal for me. I’ve been happy bald before.

The Start of the Long Path

Tue, 02 Jul 2024 15:11:38 -0500

The Facts Today I have my final consult before being admitted to the hospital to “deplete” my lymph nodes. This sounds pretty scary, and in a lot of ways it is. What that basically means is that the majority of my White Blood Cells and producers will be stripped via chemo in preparation of their replacement next week. Of course this means I’ll be more immuno-compromised that I’ve ever been. This is the biggest reason I’m being admitted, so the geniuses at MD Anderson can keep me as healthy and as safe as possible during this fragile time.

Immunotherapy Delayed a Week

Sun, 23 Jun 2024 17:49:00 -0500

Unfortunately due to the holiday and the timing of both the pharmacy and melanoma departments, my immunotherapy treatment was pushed back a week. The only issue with this was having to reschedule our hotels. My PET scans last week aren’t looking pretty, but as the Rez sang: “Things aren’t as pretty from the inside.” I’ve got major growth and new tumors on both my liver and my lungs, and I’m starting to get a little worried.

We've Got A Date

Sun, 09 Jun 2024 13:35:57 -0500

Finally, we’ve got a date for my modified T-Cell transfusion! Next week I’ll be going in for a low-dose radiation consult and “dry run.” As I mentioned in the last update they’ll be using this to “poke holes” in the tumors so that the new immune cells can zoom in and start munching. Test The week after that will be the Great Experiment as the nitty gritty of the Immunotherapy Trial finally begins.

Debian: All Systems Go!

Thu, 06 Jun 2024 12:55:14 -0500

As I mentioned back in January I was targeting Linux again, but I gave FreeBSD 14.0 and 14.1 a solid attempt, and although it’s great as a server operating system* I just can’t justify having to constantly hack with it as a desktop operating system. Once set up and if you’ve got the right hardware, it’s rock solid, but no moreso than most Linux builds. * As a server FreeBSD provided me with everything I needed with a little self-ingenuity.

Early June Cancer Update

Wed, 05 Jun 2024 14:32:53 -0500

We’re still in a holding pattern as we wait for the now late altered t-cell treatment. How I Feel My condition seems to be worsening as the pain in my abdomen increases seemingly daily. My fatigue still is a factor, but I’m learning how to manage it better. I’ve been able to mow the lawn, take care of household chores, and other menial tasks with many more breaks than even just a few months ago.

Just some random Ubuntu 24.04 vs FreeBSD 14 Benchmarking

Mon, 06 May 2024 21:14:36 -0500

This isn’t a competition. This is just a curiosity experiment, and is likely not accurate. These two NUCS are almost the same - nuc1 had a bad 8GB memory module so I replaced it with a 16g, so it now has 24G vs 16G of nuc2. Identical models, NVMEs, etc otherwise. nuc1 is running Ubuntu 24.04 Server and nuc2 is running FreeBSD 14 (not the beta 14.1 yet, but that would be an interesting test too).

Early April Update

Fri, 05 Apr 2024 12:54:29 -0500

Cancer Update This will be a short post as there’s not much new going on. The last three weeks have been quiet. I’ve been healing my belly, which is still sore as expected, but I’m nearly fully mobile now. Next week I’ll be starting FOLFIRI chemotherapy at my local oncologist to try to stem the growth while the geniuses manufacture my new immune system in May. My fatigue is not at an all-time high right now, but it’s pretty rough - especially since I’ve got so many projects to contribute to.

The last set of ingredients...

Wed, 13 Mar 2024 11:11:34 -0500

This week at MD Anderson the incredible staff there were able to remove two or three of my larger tumors from my liver. This is the last part of the ingredients needed from me to manufacture my drug. The incision turned out to be double what I expected, and because of where the cut is, I’m not very mobile right now and is quite uncomfortable to get up and down or merely to roll-over in bed.

Stem Cell Harvesting (Early March)

Wed, 06 Mar 2024 15:21:34 -0600

This week at MD Anderson I went through one of my rougher treatments, certainly the most uncomfortable so far this year. My arm veins were far too small to handle the catheter, so I had to get a Central Line down my right neck. Even with the local, the pressure was certainly noticeable and uncomfortable. Once it was installed it wasn’t so bad and I was able lie still for the nearly four hours of harvest.

Late February Cancer Journey Update

Fri, 01 Mar 2024 08:47:50 -0600

I just returned from MD Anderson. My CT scan was a bit more disturbing than I expected. My tumors grew anywhere from 30-90% more over the last month. I was expecting growth, but no more than 20% or so. Next week is T-Cell, Stem Cell, and Tumor Cell harvesting surgery CT Scan Summary: Lungs/Airways/Pleura: Multiple bilateral pulmonary metastases have enlarged. For example, left lower lobe nodule on image 82 of series 3 measures 2.

A New Clinical Trial and Health Update - 2024 February

Fri, 16 Feb 2024 12:10:37 -0600

My Current Path I was just accepted into MD Anderson’s first immunology-therapy trial for colon cancer. As readers here know I’ve been fighting cancer for over two years now, and with further bad news that I was diagnosed to stage 4 metastatic in January of 2023. Other than the cancer, I’m in great health and doing quite well (as one of my doctors told me last month “You look like a million bucks compared to your chart” 😂).

Health Update - 2024 January

Fri, 26 Jan 2024 21:03:37 -0600

Howdy Folks, As some of you know, the last 2 months I’ve been on a clinical trial of RMC-6236 to shrink or mitigate my metastasized Colon Cancer which was diagnosed on January 5, 2022. Before this I took full 24 doses of both Folfox and then Folfiri the next year. In December of 2023 I was accepted into the clinical trial RMC-6236. Yesterday I received the results: growth in all tumors, and new tumors detected.

Targeting Linux Again

Mon, 22 Jan 2024 21:10:24 -0600

Today is a sad day. Today is my last attempt to have FreeBSD as a desktop for the foreseeable future. A simple pkg update shouldn’t cause kernel panics when starting KDE (I have an idea WHAT is the cause, but it shouldn’t cause a panic/reboot). I honestly don’t have the time between my work and my health to dive into the kernel debugger and report this issue - although I might, because I’m Lawful Good these days.

FreeBSD 14-BETA2 Installation on Commodity Hardware (preview and intent)

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 12:48:13 -0500

I was going to install this on a old Dell PowerEdge 2950, but I became frustrated with the boot bios times, and was too lazy to sit fast forward. Not to mention the noise in the room would make the video even more annoying. The setup is the same on both machines except I’m installing on a hard drive on the commondity near-potato computer instead of the Hardware Raid drives of the Dell Server.

KDE on FreeBSD Spell Checking

Tue, 05 Sep 2023 07:54:16 -0500

Frankly as a Linux user I was always on the Gnome 4x camp of Desktop UIs. This is because that’s the flagship Ubuntu Desktop. On FreeBSD most folks recommend KDE, so I’ve decided to give it a try again. I’ve used it back in the late 90s and early 2000’s, so I wasn’t scared of the thought of using it at all. I just have had no experience since I never had to dip my feet into that area of desktop environments.

My Standard, Minimal FreeBSD Desktop Install Script

Mon, 28 Aug 2023 08:04:21 -0500

The following is a “living work in progress” collection of scripts I use to make life with FreeBSD a bit better and potentially more secure. Some of these are taken straight from Bastille’s recommended settings. If you’re not a developer you might want to change ‘git’ below to ‘git-lite’ # Disable Access Time on ZFS zfs set atime=off zroot # Disable Sendmail sysrc sendmail_enable="NO" sysrc sendmail_submit_enable="NO" sysrc sendmail_outbound_enable="NO" sysrc sendmail_msp_queue_enable="NO" # Update FreeBSD base freebsd-update fetch freebsd-update install pkg install -y vim git zsh bash neofetch htop doas rsync # configure doas echo "permit nopass :wheel" >> /usr/local/etc/doas.

My last chemo session of 2023!

Fri, 25 Aug 2023 10:28:16 -0500

(Updated Sept 1st 2023, see below) Today was my last chemo of 2023! I’ll be getting my CT/PET and MRI scans on Thursday to see what the next step is. This is the second time I’ve got to ring the bell at Texas Oncology. Update Sept 1, 2023 Narrator: “But this time, it wasn’t”. It would appear that I’m due for a “maintenance mode,” lower dose of chemotherapy to see if we can maintain the size of the tumors.

FreeBSD Jails Made Easy (Updated 2023-11-01)

Wed, 09 Aug 2023 14:46:25 -0500

Background This year I decided to return to my roots: FreeBSD. I learned the BSDi system as a simple unprivileged user before I really knew anything about the internet thanks to a local internet service provider including a shell account with all dial-in accounts in the early 90’s. I’m not even sure what year, but it was early college so either ‘91 or ‘92 (AOL Sucks!). I was never really scared of the command line.

Chemotherapy Status 2023/08/04

Fri, 04 Aug 2023 08:53:28 -0500

All apologies to those who actually follow this. Nothing “special” has occured during this round. My second round of Chemotherapy is nearly complete. I have two more rounds left. In four weeks we’ll be back to MD Anderson for the end of chemo CT and MRI to see what the next step for treatment and (hopefully) removal of the metastatic tumors. This round of chemo has been hell for my GI system, but (butt?

Colon Cancer: First Session of Second Round of Chemo

Fri, 24 Mar 2023 16:45:00 +0000

The first strike against the invaders is complete! I’ve had my first chemo session and pump removal finished this afternoon. Yesterday I was knocked on out by the chemotherapy. I slept easily 20 hours or more. Feeling good so far today with th reception a little heartburn. Tomorrow I wonder how it hits me when the steroids wear off. 1 dot is a chemo day, the second is the pump removal.

Colon Cancer: No longer in remission. Now diagnosed with Stage 4

Thu, 23 Mar 2023 22:45:00 +0000

My apologies. It’s been a crazy few weeks. Since my last post, all was good and well. No cancer markers and a clear CT scan. However, in January cancer markers in Signatera showed up despite being clear 2 months before. In that short amount of time my wife Kim and I have traveled to MD Anderson in Houston twice. I’m now a Stage 4 Cancer patient now going through my second run of Chemotherapy.

Colon Cancer: Officially In Remission!

Wed, 28 Sep 2022 12:45:00 +0000

Hi everybody, I’m Jeff and my Stage 3b/c Colon Cancer is in remission! The CT scan came back with some concerns on my liver, but after an MRI, it turned out to be “just” fatty liver disease. This should go away as I start eating more healthily and exercising regularly. Today was a good day.

Colon Cancer: Last Chemo Session

Fri, 02 Sep 2022 12:45:00 +0000

Hi everybody, I’m Jeff and I might not have Stage 3b/c Colon Cancer anymore! That’s it! My target has been wrecked! On September 8th I get my CT scan to see if the “pilot has escaped” (if the cancer had spread somehow) and that we indeed kicked cancer’s butt! Today I rang the “Final Chemotherapy Bell” at Texas Oncology in Wichita Falls. Kim, my wife, was as excited as I am for this difficult year to pass.

Colon Cancer: COVID Delays Final Chemo

Mon, 08 Aug 2022 11:45:00 +0000

Hi everybody, I’m Jeff and I have Stage 3b/c Colon Cancer. After years of being extremely careful, COVID finally got me. It wasn’t quite severe, certainly not as bad as the chemotherapy side effects. My highest temperature was 101F (38.3C) and that lasted only a day and a half. The fatigue on top of the already nasty fatigue I was experiencing was a little rough but I survived. However, because of this my chemotherapy sessions were delayed by two weeks.

Colon Cancer: My every two weeks ball and chain

Fri, 24 Jun 2022 11:45:00 +0000

Hi everybody, I’m Jeff and I have Stage 3b/c Colon Cancer Back in the day folks had to wear an electric pump. These days they give out a pressurized ball of poison errrm medicine for we chemonauts. This is how I get it, all swollen like a scared pufferfish ready to get a dolphin high. In 24 long hours it shrinks down to a wilting lemon. It took me a couple of weeks to find the best way to sleep with this.

Colon Cancer Status (June 13, 2022)

Mon, 13 Jun 2022 12:45:00 +0000

Hi everybody, I’m Jeff and I have Stage 3b/c Colon Cancer ♫woooaaah we’re halfway there - wooooaaah livin’ on a prayer♫ Bon Jovi, Living on a Prayer 1986 Over halfway done! My silly “BattleTech Target” chemo treatment chart below has a dot for each Chemo Treatment and each removal of the “pump.” I did it like that so there would be more dots to fill in and make it look more interesting.

First Regatta on Flash!

Sat, 04 Jun 2022 12:45:00 +0000

June 4th was my first “my boat” regatta at the Wichita Falls Sailing Club. It was a beautiful day despite the lack of wind, my wife Kim and I crewed Flash. Seven boats entered, but due to such light winds only two were able to complete - mostly out of sheer luck of getting the a breath of southward wind. We were able to complete about a third of the course, until we just didn’t have enough wind to tack around the first buoy.

Colon Cancer Status (May 12, 2022)

Thu, 12 May 2022 12:45:00 +0000

Hi everybody, I’m Jeff and I have Stage 3b/c Colon Cancer Warning potentially graphic post-surgery pics below (no blood) It’s taken me a few months to open up “publicly” about this (although I do joke morbidly with my close friends about it) 2022 has been a heck of a year. On January 3rd I went in for a semi-routine colonoscopy due to a hint of occult blood in my stool. I have no family history of the disease; I wasn’t worried about the results at all.

BattleTech Alpha Strike Learning Game

Wed, 11 May 2022 11:07:03 -0500

Last night my brother Ray, my son, and my nephew had a learning game of Catalyst Games Labs Alpha Strike, an alternate, company vs company miniature wargaming version of the legendary BattleTech from the 1980s. 3D Prints of the buildings were started two nights before this game, and there are much more in queue. We had a lot of fun, and can’t wait to have more games of both Alpha Strike and Classic BattleTech!

Victoria 18 Sailing - First Solo Sailing

Sat, 28 Aug 2021 11:14:56 -0500

Today I solo sailed my Victoria 18. This was my 4th time sailing. The first time sailing I was added as a deckhand for a regatta at the local sailing club - which I joined immediately The second time on a sailboat was with my wife making a few rounds around the local lake harbor. See Maiden Voyage I didn’t post about the third time going out of the harbor and a bit on the lake proper with my wife and my son.

Victoria 18 Sailing - Maiden Voyage

Sun, 22 Aug 2021 12:09:55 -0500

On Saturday August 21, 2021 my wife and I took my Victoria 18 on a quick “kiddie-pool” maiden voyage around the harbor at the local Sailing Club. There were some rigging mistakes which I’ve already been educated upon. My known mistakes are: the boom being too high and not level to the cockpit, and the jib sheets being free instead of through the gunwale pulleys (which I knew better, but forgot).

Victoria 18 Sailing - Power to the Stern and Motor

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 12:09:55 -0500

Last night I drilled 2 holes in my Victoria 18. Not to worry, it was all on deck or high in the cockpit. A small hole for light duty DC wire to the stern navigation light and a larger 30mm hole for a power port for my electric trolling motor. Both holes were sealed via plumbers tape on the hole and along the length of the screws mounting the new equipment.

Linux Kernel Virtual Machine Multiplatform Plan

Sun, 10 May 2020 15:47:03 -0500

I’ve been a “DOS Guy”, “FreeBSD Guy”, “Mac Guy”, a “Windows Guy”, and lately a “Linux Guy” for various parts of my life. As I get older the lines are blurring and I’m settling in on “Linux Guy” as I’ve become more familiar and less frustrated with the operating system as a whole compared to the other options. My biggest problem right now is Software. Sure I can use GIMP, KDEnlive, Blender, etc and I love and use these programs dearly, but right now Adobe is the 600 pound Gorilla that the media is using for content cration and sharing.

Accessing Data in XLSX Spreadsheets in Python

Mon, 30 Mar 2020 07:50:44 -0500

Fedora Magazine just published an excellent article on how to access CSV data using Python3 (on Fedora, but the methods work on all Python platforms). Although I do use .csv in my daily workflow, I do have many employees and partners who prefer the ease of use of sending and receiving .xlsx files. This is mainly because there’s little to no confusion on formatting of an .xlsx document (and one less step when importing in either Excel or LibreOffice).

Some Rust wasm_bindgen Hiccups

Sun, 15 Mar 2020 10:13:02 -0500

/stream of thought mode on As I’m trying to migrate savaged.us to WebAssembly components using Rust, I’m having to work-around any public fields when returning a Rust struct to my Typescript workflow. The biggest problem I’m having is that String struct variables which are made public don’t support the Copy function. I can get around this by accessing the fields from wasm_bindgen getters and setters. however, when exporting a data object, there’s no way to get a list of the fields exported for importing the data object later.

Musings of Programming Future Blazor or Rust

Thu, 12 Mar 2020 00:20:16 -0500

I’m a programming professional. I’m not the greatest developer by any stretch, but I’m competent and responsible. Even nearing 50 years old, I’m keeping my eyes to the future. Right now I feel that future is WebAssembly. I’ve been keeping my ear to the ground and the two major players aiming for developers in this technology is Rust and Blazor. As this technology matures I tend to start weighing my options on “which to choose.

New Site Migration

Wed, 11 Mar 2020 12:16:20 -0500

What has been is what will be, and what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 1:9 Back to Static Websites! Thanks to some prompting by Bryan Lunduke, I’ve decided to move this old website to Hugo. This site is now a static site generated by software on my local workstations. I find this pretty cool as this is how I started experimenting with websites back in ‘92 thanks to a BSD account and home page at Cyberstation in Wichita Falls, a pioneering ISP at the time which I believe is no longer in business.

Practice Minis are done!

Wed, 06 Apr 2016 18:01:58 +0000

This post is about 3 days late, but I’ve completed my practice “warm-up” minis and I’m ready to start work on Pinnacle’s excellent 12 Last Parsec minis The are two minis that are the same. The lady with the broom in Pic #3. One is metal, one is reaper bones. I painted them both as an experiment for reaper bones. I wasn’t disappointed. The cost difference is well worth the slight degradation (and even less apparently once painted) in sharpness.

Miniature Painting after a 2 Year Hiatus

Wed, 30 Mar 2016 03:57:34 +0000

I’ve been too busy working on our new (for us) house (hence the lack of posts too!) and just a couple weeks go I finished my study. What does this mean? I get to start painting minis again! 😀 I’m way out of practice, but these speed paints of some role playing miniatures for my Savage Worlds games are any indication, I’ll be doing well enough when I get around to painting the models I’ll need for Chupacabracon in May.

Infinity the Game Ariadna Speedpainting

Thu, 31 Jul 2014 17:50:16 +0000

Here’s just a list of photos that I painted a few months ago for my Ariadna faction of Infinity the Game by Corvus Belli. The bases are Cobblestone Rubble from DragonForge

OWC 2.5″ Tray Installation for SSD on MacPro 2009

Fri, 11 Jul 2014 02:11:23 +0000

This is post 4 of 4 in the series “2009 MacPro Upgrade Project” Aha the last piece of the puzzle (until I get my memory upgrade later). This article covers an OWC 2.5″ Tray Installation for SSD on MacPro 2009. Here’s the OWC 2.5″ Drive Tray installation… took longer to pull out of the box and take pictures than actually install (and much longer to write this blog post!). As I noted before I connected my SSD and installed the drive on the Optical Bay SATAs for OS Installation via Time Machine backup of my 13″ MacBook Pro (2010).

MacPro installation of EVGA GeForce GTX 760

Thu, 10 Jul 2014 01:10:28 +0000

This is post 3 of 4 in the series “2009 MacPro Upgrade Project” This is a visual guide for installation of an EVGA GeForce GTX 760 on a 2009 MacPro. Just a note, I’ve already installed Mavericks on my Samsung 1TB SSD, but the tray from OWC hasn’t come in yet, so I’ve got it plugged into a SATA port in the Media bay for now – the drive in bay 4 is a 1TB standard platter drive for Time Machine.

2009 MacPro Upgrade Project Inspection

Mon, 07 Jul 2014 23:25:39 +0000

This is post 2 of 4 in the series “2009 MacPro Upgrade Project” 2009 MacPro Upgrade Project Inspection The MacPro has arrived. My workbench has been set up and I’m ready for any cosmetic repairs that bother me. This post is going to give an overview of the quality and repairability of 2009 MacPro Upgrade Project Inspection. First things first. Let’s open up the box and verify that it boots and everything functions as expected.

Mac Pro Upgrade Project (MacPro 4,1 circa 2009)

Wed, 02 Jul 2014 23:23:57 +0000

This is post 1 of 4 in the series “2009 MacPro Upgrade Project” Mac Pro Upgrade Project (MacPro 4,1 circa 2009) I just won a bid for a 2009 Mac Pro (Quad Core Xeon 2.66). I plan on making this my primary technology project for the summer. It’s got a few dents, dings and scratches on it, but I think I can clean/buff those out. It’s a pretty minimalistic machine as far as it goes, but because it’s an older Mac Pro there are MANY fairly inexpensive opportunities to upgrade this box to a workhorse media machine.

Spamalot! at Backdoor Theatre in Wichita Falls! June 6-28

Wed, 07 May 2014 21:11:46 +0000

I’ve been casted in Backdoor Theatre‘s production of Spamalot! as Robin, the Brave. We’re in our 3rd week of rehearsals and it’s been a blast! James Beaman as Sir Robin There’s a pretty challenging song and dance routine with this character. I’m stoked to rise to the level to perform this song. I’ll have updates and perhaps backstage rehearsal pics as I have permission and time to post them. Until then RUN AWAY!

Infinity Fluff – from YouTube

Sat, 16 Feb 2013 00:13:01 +0000

Just a quick post of my Infinity Fluff Playlist for possible Newcomers to Infinity the Game http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MI6IEHmEaNY – [ENG] “Infinity the Game” Fluff 1/9 – Intro http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezishF133io – [ENG] “Infinity the game” Fluff 2/9 – PanOceania http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXfgmhtjCMY – [ENG] “Infinity the game” Fluff 3/9 – Yu Jing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APrnXvi3Uio – [ENG] “Infinity the game” Fluff 4/9 – Ariadna http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2zSeg_rvSk – [ENG] “Infinity the game” Fluff 5/9 – Haqqislam http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTDKIU6_avk – [ENG] “Infinity the game” Fluff 6/9 – Nomads

Infinity Tutorials

Wed, 13 Feb 2013 00:22:35 +0000

With Infinity quickly gaining interest in the local gaming group, I’ve decided to post my How To Play Infinity Playlist with videos produced by the folks at Corvus Belli. The intros are basic, but very easy to follow. There’s so much depth to the game that it’ll take us a while to get it all right. In the next few months I’ll be posting more about my Infinity experiences. My free time is about to be even less with work and a huge personal project coming up — so don’t wait on the edge of your seat 😉

Painting the Two Player Warmachine Boxed Set – Menoth – Part 1

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 05:09:05 +0000

Step one: basecoat areas that will be white with thinned GW Dheneb Stone Wash all the new basecoat with a slightly thinned Agrax Earthshade Drybrush areas with Dheneb Stone Drybrush with Skull White Basecoat the cloaks with Liche Purple Layer with Warlock Purple. The next step will to wash the cloaks with Leviathan Purple Ink and start working on the metal and other purple borders.

Mysterious Ubuntu.com Countdown

Wed, 02 Jan 2013 14:51:59 +0000

No idea what it is yet, but I’m always excited to see new stuff come from my favorite Operating System. Check it out and watch intently at Ubuntu.com

Laptop Hard Drive Crash

Tue, 06 Nov 2012 15:02:50 +0000

Yeowsers. When it goes down, it goes down fast! I knew it was coming a few months ago so I purchased a spare hard drive to archive/install to. Took about two and a half hours to recover my apps, data and settings and lost only one of my virtual machines (Windows Vista, for IE9 testing) and a few other Apps that I decided to just reinstall from the App Store, but I’m back up and going with all my old settings even without using Time Machine as my backup source.

Black. Blacker than night.

Sun, 04 Nov 2012 03:15:57 +0000

In preparation for the event/tournament (Chaos vs. Imperial) I’m getting my 1500 points of Black Legion ready to go. Looks like I have 13 models to paint to be ready for Saturday’s tournament. Quite attainable. Here’s a preview and my list. 1500 Black Legion Army Sheet

A great game of BattleTech

Sat, 01 Sep 2012 06:44:54 +0000

Michael “The Professor” V. and I had a great game of lance vs lance BattleTech at Galaxy Comics tonight. It was an even game with the same mechs vs same mechs are we’ve not played in a while and wanted to get our methods working again. It was a very close game with him coming in as the victor thanks to some not-so-awesome rolls including a snake-eye consciousness roll on my Atlas.

My Eldar Made it on BOLS Wargames Gallery!

Fri, 24 Aug 2012 02:58:50 +0000

http://www.belloflostsouls.net/images/2012/08/wargames-gallery-8-23-12.html My eldar(‘s rear armor) made it to the front page of a World-Wide site 🙂 AWESOME!

Eldar Versions of Imperial 6th Edition Fortifications.

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 23:46:49 +0000

Now that the awesomeness that is Warhammer 40,000 6th Edition has arrived, I have the opportunity to create unique Eldar fortification terrain counts-as for the Aegis Defense Line, The Imperial Bastion and others. I’ve got a few ideas running through my head (open air curvy structures with transparent plastic ‘force fields’) and have already started work on an Eldar Skyfire Lascannon/Quad Autocannon equivalent for the Eldar Defense Line. I’ll probably design the Bastion in either SketchUp or Lightwave (or maybe even use this as an excuse to learn Blender!

Rumored 6th Edition Allies

Wed, 20 Jun 2012 17:46:36 +0000

Allies in normal games. This could either the the most awesome thing ever or what breaks the game entirely. I can’t wait to see how this plays out! What could this mean? Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling! Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes… The dead rising from the grave! Human sacrifice, eldar and dark eldar living together… mass hysteria! What this really caters to is those of us with *looks to the right hand menu* many 40k armies and have a different dynamic.

Autarch WIP (Part 1)

Tue, 19 Jun 2012 05:19:54 +0000

After getting home about 9 I finished working on my last 3 Fire Prisms and I’m DONE exept for my “one more thing” mentioned in my last post. Here’s about an hours work on one of my handful of Autarchs (the cheapest points wise at 75 points !) Alls left is all the Jewels (blue for him) and cleanup. 33.897093-98.50974

Completion of Eldar Core Warhost for WARGamesCon

Mon, 18 Jun 2012 17:27:09 +0000

Right now all I have left to do is paint the green on the canopies of my 3 Fire Prisms — no more than 30 minutes of work tonight. So I’m counting this as done. However I started thinking on it and I’ve decided I wanted to paint up an Autarch for the help of reserve rolls. I can’t justify having 6 bare Fire Prisms on the table on an Apocolypse sized game.

Painted Army Stats (or, “How I learned to love the fact that I’m past the 3000 points painted mark”)

Sat, 09 Jun 2012 22:53:03 +0000

As of now (just as soon as I finished my 7 Wave Serpents) this is what I have painted in Biel-Tan fashion. Note that no non-mandatory upgrades (for example, I gave the naked Farseer mind war since at least one power is required) other than WYSIWYG upgrades (like shuriken cannons on top and bottom of Wave Serpents and scatter lasers on the War Walkers) were included in the point costs — these are effectively bare bones models (no exarch powers, extraneous wargear or vehicle upgrades).

7 Wave Serpents (part 2, very near completion)

Fri, 08 Jun 2012 17:43:06 +0000

Oh the light at the end of the tunnel! All’s left is decaling, cleanup, clear coating, canopies and canopy painting. I might be done by tonight! Decaling: I’ll have a Biel-Tan logo next to the cockpit, maybe a swordwind sword on the turret, and probably a Biel-Tan logo on the rear ramp (as Wave Serpents tend to show their backsides before releasing troops and being blown to bits by showing their rear armor).

7 Wave Serpents (part 1)

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 05:11:31 +0000

7 is probably too much to handle but here we go. I was missing 2 bottom turret shrunken cannons, so I converted my own from twin linked shrunken catapults Cheers for now, I’m beat. 33.89718-98.509709

Less than 16 days to WargamesCon…

Tue, 05 Jun 2012 17:47:07 +0000

Less than 16 days to WargamesCon and despite my best efforts I still feel that I’m a bit behind. Right now I have 7 wave serpents bodies on the table about a third to half way completed (I hate painting white!). All that is left on the tank bodies, is the chainmail for the metal bits, washing the metal bits, jeweling and cleaning up. I’ve still yet to reassemble and prime the turrets and shuriken cannons.

Something I forgot: Objective Markers (WargamesCon preperation).

Thu, 31 May 2012 17:23:28 +0000

Ok I completely forgot about finishing my Objective Markers until last night. Right now they’re on 30mm bases and they should be on 40mm bases (both in most current tournaments and according to rumor for the next edition, despite the fact the Assault on Black Reach markers are 30mm bases). This’ll give me a bit more room to put my “Eldar Beacon Antennas” and perhaps a little mini-MINI-diorama or maybe fallen space marines being shot at/cut or an Eldar casualty.

3 Fire Prisms WIP (Part 2)

Wed, 30 May 2012 05:15:42 +0000

Fire prisms are nearly done…. Just cleanup, decal transfers and cockpit canopies (I’m gluing them down). 33.897066-98.509736

3 Fire Prisms WIP (Part 1)

Tue, 29 May 2012 02:14:48 +0000

Banshees are done except Jain Zar and their aspect decal (and sealant) so I started on my Fire Prisms today as I didn’t think I wanted to paint 10 tanks in a row (putting the scorpions aside for now). Good progress, but lots of cleanup and details I plan on decaling the Banshees tonight to have them completely finished. 33.897159-98.509755

Howling Banshees (part 2, base coating )

Thu, 24 May 2012 04:27:38 +0000

Just a quick update. Right now they’re only 2 colors and a wash (scorched brown and bleached bone) with the exception of Jain Zar who has shining gold as well. 33.897225-98.509724

Howling Banshees (part 1, test model)

Wed, 23 May 2012 05:54:58 +0000

Just a slow start of 12 models (yes, I’m throwing Jain Zar in the line since she was there and based – although she’s not visible in the background 😉 ) It’s still a work in progress as I still need to wash the Powerblades blue and wash the base one last time (as well as aspect decals, jewels and sealing). 33.897045-98.509925

Preparing for WargamesCon’s Campaign Track (updated 6/5a)

Fri, 18 May 2012 22:25:51 +0000

I’m going to WarGamesCon, and taking a ‘fluffy’ 3000 point force fully painted in 33 days is going to be quite a challenge, however I am quite far along. Most of what I have to paint are tanks, which I have all the drivers and gunners already painted (luckily I did those two years ago)! 83 models for 3000 points. I wish it could be a higher model count, but I’ve always preferred mounted Eldar armies.

An experiment – eldar jetbikes (part 3, production)

Wed, 09 May 2012 03:08:32 +0000

All done except a few cleanups on the banner & sealing them with a satin finish (which will hopefully smooth out the decal lines). Now only 9 more to go 🙂

An experiment – eldar jetbikes (part 2, production)

Tue, 08 May 2012 05:01:14 +0000

Remember I never paint for anything much better than table-top quality 🙂 33.897102-98.509846

An experiment – eldar jetbikes

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 03:24:06 +0000

I had created an early prototype last year (or was it the year before?)… Now I’m nearing completion of the (surprisingly easy!) conversion. The only thing it lacks is SOMETHING just behind the rider. It’s got to be something from the old 3rd edition Dark Eldar jetbikes or the current (but still 2nd edition eldar jetbikes). I’m thinking a wavy flag like the current eldar jetbikes. 33.897194-98.509701

Shadowrun Returns

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 19:34:58 +0000

I saw. I drooled. I backed. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1613260297/shadowrun-returns

Black.

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 04:06:35 +0000

Blacker than night. Darker than death.

New life for old models

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 05:26:23 +0000

Finally. I’ve chosen my Sept paint scheme. A simple tan with goblin green accents. Chainmail for the metal bits. Now I’m not too sure what to wash with: gryphon sepia or delvan mud. Probably a combination of both: dm for metal and sepia for the rest. The pics: — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

The Fleet is being Rebuilt

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 20:48:18 +0000

After collecting several second-hand Tau armies adding them to my near 2500 points of 3rd edition Tau then putting them in the paint-strip vat over the last several months I’ve started putting paint on the vehicles. Here’s a pic of what they looked like (and very similar to what they’ll look like when repainted): There are 4 Devilfish Chassis here, one of which I couldn’t pop the top so it’s permanently a devilfish (and will likely be my one of my Pathfinder painted vehicles).

My 2012 “Movies to see” list

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 07:00:14 +0000

Ok I’m starting the new year with a non-gaming post. I’ve told my wife many times the last few weeks that our Movie budget is going to be horrendous next year. Here’s a few reasons why: Jan 20 – Underworld: Awakening I’ve always loved the Underworld series, although it’s gone a bit downhill the last few, they’ve always been entertaining. Apr 4- Iron Sky This won’t be playing at any theatre that’s local, but this is a highly anticipated indie film I’ve been keeping an eye on.

Tau – Second Generation Gue’vesa

Fri, 16 Dec 2011 00:55:48 +0000

These Gue’vesa (humans who have joined the Greater Good) were born into the Tau Empire and are fully integrated into their society. Their dedication is fully Tau as well as their technology. My first planned conversion is to make the battle suits look a little more made and designed by human hands. This requires changing the feet out from hooves and adding possibly larger hands. For this experiment I chose the Eldar Wraithlord feet as my replacement because both that I had extras on hand and the bits are very cheap online.

Eldar – Cities of Death Test List #1

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 03:54:26 +0000

1250 Pts – Eldar Roster HQ: Farseer (1#, 98 pts) 1 Farseer, 98 pts ((pp.26, 28 & 60 Eldar); Psyker; Doom ; Fleet; Ghosthelm; Rune Armour; Runes of Warding; Shuriken Pistol; Singing Spear; Independent Character) A pretty minimalist Farseer, but it’s an important one–for at least psychic defense alone. Troops: Storm Guardians (11#, 130 pts) 10 Storm Guardians, 130 pts ((p.39 & p.64 Eldar); Fleet; Close Combat Weapon; Shuriken Pistol; Flamer x1; Fusion Gun x1)

Orktamus Prime – WIP #1

Sun, 02 Oct 2011 21:43:31 +0000

33.897138-98.509583

Orky Fun Lists (Close Combat Battlewagons, take 1)

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 13:44:37 +0000

This list is just a rough draft of a daft idea: Run 4 BattleWagons up that have boarding planks (with ‘nob PowerClaws), Deff Rollas and a Wrecking ball & do as much damage to everything within 2″ It’s probably not that competitive, but it should be fun! 1500 Pts – Codex: Orks Roster HQ: Warboss (1#, 65 pts) 1 Warboss, 65 pts ((C:Orks, pp. 32 & 97); Unit Type: Infantry; Stikkbombs; ‘Eavy Armour; Choppa; Slugga; Furious Charge; Independent Character; Mob Rule; Waaagh!

Goff rock band (complete)

Mon, 26 Sep 2011 00:31:42 +0000

33.897117-98.509594

Goff Rock Band Stage

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 03:59:41 +0000

Just a little preview of a highlight of my Orks the stage is meant to be optionally put on a BattleWagon 🙂

Heavy Gear: Brainstorming & Pondering

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 13:09:23 +0000

I’ve been looking for a Sci-Fi skirmish level game (quick games of 10-15 models, taking an hour or two to play) for a few months now. I thought that BattleTech would fill that role, but it’s anything BUT skirmish style thanks to the detailed record keeping and slow-pace of the game (a game of lance on lance can take 2 hours pretty easily). BattleTech is analogous of land-battleships than a skirmish game.

BattleTech: Size 2 Desert Table – COMPLETE

Sun, 24 Jul 2011 20:13:01 +0000

Yay it’s done (except letting the Gorilla Glue dry on the mountains and then spray-Matte Coating the extensions)! Now for onward and upward on the next Table!

BattleTech: Size 2 table Work in Progress #2

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 03:35:04 +0000

Ok I’m done for the night…. it’s late for me and I got tired waiting for paint to dry. Here’s what was done in the 2.5 hours of “work” tonight (although an hour of it was waiting): I got 1 Hex Module completed with the hex lining so you can see how easy it really is… First I lay my plastic Hex template over the new Hex Module and use a Sharpie to make lines as per the template.

BattleTech: Size 2 table Work in Progress #1

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 01:50:16 +0000

Just a pic 😉 Size 2 Table Work in Progress early evening.

BattleTech: Prospective Board Sizing & Hex Module Pattern

Wed, 20 Jul 2011 17:34:15 +0000

Hex Module Pattern First off I want to share, in the sprit of Open Source, the pattern for my Hex Module. When I create my Hex Modules I make them with 1″ thick foam so that a level 2 hill covers a typically sized ‘mech pretty completely. BattleTech Hex Pattern (Large Format Printer Required) Remember to turn scaling OFF to make sure that it prints correctly. I have NOT tested this on a large format printer yet (I don’t have one), please feel free to test it and leave me feedback if it works or not.

BattleTech: “Finished” Table

Wed, 20 Jul 2011 03:07:44 +0000

It’s DONE!! At least 7 hexes are done, I actually plan on making 3 more full hexes and 4 halves (to make more of a rectangle on the table). It’s really amazing how quickly everything gets assembled and painted once one stopgap has passed (which was the template). This table is REALLY Inexpensive: Here’s a cost breakdown of materials: 5 bottles of Apple Barrel Quality Paints ($5.50) 1 8’x4’x1″ sheet of Foam Sheet ($13.

BattleTech: 3d board – nearing completion!!!

Tue, 19 Jul 2011 03:34:55 +0000

I have some more hills to add to this desert board, but it’s almost done! I’m hoping to have everything on this board done by Thursday (3 more nights!) Sure it’s not perfect, but it’s PLAYABLE (better than a plastic sheet!)

BattleTech: Custom Hex Template

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 03:45:17 +0000

Whew this one one of the most physically grueling mini-projects I’ve done. I actually (somehow) blistered the top of my index finger from the pressure I was exerting to cut through the plastic. Each of the cut-outs was painstakingly hand-cut with an ever-dulling razor blade templated by a small 1/8″ square wooden dowel. The working side of the cutting table. The back side of the working media. The results are pretty good.

Python: Associative Results with the MySQLdb library

Fri, 08 Jul 2011 13:48:23 +0000

This is more of a personal reminder as it’s not the default behavior as it is in most modern database libraries… I’ve highlighted the important bits for associative results in white below #!/usr/bin/python # Note the MySQLdb.cursors import statement # and the cursorclass declaration in the connect string. import MySQLdb import MySQLdb.cursors oDBConn=MySQLdb.connect(user="user", passwd="pass", db="db", host="localhost", compress=1, cursorclass=MySQLdb.cursors.DictCursor) oCursor=oDBConn.cursor() oCursor.execute("select `field1`,`field2`,`field3` from `mytable`") while(1): LogString = "" oRow = oCursor.fetchone () if oRow == None: break sField1 = oRow["

BattleTech: 3d Terrain Progress (painting started)

Wed, 22 Jun 2011 04:49:47 +0000

I’ve started painting on my terrain. I’ve decided to go for a sand theme for the first “board”. I’m only doing a 7 hex-module board (remember my modules will be 7 hexes wide face to face) so this board will be 21 hexes across from top to bottom. In my currently center hex-module I’ve got a depressed area for an oasis of water in the desert. This depression is cut into the hex-module and there’s poster board on the bottom of it for painting (it blue) and drawing the hexes beneath it.

BattleTech: 3d Terrain Progress & the Official Master Unit List

Tue, 21 Jun 2011 03:10:46 +0000

My Terrain Board WIP Some may think that I gave up after my dismal show up for BattleTech demo day last week. Oh no. I’m still playin’! I’ve got 13 of the big hexes (“main boards”) done and I’m starting to work on the hills (and eventually the water on some of the main boards). Mind you this is all from just ONE of the 4′ by 9′ foam sheets. I still have 2 more.

WFB: Ogres (Completed Bull Unit)

Sun, 12 Jun 2011 20:23:10 +0000

This is the completed unit from last night’s 2 hours of painting. PS: Sorry about the cat hair on the backdrop…. I did clean a lot of it, but apparently not enough. Heh.

WFB: Ogres!

Sun, 12 Jun 2011 06:21:59 +0000

Ok. The local group is starting to play Fantasy again (yay), and I’ve decided to sell my Lizardman army to a local who wants to get in so I can finance my Ogres. I bought a box of Bulls so that I can start getting into the swing of painting them. This unit is my “test unit” for painting. I started off by primering black.[ I started off by painting the flesh GW Rotting Flesh (61-43).

BattleTech: Beta Cuts of Hex Terrain Board Modules!

Fri, 10 Jun 2011 04:01:31 +0000

Ok I was really hoping to cut 3 at a time, and in the process of trying this.. I got 2 bad hexes (too small), and one “good” one. Once I cut the other 3 one at a time, I must say I’m pretty impressed considering I was cutting by eye-balling it with my posterboard template just laying on top of each one. The pink ones are the final material… the “good” one was the first (and worst) cut.

BattleTech: I got my old plastics from eBay

Tue, 07 Jun 2011 03:09:41 +0000

Schaweet — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

BattleTech: Modular Table Alpha Test #1 & Official MUL Site!

Sun, 05 Jun 2011 03:44:39 +0000

First of all The Topps Company released the Official Master Unit List site yesterday (SkyHigh, their lead developer, was awesome enough to visit my site and personally thank me for the bloggable hoopla I gave them about their Coming Soon page). To be honest I’m both honored and humbled to be singled out. I volunteered my coding skills if he needed any help, as it sure looks like a MVC PHP or Ruby site judging by the URLs and Flow Controllers, but I know how it’s harder to get help than just do it yourself.

The Anatomy of a Hexagon (and a little math!)

Sat, 04 Jun 2011 22:49:05 +0000

I know this post only has a LITTLE to do with BattleTech, but I’m putting it here because it was a BattleTech project that peaked my interest. As I’m working on my modular table, I’m working on the mathematical anatomy of a hexagon. I’ve noticed several things with my 2″ Hexagon grid: First thing I did is that I drew lines across my Hex Grid at the angles of the hexagons themselves.

BattleTech: Hex Terrain Materials & Experiments

Thu, 02 Jun 2011 16:33:24 +0000

I got my 1″ foam from Home Depot last night (I had to special order that thickness). I got 3 sheets of 4 foot by 8 foot foam. Between that and some Hot Wire Foam Factory tools that I have (and one on order!), I should be able to create some very nice modular Hex Terrain. So sorry about the blurriness, it was too dark to focus I suppose. However I’m not exactly sure how I’m going to do it.

BattleTech: Wow, I just found a really good deal on eBay (if it pans out)

Tue, 31 May 2011 13:33:20 +0000

Basically 30 of the old-school plastic miniatures for $31 after shipping. No idea what quality they’re in, but some of them are the old “unseen” plastics. I hope it’s not a scam 🙂

BattleTech: Ooooh An Official Online Master Unit List?!?

Tue, 31 May 2011 03:33:52 +0000

On the ClassicBattletech.com home page I noticed THIS Coming Soon banner: Now THIS is online support that is awesome, if it it’s as cool as I can imagine it to be. I’ve created my own BattleTech Lance Creator, but if they make one that I don’t have to maintain and work on I’m ALL for it… in fact I’d love to help them develop it. You can get the Master Unit List PDF for free from here.

BattleTech: Our second game in AGES

Sun, 29 May 2011 04:48:26 +0000

I finally got another game in with my Brothers From Another Mother Dale & Ray tonight, and they came up with an ingeniously simple way to keep up with target movement modifiers instead of using a glass marker of where the ‘mech came from: Just put a single (small) six sided die next to the ‘mech with the number being the modifier to hit from its movement. If it’s a 0 just use a 6 to note it was activated.

BattleTech: My observations of then and now.

Fri, 27 May 2011 16:09:01 +0000

There are a couple of core rules that have changed that I’ve noticed: Partial Cover BattleTech circa early 1990’s (BattleTech compendium p24): If you have partial cover it USED to be a -2 to hit (worse at the time), but all hits are punch location table. Current Classic BattleTech (Total Warfare p102) : It’s now a +1 to hit (same as walking difficulty modifier) and you roll on the main damage location chart.

BattleTech: Intro Models Complete (in 2 nights)

Tue, 24 May 2011 04:50:46 +0000

I’m not proud of them, but they’ll be GREAT for demo games. Understand that this is TWO intro boxes worth of ‘mechs, not one. I painted them both different colors for ease of demo game identification. I’ve not painted the Hellbringer (Loki) or the Summoner (Thor) yet, as they’ll be a premium paint, not a quickie Pre-Painted-Plastic quality paint job.

Who’s Awesome?????

Mon, 23 May 2011 04:07:13 +0000

Classic BattleTech: It’s AWESOME

BattleTech: A third of the way done with 46 mechs

Sun, 22 May 2011 06:00:02 +0000

Just a quick, basecoat wash & highlight of 46 mechs (2 intro boxes). Red vs. Blue mainly for Demo games.

I’ve created an online BattleTech lance builder

Sat, 21 May 2011 02:37:29 +0000

Check it out https://jdgwf.com/utils/lancemaker/ A big thank you from the Solaris Skunk Werks project for their index.ssi file where I got the data for this quickie project. No saving options, but it’s made for just quick lance (or star) creation 🙂

BattleTech: A very useful tool!

Tue, 17 May 2011 19:04:55 +0000

After surfing around and trying to find out how to better evangelize BattleTech at lunch, I came across a very interesting Java developer group & BattleTech fans. Solaris Skunk Werks has created a Java Program to build your own mechs (or load up a master list of ‘mechs). The interface is not-so-easy to use, but it is usable (and has some very nice print options, such as adding hit location tables, etc on the sides).

RANT – Well I was thinking about reinforcing a new army or two, but….

Tue, 17 May 2011 13:24:20 +0000

This happened. Forget it. I’m done supporting this company. I’ll finish off my Dark Angels and put the rest of my armies in storage. I’m no longer interested (and right now I’m only barely interested playing thanks to the bad taste in my mouth) in 40k, BattleTech is looking more and more appealing (despite my FLGS having issues getting the product currently, that’ll change.). Yearly 10% price hikes are uncalled for and a slap in the face for the consumer, crack cocaine is cheaper than this.

Photos: 1500 Points of Deathwing & what’s on my table

Mon, 16 May 2011 02:27:19 +0000

Belial’s Upgraded Squad

Thu, 28 Apr 2011 03:31:49 +0000

Complete with Apothecary & Standard bearer. I’ve blanked out Belial’s banner as I was unhappy with the way my freehanding turned out. I have a little freehanding to do on the Apothecary’a kneecap, but the first squad of 5 is painted! — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Deathwing Shoulderpads

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 02:42:25 +0000

I got them in (50 models worth) That is all 🙂 Addendum: What this really means is that I finally get to paint my troops (I cheated on Belial‘s shoulderpads). — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Belial: Master of the DeathWing (complete)

Tue, 19 Apr 2011 01:27:09 +0000

Bases, again, are from back2base-ix.com (brick series). They’re much more subdued than the Celtic Ruins that I use for my Eldar, but it’s exactly what I want… a temple-like cobblestone. Again, remember I paint (quickly) for a (hopefully good) table-top standard not for awards.

Belial: Master of the DeathWing (wip)

Thu, 14 Apr 2011 19:37:26 +0000

Sorry about the pics…. he’s impossible to take a good pic of with the Lightbox while he’s being painted on the stick (1/2″ x 1/2″ x 6″ square dowel) he’s mounted on right now so I took him out to our flower bed out front for some natural sunlight….although it created a pretty harsh light in this case. Enjoy and remember I paint for a good table-top standard, not for winning awards (and I CANNOT freehand thanks to my shakes).

DeathWing: The Start of Masochism! (and a neat tool if you’ve not seen one!)

Mon, 11 Apr 2011 02:12:19 +0000

Ok I’ve disarmed and cleaned (mostly) my trade with Evil Homer (thank you thank you!). I’ve added a purchased box of close combat terminators mainly for the bitz I’ll need for the planned DeathWing army. At 1500 points I’ve got 4 units of Terminators (including Belial’s upgraded group)… now the question goes…. should I create a 5th group (my current all-rounders will be: Seargeant with twin lightning claws, termie with twin lightning claws, 2 termies with storm shield & thunderhammer, and 1 termie with storm shield, thunderhammer and cyclone missile launcher), or have that 5th group an ‘sidelined’ set of terminators with varying options such as a storm bolter & chainfist for tank popping role if the all-rounder needs a little more flexibility?

Dark Angels – The call of the unforgiven

Fri, 08 Apr 2011 01:07:02 +0000

Green. Green is my favorite color ( a good reason I play Orks & Biel-Tan too 😉 ). Too bad my first models will be beige/white 😉 DeadDeathwing is what I’m starting with thanks to an awesome trade with Evil Homer. I expect to lose. I expect to lose BIG. But I plan on having fun modeling, painting and playing I had a small force to begin with, but lots were cannibalized for space wolf arms, etc before I sold that army to a local.

Resin Base Casting….

Tue, 05 Apr 2011 20:51:25 +0000

Classic BattleTech Fever….

Tue, 05 Apr 2011 14:43:03 +0000

Last Friday I purchased the new 25th Anniversary Introductory Box Set of Classic BattleTech. I must say this is an awesome set for US$50. It comes with 24 poor (to medium) quality plastic miniatures and two premium quality miniatures (which I hope that Catalyst and whomever is manufacturing these premium miniatures put out LOTS MORE!). The set comes with the old maps–but now they’re printed on premium hardboard board-game surface instead of flimsy paper.

Dark Eldar: 10 completed warriors, and the start of a new squad.

Wed, 23 Mar 2011 22:51:22 +0000

Here’s a few pics of 10 Completed Kabalite Warriors (which isn’t a full working squad, a Blaster needs to be added to it)…. The leader with (terribly) hand painted logo… The whole squad…. And finally a preview of Wyches work in progress or to come next post later tonight.

Dark Eldar: My Kabalic Warrior Painting Recipe

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 21:07:50 +0000

I’m typically an “open source” guy and I wanted to share my paint recipes for my warriors that I’m working on (the rest of the army should be a derivative of these color recipes). This is straight out of my TextWrangler .txt document so the spelling probably isn’t accurate 😛 😀 Oh yes a big announcement: NOTE THE LACK OF DELVAN MUD!!! Dark Eldar Armor ——- Primer Black Highlight w/ Drybrush 50% Chaos Black & Codex Gray

Dark Eldar: First of many Kabalite Warriors (Lightbox)

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 15:51:53 +0000

Dark Eldar: First of many Kabalite Warriors

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 03:57:21 +0000

Simple but effective….these really went fast for a prototype unit! Taken with my iPhone and no lightbox, so the pics are not quite as nice as it appears in my hand. I’ll take better pics later. — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Dark Eldar: Kabalite Warriors part 1

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 01:43:36 +0000

Just a start….. — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Decision time: an unhappy realization

Mon, 21 Mar 2011 01:17:28 +0000

Unfortunately after starting painting on my Dark Eldar Kabalite Warriors last night I came to a realization that I’m SO not ready for painting a whole army in our allotted time for our build up. Two years ago, I would have easily have done this, but I’m a “family man” and a good portion of my standard evening goes to them and by the time I have 30 minutes to an hour to paint I’m too “pooped to paint”.

Mac How-To Videos (iMovie & GarageBand)

Fri, 18 Mar 2011 13:12:39 +0000

Thanks to my purchase of ScreenFlow for the Mac, this is the first of a whole slew of How-To computer videos:

ScreenFlow is now available on the Macintosh App Store!

Thu, 17 Mar 2011 21:06:31 +0000

Screenflow, screen capture software for the Apple Macintosh has just been released on the Macintosh App Store. This is important as the license model fits more my style of computer use. I’ve been waiting for TeleStream to do this (and I did within minutes of the announcement!). Expect video tutorials soon!

Kabal of the Sunken Soul Colors

Thu, 17 Mar 2011 16:04:08 +0000

As tempted as I am to have my Dark Eldar green, I came to the realization that: My Eldar are green/White I don’t have a red army My blue army (Tau) is on my “For sale” list So I opened up a poll for some advice for base colors for the Kabal. I added GW Midnight Blue to the list because I had an Eldar army in the past that looked REALLY GOOD with Midnight Blue and Hawk Turquoise (the locals remember the color scheme well) that may work well for Dark Eldar.

Dark Eldar painting reboot

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 22:57:52 +0000

Lelith, stripped (I wish, Butthead: huh huh) and re-primered. Raider – I’ll have to do some spot cleaning. The first batch. My archon, the inspiration for my conversions. A warrior. Another warrior. My allergies are killing me, so I don’t know when I’ll start painting. — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

After a landslide 3-1 victory… (short post)

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 13:04:12 +0000

Dark Eldar WIN the polls and have weighed in my decision to play Dark Eldar for our FLGS ‘ard Boyz Buildup at Galaxy Comics, Wichita Falls. Watch for posts later this week for progress for painting, modeling, etc.

1000 point Eldar & Dark Eldar Lists

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 20:57:49 +0000

They’re very bare because 1000 points in a buildup can be difficult. 1000 Pts – Eldar Roster HQ: Autarch (1#, 87 pts) 1 Autarch, 87 pts ((pp.29 & 60 Eldar); Independent Character; Fleet; Master Strategist; Forceshield; Mandiblaster; Scorpion Chainsword; Shuriken Pistol; Avenger S-Catapult; Haywire Grenades; Plasma Grenades) Troops: Dire Avengers (11#, 245 pts) 10 Dire Avengers, 245 pts ((pp.30 & 64 Eldar); Fleet; Avenger S-Catapult) 1 Wave Serpent ((pp.45 & 63 Eldar); Unit Type: Vehicle (Skimmer, Tank, Fast); Energy Field; Spirit Stones; TL Shuriken Catapults; TL Scatter Lasers) Troops: Dire Avengers (11#, 245 pts)

New Poll concerning my upcoming ‘ard Boyz choice

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 17:03:19 +0000

To the right you’ll notice a new poll (WordPress plugins are AWESOME) just for a little advice for which Eldar to play for our Local ‘ard Boyz Buildup. Granted, I may not go with the winner of the poll, but it’ll certainly weigh in my decision 😉

Our FLGS ‘ard Boyz Build Up

Wed, 09 Mar 2011 15:46:27 +0000

Our Friendly Local Gaming Store (FLGS) events planner/Master Manipulator (every store needs one) finally announced a pretty big Warhammer 40,000 build up league (I loved the last one). I’m taking Eldar, that is for sure. However I’m still not sure which Eldar I’ll be taking: the mean ones (Dark Eldar), or the not-as mean ones (Craftworld Eldar). Here’s a quick breakdown of the pros and cons of both armies from my standpoint:

Titan Gladiator take 2

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 02:45:05 +0000

My previous painting was going steady until it fell off the shelf and smashed into it’s component parts and cracked in several of the flat areas. This was extremely disheartening so I’ve decided to repaint using partial speed painting techniques. This model is honestly physically painful to paint as the model is so HEAVY for a thumb and index finger after 30 minutes of painting. Here’s take 2 day 1

Titan Gladiator: Part 1 – flesh

Fri, 07 Jan 2011 05:42:20 +0000

A humble start….. — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

SKORNE!!

Thu, 06 Jan 2011 00:39:27 +0000

I got my Skorne in! Skorne WarPack Bladerunner Master Tormentor Paingiver tormentor & Beast Handlers Forces of Hordes: Skorne 15 points, ready to play – after assembly Addendum: two hours later and assembly (the pain in the arse it was!!) is complete — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

My Miniature Wargaming New Year’s Resolution

Sun, 02 Jan 2011 00:27:04 +0000

I’m going to concentrate on two things this year: Warmachine/Hordes and Warhammer 40k. On the Wahammer 40K side, I’m setting out to completely paint and finish all my Craftworld Eldar models. This is a HUGE AMOUNT of models that are both still on sprue or in blisters or boxes. I can’t even begin to guess how many points I have but I’m very sure it’s easily over 10K. On the Warmachine/Hordes side I just started Skorne by making my first order yesterday.

Ok I have a sinus infection….but I’m not sick.

Thu, 30 Dec 2010 18:35:45 +0000

…. I’m stubborn. So instead of immediately shelling out $100 to see the doctor and prescrips I’m going to try a popular home remedy. This is the generic brand of Apple Cider Vinegar at our local “ghetto” food market “King’s” (I’m not afraid of poor people, I AM ONE). I’ll be taking a tablespoon in my water over the next few days to see how it goes. If I’m not seeing an improvement by Sunday I’ll bite the bullet and see the doctor (this is a US$1.

Space Wolves: Test Model #1

Thu, 16 Dec 2010 03:49:47 +0000

Ok Grain of salt and caveats of the following testmodel. This was a half-finished paint job from a few years back that I just primered right over. I was not trying too hard to stay within the lines I haven’t even bothered cleaning up ANY of the wash (namely the splotchy areas on knees and legs-heck it looks like I even missed a spot on the shoulder) I haven’t done ANY highlighting The model was airbrushed in about 30 seconds The rest of the model was painted in about 5 minutes just to splash color to see how it’d look.

New WordPress Theme

Wed, 15 Dec 2010 16:14:08 +0000

I apologize in advance for the look of this wordpress theme (Note: It’s not so bad now 😉 ). I’ve decided to set out and create my own theme so that I’m not bothered by updates of others’ themes (namely Suffusion) that I’ve modified pretty heavily. I don’t need much as far as themes go, so I’ve set out on learning some of the WordPress API.

Space Wolves: didn’t get any painting started….

Wed, 15 Dec 2010 05:21:51 +0000

Sorry I didn’t get any painting done tonight but I finished assembly of the models from yesterday plus 10 more…. 4 black reach marines w/ bolters 1 black reach marine w/ flamer 3 meta gun grey hunters 2 flamer grey hunters 1 power sword grey hunter 1 power fist grey hunter 18 bolter & chainsword grey hunters 1 wolf guard battle leader 29 total models to start off… Not bad for what I had off the shelf.

Space Wolves: The rebirth of Logan’s Company

Tue, 14 Dec 2010 14:37:49 +0000

I’ve been playing Space Wolves since 1994…bing there I said it. At the time I played a Terminiator Heavy powerhouse supported by a few Long Fangs (I love Cyclone Missile Launchers, I’m so glad they don’t suck again!, but I sure as heck still miss my salvo fire sometimes). As you may have noticed in my preview post last night that I’ve got a few Grey Hunters and an old Space Wolf Captain (which will being used as a Wolf Guard Battle Leader).

Space Wolves: a humble reboot/restart

Tue, 14 Dec 2010 05:01:03 +0000

— Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Lelith Hesperax

Sun, 28 Nov 2010 06:37:47 +0000

The first of my new wave of Dark Eldar. It’s all speed painting as all I’m looking for is “is it good enough for the table?” But here she is–without the Native American skin tone she had before I stripped her (there’s a S&M joke or reference there). The skin was simple: Space Wolf Gray A Wash with Delvan Mud Highlight again with Space Wolf Gray Highlight slightly with Bone White The hair was also quite simple

New Painting: Some Cygnar

Fri, 26 Nov 2010 23:14:46 +0000

Thanks to Evil Homer, I now own a Charger. I painted that WarJack and Reinholdt using speedpainting techniques just to get it battlefield ready. Just a little quick post while waiting for the crew tonight at our FLGS. The lines are due to the fluorescent lighting in the store…. sorry.

Stryker, Take 2

Tue, 23 Nov 2010 05:09:08 +0000

Stryker got stripped after his last paint job….. I added cotton to the paperclip smoke using PVA glue… Primered the whole model black. I Drybrushed Heavily GW Shining Gold on all the brass parts, used chainmail on the silver bits. I used GW Tallarn Flesh (Foundation) as the flesh, and Orange as the hair. Once it was dry the WHOLE MODEL was given a generous amount ALMIGHTY Delvan Mud. The Skirt was based Space Wolf Gray, then highlighted up to white.

WARMACHINE & Hordes: First MkII Games (fun!fun!fun!)

Sat, 20 Nov 2010 06:35:46 +0000

Ok–A Quick little update: Little Barerra, Evil Homer and I did some playtesting of the new Mk II rules of Hordes and Warmachine–specifically checking the balance of the sister systems and everything worked great at our starting level (which we limited it to Wagroups, 10-11 points a side). I played my Cygnar (although I was proxying a charger with a hunter and an Ironclad with a defender since I never bought a Wargroup box), while Little Barerra was playing his hastily (note for him, he’s a fantastic painter) painted trollbloods.

New Bases for Dark Eldar ordered

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 15:41:47 +0000

I’ll be using the exact same bases for my Dark Eldar as I’m using for my Biel-Tan Eldar for a variety of reasons. I really like the bases When I play apocalypse and have them allied, they’ll look more uniformed. Easy to Paint I really like the bases But wait, I have “I really like the bases” there twice….. well, it was important enough to put on the list twice 😀

The end of the beginning….the new for the old

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 03:34:37 +0000

Some of the new dark eldar models work in progress Only assembled–not cleaned.

Dark Eldar – first (learning) game.

Sat, 13 Nov 2010 07:40:37 +0000

Here’s the list that I built to play against Dale’s Tau Archon w/ Shadow Field & Agonizer – 110 points 9 Incubi – 198 points Raider (Dark Lance, Flicker Field, Retrofire Jets) – 75 points 10 Wyches with Hekatrix upgrade w/ Agonizer – 130 Raider (Dark Lance, Flicker Field, Retrofire Jets) – 75 points 10 Wyches with Hekatrix upgrade w/ Agonizer – 130 Raider (Dark Lance, Flicker Field, Retrofire Jets) – 75 points

Dark Eldar Culling Tonight

Fri, 12 Nov 2010 16:07:37 +0000

I’ll be bringing my Dark Eldar up to the FLGS tonight for my first game with the new Codex. To be honest I’ve not had time to really delve into “the depths of torture and pain of “the new codex, so my list tonight will be very similar to my list from the old codex (Raider Spam, but units of 10 instead of 5 each). I’ll post a battle report of my loss tonight or tomorrow morning 🙂

Nerd Rage: Apple’s Antics (again, REALLY!?!)

Mon, 08 Nov 2010 16:37:12 +0000

Apple has decided they don’t care about the Server/Enterprise market whatsoever. They have decided to drop their XServe (rackmount) configuration for Mac Mini and Mac Pro configurations. They use Sun hardware and operating systems for their new data center instead of “eating your own dog food” XServe and Mac OS Server (so that their line can be improved for their customers). I’ve just decided to set up permanently Boot Camp on my MacBook Pro for Windows 7 as my primary OS and using MacOS when I decide there’s an app I want to use that’s MacOS only.

Therion – Sitra Ahra

Wed, 03 Nov 2010 20:02:07 +0000

I finally got my copy of Sitra Ahra in….I must say…. AWESOME album, but nothing super-extraordinary compared to their older work. “More of the same”, although I’ll admit there’s much more complicated choral work than previous albums (and this is saying A LOT). The more I listen to it, the more it grows on me. Don’t just take my word for it: Lords of Metal E-Zine Metal-Archives User Reviews (3 at the time of this posts writing)

Striker….Striker…

Tue, 02 Nov 2010 02:00:16 +0000

Striker….Striker…Striker….Striker…STRIKE-HER! *SMACK* Coleman Striker? Here’s my first attempt at repainting my old Cygnar. Since I’ve decided to start from the basics, I’m starting with the contents of the Cygnar Battlegroup’s warcaster: Coleman Striker. I start with adding a curved & twisted paperclip to his smoke stack then glue on cotton for the smoke coming from it. Primered him (and his buddies) black as it’s almost always the best basecoat for metal minis.

The Gauths: We’re back

Sat, 16 Oct 2010 22:03:15 +0000

After a brutal beating by Brent Friday night while playing my Eldar I’ve [decided to retire them/used them as an excuse] to start work again on my largest painted and assembled (and my most converted) Army: My Gauthic Imperial Guard. I stopped playing them mainly because they were very popular at the time and I’m not a fan of Army Saturation at our FLGS. I realize this army may be very weak vs.

MacBook Pro: 30 days later

Tue, 05 Oct 2010 16:40:40 +0000

Summary After 30 days of use with my first Macintosh Laptop, I’ll convey my feelings and thoughts. In my “First Week” post I posted my initial thoughts on this baseline and bottom of the MacBook Pro line laptop. Now it’s important to know that I’m not a first time Mac user, for I’ve owned a few G4 class PowerMacs in the past. I know that the biggest hurdle for a new Mac user is the use of the Command Key as a modifier key instead of the Control Key (assuming that the new user even knows about Control-* shortcuts), however after daily use it’s pretty much seamless as I use Linux, Windows and MacOS pretty consistently and equally the use of Command or Control is pretty automatic as I unconsciously know which OS I’m in.

My bluetooth keyboard and mouse arrived today

Mon, 04 Oct 2010 16:50:08 +0000

Although my Magic Mouse was unwisely mailed to another accessible location, my Keyboard arrived here at work quite quickly and efficiently from eBay. Here’s a quick pic from my iPhone of the new keyboard I’ll update this post later today with the mouse and keyboard together.

Eldar Pictures

Wed, 29 Sep 2010 18:04:58 +0000

Old models, new pictures. Sorry about the Farseer’s staff being bent, I didn’t notice it during the rush of taking their pictures during lunch. These were hastily taken using my shadowbox.

Preparing the Biel-Tan warhost to assist (or resist) our darker cousins next month

Tue, 28 Sep 2010 21:10:33 +0000

Humble beginnings, indeed, Daemon. Ok with the imminent release of the Dark Eldar codex several of the locals have decided to start Dark Eldar armies. I’m resisting, and boy how. I’ve already got quite a plethora of unique Dark Eldar, but I’ve decided to take this opportunity as we start playing 40K a bit after a hiatus of learning and loving the new edition of Warhammer Fantasy to finish my Biel-Tan Eldar.

Daemons: A humble beginning

Thu, 23 Sep 2010 02:20:43 +0000

Ok I’ve stripped paint, and assembled the models to my liking: (two squads instead of 3 bloodletters) and put them on round bases so they’re compatible with both systems. Here are the pics of the unprimed (and uncleaned) models… I’ve assembled so far: 27 Standard Bloodletters 2 Bloodletter Champions 2 Musicians 2 Standard Bearer 6 Flamers of Tzeencth 1 Herald of Tzeench

Macintosh & Ubuntu: Apple File & Time Machine Server

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 19:38:57 +0000

I’ve streamlined a script that will install netatalk (an open implmentation of the apple network file server protocol), avahi-daemon (Bonjour/ZeroConf service) and configure it all to set up home directories and a Time Machine shared folder at /home/TimeMachine (which can easily be changed, read below). The link to the install script is at my Ubuntu Script sub-site (look for Apple File Server). This has been tested in both 10.04 (LTS) and also 10.

DAEMONS!

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 19:02:58 +0000

Thanks to a local player who has moved on to different models for his Daemon army, I was able to purchase his entire line of Warhammer Fantasy/40K daemons for a VERY GOOD PRICE (Thanks, Evil Homer! 🙂 ) I’m in the process of stripping an repainting so I can use this as my primary army. I’m switching mainly because painting so much white is tiresome and unappealing at the moment (plus with Daemons I’m painting two armies at the same time!

Macintosh: Syncing your MacOS Contacts & Calendars with Google

Mon, 13 Sep 2010 02:11:34 +0000

As I promised here’s the tutorial to sync your calendars and contacts with your Google account (doesn’t matter if it’s Google Apps or plain Google). The instructions are a little short and to the point and the screenshots are a bit flakey, but I’m pretty sure it’ll help someone out there. Contacts Open your Address Book Go to Address Book then Preferences Click on the Accounts Icon at the top (this works like a Windows Tab) Put a check beside Synchronize with Google A dialog will pop up about they can’t take responsibility for lost contacts ,etc Type in your google email address and password Press OK Now your contacts won’t sync until you press the sync button at the top of your menu area Once it’s done your contacts from Google should now be in your Address Book!

Macintosh Impressions: First Week

Sun, 12 Sep 2010 05:04:08 +0000

I’ll admit it. I’m a Mac user now. I’ve been trying to use my new MacBook pro full time for the last week, and it’s been a smashing success. The 8 hour battery life of this little Laptop is quite extrordinary, and the few adapters and ‘nice touches’ from the MagSafe adapter to the Battery Indicator button on the left hand side of the computer are quite handy. I do wish it had one more USB port for convenience when I’m at home connected to my external monitor, but I can purchase a nice USB hub to fix that up.

My new MacBook Pro

Fri, 03 Sep 2010 18:36:28 +0000

My MacBook Pro finally arrived! It’s only a 13″ model, but it will be quite sufficient for my needs as a laptop and extremely portable. All I need now is my Laptop Bag – which will be here Tuesday. Here are some pics. At least now I’ll be running a real copy of Snow Leopard instead of the hacked copy that’s on my desktop. What I found amazing is that after only a few minutes everything was working exactly as it should…all I had to do is enter my User information (and install iWork and dropbox) and I was up and going.

Python Programming: Converting my old avi files to h.264

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 21:10:52 +0000

Here’s a little script that calls HandBrake‘s CLI interface to convert a whole directory full of media in a recursive manner. No Instructions. No warranty. No guarantees. Your mileage may vary. Yadda Yadda Yadda. Tested on Ubuntu and MacOS 10.6 Download it here or just read it (better to download it, since my blog removes the whitespace and hence the flow of the script): #!/usr/bin/python # This script requires the HandBrake CLI program

FreeBSD: Back to my roots (updated)

Tue, 31 Aug 2010 13:26:01 +0000

(Updated Aug 9th 2023, see below) I’ve just started installing a virtual machine of the latest FreeBSD Release (8.1) mainly to see what features my old favorite OS from 1993-1998 has gained to compete with Ubuntu Server. I switched to Ubuntu Server several years ago as my favorite Unix/Unix-Like OS mainly due to ease of updates and installation of software, but now that I’m not able to easily have netatalk have SSL built in (for Mac sharing & Time Machine backups), I’m looking at my old favorite to see what improvements were made.

Macintosh: How to Flatten Your Dock

Thu, 26 Aug 2010 02:52:34 +0000

I personally don’t like the default look of the Dock when it’s on the bottom. I prefer the flat look you’ll get when you move it to the sides. Here’s how to do it: Open Your Terminal (it’s in your Utilities in your Applications directory); Type the following: defaults write com.apple.dock no-glass -boolean YES killall Dock your dock will then restart and you’ll go from to That’s it for now 🙂

So it was finally cool enough to journey into my attic!

Thu, 26 Aug 2010 01:22:03 +0000

And I’ve got CAT-5 cable between the Computer Room and the Living Room! Unfortunately I only found one network plug, so I’m stuck until tomorrow when I can get another plug so that I can complete this job. What does this mean? A wired connection will make buffering between my media player and the server MUCH quicker. I’ll get my Apple Airport Express back for personal use again (which has served me VERY well for the last two years as a wireless bridge to 3+ devices) My wireless bandwidth will increase as Vonage and other devices in the Living Room aren’t chattering all over the place.

The Re-envisioning of “You’re not the Only One”

Fri, 13 Aug 2010 20:07:12 +0000

I’ve set out to rerecord/re-envision my favorite of my released songs: You’re not the Only One (recorded in 1999). The recording will start next week. Right now I’m letting my fingers learn the riffs on my guitar (it was originally composed on my Roland JX-305). I’m really, really working to keep the track count to a minimum so it may sound much more simple compared to the 1999 original. If any musicians want to join me in this project I’d be very happy to have you as there’s already a model for the vision.

Top Down Marketing and how Ubuntu should retarget their niche to succeed

Thu, 05 Aug 2010 16:11:15 +0000

I’ve been thinking about this during my my fever induced delirium and now that I’m feeling a bit better (still coughing though) I think I’m going to rant my observations and suggestions to the Ubuntu community. Now understand that I’m, for the most part, pulling any possible figures and statistics from the air and is mostly purely opinion and personal observation, but hopefully someone else can learn from and follow my line of thought, as I can already tell this is going to be a long post.

Tournament-Tracker.NET is in Release Candidate 1

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 21:23:35 +0000

Yesterday I went ahead and versioned up Tournament-Tracker to RC1. This was after I cleaned up the Stats pages, added the ability to add a “Free Game” with your Tournament-Tracker.NET Friends, and rudimentary support for campaigning (which I am running for our Warhammer Fantasy Build up here at Galaxy Comics). Remember, anyone who joins now will have Comp Credit Accounts for creating Tournaments & Campaigns (and whatever is added in the future!

High Elves: White Lions Part 1

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 22:51:16 +0000

The next project on my plate is my White Lions, which I started painting over a year ago before Kim and I moved in together. They’re in pretty good shape, and I’ve got more done than I remember having done so I may be done by the end of the week if I manage my time right. Here are the pics!

Silver Helms: Final (except clear coat)

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 03:40:37 +0000

Except for the clear-coat these two squads of 10 are complete and ready for the table of battle!

High Elves: Spearmen

Sun, 25 Jul 2010 04:41:57 +0000

I’ve got my new Lightbox last night thanks to The Master Manipulator (every store needs one!) and even with the basic lights this thing is VERY NICE. Here are my only unit of spearmen that I painted a year ago (and are still slightly unfinished as the banner is just plain white).

Games Workshop FAQ Grabber (Python Script)

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 19:10:49 +0000

I’m nerding out on ya, sorry. Programmers and Script Monkeys only, as I’m not going to explain how to use this. I’ve created a Python script that grabs all the latest 40K and Fantasy FAQ’s/PDF’s Here’s the script: #!/usr/bin/python import urllib import sys,os sGWURL = "http://www.games-workshop.com" sWarhammerFAQURL = "http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?categoryId=1000018&pIndex=1&aId=3000006&start=2" s40KFAQURL = "http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?catId=cat440134a&categoryId=1000018§ion=&pIndex=1&aId=3400019&start=2" sLocalFantasyFAQPath = "./" # I Normally just use the full filepath to my Dropbox Folder on my Ubuntu box sLocal40KFAQPath = "

Silver Helms #5: Nearing Completion

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 17:46:36 +0000

Good news! I’ll have a Lightbox Friday night assuming our friendly neighbourly Master Manipulator (every store needs one) remembers to bring it for me on Friday evening. I already have access to one at work, but that’s not so convenient, as I’m not one to bring my toys to work (often). I’m nearing completion of my 20 Silver Helms (broken into two units). I have to finish the gold & blue on the last 10, then a bit of inking.

Silver Helms #4

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 04:32:16 +0000

Halfway there!! — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Silver Helms #3: test model complete

Thu, 15 Jul 2010 04:02:41 +0000

Here’s my first test model! Disclaimer: I’m going for quantity not quality, no golden daemon for this army as I want to have them look good “on the table” Cheers! Jeff — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Silver Helms Progress #2

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 23:17:52 +0000

This is a short post, sorry.. But at least there is eye-candy…. I’ve finally had a few hours to make some progress!! Cheers! Jeff — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

WFB: High Elves FAQ Observations

Fri, 09 Jul 2010 21:05:57 +0000

Okay I’m a bit slow to be able to read my FAQ, for it’s been a very busy day today. The big wowzers for me: Speed of Asurymen – Ignore any special weapon rules for Always Strike First, this means that the Always Strike Last for Great Weapons is ignored when attacking (i.e. Swordmasters will probably get a re-roll to hit vs. most of their opponents). Elite Army – Wow oh wow.

GauthicIntenet: Blog Update

Fri, 09 Jul 2010 19:10:28 +0000

I switched to the DisqUs Commenting System, as I’ve had some login issues with the old system. Hopefully you’ll find it easier to post comments, etc. Sorry about your lost comments. Scratch That: I found an import button from my old WP comments…. awesome.

High Elf “Always Strikes First” Crotch-Punch!

Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:54:36 +0000

Oh my the GW Warhammer Fantasy 8th Edition FAQ’s are out… and I found this tidbit in my holy high elf PDF: _Q. The Speed of Asuryan special rule states that “all High Elves have the special rule Always Strike First, regardless of the weapon they are wielding.” How does this interact with a great weapons Always Strike Last? (p43)._ A. The army book will take precedence in this situation. For

High Elves: Silver Helms #1

Sun, 27 Jun 2010 22:01:26 +0000

— Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Ok I’m being drawn to Ruby (over Python)…

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 15:10:16 +0000

Lately I’ve been dabbling (and enjoying!) Python, but as of this weekend I’m being drawn to Ruby mainly because of several reasons (over Python): The ability to easily set up and run a full blown MVC web application on Apache I like the MySQL database interface better (I just finished a test and it was much more elegant than having to define a cursor, etc). The ability to command line script is about the same, but I’d rather marry myself to as little programming languages as I can this late in life.

Estimated Point Cost of My High Elves

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 01:19:39 +0000

I ran through my army collection with Army Builder™®!* and here’s what I’ve got (unoptimized) Unlimited Pts – High Elves Roster Archers (10#, 110 pts) 10 Archers @ 110 pts (Hand Weapon; Longbow) Archers (10#, 110 pts) 10 Archers @ 110 pts (Hand Weapon; Longbow) Archers (10#, 110 pts) 10 Archers @ 110 pts (Hand Weapon; Longbow) Archers (10#, 110 pts) 10 Archers @ 110 pts (Hand Weapon; Longbow) Archers (10#, 110 pts)

My High Elves

Sat, 19 Jun 2010 23:38:06 +0000

Ok here’s what I have assembled (and I have more in boxes somewhere!!) 59 archers (I found the 60th!) 25 spearmen inc command 20 white lions inc command 17 phoenix guard inc command (I have an unopend box of 5 as well) 3 bolt throwers (2 extra in blisters) 8 silver helms inc command Another 8 silver helms inc command 5 scouts (not pictured) 6 dragon knights (I have another box of the new style somewhere)

Some self-medicate, but I self-educate.

Mon, 07 Jun 2010 14:55:44 +0000

Lately I’ve been on an education kick because it seems that all my friends are going back to college or taking online courses. I’ve always been very disappointed with my mathematic education and frustrated with my inability to express and solve my few statistical problems using hard math instead of pseudomath that I stumble through. Until I get the time to actually go out and take a formal course of such a matter, I’ve been visiting the Khan Academy series of YouTube videos to refresh my Algebra that I’ve not touched in almost 20 years.

I’ve been casted in a Fiddler on the Roof Role!

Thu, 20 May 2010 15:58:04 +0000

I will be playing the part of Mendel, the Rabbi’s son in Fiddler on the Roof. It’s a non-principal, but important role from what little I’ve read. Hey at least my character has a name–and a few speaking parts! 🙂 A few lines from WikiQuote: : Tevye: As the good book says, when a poor man eats a chicken, one of them is sick. Mendel: Where does the book say that?

Auditions for Fiddler on the Roof

Wed, 19 May 2010 04:03:17 +0000

Well, tonight almost the whole family (myself, my wife, my step daughter, my father and my mother) went and auditioned for parts for at the Wichita Theatre, a local community theater’s, production of Fiddler on the Roof. I know I had my mistakes during the audition, but I had fairly high praises from everyone…got a pretty good thumbs up from one of the deciding factors of casting too. I’m actually fairly anxious as this will be my first solo singing/speaking role in over 15 years.

Cygnar into the VAT

Sun, 09 May 2010 03:35:58 +0000

I know that some of those don’t need stripping, but this’ll pull the mold grease off of ’em too 🙂 — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

WARMACHINE: A little programming exercise….

Fri, 07 May 2010 19:20:28 +0000

This is a cross-post from my Miniature Wargaming side and my programmer side. Over the last week or so I’ve been stretching my Javascript & CSS muscles and basically made a mini-game loosely based on the WARMACHINE/HORDES mechanic. There are more limitations than features at this point, and I’m not looking to make this a product so I don’t plan for it to go much further than what’s there now.

Win32/64 Drivers Rant On! (Ubuntu Saves The Day)

Fri, 07 May 2010 02:42:16 +0000

Ok. I have *2* old scanners that I was needed to scan some old photos a Canon Canoscan n676u and a Lexmark 2500 series all in one that was included in the computer room when I married Kim. Neither one of these showed up as a scanner in Windows 7 because Microsoft decides to change the driver model every other release of Windows. It’s really a shame that I had to hook up my Canoscan to my Ubuntu server (which runs the Gnome desktop), and lo and behold the scanner not only shows up, but works PERFECTLY using the Simple Scan program built in.

WARMACHINE: My Cygnar

Thu, 06 May 2010 04:11:17 +0000

Pictures of my old (“I don’t paint like that anymore”) Cygnar. They’re at least 2 years old. I have two boxes of unpainted models as well, which means if I stick with WARMACHINE I’ll probably have to VAT and repaint all of them, heh. — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Mechwarrior 4 released as a free download!

Wed, 05 May 2010 14:11:03 +0000

From ClassicBattleTech.com (May 1st, 2010) The release of MechWarrior 4 Free is a testament to the re-ignited, world wide interest in the BattleTech/MechWarrior computer games. Within 4 hours of the launch MekTek.net had received more than a 100,000 unique hits from around the globe. As the demand reached 10,000 simultaneously downloads, even the heavy-duty server couldn’t stand up to the demand and it, along with the website, have crashed. Through several reboots the server continues to crash as the demand still remains in the stratosphere.

WARMACHINE Basic Mathhammer Calculator

Wed, 05 May 2010 04:34:01 +0000

As I experiment back into Warmachine/Hordes over the next few weeks, I’ve decided to create a little Mathhammer calculator page for Warmachine/Hordes style rolls. I’ve read the Warmachine Mk II Quickstart rules and used a couple of example Jacks as the default stats. Now it’s not entirely accurate or pretty (yet), but it’s all Javascript this time you may view the source and copy the code if you like (it’s not like I could stop you from doing so anyways 🙂 ).

Kill Team w/ Campaigns

Fri, 30 Apr 2010 15:10:26 +0000

Locally I’m going to start a Kill Team with Campaigns either this weekend or next weekend, and I’ve hashed/brainstormed together some fast and loose rules. The goal of these rules are to change as little of the standard 40k gameplay as possible for a microskirmish level, yet still retain rules for individual models being lost or wounded over time. Please feel free to discuss these rules as I’m open to suggestion from those who aren’t even playing in the event who may have tried something similar in the past.

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS has arrived!

Thu, 29 Apr 2010 20:16:05 +0000

What is Ubuntu? Ubuntu is an operating system built by a worldwide team of expert developers. It contains all the applications you need: a web browser, office suite, media apps, instant messaging and much more. Ubuntu is an open-source alternative to Windows and Office. I’ve been running this OS on half of the servers at work (this website is hosted on an Ubuntu server), and half of my computers at home for some time now.

Local Top 20 players!

Mon, 26 Apr 2010 19:59:42 +0000

Using Tournament Tracker for the Tournaments this year, we’ve figured the top 20 players for Wichita Falls’ local gaming community (and our regularly visiting Okies). Currently Brent from Strictly Average is #1 here with his Chaos Daemons army. ****Edit: I removed January’s tournament due to the actual match-ups weren’t correct (it was an import of a manually-ran game). The numbers were correct, but the people played were not. The updated results are slightly different.

Photoshop Fun: Tau Crisis Suit

Fri, 23 Apr 2010 15:13:29 +0000

Bell of Lost Souls had a Caption Contest regarding the Tau’s catch phrase “For the Greater Good” and a store on an anonymous highway named “Greater Good Thrift Store” One of the comments requested that they’d like to see a Crisis suit Photoshopped in the picture. I quickly complied by adding a crisis suit to the picture, a quick saturation match of the rest of the photo and the a blur behind and near the feet of the crisis suit to look like the heat waves from the Jump Jets of the exo-suit.

Introducing… Latha Bealltainn (Final)

Fri, 23 Apr 2010 01:29:48 +0000

Here she is–ready for the battlefield! (sorry about the shakiness/bluriness of the camera, my tripod is on loan)

Eldar Terrain (pre-planning)

Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:44:00 +0000

With a little inspiration from Corbania Prime’s Scenery tutorial – Making Eldar cityfight terrain I have decided to start planning on making a Craftworld Eldar table. I’ll do this after I’m completed with my 3000 points of Biel-Tan instead of working on my Space Wolves. So you’re looking about Late May Early June before I start posting pics & ideas. This page is the best single resource I’ve seen as far as Craftworld Eldar tables go, because they are so few and far between–everyone and their brother has imperial terrain, but Xenos terrain is hard to come by–especially Eldar terrain.

Falcon chassis progress (part 1)

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 01:41:22 +0000

Ok I got the rest of my Falcon Chassis vehicles based white/green. Unfortunately I ran out of Thraka Green wash to finish the green on the Wave Serpent turrets and the bodies of the bottom left two chassis. Everything else is up to par with the rest of my fleet and boy is my left hand green from the airbrush 🙂 — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Some thoughts on Adobe Story

Tue, 20 Apr 2010 20:38:21 +0000

Adobe Story is a (currently free) Software as a Service using Adobe Air. I started conversion of the 8 minutes of script that I had in Google Docs to the more refined format of Adobe Story that Premiere and After Effects will be (well, is advertised to be ) able to use natively when CS5 comes out (which I plan to get ASAP). The process took very little time. I’ve used script writing software in the past so I was familiar with the standards tab, enter, etc for shorthand scene and character headers… it worked very fluently in comparison to the others (CeltX & Sophocles* are the two I’ve used).

Introducing… Latha Bealltainn (Part 6)

Tue, 20 Apr 2010 01:50:22 +0000

Much more (and better than before) progress on Latha. At this point she’s about 30% done… Here’s a progress gallery of the painting… More to come tomorrow!

Tournament-Tracker.NET in Beta1

Mon, 19 Apr 2010 18:24:34 +0000

http://www.tournament-tracker.net/ The site is now open to the public for Beta. Please feel free to register and run the daylights out of it. Remember, this software is in beta, and although I think I have most of the effective bugs out of line, be sure to run your tournaments side-by-side of how you were doing it. Feel free to use the Contact page as a feedback form. Also note, that I’ve designed the scoring around the way that we locally run them, so if you have slightly different methods of how this is run, please feel free to elaborate and I’ll see what I can do about integrating it!

Introducing… Latha Bealltainn (Part 5)

Sun, 18 Apr 2010 23:46:23 +0000

Out of the VAT and re-scuplted to a much more normal form. I also added the jawline of the left side of her helmet that I forgot to do before as well.

Introducing… Latha Bealltainn (Part 4)

Sun, 18 Apr 2010 20:05:22 +0000

Ok she’s in the VAT. I didn’t like what was going on and her paint is peeling and very promintent parts of her greenstuff will be removed. I couldn’t take it. She looked like a fat stripper.

Introducing… Latha Bealltainn (Part 3)

Sat, 17 Apr 2010 20:20:11 +0000

Very rough a this point. I honestly didn’t think she’d be THAT well endowed painted though. — Posted using BlogPress from My iPhone

Advertisement: Two GURPS 3rd Edition Lots on eBay

Fri, 16 Apr 2010 15:22:27 +0000

Two fairly big GURPS 3rd Edition Lots on eBay. Lot #1: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130383619006&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT Contains: GURPS Basic Set 3rd edition revised GURPS Compendium I GURPS Compendium II GURPS Grimoire GURPS High-Tech (old style) GURPS Magic (old style) GURPS Martial Arts GURPS Psionics GURPS Robots GURPS Space (old style) GURPS Traveller GURPS Ultra-Tech (old style) GURPS Ultra-Tech 2 GURPS Vehicles Lot #2: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130383618697&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT Contains: GURPS Atlantis GURPS Autoduel GURPS Bestiary (old style) GURPS Bio-Tech GURPS Cyberpunk GURPS Fantasy (old style) GURPS Fantasy II GURPS Magic Items I GURPS Mecha GURPS Space GURPS Supers (old style) GURPS Traveller GURPS Traveller: First In GURPS Traveller: Ground Forces GURPS Vampire: The Masquerade GURPS Werewolf: The Apocolypse Transhuman Space Sorry, due to the weight US domestic shipping only.

Falcon mass painting (part 1)

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 02:39:07 +0000

I’m not especially proud of ’em, but I finished my 21 gunners and pilots needed for my falcon chassis vehicles that I’ll be concentrating on the next few weeks. To be honest this was my least favorite part of painting these models. A random closeup of a gunner and or pilot: — Posted From My iPhone

Space Wolves Bases

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 18:20:17 +0000

I loved my Eldar Bases so much from back2base-ix.com I’m considering doing the same for my Space Wolves when I start working on them here in June or July once I’m satisfied that I’m not betraying my “first love” army for my “first ever” army. (This will require me to at least completely paint all my Falcon Grav tank chassis vehicles) As usual, the Wolves will be in an tundran environment, and luckily enough they have such bases.

Oh the resistance of wolven urge

Tue, 13 Apr 2010 19:46:25 +0000

The more and more I read the latest iteration of my first ever Codex for Warhammer 40,000 the more and more I want to put the Eldar on pause and do some painting on my Space Wolves. It’s not a super-dynamic codex, but it’s strong and very self-supportive. I’ve had models in the Paint Stripping Vat for several months now, and it’s high time to pull them out and start scrubbing paint and primer from the models.

The Wargaming and Personal Blogs have moved!

Tue, 13 Apr 2010 15:00:38 +0000

The new blog is a WordPress blog and is now all integrated with my personal life – to all the advantages and disadvantages thereof. Not that it was never all that hard for any body to figure out who I am, where I live and what I do. If I wished to remain anonymous, I would have never registered a domain ;). If you want to link straight from your miniature wargaming sites, I suggest linking to https://jdgwf.

Introducing… Latha Bealltainn (Part 2)

Sun, 11 Apr 2010 23:38:00 +0000

Assembly….. Unfortunately I’m out of Green Stuff and can’t fix some of the stray cutting areas… such as her right breast, and a few areas on her shoulder blade pauldron. I also need it to fix the jawline of her left helmet where it was integrated with Eldrad’s old shoulder, and to model hair flowing out the back of the helmet.

Introducing… Latha Bealltainn (Part 1)

Sun, 11 Apr 2010 03:14:00 +0000

I know I want to play the special character Eldrad, but I play Biel-Tan (plus he’s passed on), so I’m creating a female Farseer using my old Dark Elf sorceress and Eldrad’s staff, sword and helmet. Eldrad in his former glory: Now he’s half the man he used to be… In just seven days (and six long nights) I can make you a (wo)maaaaaaaaaaaan! General idea of what I’m imagining….

Quick and Dirty Farseer (FINAL)

Sat, 10 Apr 2010 18:30:00 +0000

Here’s the fella after about maybe an hour or an hour and a quarter of painting. The texture might look a little rough as the clear coat was still setting.

Quick and Dirty Farseer (Part 1)

Fri, 09 Apr 2010 04:35:00 +0000

There’s nothing special about this model (other than the paint has probably been stripped 3 or 4 times), he’s just a stock Farseer with a Singing Spear. Ok this is about 15 minutes from priming to the last inking for this part.. I didn’t get done ( I was planning on it!) because it was late. One thing I learned was I shouldn’t have basecoated the robe Dark Angels Green at this point while working on the white.

15 Fire Dragons (FINAL)

Fri, 09 Apr 2010 03:03:00 +0000

Here they are… I’m disappointed that there was not a black Fire Dragon rune in the transfers, so the yellow-on-white is very difficult to make out.

15 Fire Dragons (Part 5)

Fri, 09 Apr 2010 02:28:00 +0000

Finally finished with my Fire Dragons. Whoops I almost labeled this FINAL….On to put on 15 Fire Dragon Transfers! BBIAFM!

15 Fire Dragons (Part 4)

Wed, 07 Apr 2010 05:23:00 +0000

More progress! Part 5 should be the FINAL–I would have finished them tonight, but I had piano lessons and family plans and started too late to finish realistically and not being too sleepy to do more damage than good. Sorry about shortness of blurb, pretty tired.

Falcon Chassis State of the Union part 2

Tue, 06 Apr 2010 02:49:00 +0000

Pictures of my Humble, Work-In-Progress Fleet Edit: I should have cleaned my iPhone camera first…. sorry.

Falcon Chassis State of the Union

Mon, 05 Apr 2010 14:50:00 +0000

I finished assembling all my Falcon chassis vehicles last night. This includes: 7 Wave Serpents (5 basecoated, 2 bare) 3 Fire Prisms (all basecoated) 4 Falcons (all bare). Each is completely magnetized, but no drivers or gunners have been glued in yet (I like to paint those separately then glue in). 21 Gunners and drivers to assemble and paint…. whew (this is my least favorite part of Falcons and Vypers).

Seven Wave Serpents (Part 1)

Sun, 04 Apr 2010 04:14:00 +0000

With the assembly of my “final” two wave serpents, time to start the thread of my Wave Serpents. I only needed one more for this tier (2000 points), but I had another box and decided to go ahead and assemble and paint that one too. I’ve really enjoyed the build up of our local event/challenge. I’ve been looking for something for me to repaint my aging Eldar (although I liked them at the time, they show their age).

15 Fire Dragons (Part 3)

Wed, 31 Mar 2010 04:42:00 +0000

More progress on the Fire Dragons…. Added more color to the white helmets, sunburst yellow over the Iyanden Darksun & inked the all the yellows with Gryphon Sepia. Right now they’re almost table-top quality (they’re on bases because I needed them for our tournament last Saturday), but there’s A LOT of cleanup to do. I expect to be done with these by the end of the week I hope (Easter weekend will be BUSY).

A bit of Mathhammer for the Mathphobic

Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:51:00 +0000

There’s probably a hundred of other sites or pages that do this, but I created these for a few of the locals who are Mathphobic. It’s not rocket science, but it does help those who are unfamiliar with math and the probabilities of Warhammer 40,000 Squad vs Squad kills – Just to give someone an idea of what to expect when shooting or close combat attacking at a particular type of unit.

15 Fire Dragons (Part 2)

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 05:21:00 +0000

This is a very short post, as I’m tired (which starts with T, which rhymes with P which stands for PAINTING) Okay, here’s the progress of the Fire Dragons for tonight. I primered all of ’em white. Basecoated in Vallejo Fiery Orange (Game Color) Washed ’em all with Chestnut Ink (Older GW Ink) Drybrushed back over with Fiery Orange again Painted Vallejo Sick Green (Game Color) in all the spots I wanted to help tie into the Craftworld Colors (faces, ribbons, etc) Painted the Melta Ammo cans Iyanden Darksun (GW Foundation Paint) (as well as one squad’s helmets) Painted some of the weaponry black (about half the squad before I started to get droopy eyed and was doing more harm than good).

15 Fire Dragons (Part 1)

Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:07:00 +0000

Since we have a local tournament coming up this Saturday (wow that snuck up on me quick with our wedding plans this month), I’ve decided to put my Five Dire Avenger Exarchs on hold until Sunday and furiously work on getting my 10 Fire Dragons painted. I’ve got 15 Aspect Warriors and 3 Exarchs. Since I’m not using the Exarchs I’m working on getting 10 completely done and the other 5 base coated.

Five Dire Avenger Exarchs (part 1)

Thu, 18 Mar 2010 04:51:00 +0000

I didn’t get much done tonight since I was low on scenic bases (and I’ll still need another 10 for my Pathfinders when I get to them) I have one exarch completely finished (which is ironic as I’m not using Avenger exarchs anymore). The other four are making progress. – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Last of Dire Avenger progress (FINAL)

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 05:19:00 +0000

Ok really, really done with the basic Dire Avengers… all’s left are the exarchs… The thread I’ll have for those will be entitled “Five Dire Avenger Exarchs” (link will be later) coming up next as I’m excited to have a full squad-type of models completely painted and modeled. Once those are done I’ll move on to my Fire Dragons. Here’s the hopefully better-than-iPhone-quality pics of the 40 completed Avengers. Addendum: I forgot to mention that the only change from last time was the Aspect Shrine decals to their helmets

Ulthwe strike force warp gate

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 00:36:00 +0000

Brent was curious of how I made my old Ulthwe Strike Force gate from back in 3rd edition for a diorama that he was thinking about working on. Here are some pics of my old hashed together model. All it is is an inked Large Flying Base. – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Last of Dire Avenger progress (part 3)

Fri, 05 Mar 2010 06:26:00 +0000

Finally done with painting the basic troops!! All’s left are 4 exarchs. Four full squads of 10 are painted, based and sealed. However I’m not 100% done…each one will get an aspect rune decal/transfer on his helmet. I tried to freehand before, but I wasn’t happy with the results. Here’s the original 3 colors: red, green and yellow Starting of the final squad And the purple base…. And a quick wash of Badab Black.

Tournament Tracker Alpha 1 Testing

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 06:27:00 +0000

Videos uploaded tonight via YouTube….. www.tournament-tracker.net Part 1: Part 2:

Last of Dire Avenger progress (part 2)

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 05:07:00 +0000

I didn’t get as far as I wanted tonight, but I finished 20 bodies. 20 heads tomorrow. Still a pretty big accomplishment considering how busy Kim and I were today. The two on the right are just there to support their headless kin. – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Last of Dire Avenger progress

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 07:01:00 +0000

My last 20 Dire Avengers are on their way to completion. This will give me 4 squads of 10, and 5 Exarchs. I should be done with these tomorrow. I’ve mounted my helmets separate for ease of painting the white. – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Last Saturday’s Tournament Results (and informal announcement of Tournament-Tracker.NET)

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:58:00 +0000

Ok a little bragging here. Last Saturday was the first time I’ve played Craftworld Eldar since 4th edition and I placed 5th! I’m actually pretty pleased with the results, as my old, perfectionist style of playing Eldar-annoyingly enough-terrorized my opponents (enough to get one couple cussin’ how much he hates Eldar 😉 ). My last game was probably my best played game, but it was completely in vain. Brent just couldn’t fail a save the last 3 rounds (I believe he only lost 3-4 models in the last 3 rounds, and I wasn’t short on firepower).

20 more dire avengers on the table and plan of attack over next few weeks

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:41:00 +0000

Sorry no pictures of these new ones (if you like you can always just imagine the ones I did before–but no heads mounted yet, as it’s MUCH easier to paint the helmet white separate from the blue body). I just plasti-glued, trimmed & shaved 20 more dire avengers last night for painting. I only need like 3-4 more for the next tournament, but I want to go ahead and finish my squads out (45 models: 10+10+10+10 + 5 variously equipped exarchs–two dual shurikens, 2 dire swords, 1 power sword+shimmer shield if I recall) for fully painted when I get back into Apocalypse.

Surprise basecoating for tomorrow

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 03:29:00 +0000

My opponents will see green 🙂 All airbrushed in two hours. – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

3 squads for Saturday

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 06:23:00 +0000

– Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Completion of Dire Avengers Squad 1

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 05:29:00 +0000

Only 13 left before Saturday…but no Exarch needed as this is my only one in the list. I’m about 20% done with the squad 1 of my Fire Dragons. Here’s my buildup…. And the 5 base coated. I feel so down about the quantity of my progress so far I blame my cold & the incredible amount of detail on the exarch model. I hope to finish the remaining Avengers tomorrow and possibly the squad of Dragons on Fri.

Dire Avengers Revision

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 05:23:00 +0000

Revised DA’s a simple dark green wash over the Thraka Green Wash. The satin finish, while it seemed fine on my wrecks and objective markers seems TOO shiny. I was looking for just a tad bit of gloss. I’ll lightly Matte coat ’em tomorrow just to tone them down a tad. I’ve made some progress on their brethren, however due to illness I’m way behind from on my painting and I’ll be painting only what I absolutely need for Saturday.

List for Local Tournament on Feb 20th

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 06:10:00 +0000

1500 Pts – Eldar Roster Troops: Dire Avengers (7#, 217 pts) 6 Dire Avengers @ 217 pts ((pp.30 & 64 Eldar); Fleet; Avenger S-Catapult) 1 Wave Serpent ((pp.45 & 63 Eldar); Energy Field; Spirit Stones; TL Shuriken Catapults; TL Bright Lances) Troops: Dire Avengers (9#, 293 pts) 7 Dire Avengers @ 293 pts ((pp.30 & 64 Eldar); Fleet; Avenger S-Catapult) 1 Dire Avenger Exarch (Fleet; Bladestorm ; Defend ; Diresword; Shuriken Pistol) 1 Wave Serpent ((pp.

Dire avengers 5/25

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 02:43:00 +0000

I decided to move one group of 5 ahead of the rest so I can have my prototype Avengers done and over with. My prototypes are always my worst painting of the group. I’m not happy with these but I’m done with them. I actually have 45 Avengers in the pipe to be done, but 25 is my requirement for this Saturday (along with 10 fire dragons a farseer, 2 fire prisms and 5 wave serpents)

Completion of 43 more bases & start of Dire Avengers

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 03:41:00 +0000

Well this entry was originally supposed to be a step-by step of my Avengers. I started my Dire Avengers, but I’ll leave the tutorial/log for another day as I was out of Enchanted Blue and had to stop at my basecoat of Royal Blue. Instead I decided to finish all the bases that I’ll need for the tournament in 10 days (and a handful more). At this point I’ve painted 5 packages (50 bases)

New bases & objective markers

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 04:32:00 +0000

My new resin bases came in the post today from Australia. Normally I buy from my local gaming store, but he’s had issues getting good scenic bases and in quantity. I purchased 120 of these bases and so far (as you’ll see later) I’m VERY impressed. The total was about 55 plus shipping for all of them. www.back2base-ix.com terrible website address, great product I decided to start testing my average painting and converting skills on some objective markers.

Wave serpent progress #1

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 04:42:00 +0000

I didn’t get as far as I wanted, but I effectively assembeled the rest of my kits (3 + my old reprimered serpents). The 3 new serpents (back, bare) and the two old ones (front, primered) And old serpent with my serpent turret conversion. A view from the 3/4 rear. My turret conversion is a mix of the stock wave serpent kit and a jetbike canopy. detail of the turret bits under the hood.

Painting tests on wrecks

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 18:10:00 +0000

Airbrushing tests on some old, home-made Wave Serpents from 8 years ago (the extended compartment is cardboard, and suprisingly held up well over the last few years). Techinques Green: Airbrushed Dark Angels Green over Black Primer, Snot Green was then airbrushed on the edges and highlights, Thraka Green Ink was airbrushed over. White: Fenris Gray (Foundation) was airbrushed over black primer. Valejo White was airbrushed (one coat!) over the Fenris Gray.

The warhost is returning.

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 05:48:00 +0000

Beware, fiends and warriors of chaos and the empire of man!

Rubberstamps.net

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 23:14:00 +0000

Wow nice quality stamp and came in fast!!! Cost me $17 after shipping but will be well worth it in the end… This will help me on painting my sails Here’s a pic – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Dark Eldar Raider Painting Progress #1a: The Troop Choice Fleet

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 03:18:00 +0000

Just the same level of painting, but the whole troop-level fleet. One with flash–one without…..just thought you’d want to take a gander 😉 Oh and I killed the sails on the Ravagers (as you can see), as I hated the way they looked.

Dark Eldar Raider Painting Progress #1

Sun, 20 Dec 2009 03:25:00 +0000

Just a little update…. I finally got my airbrush to push paint out consistently finally! Here’s a quick test of the effect I’m looking for… Snot green mixed with 50% isopropyl alcohol. Once that was applied in a spray along the lines, a thin line of scorpion green was made along the seam to represent a light. Then I painted black along the very edge where the airbrush painted over the edge of the plate.

Airbrushing Problems Last Night

Wed, 16 Dec 2009 15:16:00 +0000

I’m doing my darnedest to get my airbrush to push a consistent flow so that I can do the lighting effects that I’m wanting at the front of the hull, but last night just wasn’t very good. I good results for about 5 seconds and then no paint, then lots of watery paint. that just looks like the very sprayed watery–the opposite of light (other than dark 😉 ) I did some data gathering of similar problems, and it all depends on cleanliness of the airbrush needle (which was spotless), and using something other than standard water as your thinner.

Bases Loaded!

Wed, 16 Dec 2009 03:43:00 +0000

Well I got 5 of my 50 bases in today (very low on stock at supplier). Here’s what I’ve done so far. When I build my Wych squads 6 of each will be magentized so that they may go on either a base or the raider itself so that when the Raider is (briefly) on the table it looks much better. The problem is that metals have issues staying in place (especially with a coat of primer & paint between them) when holding up pewter models.

I’m gonna cheat…. in a bad way….

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 21:07:00 +0000

I just ordered a rubber stamp from RubberStamps.net with my Dark Eldar logo on a 1.5″x1″ rubber stamp. I have 14 vehicles that will eventually need the logo installed on the sails and I just don’t see me having the talent, time or patience to paint it on that many vehicles…. I don’t mind airbrushing the green on the vehicles and highlighting the logo once I put it on the sails….

Dark Eldar Photo updates

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 19:23:00 +0000

Not super happy about the sails on the ravager right now…. I’ll make do. I used Brent’s paint stick idea for primering and basecoating since all my warriors have magnetized feet. Also note the converted disintegrator 🙂 – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Mac Mini Sold (and there was bittersweet rejoicing)!

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 21:28:00 +0000

Well, my humble Mac Mini has been sold to a localite — an acquaintance of Kim. It’s been a good machine for me, but just (not) enough for a 3d and compositing(and casual gaming) workstation. I need substantially more horsepower for some of the projects coming up, so this was a blessing. I’ll miss the Mac platform in some ways, but it’s just not enough of an open platform. I need my hardware tailor made for my needs: quad core cpus, high end memory and decent video card (not necessarily top of the line).

Tyranids vs Dark Eldar

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 04:43:00 +0000

First and foremost: this was a bad matchup. Carlos’ tyranids had absolutely no shooting and I had lots of shooting and mobility. The game was pitched battle and annihilation. I placed first and was set to take first turn, but he rolled a 6 and siezed the initiative. Starting setup. End of Tyranid turn 1 End of Dark Eldar turn 1. One dead Carnifex thanks to dark lance spam. And a small handful of Genestealers fell as well.

Video Test

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 15:24:00 +0000

Testing directly from my iPhone… – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Quick video of curving process

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:37:00 +0000

This particular video was the second sail if I recall correctly. I tried to bend against the natural curve the first time, but I corrected it the second time I warmed up the plastic… Taken with my iPhone in lower light–so not a great video in quality. On a side note: Goodness I can’t wait until I remodel my kitchen.

More Sails Away!

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 05:17:00 +0000

The sails are cut slightly large so that the curvature will still hit their points…. This will be my maximum curvature mold Watching water boil….. oh so fun. #1 had some issues–boiled too hot and curled in upon itself before I could get to it (so I cut another) #1-#3 looking good. #4 & #5 5 of the 6 completed raiders All 6 of the Raider Squad Raiders All’s left is some sail trimming and then sanding before primering and painting!

A quick 15 minute test in Apple’s Garage Band

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 02:05:00 +0000

Like yesterday’s very rough, but has a 5th track layer (Horns, Bass, Drums, Rhythm Guitar, Lead Guitar)–totally different style. Each track is a single take and no post processing other than just adjusting the volume levels for each track. The drums and bass are loops from GarageBand (I won’t take credit for the quality of those, and to be honest it’s what makes the clip even remotely pleasurable to listen to).

Sails away!

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 04:52:00 +0000

First prototype sail installed. I already see how I can improve it, but since I have over 14 Raider class vehicles to create, I think this one will be just fine as-is in the flock. Just a simple plasticard sail that was boiled and gently bent….a hasty cut and I guessed the lengths, the next 8 will be at least held up to the model that it’ll be installed on.

A quick 10 minute test

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:43:00 +0000

Yes, it’s rough it’s and simple and even uncut but at least it’s quick. This little test was created in about 10 minutes. 4 tracks (1 GuitarRig track, 1 drum, 1 bass, 1 Orchestral) 37 seconds…. this is what I was testing the new Windows 7 (32bit) installation with SONAR 8.3 on my Mac Mini.

Dark Eldar Smackdown! It’s a HATE CRIME I tell you!

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 16:34:00 +0000

I don’t have time for a full rundown, so I’ll post my thoughts and what I’ve learned from my beatings on my two games on Friday (I’m writing these off memory, so they may not be entirely accurate. However, it’s for sure not skewed in my favor 😉 ) Ok first of all: my apologies to everyone, mainly you, Brent, on Friday for the P.P.A. I was tired and already in a sour mood so I wasn’t probably the most fun opponent.

Windows 7 32 bit, Mac Mini, SONAR, and Conspiracy Theories

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 15:21:00 +0000

Well early last night I set up boot camp for 32bit Windows 7 (since it’s only a 4 gig box) on my mid 2009 upgraded Mac Mini. Partitioned out the Windows 7/OS X partitions equally and installed Cakewalk SONAR 8.3 (as I’ve not upgraded to 8.5 yet). Not a single hitch, after 2 hours of installing 7, Boot Camp Drivers and the DAW software (which was by far the most lengthy part as it’s a 4 DVD install) then immediately switching to ASIO drivers (and installing the ASIO drivers for my M-Audio Keystation 49i) I was in business.

First Dark Eldar battle reports being created tonight!

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:00:00 +0000

I’ll apologize in advance for not having my models painted. Here’s the list I’ll be using in the report(s): 1000 Pts – Dark Eldar Roster – Kabal of the Sunken Soul Scouting Party HQ: Dracon (1#, 90 pts) 1 Dracon @ 90 pts (Agoniser; Splinter Pistol; Hell Mask; Shadow Field; Haywire Grenades) Elite: Wyches (10#, 270 pts) 8 Wyches @ 270 pts (Close Combat Weapon; Splinter Pistol; Wych Weapons; Blaster x2; Combat Drugs; Haywire Grenades; Plasma Grenades)

Rough week this week….so I’ll just do some casual thought blogging.

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:48:00 +0000

Family first, toys second. Sorry it’s taken me so long to get an update, it’s been a rough school and work week for Kim and I’ve had to take care of Cam a bit more than usual. I was going to work on some models tonight, but that appears to not be happening either due to some company coming over. If I have the time tonight I’ll be placing the dark lance magnets on both weapons and mounts tonight and doing some sanding to get prepared for primering.

Raider Conversion WIP #4

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 23:38:00 +0000

I’ve completed the magnets on the troops’ raiders. There’s room for 6 models on each raider. Looks like a pewter Wych is being held up pretty well on the rails too–I was concerned with that. Coming Next/Soon: Dark Lances, Sanding, filing, crack-sealing and SAILS! Edit: At lunch I took the liberty to add a dark lance to one of the Raiders…. it was slung way too low for my tastes, but it was a test and it’s an easy fix.

First game with Dark Eldar

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 23:37:00 +0000

Well, my first game wasn’t a total bust. I think we agreed it was a draw (although technically it was a win for him because I forgot that I had two ravagers in the list and didn’t even bring the second Ravager with me). I didn’t take pictures or anything because I’m not as cool or as nice as Brent is (I’ll actually start doing battle reports in time, I just didn’t want to officially document my raid against Black Templar as I was more concerned about learning the army than documenting).

Tonight’s Gaming Night

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:17:00 +0000

Ok after a bit of thinking I’ve decided not to bring a playable Dark Eldar army tonight as I want to wow my opponent(s) with completed models–not works in progress. Normally I’m ok with playing with works (as most of us are at our gaming store) in progress, but the completed models will be so much more impressive. Since Halloween is next week I won’t be able to make it then, so I have 2 weeks to get my models up-to-snuff for the tabletop war field.

Raider Conversion WIP #3b

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 02:38:00 +0000

I didn’t get as much done as I wanted to, but I did build up 3 new Raider chassis for my Ravagers–which includes the magnetized bases and all. Having some major issues keeping the side panels on with Super Glue, I’ll have to go purchase some JB Weld as I’ve heard it’s fan-freakin’-tastic when it comes to metal to metal bonding. My current raiding party: I realize that some of the masts are not quite the same from Raider to Raider.

Raider Conversion WIP #3a

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 23:17:00 +0000

It’s early in the night and it’s almost dinner time, so I wanted to post some of my work between work and dinner. I’ve drilled holes for magnets for the flying stands and placed the magnets, drilled holes for support beams for the bow of the raiders. Before my work in progress was just glued somewhat precariously on the bow–now there’s an aluminum rod that binds the two together. I’ve got 5 basic raiders about 40-50% done.

IBM, Ubuntu, Opportunity

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:56:00 +0000

According to this article on Ars Technica, IBM and Canonical are joining forces to bring Ubuntu to the Enterprise. What I’m mildly excited about is IBM’s Linux devs getting into developing Ubuntu for Enterprise Workstations. I can’t wait to see IBM really start working on Enterprise development and integration for Ubuntu. It’d be nice to see ‘Join Active Directory or Open Directory’ in the base OS install…or create Active/Open Directory in Ubuntu Server.

Raider conversion WIP part 2

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 00:41:00 +0000

This is still an early ‘alpha build’ The Warriors are magnetized at the forward foot so that I can change them to normal bases when the raider crashes.

The start of a raider conversion

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 21:53:00 +0000

Thanks to Mike I’m the proud owner of a crapload of original series Dark Eldar models! The raiders were in rough shape, which suited me JUST FINE as I was going to strip them and slice them and rebuild them almost from the ground up. I’m really liking what I see here. The front part at this point is very fragile as I need to put a dowel from the main body to the bow of the ship as all it’s hanging on right now is two drops of glue at the where the bow and hull meet.

Another Raider Conversion Idea

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 19:19:00 +0000

Continuing along the sail ship theme, I thought that (as far as the profile goes) that the front of the ship could look more like a traditional ship if it were flipped vertically (turned upside down). I’ll have to get a model in hand to see how this will fare.

Kabal of the Sunken Soul

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 21:09:00 +0000

Finally an army name and Logo! Introducing: The Kabal of the Sunken Soul Tonight or tomorrow I’ll do some more cleaning up of the rune’s ‘dirtyness’, but it’s pretty close to complete.

Ok after discussing and brainstorming

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 05:02:00 +0000

Ok after discussing and brainstorming and showing some of my ideas to my friends, it looks like my Kabal is going for a nautical theme thanks to the corsairs! Led by the Warhammer Dark Elf pirate Lokhir Fellheart as an Archon The neat thing is that Tim (in his amazing stream of consciousness, genius mind) gave me the idea of converting the raiders to Sailboat themes….. this is actually both easier and harder than I was originally planning, but I really do like the theme much better.

Basic Raider Conversion Idea Take 1

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 21:37:00 +0000

Without a model in my hands get ideas of how the heck this is really going to look on the table I’ve thrown together (mark 1) a quick diagram of what I’m looking to do. What I really like about this is the jagged Flash Gordon moviesque fins which will be made out of plasticard or foamcore (which I’ll have to create 18-21 for 6-7 models, but that’ll be fine as they’ll all be the same).

First models have been ordered!

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 19:37:00 +0000

I just placed my order for: 2 Dark Eldar Battleforces 3 Dark Eldar Raiders 3 Dark Eldar Ravagers Dark Eldar Codex 3 Dark Elf Corsair Boxes This round of orders will give me: 5 Raiders 3 Ravagers 10 Bikes 30 Warriors (with 10 extras of the old style) I’m going to be converting my own warriors, and probably dynamically redesigning the stern-end of the raider. I’m not too worried about the front of the model, but the more I look at the vane at the end the more it irks me.

Dark Eldar ‘ard Boyz for 2010

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 04:20:00 +0000

My local gaming group has decided to push forward competitive 40k game play again (it’s been a few years since we’ve had that sort of competition) by starting up a ‘ard Boyz Tournament preparation program. Many of us have rolled randomly so that we may broaden our gaming horizons and step out of our safety zone of what we play. Dark Eldar is most certainly out of my safety zone. They’re a hard-hitting, but paper-thin fragile army that has the oldest and ugliest models in 40k right now.

Mac Mini Setup :)

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 06:03:00 +0000

Sorry about the lighting. It’s nighttime and this room is best lit during the day. <img style=“display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=“http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_kEGL1QYhSkU/Sr2u7VLnkNI/AAAAAAAABdk/5h5y9qkzL-w/s400/IMG_0346.jpg" border=“0” alt=““id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5385653063726371026” />

Ok after about a week with MacOS….

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 05:47:00 +0000

Ok after about a week with MacOS Snow Leopard on a fairly modern machine I’m starting to enjoy it…. There’s a lot of nice little character inserts that I knew that I’d miss from Windows (the ALT-numeric keycodes). However tonight I discovered that Mac has quite robust shortcuts to insert special characters. http://tlt.its.psu.edu/suggestions/international/accents/codemac.html For example in Windows to insert a Trademark (™) I’d hold down the ALT key and type 0153 on the numeric keypad… However on a Mac all I do is press Option/Alt and then the number 2.

Space Wolves Updates!

Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:34:00 +0000

I have the 5th edition Codex (to be released October 2009) in hand!!! This is exciting (for a nerd) because they were my very first Warhammer 40,000 codex army (I had my own chapter of Space Marines in 1st edition, but as soon as the first codex was released, these were my passion). Now it’s time to start learning how to paint them again–it’s been nearly 8 years since I’ve last painted a Space Wolf.

Windows 7 Rating for Mac Mini

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 00:56:00 +0000

Specification reminder Stock 2009 Mac Mini (integrated nVidia 9400M chipset) 4 gigs of DDR3 1066 RAM running in dual channel mode 320 gig 7200 laptop drive.

Mac Mini Upgrades are complete!!

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 18:46:00 +0000

My memory and hard drive came in this morning so I spent lunch upgrading the hard drive and memory. The Mini came with 1 Gig of DDR3 1066 memory on one stick.. now that I have 4 gigs on 2 sticks I’ll be able to use dual channel and have more memory bandwidth..which makes sense why my memory score in Windows 7’s Experience Score was so low for that parameter (I was wondering at the time why it was so low).

Some pics from the Rogue Trader in July…..

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 18:44:00 +0000

My Sergeants Need Laspistols and Chainswords

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 17:44:00 +0000

Well, unfortunately I created this army a tad bit too soon. A few weeks ago I’ve noticed in the Imperial Guard Codex that there is no ‘lasgun’ option on the Sergeants. This means I’ll have to create new models for my them with CC & Laspistols. The good news is that I’ll have a full new squad to add to the piling numbers 🙂

Ok lots changed today,

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 15:56:00 +0000

I just consolidated 3 different Blog Spot addresses into this one. I was getting weary of having 3 different blogs ( and was about to create a new one for my Space Wolves) for my 40k projects. All of the old Rule of Gauth, Nodrog’s Waaagh have been moved to this blog and future projects will begin here with proper labels. I’m excited because this is going to make it easier for anyone who cares (i.

The Mini has Landed!

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 18:43:00 +0000

I just ordered my UpToDate program for Snow Leopard so it’s still stuck with Leopard (not a problem with me since my experience is still with Tiger). Since I’ve already ordered it, I’ll go ahead and install it off a workmate’s disk. It’s only “shady” for a day or two….either way Apple has my order and my disks will be in next week. Wow this thing is small!! Photos were taken (shakily) with my iPhone.

My Mac Mini is on the way.

Tue, 01 Sep 2009 19:01:00 +0000

This will be my 3rd Mac, used primarily as a Logic platform and a programming environment. I still don’t currently plan on doing iPhone development, but that may change in the future. I purchased the very baseline model, and I plan on doing the memory (to 4 gig) and hard drive (7200 rpm drive) upgrades myself. I’m excited in a dirty sort of way. Correction: this will be my 4th Mac….

Current Painting Status

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:35:00 +0000

HQ Warboss Nodrog (1): complete Warboss Ffej (1): primered Mek with Shok Attak Gun (1): primered Elites Tankbustas (5): complete Burnas (5): primered Troops Evil Sunz Slugga Mob (30): complete Evil Sunz Trukk Slugga Boyz (12, + 1) #1: complete, trukk is partially painted Evil Sunz Trukk Slugga Boyz (12, + 1) #2: complete, trukk is partially painted Bad Moonz Shoota Mob (30): primered Goff Slugga Mob (30): assembled Gretchin Mobs (22): assembled, but need to convert one more Runt ‘erd

Fantasy Orcs make good Shoota Orks

Fri, 24 Jul 2009 20:45:00 +0000

Fantasy orc bodies (mostly stripped) used to make shoota boys from leftover slugga orc sprues 🙂 I was a few heads short so I used a few Loota heads to compensate.

After a slight vacation the Waaagh resumes to terrorize the Imperial Sector

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:52:00 +0000

Oi you zoggin’ blokes, time to wake up! Da squigs got nuffin’ t’ graze on and all our stuff is junk. I’ll be takin’ us far t’ get us some more stuff ’cause we’re Orks! And we take what we want. ‘Cause we’re da best!” –Warboss Nodrog After a year of working on my Guard, I’ve decided to start working again on my Orks. Nodrog has been quite itchy and restless being stowed away in my miniature case and he’s ready to bust some heads.

iPhone Development

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 19:54:00 +0000

Recently I’ve been torn between working on iPhone development or just continuing working in Windows/Web development. I’ve decided against being an iPhone developer for many reason, such as (but not limited to): Start up costs: the purchase of a Mac and then the $99/year iPhone development fee Market Supersaturation: there are so many other developer moving towards this, that every app that I’ve ever tried to brainstorm has been published (and then lots and lots and lots more!

Utilization of 64 bit!

Tue, 26 May 2009 18:33:00 +0000

My memory upgrade came in and I’ve got my venerable Asus P5k-V maxed out. 8 gigs of Memory running the Windows 7 release candidate. I’m a happy camper as 64 bit has been a long time coming. Now I’ll be able to edit video with a little more headroom.

DAW Latency Issues

Thu, 21 May 2009 14:41:00 +0000

Well perhaps my problem is with SONAR. I’ve loaded the 64 bit stand alone version of Guitar rig and there was very little latency and hiccups while jamming with my guitar plugged straight into the instrument jack on my new Keystation 49i. However when I open up the Guitar Rig audio effects in SONAR there’s much crackling and about a half second delay. I’m going to switch to the ASIO drivers in SONAR and see if this fixes the issue.

Mac in the closet again

Tue, 19 May 2009 14:48:00 +0000

Well that didn’t take long. I just didn’t see me using the Mac for anything but novel recording. Sure I know it’s an old Mac, and yes it’s a version old OS (Tiger was installed), but it just didn’t run the familiar software that I prefer to use (although Logic wasn’t bad at all). I’m a Linux/Windows guy. I have been for quite some time now (although I know more about the grits of MacOS than most Mac users).

Mac at it again.

Fri, 15 May 2009 04:58:00 +0000

I’ve pulled my dual G4 PowerMac out of the closet (pun intended, but true) and started using it again for recording. As much as I really don’t like the idea of Apple (hardware and software lock-in) it honestly just DOES WORK for multimedia. I’ll continue on my way I think and see if this will really work for what I want it to do, or if Windows is the way to go for Multimedia work.

Windows 7 RC

Wed, 13 May 2009 14:23:00 +0000

If I could define a single word that defines my experience with this OS so far it would be ‘wow’. This is the OS that Microsoft should have released instead of Vista. I don’t blame them for releasing Vista, as it forced the hardware manufacturers to create drivers for the Vista/7 driver model (which was 95% of my issues with Vista when it was released). When I dual boot from Vista to 7 I’m constantly bugged by the general lagginess of Vista in comparison to 7 (which in some cases is more snappy than XP!

State of the Gauthic Union

Wed, 06 May 2009 12:53:00 +0000

Here’s a run down of what’s complete and what’s not: All my Infantry (except one Mordheim priest to be converted into an Imperial Priest) are complete…however there’s another box of 16 Men-At-Arms on the way so that I may create more special weapons teams. My Chimeras are complete. 2 Hellhounds are complete–one is still in the box. 3 Basilisks are 60% complete. 2 Leman Russ tanks are 70% complete. 1 Valkyrie is assembled and basecoated and 1 is still in the box.

2 Chimeras and 2 Hellhounds complete

Fri, 01 May 2009 12:50:00 +0000

I’ve completed (i.e. based and washed and sealed) my 2 chimeras and 2 of my 3 hellhounds (1 is completely still in the box right now). My 2 Russ tanks have their turrents and sponsons almost complete, and their bodies are based coated Codex Gray Foundation Paint. I wanted to complete them by today but I was fairly busy this week working on trying to get the Open Wargaming System first 2009 release somewhat legible for release for today (and printing yesterday).

Personal Updates

Wed, 29 Apr 2009 21:18:00 +0000

I’ve been distributing my time the last week and a half on working on my IG vehicles, revising the rules for the Open Wargaming System and the Open Wargaming Society website. I’ve got the work done on the Open Wargaming website and rules I wanted to do a few days earlier than my intended release date (Friday), although I know I could have worked on them to revise them for more clarity over the course of tomorrow (which I may still do before I print the PDF out through Kinkos online printing).

Ok found another model

Thu, 16 Apr 2009 03:58:00 +0000

I didn’t have time to paint tonight, but I did some assembly: Assembled tonight: 1 more seargent class model 1 more Commissar (total of 3) 6 Ogryns (one of the new Bone Heads, OMG this model is so much bigger than the old Ogryns) Painting work in progress (still): 2 Commissars 80%

Current Painting Status

Wed, 15 Apr 2009 04:21:00 +0000

I am now offically out of Men-At-Arms boxes from my stash. After all this I have the following painted and completed: 60 lasgun guardsmen 13 Heavy Weapon Platforms (2 models a pop, currently have painted lascannons magentized on them) 3 flamer wielding guardsmen 6 melta gun wielding guardsmen 14 grenade launcher guardsmen 8 sergeants 8 comm guardsmen 5 junior officers 2 senior officers (same character, different equipment) That’s 132 models in 2 and a half weeks.

Wow KDE 4.2 is Slow

Tue, 07 Apr 2009 15:15:00 +0000

I thought it was just the Aspire, but after installing Windows 7 beta on a separate partition, there needs to be a LEAPS and BOUNDS speed improvement in KDE & Fedora 11 to keep up with Microsoft’s upcoming gem. Now understand I’m a Linux fan due to the fact that it’s free: Not (just) the fact that it’s price is free, but the fact that I have FREEdom to do what I like to the OS when I like.

Infantry – What I have left to do:

Tue, 07 Apr 2009 13:19:00 +0000

Of the infantry I have assembled I have: 2 Classic Commissars (they’ll be a quite a different painting style than the rank and file guys–one is the Games Day female commissar) 3 Heavy Weapon Teams (I completed 10 half-complete teams last night) 13 Lascannons (which are separate from the teams since I magnetize weapons) Getting those 8 painted by the end of the week would be wonderful, but having the three weapon teams is my only goal.

Pictures!!!!!!!!

Tue, 07 Apr 2009 04:16:00 +0000

I held my tongue right and got my camera working (although I was guessing the accuracy as the LCD is dead). Here are some better pics.

Well crud.

Mon, 06 Apr 2009 20:18:00 +0000

I just found out that my digital camera is dead… it was dying before but now it won’t even boot (LCD was broken in a party a couple of months ago, but still took good pictures). Time to bite the bullet and purchase a new one (at least I won’t need another 8 gig SDHC card! ) But the good news is that Friday I completed the rest of my basic 1″ base infantry (18) and now all I have to do basic guardsmen wise is my 13 heavy weapon bases (although I did find out in my test-run 1850 game that I’m a couple of grenadiers short of being fully represented so I’ll have to assemble a few more special weapon models).

Only 18 left!

Fri, 03 Apr 2009 17:39:00 +0000

After the completion 20 models last night I worked on the remaining 18 of my basic troops and I’m about halfway done with those. With luck and a bit of patience I’ll be done tonight with them and my goal of having all my 1″ base guardsmen base painted in a week will be complete.

My Acer Aspire One

Thu, 02 Apr 2009 14:02:00 +0000

I’ve been installing Fedora Core 11 beta on my Aspire One that I purchased last month and until today I’ve had hell getting the wireless driver to be enabled for usage. Every time I went to the network manager icon in the taskbar (I’m using the KDE version since I’m looking to do some QT development) it kept telling me that wireless was disabled. I spent the better part of last night thinking that it was a driver issue, but when I had Ubuntu installed the ath5k kernel driver module worked fine (which is what Fedora 11 uses).

Missed painting last night

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 19:06:00 +0000

Unfortunately I missed time painting last night, so I’m still 38 models away from completion of basic infantry, special weapons and leaders (I’ll be painting 13 heavy weapon teams next week). However of the 38 I’d like to complete I’ve got 20 almost basecoated (still need to do metal and black gloves, belts, etc). After that all that’s left is clean up mistakes then wash and base those 20. The remaining 18 are primed and only have faces painted and washed.

PAINTING!

Mon, 30 Mar 2009 05:08:00 +0000

I was challenged by a local player here Friday about “finishing” all my infantry by “next Friday” (April 3rd). Here’s my work since last Friday (3 days here). By finishing I’ll assume 3 colors and based tournament standard. If I have the time I’ll highlight and normalize the flesh tone of the principal models if I have the time (probably will as I’ll be done basecoating by the Tuesday–Mar 31–night at this rate)

Some vehicles are started

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 21:06:00 +0000

I’ve got 4 Heavy Stubber turrets replacing the standard guardsman coming out of the hatch with the Men-At-Arms bodies and heads. I’ve still got some conversions to do to help the vehicles blend in a bit better, but this is a first step. On a personal note, I freaking hate the Imperial Guard Tank Track sprue. I felt like I wanted to pull my hair out after installing tracks on 3 Chimera class vehicles.

Updated Cities of Death List

Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:10:00 +0000

I’ve started work on the newer style painting of the Gauths, however there is no chance I’ll complete the painting by Friday–although I intend to try to have at least my infantry base coated–it’s difficult to do with new social priorities 🙂 I must say my new formula, albeit simple, is quite effective. I absolutely adore the new Citadel washes–especially Delvan Mud which is the wash I’m using for the Gauths.

It’s been a while since my last post

Mon, 19 Jan 2009 20:00:00 +0000

It’s been quite a bit since my last post but I wanted to give a painting update: I’ve not done a darn thing since I’ve stripped the paint off the test models. However, we have a local 1250 Cities of Death tournament that we’re having on February 21, 2009 that I intend to have the force painted. Although it will only get about 1/4th of my infantry models painted, it’ll get almost all of my vehicles painted.

Current Collection

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 22:37:00 +0000

Right now the Rule of Gauth consists of: 1 Senior Officer Command Squad 4 Infantry Platoons (8 Squads, 4 command squads — all variable heavy weapon, but the Gauths prefer lascannons) 1 Armored Fist Squad 2 Hellhounds 1 Demolisher/Leman Russ (switchable) 1 Leman Russ 3 Basilisks 2 Chimeras

The VAT!

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 21:49:00 +0000

Well the test models are going into the vat this weekend. I like the colors, but I don’t like the technique–too much drybrushing and it looks terrible up close. I’ll probably stick with a very similar color scheme as I like the dark gray/red look, but instead of drybrushing I’ll be using proper blending techniques although it’ll take me longer to paint. I’ll probably move to a scab red/scar red (depending on vendor) base for the red instead of the Foundation red base to darken it up further.

My red meat fasting is coming to an end.

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 19:41:00 +0000

As some of you may know I’ve not had red meat (with the exception of a camping weekend earlier this month) since mid July. I did this mainly to prove to myself that I can go without steaks, hamburgers, etc if I have to. As some of you may know my family has a history of heart disease and my father has recently had a couple of heart attacks. I wanted to prove to myself (one of the biggest red-meat eaters I knew) that I didn’t have to have to depend on that for my staple of diet.

Comedy Gold

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 16:09:00 +0000

One of my biggest complaints over the last few months was the Developer Unfriendly nature of Apple. Today Apple posted this: We have decided to drop the non-disclosure agreement (NDA) for released iPhone software. We put the NDA in place because the iPhone OS includes many Apple inventions and innovations that we would like to protect, so that others don’t steal our work. It has happened before. While we have filed for hundreds of patents on iPhone technology, the NDA added yet another level of protection.

NO to Mac

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:31:00 +0000

After several months of deliberation I’ve decided not to invest my money in the Mac platform although my little PowerMac G4’s a neat little machine. I’ve always used Cakewalk’s SONAR (at least since it’s been out) and before then Pro Audio (from version 7 or 8–I can’t remember–cocaine’s a helluva drug, heh) and I think that the learning curve, the fact that I already have fantastic hardware and the advertised new Audio engine performance improvement and the workflow changes make an upgrade from 5 to 8 a very, very tempting offer.

Quick in-progress test models

Wed, 10 Sep 2008 22:25:00 +0000

The Rule of Gauth, an introduction

Wed, 10 Sep 2008 20:18:00 +0000

This blog is the painting, history and work in progress log of Imperial Guard regiment The Rule of Gauth. Why name them the Rule of Gauth? Latin for Regiment is Rule, and Gauth is a fan-created fictional star-system in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. Gauth 4 is the home planet and a huge industrial hive world thriving in the conquests and riches of the neighboring systems. Gauth 3 is a humid agricultural world, while Gauth 5 is a secretive research world.

Logic Express 7 & MacOS

Mon, 09 Jun 2008 04:16:00 +0000

I installed a trial version of Logic Express (casually termed as ‘Logic’ from here on) that I downloaded many months to a couple of years ago when I was just about to purchase a Mac (instead of my Dual Core Acer Laptop that I own), and looking retrospectively I think I may have made a mistake. My experience making music so far has been with Cakewalk SONAR (v5) and Project 5 (v2.

New Project Dual Processor G4 (Complete)

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 20:37:00 +0000

Very good! The refurb power supply came in this afternoon. Sorry I was a bit too excited to log the testing and then installation of it, but I do have some pics of the system up and running and various upgrades…. Quick pic of initial install of os….. Side view…. 1.5 Gigs of RAM installed on Logic Board First boot for install of OS (before I even closed the case) I upgraded the old DVD-ROM drive with a modern IDE DVD-RW drive (and it works faster, better and is BLACK) as those old DVD readers could not read DVD-R’s.

New Project Dual Processor G4 (incomplete)

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 17:49:00 +0000

I inherited this particular poor, lost & unbootable PowerMac: this one is a 2000 model G4 Graphite Tower from a good friend of mine: Tom Crane at Crane Advertising. The box doesn’t boot, I can press the power button hold it down–it just sits there like a brick should and a computer shouldn’t. I first tried removing the battery, clearing the PRAM and leaving the battery and it unplugged for days.

If I get an old fossil to work……

Wed, 21 May 2008 23:33:00 +0000

Does it make me a “Mac Guy”? I found this relic (a Macintosh Classic) almost 2 years ago when I bought my house (the garage was full of trash, this little treasure was about the only thing that was even remotely worth considering keeping). It was in pitiful condition. It was full of dust, wouldn’t turn on (turned out to be a bad fuse) and looked as if it had something sticky poured on both the box and the keyboard.

Vista Driver Issues

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 16:24:00 +0000

As I’ve mentioned earlier I’m a Cakewalk SONAR & Project5 user and licensee. Since I’ve upgraded to Vista last year I’ve noticed lots of nasty driver issues. Audio engine stops, etc. I’m going to do a system-wide search for updated drivers for all my audio hardware this week and if the problems aren’t corrected I’m probably going to revert back to XP. Now understand I’m a nerd. I’m a Linux server guy and a Windows Desktop guy, if I can’t get the drivers to work with my hardware & software after the OS has been release for over a year, then there’s something substantially wrong with Windows Vista and/or its support.

Musical itchings and lack of practice

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 16:37:00 +0000

I’ve been working on some music again, as well as changing my style a bit too. It’s been years since I’ve done anything semi-seriously, and I’ve had songs in my head for the last few years that I’ve been wanting to push down to .wav. Also, I’ve been getting the itch to go back to caressing my artistic side. Once upon a time I was quite a freehand sketcher, but since becoming a professional nerd/geek I’ve not done this so often anymore.

Why do retail stores suck????

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 15:48:00 +0000

This is re-posted from my Warhammer 40,000 Orks blog and posted here in case someone doesn’t care about 40k (lots of you out there, and that’s great!): Why the heck doesn’t Circuit City and Best Buy keep digital cameras in stock? Don’t they have market researchers who are supposed to anticipate these trends. Both stores lost 160-200 because they didn’t have a camera I needed in my price range in stock.

Mild rant concerning retail stores…

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 19:19:00 +0000

Why the heck doesn’t Circuit City and Best Buy keep digital cameras in stock? Don’t they have market researchers who are supposed to anticipate these trends. Both stores lost 160-200 because they didn’t have a camera I needed in my price range in stock. “Oh, we can order it for you” or “Oh, maybe check back tonight.” The whole purpose of a Brick and Mortar store is convenience. I want to walk out of there now with the product I want.

Dire Avengers lot 1 part 1

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Today I worked on the painting of 20 Dire Avengers. As per the last post they were primered black and given a nice Royal Blue basecoat. I then semidrybrushed Enchanted Blue over the armor. After that a drybrush from top to bottom of Ice Blue. It’s kinda thick, but the wash later tones it down. The Asurmen Blue wash is thickly coated on the model and left to dry completely.