The School of Missed Posts!

Howdy folks, long time no see!  First off I want to apologize for missing last week's post AND yesterday's post.  It was bound to happen eventually, so now we've got the off schedule bug out of my system.  Today's post will be a brief recap of the last couple weeks, paired with a little bit of anticipation for the next couple of weeks!

Hobby
Most of my hobby time has been taken up by school exploration (hooray for going back to grad school as a non-traditional student!) but I have managed to get some paint on a few things.  Some steam arachnids have slowly approached tabletop quality and more layers have gone onto my mechanical rider (the true brains behind the operation).  Willie and Joss have also gotten closer to painted, bringing my painted M&SU count even higher.  I've been having a great time experimenting with skin tones and techniques and I cannot recommend experimenting outside of your comfort zone  highly enough!

I also painted up a mini for a game of Through the Breach (that I tried out just after the last post).  I'll talk more about the game in the gaming section, the mini was a blast to paint!  It was from the multipart male kit and I think that that kit is a wonderful tool for anyone getting into the RPG

This week's major project is to finally get a real photo booth/tent set up so I can post some better photos for everyone.  I have about 70% of the materials, but since this is a project that benefits the site aaaaaaand my wife's Etsy store it may be a little easier to justify.  I'll forego pictures this week to build some anticipation for next week (and shame myself into being ready for next week.

Gaming
I played two games of Malifaux and one game of Through the Breach during my absence from the blog.  All three of the games were terrific!  I won't do a full batrep for time, but here's a quick summary:
Game 1 was a 35 Soulstone game with Reconnoiter, Bodyguard, Murder Protoge, Protect Territory, Make Them Suffer and Line in the Sand with Standard deployment.  I took Protect Territory revealed and bodyguard on Mechanical Rider.  I tried Ramos out for the first time and was not disappointed!  I think he will be my first compliment to Ironsides.  For as good as Ironsides is in a clumped up situation, Ramos can spread out across the board without a care in the world.  My opponent played an elite Sonnia Crew and we called the game at the end of 4 because of the shear number of spiders earning me points.
Game 2 was a 50 Soulstone Game with Squatter's Rights, Protect Territory, Spring the Trap, Bodyguard, Outflank and A Line in the Sand with Flank deployment.  I took Ramos again and used the plethora of scheme marker schemes to bluff my opponent (who was playing Leviticus).  I chose outflank and unannounced line in the sand.  Mechanical Rider with Imbued protection gave a strong signal toward Bodyguard, and defensive models dropping markers faked protect territory.  My miners did a great job of halfway setting up spring the trap as well.  I was proud of my ability to approach the game sideways and send spiders in to tie up a first turn Killjoy, while letting Leviticus downright delete a model or two a turn.  I wound up winning by getting ahead on squat markers and focussing on my schemes.
Game 3 was Through the Breach, and I think a mix of mechanics, a super skilled fatemaster (that gets me a free reflip at some point right?), and a great setting made this one of my favorite RPG systems that I have played for a while!  After some stutter steps in the character creation process I've found a good groove for my character to match and I look forward to playing another game tonight!

The last little bit of gaming news is pretty exciting.  http://zacgoldenhall.blogspot.com/ Is managing another season of Tale of Malifaux Bloggers!  This is a way for people to keep themselves on track (kind of like how I've been using the blog) and encourages getting a new crew painted and on the table.  I plan on picking up Rasputina's box set in the near future (at one of my FLGS's Drawbridge Games).  I look forward to adding updates to this set of games, and will be doing so outside of my normal posting schedule, so keep an eye out!

Thanks again for reading folks!  If you have any questions feel free to contact me at ToBeAnArcanist@gmail.com, tweet to @KFinchster, or just leave a comment below!  I always appreciate any criticism or encouragement and I'll apologize for the missed post one last time!

Showdown in Pittsburgh City!

Hey everyone!  It has been an amazing week, and I really feel like I've been able to get a ton of time in with everyone's favorite hobby!  I got some Hobby time, a little bit of reading with the new book, and a Game!  I have been keeping an eye on the Wyrd trade forums for new minis (thanks to all the folks that I have been trading with!) and I also made a purchase from Mats By Mars.

Hobby
I've managed to sneak in a lot of painting, model construction, and I even built some of the unsung heroes of tabletop wargaming TERRAIN!

I have some extra insulation foam laying around my house, so I decided to start building a collection of terrain to give me the option of playing some games at home.  I whipped up a couple hills in an hour or so, nothing too fancy but certainly useful.  A little later in the week I tried my hand at building a burnt out house and am fairly happy with how it turned out.  I can't wait to try all of this stuff out on my own table!

It seems like I either get minis put together or painted in a given week, and this was a models put together week.  I managed to get a bunch of GenCon and local shop models assembled.  If you notice the metal Arcane Effigy I missed my chance to pick up the plastic while I was at GenCon.  I had one in my hand the first day, and decided to buy it later to push a purchase up to the limit for another bonus model.  When I showed up later to buy him, they were out.  A word of warning ALWAYS GO FOR THE BIRD IN THE HAND!  Fortunately a local shop had a metal one in stock, so I don't have to wait until December for the excellent condition removal this little puppet provides.

Gaming
This week was amazing because I actually got a game in!  I went to one of my FLGS's and watched a couple people play before a new player popped up, and then we started a game!  It was a 30 stone game, I declared Arcanists and he declared Guild.  The strategy was Turf War and the schemes were Bodyguard, Power Ritual, Assassinate, Murder Protoge, and of course Line in the Sand.  I took Power Ritual revealed and Bodyguard unrevealed.  He took Assassinate and Murder Protoge both unrevealed.  My list was Ironsides with Arcane Resevoir and Challenge the Crowd, Mouse, Joss with Recharge Soulstone, and 2 Union Miners.  He took the Sonia Crew box (which was beautifully painted!).  This first shot gives you a good image of the board.

This shot provides a shot of my crew.

And a shot of his crew early in the game.

We had a great game, and tied 4-4.  I scored 1 from Turf war (Goofed by trying to score with Mouse) and 3 from Power Ritual (gogo huffing and panting miner).  I failed to keep Joss alive, I figured he was going to take assassinate and waste all of his time on Ironsides.  Mouse definitely did a lot of work healing up Ironsides and pulling miners around the field (to turn on hand picked men) and I think I will be taking him in future games.  My opponent scored 2 from turf war and 2 from murder protoge.  The burning overtook Joss and those 2 points were an effective 5 because he denied me 3 all at once.

Misc
With the revamp to the Henchman program underway, I'm considering applying to be one in October.  That being said, I don't have a ton of experience under my belt with the game, but I have enthusiasm dripping out my ears.  I'd love to hear from any current Henchman about what they think about the program, and if they think I can get away with being one with less experience actually playing the game than your average Malifaux player.

Thats it for this week let me know what you think about things and if you have any questions feel free to contact me at ToBeAnArcanist@Gmail.com or on Twitter @KFinchster