Final rush to finish the painting year 2020 - Updated 7th of Jan 2021.

So many started miniatures... 

FINAL SCORE is 581+107=688

As my (not so good?) habit is, I quite often quickly paint up miniatures to be "battle field ready", but not quite finished. Then, as the end of the year approaches, I focus on finishing as many as I can. I never manage to finish all, that I've started, hence my painting tracking on this blog separates miniatures finished (started before this year) and miniatures painted from scratch.

Examples of my final rushes in recent years:

• 2019
• 2018

I always post my latest paintings in Instagram - my username is "wanhaherrat" (old sire T) - follow me there for latest updates! This blogpost contains first a summary of miniatures finished since summer and then I'll update more pictures, as I finish them before end of the year. First half of the year on my painting desk is reviewed here.

As I'm publishing this blogpost on 19th of December my count is:

• 19th of December: 468 painted from scratch and 83 finished 
• 26th of December 491 painted from scratch and 83 finished  (+23)
• 29th of December 515 painted from scratch and 83 finished  (+24)
• 1st of January 581 painted from scratch and 107 finished  (+90)
• 7th of Jan Update: more pictures and YouTube video spins added
• 8th of Jan Update: more pictures and YouTube video spins added

ASOIAF: our second map based campaign concluded!

New ruler in Westeros! 

Once again we have a new ruler in Westeros!

Read on to learn about our fall season campaign and how my Night's Watch fared...

Map in the end of campaign

ASOIAF: Campaign battles Round 4.

 WIP: Attacked from all sides

After three rounds of the campaign, I was back on top leading the campaign, which lead to an onslaught of aggression against me! 

I was challenged twice; first by Mikko of House Baratheon and then by Johannes of Free Folk!

Read on to find out how I fared against this reckless hatred!  

ASOIAF: How to destroy a 50p. Lannister army in just three rounds?

 Brutal efficiency, fire and blood

In our Map based campaign For the Throne my southern domain had, inconveniently for a Lannister player, expanded to his borders and he declared a challenge to me. It was duly accepted!

ASOIAF: Stark Barbeque

 

First go with Mother of Dragons

I guess everybody in ASOIAF TMG community have waited and feared for the arrival of the DRAGONS! And now they are here! If you've been reading my blog, you might remember, that I've been dancing with the dragons before too... but this was the first time I was able to actually play with them!

War of the Five Kings - Fall Season - two first rounds

 What!?!?! Nigthswatch are messing with  politics and wars of seven kingdoms...

As reported we started a new campaign with 12 aspiring lordlings striving for the coveted Iron Throne.

I'm running Nightswatch. In the spring I played with Targaryens and did ok, but KNOWING what is coming for Targs, I chose to field the Brothers in black. They certainly have a tool kit to tailor a list for any occasion and against any opponent. 

Second map based Song of Ice and Fire Campaign started

As a continuation, with fine Tuned rules, to our spring campaign 7 veteran and 5 new players embark on a campaign to claim their right for the iron throne...

Chaos and Mayhem in Warhammer!

Triumph & Treachery @ Nopat & Taktiikka

Warhammer has really made a come back at our Nopat & Taktiikka Club. In our Summer Cabin trip we played a 20 000p. mega battle with 8th edition and Oldhammer gaming (mainly 6th edition) has been quite active indeed... then I digged up this old tome and asked if some of the fellas would like to give this oddity a go. They wanted and since July there's been about 5 sessions and one of my mates even bought the set from eBay. In this blogpost you'll see pictures from this summers Retro-Warhammer games! 

First go with Sharp Practise 2.

Revisiting Retreat from Moscow 1812

My club mate Jaakko ( @jamopower in IG) has been slowly building a napoleonic Russian force and we’ve been pondering which of the many available, skirmish level, rulesets we would use.

We’ve been playing napoleonics with Black Powder, Muskets & Tomahawks (were waiting for the napoleonic supplement to be released for the 2nd edition), Rebels and Patriots, but as Jaakko wanted to play with a smaller number of miniatures we decided to give Sharp Practise a go. Eventually Jaakko painted 30 more miniatures for the game, so the argument for a smaller amount of minis sort of flew out of the window, but who cares!

August ASOIAF-tournament part 1/2

 Our community is growing!

I / we have organized many a tournaments at our wargaming club Nopat ja Taktiikka in Helsinki. I believe this was the first time we had eight players. This is a two part tournament with 2 X three games. Second part will be played in two week's time (23rd of August 2020). At least 5 of today's participants will play at the second part too - there we have 10 players enrolled.

Nightswatch reinforcements I worked on while preparing for the tournament (a bit WIP)

Unboxing Wargames Atlantic's WW1 Germans

Turning Germans into Chinese

I recently started to build a WW2 Chinese army to Bolt Action and in the beginning of the war several Chinese units were equipped with German gear and using puttees on their legs. So these minis would be a good starting point for kitbashing and conversions. Let's see what the box contains and what is the quality of these minis...  

Visiting Military Museums this summer

Traveling in Finland

As Covid-19 cancelled our trip to Menorca, we've traveled more in our beautiful country this summer. This has given me the opportunity to visit some military related museums (mostly while rest of the family has been doing something else).

ASOIAF: 3D Terrain

Making the Battlefield more visual

Objectives (Mantic)

Introduction video to Bolt Action

In a starring role!

Our Nopat Taktiikka Club's awesome video team has made an another great video: 

I'm the dude with the machine gun!

Introduction video to ASOIAF

Last weekend we filmed a video to introduce my favourite game: Song of Ice and Fire: Tabletop Miniatures Game

It was then edited by Kalle and it came out pretty good! It’s in Finnish, but I hope you enjoy it anyway:

https://youtu.be/UMkvIHtM9cU

First half a year on my painting desk

Steady pace of painting continues

Last year I painted or finished 679 miniatures, after six months of this year my standing is as follow:

So, a little bit behind in finished miniatures, but knowing again how many started new minis there are, I think I'm more than up to speed compared to last year. Covid-19 lock down gave every one a lot of time to spend at home, but that didn't really boost my productivity dramatically - I really seem to need the "next game" to drive my painting and you don't need to paint anything for playing with Tabletop simulator.

Blast from the past: ASOAIF: Campaign Round 5 - two battles for my Targaryens

Facing both Baratheons and Free Folk

As I was leading our campaign after four rounds - and holding King's Landing, I had many enemies...

• First Mikko (Baratheons) challenged me 
• Then Heikki announced "The Destruction" event against me (rolling a D6 for all my buildings on the map, destroyed on a 1)
• And finally Paavo used the "Cut the Snake's Head" -event against me, forcing me to face his Free Folk on a battle field.

So I was facing a big challenge and needed to perform really well to keep my position and possibly win the campaign. To add to the challenge, in our campaign the challenger can choose the scenario to be played, obviously choosing one, that would benefit them over Targaryens... read on to see how I managed!

Bolt Action: DAK Army in three weeks

The Last Battle before Covid-19

At our Helsinki area wargaming club Nopat & Taktiikka we often play large battles. As this 10 000 points mega battle was announced and I was invited to join the Axis forces a rapid army painting project started. I only had three infantry and one motorbike with a side car painted, and I had to speed paint (thank god for Contrasts paints) a 1000p. army. And so I did. In just three weeks. 

Read on to see the army and pictures from our mega battle.

ASOIAF: First go with Unsullied Pikemen and Stormcrow Derwishes

Game of Thrones 50p.

As Unsullied Pikemen were presented in the CMON Virtual Expo recently, I immediately set out to convert my second set of Unsullied Swordmasters into a pikemen unit. Taking long spears from Victrix plastic Saxon set I managed to build a unit, that actually looks like they were always meant to be Pikemen! As we don't their points value yet (speculations are between eight and ten), I agreed with my regular opponents to play them at 9 points. Read on to learn how they fared against them dreaded Starks!

Armies on Parade: ASOIAF Targaryens - Updated 9.9.2023

Fire and Blood

Targaryen starter set for A Song Of Ice and Fire: Tabletop Miniatures Game was released in this years January. I had pre-ordered it and as soon as I got it, I've been painting and their mercenary allies. Here I've gathered everything I've painted so far, some 75 miniatures.

Podcasting about map based campaigns

Chat with Chase and Mika

Most pleased to feature for second time in this awesome podcast by Onthetablegaming 

This time it’s about our mapbased campaign I organised for our ASOIAF community at Nopat ja taktiikka club. Our 10 player #campaing was blast and it continued for 5 rounds, even if covid_19 presented some challenges - we went to a hybrid mode and used tabletop simulator too. 

ASOIAF CAMPAIGN: Battle for King's Landing

Failed Charges and Endless Healing

As the fifth round of our map based campaign started, I was challenged by Mikko, of House Baratheon, to  battle for King's Landing. In our campaign KL gives the player controlling it +2 campaign points and hence it was quite critical... so, gloves came of...

ASOIAF: War of the Five Kings Campaign Concluded

All hail His Grace,

Mika of the House Stark the First of His Name,

King of the Andals,

the Rhoynar, and the First Men, 

and Lord of the Seven Kingdoms.

ASOIAF: Activation tokens for Targaryens and Neutrals (Boltons)

A flayed man has no secrets

So I've taken a serious step towards the Dark Side... bit I just couldn't resist these 

activation tokens for Boltons / Neutrals

ASOIAF: Starks (Rodrik) vs. Baratheons (Stannis)

Mighty swings and burning to death! 

On the second Easter day a peculiar game was played in our War of the Five Kings Campaign.

Our Lannister player was leading the campaign after round 3 and I had already challenged and won him... but another player (Baratheon / Stannis) had used an Event to be able to challenge him too! Due to Covid-19 our Lannister player didn't want to play F2F and then again our Baratheon player doesn't want to use TTS... As I had a stake in this game (one with a greater victory against Lannisters would get to conquer first, I had won my battle with a 7 point victory margin), I offered my services as a mercenary. My offer was accepted and hence we set up this game. I just needed not to loose by more than 7 vp margin to take the lead in the campaign. 

Daenarys and Drogon

Converting the Mother of Dragons

Unboxing Anno Domini 1666

A Kickstarter arrived

ASOIAF: First 1.5.1 Tournament

New Age for Nights Watch

New players are joining our community here in Helsinki and specially at our Wargaming Club Nopat & Taktikka (Dice & Tactics). That's the welcome result of actively promotion of the game by arranging game nights with demos to new players, running a map based campaign and by monthly tournaments, always organized by the previous winners. Report of the first tournament I organized here .

Fellas; back row from left: Mika (TO) - Lannisters, Heikki - Baratheon, Esa - Boltons
Middle: Crazy dude with a sword: me - Nights Watch
Front from left: Pave - Free Folk, Jaakko - Starks - our newest player

Armies on Parade: Night’s Watch - UPDATED 06/2022

Taking the black

Nigth's Watch was my second army to SONG after Starks. After loosing many times with Starter Box Starks to Lannisters, it was nice to start with NW and WIN!

ASOIAF: War of the Kings Campaign - Battle two

My Targaryens face a Baratheon Battle line

Our campaign moved on to it's second round and I got my second round game the next night after the previous on, so I was feeling good about my Targaryens - having tabled another Baratheon army (by another player) in a practise game two weeks back...

 Our Deployment; Targaryens in a pincer formation and Baratheons in a tight battle line

Targaryens in Action - Battles in the War of Five Kings Campaign

First round of the campaign

So, we have 10 player ASOAIF Campaign running and playing my brand new Targaryen faction. So far I've played total of four games with them (Night's Watch, Baratheon, Starks, Baratheon) and I've won twice and been tabled twice! So it's a rollercoaster at the moment, but I think I'm getting the hang of it! Here you read about my first campaign game...

Battle of Oravais - Part 1.- blast from the past

First go with Black Powder 2nd Edition

Two brave volunteers joined in to give the 2nd edition a go.

See the pictures of the game in this blog post.

This is another un-finished battle report, that I'm now putting out, because why not. 

FIRST GAME OF SAGA 2 - blast from the past

And the 5th Game of our Limes Campaign 

Last Romans vs. Germanic People

Our club’s Saga players gathered again for another Saga Games Night, but this time it was a special: first go with Saga 2.0

Last Romans (me) faced Germanic People in 5th year game of our Limes Campaign (Rome currently leading 15-8 vs. Barbarians). Other games were Saracens vs. Normans (playing Crusaders) and Vikings vs. Scots. A full battle report on my game and conclusions on how we all felt about Saga 2.0 follows...

This post was created about a year ago, but was not finished. So here it is, not finished but eye candy anyway!

BOLT ACTION: New Guinea Campaign pictures

Battle in the Jungle

Couple years back (when this Campaign book was released) we played

couple of scenarios. Here are pictures. Enjoy!

ASOIAF Campaign started - War of Five Kings

Ten Warlords and Princes fighting for the Iron Throne!

ASOIAF has been rapidly growing at our Nopat & Taktiikka club in Helsinki and as I

love the game and campaign gaming, I decided to run a campaign! You can read more about it on a dedicated page here

This is the physical map from GoT Risk boardgame. I have that at home to view the situation.

We naturally have a digital version too, which is updated as campaign progresses.

SWL: Battle of Hoth, Episode 1.

Episode 1. The Approach

Taan-taan-taan-taan-tadaa-taan-tadaa (March of the Imperium)...

Since I ordered Hoth Rebel Miniatures from Alternative Gaming Miniatures, I had brooded the idea of organising a narrative SWL game about the Battle of Hoth. As FFG then also published more Hoth-models, there was no more delaying it and I started planning. What first was an idea of a mega battle to be played during a day, evolved into a three episode narrative ladder game, where each episode would have an impact to the next game. Read on to see what went down during episode 1.!

The Others - Fan made ASOIAF faction reviewed

Is Death too powerful?

So, I've been building (link to Project page) and painting an army for the fan made Others -faction for my current favourite game: Song of Ice and Fire - Tabletop Miniatures Game . I've now played 4 games with it and a talk on "On the Table" podcast & Chase is agreed. It's time to sum up a review of the faction and it's units. Read on!

Hobby Year 2019 in retrospect and prospects for 2020

Year of the Song and Fantasy

That's the only way to put it, really. When I think of 2019, it is really dictated by a new game, The Song of Ice and Fire Tabletop Miniatures Game. I played lots of other games too, but this was a clear number one on my agenda, on any metric. Read on to learn how my hobby year 2019 was!

Prima Artania Round 2.

The Meat Grinder

In my round 2. game of our map based 40K campaign I faced for the first time an army of Adeptus Mechanicus played by Martin. Scenario was ”Meat Grinder”,where attacker would win by destroying all defender units.

Destroyed units from attacker re-spawned.