Tag Archives: miniatures 6u73j

Tips and Tricks

Mini Monday #8: Expanding Your Toolbox 4vzm

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kitbashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week we’ll look at expanding your literal and figurative toolboxes, so that you can achieve more with your miniature projects. 6j122s

The Figurative Toolbox b5j31

As you tackle and complete more hobby projects, you’ll learn and practice skills, building your repertoire. The important thing is to keep challenging yourself and learn new things. Find better ways to paint or scratch build, find out what doesn’t work, and master useful skills. That will build your figurative toolbox, allowing you to achieve a much wider range of things with the hobby.

The Literal Toolbox 505l6d

This includes all the tools you use to work with miniatures, like paint, brushes, cutting boards, files, hobby knives, glues, and everything else you use to cut, shave, sand, or paint a miniature. Collecting these tools can prove expensive, but you can build your collection of tools up over time. This gives you a chance to learn how to use those tools before you become inundated with stuff.

When I got started, I bought a Citadel Colour Paint Set (which I still use), and an extra brush. I got some hobby knives for a birthday and an old emery board (nail file) from my mom. That was enough to get me started with cleaning and painting minis. Later I got more brushes and spray cans, which stepped things up a notch. I kept collecting tools and built up the collection I now have.

Here are some of the most essential tools you’ll need to get started:

Cutting Tools 351m2r

A variety of cutting tools is useful for tackling different jobs. Extra blades and a clean, tough cutting board is essential. Sharp blades make a big difference, and don’t forget to cut away from yourself.

Snip snip.

Filing Tools 605838

Different grits and types of sanding tools, like files and sandpaper, give you more control over how you finish a surface. You can glue sandpaper to a popsicle stick to make your own sanding sticks.

Painting Tools 6j274y

Paint, brushes, and a pot for water rounds out the collection. I recommend getting a starter set unless you have a very good idea of what you’ll be painting. Even though you might never use all the colors in the set, it’s good to have a wide range of colors to pick from. Don’t worry about getting an ultra-fine brush; go for two cheap, medium-sized brushes and build your collection from there.

My 20-Year-Old Paint Box

If you’re just starting out, then you’re in for a great journey. Take your time, enjoy it, and you’ll learn loads. It’s a very rewarding hobby.

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

Check out our blog, our Facebook page and on Twitter.



Tips and Tricks

MORE DAKKA — Mini Monday Ep 7 2t2o64

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kitbashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week we’ll scratch build and kitbash weapons for Warhammer 40,000 Orks. Because everyone needs MORE DAKKA!

I’m busy converting a bunch of old Warhammer Orcs into 40k Orks, and kitbashing two Deff Dreads. The hardest part has been making weapons, and here are a few lessons I’ve learned so far.

Ammo Belts 6jc10

You can make great ammo belts using cable ties. Cable ties come in so many sizes that you’re bound to find one that matches your model’s weapon.

The gun is from a Mech Warrior Clix figure.

 

Rocket Launchers 2w6p3z

Method 1: I used a cylinder of sprue to form the main body of the “launcha,” then added bits from other weapons to make it look more like a weapon. For mine, I used a handle from a Dark Eldar weapon and two disks from a Gundam kit on either end. I drilled into the ends to finish it off. Really, it all depends on what your bits box has to offer. You can see this “rokkit launcha” in the last image, below. He’s the second Ork from the left.

Method 2: I used the caps from small medicine vials, which I glued together onto plastic tubes. I added greeble from sprues and bits of bent plastic to make this monster-of-all-rokkit-launchas. They look great on my chibi-style Gundam Deff Dread, and when they’re painted will look like they’ve got rockets loaded and ready to go.

Lots of things that go “BOOM”

Here are my custom Ork Boys and Runtherd, which I hope will inspire your own army of green-skins.

More custom weapons.

I want to call out the Runtherd’s grot lash and grabba stikk. He’s the third from the left.

The grot lash was made with modeling epoxy clay, which I rolled thinly. I drilled a hole into the Runtherd’s hand, then glued it in. This guy’s not going under any bridges, but it gives him a dynamic look that the rest of da boyz are missing.

The grabba stick is a bit of wire attached to a plastic stopper from a nose spray. Yes, lots of medical waste here. Again, I drilled a hole into his hand to take the pole, then I finished it off with a bit of fine chain.

We Gotz MORE DAKKA! ic5e

Scratch building weapons can take a lot of playing around with bits of plastic until things fit, but the Orks — with their bashed-together aesthetic — are a very forgiving army to work on. Oversized weapons are never out of place in the Waaagh, and a wide range of weapon designs adds visual appeal to your forces.

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

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Mini Monday

Quick Terrain Projects — Mini Monday Ep 6 o3j1r

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kitbashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week we take on two quick terrain projects, which you can bang out in an evening.

The first project is a stalagmite, those naturally forming spikes of rock that you find at the bottom of caves.

For mine, I used paper clay, but any type of clay should work. I drilled a hole through it and threaded a bit of chain through the hole to create some visual interest. I dripped super glue down the chain, which keeps it stiff. To paint the stalagmite, paint with a dark gray then dry brush with a lighter gray on the raised edges. The chain is painted black and then painted with a metallic color. Done!

The road sign is a bit of chopstick and popsicle stick, shaped and stuck together with wood glue. I used paper clay for the base, and you need something that is heavy enough to keep the sign upright. I then painted it brown and edge-highlighted it with a tan brown. I didn’t paint a name onto the sign, because I wanted to be able to add names to photos with Photoshop, as I’ve done above.

Both of these projects are simple and quick enough that you could turn out several in an evening, and they’re great projects for beginners. Besides being cheap, you can get a lot of reuse out of each bit of scenery. My little stalagmite has appeared in every prison and dungeon I’ve run since making it, and fills an inch square nicely.

Is there anything you’d like to see me paint or build? Let me know in the comments below.

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

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Tips and Tricks

Mushroom Miniatures — Mini Monday, Ep 5 6l3e3u

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kitbashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week I’ll show you some easy mushroom miniatures to make with clay, to decorate the subterranean caverns of your RPG table.

badger, badger, badger, Mushroom, MUSHROOM!

Badgers love mushrooms, everyone loves mushrooms! On pizza or in the dungeon, mushrooms add a touch of class that’s hard to beat. These mushroom miniatures give your players something interesting to fight around, a refreshing change from the ubiquitous grey walls and stone tombs found below.

I made these mushrooms with air drying clay. I added gills underneath with a sharp tool, by drawing lines outwards from the stem.

When they were dry, I painted the stems with white mixed with a touch of green, which gives a sickly tint to them. The mushroom caps were painted purple, and I used two shades. Lastly, I varnished them with a matt varnish, and they were done.

I molded the mushrooms by hand, and there’s nothing inside them to give them more structure, but you could use toothpicks or wire as a core — a good idea for longer stems. If you’re making bigger mushrooms to take the weight of a miniature, then use a tightly pressed core of aluminum foil as the core. It’ll be lighter and will dry quicker than a hunk of solid clay.

I didn’t base them, so they’ll fit anywhere, but you could make up mushroom forests on a large base, or myconid figures or shrieking shroom markers on smaller bases. You can find rules for myconids in the Player’s Companion.

Rodney Sloan

Rising Phoenix Games

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Tips and Tricks

Set Sail in a Miniature Ship — Mini Monday, Ep 4 655f58

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kitbashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week we’ll build a miniature ship to go with your Ghosts of Saltmarsh campaign or Undersea Sourcebook inspired adventures.

“Yo ho ho, a pirate’s life for Smee!”

This little boat is very easy to make, looks great on the table, and is highly customizable. I’m planning to make a small armada for my undersea pirate campaign, which won’t take much time or break the bank with this technique.

“Arr, tis a ghost ship!”

Building the Ship 326ah

I used foam board, which I marked out to be an inch wide and 5 inches long. I then cut it and shaped the bow and stern.

For the gunwales, I used cardboard strips, which I glued to the sides of the foam board. The prow and rudder is made from balsa wood, and the tiller is a match stick. The deck was left plain, except for four struts, which are used to mark the squares off for models to stand on. The mast is a bamboo skewer, with thick yarn glued around the bottom of it.

I then undercoated the miniature ship in white, and painted the hull and prow a dark red. The rest was either painted dark brown to resemble wood, or light brown to resemble rope.

When the paint was dry, I rolled up a thin strip of linen and tied it to the mast. I then glued it in place and painted the yarn. To finish up, I painted the whole thing, including the sail, with matt varnish.

Full Stats Coming Soon 5t3h45

The wind runner, which this is a model of, will appear with full stats in our forthecoming Undersea Sourcebook: Feats & Equipment, which includes two new ships, two submersibles, and an airship.

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

Check out our blog, our Facebook page and on Twitter.


Tips and Tricks

Scratch Built Flying Sword — Mini Monday, Ep 3 2v4f2z

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kitbashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week I’ll show you a simple scratch building project for a flying sword.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Oh, never mind!

This was a simple scratch build, and there are plenty of ways to get similar results. I wanted a flying sword animated object for one of my NPCs, but the model can just as easily be used to mark a guardian of faith or spiritual weapon spell.

I took the scimitar off an old Warhammer orc, then drilled into the base of the blade to insert a pin, made from a paper clip. I then used modeling epoxy to craft the handle, then attached this to a small base. Done!

I undercoated with white, then painted black over the sword and pin. I then painted the base green and dry brushed the sword with metallic paint. I used brown with a leather brown color for highlights on the handle. I then flocked the base and varnished the whole thing with matt varnish. For the second varnish coat, I used gloss on the metallic parts and matt varnish everywhere else. And that was the painting done.

This was a quick project and the idea can be used for so much more, such as spell effects, other animated objects, floating orbs, and markers, such as a triggered blade trap.

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

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Tips and Tricks

Simple Drow Paint Tutorial — Mini Monday, Ep 2 i4zm

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kitbashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week I’ll show you a simple drow paint scheme to have you ready for your next drow encounter in no time.

This paint scheme is perfect for an Underdark campaign and doesn’t take much time at all. I used the drow duellist miniatures from the Dungeons & Dragons: The Legend of Drizzt Board Game (Boardgame Geek Link).

“This way!” “No! This way!”

Base Coat s3b4u

Base coat your drow miniatures with a medium to dark grey. I use this as the skin tone for my drow, since black is a very flat color that pulls in light. Your drow figures are going to be predominantly black, so the grey gives you some variation, and you can always darken it with a wash later.

Any Color as Long as its Black 71w52

Paint all the armor, weapons, bases, and gear black. Leave only the skin and hair grey. For variety, you could paint the armor and any cloth dark red or deep purple.



Hair 1c5051

Drybrush the hair white. This works very well with the grey basecoat, which defines the recesses.

Metals 4v2m4n

Pick out metallic parts by dry brushing with a metallic color. I used Mithril Silver from Citadel, which shows how old my paints are. Mithril Silver is a bright metallic, now called Runefang Steel. I painted the swords with the same metallic paint, but might have gone with a darker metallic color, like Leadbulcher, just for more variation.

Done, And… 4g2u6l

At this point, the simple drow paint job is done. They’re ready for gaming.

If you have time, you can go back into your simple drow paint scheme and pick out details like eyes, belt straps, wands, or markings. With white, you can highlight the hair, and use greys to highlight the skin. When you’re done, use a dark purple wash to bring out the detail, but leave the hair.

Painting Heroes and Villains g6rp

This tutorial works best for rank and file drow, but you can extend these principles for major NPCs and dark elf player characters. I use this technique as my first stage on all my drow figures, then work in more detail for the major minis.

Pro Tip: Us a purple base coat if you want your drow to look like the ones in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.

Till next time, play good games!

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

Check out our blog, our Facebook page and on Twitter.

Tips and Tricks

Miniature Japanese Torii – Mini Monday, Ep 1 194b3

It’s Mini Monday, where I share customizing, scratch building, kit bashing, and miniature painting projects for your roleplaying table. This week I’ll show you how to build a miniature Japanese torii gate for Steampunk Musha, Legend of the Five Rings, or similar East Asian inspired settings.

Here she is, folks. This miniature Japanese torii can easily accommodate most Large sized D&D or Pathfinder figures in the center.

The base is 2 x 4 inches: perfect for using on a grid map.

Steampunk Musha – Shangti Factory Hub 4o2h5b

This project is the first part of my Steampunk Musha terrain project that will consist of several factory pieces set in the mega city of Shangti. Since it’s steampunk, I figure this set will work well for both my Warhammer 40k games and for fantasy gaming, so this is a “two birds with one stone” type of deal.

The torii gate we’re making today is highly customizable, but is perfect for a Japanese themed game. You could use a similar technique to make gallows or other structures featuring a prominent wooden frame.


Getting Started 285f6l

You’ll need balsa wood for this, but popsicle sticks will work well too. A sharp hobby knife, wood glue, and sandpaper will do all the heavy lifting, then you can paint and varnish the gate as you see fit when it’s done. I used hardboard for the base.

Prep 2c6650

Make a paper template for the top piece of the gate (the kasagi and shimaki). Cut 3 of these. Cut 1 long crossbar (nuki), and 6 poles (to make the hashira). We’ll add more bits later, so keep any extra wood aside.

Torii Frame 675a20

Place 1 top section on top of 2 pillars. There’s no need to glue it yet, but you can if you like.

Glue the crossbar onto the pillars, with a small space between it and the top piece.

Connecting Things 5q6t4m

Score lines on 2 more pillars under the crossbar, like so:

Then cut along the scored lines.

Glue the longer sections of pillar below the crossbar. Glue the short sections of the pillar over the top section. This forms the very center of your Japanese torii gate.

Don’t worry too much if the glue is causing all the pieces to float around. When you’re done you can move everything nicely into place, and sanding will clean it all up when we’re done.

Bulking Up the Top 551q55

Score lines to match the location of the pillars onto the second top piece.

Glue the pieces of the second top piece onto the first top piece. In the end, this gives the model more strength and bulk.

Finishing Up your Miniature Japanese Torii 4z2q4m

Now glue on the last of the pillars and top piece. If your glue is still wet at this stage you can move things around, then put a heavy book on the gate and let it dry. 

Next, add a small down piece between the top and the crossbar. Then cut 2 identical pieces to form the very top section of the tori. These will look like slightly curved french fries.

When it’s dry, use your hobby knife to make everything flush along the edges, then sand the model. An emery board (used for fingernails) works very well for this.

There are 25 ninjas hidden in this image. Really!

I base coated my model white, then painted the whole thing red. I washed it with a purple wash to pick up the natural wood texture of the balsa wood, and to age the model a bit.

For the base, I used hardwood covered in two grades of sand, the finest for the path. I painted and dry brushed this before adding flock. I varnished everything when I was done, because I like harder wearing gaming pieces.

Pro Tip: Suppliers of Shinto religious goods will often have miniature Japanese torii for sale. Personally, I prefer to make my own.

Till next time, play good games!

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

Check out our blog, our Facebook page and on Twitter.

General

Tentacles of the Deep – An Undersea Monster 21l1r

What do Cthulhu, an octopus, and many politicians have in common? Tentacles! That’s right, tentacles!

As roleplayers, we kind of love tentacles, don’t we. Evard’s black tentacles, Day of the Tentacle, mind flayer chins, and the Japanese porn industry – tentacles have dipped their slimy appendages into every part of geek culture.

Today, I’ll share a new monster I’m working on that’s 100% tentacle, and tell you how you can in and playtest it at your table.

Tentacle Miniatures. Easy handmade monsters.

The above tentacles are based off the Watcher in the Water from The Lord of the Rings movie, and the miniature Games Workshop made of it. They were relatively cheap and easy to make, too.

In most cases, the adventurers are fighting against whole monsters, but what if you wanted to only pit them against a giant’s hand, or a dragon’s claw, or the tentacles of a creature hidden deep below the waves?

That’s where the tentacle of the deep comes in. First, I’ll talk about the miniatures, then I’ll show you where to go to find the stats.

Making Tentacles v3t11

I made my tentacles with wire and modeling clay. You could probably use Green Stuff, but anything that won’t go brittle when it cures is fine. For the water effects, I used clear silicone, then painted the tips of the waves white. Lukes APS has an excellent tutorial on water effects that’s well worth checking out for this kind of project, and his silicone idea worked a treat.

I painted the miniature dark green, and used a mixture of Citadel’s Bronzed Flesh and Goblin Green on the underside. Paint the base black, because it really adds depth once the silicone is added to the top. When I was all done I used a gloss varnish to give the tentacles a wet look.

We’ve published the stats for these tentacles, free, on the DMs Guild. Grab your copy here.

If you like the monster, let us know or drop a tip in the tip jar. If you’ve got creative , we’d love to hear from you too.

Black Friday with Rising Phoenix 4g2fy

This Black Friday we have a massive 50% Off Sale on Drive Thru RPG. This includes books compatible with Dungeons & Dragons and the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, as well as stand-alone games, map tiles, and all of our Solo Adventures.

Looking for some unique gaming gift ideas? Check out our Black Friday Buyer’s Guide.

Till next time, play good games!

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

Check out our blog, our Facebook page and on Twitter.

Tips and Tricks

Are You Painting Enough RPG Minis? 461d3w

There’s something great about playing with miniatures you’ve painted yourself. Even if you’re more a “theater of the mind” type GM, having a few miniatures on hand is useful. But are you painting enough of them?

Storytime folks (or a thinly veiled reminiscing, really).

My Life with Minis 4a431s

I got into Warhammer 40K about twenty years ago. That led me to Warhammer Fantasy Role-Playing, which was when I first bought a box of beastmen and a paint set. I painted up one of the beastmen and the chaos warrior that came with the paints, but most of my roleplaying was with grey plastic.

The first miniature I ever painted is a testament to suckage.

Over the next twenty years I bought odd miniatures to supplement my game: some hobbits, an elf, the nine companions from The Lord of the Rings, and some figures I found at second-hand stores. If I did paint any of them, they remained unfinished. Most are still grey metal or plastic.

My chaos warrior, the second mini I ever painted. This week I gave him a black wash and varnish. It really improved the old paint job.

Then came pre-painted, blind-box miniatures. I bought loads of the Dungeons & Dragons miniatures, and have nearly completed the War Drums set, with 9 rares left to go. Now I didn’t need to paint, I could just throw miniatures on the table.

Then a friend and I got into the Dungeons & Dragons Adventure Boardgames, and started painting up minis from the boxes. When I moved back home from living in Japan I discovered that my paint set, now two decades old, was still good, and kept going. Suddenly, the bug had bitten, and I was hooked.

Getting into the Mind for Minis 3vs6j

What changed? I figure it’s a mental switch that made the difference. Now, when I paint RPG miniatures, I have a few tenants I follow:

  1. Painted, even badly painted, is better than grey plastic.
  2. Simple paint jobs are perfect for gaming.
  3. Start it and finish it, then move on.
  4. Keep it cheap.
  5. Try new things, but not all things at once.

I reckon that most of us have mountains of unpainted minis because we get discouraged at some point. We know our minis won’t be Pinterest worthy, or that it’ll take too long to finish a figure, or we’re just not excited about what we’re painting anymore.

For me, having to fork out money for two pots of grey paint kept me from finishing my gargoyles. When I figured I could mix acrylic paints I had around the house there were no excuses left — and I was done in half an hour. It was a really silly thing, but I saw a roadblock and let it derail me.

This guy just needed an undercoat, two shades of grey, and a good flocking to get him ready for the gaming table.

Point 5 touches on something that can also discourage you, especially if you’re new to painting. It’s tempting to want to try every new technique you’ve learned, or to play it safe and only use techniques you’ve mastered. Trying a new thing every now and then lets you learn and explore, while keeping the process exciting. The flock on the gargoyle above was an experiment that I very nearly scrapped, but it worked in the end.

Get Motivated 686f4v

Other things motivated me to get painting RPG miniatures again too. I recently deep-dived into Warhammer Age of Sigmar, which I’ll talk about in another post, and I started watching some excellent YouTube channels.

Luke’s Affordable Paint Service (YouTube Channel) is excellent for terrain and scenery, and, like me, Luke loves finding a bargain. Luke also has a great contest on right now for his range of speed-basing materials.

Miniac (YouTube Channel) is an awesome painter, and like Luke has a great sense of humor. His level of detail is way above what I’m going for, but Scott does an awesome job of explaining the basics well. PAINT MORE MINIS!

Tabletop Minions (YouTube Channel) feels like chatting about the hobby with someone who knows the ins and outs of the hobby intimately. Atom Smasher, the channel’s presenter, has loads of great tips, presented as opinion pieces that are a joy to watch.

YouTube has plenty to offer for painting and miniature conversion besides these three, but they’re channels I keep coming back to.

The Rule of Three 4h4ew

Another thing that’s making my painting easier is that I work in sets of three. Three zombies, three wraiths, three whatevers. This lets my paint go further once it’s on the palette, and gives me a chance to try different things with each figure. For bigger miniatures, I’ll work on one at a time, but for short painting sessions, three figures usually get done in 30 minutes of painting, and I can let the others dry while I work on one. Three is also a good average when painting RPG miniatures for most encounters.

Two of three wights, done together. Skeletor, with the yellow face (right), came from me messing around. I’m very happy with these.

Paint More Minis! y5nc

In the words of Miniac, “Paint More Minis!” Keep it fun and free and you’ll work through that heap of plastic and metal in no time.

Some ghouls I painted for Part 3 of Doomsday Dawn. I painted six undead in my spare time, over a few weeks.

Till next time, play good games!

Rodney Sloan
Rising Phoenix Games

Check out our blog, our Facebook page and on Twitter.