My day started super-early at 5am. My wife and I got up and headed to the airport, picking up Sarah on the way. Once there, we checked in, had breakfast (oh and I had my fourth amendment rights violated-- being searched without probable cause issued by a judge on warrant specifically describing the items being searched for).
Our plane was about an hour late. We had some breakfast. I went to the bookstand and picked up a copy of the Economist. Since when did I become interested in that? I'm an old guy now apparently. I was in the crapper for round two when Tamie texted me saying we were boarding now, so that was a fun little vignette as I rushed out to make the plane.
We were seated in the very very back with babies in front and back of us. Oddly, that did not bother me hardly at all. After having four kids of my own I am more sympathetic. It was stifling hot on the descent, but who can complain about a 2.5 hour flight rather than a 22 hour drive.
The big changes to the vendor line-up are the addition of Coolminiornot and Forge World. I don't like Forge World to be here-- they suck up all the money, give no discount, and generally are not helpful. It doesn't affect us since we don't make money here, but I know it hurts other vendors. Coolmini's display is mind-numbingly cool with L8-9 work under the lights and amazing figures from all around the world in stock. It's drool city over there.
Sarah visited our room to watch Voyage of the Dawn Treader, but Tamie and I fell asleep so she headed out to her own room. We're going to try and finish that one today. I read and re-read the Chronicles of Narnia as a child and there's something really magic about seeing it on screen with such lavish effects.
As an added bonus, here Ron Paul makes some headway
Adepticon Day Zero
Ravens of the Void
I got to play a game today (no batrep sorry, just a summary) in which I fielded two Voidravens.
They are stupendous. With Flickerfield (5+ invulnerable) they have the survivability at least of an AV 12 vehicle (like a wave serpent). Night Shield is also a nasty trick which makes a shot or two fail.
But where the Voidraven is a terror (nevermind the two void lances, effectively two lascannons) are the four missile slots. I took Shatterfield missiles (48" S7 AP- assault large blast one shot) which re-roll to-wound rolls. A full salvo can kill off the better portion of a Seer council from just the number of hits. Against a horde I can only imagine.
All missiles are 48", Assault 1, one-shot and cost 10 pts (except implosion which are 40 pts each).
Monoscythe S6 AP5 large blast
Necrotoxin 2+ AP5 poison, pinning
Implosion AP 2 Pass Wounds test or instant death
The selling point here is that you can pack four missiles on, eight between two of them. Concentrated fire can see one unit of your choice simply vaporized. A salvo of implosion missiles will put the cramp on a lot of the uber-units floating around out there.
Side Notes
1) Blue Table is open for business Friday and Saturday. I am on TOP now which means that I am answering emails as they come in. We are ready whenever you are.
2) If you currently have a project, there may be some delays in assembly. I have already moved to solve this and we will be back on track in exactly eight days. I have extra hands on deck and all hands are being whipped extra hard. Sooo, if you have a deadline or you are getting antsy, please oh please let me know ahead of time.
3) The Creeping Death army will be up for sale as of Monday. $950 sight unseen if you pay me over the weekend. Otherwise probably right around $1250 with documentation (probably done on Tuesday).
4) I will have a total of three Dark Eldar armies coming on the block on Monday: Creeping Death, the Red ones and a third here
Silently Crawling
My voice completely went out a Valhalla last night. I think it will be good for me to listen for once.
I got the two-part batrep up last night. At the very end I express some of my thoughts on the Creeping Death list. I have to say in all I'm pleased. It doesn't take much finesse to play it, though against a skilled opponent, or someone who is prepared it might take some more thought. I mean other than rush forward like a giant meat-amoeba and consume all in your path.
I think it would be better to split the beastmaster unit into two smaller ones as the one large one was quite unwieldy. I am going to try that today. Also, didn't use the liquifier guns that much. Might be better on the Wracks to just drop them as the Wracks are a throwaway unit, or a screening unit typically.
Also, I found out Beastmaster units can't get pain tokens.
Did you know that Wracks have a Space Marine profile, except they are S3. But with Feel No Pain they have arguably the equivalent or close of power armor. They're tough to kill.
The Haemonculi are the wild card of the army, able to be equipped with all sorts of nasty wargear. I had a good time with Dark Gate, blowing up a Predator by surprise. But you won't always be able to get within 12".
This list does lack quite a bit in the anti-tank department and I am looking at cutting the Cronoses. I want to make some freakish meat and bone conversion for Voidravens, which I love. Or maybe using the Cronos models as Talos.
It's 1500 points for the round today.
Wall of Meat
Pic: Cronos conversion.
Ah. It's been too long. Got to play a game of 40K up at Valhalla, and see how the Creeping Death army worked out. It's 2000 pts and played just like it was supposed to-- tons of wounds with high defense moving inexorably like a blob of twisted flesh. Full Batrep forthcoming with my own comments a the end.
If you are a client (and I think all or most of my clients actually read this blog) then please check in with me about your project if you are curious about progress or status. If you are worried about anything, please let me know before it gnaws at you.
Creeping Death
This post to be updated later.
Here is the army I'm taking to Valhalla this round. I'm going to actually play some games. This is all painted up.
1x Urien Rakarth
3x Haemonculous
5x Beastmasters
12x Khymerae
3x Clawed Fiends
16x Grotesques
3x Cronos
40x Wracks
That's something like 2000 pts. Also got the Red Dark Eldar done and ready to go.
Voidraven or Razorwing
Now that we have done about six of these conversion, here is the price. Almost all of these are for sale by the way.
$80 unpainted
$120 painted
See more pics here
And here
Special for March 25-30:
3x Void Ravens OR Razorwings (any combination) for-
$210 unpainted
$315 painted
Child of the Galaxy
The other night I had a dream. I saw myself as a ten-year-old by, as I was after a summer in Alaska, toned by the wild and only a pair of cutoffs, sitting cross-legged on the outside wing of a starship. He is unafraid of the void or the heat of suns, the galaxy is his home, the place that he swims. Before him was a black hole, shrouded with contrails of blue light. He was anxious, for soon he would go through it, but excited for what was on the other side. And this was the music playing (Nature Boy).
Barometric Pressure
For those waiting for youtube updates you will need to be patient. It was a crazy Monday. Something is wrong. I can't quite place my finger on it. It was surreal. Tamie says that it is the change in the pressure for change in seasons. Is that a real thing.
I hope a good night's sleep will put the world to right again.
Valhalla is imminent, still not too late to attend. I plan on actually playing this time. I will be using the studio Dark Red Eldar as well as the Creeping Death Haemonculous army which is nearly painted.
Again apologies for the thin updates. I should be back in form tomorrow.
Three Days in the Rehabilitation Cube
So, what's going on in this little ant brain of mine?
First off, I've been watching Hyperdrive on Netflix. It's a british space comedy from 2007. Unbelievable that there's only two seasons. It's absolutely brilliant.
BTP is expanding. When a business expands you can either cash out or plow it under. I've been plowing it under which means long hours to get the new system all up and running. There's a time investment to getting the human part set up (ie training people). Plus we're moving to a new studio which in this case involves some money and time to get it prepared. The good news is that it's laying the foundation solidly for many years to come. The new studio is four times the square footage of the current one. As usual, always some risk involved. If we pull it off in the next six weeks it will mean a forward leap of about four years.
As usual my top business priority is tending to clients; setting up new projects and tending to current ones.
I'm back to working late. It's rough on the family and requires a lot of effort to keep both worlds humming. I'm getting home around 8pm. I'm absolutely wiped out by that time. I grab some dinner, head to the bedroom, put on Blues Clues and fall asleep with my sweet Willow in the crook of my arm. It's sort of our ritual.
I had a talk with Tamie on Saturday where I'll be going home at the normal time two pre-set days of the week.
So, that's why no Batreps. Just bear with me. We'll be back to equilibrium in May. I want to play a game of 40K so bad. And War Machine. Speaking of Warhammer Fantasy, the next studio army is likely to be jungle-themed Orcs what with the new plastics for Savage Orks. I've also thought of buying six of those spider kits to glob off the forest goblins and put them on foot for the goblin mobs. The army is likely to look something like this:
4x various heroes/shamans
60x Savage Orcs
60x Forest Goblins (with spider fillers!)
40x Spider Riders
20x Savage Orc Boar Boyz
2x Arachnarok Spiders
I think I just made that like 2500 pts. Good grief.
In other news, I am missing all 120x glade guard archers from the Rainforest Elves army. They are apparently just not in the studio anymore. I am sure they will turn up.
Quick prediction: by dominating the market GW is making itself a generic system and in the coming years, side companies will get stronger making non-system-specific models. There will be no way to clamp down on this through copyright law as people will just be using them in the privacy of their own homes. GW will try and regain control of formal play in order to get the "GW-models-only" mindset going again, but it will be too late. They will still do quite well for themselves, though. As these side companies grow, now producing comparable plastics (because let's be honest right now they are pretty sloppy), GW will crush them by lowering prices substantially for a short period of time to drive them out of business. However, none of this will matter as a second company will emerge (maybe more!) and capture the imagination of the fans. This will be possible because a foundation has already been laid-- a network of blogs, groups and tournament scenes. It's going to be a wild ride. I give it five years. Just a prediction-- just throwing it out there.
I've also been puttering around on Sundays making a card-based fast-playing fantasy RPG system. This will solve the problem with running an RPG at all: the time involved. With fourth edition D&D, which is a pretty fast system, it still takes like an hour to run a combat. I'm trying to get that down to like ten minutes, something we can play on a lunch break. I need to scratch that itch something fierce.
.
More to come.
Radio Silence
I will be incommunicado until 1:30pm on Friday. I am answering emails. I'm falling behind and I need to get back on top of the log.
Inquiries and new projects welcome as usual. We're ready whenever you are.
I just got new pricing up for Orcs and Goblins (the new models included). I'm ready to set up whenever you are.
I am currently doing a lot on Facebook. For the time being I am slowing on blog posts, well that's at least what's likely to happen. Temporarily.
Note: I will not friend people with no picture, no comment/explanation in the friend request or only very few friends. Sounds sad, I know.
Valhalla is March 24-27.
Adepticon is March 31 to April 3.
So, we are quite busy until early April. Don't let that slow the inquiries though as I am working super-hard to keep up on that and we certainly need the funds.
Making a FW order soon
Want to commission something from Forge World? I am making an order soon, you will pay no shipping (from FW to studio). Want a quote? Send to my email bluetablepainting@gmail.com
Complete Works of Francis Bacon
With a name like Bacon it's got to be good!
I've been doing a lot on Facebook these days. Be my friend!
I think it's kind of lame that I'm losing on SEO to these asian companies.
Today was pretty shabby; one complaint, one stress and one crisis after another. A few rays of sunshine: a really good client dropped by and I also got to just sit and chat with Sarah for like an hour near the end of the workday, feet kicked up. We've been so busy with various projects that it's been rush-rush from one thing to the next.
At the studio I am caught up, at least mostly. We have everything cranked up white hot. I still have a mountain of Dark Eldar stuff that we didn't end up needing for Valhalla. Still a few slots open for that if you can make it up next Thursday.
So, sorry for the lack of content, we are looking good for Wednesday, though.
Ready to Ride
Just got in the studio.
I am now updating Facebook and using that as a base of operations.
I'm ready to set up orders, answer questions.
Got Skype going, too. ID = bluetablepainting Even got a webcam up.
I am currently "on top" which means that I am answering emails etc. as they come up. Took me all week!
Grey Knights are Back
As the bulk of humanity now knows the Grey Knights are coming out. They will be available in just a few weeks (pretty sure I will have them in hand by Friday April 8 or possibly the week before that). Time to set up your Grey Knights army.
BTP has the price sheet already out. Contact Shawn at bluetablepainting@gmail.com with any questions.
First three people who set up their army get the following Strike Force special (must ask for it by name!): we will have your army done by April 28 or you get $100 gift certificate.
UPDATE: one is taken, two left.
Cookies by Cookie
Just got this in my inbox.
Good Afternoon,
Just a quick email to announce our Cookie of the Month Club. This is could be great for yourself or some of your best clients as it offers a membership for 12, 6 or 3 months!
Here are a few options we offer;
3 month trial membership - $64.95
6 month membership - $129.90
12 month membership - $259.80
Each membership provides you or your client with a dozen cookies of a new flavor each month, our newsletter telling a little about the cookie and how it came about. The cookies come in the beautiful gold scroll window box with a satin red ribbon. Shipping is included in each membership, so you have the extra bonus of no hidden costs.
This months cookie is The Nutty Hawaiian! This fabulous cookie is an amazing blend of pineapple, mandarin oranges, cinnamon, banana, macadamia nuts and coconut.
Let me know which membership fits your desire and we will be happy to accommodate your needs to the best of our ability. We will be happy to include some of your business cards or broshures in the each package if you would like.
We had hoped to have our credit card accepting capabilities up and running full swing however it is taking a little longer than we had anticipated so we would appreciate a check mailed directly to the address below. If you have any questions please feel free to contact me directly via email or phone.
Warmest Regards,
Jenna Cook
Director of Sales and Marketing
Cookies By Cookie
131 Salt Lick Rd.
Front Royal, Va. 22630
(703) 434 - 9206
CookiesByCookieOnline.com
cookiesbycookie@hotmail.com
Airport for Valhalla
Airport for Valhalla is Salt Lake City (SLC).
In most cases we can pick you up if you want it.
Shawn
