The Walking Dead Chris - Leader of the Hunters

Last month I bought a limited edition boxed set of Chris the Hunter for Mantic Games' The Walking Dead game. Normally only available at gaming conventions he was offered for general sale for a very short time. Mantic Games have offered limited edition figures for a short period in the past and for the most part I've ignored them. But this one really grabbed my attention so I placed an order for this set.

The set contains a hard plastic figure of Chris along with two resin cast supply tokens. The Hunters were a group of human survivors who practised cannibalism. They appeared in volume 11 Fear the Hunters (issues 61-66) of the comics.

In this volume, Rick and company continue their journey to Washington and begin to suspect they are being stalked by someone in the woods. They meet a pastor and join him at his church. Dale is kidnapped from the church during the night by a band of cannibals. Dale is reunited with his friends before he dies. Rick's group, enraged, hunt down the cannibals and torture them to death.

The figure of Chris is up to the usual high standards of this range. What really impressed me from this set were the two supply tokens - a grisly collection of body parts and butcher's tools along with a weapons and ammo cache. Both of these are excellent additions to the range. I admit I was very happy that I bought this set. It cost me £14.95, roughly £5 per figure. Note that this set is no longer available on the Mantic Games' webstore.

MC1 Assorted Perps 01

I am currently working on preparations for the start of my new Judge Dredd campaign, using the Judge Dredd and the Worlds of 2000 AD RPG rules by EN Publishing. I already have most of the figures I need for the start of my campaign but I'm working on adding more. A lot of my time has been taken up in creating character record sheets for my Judges, citizens and perps. In a Judge Dredd campaign, if you're playing Judges (which I'll be doing) you'll need a constant supply of perps. So in this post I present four new perps. None of them are named yet but that'll change soon.

At the far left is a tough-looking female armed with a pair of Spit Pistols. Her left arm has been replaced with a cybernetic arm, no doubt because of a serious injury. I see her as a gang leader or high ranking perp. The figure was produced by Warlord Games as a limited edition figure, along with a Judge armed with a Lawrod who were only available if you bought the Judge Dredd Miniatures Game rulebook and its supplement, Blood on the Streets. I already had both books and did not want to fork out for extra copies just to get two rare figures. However, I later found both figures for sale without the rulebooks on eBay and luckily the seller had a "buy now" option. I think I paid about £10 for the pair, which I considered a bargain.

The next two figures are a pair of Juve twin sisters, both wearing respirators and armed with a Spit Pistol each. These cost me absolutely nothing! My brother printed them out for me on his 3D printer after he downloaded them for free from the Thingyverse website. They are not perfect by any means and whilst on the small side do remember you can scale 3D prints up or down. At this size, they fit in perfectly as Juves. The one at the left is the original sculpt, whilst the one on the right has had her right arm cut off and repositioned by me. I like them.
Finally is a mutant Punk or Wrecker armed with a big hammer. He is in fact an Orc Coach from Mantic Games Dreadball game, available here http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/mantic-points/dreadball/product/15-mantic-points-coach-orcy.html I decided to paint him as a human mutant, hence his flesh skin tones and make his pointed ears and large teeth his mutation.
You can never have too many Perps when playing Judge Dredd and these are all useful additions to my collection.

Here's Negan Survivors

I present here the five survivor figures plus Negan from the Here's Negan board-game by Mantic Games. This stand-alone supplement from The Walking Dead franchise concentrates on the vicious Negan and five of his followers clearing out a large warehouse to make it safe for Negan to use as a headquarters. Although the survivors are working co-operatively, each one is hoping to impress Negan enough to earn the title, Top Dog. This is measured in Reputation levels, which can go up or down during the course of a game. The game can be played by 1-5 players. Negan and the Zombies are controlled by cards and the game's Artificial Intelligence. Making sure that Negan does not suffer from Rage will help to ensure victory. An enraged Negan can be more of a threat than the zombies.

At the far left is Negan, the brutal, foul-mouthed leader of this group. I was pleased to see a new sculpt of him. He is armed with "Lucille" his baseball bat, a sniper's rifle, a pistol and a knife. Next in line is Dwight, who is armed with a dagger and a crossbow. He is good at running. If a character runs they must roll to see if they make noise. Dwight can re-roll the noise dice. Also, his base move is 4 instead of 3. Third in line is John, the bruiser. He is really good at melee combat and can kill zombies even if he doesn't score a head shot - he just has to roll double or more than the zombie's defence roll. He is armed with a tyre iron, which allows him to automatically open locked doors.

The three females are made up from left to right of Tara, Laura and Sherry. Tara can not use ranged weapons but is very good at melee. She has the best defence dice and if her defence roll is more than twice a zombie's attack roll, she can make a free attack against that zombie. She is armed with a dagger. Laura is ranged combat expert. She is armed with an assault rifle and a dagger. Her special ability is that she can perform the same action twice in a turn. This is very useful as the default rule is that characters must perform two different actions when they activate. Finally, is Laura, who is armed with a pistol and a dagger. Stat-wise, she is the weakest but she does have a very useful ability - she can give up one of her actions to give another character an extra action, which does not affect their activation.
I have started to play the twelve scenarios that make up the campaign and I'm using all five survivors plus Negan. They are a good mix of characters who, so far, are working well together. The rules are similar to those used in The Walking Dead games but are not identical. Here's Negan is very much its own game and I have to say, it is a great deal of fun. I ordered the game shortly before it went on general release and as a bonus I received extra stat cards to use the five survivors in The Walking Dead games, which was something that pleased me immensely. The figures are all beautifully sculpted, very crisply detailed and an absolute joy to paint.

The Walking Dead Corpses

When I placed my last order with Mantic Games for the Here's Negan board-game, I also ordered a set of The Walking Dead Corpses. This set comprises of six figures - 4 zombie corpses, 1 human corpse and a dying human. All are sculpted on 25mm diameter bases and are made of resin. The detail on them is very good.

At the back is the kneeling human. I painted him with his eyes closed. He would make a good hostage. To his left is the dead human. She hasn't turned yet and bears no obvious wounds. I painted her with a very pale flesh for her skin to show she is still human. The four zombies at the bottom of the photo are very obviously undead. They all have multiple wounds and their faces look very gaunt and emaciated. All of the figures have been cleverly sculpted to fit on their bases with their legs bent.
This is not an essential purchase as they serve no purpose in the game. However, for me, in any zombie apocalypse game, corpses are an essential part of the scenery. Like zombies, you can never have too many corpses, in my opinion. This set costs £14.99 from the Mantic Games webstore, so they're not cheap by any means. Although sold as a The Walking Dead accessory set, they could be used in any zombie apocalypse game.

Mantic Games The Walking Dead Scenery Items 01

Even though the Zomtober and Zomvember challenges are over, I'm still painting stuff from The Walking Dead game by Mantic Games. Having painted all of the wave 1 figures I next turned my attention to the scenery items that are supplied with the boxed starter set. In it you get 3D models of barricades, objective pieces and vehicles to replace the card counters that also come in the set. I have painted all of the barricades and objective tokens and I'll be showing them here. I've yet to start painting the four vehicles but they are high up on my "to do" list.

You get six barricades with two of each design. The front of the barricades are shown to the left of Deputy Sheriff Rick Grimes, whom I have included for scale purposes. This barricade is made up of  a wooden wall supported by five wooden crates.

The next barricade is made up of four sheets of metal panels resting against piles of breeze bricks and tyres.

The third type of barricade is made of two metal fences resting against wooden planks and a couple of traffic cones.

This photo above shows the various objective items. There are five basic designs of which you get two of each of them - wooden crates, metal cans, suitcases and backpacks. In addition, is one special objective - the bag of guns that Rick grabs from his old police station. This is used in a couple of scenarios as the main objective that must be found.
Although designed specifically for The Walking Dead, they are all generic enough to be used in any contemporary or near future games. They are very useful items and far better than the card counters they are meant to replace.

Zomvember 2018 part 4 - Zombies

This is my final post for my Zomvember challenge and I'm showcasing the last 8 zombies from the wave 1 releases of The Walking Dead skirmish game by Mantic Games.

These four zombies are to be found in the Prelude to Woodbury Solo Starter Set and are all unique sculpts. The female at the far left appears to have been a corporate suit from her attire. She has been bitten in the neck and her right leg is broken. There is a splinter of bone protruding from the wound in her leg.
The male next to her is dressed in casual clothing and has suffered numerous bites all over his body and limbs.

The female in the ochre top has suffered a massive wound to the centre of her torso as well as bites to her legs.
Finally, is a topless male who is feasting on a someone's intestines, which he holds in both hands. I do like to see feasting zombies but they are very rare.

The female at the far left also came from the Prelude to Woodbury Solo Starter Set. Her lower jaw has been removed so that is going to make it impossible for her to bite a victim. However, she can still make claw attacks with her hands.
The female in the pale blue night dress is the zombie figure you get with the Morgan Booster Set. She has been bitten in her neck.

The male zombie wearing the jeans and white vest is from the Rick on Horse Booster Set. He has suffered numerous cuts and bites.
Last of all is a swap of the zombie crawler from the starter boxed set. I repositioned his left arm and gave him black hair to make him look slightly different to the original figure who had brown hair. His wounds are truly horrific and disgusting.
Once again, these were an absolute pleasure to paint. I haven't played many games of The Walking Dead seeing as I don't really like playing with unpainted figures, but now that I have all of the wave 1 figures painted I can see me playing this game more often. I would like to play all of the campaign scenarios in chronological order. Whether I chronicle them on my blog remains to be seen.

Zomvember 2018 part 3 - Zombies

These 8 zombie figures were part of the Kickstarter boxed set for the wave 1 releases of The Walking Dead game by Mantic Games. Although they did not appear in the top tray of figures that I painted for the Zomtober challenge, they were included in the bottom tray, which also included all the cards and scenery items. Six of them are duplicates of zombies in the top tray and two are unique sculpts.

These four zombies are all duplicates but I have given them different paint jobs and some of them have been converted. The zombie wearing the baseball cap at the far left simply had a different paint job done to him as I painted his clothes in faded denims. He has lost his left arm and his lower torso has been ripped open, so his internal organs are spilling out.
For the female next to him I repositioned her arms by bending them at the elbows by holding her over the flame of a candle for a few seconds to soften the plastic. Once I'd repositioned the arms I dunked her in a glass of cold water to harden the plastic again. Then I painted her in a different colour scheme to the first figure of her. She has had half of her face bitten off.

For the female in the black miniskirt, I took my inspiration for her colour scheme from Clint, when he painted her for his Zomtober challenge. See here - http://clint-anythingbutaone.blogspot.com/2018/10/zombtober-04-18.html
Many thanks, Clint! She has numerous cuts and bites and has lost her right arm.
I cut the left arm of the zombie female at the far right off at the elbow then gave her a new colour scheme. This was a very simple conversion.

For the zombie at the far left, I modelled a gaping hole in his stomach and added the intestines spilling out from thin sausages of Milliput. Once painted it looks very effective and is a really simple conversion to do.
The zombie next to him was also converted. I simply cut his left hand off with a scalpel. Cutting limbs off zombies is the easiest way to convert them. His gaping stomach wound with spilling intestines was a part of the original figure.

Finally, we come to the two non-duplicate figures and they're both females. For the one second from the right, I painted her in a pastel green hospital gown. Note the bandage around her left hand. I reckon she must have been killed whilst in hospital and then reanimated. Her left cheek has been bitten off.
Last up is a zombie lurching forward rather awkwardly. Her face is very emaciated, suggesting she's been dead for quite some time. She has a couple of bullet wounds in her back but no exit wounds in her chest, so they were probably low calibre bullets that hit her.
I really had a lot of fun painting these and I have another eight zombies to show in my next post.

Zomvember 2018 part 2 - The Walking Dead Survivors

Here are the last Survivor figures from the wave 1 of the releases for The Walking Dead skirmish game by Mantic Games. These are all named characters from the comic series and the TV series.

First up is Deputy Sheriff Rick Grimes on horseback. He found and used this horse to ride into Atlanta. On his back is a bag full of guns that he grabbed from his former police station. The ride into Atlanta went well but the return journey did not go so well and he lost the horse to a horde of zombies. It is an unusual figure that is of limited use but it is superbly sculpted.
Next up is Morgan Jones, who was the first human that Rick encountered after he woke up from his coma. Morgan is a good man but is haunted by the death of his wife, who returned to his home as a zombie. He helps Rick by explaining the zombie apocalypse that began when Rick was still in a coma but does not go with him to the survivor camp, preferring to stay at home with his son. He is armed with an axe and a rifle.

The figure of the boy is Duane Jones, the son of Morgan. When he first sees Rick, he wrongly assumes he is a zombie and he whacks Rick in the back of his head with his shovel, knocking Rick out. Sadly, Duane later gets attacked and killed by zombies. Morgan finds him and brings him back home and chains him up. He feeds him by shooting passing survivors.
Finally, is Brian Blake aka The Governor, leader of a group of survivors who reside in the ravaged town of Woodbury, Georgia. The Governor is charming and charismatic, but also murderous, violent, sociopathic, power-hungry, completely sadistic, and horrifically ruthless. He sees himself as the community's only hope for survival, and is thus willing to imprison, abuse and/or kill anyone he sees as a threat to his authority; for him, torture and mass murder are a means to an end. The figure of him portrays him before he meets with Rick's group. That first meeting does not go well for either side.
The figure of Rick on horseback can be found in the Rick on Horse booster pack, which also contains one zombie. Morgan and Duane appear in the Morgan booster, which also contains one zombie. Brian Blake appears in the Prelude to Woodbury Solo Starter Set, which is a stand alone supplement that contains figures of Brian, and five zombies, as well as rulebook, cards, counters and dice.

Zomvember 2018 part 1 - The Walking Dead Exclusive Figures

Yes, I know that Zomvember is not an actual thing, but seeing as I enjoyed the Zomtober challenge so much, I'm carrying on painting my wave 1 The Walking Dead figures by Mantic Games. I have another 20 figures that were produced for wave 1 of the game on my painting table right now and they should be finished soon. For this post I'm showcasing the four exclusive figures that were stretch goals for those who bought the starter boxed set from Kickstarter.

At the far left is Michonne, wielding her katana. She is a fan favourite in both the comic and TV series, and I love her. A former defence lawyer, she is introduced as a mysterious stranger towing two armless and jawless zombies behind her (they were her ex-boyfriend and his best friend). She joins the group of survivors led by Rick Grimes and quickly proves to be a valuable asset. She is truly remarkable at killing zombies with her katana.
Next up is Abraham Ford. In both mediums Abraham travelled the country with his girlfriend Rosita Espinosa to escort Dr. Eugene Porter to Washington, D.C. where the supposed cure for the outbreak is located, eventually recruiting Rick Grime's group to accompany them. Though tough, and a skilled shooter, Abraham displays aggressive outbursts and has volatile tendencies towards the other group members, but over time he gains a strong sense of respect for Rick and becomes one of his right-hand men. He is also displayed as being emotionally broken from the pain he endured due to his family being killed by zombies. His figure is armed with an AK47 assault rifle and he rests his left foot on the corpse of a zombie crawler.

Bad guy Negan is the leader of a group of roughly 1,000 survivors in the Sanctuary, called the Saviours, a group that oppresses other survivor communities and forces them to pay tribute to him. He is known for his brutality and foul mouth. His favoured weapon is a baseball bat with barbed wire wrapped around it. He calls it Lucille, the name of his dead wife. His figure is armed with his trusty baseball bat, a knife and three hand grenades.
Finally, is Walker Ronnie. I admit I have no idea who Ronnie is. I don't recall seeing him in any of the comics or the TV series. Still, he's not a bad figure, and he has been shot in the chest and his right leg appears to be broken, given how he is dragging his foot behind him.
These figures are currently available on the Mantic Games webstore as part of their Mantic Points offers. You can get Walker Ronnie for 10 Mantic points and the other three cost 15 Mantic Points each.

Vampifans Views 112 - Monthly Musings 82

Halloween greetings to you all. I start with yet another beautiful Vampirella painting by the talented Sanjulian, whom I've been featuring all of this year. It is unusual to see Vampi wearing robes but I do like her look.

So what have I been up to this past month? For the first time ever I entered the Zomtober challenge and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Initially, I decided to paint the 38 figures from the top layer of the Mantic Games Kickstarter wave 1 boxed set of The Walking Dead. Having completed that task in just three weeks I then decided to carry on and finish painting all of the figures from wave 1, which included 8 more zombie figures in the above boxed set, booster packs featuring, Rick on horseback, Morgan and his son Duane, more zombies and the 6 figures from the Prelude to Woodbury starter set, which consisted of Brian "The Governor" Blake and 5 more zombies. I know I should be calling the zombies, "walkers" when referring to The Walking Dead but I much prefer to call them zombies. So far, I have shown 34 of the 38 figures I've finished painting so far. The remaining four will be featured in my next post, followed by all the rest of the wave 1 figures. Zomtober morphs into Zomvember! I'm having so much fun painting these figures that I want to carry on. I have all of the wave 2, 3, 4 and 5 figures and I have pre-ordered the Here's Negan stand alone boxed game, which goes on sale on 19th of November. Just to prove that I have painted all of the figures from the top layer of the Kickstarter wave 1 boxed set, here's a photo of them all. Impressive, huh?

In other news, the Judge Dredd and the Worlds of 2000AD Kickstarter came to a close a few days ago and was phenomenally successful. 2,004 backers pledged £148,802 of the £7,500 needed to fund it. Within a few hours of the project closing I had received PDF copies of the rulebook, The Robot Wars supplement, the Games Master's screen and the counter tokens to use in place of miniature figures. Physical copies of these products are due to be shipped in January 2019, which isn't too long to wait. I'll do a full review of them after I receive them. I must admit that after browsing through the PDFs I am extremely impressed by the high quality and production values of these items. I have read the character generation rules for creating Judges and I have just finished designing my own character record sheet to use for the many Judges, Perps and Citizens I'll be creating. This was based on my own designs for my N.E.W. and N.O.W. character record sheets with just a bit of tweaking. I am in the process of transferring the stats of the four pre-generated Judges found at the back of the rulebook to my CRS's. Then I'll start work on creating my own Judge characters to use in the campaign that I'll start playing early next year.
EN Publishing have announced plans for some of the next products that will be appearing from this range next year. These include two supplements for Judge Dredd - Luna-1 and The Cursed Earth. Rogue Trooper and Strontium Dogs will be the next two rulebooks but note that these will only cover the characters, careers, equipment and settings for these stories. For the basic gameplay rules you will need the Judge Dredd and the Worlds of 2000AD rulebook. Morrus, the head honcho of EN Publishing, has announced that he already has a full manuscript for one more product and is half way through another, both of which should be released in 2019, so exciting times!
Comparing this version of the Judge Dredd role-playing game to others from the past I can definitely say that it beats all others hands down. It is just a brilliant product and I am mega excited about getting back to playing Judge Dredd again.

For my WOIN blog, I have been busy painting more sci-fi figures and I have increased my cast of St. Trinian's staff and schoolgirls. I am still working on creating Character Record Sheets for them all - there are about 40 in total, so it's a big cast and each one is unique. I have also been painting scenery items and furniture to use in my next The Ace of Spades Campaign scenario and my first St. Trinian's Campaign scenario, which will be my first game using the N.O.W. rules.

It's Halloween night tonight and I love Halloween. I'm stocked up on treats for the kids and I'm looking forward to seeing their costumes. Last year I had 15 trick or treaters and they all put a lot of effort into their costumes. I'm hoping this year will be just as good. Happy Halloween everyone.

The trick or treater I most want to meet tonight! It looks like she's trying to smuggle a couple of pumpkins out under her dress!

Zomtober 2018 part 5 - The Walking Dead Survivors

Here are another seven assorted survivors and gangers from the wave 1 boxed set of The Walking Dead skirmish game by Mantic Games. As usual, these are hard plastic 32mm scale figures.

 I start off with the Harrison sisters, Amy and Andrea at the far left. These were part of the group of Atlanta survivors that Lori and Carl Grimes joined when the zombie apocalypse kicked off. Amy, who is unarmed, did not survive long as she got bitten by a zombie that was part of a horde that attacked their camp. Andrea had to kill her once Amy reanimated as a zombie.
Andrea then went on to be a superb sniper and was one of the longest lasting survivors in the comic series. Inexplicably, she was killed off at the end of series 3 of the TV series, a decision that rankled a lot of fans, including me. This pose of Andrea has her firing a 9mm pistol, which she sensibly holds in a two-handed grip. I should mention that Andrea is my favourite character in the comic series.

Two more of the Atlanta group of survivors are Carol Peletier and her daughter, Sophia. In the comic series, Carol becomes increasingly unstable and eventually commits suicide. However, in the TV series, she becomes a hardened survivor and to date, she is still going strong. She is shown here armed with a knife.
As for Sophia, she would appear to have victim written all over her. She becomes close friends with Rick's son, Carl, and in the comic series, when Carol dies, she is looked after by Maggie and Glenn. She is the longest surviving female member of the comic series. In the TV series, Sophia gets separated from the rest of the group in series 2 and is killed by a wandering zombie. Note that Mantic's game is based on the comic series, not the TV series, so the events portrayed within them should be regarded as canon.

Moving on, at the far left is Deputy Sheriff Shane Walsh, who was the partner of Rick Grimes, before Rick was shot and hospitalised. Believing Rick to be dead, Shane and Lori begin a romantic relationship, resulting in Lori becoming pregnant. When Rick showed up, there was much friction between the two cops and when Shane attempted to murder Rick it was Rick who prevailed and he killed the psychotic Shane. The figure of Shane is armed with a 9mm pistol.

Finally are a pair of gangers who are part of the crew led by Derek, whom I showed in a previous post. Mantic Games have called them Craig and Reggie respectively, but I added their surnames. Craig Gehring is a thug armed with a knife, not the best weapon to use when fighting zombies but better than nothing.
Reggie Sobel is much better armed, carrying a pump-action shotgun, making him, by far, the most dangerous member of Derek's gang.

Zomtober 2018 part 4 - The Walking Dead Zombies

Here are another eight 32mm scale zombie figures from the wave 1 boxed starter set of The Walking Dead by Mantic Games that I painted up for the Zomtober 2018 challenge.

First up is the zombie crawler that Rick Grimes encountered in episode #1 of series #1 of the TV series. This zombie has been ripped in half and has lost the flesh from the left half of his body.
Next in line is the zombie version of Deputy Sheriff Shane Walsh, the former partner of Rick Grimes. The two had a major falling out which resulted in Rick killing Shane by stabbing him in the stomach. When Shane came back to life as a zombie, Carl Grimes shot him in the head, finally laying him to rest. Shane was a major arsehole and deserved to die.

The third zombie in line closely resembles Reggie, one of the gangers from Atlanta. I don't know if this was intentional or not by Mantic Games, but I painted him in the same colour scheme as Reggie, whom I'll show in my next post. Zombie Reggie has a massive stomach wound from which his intestines are spilling out.
Last in line is a female zombie who has fed recently as her hands and chin are coated in fresh blood. Tamiya Clear Red is the perfect paint for fresh blood.

At the far left of this next group is a former business woman wearing a two-piece suit and shirt. She has suffered numerous cuts and bullet wounds.
The guy standing next to her has long dreadlocks, so I painted his skin tones darker to suggest he was from Jamaica, where Rastafarianism is popular. I didn't want him to have a plain coloured T-shirt, so I painted the Smiley face on it, which I copied from a photo I'd seen. His left arm has been torn off and his right foot is only just attached to his leg by a few slivers of flesh and muscle.

The male zombie, second from the right has been shot in the right side of his chest and the bullet has left a huge exit wound in the centre of his back.
Finally is an elderly gentleman who has been shot repeatedly in the body and legs.
I had so much fun painting these and I'm pleased to announce that I completed my mission to paint all of the figures from the top tray of the starter boxed set of The Walking Dead. That's 38 figures painted in just over three weeks! I'm very pleased with that result. I'll show the rest of the figures in my next few posts.

Zomtober 2018 part 3 - The Grimes Family

For week 3 of the Zomtober 2018 challenge I present the heroes of The Walking Dead stories in both the comics and the TV series - the Grimes family. Here are three more 32mm scale survivor figures from The Walking Dead skirmish game wave 1 starter boxed set, produced by Mantic Games.

At the far left is Rick Grimes, a deputy sheriff who, at the start of the story, is shot whilst attempting to arrest a fleeing criminal. He wakes up from a coma to find a world very different to what he remembered. The zombie apocalypse has begun and nothing will ever be the same again. He seeks out his wife and son and finds them with a group  of other survivors on the outskirts of Atlanta, Georgia. His figure is armed with a hand axe and a police issue 9mm pistol. He can be used as either a Marksman or a Tactician in the game and he is the leader of any group he is in.

In the centre of the group is Rick's wife, Lori, who was forced to flee when the zombie outbreak began, believing her husband to be lost or dead. Lori is not armed and is classed as a Support member of any group she is in.
At the far right is Rick and Lori's son, Carl. Although his figure is shown armed with a 9mm pistol, he is also classed as a Support member of his group.
As the story progressed new figures for Rick, Lori and Carl were introduced but these are the three figures starting players of the game will use the most, especially Rick. As with all of this range, they are superbly well sculpted, full of detail and an absolute joy to paint.

Zomtober 2018 part 2 - The Walking Dead Survivors

In the Zomtober challenge you must paint at least one zombie or survivor figure per week. I have already shown eight zombies in my first post. Now I turn my attention to the survivors. These figures are all from the wave 1 boxed set of The Walking Dead skirmish game by Mantic Games. There are two very different groups here. First up are four of the Atlanta survivors who Rick Grimes teams up with when he goes searching for his wife and son. The second group are a gang of miscreants who are opposed to them. Most of these are only known by their first names in the comics and game but I have given all of them full names for use in my own games.

First up at the far left is Allen Lomax, who is a bruiser. His figure is armed with a bolt-action rifle.
Dale Horvath is the lookout and marksman of the Atlanta group. He is armed with a sniper rifle with fitted scope-sight.

Second from the right is Donna Bell, an unarmed support member of the group.
Finally, is Jim Rothenburg, another support member and a mechanic. He is armed with a 9mm pistol.

Leader of the gangers is Derek Prescott, who is classed as a tactician and a heartless mercenary. This brutal skinhead is armed with a 9mm pistol.
Next in line is Patrick Singleton, a bruiser armed with a baseball bat.

The weak link of the gang is Liam White, who is an unarmed support member.
Last of all is Sandra Vega, who is the gang's runner and she is armed with a knife.
These hard plastic figures are incredibly well sculpted, full of character and an absolute joy to paint. By the way, this weekend is the 15th anniversary of the launch of The Walking Dead comic, and to mark the occasion, Mantic Games have a 15% discount offer on all of their The Walking Dead products. I made use of it by placing an order for the Greene family farm scenery set and the prone bodies set. The barn, fences and hay bales that come with the farm set will also work well for my Wild West games and dead bodies are always useful.

Zomtober 2018 part 1 - The Walking Dead Zombies

This post is a bit late but that's only to be expected when I'm painting two batches of 20 figures this month for the annual Zomtober challenge. I've just finished painting the first batch and am about to start the second, so I'm way ahead of schedule. I am working on getting all of the figures completed from the Kickstarter wave 1 box of Mantic Games' The Walking Dead skirmish game. What better a way to start than with a bunch of zombies? It has been such a long time since I have painted any contemporary zombie figures, so it was nice to return to them as I always enjoy painting them.

At the far left is a severely wounded old man. His chest bears a pair of large cuts forming a cross and his stomach has been ripped open.
Next to him is a young punk with a Mohican haircut. He sports numerous cuts and wounds.

Second from the right is a young female whose left arm has been bitten off or ripped off.
At the far left is a police patrol-woman who has been shot, stabbed and bitten. The blood on her hands is still fresh, so most likely came from a victim she has recently fed upon.

In this next batch is a young man in a baseball cap who has lost his left arm just above the elbow. There is also a gaping hole in his stomach. The zombies fed well on him!
The guy in the yellow T-shirt appears to have died from a single gunshot to the heart. The entry wound is in his back and the exit wound in his chest. A nice clean kill... for a human!

The skinny-looking female second from the right has had half of her face bitten off.
The female at the far right appears to have been a shop assistant, judging by her clothing. She has been shot just below her right breast and there is a massive exit wound in her back. Also, her left arm has been broken and hangs at an odd angle, with bone showing through.
These were an absolute joy to paint. They were the first figures I've painted from this range and I like that they are made of hard plastic and that they are superbly detailed. I don't know why it's taken me so long to get round to painting them but I'm glad I've made a start on them. Lots more to follow!

MC1 Assorted Judges 01

It has been a while since I posted anything for the Judge Dredd Miniatures Game but that does not mean I have forgotten about it. A new batrep will be coming soon as I continue my campaign. I'm looking forward to using my new Battle Systems Sci-fi Terrain sets to recreate parts of Mega City One. In addition, I have been collecting some new figures for the game and painting more of my current collection of figures. In this post I want to showcase an assortment of MC1 Judges that I have acquired this past year. What they all have in common is that they are limited edition figures and I feel very lucky to own them all.

At the far left is Judge Harry Heston, an ape Judge who was part of an experiment wherein the Justice Department was looking for more diversity with its Street Judges. The project was short-lived and never really took off. Heston is an intelligent gorilla who only appeared very briefly in the comic series. The figure is a very limited edition casting sculpted by Dave Stone of Wargames Terrain Workshop. Dave very kindly gifted me this figure. The figure came with a choice of two right hands - one holding a Lawgiver Mk.2 Pistol, and the other a long Day-stick. I opted for the Lawgiver because he can do more damage with that than a Day-stick. I have to say, this is one of Dave's finest sculpts.
Next in line is Judge Dredd 04 by Wargames Foundry. Yes, this is the fourth version of Dredd that they made, and whilst not the best, he's not the worst either. Just before Foundry ceased production of their entire range of 2000AD figures they added a couple of new figures to the range. This version of Dredd was one of them and a rather spiffy Don Uggie Apelino was the other. I bought them both a couple of days before their sale ended, thus giving me their complete range of 2000AD figures. I will be using this figure as a generic Street Judge in my JDMG campaign. Note that he is armed with the Mk.1 Lawgiver Pistol. He is a good sculpt but his shoulder pads are far too big! Compare them to the next two figures who are more accurately portrayed.

The Judge with the Scattergun was produced by Warlord Games, available only if you bought the JDMG rulebook and Blood on the Streets supplement together. Also in this deal was a limited edition female ganger. When this offer was made I already had both books, so I figured I'd never get either figure. But, fortunately for me, the two figures came up for sale on eBay and I successfully bid for them. I can't tell you how delighted I was to scoop them. It is nice to have a Street Judge armed with something different to a Lawgiver Pistol, although he still has his Lawgiver in his boot holster.
Last in line is another rare figure. This one was produced by Mantic Games as a Kickstarter exclusive referee for their Dreadball game. Once again, I acquired mine from eBay but this time with the "Buy Now" option. He only cost me £3.50, which was an absolute bargain. Because he is so small and slim I have converted him into a Rookie Judge. He is, in fact, my only Rookie Judge. You can identify a Rookie Judge by his chest badge, which is cut in half down the middle. Oddly enough, in JDMG, the stats for a Cadet Judge and a Rookie Judge are identical. Whilst Warlord Games did produce figures for Cadet Judges they ignored Rookie Judges. I simply took a craft knife to the chest badge of this figure and cut it in half to convert the figure into a proper Rookie Judge.
All in all, these are great additions to my growing force of Mega City One Judges.

JDMG MC1 Zombie Civilians and Zombie Judges 01

Last time I reviewed Sabbat the Zombie Master and Malexica the Zombie Mistress. Now I'm going to review the first of my Mega City One zombies. The six zombie civilians shown below were produced by Mantic Games as part of their 28mm scale plastic multi-part Zombie Horde boxed set for the Kings of War game and were gifted to me by Paul Smith. He told me he had some spare Warlord Games Zombie Conversion Packs for sale, which I bought from him. Imagine my surprise when he also included these six figures you see directly below, all made but not painted. All six feature parts taken from the Zombie Conversion Pack (heads, one body and arm, elbow pads, knee pads and shoulder pads).

Some of these figures have been slightly converted by me but for the most part they are exactly as Paul made them. None of them were based. I glued them to 25mm diameter MDF bases and added sand and gravel for texture.  For the male zombie at the far left I bulked out his shirt covering his chest and back with a small strip of Milliput. I then added a few bullet holes to the shirt.
I decided to make the next zombie in line a female. She had the metal body and left arm that was part of the Zombie Conversion Pack to replace her plastic parts. I lengthened her hair with Milliput and also bulked out her dress so that it looked like it was one long dress.
The zombie third from the left is also a female. She was originally naked from the waist up, so I added Milliput to hide the fact that she was originally a male and to lengthen her dress. For some inexplicable reason she is wearing a respirator. She really doesn't need it as zombies are immune to gas attacks.

For the remaining three zombies I did almost no conversion work and just left them the way that they were when I received them. The two zombies second and third from the right appear to be part of a military force, most likely City Defence soldiers from different blocks. For the zombie second from the right I noticed that he had a huge gaping hole in his stomach, so I added some intestines spilling out of the hole from thin sausages of Milliput.
The zombie at the far right is very colourful. He is wearing goggles.
All six are really good sculpts. Paul did a great job in making them. I just slightly improved them. They were a huge amount fun to paint. I still have enough pieces left from the Zombie Conversion Packs to make a lot more Mega City One zombies.

Moving on, we come to my zombie Judges. All four of these were produced by Warlord Games. The one at the far left is the unconverted figure they sold. What I particularly liked about this figure was the fact that his right arm was a separate piece. This meant I could position it in a variety of ways for my conversions.
For the zombie second from the left I glued the right arm so it hung down his side with his hand just touching his knee-pad. To make him appear different to the original, I sculpted his eagle shoulder pad out of Milliput.
With the zombie second from the right I glued his right arm in a position that was halfway between the other two. I then added his uniform sleeve and elbow pad out of Milliput. I thought about sculpting on his right glove but in the end I decided he'd look better without it. So I ended up with three very different versions of the same figure - result!

The zombie Judge at the far right is a conversion that I came up. It utilises the upper body of a Judge rider of a Lawmaster bike (his arms are outstretched to grip the handlebars) and a set of legs taken from a foot Judge I had converted. His upper body was used to make another Lawmaster bike rider. I drilled and pinned the upper body to the lower body, positioning it slightly too far to the left. This was deliberate as I wanted to leave a slight gap where the right side of his upper body should be. I filled in that gap with Milliput to represent a gaping wound that exposed some of his ribs. I also drilled a few bullet wounds into his upper legs and lower back. It wasn't an easy conversion but neither was it too difficult for me. I am more than happy with the result.
Zombies in the Judge Dredd Miniatures Game come in four different varieties - Unarmoured Zombie (costs 15 Credits), Armoured Zombie (costs 25 Credits), Unarmoured Super Zombie (costs 30 Credits) and Armoured Super Zombie (costs 40 Credits). All are classed as Level:0 Illegal Infantry Minions. Both normal zombies and super zombies have only four stats. Normal zombies have Move 3", Agility -2, Melee +1 and Melee Dice 1D. Super Zombies have improved stats of Move 5", Agility +1, Melee +1 and Melee Dice 2D. The six zombie civilians shown above are clearly unarmoured but the four zombie Judges would certainly count as armoured zombies.
All zombies have the following two Special Rules - Dead Flesh. It is hard to destroy a zombie. Whenever a zombie or super zombie is by an attack (or damaged by any other source) roll one die and add the Damage being dealt. Deduct -1 if the zombie is armoured (zombies do not use the normal armour rules). On a 10 or more, the zombie is removed as a casualty. Weapons that use the Blast, Explosive or Smasher special rules double the Damage being added to this dice roll. Zombies will ignore all Gas weapons. If a zombie is rammed by a vehicle, roll the vehicle's Ramming Dice as normal, but total their results. If this total is 10 or more, remove the zombie as a casualty. In addition, a zombie is fairly easy to patch up after a battle, gaining +1 bonus to the Injured Minions roll.
Secondly, all zombies are Mindless. They automatically pass all Will checks and cannot be arrested. However, they can never become Heroes, no matter how many battles they survive. If a zombie is trying to Spot an enemy using the Stealthy Does It Talents, it will only succeed on a natural roll of 10, or if it is a super zombie, on a natural roll of 9 or 10.