Memorial weekend hiking.

Hit McCormick's Creek in Indiana this weekend for some hiking.

Down just a little past Terre Haute.

Nice little park.

Trails are mostly easy, one slightly moderate due to rocks and water.

 

Dead mudbug...or is it?

Bunch of butterflies just sitting around.

Alien Covenant

Alien Covenant

The next movie about our favorite twin mouthed acid blood having silicon based lifeform is back in theaters. This time though there is more going on than the standard people find egg, egg hatches, alien bursts forth, insanity ensues, girl crew member saves the day.

Well……there is all that going on but more too!

The human colony ship, Covenant, is on a long ass space mission to land and colonize a planet Origae-6. It is Oregon trail in space!!!!!! Anyway along the way the ship is damaged and they happen to discover a much closer and just as habitable Earth-like planet. Well of course everyone expect one person wants to check it out and maybe just colonize there instead. Off goes the landing party sans red shirts, but totally full of red shirt characters.

What a pretty world! Nothing could go wrong here.

Once on this new planet they find sustainable plant life, water, no animals and a ship that we have all see multiple times. Yup, there is a Navigator ship crashed here. Well exploration starts. Then a couple crew members run afoul of some spore producing flora. Well of course these spores are alien eggy spores and soon enough there are bodies breaking open to unleash bitey albino versions of the xenomorph we all love!

As the crew is being attacked by a pair of these creatures a robed figure arrives to save them and bring them to a strange alien city, that has more of a necropolis vibe. Who is this stranger?

 

Well stop reading if you don’t want to know! Just go see the movie!

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword....ugh..review

Alright first let me say I love my wife.

Second I think I might have to reevaluate our relationship after she wanted me to go with her to see King Arthur: Legend of the Sword.

I am a firm believer that there isn’t  a really fantastic movie about King Arthur. Sure Monty Python’s The Holy Grail is a comedy classic, but it is not a good King Arthur movie.

Excalibur from the early 80’s has Patrick Stewart, great suits of platemail and some good lines…but it really isn’t good. These two movies are the only two I can watch more than once. The rest of the list is full of high quality stinkers about King Arthur and Camelot. We have these turds: First Knight, King Arthur (Clive Owen), The Last Legion, Merlin (the miniseries), Disney’s the Sword and the Sorcerer (fun for kids but not really great and doesn’t hold up at all), Prince valiant ( which I couldn’t finish due to how terrible it was) and the Mists of Avalon miniseries (which I didn’t make it through either due to utter boredom). There a more out, but I have not and will not see them.

Yes there isn’t  a truly top to bottom good King Arthur movie and this newest version is pretty bad too.

Alright I like the following films by Guy Ritchie: Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch, the first of his Sherlock Holmes film and a couple moments in Rock N Rolla. So Guy Ritchie is alright by me. Well….I guess until this movie was unleashed.

Okee dokee then.

We have the typical Arthurian legend stuff. King with super sword. King dies. Sword goes in rock. Only next king can remove sword. Guys does this. Shenanigans ensue. Round table. Knights. Roll credits.

That is how it should go right? Well here Arthur’s parents die. He is cast away to London or Londonium/ Londinium. He is raised in a brothel and runs the streets like Aladdin. He makes buddies who become his crew. They act like some version of Robin Hood but  they keep the money instead. He learns fighting from some Asian karate master  who has a dojo in London. He grows up. He completely forgets everything about his childhood family trauma along the way.

Jump to evil Jude Law, Arthur’s uncle, is running the country. He is also trying to become a super wizard by building a tower. How does that work? There is a petty rebellion he is trying to put down as well. Then the waters part and the lost sword in the stone reappears. 

All men of a discerning age are nabbed to try and remove said sword. Arthur does. He doesn’t want it or the kingdom. Uncle comes calling for sword/Arthur. Arthur is whisked away by the petty rebellion. A female wizard is introduced. No Merlin here! Arthur begins training with the sword. Plans are made to over throw uncle. Arthur has  minor hiss fit about sword, king and various duties. Uncle king needs overthrown. Arthur gets poisoned by wizard for a dream sequence while travelling to face uncle king.  A giant snake arrives to eat castle guards. Uncle becomes guy from a molly Hatchet album cover.

Fight ensues. Uncle dies. Arthur is king. His buddies…can you guess… they all become his knights. A round table is being fashioned. Roll credits.

Sound like a kind of lame and hurried overview. Well it was.

New Cryx arrivals

Just arrived more bonejacks!

 

Why?

First, I am putting the finishing touches on two Defilers right now so that means I need more robots to paint!

Second I love me some bonejacks! Sure they a squishier now, but having 3 and soon 5+ makes for descent little swarm.

That and I have been putting off getting a Stalker for a long time. I did a proxy run a few times and though they were a fun threat. Sure they are stupid fragile, but they are pretty cheap and make a great threat against squishy casters and those all-important (and annoying) solos or small units (like the damn Menoth choir).

I also nabbed two of the older metal Deathrippers. I am either going to try and kit bash them into Ripjaws or if that looks to fail I’ll have two more Deathrippers. Sure bonejacks aren’t as cool in this edition says the interweb, but having 4+ on the table works for me.

Plus I was able to get all three of these guys for $13.00. That is with shipping. How awesome is that?! Very since all three of these guys would have run me $25 plus. I love me a free market economy and the interweb! It was like getting a free Stalker with the purchase of two Deathrippers.

It is a mystery on how some places can stay in business with competition out there like this.

D&D post game 5-13-17

I bought Tales from the Yawning Portal a while back. I tied this month’s game to the Forge of Fury. I had to tweak it a bit as the party is higher than the suggested levels, but they also have no healing either. Well they have a bard with some songs and single cure spell, but that really doesn’t cut it in terms of party healer.

I removed the orcs from the module and swapped for bugbears. Bugbears look like they can take a hit and give a nice shot back. They looked to be ok in small groups and not too weak or too overpowering. Other than that I ran the first bit in the mountain stronghold as written. Not my forte, modules as some are just horribly written, railroad the group into situations, involve too many skill checks or have too much talking ( our guys like a bit more action and less chatty).

After the dragon defeat the group interrogated the dwarf and elf that were prisoners of the dragon. They had been captive for nigh 20 years and had little recollection of anything else. They were pretty useless. The thief and monk searched for the horde of treasure the dragon must have. The ½ orc and bard questioned the prisoners. Then the mage just strolled in while reading a book. It seems he was busy studying some dwarf history and came upon the tale of a master craftsmen from the clan Durgeddin. It also seems that the group was officially hired (well the mage was and he spoke for the party) to find proof of the hidden/lost forge of Durgeddin. Being that it might be in the region (miles and miles and miles and miles away if that counts as near), he took the contract and our adventuring party had received their first official ( insert name ) guild work.

2 more robot doctors/ robot bomb makers are complete.

Previously I had finished two thrall bombs and now their associated creators are complete.

Family picture day!

I swapped out the necrotech giant scissors on a stick weapon head for a 40K ork chainsaw and an old Necromuunda buzz saw arm weapon bit.

A tiny conversion to differentiate them a little.

D&D pre-game 5-13-17

After a short hiatus we are back gaming this coming weekend.
A quick recap!

Previously the party was sent to discover/ clear-out/ investigate the dwarven ruin known as the Halls of Healing.They were hired by the archeologist Lukas Fudderer (who died tragically due to a trap during the adventure).
They found a dwarf and elf charmed prisoners, they battled ogres, giants, hordes of grimlok, and eventually a green dragon.

It is post dragon battle where the party will start up again this coming weekend.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

The Guardians o’ the Galaxy are back and…well…then they all kind of split off and do their own stuff while fulfilling a larger story during the film.

The film opens with the group saving the home world of the Sovereign from some Cthulhu-esque interdimensional being. Why do this? Well the Sovereign have Gammora’s sister and quasi-villain from the first movie, Nebula as a prisoner. So it is job with Nebula as payment. Of course the group cheeses the Sovereign off and they are on the run. While fleeing for their lives they are saved by a guy, who happens to be Star Lord’s dad, one Ego the Living Planet. Well the humanoid version of the sentient planet the inhabits the comic pages. Ego also comes with a female companion, Mantis, who is a different take on the comic character as well.

 

The party now splits so that Rocket and Groot are guarding Nebula. Star Lord, Gammora and Drax all head off to Ego’s home world to chill there. This is where the film shifts to little pieces of a larger puzzle. Star Lord reconnects with his father Ego. Drax and Mantis pair off…well so that Mantis can learn about stuff and Drax so he can…well be a springboard for some great comedic work. Gammora and Nebula (after escaping and coming for revenge) pair off for their own little sister story. Rocket, Groot and Yandu ( after a Ravager mutiny ) go off on their adventure of revenge and redemption. All this set against the Sovereign seeking revenge against the Guardians and a plot of galactic father son supremacy. It seems like a mess on paper, but on the screen it works really damn well. 

Fate of the Furious

Well here we are another year and another Fast (insert verb/nouns here) movie. Here we have Fate of the Furious, a title that should have been saved for another film as it sounds lie it will be a cliffhanger type of ending. Sadly it is not and by the end everything is 99% fine.

 

The plot is pretty thin, but we aren’t here for plot now are we? We are here for action action action! There is a super militarized computer hacker genius named Cipher. They are after weapons, EMP devices, nukes and all the bad villain clichés.  The Rock, now a stay at home dad and soccer coach, is recruited to stop this Cipher and associated goons. He of course nabs Domenic Toretto and the other Fast members to help.

This is where the film goes akimbo as Domenic Toretto goes rouge and  turns on his team. Why? Well Cipher, now Charlize Theron, has some leverage over him. This lands the team hiding and The Rock in prison with previous film bad guy, Jason Statham. Of course this leads to the building of a buddy cop type friendship between these two characters as guess what? They have to work together to stop Cipher and rouge Dom.

This is accomplished by Kurt Russell returning as Mr. Nobody and appearing and disappearing throughout the film like the Dungeon Master from that 80’s D&D cartoon. He aslos drags along Clint Eastwood’s kid as his go between (and as a probable new team member for the future films). Kurt Russell and Clint Eastwood kid set The Rock and Co. up with weapons and cars to stop Cipher and the now evil Dom.

May the 4th plus robot bombs!

It is Star Wars Day today. Go do something Star Wars related!

 

PLUS!!!!

Two scrap thralls done.

Once again not much to say. They are zombie robot bombs. I threw some paint at them. Now they are done.

 

Their associated necrotechs are almost complete, I just have to wash them pin them to their bases and over coat them.



IK RPG

I am getting a chance to dive into the Iron Kingdom RPG.

Why does this appeal to me? Well it is set in the Warmachine universe. I love me some fantasy with steampunk thrown in the mix. Not to mention the chance to dive into the Hordes side of the world as well.

The game mechanics use the Warmachine/Hordes rules for playing: 2D6 result added to a stat, movement using measurements, line o’ sight, focus and all manner of rules I am already familiar. It is basically MKII rules with a RPG setting. Really easy to grasp and get playing if you have ever played Warmachine/Hordes

Character creation is a bit out of control.