Blood Bowl: The Orcland Wanderers

Once upon a time, an entirely unremarkable Orc team was making a decent living on the tournament circuit in the Dark Lands. Then one day, they chanced upon an orc who claimed to be a prophet of Nuffle himself. Nuffle had given him a vision: he would lead the team out into the Blasted Wastes, where they would find a golden city, rich beyond their wildest dreams but lacking a Blood Bowl team. The team, almost certainly very drunk, was gripped by the prophet's vision, and they cheerfully set out into the desert, singing songs about the promised land that awaited them.

Eventually, of course, the enthusiasm (not to mention the fungus beer) wore off, and the team realized that there was no golden city. Once they'd eaten the supposed prophet of Nuffle, they were so far into the wastelands that there was nothing to do but keep going. After a succesful tour of the Chaos Dwarf circuit, the greenskins took to their new way of life and started travelling all over the Old World to play. With no home stadium, they took to calling themselves the Orcland Wanderers.

**

In other words, I was going through my old Warhammer stuff and found my old 3rd edition Blood Bowl plastics. This is the team:

6 linemen (300,000)
2 blitzers (160,000)
2 black orc blockers (160,000)
2 throwers (140,000)
4 re-rolls (240,000)

And here's the roster:

#4 Drek Garr, thrower
#8 Mark-um Maaarrgghh, thrower
#15 Nelson Agharghaaarrgh, blitzer
#28 Ork Truk, lineman
#29 Lawaaagh-Joiner, lineman
#52 Waaagh Mack, black orc blocker
#55 Von-Tar Perfect, lineman
#75 Orcius Latham, lineman
#87 Jaaarrghh Cook, lineman
#89 Aaargh Cooper, blitzer
#95 Jihad Waaargh, lineman
#98 Maxx Gross, black orc blocker

**

I started with the linemen. They were primed with Army Painter's Greenskin Primer, and they're wearing Medium Sea Grey loincloths, Ivory socks, Off-White shirts and Gunmetal Grey helmets, for what I think is a quite decent Orcland look! I drybrushed a little Deep Green over the Greenskin Primer.

And here are the positional players, as well as a goblin. I apologize for that, I don't know how he got in there.

I also apologize for the picture quality: my old phone stopped working, and the camera on the new one is rubbish. Anyway here's the team:

**

Painting these guys was a fun little project! I'll see if I can find my humans next.

Let's Paint Star Wars: Armada

On the sixth week of summer the Norwegian fleet neared Whalsay.
- Tattúínárdǿla saga, Chapter 36: Concerning the Norwegian Fleet

I made my first ever Star Wars: Armada purchase in 2018, when we first played Star Wars: Rebellion. That game ended memorably when the Emperor himself led a single assault carrier to the just-relocated rebel base. In honor of the Imperial victory, I bought an assault carrier pack for Armada, which served as a TV table ornament. Because my co-commander is a big TIE Fighter player from back in the day, I also bought the Imperial Fighter Squadron II expansion on a whim, as it includes Maarek Stele.

**

Eventually, the pressure to buy the actual game became overwhelming - especially as it was dramatically cheaper at our friendly overseas gaming store, and I finished painting Star Wars: Rebellion. However, the lockdown scrapped our gaming plans - especially when our table was taken over by the Reformation. But I found painting the little starfighters surprisingly good fun, so for the moment, I guess I'm mostly just collecting the models.

I don't know why I got such a strong sense of deja vu spraypainting them, though!

I finished the X-wings first. It's very satisfying how much better they look with just a simple paint job compared to the unpainted models. I did the same here as I did with the Rebellion ones: Black details, Gunmetal Grey guns, Ivory hull, the squadron stripes and a Smoke wash over everything.

**

On the Imperial side, I started with the VT-49 Decimators and Lambda-class shuttles. I tried to keep things simple, so I started by painting the windows and whatnots black, and then giving them a base coat of Dark Seagreen and a Light Grey drybrush.

Again, very simple and very effective. The Rogues and Villains pack was somewhat more interesting because of the variety of the models, but I'm quite happy with how I did.

The Falcon, for instance, is just Ivory with black details and a Smoke wash, but I think it works excellently. I never really had any particular feelings about any of the rebel hardware from the movies - I still don't - but painting the Rebellion miniatures made me appreciate how important the worn and scuffed aesthetic is to the rebel side. I'm thinking about some Tau in rebel-like broken white for Warhammer. Incidentally, I'm really happy with Boba Fett's ship:

The YV-666 is in yellow because that's what it looked like on the squadron card? Anyway I don't know how much use we'll ever make of these things, but it's nice to have a tiny little Millenium Falcon, and they were fun to paint. Now if only we could get the Ebon Hawk!

**

During the quarantine, we found a good deal online for the Corellian Conflict expansion. I was interested in it for the campaign rules, but it also comes with squadron cards for Norra Wexley's Y-Wing Squadron and also Poe Dameron's mother. So the sensible thing to do was put in an order for the Rebel Fighter Squadrons pack. I painted the Rogue Squadron X-wings, Poe's mom's A-wings and the Y-wings.

I said earlier I don't have any particular feelings for any of the rebel hardware from the movies, and that's still true, but I'm discovering a real affinity for the Y-wing. It kind of reminds me of the one-man spaceships in Frontier: Elite II, which was a pretty big experience for me as a kid. I repeated what I did with the Rebellion models, so black and gunmetal for the nacelles, copper for the dorsal wiring and, of course, Ivory and Smoke. Norra Wexley flew for Gold Squadron, and I'm painting the other squadron green because I like green.

**

Oddly enough, during all this Armada squadrons have become my favorite thing to paint right now. I wasn't originally very interested in Rebel Fighter Squadrons II, but painting the Y-wings got me thinking about a Rebel fleet with lots of cheap fighters, and the Z-95 Headhunters would be perfect for that. But I mean I really got it for Ketsu Onyo. Look at her!

As an added bonus, there's a VCX-100 freighter, and even E-wings. Bizarrely, I got two extra E-wings! Not sure what to do with them. Looking at pictures of the VCX-100s and Lancers online, their base color seems to be grey, but I've taken the liberty of painting them with the same Ivory/Smoke scheme of the other rebel ships.

And here are the E-wings, Z-95s and Wedge Antilles' X-wings.

**

Finally, yes, I did also eventually get around to painting all the gazillion TIE Fighters that came with the core set, and the TIE Phantoms too. I did what I had done with the Rebellion TIEs as well and started with a Neutral Grey drybrush on the hull, but I did the edges and "spokes" on the wings in Light Grey this time.

And the TIE Defenders, including Maarek Stele's squadron. On the one hand, I could have done better with these; on the other, I never want to see a single Defender on my desk ever again.

Then I made it worse for myself by getting the Corellian Conflict expansion, because it meant I had the squadron card for Ciena Ree's TIE Interceptors, so I got the only squadron expansion I was missing: the Imperial Fighter Squadrons.

And here they are.

**

So yeah, apparently a thing that happened during the pandemic was that I ended up owning every squadron expansion to Star Wars: Armada. I still haven't painted everything, but I've thoroughly enjoyed myself. This has been a really good reminder that my first love in miniatures was 6mm Epic, and I still really enjoy painting the tiny stuff. Now, I still have piles of Warhammer things to finish, but I should really look into more smaller-scale miniatures.

Let's Read Tolkien 72: The Black Gate Opens

Two days later the army of the West was all assembled on the Pelennor.

Aragorn leads the army of Gondor and Rohan, with assorted hangers-on, toward Mordor. They pass over the Great River at Osgiliath, where it's suggested that they should assault Minas Morgul. Gandalf vetos the idea, because if that's where Frodo is trying to get into Mordor, they need to make sure Sauron is busy somewhere else. So they head for the Black Gate itself. On the way there, as they enter the wastes of Dagorlad, some of the soldiers refuse to go on. Aragorn takes pity on them, and suggests that if they don't want to go on, they should head southwest and capture the island of Cair Andros from the enemy.

Somewhat reduced, Aragorn's army arrives at the Morannon, where they parley with Sauron's herald. He makes even Gandalf completely lose his shit when he presents them with Sam's sword and Frodo's mithril-coat. The parley is unsuccesful, but Pippin comes away from it believing everything is lost, and feeling a sudden sympathy for Denethor. Sauron's armies attack, and in the mêlée, Pippin stabs a troll, but is crushed underneath it.

**

So, the climax of Book Five could hardly be more dramatic!

I talked about the, in my mind, anachronistic industrial wasteland outside the Black Gate when Frodo passed through it, but I'll also repeat another observation: Tolkien is remarkably uninterested in the geography of Gondor. Aragorn's army passes through Osgiliath, the former capital of Gondor, and its heartlands - and pretty much the only thing we hear about is the king's head at the crossroads. We're just about done with Gondor, and I still have no real idea what it's like there.

At the Black Gate, the captains meet the Mouth of Sauron. In Chapter 1, Book III, when Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli are examining the remains of some Uruk-hai, they have this conversation about the S-rune on their helmets:

"S is for Sauron," said Gimli.
"That is easy to read."
"Nay!" said Legolas. "Sauron does not use the Elf-runes."
"Neither does he use his right name, nor permit it to be spelt or spoken," said Aragorn.

Yet the Mouth of Sauron freely invokes his master's name. Maybe Aragorn was wrong, or the Mouth had a special privilege in this. Either way, the inconsistency isn't explained.

I wondered earlier if Gandalf's and Denethor's contrasting leadership styles weren't a commentary on British generalship in the First World War. I'm almost sure that Aragorn's humane treatment of his wavering troops, and especially their positive response to it, is a commentary on British military discipline in the same war. The British army initially dealt with PTSD and other psychiatric problems as cowardice and handed out death sentences very liberally, although not nearly all of them were carried out. Later - I suspect because they realized they couldn't shoot so many thousands of men! - the diagnosis of "shell shock" was invented, and both traumatized soldiers and conscientious objectors like Siegfried Sassoon were put in what passed for psychiatric care at the time. It would have been extraordinary if Tolkien had had no idea of the brutality of British military discipline, and the ferocious hatred of "cowardice"; Aragorn's conduct in this chapter is so diametrically opposed to it that I don't think it's an accident.

**

That was Book Five! It's certainly the most action-packed of the six, with climactic battles, a role reversal where a hobbit stabs a ghost, and a shameless cliffhanger. For all we talk about Tolkien's scholarship, he knows how to pace a story with the best pulp authors.

Thematically and, in a sense, theologically, the main point of Book Five is to showcase Tolkien's idea of "northern courage". I've talked about it before, but briefly, it's the idea that you do the right thing, whether you think it's going to work out or not. Théoden goes to war; Éowyn stands up to the Witch-King; Aragorn leads his army to certain defeat to buy time for the Ring-bearer. The point is made several times that this isn't a courage people should or even can be coerced into, although we retain some doubts about whether anyone really asked all six thousand soldiers who ended up at the Morannon. It is emphatically not the kind of fascism Tolkien gets accused of, where very important men decide what's best for the people, and force them there at gunpoint - a theme we'll be returning to in the next book.

Finally, for all the valor and martial heroism of Book Five, it does need to be remembered that it's all in the service of Frodo's errand. There's been great and glorious battle, the sagas winning out over Christianity completely there, but at the end of the day, theology prevails: brute force can't defeat the Dark Lord. This isn't Harry Potter and the Ring of Power.

Next time: the last book of the Lord of the Rings.

28mm miniatures and conversion bits roundup

The bulk of our 28mm miniatures are obviously from Games Workshop; few other companies offer such a diverse range of models or similar value for money. However, now that I've returned to the 28mm hobby, it's been an absolute delight to discover so many companies around the world supplying both high-quality 28mm miniatures and piles upon piles of conversion bits. Over the last year or so, we've had the distinct pleasure of shopping with several of these companies, and it's high time I put together a list with some links.

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Statuesque Miniatures

Our Imperial army would be a lot more boring without Statuesque Miniatures and their heroic scale accessories line! The heroic scale female heads are perfect for head swaps with GW miniatures and other 28mm heroic minis, and I absolutely love them. Especially the beret and veteran heads are really good. The techno roider heads, on the other hand, go great with space marines and even Terminators. Highly recommended!

We also got Commissar Vespera Venko for our commissar collection, and I was very happy with the model - especially at such a competitive price!

**

Bad Squiddo Games

Bad Squiddo miniatures are simply wonderful. Here's the Women's Land Army picnic and the lovely Time for Beer model in my Blood Bowl stands:

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A post shared by Michael Halila (@michaelhalila) on Apr 30, 2019 at 2:56am PDT

These are all excellent quality models, very characterful, and I will definitely be ordering more!

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Wargame Exclusive

Wargame Exclusive do a line of fairly spectacular character models who are, well, let's say especially suitable for a Slaanesh army. Here's my Dark Apostle and an Imperial Guard Commissar.

I'll be ordering some of their Mechanic Adepts to use as, well, Warhammer Tech-Priests. Frankly, the models are good enough that these folks could do original stuff as well.

**

Brother Vinni

St. Petersburg's own Brother Vinni have a small range of good quality models I've quite enjoyed painting; below is our Imperial Guard captain and totally not Morrigan from Dragon Age.

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Eureka Miniatures

The invaluable Eureka Miniatures are where I got my Blood Bowl team and several of my Blood Bowl spectators, and their samurai rabbits provided the essential components for my Stormbun Eternals and Zootopia's finest. They were also kind enough to send us some complimentary frogs, one of whom is in the stands. I really like their models: they're full of character and very decently priced.

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Oathsworn Miniatures

Speaking of my Blood Bowl stands, I ordered several figures from Oathsworn Miniatures for them, and I have to say that out of all the miniatures I've ever gotten my hands on, I think these may be the best. I posted a bunch of pictures already, but in addition to my spectators, I've also got a Dandy Highwayfox and a fantastic Badger Mercenary waiting in case someone wants to play Burrows and Badgers. These are simply brilliant miniatures, and I think everyone should own at least one.

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Here are the first spectators for my Blood Bowl stands! Top row: #oathswornminiatures Mouse Nun and Starling Rogue, bottom left #companybminiatures tank commander and bottom right a @reaperminiatures Eastern Mousling. Very pleased with how they turned out; swipe to see them on the stands! #bloodbowl

A post shared by Michael Halila (@michaelhalila) on Jan 5, 2019 at 5:16am PST

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Victoria Miniatures

I can't say enough good things about Australia's Victoria Miniatures: their infantry models and conversion bits are fantastic, as are their character models. I also bought and painted one of their vehicles as part of their brushfire fundraiser, and it's a really good kit too.

**

Anvil Industries

Another excellent company, Anvil also produces character models and top-notch infantry bits. Several of our Rogue Trader characters are built from Anvil bits, and they are simply a delight to work with.

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A post shared by Michael Halila (@michaelhalila) on Dec 26, 2018 at 10:46am PST

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Reaper Miniatures

Reaper have been around long enough that they hardly need me to advertise them; hell, they even have a Wikipedia page. What I can tell you, though, is that their very affordable plastic Bones range is pretty decent, and paints up quite nicely with Vallejo paints. I've got a couple of their models in use as Heralds for my daemons, and some Eastern Mouslings in my Blood Bowl stands and Burrows and Badgers warband. They're good value for money and in my experience, perfectly usable in 28mm games.

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Perry Miniatures

The Perry brothers should need no introduction: I've got several of their boxed sets and they are absolutely excellent, and they're also the go-to source for horses. I'll show off what I've done with them as soon as those projects are finished!

**

Raging Heroes

A French company who specialize in female miniatures. I've bought several of their models, and I have two mildly critical observations to make. The first is that to some extent Raging Heroes are victims of their own marketing. Their miniatures look amazing online, but when you actually get them, they're, well, a lot less heroic than they looked in the pictures. I've found them to be surprisingly small. The second problem is related: the models are very fiddly, even annoyingly so. I've still got one of them lying around unfinished because I straight up lost its other arm. This does not usually happen. No other 28mm models have been anything as flat out annoying to assemble. Especially the metal models are annoying. Then again, I got some resin Davidians, and they're brilliant.

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A post shared by Michael Halila (@michaelhalila) on Jul 2, 2020 at 8:52am PDT

So I'm kind of on the fence here: when the models are good, they're very good, but then they have to be for the amount of trouble they are!

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Warlord Games

The place for World War II miniatures, Warlord Games's flagship product is Bolt Action, a 28mm WWII miniature game that's also an excellent source of Imperial Guard infantry and vehicles. Here's a Panzer IV next to some GW metal Sisters for scale:

And here's my latest purchase: the cutest little Renault FT.

I love Warlord Games tanks, and will definitely be buying more of them. The resin ones are good; the hard plastic ones are excellent.

**

Sloppy Jalopy

I bought a Sloppy Jalopy BMP-2 via Sally 4th, and I'm very happy with it!

You can see it painted up here.

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Sally 4th

A UK company with a line of fantasy football accessories, I've got their crowd waiting to get into my Blood Bowl stands. They're very good quality miniatures.

**

Kromlech

A Polish company, Kromlech are a great source for conversion bits, especially for Marines (the "Legionary" line); my Terminator Inquisitor has a Kromlech power maul. They also do some pretty neat Ork stuff, I've got an Orc Commissar lying around, waiting for my Blood Axes to show up...

High quality miniatures and bits, definitely recommended!

**

Zealot Miniatures

I've used several Zealot conversion bits and been very happy with them. My Tech-Marine has a servo arm and power axe from them, and I've been meaning to order some of their dungeon scenery for ages.

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Dark Sword Miniatures

I mentioned the complimentary frog we received from Eureka Miniatures earlier; we couldn't just have one frog in the stands, so in addition to ordering a pile more Eureka miniatures, we also went to Dark Sword Miniatures for a Frog Bishop, as well as several other models from their Critter Kingdoms line. They're absolutely lovely.

They also do a line of Game of Thrones miniatures, and how was I supposed to resist their Cersei? Would definitely throw a child miniature out of a window for her. We also received a complimentary birdman, which is also a really neat model and is definitely going to be watching some Blood Bowl. All in all, these are very high quality fantasy miniatures; definitely recommended.

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Modiphiüs Entertainment

Modiphiüs are the creators of Fallout: Wasteland Warfare, which I'm kinda interested in, but slightly put off by the high price and the fact that most of the models are, in my opinion, kind of bland. I did get their Boston companions box, so I could have Piper in my 40k Chaos army, and I can testify that the models are very high quality. It's just that most of them aren't very interesting.

Hint: if you play Fantasy Flight's Fallout board game, and you should, Modiphiüs's bottle caps are worth your money.

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Fantasy Flight Games

Finally, I should mention that we're using quite a few models from Fantasy Flight's Imperial Assault in our Warhammer 40,000 games, from Primaris Psykers and Eversor Assassins to Armiger Helverins. I've quite liked the miniatures, and in my experience they fit in just fine with the more heroic-scale GW minis.

**

I think that's everybody! I can't tell you what a delight it is to have so many different places to buy quality minis and bits, and for affordable prices too.

Let's Play Elite: Dangerous

J.Jameson Jnr
51a South Dormitory
Fish Processing Plant 3142
Sirocco
Merlin
Ross 154
-1/0Rs2a S16
31.12.3199

To whom it may concern

It is our duty to inform you of the death of your grandfather, Commander Peter Jameson.

The wreckage of his ship was found in the Reidquat system on 11 November 3199. He was presumed killed in combat after a "misunderstanding" over some stolen goods according to the local press.

A last will and testament was prepared on 3 February 3199 and section 4.1 has been circulated to all living grandchildren as instructed by our late client.

If you have any queries do not hesitate to contact us. The normal fees of fifty (50) Credits per hour (including service tax) apply.


Yours sincerely


Mr Edmond Sneer

When I was a kid, some computer games made an indelible impression on me. One of them was Frontier: Elite 2. I never played the first one, but Frontier embodied the magic of computers, space and everything just by being a space simulator game that procedurally generated the entire damn galaxy for you to fly around in and fit on a single HD disk. There was no plot as such, and no way to finish the game; you went out there and you made your own plot. It was adventure enough to do some trading and missions to save up for a better ship, and then head out to see the galaxy. I still remember deeply impressive stars like Sirius and Arcturus, finding permits to visit places like the federal prison colony on Ross 128 and the religious fanatics at van Maanen's Star, and eventually making my way to the Empire. So when some irresponsible bastard gifted me Elite: Dangerous on Steam, of course I was going to have to try it. I'm going to ramble about some of the practicalities of getting into the game, and then try to give some kind of verdict on whether it's worth it or not.

**

When you start Elite: Dangerous, you're put through a tutorial of sorts where you get your pilot's license and the title of commando Commander. You're then given a Sidewinder Mk I and let loose in a beginner-exclusive area called the Pilots' Federation District to learn the ropes.

Luckily, there are a lot of resources out there for anyone just starting out. I've gotten a lot of help out of the beginner's guide on the Caffeinated Pixels blog and the wiki, but there's a couple of things that I would have needed someone to explain to me, though. For anyone else venturing into the game, here they are.

First of all, you may have heard of nav beacons. Scanning them gets you information on everything useful in the system, so that seems like something you'd want to do. However, what no-one will tell you is that the nav beacon you can select as a destination on your navigation computer and supercruise to is not the nav beacon. Instead, the nav beacon is a white square that shows up on your scanner when you drop out of supercruise near the beacon. You then have to point your ship at it, target it and wait for it to scan. Simple, but initially incomprehensible.

Speaking of incomprehensible things, there's the mission board. I've played enough Frontier to know that when you're starting out and your ship doesn't have a lot of cargo space, you want to do courier missions and stuff like that. Also, it's good form to check the mission board to see if someone might be willing to pay a premium for whatever cargo you've got on you. Sadly they've made this last bit harder: whereas in Frontier they'd just straight up pay you for whatever you had, here you have to have a specific amount of what they want.

Anyway, say you find something on a mission board where they want you to either take something somewhere else, or bring them something. Below is an example: some folks wanted me to haul two units of Performace Enhancers to this base.

What puzzled the shit out of me was that I would increment the bar so I was delivering them the two units they asked for, but the button at the lower left was still greyed out and said "partial complete" or whatever. It took several Google searches until I figured out that I was supposed to click the "deliver items" button.

Once you've done that, the Complete button activates. I don't know, maybe this is just me being a moron, but the double confirmation required just completely confused me.

Finally, a third thing: beware the Advanced Docking Computer. So far, the landings have been fine, but the departures not so much! Once I found myself sitting in queue for so long that the timer ran out, and flight control very pointedly told me to leave or get fined. Since it was one of my first real flights, I may have panicked a little and crashed. I came away with slightly damaged shields, dented pride and a fine for reckless flying or whatever. Another time I had to cut out the docking computer when it took off from a landing pad and was very determined to rear-end another ship. Given that launching is really pretty easy to do manually, I think it might actually be wiser to leave the computer out of it entirely. You can set this up in the systems panel.

**

Anyway, after a couple of trips between Matet and Dromi, hauling space steroids and whatnot, I made enough profit to advance from Penniless to Mostly Penniless trader rank.

Once you've achieved a rank in anything, you get a "graduation mission" to leave the Pilots' Federation District. As you can see, it's very easy to achieve with just a little trading. My mission took me to HR 8526, a fairly massive trinary system some 75 light years from Sol. Along the way, I made my first proper manual landing at one of those rotating starbases, namely Noriega Port at Arare, and I think my hands shook for the rest of the day.

This experience simultaneously convinced me that I need to play more Elite, and that I needed a joystick. I was quite surprised to find how cheap some of them were; certainly you could spend hundreds, but I got a Thrustmaster T.Flight HOTAS X, i.e. a joystick and throttle, for 70€. I'm old enough to be genuinely shocked that it really was plug-and-play: you stick the USB cord in and it just works. Elite even has bindings ready for all the twelve or so buttons and various other controls, and when you actually use it to fly, it just works. I can't imagine going back to a mouse and keyboard.

Changing the button bindings is theoretically easy, but in practice requires wading through a fairly large menu that isn't always subdivided quite as logically as you might wish; it occasionally took quite a while to figure out.

**

The nearest Imperial system I could find was Ngalkin, so I headed over there to find some courier jobs. There are two major factions in Elite that you can gain ranks in: the Federation and the Empire. Back in Frontier, two of the three starting locations were in the Federation, so the Empire always seemed more exotic and interesting, and they had the coolest ships. My general plan at this point is pretty much to fly around and make some money, so I can get a better ship and maybe do some real exploring.

One thing the game could really do with is at least some geographical structure. Right now, when I left the Pilots' Federation District, I've pretty much been to systems that just feel totally random. There's not much glamour in grinding out courier missions to HR 8526, especially when I barely have any real idea where in the galaxy I am in relation to anything meaningful. I get that grinding is fundamental to MMO's, but in Frontier, two of the starting locations were in the core systems of the Federation, with marked trade routes leading to stars whose names you could actually recognize, so there was something for you to orient yourself by. Here there's nothing.

But then, I guess that grinding out trade and courier missions in unnamed systems does kind of get to the heart of the Elite experience. As in Frontier, so in Dangerous: you very much need to make your own story. I mean you're not going to be swept off your feet by the plot and the setting; there barely are any. Although there is an actual game, as opposed to a roadmap to a roadmap. So I don't know. If you're looking for an immersive, dramatic movie-like experience, this ain't it. Even as an Elite fan with lots of good memories attached to the franchise, I'd be lying if I said Elite: Dangerous captured my imagination. If you're interested in some zen space trucking? See you in the 'verse, commando.

Warhammer 40,000: Imperial reinforcements

We command bread and awe!
- misheard Sisters of Battle line from Dawn of War: Soulstorm

I made a new year's resolution to finish modeling projects, and when most of my teaching work evaporated because of the pandemic, what else was I supposed to do except paint? Therefore, here are some random Imperial units I've picked up over the last few years, finally painted.

Aubrey Beardsley: The Achieving of the Sangreal (1893-94)

**

I got a Scout Sentinel in Ophir colors, because I like Sentinels. They're very handy in Dawn of War: Winter Assault and Gladius! The legs and the inside of the cockpit are in German Camo Dark Green.

We also participated in the Victoria Miniatures charity drive in the wake of the terrible bush fires in Australia by buying a Kangaroo APC, which I'm happy to report is an excellent model. Here it is as a van Diemen pattern Chimera in Chirikov Rad-Guards colors.

I also painted a Jokaero! Delightfully, one of the special resource tiles in Gladius is a Jokaero encampment, and it inspired me to get one for myself.

**

I painted up my old metal Sisters earlier, but even before the new codex came out, I was keen to expand my collection. Or as they put it in Soulstorm: Behold! The Immolator!

Hint to anyone assembling the old Immolator kit: figure out how the frame for the glass dome fits into the turret before gluing any of it together. The instructions really don't make this clear, and it'll save you some trouble. I actually prefer this model to the new Immolator; I mean there's baroque grimdark and then there's that stained glass window...

My Sisters are from the Order of the Sorores Gratiae, and have made an appearance in my Rogue Trader tabletop campaign, where Canoness Julia Aquilia is currently leading a crusade against the foul xenos in the Acheron sector. Their home world is the shrine world of Lavina in Tertia Pars of the Acheron sector, and they wear emerald robes over their black armor.

Eventually, of course, the codex came out. As it happened, the first models I ended up building out of the new range were a Rogue Trader Arch-militant and a Sister Hospitaller, using a Kromlech apothecary conversion kit. I didn't like the new Hospitaller model; I'm all for scenic bases, but when it starts to feel like you're moving an entire diorama around the tabletop, it's too far for my taste. Instead I made her:

However, this highlighted a problem. Compared to the ancient metal figures, the new Sisters are gigantic.

You could maybe get away with having old and new Sisters in the same army, but the same unit? No way. So there goes my detachment idea.

I still made a Preacher from a Raging Heroes Davidian:

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So, the long-awaited plastic Sisters turn out to be a mixed blessing. I kind of like the squad box, but like I said, the parts aren't as interchangeable as I'd have hoped, so they're actually not that interesting to build. I also get that they needed to scale up the Sisters because of how tiny the old metal models were, but I'm still disappointed the difference was so massive.

Also, of course, we're now in ninth edition, which seems to confirm that the turnaround in editions is now three years. That's just completely absurd, and I can definitely feel my interest in keeping up with Warhammer collapse. It's time to look at other miniature games.

Let's Read Tolkien 71: The Last Debate

The morning came after the day of battle, and it was fair with light clouds and the wind turning westward.

Legolas and Gimli go strolling around Minas Tirith, where they find Merry and Pippin and discuss stonework and seagulls. Legolas tells the hobbits how they passed through the Paths of the Dead and recruited a bunch of ghosts to drive the enemy from Pelargir and set up their dramatic arrival at the battle of Pelennor.

The rest of the chapter is dedicated to a staff meeting in Aragorn's command tent, presided over by Gandalf. He explains to Éomer and Prince Imrahil about the Ring, and they agree on a strategy: lead an army to the gates of Mordor to draw out Sauron's forces and clear the way for Frodo to make it to the volcano.

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Again, this is a fairly short and simple chapter: it's the second part of the breathing space between the battle at Minas Tirith and the Black Gate, and wraps things up before the climax of this book and the entire story.

The spirits of the oathbreakers Aragorn summons to do his bidding seem more like the classic ghosts with "unfinished business" than Tolkien's wraiths. I somehow really like Legolas's thoroughly matter-of-fact statement that he's not afraid of the ghosts of men, full stop.

A couple of things are worth pointing out in Aragorn's staff meeting. First, there's the simple fact stated by Gandalf that there is no way they can defeat Sauron at war, and that was never the point. This ties in to the theological point of the whole story, but I'll get to that when we get to it! But the point being made quite strongly here is that all the military heroics of the last few chapters are at best a distraction in terms of the real battle.

Aragorn makes a point of saying that he doesn't want to order anyone to march on Mordor, and reiterates that everyone who goes should be a volunteer. It's kind of hard to take this seriously, though, when they move straight on to discussing how many thousands of men they can muster in what time. It'd be one thing to claim that oh, sure, everyone volunteered, but they're not really even trying. It almost feels like Éomer and Imrahil are humoring him.

Anyway that's it: the armies of the Free Peoples are going to march to Mordor and certain defeat, to buy time for a hobbit and his manservant.

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Next time: Peregrin stabs a troll.