Grimdark - too grim and/or dark?

I was going to write a post about the upcoming 9th edition. I still plan to, actually. However, the events around the country over the last few days have really affected me, and oddly enough, my view on the wargaming hobby. So strap yourselves in, because this one gets a little serious.

All the violence that's been going on here on our own soil over the last few days has really gotten me thinking. It's made me question a lot of aspects of the gaming hobby as a whole, where so very frequently, conflict resolution is performed through violence. In wargaming, it's the entire point of the game. Normally, that's fine with me. It's a safe outlet, a way to explore these themes without anyone actually getting hurt. But I'm finding it harder and harder to play a game where no matter what, I'm playing the bad guys in some way. Whether it's a game with subtle shades of grey like Infinity, or outright different flavors of evil like Warhammer 40k, any given wargame generally assumes that there are no good guys. Which is fine; war is nasty, and as a general rule, there are very few "good guys" in war in reality. But is that why they do it? Or is it a marketing decision, to make sure no one faction sells more than the others because they're perceived as the heroes?

Warhammer 40k is probably the worst game out there for this sort of cognitive dissonance, having spawned it's own name for the genre - "grimdark." But when does it become too grimdark? 40k, started out, back when it was known as Rogue Trader, as more of a satire, an almost comedic lampooning of the setting. Look at how ridiculous these people are, it said. But over the years, Games Workshop and the fan base have been taking it increasingly seriously. And now, it's a full on nightmare realm, one that we gleefully immerse ourselves in every time we play the game.

It's perfectly fine to enjoy things that are problematic. It's totally possible to enjoy the setting, or to simply play the game and divorce it from the cruel nastiness of the world it's part of. For me, though, it's very hard; the game, rules, and lore are inextricably woven together, because I'm a sucker for a good story. The world outside, though, is rapidly turning into a dystopian nightmare of its own. I find myself questioning if I really want to spend my leisure time immersed in something like that. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the hell out of 40k, but it's starting to hit a little close to home.

So what's a politically conscious, socially aware gamer to do? How do I maintain my enjoyment of the hobby, something that has brought me immense happiness and made me dozens of friends over the years, in the face of this cognitive dissonance? I could simply chuck it all, sell my models, and take up a peaceful, non-violent hobby, but is that the answer? Do I want to give up weekly game night with my friends, drinking beer, talking trash, and rolling dice? I really don't. I still enjoy wargames, and I don't want to give up the hobby just because I'm feeling a little uncomfortable about the settings of the games I play. I could just try to tune out the lore and back story, but it's so inextricably tied, in most cases, to the game itself, including the rules, that it's nearly impossible to do so. I could try a new army, see if that would help, but really, they're all bad guys in some degree, as we've established. Or... I could simply change the game. The concept of Your Dudes applies; these are my models, my army, my toys. I can play with them however I want.

I have yet to address my feelings on other games; I'm still working through 40k, because it's the biggest hurdle. Currently, in 40k, I play Space Marines - specifically, Crimson Fists. Now, the Crimson Fists are less nasty than most Marine chapters, most of whom view regular humans as weak and beneath them. Which is, I always thought, a strange viewpoint; who are these genetically altered ubermensch protecting, if not the humans that make up the populace of the Imperium of Man? What are they guarding against the vicious enemies that assail humanity from all sides? The Crimson Fists, at least in more recent history, have taken a much more caring, shepherding viewpoint of regular humans. However, even with that in mind, they're still the fanatical zealot super soldiers in service to the God Emperor. They're still the jackbooted fascist warriors, crushing dissent and annihilating anyone deemed to be The Enemy. The Imperium is a backwards, technophobic, fascist theocracy, and life within it is, as Thomas Hobbes would describe, nasty, brutish and short. As I think about it more and more, I find myself wanting to play as those guys less and less. So, since they're My Dudes, I'm changing the rules.

I'm not going to play the Crimson Fists anymore. Instead, I'm going to play Space Marines who are in open rebellion against the tyranny and oppression of the Imperium. And no, that doesn't mean they're Chaos aligned. The binary nature of that relationship has always bothered me to no end. No, these are simply Space Marines who have seen enough, they're done with the viciousness, they're done with the exterminatus orders, they're done executing people simply for not believing in the right flavor of the Imperial Cult. Again, they're My Dudes - my head canon trumps all. In fact, Games Workshop has even left the door open for things like this recently, with the release of an admittedly controversial short story about the Brazen Drakes, a chapter declared excommunicatus while a fresh batch of Primaris recruits were being delivered - recruits who, upon finding out they were condemned to die for no other reason than being related to the others, for not doing anything wrong, rebelled and fought for their lives. Those recruits weren't tainted by Chaos, they weren't heretics. They simply didn't want to be murdered for no reason.

By releasing that story, GW made it much more plausible to have storylines like mine be closer to fitting into canon. A Space Marine chapter that was already exhausted, already at the brink, hearing about what the Imperium did to the Brazen Drakes could easily be pushed over the edge into rebellion. Even a brainwashed zealot has his limits.

We all deal with the horrors of real life in our own way, and equally so, the horrors of the games we play. Some people brush it off, some people walk away. My life is so deeply entwined with wargaming that I can't just wash my hands of the hobby. So I have to find ways to make the games more amenable to my outlook. If that means breaking some fragile rules about "official" stories, then so be it. If I want to play a chapter of Marines who go about the galaxy fighting to free people from the tyranny and oppression of Xenos and Imperium alike, like a bunch of power-armored superheroes, who's to stop me? Nobody is allowed to tell anyone to enjoy their hobbies. That kind of gatekeeping bullshit does nobody any good. If someone has a problem with it, if they want to lecture me and judge me for changing the game so that I feel better about playing it? They can fuck right off. I don't need to play with them. Nobody gets to dictate how someone else has fun.

So there you have it. I think, at this point, that that's what I have to do to continue to enjoy this hobby. Our real world is getting really ugly, and while it may get better, it's going to get worse before it does. Why should I drown myself in this vile, nasty place with no hope for anyone, with my army - the guys that represent me on the tabletop - being representative of the very thing I despise in real life? So I'll be experimenting with new color schemes, new designs, and new stories. Hell, it's not like I have anything else to do; between the quarantine from the pandemic and the curfews from the riots, I've got plenty of time on my hands, and it's going to be quite some time before these toy soldiers see the tabletop again.

How to (Poorly) Paint a 15mm Kobold!

So I thought I'd throw together a quick bit about how I paint 15mm models. I'm no Golden Demon winner; in fact, my painting is a bit trash. But I've come to grips with the fact that I'll probably never get better, through a combination of physical limitations and a lack of desire to practice enough. I have Tourette's Syndrome, so my hands shake like a virgin on prom night (hence The "Twitchy" Painter) which is a major limitation in my ability to perform quality paint work. Also, as I get older, my eyesight is starting to go south for fine detail work, which makes it really hard to paint at this scale. But I still paint stuff, and I'm happy enough with it. So without further ado: more Splintered Light kobolds (yes, I lied. I'm doing another post with them. But it's not about them, it's about the painting, so I'm technically in the clear.)

I started off by hitting them with some cheap grey primer from an auto parts store. I'm a cheapskate, and it works just fine. Given my painting ability, I'd much rather spend $4.99 on a can of cheap automotive primer than $15.99 or whatever GW charges for their fancy stuff. Works just as well for me.

Next up, I throw on a base coat. I commit a cardinal sin here; if you're too scandalized to continue reading, I understand. Brace yourself. Ready? Here it comes.

I don't thin my paints.

I know. Shocking. Tragic. Unseemly. But I just don't. Mostly through laziness and impatience. But I also feel that at this scale, it really doesn't make a difference. So I just blithely toss on a base coat of the colors I want. Fair warning: my paint collection is old and eclectic. Many of these colors may no longer exist.

In this case, I used Skorne Red from P3 for the skin, Citadel's Rhinox Hide for the shield and axe haft, Vallejo Model Color Red Leather for his vest and loincloth, and Vallejo Game Color Brassy Brass for the axe head. Just slapped 'em on, trying to color inside the lines as much as possible.

After that, I put on a layer of washes. I have a number of different color washes, so I try to match them somewhat closely to the base coat. I know a lot of folks will just douse the whole thing in Nuln Oil, but that ain't how I roll.

I used all Citadel washes on this one; Carroburg Crimson for his skin, Agrax Earthshade for his shield, axe haft, and clothing, and Nuln Oil for the axe head, just to take the shine down a little bit. 

Then it's on to basing. Again, at this scale, I don't have a whole lot to work with, so KISS applies - Keep It Super Simple.

I have a big jar of black craft paint that I bought years ago; I was going through so much Abaddon Black that it simply wasn't economical to keep buying those tiny little pots. This stuff works just as well for my purposes. So for most of my base work, at any scale, I slather the base with a coat of that stuff, and let it dry. Next, for my 15/18mm guys, I'm just painting the top of the base with Vallejo Game Color Goblin Green, and keeping the rim of the base black. 

And there you have it! One finished, half-assed kobold. Sure, it's not going to win any awards, but this guy and three of his buddies took me an hour to get from primed to finished, and in the end, what's important to me is having painted models on the table. I'd rather have a table full of sloppily painted models than a Silver Surfer army, or hordes of grey plastic. So I keep painting this way, and I'm perfectly satisfied with it. And in the end, that's what really matters.

More Splintered Light Minis!

Okay, y'all are probably tired of reading about Splintered Light stuff by now. I promise after this I'll post something different and interesting. But I ordered from them again, and got some really nice stuff. I ordered the orc warband and female adventurers set. Quick review time!

I'll start with the orcs, as they're the most numerous. There are a lot of them, so I won't take too many pictures or bore with too many details. It was $28 USD, and I got 3 archers, 2 guys with greataxes, 2 guys with two weapons, 6 guys with weapon & shield, two leader sorts (one with a big sword and one with an axe and whip), two wolf cavalry with weapon & shield, a wizardly fellow, a shamaness, a savage orc leader with two stone axes ("savage" of course being furs, loincloths, and stone weapons), 3 savage orcs with spear & weapon, 4 with two weapons, a savage orc drummer, and 3 standard bearers (one regular, two savage.) All the same level of quality I saw from the goblins and kobolds, but much greater variance in size between the models; some of them are quite large, while others are no bigger than the goblins. I suspect these sculpts came out at different times; scale creep is a thing. Anyway, here's a couple quick shots of some of the examples:

Left-right: two swords, shamaness, leader with whip, savage with two hander, savage banner bearer

Greataxe, archer, savage with club, leader with sword

For scale: two swords, greataxe, goblin archer, savage with greatclub

As you can see, nice minis, but the scale creep is definitely there. Still, it's another excellent deal, with some really solid, well made miniatures.

The female adventurers pack was sort of an impulse buy. I was only going to get the orcs, but while browsing the catalog, I saw how cheap they were and thought "Screw it, I'll tack it on." $4 USD gets you four miniatures: a human/elf cloak & dagger type, a dwarf with a hammer and shield, what looks to be an elven spellcaster (but could just as easily be any human-sized race at this scale) and a human with heavy armor and a big horkin' greataxe.

Nice models, and a nice little add-on for the purchase. A buck a model isn't bad, and the difference between a $28 purchase and a $32 one is so insignificant compared to what value I'll be getting that it wasn't really much of a question.

One final note: I got an unexpected refund from Splintered Light after the purchase. I sent them an email asking why. Normally, Splintered Light has a flat shipping rate of $7 anywhere in the continental U.S. Well, I heard back from David McBride (I assume he's the grand poobah of the company) and he told me that when he shipped the models, the shipping was closer to $4, so he refunded me the difference. $3 isn't very much at all, but it's a nice touch, and a really respectable bit of honesty. So yeah, I continue to be impressed with this company. If you need 15mm fantasy models, go buy from them!

Splintered Light Kobolds

Well, I promised an update on the Splintered Light minis, so here it is, albeit a bit late. I painted up four kobolds (because at the moment, I only have four little miniature holders) and they turned out pretty well, I think, by my admittedly low standards. They were a breeze to paint up; while they're plenty detailed, they don't have a lot of fiddly little gubbins that need to be picked out. No pouches, no buckles, nothing like that. So my usual tactic (at this scale) of base coat plus wash works really well. Here's the full batch:

It's hard to say which one was my favorite. The spearman painted up easiest, I think, which is worth something? He looks solid though, well suited to die under the assault of my heroes on the tabletop.

I really enjoyed painting the little champion. His cloak and armor take to the wash really well. I don't often get to dust off that color of green, so I always enjoy a chance to use it.

The little shaman guy is the other contender for my favorite of the four so far, with his deep blue robes and little orb on a stick. He just exudes kobold wisdom (which, as we know, is largely an oxymoron.)

The last guy was a little fella with a spiked club. He wasn't particularly thrilling to paint, but he'll fit in nicely with the others. 

It's a good thing these guys paint up so quickly, because I have a lot of them to get through! I think it took me maybe 45 minutes or so, at a wild guess, to knock these four out. I may fire up Tinkercad and design some movement trays for them, as Sellswords & Spellslingers calls for certain models to move as hordes, and trying to move each of these little blighters one at a time is going to get tiresome really fast. 

Splintered Light Miniatures 15mm goblins and kobolds

So since we're all trapped in isolation for this wretched plague, I don't get to play my usual wargames with friends. That means Warhammer 40,000, Infinity, and my potential third attempt to make Necromunda stick are on hold. As a way to keep my hand in (and to keep myself from going insane) I've been accumulating the bits and bobs needed to play some cooperative Sellswords & Spellslingers with my lovely partner. SS & SS is a co-op/solo play fantasy wargame from Ganesha Games, designed for any scale or miniature line. The base scale, of course, is 28mm, because that's the most common scale for minis of any kind. However, we're dealing with limited space; the 28mm scale variant calls for a 3 foot square play area, but our dining room table simply won't fit that. As a result, I've been building a collection of 15mm/18mm models and terrain, which will fit nicely in our limited play space and take up much less storage.

Since I'm of limited means and nigh-unlimited time, I've been churning out minis and terrain on my 3D printer. However, there are some things that my little Ender 3 just can't handle. Tiny minis like goblins, kobolds, halflings, etc. are all a bit beyond my current printing ability; I could probably pull it off at 28mm scale, but cutting it down to almost half size really limits what I can do. Enter the fine folks at Splintered Light Miniatures! There are a decent number of companies that make 15mm scale fantasy miniatures out there, but not very many here in the United States. After perusing their catalog, I decided to roll the dice on some models to supplement my collection of antagonists. I ordered a kobold warband, a set of goblin warriors, and a set of goblin archers. I placed the order on May 8th, I think, and they arrived today, the 14th. Pretty good turnaround time, for a small business during a global pandemic! 

The models arrived well packed, in double layered bubble wrap inside of a bubble mailer. Everything is as advertised so far. Time to dig in and see what we've got!

I started with the kobolds. The kobold warband is $18 USD for 25 kobolds in a variety of styles. You get a little champion fellow, a shaman, a couple of crossbows, and a variety of spears, axes, clubs, and other implements of destruction. The detail on these little buggers is pretty damn good for the size (I busted out the digital caliper and measured the wee shaman, and he came out to a positively lilliputian 8.2mm tall!) and there was very little flash to remove. The spear hafts are a little fragile, but they're pieces of white metal the size of a sewing needle, so that's to be expected; part and parcel of working with the medium. Pardon the intrusion of the great white hand, but it provided a far better contrast than the dark table behind it. 

Obviously, that's not all of them; those are just the unique sculpts. Most of them I got two or three of, but the shaman, champion dude, and a couple of the spearmen I think were all unique. 

After satisfying myself with the kobolds, I opened the bag of goblin archers. $8 USD nets you 12 figures, four each of three different poses. These guys are substantially bulkier than the kobolds, averaging around 10mm tall to the top of their little hunched backs. Again, detail is very good for the size - I highly doubt my shaky hands and slowly deteriorating eyesight will be able to make use of it all! I was pleased to see how thick and healthy the bowstaves were, as a lot of archer miniatures tend to think about the aesthetics of the piece first and the longevity of the sticky-outy bits second. These little buggers are substantial and well designed, and should stand up to considerable table time.

Finally, I came to the goblin warriors. Once again, you get 12 models for $8 USD, two each of six different poses with various hand weapons. These guys are a bit more of a motley than their archer pals. They're not quite as chunky, and they're flailing all over the place (which, let's be honest, is what one would expect goblins to do.) That's a good thing, though. It can be hard to capture movement and dynamism at this scale, and Splintered Light did a good job with it.

All told, I'm very impressed with these minis. The detail is superb, the casting is excellent, shipping turnaround was very quick (and would likely be quicker were it not for this blasted virus) and the prices can't be beat. If a model breaks or gets lost, I don't feel terribly bad about paying for "reinforcements" at the rates Splintered Light charges. I have no doubt I'll buy more models from them as I continue to find the limitations of my 3D printer. I am going to have to find some bigger bases to mount them on, however. Those little nubbins they're sitting on now just aren't going to cut it.

Finally, for a sense of scale, here's a kobold with an axe and a goblin archer next to a human sorceress* I made on my printer - from the bottom of her base to the top of her head, she's just over 21mm tall.  

I'm going to prime some of them tonight and see if I can slap some paint on them this weekend. With any luck, this will allow me to focus a little more on using my printer for scenery, rather than churning out bad guys one at a time. It's hard to build up a good collection in a timely manner when you only have one printer working on everything at once, and I think these guys are going to help with that immensely.

* Credit to Arian Croft of Ill-Gotten Games for the sorceress - he gives away thousands of printable model files in both 15/18mm and 28mm for free on Thingiverse. If you need terrain, minis, or even an entire game system or two, check out his stuff.