I’ve been making huge progress on getting TAG Raid!
I channeled my enthusiasm for Infinity into trying to get the box fully painted, and I’m almost there!
I’m currently slogging my way through the Scenery Pack (which honestly has felt like a HUGE chore) and the Stoorwurm; that’s as fad as I’ll take it for now. I’ll still have 2 more Megabeasts (which I’ll paint if I ever get the game to table) and the Morats (which I’ll paint after I “solve” how I want to paint the new Morat sculpts) to finish.
I missed the hunters when I painted the Nomads and Ariadnan forces, so I had to catch them up when I did the Minerbots and Van Zandt (hence the updated photos).
In getting ready to head to NOVA, I realized I had a few unpainted gaps in what I planned to bring, so I filled those… and then kept going a bit further. I still have more OCF to paint before I have the entire sectorial painted, but at this point it’s just Exrah (blocked while waiting on a replacement bit to find its way to me from Vigo) and alternate loadouts.
Two weeks/three weekends back I decided to do the Infinity OP@Home Painting Challenge to break a couple of slumps (Infinity models, getting anything finished) and here I am: done.
I don’t know that I chose well in choosing the list to paint: constraints here were models I had in-hand, fully assembled but unpainted that I could but into a list. It’s likely I could have chosen a list with fewer models. It’s certain I could have chosen a more viable list. The list I chose met the criteria, though, and seemed worth taking for a spin, at least.
Anyway, I’m done. Hopefully back to wrapping up these dang Skaven models and then on to the next project.
Below are the CA models I’d painted up to run at Rumble and likely Ruckus, had those events not been canceled. They’re not all of the CA models I’ve painted since December (there’s a bunch of painted Onyx models, Unidrons, Xeodrons, Umbra) that I failed to take photos of. These are all models I’d planned to run.
I’ve been frustrated by how to manage my silhouette markers. I’ve got the old Warsenal double-sided ones, stuffed in an empty plastic card box. The S4/S7 marker has some weak magnets in the base and marker component because together it’s just too big to conveniently pack away. I’d considered going back and doing the same to the rest of the markers, decided I’d rather do it with fresh ones, realized Warsenal doesn’t sell the double-sided ones any more, and gave up on that idea.
So, over the weekend, I got into TinkerCAD and worked out a set of markers that could fit into each other to minimize the hassle.
Started out by clustering them into base sizes and considering the volume of the “smaller” sizes as constituent parts of the “larger” ones.
The core idea was that if I wanted an S1, for example, I’d use the S1. If I wanted an S2, I’d flip the 25mm tall S1 marker over and stack the 15mm S2 marker onto it, producing the 40mm tall volume the S2 requires.
Then, assuming they’re hollow (for the smaller sizes to fit in), I iterated over a couple of wall widths that would be sturdy enough but also allow for the smaller base sizes to fit inside. Settled on 4mm wide, but with a 3mm deep x 2mm wide lip. The bottom/top of each was also 3mm, except for the top of the S5, which had to have an additional ring to accommodate the S6 marker. When in doubt, I erred on the side of thickness.
I could have shaved the internal volume of the S5 a bit more aggressively, maybe, but to no point. Although the only wonky thing is that the S1+S2 markers don’t fit perfectly into the S3+S5, there’s no way I could have gotten them to fit perfectly: the base and top would have had to be 2.5mm thick on the S3 & S5, and I think it would have been too risky for the S5. Everything overall does fit into the S4+S7, though, which was the whole point of the exercise.
Infinity has a strong patch culture. Corvus Belli includes several patches in each of their tournament kits, every Real Event has its own patch, and a number of metas and individuals have their own patches.
I’ve had a number of patches produced over the past year. I’m proud of them. Two of them, the ODD patches, were commissioned, but I designed the other two myself if GIMP. These were then produced via The/Studio.
Old Dominion Disagreement 2019 patch
I had a lot of trouble getting the first ODD logo designed. I’d had in mind the Seal of VIrginia, but Infinity-fied. The person I worked with couldn’t be bothered to look at the reference materials, though, so I ended up having to half-assed copy & paste art from some dossiers and saying “make it look like this” so of course, they just traced over that.
Old Dominion 2020 Patch
For this year’s ODD, I reached out to someone who’s designed a number of patches for the Infinity community, Tim Toolen. Minimal adjustments as we went and ended up with what I think is a great design for the patch.
Mid-Atlantic Infinity Weakest Link patch
My first Rumble on Rt 66 was last year, and I was repping Virginia with the legendary Myomer and highly ranked Wattewerfer. I can hang, but I’m not in their tier of play at all. Similarly, of my Maryland friends, Top-10 players Cobraprime and Masterofmelee and… Psybilliah, who also can hang but is in a different tier.
So, we made this patch to demonstrate ownership of our (relatively) weak play.
Beltway Bandit patch
The DMV area has three major Infinity tournaments, now: ODD in February, NOVA Open in September, and Baltimore Brawl in November. I thought it’d be fun to reflect that, so I designed this patch to give to everyone who participated in all three events. For those unfamiliar, this is based on the 495 Capital Beltway sign that graces the beltway that surrounds Washington, DC.
The Dirty Deutsch patch
We have a German stationed here and, while on a tear suggested that the Anaconda is an excellent source of unexpected smoke. That one could cunningly sacrifice an Anaconda to pull of an MSV2 smoke trick. “They never see it coming,” he declared. We declared such a maneuver “Pulling a Dirty Deutsch” and that anyone who performed or was on the receiving end of such a feat would be given a patch commemorating such a ridiculous stratagem. (Fact: it’s been done twice, in both cases to the same person. “The second time, you definitely see it coming,” he says.)
I have no idea why I haven’t posted about The Old Dominion Disagreement here before now. (Actually, I’m quite sure that it’s because November & December have been a fugue-state of overcommitment, but never mind that.)
On February 2, 2019 I’ll be running the inaugural Old Dominion Disagreement (ODD), a Dire States Infinity tournament, and I’m pumped as hell about it. You can find more information about it in the Facebook ODD Facebook group.
This will be the first VA Dire States event, and at 50 players, it should be the largest Infinity tournament in the state. (I’d have expected it would have been NOVA, but no: Dire States must be standalone events and I think we’re on track to edge out the attendance for the 2-day NOVA Infinity tournament.)
On the trip back from the MichiganGT, Wilson/Masterofmelee brought up how we should do a VA Dire States; Baltimore Brawl been running for years and has a 50 person turnout, NOVA’s running at 40-to-70 depending on how you reckon it, and the Huzzah quarterlies have been getting just shy of 30 consistently. I’ve got a little sheet of what, Infinity-wise, is going down in the Mid-Atlantic month-by-month and quarter-by-quarter, and February looked like the least-worst option: turns out there’s a lot going on. It’s falling a little closer to the LVO than I’d like but that can’t be helped: if we have to schedule around events happening two timezones away, we’ll never get to have an event. (We did schedule around Rumble.)
We’re at 50 people, and were full in less than a month.
I’ve gotten an insane amount of help tracking down prize support or the event: Lee/Forbino1, Erick/BMinusCPlus, and Lewis/Myomer have all been hugely helpful in finding companies willing to send us stuff for free or cut us some deals on stuff to put into the prize pool. I don’t think I, personally, have shaken loose a single sponsor (save talking to Huzzah about the support they’re giving us). If you get a prize at ODD, it’s not ’cause I tracked it down for you.
The event goes down just about a month from today. Odds that I post about it here afterwards are… better than not.
Now, we just need to get a PA Dire States up and running, and maybe we can do an MD-OH-VA-PA circuit going like those Four Corners cats.
I painted up a couple of random Nomads & Mercenaries to fill out some options.
Lupe Balboa, obviously.
I needed a second Missile Launcher and Sniper Rifle so I have better options when linking Alguaciles. Also, a fifth Jaguar when running Corregidor.
Khal Drogo to be my third Yuan Yuan (first non-Fat Yuan Yuan)
This is my Raoul Spector conversion: mostly a Bashi Bazouk, with a few bits from a Hellcat to make it feel more like a Nomad. He’ll also fill in as a Yuan Yuan if it ever makes sense for me to run four Yuan Yuans.
A Krakot Renegade. These guys seem really useful, so it’s good I’ve got one painted up.
I also painted up a Xenotech I’m pretty happy with, but he’s got to be held back for the Mayacast thing.
I painted up almost the entire ISS Sectorial in a couple of months leading into NOVA. Right now, I think I have the whole sectorial painted (except for the named bounty hunters and a CSU, I think?).
