As I slowly get back into my model making and wargaming hobby I have been looking for new and interesting projects to sink my teeth into. I was contacted by Nick Fatchen and asked if I would like to review his Kickstarter Project called Future Worlds Landscape, and this seemed like a perfect little project to get me moving again.
The tiles clip together with a firm push and grip tightly, but also come apart easily, when you need them to.


The clips push into slots in the sides of each tile and these line up perfectly, with each different configuration.

Underneath the hills, there are extra supports that hold them up. These also hold the tiles together for added rigidity. I have only printed the 1" pieces, but there are also larger ones for the higher hills.






I had hoped to have a few more printed and have them painted for this review. As that hasn't happened we will have to make do with the painted examples from the Kickstarter page (which can be seen at the top of this article and also below).





Personally, I am not to keen on the paint job on these examples as I think it highlights the edges of the tiles, however, as this is promoting the tile system, that is probably the intention.

The detail on the tiles is fantastic, and really captures the different textures of the scenery. I was really impressed by this once I had the actual tiles in my hands.

The process of 3D printing this system is not a fast one, and there is a certain amount of clean-up involved. Although the clean-up should be minimal as the files are designed to be printed without any support material. Mine were done with support material as the guy that runs our printers felt they needed it. I will be doing the next lot without, both for speed and to save filament.

I must admit, I think this isanm excellent system and I am looking forward to getting more printed to build some nice big and versatile layouts...

My post about my terrain build for Frostgrave dried up a bit, earlier this year. The main reason was that I landed a job to sculpt one of the monsters for the Cthulhu Wars expansion from Petersen Games.

I haven't been able to say much about it until now. However, Petersen Games have added a photo of the mini to their Kickstarter update, so I can finally let it all out...

The Librarian of Celaeno is a big beastie, the round plinth that she is standing on is around 80-90mm across.


The plinth with the piles of books was supplied by Fenris Games (the manufacturer of the minis).












I really enjoyed this sculpt, it is amazing how easy it is when you don't have to work within the restrictions of human, or known animal anatomy.

I have just come across the Winterdale Kickstarter campaign.

The rewards for the campaign will be downloadable files that can be printed off as many times as you like and assembled to produce various different building.

It sounds like a great way to assemble sturdy characterful scenery, assuming you have access to a 3D printer of course! These seem like a perfect solution for Frostgrave players.

The basic reward is a versatile cottage or fantasy house and bridge.


Second up is a tower and three trees.


The third level reward are components for a city or castle wall.


Finally the castle upgrade gives a gatehouse, draw bridge and more bits and bobs to finish off the castle.


There are several very interesting stretch goals, but to my mind the goals have been set very high and my not be achievable, although I hope they they are as I am a backer...

Check out the campaign here!

I also worked in some more detail on the figure, tidying things up and getting a bit of contrast to bring out the detail.


The skin tones on the rider also got a lot more detail and tonal work. Once I have finished these figures, I will get some better photos that don't bleach the paler colours.


I am happy with the finish on the warbear now. The colour scheme on the rider is simple, but the tonal work brings it out quite well.


Now that the figure is finished I have moved on to detailing the base. I painted the earth a darker shade and have also dry brushed the slate to bring out some of the detail.

As a bit of a break from my ongoing Frostgrave terrain project I have just started painting a couple of new miniatures.

Rich at Dead Earth Games has sent me a couple of sample castings from their Warbears and Stagriders Kickstarter campaign, which starts on the 1st of November. I had offered to paint a set up for him.

The two pieces are a stag rider and a bear rider. Firstly lets take a look at what you get.

It is worth pointing out at this point that Dead Earth Games miniatures are true 28mm, so they may seem a little small compared to some of the modern 32mm scale minis. However, I like them at this size and they are beautifully detailed.

The stag rider comes in eight parts. The rider with a separate left hand holding a spear and of course the stag, which is cut into six part (body, head, two legs and two antlers). The casting is very crisp (these are early casting so you would obviously expect no less). The legs fit very nicely onto the stag as does the rider. The stags head needed a little work (to remove the locating pin), bt once that was done it was a perfect fit.
The spear hand and antlers both had very small areas for the glue surface so these were a little more challenging, but nothing that a bit of patience (and Zip Kicker) couldn't sort out...


The bear rider kit comes in seven parts, four parts for the bear and three for the rider. Once again a nice crisp casting. All of the parts fit very nicely. The bear has two separate legs. Once glued these do need a little filler to hide the joins, but nothing unexpected. The bears lower jaw is the fourth part and this finishes him off nicely. The rider fits smoothly onto the bear and is finished off with a right arm holding a raised sword and a flowing cape on his back.


I assembled both beasts first and finished them off with some liquid greenstuff.


As these are samples they were not supplied with bases. So I had a play around. The stag could fit onto a 40mm base, but the bear really needs to be on at least a 50mm base, however, I felt that the heroic nature deserved something a little special so I used a couple of 100mm discs of 4mm MDF and built them up with cork and slate. On top of the cork/slate I slapped on a generous layer of textured modelling paste and left them to dry. This took a good 24 hours (and even then it was abit soft in the middle).


Once the bases had set I played around with positioning and then glued the figures in place. As you can see in this photo I had also under coated the figures with a grey primer (my preferred colour).


On to painting. I have started giving the figures and beasts a base colour, before moving on to detailing.


The stag is going to be a basic reindeer colour scheme.


With the bear I have decided to go for a Polar Bear. It may be a bit more of a challenge than a brown or black bear, but I think it will be slightly more dramatic.


With both beasts coming from cooler climates I think I am going to do the bases with some snow on them.

Look out for the next instalment very soon.

I have just found this Kickstarter project!

Anatomy for Sculptors looks like an amazing book and extremely useful for any figure sculptor.




I've backed (without hesitation)! As I write this there are only a few hours left on the Kickstarter, so I suggest that anyone interested moves quite quickly!