Claymore 2013

I attended Claymore 2013 yesterday, so these are just my thoughts, impressions and a list of the items that have been added to the lead mountain, resin foothills and plastic lake.

Just before I start on the report, it's worth noting that the first GoblinAid sculpts are up. Excellent figures and a cause well worth supporting. Go buy some, then come back and finish reading this post. I'll wait...

My brother-in-law couldn't make it this year, so I was left to the mercy of public transport and the horror of Edinburgh on the first full day of the Edinburgh Festival (imagine one of the huge battle scenes from Lord of the Rings:Return of the King and you're fairly close).

I wasn't going for anything in particular, which is always dangerous, and so it proved yesterday...

Figures

I picked up the Wargames Factory Apocalypse Survivors: the Men set. I'd been avoiding it for a while, as it has had mixed reviews. However, the sheer number of weapons with it (albeit of a limited variety) almost make it worth it. Annoyingly, the crossbow isn't supplied separately, so I'll either have to use the arm it's attached to or make another stock piece from plasticard.

From the same stand I picked up Renedra's Ramshackle Barn in 28mm, and the Dreamforge (also Wargames Factory) Stormtrooper accessory set. This set has three cargo mules that will come in handy for my starport scenery. It also has a lot of extras for their Stormtrooper set. Unfortunately, that set did nothing for me, so I'll hopefully find a use for more stick grenades than you can shake another stick grenade at.

I bought some dead livestock (deadstock?) from Warlord Games, along with some Creeping Jeepers from Midlam Games (the link explains what they are). They're not a company I'd heard of before, but some of their stuff looks interesting.

Next up were some figures from 4A Miniatures - Hale and Pace SF Mercs and Snow Trooper Set 1. I'm not sure that they're going to be painted up for a snowy environment, but definitely some sort of wilderness colour scheme will be involved.

Last up for the figures were some cultists from Artizan Designs.

Scenery

In addition to the barn above, I picked up an Aztec Altar from Ral Partha and a knight sarcophagus for my demon apocalypse scenery. To feed my 1:300 addiction, I got a couple of 1:300 science outposts.

My starport project got the addition of an Ainsty Trolley Train (I nearly bought some of their buggies, but I'll leave that for next year). I also got their wrecked robot scenery piece and some plastic kegs. They had the Wickerman piece whose build was shown on the Lead Adventure Forum, but I don't have a need for it at the moment.

Paints

Usual handful of paints picked up. It looks like Vallejo are doing a glaze line now, which I wasn't aware of. I picked up their black and brown glazes, so it'll be interesting to see how they handle.

Vehicles

I've wanted a Games Workshop Stormtalon Gunship for a while, but it's been way too expensive. My rule, however, has always been that if I found it at a show for 20% off, then I'd buy it. Darn me if I didn't find one at 20% off. It's been added to the pile, so yet another piece for me to practise on with my airbrush (I have mentioned it before, but I suck at vehicles, so I'm hoping an airbrush will help. Trust me when I say it can't make it worse).

Last purchase was a Pig Iron Ironside MBT. I already have one (as yet unpainted, see note on sucking above), so this will hopefully push me to do something with them. Annoyingly, it is missing one of its hatches. I may be able to fake something with plasticard, but failing that, it's quite a lot of cash to replace something that should have been there (I feel an email may be required).

I had a wander back round the halls, looking at the display games. There were loads to choose from, including a couple of Star Wars X-Wing Miniature Games. However, as I'm trying to avoiding getting into this game, I carefully avoided them.

One problem I found with a lot of the games was that there was nothing to say what the game was. In most cases this was fairly easy to deduce, but I'm still not sure what a couple of them were meant to be. Even some flyers lying around would have helped, but there was nothing.

I stayed a couple of hours, but spent way more than I had expected to (didn't I say it was dangerous to have nothing particular in mind at these events). Edinburgh had got an order of magnitude busier by the time the bus fought its way back to Princes St. The train, however, was remarkably quiet (and on time), which was pleasant (and surprising given their recent record).

So that's me all showed out for another year, now I just have to make a start painting the stuff.