The Weekly Top X - A Storm of Links

It's like a regular storm, only instead of rain and hail, you get html links.  And instead of death and/or destruction, you get quality reading material.  Personally, I think its a pretty good deal.

No idea where Brent is, but for the purposes of the story, I'll say that he's probably off chasing information tornadoes with Helen Hunt.  He's crazy like that.

1) Funderhammer - Warming an old gamer's heart | Play a osom game naneed warmosheen
A heart warming tale of family togetherness in the war-torn Iron Kingdoms.  No, really!

2) Rebel's Grotto - Angelic Storm Shield: A Quick Tutorial
Ever looked at your Blood Angels and thought: "Man, they could really use some more angel stuff".  I kid, I kid, this tutorial is actually pretty badass.

3) A Year of Frugal Gaming - Termite Art, Branded Materials, and DIY in the hobby 
Dr. Who, Children's television shows from a far away land and the strangeness that is each gaming companies attempt to ignore all other gaming companies.  Who else but Von?

4) Mid-Life Gaming Crisis - The YTTH Litmus Test... and Tyranids
In which the importance of testing gauntlets is discussed, mental energy is expended on space bugs and many links are shared.  

5) Here be Geeks - Khador Gun Tank WIP: How to Convert Your Khador Gun Carriage
You know what, man?  FUCK horses.  Uh... that came out wrong. 

6) Ave Dominus Nox - When Grey Knights weren't cheesy... 
Ye Grey Knights from ye olden tymes.  Moving up a few centuries- enjoy the  daguerreotypes of the lost tribes of terminators.

7) D6 Gaming - A price increase! What’s it in retrospect!
Stop Whining and pay attention to how much other stuff costs!  Sorry Australia, your issues are dealt with in another castle.   D6 gaming has bigger fish to fry.  Namely North American entitlement.

8) Wolves for the Wolf God - Building the Killzone "Booster Pack" Tables: Part I
Terrain is fun.  In situations like these, its a perfectly reasonable excuse to make the GI Joe playset you always wanted without fighting over who gets Duke this time.

Gaming on a Budget: Making a Gaming Surface Part 1

Greetings everyone.  I've been hard at work on the new gaming table all week and am happy to announce that things are going to schedule!  This is a small miracle in itself, so I'm very excited about the progress of the project.

painting the pink board blue

Part status update and part tutorial, today I'll be talking about making a modular, storeable gaming surface using blue board foam insulation.

**I will be 100% honest and let you all know that I did not actually cut or put sand on the tiles you're about to see.  My friend and band mate Hoagy did the cutting and put the first layer of paint and sand down several months ago in a project that never came to fruition.  That notwithstanding, I can still discuss these early stages of building, but not be able to show any pictures.  The materials used will still appear in my final budget and the process is fast enough that it wouldn't have thrown off my timeline if I had had to cut the tiles myself.**

User Content Wednesday - Assault on Rebeccah Black reach

Thankfully, I don't have to do this all that often, but...  I fucked up again.  It turns out that during a period of tumult and upheaval in the distant past of last month, I forgot to update a blog url in the roles.  So, by way of an apology of sorts, I decided to do some light pimpin' of The Dark End of the Street.  Which turned out to be fantastic since the resident ginger bent on world domination is hilarious.  What follows is the post that appeared on the exact date I forgot to update his URL.  It also happens to be funny as hell.

Games sweatshop have just announced their latest release in the popular Warbastard 40 000 series.

The 6th edition of the game will feature 5001 highly detailed plastic miniatures and - in a potentially confusing and unpopular move - absolutely no rules updates, or amendments whatsoever.

The Dark end of the street was able to catch up with one of Games sweatshop's founders for a few quick words on the hush-hush project:

"Well basically, we were inspired by the general loathing that has been expressed by music fans and random cunts off the internet and that." said the highly respected games designer and father of 2. "We just thought; hold on a minute, here's a chance to do something right AND make fucking tons of money from emotionally retarded men aged 16 - 48 that still play with toy soldiers!"

The premise of Warbastard's latest introductory boxed set features the game's usual army of villains bent on destruction and death. However the designer's of the game's 6th edition have opted to take the system down a hitherto unexplored avenue of wargaming.

"Basically, we've opted to take the system down a hitherto unexplored avenue of wargaming." said one of the game's designers. "While the boxed set features 5000 plastic space urks, (which is almost enough for a squad once you move past the boxed set) we've opted to take the system down a hitherto unexplored avenue of wargaming with regard to their opposing number."

A Question of Balance...

For those of you who are unaware I have certain preferences......

No not those sort of preferences...gaming ones.....

I am the poster boy for shooting things to death from a good safe distance. The more shots the better as far as I'm concerned and if they're high strength ones then all the better.

I adopt the principle that if I roll enough dice at you, then the soul destroying number of saves that I force you to make will mean that you'll roll enough of the 3's, 2's or 1's that I need to make your unit die.

New Member Monday - Macho Nacho Man

So the whole rapture thing was a bust.  For me at least.  Which was kind of a bummer.  I was really looking forward to not having to wade through another week of anti-GW rants from a collection of people who seem to genuinely believe that the combined knowledge from their intro to economics textbook and a handful of sprues qualifies them to run an international corporation.

On a serious note, there are a ton of Harald Camping's followers out there who I genuinely feel sorry for now that they've learned an important (and expensive) lesson about human nature.  Kinda puts this whole pricing thing into perspective, huh?

At least Macho Man Randy Savage will be sparred the ignominy of it all seeing as how it looks like he may indeed have been called to a better place.  The further I get into his Wikipedia entry, the more I'm convinced that we should strive to become like unto him.

New Member Monday

WarFrog's Hobby Blog
Keywords: 40k, Tyranids, Eldar, Bloodbowl, Necromunda, BFG.

The Army Collector
Keywords: Warhammer 40K, miniature painting, Dungeons & Dragons, Victorian Science Fiction

First Blood
Keywords: Pyschic Mermaids, Warhammer 40k, Badminton, Conversions, Firm Handshakes, Orks, Things Crafted from Endangered Species, Red Scorpions, Snorkels & Flippers, World Eaters, Vigorous Fornication, Death Guard, Punching On, Gorkamorka, Watersports (The sexy kind), Necrons, Sunglasses on Animals.

Warflake's 40k Blog
Keywords: Warhammer 40k, Imperial Fistsing, Newness, Suckin' on toes (ooh, sexy time)

Cupboard of Nurgle
Keywords: Warhammer 40,000, Tau, Blog Wars, Old Mother Hubbard

NaughtyBadFun 40K
Keywords: Warhammer 40,000, Dark Eldar, A Man Who Uses Jump Breaks, A new Pinkness (A Challenger Appears!)

The winning essay today is a bit unorthodox.  First Blood picks up the win - not for the actual essay, but for the keywords.  All those jokes are theirs!  We're on the same wave length guys - we should totally meet up somewhere and have hijinks the likes of which are rarely found outside of blockbuster summer comedies.  Also thanks for not making me have to make up a bunch of my own joke keywords to fill space.

[Musings of a Game Store Owner] GW and "the Bubble"

I own a game store. It’s doing pretty well, but I can always improve in some way.


Something I work hard to do is to give my customers a sense of community. My husband and I make serious efforts to build strong relationships. We give our customers as many opportunities to be invested in the store as we can- because we know that if they don’t like what they are getting with us, they can go somewhere else. We want our customers to feel welcome, like they belong to something bigger than just my paycheck. I like to think it’s working, but I know I can’t just “coast”- I have to work hard to keep the store at its best.