Back in the early ’90s, Games Workshop tried appealing to younger generations by releasing simple and self-contained boardgames. Their experiments with the then-revolutionary idea of making wargaming figures out of plastic meant they’d got child-friendly products that didn’t need assembly, or give you colica Pictonum. The rules were badly designed and largely random. All in all, a lot like Dreadfleet.

Kerrunch was a one of a series of four games: Ultra Marines (where you played as, erm, Space Wolves battling the Blood Angels); Space Fleet (spaceship comabt); and Mighty Warriors (which reused the Heroquest concept and models).

Blood Bowl Miniatures

Kerrunch came out after Blood Bowl second edition, and reuses the Orc and Human miniatures from it. They’re joined by the Elf and Dwarf plastics from the Dungeonbowl supplement. And they’re all in lovely bright colours.

It appears the colours varied, I’ve seen Orcs in blue, Humans in green, Elves in yellow. Though I’m not sure which colours are from Blood Bowl, Dungeonbowl and Kerrunch. Do you?

The 6-piece card jigsaw pitch is rehashed from 1st edition Blood Bowl, only on a much thinner card – pictures when I’ve dug out my 1st edition Blood Bopwl pitch to compare it to.

The rules fit on a single sheet of paper, and the miniatures are brightly-coloured – two signs it’s aimed squarely at kids. The central game mechanic firmly establishes the pediatric appeal – throwing the dice into the lid. The box is also a component.

People say 40K has dumbed-down recently – but I have yet to see it with box lid mechanics. I look forward to playing this for kitsch value, both with adult gamers and genuine eight year olds.

Wormito’s Blood Bowl team are a mix different Blood Bowl generations. Knowing my passion for 1980s lead Wormi based the bulk of the team around the classic Jes Goodwin sculpts from Blood Bowl’s second edition. Jes’s work on the Skaven was seminal – the Skaven were the first race he brought to life from scratch. Of particular favourite is the number 9 kicker model (at the front below). Ahh, remember when Blood Bowl had kickers and catchers? There’s a smattering of third edition Gary Morley models, and then a 2010 Warhammer Island of Blood Rat Ogre.

Wormito specified the colour scheme. White?! They’re rats that live in sewers. Blue?! But that’s the Forge Father signature colour! To pull it off I avoided the standard Skaven colour of brown and went for a pale Dheneb Stone fur that’d work with the Astromican Grey plating. I upped the redness in the flesh to provide visual interest. I like doing Goblin Green rims on my own Blood Bowl models, but that’d clash with the blue so I went for muddy brown bases. With brown rims. Mmmmm, brown rims.

Eine Kleine Schlachtmusik will be flying out to Amsterdam for the Blood Bowl NAF World Cup later this month. You can follow Wormito on Twitter, join in his frequent Name That Tune contests and groan at his puns.

This guy’s had some minor conversion work to him. I didn’t attach the shoulder horns that came as seperate pieces, and filed down their mountings. I figured the model’ll be on its side so often that delicate pieces will quickly snap off. Similarily, I bent the tail around in a u shape and glued it to the side of the leg for added stability. It’s already chipped and come off after just three games. Pinning and epoxy repairs are in order, but it’s hidden in the photo.

Problem with this model is that you can only lie it down sideways. Makes it difficult to work out whether it’s knocked down or stunned in gaming terms. But there’s only one of them on the team at the moment so it’s not something you can forget too easily. I want a second since the team’s composed largely of cheap Hobgoblins. With their high movement, Sprint and Sure Feet these guys can pretty much power their way through the opposition and score if you’re lucky enough to have them get a hold of the ball. Which is difficult thanks to their low agility.

I’m going to treat myself to some support staff models after I’ve finished the team. Gaspez‘ve got a lovely Spaghetti Goblin, and a Pizza Goblin. Dammit, and they’ve ust released some little fantasy football lizards they’ve painted in beautiful bright colours.

The Chaos Dwarf himself was done back in November, and I decided it was best to crack on with the least exciting and most numerous models in the team – the Hobgoblins. Now they’re out the way I can enjoy the three remaining Chaos Dwarves, and the centerpiece – the Bull Centaur. I do need to revisit these guys and number them, but I’m unsure if they’d be the low numbers or the high numbers. Any Blood Bowlers out there that can tell me how teams are numbered? Post a comment, or email me at the address right at the bottom of the page please!

The local gaming club took a break over Christmas, releasing that everyone spends Christmas with their families and other non-gaming personages. And when New Year rocks around everyone’s gone cold turkey with their gaming and is desperate to get back. But the heavy snow has frozen us in, and cancelled club night. Just look at the icicles outside my office window.

And bleeding hell, does it feel good to paint rims in the classic Goblin Green.

There’s my finalised scheme in the middle. I did originally do a more caucasian skin, but it looked a bit bland. I remembered the fourth edition Chaos Dwarfs were heavily influenced by the Persian Empire, so I experimented with darker tones (a la 300). And then, rather than classic Red Era red, I settled on a pinkish hue that makes them look evil and dedicated to Hashut, while also retaining an air of foreign decadence. (Oh dear, it sounds like I’m reviewing a wine or something.)

I bought the starter team as I’m largely oblivious to how to build an actual team. It seemed balance. You get four Chaos Dwarf blockers, and two of them had sillily small helmets that are actually smaller than the heads they enclose (compared to the unhelmeted models). It seems one of the tropes of miniatures. Here’s the official Gaspez Arts studio photograph of what it looks like uncoverted

I clipped off the horns and bulked out the helmets with Brown Stuff. I’m just experimenting with horns at the moment from plastic Chaos Warriors. I want little forward-facing horns but I can’t find any in my bits box.

And instead of finishing off the team we went to a Halloween house party last night. My housemates made quasi-pumpkins out of some spare black gem squashes we had around. They’re little black mini-pumpkins we bought but had no idea how to actually eat.

And one of the other attendees had carved this awesome geek pumpkin.