Vortigaunt alien
~50mm
Vortigaunts are aliens from the "Half-Life" games; Gordon Freeman first meets them as opponents, enslaved troops firing an electrical attack. In the second HL game, we meet free Vortigaunts, and they've joined the human resistance against the Combine's invasion of Earth.
Cyberpunk Chopper and repair bots
28mm
"The future is already here, it's just distributed unequally"
This skilled mechanic and his AI assistants can fix weapons, vehicles, and any high-tech gear you need for your next combat run or burgling Arasaka's core facility or some other near-suicidal heist. Just don't ask him to fix your cyber implants... he draws the line at anything interfacing with human meat.
All Reaper miniatures.
Chthonian and Mi-Go
28mm scale
Drain you of your sanity
Face the thing that should not be
These two Mansions of Madness game figures depict a few of the sanity-draining horrors of the Lovecraftian mythos.
Chthonians are huge creatures that live deep in the Earth's crust, burrowing through rock and communicating telepathically. When they (rarely) emerge above ground, they resemble thick segmented worms with squid-like tentacled heads. They can control humans and other beings telepathically.
Mi-Go are fungal-insectoid alien beings, interstellar travelers that have established a base on the planet Pluto (which they call Yuggoth) to explore our solar system. They are scientifically advanced and are expert bioengineers and surgeons. The Mi-Go abduct and transport humans through space by removing their brain and placing it into a "brain cylinder", a device that maintains its life and consciousness and can be attached to sensors to allow sight, hearing and speech.
Cthulhu Swamp Cult Party Shack
15mm scale
I got me a car, it's as big as a Shoggoth
And we're headin' on down to the Cthulhu shack!
I got me a Chrysler, it can carry a ton
So hurry up and bring your Great Old One!
The Party Shack is made of coffee stir sticks and corrugated cardboard (and a spare LED)... great results! All miniatures are from Khurasan.
"Nekroplanet Grob" is an incredible, spooky, and grimly whimsical sci-fi setting created by Ana Polanšćak, also known as Gardens of Hecate. It's a tomb world of red sand and mysterious ruins, protected by terrifying skeletal automatons and bizarre phenomena. Nevertheless, raiders travel from off-planet to risk everything in search of the treasures of the long-ago tomb-builders...
Tomb Raider
28mm
Raiders arrive on the necroplanet with heavy weaponry, power armor, and advanced scanners, in the hopes of uncovering mysterious and valuable artifacts, and detecting the planet's defenders before they arrive. It's always a deadly game of chance, as weapons and sensor technologies you don't always work the way you expect, and the planet has defenses that even the most skilled adventurers have never encountered before...
An EM4 miniature.
Traveling Hexahedron and Hedral Pillars
Traveling Hexahedrons are black cubes of unknown composition and apparent indestructible nature, which slide across the planet's surface seemingly at random. As they move, they will indiscriminately crush any creatures in their path.
Hedral Pillars exist in sporadic clusters on the planet's surface. They seem to attract traveling hexahedrons, but a space in between at least three pillars is the only place on the surface a creature cannot be crushed by the Hexahedrons' movements.
(The Traveling Hexahedron concept is created by Ana Polanšćak. The Pillars are my idea. Both are created from cheap puzzle toys.)
Nekroplanet Blitzer
The Nekroplanet's Grobnik infantry are lethal and resilient in their own regard, but their heavier support can be truly terrifying. Although Annihilators are more heavily armed, Blitzers move across the treacherous nekrolith at high speed, seeking intruders on their own or rapidly arriving to reinforce Grobniks in battle.
The Blitzer is made from a dollar store Halloween decoration and the wheels for a toy car. And it's definitely inspired by the band Megadeth's mascot "Vic Rattlehead"...
Bounty Hunter and Enhanced Raptor
28mm
Artemisia Kian doesn't use unnecessary violence. But she did choose a career where a lot of violence is usually necessary. Hunting down the scum of the solar system on the run from the law, or their creditors, is just violent work. Fortunately, she doesn't have to do it alone. Her cybernetically-augmented neoraptor partner Belinda is fully equipped both naturally and technologically to track down the most evasive prey.
Artemisia is a Starfinder figure, Belinda is a converted D&D figure.
Pharaoh Eddie
Cyborg Eddie
28mm
There's a time to live, and a time to die
When it's time to meet the maker
There's a time to live, but isn't it strange
That as soon as you're born, you're dying...
These amazing models are from the Iron Maiden Zombicide box set. In addition to a bunch of game cards to use in a variety of different table top games, it comes with six detailed figures of Eddie in his different guises: Pharaoh, cyborg, Reaper, trooper, samurai and undead. And there's a whole other box I didn't get, with six more!
"I don't want to die, I'm a god, why can't I live on?"
Dr. Luwazi Elsebo
Zan usu Zan usu Midaxon
Brett Solaris
28 mm
Well, we had a lot of luck on Venus
We always had a ball on Mars
We're meeting all the groovy people
We've rocked the Milky Way so far
We danced around with Borealis
We're space truckin' round the the stars
I recently finished this fun trio of science fiction figures: very different concepts and designs but I think they'll all fit into my collection nicely. Dr. Elsebo is a Starfinder figure, an explorer and scholar seeking to discover new things and unravel mysteries of the universe. The other two... it's less obvious. I see the non-human Zan usu Zan (Stargrave) as a telekinetic/psionic or Force user, and "Brett" (Ganesha Games) as a neutral-good leaning rogue or freelancer. Like Han Solo... but with a lightsaber.
Astro Princess Warrior
28mm
Must be an alien, swear to god I am
dropped down, from another planet
With her laser jezail, this alien princess warrior is ready to defend her space kingdom from all enemies!
I deliberately went with a highly colorful campy look for this character, because the whole concept is pretty reminiscent of something from Buck Rogers or even "John Carter of Mars". Or... Astonishing Science Fiction.
Slade, Cyborg Hero
28 mm
Man Machine
Pseudo-human being
Man Machine
Superhuman being
I knew I had to add some color accents to this figure, because otherwise he's extraordinarily similar to the DC comics character Cyborg, from the Teen Titans. And since orange is the best color... 😄
Both of these are Reaper Bones miniatures, acquired in my very first expedition to the incredible Meeplemart in Toronto.
Smegatron the Pallid
28mm scale
Once his armor was gleaming and white, now a mass of scraping rust and foul suppurations. On the battlefield he swings a deadly flail, its spiked heads spewing contagious vapors even as they crush his enemies. One chain has snapped, but a helpful Nurgling has leapt up to take its place...
I popped into my local game store a while back and there was, by Father Nurgle's poxy benevolent hand, a single Series 3 Space Marine Heroes box left there. So I bought it. GW blind-boxing these is cynical bullsh*t, but I will not lie, the model is a good one. It avoids most of the problems with plastic sprue figures, and its icky, Nurgley design is uncompromising. I love it!
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| "Scabboth". I chose the other head option and it's definitely better. |
Ogron Foulbreath
35mm
I could not tell what or who was behind the giant helm: man, orc, ogre, or fell thing; alive or undead... but every warrior's instinct told me to fall back, that to fight it head-on would only be madness and death.
This is "Ogron Foulbreath, orc champion" from Citadel's 1983 catalogue. A battered old lead figure I got in a trade years ago; I always wondered where it was from. I always thought his crested helmet and shield designs were really cool. IMO he makes a better Chaos warrior than an orc.
Salamanders Techmarine
28mm
Yours is to heed the machine as others heed their kin. Tend to the war spirits all about, but do so in the knowledge that you do the Emperor’s duty. Without your ministrations, no bolt may be fired, and no enemy slain.
Another old Citadel/GW figure, though not quite as vintage! This Techmarine was one of a group of (in my opinion) really great sculpts that appeared in the 1988+ catalogues. They're simpler and have more character than the overdone modern ones. I have a couple more of these squirreled away from when I could afford to splurge on eBay:
Kisathi Gunslinger
28mm
"If you're gonna shoot, shoot. Don't talk."
I recently entered this figure in a painting contest at my local game store, The Dragon. It didn't win, but I did have a lot of fun conceptualizing the character of an alien spaghetti Western gunfighter and capturing the look I wanted.
His poncho is a piece of "Kimwipes" brand lint-free tissue soaked in PVA glue and paint, and carefully draped over the already-basecoated and shaded figure. I had to paint over it one it was dry, but pre-tinting it saved a lot of work. In the end, I think I created a nicely Clint Eastwood "Blondie"-like character...
The Tenth Doctor
28mm
"Okay, that’s scary."
"You’re scared of a broken clock?"
"Just a bit scared, yeah. Just a little tiny bit. ‘Cause you see, if this clock’s broken—and it’s the only clock in the room…" tick tick tick "Then what’s that? "
I've had this great, but sadly OOP, Heresy model of the Tenth Doctor for a while... and recently I heard that David Tennant was returning to play the Fourteenth Doctor. So, the perfect time to paint this!
With this finished, that leaves only one Doctor model in my unpainted collection... the First. And his young "granddaughter" Susan, both Black Tree Designs models I bought ages ago. Maybe I'll paint those up sooner rather than later. I unfortunately don't have the Second, Sixth-Eighth, or a few of the modern ones. Good thing I'm not a completist ;)
Lord Izlyr and Sssorg, Ice Warriors
28mm
Oh why, oh, why should love ever come
To couples, like you and me
Whose cold, cold wars are never done
The Martian "Ice Warriors" were second tier villains in Doctor Who starting with the Second Doctor. Their first appearance was in a serial where Earth scientists thawed them from beneath glacier ice and they sought to conquer the planet.
I first saw them in the 1972 Third Doctor serial "The Curse of Peladon", which these figures are inspired by. Alien delegates (quickly joined by the Doctor and his companion Jo Grant) are meeting on the planet Peladon to decide whether to admit it to the Galactic Federation. When the Peladon High Priest uses a hidden monster to attack the delegates and prevent the admittance, the Doctor and his companion are suspected of murder. But the Martian delegate Lord Izlyr defends them, telling the Doctor that his people have embraced peace. Along with his underling Ssorg, he helps the Doctor reveal the murderous plot.
The Ice Warriors returned more recently for two episodes, "Cold War" and "Empress of Mars" featuring the Eleventh and Twelfth Doctors.
These figures, from Black Tree Design, sat half-painted in my lead pile for a good fifteen years until I decided to finish them off last weekend. As they say, it's never too late to do the right thing 😄
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| "You came in that thing? You're braver than I thought!" |
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| "But if she's the Earth representative, then who are YOU?" "Gosh, look at the time! Gotta go!" |
