Confrontation Goblin Archers

I present 3 Confrontation Goblin Archers by Rackham (long out of production). I have had these lads on and off the painting table for ages. 

These are lovely figures with lots of detail. I hope I have done them justice - not sure if I have over done the skin highlights. I have to varnish these - do I use the gloss varnish like the rest of goblins or do I use the matt varnish? 

So on to something else now!

Morts

Twilight Imperium 2026 - Thunders Edge Expansion

The annual trip to Kernow for the Collective’s Twilight Imperium game took place, with the latest expansion Thunders Edge. This expansion added some new features - a rift/fracture section of the galaxy, alliances and new factions. Allegedly the expansion should make the game quicker, so Snake-eyes had decided to play to 14 points  … I was not so sure.

We did the usual trip to Strawberry Fields for breakfast and and picked factions, off a dice roll. I picked first - but then had the last pick of the alliance and slice of galaxy.

Morts - The Ral Nel Consortium (orange)

Steedo - The Firmament / The Obsidian (yellow)

Sylon - The Titans of Ul (black)

Snake-eyes - The Arborec (green)

DK - The Deepwrought Scholarate (red)

We then picked alliance factions - where if we conquered their home world we picked up the abilities of that faction hero or commander … can’t remember which.

Below the starting point (approximately noon). Everyone is ready to play … nicely. Surprisingly I managed to get the first breakthrough to find Thunders Edge ( this unlocked at faction specific trait that helped build up action cards in my case), unfortunately I wasted a few rounds not quite getting enough bits to actually win the planet - d’oh. I also revealed the fracture and its access points in my first action … didn’t go there until much later in the game.

Turn 2 - we have some controversy - I checked with another player that I could produce some infantry by activating one system, then pick them up with ship passing through. However on trying to carry this out, was this is not correct. There was then some discussion about if I could carry this out, as I had planned for this over a number of rounds - the decision was that for this game, there would be house rule which would allow this. I appreciated Sylon’s intervention here. 

Sylon and DK were working well together - to be fair DK was refreshing commodities for everyone, although not truly altruistically (as he could get tech and in some cases co-existence. Steedo was trying to work out his complicated faction and Snake-eyes made a run on Mecatol Rex!

Turn 3 - I was on Mecatol Rex - I was feeling a bit stretched. Snake-eyes had moved off after all of his infantry had been “weeded” off (the Arborec are a plant based race, which grow infantry) Mecatol. 

However as the turn ended things were looking ok - I might take the 8 card again to see if I could score a few more points. Sylon’s Titans were a growing power - with DK leaching off co-existing off his advances. 

In the Status part of the turn there was an agenda to be voted on which was FOR, (Against nothing happened)if the Speaker (Snake-eyes) rolled high (there was an issue here) everyone would get a tech upgrade or if he roll low everything in Mecatol Rex was wiped off the board, and every hex around Mecatol had to lose 3 ships. 

Now I expected that any reasonable person would see that voting against was the RIGHT thing to do - however the rest of the collective are obviously not reasonable. This coupled with Snake-eyes inability to roll high when he should meant that I lost the ships, mechs, pds, and infantry in the insert. Basically I was shafted! To quote Hudson in Aliens  “Game over man!”.

The start of turn 3 or 4 … doesn’t matter, what was the point of continuing to play … the others had fighters to sacrifice to the hideous and nefarious action they had chosen to enact … DK was on Mecatol. Snake-eyes was fungally growing dreadnoughts and Steedo was doing his usual … “don’t look at me, I’m not a threat”. 

I was not a threat - just trying to rebuild. 

Mid game scoring - DK opening up a bit of a lead. This was after 6 hours of play - 14 seems a long way off. 

Losing track of turns - Sylon and Snake-eyes have clashed over Mecatol and are both weakened for a bit - DK has started building a monument - a victory point after three turns … but could become more, so was protecting than. Steedo’s faction had done its swappy thing and shockingly he was spreading across the board. I was working on recovering from the underhand backstabbing I had been in the receiving end of…

At this point Sylon and myself were out over the running for a win or top 3 placing - DK was 2 points away from victory, so Snake-eyes and Steedo went in full “stop the win” mode. 

Steedo when for removing DK’s planets (the earlier house rule then worked against DK much to his annoyance), while Snake-eyes tried to remove DK’s legendary planet in the fracture which was worth a victory point. Sylon made a run on Mecatol and took it , while I took a planet (and victory point) in the fracture - which was nice. 

DK was just having to bat off the attacks as he had a target on his back. 

We had some more controversy, where DK didn’t hear when Steedo ask for the secondary action to get a secret agenda - DK couldn’t understand why he wasn’t allowed to pick one from the deck. The reasoning was that we had picked in order. If DK had picked first (which he should have) it would have changed the agendas for the rest of us (the one I had would have gone to Snake-eyes and it suited his faction). 

Back to the game and Snake-eyes managed to roll high and managed to wrestle the planet off DK - who was 1 point short of victory (22:40 to 00:50 off the photo time stamps) … would we play another round?

Then in the status phase the monument received another commodity, which increased it to 2 victory points and DK won! 

So after all of Steedo and Snake-eyes efforts DK’s victory had been inevitable from 2240 …

It was over after 13 hours (much to Sylon’s and my relief as we had been out of the running for about 3 or 4 hours).

End of game score board.

Congratulations to DK on a hard fought win!

A quality but long day - I definitely think that we need to stick with 10 points - a big thanks to Snake-eyes for hosting and a lovely curry and DK for driving Steedo, Sylon and Myself down to Kernow. 

Morts

Drakon Rider - Painted

This Mantic games Drakon rider - with some additions - GW Elf head and lance shaft - press moulded chain mail skirt from a Ral Partha elf. The additions were made so he fits in more with the rest of the elf army. 

Overall happy with this - I have 2 more Drakons and they’re riders to paint. And the Drakon Lord … and everything else!

Anyway I have finished something so perhaps the painting mojo is coming back!

I have had some more mischief just arrive, so will show that later. 

Morts

Happy New Year and all that

As the title says happy new year for 2026, apologies for the late start to this year’s blog … still suffering with motivation - I did think I had sorted that after our new year travels. 

So since the last blog we have been to visit my brother’s family in Denmark (no claims of sovereignty there). A jolly splendid time we had there too!

We had a wander around Roskilde and found Kelsor game shop (where my brother and nephew picked up some paint and Raven guard) and the cathedral.

The following day we had a walk along the beach and …

… found a Danish fort from WW1 - Mosule - which they they weren’t involved in, although they did give the name to the largest naval battle of the war. It was closed, but looks if they do some educational stuff in the summer. I do like a good fort!

While in Denmark we played a few games - Skip Bo - a fun card game, mainly luck based but good fun. We also played a couple of Deckscape “escape room” card game. We played the fate of London and curse of the sphinx - while the games were good fun, although some of the clues were too complicated, cryptic and just silly which did take the edge off of the experience. We might try the Kosmos Exit games to see if they are better. 

The sunset on New Year’s Day. New Year’s Eve was a demonstration of how much money the Danes are willing to spend on fireworks - a good 40 minute display at midnight from private households in a small town … sorry no pictures was too busy going Oooo and Arrr trying to stay warm. 

My nephew has got into 40k and was keenly painting his Christmas presents of Shark Daddy and carcharodons space marines from Majorminis. A very neat painter he is too. When I got back I did make a little progress on a Drakon and the Confrontation Goblins. So I picked up a little inspiration. 

Steedo and my good self also managed a game of Raiders of the North Sea with BUTR (boy up the road) and his good lady … a tight win for Steedo and a close game overall. 

Out on the moor this weekend and the annual Twilight Imperium game the next … all go here now we are back to work. 

Morts