Comte Vendredi

Comte Vendredi
Villain, Support, Level 2, Mystery 
40 mm

It has been far too long since my last painted Pulp City mini. I can only apologise!

Comte Vendredi is a minor spirit who has grasped power within the Coven, with particular mastery over the ranks of the Dead Guard. The mini depicts the tiny entity atop the shoulder of a Dead Guard host/platform.

In game terms, Comte Vendredi is a formidable and very durable Level 2 Support, especially when compared to comparable Level 2 Support models in other Factions.

I knew in general terms how I wanted to tackle Comte Vendredi as soon as I saw the mini, however when I started painting it my choice of green felt wrong, and that stalled motivation, until I over-painted the green with a different shade at a much later date, and I knew then how I wanted to proceed.

Comte Vendredi is the 120th Pulp City mini that I have painted. I have just today done a little projection of how many more minis I will need to paint to paint everything currently available now and due with the Kickstarter, plus a couple more duplicates, and it looks like I have a whopping 70 or so minis to go - let alone what future plans we have for further out! I really must start finishing more Pulp City minis much more quickly!

Grimmancer (2)

Click to enlarge-icate

After the Fall, the Grimm have changed. They have grown more powerful, and increasingly there are new enclaves that have been found under the city’s boroughs.

Not my best work, but this has sat unfinished for months, so I was determined to get him out of the painting queue at the weekend. I actually enjoyed finishing the mini more than the preceding stops and starts which may explain why I was able to finish him quite quickly (I say quickly; that is relative to the months of stagnation on the work!).

In the current edition Grimm are a Minion or Resource option; in the SE version expect them to change and be something more, even though it may be a while before they re-appear fully. Be sure that they are not gone though!

Getting this one done has reignited my enthusiasm so I hope I can finish a few more Pulp City minis in June; I have 3 Terror Cotta Warriors and Night Fright & Leech part painted so they need to be my priorities.

Before they appear though, expect another Pulp City minis post or two in the next few days...

Tanuki

Outside of the closed ranks of the Jade Cult, Tanuki’s origin is veiled in secrecy, and even within that terrible society few know the truth. One of the Jade Cult's mysterious spirit-oni’s, Tanuki is probably the least loyal of that kind, even if ultimately he is the only one that recognizes that fact.

My third of a planned four Super-November minis, Tanuki has been a long time in coming, although not so long in painting!

I started this just after the launch of this shared challenge with Rob, and the bulk has been painted in the past few days. I found it quite an enjoyable mini to paint, with nice areas and textures to work on. That said, with my new job (I say new; been in post two months), I do not get much day-time to paint in, so Tanuki has mostly been painted at night, which has played havoc with the dark greens, so if anything looks a bit ropy, I blame the lighting! Ahem...

This is the first Pulp City mini for my own collection for quite some time. In game-play Tanuki is very much a Support Supreme, there to help his Team-mates through his unique Actions; he certainly has his own little niche, and is quite unlike any of the other Jade Cult.

With the Terror Cotta Warriors and Green Emperor on the horizon Jade Cult is near to be able to field a sizable Team.

I do think this is a really fun mini, and one I probably enjoyed painting and that I am happier with than any other this year.

I have veered away from my usual Villain colour motif (good old purple!), but hey, the Team is called the Jade Cult after all!

Next up for Super-November? Well that would be telling...

Riposte

Click to embiggenify.

I am glad this one is done. It has been a pain in the behind for me to be sure. Firstly my planned colour scheme just did not look right, and secondly I dropped it (maybe a couple of times), which necessitated repairs to re-fixing the sword arm and the mini to the base.

I like the model, and my end result is okay, maybe, but this particular painting experience has been frustrating at times - mainly due to my own clumsiness. I really like this sculpt by James Van Schaik, but it has nonetheless been an awkward process.

Oh well, done now. The original colour scheme had been intended to be a deep purple (which I kept) contrasting with a paler lilac or similar. the colour choice was influenced by Marvel Comics' the Swordsman, a former Avenger (so a complement to the Hawkeye them for Arquero). I just could not get a satisfactory colour for the lighter tone, so ended up with the blue-grey type colour here which works better I feel.

In game terms Riposte is no combat monster. Instead she is very much a finesse Supreme with Actions that benefit from considered use and planning - maximising benefits can require a little forethought and calculation by the player using her.

Dr Red

Some beings are born to be leaders. The problem of Ape Revolution Committee is they have a few too many alphas in their ranks.

When Channel 4 mentions the bravado actions of A.R.C., Guerilla is usually the one mentioned. But only a few outsiders are aware that most of the progress made by the primates in the last years was sparked by the twisted mind of the alpha orangutan, the self proclaimed Dr. Red. Although his first attempt to take over the group while still in the space ended up with Guerilla beating him to a bloody pulp, Red mastered the art of patience.

Took a long time this one, it really did. Base colours were splashed about with hairy stick abandon when I was gripped with some great momentum, and as is always the way with momentum, it petered out...

Work on Dr. Red started many months ago, when I saw a short-lived resurgence of focus, and then he essentially got pushed further down the painting queue, generally in favour if some minis that were simple, or perceived to be simpler, to paint. I finally knuckled down slowly over the past week or so to occasionally dab some acrylics to the thing, and I have to say I am moderately pleased with how he turned out. Yes his power glove device could have benefited from a free-hand red star or some such, but lacking the confidence to pull of a weathered look to such an option as I would choose, I instead shied away from doing so. There are some parts that have or will be touched up a bit further before varnishing.

Dr. Red offers some useful Team-building options: Tactician 1 (adding AP) and a couple of Actions specifically intended to aid or buff other ARC members, and his Team Power can also offer help. He offers some ranged attack options with Throw Then Think, and Weapons Crate - if taking this Resource, seriously consider also taking Guerilla, Howler and/or Gentleman (with an ARC majority) to maximise benefits. Lastly, he can even stand up to moderate close combat attacks fairly well, so he is a good all-rounder.

Grimmancer

Grimm seem to be evolving much faster than other species. Creatures are able to adapt themselves to specialized functions within their society.

As with the Hulking Grimm and Grimm Digger, the Grimmancer was sculpted by Christian Danckworth. I think he did a great job on all three and I hope that future Grimm are sculpted by him. Looking at the concept art for as-yet-unreleased Grimm in the Guide, there could be some fun minis forthcoming in the future.

Gemini Y

Master Caste - Gemini: Twisted and broken. Gemini X and Y are Ulthar's only known psychics.

They [the Ulthar] embody every damn stereotype of an alien we had before: green, funny language, high pitched voices. Even their ships look like flying saucers!

The other half of the Gemini pair, Gemini Y was painted at the same time as Gemini X for obvious reasons. As I suggested in the Gemini X post, I hope to maintain the regal purple theme, and will see if I can incorporate the yellow elements as well to really draw the minis of the Ulthar together as they are finished in good time - I currently have 2 more Ulthar to paint, as well as one of their subjugated species (a Taurus; still counts as Ulthar Sub-faction).

As with Gemini X, I did find my painting of this mini difficult; the results are satisfactory for gaming, and I accept the final results since I am far from being a perfectionist, but sometimes one wishes that something was just simply better in its execution.

As an aside, the bases I am using for all my Ulthar are from Dragon Forge. They are from the Lost Empires range, painted to match the colours I use for my urban bases. I just thought it would add to the alien-ness of the minis to have a distinct set of bases. I ordered them months ago in anticipation of painting the Ulthar, and was pleased I did so.

Gemini Y offers Actions that concentrate on limiting enemy capability, in contrast to the focus on battlefield control that Gemini X has. In this regard, if pushed to suggest which is 'better', then if playing in a more aggressive style I would probably go with Gemini Y, whereas if playing in a more defensive style Gemini X may offer better value. of course in an ideal situation it may be better to take them both and maximise their capabilities.

Gemini X

The Ulthar are a warlike race of aliens travelling to Earth through Quantum Holes.

Master Caste - Gemini: Twisted and broken. Gemini X and Y are Ulthar's only known psychics.

One of a pair (along with Gemini Y), Gemini X is a Level 1 Villain from the newly emerged Ulthar Sub-faction. The Geminis can be used together or separately, but really benefit from synergistic rules that each has. Gemini X offers a healing Action, Actions for battlefield control, as well as synergies with Gemini Y.


The Ulthar offer something quite different in Pulp City, in that most of the Sub-faction Supremes have a Nature Origin, giving a different slant on Team construction. The other villain Sub-factions have thus far been dominated by Mystery Origins, resulting in a slight disadvantage against Science Teams (such as Heavy Metal).





I struggled a little with the mini, as I have been with my painting in general in the last couple of months (except for the Hulking Grimm which was nice and simple to paint). The purple colour used for the robes will hopefully feature on each Ulthar mini I do, and I will try and maintain similar flesh-tones across the Ulthar (although not all Ulthar Supremes are of that species...) to try to tie them together.

Virus

Subject 046 appears to be highly interested and proficient with hand-held electronic games.

A long time before the shuttle crash, Virus mastered all the primitive electronic games the 80’s could muster.

Virus is really intended to be used as a partner to his companion Apebot. Since I procrastinated for a long time in finishing Apebot, that had the knock-on effect that Virus was left only undercoated for quite some time.

I wanted to step away from my usual Pulp City palette, so the green shirt made sense, with light brown/buff coloured cargo pants. What I am doing with the ARC minis is to include some black on each of them as a unifying motif (Chimp Chi has black garb; Howler a black shirt; etc).

In the end it was quite a quick paint job that I ma reasonably pleased with. That said, I don't know when i will game with him, since I only tend to use Chimp Chi if playing with an ARC, but I may try an all-ARC Team soon.

Sanguine and Draku

Guillaume Sanguine, the French entrepreneur, whose blood thirst extends far beyond just the business, visits Pulp City.

I really enjoyed painting Sanguine and Draku - opting for simple colour schemes (including the flashes of purple to tie them in with many of my other Villains); the net result was that they were painted pretty quickly having obtained them from Maciej at Salute 2010.

Sanguine offers quite a few team-building options: he can be fielded as either level 1 or Level 2 (and the Level 1 option can potentially upgrade mid-game!), and he has the Necroplane allegiance, which he can drop thanks to the nifty new Freelancer skill. Basically that means he can work in either currently available level 3-led Villain sub faction - unaligned (Mysterious Man) or Necroplane (Dr. Tenebrous).

The minis are sculpted by James van Schaik, and I think he did a superb job on both. The posing is really suitable for a vampire, and the costume has arguable nods to comic-book characters like the Crow. James has sculpted a lot of the line and I think his work has been of a superb standard.

Draku offers a Minion that can hang around the game with decent HP (for a Minion) as well as having HP recovery, and to cap it all, if he is taken out, Sanguine gets mad and adds a bonus to all of his Action Rolls. Add to that that I think the model is incredibly cute, and perhaps best of all is that it is modeled on and named for the dog belonging to Maciej, the game's originator.
I believe the art on his Minion card is taken from a picture of the real-life Draku.

As a Pulp City SE update, Sanguine is a Support Supreme and Draku is a Tank Minion; a great little combination.

Nuclear Jones

Once upon a time, in the darkest alleys of Newport, two brothers led the sinful life of crime and terror. Such were their feats that the watching eye of the Mysterious Man turned their way and he nominated them the ambassadors of his evil empire in Pulp City. The goons became his trusted lieutenants, but when Heavy Metal invaded Kodo Island, the kingpin didn't hesitate and unleashed the brothers, side by side with his monstrous creations. The rampaging dinosaur, tore the goons to pieces before the might of C.O.R.E. stopped him. One of the brothers was beyond help, but the other still lived, and the heroes retrieved him from the island. To sustain his life, his body was rebuilt upon the small atomic reactor, the nuclear heart. Thus Nuclear Jones was born, half-man, half-machine, with a debt of returned life to be paid off.

Sculpted by James van Schaik, Nuclear Jones is the heroic antithesis of Nuke. On opposing sides, neither is really able to harm the other so they can cancel each other out, yet both are very dangerous in their own right.

I really enjoy James van Schaik's sculpting, and this mini is no exception. I am glad he has more upcoming Pulp City projects (Kitty Cheshire for example), and with minis such as Nuclear Jones it is increasingly possible to aim for a more 'spandex-y' looking team. One of the great things about the range is the eclectic nature, so much so that various themes are available to hobbyists.

I may re-photograph this model at some point as the lighting makes it appear darker than I would like, but that said I was fairly pleased with the painting, particularly on the NMM (Non Metallic Metallics) parts of the mini, as well as the OSL (Object Source Lighting). I have not yet perfected either technique, but I hope I am improving.

Xenobi

Malicious, vulnerable to his own unstable mutations, he may be a goofy little mutant reject, but he can kick some hero butt too.

The first and only model I have painted this year - my self-imposed painting challenge isn't going as quickly as hoped! I just wanted to get something done and couldn't spray up anything new due to recent snow. In addition I had ground to a halt painting two big models, so wanted to finish something. In hindsight I may touch up a few places before varnishing, but I find the outcome at least to be fairly agreeable.

Sculpted by James van Schaik, this is a tiny little model, which may not be wholly obvious at first, so I wanted a base that raised him up a tad. A fun little model that I look forward to suing in games.

Trail

Trail doesn't have a single damage dealing Exclusive Action. His Traits on balance may be described as mediocre. Neither of those is the issue when it comes to taking him in a Hero team. He can take over enemy Supremes, bump the team's Action Pool and deceive enemies in more than one way.

I loved this mini from the moment I first glimpsed it. Why? The big cape. A big cape done well is a rare thing in my view, even in the supers miniatures genre. The Pulp City range has a couple of real contenders, and Trail is among them. James van Schaik did a tremendous sculpting job on Trail in my view.

I love the mix of spandex allusions (cape and mask) with regular clothes. I knew early on what I wanted to do colourwise, basing the palette across a spectrum of red-purple-blue which I think work nicely as a trio, while hopefully suggesting some mystery and possibly even menace through the colour selection. And yes, this is a good guy!

Trail is one of my favourite Hero models from the game, from concept and background through to sculpting. The model is a great little 'canvas' allowing for some real creativity. I have seen some very inventive versions of the model painted by other hobbyists, so maybe pop by the Pulp City forums to see some other great examples.