Ships of all kinds!

Well, two kinds anyway.

I've been painting again, and again have some things to show you. This will allow you all to heap upon me the praise which I so richly and obviously deserve. In many ways, this blog could be considered a public service.

Anyway, enough modesty. Let's look at some pictures!

First off, another Shaltari Voidgate for Dropfleet Commander. You may be getting fed up of pictures of these by now, but let me tell you, it's nothing compared to the tedium of painting the things.

This is a new photo, although there's no real way to tell.

Voidgates are an absolute requirement for the Shaltari fleet (they're the only way for the blue hedgehog fellas to land troops, which is the whole point of almost every mission in the game), so you have to have several. However, they're also the most involved model to paint, at least in the colour scheme I'm using.

All of which is to say, sadly, I'm stuck painting several more of these, and you'll have to look at them. Sorry.

All is not lost, however, as I've also painted something new...

...and photographed it badly!

Those are Azurite light cruisers. They have the "Vectored" rule which allows them to make turns at any point during their move, not just the start. Normally, that would only be possible using a course change order and would add a spike to each ship, making it easier to target. So I'm hoping these can be like a stiletto blade slipped neatly between the ribs of the enemy fleet (ooh, that was evocative, wasn't it?). To be honest, if they're useless I'll be somewhat irritated as they've cost me two cruiser sprues (they have to come groups of at least two) that could have been used for something more obviously powerful. Time will tell.

And finally, one last thing to show you...

Ships again, but of a subtly different type

A couple of American Civil War armoured gunboats. I got these the last time we had some interest in Black Powder, which was long enough ago that I can't remember where I got them. However, we've just had a bit of a resurgence of interest, and Pete's acquired a fort. We need a fort and these for the next scenario in the Black Powder ACW book, so it seemed like time for them to make an appearance. Reading the rules, ships in Black Powder seem to be extremely situational (which I suppose makes sense as otherwise they'd be far, far too powerful for the game) so they may never achieve anything, but it makes life a bit more interesting I suppose.

So there you go. Now, onto my scores!

Painted: 86
Acquired: 78

Still seems like I should find something to paint a lot of quickly - we're quite close to me going back into negative painting equity...