Unboxing: Oathsworn Miniatures: Burrows & Badgers - New Blood

I was aware that Kickstarter campaigns could run for varying lengths of time, but it wasn't until Boxing Day that I realised that a really short campaign could do surprisingly well.

Why Boxing Day? Well, that was when Oathsworn Miniatures ran their New Blood Kickstarter for their Burrows & Badgers line - and ran it for just 24 hours.

The combination of the two things struck me as a bit odd - you'd expect potential customers to be busy on Boxing Day with family affairs, while most Kickstarter campaigns rely on the first and last 2 or 3 days to raise the bulk of their funds. Stripping a campaign down to 24 hours, especially on Boxing Day, felt like it should've been a disaster.

Instead, the micro-campaign was a roaring success, funding in less than 20 minutes and eventually raising nearly nine times the initial funding goal from over 300 backers. I'm still not sure exactly how they did it, but I recently received the fruits of the campaign, so I reckon it is time to take a look...

Tor Gaming - Death from Above

The Relics C'thu range keeps on growing - Gav¹ still has several codes from the initial C'thu line to release, and this month it was the turn of the Vesparther. Given I'm working on a C'thu army, alongside my Britanans, I pre-ordered them, and was fortunate enough that Gav was feeling generous, as I got them a little early.

While this is the third time I've reviewed a C'thu figure, I'll give you a quick recap - Relics is a skirmish game produced by Tor Gaming², a small company based in Sheffield, UK. It is described by its creator as a stitch-punk game, and sees forces from six different factions³ battling it out in the world of Relicia. A second edition of the game is, at time of writing, undergoing a final public review and test before going to print, so this is a good time to think about diving in.

Oathsworn Miniatures: Burrows & Badgers - Figures

It is often surprising the new ranges and companies you find at shows - even if they've been around for a while, they can still be new to you. I'd vaguely heard of Oathsworn Miniatures before I attended UK Games Expo in 2016, due to their Heroines in Sensible Shoes Kickstarter campaign, though it hadn't grabbed my attention enough to back it myself.

While I was at the Expo, though, I came across a cabinet of painted figures on their stand, and realised by the end of the weekend that I needed to own some of them. These weren't the Heroines, but rather the Burrows and Badgers range. For someone who grew up reading the Redwall series, these were a firm kick in the nostalgia.

Burrows and Badgers figures at UK Games Expo 2016

Tor Gaming - Day of the Tentacle

Back in January, I was fortunate enough to get access to the C'thu Prime a little early, as you may have seen. This all happened because Gav¹ was dealing with an order I'd placed at my NSLBFGS².

That was cool, but I wasn't expecting a repeat. However, when I was at the store last week picking up my new Blood Bowl team³, the Chris I was dealing with noticed that I had pre-ordered the two new C'thu units due out this week - the Barbs of Thamos and Thorns of Thamos. Chris had a quick word with Gav, and soon enough I had the blisters in my hands.

Result!

So, given I have these ahead of the general release, let's take a look at what you get for your money this time...

Unboxing: Bad Squiddo Games - Ghosts of Gaia

Sometimes, following people on Facebook can be an expensive proposition.

As it happens, I follow Kev White of Hasslefree Miniatures fame. Back in November, he plugged a Kickstarter that was being run by Bad Squiddo Games. For those of you who aren't aware, Bad Squiddo Games is the miniatures company being run by Annie Norman, who you may know better as the Dice Bag Lady.

Bad Squiddo were running a campaign for female post-apocalyptic gang figures - a bit Mad Max, a bit Necromunda Escher, that sort of feel. I'll be honest, there weren't many of the initial sculpts that grabbed me, and I forgot to close the tab on Chrome.

Fast-forwards a week or two, and I realised I still have a Kickstarter tab open¹. Before I closed it, I thought it'd be interesting to see where the campaign was up to - and that's when I saw the two packs of gun pigs, and the option to order them as the core of your pledge. For those of you who are unaware, the gun pigs are two sets of four figures, featuring guinea pigs armed with some quite serious weaponry.

While I have no specific uses for heavily-armed rodents, the models were cool, and I'm all in favour of cool models. As a result, I found myself backing the campaign, when I didn't initially expect to. Fast forward to the first week of February, and my new pets were collected from the sorting office - and I thought you'd be interested to see how these look.

Tor Gaming - C'thu Prime

Sometimes it's funny how things work out. I went down to my local gaming store's hobby evening on Friday, both to get some painting done, and to pick up some bits I'd ordered over the festive period. As it happened, Gav¹ was the gentleman sorting out my order, and he noticed that I had a pre-order for the new C'thu Prime as one of the bits I was waiting for.

Apparently in a good mood in the new year², he decided to let me have the Prime there and then, despite the fact the model wasn't due to be released until the 14th. Never one to turn down the opportunity to get stuff I'd bought early, I thought I'd take the time before general release to pull a review together.

Unboxing: Macrocosm Miniatures - Dark Dwarves

I first found out about Macrocosm when I was at UK Games Expo 2015, where their stand was tucked away on one corner in a particularly cramped trade room. While I wasn't looking for anything in particular, their Digger Corps and Malignancy ranges caught my eye, and the gent behind the stand was willing to cut me a deal on the Sunday, which is always appreciated.

When I heard they were doing a Kickstarter campaign to make some Dark Dwarves, having picked up the range previously released by Hasslefree Miniatures, I decided to back it to both support a small company and get some quite cool armoured Dwarf models. While I wasn't a major backer, I did spring for two 5 Dwarf units and a character, as a potential starting point for a force for Dragon Rampant.

The campaign went pretty well for Macrocosm, raising £6,713 against their initial goal of £1,000. Delivery was listed as November 2016, so I'd mentally pegged them as arriving in the new year - imagine my surprise, then, when I received a package towards the end of September.

With the package in hand, I thought it might be taking a look at what was inside. And yes, I know it's taken me nearly a month to get to this point...