British Royal Mail and Customer Service

So I recently ordered some bits being offered by very cool company in England.  I figured they would look great on my Rough Riders and I just couldn't resist.  As usual the bits were shipped within days of ordering and I sat back and began to wait.  About 2 weeks later I came home and there it was, the little brown bag o bits, and I couldn't wait to get it open. 

As you can see by the above and below pictures the contents were not quite what I had expected. Some Wingnut decided to swap out the original contents with those displayed in the pics. (I have to admit though, the Lindt Chocolate was good, The bacon chips thingy... not so much)

To make a long story short, I jumped on the computer and shot an email of, and over the next day or two we came up with a plan to get the order shipped again.  The company planned on registering a complaint by the Royal Mail, and I do hope they figured something out. And the whoever made the swap deserves a good slap upside the head.

Not to drag this out, but the new shipment arrived yesterday, and this time it is complete. :) So be looking forward to some Rough Rider updates.

 @ "The Company" Seeing that I didn't ask if I could post about this, I've removed all references to the real you. 

6 Years of Blogging (Mar 2008 - ?)

Imperial Fireworks

Yup, I've been blogging about my army's now for 6 Years, and I've been playing 40k since just before the start of 3rd Edition.  I've dabbled Epic, BFG, and Inquisitor but the group I played with back then just didn't much interest in these.  Over the years I've played Black Templar's, a Mordian IG army, two different Eldar armies, and a Tau army, but my foremost love has always been the Imperial Guard. My current IG collection spans back over 10 years and is still evolving.  In fact I have painted and played 40K in the USA, Afghanistan, Iraq, Kuwait, Spain and now Germany.  The Guard have been with me through it all.

One of my oldest Paint jobs ca. 2000 (I think)

I'm sure you've also noticed that I am far from a "regular" poster.  I model, paint, post, play (in that order) when I have time.  I typically work 10 hour days, so when I'm home I prefer to spend time with my 3yr old, my weekends are filled with "Family obligations" and I typically write my posts between 6 and 6:30am over coffee before I'm out the door.  As a matter of fact that's one of my favorite times to paint (everyone else is sleeping!) if I don't have something that I want to write about.

Now why have I told you all that?  Because I would like to say "Thank You!" Without you there wouldn't be a blog, even if I have less than 100 "followers" and I think I can name the 6 people that have regularly left comments on my blog.  (Zzzzz, Drax, Col. Ackland, Hollyoake, Howell, Scipio) Without them it wouldn't be as much fun.  In my humble opinion it's the things that pull someone in and make them feel like part of a community.   

Something a bit more recent... (2010)

Blogging for me twofold, I enjoy sharing the little things that I do, and it's been neat to see how ideas can be stolen, improved upon, and re-stolen by different people through out the hobby.  I think it's the sharing of ideas and (in my case) Army background or fluff that really keeps me interested.  Even though I don't blog regularly, I do spend a considerable amount of time reading what other people have posted. 

And just to show that I have been doing a bit of painting here's a quick sneak peak from an upcoming post.

Re-Post: The future of Games Days and Games Workshop - Part 9

 Now I'm not usually the one to do this, but I thought this has been one the most interesting reads regarding GW's financials on the Internet. This is a chain of post by Zaphod over at Masterminis.net

n Zaphod Beeblebrox

n Zaphod Beeblebrox

Read more at:

I know, it's another wall of text. But I believe you really should read this if the miniature and gaming hobby is close to your heart. 

I am old and slow. And apparently I have at least one working crystal ball.

Two days ago we simply reported about the dramatic decline of Game's Workshop's value. On a single day, the Company lost 24% of its value. This followed the release of their half-year-report in which they showed -12% lost sales, -30% profits....
It is unlikely you have not heard of it, since our post about this yesterday has become our 2nd most read post ever And it's even just a little over a day old.

- See more at: http://masterminis.blogspot.de/2014/01/the-future-of-games-workshop-part9.html#sthash.EjPkneyn.dpuf

The future of Games Days and Games Workshop - Part 9 

Well, that escalated quickly!

I know, it's another wall of text. But I believe you really should read this if the miniature and gaming hobby is close to your heart. 

I am old and slow. And apparently I have at least one working crystal ball.

Two days ago we simply reported about the dramatic decline of Game's Workshop's value. On a single day, the Company lost 24% of its value. This followed the release of their half-year-report in which they showed -12% lost sales, -30% profits....
It is unlikely you have not heard of it, since our post about this yesterday has become our 2nd most read post ever And it's even just a little over a day old.

- See more at: http://masterminis.blogspot.de/2014/01/the-future-of-games-workshop-part9.html#sthash.EjPkneyn.dpuf

    The future of Games Days and Games Workshop - Part 9 - That escalated quickly!

The future of Games Days and Games Workshop - Part 9 

Well, that escalated quickly!

I know, it's another wall of text. But I believe you really should read this if the miniature and gaming hobby is close to your heart. 

I am old and slow. And apparently I have at least one working crystal ball.

- See more at: http://masterminis.blogspot.de/2014/01/the-future-of-games-workshop-part9.html#sthash.EjPkneyn.dpuf

I would recommend taking an hours time and start with Part 1, and work your way up to the current post, but if you start at Part 8 that's enough.

2014 Hobby Resolutions

Well it's the start of a new year and as custom dictates, here are my "Hobby" New Years resolutions. I'd sum up the results of last year but I didn't make any for 2013, and besides me getting back into the swing of things is enough.  So enough of that and here's my list:

1. Blog Regularly.  
This goal works partially with points 2 and 3.  The more I game and paint the more I have to blog about.

2. Game Regularly.
See, I've already talked this over with the wife and as long as life and work permits I'm going to try and visit the local club twice a month. Even if I don't get a game in, I can always use the time to model or paint.  There are some great guys down there and I always enjoy the Apoc games, and the 1-2 "normal" games that I get in.

3. Finish the following Models:
Yes, some of these are rather old, but since my daughter was born (she's 3 now) I always find myself busy with other things.  Not that I mind see, she is by far more important, but even she knows not to play with "Papa's little army men".

  - 7th Scansin:
      - Hvy Weps
      - 2nd Squad

  - BG 82:
      - Arial Support
      - Warhound


4. Use the Painting Chart to track my painting progress.
See  point 3.  The more I paint the more I can fill out :)  nuff said.


5. Finish and post up my collected Fluff and Background information 
This should be a no brainer, but I've been putting this off for years...  Partially because my fluff is in 3 documents and reads more like scatter brained ideas, and partially because I'm not so very good at writing fluff.

Well I guess that's it.  Happy New Year to all and I wish you all the best in the coming year.  Unless of course your playing against me, in which case, I hope you get a tie.  

A new Milestone

I just wanted to thank all of you who have helped me reach reach 50,000 page views!!!  I noticed last week that I was a few hundred views away, but didn't expect it to reach it already.

So once again, thanks for the last 4 years and here's to another 10!  :)

- Marshal Argos

New Air Brush

 

So I picked up a new airbrush a couple weeks ago and finally had the chance to try it out the other day.  I'll admit it's a beginner's class starter kit from Revell.  But I am just a beginner with one of these so I don't mind at all.  Besides it's there to help m repaint all my armour, and as you can see in the two pics below it works wonders.  It's super easy to use, and feels quite comfortable in the hand.  The trigger on top is easy to push so you don't have to squeeze hard at all.

 The clip in the front is for the paint jar so and feels quite balanced in the hand.  He only issue I had was that I originally didn't have  enough paint in the jar (I was only testing it) an I found that rotated the gun to achieve different angles I would loose the paint... 

So anyways heres the progress of tank one after 20 minutes time painting and a bit of drying time between 3 layers.  

Yes I said 3 layers.  Black, Dark Green, hairspray with salt, and the 3rd layer of lighter green. And all that with a painting time of 20 minutes!!!   Love this thing!!!

Here's my only worry..  how long does one of these cans last? 

 More news and pics as I get further along.

Kangaroo? (non-40k related)

Well some of you may have noticed that's it's been almost 4 weeks since my last post...  What's shown above is just one of many real life projects that has kept me away from 40K over the last month.   Yes, they are supposed to be Kangaroo's and there will be a pouch hanging underneath to store toys and stuff in.  And yes, I made it myself, but I will say the idea is copied.

And why am I making this?  Because the ranks of the Imperial Guard will swell by one in the next 2 weeks.  Now see, I decided that I had to make something for her when she was born, and although she won't be able to use it right away, I hope it will last a few years.

Now that, that is outa the way, I'll go ahead and say to expect fewer posts here as things become hectic and we all have to find our new "rhythm".  See ya'll 'gain soon.

Site updates

As some of you may have noticed I changed the banner on my blog.  Originally I this blog was only about my guard but as time progressed I started different projects and thought I'd incorporate them into the title as well.  There's is no need to change links or update anything. 

Over the next week or so I'm going to try and get a bit of site cleanup and updating done as well, so expect to see a few minor tweaks and changes coming up in the near future.

Till then I hope the servants of the Emperor smite their foe's, and those alien, traitor ,and green skin lovers go down in righteous flames.

Sometimes I hate Change

and yet I brought it upon myself.   So my old template wasn't compatible with Blogger, and that leads us to the new "temporary" format that we have now.  What I noticed with the old one was that anyone who was using Internet Explorer couldn't see anything outside of a green screen.  My first question is, why the heck would anyone still be using IE?   My second and 3rd questions led me to change the format for the foreseeable future until I get the chance to go through the CSS code and fix it.

So, everyone, I hope you've updated the RSS feeds to the one posted on the right, and here's to hoping I get the old format back up soon.  Of course if all else fails I'll just have to come up with something better.

Oh, and just to wet the appitite a little, here's another pic of my upcoming project. I'll put up more pics tomorrow or the day after, depending on how much time I spend working the blog format.

Jumping Ship

Well some of you may have noticed a few problems with the blog this morning, some of you might even notice that the blog looks just a little different... Well if you did notice, the reason is that I've moved from Wordpress to Blogger. Don't get my wrong I like WP, hence the reason I installed it on my server, but the issue was the server itself. I looked into moving my blog to WP's free blog, but without having to pay I couldn't keep my layout, so blogger won out. But it's not a bad thing.


I've been working on importing my content from one to the other over the past week and finally got it done last night. I was going to wait a bit longer to do the swap but finally just decided to take the plunge and do it today. So, I'm hoping for a seamless transition, but I know there will always be issues. The old URL "313th.dsnetz.com" will redirect you to my blog, in fact for those of you subscribed, you don't have to change a thing as the feed has been transfered as well. The only links that won't work were links that brought you to specific pages. Unfortunatly WP and Blogger use different naming conventions for their posts, so old links won't work. For those of you that I know have links to my sight I'll send out a short email with the updated links. If you need to update your feed the new feed is:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/313thDtr


Well I guess that that's it for me, I hope the change has payed off and the rest of you can still see/enjoy the site. If you want feel free to leave a comment or join the Allies/followers on the left, at least than I'll know if this bloody change worked or if I should brink back the old sight until I find a better solution.