A few days late but here is for Mr Ray Harryhausen.

                                          Raymond Frederick "Ray" Harryhausen (June 29, 1920 – May 7, 2013)                                          

Dadhammer, gaming as a dad rather than in spite of it.

So a great many of us have time commitments that far outweigh this trivial business we call fun.  I cannot see it as a mere coincidence that most of us Oldhammerers are within the same generation and have young children, some time ago I coined the phrase Dadhammer and this is perhaps the first true Dadhammer post. Dadhammer is all about, “cheating”, to get the most bang for your precious time. In the future I’d like to start posting up tips of how to do that or links to other sites such as Blues one.. Blue has specifically gone for dipping because of the time constraints of a busy Father. Dadhammer is also about sharing your hobby with the little ones and Rabhere is leading the way with his Goblin quest, it may not be warhammer but it’s close enough to consider it Dadhammer. Or how about Springinsfeld over at Broadswords andthe Beasts proudly having a Dadhammer moment. In short if it makes the most of your limited time or brings the kids into the fold its Dadhammer.

Now to bring the predicament of a Dadhammerer into focus here is a list of things to do in no particular order:

Get some more roll20 games in with Oldhammerers.

Get some real world games in with my brother and friends.

More dungeon cards, I have quite a stack written and just need to get them edited and pasted into the cards.

More games of Hammers and Helms with my eldest. Lots of fun and I promised to explain the dice.

Post regularly to Sofonto’s pbp forum game of Labyrinth Lord. My hafling Esro is proving to be lots of fun as we delve into Stonehell.

Finnish those third ed Orc crossbows. Base colours done and layers are being added as we speak.

Post up the last Realms of Chaos Warband battle as a comic style report.

Work on warband to finish painting it.

Update the painting on my existing O&G army, needs to look good for August.

Paint some otherworld goodies, monsters and adventures.

Post up a 4^th ed battle report.

Post up more 4^th ed articles.

Oldhammer fanzine, some good people on board now so should be able to get a good zine out incorporating Oldhammer stuff, RT stuff and perhaps some 90’s love too.

Forenronds last stand terrain to paint.

Show my elf cavalry some painty love to update for August.

Look forward to receiving some Dwarven forge stuff this October (this is Dadhammer at its laziest, throw cash at it!).

Update the list of Oldhammer blogs on the Oldhammer blog.

Write some dadhammer articles!

That’s all to get done in whatever free time is left after the more obvious dad duties. Mutual support and encouragement that’s the way forward.

Total power! Showing 4th edition Warhammer some love.

OK we all know that the 80’s have been cool for like ever, well except the 90’s when they were the height of bad taste. Recently I’ve begun to see an increase in 90’s nostalgia. Kids wearing Nirvana Tee-shirts, high top trainers, leggings with over detailed prints and lumberjack shirts are to be seen. Even in gaming there appears to be a bit of reverence for 2^nd ed 40K going on.

Where is the love for Warhammer 4^th edition? Perhaps it isn’t Oldhammer enough, is it Midhammer?

When 4^th came out in 92 I must admit I was excited. My third edition armies to date where on the small side, I couldn’t field a, “legal”, Orc army without using the card counters from Forenrond’s last stand to fill in for my Stikkas. My wolf boys were also counters. My Wood elf army relied on counters also for a fair section of its force.

My friends Chaos consisted of a few RoC warbands and Chaos warriors/Knights, not very rounded. Already much of my empire force relied upon the Perries new Empire range and the later 3^rd ed Marauder empire stuff too. A box full of miniatures then was the main draw of the new system to me.

Opening that box was as exciting as opening hero quest for the first time. My younger brother and I invested in the new set agreeing to split the models, high elves for him, his first army, goblins for me. At last I would have my unit of Stikkas. The card scenery was also a bonus, I actually saw the last pack of townscape card buildings being sold in my local GW, when I asked for a pack myself I was told that was it, they never returned. I’d drawn a few buildings in felt tip and even made one of the great modelling workshop town houses from WD so the addition of the house and tower was greatly appreciated.

The rule books in three parts, rules, bestiary and army lists were new, colourful (well except the lists) and enticing. How could we not read them. We played them, never meaning to, they played well. I bemoaned the loss of shield walls, free hacks, advance and trailing forces but liked the march move (we were already doing it) and bloodier combat. I believe I may even have mentioned dumbing down, I continued to play 3^rd with friends but 4^th only with my brother, though elements of 3^rd crept in. We even wrote magic lists for the forces based more on the heroquest magic than 3^rd ed magic.

The release of the first army books (Empire and High elf) was closely followed by dedicated ranges for each race, at the time we thought this was great. 

The battle Magic came along and yes we ate that up too. After all GW had been preparing the way for some time in WD with tales of colour magic, colour wizards appearing in AHQ, rules for Dwarven rune weapons and armour for 3^rd,  indeed the last ever 3^rd ed battle report included trial rules for Amethyst wizards and rune weapons. It was full of colour, cards, magic weapons (3^rd ed ones for all but chaos warbands were limited and old and stale) and awesomeness. So yes for a few years I loved 4^th edition. Then University, girls (finally!), beer and first job happened, I stopped playing so much, missed 5^th entirely and when I picked up again in the late 90’s went straight back to third. Indeed I never stopped collecting, but it was always 80’s stuff. But that’s all a different story. Here’s to the 90’s and Warhammer 4^th. Total power!

Some Oldhammer greenskins and a plan.

Back to Oldhammer now some nice Orc crossbows from 3rd edition Warhammer. Generally I don't do WIP shots of minis, my finished results are ropy enough without foisting my unfinished splatterings on people. But making commitments on projects does seam to help them get done so in a month I will present whatever state the following orcs are in as done to you all. The black undercoat obscured the details of these great miniatures so I've played with the brightness and contrast to bring the detail out.

I also hope to get this iron claw shaman done too.

Dungeon Adventure cards- card driven dungeon bash

So after a great response on forums, the blog and messages I got straight on an put the finishing touches to the first few cards for the Dungeon Adventure Decks previously mentioned. Thanks to all who showed support. I hope you like these because they were great fun to make.

Here is the link: Dungeon Adventure Decks.

Please feel free to print out for your own use and give them a go. I’d love to hear how you get on with this more limited set whilst I get the others ready, they will be posted free to use as well as and when I find time. These are I guess a sort of a play test.

Illustrations as previous by William McAusland.

Otherworld Adventurers, news and extras review.

We've all seen Otherworld's adventurers painted up beautifully on the Otherworld site.  It's worth looking again because a few excitingly good variants of these adventurers are beginning to appear on the site as well.

Variant model of DAH1a. Think I prefer him for my fighter.

Variant model of DAH4a. Great model use to represent Merlin or even DrBargle.

If you want to see any of the others you'll have to go over to the Otherworld shop!

That all said the main point of this post is to take a closer look at all the wonderful extras released so far for the backers of Otherworlds indigogo campaign.

First up we have a nice treasure pile. Its a good haul with one large chest, two medium and one small all with good detail. Some over spilling sacks of coins and a pile of coins, scrolls and a crown finish the loot. They could work well as separate piles but really for the best effect your going to want to mount them together.

Next a pair of guard dogs, a realistic size, smaller than the marauder dark elf mastiffs but not horribly so. They have an armoured harness on and will look great painted up as Bullmastiffs.













The dwarf mercenary is a lovely if simple sculpt. The style is a little different to the adventurer dwarves but they will still work together, particularly when painted by the same person. He will be a great bit of muscle for any serious party who take along henchmen.









Except for the shields and backpack the extra weapons are cast with hands attached. The same style as the adventurers, the temptation to use them is strong but I cannot see myself cutting up the lovely boxed sets I just received  A shrewd move by Otherworld? Could be, I may find myself buying extras to convert using this set.

The hirelings are a great addition to any party and will complement the boxed set coming out soon. In order we have here a lantern bearer in padded armour wearing a kettle helm. This along with the notched sword he holds shows that he isn't there just to hold the lantern. He has no backpack (but see the spare above..) and a sling bag holding what looks like spare flasks of oil for the lantern that he carries suspended from a pole. Rope is coiled over his left shoulder. The mule handler appears to be wearing a leather apron and close fitting hat. He certainly isn't here for combat. His backpack holds bundles of fodder and various water skins. He has a bucket of I believe oats and a a rope lead ready to bend to attach to the mule. The porter has a  padded jerkin on, smaller than the lantern bearers. He also has a Norman style pointed helm and a dagger. I guess this means he is prepared to face some danger but perhaps not in the front line. He has a staff to help with his load which is quite considerable. There is a fair sized chest, bedrolls leather packs, wine skins, rope, a lantern and plenty of sacks.

The mule handlers and porter from behind showing pack details.

Left side.

Right side.

Finally my favorite, the familiars. A flying raptor, (a hawk?), a raven, a perched owl, a minute weasel stoat/martin, a frog/toad and a cat.  All just the right size all completely perfect. I wouldn't mind a few of the raptors fro my wood elf falconers to be honest. A nice touch is the inclusion of some 1mm thin clear plastic tubing to mount the flyers on.

Otherworld goodies.

OK I'll admit, this is a bit of a showing off post but look what I picked up from round the corner at Otherworld HQ today:

First two adventurers boxed sets and about 2/3rds of the stretch goal goodies.

Inside one of the boxed sets.

So far my favorite extra! Sad I know but I love Familiars. These are tiny.

Perhaps I'll do a bit of a review in  the coming days.