Crisis… What Crisis?

Gambit… tricksy little X-Man and tricksy little build. Painting his empowered cards is going to be a challenge I think… making it look suitably explosive.

Next was Beast. Two options on him. Goggles or no goggles. Book in hand or clenched fist. I went for Goggles on and clenched fist. His feet are part of the terrain base of girders and I’ve left him footless for now to facilitate painting. Probably the second easiest build so far.

And finally… Wolverine. Lots of parts that feel as if not well glued will snap apart in play. The irony of the indestructible adamantium skeleton and an all too breakable plastic miniature. Yet another fiddly build. There was a head option… the original mask with the big triangles or the wild hair. I chose hairy.

I’m saving the Brotherhood for another time.

Started to glue the X-Men together.

Cyclops was relatively simple. Two head options and I chose the older hooded version.

The lightning base for Storm was a challenge and it worries me how fragile it looks so storing will be tricky. The miniature itself is quite delicate with her billowing cloak. In play I need to be very careful handing the miniature.

Rogue was next. Another fiddly miniature. Great pose, but tricky to assemble.

I’m doing partial assembly to make painting easier.

The X-Men Starter arrived yesterday, but not assembled anything yet.

Tomorrow I’m expecting Sentinels which was not part of my purchase plan, but I had a rough week and needed to splash out on something.

Mutant Massacre refers to how the minis will look if I do a terrible job painting them…

And it refers to an event in X-Men history from the 1980’s when an injured Kitty and Kurt were recovering from the Mutant Massacre in the UK and joined the comic book Excalibur alongside Captain Britain, Meggan and Rachel Summers.

Without Excalibur I would not have discovered comics… and would not have spent way too much money over two decades buying them.

These are the proxy miniatures I got from Etsy some time ago and never got around to finishing. I bought the updated card pack and the cards included some Guardians of the Galaxy,  Enchantress and the Hulk.

Don’t have Cards for: Mystique, Emma Frost, Dazzler and I think the one at the back might be from Alpha Flight (or maybe not even Marvel – I forget).

Anyway… I only have a B&W laser printer, so if I print the cards from the website they will look terrible, but I’ll get it done somehow eventually.

From previous games I have some scatter that needs work before I can use it.

And yes… the windscreens look terrible.

The park tiles has brick work in the middle of the edges etched in the surface.

The corner pieces have the outer brick work separate which makes it easier to paint. The inner bit of the corner I primed with dark green and then added PVA so I could flock them. I think it was a wrong flock to use, but all I had at the time.

The tree stumps are from an Archon set I have. I like that the stumps are separate and the trees balance on top with a hint of stability, useful as in MCP the terrain can be used as a weapon. I might drill the stumps and trunks so I can add something to make it more stable.

The fountain was built up from multiple pieces in the terrain tiles. The bottom includes a piece of ‘water texture’ plastic I had. Added a magnet (the bright spot in the middle) so I can add different statues. It comes with a dolphin centre piece. When the the glue was set I poured in some liquid resin to make the water look a bit more realistic.

These are the modular tiles from Battle Kiwi. Sealed with PVA and water mix first.

I textured the roads with sandpaper and sprayed that black then dark grey. For road markings I used a template on straight lines and hand painted the curve.

Pavements and block tiles were sprayed dark gray then misted with light grey.

The park was a bit more complex and I’ll go into that in a moment.

So this is what I have from the core set…