Well, still working on the rules for this, but still painting up minis for a game that I hope to have working soon. Doing actual extent animals is tougher than extinct because you can't just make it up as you go. A Jaguar is a Jaguar and his coat has a certain pattern to it. Even if the pattern does change from animals to animal, painting multiples of the same type start to get to you. This project has me understanding why I dislike painting more modern periods of soldiers, as opposed to ancients and Medieval warriors. And why I love doing the American Natives for SDT (Song of Drums and Tomahawks), our FIW rule set. No set pattern to follow other than the war paint colors used and each pattern is different for every warrior. Much more satisfying in my mind, than doing 30 belts, then 30 cross belts, breeches, coats........ Just don't like them as well.

First up are the Zebra, almost bought two more packs of these not long before I started painting and glad now that I didn't. And that a few of these figures became early wild horses for the Americas.

Next three had me putting 4 and 5 back into the do later box. The three of them took as long to do as the whole herd of zebra had. (Not sure why the second shot is so much darker than the first.) Enjoyed the first one, but by the third was seeing little brown squares where I hadn't painted the lines in yet. And for both the giraffe and zebra, I base coated them and then painted in the lines. For giraffe it worked much easier that way, and for zebra and tigers was a must. I started one zebra and a tiger using a method I was told about years ago. Base coat with stripe color (black) and use overall coat color (white or orange) to create the stripes. That method drove me nuts, or at least more than normal. Like the guy had said small lines were easier and little slop over onto a stripe didn't show badly, but to get a nice white or orange coat color was taking 4-5 coats of paint and still didn't look quite right. Was glad I switched back to my original thought, which was easier to do. Paint the coat color as base then add stripes, much easier, good enough though not as nice as the ones the guy had using the other method.

Did not have all my chimp pictures turn out well, but the one below is good enough for now. Would like to find some more poses just to vary them up some more.

The baboon troop looks good, but would like a little more variety in the poses. Maybe I'll find some more of these as well.

The Ostriches are just a male and two females, had to rebuild the head on the one pecking at the ground. Not sure if it was supposed to have buried its head or what as is it didn't have a head and wasn't attached to the base. So just created anew head for it looking for food.

Oryx and Kudu, these are fairly common antelope on African plains. I thought they painted up nice and are another group from the Ral Partha/Iron Wind bulk box at cons. Looking for Some of the smaller types next, Impala and gazelle would mix in nicely. 

Not last by a long shot but the biggest, Elephants. These were by far the easiest to paint and came out fine. Would like a few more poses, but this works.

 Animals everywhere!!

Hi everyone, well I've been working on a set of rules for Victorian/Prehistoric Game hunting. A set that in realty will cover from the stone ages to Sci Fi ideas of time travel or parallel dimensions. We read about the fantastic waste of the Big Game Hunters of the late 1800's, but WHEN you look deeper into it you start to realize that it is that more people lost their lives Hunting dangerous game than became known for it. Look up stories of men hunting buffalo( both African Cape and American Bison) and you find stories of men dying at it. Wild Boar, Big cats and more can be as dangerous to man as man can be. Modern Hunters are hurt or killed every year by the animals they thought to take home. 

Well the rules started out to be about hunting for meat for the group, tribe or family. And evolved to take in the period after the Asteroid hit killed off the truly big game, to modern day. Hopefully we will be playtesting these at conventions by the end of the year. But, for now here are some of the animals that will populate the tables. Extent and extinct are included. First up Afirca

These are going to my African bears, Agriotherium on left and an Atlas bear on right. There were bears in Africa until almost present day. The Agriotherium was an ancient lineage that died out. 

With the lion pride I painted up the males to represent most of the known mane colors. They prey on about all the animals in Africa, smallest to Elephants are all prey, granted older elephants unless hurt or very old are safe but anything short of full grown has been seen getting stalked. With humans being well within the range of a quick meal.

And while lions are dangerous, the second most lethal animal to humans in Africa isn't the lion but Hippopotamus. These bad tempered herbivores kill a large number of people every year. The Lions are even in the top three, but Hippos are every year. Get between them and water or enter their territory and they use their 2 foot of tusk on you.

Gnu or Wildebeest are very common on the plains and savanna, they are prey for all the large carnivores. But don't be in front of them when they stampede.

This African Python is a hidden danger for hunters, in the past they came a little larger than todays ancestors.

I thought my Cheetah came out looking good, except for the King Cheetah on the left. He is ok but looks to tiger like, think I could do better, and I may try sometime to find a cheetah in a different pose to paint up.

My Cape Buffalo herd lead by an old male came out well. I was surprised that they can run from brownish black to grayish black to full on black, mostly by herd and area. Mine are the more brownish type. Aggressive, large, and herd mentality make them something to fear. They may run away or they may start hunting you.

A black Rhino, he was sort to bitter-sweet to paint up. First I have always admired them as animals that while having their faults were pretty must live let live when shown in the Wildlife shows of my youth. Plus this model when I opened his package was missing most of the body between the legs on the back side, a bubble had formed in casting. I thought it was unusable, but some Green stuff and lots of mistakes and fixes later I have a hard time figuring out which side it was. 

The girl used is a Reaper Chronoscope mini, the animals come from everyone from Acheson, Reaper, Ral Partha, North Star and more. Some figures came from flea markets and others from my RPG days. More and more are appearing on Etsy and other 3D sites in multiple poses. More next post, still in Africa, but much harder painting ahead.