Sunday, December 30, 2012

DCC Critical hits for S&W

I want to use DCC critical hits and fumbles for my Swords & Wizardry game. Fumble table maps directly. The classes map as follows:

Fighter --> Warrior
Cleric --> Cleric
Thief, Assassin, Monk --> Thief
Magic-user --> Wizard
Paladin, Ranger --> Dwarf
Druid --> Elf

The only thing I haven't decided is whether to keep the levels the same. DCC is only a 10 level game, S&W is theoretically 20. I think it might work fine to just keep the levels the same though. This fits with the flattening of the power curve after level 10. That being said it would be something to strive for at high levels.

Saturday, December 1, 2012

More on paint

Since my last post I've been working more with the paints I have bought and changed my mind on a few things.

While I do love the stickiness of the Vallejo paints they are not well suited for blending. They lay down an excellent base coat (and I have read they are likewise great for layering - I don't have enough colors to try it). They look a bit "out of the tube" though, very bright and flat. The Reaper paints in contrast mix and blend beautifully. I mixed the red I have with the flesh tone and wound up with a wonderful leathery pink that I used to paint a grimoire (Malifaux Student of Battle if you care).

I have also continued to research (I am planning to buy a paint set) and apparently the Vallejo paints have a very bad separation problem. I haven't seen it yet but I don't do tons of painting so paint needs to last for me. The more I use the Reaper paints the more I like them, so I think I will probably buy a set of Reaper paint and only possibly buy Vallejo for colors that are tricky to basecoat - like yellow for example. Also, Reaper I can buy directly from them instead of going through unknown ebay dealers which to me is a plus. I have had great experiences with Reaper's customer service and they ship like lightning.

Lastly, the more I work with either of these paints the less I like my Citadel paints. Some people swear by them, and some people claim there is no difference but if I could go back I would never have bought them. They are more expensive and I find them much more difficult to work with than either of Reaper of Vallejo. My recommendation for a new painter would be: skip Citadel completely, buy a few of Vallejo and a few from Reaper and try them out, see what works for you. I have heard mixed things about P3, but I've never tried them.

Edit: One good thing for a beginner about Citadel paints for beginners is that they have pretty good coverage. I think it is hard to get a precise edge with them though due to the consistency of the paint. So a beginner might be able to lay down only a coat or two (which is satisfying) you will have a hard time not obscuring details and getting paint all over the model. I think a beginner might be more satisfied with Vallejo if coverage is an issue. Reaper is thin, which is nice for details.

These are both good paints with strengths and weaknesses. If I were rich I'd buy both. In reality I think I am going to buy heavily into Reaper and supplement here and there with Vallejo.