Wizkids Classic Beholder - WZK90740

 

This was great fun to paint and I used a variety of styles and paints to put this one together.

I started off using Vallejo Xpress Color paint, but through an airbrush. First time that I've tried using an airbrush with the Xpress paints. I did not add flow nor thinner to the paint as I wasn't sure how that would interact with the formula of what Xpress is - so these were pumped right out of their bottles. I also know that usually you can't go lighter with Xpress paints so I started with the lightest first and then layered down into the darker colors (however, an experiment for another day, I think atomizing the paint through an airbrush might work based upon how I saw these colors lay down on the model).

The Xpress colors used through the airbrush were...

1. Imperial Yellow (lightest)

2. Nuclear Yellow

3. Martian Orange

4. Plasma Red

5. Velvet Red (darkest)

I was really impressed at how well the Xpress paints flowed through the airbrush - no hiccups or problems at all whatsoever. Coverage appeared to be really good. I was able to blend the layers together starting at the top with the lightest color and then flowing downwards to the darkest color.

Then I switched over to the Sharpie Creative Markers.

6. Purple on the lips

7. Pink on top of the purple to highlight the gums

8. White on the teeth, they center eyeball

9. Red thin line around the outside edge of the center eyeball

10. Orange thin line around the outside edge of the center eyeball but within the red line

11. Yellow central eye on the center eyeball and struck lines from outside edge to just short of yellow center; then all 10 of the stalk eyeballs

12. White medium dot on all 10 of the stalk eyeballs

13. Black tiny dot on all 10 of the stalk eyeballs and elongated pupil on the yellow eye

14. Grey as a highlight on the black pupil and around the yellow eye

Finally, I used traditional paintbrush and Vallejo standard paints to paint and drybrush the base

15. Black

16. Neutral Grey

17. Stonewall Grey

Asking Google's Gemini to convert the painted model into artwork generates probably the model closest resembling what I painted - it did enhance the eye...

As to ShadowDark stats - as mentioned with the Beholder Zombie, I'd probably use the stats in the core book for The Ten-Eyed Oracle. However, when comparing the stats to the original AD&D monster stats I might make some changes that would make the Classic Beholder unique in ShadowDark. I think the Eyestalks are a good compromise between ShadowDark and the original AD&D ray attacks - many of them are the same. Two attacks that are missing which this Classic Beholder should have would be the anti-magic cone and its bite:

1. the core rulebook has hostile spells targeting The Ten-Eyed Oracle are DC18 to cast and I would replace that with an anti-magic cone from the central eye which I would ShadowDark as filling a double-near sized cube extending from the creature with the antimagic shell spell.

2. a bite attack +4 for anyone silly enough to get within close with 2d4 damage

And finally I would restrict its movement to 1/2 near - the original beholder was a slow moving tank of a monster - it hovered a few feet above the ground and slowly obliterated everything in its path.

Final thoughts - I posted a pic of the front image to a local game store Discord and someone mentioned it reminded them of Cheetos. So this new ShadowDark monster is now named Hot Cheetos and upon its untimely death it explodes in a fireball as if the spell was cast on a natural 20.

Reaper Miniatures - Eldritch Demon - 77113

 

This model expanded my Sharpie experiment - just like Sir Conlan, I decided to use the Sharpie Creative Markers with the paint brush tip. It's an interesting pack / marketing decision made by the Sharpie folks. The nub tips actually have the same 12 and then another 12 more colors in what I think they call earthen colors. However the paint brush tip has only the primary colors with the exception of green.  Picking up the pack of Sharpie's gets you 12 colors to play with...

1. Blue
2. Purple
3. Pink
4. Red
5. Orange
6. Yellow
7. Black
8. Grey
9. White

and then I left the greens for the end - instead of primary green you get...

10. Blue-Green
11. Cool Green
12. Yellow Green

A minor pain from my perspective is that Sharpie doesn't actually name the colors - however, they do have a nice cap system with the color but if they ever do expand the line, it would be nice to have color names.

This model had been sitting on the bench for quite awhile - I originally had it painted a goblin green body with medium brown wings - the paint was airbrushed on with extra paint remaining in the pot from other painting projects. It wasn't really doing much for me and this Sharpie set has a bunch of greens so I figured this was the perfect experiment.

The three greens were used as follows... blue-green on the body and the wing structures - cool-green on the wing membranes - yellow-green to pick out the details around the body and the belly. Mentioned previously but it's easy to see, the paint is very opaque which was great to cover the airbrushed paint. However, sometimes it would be nice if just a bit of bleed/transparency was there to blend - the AK's are similarly very opaque.

A bit of Google Gemini magic and we have a Eldritch Demon for a VTT session...

What do we do with what is essentially the aspect of an elder god making its way to the material plane through space and time (tampered just a bit because I do have Reaper's C'Thulhu which is twice the size - a true LV20 beast). How about a large bit of demon, some dragon, a bit of brain eater, and finally some gibbering mouther (elevated) for anyone near the beast.

Finally we do get to deduct another model from the Kickstarter Bones pile...

Kickstarter paint total 230 + 1 Eldritch Demon = 231

Reaper Miniatures - Sir Conlan - 77200

 

I used this Reaper Bones model for a bit of an experiment - it had been sitting on my desk with a coat of light blue paint over it from some leftover paint from airbrushing the ocean hexes. It's also a Bobby Jackson sculpt which means it has some nice flow to it as all of his sculpts are awesome and would work well for this experiment.

I wanted to use only the Sharpie markers on this as well as some acrylic metallic markers I found on Amazon (Pagather 24 Metallic Acrylic Markers). I've been playing around quite a bit with the AK Interactive markers but they do tend to be a bit messy and I wanted to give the Sharpies more of a go. However, the Sharpies are very limited in color - so now I have 24 metallic colors (too many to be honest). 

This was a lot of fun and super easy. The blue cloak, the grey shield, the black straps were all Sharpie. The gold armor and the silver sword were the Pagather metallics. Like wow, that was simple. I did need to go to the AK's for the dark skin on the face. May need to see if the Pagather's have more colors to supplement the Sharpies. 

The Pagather acrylic markers were interesting - they're dual tipped with the brush tip on one side and what they called fine tip on the other which was more of a ball tip like the Sharpie bullet tip version. And like the Sharpie bullet tip version there wasn't a shaker ball and no instructions to shake. However, the brush tip acted and looked exactly like the Sharpie brush tips and the paint flowed quite well from the tips. I was accurate enough with the tip to get the gold chain going down and carefully follow the lines of the sword through the cloak.

One more test... I don't normally spray Bones models because they're so soft that the paint doesn't chip like a metal model would. However, I wanted to give it a go and see if there was any adverse effects on the model like what happened with the Vallejo Xpress Color paint on the Wizkids Raging Troll.

I gave it a pretty solid coat of Testor Dullcote and there was no reactivation or disintegration of the paint. Looks the same...

Time to bring the model into Google's Gemini and convert it to artwork for your VTT sessions using AI...

Now for some ShadowDark goodness for Sir Conlan. As he's designated as a Paladin which isn't in the core rulebook, let's take from the Monsters a combination of the Knight and the Acolyte - then give him a couple bumps in level...

Finally, this does count against my giant kickstarter pile (it is going down). 

Kickstarter paint total 229 + 1 Sir Conlan = 230

NextLevel Miniatures - Gold Dragon

 

This is a huge mini from NextLevel Miniatures on a 3" base and sits at 4" tall from tail to horns with 4" wings - actually quite a beautiful miniature - well sculpted with good proportions.

I airbrushed this with Vallejo Air Gold. I really like the outcome - it shoots extremely well through the airbrush.

Then it was back over to the AK Interactive Playmarkers and I used Desert Ochre on the belly and inner wings. Finished off with Black on eyes, nostrils, and claws.

Brought the first photo into Google Gemini and asked it to convert it to artwork for your VTT...

No ShadowDark card as essentially the Gold Dragon is the equivalent of a Lawful Red Dragon - use those stats on page 210 of the core rulebook.

NextLevel Miniatures - Morlock Wretch

 

More of the same as the last batch of Morlocks. Using AK Interactive Playmarkers I put down a layer of Zombie Skin, then hit the teeth with White and the eyeballs with Light Green. Black on the base with dithering of Dark Grey and Light Grey. These did have some hair which I used the Dirty White - I probably should have highlighted some of the strands with White for more pop.

Google's Gemini A/I got it half right - it found the hair on the right Morlock but not the left.

Image "enhanced"...

See the Morlock Lurker for the ShadowDark stats.

NextLevel Miniatures - Morlock Lurker

 

As easy as it gets with paint markers. Using AK Interactive Playmarkers I put down a layer of Zombie Skin, then hit the teeth with White and the eyeballs with Light Green. Black on the base with dithering of Dark Grey and Light Grey.

Google's Gemini A/I is just so much fun - here's some VTT artwork...

Here's my ShadowDark Monster Index Card. I wanted to give these guys a bit more than just another goblin. They're aggressive subterranean creatures with violent tendencies - they crawl up the cave walls, hide in the shadows, and then jump down on their victims slashing them with a clawed hand and then biting them while wrapped around their victim. I thought about giving them Dodge monster talent - I still might - let's them dodge a successful attack once per day.

NextLevel Miniatures - Bartop

 

A fun miniature to paint by NextLevel Miniatures - later I realized they had a human barkeep - should have picked up that model as well. Again, I'm trying to use more of a coloring book style (at least that's what I'm calling it) with dramatic contrasts while using the AK Interactive Playmarkers. Normally my approach would have been to spray a black basecoat and then drybrush everything else.

I used the Black to paint all the stones. Dark Grey on each individual stone. Then a thick "edge" highlight of each stone on the actual face on the stone. The wood pieces were completed using Leather with highlights of Wood along the grain.

Here's your VTT model using Google Gemini A/I...

Asking Gemini to enhance the artwork is interesting - it used patterns to enhance the woodwork which isn't so dramatic - but the stone it completely revised and added moss, lol...

NextLevel Miniatures - Archway

 

Another fun miniature by NextLevel Miniatures. This is the Archway and unfortunately when I purchased this I missed that there was an Archway with Portal - so I cheated and made my own using a bit of A/I to give me a green portal swirl and printed that out on a color printer - not as good, but it'll do on gameday...

Using most of the same techniques as the Runed Gateway, I painted using the AK Interactive Playmarkers all the grooves in the stone and sockets in the skulls with Black. I also completely did the stepped base in Black. Then I used Dark Grey for the stones and Light Grey for "edge" highlights - and I use the term "edge" loosely because it's really a thick line along the edge but on the flat to give an interpretation of depth. For the steps of the base I did something a little bit different, I wiped off the excess paint on the Dark Grey and dabbed using the side of the brush onto the black steps and it gave me that mottled granite look I was hoping to get and then did the same with the Light Grey as a highlight/color variation.

The skulls were painted with Dirty White and then a bit of White for the highlight. Finally, the vertical plates on the column were painted with Copper - the idea of that detail being a copper plate versus carved stone appealed to me.

Here's some great artwork for your VTT session using Google Gemini...

And how about a portal for your VTT session as well...

One more - I asked Gemini to make the runes glow with the portal...

NextLevel Miniatures - Runed Gateway

 

This is an awesome miniature and a blast to paint. Again, I used the AK Interactive Playmarkers for this and I was quite pleased with how it turned out - mostly because it's a paint style I'm learning.

I started off with Light Green on the outer part of the magical portal and I wasn't particularly careful because of the opacity of the paint, any mistakes would just be painted over. I grabbed Black and ran that through all the stone lines throughout the entire model including a thin line between the stone and the Light Green of the magical portal - except for the line break between stone and portal I again wasn't particularly careful. Then I used Medium Blue on the inner part of the magical portal edging along the Light Green. Finally, I used Dark Grey on all the stones being careful not to go into the black grooves.

That setup all the base colors. I think used Light Green and carefully dripped paint into the runes. Next I took Light Grey and did a bold "edge" highlighting on every stone including the lines on the base stones. That took care of the stonework. Next was Light Blue giving the magical portal depth. The last step was a Dirty White on top of all the energy bolts and within the Light Blue lines to give it more depth.

Wasn't sure that I wanted to base the item, but I think it was a good choice for stability purposes - particularly during the game when everyone is knocking stuff all over the table.

Taking that into Google's Gemini to get some artwork for your VTT sessions...

For giggles I asked Gemini to enhance the artwork - not sure if it's "enhanced" or not - up to y'all to decide - it's interesting...