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Who doesn’t love to get some of them high quality brushes? I’ve been painting since the mid-90s and if experience taught me anything it is that there’s never enough brushes to go around with. Luckily, just when I was about to sweep the Internet in search of something new, that I could feed my brush hunger with, a package from Iron Keep came in. Inside there was a trio of Fine Sable brushes that I got to test. Here’s my honest review of the three.
All three Iron Keep brushes came packaged in separate plastic tubes, accompanied by instruction manuals. Each tip was lined perfectly and secured by a protective cover. Visually appealing, the brushes made a good first impression. An original choice of colors for sure – not really my cup of tea, but I wouldn’t stress over the color of the handles – it is the head of each individual brush that I’m most interested in. In this case the tips are sharp and flexible and bellies have just enough girth and length to my liking.
There’s a lot of brushes in the market that I could compare with Iron Keep Finest Sable. For the purpose of the review I decided to compare Iron Keeps with brushes I use on a daily basis. That would be:
Citadel (Warhammer) Artificer Series: 22€-32€, daVinci Maestro series 10 (much smaller belly): ~10€, Army Painter Masterclass (smaller tips): ~10€, Green Stuff World Silver Series (lower quality): 6-10€, W&N Series 7: 17€-25€
All sizes of the Iron Keep Finest Sable brushes are about 14€-15€ each, which might be more than cheaper and arguably lower quality alternatives, but also less than Citadel Artificer series and Winsor & Newton Series 7.
In order to be thorough I took all three brushes on a four days spin. I have used the trio almost exclusively for the entirety of the latest Warhammer 40,000 Genestealr Cults commission of over two dozen miniatures. All three brushes performed admirably under my typical rigorous routine. Take note that I do not care for brushes much. These are the tools of my trade and as such, are required to carry a burden of all kinds of paints including washes, metallic pains, textures and varnishes. Not only did the Iron Keep Finest Sable emerge victorious, but I have no bad things to say about the performance. The brushes behaved just like I would imagine from other mid-high end hobby brushes.
When it comes to comfort of work and belly/tip behavior, Iron Keep overperformed compared to Green Stuff World Silver Series, DaVinci and The Army Painter. Throughout the process my impression was that the Iron Keep performed on par with Citadel Artificer and W&N Series 7, which are some of my favorite lines of brushes. Below are a few pictures of the brushes after the job was done.
Iron Keep delivered and I am genuinely happy about the three brushes. Both pricing and the quality works for me. The only issue I have is the limited choice of size. I prefer to work on slightly larger brushes and would definitely get size 3 and 4 if available. Either way this is not the last time you will see Iron Keep Finest Sable at my workbench – they now join the ranks of my favorite brush lines. Look out for yellow handles all over my workspace from now on!
Why not at the very source: Iron Keep Fines Sable
You might also find these brushes at selected online stores.
I hope you find this review interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below, or at Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Ahoy Sailors! As you know I am most and foremost a passionate hobbyist. That being said I am also a pirate, a scoundrel and a fanatical enthusiast of Mantic Games Kings of War: Armada – a naval strategy game set in a rich world of Pannithor, pitting multiple wonderfully crafted and strongly themed factions against one another. In this article I present to you a new, fan made, “Creeping Death” Scenario.
Armada Scenario: Creeping Death
An unnatural fog starts to creep into the sea. Two fleets caught mid-battle must now face a chilling touch of an enemy they cannot fight against!
Setup
Each player’s deployment zones are two 16″x16″ triangles at the opposite sides of the board.
Both players deploy their fleets one ship at a time, as usual, except no player can place two ships in the same deployment zone one after the other.
Roll a D6, on a 1-3, the Wind starts from the West, on a 4-6, it starts from the East.
Victory Conditions
The game lasts 6 turns.
Players score VP at the end of the game, as follows:
● 1VP for each destroyed enemy ship up to a maximum of 4VP.
● 2VP if the most expensive enemy ship (‘Capital Ship’) is destroyed.
● 2VP if more than half (rounding up) of the enemy ships are destroyed.
The Player with the most VPs is the winner.
Scenario Rules
At the end of each turn, the deadly unnatural fog creeps further onto the board. Any ship caught in the fog is immediately hit* and suffers a Critical Hit (Critical Hit Table p.26 Rulebook). Any Tiny and/or Surrendered Ships that are caught in the fog are immediately destroyed instead.
*Ships can freely start and end their Activations in the unnatural fog. The hits occur at the end of turn only.The deadly fog creeps from the outside of the gaming board as follows:
● First Turn: 3” from the board edges.
● Second Turn: 6” from the board edges.
● Third Turn: 9” from the board edges.
● Fourth Turn: 12” from the board edges.
● Fifth Turn: Players roll a D6. On 4+ the fog progresses another 3″ from the board edges and towards the middle.
● Sixth Turn: Players roll a D6. On 4+ the fog progresses another 3″ from the board edges and towards the middle.
I hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below or via Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional Warhammer miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Ahoy Sailors! As you know I am most and foremost a passionate hobbyist. That being said I am also a pirate, a scoundrel and a fanatical enthusiast of Mantic Games Kings of War: Armada – a naval strategy game set in a rich world of Pannithor, pitting multiple wonderfully crafted and strongly themed factions against one another. In this article I present to you a new, fan made, “Hellish Trident” Scenario.
Armada Scenario: Hellish Trident
Three Islands in this area are believed to be the cursed tips of a Hellish Trident. Every now and then the Islands resonate creating waves of vast magnitude, dealing massive damage to nearby ships. Most fleets avoid the area, but on this very day the orders were given to gain control of this cursed place…
Setup
In addition to any terrain, players place three small Islands, representing the tips of the Hellish Trident, on the table in the following configuration:
● 1 Objective Marker in the center of the table.
● 1 Objective Marker, 8” from the left side and 8” from the top side of the board.
● 1 Objective Marker, 8” from the right side and 8” from the bottom side of the board.
Each player’s deployment zones are 24″x24″ triangles at the opposite sides of the board.
Roll a D6, on a 1-3, the Wind starts from the West, on a 4-6, it starts from the East.
Victory Conditions
The game lasts 6 turns.
Each player scores VP at the end of the turn, as follows:
● 1VP for the player who controls more Islands.
Additionally, at the end of the game players score VP as follows:
● 2VP for the player who controls more Islands.
The player with the most VPs at the end of the game is the winner.
Scenario Rules
From the second turn onwards, one Island will start to Resonate. Any ship that ends its Activation within/partially within 8” from the Resonating Island must pass a Skill Test. If the test fails the ship will suffer D6 Damage. If the Skill Test fails on a natural roll of “1” the ship will suffer an additional Critical Hit (Critical Hit Table p.26 Rulebook).
During the last game Turn all Skill Tests made by ships within 8″ from the Resonating Islands suffer a -1 modifier and each Damage Roll suffered as a result of Resonating Islands are automatic Critical Hits (Critical Hit Table p.26 Rulebook).
● Second Turn: Players roll-off, the winner selects the Island to resonate this turn.
● Third Turn: The opposing player selects a different Island to resonate this turn.
● Fourth Turn: The last Island is the one to resonate this turn.
● Fifth Turn: No Islands resonate this turn.
● Sixth Turn: All Islands resonate this turn.
Each player scores VP at the end of the turn, as follows:
● 1VP for the player who controls more Islands.
Additionally, at the end of the game players score VP as follows:
● 2VP for the player who controls more Islands.
The player with the most VPs at the end of the game is the winner.
Controlling Islands
Tally up the CS of non Surrendered friendly ships within 6″ from an Island for both players. The side with greater CS within the area Controls the Island. The majority of the ship’s base must be within the area to count towards the tally.
I hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below or via Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional Warhammer miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Playing miniature wargames used to be all about textured boards and fluffy static grass mats. These days there’s a variety of alternatives, the best of which is in my opinion a proper gaming mat. Gaming mats look great, they’re durable, easy to store and most importantly offer a wide spectrum of themes to improve the gameplay experience. When it comes to gaming mats there’s a few clear leaders in the market, but my favorite is the Playmats – a well established Polish brand of gaming accessories and Battle Mats for wargames. For years now I have been a faithful customer, improving my wargaming experience with Playmats, be it with their original designs or via commissioning them to produce items to my personalized specifications. This review is less of a classic price/quality/etc. and more of a product-focus. As it happens the Playmats just released a Battle Mat produced in association with yours truly. A great opportunity to present to you my own idea realized as a fully fledged product of a well known company.
The product in question is the “No Man’s Land” mat for wargames. The idea behind the mat is to provide a ravaged trenchline background for a desolated battlefield, so that any configuration of so-called trench-hills will fit, regardless of setup. The inspiration came out of nowhere when I was making a new Trench Crusade gaming board and weighted my options between fully 3D modelled, plank covered ‘ground floor’ and a standard battlefield type gaming mat. Modelling floor tiles is a tedious task that limits setup options for scenery, whereas for a gaming mat – there was just no design of what I had in mind anywhere out there. Most gaming mats are designed to look good as standalone products and are not necessarily treated as a background for a full scenery set – I figured to pitch my idea to Playmats and to my surprise they took it in with an open mind.
I will skip the entire design process and focus on the finished thing instead. The gaming mat I got is a standard 48×48″ (122x122cm), one sided print on a rubber pad. I have many Playmats products already so to no surprise the quality is very good, with strong and vibrant colors, smooth cutting lines and perfect rubber pad to print adhesion. The final design is very much to my liking, full of messed up trench floor, ideal to stick out from beneath trench-hills.
The No Man’s Land comes in a variety of sizes and as such it fits a variety of games, including Trench Crusade (like in my case), but also an Imperial Guard themed board for Warhammer 40,000/Kill-Team or a cool Warzone trench line. I am very happy with the results.
For the record: I do not earn any affiliation based returns from the sales of this product. Now that I have a cool No Man’s Land gaming mat of my own, I have no further horses in this race, if you catch my drift. I’m here spreading the hobby love because I do appreciate Playmats eagerness to release my idea, not to forget the great quality of all the cool stuff they delivered throughout the years. At this point I am a fan of theirs for life!
This and other Playmats products are available at Playmats.eu or Playmaty.pl for all of you – Polish friends.
I hope you find this review interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below, or at Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Exactly a year ago I made my first Trench Crusade gaming board. The Silesian Trenchline was a project of passion combining a lifetime of previous terrain making experiences with a wide array of expectations towards the game of Trench Crusade – I did not yet played at the time.
It is 2026 now and I’ve been playing Trench Crusade extensively for the past twelve months, both at home and at various events. I have tested my wargaming mantle against some of the best Trench Crusade competitive gamers in Poland, emerging that much more experienced in terms of knowledge of the flow of the game. Even though the previous gaming board is considered very playable, it is not without some key issues that grew on me over time. I have adjusted some features and added a few extras. At the end of the day I still felt it was time to ‘update’ the whole set. Thus here we are – the Silesian Trenchline 2.0 project begun on Monday 9th of February 2026.
This time around the main focus was to:
– Prioritize gameplay features over looks,
– Copy the core, well tested and Organized Play viable, board layout,
– Increase stackability (less occupied space when fully compacted),
– Maximize looks within the limits set by the above directives,
The project began in earnest on Monday afternoon, when all the necessary material got delivered at my doorstep. 2″ thick XPS foam, corrugated paper, wooden coffee sticks, PVA glue, lots of Cyanoacrylate glue and other stuff plus some 3D printed bitz and pieces I produced throughout the previous Weekend.
I copied the exact layout of the previous board by outlining each piece on a fresh XPS foam board, then cutting the XPS along the lines with an exacto knife. The next step was to fit the shapes onto a board to see if they require any adjustments. A few dimensions did get tuned slightly. I then followed up with the standard side decoration – a mix of corrugated paper and hundreds (actually over a thousand) wooden coffee sticks of varied shapes, all mounted firmly with PVA glue.
I made sure to glue coffee sticks so that they created a ragged top edge, but stuck out on the underside, to then cut them off along the natural line of the XPS foam, once dry.
In order to improve visuals in a way that will not impact gameplay comfort, I have built a few shrines and ammo caches that I then mounted inside some of the trench walls.
With all the scenery pieces prepared I have arranged a game with my buddy to see how the updated board performs in ‘real combat’. The test was a success. We both felt this was exactly how a top competitive one-off game should feel. The board was approved and ready to get painted.
The painting process was nothing new. I followed the same color scheme as before, except for the texture. This time I used AK Interactive Dark Earth, rather than a DIY mix of fine sand with brown paint and PVA glue. It saved me a lot of time. On Friday 13th of February I was done with the project – for the time being…
The board is very playable, although compared to the previous set of the Silesian Trenchline, it looks somewhat empty. I have purposely resigned from angling the side walls and adding sandbags – for smoother gaming experience, but now feel that the new board is way less fotogenic than the last one was. Because of that I am working on adding a few removable obstacles that should bring back some of that fine color to the entire thing. What do you think – how much worse does it look by comparison? How much more playable do you think it is now?
Stay tuned for updates as projects such as this are never really finished.
PS: The amazing ruined trench bottom game mat is “No Mans Land” from Playmats.eu that I helped to develop.
I hope you’ve found this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments at Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Here are some Color Recipes for Trench Crusade themed scenery from Gallery: Silesian Trenchline and Gallery: Silesian Trenchline 2.0. Please take note that this is a simple color scheme, not covering multiple overlapping layers and blends in between, that lead to the final product. It is supposed to be used as guideline not a step-by-step.
DARK wood:
Vallejo Panzer Dark Grey 74.603, *
Vallejo Grey RLM02 71.044, *
Vallejo Cold Grey 72.750, *
Vallejo Cold Grey 72.750, drbr
The Army Painter Grim Black, thinned wash
The Army Painter Strong Tone, wash*
Games Workshop Flayed One Flesh, l&p,
AK Interactive Dark Earth texture, thinned blend
Vallejo Barbarian Skin 72.071, weathering, drbr
WEATHERED metal:
Vallejo Tinny Tin 72.060,
Vallejo Chainmail 72.053, flbr
Vallejo Silver 72.052, scratches
The Army Painter Strong Tone, wash*
AK Interactive Light Rust wash, weathering
SANDY sandbags:
Vallejo Barbarian Skin 76.071, *
Games Workshop Flayed One Flesh, stpl
The Army Painter Strong Tone, wash*
OLIVE accessories:
Vallejo Grey RLM02 71.044, *
Mix Vallejo Grey RLM02 71.044 4:1 Games Workshop Flayed One Flesh, flbr
The Army Painter Strong Tone, wash*
Games Workshop Flayed One Flesh, l&p
AK Interactive Light Rust wash, weathering
EARTHY ground:
AK Interactive Dark Earth texture,
Vallejo Barbarian Skin 72.071, drbr
EXTRAS:
Gamers Gras 2mm Brown Tufts
I hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below, or at Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Ahoy Sailors! As you know I am most and foremost a passionate hobbyist. That being said I am also a pirate, a scoundrel and a fanatical enthusiast of Mantic Games Kings of War: Armada – a naval strategy game set in a rich world of Pannithor, pitting multiple wonderfully crafted and strongly themed factions against one another. In this article I present to you a new, fan made, “Marked for Death” Scenario.
Armada Scenario: Marked for Death
An opposing fleet was spotted on the horizon. Soon the orders got relayed to mark priority targets for the immediate destruction. Unbeknown to the fleets captains the enemy prepared plans of their own…
Setup
Each player’s deployment zone is 6” deep and 12” from each table edge.
Roll a D6, on a 1-3, the Wind starts from the West, on a 4-6, it starts from the East.
Victory Conditions
The game lasts 6 turns.
Players score VP at the end of the game, as follows:
● 1VP for each enemy Marked for Death ship destroyed.
● 1VP for each enemy Marked for Protection ship destroyed.
● 1VP for each friendly not Surrendered Marked for Protectionship in the enemy half of the table.
● An additional 2VP for the player who destroyed more Marked for Death enemy ships.
The Player with the most VPs is the winner.
Scenario Rules
Before Deployment each player writes down in secret two of their own ships of size M or larger. These ships are now “Marked for Protection”. Next, players write down in secret two enemy ships of size M or larger. These ships are now “Marked for Death”. If there is only one ship of the appropriate size in a fleet, it is Marked automatically by both players and counts as two ships for the purpose of Scoring.
At the start of each of the first four turns, both players reveal one of the Marked ships simultaneously, as follows:
● First Turn: Reveal one enemy Marked for Death ship.
● Second Turn: Reveal one friendly Marked for Protection ship.
● Third Turn: Reveal second enemy Marked for Death ship.
● Fourth Turn: Reveal second friendly Marked for Protection ship.
The Marked ship can already be destroyed when revealed. The same ship can be Marked for Death and Marked for Protection at the same time.
I hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below or via Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional Warhammer miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Welcome to Painting Trench Crusade Antenna Cross tutorial. Here I will present to you a Step-by-step of an easy and fast painting process for this outstanding Trench Crusade sculpt.
This tutorial, is in video format. You can find it at Scarhandpainting YouTube chanel. Embeded video below:
List of colors:
Vallejo Tinny Tin 72.060
Vallejo Hammered Copper 72.059
Vallejo Silver 72.052
Vallejo Off White 72.101
Vallejo Steel Grey 72.102
The Army Painter Tyrian Navy SP
The Army Painter Grim Black SP
The Army Painter Strong Tone Wash
Games Workshop Blood for the Blood God
I hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below, or at Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
Ahoy Sailors! As you know I am most and foremost a passionate hobbyist. That being said I am also a pirate, a scoundrel and a fanatical enthusiast of Mantic Games Kings of War: Armada – a naval strategy game set in a rich world of Pannithor, pitting multiple wonderfully crafted and strongly themed factions against one another. In this article I will present to you a fun play mode to spice your games of Armada with Faction Forts!
Faction Forts is a fan made game mode for Armada. In this mode both players set up two 40mm based Forts with no additional points cost. that count In order to use the Faction Forts (MOD) ignore the Coastal Defences (p.9-15 Seas Aflame).
Faction Forts: Fortifications based on a round 40mm base, that count as Large size Main Battleships with a few exceptions:
Faction Bonuses: If both players agree the Faction Forts gain the faction specific bonuses listed below:
I hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below or via Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional Warhammer miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
To those of you who follow my work it will be of no surprise that I am a huge Armada enthusiast. The game by Mantic Games hooked me up since day one. My personal collection consists of eight fleets of varying sizes and multiple dedicated scenery sets. I went deep and beyond, dedicating a part of my hobby blog exclusively to Armada, not to mention a huge part of my life.
Regardless of multiple fleets I have been playing the Salamanders fleet almost exclusively for the past few years. This is because I really like their playstyle, but also due to the simple color scheme and a fast painting methodology that allows me to add more ships ASAP whenever I decide to test out some borderline insane lists. One might even say that in the end comfort and speed of painting won with all the other, much fancier fleets.
But my only true miniature love of all time was always the Undead. We’re talking since the early 90s. I have been collecting skeletons and wrights, vampires, mummies and zombies of all kinds in a variety of miniatures games. The time finally came for Armada to get spiced with some bones if you catch my drift.
As it happens I am a part of the Mantic Games Rules Committee and participate in the design process of the new fleets that come to the game. When an opportunity to write the Undead fleet rules presented itself I called dibs! I was given a guideline of what types of ships I was to focus on, created a draft, then playtested the ruleset extensively before presenting it to Mantic Games for further testing and eventual approval. All that to say I had the opportunity to write the rules for my favorite faction in my favorite miniatures game…
…but the rules are just half of a fleet. The models are a different story. Although Armada has a set of beautiful STL files for every existing faction available through Mantic Vault (including the Undead), there’s nothing stopping players from outsourcing models. More so, I do believe that the game is somewhat miniatures agnostic – it is the base size that represents a ship class and it is easy to track what’s what as long as players know what faction is being played.
With that in mind and being a creative dude, I wanted to really flesh out the Undead that I feel. A mix of old Warhammer with Heroes of Might & Magic 3, more bones, more gothic afts, more spikes and tattered sais… but also something disturbing and strange about the fleet I had in mind.
In the end I digitally kitbashed my own fleet with official Mantic’s files of the Twilight Kin (hulls) and Forces of the Abyss (sails, flames, bones), adding a few extras (tombstones, piles of bodies, etc.). It was all done in Meshmixer, which I learned from scratch as I went. The end result is clunky, but has some charm to it.
At that point I had a fleet of Undead ships built in advance to the possible maximum and over the top. For those who don’t know – Armada is a game of usually between five to nine ships with some borderline examples of over a dozen. Still, with multiple fleets and a multitude of list archetypes there’s ways to lean into a particular ship class or playstyle, thus covering some extremes. I’ve covered this particular topic in Armada Expanding Collection Guide for those interested, but for now, allow me to state that with the Undead I aimed at truely embracing the fleet with all of its possible configurations.
And it broke me! Because of the sheer number of ships, the magnitude of the project somehow turned it from a ‘hobby boner’ into a downer. I laid the undercoat, then shelved the project for a later date. It was June 2025 and the moment of inspiration did not come in 2025. I just continued to play the Salamanders as usual…
That is until Saturday 17th of January 2026! New year, a lot of commissions completed ahead of time (I’m already working on stuff planned for the end of May), a lot of gaming spread across the month… an Armada event hit! “Black Waters 16” is a cyclic local event I organize. This one was a blast. We had a full house with players from across Poland driving in to attend. I had a great time and as usual the event energized me for everything Armada. I managed to focus this power of hype into painting a shelved project – the Undead got onto my desk the day after!
In the end it took me about 16 hours of intense painting, spread across Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. After over half a year of waiting the Undead Fleet is now completed and I cannot wait to take it to the sea and play my very first game! (other than the beta testing).
More pictures and close-ups for every ship class at: UNDEAD FLEET GALLERY
Lemme know what you think of the ship designs, how they feel and how you like the color scheme for these bony puppies!
I hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below, or at Facebook or Instagram. If, by any chance, you are looking for a professional miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
