TheDudeThatSleeps

20 || Absolutely hopeless bisexual || Asian Australian (Yes, we lost a war to emus) || Mainly about nerd stuff (DnD, Warhammer, movies, games and other misc stuff). I made this blog for the Monty Oum Project. I write and paint and I'm gonna learn how to draw and animate.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 16 progress:

So here's some more progress on what I've done. Firstly, I sprayed all the pieces for Reivers, but only sprayed 5 actual models just because I forgot to attach the grave chutes to the squad and I had to glue them on and wait for them to dry. Secondly, I finished the gun metal parts of for my Baal Predator and I've begun the process of recess washing with Agrax Earthshade. This coming weekend, I plan on spraying the rest of my Reivers and then basing them. Considering the colours needed to finish them, they may actually be my first squad that I actually finish. Til next week.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 15 progress:

Sorry for the super disrupted posting schedule lately. It seems that whenever I have time to paint, something pops up and takes me away from my painting but here are my Primaris Reivers freshly spray painted with Mephiston Red and my Baal Predator with most of the gunmetal and scrolling done. I hope to continue painting this weekend since painting is very therapeutic for me especially since university started up again and I'm doing a full semester this semester.

[thedudethatsleeps]

DnD Writing

Week 9:

So one of my other areas that I have is the Isle of Gold and Rum, a pirate haven based off of the Golden Age of Pirates and Pirates of the Carribean. They have no formal government and more of a haphazard “those with riches rule society”. Thus the island’s infrastructure is very haphazard and inconsistent. There is no security force in place and it pretty much is a law of the jungle, survival of the fittest kind of lifestyle. There are no schools, no hospitals and really the only kind of building there are taverns. The Isle also has an equatorial climate; warm and hot months with monsoon seasons instead of winter. Their food source consists of fish and whatever hardy, tasteless vegetables and exotic fruits that they can grow. They also produce a vast amount of unique alcohols which they consume by themselves.

They have no military being a pirate city, they are raiders and pirates by nature but thats not to say they are the weakest in terms of power. Their navy is second none boasting a far greater number, far higher skill level and far more potent weapons than anybody else. They have no hospitals and no mages so they make do with what they can. Amputations and mercy killing is extremely common just because none of them actually know how to heal themselves and their health is constantly poor because of their diet and lifestyle. The average age is about 20 with those considered lucky if they reached 30.

Religion-wise, they don’t worship anything. They are outcasts and exiles, they only speak in terms of gold and alcohol. They have the mindset that they make their own fortune and that they live their lives their own way rather than some god writing their entire lifestory for them.

That’s the basics of the Isle of Gold and Rim. Next week, I’ll talk more about the people, the military, the organisations and the general life of a citizen before touching on the quests in this area. I’ll do this for my last kingdom before talking about the main quest line of my campaign and then the elemental realms and how magic works. Till then, stay turnt.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 14 progress:

Hey all, I'm back with another warhammer 40k update. Now I know I said I would get the gold and white done but as you can see my white was unusable even after stirring and shaking for 15 min. I bought the pot probably a year and a half to two years ago and now that I finally got round to actually opening and using it, it turns into a paste like substance with water on top. I went online and it turns out that Ceramite White is super faulty and GW quietly released a new white two weeks ago so yeah go figure. So now my goal for this weekend is to clean up any mistakes I made and the finish the parchment areas. So I'll see you all next week, bye for now.

[thedudethatsleeps]

DnD Writing:

Week 8:

So in this area, I wanted to do something different to your standard hack and slash quests and so I lean very heavily into the quests used in Assassin Odyssey and Origins because I really like their exploration mode and so I used it as a template to play around with my quests. I especially liked the Cult of Kosmos and wanted to also use them somehow.

The premise of this area’s quest is that one of the Big Bad’s lieutenants has uncovered the ruins of an ancient civilisation in the region. This ancient civilisation was the most magically advanced races in the world even till now, no one has reached the same magical power and knowledge level as they did. This quest line will run alongside the region specific quest line. The group would have to find and eliminate the said lieutenant. But what they do with the knowledge is up to them and that choice will have consequences to the world. This would lead into another quest line on the discovery of the other ancient race and what happened to the world. I like to tie my side quests into my main quests so that at least my players know that there is the opportunity to delve further into this. Of course, the rewards will be significant so to entice my players into playing them.

My side quests would really depend on the decisions of my players, certain quests may not be available if let’s say hostilities erupt between the nations. But I really can’t say much more than the fact that they will be bog standard side quests because it depends a lot on my player’s decisions and actions in the world.

So these are my quest ideas in the Phaetian Islands area. I’ll talk about my next area next week so until then, stay turnt.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 13 progress:

I'm back and I got some stuff done. Between sleeping, honey lemon tea and my lungs trying to violently eject itself from my body, I managed to base some Death Company. I painted with Mephiston Red (Need to finish basing with that on some parts) and Leadbelcher. Next up is basing with Retributor Armour and Ceramite White and then touching up before shading. You would not believe the amount of times that I had to retouch my basing because I coughed while painting. Now I'm just going to sleep for the next 18 hours so I'll see you all next week.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Really sick, no post this week.

Hi all, really sorry about the lack of posts or late posts recently. Hit by a cold of immense proportions. I’ve been bed-ridden for days and I haven’t been able to do anything. I’ll be back on my feet by next weekend hopefully. Really sorry everyone.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 12 progress:

Sorry about the late update and the missing update from last week. Utterly collapsed after a while weekend volunteering at Supanova, a pop-culture con. Then spent the last week trying to recover from a bad mental streak. Anyway here are the Oathsworn with the silver parts based with leadbelcher. I'll try and get more done this week but it's been a rough one. Til next time though.

[thedudethatsleeps]

DnD writing:

Week 7:

It’s time to talk about the citizens of the Phaetis Islands, the Phaetians. My idea for the government of this nation is that they had a senate like system but still kept their martial way of life and their “might is right” ideology. The senate would consist of representatives of each island. This will reflect on the number of people in their army as every single citizen is expected to do their duty. The larger the population, the larger the army and therefore the more their people will be represented in the senate. These members will chosen from those who had served with honour and distinction. Heroes, champions, generals and all others can serve their senate. This is seen to be the ultimate end to a soldier’s career; to be able to continue serving their people in their fullest capacity, on a national and international stage.

Socio-economic classes are not really a thing in this society. The government will look after you if you will serve / can and am serving / have served the nation. Their people are not poor nor rich but there is a distinct class between the officers and the general soldiers. The general soldiers are equivalent to well-paid skilled workers as they will have a secondary job as a blacksmith, cook or whatever they have been assigned to fill the quota and these can earn them extra income out of the army. The officers will not have a secondary job but will be paid a higher wage on because of what their job entails. 

Families are an extremely tight-knit and important aspect of the Phaetians. They are the social base for everything. Officer families are especially distinguished in this society. It gets them more slaves, more income opportunities and better equipment but it means that they have a lot more to live up to in the eyes of society. More will come about this section in the quest lines.

The Phaetian Army is the perhaps the most strongest army in terms of raw strength. Initially, this army were seperate military groups formed to fight their inter-island wars. Overtime, islands soon distinguished themselves in different aspects of war. The fleet, the mainline, the calvary and the light infantry are some examples of this. They do not often deal in formal large contingent training to maximise flexibility, preferring to refine squad based tactics though said squads could number in the hundreds. Their main tactic is to grind their enemy under their phalanx formations.

There are no guilds but there are certain specialty groups. Those considered too young or not strong enough to join the phalanx formations join the light infantry corp, who hold a certain pride in their duty even though their people hold those in the phalanxes in higher regard. Their job is to skirmish, scout, raid, harass and ambush the enemy. Going one above is the calvary corp; these warriors are essentially a spec-ops version of the light infantry corp who undertake more dangerous missions. Then there are the fleetmasters who are seen as a more eccentric breed since they prefer naval combat and ships over a “good old” spear and shield. But there is one held in higher regard than even the phalanx warriors themselves; the enchanters. They are seen to be the harnessers of the magic of the Gods and as such are seen as holy ones.

That’s the society and the people of the Kingdom of Doonatel. Next week, I’ll talk about the quests in this area. So until then, stay turnt.

[thedudethatsleeps]

DnD Writing:

Week 6:

I’m going to talk Martial State-Cities of Phaetis Islands. I used a lot of Greek and Roman inspirations taking ideas form mythology and history. They have a democratic government but only those who have served with distinction in the military are allowed to represent their people and their state. A certain amount of leaders will be elected depending on the amount of people they represent. The more population an island has, the larger the percentage of representatives representing that island that will be present in the senate. These leaders also have a forced retirement age of 65 so as to allow fresh blood into the government. There are multiple islands (total number to be confirmed), all of which will have their own specialty or unique reputation.

The Phaetis islands have a Mediterranean climate; warm and hot months with monsoon seasons instead of winter. They are produce a lot of food due to their string of volcanoes dotted around the islands. However, the oceans surrounding them teem with sea life, both monstrous and monstrous, and as such provide a banquet of food for their people. Those volcanoes also have a secondary function and they are to act as large forges, easily accommodating a hundred blacksmiths in each. They have a relatively basic technology level, similar of that to Ancient Greece and Rome. However, they are masters of enchanting and using mystical rituals to empower their equipment and people. Their healthcare relies on a lot of mysticism but recently, medicine has had an explosion of growth thanks to the ongoing hostilities between the islands and the Doonatel Kingdom.

The might army comes from their infantry, feared throughout the world for their prodigious strength and resilience. One of their feared Phatirs is worth at least ten of an other soldiers bar the warriors from the East. Their navy, while relatively primitive and basic is among the most feared due to their shock tactics and devastating nose mounted rams. They do not have much in terms of ranged units, these roles are filled by those deemed too young to serve in the phalanx but old enough to participate in battle. And calvary is reserved for a purely communication, scouting and logistics role after being deemed dishonourable in combat as the horses would usually die in the charge.

Religion-wise, they worship a pantheon of gods that take are modelled after the number of islands there are. I haven’t gotten that far into writing them this week due to me volunteering at my local Supanova Convention.

That’s the basics of the Phaetis Islands. Next week, I’ll talk more about the people, the military, the organisations and the general life of a citizen before touching on the quests in this area. As always, I’ll do this for every kingdom before talking about the main quest line of my campaign and then the elemental realms and how magic works.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 11 progress:

This week I found out that I ran out of a few paints and shades but Thursday was pouring down and I didn't want to get drenched on the way to GW. That means I couldn't proceed any further on my Assault Terminators and Devastators. So I started basing Tactical Squad Talerin (formerly known as the Kingslayers) the "Oathsworn". I started doing their trims, chest pieces, weapons and other winged icons. This took a surprising amount of time to complete, three hours to complete the black sections. I was planning on doing the gold and silver as well but I have to wake up early in the morning (I say this at 1:00 in the morning). Hopefully I can do a lot more next week and hopefully my paycheck comes so I can buy some more paints online and in a large amount so I can get the free shipping.

[thedudethatsleeps]

DnD Writing:

Week 5:

So something I had struggled with was getting the right amount of quests and making sure that they were of a high quality (Witcher 3, Assassin Creed Odyssey and Skyrim being my benchmarks). I went with a formula of 2-4 side quests / small quests per settlement depending on the size and the larger ones or the more important ones having a quests attached to it that was it’s own quest line and somehow affected the main quest. So overall, one main quest, several other fairly important quests, a few side quests and maybe some guild contracts for money and maybe lore exploration. One thing I don’t tell my players is that they have personal quests as well, so stuff that could relating to their backstory and maybe even revelations about their future.

So to start off, the premise of the main quest is that there is an immortal tasked by a primordial being (My in-game character), who is essentially a multiverse character, to keep balance in this world. But after millennia of trying to keep the balance and suffering from the guilt of multiple failures and in general wanting to see his family again, he has decided he wants to die but given his task and “contract”, he can’t kill himself and so he has created chaos in the world to generate heroes that one day could unite to kill him and end his suffering. Over time, he has recruited followers to help him and they will act as mini-bosses before they can reach the Big Bad. The players will start off as a band of adventurers who have recently joined forces to tackle a contract. They will be based in their home town and during that time, they will complete small fetch quests and do a few other small things to endear them to their village before going on their bigger quest. On completion, they will find their village and the occupants destroyed. This will then lead them on a quest of vengeance.

Some other quests include finding legendary items, completing diplomatic missions, discovering new places and that sort of thing that you would find in a video game.These quests would be spread out through the Material realm and the Natural Planes so that it encourages the players to venture into the unknown. Just typical adventuring stuff. Some quests include retrieving the gear of the Mad King to gain an edge in fighting Big Bad and completing the quests for the Festival of Dancing Silver, which if failed greatly lowers the morale of the Kingdom and increases bandit and monster attacks.

Side quests include just your typical fetch quests for people and escort missions but it could include guild related missions. These quests are taken more for generating income, renown and experience but it won’t be the most glorious quests but as they complete them and endear themselves to the denizens of the kingdom, the quests may become more lucrative.

Personal quests are just ways for me to have dun with the bland background system of DnD 5e so it’s a way for me to play around and just do stuff for the sake of player reactions. I’ve been told and I quote my friend; “I want to be absolutely emotionally destroyed.” And so I do this, not just for my fun but also these quests are great for roleplay which in my first iteration of this campaign had barely any of.

So these are my quests in my campaign in general, I can’t go into great detail because I simply don’t have that much or because one of my friends follows me so I can’t post anything that could spoil anything for him. I’ll talk about y next area next week so until then, stay turnt.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 10 progress:

Hi guys, it's been a really productive week. Firstly finished basing the black and gold and almost have the grey areas complete. I'm using a different colour scheme; I like the look of the gold helmets on the terminators and in my mind they should have gold helmets because of their veteran status even though their box art show red helmets. I used Retributor Gold for that and I'll wash with Agrax Earthshade and then layer or maybe just highlight with Liberator Gold. I plan to get the bones, robes and cloaks done at least this week. Now onto my devastator, I based their weapons with Abaddon Black and Leadbelcher and painted their helmets with Kantor Blue. I also painted some other parts with black like the shoulder pad rims for the non-sergeant models just to break the monotonous red colour going on. Similarly, I will try to complete the bones, robes and cloaks as well as the gold bits on them. I'll be heading to GW again on Thursday so that I can pick up more paints and hopefully this time next week, I'll be at the washes stage.

[thedudethatsleeps]

DnD Writing

Week 4:

It’s time to talk about the people of Doonatel. Initially I had society be very feudalistic in Doonatel but I changed it up to more of an oligarch style government with the head ruler being chosen via Phoenix King style trials from noble houses. That being said, these trials could be tampered with and would lead to “accidental deaths” and other mishaps. I’ve even written a house who doesn’t even want to rule, they just want to play this game of thrones for a lack of a better term. The older houses consist of only a single race, eg. purely elves or dwarves, whereas the newer ones may consist of multiple races but only because a newer family will usually not have the numbers to form a noble house and so they will band together through marriage or familial alliance. The power is skewed towards the older houses as per norm due to their influence, age, experience and resources. So the newer houses act as supporting houses; they’ll support their choice of older houses in hopes of being on the winning side and gaining prestige. Some lesser noble houses however have been known to be integrated into the greater noble houses through marriage or just adoption due to losses in the greater noble house.

On the other side of the spectrum are the normal civilians of the kingdom. There are of course socio-economic classes ranging from peasants to scholars, but those lines are stop there. They do not restrict a person to that class forever; anyone can work their way up the ladder or sometimes even go down a class or two because they have a free market. Overall, just imagine a first world country but with an oligarchic government rather than a democratic government.

The Doonatel Legion is the main military might of the Kingdom. Pre-formal military, the closest thing that could considered as a military force were the small armed militias that patrolled each of the cities, towns and villages. Their origin started with a band of heroes that stood as the turning point in the Great Cataclysm, a massive daemonic incursion that caused great natural disasters as they tore their way through into the Kingdom. The 10 heroes led the militia of Doonatel and they took back their lands. During the last battle, many were lost including the 10 heroes that led the Legion. To honour that sacrifice, the Legion has remained broken into each of its Banners, one for each of the heroes. The Legion, an army of around 500,000 men, breaks down into 10 Banners, each designed to be a self-sustaining force capable of launching its own campaign. This Banners can be broken down into 10 Cohorts, a smaller formation similar to that of a company. Most of these Cohorts will be deemed as Standard Cohorts. Generally, the Standard Cohort will consist of most races and will make up the backbone of the Banner. Each banner will contain a set of specialist cohorts such as a Line breaker or Magic Caster Cohort. These will likely be formed with a select few races whose traits allow them to perform certain task. There are other numerous types of other Cohorts, many of which are Banner specific but some can found universally across the Legion. Most Cohorts are multi-racial but some are purely human due to them being the most numerous race in Doonatel.

Other specialty groups are the guilds. There are five guilds in Doonatel: Valiant Steel Brethren - An adventuring, dungeon crawling fighter’s guild Mystic Incarna - A magical guild whose main purpose is to learn, recover relics and spread knowledge but they also field battlemages and other magic combat classes Hesperax - A monster hunting guild not unlike the Witchers Fallen Requiem - An intelligence gathering guild made of thieves, assassins and rangers whose service to the kingdom go unnoticed (Undecided name) - An artisan and merchant guild who supports all forms of art as well as being a business and banking clan.

I have idea about inter-guild conflicts but I’ll go into those more in the quest line because I still need to flesh them out a bit more. But other than that, that’s the society and the people of the Kingdom of Doonatel. Next week, I’ll talk about  the quests in this area. So until then, stay turnt.  

[thedudethatsleeps]

Week 9 progress:

Hi everyone, I’m back with my week 9 progress report. I finally visited Gamesworkshop and managed to buy most of my list; I will need a second round though. I got some advice with the redness on my blood angels and that is to do a recess wash of Agrax Earthshade. Also got some help with doing the green for the eyes and the plasma weapons I have and managed to get my hands on some of the new Contrast paints. Personally I made progress with “The Thunder Lords”, I got some of the grey parts based with Mechanicum Standard Grey and I got most of the black parts done with Abaddon Black. I didn’t make a lot of progress painting wise because of my trip to Gamesworkshop but I did get a lot of my questions answered. My second picture is my test model for my Tyranids army. Shyish Purple with Black Templar. With the contrast paints coming out, I’m actually thinking of redoing my Tyranids just because it’s going to be so much easier and quicker to paint them. I want to at least finish basing my Terminators and move onto the recess washing next week so then I can move onto my tactical marines.

[thedudethatsleeps]

DnD Writing

Week 3:

I’m going to talk Kingdom of Doonatel. Like I said the previous post, I used Gondor, Witcher and Medieval Europe as my main inspirations but I did include some bits of Game of Thrones and Warhammer Fantasy in this. Starting with the government, I established a bunch of noble houses in which a candidate would be chosen for to become the Matriarch / Patriarch Ascendant (Queen / King figure), similar in the way that Phoenix Kings used to be chosen by the High Elves in Warhammer Fantasy. While there are 5 major houses, there are a bunch of minor houses that are essentially the vassals in Game of Thrones. While they can have a candidate of their own, it is more likely for them to support a house of their choosing since they don’t have the financial and political strength to put a candidate forward that can be taken seriously. 

Doonatel itself is a prosperous land; temperate climate, fertile land thanks to the string presence of magical wey-lines beneath the kingdom. They produce a lot of food but they don’t have much in the way of industry other than their University-City which harness magical technology on a small scale. This advanced technology however is extremely scarce but the more basic ones are abundant. Magical crystals, Runes and other sorts spells help make life easier. A skyship navy has recently been funded with the mages of Mystic Incarna (more on them next week) having just discovered how to infuse elements into crystals. As a result of this, their infrastructure, while still very basic, has slowly been turning more and more advanced with the widespread use of these crystals. However, their tech level is still Medieval at best due to the lack of people understanding how these crystals function. Think instead of torches, you have street lamps with crystals of light.

To put their military strength in terms with the rest of the world. Their infantry individual skills are probably one of the weakest but the overcome this with strategies and other supporting units such as battle mages, archers and calvary. They also have the largest army in the world just due to their larger country size. Their navy was formerly the strongest until it came across the Blood Daemon’s fleet, a pirate fleet of gargantuan proportions.

Religion-wise, they worship a pantheon of gods that take after the eight elements in the world. Fire, Water, Tempest, Earth, Nature, Metal, Radiance and Void. However, a new religion has popped up amongst the humans. A religion known as the Sect of Human Spirit. A religion that is anti-non-humans and I will go into more detail when I talk about quest lines.

That’s the basics of the Kingdom of Doonatel. Next week, I’ll talk mire about the people, the military, the organisations and the general life of a citizen before touching on the quests in this area. I’ll do this for every kingdom before talking about the main quest line of my campaign and then the elemental realms and how magic works.

[thedudethatsleeps]

Sorry for no posts last weekend

Really sorry about the lack of posts last weekend. I was super busy with a job interview and my boss called me in last minute on Friday, I had a 6 hour Dan grading in which I graded people for the first time on Saturday and Iastly I was sick and I had a volleyball scratchie in which I injured myself yesterday so yeah. I was just super tired to do anything but I'll get back onto creating for this coming weekend.