Kosh's Korner - Wargaming on a Budget

Clear Coat Finish, Modeling Putty and Sculpting Tool
At this point there's only a few more things needed to complete the basics of painting and modeling supplies. Really, a couple of these things may not be necessary at this point. The modeling putty and sculpting tool may not be needed until you get some metal models.

Clear Coat Finish
You will really want to put a clear coat on your models if you plan on playing games with them. A clear coat will protect your models and the paint job. Testor's Dullcote and Citadel Matte Varnish are a couple sprays you can use as a clear coat to finish off your models. These two products I mentioned are matte, meaning they won't leave a shiny appearance. If you want a particular part of your model to have a shiny appearance I'd recommend picking up a bottle of gloss varnish and use a brush to apply it to the particular part after you have sprayed it with the matte varnish. Most of the paint producers, Citadel, Vallejo, etc. make a gloss brush on varnish.

I don't have a lot of experience with the two sprays above, but after doing a little reading on these items it seems the Citadel brand Matte Varnish spray isn't that good. I picked up a bottle of Testor's Dullcote for $4. This particular product is no longer available in Europe due to the EU banning a certain chemical that is used in it's production. I've also heard that Krylon makes a good spray varnish and is probably the cheapest. You can find it at most home improvement stores, but I think it's only available in North America.

Modeling Putty and Sculpting Tool
Modeling putty, also called "green stuff," comes as two separate strips of putty, a blue strip and a yellow strip. Once the two are combined the magic begins to work, it turns green and begins to harden. It takes about two hours to completely harden, which means you have two hours to do with it what you want. It's mostly used to fill in gaps on metal models, but you can sculpt a complete model out of the stuff. It's packaged and sold by GW for $8 for a small amount. You can also get about four times the amount GW sells from Gale Force Nine for $18. I bought a package of GF9 putty.

A sculpting tool is used to spread and manipulate the modeling putty. This keeps from leaving fingerprints and helps smooth the putty out. GW sells a tool for $6, GF9 sells a 3 piece tool set for $12, and if you're really into sculpting you can get this nice 12 piece set pretty cheap. I picked up the Citadel tool, because that's all I could find in my area. You can check out this article for tips and tricks using green stuff and a sculpting tool.

Odds and Ends
You may also want to pick up a few more things for your work space such as shelving. I had a local carpenter put together a simple shelf out of some scrap wood he had lying around. It was only $6, but something you could easily do if you have the tools yourself.



I also bought a couple of flatware trays at a flea market for $5. I had originally intended to store my paint on them, but that was before I decided to go with Vallejo paints, which didn't fit. However, I will use it to put my infantry size models on it for display. I picked up a cheap cork board as well for $10. I put a color wheel, mixing charts, and a Citadel to Vallejo equivalency chart on mine. You could also use it for inspiration by putting pictures from magazines or the internet on there.



That does it for this budget, it came to $49. That pretty much does it for buying painting and modeling supplies, from here on out you will just need to replenish what you have or maybe pick up a few new colors of paint. There will still be more budgets coming, we still have models to buy as well as gaming accessories.

A Note
As you can see, I changed the name of my blog from Warhammer 40k on a Budget to Wargaming on a Budget. The reason is, I'm branching out. It's going to take me a while to buy all the models to make my 40k army, but I'm itching to play something. I've been checking out another game recently, Warmachine/Hordes by Privateer Press. From what I've seen it's a fun game and pretty cheap to get into. Most games are 500 point games, you can get a battle box of 350 points for only $50 and then build to 500 points for less than $100 total.

I had some credit at a game store I used to frequent and used that to buy a Legion of Everblight Hordes army. The local store is starting up a WM/Hordes league next Tuesday that I hope to get in on. I will try to get some pics up of those models as well as my Chaos Space Marine squad that's about half way done. Until then...