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Irresistible fellows, these. Shaggy, bulky bodies like a ROBOT MONSTER or a moa; long, bendy necks; beaks somewhere in the hornbill-flamingo-shoebill-Skeksis-vulture range. From CP miniatures. They came in 3 packs: Soldiers (4 riflebirds plus a squad leader), Diplomats (3), and Auxiliaries (3 riflebirds with hats). The skin color scheme was based on blue, red, and yellow boobies; the beaks were inspired by a number of large birds. I added some headgear for fun and in homage to the dandelion-headed Looney Tunes "Instant Martians." I get the idea they are of a highly organized bureaucratic culture with expansionist tendencies, unlike the tribal Venerian Amazons (Hydra Valkeeri). The Hydra Imperials, below, are also from an expansionist imperial culture, but the Terror Birds are less centralized and more impersonal in their cruelty. They get around. Seen here with Hydra's Slishans, who have little culture and almost no technology but DO know from mineral resources. And seen here engaged in diplomatic negotiations with the highly-cultured Andromedans/Neirans. Both species have a great appreciation for the arts and for manipulation. You wouldn't call either culture "decadent," because of the railguns, but 'Baroque' might be appropriate. Notice that the Bombshell Neirans are towering statuesque specimens. Vavoom to a point that makes the Venerians look puny. Trade talks with a chieftain of the Mole People from Sirius B. and theological disputation with an Exalted Proselyte of the Yoggs. The Brain Squids are an esoteric lot and require a delicate touch.] A disputed claim of precious nuclear resources on the border of the Robot Hegemony. The Robots are prohibited by First Law to harm humans, but your beaky bois here do NOT qualify. A Martian delegation, bearing the wisdom of aeons of progress and aeons of rust. A culture this antique requires more than one specialist. The Krodox are one of the few spacefaring species to outmass a Terror Bird, They are willing to trade ceramic goods for new and exotic meats, and respect bigness in a fellow-sentient. Humans are not known for their bigness, but are slippery customers. Tricksters and clever dodgers. Lastly, a diplomatic summit with representatives from most sentient, spacefaring species. As always, C&C welcome! What do you think their alien avian civilization is like?

FROM SPACE IT CAME! Its motives--INSCRUTABLE! Its desires--UNKNOWN! This is why the Galacteer Academy requires three semesters of Xenodiplomacy, cadet! This spacefella was an excellent excuse to experiment with colorshift paints. Betty (50150) and Rizzo investigate. Further scans are necessary! Good news! It seems to be benevolent, desiring only TO SERVE MAN. Whew! What a relief! That could have gone so much worse. Another crisis averted, thanks to the Galacteers!

Matthew Beauchamp recently sculpted an excellent line of Dragon Men for his Retroverse. I had to get them--and they are massive and burly, about 45mm or so! Great scaly brutes, But the heads were a little less reptilian and more orcish than I would like, having committed to the Antediluvian aesthetic of Buckland Rogers. Don't worry, I'll find a use for that head somewhere. So I took a couple of hours with Green Stuff and a dental tool and made a new hunchbacked crocodilian/mosasaur head, scarred and with a toothy muzzle. This is a prominent NPC in my spacefuture games, Atrox the weapons merchant. He is about nine foot tall, cheerfully violent and moderately amoral. Won't sell biological weapons or anything with long-half-life decay products, but otherwise it's fair game if you have the credits. Pretty scarred about the face and neck, because he's a professional and insists on testing each type of weapon before selling. Also from ritual Laser-Glaive duels. I have decided his species mostly practices gigantocracy: whoever is biggest gets to rule. Not a perfect system, but very good at supply logistics and famine avoidance. "Perhapf sir would care to infpect our line of Deathshead blafters? Only the finest quality!" "Flamerf, zapperf, plafma-bolterf, we got it. Throw in a laser free with every third purchase." "We think thif one is from the future. I call it an Ontological Disruptor. Dunno HOW it works, but push thif button and the target vanishes from the physical univerfe for 6.3 secondf. The savvy tacticianf can immediately fee the poffibilitief." "Or perhapf sir would like a more ELEGANT weapon, from a leff civilized age?" "Clubf, maces, nooses, axes single or double, goads, prods, glaivef, fpears, throwable mambelef--oh, the Vault?" "I see that sir is a discerning customer! Only the moft DEVAFTATING beam weaponf and mortarf to be found thif side of New Xibalba!" "But don't juft take MY word for it! Liften to the teftimonialf of our satisfied customerf!"

I sculpted this 5 headed nightmare 🙂 Made a post about it here https://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/95758-goosedra/ And as promised, I painted it!

I saw a picture online of an angry 5 headed white goose suggested as a custom monster for D&D. And I just couldn't resist 😄 Behold, the dreaded GOOSEDRA! I will make a separate thread in Painting Show Off once I paint it 🙂 Close up of the heads This wants to be a Chinese Goose head. And of course I had to have the memed Untitled Goose with a knife head And a Canada Goose Head as the leader The other 2 heads I'll paint as Greylag geese This is how I made it.

Space is full of perils. There are creatures out there that have evolved to be perfect predators, killing machines without remorse or hesitation, carnivores with the cunning to manipulate tool-using sentients and the ferocity to exterminate entire species. One such evolved on Earth, and is greatly in demand for controlling space-vermin infestations on board ship. Don't leave port without a ship's cat! That's how the xenomorphs get you! The handsome fellow in burgundy is Commander Mudpie, from Hydra. More pics below: You thought letting the cat in and out was a hassle on Earth... The humble dog, one of Earth's first pioneers into space, can't be beat for loyalty or tracking. The hard part is making a spacesuit that can pick up scent samples in an airless environment. Who is a good spaceboy? It's this guy! More below: And lastly, another for the Space Apes faction. Having four hands is a real problem-solver in zero-gee. I love the little thumbs on Hairy Herbert's boots. Again, click for more angles. The bubble helmets are clever, and add to the effect wonderfully. I might remove the chimpanzee's faceplate for uniformity's sake. Special guest appearances by Space Roughnecks and Cold War's Space Ape (last seen as Gordy). Keep watching the skies, cadets!

A return to the psychedelic fungal jungles of Retro-venus and the harsh plains of the Imperial homeworld, with a Space Princess for each. I really can't overstress what a lovely sculpt Azeemah, from Hydra's Imperials faction, is. Definitely looks as stern as she is beautiful, though not as cruel as her unstable sister. With her Void Metal saber and standard raygun, she is all business. More angles: Both the Princesses: And a cadre of the Imperial Court: And in the Venerian jungle, the no-nonsense Princess Alluria, ready for anything the planet throws at her, animal or vegetable. Guest appearance from the Death Lilies, and some Halloween Venus Flytrap decor. More below: And with a couple of her retinue (TWO males, she is *very* high-status).

I painted some Warhammer snake elves up as corn snakes a while back and really liked how they came out. I didn't think the full pattern would work well on a hydra but I went with the same colours and I'm pretty pleased with the result.

I got this awesome looking Hydra from the EU Box of Goodwill. @GlitterwolfGlitterwolf got it years back from another bogw. I traced it to be part of a kickstarter, where originally it was a fountain! Not having the water parts, and also wanting to paint out alive, it resulted in this! I tried to create a shadow of his body still under water, although I didn't think of it till after the water texture was added. Still happy on the outcome :)

This Grenadier Hydra (SKU 124) has been languishing on my painting table for a really long time (maybe 30 years), so I decided it was time to finish it once and for all. I wanted it to have a similar color scheme to the Grenadier Hydra Dragon (SKU 9911) I painted 30+ years ago, in one weekend (to get it ready for the game on Sunday afternoon). It is a true oldie, with a bunch of that old mini charm, but it has a serious lean. I didn't realize how bad it actually was until I glued it together after painting.

Diversity is important, and my Imperial forces and Venerians have been lacking. Well, I mean there's some ethnic diversity, but all the Venerians are ladies and all the Imperials are men. So here's a male Venerian (Hydra Valkeeri Mind Slave B if I recall). He looks like he should be played with minimal charisma by an actor named Brick Manjaw. Or Chet Chesthair, something of that nature. Him with the gals: And likewise from the Valkeeri line, here's Empress Xenovia. But a) she's an Empress, and b) the outfit seems a bit more like the Imperials of Lord Zarek than the retrofuture vavoom Valkeeri. And the whole crew:

As every space-cadet knows, life exists just about everywhere it can. Our spiral arm is just teeming with sentient species, Space Monsters, and things in between. These silicious stalagmen, the Slishans of Titan, are probably in-between. They're from Hydra's Retro Raygun series, and their grumpy expressions and rugose crusts are delightful. Meet Gak and Yurk: And their colleague, Vork. Wait! Vork's got a gun! How did it get a gun? IS it actually a gun? Does it know how to use it--and if so, will Vork be a benevolent leader? Last but certainly not least, Old Grandcestor One-Tusk. I got a Roper in one of those WotC random boxes, and then never used it for a year. So I got some Green Stuff and put lips, tusks, a tongue, and an extra pair of eyes on there. What great spacebastards they are!

All Hail Hydra! This one I have put off painting since way back when. In it's unpainted form I thought it had soft details and was a bit crude. As soon as I started painting it now, the drybrushing revealed another side to it, so to speak. It turned out much better than I expected, mainly as the faces are easier to read than when unpainted, and the details are not as shallow as I had thought. Again, I use a big brush when painting big bones, this one was mainly painted with a 15mm wide flat and a 5mm flat. It was painted mainly with drybrushing with no washes used at all. I started over a black undercoat, I painted the entire thing with new Citadel Incubi Darkness, and drybrushed this heavily with new Citadel Kantor Blue. Next was a heavy drybrush with old Gamecraft Olive Green on the top half and Vallejo Game Color Dead Flesh on the bottom half. The stripes are in an old dark red I think is Leviathan Fire Dragon Red. I am not quite sure, as it was poured over into another pot at some point, and I did not write what it was on the new pot. I drybrushed the stripes with new Citadel Wazzdakka Red. The back ridges, horns and claws were done with new Citadel XV-88, Bleached Bone and Reaper Splintered Bone. The mouths were painted Kantor Blue followed by Citadel Screamer Pink and Wazdakka Red, and a mix with yellow at the edges. Eyes in bleached bone, Yriel Yellow and Wazdakka Red. Teeth in Reaper Splintered Bone. I printed out a base for it, and built it a little up on the front end to make the beast stand a little taller. The cracks and edges were hidden with clumps of tufts. Many of the miniatures in the first Bones kickstarter were based on metal minis already in production. Might this be a factor for softer details on those than on the newer ones? This was a paid add on on the KS. 77191 Hydra Reaper Bones, from the first kickstarter 2013 Sculpted by Sandra Garrity Made from Bonesium PVC Bespoke printed 130mmx80mm base Currently available from reapermini.com

I've been working on some really large dragons and some time sensitive commissions as of late. So it was nice to have a client say, "Take your time, no rush" and give me details on what they wanted. I wanted to go with some muted colors on the hyrda. I've burnt myself out on reds, greens and blues for dragon/lizard skin. So I went with a red brown instead. Namely Ruddy Leather and the Redstone triad for the upper scales and the Olive Skintone triad for the belly scales. I painted the left and right side head first, then the middle head and body, then attached them after they were done. Thanks for looking!

A wonderful piece of pulp adventure terrain, suitable for the Serpent Men of Valusia, the Yuan-Ti or Lizardfolk, or any game with dinosaur cults or a reptilian civilization. @Glitterwolf might find this useful--and it's a very painter-friendly sculpt. For scale, we have a 28mm Kirangozi and a 32mm safari explorer.

If anyone looks qualified to declaim the Litany of ZAREK into an Omnicrophone from atop a golden hover-chariot, it is surely 62107, the Aeon Priest from Reaper's Numenera line. Look at this robed and jowled hierophant! I feel like I should put more patterning on the robe, besides the Eye of Marduk. Any suggestions? There was also a Githzerai Monk I got in a grab-bag some years back and never used. A quick repaint and a pair of chainmail rings later, and hey presto! an Imperial assassin. And here's the landing party in total. If they need to conquer a *second* planet in the same day, they might ask for backup. (A lot of alien worlds look like the southern California Desert; this is well-known.)

The Hype Priest spoke, his amplified voice shattering windows for blocks around. "Who is like unto ZAREK?" he said, "Or who dares to oppose ZAREK? ZAREK, the Ineluctable! ZAREK the Subjugator! ZAREK, the Undefeated! ZAREK--merciful to his vassals! ZAREK--cruel to the rebellious! ZAREK of the Shining Hawks! ZAREK of the Galactic Throne! ZAREK the Ever-Living! ZAREK the Conqueror of Suns! Prostrate yourselves before ZAREK and live! Surrender your abject planet to ZAREK and live! Resist ZAREK and be swept from existence! Glory to ZAREK!" Any good spacefuture game needs an expansionist god-king with a cult army bent on planetary conquest, and Lord Zarek of Hydra's Imperials seem up to the task. I went with blue skin partly to emphasize them as aliens, partly to evoke blue-skinned gods and demons of multiple cultures (and also the Kree, various X-Men and Smurfs), and partly because I'd already used a lot of non-blue color schemes. The green and gold and metallic red are garish, but garish in a way I could see Frazetta paint, or imagine from Buck Rogers or Ming the Merciless. Zarek is seen here with his Psi-Mages, Nodens and Oannes. Better views of the Psi-Mages: Commander Shamash keeps the legions in line with draconian discipline: Lugalbanda and Urartu, a pair of troopers. They drop out of the sky, take over a world, run it for a few hundred years, and set off for the next one. No one is quite sure why, but most of the sentient species in this sector have a cultural memory of the blue conquerors that came from the sky at the dawn of civilization. One such species, apparently very far advanced technologically, just up and *vanished* in the galactic recent past. Their ruined crystal sky-cities hung abandoned over a planet whose crust had been cracked into the familiar Eye motif. Glyphs a hundred kilometers long overwrote the main continent. Xenolinguists are still working on the translation, but have come to a consensus that one of the letter-groupings translates roughly to CONSCRIPTION.

Hydra's Robot Legion is fantastic. These are considerably taller than 28mm scale, and are big even on a heroic-scale standard. These 'bots are how we learned tinkering with the First Law is a bad idea. Older models popular for security applications came with rheostats that would adjust "how harmful does a thing have to be to be Harm" and "how human is Human, anyway?" This allowed them to rationalize the use of nonlethal force to protect Earth (and Company) interests. Hoooo boy. THAT was a lesson Earth learned in short order. Half of the Kuiper Belt is under the Moravec sphere of influence now. Here is a Heavy Support Legionnaire on patrol with a Neural Inhibitor. Be prepared to prove you are, in fact, human. or it will shoot. Documents are not sufficient as proof. And an Optio out with a Legionnaire on perimeter duty. Their commanding officer, the Centurion (memetic viruses have become widespread on the outer settlements, and some of the robots have developed...eccentricities.) And the entire hegemony under the literal iron fist of their gracious hierarch, Queen Mechanika. ALL THE BOTS!

The high desert of the Red Planet can be perilous, what with the Crawlers and the Mind Worms. Martians are trained in the use of psionics, and also distortion cannons. Here are some Martian troopers (Hydra's Zenithian Alpha Cadre). A tiny bit of drybrushing in metallic red on the eyeballs gives them a nice alien gleam. 4 And here is an ambitious cadet, Zombiesmith's Captain Bucket. I thought his uniform could be made to mimic the troopers'. And Zombiesmith's wonderful Commander Y'nitum. What a pint-sized little space Napoleon! A great expression. I wanted his togs to be midway in between the troopers and the Grand Martian (as befits a commander of his...stature.) We've seen some cousins of these two before: http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/82008-50068-john-bishop-space-marshal-aka-maurice/ And here is the Martian Command:

More planetary explorers! Hydra's Jane Hunter x2 and Galacteer Trooper Advancing with Atomic Bazooka. I picked up a Reaper Futuristic Weapons pack (50025) and didn't know what to do with it for the longest time. But then the Muse slapped me in the head, saying FLAMETHROWER SPACE LADY. How wise the Muse is. Presenting "Torch" Marigold of the Galacteers. You need a seam welded or a bug-eyed monstrosity turned to ash, she is on the job! Also presenting Corporal Hernandez, heavy weapons specialist. Space is big. Sometimes it contains big problems. Sometimes those big problems require big solutions. That's the good Corporal's time to shine. With the brightness of a thousand suns. I love this sculpt so much. And here is Lieutenant Yang, xenthropologist and exodiplomat extraordinaire.This is the unmodified 'Jane Hunter' model. This spaceship is an even larger plastic egg with fins made from wooden dolphin cutouts and engines made from multiple types of fruit-paste-pouch caps. Why do I have so many of those caps? Children/nieces/nephews are the gift that keeps giving. Until next time, cadets!

Continuing our exploration of exoplanets with the Galacteer forces! Every crew needs a competent doctor, and what better doctor than one immune to organic sickness, and also largely bulletproof? Guaranteed to be Three Laws Safe, this docbot from Brigade Games (BG-APC134 X2) can treat anything from radiation poisoning to Space Madness to xenomorph infestation to Chronal Inversion. It *is* equipped with a factory-installed Snarky Banter Personality Module. And who better to lead this crew than the gallant captain and first-rate astrogator, Ace McGuire? Hydra has captured that balance of intrepidity and circumspection needed in a commander heading into the unknown! He'll try to talk things out if possible, but knows when to break out the zap guns. Here's the whole crew. Until next time, cadets!

Here are a couple more vivid vavoom Venerians from RETRO-VENUS. They both have Master's degrees--in BEASTS. They are beastmasters, is what I'm saying, which is a valuable skill in the beast-intensive rainforest-marshes. DON'T call them beastmistresses; that's what you'd call Maurice's daughter Belle. Beast Mastery is a different thing entirely, quite independent of gender. This sculpt is Hydra's Valkeeri Controller A. The Beast in question here was a Paizo Hound of Tindalos, which didn't look creepy enough for Cthulhu use, but which would fit right in with the fungal jungles. I assume it fills a coyote-like niche, if coyotes could climb trees and swing from vines. This Controller is quite self-assured; you just need to take a firm tone with these creatures and establish dominance. And here's Controller B, dealing with a recalcitrant and obstreperous reptile. The Beast here started as a D&D grab-bag Basilisk, but those extra legs looked perfect for a Space Marine Iguana*, so I painted some eye-watering aposematic spots on it. This thing is poisonous and venomous and psychoactive and also pointy. RETROVENUS demands such adaptations of it to deter its natural predators. Now, imagine how badass the Venerians must be to have no spines, fangs, claws, or poison sacs. Controller B is making that point abundantly clear even to the dull-witted lizard brain of this Beast. *Do I mean a xenoequivalent to our Galapagos marine iguanas, or an iguana as tough as a Space Marine? Yes.

Venus, as we all know, is a boiling toxic hell of molten metal and sulfurous rains. But in our grandparents' day and the day of *their* parents, it was a mysterious swamp/rainforest of impossible lushness and growth, a primordial and fecund Ur-Jungle of perpetual rot and growth. So it is in my Spacefuture games. Nolzur's makes a Displacer Beast, which iconic D&D monster was inspired by van Vogt's Coeurl (from the "Voyage of the Space-Beagle"). It seemed fitting to paint it up as a SPACE PANTHER! taking patterning cues evenly from tigers and blue-ringed octopodes. Here is a Hydra Valkeeri trooper with a disruptor rifle. They are a broad-shouldered, statuesque people, and I've painted them as photosynthetic. Which is the more dangerous game? Who the hunted, and who the hunter? Or do they hunt together, pursuing that floundering interloper upon their planet--MAN? (Yes, it's that one; that's what they are hunting.)

Hydra's Retro Raygun line is delightful. I've finally managed to get a couple of shots where the light is adequate to do them and their jetpacks and spacesuits justice. Meet Dr. Zahn, Chief Science Officer. He's not the fittest or youngest of the Galacteers, but a genius intellect and a life of broad-based learning can more than justify a broad-based spacesuit. And here is the Chief of Security, Sergeant Macklin. He looks like his springs are wound a bit too tight. SPACE MADNESS is always a risk on these excursions, especially with a dangerous job like his. The Redshirt Blues are a known issue. Next, here's Comet! An uplifted chimpanzee, Comet knows more spaceship engineering than most humans. After all, Comet was designed for the job, and wefumblefeet have to make do with studying. (I think my favorite detail is the foot-gloves. Genius and adorable.) Comet would never mutiny and side with other Space Apes in a waste-flinging rebellion, overthrowing his human pals for primate self-governance, so let's forget the subject even came up. Just put that thought out of your head, mister! Nope, not something to worry about at all. The landing craft is a wooden egg with some bird cutouts mutilated into fins, an applesauce-pack-cap jet, and some goggle-vent retrothrusters. Until next time, cadets!

Well, I lied. Looks like we're doing spacefuture minis first. I'm a big fan of the retrofuture aesthetic, and 50227, DeeDee, is a great example. So are Hydra Miniatures' Galacteers, which I've been painting in neat color-coded fashion. Here's the AstroGirl in that scheme, a laser-packing, problem-solving planetary explorer. Hydra also has a set of Valkeeri, which are more or less Space Amazons. DeeDee would work out well for these too! This time the uniform is painted less extensively, as is appropriate for the boiling jungle-swamps of Retro-Venus. Other things you may expect to see in the SPACEFUTURE!! tag include BUT ARE NOT LIMITED TO: -galacteers - green-skinned Space Independent and Confident Women - MOLE PEOPLE FROM SIRIUS!! - Moravecs (androids) - Mutants and wasteland survivors - Crawlers (Bathalians and similar) - COMMIES FROM THE MOON -Technophilosophers of Mars (Reaper's Alien Overlords and similar) - Space Apes - Other, different Space Apes -SPACE MYSTERIES?? Until next time, cadets!