Captain Barbossa--32mm Black Scorpion Pirate

"Y'er off the edge of the map now, mate. Here there be monsters!"
-Barbossa, Curse of the Black Pearl

Objectively, Pirates of the Caribbean is not the best franchise in the world. Personally, however, it is one of the all time greats in cinema history, and Captain Hector Barbossa helps make it so. His arc from main antagonist to redeemed anti-hero is magnificent, and Rush's acting sells all the pirate stereotypes as an actual threatening character.

So, when I saw Black Scorpion sold an undead pirate with a huge hat, I knew Barbossa would be a must.



I had to make some modifications to the figure, namely in giving him hair and a beard, and sculpting a little Jack the monkey his shoulder.

One thing that worked really well is making the color palette totally washed out with the exception of the bright yellow rag hanging from his belt. It adds a nice pop to an otherwise grey character.



Not as clean as I'd like at the coattails, but I'm pretty pleased with how the caribbean beach baseplate turned out.

Not much, but a fun return to the world of piracy on the high seas... but a penny for your thoughts, mates?

-BG

The Pirate Project 4--The Black Pearl

"Strike yer colors, ya bloomin cockroaches!"
-Barbossa, Curse of the Black Pearl

What good are pirates without a ship, ay mates? Welcome aboard the Black Pearl mates!

Here's a basic shot of this. Black hulls, died sales and twine rigging! The hull of the ship is made of soft cardstock and foamboard, using a template that was originally for 10mm scale, which I blew up 250% and away I worked!

Here's one of me wee mates taking shots off the bulwark (is that what you call it?)

Shiver me timbers! Mr. Cotton walks the plank!

The purple jacket fellow shoots over the rails.

 The captain at his station. Wait! Is that ole Barbossa at the helm? XD

The colors fly over the pearl! The flag is that of Barbossa. Also, as my sister told me, that is historically the flag of Callico Jack Rackham!

So what do you think!? Does the Pearl look ship shape to ye? Sound off in the comments below!+

The Pirate Project 3--Mr. Gibbs

"Mr. Gibbs, you may throw my hat. Now go and get it."
                                          -Jack Sparrow, At Worlds End

So here's an actual named character: the ones the Pirates screenwriters refer to as the "beacon of hope for humanity," Mr. Joshamee Gibbs.

It's hard to hate Gibbs. Gibbs appears in every movie, and never betrays anyone ever. He's the only guy you can really count on in a film series flooded with back-stabbery.

Now, perhaps it's odd that the first character I'm showing off is Gibbs of all people instead of... ya know... Jack.

I have a design and Army Card for Jack... but alas, the figure is in the mail still! Gibbs is a figure I already had... a Black Scorpion Pirate.

So here he is! Mr. Gibbs!




And here is the Army Card for Gibbs. His usefulness is as a First Mate to spur on your crew... and he does that very well!



So what do y'all think!? Sound off in the comments below!

The Pirate Project 2--Pirate Island

"Ya know, we Pirates are an awfully un-creative lot at naming' things."

                                                            -Jack Sparrow, At Worlds End.

Previously, we looked at the buccaneers that will make the bulk of our pirate armies. Now, whatsay we look at the island these buccaneers inhabit, ey?

Jungle plants from cut up fake plants.

Palm trees! The fronds are from fake plants, the trunks are from MegaBloks.

An old ruined cart with the East India Co. Brand sits forgotton… save for the map inside!

Every now and again, a pirates gotta fight dirty...

A small unregistered craft takes to the canal (megabloks with a foamboard floor and a sratch built mast.) A modified version of Henry Every’s jolly rodger hangs from the mast (my girlfriend picked it out.)

Thieves beneath the king's flag...

A diversified 401K...

My first attempt at a pirate building, and not a bad one!

A drunk with one leg… not too good!

Reward of £1? Undoubtably the worst pirate I’ve ever heard of!

What are your thoughts of this new terrain? Piratey enough? What's the island missing still?

The Pirates Project 1

"I have no say in it, Mr. Gibbs. It's a Pirate's life for me, savvy?"

-Jack Sparrow, On Stranger Tides


While work is still being done on the BoTF Project, another project has been launched: The Pirates Project!

The goal of the Pirates Project is to make a variety of characters and terrain (which I will sneak in with my characters or the sake of keeping things condensed, if this is alright with our mods) from the Golden age of Piracy, namely as represented in the Pirates of the Caribbean film series (of which I am an avid and slightly ashamed fan XD) While there will be a few characters and such from other pirates lores, my plan is to focus on Pirates of the Caribbean (savvy?)

With that lengthy intro, allow me to show you our buccaneer squad characters and the board we have set up for them!

The figures we used for our buccaneers are Black Scorpion miniatures (as will be most of the pirates ya see.) They are about two millimeters short (being 32 instead of 34) essentially a heroic 28mm but they do the job nicely and are really beautiful resin (I believe?) sculpts.

These are of course a common squad that could be assigned to any pirate crew, although one of them just happens to look exactly like Mr. Cotton, the toungless pirate of the Black Pearl.

The Arrrrmy Card is a square (we’ve switched to all squares for our customs about a year ago.)

A simple but effective batch of bad eggs, wouldn’t you agree?