Saint Astraega

Click to enlarge-icate

It seems like ages since I finished an Anima Tactics mini so I am glad to rectify that right now. This month has not felt too productive, although I have now painted in just two months (13 models) what I painted in each of three months (January to March; April to June) across all ranges I am working on, so not too bad I guess!

I have turned out 4 Pulp City minis this month so far, which has impacted on my productivity with Anima Tactics. So as I stated up front, I am pleased to have finished another.

Saint Astraega is one half of Team Saint Council with Saint Evangeline, and very much a support unit. As the number of Church units I have completed grows, so to do my options. I am now at a stage where 3 models (Grey; Luzbell; and Saint Astraega) would likely be vying for 2 'slots' in a level 300 Party, and looking at Astraega's capabilities, I think she is edging out Grey, since she may be the model to keep Lostaroth Marchosias in play since I have struggled to keep him alive against Rob in the games we have played; he has definitely been a high priority target!

Since the two key Actions I imagine using require 4 Action Points apiece (Astraega's limit), I think a likely Advantage Card will be Clock of Chronos, although once I can field the Team Saint Council, more options will become viable, since Astraega will be able to replenish Action Points through that card.

This one was started a while back painting wise, but kind of got left behind as I was inspired to finish sundry others. I even made a mistake by starting to paint the stems of her flowers magenta before I actually realised they were not flames!

I have started work on a couple of other Church models (Damaris and Saint Evangeline), so as soon as the next one is done, I will do an updated Church Party picture. In the mean-time I hope I can sustain some momentum as I do love this range of minis.

Running Totals
Anima Tactics Minis: 137 (added: Medeus; and Alis Testarossa; more on order)
Anima Tactics Minis Painted: 27
Painted Minis Percentage: 19.7% (percentage of AT minis owned that are painted)

Empire Agent (female)

Okay, okay; I did paint more minis for Anima Tactics than I hinted at near the beginning of June.

It has been a productive month for me, with 4 Anima Tactics minis, and 4 Freebooter's Fate minis painted (see here for my Freebooter's stuff), taking me to 34 minis for the year so far - I only painted 24 in the 12 months of 2012, so far so good then in terms of my productivity.

This is my second Agent, and means I am up to 155-175 Levels of Empire depending on how the Agent is configured. It looks to me that the Empire Agent can be made a very solid unit, with Armor 5 a very attractive option (I think my go to set-up will be to recover 3 Actions per Turn; +1 Attack and Damage; +3 armor for Armor 5).

With this mini I am up to 4 Empire units so far, and I am hoping to add Lilith as a Leader model making a potential 250 Levels, which in turn will be fairly easy to round out to 300 Levels with a Wanderer or an appropriate 50 Level Empire unit added.

For Advantage Cards, while it might me tempting to add Supernatural Armor, I think that is too costly to justify, so probably a simple Elemental Weapon to make an okay close combat unit. If taking a risk that I am fighting someone without decent anti-Armor, maybe Raphael's Gift to 'tank' the Empire Agent up a little.

Running Totals
Anima Tactics Minis: 135 (added: nothing new arrived yet, but one or two on order)
Anima Tactics Minis Painted: 26 (a few more are in the dreaded queue)
Painted Minis Percentage: 19.3% (percentage of AT minis owned that are painted)

Church Party

Click on me

Hot on the heels of my Wissenschaft Party post, here is my other (so far) 5 unit Organization Party.

This collection of Church units comprises 220 Levels, or 225 if Lostaroth Marchosias is used as an Optional Leader.

Right now the only real option I have to expand this to 300 Levels with what I have already is a combination of Wanderer and Summons, or to take an Advantage Card to boost Sarah Reindhold's Summoner Level to 2 and take a couple of Summons (I currently have 3 combinations of 75 Levels of Summons).

Therefore there is probably a greater need to fill out those 75-80 Levels for Church more than Wissenschaft right now.

Wissenschaft Party

If you click I will grow

I plan to post Organization Party pictures every so often, when I get five or more painted for a specific Organization, and then maybe every two to three models hereafter.

First up is Wissenschaft. These models amount to 240 Levels, or 245 if Valis Ul Del Vilfain is used as an Optional Leader. I think games tend to be played at multiples of 100 Levels since many Party-building benefits kick in at those thresholds. So with these 5 units, I would be looking to add either a 55 Level Wanderer (Bella and Aqua are a good fit since as a Team they count as just a single Wanderer choice), or 55 Levels of Summons (maybe Lesser Hamadria and Elhaym, Maiden of Light). As my collection grows, there will be more options to bolster their ranks.

Alessa Raincross

Click on me to embiggen

This one was *mostly* finished around a week ago after a period of on-off 'work in progress', but when looking closely I realized I had initially missed the lacing on her crop top, so that was rectified a few days ago. Considering I did not expect to do much Anima Tactics this month, this is my third for July!

Alessa Raincross is a Wissenschaft Crow and former bounty hunter who was caught in an explosion when she hunted the assassin Vayl. Her legs were replaced with technological prosthetics and subsequently she joined the ranks of Wissenschaft.

There are a few gun-toting female characters in Anima Tactics (others that come to mind are XII, Cordelia and Kira, both also Wissenschaft; Valentine from Empire), so I am happy to get one done as a contrast to the regular 'huge swords'!

Game-wise Alessa Raincross is very much focused around her Ranged Attacks. In addition, like most non-Gear Wissenschaft units she can have 2 Advantage Cards attached. Assuming use of the Lost Loggia Organizational Advantage, then she can be loaded up to make a very effective sniper type based on he Stealth Action.Therefore the Nue Advantage Card could be useful to make Alessa harder to find when using Stealth; or perhaps Covert Operation to allow Alessa to gain Advanced Deployment. Finally anything that stacks with Attack or Damage is inevitably useful given her focus on Ranged Attacks.

With my Wissenschaft shaping up, a couple more would be nice before I switch focus to the Gears.

Running Totals
Anima Tactics Minis: 135 (added: nothing new since the last update!)
Anima Tactics Minis Painted: 25 (a few more are in the dreaded queue)
Painted Minis Percentage: 18.5% (percentage of AT minis owned that are painted)