First Post: The Adventure Begins!

My goodness, here it goes!

For a blog aiming to post Miniatures and Miniature art for Dungeons & Dragons, I am going to start off with a text post about my goals for this blog, myself, and my art journey including making minis.

Firstly, I apologize for basically bombarding an already saturated internet with more content that is decidedly niche. But I think there is a wonderful power in small communities, or even communities that are large, but fragmented by distance. That's the power of the internet! Thank you for choosing to connect with me. Even if you won't read this post, thank you for looking at my minis, encouraging me to work harder, and even just letting me know that you are out there.

I was introduced to D&D by the cartoon. God knows how long ago that was. I re-watched the series when I was studying in undergraduate... But never had the time, money, friends, or courage to actually dive in and play for a long time. So I finally coerced my current group to play with me in August of 2017. It's almost my anniversary! But it took (I looked it up) over 7 years to get me from interested student to actual playing twenty-something.

Warning! Huge Section About a D&D Stream I like!

As far as current D&D inspiration, I am a fan of CinnamonToastKen's D&D show Charisma Plus. It gave me the courage to roust up the small group I play with now. The Charisma Plus community is also so wholesome and great, and the players are lovely, expressive, and make the game so interesting. Also, I shouldn't forget all the majorly awesome work Ken (the Dungeon Master) did in creating this huge, interesting, intertwined world they play in. 10/10 would definitely recommend. They just finished Season 1 and it was amazing.

I will put some links to all the Charisma Plus things I can think of.
CinnamonToastKen's Twitch (They usually stream Charisma Plus on Saturdays at 7pm, but they are on hiatus now between seasons): LINK!
The Charisma Plus YouTube Channel (where Ken posts the episodes for those who don't use Twitch): LINK!
The CharismaPlus Hashtag on Twitter (Great place to see the community, fanart, the interact with the players/DM. Note: some people post not-D&D related content here... but most people mute those...):  LINK!
The CharismaPlusDnD Hashtag on Twitter (The lesser used hashtag, but it works the same with less unrelated stuff!): HAVE A LINK~!

Now that I have finished fan-ing out over that show...

I have heard of more popular D&D streams/shows, but I don't have the time nor mental space to start or keep up with them. Hopefully in the future I will!

Goals for this Blog

So I started this blog because I wanted to share with the community and connect over what I consider the best experience in imaginative, creative gaming. Not to mention exercises in problem solving, situations of maximum hilarity, and times to reflect and process difficult topics. All at the whims of the dice. Also the DM, but I digress.

So, I have already started 3 projects that I hope to share: The A to Z Monster Manual Crawl, The Generic Human Enemies/NPC Mini Set, and The Common Monsters Set. Note: these are all done in 2D, fronts and backs, which will then be printed, pasted together, and then cut out to be added to my growing menagerie.

The A to Z Monster Manual Crawl will be me literally going page by page in the MM. I have started sketches, and currently I have a few to rework, because I want to adapt certain monsters even more to my style. I don't want cute humanoid minis and then more realistic monsters. Not for me at least.

I started The Generic Humans/NPC set because a good number of campaigns have humans as battle enemies. Also because I think that having multiple avenues with which to work will reduce the chances that I get bored, frustrated, or give up on a set before they are complete.

Lastly, The Common Monsters set will be for all those campaigns that literally use the same basic monsters. Let's be fair, when you start a low-level campaign, you are going to end up ambushed by goblins, zombies, umm... maybe a bugbear? But these monsters are classic, common, and well-used. I will basically be pulling from my own minuscule experience to figure out which monsters land in this set, and working from there. I have one completed monster from this set, which is the classic feral goblin.

I hope to post progress sketches, completed minis, and maybe if there is enough interest I can post speedpaints.

I may post some other art from other areas, like character minis (as I have done maybe... 10 to 15 character minis so far. I have a problem), hand-drawn sketches ( 99% of all my D&D art is done digitally), and minis from competed campaigns (a member of my group ran a Big Trouble in Little China campaign which was hilarious and awesome and had special styles of monsters as well as a bad guy/boss with 6 different designs so the DM could have their pick). I can also post pictures I take during play, minis in action so to speak. I have had my DM ask for monster minis as we sat down to play with hilarious results (quick drawn monsters on index cards).

My main goal is to post somewhat frequently and connect with the people who visit here. It is a wonderful thing to be a part of a community.

Cheers all! Be kind and lovely to one another.