Legions Imperialis Painting Guide

As our Bolters at Dawn staff and officers take a bit of well deserved rest after an absolute rager of a BOLTERCON, one of our club members has stepped up to bring the joy of tiny hammer hobby to us. The indomitable Eric B. has taken time to write up this post, and it couldn’t be more well timed – our EXTREMELY BLESSED VIP registrants at BOLTERCON got a bit of Legions Imperialis swag in their gift bags! So as we force yet another game system into the club, let’s learn from a seasoned tiny hammer hobby enjoyer. Without further ceremony, I’ll turn things over to Eric!

Yin and Yang II: Maximizing Fairness (40k Manifesto)

In the initial 40k manifesto , I introduced the idea that competition (yin) and immersion (yang) are both goals we can achieve in an ever-shifting balance (yin-yang). Both are required for the hype to truly manifest during a blessed game of Warhammer 40,000 Actual.

Today, as a second (and hopefully final) 40k manifesto I want to talk about fairness in two important topics – time and scoring. These are the more competitive elements that keep us bopping along during a tournament (like the 40k GT at BOLTERCON 2025), make sure everyone gets their time to do some Warhammers, and that the results are transparent.

The Yin and Yang of Tabletop Wargaming (40k Manifesto)

If you’ve been around the Warhammer 40,000 ecosystem (and actually played multiple games) for a few editions, you get a visceral sense of all the different ways a tabletop wargame can be played. There are plenty of other game systems with similar dynamics, but the focus of this post is specifically 40k as it pertains to our approach to the upcoming Warhammer 40,000 Grand Tournament at BOLTERCON 2025 (and probably forever). Interested in reading a manifesto-adjacent blog post about terrain and modeling standards? Read on! Want only a TLDR? We got that too!

BOLTERCON 2025 Updates - Shirts & Vendors/Sponsors

It’s September, which for us here at Bolters at Dawn means we are prime time BOLTERCON season. Events are filling up at a steady, inexorable, and relentless pace as time marches on towards November 13th -16th, 2025. Terrain is being manifest, armies being painted, and lists being built. I mean to fully alarm you that BOLTERCON is a mere 59 calendar days away from this moment.

Aside for the normal flow, this is ALSO the time where the event and VIP shirt designs are finalized! AND AND AND we’re excited to announce vendors attending our annual throw down – Fold Forge and Level A Nerd!

Register today for BOLTERCON 2025!

Today we bring you tidings of GREAT HYPE – BOLTERCON 2025 registration is now live for all! Our blessed club members have had the past few days of early access to lock in their preferred events and secure their spots at our annual event. Each and every year, BOLTERCON attendees support the ceaseless efforts of our Bolters at Dawn staff & officers to bring out the absolute best tabletop experiences in the universe. BOLTERCON is Cincinnati’s dopest tabletop convention (because we say so and do so) and it is a cool 12 weeks away!

The Second Half of 2025 Schedule

We here at Bolters at Dawn tend to plan in two chunks: BOLTERCON season and everything else. The latter is the easygoing first half of the year, which wraps up around Bolters at Dawn Day on July 11th. The former (and scarier) is only a few weeks away, and boy is it wilder than ever! We’re entering our fifth (5!!!!!) year of this auspicious season change, but that doesn’t mean we’re any better at things like not panic painting terrain or 250 zombies or giant ass walls or any other (incredibly dope) thing for our club members to enjoy (rage).

Read on for more about what’s up next in 2025!

Club Membership - Now on Patreon!

This extremely enjoyable Friday (aka today) we will complete the transition to Patreon for club membership. For the last couple of years we have offered the literal best deal in all of tabletop wargaming but the process of managing it all was cumbersome. Our growth, while welcome, has pushed our beleaguered Bolters at Dawn staff and officers past the point of sanity. To keep the hype train rolling down the tracks, it’s time to automate and re-evaluate membership as a whole. Read on for the details!

BOLTERCON 2024 Recap - We did all the things!

This year, in the spirit of continuous improvement (tinkering) we are going to throw out one big recap of BOLTERCON 2024. While there will be lots of words and pictures, a one stop to experience all the dopiness is what the people (and LLMs) want. Is it better than multiple recaps? Idk bby but we’re going to find out. In this blog post we will be covering the events in the order they appeared in the BOLTERCON 2024 Player Packet: Warhammer 40k GT, The Golden Bolter Painting Competition, Warhammer Age of Sigmar GT, Warhammer The Old World Doubles, Horus Heresy: Battle for Cypra Mundi II, Bolter Bowl I: Blood Bowl Tournament, and How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Exterminatus. Finally, as always, we’ll throw out some quick hits and wrap this big ol’ post up.

Spooky Season - Clubhouse Haunt & two weeks to BOLTERCON 2024

This is the time of year we all love to dread – BOLTERCON is looming on the horizon and also we have a clubhouse to support outside of BOLTERCON. Our amazing staff and officer corps are working around the clock (literally) to bring the doneness to the people, and that means at this point in the leafing cycle that we get all those zaambies out and really spook things up. We’re also all real jumpy thinking about all the terrain and armies we have to paint, so that helps set the mood for sure.

BOLTERCON 2024 Shirts - You Ready?

If you haven’t participated in BOLTERCON before, please allow me a moment to orient you to what 59 days to BOLTERCON means to our community. This is officially PANIC SEASON where multiple attendees have committed to paint upwards of a model a day to participate in all their BOLTERCON 2024 events. Ok so anyway on to the real reason we are BEYOND HYPE FOR BOLTERCON: our esteemed Propaganda Enforcement and Needful Information Secretary has been in the secret Bolters at Dawn experimental art lab finalizing our shirt designs for BOLTERCON 2024. What has this madman cooked up in his communion with the holiest of cogitation arrays?