2016 to date update

Real life put some spanners in the works this year, but I still managed to get some painting and even gaming done. But not much time to post any progress posts, so you all will just have to be happy with this compilation posts with some (horrible) pictures of what I've been up to...

First my French paras for Indochina - we're doing a series of participation games at GothCon (a big game convention in Göteborg) for a forthcoming CoC supplement for the First Indochina War (1946-1954). Figures are a mix of FNG Miniatures (ex Red Star Miniatures, available through Empress Miniatures), and converted Warlord US Marines (the French used lots of US equipment), with some Berlin or Bust heads thrown in for the conversions. I also used some Warlord British commando heads to get figures with the para berets.

1. French Colonial Para platoon (1953 organisation)

2. An additional understrength section of same.

3. Supports and scenery: a Buddha statue (to be used as JoP or simple scenery), an asian water buffalo (we always have some thematical animals in our games, last year it was our epical dead camel, this year it's a water buffalo). A medic (the base with medic and casualty), a .30 Cal MMG team (3 crew + team leader) and a flame thrower team. 

And then for something completely different... I started to paint some fantasy stuff for Frostgrave. Some you'll recognise as GW LotR figures. Some of these will also double as figures for a planned Dux Gondorum campaign, Dux Britaniarum in a Middle Earth setting. Sometime after Easter (when I've finished some remaining French paras, I'll start painting up a lot of GW Rohirrim and Uruk Hai I bough 2nd hand.

1. Two Wraith Knights from North Star's Frostgrave range and Gandalf and Aragorn from GW's LotR range.

2. Twelve skeletons from North Star's (Mantic's really...) Undead Frostgrave pack

Then some stuff I sent out for the Santa Clause...

1. Ten Kriegsmarine troopers, 28mm Warlord (2 different Santa Clause presents)

2. Six British commandos, 28mm Warlord

3. Seven Home Guard characters, Wargames Foundry 28mm

4. Sovjet Maxim w 3 crew, Warlord 28mm

5. Nine Imperial Stormtroopers, Imperial Assault 35mm (actually not a Santa Clause item, but stuff I'm painting for a friend of a friend ;-))

And finally some mixed 20mm items:

1. British paras, 2 sections, 21 figures, AB figures 20mm

2. Four 20mm JoPs for CoC (I think Sgt's Mess truck loads, with tarps added with tissue paper soaked in thinned white glue)

That's it for now, hopefully back soon with more. I have some WW2 desert stuff to complete, some more French paras, more 20mm British paras and the LoTR and Frotsgrave stuff. So no time to get bored ;-)

Oasis

I forget to take further pictures while working on my oasis, so can only show the final result here now. But construction went like this:

• I cut out a rough shape from cork matting (IKEA used to sell this as placemats, but have stopped carrying them, although I'm sure other shops still do)
• I smeared out beige caulking all over the cork, also built up the rim where the water would be, I let it sit for a couple of minutes, then spread sand all over it and pushed it in (a messy job)
• I then let that dry for several days before painting it dark brown
  
• I wetbrushed with sandcoloured acrylics, then drybrushed with the same with added white. A final drybrush with almost pure white (just a touch of sand in it).
• I let that dry a couple of days again, then washed with Army Painter Soft or Strong Tone (I can't remember...).
• I then poured in Vallejo Still Water, and added more after 24 hours. It then sat a couple of days in our spare room and all looked well.
• As we were having guests (my dad) over for a week, I took it out to the garage (heated and dry), where it then sat for a week, When I was going to take it in again, most of the Still Water had become cloudy/white. Luckily after a couple of days in the house, and pricking a few tiny holes in the top layer, it all became clear again. My guess is that the bottom layer wasn't fully dry when I added the second layer and that that condensed when I put it in the garage. It then dried out completely when taken into the house again and the couple of small holes helped with that process

This is what it looked like at GothCon, with palm trees and some bushes added

I feel it turned out well in the end, but I would do some things differently now...

GothCon status

My Desert Rats for GothCon are nearing completion... All are assembled, converted and painted, just about half need their bases done. And if there's time they need to get a coat of matt varnish, as some are a bit glossy (due to the Pledge ;-)).

1 full platoon with:
Platoon HQ: 1 officer, 1 NCO, 1 AT team (2), 1 2" mortar team (2)
3 Sections, each @ 1 NCO, 1 Bren team (3), 6 riflemen

In support:
1 FOO team (2) - conversions from the standard plastics Perry box
1 Vickers MMG (5)
1 Universal carrier (3)
1 medical orderly
3 engineer teams: demolition team (3), mine clearing team (3) and wire clearing team (3) - all conversions from the standard plastics Perry box
1 company commander w radio operator
2 jump-off points for CoC

I have a Crusader Mk I, a Morris CS9 armoured car and a Dingo scout car on the way... Hopefully they get here soon, so I can complete them in time.
!Update: they arrived today (16 March) :)

My oasis is also getting along. I built it at our terrain day, but started painting it today. Dark brown basecoat. Once dry, it'll get drybrushed in several layers of ever lightening sand colour. Then it needs green flock, and some bushes, maybe even some reeds. Then the water pool in the middle will get a green-grey wash, and after that I'll fill it with 2 or 3 layers of Vallejo still water.

And finally, I have my first Germans ready painted, as we discovered we were a bit short on German infantry. About half a section of DAK and a platoon commander.

Where there's rats...

Look what's all of a sudden, as if by miracle, appeared on my painting table...

MG firing from the shoulder, inspired by Laffe ;-)

Desert Update

Basecoated the remaining desert rats tonight, and I've started the basing process on the others. They should be all done by the end of the week. Then for some Germans ;-)

Some quick (bad) pictures:

Hugh Jarce, the 2" and AT gun teams, as well as the MMG main base (2 loose figures are in the pic below), the FOO team and the Company commander's base.

Senior and junior leaders (on hex bases), the medic (the one with the red cross armband ;-)) and some troopers (on round bases - actually 5 eurocents)

The TFL jump off points.

Bases are a mixture of various decorative sand and stones that IKEA used to sell. Stuck to the bases with diluted wood glue (white glue). When dry, they will be wetbrushed with cheap sand coloured artist acrylics, then drybrushed after adding white to the same. Depending on how they look after the first wetbrushing, I might add a wash (soft or strong tone) and a drybrush with sand in between.

Oh, and I watched Arsenal beat Utd in the FA Cup 1/4 final while painting :-)

Penguin Terrain Day

We got together last weekend to build some terrain for our demo/participation game at GothCon. We found out we have very little desert terrain (although we discovered Jocke's 20mm houses are very useable).

So we set out and managed the following:

• 6 HE/smoke markers. Thomas glued these together with his brand new glue gun (and burnt his fingers in the progress), I then took them home and spray painted them.

• 4 sand dunes that I bought from Amera and that we painted
• a temple ruin, also from Amera, that just needs some finishing touches
• plenty of sangars and sangar walls
• an oasis of cork, caulk, sand and stones, that needs painting now
• based 13 palm trees (I'm now washing and drybrushing them)
• plenty of rocks and cliffs and loose rocks
• our battle mat - we had high ambitions to make one with caulk and sand and paint it. but we lowered our ambitions and just painted a beige bed sheet ;-)
• No pictures of most of the stuff, but I have some action pictures, from left to right
• Henrik painting sangar walls
• Jocke cutting cork for more sangars for the MMG and AT teams
• Thomas glueing smoke markers (and his fingers). Note his brand new glue gun! ;-)

Figure fanatic's giveaway...

One of the guys in our Scandinavian Lardies' wargames group (aka the Penguins) is organising a giveway to celebrate his 200th blogpost...

http://figurfanatikern.blogspot.se/2013/12/200th-post-giveaway.html