Annie's second Kickstarter

I don't often link to commercial items, but I tend to make an exception for Annie, of Bad Squiddo Games fame... She's just put on her second kickstarter, the sequel to her earlier Ghosts of Gaia. This one is Ghosts of Gaia II, and contains 13 (for starters) additional female SF/Post-Apoc figures by the same sculptor. And promises loads of interesting add-ons and stretch goals, like Bunnies with Bombs! (not that kind of bunnies!!!!).

Without further ado, go here and support Annie!

Painting and basing my Red Dragon Gaming walls

Follow up on the article on the Red Dragon Gaming walls I got.

I missed some pictures along the way, but those steps are easy to imagine...


I started by washing them in the sink with detergent.

As the walls have inbuilt bases that I figured big enough for my purpose, I decided not to base them.

Next step - spraying black with a cheap primer (from Biltema for my fellow Swedes)

After drying outside over night, I checked the priming and did some extra touches on missed spots with Vallejo paint-on black primer. At this stage I noticed that there are some real deep holes in the walls - it seems that the masters were built by glueing together some stones and a mould made of that. Not a problem for me (I want these for Dark Ages and Dux Gondorum), but could be that they're less relevant in a more "ordered" environment. This was also something that my friend Laffe commented on.

Next step: drybrushing the walls in shades of grey (definitely not 50!!). I used a white acrylic craft paint for this, mixed with some Vallejo black primer (as I'd run out of black craft paint and I have literally half a liter of primer).

I did three drybrushing layers, adding more and more white for each layer.

After that I painted the ground dark brown with an acrylic paint for the same range, and then drybrushed that, by adding more and more sand colour to the brown. Again, I used three layers.

After drying, I mixed up a wash consisting of 50% Futur Pledge (product to clean/treat stone floors, which acts as a protective layer as well as good basis for a wash. It is slightly shiny, so requires a matt varnish afterwards), 40% Army Painter Dark Tone ink and 10% Strong tone (to give it a more earthy appearance). I generously slathered the walls and the ground with this, this brings them "together" I feel. I missed taking a picture after this.

Next came a final drybrush - Vallejo model Off-White on the walls and Pale Sand on the ground. No picture here either, I was cracking on at this stage.

I then started to add flock and grass. I didn't take pictures after each step though, but here's what I did:

• First I added some Gamers Grass spring tufts to the ground, some smaller regular ones and medium irregular ones, both 4mm. At the same time I put on some spring flowers (white and yellow), I think from Mininatur, that I got off Bad Squiddo Annie, although she no longer seems to carry them).
• Then I added some Army Painter small green tufts in some of the cracks in the walls, to represent weeds popping up in an untended stone wall.
• Next was some fine Ziterdes light green flock, added to some other recesses in the walls, to represent moss and other weeds.
• Next came some light green static grass (I think from Ziterdes as well) to ground next to the walls (in some places only to create an irregular effect)
• Finally I added some Woodland Scenics fine-leaf foliage branches to the deeper recesses in the walls (the ones I commented on earlier, they came in handy for this step, or better, seeing them gave me the idea to do this), to represent some brushes and smaller trees growing out of these walls. I reinforces the untended appearance.
  
  

This give this endresult (before applying a matt varnish spray.

In the end I spent quite some time painting and basing these, but I'm very happy with the end result. From a modest investment of £16 and a couple of hours of work, this is a nice result.

Note that there is one piece that I have not painted, another "entryway", similar to the piece front left. I'm not sure I'm going to use that as is, or convert that into another piece of broken down wall (there is one piece of broken down wall - the middle one of the 5 long straight ones.

Review of Red Dragon gaming resin scenics

I ran into this (for me) new company through a friend's post in twitter and decided to give them a go. The company's website is http://www.reddragongaming.co.uk. They offer mostly resin scenery and terrain bits, both painted (in various finishes) and unpainted. As I like painting, I looked mainly at the unpainted versions. For our Dark Ages and Dux Gondorum games, we could use some flint walls, so I checked out those. They have various single items and two packs:

• A standard stone wall set, containing 4 large corners, 3 long walls and 1 wall with entry
• An extension wall set, containing 2 large T-shaped bits, 1 long broken wall bit, 1 normal long wall bits and a wall with an entry. Most of the wall bits are 15cms (6") long.

Both sets cost £8 unpainted, which I thought was very reasonable. Painted sets are about 50-125% more expensive, which is still reasonable in most cases. You can choose various finishes (wasteland, grassland, desert, with or without flocking.

I also grabbed a bomb crater set while I was there, for £4 (painted is £7,50). The set contains 1 larger and 2 smaller craters.

I got the order today (I ordered 9 days ago, which is decent turnaround time from the UK to Sweden). 

Big jiffy bag with all the goodies

On opening the bag there were 2 smaller packs (each containing a set, the extension set also had the crater set in with it). Both sets were in zip lock bags, and wrapped in more bubble wrap. Everything had survived the trip unscathed. Bonus points for that!

2 bubble wrapped bags containing a set each

 

Each set came in a zip lock bag

The standard wall set

The extension set

Closer details

More closer details

On opening the bags, you get that special resin odour coming out ;-) The resin (off-white, slightly transparent) is crisp, I have seen no signs of worn or bad moulds. Details are fine, no bubbles or damages. Detail is deep, with even some deep recesses between some stones. The walls all come on bases. These have been sanded straight on the bottom and can be used as is (so no need to add extra bases, unless you want to). The bases are detailed and can be painted as they are, there is sufficient patterning to represent rough ground. They should be suitable for 20 to heroic 28 (or 32mm ;-) ) gaming.

I plan to paint these quickly as they shouldn't need too much work. Black priming, grey drybrushing in a couple of layers, paint the bases brown, with some drybrushing, and some flocking. Maybe some washing in between. I'll put up some pictures and report how they paint up.

As a summary - these look like a good buy, at a very decent price, and I'd like to recommend these. 

Scenario sale @ Wargaming Odds and Ends

Have a quick look at http://cstoesen.blogspot.se/2017/05/spring-scenario-sale.html, where Chris Stoesen is having a scenario sale (50% off) on scenario booklets suitable for different Lardie rulesets.

Just some pictures

Cold stuff

Another quick update...

In an earlier post I wrote about the Frozen characters I was painting for my daughters. These are done now, and the girls are very happy with them. Here's some pics of the finished sets.

I also finished a single figure for Frostgrave, an apothecary. This is a metal Reaper figure, Olivia, Mercenaries Cleric, that I got from Annie @ Bad Squiddo Games early last year.

See you in Hell, Billy Yank...

Thomas and I decided to start a project for SP2, playing ACW. He'd started painting Confederates a while back, and I'd do Union. So I picked up some heavily discounted boxes of Perry plastics (these are from the new Union Infantry in Sack Coats box) and started painting. Here are my first Union units: 20 infantrymen (2,5 units in SP2), 2 leaders (an officer and a sergeant) and a drummer.

Up next, another dozen infantrymen (I paint by groups of 12, usually), and probably the dozen Union cavalry skirmishers I got in the Secret Santa scheme.

Female Soviet Snipers

I got some of these off Annie's Kickstarter a while back, and decided to paint some as a Christmas surprise present for a good friend.

Find the whole range of Bad Squiddo Games, 28mm female soviets.

First secret santa present completed

A quick update to thank the Secret Santa that sent me the Perry British 6pdr w crew for North Africa. I just had to paint it ;-)

Here's some pictures:

All assembled and ready for painting

All done and ready for action

Frozen

My daughters (aged 5) have been looking at Daddy's figures for a while now, so I thought it was time they got some figures of their own. For display, mainly, maybe a bit too soon to get them playing, I guess. As they like/love the Disney movie Frozen, I looked around for some figures matching that. Annie, the ever lovely Dice Bag Lady @ Bad Squiddo Games has some North Star figures called Two young Fire Elementalists that would be a nice match for Anna and Elsa, if painted in the right colours. Olaf was a bit more difficult, but a bit of a search in Thingyverse and help from a colleague at work who is a 3D printer fanatic got me figures for them as well. Now I guess I'll have to go source some Kristoffers and reindeer as well ;)

Some progress pictures:

Annas and Elsas blockpainted and ready for wash, Olafs primed grey

Annas and Elsas closer up

First set as good as done, some details left on the girls and forgot Olafs eyes

Second set at the same stage, set in the background. 

All figures were primed light grey with Vallejo Surface Primer. The girls were then blockpainted with thinned down paint and washed. All the blues were washed with Drakenhof Nightshade, thinned down in various degrees for the light colours, almost straight for the dark blue on Anna. Faces, red cape, fur (on the cape) and hair were washed with (somewhat thinned down) Army Painter Strong Tone wash. After that, all the colours were highlighted to various degrees, the blues on Elsa with several shades, the other colours just with the basecolour again. Thinned down paint, so the application of one or more layers gives different hues and shades.
Olaf was just wetbrushed several times, then the nose, "hair" and arms painted and highlighted. Some white highlights on the body, and the eyes and buttons painted black. Now I just have to paint in the eyes and eyebrows.

Varnishing and basing left to do, pondering whether to have one large base for each set, or individual bases per figure...

Secret Santas

I'm quite pleased with the stuff I got from my Secret Santas :)

This year I participated in 3 of these, one was Chris Stoesen's, where you paint something for your "target". The other is the original Secret Santa by Ian and Catherine Wiley where you send your target something wargames related worth around £15. Finally we had our own little Penguin Santa thingy between Jocke, Thomas, Laffe and me, with some meddling (errr... help) by Chris ;-)

I've received 2 presents to date, and have been told the 3rd is on it's way. I opened them on Christmas Day, together with my daughters (well, I let them open the presents, there good at it, having had loads of practice again this year ;-))

Out came these two nice presents:

2 packs of Perry dismounted Union cavalry

Perry British 6pdr for North Africa

Both of these were on my wishlist, and will come in very handy. The first as skirmishers for our SP2 ACW project, the other for our ongoing CoC North Africa project. I'm planning on getting both painted soon ;-)

Thanks very much to my Secret Santas ;-)

Bad Squiddo Games kickstarter

Wednesday 16 November 20:00 CET, Annie at Bad Squiddo Games / The Dice Bag Lady is launching her first ever kickstarter, Ghosts of Gaia. 6 kick-ass post-apocalyptic ladies, hopefully stretching to 10 if all the stretch goals are met. And laser armed guinea pigs if we get even further! ;-)

Get in there and support her!

In Annie's own words:

"TOMORROW! I am launching TOMORROW! Ghosts of Gaia, 28mm post apocalyptic badass ladies. There are 6 in the opening pledge, but with another 4 to be unlocked - and if we get that far, a nice deal for em all. 

If we get that far.....then.............. guinea pigs with fricken laserbeams?

Full line up shots and more to come before launch,

Start spreading the news (if you haven't been already), I've been a bit rubbish at my usual "tell the whole internets!" of late because of just having so much to do, so any help is appreciated so much!

Woo!

Cheers
Annie

Bad Squiddo Games"

Check her Facebook page for more info

2017 wish list (for all sorts of secret santas ;-))

My wishlist for 2017 ;-)

• Perry Confederate Infantry
• Perry ACW dismounted cavalry and horse holder
• Perry ACW camp set 1 or camp set 2 (for SP2 deployment points)
• Renedra fences or fences on low stone wall
• GW Son of Eorl
• Perry tropical FJ riflemen
• Perry tropical FJ MG42 teams
• Perry tropical FJ support teams
• Perry Desert 6 pdr AT gun

Look ahead at 2017

Long time no update and I'll have to sort that out soon, I have done quite some painting this summer.

Now however, I want to take a quick look ahead to next year and my projects. But first a little reflection on what I had planned for this year...

1. Desert 28mm (mostly Perry miniatures)...

Nope, nothing of this happened. Maybe next year ;-)

2. Our Dux Gondorum project, Dux Brittaniorun in a Middle Earth setting...

YES! I got some LotR stuff in one of my Secret Santas, which enabled me to sell off my Normans to Thomas. I painted up quite a lot of the second hand stuff I grabbed last year, mainly Uruk Hai, more than enough to play Dux G, and actually managed to get a couple of games in against Thomas and Jocke. They even saw action in Open Combat (less succesfully...). I seem to have all I need for this project, though, so nothing extra planned - just more painting and playing.

3. Extending my AB miniatures British paras...

Bought some extras from Battlefield miniatures and got more than a platoon's worth of AB and SHQ figures for free from Thomas and Laffe. I painted 2 platoons with supports and a recce jeep squadron of these, and hopefully can get the rest done this winter. Nothing more is planned for these, as with the stuff I still have to paint, I can field a well supported company! We need to get our Normandy or Arnhem campaigns started for these!!!

4. Frostgrave

Managed to get a warband or two together, and played one or two games. Hope to paint some of the extras and monsters I have, and get some more games in, but will not get anything extra for this.

5. Perhaps start Norwegians, Dutch or Belgians for CoC for WWII in 20mm

Didn't happen either, although I am supporting May 40 Figures's new 28mm Dutch figures startup. So this may mean this happens in 28mm next year instead...

6. Our French in Indochina project...

We had a series of very successful demos at GothCon using/testing an as-yet unpublished supplement to CoC, and I have about 2 sections worth of infantry and some support (including a Bison tank) to paint.

So, then, onto next year's projects... And yes, this is a nice wish list for the various Secret Santas I'm in ;-)

1. Sharp Practice. Thomas and I are keen to get into ACW with SP2. I'll probably get one or two of the cheap-ish plastic Perry boxes (probably the new Union infantry box and the Confederates box, to have some for both sides, or even some Cavalry). I could also do with some dismounted cavalry or other skirmishers (e.g. these or these). Should be a relatively quick and cheap project, although we may also want some terrain (houses or fences or more fences).

2. Dux Gondorum. I'll continue painting most of the second hand figures I grabbed last year, but nothing additional is needed, perhaps a "Son of Eorl" to use as a mounted leader for my Rohirrim. Hopefully we can get some extra games in, as this was fun and my Uruk Hai seem to be on a roll.

3. WWII Desert 28mm. As I haven't done anything with it this year, the situation is unchanged: "most of the stuff is done for this, but I may need a British 6-pdr, as we saw in our last games, when the German armour comes on, that the Boys rifles and 2 pdrs can't cut it. I also want to extend my German FJ för the Ramcke Brigade (that can also extend to Sicily, Italy and at a pinch even Normandy) with some extra troops, e.g. more riflemen, support, even MG42s, and the cool LG40 75mm RCL, or the sPzB AT gun"

4. Frostgrave. I have some loose figures and some monsters left to paint, and I hope we can play a bit more, but I won't get any extras for this. 

5. WWII 28mm. I've supported a friend's startup, which should get me some 28mm Dutch for 1940. I might get some early Germans or FJ to go against these. Foundry has some nice ones, and obviously Warlord has the Blitzkrieg plastic box. I've also got some of Annie Norman's (The Dice Bag Lady) Russian Women of the Red Army that I'll paint up this year and maybe add some other Russians to. Laffe has plenty of Germans he says ;-)

6. Indochina - I feel I have all I need for this project for the French side (and about 20 figures still to paint)

A summarised wishlist can be found here

These are not the droids you're looking for

Sometime last year I promised a friend of a friend to paint the figures that came with his Imperial Assault base set, and I did some storm troopers earlier 

Fire away, they won't hit anything anyway...

A lot of other things got ahead of painting more Star Wars in the meantime (Indochina, Paras, even some Frostgrave...), but now I felt it was time to paint some more of these. Here they come...

The 3 droids from the set. I used 3 different metallics as base (bronze, silver and gun metal), with appropriate washes and drybrushes, The gun metal one even has some patches of rust). Different colours for the leds/lenses as well.

e-Web engineers with heavy lasercannon (or whatever it is); 3 Imperial Navy officers (in 3 different uniforms); 4 Royal Guardsmen

 From the Imperial side, there's only Lord Vader left, as well as the 4 bounty hunters and 3 ferocious animals. Oh, and the AT-ST. And then there's all the rebels of course... I got them all undercoated, will try and finish them soonish.

Back to the Paras...

It's been a while, but here's another para update... Thanks to the box I got from Laffe and Thomas, and which contained more than a platoon's worth of figures plus some supports, I can now complete a full company, with bataljon and brigade level supports.

So, what have I been doing since the last update:

Company CO, mix of Blitz and SHQ

A bunch of 12 paras from Blitz

Another batch of paras from Blitz (11 of them, 4 NCOs, 2 snipers, an ammo bearer for the PIAT and some riflemen)

A PIAT gunner from the Blitz PIAT pack

The Kubelwagen and the Jeep are from Academy, the crew is all SHQ
(Jeep and its crew were in the box from Laffe and Thomas)

A flamethrower team, all SHQ figures (kindly donated by Laffe and Thomas)

3 JoPs for CoC - all from Blitz's "Para supplies pack"

Another JoP for CoC. The models are TQD (actually Polish paras, but the difference is minimal)

75mm pack howitzer (Airfix) and crew (Blitz)

More paras on the painting table now:

• 4 more jeeps (another Academy one, the Airfix one, with the trailer, and the two from S-models), with around 18 SHQ crew
• Airborne Morris (SHQ) and 17lb AT gun w crew (Blitz)
• 2 more JoPs: 2 paras w trolley and an HQ set (4 officers and a radio operator around a table) (both from SHQ)