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! ;-)

Progress ;-)

Been a while but I've been busy. Busy painting that is, and building terrain.

First the carrier. It's ready , apart from basing (which I'll do when I do all my desert bases in one go, to ensure they're uniform). Painted, washed, highlighted, weathered. Crew and stowage added and weathered again. Some pictures below. Sadly I think that it looks much better IRL than on pictures, I have bad lighting on my paint table (a continuous discussion with SWMBO) and my painting style doesn't really show up will, I feel, on enlarged close-ups. But I'll leave you to judge that ;-)

Then I also started on my desert rats. First the Perry MMG team and company command I mentioned earlier. I also painted TFL special figure Hugh Jarce, but my pictures of him all turned out overexposed. I'll see if I can do better this week.

Then I started assembling the plastics, and I did some minor conversions: made a medic from an extra radio operator (simple head swap and giving him different arms), used the bits I swapped from the radio operator on a kneeling figure to make a kneeling radio operator, to go together with another kneeling figure who got an arm with binoculars from a German para officer and the arm with the pistol from the desert rat officer. Together they make up an FOO team. I also played a bit with the arms of the prone Bren gunner and created a kneeling Bren team. Not entirely happy with it, but it'll do.

All of these conversions and just over half a platoon of infantry are now painted. No pictures yet, I'll have to add some tonight or tomorrow.

I also assembled the rest of the platoon (finishing the first box and starting on the second) and did some engineer conversions (as I couldn't find enough desert engineers poses I liked). These are now assembled and waiting undercoating. Some pictures:

From left to right:

• Demolition team (3): 2 running with a box of explosives, 1 kneeling with a detonator
• Mine clearing team (3): 1 with a mine sweeper, 1 with a bayonet, ready to dig up a mine, 1 with a spade sitting back and waiting
• Wire clearing team (3): 1 kneeling with clippers (they did't turn out that well, but they'll do), 1 lying with Bangalore torpedoes, 1 with a rifle grenade. I might do another with Bangalores or something else, and use the guy with the rifle grenade as an ordinary soldier.

I was also thinking about a flamethrower team, but got some conflicting info on the "Life buoy" flamethrower that perhaps wasn't in use prior to 1943 or even D-Day. Anyone can shed light on that? I might still do an ft team later.

Some vehicles on the way (a Crusader tank, a Dingo scout car and a Morris CS9 armoured car. And then some DAK, as we see to have more British than Germans on the way for GothCon.

Butterfly

Flapping about like a butterfly just now, going from item to item and not completing much, but there is a theme to the madness: desert rats...

All the figures I assembled and fixed are now undercoated and some even have some real paint on them, but I'm going back and forth a bit how I want to paint them (how many layers and how, and how I can simplify things by using a wash and which wash, and which colours I should use). Nearly decided on that, but want to get that clear in my head before I start painting 2 boxes worth of desert rats. And I have all sorts of ideas for conversions (e.g. engineers etc...).

But while thinking and deciding I picked up on something else, my universal carrier. Wanted to do a Caunter scheme on it and have researched that a bit and decided on the colours. Undercoated black first, then wetbrushed Dark Sand. After that set the scheme in Dark Sea Green and Green-Grey. Washed with Devlan Mud (not entirely happy how that came out), then painted again, in Dark Sand, Green-Grey and Basalt Grey. I'm reasonably happy with how it's come out. Will do some more detailing tonight, then will do the tracks, then drybrush Pale Sand or Bonewhite. And do the figures that come with it.

Some pics from before the wash and repainting. Will try and add some more tonight. The Basalt Grey I've repained with is a couple of shades lighter than the Dark Sea Green and a better fit, I believe.

Not done a thing on the tracks yet, so they're just black now...

Desert Rats

For our demo/participation game at GothCon, we've chosen the desert theme, and what better figures than Perry Miniatures to do that. So after "Jultomten" (aka Leif and Thomas) gave me a Perry universal carrier for Christmas (read: dragged me in to their plans...), I got some Desert Rats, the box of plastics (38 figs) and the Vickers MMG with 4 crew.

I've started assembling some tonight and did the MMG and crew. Little flash and nicely cast and sculpted figures. I also opened the big box tonight, and I noticed I had an extra command sprue :) So I decided to assemble the officer with cap and pistol, and use him as a more senior officer (company commander), to be used for Big CoC, and base him together with the radio operator. I can then use the bonus sprue for a platoon officer, with helmet and pistol or SMG (not decided yet). The second radio operator will go into the bits box for later use with a suitable figure for an FOO (once I get my second box there will be plenty suitable figures for that).

I also drafted one of the figures from the plastic box in a suitable posture to become the 5th crew member for the MMG (CoC lists have 5 crew members for an MMG). He can be easily recognised in the picture below.

I need to do some undercoating tomorrow, as I've now lots of assembled bits on the go, and need to start painting them. There's also an undercoated group of 8 Valiant Fallschirmjaeger waiting for some licks of paint and I need to finish those sometime soon, so I can start basing them (16 are already painted and waiting for varnishing and basing, something I prefer doing in bigger batches so they look uniform).

Jump Off Points

Started on some jump off points (JoP) for Chain of Command (CoC) tonight.

From left to right:

1. Generic JoP for 20mm games - these are from Sgts' Mess, targeted as loads for trucks. The ones I get are 4 bases of six milk churns and 3 crates. They will need some work, inspired on the ones that Rich at Toofatlardies had made (see below). I plan to use some rectangular bits of white glue soaked tissue paper to represent tarps or Zeltbahn thrown over the loads, and add some guns and/or other bits of equipment. I was going to do that tonight, but forgot the white glue in the garage. Doh!

2. Toofatlardies specially created CoC 28mm JoPs. These will be used as is, and will be based as desert, for our CoC demo/participation game at GothCon in April.

3. Some Warmodelling (ex-Fantassin) Finnish ski troops, to be used as JoPs (or patrol markers, or both) for our 20mm wintergames. I also plan to use their reindeerdrawn sled as a JoP, but was a base short tonight. It's lying next to the white glue...

Next steps - base the reindeer and the sled, and pimp the bits from Sgts' Mess. Then undercoat all black with thinned Humbrol Matt Black. Then paint and base. Hopefully these should be done (apart from the basing) this weekend. If my wife doesn't send me on an expedition to IKEA again.

Toofatlardies Christmas Special

... is out now. Speed along and get it now ;-)

http://toofatlardies.co.uk/blog/?p=3466

/K

Back to painting again!

Jay! Back to painting again.

For Flemcon Thomas and I had to come up with a scenario and game last minute as others had become ill. So I quickly painted some German armour for a France 1940 game.

That kind of kickstarted me, and I've been painting more regularly since, completing some of my Warmodelling winterwar Finnish and some Valiant Fallschirmjäger. They still need basing and varnishing, but that should be done as soon as I have a bit of a batch so I can do them in 1 sitting.

Some pictures underneath (not the best of pictures, the lighting wasn't too good...).

2 PzIII, a PzII, a Pz38(t) and an Sdkfz222. The PzIII are HAT/Armourfast, the rest is SHQ. All 20mm.

Valiant German Paratroopers

This and the picture above are Warmodelling (ex-Fantassing) Winterwar Finnish.

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

Spartans!

Here are some Spartans I did a year or 2 ago. 15mm Xyston figures, based for DBA. I also did a loose general, so they could be used for other rulesets as well. I still have 6 more stands lying about somewhere (probably neatly packed away in the attic), that I may do someday...

A batallion for Marcel - part 2

Also on my painting table since last week (http://dalemunk.blogspot.com/2010/02/battalion-for-marcel-part-1.html), are the first 12 figs for my "batallion for Marcel", that I assembled, converted and primed last week. Last night they go a light white drybrush, which helps get out the features on the figures (which is handy while painting), and adds additional highlights. I may have overdone it a bit on some figures, so some may get an additional black or dark grey wash.

All figures below are from the Perry FN100 box, some slightly converted using the available heads and extra equipment in the box, unless when stated otherwise.

Command stand (figure on the left is from the Perry FN13 (Line Infantry NCOs) pack, as there are only 3 command figures in Perry boxes)








Grenadier stand (figure on the left is from the Perry FN22 (Line Infantry Officers in campaign dress pack), although I may decide to move him to the Voltigeur stand, and use another grenadier or NCO for this stand. Second figure from the left has received an arm and a head swap.










Fusilier stand (head swap for the second figure from the left)










Next up - washing where I overdid the white drybrush and then painting.

More Swedish GNW troops painted

Got some painting done last night, and apart from some Austrian colonels I completed for a friend recently, it had been a while. First up last night were 2 batallions of the Dalregemente (Bacchus 6mm GNW). They still need to be properly based and varnished, and they need their flags, but at least they're painted. This brings my infantry up to 8 batallions in 4 regiments (2 Livgardet, 2 Södermanlands, 2 Närke-Värmlands tremänning, and now these 2).

I also completed 1 base of the Östgöta kavalleriregemente, my first GNW cavalry base. Again, they still need to be properly based, and varnished, but I'll do that when I have completed a large amount of bases, so I have some uniformity on the base paint job. Again these are Bacchus 6mm GNW.

Next up some artillery, and I hope to have some time tonight to prime some more cavalry.

Raab Refight - 6 Feb 2010

Some Stippies (or Stipsciz Hussars) did a refight last Saturday of the battle of Raab. Some pictures below...

Left: The table setup at the start of play in Karim's new wargames attic; Right: The French start advancing














Left: Willie and Erik are still smiling (to be honest, they were still smiling at the end of the game); Right: First French successes - several battalions have managed to cross the river, and have pushed back the Austrian skirmish screens


Left: Karim (our host and umpire), Willie and Erik are watching how the scenario unfolds; Right: Things are developing for the worse, and Marcel is starting to look worried...


After the initial French successes, the situation quickly deteriorated for the Italo-French troops, as they were pinned against the river with little change of getting any reinforcements across. In the end we gave up and pulled our troops back.

A battalion for Marcel - part 1

My good friend Marcel made the pledge to not buy a single figure in 2010. As an incentive to help him through these difficult 365 days, I decided to paint him a battalion of French infantry, which he will get on 1 Jan 2011 - assuming he manages to get through 2010 without buying any figures.

Last Saturday I dropped by another friend, Fons, who is selling off a lot of his wargames stuff, and picked up 2 boxes of Perry plastic French infantry. Last night I assembled/converted 12 figs (3 companies or half a battalion), put them on their painting bases and primed them. Step 1 of "A batallion for Marcel" has been completed ;-)

I hope to have some pictures of the first 12 primed and ready to go, but that may be a few days, as I'll be travelling for work.

Quatre Bras / Ligny refight (part 3)

And finally a snap shot of (part of) our umpire team, hard at work (left to right: Marcel G, Joris R, Alexander "Willie" W) :)

Quatre Bras / Ligny refight (part 2)

Some pictures of the Ligny table

Quatre Bras / Ligny refight

Last weekend, about 25 people from various Flemish wargame clubs, did a refight of the twin battles of Quatre Bras and Ligny. This was neatly organised by Karim VO, and well led by a team of umpires consisting of Marcel G, Alexander "Willie" W and Joris R, as well as Karim himself.

Below are some pictures I took on Saturday of the Quatre Bras table (where I took charge of Reille's corps) (I couldn't attend both days, sadly).

Some more 20mm Finns

Tonight I completed a couple of Finns from a batch I started 3 months ago, when I was still spending my weeks in Zurich for work. Finally got some done now... Hopefully I can get some more out this week. They're all Warmodelling (ex-Fantassin).