Monday 7 July 2008

Paint Fest

Last night Keith came around to see for himself the wonders of''Army Painter' (AP). We sat and shot the breeze for around four hours talking wargaming, films, wargaming, figures, painting,wargaming....you get the idea!
Anyway, I demonstrated the effect by slapping a bit of paint straight onto some Peter Pig Roman Legionairies. No undercoat, a bit of red on the shield and tunic, a brown strap, gold on the shield boss, flesh.....then slap pn Army Painter. After around 10 minutes of painting I had done 8 of these.
So, no undercoat. No basecoat. The metal bits on the figure are the bare metal covered in AP. Keith nearly fell off his chair. "Its the future and I have tasted it!" he said.
So he got to work on some Warhamster High Elves. Although I grew a beard in the time it took him to paint two bases including the command base below, I think he was please with the result.

Meanwhile I had painted a whole Viet Cong army for 'Men of Company B' (ok only 36 figures, but not bad!).

To finish the night Keith got to work on a High Elf General on warhawk.

Which I think you will agree turned out nice! I painted a unit of 18 Confederates for 'Civil War Battles'.

The end result for me for the evening was :

8 Roman Legionaires

3 Ancient Germans

18 Confederate infantry

1 boar (!)

36 Viet Cong.

Keith did a unit of archers, along with what you see above. Later today we are going along to Stafford Games to buy some more of this mystical product. I still have about half a tin left, but it wont hurt to stock up!

No bids on the Orcs yet!

Sunday 6 July 2008

New Peter Pig Samurai

Three pictures of my first unit of Levy Ashigaru. Painted by Jason Hurst, they are rather good!




This is the start of a 12 month project for me. Jase will be painting most of the figures with me chipping in here and there.
On another note I listed my Warhammer Orcs and Goblins on Ebay today. Every time I paint an army and sell it, I regret it a week later. Well, I regretted it when I pressed submit listing. So a new record! Oh well.



Saturday 5 July 2008

AK47 and bits

No pictures, but Keith, Ade and Mark had their baptism with AK47 last night. Ade and Mark were the Peoples Popular Front with Keith being the Dictatorship.

Peoples Popular Front

1. Militia
2 x Tanks (standard)
120 pts
2. Militia
2 x Tanks (standard)
120 pts
3. Militia
8 x S/A bases (56), 2 x RPG’s bases (14), 1 x Hmg base (14)
84 pts
4. Militia
4 x S/Abases (28), 1 x Hmg base (14), 2 x Mortar bases (40)
82 pts
5. Regular
6 x S/A bases (60), 2 x RPG’s bases (20), 2 x Trucks (20)
100 pts

Popular Leader
25 pts

Political manoeuvre
69 pts

The Dictatorship

1. Militia
5 x S/A bases (35), 1 x Hmg base (14), 1 x Mortar base (20)
69 pts
2. Militia
5 x S/A bases (35), 1 x Hmg base (14), 1 x Mortar base (20)
69 pts
3. Regular
4 x Toyotas with Hmg’s (100), 2 x Toyotas with RCL Gun’s (40)
140 pts
4. Regular
2 x A/Cars with Hmg’s (60), 6 x S/A bases (60), 2 x RPG’s bases (20), 2 x Trucks (20)
160 pts
5, Regular
2 x A/Cars with Tank Gun (80)
80 pts

Dictator Leader
25 pts

Political Manoeuvre
57 pts


Following th Politcal Flow charts, the game was probably won! Keith upgraded unit 1 from militia to regular and managed to arm all but 1 of the small arms bases with HMG's. Then with typical luck, during Ade's politcal manouvre, he upgraded one of Keiths units by one level and Keith rightly chose unit 1 who were now Professional! With 5 HMG's!

To be honest the army lists I used were the stock arnies from the Peter Pig ready made armies. In hindsight, they aren't very good with lots of militia as units 1 and 2 (which are generally the first units on the table. Common convention in most AK armies is to have professional or Regular troops on first to take a foothold and follow that up with militia. Oh well!

Ade won the dice off for attacker (using the optional rule of roll 1 dice for every 5 political points, most 5's or 6's becomes the attacker). Then with more typical luck Ade only got on 2 units of militia to attack Keiths 2 units, one of which was the professionals, who occupied the shanty town and were never going to be shifted. Keiths other unit was the Toyota technicals.

When Ade lost one of his T55's to HMG fire in turn 1 or 2, we knew this game was going only one way. Even when turn 4 came around and Ade and Mark got on all of their off table units, it was a touugh ask. Ade managed to occupy a jungle template where he had put his 10pt objective, but the 20pt and 30pt objective were in one of the shanty town templates and at the road crossroads that dissected the shantys and they were guarded by Keiths pros.

Mark made a valiant attempt with 2 more militia tanks and a large unit of militia foot troops, but Keiths technicals played a blinder and took both out.

In the end it was a massacre to Keith, who went away writing the histroy books. The game was part of a small solo campaign I am running. The narrative being that despite free election in umBongo, a central west African state formally colonised by Belguim, no clear winner emerged following allegations of vote rigging. The town of Mumptu was one of many where re counts were ordered. Keiths army led by General Chumbawumbo got their first and held off the PPF who were looking to balance the ballot some what. Chumbawumbo is now off counting the votes for himself....

On another note, Jase Hurst of 'the Bunker13' painting service and a member of my club has finished the first unit of Levy Ashigaru for my Battles in the Age of War samurai game. And they are fantastic. Pictures will e forthcoming but you can find his link at...
http://www.jasonhurstthebunker13.tk/

At £1 for a 15mm figure including basing, he offers excellent value for money. He is very busy however! Highly recommended.

Thursday 3 July 2008

Lots of piccies!

First is an atmospheric shot of the Menin Gate at 8pm on 11/11/06. This place really is the spiritual home of the British and Commonwealth armies on the Ypres Salient.


Tyne Cot cemetary on Passchendale ridge. I think this is the largest Commenwealth war cemetary in the world. The dead from 1917 to the end of the war on the Ypres salient are buried here.

The Theipval memorial on the Somme.


Back to some wargaming with Peter Pig Fuzzy Wuzzys on a rocky outcrop surveying the oncoming British patrol. A game of Patrols in the Sudan from last year.


Here are the British from the same game. An atmospheric shot with the Brits emerging from a sandstorm.

Some AK47 action. A base of 'looters', one with a chainsaw, the other in a Manchester United shirt!



The commander of my Colonial/Settlers AK47 army, Mnr Pierre le Porc. This is a limited edition figure released by Peter Pig and given to people putting on a game at 'Fisticuffs' in Weymouth about 7 or 8 years ago!


A nice T55, one of several in my AK47 collection.

A Hammerin Iron game at the club from last year. Loads of ships, 5 players and a lot of fun!





And finally one of wife, looking very cold in Prague a couple of years ago on our wedding anniversary!






Wednesday 2 July 2008

Regiment of Foote action

A game of Regiment of Foote at my club last Friday. The first game for Ade, who took the Parliamentarian forces.



Ade is looking forward to the challenge ahead!





One last check of the rules!
The armies deploy...


In the 'campaign' section, Ade lost a several bases from a regiment of foote and gained an extra first fire that he put on his veteran troops. I lost one base of horse, but only managed 4 marches to Ade's 5 so he was attacker. During the late/lost phase, I lost a 2 regiments of foote and 1 of horse. So I was very much on the back foote! Ade also managed to remove a hill from my deployment zone, meaning I was defending, with nothing to defend!
Here Ade is pointing to his right wing troops, most of whom were conscripts, with a level 3 general commanding. Not a good combination. They got a bit lost in the wood to their front and to be honest, not much happened here.

Different in the centre though where Ade pushed on with 4 solid regiments of foote to my 3. His were bigger than mine and he had a veteran and 3 trained units to my 2 trained and 1 conscript. This 'push of pike' is between Ade's blue coat veterans and my red coat conscripts. A bloody tussle won by Ade but at great cost!

The situation in the centre earlier in the battle. My left wing had a level 4 general who failed to inspire the regiment of horse with him to do anything in the whole game!
Here my right wing cavalry with some commanded musketeers prepare to face the onslaught of Roundhead horse. I faired better down this flank and fought and won two melees.

We reached 7 on the countdown clock at around 11.45pm so decided to call it a day with advantage with Ade, but only just. A great game and we are looking at a rematch in a couple of weeks or so! AK47 next week though.
Ok here are the boys in blue well under way



A close up of some boys 'pre-dip' and 'post-dip'. No highlighting or shading, just basic colour over the blue spray paint then Army Painter brushed on.


This is the army done after 2 days pretty much solid work, breakig off for the odd pizza and Euro football game. 195 foot figures, 7 generals and 6 guns. Not bad.

Army painter really is great. OK its gloss varnish with paint added but, it does what it says on the tin. I used the 'dark tone' and having painted a load of ECW, AK47, WW2 for PBI and now a Civil Wars Battles army, I am half way through my first tin. I do give the figures a coat of polyurethene matt varnish (from B&Q) to take most of the gloss off them, leaving more of a satin finish. My figures are now bomb proof!
I may experiment with adding paint to my gloss varnish, but to be honest I may just stick with AP. I reckon I will get the Rebs done plus a few other bits with the rest of my first tin. That will be 3-4 15mm armies around 800 figures) for £18, so pretty good value. I have put links to Wallord Games and Stafford games who both stock the stuff.