Apache Cheif.

Due to my nephew and the painting of space orks I have only finished 1 figure this week. This is a Black Scorpion Apache chief. A very nice sculpt with a lot of detail. I am not totally sold on the historical accuracy of the figure but I'm not going to worry about it over much as it is such a nice sculpt. It's things like the necklace the boots etc. that make me doubt the realism. Small things I know but sometimes I just get very picky.  He clearly covers a double barrelled shotgun which should give any adversaries second thoughts. Again no visible knives or daggers but the long coat could easily conceal them and pretty much any other weapon smaller than a gatling gun.  Painting wise it really was a joy to paint, despite the fact that I mucked up the eyes.  For the colours I have mostly limited myself to the colours and tones that I feel a tribal culture could create. Even the blue I could dye myself using Brazil Wood and a good mordent. Given that Brazil is named after this wood it is possible that it could have been traded through central America although I have no evidence to support that fact. Or the material could have been dyed by white men and traded for furs. Either way the colour would have been rare if it existed at all. I don't need to justify the colour choice any further than that as all the other colours and tones are very natural earthy hues. Not much more I can really say about the figure, except this was my first Black Scorpion figure and having painted it I would be happy to get some more either of this range or maybe to try another.... Fantasy pirates look great and I anticipate would be tremendous fun to paint even if I have no use for them.

Anyway I have finally worked out how to crop pictures on windows 8 which is why these are both in focus and bright enough to see. Which makes a change for me, but now I have no excuses at least from now on.

Other news: I am clearly visible on Google Earth should you have my address. I am talking to the window cleaner. I have painted the front of the house since the picture was taken so it looks a little better. I only mention it as I was told Thursday after my last blog post. It seems strange that I am now an extra in the worlds largest game of "Where's Wally!"

Club tomorrow so no doubt something club related on Monday when I post again. Until then enjoy the upturn in the weather have some fun but not too much and I'll catch you all later. Take care folks.

WAR of the worlds (2)

I have to be really quick before I get guilted into painting more space Orks... which I'm quite enjoying but don't tell anyone.

Anyway cutting a long story short, Kev from the wargames club emailed me this last night.

This is a link to a new wargames Pre-kickstarter.

My reply was "OH F**k! No way round it. think it's a must! "

 It's kind of right up my street so I feel sure I will get sucked in. There are a number of other kickstarters I would also be interested in as well and needless to say no one is going to give me any more money, so I will have to start selling things. Maybe a lung!

Anyway the slave driver (nephew) has started to pester so that's it for now.

Have a good couple of days and I will post again on Saturday.

EDIT 7am Friday morning, having slept on it for a second night.

Having thought about it, It's a NO from me. There is just too many fundamental flaws with the whole idea.

Tanks were created to counter the trench warfare stalemate of 1916-17. Not how we use them today.

I can't conceive of the Martians building trenches ergo the trench stalemate would not come to be.

Unless the tanks are made out of ceramics then they will be worse against heat rays than being in the open.

The whole idea is set in the wrong scale. If tripods are that big then a smaller scale like 6mm or 10mm would be better. If tripods are not huge,  go larger to 20mm where there is already a lot of commercial kits already about. 15mm seems to be 100% designed to limit all the spending to one company, with no other options.

I think it's the wrong era. I think set later, in the great depression maybe. when tanks are in existence and that counters my first point. It also allows you to do gangsters verses Martians which would have much more appeal to me. "Eat Lead you slimy rat!"

SO to conclude it's a No from me there are some nice ideas but overall too many flaws and missed opportunities.

Another gun

As mentioned previously I am trying to finish some things off before I go to Salute. In that vein here is another of the Peter Pig 15mm scale pieces of artillery for PBI. I have all ready put 2 of these on my blog last year and this is the third and most likely final one. A 105mm gun for my US infantry company the other two have not yet seen action on the table top, but it's only a matter of time. Adding an extra gun to the battery is a good step forward not many points and a very useful addition as it can and no doubt will be used in anti tank and against footsloggers. The crew of the other two are in Vietnam era uniforms, while this one is strictly WW2. It makes hardly any difference to me, they were all painted the same way. The difference is the Vietnam era uniforms look scruffier,  with shirts untucked and open at the neck which I am sure I would have done if I had been working in a jungle as well.

Very close examination of the second picture may reveal the differences, but it will most likely show the similarities. "Shelldrake" pointed out last time that you would never store ammunition in this way (standing up) as it is possible to accidently set one round off! As this was my last piece of ammo for these guns I have put it on in the same manner as previously only for continuity and not for realism.

As we are now into the Easter Holidays I will of course be looking after my nephew for a few days. If he's happy to play on my computer it will mean I will get some painting opportunities, but should the weather be better he may decide to do something out of doors in which case for me painting just won't happen. So while I intend to continue to blog and post as normal there may be some disruption. Anyway that's todays quick update, not a huge amount to show I will try to post again in 2 days but I can't be certain that I will manage it. Still until I do have fun, enjoy the sun (yes it's out as I type this) and try to get some painting done. All the best Clint.

Happy Easter

Without kids all the holidays kind of sneak up on me and this Easter is no exception. I did manage to buy myself an Easter egg though so It's not a bad thing. Actually out of all the holidays we have in the year Easter is possibly my favourite.

But you did not check here to read about my thoughts of Easter. As you can see a few more 28mm Apache warriors from Foundry. Only one with a bow but he also has a revolver in a holster so it's not like he's shunning white skin weapons. The other three are all rifle armed, 2 Winchesters and one breech loader. Painted in the same way as the other 4 from two days ago. To be honest I started all of them at the same time but only finished 4 at a time. I have stuck to the same palette as last time so they all should look compatible. I have one more 28mm Apache to do, so expect another one soon. (different manufacturer though). I might pick up a few more at Salute in a few weeks but if not that will be the extent of them for now. There is not too much on my Salute shopping list at present so anything is possible. This is because I want to get a few existing projects moved forward rather than starting something new. Therefore expect the time between now and Salute to be me working on existing things and rounding armies out. This is for 2 reasons, 1) because I really do need to get things finished that are half started. and 2) because I want to start the War of Spanish Succession but to be honest I am a little daunted to start. This reluctance is well set in my mind but I will overcome it in time. However for the next few weeks a little tidying up and finishing off is in order.

It's a bit rambling today, which shows how much my thoughts are all over the place. I shall post of the blog on Tuesday and with luck will have my act together. Thanks for reading todays waffle, hope you have a wonderful holiday and that the weather improves for you where ever you are.

Until Tuesday, take care and try to get something painted! Best Wishes Clint

28mm Apaches

I wanted a break from my usual painting so I went back to the old lead pile and dragged out some old Foundry 28mm Apaches. When I went to the box containing my un-painted lead I had no strong idea what I was going to select this time, I wanted something fairly self contained so I could do them start to finish and add them to an existing set of figures that I already had. For that reason these appealed. I have a reasonable range of 28mm wild west figures mostly used for gunfight type games but very few Indians so I'm quite happy to round out their numbers a little.
I did not find any plains Indians on foot, although I did find some on horses. I did find a few Apache Indians. As you can see they are all rifle armed but a couple also carry pistols in holsters as well. The rifles are a mixture of Winchesters carbines and breach loading rifles, I like the mixture on these irregular foot.There are a couple of knife sheaths as well, but I am surprised that not every figure carries one. I would imagine that a knife might be more use in day to day activities than a long arm or pistol, but there's not a huge amount I can do about that with regard to these figures. If I could sculpt (I can't very well) I would have added some more knives. It's probably just the selection of figures in this batch. I have deliberately added some bright colours to their clothes as I did not want them to look all the same or in some kind of uniform. They have been quite a tonic and have shaken of some of my painting lethargy which was the reason for selecting something a little different. As such I have undercoated 4 more and will start them this afternoon.

UPDATE:
All the components for the 1/2400th scale fishing village have now arrived (on Thursday) so I should be able to proceed on that project in this coming week. Should it turn out how I anticipate I can see everything being finished for the Broadside show game in 2 weeks time.

That's it for now, have a good Easter Break and I'll do my next blog post on Sunday. All the best Clint.

Necessary but not pleasent.

Hi Folks, I have struggled to get anything done these last couple of days. No Physical problems, just apathy and lack of direction. It is so much easier when you know what you are supposed to be doing and can crack on with it. I have finished my reading book and can't get into a new one and my usual selection of computer games has left me feeling Meh! I shall blame the weather for now although I really know it's just a passing phase and a few day down the line and I'll have rocketed forward with enthusiasm.
That said I have finished 4 stands of casualty markers for my US Infantry PBI company, So It has not all been a waste of time. These are by Peter Pig and while casualty markers are no ones favourite things to paint they are necessary for some games, PBI being one of those. Hence the blog post title. For many people casualty markers are unpalatable but for me I have no moral issue with them. There has been some discussion on wargames boundaries of late on a couple of blogs I follow (Hi Brian, Hi Lee). And for some people this would no doubt cross some sort of line. Personally I would rather put some counters like this on the table than for example a dice (die! No Pun intended).

So before this gets heavy and maudlin please remember if you see someone without a smile on their face, give them one of yours.

All the best Clint

Trial Games at Club

 AT the club yesterday I found 2 chaps (Graham and Tim, Patrick as well for the third game) willing to try out the Blood Bilge and Iron Balls rules, (BBIB). So we settled down to make sure as a club that we liked this set. I talked them through the set up and how the rules worked and we played the first game with me as a reff. They each had a 64 gun third rate ship of he line, with no fancy optional rules or different ships. Just the basics to get us going. So the first battle went like this. Two or three turns of moving ships and very little shooting, which you expect until they get pretty close. Even using the 2400th scale ships the guns have a 12" range so "close" is a comparative score. Now one of the things I like about BBIB is the turn sequence. It's random! By that I mean that each player has a sailing phase in which they move, a firing phase in which they let loose with the guns and a repair phase in which they get to re order the ship, mend sails patch the hull reinstate the chain of command and those sort of things. At the beginning of the game the Repair phase is  Meh. Once you ship starts taking damage though it's vital if you want to keep afloat. Anyway cutting a long story very short Tim Manoeuvred, then Graham sailed into position for a stern rake and the last phase (as already mentioned was randomly drawn ) turned out to be Grahams Firing phase. One Stern Rake on Tim's 3rd rate but Grahams gunners mostly rolled low and only 2 cannon factors hit. Still devastating, but Tim ship "EL Titanica" (Made up name for the day) survived. Next turn and the first action drawn was Grahams Firing phase. So before Tim could move or repair anything Graham gave him another stern rake. Ouch. This time his gunners were on target and 5 of his 6 gun factors hit causing 15 damage cards to be drawn. This is Bad! What makes it worse was that the second damage card Graham drew was the red joker (A critical hit) and 5 additional cards were to be drawn. It could not get any worse for Tim until the black Joker was also drawn, and another critical was achieved and Tim's ship was pretty much turned to ash by the damage and raging fire.

So for the second game they took two 64 gun 3rd rates each. This Time it was Grahams turn to suffer. After some initial turns of manoeuvring and getting into range Tim was able to bring the broadsides of his two ships onto one of Grahams. While Graham was out of ark to return fire. he made them count and although it was not an instant ship death like the previous game had done enough damage to cripple Grahams ship "Grey Lady" and to stop it from being able to steer until he could get the steerage repaired. Which he failed to do for a couple of turns so the ship had to just carry on in a straight line which meant that Tim could pound it some more with one ship, the other going in the wrong direction and therefore literally two ships that passed in the night (ok it was daylight but you know what I mean). This second ship of Tim's "El Lusitania"  moved into ark of Grahams other ship and it too suffered steerage damage and was stuck facing into the wind, unable to change course until it finally managed to repair the damaged rudder controls. All the while Graham was dropping shot all over it.

So as Patrick had now been observing the game and both Tim and Graham had one relatively undamaged ship each and one ship sinking each (Graham from a severely breached hull and Tim's ship on fire but without sufficient crew to put all the fires out in the repair phase) Both Myself and Patrick bought another 3rd rate each to control. Both the picture pertain to that encounter. It was a chaotic cat fight with each captain reacting to the other sides positions and trying to out-manoeuvre them. The last few turns though saw me dispatch Patricks ship, The ship was relatively intact and would make a good prise, as I had mostly (by fluke) managed to kill crew and not damage the ship. even his command structure, was in good shape. At the cost of one of my masts (which reduced speed and manoeuvrability my ships master gunner, carpenter and with a chain of command so full of holes it was more sieve like than chain like. Grahams ship had likewise lost a mast and most of his crew and was trying to "limp" of the table. The final two turns saw Tim shine. He completely outmanoeuvred me  managed to Stern Rake me (he must have learnt how to do that in the first game), which again surprisingly resulted in both Joker criticals being drawn. And then he boarded me. My crew now so reduced as to be rolling just 2 d6 put up a good fight against Tim's intact Marines but as Tim managed to score 3 "kills" to my two, I literally had no crew left so he carried the day and I struck my colours!

Conclusion: Firstly It was a lot of fun. The rules work well, but we all thought that controlling more that 3 ships was beyond us (at least at this stage). The rules are simple and straight forward even intuitive but give a sufficient level of challenge. This make the games playable as games arher than exact detail simulations. To me this is the right approach.
Given the size of the ships (40mmx 20mm bases) My ship starting the game late still managed to travel 4 and a half feet down the table with the wind and about 9 inches tacking back into the wind. Which tells me that the ship size is about right for a game on the boards I have started to make. (Big smile on my face). There are a number of tweaks I need to make to take the game from club level to show level. Things to indicate full or half sail settings, measuring sticks and better Phase activation cards spring to mind as well as a couple of stands for sinking of sunken ships would also be nice.

So what next? As I need to get a couple of bits and bobs to do the next stage of the boards I will give them a break for a week or two, knowing that the game will work in a show setting. As I still have plenty of time, Broadside is on 9th June, there is now no need to rush and I will look to get everything finished mid May so we can get a practice game in with the full set up and everything looking groovy!

Thanks for reading, I hope you found something of interest, and I will do my next blog post on Wednesday. All the best Clint

Ship Ahoy!

So far I have managed to get 5 ships painted, and intend to paint another 5 this afternoon. Here are a couple of snaps of them on the partially finished boards. These ships are 2400th scale, a smaller scale than most people use for this era. However this compact and bijou ness allows me to hide the fact that I know NOTHING about the rigging of ships. yes I know it involves ropes and block and tackles and knots and things like that, but if you asked me to rig a model ship I would be stumped. So this smaller scale lets me avoid the issue. Yippeee!

These ships are about done, bar so tweaking and no doubt some repairs when they go to the club tomorrow. I look forward to being proven wrong. I have tried to keep to what I believe are the correct colours of the period. I tend to think of the ships being a mixture of Yellow and Black. The yellow seems to have been any and all shades of yellow from a light "lemon" to a dark "Ochre, while the Black could actually be a dark grey. I am told that the captain of the ship was responsible for paying for the paint so no universal colour scheme or pattern was established. However I am also informed that the Royal Navy would supply yellow and black paint free of charge, which is why we tend to think of the Nelson Checked wooded walls. That being the case I have one red ship and the others are is different yellows and blacks. As such They look alright. And I'm definitely not going to be too concerned about the colours selected while sticking to what I have been told.

So this afternoon I will have to paint 6 more ships, read the rules make a wind direction counter. (This can be static). In most battles of this period the wind direction and intensity did not change so once set for the battle so it will stay as set.
As you can see in this last Photograph the ships are quite small and given that the effective range of there guns is a mere 6" perhaps I can get away with a smaller board.

That's it for today, thanks for looking have a great weekend (in the sleet snow and rain....and that's just so far this morning). All the best Clint

More WIP BBIB Boards

 As you can see a little more done on the land boards for BBIB show game for Broadside. All I have really done since last time is neaten them up and add some colour. Which is a very English understated way of saying repainted everything completely.
Starting with the beaches I dry brushed two lighter shades of the sand colour, lightening with white and a very small touch of yellow each time. The yellow is powerful so really be very gentle with it. I then dry brushed the cliffs with the same tomes to make it match in. The green for the grass was straight from a tube of acrylic from "the works" discount book shop (2 for £5 so very good value for money). Again this was dry bushed to simulate a texture. I was a bit heavy handed in places but I have more to do on the land so any mistakes will be rectified in subsequent treatments. Again I used both white and Yellow, but now with considerably more yellow than white to hi-light the texture of the builders sand.
I did drop some paint onto the land section of a different colour (beach colour as it happens). But this is a happy accident as I have painted it into a more "regular" shape than the splatter and the area will grow into a field on the finished headland. It is important for me to take this sort of approach and not try to make it look perfect. Accidents happen to us all and it's sometimes best to just roll with them.



Together as a river mouth



Together as a peninsular

I also thought to show you the two sea shore boards together so that it was clear that they would look ok next to each other either as an estuary or cove or inlet or as a headland or peninsular. being able to move them around is important to me as it gives a far greater use from the boards than just one set up. The estuary is particularly of use as it allows for blockade running scenarios where the ships have either to leave the river moth or to enter it which give a strong reason for a battle. Of which there are a number of historical examples.

 Overall I am very happy with the result so far. Obviously there is more to do so it is just another WIP post today but I thought it was worth showing the progress. Thanks for following my progress and I hope to have more to show on Saturday, maybe even some ships!!!! (I know how to tease you!). Have a good couple of days all the best Clint.

Land ahoy

 

These two pictures show the next step in creating the boards, adding texture. Still a long way to go, but they are coming along at a pace I am happy with. Let me be blunt and say none of the colours or textures you will see on any pictures will be how the boards are finished. But later I hope there will be a "Rolf Harris" moment when it all comes together at the end. (Well let's hope so!) All the texture is, is "builders sand" (the cheapest sand I can buy) applied through a sieve onto all the areas that I want to add some form of ground texture. The sand is attached using a combination of Resin W (PVA wood glue) water and paint (a mix of ready mixed poster from a toy shop and acrylic for the book discount store "the Works". Using just poster paint would have been easier but the colour would then "bleed" through onto other colours applied over the top. Needless to say wait a few days for it to dry. In this instance I painted it first thing Saturday morning before going to Reject Central for the game.

The next stage (once dry) is to seal the texture. At this stage I have started to add the first indications of colour. This is only an under-painting colour and will not be the finished layer. It does serve to indicate to me where any painting problems will occur further down the line but is so roughly applied that it is just to make sure that the sand used to texture the boards will not shake loose.

As a couple of people wanted me to put a ship in for scale I have done so,. This ship is a 50 gun 3rd Rate Ship of the Line. The smallest Ship of the line I possess It was randomly selected from the selection on my painting table that are primed and that I will start to paint later today ready for a game on Sunday. I hope to have them done in time as It will be the first time most if not all the club players will get to try the rules I like out.  These ships at 1/2400th scale are small the base size is 20mm x 40mm which does make them look insignificant on the boards (see final picture) I have mixed feelings about that. Bigger ships would look more impressive, but is it all about trying to impress people, or showing them what they could do themselves. Alan Abbey of the Milton Hundred Wargames club and author of the rules started playing with those cardboard "Pirate ships" that you had to pop out and assemble. (Yes I have some as well.) But has now managed to acquire some 1/700th scale ships which when painted and rigged will no doubt look fabulous, and is definitely a step forward from the cardboard ones but I quite like the look of the smaller ships, it makes the sea seem more in scale.

That's my news for today.
 Thanks for reading have a great day and I'll blog again in 2 days time.

Best wishes Clint.

Nine big chaps in one Big shed!

AS regular readers will know I had a day out yesterday visiting the "Posties Rejects" in order to play a game. Before turning up I knew it was Napoleonic and a follow on from their previous game and was advised to read the AAR on various Reject blogs. Being honest, I looked at the pictures and read about 1/2 of it as who really enjoys the homework side of the hobby? Anyway Postie had sorted out the sides and I was given 2 units of cavalry and one of horse artillery, already set up in position on the table. Not complaining and to be honest quite happy with what I got, even If I would have deployed it differently. Still you get what you get and you don't get upset. I will only talk in this AAR about my very slim section of the battlefield as there were 5 bloggers present. Brian ( His Blog Here), Ray (His Blog here) myself and Surgit (Possibly spelt wrong sorry mate) comprised the Allied forces about 3-5 miles from Brussels. While Fran (It's all lies) Smiffy, Big Lee (A possibly less jaundiced view from the nasty French side here, but it's still all lies) and Ian made up the wretched French forces of the despicable dictator. (feel free to Boo and Hiss them each time they are mentioned for they are the enemy). Both Brian and myself were the newbies not really knowing the people or the rules at all but that's Ok we trust Ray and Postie. While it was clear to some of the players that my lack of starting forces would mean I would have some reinforcements I had no way of knowing that so I assumed that what I started with was what I would have all day. Anyway I was under orders to hold my position, so I did not move or manoeuvre at all for the first few turns.  This second Pic shows the centre of the board and therefore my left flank, commanded by Ray (our glorious leader).
So as mentioned I held my position while Surgit with much elan sent his cavalry forward and managed to get a couple of charges in. But everything He charged ran away which did leave hiom exposed and vulnerable, but it did slow the French advance. As he was exposed I moved my horse out ready to charge any French (boo hiss Boo!) Cavalry who would have charged them. Being honest I was a turn to late but still the thought was there. My horse returned to my start line the following turn as Surgit's cavalry were dispatched. Not an easy task it would appear for the close infantry firing into their rear and Flank as Ian rolled the dice and the gods favoured Surgit.

As the nasty garlic eaters approached I was fortunate to get a few good shots in with the horse artillery. Only one shot of this unit failed to cause a casualty the whole game so definitely worth having on the field of battle. While it did not do a huge amount of damage I would imagine the opponents were discouraged by it at the very least..... If only they'd shown it! After a few turns my reinforcements turned up. As mentioned above I did not know they were coming. It did take them 4 turns to get into position but still beggars can't be choosers.

Here is the obligatory and contractual picture of the opponents on the day, everyone a Reject! Yes that's a lot of troops they have all formed up and aiming at Ray, Brian Surgit and myself, but mostly at Ray whom they seemed to want to target.

As no one had at this stage their name on the wall of Shame Fran gave me that dubious honour. For which I am very pleased as at least I know I left my mark. Should I visit them again I will attempt to get it written up as many times in a day as I possibly can and try to set some kind of record! Rejects you have been warned!

Surgit's reinforcements arrived directly behind my troops. The French guard Cavalry also turned up on the opposite corner ready to do unpleasant things to me, you could smell them coming for miles the dirty so and so's (booo!) so I moved my troops to the right and Surgit took my position and rushed to support Ray in the centre. Big lee used his horse artillery on my skirmishes to no effect so I returned the favour and my rifle armed skirmishers wiped his artillery out. (Ner! to you Lee.). Ian took exception and took my horse artillery down to half strength and then killed a stand of my skirmish line. (The only real losses I suffered in the game.) My light foot artillery (having just got into position) took a lucky shot at Big Lee's Cavalry managed to inflict a luck casualty and as his divisional commander was attached lee then rolled a 1 on the d20 and forever that little bit of Belgium will be forever French to a depth of 6 feet!

Despite a valiant defence of the town by Ray's Dutch militia, as the last picture will show, Check those dice scores! Smiffy fired his guns into the town and falling masonry killed Rays supreme commander and our centre collapsed in a rout.

As mentioned at the very beginning this AAR is only concerned with my very small section of the battle field. I would strongly recommend reading the other bloggers reports for a more accurate and less partisan view of what actually happened. But please take everything typed with an Irish accent with a large pinch of salt. I say that having not read it but in anticipation!

Conclusion: Well the observant will have noted the Rejects Logo on the right of the page as ray has given both me and Brian permission to use it on our blogs. You may take this to mean that I did enjoy the day. There are a number of game innovations that I will be introducing to the Rainham club. (Rainham club please be aware of this). Dice rolling throughout the day slightly favoured the Allies but when it mattered it deserted us completely so I can't even blame the dice this time although I no doubt will at a later date. I have been invited back and would choose to go if the time is right. I also hope to see the Rejects come down for a quick game at the Rainham club.  They've had that offer for over a year so I am no longer holding my breathe.

Very finally Postie very kindly gave me a gift which I will no doubt photograph and post on the blog later this week

Thanks for reading this AAR. Please check the other bloggers (listed above) to get their view of the day or if you have come from their blogs I hope you enjoyed this and will post another blog on Tuesday.

Best wishes Clint

Waiting for Paint to Dry.

 
 


The different shades of tan on the land sections of the boards to the right show different levels of dryness of the boards. A wordy way of saying that the boards have not quite dried out yet.  At this stage I have carved out the cliffs and for the most part I am happy with the results except where It has crumbled and needs to be made again. 








It's still a long way from being perfect, but hopefully the close up will show that they are meant to be cliffs and not just "dollops!"

Unfortunately the boards are not perfect fits, but I can and will work round that and get them closer than they are now. But for now I am concentrating on the land masses. The Paint should dry by this evening so I anticipate starting the next step (ground texture and beach texture) either late today or on Sunday, depending on the weather. I have worked out how I will do trees, but until I get scale pinned down I am still open on how I will make some buildings. You would hope that I would have scale pinned down long before I had gotten this stage. I have two choices either the more traditional 1200th scale or the less common 2400th scale. I am waiting for my 1200th scale ships to come back home and then see how many I have of them and in what condition. I also have some 2400th scale ships which are now primed and sitting on my paint table. 1200th scale would look better but until I get them back I will work on the smaller scale. Just incase he somehow "forgets" to give them back!!! And even if he does then I will have to re-paint and no doubt re-rig them so it might be easier to stick with the smaller scale and be done with it. The other advantage of the smaller scale is that the cliffs will look more substantial and therefor impressive. Time will tell.

This picture shows where part of the cliff has crumbled. AT this stage I have dropped some filler (among professional modelmakers Filler of different kinds is known as "Plod"). So this cliff section has been plodded and once dry I will re asses the situation. I could either re surface the cliff in this area or go with the situation and adapt the cliff and cover the error with some form of foliage. This is my preferred option as the cliff is not a prescriptive cliff of an exact coastline. This gives me far greater lee way with how It can look when finished. So we'll call this a "happy accident" and no one other than blog readers will ever know the difference.

Another closer view of the area in question. As mentioned above it's not the desired result, but I hope to turn it into a feature rather than worry about it.

Barring accidents, mishaps and problems with British Rail I should be going to visit the Rejects tomorrow for a game. Needless to say I and no doubt Fran, Big Lee, Ray and I am told the Lead Legion (whom I am don't think I know yet) will all do our own AAR of the battle. To be honest I have very little idea what to expect but as all the guys are quite personable (for a given and set value of personable) I do anticipate quite a good day. I am told it will be a Napoleonic battle organised by Postie. Napoleonic's are really not me period of choice but I can roll bad dice for any set of rules or wargames period so I am not expecting it to go my way at all. However one does not travel to the Rejects home turf expecting to win, but more to witness the banter (erhm... I mean, the slagging of each other off). Let's hope I'm not disappointed!

That's it for today, feel free to wish me luck for tomorrow and the Rejects. Have a good weekend and look forward to the AAr on Sunday (assuming I have recovered from the ordeal!)