Building a jungle.

Nope Not finished just yet.  By which I mean I have finished this batch of trees but there are more still to come.

I purchased these via eBay. They cost £2.49 plus 99 p postage so all for less than £3.50. They did come from China and arrived within 1 week of ordering. While they were advertises as 50 when I can to use them (I had already given feedback) I found there to be just 45.  So If you order any just count them before you give feedback. And if you are short let them know.

But for the price 45 small trees is still good so I am quite happy. Trees have no scale so they can be for any size figure you choose. But for me I will be using them for 20mm Vietnam and 28mm Sci Fi. But there is no reason they could not work for other scales. And for the cost and swift delivery I think they were quite good value.

 As they come with plastic spikes at the bottom I first snipped the spikes off. Then having collected a large number of metal discs I used Milliput (a 2 part epoxy putty) to attaché the "Shrubs" to the metal discs. Then waited 24 hours to dry. Epoxy putty does take a while to dry so I find it best to wait overnight.







Once dry I painted the bases with Brown Acrylic paint that I buy cheaply in "The Works" book shop. While the paint was still wet I covered the metal base and the milliput with sand. It is actually "Builders sand" (as that is the cheapest) that has been passed through a sieve to keep it loose and very fine and granular. Again I waited over night. The following day I mixed up a quite runny brown paint (the same paint as before but mixed with water). And then all the sand on the bases were painted brown with a big brush.

As I already have 2 different types of trees for my jungle terrain there should mostly be ground cover. They are cheap and easy to make and will I have no doubt cover the table with terrain which will block line of sight and resemble jungles.

So there you have a very quick and simple terrain tutorial.
All the best Clint

Rogue Stars !

Me start a new project Nah that never happens why would I want even more shinny toys? And truth to admit it has not actually happened this time either.

Okay it might happen. This time last week I banked the money I have received from Painting and was pleasantly surprised. So I decided to treat myself. Not a major splash out only about £8 and that includes postage. SO on a whim I purchased the "Rogue Stars" rules by Osprey. I did do a little research and saw they could be used for any sort of science fiction and was originally thinking VSF (Victorian Science Fiction) and yes they would work very well for that.

Then the rules arrived and I first checked  You Tube and found a good walk through of the rules. I will include that at the bottom. Watch it and make your own mind up that is far easier than me trying and failing to write a review.

So I looked through the book and looked through my unpainted heap of mouldering lead. One thing I did not have enough of was "Cultists".  As Cultists are also one of the crew/gang types and as in addition I was thinking they will be easy to paint and be about as far from 10mm Zulus as I Can get. As I had 2 packs of "Battle Brothers" From EMP Games ( LINK ) and the difference would be a change of colours and the figures would go from Sci Fi Monks to Sci Fi Cultists.

So I have started painting the Monks a suitable Cult colour. I was going to do Red Cultists but the first one came out looking like Santa. So I swapped very quickly to Cream and Purple. And when Painted they should (I hope) look like Cultists.

Sorry it is a work in progress day today. But The Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge means I can only show painted once a week and last week the person in charge of publishing my work failed to do so. So this is a filler post until I get something on there blog posted. Hence a delay on this blog

Anyway take care have fun and paint if you are able.

All the best Clint

WW1 AAR (The men who would be kings!)

Early in January the club had a game of early WW1. We used the rules "The Men who would be kings!" while they are a colonial set of rules we thought they would work for early WW1 before the trench warfare took hold. All the figures and terrain belongs to Matt.

The Mission.
Very simply the Germans had to force a river crossing. The British had to hold them and the French had to arrive swiftly and set up promptly and help the British out.

The German Players were. Peter, Dick, Tim, Bob played the British and I played the French.

As there were two crossing points Bob too the British to cover just one, a ford! A risky strategy but if I could arrive and set up in time it just may work!

Tim was in control of the German jaegers and he was to keep Bob busy while Peter and Dick moved up as swiftly as they were able to take the second crossing a bridge! As a
All units except the British had to roll for arrival, Bothe French and German It would be an awkward start for all sides.

The Vile Hiun
Peter Dick and Tim!
The Bridge is on the road (Der!) in front on Dick.
The ford is in front of Tim

The British deployed in as much cover as possible
sometimes this also meant they were not in the best positions to shoot!

The French cavalry start to arrive
And I get troops on the table from turn 2 onwards.
The Germans start to arrive on turn 1.

My elite foot arrive and move up the road but once they
get into position their officer panics and flees the table.
This mean they can only activate rarely and are left in woo
ds but in a position to
be shot at each and
every turn by Peters troops.
But nothing I can do about that.
 

German Cavalry controlled by Dick
 swarm over the baracade on the bridge
Ready to charge my only artillery piece.
 

Mid battle Bob has lost 1/2 the British and Tim has
crossed the river. I had lost my elite unit.
My artillery was set up in the wrong place.
Which actually turned out to be the best place in the end as It covered the bridge.

The French Infantry firing from a building
along with my artillery were able
toBring fire on the German Cavalry.

As a last ditch action my artillery were able to fire into the German cavalry
that was now charging them. Lucky dice rolls
killed the Germans and made the remainder
 flee back across the bridge and off of their own table edge.

As Bob was so short of troops I let him have a
 French cavalry unit and a French Infantry unit..
In retrospect when he tried to charege the German machinegun
on horseback. I thought better of it. but too late by then.
In 2 turns the cavalry unit was all dead and had achieved exactly nothing.
For those not in the know.
CAVALRY do not fare well against set up machineguns!
(I bet like me you already knew that!)

I fanally got to set up my own machinegun to cover the bridge.
Matt was trying to sow dissent between me and Bob .
But having seen what Bob had done to my Cavalry
 I was not going to let him have a machinegun to waste as well.

Conclusion:
Firstly a very good game and even more surprising I played well. (Even if I do say so myself). The French arrived in a timely fashion and I was able to hold the bridge. The Germans under Tim did well and had managed to cross the ford but were unsupported in any real strength. Peter had done well and was just a little bit slow to move up. Dick had also played well but the loss of his cavalry had sent a shock wave through his troops and made them unsteady.I am not saying Bob played badly. But he had lost almost all his own troops and about 1/4 of mine.

Blog posts may be a little sparse this week due to me submitting things to the Analogue Hobbies paining challenge BUT them not being entered as the person responsible was supposedly on a business trip to a sun drenched beach and sipping alcoholic beverages. I have completed 3 different lots of painting and I just hope they will go on next week as they were submitted on Sunday ready for publication on MONDAY.

Anyway thanks for reading and catch you soon. It may be Work in progress photos though!

Zulu's (finished for now)

Well as promised on the AHPC here is all the Zulus painted all in one go. By that I mean all in one photo. NOT all painted in one sitting! That would take more endurance than I have.

All the figures are 10mm or 1/200th scale. And while the majority are New Line Design (I bought a £30 army pack!) there are also Penrdraken miniatures scattered among them.

 From left to right. 3 figures on a base or 6 on a double base except rifle bases and then just 2 figures on a base.

Black shields and headdress 24 bases

Black and white shields and headdress 24 bases.

These 2 units will be married veterans so they will be in essence the elite of the army. Feel free to disagree as I have no real strong ideas.

 White shield. 24 bases. These will be the unmarried un bloodied warriors.

I bay need to add a further 8 bases to each of the above units to fit in with the rules, but I will probably just ignore the first 8 hits BEFORE removing bases.

The larges single unit is of course the unmarried but blooded warriors with brown and white shields and there are 61 bases of those. So a further 3 bases would totally finish them

Again I may need to add 7 more bases to fit in with the rules.

And Lastly all down the front 12 bases of rifle armed Zulus. Strictly speaking in the rules I should add a further 4 bases, but I am not sure I will. These have brown shields with white markings.

If I was being totally accurate I would mix and match shields as they did tend to mean different things in different tribes of the Zulus but realistically for game purposes It is easier to keep this simple method for identification purposes.

 In an ideal world where time money space and nagging did not matter I would finish these off with the extra figures as detailed above. But in real life I suspect I will draw a close on this army about here. I still have about 30 figures left unpainted so I have the choice either a small unit of tribal warriors allied to the British (with red headbands) or to bring one other unit up to full strength. So maybe it makes sense to do a further 9 figures (3 bases) of Brown and white shields)

I am not sure which is the best option but I do know I want a break from painting Zulus!


Hope to see you all again on Tuesday, so until then take care have fun and paint if the mood takes you.

Logilistics Sci fi 6mm

As it is now approaching 7am It is too early to take any photos. So The Zulus will have to wait a few days s I can do a group shot of them all. So Zulu Sunday. I should imagine.

So Instead here are some 6mm (1/300th scale ) Sci fi goodies for my Frozen planet setting.

With all of these I have used the camo I am using for the Chinese Democratic Socialist Union (CDSU). Which amounts to blue and grey rectangles over a white base colour and a dark blue was to pick out the detains.

First up we have 4 armoured cars By Ground Zero Games. I may have the turrets on back to front, or I may not, I just do not know. These will have a duel role. 1 convoy protection. 2 Scout transportation. In my head I can justify the 2 scout stands being carried in 2 armoured cars. So that would work for me and give any foot scouts a bit more punch on the table top.

And 2 scout stands each of 2 figures. (Scouts should not be clustered!) These are spare infantry figures from Brigade Models. Both are carrying suitably man sized weapons but their main purpose is to find the enemy.

Finally 6 trucks. 4 have flat beds and are used to carry a variety of goods. Everything from bullets to bull dozers. And probably a load more than that as well. Just assume nearly everything you would need to survive and thrive on a frozen planet.

The other 2 trucks (All trucks are Brigade Models) are an office body. You are more than happy to make up what the office does. It may be an ambulance or it could be a forward command post or it may just be a warm place for all the drivers to grab a hot beverage. I don't know and I am sure it will change as scenarios evolve!

The last truck is a liquid transporter.  As to what the liquid is I am more  than happy to also leave that to your imagination. Maybe fuel, maybe drinking water or maybe even gold fish I don't know and it will probably also vary with time and scenarios. I will assume the ground crews either keep it to a single cargo or have a very good way of cleaning it between loads.

That is it for today. I do have some more 1/300th Sci Fi already painted for next week. But I want to show all the Zulus on Sunday.

With that I will sign off wish you all a very good and productive couple of days ALL the very best from Clint

East Bonus Round.

On Sunday the "East" Bonus round was carried out. Originally I was going to do some "East Africa" WW1 figures. But as we all know they did not arrive in time (my fault I should have ordered them earlier). So I had a rummage and painted a "Ferdinand" .

For those few who do not know the Fedinand was the version of the "Elephant" used at the battle of Kursk. It did have a few drawbacks and those that survived the battle were fitted with an mg 34, Zimmermit paste and improved vision as well as a copla with another mg for the commander to use as well as upgraded armour.

2 were captured during the war, One by the Russians at the battle of Kursk and one (an Elephant) by the Americans at Anzio. Both are now restored and on display. Only 98 were ever made so this beast will almost never see action on the table top. It is just too rare to make many appearances and still count as credible. While MOST were only used in the East some were used in Italy.

As the Zvezda model kit only cost me £2.75 though having this as a 15mm option is still acceptable to me. Needless to say if I was to pay more the result would be I would need to justify it more and put it on the table for games more.

The camouflage is simple 3 colour camouflage and should (I hope) break up the contours of the machine when on the table. But only time will tell. Clearly I have not slavishly copied the camo from the video but the colours should at least be close even if the pattern is not!

The Video just shows the American Elephant arriving at Bovington. (on Loan). There are plenty of other videos so feel free to either watch or skip this as you see fit.

Thanks for looking and more again in a few days time. Until then take care have fun and do some painting if you can.

Post Xmas Shinies!!!

One of he joys of a decent wargames club is that if someone has something they are not gonna use they pass it on to another player. I did this before Christmas and Yesterday I got something back that I do Intend to use. Kind of like a wargames swap shop.

 
 
I passed to Tim (before Xmas) 3 Langton ships and a pack of 10mm ACW buildings as I know he is working on 10mm ACW project (About the only ACW project he is not working on seems to be a 6mm ACW project) and I know he got the "Fighting Sail" rules for Christmas. He asked me what I wanted in return. As Tim Owns (And runs) Both IT Miniatures and Frontline Wargasming. I asked for a few items from those ranges.

Firstly let me say I am VERY happy with the swap as it is things I was going to do but project I have given up on swapped for things I intend to do and have not (as yet) given up on!

Although the pics are unclear here are 2 WW2 Italian armoured fighting vehicles. As I want to do Chain of command in 20mm western Desert The Autoblinda Armoured Car and the CV33 Tankette should I hope pump up the Italian forces. The Tankette is a 2 man Tiny vehicle on the right and the armoured car is on the left,

I also received a WW2 Japanese Machinegun nest also in 20mm. This will not be for WW2 nor the Japanese. (That is a wargames project I have yet to even think about! But It is intended for my Vietnam collection. While not exactly right for that It will still be usable and will get used. I will of course make it harder to see and be seen in not just with paint but also with foliage and it can function as both Viet Mhin and US positions. Not tha I have a plan for a Vietnam base being over run but one can at least day dream.



Finally for a project "Started" a few  years ago that sadly stalled very quickly 2 lots as Askari 20mm WW1 East African Troops. These two packs will I hope give me enough for a starting force or two small skirmishing forces in east Africa.

For me WW1 East Africa has a lot of potential the battles were more skirmish based and the battlefields are a very different. While there were Trenches at places they were not on a similar magnitude to the Western front and tha battles did tend to be skirmishes and not mass infantry battles with tanks and Planes and Gas and the like. From what I have read a much more enjoyable affair. And yes Cavalry were used in limited numbers but not for long as the horses tended to die of fever!

But Imagine a game of Skirmishers versus Skirmishers with Germans, British, Indian, Portuguese, Belgium and Native Tribal warriors (The Massai) and it becomes far from a typical WW1 game at all.

Best get something proiductive done so I will sign off for now and let you be about your business.

All the best Clint

chasseurs à pied

These are 28mm Renegade Miniatures (and 2 Scarab Miniatures) WW1 French Light Cavalry. When I say cavalry I mean they went to war on Bicycles and not horses but the French army classed them as Cavalry. As you can see from the picture this is the whole unit together. I could find little real useful information on the unit, I am sure there is LOADS  but I am equally sure I am a dullard and that my webfu is not very good.  So do me a favour and do not point out the best source
 
for information on this unit. Even if yuou do I will not look at it as they are done now and I doubt I will ever paint them again.

The next 2 pictures show the Scarab miniatures or the right to contrast with the Renegade miniatures on the left. I have shown these in close up so you can see the cat and the pigeon as well as to notice the differences and similarities between the two companies.

I want to say how much fun these were to paint Unfortunately that would be a lie. Not that the figures are bad or miss cast or poorly sculpted but rather that painting dark blue when ill in the middle of winter is not so much fun. (This was carried out last week and I am all better now!) needless to say getting the right blue for shading and highlighting was a right kerfuffle! Yeah I know I am labouring the point.

The last 2 pics show French Re enactors (I believe in Belgium) who are dressed in the uniform of the Chasseurs à pied which should show where I took all the colours from. The models did not have any markings on their trousers or kepis so that has all been done free hand but I for one think it works. By the way only the guys on the bikes are in the right uniform so no one ask why they do not have red trousers like the ones in the back. I am sure someone will and that someone will and it is not at all funny!

That is it for today a wave of apathy has struck and I was unable to post last weeks battle on the blog. But I shall attempt to in the coming days.

Until then take car have fun and paint if you can.

best Wishes Clint

Sci Fi infantry Company for Frozen planet.

YES I have started my Frozen planet force. These are 6mm (!/300th scale) Brigade Models (UK) CDSU (Chinese Democratic Socialist Union) Infantry company.

Personally I judge them more a platoon than a company. I only put 4 figures to a base (2 figures for a command base) and have 1 infantry base in a vehicle. For game purposes this should work AND it does give me some left for specialist heavy weapons stands and scout stands and generally just more infantry. Which makes me happy with my frugality!

The MICVs are hoverfraft (type) vehicles so of course I Ignored technology I gave them black skirts. I could so easily have gone for camo all over but theskirts in black just looked right and when on the cloth will look Ok and no one will really question why they are not camouflaged. Queue a flood of inquiries  from my players as to why they are not camouflaged.

Personally I like the figures and as I want this to be both a cheap project AND an easy to transport project I am more than happy with the results.

I suspect I will purchase more of these troops before the weekend. I still need an opposing force and am sure I want more Brigade models so It just comes down to which I like best on the day as I should be buying them locally.

There should be more from me very soon. So until then take care have fun and enjoy the weather no matter how bad it gets where you are. Or at least try to.

best Wishes Clint

Flo

Well the Bonus round has finished and it is safe to now show you FLO!

This Bonus round was called "Armour". That was the only clue that was given and it was up to everyone to interpret it in what ever way seemed the most fitting.

As I want to do bore Chain of Command this year and as I like the early period of the Western Desert. What could be better (I thought) than an Armoured Car. And if I was going to do an Armoured car for the Western Desert well I thought a  Rolls Royce Armoured car would be the best one to do!

As It turns out I was not the only person doing a Rolls Royce armoured car.  But at least they were in different scales. My one is a Frontline 20mm resin cast vehicle.

As you can see I did select the British desert camouflage pattern that does incorporate the light blue and the Aircraft recognition roundel. Which is placed slap bang (like a Target) across the top of the turret. The Black and white image does show one actually in the desert and painted in this manner. Lacking the roundel for aerial recognition but clearly showing the angular pattern and the different tones. For the actual colours I looked at the Matilda2 at Bovington Tank museum and with any luck my combination of the two will be just about right. Or at least good enough for a game or two.

While a long way from being perfect it is good enough for my amusement and painting skills.

So just before I go why "Flo"? Well I wanted a name that was easy to paint and was a female name of the period. with Flo being short for Florence. It did help that the name also has a connotation of movement and as a scouting armoured car the name just seemed to fit.

I appologise.

Several things all happened at once which meant I have been unable to blog as frequently as I would like.

Well the AHPC is still continuing but I have sufficient back log so start showing stuff on the blog more frequently!

Secondly My sister is back from Texas, having told me it would be 2 weeks and her leaving on BOXING DAY! SO the Dogs and the horses no longer my responsibility!

Thirdly the bug seems to have passed. I am still a little weak and coughing and spluttering and with a headache but seriously so much better then yesterday when I had to go back to bed! I cannot remember the last time I needed to go back to bed.

BUT the good news is I was given 2 gifts.

Long tem member of the blog may recall me starting and stopping a WW1 East Africa Project. Well another club member wants to do some of this and these are the rules he wants to use and this was a spare copy of the rules he gave me. I shall enjoy reading them but whether I will use them or not I just do not know.

The other is a small book on the Battle of the Alamo. Now my sister has no interest in war, battles, wargamin, very little interest in history (I am sure she would say otherwise but in 50 years I have not known her to buy 1 history book for herself!) however she did do to San Antonio and see the site of the battle and the museum. Probably I suspect because my nephew and brother in law wanted to go. Still anyway a book on a battle I have not read and that will be difficult to acquire in the UK so I am not complaining!

I will tryto do another post tomorrow. Until then here are me and the 2 dogs at about 3 am having just been woken up to let them out for a wee! Kindly forgive my dishevelled appearance! And the fact that the dogs are not allowed on the sofa at their own home!