490 - Bolt Action Infantry Progress - Bit-by-Bit (W-i-P)

I've been forcing myself to paint again...

It may not look much, but these first six men (2Lt and one fire team) are almost done. By 'almost' I mean what's missing includes this:

• Some facial detail (and hair - I hate hair. That's why they're all wearing their lids),
• Rank insignia,
• Helmet camo for those requiring it,
• Maybe a bit of drybrushing on the khaki, and 
• A metric tonne of inky wash, which I've no doubt will make a substantial improvement.

My photography is as unflattering as ever, but here they are (NB: the rest of 1 Section are almost up to this point too:

They even sport enamel mugs in a subtle range of colours...

Cheers,

- D.

489 - Painting the Black Bull at 28mm

This is what worried me most about approaching historical gaming at 28mm: painting unit markings.

It turns out (and thanks to those of you who punted me in this direction) that freehanding the Black Bull of 11AD really isn't too bad - at least with my trusty '005' fineliner pen to help with the black!

I thought I'd practise on my spanky new Bren Carrier crew:

Mmm...unflattering, garish flash!

- sans flash -

In my head, THIS is how one gets in and out of a Bren Carrier...

Top view, naturellement.

And yes, I do know there's more yet to be done...

Cheers, 

- Drax.

488 - Plymouth Association of Wargamers - PAW 2015 Show

Geekfest!

[Sorry for the radio silence: I've had the dreaded ManFlu.]

This was last week, and it wasamazing! It's always a good start when it takes me an age to park even in my tiny wee Fiat Panda, but when I got in it was as busy as you like.

Much props to the wargaming friends Lee, Jay and Gary I got to see there, and it was particularly great to see Col. Gravis of 'Curious Constructs' fame.

My photos were rubbish, alas, but I'll try to communicate the highlights briefly below...

Above and below: the first thing that caught my eye - a gorgeous Wild West game set-up, complete with narrow-gauge railroad and train in the background! - shamefully, I didn't catch the name of it. 

Above and Below: Across a Dead Earth exhibition game. I wasn't able to see the game in action, but the board looked just amazing!

Above: a massive exhibition game of Flames of War. Russia Vs Germany as far as I recall.

Above and two below: A huge Pegasus Bridge-themed exhibition game of Bolt Action. Gorgeous. 

Above: All Quiet on the Martian Front. I had a nice natter with the chaps playing this. I got the impression it's a good fun game but one whih still needs some tweaks to its peripheral mechanics.

The game above was so damned  interesting, I'm going to give it its own post...

Above and the two below: a rather beautiful looking ACW game based around the Battle of Belmont.

Above and below: Curious Constructs. Just amazing kits. Amazing. Seriously, check out the new walker platforms below.

And wasn't this just a treat - that's right: one of Jon Lambshead's 'Hammer's Slammers' books - why not pop over and see him now? Link here: [link] 

 So there you go. Although I don't have any decent pics of it(!) the highlight of the day (other than meeting up with folks I know) was watching a couple of chaps play a game in the Bolt Action Tournament: British Commandos and Paras Vs some very unlucky Russians. I must've stayed with them for almost an hour, and it was brilliant. What a great system Bolt Action is!

Here's to PAW 2016, eh?

- D.

487 - Bolt Action: Field Modifications at 28mm

Hullo, All.

Good news! I've finished making up my Core Platoon for Bolt Action in 28mm: 25 plastic Tommies plus the 'Command' models in metal (these will be based on washers).

Their construction was a long process, but reassuringly fiddly after years of just chunky GW models, Detailed below are some of the more fiddly tweaks I had to make:

[above] In this case, note the pickaxe and spade on the 3rd and 4th models. In each case, I had to cut down the soldier's spine, the backpack and the haft in order to make it all squeeze in.

[above and below] In this case, please note the added carrying strap for the PIAT ammo and the grasping of the PIAT bomb by the left hand. Tricksy.

[above and below] This chap, you'll note, has the Bren gun accessory bag over his shoulder. Apparently this was often how it was worn by gun no.s 2, but more usually over the left shoulder (understandably!) - sadly, the bag didn't have nearly enough flexibility to fit naturally on his left. It probably goes without saying that putting a strip of paper on as a strap was...fiddly! 

"Group hug!"

"Smile!"

Much to my surprise, I'm actually looking forward to painting these...more immediately though, I'm looking forward to going to the Plymouth Wargames convention tomorrow ('PAW 2015') to see Col Gravis with Curious Constructs and the Warlord Games team too...Yay!


I'll let you know how it goes, eh?

- Drax.

486 - In Case You Missed These Wonderful Praetorians...

...You need to look at them:

They belong, of course, to the ever-brilliant Ady, over at Praetorian XXIV. Go there from this link here: [link].

That is all.

- Drax