Star Wars Legion, Games night and other sundry items

Craig is playing Star Wars Legion at NICon as I type, using an Imperial army that I finished painting on Monday for him.

The AT-ST is so big he doesn't fit my backdrop...

The full Imperial force, consisting of two starter sets and and AT-ST

Craig was finishing the basing off on these. In this photo it is masked for the airbrush.

I still have the rebels to paint for him, which I'll get to relatively soon. In the meantime I have a parcel of goodies to paint for Geoff - just a couple of dozen figures which I've already undercoated and done some prep on. They should appear on here over the next couple of weeks. In return he sent me a spare copy of the Trafalgar Warhammer rules.

A blast from the past. I got rid of my old copy a couple of years ago when Dan and shifted and plans to do a few ships evaporated.

Because I've just invested in these:

1:2400 Napoleonic ships from Tumbling Dice. This is the Victory, and it is tiny. There's another 15 ships where this came from, but Napoleonics is next year's project.

I also found time to finish off a unit of the British 43rd Foot for Muskets and Tomahawks.

My shiny toy soldiers

The French Indian War project is all going to be painted in glossy toy soldier style. I love the aesthetic, and there is something very pleasing about handling gloss varnished figures that I can't really explain.

I was sick for a couple of days this week, and couldn't get any painting done, but when I came out of my malaise I was able to finish off a few bits and pieces, including the ACW naval elements.

The Union fleet of the Chickatachee river campaign (yes, that is made up).

The two timberclads

The USS Choctaw repurposed for this campaign. Big and ugly. I love these boats!

Adding to the preparations for the Chickatachee campaign, I finished a few artillery pieces and some cavalry (mounted and dismounted). At the same time my order turned up from Hovels.

A farm set, two buildings which will be able to represent a town, and a timber mill. Yes, I intend that there will be trouble at t'mill... (full marks if you get the reference).

 And Geoff also supplied me with this Spartan Games Uncharted Seas fortress. It's a bit over the top, and in smaller scale than the other buildings, but I still plan to use it on the same table - just like I'm using 1/600 boats with 15mm figures. It's all represnetative.

This'll be a hard nut to crack.

So last night was Games night, and saw Mike and I have our first game of Burrows and Badgers. It took  along time to play, not because the rules are difficult, but because, as always, it was very easy to get distracted with food, drink and conversation. But we did get there in the end.
Mike was rather underprepared, but his Rogues warband was drawn up and put in the field against my Wildbeasts in an Open Battle scenario.

 

The first moves of the game saw my animals move forward to try and secure the centre of the board.

Mike deployed his leader, Arnold von Schwartzenotter and his Weasel (unnamed), in the centre of the board. The rest of the rogues had to make their way up from their deployment area.

The view from the position of Angry McAngus, the Shrew-zerker. He was chomping at his axe (literally) to get over that hedge and into combat.

Otter and Weasel move into combat with wildcat and sparrow. The combat in the centre heats up. Hunny Bunny the archeress slips around the side and puts an arrow into Hamish McFeatherface's (the sparrow if you hadn't worked that out) behind. Wee Wullie the dormouse takes aim at her with his sling, but fails to gain vengeance.

The Rogues are not rolling the greatest and being held up by terrain.

In one turn things begin to turn. Fiona McAcorn, the Squirrel Witch, casts a curse on von Schwartzenotter, rolling a perfect dice to do so. Then Hamish attacks the otter with another perfect roll. The Rogue leader is struck down! In his place the Fennec fox charges forward.

At the same time Hunny Bunny is attacked and removed by Tam the mole and Angus the shrew.

Despite a small victory over Hamish by the Mouse knight, Gordon McWhiskas the Wildcat seals the game with a devastating blow on his Weasel opponent.

Burrows and Badgers is a cool game, and led to much mirth as we played. It is unpredictable, and the lowliest shrew can take out a large character with luck and good use of combinations. Mike is off to revamp his rogues warband - he didn't get a chance to read the magic rules before making decisions last night, and this wasn't a campaign game as a result, just a chance to try out the rules. Everyone loved the figures, which are beautifully sculpted, and a joy to paint. There is more that we need to learn to use properly - like hiding for one - but by and large I'd recommend anyone to invest in Badgers and Burrows if you are the remotest bit keen.

Next to us on the table Paul, Terry, and John were playing a 28mm Napoleonic game with Black Powder. The distances were shortened to accommodate the fact that we use a normal 4' wide table. John started by charging with his cavalry - just for a change. They had a lot of fun, although at times they found the Black Powder rules (which we haven't played in years) more than a little counter-intuitive. Below are random pictures of the battle.

There was time at the end of the evening to have a game of Shadespire which Adam had brought along. unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of his nicely painted figures because I was too busy trying to climb the steep learning curve, but by the end of the game I had the hang of it (I think). It was a cool little game, and well worth playing if you get the chance.
Shane and Jeremy had a small 500 point 40K skirmish, that was pretty much completed before we got Burrows and Badgers set up, so I didn't get any photos of that either.
Overall it was a great night, with lots of laughter, food, banter, drink and a lovely single malt that I couldn't partake of because I was driving.

Nate

More shiny experimentation

Relatively happy with my test figures for the French and Indian Wars I decided to see how some of the other units would look. This included a French soldier from the Guyenne regiment, a Black Watch Highlander and a Coureur de Bois.

 I've now decided to paint in the eyes. It livens up the faces quite considerably.

 The Coureur got a little bit of drybrushing for his hat and a wash with army painter strong tone ink (as opposed to the dip). The green on the black watch tartan is quite bright but I wanted a strong contrast with the blue.

 And another shot of the updated 43rd Regiment figures with the undergrowth on their bases and eyes.

 And just in case you thought that I had forsaken my black undercoat and traded in my 3 layer technique, here are the latest figures that I've painted for Geoff, some Mutton Chop British infantry from the opening of the Great War.

The shiny toy soldiers are only going to be for the French and Indian War and the English Civil War projects. I haven't retired the matt varnish permanently.

Currently I'm still painting for Geoff, and for my own collection I will leave the experiment until later and return to completing the 28mm Marlburian project.

Nate

Taking a shine to my painting.

I love the Old School look of shiny toy soldiers finished in glossy varnish. Something about them reminds me that playing toy soldiers can be fun, not just an endless pursuit in painting like a full-time professional. But I haven't painted any glossy toys since I was a teenager and Humbrol French blue only came in gloss to coat my plastic Esci and Airfix models with.
It also doesn't help that modern figures have so much detail I almost feel compelled to paint with at least 3 layers of colour. And I also don't have a lot of experience painting in this style. Can I make it work?
It was with some trepidation then, that I took a break from painting Geoff's latest batch of figures and made the decision to go 'old school' on one of my projects. The chosen victims were the French and Indian Wars figures. Nice bright reds, whites, blues and greens to sit in a single block coat beneath their shiny exterior. The results are as follows:

'I say old chap, I can't see anything.'  'That's because no-one painted your eyes old man.'  

And from the back

The 43rd Regiment are my chosen British infantry unit for the French and Indian War, and here they are with all of their lace intact on their uniform. They started with a white undercoat - not a technique I have ever used very much at all. I considered googly eyes, but decided against it, in favour of giving the flesh areas a wash, and a highlight on cheeks and nose. The only other places that got more than a single layer were the hat with some German Grey, and the haversack with a beige brown drybrush. The red was given an army painter red ink wash.

These figures were relatively quick to paint, and I'm happy with the final result. My biggest concern was that I would feel somehow unfulfilled by not doing multiple layers of shading and a matt finish - almost like I was wasting the figures' potential, but now that they are done, I'm rather pleased. I'm also thinking that my 28mm English Civil War project might be done in the same way.

The only thing that I'm not 100 percent sure about is the bases. Should I have done these  just plain green? The problem is that I've already prepped the bases for the whole French and Indian Wars project, so it would require an awful amount of rebasing. I've noticed that Stuart Asquith has used realistic basing on his American War of Independence figures and they work well. Maybe I need to glue on a few more stones? What do you think gentle reader?

Nate

Woodland Indians, Vikings, a geriatric hillbilly woman and Oliver Cromwell walk into a bar...

And they all say ouch.
Seriously, how was I supposed to end that title? It refers of course, to the latest batch of painting for Geoff. Without further ado, here is the parade:

These are some of the Blue Moon Woodland Indians.

And their three friends.

Gripping Beast berserkers. I'd be crazy too, if I lived that close to the North pole and wandered around shirtless.

'So ya'll want my guns sonny? Come and get 'em!'

The Seventeenth Century's answer to the Cromwell tank...

I have marking to do and reports to write, so it is unlikely that I'll be posting anything much in the coming fortnight - but you never know! The next item on the painting tray will be Japanese tanks for Craig.

Nate

Delivery from Australia

On the doorstep when I got home was this delivery from Dan, all the way from across the ditch:

I had contacted him last month to ask him to look out for any cheap Muskets and Tomahawks at CanCon that he could pick up for me. He didn't see any, but then said that he didn't think he would get around to getting his own up and running, and did I want them? In return, I could send him the old Warhammer 40K second edition rules. As this was a bit of a one sided deal, I've also offered to paint his Samurai buntai for Ronin.

So what arrived? The rules and cards, French Wilderness, Indian and British Wilderness forces from North Star, and a Last of the Mohicans pack from Warlord (I think). Also in there are some Three Musketeers figures from the Brigade Games range for use with En Garde. They were a surprise. Very, very cool, especially as I was reading about the battle of Rocroi last night and thinking about French figures for the Thirty Years War. Admittedly I was thinking One Hour Wargames pocket project, but I'm not going to quibble!

The French and Indian War has always been a bit of a favourite of mine, and I'm keen to add a couple of regular units to these Wilderness forces, along with some civilians. This year is officially accumulation year, where I forsake any great advance on my own projects, paint for other people, and build up my collections to paint from next year onwards. The French and Indian War is pretty high up on that project list, after 1588, Ronin and my mid-war German Flames of War army I will probably start painting these guys, so I should get to them later this year.

Thanks Dan!

Nate