Gripping Beast Plastic Vikings

Well all it took was a chance comment at Evesham Wargames club that I'd be teaching year 5 children about Vikings next school year; followed by Paul letting me know that Gripping Beast were about to launch a new set of dark ages skirmish rules and before too long I had a box of Gripping Beast's new plastic Vikings.

£17 on Ebay gets you 44 multi pose plastic models. The range of poses and weapons available gives you a good range of completed figures, all of which are well moulded and highly detailed.
I decided to give myself an easier paint job by leaving off a lot of the tiny add ons - belt pouches and daggers, but I don't think it detracts from the finished model.

The pictures below shop the first 11 off the paint bench, they have been painted using a mix of Citadel and Vallejo paints and finished off with shield transfers from Little Big Man Studios.

Only 33 more to go....

British 14th Army in Burma (2)

Following on from my last post, here are the photographs of my next six forgoten 14th. The figures are from The Assault group and the paint scheme is as per the first batch.

More of these to follow in the future, but for now i'm heading back ino the dark ages to paint some Gripping Beast Vikings.

British 14th Army in Burma

Since I started wargaming, I have always wanted to recreate the Burma Campaign of World War 2 (My Grandfather fought in the 1942 retreat - more about him in a later entry). Sadly no-one produces suitable miniatures to represent the British troops from the early campaign, so I finally opted for troops from the later campaign and Chindit operations.

My first set of figures are from the Assault Group ( http://www.theassaultgroup.com/ ) - lovely figures, but their delivery is bloody poor!

The pictures below show the first six of the paint table.

Paint Scheme:

Uniform - Vallejo Bronze Green; washed with Citadel Devlan mud; dry brushed with two progressively lighter dry brush coats of a Vallejo Bronze Green and Citadel Skull white.

Webbing and Bush hat - Vallejo English uniform; washed with Citadel Devlan mud; dry brushed with Vallejo Khaki.

Puggaree - Vallejo Khaki; washed with Citadel Devlan mud and dry brushed with Vallejo Khaki.

Rifle - Citadel Scorched Brown; highlighted with Citadel Vermin Brown; Citadel Boltgun Metal; washed with Citadel Badam Black.

Face and Arms - Citadel Bronzed Flesh; washed with Citadel Ogryn Flesh; Highlighted with Vallejo Basic Skintone and washed again with Ogryn flesh.

I have six more from The Assault group primed on the paint tray, but I think I will be going to Warlord Games (http://www.warlordgames.co.uk/) for reinforcements!

New Pig Iron Heavy Infantry

Following their first outing on the games table, where their commander led them to glorious annihilation against an inferior force of Kolony conscripts (well done Stu!), I decided to add another SAW. I ordered a packet of Pig Iron assault troops that contains the SAW and, in order to give a little figure variation, a packet of backpacks and belt gear. When the packaged arrived, only two days later, Pig Iron had mistakenly dispatched the HQ pack instead. To their credit, after contacting them by email, the correct packet arrived free of charge two days later.

The heads are not separate heads in the Assault troopers packet so to increase variation I chopped the head off the SAW gunner, replacing it with a helmetless head off an alternative head sprue.

I used the same paint scheme as before (see earlier post) but with one difference. Having spent a little time playing the PS3 game Killzone 3, I noticed that the uniform lights and optics of the ISA troops are light blue. Dutifully I painted the optics on these figures in Citadel Regal Navy followed by a smaller dot of Ice blue... now I've got to go back and repaint the others!

The optional backpacks make the figures stand out from the original group and give them a real 'on campaign' look.

The poor SAW gunner now has to contend with male pattern baldness and a ruddy great backpack, as well as his cumbersome firearm!

I used three of the figures from the command pack; I swapped the heads of the sniper and the officer and added backpacks for further variation.

New Kolony Militia Squad

Now the SATs exams are out of the way, I have been able to put brush to figure! Below are the results, a second squad of Pig Iron Kolony Militia.

To distinguish them from my existing squad, I opted for the winter headgear alternative head sprue. Basically the figures are wearing Soviet style, fur Ushankas and side caps.

The pictures below show the squad defending a heavily bomb damaged factory unit (an old Snapdragon miniatures piece).

On Sunday I will be trying them out for the first time using a set of free rules I downloaded called FAD - Fast And Dangerous. A battle report will follow.

Completed 'Kindle' Sci- fi Bunker

In my last blog entry I mused on the possibility of converting the cardboard liner from the box of my Amazon Kindle into a Sci Fi Bunker... Here it is... The model was painted using a mix of Vallejo, Citadel and B&Q paints; it was 'dirtied' and 'worn' using citadel washes.

The Helghast logo was copied and printed off the net and glued in place, the lettering was hand painted from a Helghan Alphabet (also found on the net).

The steel pipes are made from large bore drinking straws.

The ladders were made from 'granny grid'. The pipe leading into the bunker was made from the flexible part of the drinking straw. The slogan reads 'Victory or death' in Helghan.

To give access to miniatures (Pig Iron Kolony Militia - see earlier posts) I cut the card structure at the base so that the whole top half lifts off. The boxes and cases are from Fenris Games.

I felt that the bunker stood a little too high. I couldn't make it lower, so decided to justify the height by cutting into the roof and forming a rooftop observation post. Here an Helghan Officer consults with an Technical NCO.

A birds eye view shows off the whole model nicely.

Another scratch built Sci-Fi Bunker

The first thing that struck me when I unpackaged my new Amazon Kindle was, 'oooh... gadget!'

The second thing that struck me was, 'hey that packaging would make a superb bunker!'

Take a look... if you can't see the potential in the picture above, you shouldn't be in the hobby!