NEW STAINLESS STEEL FICTION!

Hi!

Just a quick update but theres been some new (well newish as Ive not had chance to look at them as yet!) books featuring our favorite anti hero Slippery Jim diGriz!

First off theres the Stainless Steel Rat Returns, A series of stories featuring the Rat in his latter years. Secondly theres a compilation of the old 2000AD comics in one handy volume!

The Stainless Steel Rat Returns

The Stainless Steel Rat Graphic Novel!

Hopefully they will provide me with a host of new bits and bobs for use with gaming.

In other news I plan on making a couple of small orders over the coming weeks which will allow me to complete my existing forces and provide some new enemies and allies for Jim.

All the best!

Rules Update!

Hi!

Well its been another busy week at uni leaving me with almost no time to get any painting done! Alas Ive only managed to get a single miniature painted all week!

Other than that Ive had a further perusal of the internet for some suitable rulesets to try out, including Wildfire, Savage Worlds, and Chaos in Carpathia. The rules range from hard sci-fi to pulp but with the wide array of tech levels and planets featured in the stainless steel rat books I figure they will all be of some use!

Hopefully over the course of next weekend I will be able to get either a bit of painting done or try out a couple of rulesets! I hope to start up a bit of a mini campaign and play a couple of games a week (uni work permitting!) featuring Jims mission to Freibur!

Ive already got enough painted miniatures to play a couple of different skirmish level games so hopefully there will be some reports coming in from Jim soon!

All the best!

Hired Thugs!

Hi!

Ive had a quick update from the chaps over at 15mm.co.uk! Heres the message:

Want Something for Nothing?

Get yourself a FREE pack of 15mm Science Fiction miniatures from the HOF range by 15mm.co.uk.


HOF54 Rim Mercenaries (10 Miniatures) worth £3.50 for nothing except the postage.

HOF 54 Human Rim Mercenaries. This pack contains ten miniatures taken from three poses of human males armed with automatic rifles dressed in paramilitary gear. Useful for any scenario or force that needs skilled fighters who wear no official uniforms such as guerillas or levies raised for planetary defence or alien invasion.

Go to this Link and add ONE pack to your cart and then proceed to the checkout page.

You need order nothing else if you do not wish to. We will then send you your free pack of science fiction 15mm miniatures.

PLEASE NOTE: We will only honour orders which contain ONE FREE PACK ONLY. If your order contains more than one of these packs we will still supply you but with only one pack.

This Offer is Valid Until Monday 19th October 2009

As always if there are any questions please email me directly at sales@15mm.co.uk

Ive got some of the figures and they did paint up rather nicely and I have a batch more which will be acting as heavily armed re-enforcements for Angelinas thugs!

All the best!

All the best!

Yet Another Halt To Work!

Hi!

Just a quick update!

Im really busy at uni at the mo so my painting time is almost non existent so I doubt I will have chance to get any painting done for the next week or so!

Worry not! Things will be back to normal after that as I am determined to get an evening off every week to get some miniatures painted!

In the meantime all the best!

Police Skimmer!

Hi!

Heres another police skimmer:


Police Float Disk

The miniature is one of the Foatdisc Heavy Scouts and as its a commission piece I didnt add the new style 30mm round base. I quite like the pilots irate expression!

UPDATE!

Ive just finished a heavy weapon version of the skimmer to add some firepower to my police forces:


Police Shooters!

All the best!

Stainless Steel Battle Report!

Hi!

Ive managed to get another game in using Rogue Trader as a ruleset!

I will post some pics in the morning but in the meantime heres the battle report:

The Scenario

The Special Corps has dropped Jim some top secret supplies onto Freibur cunningly concealed within a meteor. Unfortunately for Jim the meteors trajectory was slightly off and the falling rock impacted close to one of the Rdenruntian outposts and a small village. Jim has raced towards the impact site only to find a couple of thuggish troops poking around the meteor.

Its now up to Jim to sneak up on them and immobilise the troops without raising the alarm and unload the spy gear from the meteor before the remainder of the Rdenrunt patrol turns up.

Unfortunately the troopers have already called their base and a truck is heading for the crash site to recover the meteor so Jim has a very tight schedule!

Setup

Jims deployment zone is in the village while there are two Rdenruntian troops guarding the meteor. The remainder of the squad are in a building opposite the village with an armoured car parked outside with a single sentry patrolling the compound. There are also over a dozen civilians milling around the village itself.

The Game!

The game began with Jim beginning to move towards the impact crater while the sentries milled around aimlessly.

Jim was soon in position in the undergrowth overlooking the sentries but sees the truck rumbling along the roadway so springs into action by firing his needle gun at one of the guards. Unfortunately the guard slumped to the ground just as his companion turned round. The guard scanned the bush but failed to spot Jim, meanwhile the truck left the road and promptly got bogged down in the mud (i was to spend much of the game in the same position!)

The next turn saw a brisk exchange of fire between Jim and the remaining sentry which saw Jim take a wound while the unfortunate trooper was knocked out with a burst of tranquiliser darts. Unfortunately the sound of gunfire had alerted the garrison and Rdenruntian troopers began pouring out of the building towards their armoured car and the crash site.

Jim soon made his way to the meteor and quickly set about recovering the equipment concealed within. In the meantime Troopers attempted, without much luck to get their armoured car started and the remainder continued closing on Jims position.

After recovering the equipment Jim made for his skimmer but was spotted by a cleaver wielding civilian who promptly charged screaming at diGriz. Somewhat taken aback by the old lady with the cutlery Jims needle pistol fire missed her and she managed to get into combat with him forcing Jim to knock her out!

The delay caused meant that Jim couldnt make it back to his getaway vehicle before the troopers got to it and began blazing away at him. Fortunately their marksmanship was truly awful and they all missed.

Despite a storm of lead whistling past his ears a somewhat bloodied Jim managed to run for the edge of the table and escape.

I also have a second game to write up featuring the flight of Jim as he attempts to find a medical kit and transport while dodging military patrols and local hicks!

I will try and post some pics and a second battle report over the course of the next couple of days but Ive got a fair amount of work to do both with my painting commission and uni!

All the best

Starship Crew!

Hi!

Just a quick update with a pic of my starship crew:


Starship Crew

The figures are from the 15mm.co.uk Starfighter Crew pack and are a nice batch of figures, especially the little asronavigation droid!

I plan on using them as an objective in some of my Stainless Steel Rat games as theres several instances when Slippery Jim has had to overpower or avoid starship crews while carrying out heists and daring escapes!

I'm Back!

Hi!

I'm back from my hols and am back at uni from tomorrow!

I am planning on posting a basing tutorial on the blog here as theres been quite a lot of questions as to how its been done and what materials Ive used!

The plan is to post some step by step pics and a bit of a blurb about the process. Alas Its going to be a couple of days before I get anything done for the article as Ive got some commission work still to finish and I suspect I am going to be a bit busy with my uni work too!

Till then all the best!

A Commission, A Holiday And Uni! Oh My!

Hi!

Ive got a bit of a commission to paint some 15mm sci-fi miniatures so Im not going to be able to update this blog for a week or so as Ive got till Saturday to finish painting them and then head off to Skye with my friends before returning to university in a week and a bit! The first batch of painted miniatures has gone on here. here
and here!

Its all very action packed but hopefully the Stainless Steel Rat will not suffer too much and I will be painting some more stuff and indeed playing some more games soon!

In other news I seem to have been awarded a Academic Achievement Scholarship from uni which is nice, if somewhat unexpected! It comes with a cheque for £1000 which was a nice surprise! Alas Im not going to spend it on miniatures but on some much needed drawing software upgrades for my illustration work (Ok there may be a bit left over for miniatures!)

All the best!

UPDATE!

Theres some more pics on my other blog showing some more commission work along with some other bits and bobs!

All the best!

Angelina: Interstellar Criminal

Hi!

Just spotted this pic while perusing the Harry Harrison blog:


Angelina

Its quite a nice match for my Angelina model:


15mm Scale Angelina

I may paint up another one with brown hair and pointing the pistol a bit more aggressively!

All the best!

Freibur Frontiersmen!

Hi!

Heres a pic of the latest additions to my Freibur frontier settlers:


Frontiersmen!

Ive now got more than a dozen of the fellows painted and I hope to get a game involving a posse of frontier types trying to capture and lynch our intrepid hero! I was in two minds as to which of my blogs to post them on but as they cover both Stainless Steel Rat games and general sci-fi I think they will get posted on both!

With only two of the frontier miniatures left to paint I am now turning my attention to the Stellar Guard which were undercoated last night...

UPDATE!

Heres a pic of the last two of the frontier posse, including Hanging Judge Jenkins!


Hanging Judge Jenkins & Minion!

The Judge is a Peter Pig wild west character (the pack comes with him mounted, on foot and dead allowing me to use him as part of a mounted or foot posse as well as an objective!) The figure has literally tons of character ranging from his gaunt, old guy face to a pair of rather impressive spectacles! I can see him shuffling around in a crotchety manner giving the townsfolk orders while blasting at anything that comes into his myopic field of vision with his trusty shotgun!

With the addition of a sheriff and some deputies to lead the posse it should make for an interesting game fielding a bunch of backward hicks against the galaxies finest criminal!

Theres some more pics of them over on my other blog Farpoint Salvage!

All the best!

An Update From Inskipp!

Hi!

After my re-think of my blogging I have been off to see my friends in Newcastle for a bit of a break. Now Im back I have been rummaging round my box of unpainted miniatures to see what Ive got that will fit in as some of the assorted characters from the Stainless Steel Rat books. Ive got a load of bits and bobs waiting to get painted for my Farpoint Salvage blog but not much for the blog here.

This must be sorted out soon! I am going to place a small order for some new characters and have got some stellar guard to paint while Im waiting.

The Stellar Guard are mentioned in the first of Slippery Jims adventures and I figure they could make a nice, bright addition to the forces of good. I plan on giving them very bright uniforms, based on the classic pulp sci-fi films and comics as they are described as being a bit flash and showy.

I am using some of the Laserburn miniatures as the basis of them (theres a couple of armoured types with the Flash Gordon type of helmets and cloaks) The patrol is a bit under strength at present as there are only three of them but will soon be re-enforced by a further five troopers. I also have another chap whos perfect for an officer to lead them.

Hopefully I will be able to get some painting done today and post a pic of my progress tomorrow!

All the best!

Police Re-enforcements!

Hi!

Just a quick update from 15mm.co.uk! Theyve got a small feature on their Metropolis Police Patrol:

Heres a quick pic of some I painted a while back:


Police!

http://www.15mm.co.uk/HOF52_Megopolis_Police_Patrol.htm

The packs been available for a while now but theyve got some nice pics of painted samples online now. Theres a small review of them earlier on in my blog too.

All the best!

A Quick Rethink!

Hi!

Ive finally given up on painting 28mm stuff after a truly miserable evening spent getting more and more frustrated after three miniatures paint jobs in a row proved to be abject failures. I suspect its because I have been painting, and more importantly enjoying painting, 15mm scale figures.

Because of this I have decided to re-work my blogs a bit as after reviewing some of the stuff I posted here I have noticed that quite a bit of the recent posting has got away from the spirit of the Stainless Steel Rat books. Essentially the project was originally more about collecting characters, individuals and some minions based on the characters in the book. Lately Ive been getting a bit too enthused with painting military vehicles and mechs which while fun, arent what Slippery Jim is about!

From now on I will only be posting the more pulp miniatures and Stainless Steel Rat battle reports here while all the military stuff and sci-fi wargames and so on will be posted over on my Farpoint Salvage blog:

http://farpointsalvage.blogspot.com/

As already mentioned in an early post here Slippery Jim deserves his own blog and in keeping with that I think a bit of re-organisation is just whats needed!

Worry not its all going to be 15mm scale goodness but just a bit better oganised and I will be updating both blogs at regular intervals!

Next up for this blog is to get some of the named characters from the first Stainless Steel Rat book painted up!

All the best!

Tiny Robot And Giant Spider!

Hi!

Alas I didnt have much chance to get any painting done yesterday but did finish another small robot:


Robot!

Its a Mechwarrior plastic power armour miniature and because it looks a bit Japanese I decided to paint it up in a slightly manga style using purple and white. Alas the picture isnt that great but its quite a nice little model. I am going to have a rummage through my bits box to see if I can find any more!


Giant Spider and Some Meteorite!

Also a Giant Spider and another salvage/objective counter, this time a valuable lump of meteoric rock (in one of the Stainless Steel Rat books Jim uses just such an item to drop all his gear onto an unfriendly planet undetected so it could make for a good objective for Jim to get to before a patrol of troops turns up)

The spider is a plastic Warhammer Quest giant spider and the objective is a small rock I found (I continue to try and work to a budget!)

All the best!

Frontier Militia Re-enforcements!

Hi!

Heres a quick pic of my frontier militia heavy weapons!


Guns and Stuff!

From left to right: Frontier type with shotgun, missile launcher, support laser and heavy sniper rifle. The heavy weapons are all converted (the missile launcher is a cocktail stick, the laser is a plastic piece from Battlefleet Gothic and the sniper rifle is a couple of pieces of wire!) At 15mm scale weapons are really easy to convert which is a definite plus!

I quite like how the weapons turned out and may have to have the heavy rifle armed guy leading a Sponk hunting party at some point. It reminds me of Burts punt gun from one of the Tremors movies:



Ive still got another few frontier types to paint up but they are all armed with an assortment of small arms and Ive got another small robot, a giant spider and another salvage objective marker undercoated and waiting to be painted today!

All the best!

A Fair Sized Update!

Hi!

Ive been working on a few vehicles, frontier types and even the occasional objective counter so without further ado heres the pics:


Mining Mech


Unmanned Scout Drone


More Frontier Types!


Salvage Objective Marker!

The mech is on of the old mechwarrior plastic mining mechs and is equipped with mining hammer, lasers and seismic charges. I used an article from Ramshackle Games to get the rusty look and quite like how its turned out.

The Unmanned Drone is one of the plastic starships from EM4 Miniatures and Ive had it kicking around for ages and decided that my frontier militia could do with a fairly low tech scout vehicle. I still need a controller figure for it but am sure I will find a suitable figure somewhere! It could make for quite an interesting scenario with one side controlling the drone and the other trying to either avoid being spotted or shooting it down with the possibility of a herd of militia turning up to see what happened to their drone!

The frontier types are all Peter Pig cowboys with the occasional piece of wire to convert a normal pistol into a heavy las pistol! Ive got another dozen to paint so will try and get them finished over the next day or so! I tried to go for a combination of traditional and new clothing and equipment as befitting a bunch of hardy frontier dwellers!

The salvage is a mixture of plastic gubbins I had kicking around and some metal stowage from Ground Zero Games that Ive had in my bits box for best part of a decade. Although intended to be 25mm scale I found they worked just as well in 15mm. I plan on placing a small order with GZG over the next couple of days for some more barrels and possibly a few infantry!

I am also hoping to get a game or two played at some point today but wont be posting any pictures as many of the miniatures are unpainted!

All the best!

Yet More Rulebook Ponderings!

Hi!

Well Ive managed to play more games using 15mm scale over the last month than I have over the previous 3 years using other scales so its looking promising!

Ive found some more rulesets I plan on trying including VOR, Void and two editions of Warzone. Although several of these systems have specific settings I dont see why I cant do a bit of conversion work to allow existing stats to be used for characters, vehicles and units in Stainless Steel Rat gaming.

In fact Void and Warzone have some really interesting units and forces which could fit in really nicely with the universe of Slippery Jim (admittedly not the mutated monsters and aliens of the dark legion or koralon but Bauhaus, Imperial, Cybertronic, Capitol, Syntha, Viridia and the Junkers could easily be converted to act as planetary defence forces, league troops and assorted villains!) Meanwhile VOR has a custom force generator and the Growlers are just begging to be converted to 15mm scale (Imagine a giant angry ape/lizard, then imagine a pack of them hurtling toward you!)

Heres a pic of some I painted a while back:


Growlers

Admittedly they are 28mm scale but the pups (the little guys) are just about perfect for 15mm scale while the big guys can easily be seen as a sort of bio-tank! Imagine Jim being sent by the Corps to find out what happened to a newly built colony which has lost contact only to find its been over run by a pack of angry growlers defending their territory. I can imagine Jim calling in some big guns to help deal with the situation which could make for a really interesting game!

Im hoping to get another few games in over the course of the next week or so using an assortment of systems but I think the beauty of 15mm is that I can collect forces for each game, paint them and tailor them to the Stainless Steel Rat universe at a fraction of the cost, or indeed painting time of attempting the same in 28mm scale.

Alas I am back at university next month so my hobby time will be seriously curtailed but I plan on setting aside an evening a week to get some games in or paint up some more stuff!

All the best!

UPDATE!

Hi!

Ive just found my copy of Battleground Trinitry and will have a go at that too. It features quite an interesting setting which could be ported into the Stainless Steel Rat universe with little effort!

Frontier Cargo Vehicle

Hi!

Heres a quick pic of another vehicle, this time a light cargo vehicle for use on some of the more backward planets of the League:


Cargo!

The vehicle is another mechwarrior plastic miniature with all its missile launchers chopped off. Its just about perfect for a light cargo hauler for frontier worlds without a proper road system. Its still equipped with a defensive weapon as you can never be sure that some lawless types arent going to try and try and steal your cargo.

I reckon it will also do for games of star mogul as Ive been looking for a decent salvage vehicle in 15mm scale!

I also have a few more hover tanks to paint up for my League peacekeepers but think my next objective will be to paint up some more infantry and characters (these will include some more frontier types, a squad of elite league troops and a few more of Angelinas armed minions!)

All the best

League Peacekeeper Armoured Car!

Hi!

Heres a pic of the first of my Galactic League peacekeeping vehicles:


League Armoured Car

The vehicle is quite a bit more high tech than previous vehicles Ive painted but it looks the part for a member of the Leagues peacekeepers. Although the Mechwarrior miniatures are 10mm scale the vehicles fit in quite well with 15mm stuff!