From StuartL - Into the Void Once More - Lady Sarah's Limousine - 75 Points

Hello again,

To continue my exploration of the AHPC Challenge Studios, GmbH., it is time for another trip in Lady Sarah's Limousine. Once again, I will be offering a miniature from the Void range as payment, and this time heading to the Historical Drama area.

This is another marine from the VASA faction of the game. Void was ahead of its time in offering mixed units of men and women, but still a bit behind the times in terms of design. The men are generally in shooting or action poses, but the women are in more of a 'posing' pose.

As I used the same design of figure for my last trip, I thought I should show you both side by side to prove that I didn't just repaint the skin and call it a day. This brings me to the last of my painted Void figures, so I am going to have to start looking around for more female minis if I hope to continue enjoying the luxury of the limo service.

And to help fill up this post, I also painted up a bunch of Arabian troops for Saga.

These ten figures are a mix of Gripping Beast plastic and Black Tree Designs metal minis. The two ranges scale pretty well together and the BTD figures will help break up the monotony of the 5 poses in the GB figures in my force. 

For historical figures like this, I tend to go for three colours for a force and repeat them for the main items of clothing, in this case their robes and their turbans. This helps to give a slightly uniform look to the force on the table, while still making them look like a bunch of individuals. I haven't done much with the shields, so I may revisit them when I have had time to look up some suitable designs.

So for scoring:

11x 28mm infantry = 55 Points

Lady Sarah's Limousine = 20 Points

Total = 75 Points.

My side duels:

Squirrels +1 = 18

Anglo-Saxons, Vikings, Dwarves, Fire Giants, WW2 Polish, Daemons, Viridians, Vasa, Junkers, Turnips, Necrons, Tau, Genestealers, WW2 Japanese, Teutonics, Lizardmen, Gnolls, Arabs

Skullz +0 = 188

Turnips +0 = 85 Points

Brilliant use of purple here. Love the Arab chaps as well.

From StuartL - Nearly At The Finishing Line - Lady Sarah's Star Yacht and Arrakis (95 Points)

The clock is ticking and there are still minis to paint, however I do have time to post up a few minis while I wait for some paint to dry.

Continuing with finishing off minis that were being considered for the planets, I need to take a quick trip to Arrakis. As I need to keep racking up the frequent flyer miles for the Star Yacht, I have another female mini to pay for my ride.

This clerical looking figure comes from Reaper Bones and has been painted up in simple colours. To add some detail I painted a sun symbol on her back. In Dungeons and Dragons, one of the good deities is Pelor, God of the Sun. His clerics travel the world helping people and curing the sick.

So with payment made, it's time for my second visit to Arrakis. Following the theme of Desert this time, I have painted up some Arabian type warriors for Saga, Age of Crusades.

These minis are from Gripping Beast and were pretty easy to paint. Unlike their Viking and Saxon boxes, the Arab set is pretty plain as far as options go. That said, you can still put together a few different types of warriors, having choices for spears, javelins, swords and bows.

There are 14 of these in total. I had a lot more primed up, but these ones were the only models with the basing materials applied, so the rest will have to wait until a future challenge.

So, for 15x 28mm models I should score 75 points, plus an additional 20 for a trip on the Yacht.

One more post to go, fingers crossed I can get everything done before the deadline.

Nice lady and Arabs, Stuart!

Tamsin

From EdwardG - A mix of 15mm, and a trip to Arda (67 points)

Hello all, 

I hope everyone is remaining well. Sadly in the past month I have not had the time I had hoped to paint and to be commenting! Fingers crossed that improves in February...but I am not hopeful. 

Due to my ad-hoc painting time, I have only been able to output an ad-hoc group of painted miniatures. The first group I concentrated on were some additional elements for my Arab army. It is not many figures, but they were required to make up the numbers to allow me to field my old DBM army as a FOG-AG force. 

The first element is a Generals base. It is made up using left over figures I had in the lead pile. I believe the figures were originally from Essex, but I am exactly sure. I have had them for a very long time! I like to think that I will use this General in the centre of the FOG-AG army, he is happily ignoring a messenger from the left wing who is in need of something...perhaps two and four pence...

 

In addition to the General, I added a base of spears and a baggage element. The spearmen are the remainder of a long ago Legio Heroica order. In DBM I had only ever needed 7 bases of these chaps but FOG-AG has round numbers of most things, so the 8th base is now painted! In addition while scouring out the lead pile for these figures, I came across the last odds and ends of the unpainted Arabs. These were two camels and a lonely spearman. Tbh, I was not sure what to do with them, I normally dislike painting camels as I know I cannot get the colouring right. But, I thought what the heck, I can always use an additional baggage element. Perhaps these are the drummers directing the army, or acting as a relay station for orders from one end to the other. Along with their close protection to give them time to get away should an enemy light horse appear flying in from a flank. And the final photo shows all of the baggage together. I grabbed the excuse of the new element to re-base the my previous baggage elements onto a matching bases.

For a change, as I was going a little sand blind, I decided to paint up a couple more elements for my Serbian army. These are to reinforce the Bosnian Hillmen who act as Rough/Bad Going clearance troops. They are very useful, reasonably cheap, and can be taken in enough numbers to make them a threat the opponent should take note of. Having two more elements is always helpful! The figures are Essex again, and are another set of lead pile lurkers who have been shirking their battlefield responsibilities for far too long! I began thinking I would paint them with contrast paints, the first chap in blue was the test piece. But I was not very happy with the outcome. I think these figures are not not detailed enough to get the best out of the contrast paint style. I switched to my 'normal' style using acrylics and doing two layers. I find three layers is just overkill at this scale.

As a final mini for this rambling, meandering post, is my offering for the planet Arda. Having seen the minis painted by Curt the Great, over the summer. The wife and I decided to give moonstone a try. We managed to persuade a couple of friends to join us on the trip, and we ordered some minis. Now sadly our order, but funnily not our friends, managed to be caught in the Brexit Britain-Europe Postage Bermuda Triangle. For some reason the package never arrived. I hope those minis have managed to find a happy home. In the end we did manage to get some minis on the second attempt, but the whole project was very delayed. Since then, we have managed to build the minis, and even get some base coat colours on some. But I have finally managed to paint the first one to completion! I present Boris, The Bunny Summoner (minus bunnies so far)! He is certainly very fantastic, and possibly even a little Tolkeinesque (although more towards CS Lewis).

Finally on to scoring. This is certainly a random bunch and I have calculated the following. Dear Minion, I hope I have done my mathematics correctly!

• Arab Generals - 15mm Mounted x 3 = 12pts
• Arab Spearmen - 15mm Foot x (4+1) = 10pts
• Arab Camels - 15mm Mounted x 2 = 8pts
• Bosnian Hillmen - 15mm Foot x 6 = 12pts
• Boris! - 28mm Foot x 1 = 5pts
• Visit to Arda = 20pts

Total =  67pts

All the best and hope to see you all sooner next time around!

Best,
Ed

***

Hello Ed, thanks for this varied and wandering submission. I know many Challengers will relate to your situation in terms of finding time for hobbies - it is an issue where we all wish we had more time. I certainly do. If only my clients would pay me to paint figures! Anyway, credit to you for getting some brush momentum going, and putting a dent into your lead pile and some points on the board!

Miles' spreadsheet tells me your scoring adds up, so 67 points for you! Unfortunately, Miles' spreadsheet cannot help me with all of the acronyms involved with DBA/DBM/FOG etc...but I'll need to have SOMETHING to search online, right?

GregB

From MartinC - Some Random Stuff Wot I Painted (245pts)

 Hope you are all well and cracking on with painting and the such like. I had a fun weekend fighting with the Dunsterforce, Lionel Dunsterville was killed by a direct hit from a light howitzer but my Hussars made a valiant charge and captured the Turkish commander, a machine gun and a howitzer. I also went shopping at a bring and buy and bought loads of things for the challenge, including all things Were.

I have also done some painting, with no general theme to it, just some stuff I fancied painting.

WW1 Arab Irregular Cavalry - can't remember the manufacturer but think it was Great War or Artizan or somebody else

These will double up on either side as Arabs or Turkish Irregulars

Next up 15 Russian Civil War Whites. These are Old Glory Boxer Rebellion Russians but uniform is the same. Plan to do lots of Back of Beyond gaming this year

Old Glory are terrible looking unpainted but paint up very well

In a similar vein, 4 Russian sailors

Finally 12 more Sci Fi troops, these are from the Stargrave Mercenaries box with a few hand cast bodies and legs by me - there are so many spare weapons and arms and heads that I can cast up 50 bodies and build them up in 1 box. Great value. Today's task is to find out which ones I cast.

Scores on the doors

31 x 28mm infantry = 155pts

9 x 28mm cav = 90

Total = 245pts

I think, for a "consideration", that I can keep it quiet from Nick at North Star that you have been recasting bodies and legs of his Stargrave figures!

What an eclectic collection of figures. Lovely stuff!

Tamsin

(From RossM) Various scales and periods including Ancients, Crusaders and Seven Years War 15mm & 28mm (127 points)

 The second post for the early hours and this is a mixed bag of periods and scales.

Bavarian Seven Years War Artillery: 18mm Eureka Miniatures

24 Points

Arab Naffatun Skirmishers: 15mm Museum Miniatures

12 points

Early Imperial Romans: 15mm PSC Auxiliaries 

There are 17 of the new Ultra Cast figures here and 1 from Corvus Belli, don't ask which is the one though. Shield transfers from VVV.

36 points

Crusaders: 28mm Gripping Beast

These are the other eleven figures to make a unit in Lion Rampant and support the two handed sword wielding knight from the Pit and the Pendulum

Kept the colours here simple and bold. The shield transfers are from Little Big Men and have been overpainted to match the tabards. 

Have always liked the idea of painted helms and went with that. Not sure if its historical or artistic licence however, they look good in a mixed group. 

Here is the full unit with the Pendulum in full swing

55 points

Sub total for this post is 127 taking the running total to 309 points (52% completed to date)

Stay safe and thanks for looking