From Barks: Tommy Atkins's weird WW1 day (Limbo)(64 points)

I've been a little slow getting off the starting blocks for this Challenge, but I'm happy to be back.

My initial Limbo entry is this Martian scout tripod from Alien Dungeon, which I picked up from the good people at the War Library. I sprayed the whole thing silver and washed it black, and then hit a creative wall. Should I make it rusty and decrepit? What colour should the eye be? Should I make the details more defined? So it languished, until the Challenge inserted new life.

I decided to leave it un-rusty, and go for a red gem effect on the eye. I blended a deep red to black and orange, and then gave it a gloss coat. I'm not entirely happy, but it is done. The photos are with a previously painted PSC 15mm plastic soldier for scale. What else will poor Tommy Atkins encounter today?

I painted the tripod because I had been inspired by The Last War, a Forbidden Psalm/ Weird WW1 ruleset. My 15mm WW1 project had also been in a bit of limbo as well, and Last War has helped it approach completion. The tripod will be my 'Thing from the fog'. To add to my meagre Squirrel score, I've painted a few more gribblies.

First, I had a bag of transparent zombies from a board game. These made great ghosts, and also mud ghouls when liberally coated in mud effect.

Ghosts

Mud ghouls

I 3D printed some other figures at 50% size.

Trench maggots (Goonmaster)

Hounds of Annwn (Knucklebones)

Gas bugs (Goonmaster)

Trench rats (Duncan Shadow)

Some of these were barely painted (mud ghouls and ghosts) and others are small (15mm giant rats). So how about:

• 1 x 25mm vehicle: 20 points
• 24 x assorted 15mm gribblies: 24 points
• Limbo bonus: 20 points
• Squirrel (Last War) +1
• Can opener duel +8

From Millsy:

Great to have you join us again this year Barks! This is a great way to kick of your Challenge and I think you did the right thing sticking with the shiny finish on the walker. I've always thought part of the otherworldliness of tripods is they were made of unknown materials and wouldn't rust. I've scored it as a 28mm vehicle given the scale.

Nice work mate, a healthy 64 points to kick of your Challenge.

Cheers,

Millsy

From Rob Hingley - At midnight, on the twelfth of August, (25 Points)

"a huge mass of luminous gas erupted from Mars and sped towards Earth. Across two hundred million miles of void, invisibly hurtling towards us, came the first of the missiles that were to bring so much calamity to Earth. " was my planned entry for the Recce Bonus round.

Death of the Thunderchild

However on Friday I knew that the bases would not be ready in time for photos. The sun sets far too early for my liking in winter.  Fortunately, I had a Plan B (not from outer space). The above intro is taken from Jeff Wayne's, The War of the Worlds.  The narration brilliantly preformed by Richard Burton.

From the time I first ventured into the realm of Sci-Fi wargaming I desired to own a trio of Martian Tripods.  When the Kickstarter campaign for All Quiet on the Martian Front commenced I hemmed and hawed. As I was underemployed at the time I dawdled until it was too late. Most likely that was a good thing for me.

Last year I was lucky to find a set for sale on eBay and I happily made my purchase from a gentleman in Denmark. The price was very reasonable. One model was missing a body part that I was able to construct from green stuff. Next to duct tape, green stuff surely is one of the great forces that helps bind the universe together.

I'm unlikely to acquire any more materials for which to play All Quiet on the Martian Front, but I wouldn't be surprised if the tripods made it onto my gaming table in a tabletop game of Future War Commander.

3 x 15mm Vehicles = 24 Points

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Always good to see some Victorian SF in the Challenge, Rob, and these are great little figures. Pity about missing the Recce deadline, that's happened to me too many times to count!

24 points plus an extra point for nostalgia value (I owned the album, back in the day - you never know what will prompt extra points, so surprise me!).

Ev