Finished: 3mm Ultramar Auxilia tanks

Hi folks,

Another diversion from what I should be painting, but something I had wanted to do for a while. These are 3mm Vanguard Miniatures tanks, proxying as the Ultramar version of the Imperial Army for my Calth collection.

First, some fluff:

 “Ultramar, the realm of the Ultramarines Legion and part of the greater Imperium, consists of a sub sector of approximately five hundred habitable planets. Ruled over by Roboute Guilliman, the Primarch of the Ultramarines Legion, this realm is regarded as one of the most prosperous, efficient and advanced regions of space in the whole Imperium.

While the realm of Ultramar is exempt from the normal tithe of military units expected from worlds of the Imperium, the realm itself maintains many regiments ready for deployment outside of Ultramar. 

The CCIXth Ultramar Auxilia Regiment is one such formation.

The Regiment is a combined arms force consisting of detachments from many Ultramar planets, each adding mastery of their own speciality to the whole. Comprising many tens of thousands of highly trained Auxilia the CCIXth included sub units of infantry, armour, artillery and various support arms. It should be noted that the term 'regiment' is not associated with a particular size of formation, and is more the generic name for a particular body of troops.  

As part of Ultramar’s muster of force ordered by Warmaster Horus (supposedly for operation against an anticipated incursion of Orks in the Veridian system), the CCIXth was deployed to Calth alongside numerous other Imperial Army, Titan Legion, Skitarii and Knight units - as well as the Ultramarine Legion and the Word Bearers Legion. With barrack space being at a premium, the Regiment found itself billeted amongst several small settlements on the Northern Continent. In honour of the hospitality they had received, and prior to donning campaign appropriate camouflage schemes, the CCIXth’s vehicles were painted in colours representing the heraldry of the local principality.
On the day of the Betrayal, when the traitors of the Word Bearer Legion and their allies struck, this particular armoured detachment of the CCIXth found themselves without communications with either Regimental or Planetary Command. Initially assuming a planetary attack by an unknown foe, the armoured element took up positions to defend their billets. In time they linked up with units from the Ultramarines Legion, Adeptus Mechanicus Skitarii, Legio Praesagius Titans, other Auxilia Regiment and Knight detachments in order to take part in the fighting on the Plains of Dera against the betrayers – by then the previous well-maintained farmland had been turned to wasteland due to the host of powerful weapons unleashed.

Surviving elements of the CCIXth eventually made their way into the underground shelters following the Word Bearers poisoning of the Calth Systems sun and evacuation of the planets surface. There they continued to battle against surviving Word Bearer forces, protecting the remaining sheltering civilians. After years of fighting in the Underground War, the few survivors went on to form a new CCIXth Regiment.” 

With some Vanguard Stalkers for scale

Vanguard 'Centurion' MBTs. Proxying here for early 'Gantz' pattern Leman Russ tanks. 

A few of Vanguards 'Heavy' tanks to reinforce the company. 

Mixed in with the recent Ultramarine proxy detachment - also Vanguard 3mm models. 

The very small, and the very large...

We fight for Macragge!

This little lot help me complete the Challenge Island final location, for which Dave has made me a lovely burning Sherman, complete with flickering LED!

Finished: 3mm Terminator Detachment

Hi folks,

Another quick post - looking back I can see I've fallen a bit behind on my posts recently, focusing more on getting stuff done for the AHPC entries.

This recent entry consisted of some lovely Vanguard 3mm Novan Elite Siege Breakers and Striker Heavy Assault Transports. These have been painted up as 40k Ultramarines for my Calth project.

Three stands of Terminators along with Spartan transports. I can switch out the Spartans for other options as well, hopefully.

A nice little addition to the collection which also ticked off a challenge island location for the competition.

Finished!: Vanguard Miniatures 3mm Sci Fi

Hi folks,

Slight delay since my last blog post due to working on a new project and having a small break up in (very) rainy Scotland.

Before I headed up north, I managed to 'complete' (some small finishing touches to do) some more 3mm sci fi units that have been sitting on my desk since the start of the year.

These are for 'Dominion - The Wars of Tusculum Nova', from Vanguard Miniatures. I've continued with painting mine in a '30k' theme, with the Ultramarines being my legion of choice.

This batch of painting saw me finish a 'Mechanised Infantry Century' with three stands of infantry transported by three stands of 'Trojans'. These take a little while due to my painting of shoulder pads...

I've also painted a could of bases of 'Gladiator' robots:

And three 'Hammer' support tanks - the gun barrels on these needs a bit more definitions to make them stand out:

As well as some more 'Scorpion' tanks, seen at the back, and a command base:

Highlighting on these is quite heavy close up, due to the size of the models and the need to make them pop on the table.

Some of my collection so far:

I've still a lot to paint for this project, and thankfully it's relatively quick to do. My main issue is getting a new type of vehicle painted to use as a template for the others. I've one more infantry unit of three bases to do, as well as 'siege' troopers which I'll be using as Terminators and close combat troops both on foot and with jump packs. I've a lot of armour to paint as well and recently got some of the new 'Novan Regular' tanks, which I will be painting up as IG/PDF.

Slow progress, but progress none the less!

Finished!: 3mm Vanguard Stalkers and Super Heavy Tanks

Hi folks,

A slight change in direction for me this last week. I was (and am) supposed to be painting my German 88's but following the big game the other week I had a bit of a break from 15's!

Instead I focused on getting some of the 3mm Vanguard Miniatures 'Defeat in Detail' models that have been sitting on my desk for the whole painting challenge. Specifically two 'Dreadnought' class Stalkers and one 'Jaeger' class hunter/ambush Stalker. These will be proxying for different 'marks' of Reaver Titans for my Legio Presagios force. The Dreadnought's are pretty close to a 'Reaver Type' look, while the Jaeger is close but different - an older type from the Dark Age of Technology who's origins have been lost.

3mm Vanguard Jaeger Stalker

3mm Vanguard Dreadnought Stalker

3mm Vanguard Dreadnought Stalker

These models were entered into the AHPC8 themed round last weekend, and are now available to be voted for here! All votes in my favour would be very much appreciated (the voting panel is on the right of that link, but if your on a mobile or tablet you'll have to go to the bottom of the page and click 'view web version' to make it appear)!

I also finished off 3 super heavy tanks for my Novan Elites. Specifically 'Challenger' Super Heavy Tanks from Vanguards 3mm range. These will be proxying as Ultramarine Legion Fellblades. Shown below with an infantry base for scale! I think I said on the AHPC blog post that the Novan Elites are 7 meters tall, but they are not - more like 7 feet tall!

3mm Vanguard Challenger Super Heavy Tanks and Stalkers, with infantry for showing the true scale nature of the 3mm range!

A 'standard' sized D10 for scale!

The Stalkers with some infantry on the base along with a Gladiator armoured support walker. 

As above, but with a Trojan APC added. 

The force I've collected as a whole is growing, with the majority of the models from Vanguard but with a few 3D printed from elsewhere.

I've still got a lot to paint, including more Stalkers, infantry and tanks from Vanguard. The plan is to have a decent sized Ultramarine proxy force for the Battle of Calth. At some point, I'll have the Word Bearers to do (in their... white and blue... scheme!)

Finished: 3mm Dreadnought Stalker and AHPC 8 Prep

Hi folks,

Apologies for the lack of content of late, I've been focusing on prepping for the upcoming Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge as well as trying to finish off my first Dreadnought Stalker for my 3mm Sci Fi army.

First up, the prep. I'd already done some prep on my 15mm German arty, but needed to finish off the rest. I've not got quite a bundle of this stuff to do - which will be my Gunuary project as well. I'm hoping that the guns themselves will be quick to paint, but am not looking forward to all those gun crew!

I've also been prepping some more 3mm Sci Fi stuff as well as my 6mm Team Yankee British force. We're hoping to get some games of this (myself, Dave and Martin) in the new year. Dave has a load of Russkie stuff done, so I want to get some of my Brits painted up.

Linked to the 6mm stuff, I won a competition for a £20 voucher from Butlers Printed Models this week. Just a random draw for completing some wargames magazine quiz, but that has gone towards getting some of the BPM 1/285th printed British models.

The model I've finished is my first Dreadnought Stalker for my 3mm army. In the DiD universe these machines are operated by the Cybershadows, who are a breakaway faction of the Novans.

I've painted mine up to be a Reaver Titan proxy for my Ultramarine proxy infantry. I've not gotten a name for it yet, but the model is roughly painted up in Legio Praesagius colours.

I'm pretty pleased with how it's turned out. I used decals I had from the 40k Primus Marine decal packs I had bought online. I'm waiting for some other bits from Vanguard to see if I can add some banners and stuff, as well as some other decals which might help add some Ad Mech elements. This is one of the early prototype Dreadnought Stalkers, so has a fixed head. I understand the newer ones have variations in leg pose and head options. The models also come with a huge range of weapon loadouts. I've kept mine in keeping with the Legio - lots of precision weapons and anti titan loadouts.

Looking forward to getting some of Vanguards scout stalkers, and hopefully one of their newer style stalkers - a variation on the Dreadnought Stalker seen here.

The Other Partizan 2017 - Game report and loot!

Hi Folks,

A very interesting and enjoyable weekend was had with Martin and Dave down at Newark for 'The Other Partizan'. My first time at this show and it was really nice to see various retailers and tables which don't travel as far north as us.

Firstly, a slight diversion! We started the morning with Martin and I taking a quick walk over the road from our hotel to the Polish Wargave site. While the cemetery is mainly filled with Polish war dead, there were other Commonwealth graves as well. A very nice location and something I didn't know was there. There was also a memorial to the aircrew lost trying to supply Warsaw during the uprising there. The graveyard was well kept and the Polish grave stones look very smart. Mainly the headstones appeared to be for aircrew, but in one section I looked at there were Poles, Australians, Canadians and New Zealanders:

Onto the show after a quick breakfast...

Game wise, Dave had put on a massive Sudan game (similar to the game of his which is covered briefly in this months interactive Wargames Illustrated!). Myself and Martin were the Imperial commander. I'm not doing a full on battle report, having done a short video instead:

Martin has a battle report here, while Dave has his split in two parts, here and here.

Dave's collection is impressive in it's detail and scale. We had a lot of people stop by the table to ask questions and talk about his collection. There were a lot of great games on display (and to be honest, I didn't see them all, being caught up in playing and shopping!).

Shopping wise, I picked up a selection of stuff:

Magnetic sheeting, the new hardback Battlegroup rules, the first book in the 'Armoured Hussars' series (about the Polish 1st Armoured Division), some spray paints, cork chips, flowers, ultra mat varnish, a resin Normandy Barn, Railway station and MDF barn... 15mm wise, there was very little to chose from.

However, I did spot these:

Which are a small scale set of mini's from Vanguard. They have been painted up to look like 40k models, but the vehicles themselves are not 40k models. The APC's are based on British 432's, for example. The larger tanks have different hull shapes to the 40k ones, etc. The infantry were teeny but the detail level on these was superb. A definite future project for me I think!

Also of interest, I spotted this at the Old Glory stand:

Again, not something that fits with what I'm doing currently... but maybe a project idea for later. Really cool mini.

And also these:

Which also caught my eye. Possible 1/3000 Naval games in the future? Anyone know any good rules?

So that's it really, I'll stick some pictures I took from the game and the show below!