From TomC: Victory At Sea USN [Maritime] (34 points)

 Ahoy fellow challengers, like the Loch Ness monster, I've been out of sight for a while, sorry I haven't been able to comment on all your wonderful work!

 I at least have a contribution to offer, this week is another brace of ships from Warlord Games's Victory At Sea starter set, USS Northampton and an accompanying Fletcher-class destroyer, both hopefully wet and offshore enough for the Maritime section.

 As a bit of context, the Northampton class, of which this was the lead, were all built in the '30s under the auspices of the Washington Naval Treaty, which restricted both their weight and armament (and which was also quietly disregarded by the Japanese navy). Northampton herself had a busy career, first with Enterprise for the Doolittle raid and Midway, with Wasp at Guadalcanal (where she was lucky not to be torpedoed), then Hornet at Santa Cruz, before being torpedoed by Japanese destroyers in her first surface contact at Tassafaronga. 

The photos I've seen of Northampton in 1942 show a simple single-colour scheme but there's a series of images of Northampton in 1941 in this unusual camouflage scheme with a fake bow-wave and countershaded forecastle. Couldn't resist! 

For completeness, there are some liberties I took with the scheme for my own amusement, the orange lifeboats in particular but also the edged smoke stacks (it's a lot of grey otherwise!). Tangentially, the teak deck is a bit of a guess, I couldn't find many images of such things and I have previously had mixed results from eyeballing colours...

The destroyers in Victory at Sea aren't named, but one can never have too many of them! I'm trying to keep them all distinguishable, luckily the Americans had plenty of different schemes to choose from, this being one of the simpler.

 This makes just over half the American vessels from the starter set, which definitely merits a group shot.

In terms of accounting, although the scale is off, the cruisers are c. a 15mm vehicle for 8 points, the destroyers less so at 6 points. Together with the Maritime bonus, that should make 34 points, otherwise known as very slow progress... onwards!

***

Sadly for you Tom, you are stuck with a minion who is, in general, quite ignorant of all things naval when it comes to historical gaming. I will happily charge into all sorts of new periods, but when it comes to ships from WW1 and WW2, I may remember the names and some high-level info about the battles, but am otherwise laughably ignorant...

All this to say while I love these pretty ships, I have nothing to offer as commentary...although so many seem to come to a bad end. Torpedo in her first surface engagement? That sucks...

Fine brushwork here, and great effect of the water vs. the ship. I have seen people struggle with the names of the ships cast right on to the bases, but you seem to make it work nicely! Well done, 34 points for you.

Polite reminder: please use the labels when composing the post! This helps ensure the data/meta data etc. for the Challenge meets the requirements of our Cthulu-like statistical gods...

GregB 

 

From MikeW: More Tau and Orcs plus lots of Odds and Ends. Squirrell, Skulls (227 Points)

This week has been one focused on building and preparing more figures for the painting production line, as such I have a handful of Tau, a group of Savage Orcs and a smattering of other periods and scales to keep the paint flowing whilst the glues, undercoating and basing materials dry!

I have concentrated on getting my Tau Commander completed this week, accompanied by a few Tau Troopers. I'm also being cheeky and painting up a few female Tau Ge'Vesa to enable me to flit from my current Library location (Maritime) to go straight to the SciFi selves and claim the Sci-Fi Bonus, then on wards to other shelves!

I guess I should therefore start with a Tau Gue'Vesa for Lady Sarah's Trolly. This female human fighter is with the Tau as a Ge'Vesa helper. She is depicted as unarmored, carrying a rather large Combi-Weapon and dressed in her underarmour trousers and vest.

Female Gue'Vesa in  underarmour carrying a Tau Combi Weapon

Rear view, showing ceremonial sword and Tau inspired hair braids

From her waist hangs a ceremonial Tau Sword and you may note that her hair is styled with a typical Tau 'pig tail' or braid at the back.

The figure is based upon a Warlord Games Zombie Gang Biker model with Tau accoutrements from GW.

Now on to the main course - for which I will claim the Sci-Fi bonus, the Tau Army Commander. This is a again a large power suit and painted in my army's colours of white and orange with black lowlights and sky blue lenses and digital displays etc.

Front view, with three weapons systems and a force shield deployed on the suit's hard points.

.

The figure was again from eBay and so painted as built, the base incldes a skull for my Skulls tally and some basic battlefield scatter that came with the model when purchased.

Side view, showing shoulder monted combi-weapon and a plasma gun 

The other side, showing sholder mounted shield and a Fusion Blaster weapon.

And the rear view, the 'figure is flying using the suit's onboard propulsion units,
a clear view of the base finish can be seen in this shot. 

 To accompany the commander I have completed a couple of Tau Troopers.

Two Tau troopers with hand grenades.

Another view...

More Tau under construction!

This batch of Warhammer Fantasy / Old World Savage Orcs fortuatously landed on my doormat last week, saving me the problem of trying to source and build additional Ocs for my ongoing Orc Army project. The batch cosists of 10 x Savage Orc plus a War Boss, between them a measley +2 skullls when oainted.

The whole gang, painted and based!

These guys arrived partially undercoated and requiring some basic first aide to fix figures to bases, limbs to bodies and hands & weapons to arms. This was achieved pretty quickly and then the batch was undercoated in black before getting a heavy dry-brushing of grey then white to highlight.

Close-up of theree Orc warriors, notice the focus on mouths, bone items and bright lizardskin clothing

I used GW 'Goregrunta Fur' to paint all the wooden items (spears, shields & handles) followed by GW Leadbelcher to do all the metal work. Not surprisingly I used GW 'Snakebite Leather' to do all leather work and GW 'Skeleton Horde' to all the bone items, before then applying Army Painter 'Orc Flesh' - logically enough - to the flesh areas!

Another three guys, again a lot of bones and teeth!

I generally try to work from light to dark when painting these guys but it doesn't always work out that way - I often miss items and have to go back out of sequence, or I make errors and have to fix painting messes after the event! Anyway after all the base colours are in place I then set about highlighting all the figures with lighter versions of the base colours as well as adding in the all important details to catch everyone's eyes and save them looking at the rest of the model to closely!

These two Orcs, had whip hands added and will be treated as Discipline Masters to keep the unit in line during battle.

As ever with Orcs the eye catching detail is usually their mouths and impressive teeth plus any gold bling. As these are savage Orcs, they don't appear to have much in the way of gold bling, so instead I have concentrated on their bone items, treating these items as if they were skeletons and trying to do a good job on these!

Two more Orcs, with Lizardman loincloths

As noted some of the figures had no weapon hands, I managed to replace all but two of these from the spares box, with Savage Ork items. However, two of the figures had to have other replacement hands - I landed on a pair of hands holding whips (from the Grot Herder kits), my rational being these guys would be Discipline Masters within these Savage Orc units.

The War Boss, on a tiles base, just to help him
look bigger and stand out on the tabletop

The War Boss has a huge Axe and a lot of teeth! He is on a slightly different base, that give him some extra height. I did think of replacing this but n the end decided that the flagstone base helps to single him out as a leader, so the base it came on stayed in place....

Next on my list of completed models are some10mm Scots, from the  Pendraken Flodden Range. I'm not convinced that the Scots had many hand gunners at Flodden but these models were included in an army pack I purchased from a Games Show many years ago and its high time I started painting them,especially as I'm scrambling to ready other figures.

The completed unit of Hand Gunners, based to use Warmaster rules

I undercoated these guys in white then applied GW Snakebite Leather all over, before again picking out faces and hands in white. Skin was painted using GW Darkoath Flesh,which in turn had a highlight of Army Painter Barbarian Flesh.

The unit in column of march,                                  I've long fancied doing a Flodden game, now might be the time!

Trousers were picked out in blue, brown or grey at random, with most in blue. Jackets were left as brown leather but sleeves were mostly painted with GW Slaughter Red, with some left as grey. Muskets were painted using GW Goregrunter Fur, metallics were added with GX Air Leadbelcher and socks were painted grey, before a watered down wash of brown ink to tie everything together.

Another view!

Based using my patent brown gloop and fine sand before adding a mix of self adhesive tufts to finish them off. 

And next for Flodden?! Trying to prompt myself to do a unit of Scots Archers next!
If I show the picture I feel more inclined to get the job done... maybe.

                                         

Next we have a base of Warlord Games 15mm Epic ECW Scots Covenanter dismounted dragoons. Just five of these guys to the base, all in Hodden Grey with blue bonnets!

5 x Scots Dragoons in Epic 15mm scale

Another view, the don't look that great close-up but do the job en-masse!

Another quickie, with a base of  20 x Warlord Epic ACW Rebel 15mm figures, these are late war troops and painted up as an Alabama regiment, likely operating in the western theatre of the war. 

Head on, view of the figures.

Side view, with the Alabama (nofficial) state flag and regimental banner.

The other side view - unfortunately one rifle snapped off on the
back rank and has dissapeard into the carpet!

A quick return to an unfinished batch fom last week - namely three more 20mm British WW2 infantry, these guys got seperated from their comrades on the painting prodction line and ths I didn't have time to finish them off ready for last week's post.

Left to right - Bren Gunner, Greade Thrower and Rifleman

These guys were painted in exactly the same manner as last week's batch - just a week behind ther comrades.

These guys were dressed in a variety of kit - battledress, shirt & sleeves etc, to reflect the theatre of operations

Again all the figures were based for the Italy / Greece theatre of war.

Next on the Historical side are some Warlord Games (I'm pretty sure) 28mm US Infantry, they were painted using the Warlord Games painting guide found here.

The completed US Infantry men, Normandy '44

So undercoated in white before Khaki jackets and gaiters, US Green for trousers and Dark Gree (actually Russian Green) for helmets - all Valijho paints. Guns were GW Goregrunta Fur and Leadbealcher and the skin was done in the same manner as noted for other figures here - GW Darkoath Flesh followed by highlights in Army Painter Barbarian Flesh.

Close-up on a Captain, Lieutenannt, riflemen and a BAR gunner.

I used a watered down GW Agrax Earthshade to blend all the colours together before highlighting the khaki items with the base colour agiain.

and an NCO and three more riflemen

Bases were the usual fine sand and electrostatic grass combination on MDF discs.

Probably more familiar to the British and Astralian/Kiwi readers I have just completed two characters from the 1960s TV show Captain Scarlett. Namely these guys are Captain Blue and Captain Scarlet, from the TV series Catptain Scarlett.

Captain Blue, aka Adam Svenson a former astonaught
and Captain Scarlett's right hand man

Captain Ochre, aka Richard Fraser
a British former policeman

These Captains were special operatives of an organisation known as Spectrum who were engaged in a deadly conflict with an alien race called the Mysterons.

The two painted models

Captain Blue

Captain Ochre

I believe that these are old board game pieces that fit really well into 28mm scale, although both basically the same figure they have been painted in different colours to accompany a Captain Scarlett figure I did back in AHPC XIII.

Finally a quickie - a Classic Empire Archer, undercoated in white, I decided on a blue and yellow livery.

The classic Empire Archer

And the rear view

POINTS

Tau Commander                                           10 Points

2 x Tau Troopers @ 5 Points ea                          10 Points

1 x Female Tau Gue'Vesa @ 5 Points ea                    5 Points     

11 x Savage Orcs @ 5 Points ea                          55 Points

30 x 10mm Scots Hand Gunners @ 1 Point ea               30 Points   

5 x 15mm Scots ECW Dismounted Dragoons @ 2 Points ea    10 Points 

20 x 15mm Rebel ACW INfantry @ 2 Points ea              40 Points  

3 x 20mm WW2 British Infantry @ 4 Points ea             12 Points

2 x 28mm Captain Scarlett Figures @ 5 Points ea         10 Points

1 x Classic Warhammer Empire Archer                      5 Points

Lady Sarah's Cart                                       20 Points

Sci-Fi Bonus                                            20 Points

TOTAL                                                  227 Points

+ 3 Skulls

+ 3 Squirrels (10mm Flodden Scots, 28mm US WW2 Infantry, 15mm Epic ACW Infantry)

 

Sylvain: A very good harvest of points for you this weeks. You are fluent in many genres of games and it's a pleasure to see all your various projects coming together. I really like how you round up your weekly production with little side projects, as a way to expand your painting skills. Your Captain Scarlet related figurines brought me back to my teenage years when I was watching the show in French. A very productive week!

 

From Tom C: US Airborne [High Adventure] (44 points)

Hello again, and a belated happy new year, if I painted faster then it would be more socially acceptable! Many of you have been a lot quicker with your output and it's great to see, thanks everyone.

What should be a simple entry in theory today, when I thought of what fit the bill for daring and risk-taking, who better than the American Airborne? Although, there is a fantastic quotation about a potential recruit listening to the recruiting officer talk of jumping out of aircraft with understandable scepticism until he heard there was hazard pay, so adventure might perhaps be put to one side... either way, no further introduction needed from me for these, I'm sure lots of us have seen Band of Brothers!

So, here we have about half the minimum size of a unit of US paratroopers which can be fielded in Flames of War, all 15mm Battlefront plastics from the Hit the Beach starter. I paired them with the plastic urban bases which Battlefront also do, thinking of Normandy towns and villages and when I have the full platoon together I'll integrate them properly. I've not painted any of the Flames of War teams before and I'm sure I'm not the first to scratch my head over the best way to do this but I thought I'd rather paint them separately, blu-tac-ing them onto Vallejo bottles. Now I'm here though I think I need to go back for extra groundwork, perhaps something I should have foreseen!

I also need to go back and do the base rims... I only did the individual paras!

The sculpts themselves have highs and lows, I think the actual machinery of producing them has, amongst other things, left the machine gunners looking like Quasimodo in French Foreign Legion service (a film I would watch). When it all works though, there are some great face expressions and details in there. I am quizzical however as to why only one of the mortar team is covering his ears, the other two are waiting quite patiently and so might find themselves joined by another metal sculpt I have to hand instead.

Quasimodo ringing a different tune now.

For the actual painting, I opted for the Normandy uniform as I felt it offered a little more flexibility. Battlefront's own Colours of War guide reckoned Olive Drab for this, surely a typo as they also reckoned this for the helmets. I used a mix of Green Grey and Khaki as recommended by a different Battlefront guide which seemed more appropriate, with Green Grey for the webbing. With hindsight, the Market Garden M1943 uniform would probably make for a better paint scheme, offering a bit more contrast with the accoutrements. It took a reasonable amount of time with the Nuln Oil lining the boundaries to try and improve the definition, hindsight would probably also have me doing this right after the zenithal prime: I liked the brighter colours and ease of coverage but the shading was a lot and I honestly feel like more work would be worth the investment but tempus fugit! 

The mortar team had their brickwork rendered,
the bazooka boys have to make do with my freehand.

In terms of scoring, we're in 15mm, with 11 upright/kneeling infantry (22 points) and 2 prone legionnaires (2 points) and the shoehorn hopefully strikes to lever high-altitude parajumping into enemy territory into High Adventure for another 20 points. 

The sights are now set on Historical Drama...

...but when will the snail get there?

Minion Phil: Hey Tom, nice tidy work on these US paras for some high adventure! These Battlefront plastics came out great, our method seems very sound and has given a nice tidy result, even if it was a bit of a faff. I don't think I saw any quasimodo-like figures in there. 

I suppose an issue with those urban bases is how to hid the small base the model is mounted on, I wonder if a little dark wash would tone down that lighter grey to match the finish on the multi base? 

44 points for your tally!