From ScottM: Assorted Early-WW2 Goodness (100 pts)

My last few figures to get done this year are some World War 2 early-war infantry and tanks. All these 28mm figs are from Warlord Games. First up is a small group of plastic Soviet infantry.

Next up is a T-38 tankette. This resin and metal fig is sold by Warlord but is actually from Trenchworx. This little guy is why I like the early-war stuff. Lots of neat armoured cars, tanks and no nigh-indestructible Tigers and IS-2s. 

Next up is a plastic T-34/76. This little kit came with the option to make it a variety of models and went together really nicely.

And here's the pair of them. Bit of a size difference.

And finally is a German Panzerjager I tank destroyer.

So that should be:

8 - 28mm foot figs = 40 points

3 - 28mm vehicles = 60 points

Total = 100 points

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Great work Scott. I love seeing all this early war stuff, especially all the whacky light vehicles like that Panzerjager I and the T-38. You can understand that when the T34 was encountered in June '41 it came as quite a rude shock to the Germans - thus the tank design war really kicked off. Well done!

- Curt

From Guy B: [Hall of Heroes] We could be heroes, just for one day... [90 points]

These lovely miniatures almost were the miniatures for the Oubliette. I bought some lovely BEF miniatures (from BEF Miniatures) over a decade ago, but never got round to painting them. They are now supplemented by Warlord Games and 1st Corps models. 

I loved the BEF Miniatures, but they were sold to Warlord Games, so are no more. The Warlord models are similar but not the same sculpts (I'm not sure why). The Bren gunner above is a Warlord one.

The models are painted in Vallejo colours but using thinners to achieve a washed effect (similar to contrast). I'm still experimenting with the technique, I'm not 100% happy with it, but it shows promise.

Oddly, the Warlord ones come with separate heads and are a tad shorter than the BEF ones. I am glad to get paint on these finally and have enjoyed painting them.

Next, I need to add some vehicles and support weapons, probably an 18/25 pounder. A Matilda tank would be cool, probably the Mark 1.

There is also the 1st Corps range, which I do like. The sculpting is perhaps a tad simpler than other ranges, but they mix in fine. Painted up, you can't tell the difference. The Boyes team is a 1st Corps model.

So, that's fourteen heroic BEF soldier ready to defend Dunkirk, Calais or a Seelowe invasion. I make that 70 points plus the 20 point bonus.

From ScottM: Soviets at O'Grady's Gulch (315 Points)

My last stop on Challenge Island is at O'Grady's Gulch. A friend of mine is looking to get into Chain of Command. Unfortunately he doesn't have any capacity to actually paint figures so I volunteered my services to paint up his figs. So here is the bulk of his infantry force, a box of Russians in summer uniform. These 28mm figs are from Plastic Soldier Company.

Here's the entire lot of 57 figs.

The first group is a half dozen LMG teams.

I'm not a fan of the lying down poses but I can see the utility of them.

Next up are the command figs.

There's three senior officers (I've painted one of them up as a Commissar), three junior officers and three adjutants/medics etc.

Next are all the rifle figs.

And finally are all the SMG armed figs.

And that completes my last stop on the island.

So that should be: 57 x 28mm foot figs = 285 +30 (location bonus) = 315 points

From DaveD - a fine hump day points bombe Huzah!

From MikeW - Onto the Snowlord's Peak with 17th Century Saxon Infantry (155 Points)

It was with some trepidation that I awaited the challenge to be thrown down at my door by the Snowlord after I dared to say I was ready to climb his snowy peak! After deliberation he got back to me to say I had to pick one of the following...


1) Another unit for your spiffing Siege of Vienna collection;
2) Something for your VBCW project you dabbled with a year or so back;
3) or, some more Bretons to be poor cousins to the Normans.

What a choice I had to make, as I said to the Snowlord - 'Its like having to pick my favourite child' - but secretly I knew it would be another unit for the Siege of Vienna!

The unit awaiting preparation and undercoating,
they came so close to getting a Primrose Yellow finish!

I have been wanting to complete my Saxon Infantry Brigade by adding a third unit....

White Gloss Skirting Boards, Window & Door Frame
and a Primrose Yellow Emulsion on the walls...

... However, before I could start this challenge item - I had to overcome a home challenge that we'd been putting off for too long, which delayed me even getting to base camp for this AHPC final summit attempt. I had to do another painting - arguably the wrong kind of painting - that's right I had to paint the spare room, this took most of last weekend!

Back to painting figures...

The whole unit

The vision was to represent a hastily recruited Saxon unit, who had been issued some coats and equipment but maybe not quite enough of each to go around for everyone. Hence you'll spot that some of the little fellas are still wearing civilian coats and most wear their own hats. What ties the unit together is the all red coats on most the figures - no contrasting cuffs and linings to emphasis the hasty issue of these coats, plus red hat bands and knee ties for their breeches.

Close-up of unit's left flank, pikemen stands are aligned behind command elements

Close-up of unit's right flank

The unit is 24 x 28mm figures, with one prone, wounded musketeer - it is based upon 4, 40mm x 40mm bases for the musketeers plus 4, 40mm x 20mm bases for the pikemen and command figures.

Two Pikemen Stands

Figures are by Front Rank and I will not bore you all with how I painted these - as it is the same as with all others that I have submitted to the challenge. Flags are from Warfare Miniatures, bases have electrostatic  grass added and lashings of grass and wild flower tufts..

The Command Stand split into two - to help with storage of units
when not in use - you can lie them down better!

Only exception to the above is the prone figure - a lone Ebor figure, that was left over from another unit in the collection, I picked this one as it is moulded somewhat flatter than the Front Rank figures and thus would look more convincing lying down.

Musketeer Stand with casualty

The 4 x Musketeer Stands

I cut off his musket and tricorne, replacing his hat with a floppy hat from the Warlord Games ECW plastics box and added a new musket from the Warlord Games WSS Infantry box, lying across the body. I reworked his hands to look like he was clutching a rag or cloth to his wound, the results seem OK to me.

Completed Unit

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Wow, Mike, very impressive. This is not only lovely work, but done so quickly as well! So much to admire here, from the brave banner to the great groundwork. I like the thought and care you put into the unit's colour selection, reinforcing that it has been scraped together from recent recruits. I'm also really impressed with the casualty figure mod, with the hat and weapon swap - very effective.

As to points, I'm going to award you a few more for the banners and bespoke casualty figure which will put you at a very tidy 155 for this unit. I also notice that this entry will put you over-the-top for your personal points challenge as well. Well done and congratulations!

For your prize, I'm happy to award you Ken's wonderful Zweihander Landsknecht, which will give you a nice start to a First Siege of Vienna project. ;)

Thanks again Mike for taking up the SLP challenge!

-Curt

From ScottM: Burch's Bluff: Rausenburg Army Squad (80 Points)

Continuing down the Path of the New Shiny, we arrive at Burch's Bluff and it's 30K theme. I don't actually play 40K (or 30K for that matter), but at one point I was considering it. At the time I had picked up a bunch of infantry and heavy weapon teams from Victoria Miniatures. Perfectly suited for use as Imperial Army in 30K. Here is a 10-woman Rausenburg Siege Corps squad of infantry.

I went with a Prussian type paint scheme and I think they turned out quite nicely. The resin figs themselves are quite nice and have all sorts of bits and bobs that can be attached. If you're looking for some squads that aren't bog-standard GW Imperial Guard, I'd recommend giving Victoria Miniatures a look. That completes Burch's Bluff as we continue our trek across the island.

So that should be: 10 28mm foot figs = 50 +30 (location bonus) = 80 points.

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A very nice entry here Scott, and very fitting for guard in 30k.  I really like the miniatures and the colour choices here.  The overall look and colour choices make me think almost more Great War French rather than Prussian, but the blue would need to be a little more pale for that, but they do remind me a lot of my WW1 french.

Great work here Scott, keep it coming!

- ByronM

From MikeW - 32 x 28mm Late 17th Century Figures (160 Points)

This submission is in two parts, the first and biggest part is the representation of the Spanish Tercio 'Los Blancos', officially known as the 'Tercio Provincial de Segovia'. The second part of the post is a follow on from my earlier post where I did 8 x French Dragoons of  'La Bretesche Regiment', see original post <here>.

The 'Los Blancos'

I originally got these figures from North Star Miniatures sometime in the late summer last year, I have already painted-up one 24 figure Tercio of little guys but wanted to complete a second Tercio, to join my other Spanish tabletop forces.

Spanish Tercio in waiting, figures based, awaiting undercoat

For, anyone that is interested, these are relatively new additions to the North Star 1672 range, they replace similar figures that North Star were stocking up to about 18 months ago, that were based upon the original Copplestone Casting figures that are the basis of this range. As such some are a little smaller than the old range, which makes up the majority of my Spanish Army.

Pike stands formed up around the central with
Command stand, OCD at work here!

As you may know Spanish Tercios of the period tended to adopt distinctive colours to distinguish them selves form other Tercio units. This was the beginnings of the move towards regimental uniforms - in the Spanish world each unit picked a coat and facing colour. It wasn't until the early 1700s that coat colours became standardised and the distinguishing feature was the facings colour!


So for the challenge I decided to do a unit based primarily in white with red facings. I had seen pictures on the internet of a couple of Tercios that had these colours - the 'Los Blancos' and an enigmatic 'Tercio Alemana' or German Tercio, for which I could only find an illustration of an officer. I opted for the former with the option of changing unit flags to allow for the later if scenarios required.

Another view of the Pike Block

Well I have always struggled with White uniforms - especially getting the shading right, and this unit was no different!

As usual I undercoated in white, before doing a top coat in white, then adding in deep red facing colours. I then built up the other required colours - browns for musket and darker brown for shoes and scabbard. Tan leather was added for the straps, gloves and boot laces and then flesh, steel etc.

4 x Musketeer Stands

I then went to fix all the mistakes and in doing so ran into the challenge with white - most colours show through it - and with reds the colour seems to bleed into the white paint and stain it pink. I had to leave the figures to dry for a couple days, when I returned to them the bleeding issue was solved!

In the meantime I started work on the French dragoons - see below...

When ready I used Army Painter dip to add shading, I deliberately left the tin unshaken so that the level of pigment in the dip was as low as possible, nevertheless for a number of the figures the white uniforms ended up being over-stained and looking rather grey and dull.

The command stands, featuring the speculative flags I made

So after applying matt varnish, I over painted the white coats with white paint again - using a semi-dry-brush method, really just to emphasise the highlights and lightening up the coat colours.

Completed Tecio lined up just as I like them!

I based the figures as per other units, on 40 x 40mm bases, Pikemen and command stands on 40 x 20mm half-stands to enable my OCD tastes in figure placement within the units - i.e. A central block of 8 Pikemen, surrounding the command stand , flanked by two musketeer stands on each side....

Final touch was to make two speculative flags for the unit, if finding info about uniforms is hard for the period it's even harder finding info on Tercio flags - plenty of pictures but no one seems to know which units they belonged to!

So I kept it simple a couple of Burgundy crosses on white backgrounds, they came out a little small for my liking so may have to redo them a bit bigger!

The 'La Bretesche' Dragons

These four guys were painted to add to the 8 other Dragoons that I recently painted - enabling me to bring the unit up to two dismounted squadrons of 6 figures each. I still need to do the mounted versions at some point!

Completed - Additional French Dragoons before integrated with existing figures

These also enabled me to continue being productive whilst pulling out what little hair I have left waiting for the Spanish figures to thoroughly dry!

And the figures integrated into the existing unit.

I have also re-worked the bases of the original 8 figures to integrate the new figures into the stands.

POINTS
28 x 28mm Spanish Infantry @ 5 Points ea = 140 Points
4 x 28mm French Infantry @ 5 Points ea = 20 Points
Total Points 140 + 20 = 160 Points

From DaveD - Lovely work Mike. The extra work on the white has come out well indeed. i am going to make it 165 for the flags too