From AndrewB- Big ol final points pile! 1020pts

Well, this year I told myself I was going to focus on painting, not necessarily posting every week, but then March 20 was rapidly upon me!  Here we go, for a great big points bomb to finish off!  

First, a big bundle of Soviets I painted for a big bolt action game.  These are a mix of 28s, some printed, some metals mixed from a number of manufacturers! 

There's something like 22 infantry, 21 gun crews and guns, and a vehicle(tachankas are wild, that was a fun build!)

Next, with more WWII, I did a bunch of printed and Warlord Games Italian vehicles, along with a bunch of Old Glory infantry!  More fuel for the Bolt Action fires!

Italians have some whacky vehicles, which really makes for fun and interesting painting, if not particularly effective gaming!

I'm not sure I'm the biggest fan of the army building for Bolt Action V3, but I figured I should give a gun platoon a shot, with a couple light howitzers and a light AT gun(gonna need more crew!).

Looks like 23 infantry, three guns, and eight vehicles!

Now we'll stick to the Med, but perhaps a couple thousand years earlier, with some generic armed Greek/Roman civilians, as well as some character figures and a mythical opponent, a giant Cyclops!

I believe the characters are mostly Footsore, with the Cyclops being Reaper, and the civilians a mix of unknown manufacturers, for a total of 22 figs!

We'll finish off with a big old lot of Lord of the Rings figures, split between Uruk Hai and men of Gondor, with a mix of random generic men mixed in, to use as stand-ins for wild men, or some random brigands or such.  

These were quite delightful to paint while listening to the book series in audiobook form!  The figures are a mix of GW and 3d printed, and I think the random men might be old Warlord of some variety, perhaps Gauls or Germans!  The stand-ins for the clansmen of Lamedon are likely my favorites, with the leader being particularly 'cheeky', and kept facing forward for modesty's sake!

Counting these was a bit of a struggle, but it would appear there are 30 Uruks, 36 men of Gondor, and 11 of the random men, for a total of 77!

Sliding in about a half hour before midnight, we've got 168 Infantry figures, and 9 vehicles, for a total of 840 + 180 = 1020pts!

This year's challenge has been quite a delight, but I certainly need to figure out a better method for submissions, to avoid this sort of rush, and bring you fine readers better detailed posts!

Shout out to the figures who didn't get photos taken, fifty-something 28mm Bronze Age chaps, and 35 1:600 ancient galleys, among a good number of smaller scale figures.   

Thanks to all the entrants for their inspiring posts, and the organizers for the hard work!  I'll see you all next year!

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A parting points airstrike, eh Andrew? Wow, this is a great finale to your Challenge this year - fantastic stuff. Of all these I think the Cyclops is my favourite, but that may be because he's the largest of the batch, but also because Ray just had a Jason and the Argonaughts entry and I was thinking, 'That boy needs a cyclops for this lot.' Any here you are with the perfect solution, and so well painted to-boot! 

Wonderful work Andrew, and this will shoot you well past your points target for this year. Well done!

Until next Challenge then!

- Curt

From MartinN: Fallschirmjäger and Firefly (65 pts.)

Another challenge is drawing to an untimely close and once again I come up short a few points. While I had a good start I rapidly lost steam and only were able to pick up speed again those last few days. I'm pretty certain that a lot of you know the feeling only too well. But the ride was a lot of fun and once again I enjoyed myself immensely. I wasn't as active on here as I'd have liked, but I enjoyed watching the daily stream of gorgeously painted miniatures.

First off for my last entry this year is a 20mm 3D printed Sherman Firefly by Arvernes Miniatures. Having painted two regular 75mm Shermans for my Canadians previously I felt the urgent need to add a Firefly for that little bit of extra punch. The stowage is mostly from AB Figures as is the tank commander.

This is then followed by a Squad of 20mm Fallschirmjäger, also from AB Figures. They're a mix of regular Heer figures, mainly with Zeltbahn, and Fallschirmjäger with head swaps as I was aiming for a very late war feel. So these should be more suitable for those battles following the German defeat in Normandy. A time when the Fallschirmjäger were a mere shadow of their former strength. I don't like the hype that surrounds some of the supposedly 'elite' German units and having this hodge podge of grizzled veterans and raw recruits is just my thing.

For points we have one 20mm tank clocking in at 15 points, a half figure tank commander for 2 points and 12 Fallschirmjäger of which two are prone figures for another 44 points. All this should give me 71 65 points.

A huge thank you for goes out to my good friends Sarah, Curt and Greg as well as all the other minions. 

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Nick I am confident I speak for all Challenge participants when I tell you it has been an absolute treat to have you along for the ride once again. Your brushwork sets the bar, as ever, and combined with top-shelf photography, your entries are a real treat for all of us. I think many Challengers will relates to the ebbs and flows of interest and momentum when it comes to painting all of these miniatures - and many of us will come up short in the face of our targets (certainly I will!). 

But what a treat is has been! And you close out with some absolutely stunning brushwork. Nothing makes me bonkers like camouflage patterns of late WW2 German units, and you have made it look stupendous here, and the blend of the zeltbahns and sky-blue uniforms, of the veterans the rookies, it is all just spot-on and makes we want to get back to painting some WW2 myself!

But my favourite here is the Firefly! When it comes to WW2 tanks, I'm always struck by how dreary so many of the western allied designs were. Even the ones with cool names were disappointing to see. But NOT the Firefly! One of the best silhouettes of the war (and only improved once the IDF started cracking out I-Shermans later on) and you've done it absolute justice here. Even the weird colour pattern at the bottom of the barrel - excellent!

As for your points, the magical spreadsheet tells me this is all worth 65 points - so I'm going to listen to the spreadsheet. Great Challenge Nick, it has been a treat to "minion" your work!

GregB

From SteveA: Bolt Action US Army/Marines (60 points)

This here is the beginnings of my Bolt Action WWII Pacific Theater US Army/Marines.  Its my first attempt at painting WWII soldiers, so hopefully I did justice to the uniforms using a variety of Vallejo, AK, Army Painter and Citadel Paints.  

To inform my target color palette googled up images for "WWII US Pacific Theater uniforms" and  watched HBO's "The Pacific", and then soon released the sprues of Warlord Bolt Action US forces I had used to build these minis appeared to assume the climate of the European Theater and if I am creating a Pacific Theater force, then my future mini builds for this army ought to undergo some uniform conversions to better reflect the heat the soldiers in the Pacific had to endure.   So for the sake of my own head canon story for this force, these troops I painted here are newly arrived reinforcements from the mainland and have yet to start tearing off sleeves to better adapt to a tropical battleground.

For this first effort, I aimed to represent the US Marines as the Bazooka Team wearing camo helmets, and the US Army as the typical olive green with or without the mesh netting.

I have long wanted to add WWII allied forces to my collection of painted minis, so I very much enjoyed painting these and then placing them into my display cabinet to await future games of Bolt Action.

12 x 5pts 28mm Foot Figure = 60 points

Squirrel = My other submissions this year are 28mm 40k Space Marines and 10mm American Civil War Union forces.

Steve, these are some great looking Pacific Theatre US infantry and Marines! The Pacific is the one theatre I've never gotten into with my own WW2 gaming and painting but you've set a great example with these American troops, they look very "cool" (jungle temps notwithstanding) indeed.

Sixty big points for your tally!

Dallas 

From MartinN: 20mm StuG III and Opel Blitz (62 points)

This submission has been simmering for a while, but I had a hard time getting started on the weathering.  I quite like the look of the vehicles once finished, but getting there is always a little tedious in my opinion. I'd rather paint some foot sloggers instead. Anyway, here's the latest reinforcements for my German motor pool.

First of a 3D printed StuG III Ausf. F/8 from Night Sky Miniatures with an AB Figures commander. While I was a bit of an early adopter when it comes to resin printing, I never got comfortable with the process. It's smelly, dirty and needs a lot of effort to get right. In short I can stand it even less than weathering the final product. And probably that's the only reason I'm not drowning in unpainted prints and I'd call that a clear bonus. I turn on the bloody machine once or twice a year and that has to suffice.

Anyway, there are certainly upsides to the technology. For one there's lots of niche stuff out there that'd be hard to get commercially and I can scale to any scale I like. So while the file was scaled to fit 28mm originally it was quickly converted to go with my 20mm collection. Especially helpful as I feel that there's less 1/72 stuff available than it used to and if it's available it's just as expensive as 28mm.

Next is a trio of 20mm PSC German trucks. The vehicles are a little too basic for my liking, but went together easily. For a little more variety I printed a box body to go with one of them. Can't remember the sculptor though, I'm afraid.

So, 4 vehicles in 20mm as well as a half figure should give me another 62 points towards my total.

Still quite some way to go to 300pts, so we'll see how much I can squeeze in over those last few weeks.

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Always such incredible work Nick! I am out of superlatives on the painting, beyond just noting that it meets your usual incredible standard of brushwork and weathering. I love the foliage on the vehicles, speaking very much to the whole "let's hope they think it's just some bushes moving along" amid skies full of Allied fighter-bombers. 

I also love the off-colour look of the barrel on the StuG's 75mm gun. I often don't think of how often barrels on guns like that need to be replaced, and the presence of a barrel which doesn't match the rest of the paint speaks to the under-pressure nature of the German forces late in the war. 

62 brilliant points for you!

GregB

From MartinN: Detroit Tank Arsenal (50 points)

I've to apologize for my lack of interaction here, but I've been busy with job interviews and what not those last few weeks. Also I haven't really felt like hobbying at all. But at long last I've finished something worth posting about. 

First off a 20mm PSC Lend-Lease M3 Stuart for my Soviets. The PSC kit is a sturdy enough kit, able to withstand the rigors of the wargames table well enough I imagine. Personally I'm not a huge fan of those kits as they're by necessity very basic with overblown details. Looks nice enough when painted though.

On the other end of the scale we have a 1/72 M4A4 Sherman from Dragon Models. The kit was fun to build and came with etched brass (which I didn't use) and even 3D printed (some of which I used) upgrade parts. Only let down were the vinyl tracks. First of all I managed to put on one the wrong way round and then they're just a smidgen too short, meaning that when you put them on you might snap the delicate plastic connecting the rear idler wheel to the hull... Of course I also managed to break off some of the more delicate parts during painting, but that's a whole other story full of fat fingers and too little patience. The tank commander is from the ever excellent AB Figures range.

Occupying the middle ground in model complexity is a venerable 1972 vintage ESCI M4A1 Sherman nowadays sold by Italeri. I got this one from a friend, so I can't say anything about how it went together, but looking at it I'd be highly surprised if it was any challenge at all, but as with the PSC Stuart the detail is a little basic. I really love the rounded shape of the cast M4A1 hull and hope to add a few more to my collection at some point. 

So that's about it for the moment. I do have some more half finished stuff waiting in the wings I hope to have finished before the clock runs out in about a month time. 

3x 20mm vehicles plus 1x 20mm figure (yes, it's a full figure, just lacking the boots) should net me 49 points.

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We have missed your work Nick! I'm sure we can all relate when the elusive "hobby mojo" is just not there, owing to real life events. That said, I'm glad you have found a way to power through it, and I know I speak for all Challengers when I say it is always a real treat to enjoy your work!

And, as ever, it looks just...amazing! Incredible stuff. The green is just-right. The shading is incredible, and all of the extra bits and gear give the armour that "live, lived in" look the radiates from the photos of these vehicles on campaign in that era. They look like they have been through weather and rain and dust etc. It's just excellent. 

Plastic kits are a challenge for me too - and I suspect, a bit of a mixed bag for all of us. No doubt many can relate to details or bits being lost in the hobby process. Some of us even straight up drop them - multiple times...anyway, rest assured they have come through the process to look incredible. That is probably why I am prone to preferring a "PSC-style" kit (assuming they are ever in stock, but that is another issue) to others. 

Vinyl tracks? Screw that! You get an extra bonus point for fiddling with that nonsense. 50 points for you!

GregB

From AdamC: More Japanese ships (10 Points)

 

Here we have 5 more Japanese's ships 4 Asashio class Destroyers and the Cruiser Mogami in her late war configuration with a flight deck of all things. 

The Mogami was badly damaged off Midway in 1942 and was rebuilt with a flight deck to carry sea planes to boost the recon assets available to the fleet.

Here you can see a photo of the sea planes , They are a handy assets but you might want your 4 8 inch guns back.  Hybrid Cruiser carriers were an idea that got tossed around a lot in the 1920, very few were made Japan did it here to save time an money rebuilding the aft turrets or so I believe. 

This one was printed for me by accident I wanted some early war versions of these but it could be useful later. 

The Asashio Class were a design of the late 30s Japan's first design of greater than 2000 tons Displacement.  They were fast, 35 knots, with 6 five in guns and a pair of 4 torpedo launchers (with reloads). They were also the First Japanese destroyer equipped with Sonar 

The Asashio were considered a very useful design and became the basis for both the Kagero and Yugumo class which were basically larger versions of the same design. 

We have 5 ships of 1/2400 Scale for another 10 points

 

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Sylvain: Great little squadron! Your Japanese fleet seems to be coming along quite nicely. Génial!