From TeemuL: Wild West and Eastern Front (71 points)

Two different projects gaining additions this week, and both of these are projects I have already played games with and hope to play more in the future! Let's start with Old Wild West or how you want to call it. This fellowship of nine are Great Escape Games multipart plastic gunfighters from Gunfighters and Gunfighters II boxes - the first one contains the gentlemen and the second one the ladies. I shared these boxes with a friend and painted one lady on last challenge, hence the odd number. What a Cowboy is the ruleset I have and have played with, so I went with varied weapons to have all kinds of different options available. I have painted some several Old West minis in the past, now I should have quite a large selection - barring the mounted options.

I used mainly quite dull, earthly colours and drybrushed everything in the end to get a dusted appearance, but tried to add some bright colours here and there - the scarf, undershirt or something. So you see lots of different browns here, lots of Reikland Flesh Shade everywhere, but still not exactly Sergio Leone dust levels. :)

Playing around with some other environment than the dungeon (see below), I decided to use Last Chance Saloon for my Gunfighters, and it is quite ok. I just need something colourful for the background.

I painted some SU-76s for the Soviet Army for Bagration and since I'm in the process of painting the both sides, it felt only fair to give something for Germans as well. I guess the Russians have quantity and Germans have the quality, here are two Hornisses, also known as Nashorns, and officially as Sd.Kfz. 164. These are part metal part resin figures, a bit painful to assemble thus, but they look quite nice when ready. They are tank hunters, rather cheap and manouvarable solution to break Allied tanks. Open topped with a highly effective Pak 43 gun, similar gun was used later in Tiger IIs and Jagdpanthers. And of course as anti tank gun as itself. Hornisse first saw action at the battle of Kursk and remained in the service until end of the war.

I have used Averland Sunset as the yellow colour, then some green DIY store green added with blister foam to create the camouflage and finally some XV-88 (nice connection to the gun "8.8cm Pak 43" this vehicle carries) to finalize to overall look. AA gun was painted black, same as the wheels. Tracks are some greyish colour I had. Reikland Flesh Shade is used here, too, some touch ups and identification info. Glued on MDF base with some green sawdust and tufts to tie them nicely to Eastern Front in summer 1944. My philosophy with late war Germans is, that anything goes. I mean, there are of course rules to follow, but as long as playing Flames of War type of games, which are not strictly historical battles, rather generic encounters of what-ifs, German forces are happy to field what ever they have available. Retreating units from the front line, reinforcements from the reserve, you take what you have to fight for the Motherland. So these two Hornisses should have no trouble finding a home in my army.

The crew was painted separately, because that was easier and I could then claim full points of them. Khaki jacket and caps with dark brown and bright green camouflage pattern, grey pants and black boots. And that famous Reikland Flesh Shade pretty much everywhere.

Nine 28mm gunfighters for 45 points and a "28mm Old West Squirrel!"

Two 15mm vehicles for a total of 16 points and then 4 and 2 halfs of crewmembers for 10 points, 26 in total and a "15mm WW2 German Squirrel." It's amazing how they plan these "Squirrel in a box" products!

Total for this post is 71 points and 2 squirrels, no skulls or stompy robots, but something for Lady Sarah, if that is still a thing. :) And three cardboard boxes are now empty and ready to be recycled.

Fellowship of Nine on the balcony

P.S.While I was taking photos of these, my 10 year old son was bored, because screen time was all used up and he then spent some time chatting with his mother and I overheard this kind of question:

- What is that "Desert song" that is always played in the movies, when they are in the desert?

I'm quite sure he means Youtube videos and such like, since he doesn't watch movies, they are too long and boring. My wife was a bit puzzled about this "Desert song", but our son insisted that it is a real thing and told her to search for it. She thought a while and then played this song from Youtube and that actually was the "Desert song!" So now you know, too! :)

P.P.S. I did write the text about "Sergio Leone dust levels" before this conversation!

There's nothing better to get the vreative juices going then playing the game that needs painted miniatures and while those Eastern front tanks are awesome, for me it's the Wild West figures taht are the star of this post, more so because of the very recognisable story about your son and his questions... it's no different at this end of the line mate. 

 

Great work and see you next week, Cheers Sander 

From PeteB: My last post of this challenge! (45 Points)

This last post for the challenge was one with handicaps for me, due to family matters . Now I'm happy I could finish these figures. I was thinking to bring these in for two of the circles of "Paradise" but I'm not sure if they fit in it. 

3D - Calamity Jane - 28 mm - 5 Points

I found this figure years ago at the meeting in Mol, Belgium, and now I found the time and the occasion to paint her. I've painted with some bright colors because I see her here as the owner of a bar. But we all know that she did so many jobs that this was just for a while. But she looks good in this clothing (I wouldn't dare to disagree with her because she has a rifle and a gun!😁).

The circle I was thinking about for Paradise was "The Inconstant". I let it to the minion to decide if the points can be given.

Jecsan - Spanish Knights - 54 mm (70 mm) - 40 Points

These four knights are very high, 70 mm, and it is the first time I painted the armor in this way. With this way I mean I painted them first black and I did some drybrushes with Games Workshop Chainmail. In the past I've painted armor with Chainmail and then I gave them one or two layers of black wash. 

I hope you like them. And I wouldn't know in what circle of Paradise these knights would fit.

Total points of this post = 45 Points

So this was it for this challenge. It was my first time and I'm happy with the final result. I believe it is tradion after the challenge to post a picture of the whole lot, so i will do that when it is allowed. thank you all for letting me join this madness! 👍😁

Sylvain: Calamity Jane scouted the area not far south from where I live. She looks ready for her next adventures. Your knights looks very detailed and very shiny. It's a great post for your last entry of the Challenge. Well done!

From MikeW - 20mm WW2 Infantry, Orcs, Tau and 28mm Wild West. Squirrel, Skulls (217 Points)

 I open this weeks post with a tilt at the Local History Bonus in the Competition Library! I present a group of 16 x 20mm WW2 British Infantry, namely men of the Royal Sussex Regiment who fought in North Africa, Italy and Greece during the later stages of the war. I have spent most of my life living in Sussex, England and thus my claim to this being local history...

16 x 20mm WW2 British Infantry, North Africa / Southern Europe Theater

Close-up of these guys from the left, the bases were painted with Brown PVA gloop and fine sand added before a few strategic tufts.

The figures have been kicking around my loft, garage and workbench for a number for years. Believe they originally came from eBay but I can't actually remember, as such I can't identify the manufacturer either. So I undercoated these guys in white and then blocked in the main colours with a series of khakis (trousers, jackets and shirts), tans (webbing etc), greens (shirts, helmets and boxes) and the like. Guns were painted in with GW 'Leadbelcher' and wood was GW 'Gore Grunter Fur'.

And from the right. The officer on extreme right has a 'Tommy Gun', as do the NCOs. This reflects the close fighting in and around Monte Casino.

I've brought the rear rank forward here to give them a better view. Second left there is a guy carrying an Ammo case, fourth left is a Bren Gunner, carrying his weapon

Flesh was GW 'Darkoath Flesh' then highlighted with Army Painter Flesh colour. I applied a wash of GW 'Agrax Earthshade' to the whole figure and then gave the dried figures a light dry brushing of light Khaki before adding in red shoulder titles and chevrons in red and green respectively.

A view of the rear rank guys from the right

I based the figures to reflect arid conditions you might expect in North Africa, Italy or Greece, in my minds eye, I was focusing on the Monte Casino battle, where the Royal Sussex served, an action that has always caught my imagination. Maybe I'll now look to find some Germans to act as defenders....

And from the left, the figures are mounted on single 20mm MDF bases. Can yo spot the guy with a broken bayonet, darn thing snapped off as I was varnishing the figures!

Close up of a few of the little guys, daylight here in UK for such photos is terrible at present, we need some sunshine and I need a better camera and photography skills!

The next item is a bit of a filler, a 28mm Wild West figure that I found with the above WW2 infantry. So I painted him up at the same time! I'll pass him and a couple other figures I have to a club colleague - to join his huge Wild West collection.

I believe that this is an old Wargames Foundry figure,
a townsfolk character armed with a pistol 

A fairly straight forward paint job on this guy, white undercoat, black boots, jacket and bowler hat. Brown trousers and flesh & hair as appropriate. I dry brushed the figure with a light khaki to give some highlighting to the brown trousers and black jacket and hat. Then a flesh wash to hands and face to add details.

What can't quite be seen in the pictures is that he is holding a cigar in his left hand

On the Tau front, I have concentrated on a large Tau mech this week, plus a handful of Warriors, a Drone and what I think is a Communications Relay or Defensive Shield Device. Again apologies to my minion but I have classed this as a terrain piece and am just claiming 1 point for it - I'm not sure if there is any other example of this item in previous challenges!

This Tau tech is a big model,
a suitable commander for my growing Tau army.

This Coldstar Battlesuit was sourced from eBay and has
three major weapons systems plus a defensive shield

Another angle on the finished model

Not sure what happened to the colour on this photo!

And a final rear view of the Coldstar Battlesuit

The rest of this week's Tau batch.

On reflection I'm pretty sure the device on the right is a Defensive Force field generator - I am working on a second one for next week. 

The center piece this week is a Commander in a Coldstar Battlesuit, I have assigned this 10 Points but this guys is bigger than the Crisis Suit techs I did the other week at the same points. Again I'll leave this to my minion to adjudicate!

The range of model sizes in my growing Tau army!
From Left: The new Coldstar Battlesuit, next the Crisis Battlesuit,
second right the Stealth Suit and extreme left a regular Tau Warrior (28mm Model).

You will see on the Commander's base there are two terrain items that I painted up , I'm claiming 1 point each for these, hope this is OK.

Two GW alien plant forms,waiting to be
added on to the Commander base !

Now for more Orcs! This week I have completed a regiment of 18 x Orc Archers, including a musician and a standard bearer. I have shared the recipe for these guys in earlier posts in this year's challenge and these are no different.

A completed group of 18 x Arra Boyz!

From a Skulls Duel point of view these have 6 Skulls to add to the ongoing tally!

As usual I have split the batch into smaller 'bite' sizes!

Five more Orcs...

I set batch painting process of most of my models, leaving character or commander figures to be done separately, usually with a little more detail.

A case in point, I spent a little more time on the standard bearer,
with this hand painted Orc Rag....

Other than that these are all pretty standard fare.

Finally a cheeky Late 17th Century dismounted Dragoon. Truth be told  I started painting this guy for my Local History topic, the Royal Sussex being known as the "Old Oranges' due to their facing colours.

Close-up of the Dragoon figure

Trouble was, that I didn't realise that this was a Dragoon figure until I began getting painting process and was preparing to paint his trousers, socks and shoes. Imagine my surprise when I realised he was wearing riding boots! My eyes aren't what they used to be...

In my defence, I wasn't wearing my glasses when I digged out this figure to paint. In the past I have converted spare Dragoon figures into regular infantry men, however, this is not appropriate with half painted figures.... 

Anyway, a white undercoat, base colours applied and use of washes and highlights gave this somewhat pleasing result that will join some other Donnybrook compatible figures!

Next week I'm doing the last of my outstanding Orcs but after that there is only a few more Swamp Goblin Herders and more of their Frogs! Of course there are more Orcs on order from eBay! Also a small batch of Bretonnian Archers and some Lizardmen to come.

POINTS

16 x 20mm WW2 Infantry @ 4 Points ea                   76 Points 64 points

1 x Local History Bonus                                               20 Points

1 x 28mm Wild West Figure                                          5 Points

1 x 28mm Late 17th Century English Dragoon           5 Points

1 x Tau Tech Coldstar Comander @ 10 Points           10 Points

4 x Tau Warriors @ 5 Points ea                                    20 Points          

3 x Tau Terrain Pieces @ 1point                                      3 Points

18 x Orc Archers @ 5 Points ea                                    90 Points

TOTAL                                                                         217 points

+6 Skulls

+1 Squirrel (20mm WW2 British)

 

Sylvain: Very impressive submission this week, equally in terms of quantity, quality and "squirrelness". You WW2 soldiers really look disgruntled, ready to fight another day, and the bases give all the hints we need to figure out where they might be fighting. Your Taus, which you have been showing us in the last few weeks, this time  bring in the big units. Very well done. And your orcs are the classic fantasy units that everyone need in their army. A good week for you and the Monday Crew!

P.S. I made a small correction to your points tally. My calculator tells me that 16 x 4 = 64. 

 

From ScottR December Painting (470 Points)

Well its taken awhile to get thinks started this year.  However, I managed to get my Wild West painting sorted out to run a game from Wargames Foundry called 'Rules with No Name'.  I had painted up some western figures during my year studying in the UK.  I then attended a game at Historicon last year and really enjoyed it.  So for the start of the challenge I figured I would add all the painting work i have been doing for the game.

So here is the Town for the first game.  Most of the buildings here were painted for the game.  The mexican style buildings on the left side have not been finished yet.  

This was the table layout for the second game after the cactus plants and outcrops had been printed and painted.

First off, i managed to pick up a few MDF buildings at Historicon and they sat around until I had the time to get them done.  I spent half a day just building them and working out what they needed to be, Undertaker, Bank etc.  I base coated them in a few different browns and then went on to do the different colour frontages.  After that was some minor detail work like windows, doors and posters.  Here are some photos of the MDF buildings.

The centre building.  The Barber shop even had some NPCs done up to add some character.  This included a barber and a customer in the barber chair.

The barber, customer, chair, wagon, barrels and standing horses are all 3D prints.  The two figures are metals with one from Colonel Bills and the other is from Wargames Foundry I think.

Part of the game is to have factions consisting of three, four or five members.

These are the lawmen, 3D prints.

Comanches', 3D prints.

Comancheros, 3D prints.

Oh and While I dont have a Saloon yet, I do have some of the staff with these Can Can Girls and the Piano and Piano player, also 3D prints.

I needed some specific terrain to give the table the proper look.  The next step was to find some suitable terrain pieces to add to the game table.   I found some individual Cactus's and clusters which printed and painted up nicely.  A wagon, some horses, water troughs and barrels.  I need to find some more items and add some extras later but for now. here is what's been done.

Final casting, getting ready for the undercoat.

  

So here is the game in progress with one of the new buildings and the cactus adding a bit of character to the table.

Ok so now for the second part of the article.  Yes I could have done a completely new article but hey.  

Next up.  A few of us are old 40K players and decided after 10 years to jump back into 10th edition.  For me I started with a Sisters of Battle Force, a few marines on the side and for a second force the Eldar which are now called Aeldari.  I managed to finish off some small units to fit out my 1000 point starting force.

So like all, there is always the preparation.  With Games Workshops new plastic miniatures, I like the build these days.  They are easier to clean and the figures go together really well.  There is a little bit of gap filling to be done but this is fairly easy to do.

Then of course base coating or undercoating and then the real fun begins with the painting.

First up was a unit of Dire Avengers.  This were done with a two layer coat of citadel contrast paint to give it the dark but rich blue that they are best known for.

The next unit off the bench was a unit of wraithguard.  these were fairly easy to do as they have far less attachments and they consist of mainly wraithbone armour and weapon system.

The last unit out and by far one of my favourites was a unit of Howling banshees.  The red hair on these is awesome.  I tried to keep the brightness with a small amount of shade at the base only.

I have included the 3 veteran blade guard marines I did as test figures.  The armour colour was taken from a mix of Imperial Fists and Salamanders.  I have kept the Salamander iconography and written a small amount of lore to support the establishment of a sub chapter of the Salamanders called the Basilisks.

So thats it for this one.  Up next will be some more 40K.  With the Eldaeri done for now, well a few more but not a priority.  No, next up will be some Thousand Sons.  Rubic Marines, Scarab Terminators, Ahriman, chaos spawn and an infernal master.

As to points:

5 Buildings that are 5" x 11" so say 30 points each = 150 points
1 building 4" x 3" 10 points
Scatter cactus terrain 8 pieces 20 points.
2 walkways 6" long by 2"wide each so 12 x 4 maybe 10 points
Carriage vehicle 15 or 20 points
Cactus large pieces x 3 each is about 5-6" round say 15 each for 45 points
24 western 28mm figures 5 each for 120 points
20 40K figures 5 each for 100 points

Total points 470 points roughly, maybe....

_____________________________________________

In the flurry of under-the-wire posts last week I regrettably forgot to upload this one from Scott - my most sincere apologies sir!

You may have been holding back but the wait was well worth it. Wow, what a tremendous amount of wonderful work. Your Western town along with its various protagonists and antagonists are excellent, though I must say my favourites have to be your large cactus bases - those outcrops are magnificent. 

With the outriders of Eldar and Space Marines on offer I very much look forward to seeing your upcoming 40K submissions. 

Well done, Scott!

- Curt