From MartinC - Iranian Air Power and Iraqi Command and Control (140 Points)

Firstly I would like to thank Curt, this year's challenge was my first foray into the blogosphere and my first real contact with like minded individuals for many years. It has been the most fun I've had with my hobby. I have painted a ridiculous number of figures covering 2500 years of history, I have received countless pieces of invaluable advice, I have learnt a whole new painting style which I really like, I have new favourite manufacturers (Aventine and Hasslefree), I have spent a bleeding fortune on figs and painted nearly all of them, I'm still pretty bad at photography, I have discovered the joys of broom bristle spears, grass tufts, thinned down paint and super sculpty, and I appear to have accidently invented battles on flying carpets. Thank you all, it's been the least boring winter since I was 7.

So this week I have built and painted the opposition to last week's Black Ravens, The Sultan of Baghdad's Flying Carpet Corps. These are the Sultan of Basra's Eagles. The Sultan of Basra was the good guy in the original Thief of Baghdad (the one who got the magical flying horse - and that may follow). These have carpets with only archers or carpets with only halberders. There is also a magician to provide dust devils and fireballs.

Eagles

Sultan and Body Guard

Magician

 Archer Carpet

 Halberder Carpet

The figures are a mix of Black Tree Design (they arrived in 48 hours as opposed to the 7 weeks for the previous order) and Gripping Beast Plastic Arab Warriors (also arrived in 48 hours). The carpets are again Super Sculpty.

Still working on rules, elevation is a issue as height is an advantage and therefore all units will end up high up which defeats the objective.

I also built the transport for the Sultan of Baghdad. I wanted to do something different for this figure and thought about other forms of transport, balloons, eagles, dragons, dirigibles etc. but instead I decided a man of his power would need to flaunt it. So I present the Floating Court of the Sultan of Baghdad. The Sultan has kidnapped the Sultan of Basra's beautiful daughter Fatima and has her chained to his chief torturer Mustapha. He is protected by his 2 nubile Nubian bodyguards and has brought along a slave girl for "entertainment".



Fatima

The cushions, vases and recliner are made from Super Sculpty and the tables are cut off roofing nails, the dog tooth pattern on the carpet hasn't shown up too well on the photos.

The Sultan is a BTD Dr Who villain (can't remember who) but I liked the figure and the mask and robe look suitably sinister. The rest of the retinue are Hasslefree. The carpet is 10cm x 10 cm and a little unstable so I pre-drilled a hole and nailed it to a wooden baton, when in doubt use a hammer. I tried to make the clouds interesting but had issues with dying / painting the cotton wool so will do that again.

This is about 135 points, unless Curt feels generous about the points for the floating court, and puts me though my 2500 goal, which is nice. That means I've exceeded my initial target by 150%, also nice. Next stop daylight and gardening, although maybe one more unit and if I can find a table big enough a shot of all I've painted.

From Curt:

I've really loved this little Harryhausen foray of yours Martin - it's so wonderfully creative. I think you need to add a Cyclops and perhaps some skeleton warriors. Great fun.

Congratulations on hitting your 2500 point target. An impressive feat for your first foray.

Finally, I'm delighted you've found the Challenge so enjoyable. As you say it's a great way to share time, be productive and have a few laughs with people of a 'singular character'.  I can't think of a better way to spend the winter! :)