AdamC: Armored Pikemen (71 Points)

 I picked these guys up on Ebay some time in the early 2000s I have no idea who made them.  I had painted up a few and sold them off.  These guys lingered because they just weren't that fun to paint and I didn't have a need for them.

 Now with Pikeman's lament coming out I now have the opportunity to use them.  The Flag is a Spanish one from the 17th century it's associated with the battle of Ricroi

  I did the armor in plate armor gray-black the helmets and chain are in sliver I did the ther clothing items in various browns grays and blacks.  Note one fellow has a halbard.

 Another guy has this odd polearm? perhaps a mace or maybe its a some jangly musical instrument

The armor also has some trim in bronze that shows up better on the backs than the fronts.  I have 14 figures here and they are 25mm figures for 70 Points with a possible 71 with the flag.


MilesR: It's not a possible +1 for the flag, it's a definite.  Although I see you're back to you multiple posts thing per Monday.  With mini's this nice I shall choose to overlook your transgression.  Nicely done.

AdamC - Regiment Paine (31 Points)

 Another Imagi-Nation unit for D'Argent's enemy Draconia.  This is the personal guard regiment of Bishop Paine Prince-Bishop of Haingchausen one of the more militant clerical states of the Draconian Empire.

 Mike said he wanted his regiment in back coats with gray cuff, facing and turnbacks.  He also wanted maroon for the small cloths.  I thought the overall look was a bit clerical so I decided his troops would be from the territory of a bishop-prince.

The flags are taken from a collection of Riecharmee flags I had in my folder or images.  They seemed to fit.  There at 15 figures in for another 30 Points toward my goal and the Side challenge. There might be another few more points for the flags or not as the minion judged appropriate.

MilesR: Another imaginations regiment - I really like these.

Snowy and Two Step (10pts)

As life has gotten VETY busy at present I have all but withdrawn from the challenge. But I do tend to each year do a "Micky Taking post" It was going to be of between 9-15 blogers and I have asked their permissions (mostly) but time overtook me. So maybe next year as the figures are all purchased and even primed. But this year it will not be the bloggers as "Nuns" or "Saloon girls!". Sorry Dave Doc you will have to wear the coral coloured dress with Millsy in your own time!

So instead I present Snowy and Two step, who should be known to you all.

Snowy comes from the north I did hear Chi town mentioned but I think it is north of there maybe he's a cannuk? He's polite enough! Anyway among the 5 families he is known as "Snowy".  That is not the name on his jacket thou' or what polite folk call him. Then it's "yes sir Mr Campbell! or "No sir Mr Campbell." It is after all best to be polite to Snowy. After all he is a polite gent to you. and will always treat you with respect. Snowy was called the "Smiling Assassin"  at one time due to his warm and engaging personality. I an not saying those days have passed, No Ma'am Mrs Two step I am not saying that at all. Beg your pardon Mr's Two Step I am not saying that at all.

Snowy is called Snowy because of the frozen North and NOTHING at all to do with anything you might want to snort. In fact do not even talk about sniffing anything when in his presence not if you enjoy breathing in and breathing out. That has a habbit of stopping if he don't like you, or so I am told. I am not saying they die or anything but they do leave town never to be seen again.

As for Two Step yes she is married to Snowy, or is that Snowy is married to her. Anyway I am sure you are thinking 2 step is a dance. And right enough it is. But  that is not why she's called Two step. That name comes from the number of steps you take after you Meet her in a business way. You may think North Korea had a good poison after all that one took only 30 minutes before fatality. All I am willing to say is that "Two Steps" has better, both quicker and cleaner!

Now in real life they don't look like this. If you knew what assassins looked like they would not be very effective for Phuksake! So no thing said here is in anyway ...... what's that noise?  I... don't.... feel......

The figures are Foundry street Violence 28mm. Just in case anyone wants to replicate thes two VERY FICTIONAL characters But remember they don't look like this in real life! I have labelled this as Sarahs choice please feel free to take that labe out if it suits you (Sarah/Curt/Miles) best! I am not messin with Two step!

MilesR:  Very nicely done!  Perhaps next year we'll see the challengers in miniature.  I'm not sure where your would have sourced a George Clooney miniature to represent me,,,

From Nick J - Spawn, Rats and Packmaster (79 points)

Once Upon a Little & Large...

Made it back safely from the U.S. and as March dawns I'm now way behind on my painting challenge!

So without further ado I present to you the Chaos Spawn Avengers... The What?... Yes well I seem to have accidentally painted homages to various Marvel Avengers whilst creating this squad.

Honest...

Picture Proof? Well why didn't you ask?

Avengers Assemble!

Iron Spawn

Wolverine

Hawkeye

Quicksilver

Hulk

Spider-Spawn

See. You do see right? Not just me? I now want to paint more...

Oh and Miles - as I've painted a Hulk does that mean I get extra points for painting a Banner? I'll get my coat...

Whilst the Avengers are busy Assembling I also managed to paint the little element for this week. Here is a Skaven Packmaster

Normally he sits on a 25mm base but I'm planning to base all Leaders in the Pentagram Army on 40mm bases. He looks lost on a 40mm base so I found something for him to stand on!

I'm quite pleased with how he has come out considering he only had a couple of base colours on this morning!

You're probably thinking that the title of Packmaster suggests he has a pack to be master of. Right? Well for those not keen on rodents with long tails I would recommend looking away now.

Still here? Good.

Meet the Pack!

32 Giant Rats skittering along

There are 5 varieties of Rat in this pack including Black, Brown and White. Well I didn't want to get bored painting up 32 rats with the same colour scheme!

And here is the Packmaster surveying his brood.

In the land of the Rat the Packmaster is King!

And finally a picture showing the Little & Large of this week's submission

For scoring purposes I will of course leave that to the wonderful Miles, however, some size aid just in case!

Everything is 28mm scale.
Rats = 6mm = 0.5 pts * 32 = 16
Spawn = 40mm = 7 pts * 6 = 42
Packmaster = 28mm = 5
For a lovely total of 63 points.

So that should take me just over half-way to my target with only 2 weeks remaining. Well. That's going to be a challenge isn't it?

MilesR: really cool and spooky minis - I must say the rats gave me a bit of a shiver - not a fan of the real things but really like your rendition.  I'll run with your point total but will score the rats as 10mm figs as there's a good bit of details on the tiny things.  That'll net you 79 points in total.

From DaveD - 10mm Kettledrummer conversions (4 points)

I forgot I had completed these a few weeks ago and had not photographed them. So here is a very small entry. These are two Napoleonic kettle drummers for my friend Gerrys mad collection (The Situation Room blog). He asked to could i do some conversion work involving swapping the heads from the cast version which has mamaluke type headress ,  to make some specific ones for a Dragoon and Grenadier a Cheval one. So armed with the magnifying light , minidrill and a small soldering iron i was able to swap out the heads and paint them up. They are now ready to add to his 40,000+ figure collection...everytime I think I am mad ... I know that I know someone who has it worse!

 They are 10mm Pendraken Miniatures

work has started on the new man cave - off to do more clearance work!

MilesR - A very nice submission - any chance for some pictures of the new man cave as it comes together?  The posts about your Sudanese game was inspiring.

The Thing that Haunts You in Your Bits Box, MartinC (390 Points)

We all have a bits box, mainly fully of Perry plastic heads. When you open it does one thing stare back at you and say "Use Me. Make something cool out of me." Mine contains 6 Perry metal ACW gun barrels - when you buy a cannon you get 3 barrels.
After years of pleading I finally used them. Warbases sell a 6lb Napoleon cannon with limber for £4 with a metal barrel, I have one. A quick email conversation with them, they are lovely people to deal with, and I could buy the carriage and limber for £3.50. So I bought 6 sets. Limbers need horses so I bought some from Irregular miniatures at the York Show. The horses came with no tack so I just added a some side pieces.

They are not perfect but I like them. I now have 7 extra guns, I laugh at Napoleons grand battery.

All guns need crews

ACW Union crew - various manufacturers

Rebel Crew

Afghan crew - out of a pile of scrap DaveD gave me. Pretty crappy figs but they will do a job

Sometimes horses aren't available to pull cannon so oxen will have to do

Ist Corps Oxen - the horns were separate and a bugger to fix in place

I've have been painting a lot of other random things.

1st up some Northstar Africans, 2 cool witch doctors and a Zulu type

The one on the left is reversible

 I have finished my Back of Beyond Afghans for now. This maxim gun is by Empress and is fab

 It comes with a sniper

 Next a Northstar Boer - another nice fig

Nearly finished. Back to Warbases. These 2 Lancia trucks are really cool and come as flat packs. They are a doddle to put together. I added a Lewis gun and an M1917 Browning, both by Pulp Miniatures from their deck gun pack 

Vehicles with weapons need crews and I bought these at the York show. They are by Reiver Castings, not the best but very useful

Obviously if you have crews then you need vehicles to put them on

The trucks are from the flea market and had been previously painted so don't count here. I did add steel paper to the flatbed bit and magnets to the bases of the figures and guns to keep them in place. The 2 guns are an undersized 2lb AT gun from Britannia and the taller one is a 37mm deck gun from Pulp that I bought with the guns on the Lancias.

 Finally I bought this old school witch with massive boobs as a job lot from the flea market.

In case you haven't noticed she has massive boobs and is naked under the apron.

Right now for the maths bit

7 cannon and limbers - I reckon 15 pts per set - 105pts

12 horse and oxen and 1 Mtd Boer = 130

15 artillery crew = 75

3 Africans = 15

1 Afghan maxim gun and a sniper = 25 (inc 2 prone figs at 2.5 each)

1 witch = 5

2 Armoured Trucks = 40 (I think)

10 vehicle crews = 50 pts

I'll leave it to Miles to decide about the 2 cannon on the back of the trucks but they were pretty simple so 5 each would be fair

So that is about 415 I think. Luckily I have the maths minion on Monday so Miles it's time for creative accounting. Can we go with Enron before somebody checked their sales figures and not after. 

MilesR: My gosh my head is spinning - so many different subjects, so many points and the witch is something that once seen can not be unseen....  You are a productive but evil man Mr Martin.  

I did score the horses and oxen as single figures (not mounted cav) which is what we've done with similar subjects this year.  Your math above totals to 445 and my tally nets out to 390 with the big difference being lower points for the horses and two trucks.  Never-the-less a most impressive points bomb, but the witch, the witch will cause nightmares..

Very nicely done.

From TamsinP - Last of the SYW Russians (106 points)

I think KenR and IanW will have been waiting for this post with a sense of trepidation - my final 15mm SYW entry of this Challenge. Now they will know how many points they need to paint in the final three weeks to catch up and overtake me in our side duel!

I did use the right flock this time!

Yes, this post is the end of my 15mm SYW Russians for now. To be honest, I'm glad to have them out of the way and ready to take the field in one of our club's big bank holiday games.

Let's start with the infantry.

Bjeloserskiy Regiment:

Kegsgolmskiy Regiment:

To assuage my megalomania, there are another thirteen infantry regiments that fought in the SYW to paint. And the Corps of Observation for earlier battles, so this is not the end of my collection.


Generals:

I might have gone a bit too far with highlighting their cloaks, but they still look OK.

I had two spare cuirassier troopers, so decided to add them to bases as "lifeguards" for a couple of the generals - maybe some princelings who are favourites of the Empress.

All the figures here are from Essex Miniatures.

Now, scoring, let's see:

36 foot @ 2 points = 72
2 hand-painted flags @ 1 point = 2
8 mounted @ 4 points = 32
Total = 106

This might be my last post of the Challenge. My father passed away on Friday and I may be otherwise occupied over the next few weeks and not be able to complete anything. Certainly nothing major, but possibly some small groups of 28mm figures just to distract myself.

MilesR: Very sorry to hear about your Father's passing.  I know I speak for all of your fellow Challengers when I express my deep condolences in this difficult time.  Your mini's are superb, as usual, but that's not really the important thing now.