Totally Tamtastic saTurday

Well, good golly gosh! That 'flu was particularly nasty. Not to mention embarrassing - having promised our beloved Snowlord that I'd cover for him two weeks ago, I ended up missing the flight.

Fortunately I've bounced back and will be substituting for him today while he deals with all those nasty mercenaries that have been sent his way. I understand from our dear Lady Sarah that he has activated the defence grid and has called the cats of anti-war into action to neutralise the dogs of war.

But that's enough wittering, on with the in-flight announcements.

"Ladies (hmmm, hang on - I'm the only one this year!). OK, gentlemen...and Ray...welcome to flight AHPC9 out of Challenge, Blogland. We are currently cruising at 33,679 points on the way to our target altitude of 74,853 points. As we are now halfway in to this year's flight, the fact that we haven't reached half of the target altitude is a little concerning. So, chaps - pull your bloody fingers out and get painting, pronto! Alex, Noel and Martin can't be expected to do all of the work.

"We have a number of entries to enthrall you today:

Lee H presents a dashing Rupert of the Skies
Dave D  can't see the wood for the trees as he invades the coast of Normandy
Paul O'G thinks he's Rommel
Barks takes us back to the eighties and chaps wearing VW symbols around their necks demanding that we fight, for the right, to party*.

* It's quite possible that I have misunderstood the tags of this one

"Nurse Docherty will be around later with the meds.

"Today's crayon colours are magenta and lime."

From MattK: More Uruk-Hai (75.5 points)

For this week I painted more Uruk-Hai and I finally Finished my Colossal Squig.
First for the Isengard force is a banner bearer.

This is one of the metal figures I grabbed in the used bin at a local shop. I'm really happy with how the hand turned out though if I do another banner later in the army, I think I'll try to make it a bit bigger.
Next is a block of 10 pikemen

These are the other half of the plastic box from a few weeks ago. I was less excited painting these but boy do they paint quick.
Finally, here's the centerpiece for my squig army for Age of Sigmar; The Colossal Squig

This guy is HUGE. the base its on is a 120mm oval. The stalagmite are 3d printed from a file I found on thingiverse.
The 11 Uruks net me 55 points but I'm totally at a loss on this beast.

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That is an interesting take on the white hand of Sauruman. More of a wide fingered palm than the usual fingers together you see. Very well done. +10% for the outstretched fingers of Isengard, may they never be pruned.

The squig is ridic! How a gobbo is able to keep that thing in line, I'll never know. Based on the base, it looks to be two 54mm figures tall, so I rated it 20 points. So a well-earned 75.5!

And that looks to wrap up tonight, folks.

From DavidB: Dogs of war (228 points)

Swimming and rubber fast boating in the great lakes only to head back home to -50 degree F...I was thinking all about wolves.

My first painted marines were inspired from the graphics of the old RTB100 or the space marine beakie plastic set. I had 10 man squads from most of the chapters with crimson fists and spacewolves getting further 10 man squads as my collection grew.

I bought a lot of the Ragnar Blackmane wolves over 18years ago. I thought I had them all painted in the white grey colours, but then again they were being painted while my daughter Valerie was due at any moment on a cold December day. With the holidays, birth, and trials of new parents, space wolves were not high on the priority.

A friend gave me a large collection of 13th company Space wolves and I spent the summer fixing them and adding bits to make them more spacewolf. I also repurposed some f my old space wolves to 13th company and discovered that maybe only 3 squads were painted with the majority just painted in grey primer.

I did find all my old space wolf decals and surprisingly even the old RT  ones still worked.

the 13th company has heresy war dark grey armour and some work was needed to make the decals pop. My red paint also acts peculiar over decals and varnish which gave an interesting blood red colour.

Since he just used traditional marine bikers, I added wolf pelts, icons and even modified Skaven shield icons to wolf them up a bit from traditional Space Marines.

I bought these over the summer as they are an improvement over the goblin wolf mounts of the past. these are probably my favourite models to paint this challenge and the detail on them is fantastic!

these fellows are going to get a lot of use from other games besides 40k

Some old Rogue Trader marines in Ragnar colors. these will be Wolf guard used to lead spacewolf squads or act as bodyguards for characters. Yes that is a conversion beamer and he was a blue ultra marine before I made him jump in with the space wolves.

space wolf scouts are elite and with my latest codex from 40k 7th, 4 man squads.

These are my favourite sculpts as the old metal is the best. the 2nd generation was too thin to be marine and the 3rd generation looked too much like young marines to be old cranky, grizzled space wolf scouts. Model to the front has now been painted 3 times and was previously a ultra marine, then blood angel before a  hobby knife removed the laspistol and replaced it with a plasma gun so he could be the special weapon trooper for the squad.

The 13th company have no recruits. they are all veteran and tough with the red slayers being the toughest of the tough. Red slayers are honed close combat warriors relying on the grey slayers and long fangs for fire support while they close in. This bunch is designated for bodyguard duty for characters.

The 13th company have been prowling the realms of chaos hunting the traitor marines so they replace damaged wargear with items retrieved from their foes. Hence the black, red and blue armor bits. I doubt they would use nurgle marine gear...I think that is just burned as nobody has the time to clean that correctly!

I used the great wolf himself to be the leader of my 13th company. He is the only one with terminator armor.

He is mounted on a ruined temple base from coolminiornot. It was a freebie as basing an army entirely on those bases is almost as much as a new army!

a slightly blurry photo of my second strike cruiser.

painting a black wolf head on a small yellow disk was much easier than a red  fist!

so 8 bikers for 80 points(three unbased at -6points?) 74

5 fenrisian wolves(bigger than dire wolves) 25

17 sons of Russ   85 points

and one cruiser for 5

189 points which will also go to the Games workshop challenge and 5 points which gives me a nice but solid total of 10 points in the navy challenge. i may be last there, as the ships Ive been seeing are quite numerous, but extremely well done!

pink floyd "dogs of war"

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And more! 

I agree with the rating of bikes as vehicles. However, upon close examination, the unbased bikes do not appear to have integral bases, so they do not suffer the dreaded unbased penalty. So 80 points there. Per the Snowlord Conversions, which sure are getting a lot of use this week, dire wolves count as 40mm infantry, so 7 points per, or 35 in total. The Sons of Russ score you another 85, and the cruiser is 8, for a total of 228 points on the board!

From DavidB: Back again and almost warm (60 points)

I suspect the Snowlord may have pulled some strings as I have spent most of this new year having a lot of fun working and training with Canadian and American military and law enforcement. Simple fun involving surveillance, tracking, pursuit, technology, medical, shooting, and all under the umbrella of winter survival in the great lakes and her forests....and roads!

I couldn't turn down the opportunity as 50 year old grunts seldom get to have that sort of fun. I was disappointed that Canadian Mounties DO NOT wear that cool looking hat and snazzy red jacket all the time especially on tactical missions....though they were disappointed that I didn't wear furs and leathers and gather scalps, Fair enough! ;)

these are a kitbash from defiance games, wargames factory, crossover miniatures and all sorts of random bits from nearly any company I bought miniatures from. I built them and intended to make them as a near future terrorist fire team back in 2012 when I got back from Afghanistan.

Real world events kinda sucked my enthusiasm from working on them so they sat primered for some time.

The bases are resin urban terrain, so I am going to claim some squirrel points for modern near future just to paint the ground they are standing on. I was aiming to paint urban decay and not battlefield damage, so the curb has old and new scuffed yellow paint and the road way and sidewalk has needed repair for sometime.

At least they are finished and I will try to find a modern team to take them down.

This was a freebie bit of laser wood terrain from Adepticon and Mantic Night.

A fast non mettalic metal paint with a bit of weathering and I now have a unique bit of scatter terrain.

I finished up this fellow. A Space marine chaplain is a fearsome opponent and this chaplain just upped the ferocity by donning terminator armor.

The figure is adorned with all kinds of 40k decorations and i really like that pose.

I even like the imperial eagle looking like a "tramp-stamp" on his rear armor plate...just in case the foul, xenos wondered who stomped them!

With the crimson gauntlets and navy shoulder pad, he is allotted to the Crimson Fists.

I was graciously allowed to submit Battle fleet Gothic for the nautical challenge and so I wrapped up this space marine strike cruiser. Carrying a full company of 100 marines and support in addition to ships crew, this is vast like a small city....but tiny in miniature!

The red fist on the panel took a moment to get tolerable. I'm going to invest in some pens paint it red and try again.

I found a solo fighter craft and painted it up too for practise before i tackle the rest

I bought the strike cruiser from a used shop at adepticon and it was only prepped. I like the rod that fits into the flight base which is a novel approach that would've saved me a lot of broken flight  bases.

I have purchased a few models for the killteam game. I can easily field a kill team without new models, but I rather like the distraction of new models!

These are tempest scions...but I'll still call them storm troopers.I really liked the plastic kit and all the details. like this trooper with grenades racked along his backpack. These aren't for him, but are readily available for a teammate to use.

I built the whole squad like a traditional light infantry squad. Here is the teams medic who is armed with a hel-gun and all the other equipment his squad mates have. being the medic he also carries his medical bag. his pockets will be filled with tourniquets, bandages, and other medical supplies he may need fast.

I wish the plasma gun was being fired and not carried, but I gave him the imperious pointy finger of pending doom to compensate.

Commo guys also carry a rifle like the others and all necessary rifleman equipment in addition to the radio. I gave him a pistol and slung his rifle on his backpack. I like his pose the best as he seems to be screaming" DO YOU MIND!? I'M ON THE PHONE!"

This is an ancient warhammer war hound.How Ancient? well, he was painted black over bare metal and mounted on a no longer made hexagon Games Workshop base old.

He is a great companion for the killteam and may see service with an Inquisitor or Imperial Guard force as well.

so points time...

10 28mm infantry at 50points

a space cruiser I'll guess for another 5

a dog for 5

and a sign and small ship for viewing pleasure!

35 points to the gamesworkshop duel

20 to the squirrel challenge

and a hefty 5 for the naval competition

breaking benjamin "I will not bow"

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Well, that's quite a collection! Though I am not so sure you can say anywhere in North America not California is truly warm in this polar vortex. It being 54°F here, perhaps it's time to kick on the fire.

I'm not too keen on the medic laying down fire instead of tending my wounds. But, shrug, not too keen on getting shot (again) and thus needing his attentions more.

Using the Snowlord's formulation, the dog would be rated as a 15mm infantryman, at 2 points. Conversely, I'd say Battlefleet Gothic ships, especially cruisers, are closer to 15mm vehicles. So it all evens out to 60 points.

Remember to email the Duels Wallah what goes to what duels. He's getting a mite testy and has been seen practicing with his spring-loaded matched dueling pistols, waiting to challenge any who ruins his finely crafted spreadsheets!

From AdamC: Fantasy Civilians and Dire Wolf (29 points)

Part of the Bones III set some civilian figures two dwarves, a halfling and a half orc. I imagine they are at or least near a tavern.

My favourite the brew master... who is doing a quality control check of the product. He's an old gray beard and probably dispenses wisdom with the ale.

With his armor and big hammer I figure he's probably an retired adventure who also provides security at the tavern.

The Dwarven butcher this odd fellow looks more like he's comforting a pig who has been threatened not the fellow who is going to turn him into pork chops

Look at that hug he's giving the pig... this is one strange butcher.

The halfling cook.  Perhaps he's the one who threatened the pig?  I like civilians doing civilian things and this guy is perfect.

I can just imagine a line of hungry patrons waiting for the soup from his copper pot.

This one is interesting one its a half ork merchant.  Not a roll most people would cast a half orc in.   Hes a bit of a dandy with his slashed sleeves and bright yellow codpiece.

Clearly he is taking advantage of his racial strength bonus to save on the over head of porters or mules.

Finally we have a dire wolf a very large miniature with lots of great texture for painting on his fur.

New to him is a regular wolf form Northstar I painted a few years ago.  You can see I've improved. You can also see he's huge by comparison. I'm not sure how to score this one.   The halfling is a little smaller than normal but the "butcher is almost two figures." Lets call the halfling a 20mm so for points the other three civilians are 25mm so that 15 points... then there is the pig maybe 2 more for him?   The dire wolf is quite big for the scale lets call it 7 points (scoring as at 40mm)?   if my suggestions are take the total would be 28 Points.  Robert I leave it to you to judge if this is fair.

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Not only is the dwarf checking the quality of the brew, he seems a might displeased with the results! Must be a skunky brew?

The dwarf with the pig does seem an odd pose. Perhaps there was a spot of pig rustling preventing pork put on the menu? Certainly the pig does not seem all that concerned to be held by a dwarf wielding a meat cleaver.  

The halfling fellow looks like he belongs with the crew of the halfling hot pot:

Which does not exactly raise my faith in halfling cooking.

Is this half-orc merchant putting all his skills into Intimidation? "GROK SAY YOU BUY GOODS NOW!"

Enough chit-chat. Based on the Snowlord Wolf Accountancy Methodology, verified by Millsy to a p-value of 0.00034981, dire wolves get scored as 40mm (7 points). Now, the halfling may be small, but the half-orc balances, so that and the dwarves come to a wash of 20 points for 4 28mm figures. Animals score as 15mm figures, so there's another two for the pig, coming to a grand total of 29 points.