Paul Sets Down on Snow Lord's Peak

Paul rappels down from Sarah's Balloon along with an elite team of female Rebels acting as his personal guard (and to make sure he doesn't get into too much trouble). They land and deftly deploy into a circle, Paul in the center, scanning the environment.

The final week of Snow Lord's Peak brought to you by Mount Rundle, Alberta

'Wow, what an entrance! That's pretty impressive. It's just like watching Cirque du Soleil in Vegas.' The Snow Lord claps his huge hands.

Slightly embarrassed by the choreographed display, Paul shrugs and smiles, 'They're perhaps a bit overzealous, but they have heart.'

'No, this is good. I was just going through the finer points of transporting manure with Mark so this is a pleasant diversion. How can I help you?'

Paul puts his hands in his pockets to keep them warm and rocks on his heels, 'Well, I was wandering around the island and heard tell that there was some treasure up here. Do you know anything about it?'

'Yes, there's treasure,' the Snow Lord smiles, 'but the deal is that you'll have to provide me a boon first before I'll show you where it is. You good with that?'

'Sure, depending on what it is...'

The Snow Lord rubs his hands together delightedly, 'Okay, this is what I have in mind. I've noticed that you've been working on a collection of 6mm figures for the War of the Spanish Succession, so how about you do up another wee unit for that project and we'll call it square.'

Paul nods, 'That's more than manageable, you've got a deal, sir.'

_______________________________________________

Okay Paul, we all look forward to seeing some WSS figures emerge from the attention of your talented brush. See you back soon!

Curt

From PeterD Navarre Regiment SYW 28mm (122 points)

I am working away on my task for the Snowlord, but also have some bits and bobs from stuff left mostly completed before submitting.  In this case I had all of the figures painted before I hit the summit, but I hadn't based them.

In my terms this is a paint bomb, maybe my largest ever point total.  It's a full 24 man battalion of the Navarre Regiment from the French Army for Seven Years War project.  Navarre was one of the oldest regiments in the French army, dating back to 1558 but not joining the French Army until Henri IV because King.  They served in Western Germany from 1757-1762 and took part in most of the big battles.

He doesn't show well here but I really like the Crusader drummer.  The  standard bearer in the front rank is from Front Rank

Close up of the Grenadiers.  The NCO pointing is Front Rank.

You can see the variations in Crusader's marching figures.  The office waving his hat  is FR.

Normally I roll my battalions out in three lots of 8 so as to keep up the image of progress, so a 24 man posting is rare for me.  I had planned to do the same here, but when I finished the first lot I realized that I was out of the bases I use for this project.  Challenger Byron of https://northernlightsterrain.com/ sourced me some free of charge (thanks Byron) on his most recent trip to Regina, but which time I had all 24 set to be based.  My Sarissa order has since arrived so I'm now Covid-19 prepared with bases.

Figures are Crusader mostly with a few Front Rank command figures.  I've done most of the unit with turn backs but added a few figures with coats undone for variety.  There's the normal command treats, two drummers in King's Livery, two flags (sourced from a gamer blog and printed at home) and a grenadier stand.  The grenadiers are over represented in the unit as there should be only 1-2 in the 24  man unit but I like the bearskins. I like to think that fusiliers were detached to guard the camp, perform picket duties etc upping the proportion of grenadiers in the main unit.

The Crusader and Front Rank figures both paint up nicely.  I like the Crusader private soldier figures with their subtle mix of related poses and the drummers are nice.  However, Crusader's officer, NCO and and standard bearers are a little static and low key so I often sub in replacements from Front Rank.  The two companies work ok to my aging and fading eyes.

Points wise that's 24 figures @ 5 point a pop for a grand total of 120, which leaves me almost exactly at my Challenge target of 500 points.  There's more stuff in progress plus the Snowlord's Challenge so I'll make my target with some room to spare.

lovely unit, especially now they all agreed to have their picture published

Martin

Thursday's minion is....

well I dunno really.

Can all submitters check their posts please, there is a bug going round (not that one) that is removing images

Martin

From GregB: 20mm WW2 Odds & Ends (54 Points)

20mm WW2 odds & ends - AB, SHQ, Elhiem, PSC.

Early in this edition of the Challenge I had been finishing off some long-delayed 20mm WW2 projects which had been sitting on the side of the painting desk for too long (years).  As I work to complete the task set before me by the Snow Lord, I am also trying to finish off a few of the odds and ends which had been sitting on my painting desk back in December when Challenge X got underway. The assortment of 20mm odds & ends in this submission is a product of those ongoing "side efforts" - might as well collect the points while I can!

Random 20mm German Infantry

This small collection of German infantry here covers three different figure manufacturers. The German NCO is from AB - an excellent casting, as always.

German NCO from AB Miniatures...great sculpt as always.

The MG42 team is from SHQ.  When I first opened up these packs of figures, I was kind of disappointed...I thought they were a touch skinny/small.  But now that I have painted a few of the SHQ figures, I am warming up to them a lot, and will probably add more SHQ castings to the collection.

MG-42 team from SHQ miniatures.

The SHQ sculpts have really grown on me...I quite like them.

The German sniper is from Elhiem Miniatures.  The sculpts from Elhiem have a lot of character, and this fellow is covered in all sorts camouflage, including a canvas mask of sorts...I tried to make the colours pop a bit - something the actual sniper would not want, but I wanted this fellow to stand out a little bit from the muted colours seen elsewhere among the German infantry.

German sniper from Elhiem Miniatures.

Lots of little camouflage features on this sculpt...very nice.

He'll provide some scary marksmanship in 20mm WW2 games to come. 

Raupenschlepper Ost

1/72 RSO kit from Plastic Soldier Company.

This little plastic model kit is a 1/72 piece from the Plastic Soldier Company - it comes in the same box as their PaK40 AT guns.  I painted one of those back in the fall, and I thought for fun I would paint up one of these little "RSO" vehicles to transport the AT guns around the table.

Lots of room to carry ammo, spare parts, fuel and other supplies - or troops.

One can see how this little vehicle would have been important while fighting in the vast and challenging eastern front of WW2.  They towed guns, carried supplies and even troops. Naturally there were never enough of them available, but the Germans built thousands of these things and so I thought it would be a nice addition to my 20mm collection.  It was also good to keep in practice painting non-winter German WW2 vehicles.

SU-76 

1/72 scale plastic SU-76 kit from Plastic Soldier Company.

Over to the Russian army now, here is a 1/72 plastic SU-76 assault gun - another little gem from the Plastic Soldier Company.

The Russians built boatloads of these vehicles, using them for direct fire support, anti-tank efforts and mobile indirect fire in support of Red Army formations.  It seems the vehicle was difficult and uncomfortable to operate - nearly every set of hobby rules refers to how this vehicle was nicknamed "bitch" by its crews.  But getting a 76mm gun into action never hurts, and this vehicle was able to bring the weapon into frontline action in difficult conditions.  Given how many of these were built, it made no sense not to have them on the table, so I thought it was time to get one done.

Crowded fighting compartment in this vehicle...have to paint the crew and gun seperately.

It's a great little model kit - complete with interior detail and options for crew.  Certainly the compartment is cramped and so I suggest you will need to paint the crew and the weapon seperately and complete final assembly when you have finished painting them.  But it all worked out pretty easily, and this is another great kit from Plastic Soldier Company.  I still have two more vehicles from the box, to put an entire battery on the table.

The USSR built thousands and thousands of these vehicles during WW2 - so good to finally have one available for my 20mm Russians.

So for points, I have four 20mm infantry, two 20mm crew (and they are full figures), and two vehicles...so I think that is 54 points, but as always, defer to the Minion overlords. Thanks for reading...now back to things Byzantine!

From DaveD - Grand stuff Greg. the SU76 is always a personal favourite.

We still seem to be having bloggerissues with pictures - so if yours is sitting in draft please check 

with that i am checking out for the day - over to Dr Cooke to bang the rocks together tomorrow

Notice - Pics Going Missing From Draft Posts

Good evening one and all.

There seems to be a bit of a bug with Blogger at the moment. We have had a number of posts where some of the photos have disappeared from the drafts when minions have come to edit them.

I've got no idea what the cause of this is, but would suggest that after you have "saved" and "closed" the post that you then check it in "Preview" to ensure they are all there.

I have just remarked five posts from four challengers as "draft - pics have gone missing".

Please can the following individuals check their draft posts and re-upload the missing pics:


MikeW
PeterD
RossM
SanderS


Edit to add:
For those who aren't sure how to go back and check their draft posts:
1. Open the Challenge blog.
2. At the top right you should see "Design" - click on it.
3. Select "Posts" then "Draft" on the left sidebar.
4. Find your post(s) and select "Edit".
5. Any missing pictures will show up as a blank box where they should be. 
6. Click "Remove" and then re-upload the photo in its place.
7. Repeat for any further missing photos.
8. Click "Save" and then "Close".
9. Hope that Blogger doesn't mess it up again.

Many thanks,

TamsinP
Senior Flight Attendant

From SimonM: "Otherworld Miniatures" Green Slime and Yellow Mould (10 Points)

This 28mm scale pewter model of some Green Slime is produced by "Otherworld Miniatures", and can be bought as Code DM7a from their range of Dungeon Monsters. Hand-sculpted by Paul Muller, the creature made its first appearance in the original 1974 Dungeons & Dragons set and represents "a large colony of green slime; a very unpleasant plant-based life-form that lurks on the floors, walls and ceilings of dark dungeons, ready to drop on careless low-level adventurers."

Despite being advertised as only being 45mm wide, I soon found the "bright green, sticky, wet moss" to actually overlap the edges of the "50mm round plastic slotta-base" it came supplied with. So in the end I decided to super-glue it to a 60mm circular base instead. I then applied a basecoat of "Vallejo" Russian Uniform over the deadly ooze and washed it with copious amounts of "Citadel" Biel-Tan Green.

As I wanted to use the mindless monster as a test piece for my recently acquired "Vallejo" Green Fluorescent Model Color, I first dry-brushed the miniature with some (more) "Vallejo" Russian Uniform, before individually 'picking out' each and every lethal blob with some "Citadel" Agrax Earthshade. These pustules were later repeatedly dry-brushed using an increasingly lighter combination of "Vallejo" Russian Uniform and White.

Once I felt the "horrible, fetid growth" was highlighted enough, I dabbed the entire thing with "Vallejo" Green Fluorescent and allowed it to dry. As a final touch, I went back in and reapplied more "Citadel" Agrax Earthshade to the highly corrosive creature's numerous bumps and bulbous stalks.

With my Green Slime finished I then moved on to a 28mm scale pewter model of a Yellow Mould, also produced by "Otherworld Miniatures", and available as DM7g from their range of Dungeon Monsters. Hand-sculpted by Paul Muller, the creature represents "a colony of yellow mould, a nasty fungus-like infestation, often found growing on decaying matter in caverns and dungeons."

"Very dangerous if disturbed by unwary explorers", I originally super-glued the furry textured monster to a plastic "Citadel" 40mm circular base, and primed it with "Vallejo" Heavy Brown. I then applied two coats of "Vallejo" Heavy Goldbrown over the entire creature, and shaded it using a copious amount of "Citadel" Gryphonne Sepia.

Lastly, the "deadly threat to adventurers" was dry-brushed using some (more) "Vallejo" Heavy Golden Brown, and a lesser highlight of Heavy Ochre. At this stage however, I suddenly realised that there wasn't any room on the model's base for me to apply wither any sand, grit or static grass. As a result, I therefore carefully prised the Yellow Mould from off of its stand, and permanently attached it to a "Citadel" 50mm circular base instead.

From DaveD - Blax to devil you ... yet more stuff i have never heard of . -its always a pleasure to be educated 

From TamsinP: These Aren't The Hairy Bikers I Am Looking For...(20 points)

Extracts from the journal of TamsinP, Time Traveler, Society Girl and Adventuress

9th March, 1660ish, Paris

Following my escape from the ensuing brawl in the market place, I take rooms in a respectable part of the city. You can tell it is respectable because there is a separate room for performing malodorous bodily functions. I spend  a day or two to see the sights of the old city, although my limited schoolgirl French does leave me at some disadvantage.

However, I tire of Paris and awake feeling the need of a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs, ideally cooked on a campfire. Retrieving my device, I try to remember where and when I encountered those lovely ursine bikers. Ensuring that I am unobserved, I set the device and open the rift. 

As I step through, I can tell something is wrong. The site looks the same, but there are no signs of my hairy biker friends, the air smells wrong and the sky has an unnatural tinge. Checking my device, I see that in my haste I have entered the wrong year - it is 2120 instead of 2021!

I hear a scuttling sound from beyond the scrub.

"Wheeee, doggie!" I hear a young voice cry out "It's a girly, Paw!"

"Fresh meat for dinner, boys!" an older voice calls out from a little further away.

Ducking behind a rock to hide, I find a bag containing old newspapers and a journal. From my hiding place I look out and see three very strange men and an even stranger boy approaching. Not wanting to be invited for dinner, I grab the bag and hit "Home" on my device. As the rift opens, I roll through and find myself in my lounge at home, just as I left it.

Sitting down with a coffee (fortified with a generous slug of whisky) I peruse the documents from the bag. From what I can make out, it all began in this very year, 2020. Mass hysteria over Covid-19 led to panic buying around the world as people stockpiled various things. Shortages in the shops led to rioting and calls for politicians to do something, anything. Mass demonstrations overtook major cities, with the crowds chanting:

"What do we want?"
"Toilet roll, handwash and dried pasta!"
"When do we want it?"
"Yesterday!"

Faced with mounting civil unrest, politicians around the world took stock. Most were sensible and realised that it would all blow over soon - shipments of toilet roll were continuing to arrive, factories in their countries were still producing handwash and dried pasta and trusted that the panic and idiocy would soon subside.

Others, however, who were more volatile (and dumb) took the "do something, anything" calls as giving them carte blanche to demonstrate their own panic, fear and idiocy. 

"I say we take off and nuke the planet from orbit! said one.

"That's not possible, Mr President. We don't have the spacecraft to do that." an unpanicked aide replied.

"OK, let's just nuke the planet then!" retorted the President.

And so, panic over a virus had resulted in a nuclear apocalypse in 2021. One country launched its missiles, other countries responded. The world was devastated.

In the aftermath, the human population had been almost extinguished. Scattered groups of survivors lived on in pockets. Most newborns showed signs of mutation.

Depressed by this prospect, I put down the papers and hope fervently that this was all from an alternate dimension and won't come to pass in this one.

These figures are 28mm from Copplestone Castings. At 5 points each, that will give me 20 points for this submission.


From DaveD - Nice job Tamsin..very colourful! always nice see Copplestones well done. 

From JohnM: Sainte-Mère-Église - 110 points

 

Yes, I know I promised no more terrain but this model has been an albatross around my neck throughout the AHPCX, without exaggeration there is probably over 300 hours of print time here with multiple failed pieces. This is a model from 3d-print-terrain, there are 14 pieces to print, the longest one clocking out at 38 hours alone. I had multiple problems throughout with both adhesion and extrusion problems. Anyway, I suspect most of you shall have no idea what I am talking about, so I shall stop. The fence come from the same set and I found the headstones on Thingiverse.

I needed a church, as I sold my massive Italeri hard plastic one, this is much nicer and of course Sainte-Mère-Èglise is one of the classic WWII Normandy set pieces. I based it on two old placemats and added a small cemetery as you can see.

 

 

 

I will treat it as 3 separate units in respect to bombardment for CoC, the two large roofs come off, and the centre tower comes off. Difficult to say whether the ground floor windows can be used as firing positions but there are 3 doors, one large and certainly the tower would be an excellent firing position. Funny how I think of terrain in game terms!

I am quite happy with it, the structure is 22x9x11" in total but a lot of empty space. Using a cubic calculator this is near on 2200 cubic inches, but I will remove a half so maybe 1100 cubic inches. this is where I get into trouble but I think a 6" cube is 216", so if I have it right maybe 5 cubes aka 100 points!

From DaveD.  Now thats an excellent piece John. i will meet you at 110 points ..  

From AlexS: many different things (180pts)

Hello everybody! My name is Alex and I love variety. Today is such a post - you will find many different things.

Firstly, the Norman heroes - they will portray warband leaders for the SAGA game system. Well, or the leader and the priest (the one with a club, obviously can be a priest).

Secondly, African warriors led by their leader. They can easily fit into most conflicts - from antiquity to the 19th century. War paint I especially succeeded, is not it?

Thirdly, I more and more liked to make lenses, markers and other small dioramas. This time I made a captive African warrior in a cage. He can be released during the game and get powerful, like Hercules from the novel of Jules Verne, an ally. Well, or just put in the middle of an African village. As always, I used improvised materials - I bought a ball of twigs in a store of decorative products for the home.

I liked the material from which I made Сurt Island (many thanks to everyone who expressed admiration for my work), and I decided to try to make a house out of it. It looks a little awkward and dirty, so it’s great for playing about pirates.

Finally, in the finals - I painted an addition to the English squad for games about pirates. Now they have a horse officer and two guns. There was the standard bearer and the grenadiers, after which I will calm down. May be...

The general view gives an idea of my eclecticism this time.

points:
28mm inf - 19 x 5 = 95 pts
28mm cav - 3 x 10 = 30 pts
28mm guns 2 x 10 = 20 pts
28mm wounded 1 x 2,5 = 2,5 pts
A house of about one and a half cube with sides 6 inches = 30 pts

total 177,5 pts

From DaveD , indeed a range of different things alright - lets call that 180 

All - beware blogger is playing up - you may need to check back on your "ready" posts as the pictures are not showing. i am assured this is not Ray or Peters doing - but....