From ScottC: Soviet Nbc and tankers: Laboratory submission (100pts)

I bought this mishmash of models to use in a post apocalyptic setting, namely zona alpha, but the models are so darn cool I think I may have to use them whenever I can. 

The Soviet tankers are from eureka as are the 4 smaller nbc suits. The 5 chonkier nbc fellows are from Copplestone SciFi / military line. The 2 scientists are 3d printed. All in all they make an interesting bunch and I look forward to using them. 

Points

16-28mmx5 =80

Chellenge bonus 20

Total 100

From StuartL - Naval Brigade at Adventurer's Landing - 45 Points

Hello again.

For my second post today, I am working on clearing out the remaining locations on my trip through the Chambers of Challenge. Having bypassed a few spots on my mad descent to the Altar of the Snow Lord, I still have a few bonus points to grab before I am done. So, this submission is to fulfill the target for Adventurer's Landing on level 2. 

Like many hobbyists, I have multiple projects that I am working on at any given time and several that I add to as and when the mood takes me. For the most part, I try to collect armies for games that at least one other club member plays, simply because it is easier to do so. However, one of my largest projects is one that only I have any interest in, the Anglo-Zulu War. Having seen the eponymous movie multiple times in my childhood, when Warlord did a range of plastic minis about 10 years or so ago, I leapt at the chance to recreate it on the tabletop. Since then, I have bought up a bunch of Ospreys on the subject as well as multiple books by a variety of authors in an attempt to understand the short, bloody war in as much detail as possible. While I still enjoy the movie Zulu and it's prequel, Zulu Dawn, very much, it's quite sad how much of it was changed from the original history. 

While Warlord provide decent enough plastic minis for the bulk of the British regulars and the Zulus, the conflict included a lot of other auxiliaries and volunteers on the British side of things, and for those I turned to Empress Miniatures. (The Perrys do some figures for the AZW as well). Empress minis are nicely detailed and accurate figures, though their shipping can be a bit on the pricey side. 

Due to a lack of regular infantry at the start of hostilities (by the British, the Zulus weren't the aggressors in this case), Lord Chelmsford grabbed every able bodied serviceman he could get. After the debacle at Isandlwana, the lack of manpower became even more of an issue. Several Royal Navy ships docked at Durban deployed crewmen and marines to aid the British column fighting around the coast. One of those ships was the HMS Shah, a steam powered frigate named for the Shah of Persia. These four sailors are sporting the sennit straw hat with headband identifying them as from the Shah and are equipped with cutlass bayonets. While most of my collection is multi-based, these four have been given single bases to allow them to be used as a tiny unit of skirmishers in Black Powder.

Not a member of the Royal Navy, but just an extra AZW mini I had lying around, this is another Empress mini. By the brace on the neck, I think this is meant to be Private Hughes at the Battle of Rorke's Drift, played by Larry Taylor in the movie. Again, he is mounted on a single base as a skirmisher.

And here we have the five of them all together. Painting them was fairly straightforward, though the lettering on the headbands was a little tricky. 

So, for 5x 28mm minis, that should add 25 points to my score along with the bonus of 20 points for landing some troops on a foreign shore in the Chamber. Again, no skulls or GW minis, but another Squirrel point for my side duels.

My running Duels totals:

GW Points - 806

Skullz - 451

Squirrels - 17

From StuartL - A Grave Among the Stars - 25 Points

Hello everyone.

I'm sure that most of you will be familiar with the game Frostgrave, a fantasy skirmish game set in a ruined city. It proved quite popular for a while in my local gaming club, but had all but vanished from the tables even before Covid hit. The author of the game, Joseph McCullough is planning to release a Sci-Fi version of the game called Stargrave, which looks kind of interesting and I'm sure some members of my club will pick up. So, in a pre-emptive strike on my collection, I have painted up half a dozen alien characters. I have no idea if I will be able to use them in the game, but if the game is similar to Frostgrave, I should be able to work them in somewhere.

All of the minis are from Reaper's Bones range, though done in their Bones Black material which is slightly less bendy than the regular white plastic. They have a nice level of detail and painted up pretty quickly.

I have tried to give them a bright, colourful look, rather than the usual grim dark appearance of my usual SF minis games. I wanted them to look kind of retro, like the aliens you'd see on old TV shows and B-movies.

The three-eyed critter and the handler with the shock prod (and marigold gloves) are quite short, so I'm thinking they should count as half a model each? So I should score 4x 5 points plus 2x 2.5 points for a total of 25. Being skull-free and non-GW minis, I don't score any points for those side duels, but they are a unique entry in terms of my Squirrel count.

My running Duels totals:

GW Points - 806 

Skullz - 451

Squirrels - 16

From MilesR: I Remember what I forgot - the Final Section of Stalingrad is Done (240 Points)

 

The final section of the Stalingrad table (2ft x 6').  The total table will be 10ft x 6 ft and I think it looks pretty good.

The first picture is taken looking west with the Volga river bank in the foreground.

Along the river bank is one of the more iconic buildings - The House of Specialists.  This will be a key German objective during the game as it is a very good artillery observation post to shell the other side of the Volga.

A generic set of ruins

Red Square and the iconic Univermag Department Store.  I designed the Department Store in Inkscape and used a cricut machine to cut out all the parts in 2mm chipboard.  The park is about 75% accurate to the real one and I made add a little bit more green

The front of the Univermag.  I like how the rubble came out.

a "street" level view

The Nail Factory and a large generic ruin

A shot for the other side

Some Russian village shacks - these might get changed out

The other side of the House of Specialists

I dont have a table big enough to put the whole city up in one go so here are some pictures of the three sections:

South (this is a repeat) and only the left half is the Souther section)

The Center section

and the Northern section (completed pre-Challenge)

Here a diagram to help orient you.  Oops - the diagram is out of date because the House of Specialists has been built and so should be green not red.

There is still a lot of detail work to complete but it feels really good to get the table to a playable state.  I can't wait to get this up to the club and start play-testing the rules - once I've got my vaccine, of course.

As for points, let's use the method from last time.

The base layer if 24" x 72" x 0.75" which equals 1,296 cubic inches.  The total volume of all the buildings is roughly 1,300 cubic inches so that brings the total to 2,596 cubic inches.  Divide that amount by 216 and one gets 12.0185 terrain "cubes".  Lets round that to 12 and call it 240 points.

From MartinC Pajama Party (210 pts)

My Vietnam war project is progressing very quickly. I bought some VC from Westwind - 40 metal 28mm figures for £30! Ridiculous bargain. The figures are terrible. Poor sculpts with huge amounts of flash. 

They have painted up quite well, like Old Glory - unpainted figures look terrible, painted ones look great. These aren't that good but for 75p each I'm not complaining

There are 40 of them armed with LMGs, AK47s and rifles

Also made up some more jungle, this is 210 cubic inches and brings my jungle total up to 5 square feet!

I've also tinkered about with my previous photos of the USMC and NVA to show the figures better

This was what they actually looked like

Off to by a few more USMC to give me a full platoon with support, I was too M60 heavy

Scores on the doors

40 VC in 4 prone = 190

210cubic inches jungle = 20

total = 210

From MilesR: 15mm Soviet Naval Infantry and Snipers (172 points)

 

It's been a hectic few weeks here - what with my water heating deciding to flood the basement and some work stuff, but I have managed to get some hobby time in hear and there.  First up is my entry for the Adventurer's Landing room - 2 platoons plus an extra squad of 15mm Soviet Naval Infantry,

The figs are from Peter Pig and represent my first experience painting figures from Mr Porcine.  Peter Pig is a favorite manufacture with other club members and they do have a very nice selection of specialty WW2 figures

They make 2 packs of Soviet Naval Infantry - 4 sculpts with sub machine guns and 4 sculpts with LMG and submachine guns.  Not the greatest selection but better than nothing.  I can see why everyone at the club really likes Peter Pig - the figures were a joy to paint.  You may see some more Peter Pig stuff.

These gentlemen are tenacious fighters and will serve as a support option for the Soviet players.

These 40 figures and the 20 point room bonus will net a cool 100 points.

My next submission will be a request for a ballon ride from Adventures Landing to the Hall of Heroes.  My toll will be paid by these 8 lovely Soviet female snipers in 15mm.  More figures from Peter Pig - I do think Mr Oink will be getting a few more orders from me as I round out the Stalingrad forces

8 15 mm figures and a balloon ride equals 36 points.

Lets us say goodbye to these lovely yet fierce ladies and soar away on our balloon

And fly over to the next building, where my Hall of Heroes submission can be found - 4 2 man Russian sniper teams.  And you guessed it, these are 15mm Peter Pig figures yet again.  I wonder if there are any German snipers on the painting bench?

I really like these figures - each base has one shooter and either a spotter of a guy waving a rather ridiculous decoy.

Lets bring that Balloon in a little closer for better look.  I think these chaps came out rather nicely (at least to my limited standard).

Another 36 points here from 8 15mm figures and another 20 point room bonus.

56 15mm infantry figures for 112 Points and 3 rooms/balloons for 60, bringing the grand total to 172 points.

Hmmm, I seem to be forgetting something......

From GregB - 10mm French Cuirassiers for FPW

10mm French Cuirassiers for the Franco-Prussian War of 1870. Figures from Pendraken.

Hello again fellow Challengers and blog visitors, and happy long-weekend to those of you in Canada! For this submission, we return once more to a familiar setting for my brushes: the tabletop battlefields of 19th century Europe. Here are some 10mm French Cuirassiers from the Franco-Prussian War. These are metal figures from Pendraken. 

As always, the castings from Pendraken are amazing.

With their beautiful uniforms and bright, polished/burnished helmets and breastplates, the French Cuirassiers are an iconic military symbol, of both France's military prestige and the idea of heavy cavalry from the so-called "black powder" era of war. Through the Napoleonic wars, these well-trained, hard-hitting heavy cavalry were called on to make a decisive impact in a number of battles - and they did so, many times cracking the enemy when the Emperor called them forward.

Reverse-pattern uniform on the trumpeter in the foreground...I just noticed that I forgot to paint the stripes on their pants...oh well, they are only 10mm...

In the time of the Second Empire, the Cuirassiers strove very much to maintain this tie to earlier times, and the French army retained several regiments of these bad-boys, ready to deliver a knock-out blow on the battlefield. But as many accounts will share, technology and doctrine were evolving. Many sorts of cavalry found they could not overcome the massed fire of bolt-action rifles and artillery, and the Franco-Prussian War saw mostly empty saddles when cavalry went into the main battle. This was an issue for the cavalry on both sides, but the losses suffered by these glorious French cavalry troopers seem somehow more dramatic to me, especially as they often occurred in the context of a broader defeats underscored by the incapability of a French general staff to truly grasp WTF was going on while the Prussian forces enveloped them. The shattered regiments of Cuirassiers were a fitting symbol for fate of Napoleon III and his Second Empire.

Glory awaits on the tabletop...

Whatever the lessons of history, on a wargaming table, launching heavy cavalry is always fun, and I was looking forward to painting these figures. I just love the uniforms of the French Cuirassiers - they are among THE sharpest uniforms out there, and the Pendraken sculpts are fabulous, showing the troopers in reserve, ready to follow their commander along into one more glorious charge...these are great castings, and I really had fun working on them.

As with all of my previous 10mm FPW work, these are based for the "1871" wargame rules, in which two bases comprise a cavalry regiment. So there are meant to be two regiments here, but of course there are many ways to configure these for different rules. 

For scoring, we have 16 mounted 10mm figures here, so that should make for 32 points. Thanks for reading everyone - stay sane and safe out there!