From GregB: 28mm Afghan Tribal Warriors (155 points)

28mm Afghan tribal warriors from Perry Miniatures, ready to close in on the British columns...

For my second submission today, I'll be switching gears to a completely different setting and a new project for me - the Second Anglo-Afghan War. These are 28mm Afghan tribal warriors, multi-part plastic figures from Perry Miniatures. There are 32 figures, enough for two units/groups of tribal warriors for the Osprey skirmish game "The Men Who Would Be Kings". 

An assortment of rifle-armed tribal warriors.

This setting seems to be popular among colonial wargamers, including several fellow Painting Challenge participants. Their various efforts through the years have intrigued me, and between looking at those, and a couple of "just browsing" sort of visits to the Perry Miniatures web site, I was intrigues enough to take the plunge myself. Reading through the "The Men Who Would Be Kings" rules sealed the deal for me...

Very basic hand-painted flag.

This project has been under way for quite some time. I had started the majority of these figures right around Christmas last year. But owing to the disruption caused by moving to a new house, I was not able to complete the basing and the (very basic) hand-painted flags until last week. So here they are today!

I love the guy loading the jezzail!

These multi-part plastic from Perry Miniatures are fantastic. The metal castings are still better (because obviously) but the plastic boxes are very well done and have been an excellent way to accumulate a relatively large number of tribal warriors. I plan to add units of cavalry and regular infantry from the Afghan army, but the tribal elements would be core to any Afghan force and I wanted to start with them. 

There are lots of swords and shields in the mix too!

I tried to mix up the colours a bit, and sought out different bits of inspiration in the hopes of not completely f*cking everything up, which is always a risk when one comes to a new period/setting. The warriors are equipped with a broad mix of muskets, rifles, jezzails, swords and knives of various sizes, and even shields! It all gets abstracted in the rules, allowing for a nice and motley appearance for the tribal warriors.

This lot is ready for battle!

One area that still needs a ton of practice is the skin tones. I wanted to get some different skin tones, and it was quite hit-and-miss, owning in large part to the fact that GW paints I use have tended to be out of stock, leading to improvisation, and combined also with the fact that, in the chaos of moving, I haven't really kept careful track of what worked and what didn't...maybe this will improve when I get to the next round of Afghan units for this project...

A 16-figure unit of Tribal infantry for "The Men Who Would Be Kings", ready for action on the table

Anyway, for scoring purposes, we have 32 figures in the photos, but there are a couple of pre-Challenge test paint jobs in there, so this will only count as 30 figures in 28mm scale - should still be good for 150 points, and by my recent standards it feels like a "points bomb" for me (even if, by current Challenge standards, 150 points does not even count as a "points candle" but who cares). Thanks for reading!

In my this book this is a points bomb, Greg, and what a great one! I really like how you achieved some uniformity while still keeping it so diverse and interesting. Great figures and a great paint job! An excellent start to a promising new project, and I am already looking forward to the next installment. The swordsmen are especially fine, I love the striped turban! And you may call them basic, but I think your hand-painted flags still warrant some bonus points. As I like round numbers, that's another 155 points in the bag. 

Martijn

From PeterD: With View Halloo Pursue the Gnu (70 Points)

Second post from me today.  First up is a straightforward points grab for the nature shelves in the form of a 28mm Gnu (ok it's a wildebeest but Gnus are way more fun) from Ray Partha. This figure has been kicking around my spares bin for 20+ years and was picked up for a potential Southern African colonial project.

I think this needs a Wild Kingdom vignette with Marlin Perkins safely in the Landrover while his sacrificial offering assistant attempts to hog tie the gnu.  Sadly this was beyond my resources.

While others may look to use the Gnu as the basis for cheap puns, I instead will use it to reference a much higher art form, that of Poetry.  I present Good Gnu (A Vignette in Verse) by P.G Wodehouse.   This poem comes from the story Unpleasantness at Bludleigh Court in which Mr Mulliner's nice Charlotte (an animal loving poet) comes under a blood lust spell while visiting family friends.  She is most put out when Animal-Lovers' Gazette rejects this poem as seen at 18:00 of this clip Wodehouse Playhouse.

When cares attack and life seems black,

How sweet it is to pot a yak,

      Or puncture hares and grizzly bears,

        And others I could mention;

But in my Animals "Who's Who"

No name stands higher than the Gnu;

      And each new gnu that comes in view

        Receives my prompt attention.

 

When Afric's sun is sinking low,

And shadows wander to and fro,

      And everywhere there's in the air

        A hush that's deep and solemn;

Then is the time good men and true

With View Halloo pursue the gnu;

      (The safest spot to put your shot

        is through the spinal column).

 

To take the creature by surprise

We must adopt some rude disguise,

      Although deceit is never sweet,

        And falsehoods don't attract us;

So, as with gun in hand you wait,

Remember to impersonate

      A tuft of grass, a mountain-pass,

        A kopje or a cactus.

 

A brief suspense, and then at last

The waiting's o'er, the vigil past;

      A careful aim. A spurt of flame.

        It's done. You've pulled the trigger,

And one more gnu, so fair and frail,

Has handed in its dinner-pail;

      (The females all are rather small,

        The males are somewhat bigger).

In other gnus, I have another unit of 4 Pict Light Cavalry.  These are 28mm figures kit bashed from three Gripping Beast plastic kits. They are pretty much the same as the last two units that I have previously posted.

Note to self - I need to fix the labels which got lifted up during posing.

I think it's 5 points for the Gnu, 10 each for the cavalry and 20 for the Nature topic for a total of 65 points.

With two rooms ticked off today, my updated may looks like this.

First Germanus of Auxerre, and now P.G. Wodehouse! This day gets better and better, and I would almost think I'm being bribed here. However, there is absolutely no need for that with this second great entry for today, Peter. The gnu is very nice, I absolutely love the poem, and the Picts are on a par with your previous submission, a fine job! Again trying to be somewhat consistent I'll add a couple of bonus points for the kitbashing, the hand-painted shields, and a little carry-over from Germanus' vexillum, so we'll settle at 70.

Martijn

From GregB: Imperial Shore Troopers (70 points)

More members of the Scarif garrison ready to deploy.

It is good to be back on the painting wagon again, and for my first submission today I return to a favourite subject from last year - Star Wars and the Scarif garrison from the movie "Rogue One". We have a group of Shore Troopers to bulk out the garrison. These are 28mm figures (yes, they still are, even if they are big), a mix of "official" figures from Fantasy Flight Games (not called that anymore, but I have lost track of what they are now called) and 3D print designs from DarkFire.

Shore Trooper squad from Fantasy Flight Games.

The Fantasy Flight Games figures comprise a regular squad of Shore Troopers, an officer and five troopers, including one with a heavy weapon. These are lovely sculpts and I really like the poses of the troopers, a nice mix of action, firing and moving among the group.

Squad leader and corporal, ready to deploy.

I love these firing poses...

The action poses are fantastic too - great sculpts.

Moving into the 3D prints, we have two support groups that are rounding the garrison out nicely. One is a sniper team (cue the jokes), comprised of a marksman and a spotter.

Imperial Shore Trooper "sniper" team - we know all the jokes about Imperial soldiers and their inability to hit anything in the films...but in actual table top games, the Imperial soldiers can indeed hit targets!

And to provide some leadership and direction for what is now a platoon-sized Shore Trooper force, we have a senior officer and a communications trooper. 

Command team for the beach!

Another view of the officer/command team.

I have applied my own interpretation of the various colour schemes I have seen online - and in the film - for the Shore Troopers.  The senior officer has the greatest variety of colours - between that, his pose and his pistol armament, and the flunky with the comms unit following him around, he is all set to look the part on a gaming table and lead an Imperial garrison in response to terrorist acts carried out by the so-called "Rebel Alliance". 

The Fantasy Flight sculpts of these figures are awesome, but the 3D prints are tremendous too - Dark Fire Designs is just great, and if you like Star Wars, I really recommend checking out their STLs. They have a number of licensed printers too, so you are spared from actually having to contemplate owning one of those !@#!@#ing things yourself.

For scoring, these are 28mm figures, although "Star Wars Legion" models have been scored at a larger 35mm size, so with ten of these in this submission I believe this will be worth another 70 points.

Another great contribution, Greg! I really like the colourful accents on these figures, although while they will not help them hitting any better they might help them getting hit. But I am confident they will teach those terrorist upstarts a lesson or two! I must say that the 3d prints look fine and go along very well with the "official" range, and your excellent painting really brings them together. Well done indeed! Now there seems to be some confusion about scoring these, as I have seen them scored as regular 28mm as well as larger, but for the sake of consistency I'll score them just as the last minion did ;-). Besides, after your fabulous monster tank for a mere 20 points I think I owe you something too. So 70 points it is!

Martijn

From PeterD Saint Germanus of Auxerre for Famous Person (60 points)

 

I missed a week last week, but caught up on some painting during my Uni's Winter Break.  My first post is of Saint Germanus of Auxerre which I am attempting to claim under the Famous Person Category.  There's a bit of ambiguity in the title here, with the Map indicating a Statue and the Library Catalogue just indicating a Famous Person.  However, Big Lee got his painted Patton under this category on the weekend, so I will use this and the ambiguity to claim my points. Also I happened to know that my minion is an archeologist whose speciality is Rome and I'm hoping for brownie points!

Who is Saint Germanus you ask and why is he famous?  He is a Bishop from Roman Gaul who came to Britain c 429 CE to defeat the Picts and Saxons at the Alleluia Battle, where the barbarians were so put of may the vocal chants of the Romano British that they figured that they were badly outnumbered and buggered off.  You can read his Bio here.  Germanus is one if the few named leaders from 5th century Britain whose existence can actually be verified since most of the names (Vortigern, Arthur, etc) seem pretty mythical.

I based my version on this lovely illustration from a recent Osprey offering.

The figures are from the Victrix Late Roman Armoured Cavalry kit, which is excellent.  I didn't have a cross so swapped in a Chi-Rho vexillum for Germanus to wave.  I never liked the jumping jack hold two weapons up pose, so gave him the shield carried by the infantry man in the foreground.  His body guard is a Roman Cavalry officer, who gets a proper helmet instead of his Smurf Hat Phrygian Cap.

Germanus' visit(s) to Britain came after the "withdrawal of the legions" in 407CE, but what happened afterword is very cloudy.  I plan on using him as a standard bearer or general for my Late Roman Defenders of Britain.

Points wise that 2 28mm cavalrymen @10 points =20 plus 20 for the Famous Person bonus for a total of 40 points.  I will claim the figure points under the legions Side Duel. 

Germanus of Auxerre! For many people perhaps not that famous a person, but you have definitely made my day, Peter. What an original choice, and very fitting for this section of the Library I should think. These are some lovely figures, and the brushwork is great. Germanus and his companion look more than ready to put the fear of God in some heathens! I am happy too that you decided to ditch the smurf hat, a helmet is so much more elegant. 40 points added to your total!

Martijn

From: MarkB: Hunting Monsters -Local History - The Challenge Library (55pts)

 

Hi all,

I am continuing to paint up miniatures to do some monster hunting. These 6 28mm miniatures are from Bloody Miniatures and are very good. I took 3 miniatures from there dismounted dragoons and 3 miniatures from there looting pack to make up this group of Monster Hunters. 

 

These are ECW sculpts but I am using them to represent soldiers from the Kalmar War which took place here in Sweden from 1611-1613, this is the time frame that the Monster Hunting will take place. (Local history)

The War was fought between Sweden and Denmark and was the first war that Gustavus Adolphus fought in and learned from. The colors for the uniforms come from two units of the Swedish Army.

The dragoons are painted to represent the Robert Haswell company. The other miniatures, in brown, are painted to represent members of the Per Måsson's Västergötland Company. 

I also painted up some scatter terrain for the monster hunting game. I have painted up 8 graves that can be placed as needed. I am not sure how many points I will get for them but I am hoping for 5 points.

 

I plan to get back to painting 6mm miniature armies now that I have what I need to start hunting monsters.

For the points I came up with:

6 x 28mm miniatures at 5 points each = 30 points

The Challenge Library entry for local history = 20 points

And the 8 graves scatter terrain = 5 points? 

Total = 55 points

Have a good week. Skål

Great work, Mark! Let's hope your monster hunters will not end up in your graves, nice though they are! I had not heard about the Kalmar War before, you always learn something new during the Challenge. The figures look great, full of character, and I like the grey and brown uniforms with the buff leatherwork. It is nice and sunny here, spring is in the air, and I really don't feel up to doing the complex cubic calculations for the scatter terrain, so I'll take the easy way out and go along with your suggestion;-). Well done, 55 points it is then!

Martijn