From IanS: 15mm Japanese Infantry 1943 (38 points)

Dear All,

This is my first post for this years Challenge, and it has been delayed as the orginal set of figures is still being based. So the Japanese have got in first. These figures are from Eureka and they are lovely sculpts that take paint well. The figures are to be used for the new Far East version of the Chain of Command rules from Two Fat Lardies.  First up is a section of infantry for the 1943 Platoon orbat. This section has a squad leader and to identify him for the games all my squad leaders will have rifle flags. In addition this squad has two teams. The first team is all rifles with nine figures and the second team is the LMG team with a Type 96 lmg and three riflemen.

Next up are two snipers, not sure I am happy with these but I have based them, so no going back.

Then we have a flame thrower team of three figures.

The basing style is a new one for me and consists of army painter swamp tufts and dried thyme. The thyme idea for jungle litter came from a recommendation from the Storm of Steel blog. Although the wife has insisted I have my own jar when she saw me putting in spare thyme from the bases back in the jar she uses for cooking (Bad me). 

 So pointswise: 19 x 15mm foot figures at 2 pts each - 38pts.

Welcome aboard, Ian! Glad you have managed to avoid the cut. Some nice Japanese you are showing us, I think the basing looks good and I really like the little rifle flag. Perhaps you would be well advised, however, to get your own thyme jar, depending on the planned sizes of your new jungle armies. Anyway, it is good to see you kick off with 38 points!

As a side note, please remember to resize your photos and add your labels...

Martijn

From AdamW: Get orf My Laaaand (15mm Boers) (Violence) (432pts)

My third and final entry for this week has taken me all week and the paint is barely dry :)

As Curt has said the Violence circle of hell is perfect for wargamers.  I have chosen a project I planned to get done for the challenge, rather than being taken off track by some new fun figures.

My take on the violence theme is farmers taking to arms to defend their lands.

These 15mm Boers were part of a job lot of figures I bought at a bargain price on ebay a while ago. They are to bolster the number of Boers we have in our group already, and will probably double as ACW confederates at some point.

As they were from a bulk purchase they are not a  balanced force, with more dismounted than mounted.  It also contains some prone chaps, which I have learned is not so good for the points score!

I have made up some horse holders with some odd altered figures and a load of horses that are a bit small and thin. Surprisingly those horses are actually nicely detailed.

I also have a few wagons, but they will have to wait for another time before they join the army.

The majority of models are old minifigs with a few odd figures from unknown manufacturers thrown in. I was pleasantly surprised how nicely the minifigs turned out with their limited poses in an irregular army.

I am claiming the following points:

30 x mounted 15mm @ 4pts = 120pts

12 x horse holders 15mm@ 2 pts = 24pts

24 x horses 15mm @ 2pts = 48pts

20 x prone 15mm@ 1pt = 20pts

100 x foot 15mm@2pts = 200pts

Violence bonus = 20pts

Total = 432pts.

Not only three posts today from you, but a veritable points bomb at the very end! If you had given me notice beforehand, I would have brought the sandbags out! It is good to see, however, that your quality does not suffer from your quantity. These Boers look the part, and I can see how they might double up as Confederates too. The horse holders are a nice touch. I like Minifigs, they have a distinct quality of their own, and though they might be rather simple figures, in large numbers they are very effective. Well done Adam, 432 points added to your score!

Martijn

From EdwardG: More Swiss than you can shake a chocolate stick at (100 points)

Hej all, 

As of the posting of this entry, I'm now officially one week away from leaving for the SAGA tournament where I will be playing my Swiss force for the first time :S

Luckily, as the supplement was shipped only a few days ago, I'm going with the hope that no one else has managed to practice with their warbands. So it's hopefully going to be a level playing field on that basis at least 8)

But being only 1 week from getting on the plane does mean that I'm very tight for the minis that I can get finished. 

So far this week I've managed 12 crossbow armed Levies, and artillery piece, and two flag holders!

All are Perry Miniatures, with minor conversions as before. I'm hoping I can get a final picture of the force before I pack everyone up. If not it'll be action shots from the day ;)

Points:

12 x 28mm Crossbowmen = 60pts

2 x 28mm flag holders = 10pts

1 x artillery piece = 10pts

4 x artillery crew = 20pts

Total = 100pts! 

Hope to see you all next week with my final last minute (I mean perfectly punctual) Swiss!!

TTFN :D 

Ed

Some goodlooking Swiss, Ed! I hope you will do well in your tournament, and I'd love to see some photos of your complete force. 100 points added to your total.

From LeeH: Russian 12pdr Gun & Crew (50 Points)

I have been looking forward to starting this piece since I bought it at Partizan last year. This is a Perry miniature and comes with four crewmen. But only last week did I realise that Sharp Practice guns have five crewmen…so I found an extra figure from another set to make up the numbers. I’ll worry about replacing the crew from the other gun later. The sculpts on these are outstanding and the crewmen all look suitably cold, especially the guy hugging his hands in his greatcoat. He looks thoroughly miserable and makes you realise that while the French army had a terrible time in Russia, the Russian troops weren’t much better off. There’s a good reason why campaigning in winter is a silly idea, even if it is your homeland and you are used to the weather. When the temperature drops to -20℃ everyone suffers. 

The 12pdr was the standard heavy artillery piece of the Russian army in 1812 and their crews have been described as highly professional and very well trained. At the Battle of Boridino, General Kutuzov ordered the artillery to hold their ground to the last possible moment and then fire at the enemy with canister. When artillery is about to be overrun it takes a significant amount of training and discipline to follow such orders. 

I also wanted to get a few more officers painted so here are three, including one who seems to be overcoming the cold from the bottom of a bottle. All three officers are from Wargames Foundry and are beautiful minis with plenty of character. 

 

Already on the workbench are the next unit, a fearsome looking unit of Don Cossacks. Once again, I should stress that I haven’t painted multi-part 28mm cavalry in decades so I am approaching this unit with some trepidation. However, now that I have got started I am enjoying it. Whether they are finished by the next submission day remains to be seen. I’d rather take my time than rush these… especially with their sharp lances. I’ve drawn blood already and I’m not even half done. 

(Scoring: 8x28mm Foot = 40 points + 1x28mm Gun = 10 points : Total 50 points)

More great Russians, Lee, excellent! The figures are full of character, and your painting is crisp and clean as ever. I like the snowy effect on the greatcoats. And yes, they show why war is not really an activity for winter. Nor for spring or autumn with their pouring rain, nor for summer with its sweltering heat... Let's keep it to our wargaming tables, and yours will be graced by these lovely figures. 50 points then.

Martijn

From AdamW: Carry on up the Khyber (Heresy) - (40pts)

 

I'm not sure if anyone apart from the Brits will recognise this one.

This entry in 15mm, is for the Heresy circle.

Curt's notes say 'Something that breaks with the accepted code'.

The classic comedy film 'Carry on up the Khyber' bases a lot of the plot on the tradition of the highland infantry, and Scots in general,  to wear nothing under their kilts.  In the film Private Widdle was caught wearing some underpants. This resulted in an inspection parade where it was found all the soldiers were wearing them.  The wife of the governor Sir Sidney Ruff-Diamond was standing by with a camera to take a photo.

My take on the heresy theme is that the wearing of underpants broke with the code.

Extract from film

This is my homage in miniature to this famous scene. Various 15mm figures from the spare box inlcudes some Essex or Irregular officers.

The privates on parade are 15mm Peter Pig figures. They are flashing highlanders with head swaps, and also removal of some.....umm..extraneous parts to enable the pants to be painted on!

Lady Ruff-Diamond hides behind the hedge with a roughly constructed camera.

10 x 15mm figures @ 2pts = 20pts

Heresy bonus = 20 pts

Total 40pts.

That's hilarious, really! Oh yes, even this non-Brit gets this. The Carry On series epitomises the best and worst of British humor, I'd say. The whole idea is brilliant, and the execution rather flawless, including the fabulous scene setting and photography. I don't know how you keep coming up with these things, but please... carry on!

I'm topping up to 45 points as soon as I stop laughing.

Martijn

From PeterB - A gluttonous points bomb (Gluttony) (373 points)

My progress through the Abyss continues slowly. For the layer Gluttony I have found a model that is a monstrous creature that is a nightmare for those that overindulge. I present a Mimic from Archon Studios.

You feel peckish, you want a full fat fizzy drink full of sugar, some crisps and a chewy chocolate bar. You put your money in and a giant tongue slithers out of the collect slot and grabs your arm. You are the next victim of the Mimic.

The Mimic is 28mm scale and was a fun little distraction to paint.

Now to the bulk of the weeks painting. Firstly some of you may remember my Zulu War project from last challenge, well I have added some Natal Natives to give a bit more choice in army selection. Friendly natives who lived in Natal under British rule were conscripted into the British army to fight against their foes the Zulus. They were equipped with outdated weapons and minimal ammunition, some preferring to still use their native assegai and shield.

They would have been formed into regiments and companies as normal, but their only uniform was a red rag tied to their head or arm. Estimates are that about one I'm ten actually carried a firearm, I have increased that ratio somewhat, just so I have choices for wargaming purposes. 

We have been playing a lot of the Old World at our local club, my Orcs and Goblins army and Khornate Chaos Warrior army have both been reasonably successful. A chance opportunity to purchase second hand some Empire Knights and a Steam tank however that could not be passed up has led to the start of a new Empire army. I can't imagine I will have as much success gaming wise with this army as I will probably need to use tactics rather than just charge forward. I have had great fun painting it though and the latest work done is two units of infantry. Finding vintage GW models at a reasonable price has been tricky, so for Christmas I asked for some Warlord Games Landsknechts with zweihanders. This box combined with a box of Wargames Atlantic Landsknecht Ogres is enough for two units. One core infantry with halberds and a unit of Longswords.

The Ogres are unit fillers and game wise will just count for 4 normal men. It makes painting the unit easier and makes for an interesting looking unit.

For the longswords I chose all soft caps with feathers to identify them easier. Oldhammer rules mean you need larger bases now and instead of rebasing everything I bought these movement trays with slots from Warbases. At first I thought it would cause an issue with the Ogres, then I came up with this ingenious idea:

They slot snuggly in and don't shift about.

Finally, I have also over some time, been making a barbarian/viking/marauder army, not historically accurate, but useful for a Chaos marauder army, or Midgard or Dragon Rampant. I already have plenty of foot troops and horse riders, I felt like they needed some chariots. Victrix do a great set of three chariots in plastic (parts of which were used in my last post for the Mammoth crew. This week my large bases from Warbases arrived, so I could finish off the chariots.

They are fiddly kits with individual reigns to glue on, but I think they are worth it. Yes, technically the kits are Celtic Chariots but I think they still fit in as I have avoided the shields and helmets.

To the points.

One 28mm Mimic - 5 points

One location-  20 points

32 Natal Natives in 28mm - 160 points

20 Empire human troops in 28mm - 100 points

4 Empire Ogres (counts as 40mm troop) - 28 points

3 chariots in 28mm scale - 60 points.

Total = 373 points.

"A chance opportunity to purchase..." Ha, I had never had that happen to me, surely! But I am glad you did not let it slip, for the Empire troops are the highlight from this points bomb for me. Excellent sourcing of "alternative" miniatures, and a cracking paint job. Very clever solution for the basing too. I also like your NNI, I think you captured the skin tone really well. And the chariots, well who doesn't like a good pair of wheels, Celtic or not? Last but not least, the Mimic is a great find. Better think twice before indulging! All in all a great post, and a major step on the road to your target!

Martijn