From BruceR - Twenty Six 28mm AWI Grenadiers (130 points)

For my Wednesday submission this week, I continue to flit from project to project.  A group I game with on the eastern part of the state in Fargo will run a Concord refight in April.  When word went out I was set, as I have a fairly large continental force for skirmish level games such as "Muskets and Tomahawks", which is the rule set chosen.  I've only played this set of rules once, and the 1st edition.  My crown forces are Hessians, except for some light bobs.  

Enter the bane of many lead gatherers, Ebay.  While wandering through the shopping halls of Evilbay, I found these Front Rank crown troops and for a very reasonable price.  I enjoy these figures and getting them from across the pond is a bit cost prohibitive.  I bit and the post delivered shortly thereafter.  A large portion of my current force is Front Rank so they fit right in.  

Only a couple of poses, with a commander, a trooper taking a hit, a trooper with a head bandage, and a drummer add a little mix to the unit.

I approached these a little different.  Normally I'll black undercoat.  I looked around and I had some airbrush basecoat in a terracotta color.  Why not, as red and white are tough colors to cover over black.  Break out the airbrush as living in the North there is no spraying outside.  Base coated and then hit them with a zenithal coat of white hitting the upper areas of the miniatures.  Airbrush work done.

I tackle troops in a eight packs, this is my comfort zone for getting blocks of painting done in a sitting.  For the red and black I used Army Painter Speed paints.  The remainder are a mix of Vallejo and Army Painter acrylics.  

Once blocked in I used a mix of a wash created by Sonicsledghammer from YouTube.  This is a little lighter than the Army Painter dark tone.  I highlighted white areas, face, and did a light dry brush on the fur hats.  Next paint and dry brush the base grit.  Glue, static grass, and tufts.  Done.  

I went for painting the unit as the 23rd Royal Welch Fusiliers as they seemed to fight in most battles during the war.  My blue for the cuffs, etc is slightly lighter, but dark blue would simply look black on the game table so I tend to lighten up the colors for the 3' rule.  

I didn't paint the two flag carriers as I don't yet have flags and the skirmish style games of Sharp Practice and Muskets and Tomahawks do not usually have flags in units.  I'll likely get them done later as the rule of cool will require it.  

23rd Royal Welch Fusiliers Grenadiers:

Points:

26 28mm @ 5     =     130 pts

Thanks for looking.

Bruce

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"I continue to flit from project to project"

Let me assure you Bruce, you have come to the right place! These grenadiers look wonderful. Is there a finer sight than grenadiers going to battle wearing some manner of insane headgear and glorious uniforms? My favourite grenadiers are the classic Austrian ones from the Napoleonic era, but any chap marching out in a bearskin shako is surely as fine a miniature soldier as one can hope for on our tabletop battlefields.

130 points well-earned.

GregB

From SylvainR: 28mm More Giants for D&D (45 points)

 

Another band of giants. I painted them as a "band" (or a "horde"), with similar color patterns and bases. All these miniatures are from Reaper, are made of vinyl and were part of the miniatures exchange with JeremyM. Again, all these models are looking downward (probably at some helpless party of heroes), which is fine on the table, but it looks odd when taking pictures, as you can see in the photo above. Below is a size comparison between one of the giants and the fat cleric.

First, we have a giant with a bone sword. Because his weapon was really crooked when I put him together, I had to give him the heat gun treatment. Despite being very careful, I melted some of the "teeth" on the lower part of his sword.  With a huge fur cloak covering his shoulders, the back of this giant does not have much details to offer.

The next giant is equipped with a "konda" sword as tall as two normal humans. Note the treasure chest attached to his bum.

I wanted each giant to wield a different kind of sword. So I watched this video on Youtube and gave a try at what I wanted to be a sword crackling with magic. In the end, I find that the weapon looks more like a scifi "power sword". However, I like how the runes are highlighted by the energy within the sword.

Finally, giant number 4 was given a heat sword and I used the techniques described in the video mentioned above. I used multiple layers of diluted orange and red on a blade painted yellow, then used a sponge with black paint to simulate the cooler parts of the blade.

Points claimed:

4 x 54mm foot figurines at 10 points each = 40 points

Total = 40 points

Thanks for reading!

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Another fantastic fantasy foray for you Sylvain! The sword effects are all impressive, and I hope you are pleased with the results. No doubt the adventuring party will marvel at how cool the swords are shortly before these giants but the blades to work...

The "heat" effect is probably my favorite, but the crackling one looks awesome too. I can see why you might be thinking "sci-fi" on that - my brain has similar wiring - but absent the usual sci-fi prompts (like some manner of power pack near the blade or on the hilt etc) I think this is firmly a fantasy outcome, particular the in the context of his fellow band/horde members.

I shall award a bonus of five points for messing around with sword-painting-tutorial stuff - great work on your part to give them a go! 

GregB

From JamieM - Limbo Ogryn and More Boats (96 points)

It’s been a while since my last post and, perhaps fittingly, it’s the limbo entry on the circles from hell that delayed me. I have a lot of half finished projects (I feel I might be amongst like minded people with that here) so I decided to only do the odd figures that were either left on my painting desk because “I’m sure I’ll pop enough paint on them to finish them in between other projects” ( spoiler: I didn’t do this) or the projects that were within reaching distance of my painting desk, so any slightly larger projects that had been moved to shelves to await their turn (for months….. possibly even a year).

So, firstly, here is a larger project, Ogryn for my Horus heresy militia army

As some may know (especially after the knowledgeable and well informed posts from GregB and Curt on the subject) the Horus heresy occurred in the 31st millennium when fully half of the space marines rebelled against the emperor and threw their lot in with the chaos gods instead (who tricked them into thinking life would be better under them). This resulted in a cataclysmic interstellar war and sowed the seeds for the dystopian 41st millennium that warhammer 40K is set in.

Most of the books and other literature concentrates on the space marines fighting each other (because space marines are rad as hell, obvs) but amongst the huge empire that The Emperor's minions had carved out, there were many, many more “normal” folk, who were forced to throw their lot in with either The Emperor or Horus, often with little information as to what each really stood for. Games Workshop are renowned for getting customers to spend a lot of money on specific infantry, vehicles, etc for each setting, which is fine as a business plan and all that, but does veer away a little from the origins of Gee Dubs when scratch building and converting was the cool thing (roll on deodorant hover tank anyone?). These days, every army entry has to have a specific kit you can buy for it or they remove the entry from games until they’ve made a kit for it.

Now, it seems to me that as the Horus heresy/30k range isn’t one of their most popular ranges, the designers seems to get a little more leeway and so they produced the Militia army list to represent the many and varied standing armies and militias present on any given world. At the start of the army list there is a little bit of blurb telling you that there are no kits specifically for any of the entries and you are encouraged to use the other kits they make and kit so to build your army!

Now, I’ve always been a massive kitbasher and this was music to my ears! Even better, as a child who grew up with the first edition of war hammer 40K (aka "Rogue Trader") I’ve always had a massive soft spot for the Ogryns, who are the sci fi equivalent of the ogre. Large of body and small of thinking (“Blessed is the mind too small for doubt”) ogryn have always been taken advantage of by the imperial forces to get them to do what they say the emperor commands (“a small mind is easily filled with faith”). The militia force allows you to field big units of ogryn as your basic troops! And I could kitbash away to make them happen!

So here they are. They languished in limbo as our club played 30k for about a year and then moved onto other games and that coincided with me getting partway through them. The options for a militia force are many and varied, but I chose to have my ogryn toting shields (some official, some converted from half of a dozer blade meant for the front of fighting vehicles) and chain axes. In order to get enough chain axes, I converted them from Ork choppas and spare chain swords. I’m really pleased with the result and have 12 more to do to give me my two big units of ten. I still don’t think ogryn will stand up to the best that space marines have to offer, but they are ogryns and that’s plenty good enough for me.

Next are three more boats painted up as ghosts for Mantic’s Armada game (and warmaster naval too). Nice and simple and give me more options when added to the ones painted earlier in the challenge.

And from the other side…..

In summary then:

8 x 40mm figures = 56

Limbo bonus = 20

Three boats (worth 10, 5, 5 I think?) = 20

96 total points.

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"I have a lot of half finished projects"

While I loathe the tiresome babble of progressivism, let me assure you: this is a SAFE SPACE for you! I am confident many/most Challengers will relate to the approach and sentiment which left your Ogryn unit to wait - and wait, and wait some more - before finally getting under the brush. And they look tremendous, and as you say, part of what makes 30k so fun is the lingering residual hobby spirit of GW's elder age where participants were encouraged to experiment and come up with their own kits. While Horus Heresy fans like myself are certainly excited to see the huge volume of kits now being released in plastic, 30k still retains things like the Militias which allow for creative folk like you to have some fun. The dozer blades...that is perfect as a shield for them! Can totally see a Commissar pointing at some in a yard and saying to the Ogryn "hey, just use these" and their perfectly small, loyal minds obeying immediately...

And also some naval stuff. Sigh. Whatever. At least they are spooky-looking ghost ships. 

96 points for you Jaimie! May the Hobby Gods infuse you with sufficient will to finish another project from the half-started pile...I mean...nothing new or cool being released? Right? Right?

Greg B

ByronM - BloodBowl and Trench Crusade [ 100 Points]

For this Tuesday I have an item off my to do list for the year and some more figures for my new Trench Crusade force.  First up is a set of figures that have been sitting around for years that I really wanted to get done this year to help reduce the pile of shame sitting around, that is the set of human Blood Bowl figures.

I painted up the Orks from the Blood Bowl set a few years ago as my favourite NFL team the Greenbay Packers, and painted them up as the Greenskin Packers.  However, to teach people the game I really needed to get another faction painted up.  So I decided to paint up the human team as one of Greenbay's rivals the Minnesota Vikings.

I like how these came out, but they need to be brightened up a bit somehow, maybe when I actually create the team and put white numbers on the back that might do it, but we will see.

Second up in this post are two more miniatures for my Sultanate for Trench Crusade, a pair of Lions of Jabir.  These "Lions" are grown by the Jabirean alchemists to prowl the trenches and destroy the hellions pouring out of Hell.

As for points, there are 12 Blood Bowl figures @ 5 points each, and 2 "Lions" which are on large 45x60mm bases so I am counting them as Cav/Monster figures @ 10 points each.  This should total to 80 points.  Oh, and since my next circle of Hell is Greed, why better submission that a pro-sports team!  I mean after all the Minnesota QB is set to sign a $125M contract???  To play a game he loves???  Wish I could sign onto that!!!  So with that it should take me to 100 points for the submission.

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Lovely additions to round out this Tuesday - I always love a good Blood Bowl team, especially while getting ready for the Superbowl shortly! Those Lions are quite something too. I've somehow managed to not commit to Trench Crusade - perhaps my Turnip induced burnout is to blame!

- Paul

From GregB - Dogs of War Characters (15 points)

Marco Colombo directs a fellow mercenary commander. 28mm figures from GW's "Dogs of War" range.

We are back with the Dogs of War this week! No new units yet, but a couple of characters. Here we have the "Mercenary General" and the special character "Marco Colombo". These are old 28mm GW metal figures (although the general's horse is a mix of plastic and metal). 

Mercenary General

Ready to work! Just need to complete a contract...down payments in cash only...

Tilean mercenary armies need a Tilean mercenary general, and that is what we have here! This figure was part of the initial wave of sculpts that accompanied the release of the "Dogs of War" army book back in the day. 

You can see the insignia on the horse's barding, and just peeking out from the left breast of his overcoat.

I imagined this fellow as a tough, no-nonsense warrior, a hardened veteran. He has material success, and so shows some "bling" in the form of nice plumes and combs for his horse and helmet, and beautiful gold armour, along with a purple overcoat. He dares you to comment!

Nice purple overcoat...go ahead and ask him how he has the money for that!

At the same time, he has no specific regional or royal insignia. He has his own symbol on the barding of his mount, and on the breast of his overcoat, but nothing beyond that...after all, he is ready to be hired by anyone! No need to have a specific regional crest limiting him from business development opportunities in the Old World...

Marco Colombo

Bold Tilean explorer, Marco Colombo.

Marco Colombo is a merchant prince and notable explorer from Tilea, and he can join your mercenary army as an independent character. 

"This way to Lustria!"

This is a beautiful figure, but I found it a bit odd that the figure is an instance where the sculpt did not match up with the original rules from the army book - in the rules he is supposed to come with a warhorse, but as far as I know, GW never did sculpt a mounted version, and this fellow is the only "Marco Colombo" that I know of. 

Maps, compass and telescope in hand...a beautiful sculpt.

But he totally looks the part! He has a telescope, some maps and other goodies to lead/incite a Tilean mercenary army to great exploits. Chances are the mercenaries will be more keen on treasure and less worried about exploration and discovery, but Marco doesn't care - his Tilean pikemen will provide protection and help secure his trade missions. 

Scoring for this submission is pretty easy - one 28mm foot figure and one 28mm mounted figure, for a total of 15 points. A modest contribution, but the Dogs of War project continues!

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Lovely to see these classic characters get some love and your use of splashes of colour really brings them to life. Nice job Greg!

-Paul

From GregB - Hospitaller Banner Bearers & Infantry (44 points)

Some 28mm Hospitaller knights - figures from Footsore, sculpted by Paul Hicks.

For my first submission today I have some figures which have been sitting in the queue for over a year...here we have some members of the Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem - the Hospitaller Knights. These are 28mm metal castings from Footsore Miniatures, received from a Kickstarter I backed a few years ago. The figures were sculpted by the amazing Paul Hicks, and the flags are from Little Big Man Studios (now available through Victrix). 

Banner man and fellow warrior - I particularly enjoy the Knights who have some mix of cloth in their headgear...really sets the "period" for me. 

The Crusades are a period of history that has fascinated me for years. I love reading about this era of history, and as you might expect this interest has naturally merged with my hobby mania such that I am keen to run games set during the period. So you would think I probably have a well-organized collection for the setting, right? LOL. 

"Prepare to believe!"

My intense interest in the Crusades has often floundered on the kinds of mental rocks that often wreak havoc and limit or stop any useful progress among wargamers. Mostly I have waffled between hoping to play skirmish games like "Saga" and then suddenly wanting to do larger games like "Hail Caesar", and then struggling with how to base the figures...inducing paralysis via analysis and causing me to go paint some more 30k stuff instead :) Over the years I have managed to paint what amounts to a pair of large war bands that would work for "Saga" - not nothing, but hardly great progress.

More awesome poses from Paul Hicks...man I love his stuff...

These Footsore figures were meant to jolt me out of this stasis, but instead have been a prime example of this unfortunate tendency...at first I was using the round bases to paint them - you can see some of the initial figures back in Challenge XIII. Since that time, I have come to my senses and re-based those original figures on more traditional square bases to allow for their deployment in a game like "Warhammer Ancient Battles" or "Hail Caesar". Moving houses last year didn't help with progress on this effort, but in the summer I did get a second bunch of Hospitallers based up and primed and...well, you know how the rest goes...

Love how his hood hangs over his brow...adds to a menacing air...

Another view of the mounted banner man.

But here we are in AHPC XV, and I can make a bit more progress again! These sculpts are just amazing to paint - beautiful, proper metal sculpts created by the talented hand of Paul Hicks...what else could a hobby squirrel want?? The colour palette for these warriors is fairly basic and muted, but still fun to work with. The shields are hand-painted, not my preference, but it didn't turn out too badly. 

For scoring purposes we have six 28mm foot figures and a single mounted 28mm figure, which should account for 40 points. Hopefully some more Crusades-era figures will join this lot on the painted shelves before this edition of the Challenge concludes. 

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One of my favourite periods also Greg, and lovely Hospitallers they are too! If you want to play some smaller scale games with them, check out the rules "Outremer" in the Osprey Blue Book series. Lots of fun, RPGlite skirmish level gaming fun to be had, and you've got all you need already painted in this submission. Take a few bonus points for the banners too :-)

- Paul

From TomL, Wrath & ACW CSA troops (185 points)

To start is my first complete CSA regiment of the AHPC - the 44th Alabama.

I like this look better than the previous stands I painted pre-AHPC so some repainting will be in order for those.  From what I have read many CSA regiments didn’t carry the state flags in battle but I have flags & two flag bearers so..mine will have a state flag. Might just be me, but adding flags at this scale is almost as painful as painting horses.

Continuing our path through the Abyss we move from Greed to the 5th circle of the Abyss - Wrath.  There we find some Pulp Figures Coweled Cultists (#2) up to no good.

These scorned angry women hunger for vengeance.  EMaking a deal too terrible to contemplate they have summoned demons from beyond as the embodiment of their Wrath.

Though for one of them this will prove to be her final favour...

The demons are from Crooked dice. All the 28mm figures were painted using TTC & Foundry acrylics and a few GW washes. The universe conspired to keep the large demon from completion with figure issues and my airbrush dying while applying the base coats.  Hopefully I will get back to him later in the challenge but no points for him today. 

Points:
CSA unit - 60 15mm troops for 120 points.
Wrath - 20 points
9 28mm - 45 points

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Nice Rebs Tom but I LOVE the cultists - our second submission of such committed team players this Tuesday! And how nice that the horned goat men have come to frolic with them in the fields. Dont see how that could go wrong at all...  185 points tallied!

-Paul