100% painted 1600 pts US army

Heyah,

Since finishing Trovarion's zombie bust I was hoping to jump deeper into fantasy theme, but once again Bolt Action was stroger. Main reason was the fact I needed just a few models done to get my US army force 100% painted.

So first of the bunch: Willys Jeep.
Actually this one was finished few weeks back, but somehow forgot to take any pictures of painted model. As mentioned earlier assembling the model was kinda pain in the ass, so I am more than happy seeing this little pest painted.

You may notice (or not) that mmg's barrel is placcy replacement from M3A1 halftrack. It's because I simply lost original piece during works. But since the bond is pretty solid (greenstuff + superglue) so until now there was no accidents while riding to gaming spot.

As for gaming I really like this little bastard: it's small, fast, cheap and scare the shit out or enemy forward observers, spotters and ficed weapons' crews.

As for most recent painting progress in order to get an over 1000 pts army fully pained I needed another officer to lead the second platoon and bit of anti-tank punch.
For the second lieutenant I chose West Wind's infantry model from Berling or Bust game. I really like it's running pose, this combined with "young" look gives impression of impetuous, hot-headed killing machine, feeling best at the very front line of battle!
I probably should organize him a bodyguard or two...

As for upgrading anti-tank fist I finally painted M1 57 mm gun's crew and additional bazooka team.
Black Tree's infantry minis often have kinda weird / deformed faces (I assume it's simply because sculpts were made a while back) but I love wide selection of models they provide.
Not mentioning the fact every week there are promotions in the official online store so you can actually build core of any force really cheap,

And cherry on the top:
last week I was asked to show pic of the whole army but decided to put it on hold until both platoons are fully painted. At this stage it's about 1600 pts strong (some more if veterans are hired) and it's rather reliable and balanced, providing lots of fun and nazi-spanking (sometimes).
There are still reserves waiting for painting (and decals...) but it's nothing urgent at this stage: about 25 riflemen, several BAR operators, 2,5t transport truck, light tank.
Hope you like it.

(direct link to larger photo)

Seeya!

Zombie bust

Hey again,

At the end of previous post I mentioned there'll be zombie coming.
So here it is.

I must say it was great feeling to take a break from painting all this Bolt Action stuff (no matter how cool the game itself is).

As for choosing the model I know I wanted to paint something from fantasy range (let's be frank: demon or deader in my case) and while checking the unpainted resources I realised about last winter I got resin bust from Trovarion's range (you can also get the models and learn more about his whereabouts on Facebook site).

As for the sculpt - it's just fucking sweet: flawless. Model comes in 4 parts and you can paint it like straight from the box. Definitely worthy hobby-investment, Demi-appvoved.

The idea was to paint it more-less natural and believably. 

Flesh ain't THAT rotten so armour is not lumps of brown and orange textured rust. I imagine this dude as (pretty) freshly buried knight or noble, now called from it's old grave to serve Dark Master once more. Like wight from Warhammer Fantasy range. Something.
Photos taken straight on my painting station are bit too colorful for a self-respecting zombie, but every time I try using black background colors ger burnt and models is just blurry. I can smell bad mojo in the air. And poor photo-skills.

Anyway I had lots of fun painting this bust, hope to drag some more deaders from the pile ov shame sometimes to expand my restless legion. The piece will probably end up in my office, with some luck part of potential clients should get scared away and leave me alone doing my shit. Hope you like it. And always remember: dead = good...

Seeya!

US engineers

Heyah,

It's been a while since the previous post but I wanted to get whole unit finished.
This afternoon the last member of the team has been sealed so I can proudly present engineers squad. The guys were baptised by fire during the last 4-players game, still unpainted, but after seeing what terror they can spread among enemy units the decision was made to paint full squad.

The squad is mix of models from Warlord Games, West Wind Productions and Black Tree Designs. At closer look there are slight differences between the brands but minis look just fine alltogether in my opinion. Really hope to torch an enemy vehicle shortly with that puker...

I need a break from painting Bolt Action stuff. The army is nearly finished but I am getting bored with those uniforms. Really wouldn't like to loose enthusiasm for bringing whole project to the end. At this point I think there are like 20 infantrymen left (including bazooka and 57mm gun teams) and 2,5t truck. More than enough for the scale of games we play here.

What else? Recently during walk with my kid I found some sticks in the park and decided to turn them into something useful. Gaming-useful that is...

I cut them at more less inch-long pieces, attached to pcv bases with lots of polymer glue and after adding some sand I got 4 really useful terrain pieces. Not enough to hide a tank but definitely enough for sneaky flamethrower or bazooka team.

And the last thing: Photobucket recovery.

Since whole post is Bolt Action-related I chose M3A1 halftruck painted in December 2016. Since it was finished I used it many times and it's quite reliable piece: it can carry large squad, has pintle-mounted heavy machine gun (I even managed to immobilize enemy tank with it once!) and you can buy additional medium machine guns (waste of points in my opinion since these are no pintle mounted). The model is just really cool nonetheless, the anti-aircraft version is on my secret x-mas wish list.

Hope to bring a big zombie next time...

Zee Germanz!!! (+ zee zombie dragon)

Heyah,

Once again I've managed to slap some paint on toy soliders, this time it German tank destroyer: Jagdpanzer 38(t) a.k.a. Hetzer.
It's special piece because this sneaky bastard it birthday gift for my brother - painting that is, the model itself arrived a while back.
Anyway I wanted to paint it so the color fits brother's Heer infantry. Most of official patterns I found in the webspace is fancy camo but I went into something similar to german uniform / feldgrau (based on mix of olive and greys).
Everything was more-less fine until I started adding chipping and mud. All in all now it looks almost like my US vehicles. Next time I think I'll give a try to pure grey as base tone, maybe with nazi flag laying on armour for contrast. Plenty of time for planning 'till the next birthday.

Hope you like it:

 

Because my short "holiday" is over so I decided to get remaining 4 models painted, to get basic US army detachment fully painted. 

Sure, there's still plenty work ahead, but it's just basic ~1000-1200 pts.

Remaining models are 3 Black Tree Design riflemen and West Wind Productions BAR operator. They are all cool: models are more-less same size as my fav Artizan pieces so they all look great as crowd / squad. Besides my infantry constantly remains 100% metal =]

Painting is nothing spectacular: the same color palette as before to keep whole infantry coherent. Backpacks and ammo belts of the shooters were painted with VGC camouflage green, which nicely fits olive uniforms. 

If I find more models with backpacks I hope to build 8-men strong engineer squad: 2x BAR and flamethrower in a single unit sounds just sweet! (and smells gasoline + burnt flesh...).

Field "hospital" in the back (or rather camouflaged ammo storage as my opponent claims...) is adopted spare piece from Rubikon Models US truck I got recently. I was hoping to get more striking colors using chalks, but all in all it didn't turn out as planned. 

Red Cross is another experiment - more successful this time. I wanted it look like soliders painted it in the field, so I prepared simple stencil and used sponge for applying thick layer paint. Some unpainted areas were left on purpose so whole thing looks more realistic (hopefully...). I also hope to paint some camo on next tank (Sherman 76mm or Chaffee) using sponge. Results might be interesting.

And last thing 'bout BA this time: since the last post we've also managed to play some Bolt Action games - improving the matches a bit. 

First improvement is aerial recon. General idea is:

battlefield is set up at least few days before the game and players can find in mail boxes (mail, not e-mail!) photo of the field so the best forces can be chosen. Usually some partisans gets killed to provide such materials for the commanding officers:

Nice, eh?  And below - the actual battlefield.

All in all it's not much effort but lots of fun getting true letter these (modern) days.

Another upgrade is grass: 

until now we played of simple board painted green but last week proper gaming mat was found and suddenly everything looks WAY better. Kinda brings back memories of Warhammer Fantasy Battle 5th ed. reports. Almost pro.

All I have to do now is somehow force the opponents to paint their minis. Or at least spray undercoat, so the battle photos don't look like US army faces bunch of T-1000...

And last but not least: Photobucket recovery series.

This time I'm bringing oldie Zombie Dragon painted on February 2014. 

The model is quite old and for me it's still one of fav miniatures from Warhammer Undead army. I think I should give it new pictures next time I get it cleaned. 

And maybe finally assemble Dieter Helsnicht...

Since we're around Oldhammer - recently I found oldie chaos champion model in the back of glass case. Sadly I have no use for it so decision was made to find new home for the piece.

If you think it might feel better in your place - let me know (here or via FB), for gaming purposes I can remove the plinth and replace it with standard base.
Some more pics in the proper Facebook Oldhammer Trading Post thread.

Till the next time!

Licking wounds after Photobucket accident

Since Photobucket changed the policy some (bloody lots actually) of my pictures disappeared from the blog.

Lucky for me I still have some of them on hard drive so decision was made to upload them again - on google server this time. You can expect more pics being posted between normal posts. The ones I can find that is...

  

 Laters!