Completed Projects

I have been a slacker when it comes to posting. I have played many gaming sessions. Mostly Bolt Action and Empire of the Dead. I have played some DBA as well. Including DBA in Ottawa while on a business trip! How about that??!

I've been hard at work on a few things:

This is your standard Deuce and a half. From West Wind's Berlin or Bust line. 

Sherman from Warlord. I want to start building tank platoons. Decided I needed to go with 28mm rather than the 1/48th scale that I was using. 

Couple of Pak40s also from West Wind. I didn't realize there were TWO in the pack until I started to put them together. So I opted for two different color schemes. One your basic German gray.

Lastly, I couldn't resist Uncle 'Thulu from West Wind. He will be my faction leader for Empire of the Dead. I run a Darkfire Faction. Next game this guy will be able to summon zombies! 

My Own Game Table

W00t! My own game table. I cleared out the spare room in our basement. You can still see the remnants of clutter. It is a 6' by 4' table. The table is just a piece of plywood on top of a folding table. The "grass" is green felt from Joann's. On sale. I have a mix of terrain features that I have been collecting over the last couple of years. Now...I just need to game!

WIP: Normandy Farmhouse and Barn

I finished up the Normandy Farmhouse and Barn. I think they turned out pretty good. Here they are on my table! That's right MY table. In MY basement.

I had some trouble with the roof of the house. As you can see, it doesn't sit perfectly. I left the roofs off the structures so the little mens can get in. Neither building has a second floor. I am thinking of correcting that with a little bit of plasticard and balsa wood.

WIP: Sd.kfz 251/1 Ausf C Hanomag (Complete)

Jeff at Pair-A-Dice started carrying Bolt Action figures! W00t! I went down and picked up this halftrack.

I really tried to muddy this thing up. Front view is just about all mud. 

Green camo only. No red on this one. Just for some variety.

The machine gun mount in the back already broke off. I intend to just lay the MG in the open bed so we know it is there. I also need to paint the MG gunner.

This is 28mm. I just think it is too small. It holds up against the figures just fine. I probably should have taken a picture next to a mini. Sorry.

WIP: Jadgpanther! (Complete)

Around this time of year, it gets a little crazy around the Legion. Our daughter is involved in a million different activities. I spend a LOT of time sitting in our car, waiting to pick her up. She is almost 13. I keep trying to get her to drive herself. :) Anyway, I have been remiss in posting. I HAVE been slowly but surely working on various projects.

I have always loved the Jadgpanter. This is a 1:48 scale model from Bandai/Tamiya. This is all hand painted. No airbrush. I am really pleased with how it came out. I have been working on my weathering skills with pigment.  Click for larger pictures.

 Front view.

 Other side view.

 I can't wait to use this in a battle. Although, I have not been having good luck with tanks lately. I like the 1:48 scale for vehicles. 28mm feels too small as you will see in the next couple of posts.

Way Cool Late War German 'Mech

 This deserved its own post. I wanted to show some pictures on this Japanese Anime 'mech I had painted up to be a Secret Nazi Experiment. My painter, and all around good dude, Brian, did an AWESOME job on this guy. I had him use a "Sparkle" pattern that was seen on many warships during the war. It just rang true to me. Think of this thing as a "land battleship" and it will begin to make sense. 

Brian had painted on a German identifier. I didn't take a picture of it. :( I added the one to the top and the numerals. This is the 73 prototype.

My plan is to use this as an objective marker. I suppose I could write up some rules for it. But my vision is to just really have this thing sitting in a warehouse that the opposing force needs to go blow up. :)

Completed Terrain

I've been working on terrain lately. I made some great ebay finds on some O scale fences and telephone poles.

The fences have only been primed. And this is only one batch. I have about 5 or 6 more sections.

I also started working on some felt road pieces. I saw roads done nicely at the This Very Blog site. I decided to copy the method. Brown felt, these are 2 foot strips. Spray paint the felt with a textured paint. $6 for a can, $6 for the felt. Then I took some sandy brown craft store paint and drybrushed the sides and middle to create "tracks". My 12 year old daughter was impressed. :)

When I bought the sandbag Indiegogo from Baueda, Claudio included 2 extra "bases" and also some free miscellaneous pieces. I created a third base with the pieces. I will use these as terrain or objective markers. By the way, I officially started using Army Painter Strong Tone ink on these. It works.

I love the detail on this one. Different types of crates. Tarps, bags, and the rifle laying on top.

This is the one I put together. Some of these pieces might actually be from the Verlinden set I got for the Sherman. They look good together. Baueda is the big pallet of tarp covered crates and the barrels. I tried to paint the bucket on top so it looked like it was full of water. I think it came out ok.

 Trying to work out using the Rust pigments. I still need some practice. I like that these bases have a spot in the middle to insert a 28mm figure. To meet the objective, you need to have one little mans in the circle. :)

Sherman Finished!

 I put some muddy weathering and the dull coat on the Sherman this morning. I am really very happy with how it came out overall. Prime, basecoat, wash, highlight, weather. Those are the steps. I wish I had a bigger decal to lay over the engine vents in the back. But I don't and I am not going to worry about it. I cannot wait to get this thing on the field.

In the picture on the right, I see a tiny problem. There is a vent on the turret that is showing the primer I used. I finished up a can of Army Painter Desert Yellow and you can see it. I will not make that mistake again. I always have primed black. I will start doing that again.

Last note. After I put the decals on, I applied a wash to dirty them up. I left some spotty areas. Those, I think, were quickly fixed by the mud spray effect.

Let me know your thoughts!

Sherman WIP +1

I just finished putting a wash on the Sherman.

Next step is a highlight with a mix of Violet Brown and Desert Yellow on the hull and turret. OOO....I can see some spots on the wheels and tracks that I need to touch up. Son of a biscuit! The wash is drying as I type. I think it looks good. I am going to wash the tracks in a more muddy color - sepia.

I really like the sandbags and other small bits of stowage I have.

WIP: 1:48 scale Sherman

It took me awhile to put together, but I put the treads on over the weekend and primed this 1/48 scale Sherman Tank from Hobby Boss.

The stowage is from a kit by Verlinden. If you look inside the hull in the top picture, you can see the washers I added to make the model a little heavier. I like the size of the 1/48 models for 28mm games. The lightness of the plastic just worries me a little. So I like to weight them down.

I am still on disability from having a blood clot so I will start applying the base coat today. I am waiting on some Army Painter Strong Tone ink to be delivered for the wash.

The Verlinden kit was great. I have a ton of parts left over. The sandbags were easy to manipulate. I love the spare tank tread. I should have taken a rear view...the back has a couple of gas cans and a bucket. But the best part from the kit may have been the antenna. Because the kit asks you to heat up some plastic. Pfft - no way.

Finished US Infantry

I just finished up basing and applying transfers to 20 US Infantry for Bolt Action.

They were painted by Brian out of Pair-A-Dice games in Rochester, NY. Brian did an amazing job! I based them and applied the shoulder patches (flag and rank insignia). I've decided I need glasses on a more permanent basis. :)

The basing was pretty easy. Rock mix, paint and highlight. Static grass. Tuft. I did add a metal washer to the bottom of the Warlord base to give it some weight. The plastic is too light. I find that I knock these things all over the place.

I like the flowers on this guy. I have a set of these. I only added them to a few of the minis. These are white, others are in yellow. I think they make for a nice change of pace from the standard tuft of grass.

Battle Report: Bolt Action Sunday, April 21, 2013

Jon L. and I got in a game of Bolt Action on two Sundays ago. It was Germans vs. Americans for a "Control the Crossroads" scenario. We rolled for table edge, we ended up ignoring one half of Jon's table.

At the end of turn 1, I had deployed on the southern road into the town. I had an armored car make it all the way across the crossroads and start executing a K-turn. My goal was complete fields of fire on that road. My PAK team was set up on the right house in the foreground. I had placed the motorcycle with sidecar to block anything coming out of the fields/bocage to its left.

And Jon had come in from the western road. Notice Jon's Stuart in the middle of the road. He has mortar and machine guns on the hills looking down into the town.

Turn 2: I continue deploying. I have a squad in the house on the left with a panzerfaust thinking about that tank in the front yard. Armored car is right where I want him. MG team in the middle of the road controls that side. Infantry next to the MG is going to sprint across the crossroads next turn and get into the house on the far left. This all starts to unravel when the mortar team at the bottom of the page and the squad in front of it start taking fire.

Jon moves up. He pushes his infantry forward on both sides of the road. The Stuart and supporting teams open up and start dishing out pins and deaths.

I pull a squad back to defend the rear. You can see the pins stacking up on the one squad. Mortar team is almost dead. The squad with the pins was funny, the kept successfully promoting new leaders. It lent itself to funny jokes in bad German accents. :)

Jon has two squads in the foreground. They are causing a lot of trouble. The motorcycle with sidecar is dead. Such a cool model but I find that the jeeps and the motorcycle are quick to die. Jon has also moved into the house on the top of the picture. 

Only one picture for this next round. Armored car starts hitting the Stuart. That's it really.

Pak is KIA. Every one of my units has a pin marker. Not good. Plus side is that the MG in the road is just waiting for the unit in the far house to pop out.

Stuart taking hits. One stinking pin marker on one of the two units in the woods to my rear. 

The armored car destroyed the Stuart. This was the one bright spot of the battle. There was also a point where the Stuart FUBARed and killed one of Jon's infantry. That effectively DOUBLED my kill count. :(

Jon broke from the woods and just tore me up. I pulled the armored car down to try to help. It didn't. The rout was on. Americans take the crossroads. 

All in all, I do like this game. I like the rule set. Not overly complicated. I think I had a decent plan. I left the motorcycle exposed. That was a mistake. I maybe should have brought the Pak up instead of leaving it behind. Hard to tell. Bad die rolls and a couple of pins and it starts to go bad in a hurry.

Completed Bolt Action Box Set Buildings

The damaged buildings in this post come from a Bolt Action box set that Santa brought me. I didn't get a chance to do a WIP post because they went together and painted so quickly!This is a rear view of the house. I am pretty proud of myself. I got some plascard "flooring" from Dan's Crafts and Things. I think it came out rather well for a first time n00b. :) Next time, I will be a bit more brave and carve out some damage in the middle of the floor.

 Here is a front view of the house. Normally, I would paint the rocks black and dry brush them grey but I left the stone as-is. I thought it matched the stone of the house pretty well.






I did get more brave with the flooring in this one. Now that I look at it, next time I am just going to snap it off to get a more realistic break. Still...I think this came out rather well.

Battle Report: Bolt Action January 20, 2013

Jon L. organized a Winter Games Day at his church in Henrietta yesterday. I got in another fun game of Bolt Action. We played a 2 on 2 game. I brought my American Airborne supplemented by another airborne unit of Jon's. My partners had British troops. We were playing against Gary C. and Bo as the Germans. The scenario was for the Germans to "hold until relieved" the crossroads in the middle of the town. Here's a shot of the initial deployment:

My forces are deployed on the bottom quadrant (if you will). Bo had an infantry unit hiding in the leftmost house on the far side of the road. There is an observer and a MG team in the right most house on the far side of the road too.

We essentially played two games on the same board. We weren't really all that integrated in our attacks. It was me against Bo. My plan was to run around the left flank, let my mortar team do its job and then clear houses and Bo's mortar.

Turn 2 or 3 on the right. I have a command stand on the corner of the near house. These are working as observers for my mortar. I have an MG team in the house too. Infantry is in cover except from the mortar. Mortar mechanics are interesting. It takes a 6 to hit the first time. If the target does not move it goes to a 5 and so on. If you hit, from then on, it hits on a 2. As long as the target doesn't move.

I think I missed a picture. My mortars hit. Bo's mortar kept missing. I hit the house with Bo's infantry. Resulting in a pin marker. Pinning is a dynamic part of the rules that can be your friend or enemy. You have to rally from it. And you take -1 penalties for every marker when shooting. Bo took out my MG team in the house. My infantry teams landed some hits. I effectively took his team  out of commission. I kept the pressure on.

This is a close up of the current turn. Bo did manage to take out some of my Airborne. But I continue the press.

You can see the pin markers stacking up on Bo. The funny side action is in the foremost house on the right. Bo ran a command section at my mortar. They are between the houses. I moved a bazooka team into the house. They are literally right on top of Bo's unit. Neither of us could hit each other! It was funny.

I missed another shot here. I took out the unit in the house finally. Bo actually rolled double 6s which is a FUBAR role. The unit ran from the house into the crossroads and were cut down by my allies. I also took at a MG team that Gary backed out of the house. Another instance of getting some pin markers down. I took out the mortar team. Then I started running towards the crossroads. This was the final turn. We actually failed the objective. We did not take the crossroads. I needed another turn.

I really like this game. 2 on 2 bogged down a little bit with the dice pulls. We could have easily played it as 2, 1 x 1 games. I am really looking forward to playing this more.