Introducing the Perishables!

Well, it's been three months since I last was organised enough to post anything here, but now I have something to push me to do it - a new cast for 7TV, to coincide with the arrival of 7TV Pulp!

To pull this together, I raided my lead pile to find anything vaguely appropriate. I had the idea of creating a band of mercenaries in the mould of The Expendables, but set in the 1930's - so a variety of uniformed and non-uniformed cast members, but all with a military theme. 

I also got slightly excited at Partizan, and bought a pulp miniatures film crew for reasons that don't necessarily make sense.

Once I had that, and a billboard kindly donated by Kieron, I was pretty much duty bound to make a scenic base to keep it all on. And thus, the Perishables were formed...

 All of this was kicked off by the announcement of the Wargames Illustrated 7TV day for this year, which was held last weekend at Wargames Foundry.

To be honest, pulp isn't a genre that I've ever been particularly excited by. So it really was the strength of the 7TV Apocalypse day last year that drove me to pick up the Pulp version of the game and pull a cast together for it.

This year's was, if anything, even better, so I'm very glad that I did! We were each assigned to either Hydra or the Strategic Scientific Reserve to give an overarching theme to events. As a group of hopeless goody-goodies, the Perishables were on the SSR side.

On the day I played three games. The first, against Adrian's cultists, saw us scrapping over the components of a potential super weapon. Particular highlights for be were a scuffle between two spies on a cliff top, that was eventually resolved by my man shooting his opponent in a the back, and my completely forgetting to collect one of the objectives that I'd carefully deployed in front of until the end of the game.

Largely though, this was an object lesson why it's better to bring a gun to a knife fight if possible, as my rifles gave me something of an edge against cultists holding scary blades. I was thus able to snatch 4 objectives to my opponent's 3. All of which would have been more impressive if I'd actually won, but thanks to my failure to seize the McGuffin, I didn't.

Second, I was up against Matt's mobsters, attempting to capture a secret super weapon production facility, deep in the jungle. It's fair to say this went somewhat better, as a timely cliffhanger card combined with the gangster's positions to allow my rugged veteran to mow down half of the opposing cast in a single turn. I reduced Matt's mob to just the crime boss  (and I probably could have finished him off too if I'd remembered to steal the scene) and grabbed the lab too, but I can't claim this was due to tactics so much as pure blind luck at the right time.

The third and final game was where things got serious. The super weapon had been assembled, and the Perishables needed to destroy it before it could rain terror onto an unsuspecting populace. I was up against Simon's very nice gangster cast this time, and Simon made good use of cover to form two firing lines that covered every possible approach to the weapon. This made things very difficult, but I was able to combine stealing the scene and heaping almost all my plot points on one action to stagger through with the rugged veteran and plant the bomb. The mob boss made a stab at defusing it, but couldn't pull it off and so the Perishables saved the day!

The terrifying super weapon is just visible through the trees...

So, my results were a loss that I thought I'd won, and two wins that I'm not at all convinced I deserved. That's the wonder of 7TV, and part of the reason I enjoy these days so much. The game doesn't lend itself to competitive tournament-style play, so mostly people just revel in the glorious daftness of it all. It's a lot of fun.

Also, there were a few freebies and I managed to win some prizes by coming something like 4th in the overall rankings (there were a lot of prizes). After a bit of horse trading with Kieron, who also had some prizes, I ended up with 66 new models, so that's not going to have helped my painting totals enormously.

Incidentally, we'd been asked to provide a super weapon, and I struggled a bit for ideas. This is how I ended up with the terrifying spectacle of the board with nails in it...

Fearsome!

I wanted to get started early so I actually painted several more models than you see here. The rest are awaiting bases, but I've cunningly left a few spaces on the scenic base that I can slot them into. So that will be my next bit of work here, which you can expect to see here in another three months or so. 

Right then, painting scores. It's been months, so you'd expect a fair amount of movement in the figures, and indeed that's what we find.

Acquired: 126
Painted: 29

Right. Something of a mountain to climb there. The remaining pulp figures should help a bit, but it looks like I need some more quick to paint but numerous stuff to try to bring this under control. I'll see what I can do! 

Big cat on the prowl...

It turns out, now that I've checked, that by sheer fluke my last post happened to fall on the last day of the 6 Month Mountain Reduction and Painting Challenge for 2015. So, how did I do in the challenge?

Well, my goals were to finish my WW2 French army for Bolt Action, and to complete my Shaltari force for Dropzone Commander.

I managed both! I'm basically stunned by this realisation. My French force has been terrorising Pete's Germans for a while now, and my Shaltari have, er, also been involved in games.

Overall, my numbers for the challenge were:
Painted: 68
Jokers Used: 4
Jokers Earned: 2

Which doesn't seem bad to me at all. I'm really happy with that, and I'm looking forward to repeating the experience again next year.

Anyway, back to unguided painting and mountain reduction. We're planning a big Bolt Action fall of Berlin game for our Christmas all-day gaming session, and I'll be joining Pete on the German side.

To do this I needed to get more points of Germans ready, so a quick way to do this was a to paint a Panther. Which I have.

Big tank!

The turret turns and everything!

This is a Rubicon Models kit, and it went together pretty easily. The only issue I had was the front of the hull, where it didn't quite meet. I've had to use some filler there, but it's not too obvious and will be even easier to miss when there are other things on a table. So I'm happy.

It can even point the other way!

Unfortunately though, I've been forced (forced I say) to take advantage of the sprues sale that Warlord ran recently, so I've acquired 24 German infantry and a tiny truck for the French. So that skews my totals a bit. Ah well.

Right, what's next?


For 2015 so far:
Painted: 126
Bought: 93

A long overdue update - with more Shaltari!

Hello!

Yep, it's been three weeks since my last post, and longer than that since I posted any painting progress. This is because I've been in the throes of a secret project, and I didn't want to tip my hand to Pete "Just War" McSecretpaint by putting pictures up here too early!

So let's hope the incident where the Blogger app decided to "publish" instead of "save" when I added the photos didn't blow the whole thing.

Anyway, here we are at last. I've been beavering away on my latest Shaltari acquisitions for a while - because Pete was one of the first in our group to start a Dropzone Commander force, he's been able to get more options ready and had the advantage of more or less knowing what other players would show up with for a smaller game.

Now I've added some more options of my own, and can take the game size up to 1500 points. Hopefully some things here will be nasty surprises for Pete, but even if not, they should at least make games more interesting by giving me more stuff to suffer a humiliating defeat with.

So here we go, onto the models...

First is a Warspear. This is a fast mover, which means it makes attack runs across the battlefield and can only be targeted by reaction fire. That makes it hard to shoot down and gives it the ability to attack almost anywhere, but I suspect it's lacking in firepower so I'll need to be careful in selecting appropriate targets for it.

Whoosh!

Zoom!

And from underneath!

Then, two Tarantula battle striders. These are probably going to actually be my biggest hitters, and I wanted more than two when I went to get them. Sadly, only two were available, so that's what I have.

These have a special weapon that is better at damaging targets with heavier armour - something I've struggled to do up to now.

See? Two.

This one sort of crouches to target something on the ground.

While this one is more upright.

As there weren't any more Tarantulas in stock at the Outpost when I went shopping, I got a Jaguar warstrider. This is a big beast, with it's own AA turret. Ideally this can soak up a bit of fire and still punch back.

To the left...

... and to the right!

Last, but by no stretch of the imagination least, a Firedrake. This is a lovely model, and much bigger when I put it together than I was expecting! I had to get some parts replaced as they were miscast, which has left me with the miscast bits as spares, which I do have a plan for. 

This thing can beam in my troops, flies pretty fast, and has a powerful area effect weapon. I'm just hoping it isn't embarrassingly shot down before it can do anything!

*glides past menacingly*

So big the backdrop can't contain it!

View from above. Yes, this was fiddly to paint.

And breathe!

As is customary, let's see what that did to my numbers...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 125
Bought: 68

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 68
Jokers Used: 4
Jokers Earned: 2

Struggling to Contain Myself

I'm sure people must think I do some of my painting just to enable hilarious blog post titles like this one. I couldn't possibly comment.

Anyway, a bit more painting. These are the 10mm shipping containers I bought at Derby Worlds, for use as scatter terrain for Dropzone Commander.

These are from The Baggage Train, they're not the cleanest castings in the world but for something like this, especially at this scale, it doesn't really matter.

Anyway, I'll be hiding behind these in due course!

And now more numbers...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 119
Bought: 68

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 62
Jokers Used: 4
Jokers Earned: 2

More Shaltari!

Kieron pointed out in a comment on my last post, about my tower, that it was the first thing I'd painted all year that was neither French nor Shaltari.

I shall now redress that by posting some more Shaltari. Everyone wants Dropzone Commander pictures, right?

First up, some Spirit light gates.

Fwoosh!

Hover hover. Once again, poor lighting strikes my pictures.

These are super fast, and can deposit an infantry squad each. They are, like all Shaltari gates, a bit flimsy, so keeping them away from AA fire tends to be a good idea.

Then, a commander!

Yes, we need seven separate canopies on the turret.

It's just struck me that it's not obvious how the sponsons are aimed.
Maybe they just guess.

This is my Gharial, which at the moment only has experimental rules. I like it because it has powerful, but short-ranged, weapons. This means it forces me to fling my commander into the action head first, which is the kind of thing I tend to do anyway.

With these painted I'm at 1000 points of painted Shaltari now, and can abandon the shameful practice of playing with unpainted models. Just need to paint my secret reserve models so I can reach 1500 points!

I have also done some spending though - I was at Derby Worlds at the weekend and came away with a 28mm Panther for Bolt Action (with no immediate plan to paint it, it was just cheap...) and some tiny shipping containers, for my sneaky Shaltari to lurk behind.

Right, numbers time again...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 111
Bought: 68

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 54
Jokers Used: 4
Jokers Earned: 2

A Towering Achievement

Yes, I am fairly happy with the title of this post, why do you ask?

Our merry band of gamers has recently been a bit swept away by excitement over the new version of Kings of War. As this has follows hot on the hills of the Age of Sigmar travesty, we've gone for the obvious route of having games set in the Warhammer world but using the considerably simpler KoW rules.

I've decided that we need more terrain for this, and rooting around in my disturbingly colossal heap of unpainted models, I uncovered a tower. It comes from Battle Masters, the old MB/GW crossover game that I had as part of my unholy pilgrimage into the hobby (which, if you're interested (you aren't), roughly ran as follows: Fighting Fantasy books, HeroQuest, Battle Masters, Warhammer, 40k...). I sprayed it black some time in the late '90s, and a couple of brief decades later, I've finally finished the job. Well, apart from the flag.

So here's some pictures!

The flag needs something. Dunno what though.

Possibly some work for a plasterer there.

Stairs!

I've got nothing to say about this picture.

Trapdoor!

Of course, you're now desperate to see some numbers. And here they are!

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 108
Bought: 59

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 51
Jokers Used: 3
Jokers Earned: 2

Joker #2 Claimed!

I missed last week for blog updates, so now you get lots of Shaltari all at once. I imagine you couldn't be more excited.

That's right, it's more Shaltari, as my one-track mind continues to push me through dozens of tiny purple models. I've now completed everything from the starter set, which was my goal for my second challenge joker.

This includes the "spare" Haven Terragate, and an extra unit of Braves. These aren't counted in the starter set force, presumably to keep the starter sets at a similar points level, but you get the models, so I've painted them up. The Braves are actually on non-standard bases (generously provided by Kieron), but this doesn't really matter as infantry in Dropzone Commander is rarely on the board anyway - it's normally being transported or lurking in a building - so the bases don't matter too much.

So, the final bits painted for this are the super-fiddly Havens:

Wes calls these "bear traps". Can't think why.

And a unit of Braves:

Poor lighting strikes again.

I do still plan to make these bases look nicer later, but I'm going to keep getting more stuff table-ready first.

Stuff like these Yari scout vehicles!

Pew pew pew!

These were quite nice to do, as they were small but pretty heavily detailed.

Since I'd earned a Joker, I immediately spent it on more Shaltari, so once I have it all ready I can do a 1500 point force (or just have more choice at 1000 points). More on that to come no doubt!

Once more, let's look at my stats...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 107
Bought: 59

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 50
Jokers Used: 3
Jokers Earned: 2

More tiny purple tanks

That's right, I'm continuing with the Shaltari! If it's any consolation, the smaller models and the fact that there are less of them will hopefully prevent this from going the same way as the seven month "I-only-paint-world-war-2-French-and-you-will-look-at-them" period I've just come out of.

With that introduction to get you really keen to see these, let's have a look at more Dropzone Commander Shaltari models.

Hover hover, pow pow

These are Kukri skimmers. They have anti-aircraft guns, which are pretty important in a game where most units are carried around on big aircraft.

Not much else to say about them really, so if nothing else this post is mercifully short.

It's numbers time again...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 94
Bought: 54

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 37
Jokers Used: 2
Jokers Earned: 1

More Shaltari - infantry this time!

A quick post for once! I've continued my Shaltari-painting for Dropzone Commander, and now have these ready:

Tiny people!

They're Shaltari Braves (space hedgehogs in 8 foot tall battle suits, obviously). I'm going to go back and make the bases more interesting later, but the priority is to stop playing with unpainted models as I'm sure it's offending the dice gods.

Anyway, that's done stuff to the scores...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 91
Bought: 54

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 34
Jokers Used: 2
Jokers Earned: 1

The Shaltari get started

Having completely exonerated myself regarding any suggestion that I should be posting more often (see the entirely reasonable explanation for more details), I can now move on to some details of my recent painting.

Before the Great Failure to Post, I intended to show you this, my first painted Shaltari model, a Tomahawk skimmer tank thing:

Thank you to the people suggesting I use a white backround!
This does definitely look better, even though I painted it.

It's got a back too. Don't listen to Pete when he complains
that I haven't highlighted the underside. There's no light under there!

I was after a bold, simple to replicate colour scheme that I could use to paint an army quickly. I've sort of managed that. It was quick enough to finish the unit of Tomahawks:

Now there's three of them!

But then I moved onto the big stuff, the Eden gates. These are biggish flying units, and I wanted to get them done (mainly so I could glue the bases together) but they ended up taking ages, despite my "simple" colour scheme...

I need a bigger white background!

Ominous, aren't they?

Still, they're done now, and I can move onto the rest. I have some of the infantry about halfway to being done (4 bases of them. This should be all of the infantry from the starter set, but there's actually another 2 bases' worth in there - it's just that they don't come with bases. This is presumably just so the points value of the Shaltari set isn't loads higher than the others, but it's a bit irritating as I really want more infantry. Alternative bases have been acquired (thanks Kieron!).) and have started the Kukri AA tanks as well.

Which is just as well, as I've got excited and bought some more bits - a Gharial command tank, some Yari scout things and some Spirit light gates. This uses another joker, but I'm hoping to finish the starter set and claim another one quite soon! This is good, as Partizan is next week and I might be tempted by something there.

So, what's that done to my scores? Let's take a look...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 79
Bought: 54

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 22
Jokers Used: 2
Jokers Earned: 1

Joker claimed!

This is not likely to be among my most thrilling posts.

But following on from yesterday, I have painted the French mortar, and so have completed the army!

It's ok if the understated beauty of this picture makes you cry a little bit.

The medium howitzer I posted about doesn't count, because shut up.

Since this completes the project, I get a new joker available for use. Which is nice, but I in no way need to buy more models at the moment, so I won't be using it, at least for now.

At some point there may well be a picture of the whole force, when I have time to set up and take one without toddlers becoming involved.

So here are some updated stats...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 73
Bought: 47

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 16
Jokers Used: 1
Jokers Earned: 1

Starting something new at last!

If I just bluster in here and start writing as if nothing has happened, hopefully no one will notice that it's been two weeks since my inexplicably popular post dismantling the background for Age of Sigmar and I don't have to admit having failed one of the requirements of the 6 Month Challenge. So I'm going to do that.

Having finished the infantry bits for my Bolt Action French, I was forced to put that project on hold until I went to the loft to retrieve a big enough base for the mortar team - meaning that it's agonisingly close to being complete but doesn't quite make it yet. I've since acquired said base and assembled the mortar, but I haven't actually painted it yet, so I'm still just on the cusp of finishing the project and claiming the coveted extra joker (which I don't currently have a use for, but whatever).

Haven't taken a photo of it yet either, so this'll have to do.
It's one of the tiny number of non-Batman-related images you get
if you search for "joker card" on Google Image Search.

While I forced to stop painting French things, I started assembly of my Shaltari force for Dropzone Commander (a game that seems to have almost dropped off the group radar now, but I'm hoping that's temporary). Not had time to do more than that (he says despite having suddenly restarted Fallout New Vegas and spending many hours on that) but here's what's done so far:

Things!

With the fiddly exception of the Haven Terragates, these are all nice easy models to put together, which is nice. Experimental painting of those to start soon!

I've also received this beauty in the post:

Random German for scale. It's a big gun.

It's the medium howitzer I ordered for Mad Bob Miniatures a while ago. It's a nice model, but the casting isn't perfect, it needed a touch of trimming and there are parts that haven't quite come out properly. I think it'll all come out when it's painted though, and no one else seems to make one! At some point I'll need to find some crew, and a base big enough for this thing!

On the gaming front, we're supposed to have our first game of Frostgrave on Saturday. This looks interesting, we'll have to see if it's compelling enough to draw us all in for more than a few games. I'll keep you posted, I'm sure you're all enthralled!

French Reconnaissance Begins!

Probably they should have done this first, but my French Bolt Action forces now have the ability to carry out reconnaissance!

Yep, in a move that will surprise no one at all, I've painted more French stuff, specifically this Panhard 178 armoured car:

In the game, it functions like a less-good version of the Puma I already use with my Partisans - it has a machine gun and light anti-tank gun, and can run away when it gets shot at, but it doesn't have dual-direction steering (so isn't as good at running away) and it has thinner armour (so when it runs away less effectively, it's in more danger).

Looks nice though, dunnit?

So, outstanding things to paint for the French now are the mortar (can't do that until I go into the loft) and the medium howitzer (hasn't arrived yet).

I'm so nearly done!

So, let's have another look at the scores...

For 2015 so far:
Painted: 72
Bought: 47

And for the Challenge:
Painted: 15
Jokers Used: 1

French Infantry are done!

I've done it! The last 7 infantry models for my French Bolt Action force are now painted!

This means the army is very nearly done - all I have left is a Panhard 178 armoured car, a medium howitzer (which has yet to arrive from Mad Bob Miniatures) and the mortar.

Not having the mortar painted yet is a bit weird as I have done these guys:

I'm pretty sure we've forgotten something...

Unfortunately though the mortar is much easier to stick together if I also attach it to the base, and I somehow managed to leave all appropriately sized bases in the loft, so that'll need to wait until I go up there and get one.

But I have done two riflemen, one of them with a VB launcher:

By this point I have very little left to say about French riflemen.

And of course the LMG team:

Ratatatatatatatatatatatatatatatat

So now I have four 10-man squads painted - that's a pretty solid core for a Bolt Action force.
Unfortunately the French squads can be up to 12 men, so I'm sorely tempted to get 8 more at some point and bulk the squads up further... but not for now!

So what has this done to my scores? Let's have a look.

For 2015 so far I'm on:
Painted: 71
Bought: 47

And for the Challenge, it looks like:
Painted: 14
Jokers Used: 1