From GregB - More 12mm Germans for Early WW1

In this squinty photo are more 12mm early-WW1 German troops - nearly all from Kallistra.

Greetings all - here are some more 12mm Germans for my early WW1 project. There is a bit of a twist compared to my previous submissions on this subject - where my previous figures had been from Great Escape Games, nearly all of the figures you glimpse here in this submission are from Kallistra's 12mm WW1 range (the lone exception is the MG08 gunner - an extra I had found in one of my packs from Great Escape Games - always nice to get a surprise like that :) 

View of the infantry elements - the MG08 on the right is from great Escape Games - everything else is from Kallistra.

Most of the basing is consistent with the game "1914" from Great Escape Games, but there is one square base in the group - I intend to use this as a "Regimental Command" for games of "Great War Speahead". There is a unity of infantry, a command base, and a regiment of cavalry, both mounted and dismounted.

The Kallistra sculpts are very nice, and there is a bit more variety of poses available.

The Kallistra castings are a little thinner than the ones from Great Escape Games, but also have a bit more variety of poses and the range is a more established one with some extra variety. I recommend both Great Escape Games and Kallistra - they are excellent either way - but this gives some variety. 

German Dragoons - mounted.

For example, with the cavalry unit, these could/would represent some German Dragoons - either mounted or dismounted - to give some variety to go with the Uhlans. It's an example of how the Kallistra range is just a little more rounded out than Great Escape's (although, again, both are excellent - I recommend both). 

Side view of the Dragoons.

German Dragoons - dismounted. I might paint a base of horse-holders or something at some point...

It's been quite a dash to start this project. I have made a good start, and I feel a bit of exhaustion when it comes to this project, with my interests moving back toward other subjects for a time. We'll see where that goes - and at the rate vaccinations are proceeding in Canada, I expect you will see more of whatever that will be posted here...take care all, and thanks for reading!

From ScottM: Russian Infantry Final Post

So this will be my last post as I have received my first vaccine shot. So for a finale I've got a group of World War 2 Russian infantry. This group of eight figs are from Black Tree Design.

Nothing outstanding for these figs, just basic riflemen.

And lastly is Lady Death from Warlord Games.

So that will give me an additional 45 points for a total of 235 points to end the challenge with. 

Cheers to everyone and I'll hopefully see you all in AHPC XII!

From MartijnN: Celtic Bowmen

Well, no sign of an invitation for vaccination yet, so here we are again. Last week I painted some medieval bowmen, so this week I thought I'd do some Celtic ones. These are 3d printed 28mm figures from the March to Hell Rome series; you guessed it, another Kickstarter. They are simple figures, with a somewhat cartoonesk flavour, but I like them a lot and they paint up fairly well. For some reason I printed only four of them, so a few others will follow to make up  something representing a unit. Mind you, I do not really have a purpose for them as yet; I plan to do something of a skirmishing type of game, perhaps Infamy, Infamy or SPQR. The MTHR range is fairly extensive, the Kickstarter had Imperial Romans, Republican Romans, Celts, Germans, Carthaginians and sundry fun items such as gladiators, so all options are open really. 

Next up some figures I painted up just for fun. From the Scourge of  Valtan Forest comes this leprechaun. The concept completely eludes me, but it is a fun figure and painted up easily.

Finally, two figures from Ian Lovecraft's Viking Legends Kickstarter. Lovecraft projects are always fun and of very good quality, and this was no exception. These were among the very first figures I printed, and thus details are not always crisp and clear and I really didn't know how to  remove the supports easily; but the figures were still too good to chuck them into the bin. The final result is not too bad, I would say. These are Brynhildr (after the snake lady in Challenge XI the second female figure I ever painted), who surely looks suitably ladylike but definitely seems to know her business, and Eric Bloodaxe carrying some very compelling arguments.

Seven 28mm figures make 35 points. At least one more post to go, but I'm not holding my breath.

From SanderS: Corona Survivors (20 points)

 Hoi,

 

WhenCovid had just started rearing it's ugly head a 3D printer designer made a STL for a group of Survivors gathering that most precious of commodities: toilet-paper.

 

 I had a set printed by the ever obliging Perikles.be people and finally have found some time to paint them up. 

The figures are really nicely detailed and paint up a treat. The bases are all resin scenic ones from an unknown brand and the building in the background is my TT Combat comic store with Greenstuffworld posters on the walls.

Cheers Sander

From GregB: Ork Dakka Jet & Ground Assets

Ork Dakka Jet and ground assets - plastic models from GW.

Hi everyone - glad to see there are participants in the Challenge getting their jabs! Here in Northern Ontario, Canada, I expect it will be quite a long wait for me, so I hope you don't mind these random submissions. You will see that further efforts on my WW1 painting have been delayed by this sudden lurch back into GW territory. This is an Ork "Dakka Jet" and set of Ork "ground assets" for GW's 40k-themed air-combat game Aeronautica Imperialis. These have been sitting on my painting desk for months, and when I finished those 10mm Roman Auxilia a couple of weeks ago, I thought I might as well finish these bits too. 

The dakka jet is the basic fighter for the Orks - can be upgraded with extra rockits for air-to-air combat, or given bombs for ground attack missions.

Aeronautica is a fun game - obviously the setting won't be everyone's cup of tea, but I enjoyed the original version of these rules that Forge World released many years ago. The re-booted version, with nice plastic models, is a lot of fun too. The rules are not complicated, and it is fun to have these little combat aircraft from the grim and dark future zipping around, blowing up stuff, and each other. 

A bunch of random colours and patterns...fun little models to paint, although it can be slow going.

The initial model range focused on the Imperial Navy and the Orks, but it has since expanded to include Imperial Army (Valkyries) and the Tau (really cool!). I started painting my initial sets last summer, with the expectation that I would finish all of the models in short order...but hobby squirrels run around in my brain and I get distracted. This is a particular issue when trying to paint Ork subjects...they don't really have a uniform look to their gear and kit, and so each model is something of an individual effort for me, which makes painting Ork stuff a slog.

And so this poor Dakka Jet has been sitting even longer than the Roman Auxilia from my last submission. Probably since last November, when I had been last working on Aeronautica stuff...this one Dakka Jet was sitting there at the corner of my painting table, falling on to the ground occasionally, with a couple of base colours already on, waiting for me to finish it. But for months I just could not find the inspiration - I didn't feel like painting check patterns at the time, and besides, I had momentum with some other projects - but I finally just picked up the brush last week, and now it is ready.

Ork ground assets...a bunker of some kind, and assorted flak batteries to protect it.

In the Aeronautica game many missions involve bombing runs. You need something to bomb - that is where these "ground assets" come in. The bunker-looking thing serves as a target for the incoming bombers...the same pack came with an assortment of Ork flak emplacements which would protect this and add to the fun in the game.

Another view of the ground assets...these are in the same "scale" as the models for "Adeptus Titanicus"....

So there we are...my first GW and first sci-fi models painted in many months! Thanks for reading, hope you are all doing OK out there. Cheers.

From StuartL - Inquisitorial Team

Hello again,

Despite my best intentions, my painting pace hasn't picked up by much, but I do have some finished figures to show off. This Sunday I will be attending my local gaming club to pick up some 3D printed minis from a friend. Since I am going to be there anyway, I figured "Why not take some minis along and play a game?" I've been toying with the idea of trying out Inquisitor again. Inquisitor is a game released by GW a couple of decades ago, intended to be a cross between a skirmish game and an RPG. For whatever reason, GW sold the game alongside 54mm scale minis, which meant that it didn't do very well. The figures (while nice) were expensive and nobody really wanted to build a whole new set of terrain at that size. Luckily the rules were pretty good so a lot of players simply played with their existing 28mm collections, an hence Inq28 was born. 

I've played the game before and the rules can be fairly solid so long as players don't try to abuse them and you have someone running the game. I've managed to rope two friends into playing, so I plan to be the GM this time. 

The above figure is an Imperial Navy officer which came with one of the old 40K intro sets for the game, along with a crashed shuttle. For a monopose figure, it's really nice and painted up really quickly.

Inq28 is popular online for it's weird and often grotesque conversions. Inspired by the likes of John Blanche, GW's lead artist, the hobby side of the community is very active in producing all sorts of oddities and nightmares. This is my attempt to kitbash something for the theme. I see this guy as being a prisoner who has 'volunteered' to aid the Inquisition to reduce his sentence. Sadly the Inquisitor's interpretation of reducing a life sentence is simply to reduce the amount and quality of life you get.

For those situations where a gun isn't the answer, we have a heavily cybered up savant. This scrawny looking fellow and his companion come from one of GW's old metal Inquisitor sets. Loads of character and details in the sculpt, and they fit the theme perfectly.

Including the Guardsman I painted recently we have the full team of 4, plus the servo-skull. Will they be enough to get the job done this weekend? I'm not sure, but at least they look the part.

See you all next time.

From MartijnN: Medieval Bowmen

 As you now, I am really one for the smaller scales. As a matter of fact, before Challenge XI began I had not painted a figure larger than 15mm since the eighties, apart from some few Warhammer 40K figures bought on impulse in 2018. Mind you, I do have a sizeable (unpainted, of course) stack of  GW fantasy figures and some medievals for a fantasy project that has been on the backburner since time immemorial, but I had not yet come around to painting any of them. However, more inspired by following the Challenge during the last few years than anything else (I guess I, too, can blame Curt), I bought some medieval figures. I prepped them for the "main" Challenge, but you know how it goes. Now seemed as good a time as any to get them done, so here are no less than eight medieval bowmen:

 

They are plastic Fireforge figures. Now I am not a great fan of building figures, nor am I very adept at it, so please excuse the somewhat irregular poses. I am sure that it is more due to my poor modelling skills than to the quality of the figures themselves that some of them look like they have been overindulging in Mister "Cut me own throat" Dibbler's fine sausages again. Still, as a group I am not too dissatisfied with them. Of course I had to drop one of them on the floor, causing the bow to break. I'll have to find an alternative way to repair it, as I have lost the missing piece, but I wanted the post to go up today so that will have to wait.

Needless to say I used Contrast paints again, as well as some colours from the Scale75 Instant Colors range. I find the Scale75 paints a little fainter, or less opaque, than the Citadel paints, but they generally work ok. Obviously, I had to finish the figures with a coat of your friend and mine, as Youtube miniature painter Sonic Sledgehammer calls it (check him out, he is great): Agrax Earthshade.

So, as if I needed another project, eight 28mm figures for 40 points. Yeah!

From TeemuL: Ten Martians (50 points)

Still alive, still painting. Like mentioned before, I have moved and started a new jog, so everything is bit of a mess, but I have managed to paint something on my temporary paint desk. I assembled and primed these Martians from the Kill Team starter about the time I bought them and then put them in a box. Since they were almost ready, I thought they would be a quick paint job, they are basically just red robes and so on, correct?

Well, they are Games Workshop models, so they have quite a lot of details... I skipped most of them, but not all. I like the finish, the colored purity seals and other stuff brings them alive and bit individual, should be good for Kill Team, I think.

Contrast paints and metallic paints and they were done. Picking up the bright details makes them look much more finished and tidy than they actually are. :)

I have new "photo-booth", which means I don't have a photo booth, just taking photos in the most well-lit area I can find in the new home, kitchen. I also have a different mobile than during the Challenge XI, so everything is different. They look quite cold, but there's a nice mood, I hope.. Purely unintentional.

10 28mm models should give me 50 points, if I am counting. There are skulls on the chest of each of them, painted black on basically invisible in photos.

From ScottM: French & Indian War Indians

I've been slowly plugging away on these figs the past few weeks and finally got them finished yesterday. These figs are all 28mm metal. The first group are from North Star Military Figures' Muskets & Tomahawks line.

The next group, with the exception of one of the figures, I don't remember who they are from.

The second figure from the left is from Warlord Games and came with the A Dark and Bloody Ground book. The other three, I'm not sure where they're from. They're either from Warlord, North Star, Sash & Saber or Galloping Major. No idea. Anyway they're pretty nice figs to pad out my Indian units.

So that should be an additional 50 points for a total of 190 points.

From SanderS: I blame Curt and Sidney! and some Germans (50points)

 Hoi,

 2021 just keeps on giving... While I thought I was able to get some more painting done, here I am correcting papers again. 

In the few moments of spare time I have managed to finish 10 WW2 Late War Germans that I had started already but wasn't able to finish during the Challenge proper. The Stalingrad Collectors edition box from Warlord games that I am painting as a commission, has sooooo many plastic Germans that I promissed my employer Martijn, that I'd paint him a squad of late war troops for use in his store demo-games. 

The fun part for me was getting to try out the Valhallan Blizzard snow effect from Games Workshop. Now and then they actually get something useful done and this is some awesome stuff indeed! It is so easy to use and gets a really good and rather realistic effect of snow on the bases. I am going to try the snow on some of my SW Legion Snowtroopers next, when grading permits.The pictures are rather dark due to a lack of light over here and with artificial light on they were too over-exposed even for photoshop to get right.

In the catergory "Other News": a round of calling 3 different Public Health Services during 2,5 hours of my day off last week, I found out that I MIGHT get a summons to be shot, eeeehh get a shot somewhere in May. So it's possible I get the summons in May but probably later and the actual shot will be set even further away because I was set up to get Astra Zenica, which due to the Trombose thingy is now on-hold for people under 60 years of age, lucky me. That means I will be here a while longer which is great since there's two gentlemen from the Challenge that have gotten me in trouble. 

First up is our beloved Snowlord Curt; I asked him what glue he used to stick metal figures to clear acrylic bases without getting the haze on them due to the super glue fogging over. Greenstuffworld says he, the result may be guessed:

And than there's mister Roundwood who has done such an awesome job of creating the Laarden Project. I read Arthur his posts and the Lad has now persuaded me to visit Laarden in the future so quite a lot of orders have gone out. One of those was to Colonel Bill's shop and has arrived over here by the time of writing.

There's a lot of prepped figures left over from the Challenge and I will get as many of those done during the coming weeks but first I have to get all the papers graded so I am off!

Cheers Sander

 

From MartinN: A premature end to my Vaccination Challenge [108 points]

I wouldn't have thought to be one of the first to drop out. But apparently miracles do actually happen as After a single entry to the challenge blog I already had my first jab. Long before schedule. 

Originally I had big plans of "finishing" my 20mm Soviets, getting the opposition to a playable size as well as doing lots of other things that now will have to happen elsewhere. But in this case I certainly will not complain.

So first for my final submission we have some more Soviets to go with those I painted earlier. Again these are lovely sculpts from AB Figures. 

Then we have the first squad of German Infantry to oppose those above Soviets. Again these are AB Figures. For flexibility I painted up enough men to either field them as regular Infantry with just one LMG or as Panzergrenadiere with two LMGs.

While I went with a completely different paint scheme with my Soviets than in 28mm, for the Germans I very much stuck to my standard recipe .

26 upright and 2 prone figures in 20mm make for 108 points to add to my total. So 611 points this year thus far.

Apologies for this rather short post but I don't really feel very talkative today. So I hope all of you stay safe and get vaccinated as quickly as possible.