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.

From MartinN: Full throttle into the Vaccination Challenge [26 points]

Well, usually I feel somewhat exhausted after the three months of AHPC but not this year apparently. I'm still on fire and chomping at the bit to crack on with my foray into the world of 20mm wargaming. Thus this Vaccination Challenge thingy should be just the ticket to keep me focused.

So to follow on from my last post over on the AHPC blog we have the ZIS-3 AT gun for which I had already painted most of the crew (bar one). One of the things really appealing to me in 20mm or 1/72 is the sheer amount of stuff you can get. 

Whereas in 28mm you'd be hard pressed to find a crew of six for your AT gun, let alone one that could be arranged in almost mini-diorama style, all figures below except the gunner are AB Miniatures. Best of all they sell the crew without guns so you can take full advantage of all the model kits out there. I went for a rather cheap but cheerful gun by Zvezda, the gunner came with the kit. The gun is not overly complex and went together easily. But I still managed to loose a small but important part I had then to scratch build.

Anyway, I'm rather chuffed by how the gun turned out. It'd have been nice if there'd been a few more shells with the set but you can't have it all, right?

Next is a set of Soviet medics with casualty. As AB only released a set of Soviet medics this last saturday (and I of course had placed my latest order on Thursday) I went with Zvezda again. I've to say I really like their offerings as they scale well with AB and for the most part have excellent detail.

I didn't paint on any Red Cross markings as I believe to remember to have read that these were, due to the nature of the conflict, rarely observed on the Eastern Front, thus likely to have been omitted by the troops anyway.

I re-positioned the head and left hand of the female medic as to better interact with the casualty, but other than that it's the stock kit. In retrospect my Soviets might probably be a little too uniformly dressed with no variation in their clothing at all. That said it sped up painting no end and actually looks quite nice when arrayed together.

I've decided to carry on counting my points throughout this year till the beginning of the next Challenge. Both to motivate me and keep track of my progress. Thus with a Challenge total of 477 points plus the 26 points of this submission I'm currently at a 503 points. 3 points above my target for the Challenge.

With my government currently making a complete laughingstock of itself I'm rather sure to be among the last to submit to this blog. Hopefully it's the last time we "need" a Quarantine Challenge though.

OK, that's it for the moment. Next up some armour maybe.

From RossM; 20mm DAK Support Weapons: (28 points)

Next finished pieces to show are additional support weapons for the D.A.K. started in the AHPC X.

The next two support stands for the D.A.K. from SHQ Miniatures include an 8cm Grw 34 mortar and crew plus a second MG34 because you can never have enough suppressive fire...

These were started during the AHPC X however where not completed in time to be shown there.

To follow these will be another infantry section and some more support for the poor bloody infantry.

These would be worth 28 points in the AHPC X

Running total is 88 of 500 points; 17.6% of the way there. 

Thanks for visiting and hope you found something of interest.

Stay safe

Cheers for now.

From PeterA: Some Modern Russians

Despite being on lockdown, time seems to have slipped by alarmingly quickly since I last posted at the beginning of the month. So, even though the unit isn't finished, I thought I had better post these up sharpish.

They are all 20mm Modern Russians from Liberation Miniatures. I attempted to represent VSR camo on some of them, but at tabletop distance it can't be made out (which is its job I suppose) so several are without - I may go back and add this in later, but for now they are done. The other feature was adding a bigger collar out of greenstuff in an effort to represent the jackets many Russian soldiers wore in the First Chechen War.

I also revisited a couple of BTR80s (also from Liberation), heavily weathering them with AK pigments. I may have gone too far with this but then again, I have seen plenty of pictures of pretty filthy Russian vehicles!

That's all for now - stay safe and stay healthy!

From TeemuL: Cavalry Charge! (92 points)

Now I return to my last post on Challenge X, where I posted my first ever Napoleonics. I have now finished the whole Italeri box of 20mm Prussian Cavalry. From Italeri web site:

"On October 16th, 1813, general Yorck led his Prussian Dragoons in a desperate charge against the positions defended by Marshal Marmont's French troops during the assault of Mockern, a village near Leipzig. It's one of the main phases of the famous “battle of the nations” that radically changed the alliances and boundaries in Napoleonic Europe. The Prussian light horsemen are represented with their headgear protected by oilcloth, as customarily worn during military campaigns"

Most of the horses are running, some walking. I didn't mix them on the bases, and it might not look nice, if mixed in a unit.

I painted them by paying attention to the painting guide on the box, black boots and hat, grey trousers and bright blue jacket with white gloves, belts etc. I have no idea if they are historically accurate or not or do they represent some real unit or not. The flag has yellow borders and something blue on the white field.

I started the basing, but after finishing the three small bases I run out of the stuff and had to change to different one for the big base.

There are five different types of horses and riders (plus command), so I used three different colors on horses to create some variety.

Close up of the small flag and horn blower

I have a bit mixed feeling on these. They are superbly quick and easy to paint compared to current GW range for example and they are very cheap (17 mounted figures for less than 10 euros). But I still might want even smaller miniatures to create even bigger forces and battles. So even though these are painted to tabletop level, they might end up spending rest of their lives in cabinet. Anyway, I guess I'll buy some more Prussian Cavalry in this scale in the future, just to create a bigger force (and have separate units for walking and running horses).

One of the horses charged very fast and dropped a rider. Or did he took a bullet? Vacuum cleaning might be related to disappearance as well...

12 mounted 20mm is 96 points, but since one of the riders is missing, the total is 92 points. These are Fresh miniatures bought this year and they Reinforce (and complete, for now) my Prussian "army", which I started at the end of Challenge X.

U: 0 (total 3)
N: 0 (total 1)
W: 0 (total 1)

N: 12 (total 12)

R: 12 (total 12)
Points:
92 points for miniatures (total 142)

From Minion Teemu:
I'm sorry to hear about your vacuum accident and problems with basing material, but the bright blue colors should cheer you up!

From Curt: Pak 40 Anti Tank Gun (25 Points)

We're almost a week into the Quarantine Challenge, with a very tidy 32 posts under our collective belt. Great work folks - well done!  The week coming to a close also means that my self-imposed deadline of submitting post each week is fast approaching.

So I was casting about my hobby room trying to figure out what to do next, when Nick came to the rescue by tweeting me, asking what was going on with my 20mm WWII Italian Theatre project. The quick response was 'well, nothing actually', but it did make me think and prompted me to uncover a few half-completed projects I had been working on; one of them being this German Pak 40 that has been sitting on my desk for the past year or so.

This is fitting as I had done up a trio of Canadian Shermans from the Three Rivers Tank Regiment a while ago and thought that they needed some opponents to give them a bit of pause. 

This is a plastic kit from PSC. They do a very nice job on the gun, with lots of nice extra bits, but I found the figures to be a bit soft in detail. No matter, as we all know, everything looks better with a lick of paint, right? 

I had some extra MDF wall bits left over from Byron's excellent Italian buildings he designed for me and so decided to have the gun nestled in a wrecked structure, waiting in ambush. This will provide a nice anti-tank option for German players in our ongoing Italian theatre games.

Okay, this should give me 25 points, with 10 points for the gun and 15 for the three gunners. This will put my running total at 45 points towards my 500 point target. Yikes, time to get a wiggle on!

-Curt

From PeterA: Ruined Apartment Block and Burnt out Car

First of all a big thank you to Curt for organising the Quarantine Challenge - a splendid opportunity to keep spirits up at this pretty surreal time.

My first submission is a scratch-built apartment block in 20mm for modern wargaming. I have been interested in the first Chechen conflict for a while now and the news that Carl Titterington is planning on releasing a Chechen War supplement for his Contact Front rules got me fired up to add some terrain. It is made out of foamcard and artists mounting board and is meant to survive the rigours of gaming rather than being an architectural masterpiece! So I haven't bothered with doors (might go back and add these later) although I have put in a few shattered panes of glass here and there (made from plastic blister packaging)

Depicting rubble is always a compromise between realism and playability - I have gone firmly for the latter so that I can place figures without precariously balancing them. With my sausage fingers, I need all the help I can get!

To make it a bit  more user friendly in games, the rear wall slides off, making access to the inner floors more straightforward. Again, function over form so no staircases, internal rooms etc. I started painting the internal walls but the card started to warp so I have left the rest. The idea of the removable wall has been pinched from Alan Sherward's utterly brilliant Stalingrad table (featured in Wargames Illustrated a couple of issues ago - you can see it here on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yJsgbZ4wUo).

Finally, a bit of scatter terrain for figures to take cover behind. This is a toy die cast VW which has been weathered using GW rust effect paint. The windows have been damaged and I drilled a few bullet holes as well, but it was basically a very quick and simple job for once.

I hope to add more bits and pieces for this conflict over the course of the Quarantine Challenge, as well as finishing off a few of the things started during the Painting Challenge.

All the best - stay safe and stay healthy.