Christmas goodies

so the fat man has come and gone, and what did he leave for me. Well he left a bag of Old Glory Bengal Lancers for my 19th century british army, and US Cavalry command. I have this desire to wargame the Harry Turtledove book `How few remain', so just need some more US now.

I also had a £30 voucher for my FPGS so this translated into a chimera and a Sentinel for my IG army.

My son got a box of tactical marine, scouts with sniper rifles and devastators for his Ultramarine army. He also got the new movie so I look forward to watching that.

This year will be a year of gaming austerity as I need work doing to my house to the blog will be devoted more to pictures of completed projects rather then new ones.

Thanks to all those that bothered to read my idle musings and Happy New Year

iPhone apps

As pat of my attempt to join the tech savvy crowd, I've upgraded to an iPhone . This has introduced me to the delights of the app store and so I've spent more time thanks healthy searching for gaming apps . I've yet to find one for warhammer or 40k but have downloaded a really good dice roller that allows you to set the number of dice tone rolled and the pass number. It even has a speed roller option to allow only the passed dice to be re-rolled. This could be godsend with the amount of 40k I'll be playing over the holidays with my son. If i find any other good apps I'll post them here.

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Ebay smeebay

Hello, My name is melvyn and I'm an e-bay addict. I've had this idea of running a mid C19th WW1 for a while now, and have been deciding what scale to do it in. Initially I thought of massed battles using 10mm figures but that meant painting thousands of stands and I stalled after undercoating the Austrians. So onto the ebay purchase. I picked up 500 Helion 28mm castings of 1866 Austrians, so thought mm need some more prussians. Thankfully I lost the auction to win 2000 castings! As I may have mentioned, I'm at risk of having more lead/plastic than I could paint in a lifetime.... And still the Sudan is beckoning!
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Some more photos

Whilst I come to terms with the enormity of the project I've started with my Austro-prussian war project, I thought I'd post some more photos of yet another game I failed to win against my son. I think I must be misreading the rules( WHH Great War), as I could not find any gun that was capable of penetrating the armour of my tank. So the game degenerated into the two tanks chasing each other around the table failing to damage each other until my infantry decided to fail a morale check and scarper.

Busy year

As I am in the process of transferring to next years diary, I thought I'd tally up my painting stats for this year:

501 28mm Castings painted

2 flames of war platoons, 16 tanks and 7 artillery pieces

104 20mm plastics (for my son's collections)

Overall - not bad.

However in the same period I bought or won more so the unpainted lead mountain has not decreased. In fact one e-bay purchase is about to wipe out the whole years work (500 28mm 1866 Austrians), so back to the drawing board.

I think I might have a year off buying models next year! (tongue firmly in cheek)

Update on painting

last time I posted that I was working on more Nazi zombies. Well these are finished to the point the quickshade is on and once it's dry I'll drybrush the bases with a dark earth colour. Also waiting for bases to be completed are the dark angels veterans and the chaos marines as well as a new unit of 10 imperial guard. Previously my IG were Tallarn and Cadians in a desert camo scheme as they were painted at around the same time as my 28mm modern US troops, (remember them?). This group have been done in feldgrau with black armour and guns. I have to say they look ok, especially when the dip is applied.

Next onto the painting table are a FOW German mortar and HMG platoon, and some WW1 French for variety.

I hope to get through these in the not too distant future so I can move onto the WW2 Russians I WON in a Battlegames competition. Yes a £50 voucher gets you a lot of 28mm Plastic russians from the plastic toy soldier company (3 boxes by adding £5 of my own money, or 171 miniatures). I don't think I'll do all 3 boxes in one go or I'll get bored and stall. Perhaps if I break them up with some sudan fuzzy wuzzies (it will give me an excuse to get some more British for that period), or some Warlord games ECW?

my painting time is limited now as my job has changed slightly so I now have to work shifts including nights, rather than an on-call system. Still it does mean that for 6 weeks in every 12 I only work 9-5 so it can't be all bad.

More 40K

It was my son's ninth birthday the other day so I've spent the weekend helping him assemble his new space marine battalion (5 scouts, 10 tactical marines, 5 assualt marines and a Rhino) so he can paint them with the new paint set he also received.
Saturday afternoon involved a trip to our FPGS to part with all of his birthday money. He returned with a landspeeder, a ironclad dreadnought and Terminator chaplain and librarian. He wants to paint them in his rugby team colours (gold and blue), so we've been using the Bolter and Chainsword application to devise the precise colour scheme.
All this has got me excited about space marines again so I broke out a box of veterans I'd bought a while ago for my Dark Angels sucessor chaptor. When all is done I'll post some photo's.
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Books - curse them

This month I've been re-reading Dan Abnett's 40K books and that's got me back into 40K. The Nazi zombies are finished and so I've got out some cadians and space marines that were at the bottom of my cupboard. This has delayed me starting a Flames of War campaign with my son, (Market Garden anyone?) I've got this idea about refighting it using guard and orks (with the latter being the germans) or guard vs space marines.

I've managed to get some real e-bay bargains recently. The best of these was one of the old Warhammer regiments boxes. I can't wait to paint these if only for the nostalgia factor. If I remember I'll post some photos here.

Right, back to the 40K rulebook.
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I am disappointed with GW

I think I mentioned a few posts ago that I'd bought some chaos space marines - namely Thousand sons and Noise Marines. Well, I tried to put them together this week with a view to painting them at the weekend. I say tried because despite my trusty super-glue I could not get the arms to stick to the plastic bodies no matter how hard I tried or how loudly I cursed. I'm going to try again this weekend.

I was cheered up slightly by finishing my secrets of the third reich zombies. Without sounding big-headed 'm really proud of the way theu turned out. GW bleached bone highlighted with rotting flesh, then inked with Thaka green and finally brushed with army builder strong tone. It really makes them look rotting and I'll post some pics soon for comments. In fact I was so happy that i went out and bought another blister.

Next to the painting table are some skaven and dwarves for WHFB 8th edition which I picked up cheap from my local friendly gaming store.

Pause for thought.

I have been listening to old D6G podcasts and realised that I hadn't really noticed what good reviewers they are. Although they have a strict 'no hate' policy, they're not afraid to voice opinions on games that will win them no friends.

Other than that I'm slightly depressed by the lack of painting in the school holidays. The alure of sitting in the evening sun/rain with a cold beverage has been hard to resist, and even this is partly the D6G's fault. If they hadn't raved on about Harry Dresden, I wouldn't have read the first on and then had to buy all the others. Ah, beer and good book, almost as good as gaming
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More new photo's

the second game was WH40K with orks going up against the mighty verdigris angels (a Dark angel successor chapter) I think the pictures speak for themselves and you can guess who won (not me)!

Long promised photos

So here as promised are some photos of the games I played recently with my son Tom. this is from the imaginary 19th century British vs Germans battle using Warhammer Great War rules. Tom was the Germans and managed to advance despite the well entrenched 24th foot (2nd battalion redeployed urgently from South Africa so still in colonial uniforms)

I hope the uniforms come out, I have to say that I'm fairly proud of the painting here but still happy to admit that even on a good day it's only mediocre

hurrah back on line

It only took my IP 30 working days to reconnect me after my move, so haven't been able to post for a while. In that time I've moved house, unpacked most of the boxes, and even managed to get a game of 40K in against my son. Just a quick 1500 pointer of orks vs space marines, yet predictably I lost! i just can't help rolling badly. It gets even more embarrassing when my deep striking terminators deviated into firing range of his gretchins; who managed to roll outstandingly (30 grotblasters hitting on 6 managed 20 hits!), and I then rolled awfully (saving on 2+ only managed to save half of them) to see the unit wiped out before firing a shot!

I'm thinking of giving up or investing in some loaded dice (just to even things up honest).

So I finished the ork painting marathon and somehow got diverted from my projects to painting my son's 20mm Celts and Romans which I've based for warhammer ancients.

when I get through these I'll probably move onto some 28mm WW1 or some el-cid islamic armies, although I've got some itching to paint some more space marines or possibly some plastic vikings from gripping beast or............

not moving yet

So we're probably not going to move until the end of July, so I've been trying to get through as many of my unpainted figures as I can. The problem is that I've got 72 2nd Edition Orks to paint and then 60 WW2 germans, as well as 30 nazi zombies on the painting table. I think I've stalled, but am forcing myself to wade through them before I go onto something more exciting (like some ECW plastics from Warlord).

I went on a course the other week with work which was held in the Royal Armouries, Leeds. For those of you outside the UK this was built to house the enormous holdings that had outgrown the White Tower in the Tower of London. It is divided into 4 sections. My favourite was the War gallery with a diorama of the battle of Pavia. This was of lifesized Lansdknechts and Gendarmes, and had a audio clip that was designed to be as if a reporter was commentating on the battle in a manner akin to a football game. Very cool.

So hopefully the next post will detail either some gaming or painting, but don't hold you breath.

Oops

drat I won.

games what games?

So I'm moving in the near future, and my wife has put a veto on buying any more lead/plastic. I think this was in response to 2 things. Firstly I've boxed up all my unassembled and unpainted figs (2 large boxes) ready for the move. She wasn't all that impressed when she saw how many there were. This was the same day as 5 regiments of WW1 infantry arrived from Renegade Minis. My usual argument of having ordered them 'ages ago', which whilst true this time, didn't impress her.

she has suggested that I don't need to but anymore until I've 'played with what I've got'! So I'm now desperately trying to finish all the undercoated projects before we move as some of the armies may have to go into storage until I either burglar-proof the shed in our new house or build another.

Ooops. Just remembered, just before she banned my I bid on some eldar, still I might not win them...........

Waargh!

So there I was, churning slowly through Tom's christmas presents (4 boxes of orcs and a Tiger tank, eclectic or what?), when the D6G did it again. I was listening to their one year on review of WH40K 5th edition and they praised it so highly that before I knew what I was doing I was in my local friendly professional gaming store (firestorm games, trade street, Cardiff) looking to get a new army. This was where I had my meeting with what I believe is termed a Hammerhead. I was weighing up the pros/cons of getting the rules and perhaps a codex or 2 when over he came. In the next five minutes I managed to get three words out, but he did give me one nugget that was useful. He pointed out that the Black Reach box set had around 750 points for both the orks and space marines, as well as the rules but without all the fluff. As I can take or leave the fluff of the 40k universe I realise that this might be a good bargain, so I bought it.

When I got it home, I was very impressed with the standard of the plastics especially the defcopters. My son has claimed the orks for his army, and I think that gives him 1000points, but he still needs some runtherds. I've tried getting some on e-bay, but without much luck. I may have to bite the bullet and order them from GW.

I had a load of amazon vouchers through work so as well as appeasing the wife with some books, I bought 2 boxes of chaos space marines (emperor's children and thousand sons) to finish off my chaos army. However amazon has sent me a box of noise marines instead. I don't mind as they look cool and will probably go on the painting able next, after black reach, before the victorix british and the warlord ECW, as well as the 10mm stuff........

I had a game!

So my wife got me a year's membership of my local friendly gaming store (firestorm games in Cardiff), but I hadn't had a chance to use it yet. Then my brother promised my son that if he came to visit he'd play 40k with him having been quite the player himself back in the day. So he came down this week, and we held him to his promise. However, we didn't play 40k as neither my son nor I have a complete army (1500 points) so we decided instead to play our usual 19th century game but using the Warhammer Historicals Great War rules.

On a table with probably too much terrain we had a blast. I learnt that artillery is can be devastating. Somehow even when the barrage deviated it was always into one of my units; and my brother learnt not to charge infantry in cover with lancers. We managed a six turn game before packing up, and as usual my appalling dice rolls lead to a German victory. In my defence if the last assault phase had been kinder, I may have scraped a narrow win. As it was a failed morale check saw my 24th foot disappearing in to the distance taking a platoon of the 88th with them, and the final nail in the coffin was the scheduled appearance of yet more lancers making their appearance on my baseline.

All in all a good week, but no painting done.

Lent is over! So have celebrated by taking advantage of the Renegade minis offer to increase the size of my WW1 armies so the lead mountain looks like increasing.......

Just been looking at the lead mountain, and thought I'd share it with the world:
WW1 10mm Russians - 2 armies
WW1 10mm Austrians - 1 army
1866 10mm Austrians - 4 armies
All from Pendraken

1870 French 10mm - 4 brigades of infantry and on of heavy cavalry - from Magister Millitum.

24 28mm Greek Hoplites
24 28mm Crimean British inf
30 28mm Bavarians for FPW
12 28mm WW1 British Cavalry
24 28mm WW1 German Cavalry
90 28mm Sea Peoples
16 28mm SYW British Inf
50 28mm SYW Prussian Hussars
6mm Baccus Austrian and French armies
6mm Baccus WSS French and Bavarians

Boxes of the following plastics:
Warlord ECW (10)
Warlord Romans
Warlord Ancient British (2)
Perry French Curraissiers (2)
LOTR Rohan army
Cadian IG (2)
Space marines (3)

As well as 3 boxes of 1/72 celts my son has asked me to paint for him.

I think at my current rate of painting I should finish this in about 2-3 years! But only if I don't waste time gaming!
I had thought of going to Salute but will have second thoughts - especially with the release of plastic vikings and hoplites!

Perhaps my daughter has done me a favour and I should aim to be lead/plastic neutral this year.
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Dawn of War

I found this at the bottom of a drawer and loaded it up onto my laptop. I think I may lose lots of my life to this game especially as I'm getting back into WH40K with my son. He's collecting an orc army which I've supplemented with some judicious e-bay purchases (gretchin anyone?).

The other reason I've been playing the game is that my daughter has forced me to promise not to buy any soldiers in Lent. This has had an impact on my willingness to paint. Usually I motivate myself to crack through the grunt units or large units by promising myself that once I've done the current unit I'll get to paint the new hotness whatever that may be. Not getting any new mini's to kick start/refresh my enthusiasm for a period has really reduced my willingness to paint. I didn't think that this would be the case when I agreed as I thought it would be the opportunity to catch up and reduce the lead mountain a bit.
Roll on Easter!
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New technology

So I got one of those raspberry things and thought I'd try to see if I could keep the blog more up to date that way. So this is a trial run of a posting.
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So I do update this blog!

So I just realised that I sort of forgot about this blog! To my one follower - sorry and thank you for being interested enough in my ramblings to want to read them as soon as their posted.

So Christmas was the usual round of beer food and presents. Not much on the wargaming front this year, although I did get Tide of Iron and the Rommel expansion. I think this might be a way of getting my 8 year old into Flames of War. This is looking a better option since he has discovered the old WW2 film "the longest day" and now is obsessed with the paratroops, and this was solidified by showing him "A bridge too far" on NYE.

since then I've been relatively busy on the work front, managing to secure a job I'd been waiting for for over a year. This gives me a degree of stability so I can concentrate on other things - like gaming.

I've had a couple of games with Tom (the 8 year old), mainly using 19th century British and Prussians, usually contesting a river crossing and a town. The rules are modified WH40K so that if and when he gets his orks ready, he doesn't have to learn new rules. The main thing is that they are simplified. If anyone wants them leave a comment and I'll post them here.

Finally let me update you on the lead mountain progress:

Bought: 20 28mm US Paras

40 Plastic WOR billmen

15mm Stuart x2

15mm Universal Carriers x3

Protectorate of Menoth starter box/swordsmen/bastions

Warmachine Mark 2 rules

War of the ring rules

10 plastic Catachans

60 28mm WW2 Germans

5 15mm Stugs

15mm 88 PLatoon for FOW

Arnhem book for FOW

4 Howling Banshees

Painted: 40 28mm Zulu warBritish

20 28mm US Paras

20 28mm WW2 British

15mm FOW US para platoon

All the menoth stuff

12 28mm German WW1 Cavalry

4 15mm Italian tankettes

15mm Bergsegali platton for FOW

15mm Italian AT guns x 6

15mm Italian Infantry guns x 6

5 Plague Marines

4 Howling Banshees

10 Catachans

10 Slaanesh daemonettes

5 15mm Stugs

48 20mm Italian ww2 infantry (for my son)

2 15mm stuart tanks

3 15mm bren carriers.

Whew, that is more than I thought. The sad thing is that I don't think I've made much of an impression into the mountain!