Napoleonic French Artillery - In Progress

I've slowed down alot this month, far too much happening and too little hobby time or enthusiasm available. But in what time I did manage I've been putting together some Napoleonic French artillery.

It's a Victrix set which I've had for a good year plus (possibly last year, or the year before Christmas present), and it's very nice looking.  My creativity seems to have taken a hammering I the last few years so I've struggled a bit with picking arms and poses but overall I'm happy. I've made two cannon and crew and here they are stuck to plasticard ready for (spray) painting.  The third artillery piece from the box I'm doing as a howitzer and I've yet to make the crew.

The Black Coach - An Undead Relic

In a land before time, back in the early 2000s, I purchased a Black Coach.  It was painted...well Black obviously, no self respecting vampire is ever going to be seen in anything else.  I didn't want to hide the vampire in his coffin so left his coffin and it's lid loose so he could pop in and out of the back, and with the addition of a couple of skeleton horses, a whacking huge MDF base and a very early 2000 paint job it was done.  It even travelled to university with me, spending a couple of years on the mantlepiece of a fireplace in my room.  

In the follow years it saw much use, scaring the forces of good across the land, and with this it became a little tatty.  It was a time before I'd worked out varnish coating, and there was plenty of scratching on the metal.  It was in need of a revamp; the base in particular annoyed me because it made the model an easy target, and also look very 'meh'.

Stage one of the revamp saw me tear the model from the base, something which the horse still took badly, and still haven't recovered from.  That wasn't something I worried about however as I planned to give it a spookier vibe with some 'real' horses rather than skeleton cartoon ones. Painted black of course.

The model then lay in a box all but forgotten for a while. Days stretched into months, and months into years, and one day I decided that while fixing up the Skelton chariots the coaches time had come.  Stage two appeared, with the cleaning of the paint from the metal, then plenty of green stuff helped me put it back together on a custom made base (customer made by me out of plasticard).  The coffin lid was glued shut, and the coffin itself glued into the back of the coach.  A little bit of bending of the traces saw the new horses 🐎 fit it nicely, even if one of the tails was a bit long.

Overall I'm very pleased how it looks on its new base with new horses, although I am getting nervous about making a decent job of the Black.  The next stage will be sand on the base, then a base coat (most likely brown) before I see if my painting kills are up to the task.  If it comes out similar to my black robed wraith I'll be happy.

Old black.

A Week Of Wheels - An Undead Tale with bits of carriage....

These last couple of weeks I have mostly been working on things with wheels.  Having decided that my Skeleton chariots would be fun to work on next somehow my black coach was added, then a superb ECW Warlord games coach came into the picture.

I've had the chariots for.....25 or so years, and this is yhe best cobdition they've ever been in.

This chap needed a revamp, he doesn't have wheels.

ECW coach - the most difficult of the transportation devices I was fixing up -ive had to brace the extra long base to stop it flexing, and lots of varying glues and putty had to be used.  The passengers, dog  hat and roof to be painted and stuck on later. 

The artist formerly known as The Black Coach.   Usually seen with skeleton horses but I liked this look more. Probably end up black again.

What the coach used to look like, a very dated and scratched paint job.

Digging Up Old Bones - An Undead Post

March of the mummies - an incredible present from a very good friend; six classic GW mummies teamed up with a couple of strays picked up/donated to the cause (possibly originally intended to be part of a blood bowl team.

I added a couple of bits of scatter scenery at the back, and a magnitised movement tray and it looks....well....actually quite good!  For once the pictures don't do the paint job justice, and they join what is a growing band of revamped undead.

Airbrush Adventures

 A few years ago (7 years.  How has it been 7 years?!?) I was gifted an airbrush for the first time.  Not an expensive shiny one, because I’d never had one before so didn’t know how much I’d use it, but an ‘entry level’ kit, as seen in the lovely pictures below.  It was great, I used it a fair bit at the time, mostly for painting 15mm German late war camouflage on my Flames of War vehicles, and rather super they look too if I say so myself.  However, it has been languishing in a cupboard with most of my modelling kit for a long time now. 

Until last month that is when, having watched some ‘Eons of Battle’ YouTube videos I decided to get it out and see if a). It still worked, and b). would it make my current (Wars of the Roses ) project more interesting/impressive.  So I whipped it out and stuck it on a table.  I tested it and all seemed fine – compressor worked, buttons worked, fingers worked pressing the buttons, and air shot out of the airbrush nozzle (a 0.3mm version in case you’re interested).  I laid out newspaper paper, I created a cardboard box backdrop to catch stray droplets, and I even got myself a facemask so I didn’t breath any in, which was oddly something I never thought of first time out.  Luckily there are many facemasks around at the moment. 

I loaded paint, aimed at the first victim…..and nothing happened.  No air, no paint, and nothing would make it clear.  I assumed there was an old blockage of dry paint so went about taking the airbrush apart, and found, well, no obvious blockage.  So I put it back together, only to overtighten the nozzle which promptly snapped off.  After some choice words I prepared to buy a new brush, but I was fortunate enough to air my frustrations on a gaming Facebook group, and a friend who’d had a similar occurrence gave me a link to a video on fixing exactly that problem.  Less than £5, a few days, and a new nozzle and needle dropped through the post.

Having installed them I put it back together and readied myself…..and the paint came out!  It looks as if I hadn’t pushed the needle all the way into the nozzle after cleaning it originally.  The fix came just in time for me to change my interests to Warhammer and my Undead (more on that another day) who were the reciptiants of a coat or two of lovely paint. It’s going to get a fair bit of use, and I’m also looking forward to trying out some new techniques I’ve seen online – YouTube really is a wonderful place, and for anyone new into airbrushing I can thoroughly recommend watching a few videos.  More results when they happen.  Or not.  Or not.

A Warhammer Siege - 7th Edition Style

But with a touch of 6th and 5th edition….. The son formally known as the bio-titan (and now aged 10+ with a wargaming obsession) decided that Warhammer Siege was where it was at this week, and feeling a bit of nostalgia I broke out the castle, the siege equipment, some classic buildings and my half-finished undead to storm his Empire fortress. The empire troops were his Perry miniatures figures from the Wars of the Roses, the Empire rules came out of the 4th ed rulebook, the undead came out of the 6th ed rulebook (with a bit of ‘winging it’) and finally the main rules were 7th ed, but with the siege rules I could remember from 6th ed….and with the Heinz 57 in place so it began. *

The Opening Gambit 

The Undead began with a shuffle, and headed for the castle. Lead by Nagash, representing a master necromancer in this game, they moved quick enough for a bunch of dead guys and swiftly closed with the walls. The defenders opted to unleash arrows from the walls, and sally out with some knights. The knights met the zombies and their battering ram, and, having caused insufficient casualties to stall them, fled back through the gate. At this point the Empire unveiled their not-so-secret weapon; a wizard lord of the ‘Light Magic’ variety. Who promptly blew Nagash away with irresistible force. Greatest necromancer of all time killed in a minor skirmish. Awkward.

 

 

 

The Charge Continues 

Luckily for the forces of darkness their main units were lead by characters, and while the side units of skeletons and screaming skull stone throwing thingies faded away the zombie and their battering ram, led by a wraith, carried on. They had to put up with another sally forth by a second company of knights, equally unsuccessful, before they could put ram to wood and start pounding at the door. Unfortunately their ram was clearly made of soft wood, and the door of something rather harder, and they barely made a dent. On my left a vampire thrall led a tide of zombies over the walls with the aid of a siege tower, throwing back the defenders and spilling into the streets beyond. The grave guard also made it to the top of the walls, where their vampire lord leader cleared house, and the defenders fled to the nearest tower for safety, locking the door behind them.

 

Fighting in the Streets 

The Empire knights, having recovered from their battering-ram phobia, counter-attacked through the streets, crushing the vampire thrall and his zombie helpers under their hooves. The Vampire Lord led his troops in a swarm into the flank of the knights, driving them off, only for the second knight company to crash into the grave guard from another angle. The vampire was gradually gaining the upper hand, but the grave guard were almost spent, the zombies and vampire thrall gone, the door knocker wasn’t working, and, finally, that dastardly Light Wizard Lord was heading his way. It looked about as promising as a garlic stall at a vampire convention, so he chose to shake his fist in classic “you haven’t heard the last of me!” style, and hop back over the wall and into the nearby wood.

*Disclaimer - any injury, physical or mental, caused by the appearance of so much unpainted/half painted material is not the responsibility of the author.

Wars Of The Roses - Part 5

 A mere four years later and a Wars of the Roses post appears.....between children, football (children's football!), work, general exhaustion and indeed now Covid-19, I have done little in the way of gaming and modelling.  However, recently I have been tinkering a bit.  My 10 year old is very keen on wargaming, and this helps, although he bounces between periods and genres quicker than an Audi going between lanes on the motorway.  

I started by fixing the odd bit here and there - broken Imperial Guard sentinels and guardsmen, and an undead dragon or two - and found it therapeutic.  Buoyed by the appearance of a nice set of rules called Never Mind The Billhooks I began putting together a few figures from the many boxes of Perry Miniatures Wars of the Roses figures which have been laying about for about  four years.....and we're back were we started. Since I discovered the period theres always been something about it that makes me keen coming back. In the future there may be more posts; I'm hoping to explain how the army is based - expensively it turns out - and I've dug out my airbrush so that could be good for an 'amateur destroys army during horendous airbrush fail' post, but for now heres a few pictures of my current collection (should you have a fear of grey plastic now is a good time to avert your eyes or find the washing up etc more enticing). Yes, most of it is grey. In fact even the bits that are painted have bits which are grey because they needed arms and weapons (and tails) replacing or repairing after years of being ignored or 'played with' by a well meaning smaller person. And theres a chicken coop. And a badger. I don't know why there is a badger. There is some brown however, but that is mostly the bases. I should also mention that the bottom picture is some of my son's army, complete with Henry VII. He has many, many models and will hopefully be quicker at painting that me.