Triples 2013

After no posts for ages its all turned a bit bus-like! Mainly because I’ve got a gap in my painting.  I made the trip over to Sheffield for Triples 2013 in the excellent company of Michael (chauffeuring), Red and Luke, Red thankfully restrained himself from suggesting an entirely new period/project (unlike York in February and the Saga epidemic!).  We arrived before 10am, and left around 4ish, spending most of the time browsing the stalls, although I had a (very brief) go of Saga using the Normans, and to my shock found rolling ‘6’s’ for them much easier than for my Welsh!

I also spent a fair amount of time restarting my 6mm American Civil War project in that I bought a bit from Baccus, and also did a painting tutorial with an excellent coach of 6mm painting – looking forward to putting it into practice once my ECW gets out of the way!  The time spent around Baccus was also bad for Lukes wallet as he invested in a Confederate starting army, and has already bypassed me in models painted.  The show itself was well populated with traders, all the usual faces were there apart from Gripping Beast (but their stuff was available all around), it seemed notably quieter than York had been, but that could be the size of the venue and its more useful rectangular layout.  There didn't seem to be as many participation games going (Mad Max and Saga the most visible exceptions), they were mostly of the demo variety, and if I'd been playing in the tournament games in the end hall I would have been most upset to have put my nicely painted army on a plain wooden table top.

Onto the list of purchases, I went with a fair list, although not all was bought either because it was unavailable or I decided against it on the way/while there.  I also took a list for Dave, but all the things on it were unavailable!

Saga Bits:

Blister pack of 4 hearthguard.

Pack of wargames factory ancient Germanic cavalry to turn into mounted warriors.

A box of the new Gripping Beast dark age warriors to serve as Welsh warriors.

Some renedra round bases to base the lot on!

Scenery:

A few more sections of road to expand my collection to around 11 feet long.

Hobby:

Army painter black spraypaint and 5 different Vallejo paints to work on my ACW 6mm troops, turned out I was using all the wrong colours (too dark) which was why my first efforts looked terrible!

Flock, or rather flowers for my Saga troops to make sure I don’t have to change their bases before I finish them.  I am hoping to turn them into a small Hail Caesar army, and so need more flowers, and the below item.

Warbases movement trays x 2; trials for moving my Saga troops around.  Very much a positive trial, I’ll be getting more!  I also got some larger round bases for small dioramas and as a test of using MDF, and Luke kindly donated some of their 40mm by 20mm bases for my Union troops.

English Civil War:

A collection of bits from Irregular Miniatures bits trays, including fires, benches, goats and several dogs and civilians including the already infamous pregnant vampire!  Actually bought after the game of Saga because they could be used in all sorts of games.

After the event I also ordered a petard assault team (Warlords best) from Triple Helix after missing out on them  there.  I bought some pointy metal javelins at the same time for my Welsh Warriors.

Total spend, including the petrol, parking and entry fee (£5 this year) was just shy of £160, which was ironically almost exactly the amount of money I made from selling my Bretonnians on ebay the next day!  Happy, happy.

Ricks Great English Civil War Painting Quest - Part 2

Time for a Royalist Update.  Its been a while, and the last two months I have been fairly busy in my spare time painting as many Royalists in a semi-organised way so I will be able to use them at the Deeside Gauntlet show on the 7^th July.  With the ECW game organiser, Dave, striving for high standards of presentation (and also of entertainment and bizarre shouting) I realised that anything not completely painted was going to miss out completely, and set too with a will.

I broke my large pile of models into three main sections; the foote (a foote regiment – Talbots – of 40 models), the horse (4 horse regiments and their CO – 33 models – possibly the most challenging), and the dragoons (28 models, mounted and dismounted), with the remaining models for the command and supply units to be stuck in wherever possible.  I had three months to do all this painting, and so the split into 3 achievable chunks seemed logical. 

I chose the foote to do first as Aprils chunk, partly because they already had a lot of paint on them so looked like a quick start, and I added in the supply units and the civilians (pigs and a farmer) for a total of 59 models.  These were just about finished at the beginning of May, with the Dipping process done around the 5-6^th.  In May I got a sudden unexpected urge and enthusiasm to work on the horse.   This died out around three quarters of the way through, but I’ve finished them with 4 days to spare, along with my officer command scene, and their CO on his white horse.  In truth they still need the final spray of matt varnish but the weather has turned damp so I’m not risking it yet, no rush.

That leaves the third chunk of the dragoons, who have acquired a few more models to the foot elements (my efforts to find a couple of musketeers holding horses to give them character failed at Triples – waiting on Empress Miniatures later this year I think).  There are also a number more hangers on, with a number of civilians purchased, an officer, and I’ll be ordering the oxen and a cannon limber to transport my Saker, and to finish a third supply unit – two looks good, but three should finish it off.  I’ve also a fortress gatehouse to paint for Chester city walls. 

Plenty done, and plenty to get on with, and I’ve included a few shots, plus a ‘whats left’ shot at the bottom.

Models Finished: 92

To be done: 48

Average Joes 2013 - Match Day 1

Its been a while since the last post, so I'm going to keep this simple: I Won.  

And now onto the slightly more complicated version.

Average Joes  2 - 1  R Sovertit

The rats turned up for their opening group stage match against the comically named R Sovertit, an Amazon side coached by the indomitable Pete Derrick.  Defeat would have been a bad start to the campaign, victory could have meant a long walk home (the opposition was providing the team bus for the evening).  Fortunately it was a quite close game so neither eventuality happened.  The rats scored first, with an unsurprising gutter runner break through after the Amazons put 'Joes in to bat first - scorer Cotton McKnight.  The first half finished at 1-0, although it could have been worse for the dodging women but the rats made a mess of it.  A fair bit of bang-the-rat was going on however, and 'Joes were only just able to field 11 players at the start of the second half.

That didn't last long, and 'Joes were soon into single figures in terms of players.  The Amazons took advantage and scored an equaliser, celebrating by bashing a gutter runner into the next century.  Weakened in terms of player numbers the rats were still dangerous, and with minutes to go took the lead for the second time, Pepper Brooks (the only gutter runner not unconscious) running in after a hand-off.  There wasn't enough time for an Amazon reply and Average Joes celebrated a victory in their first game of the campaign.

'Joes next opponents are an Orc side, coached by David A, and they will face them with only 11 players from the start; storm vermin Tank suffering from a niggling injury in the form of a fractured leg (!), while gutter runner The Rat also misses out due to a pinched nerve.  Vicious those Amazons.

Work In Progress.......April 2013

I’m thinking of switching the work in progress post to once month, that’s seems to make more sense!  As such here is the Work In Progress report for the month of April, and with much excitement building over the prospect of a large English Civil War game at the Deeside Defenders show of Gauntlet on Sunday the 7^th July I’m unsurprisingly focusing on painting a few more of my Royalists.  My mathematics says that I will have had to paint a total of 130 Royalist models by that date, including all my dragoons (28 figures mounted and unmounted), all my horse (32 mounted figures), a regiment of foote and plenty of extras on top.  To that end I’ve been working on the regiment of foote, and my supply units this month, with the result that I’ve finished painting (although not Dipping, flocking or varnishing) the following:

16 pikemen (Talbots foote)

A cart pulled by 2 oxen with a barrel load (counts as 4 models)

A supply unit of musketeers and donkeys (9 models)

4 pigs

1 farmer

1 tavern owner

The musketeers for Talbots foote, all 24 of them, are currently on the painting table and in need of their muskets, hair and hats doing before a general tidy up and they will be finished.  Once they are done I will have 59 models ready for some Dipping, flocking and varnishing, and can move onto the next bunch.  What the next bunch will be I’m not 100% sure as yet, the horse have been sitting very unpainted for a long time, so I will probably turn my attentions to a couple of regiments of them, as well as my section of ECW command which will provide a nice distraction

In other distracting news I took the leap and placed an order with Baccus (creaters of 6mm models) for some American Civil War troops, more about those in another post, but enough to say here that I’m doing a small (!) sideline in an infantry battalion and cannon battery for them to break up the ECW figures.  So far I’ve finished one base (40mm by 20mm, and with 16 infantry men on) to test the colours out on, they seem to have gone ok so far.  I’ve also applied some flock to the bases of my two Battlefront ponds to give them some ‘life’ and colour, they certainly look better for it, although quite how the tiny bag of flock that came with them was supposed to achieve the same look I’ve no idea!

Talbots musketeers, the supply train, and some pigs!