The Belgian Detective

Here's a little chap that I found at the back of the painting cabinet.  I'm rather pleased with him.  I have no idea how to fit him into 1938 VBCW other than as a random civilian but if nothing else he'll look nice in the display cabinet!

Overlord Improvised Armour Conversion Kit

Back at Border Reiver 2011 I picked up one of the Improvised Armour conversion kits by Overlord that Solways crafts and miniatures offer for sale.  I put it together and part painted then didn't get round to doing anything with it for months.  There's a theme developing here today isn't there?!  Anyway in a moment of cheesy madness I decided that this would be Jack Jone's van.  I'm hoping that the decals aren't so bad that people can't draw the link.  I can't remember which type of Lledo vehicle the kit is designed for but it's certainly achieved a rough and ready improvised look on the Model T ford van that I used here.  This vehicle will either deploy as part of the Longhoughton Defence Volunteers or as part of the Ashington Coal Collective.  Probably the earlier rather than the latter.

BUF Adler Armoured Bathtub

This is a German Adler Armoured car from BEF Miniatures (now part of Warlord Games) that I picked up a while back, built, part painted and then never got round to finishing.  Well this afternoon I finally got round to printing off the decals to finish things.  The kit is exactly the same as the original except that I swapped the heads out for ones that I had in my bits box.

I wasted a small fortune in smudged decal paper until I remembered to adjust the paper type.  They're far from the best decals that I've ever made but they're getting better, I just need to use a better graphics app in order to be able to print at the level of detail that I want.  Anyway, here it is, far from the best that I've produced in a while.

The World's Smallest Wargame?

I've been clearing through the painting cabinet today and come across a couple of oddities whilst doing so.  This would appear to be the smallest wargame in the world.  I've not seen a smaller game - have you?

Yes that is a 1p piece!

Zulus

"The Sentries report Zulus to the South West . . . . . thousands of them"

An immortal line from one of the greatest films ever.  The big question is - has anybody seen the new miniatures from Warlord Games and Empress Miniatures in the flesh?  This set is seriously tempting but I need to know about the quality of the miniatures before committing to spend this much on them!

Some Very British Civil War Characters

These are 3 characters that I recently purchased from Artizan Designs.  I think that they are really fabulous models.  Really well sculpted and cast - a complete joy to paint.  I bet that you can guess which one is my favourite!

I'm thinking about forming a new faction for 1938 VBCW of brigands hiding in the Cheviots and subsisting their life by raiding the local countryside in the same way that the original Reivers used to.

More Northumbrian Police

I bought these chaps a few weeks ago from Artizan Designs.  They are absolutely lovely miniatures to work with, they come with hardly any flash or mould lines and they were really enjoyable to paint.  The big debate is whether or not they can be used alongside my other Policemen from Reiver Castings as they are actually more like 25mm rather than 28mm.  Also the quality of the sculpt and casting is not as good on the Reiver miniatures but then they cost less than half as much so it's not surprising.  Anyway, enough rambling, here come the fuzz!

Just in case you were wondering how distinct the difference was between the Artizan and Reiver miniatures . . . . . . here it is although I must say that the photo makes it look a little worse than it really is (plus I hadn't finished painting the Artizan one when I took this photo.

Dreadfleet - Part 3

Well, I finally got round to playing Dreadfleet last night.  A couple of friends came over.  The girls watched Bridesmaids and we played Dreadfleet.  Well, I say played. . . . . .

None of us had found the time to read the rules so a lot of time was spent working them out; concurrently a lot of wine was drunk.  After a couple of hours floundering we were getting into the mechanism.  It's not a bad game, the scenarios seem good.  It's certainly not a simple game to play and at points can seem a little over complicated but I reckon that will go away with more games.  It is a great looking game though.

One thing is for sure.  Wine and wargames are a dangerous combination judging by the state of everybody's heads this morning!

Artizan Designs Maquis - also perfect for 1938 VBCW

I can't remember when I picked these guys up but they have proven to be really lovely miniatures and persuaded me to order several more packs from the Thrilling Tales range that Partizan offer.  They are very well sculpted and cast and I think that they've painted up rather well without much effort.

The other miniatures that I have from Artizan have now been prepped and undercoated and are awaiting the attention of my brushes.  There are a couple of section of Police from the Long Arm of the Law range as well as a couple of packs from their Very Private Army Range.

Field Communications

No military operation is likely to succeed without effective communications and as I was already ordering the British Casualties pack from Great War Miniatures I decided to add these guys too.  I decided that the chap with the binos would be more suited to being a Royal Artillery Forward Observation or similar rather than another scaleyback.

The Casualties of War

I realised a little while ago that I didn't have any models to represent casualties.  I secured the civilian stretcher bearers from a chap on the Gentlemens Wargames Parlour.  They were nicely painted but didn't really fit in with the style of the rest of my miniatures so I popped a quick lick of fresh paint over them.  The rest are from the Great War Miniatures pack of British Casualties.  They're lovely sculpts but a complete pain to texture the bases on the chaps on the ground.  I removed the rifle from one of the chaps.  Not sure why I did that, it might have been miscast or something but my memory fails me.

More BEF British Infantry of the 50th (Northumbrian) Division

It seems like forever since I last wrote anything on here.  I've been running around all over the place, working like a man possessed and getting no time for painting.  I finally had some time over this weekend so the brushes came out to finally finish another section of the rather fine Early War British Infantry from BEF Miniatures that is now owned by Warlord.  I love these models, I think that they are some of the best sculpts available. 

Dreadfleet - Part 2

Back to Dreadfleet - Part 1

As well as all of those rather fine looking ships, the Dreadfleet box includes all the scenery and accessories that you need to play the game.  It's all well made and easy put together.  The only downside I think is that they've gone totally overboard with the skulls; but hey, that's what is to be expected from Games Workshop!

Some of the islands:

Giant turtle skeleton:

Cogs and auxilliaries:

Accessories (I'm rather pleased how these turned out):

Sea monster:

Dragon:

Sea monster (not so happy with this one):

Another sea monster:

Scenic scatter items:

And finally the trophies:

Overall it was quite a nice break from the sobre colour schemes of the 1930s that have dominated the last few months.  It was rather fun to break out the bright colours for a change.  I'm looking forward to seeing how this game plays though.  It looks good, I hope it plays as well as it looks!