Kings of War Elf test figures and more ACW

Hi,

I picked up a small Mantic Elf army as they were on sale and then ran into the issue in that I have never painted an large scale armoured figures. Thin figures but they look the part so I made up the archer pack and thought I would test some out.
My attempts at painting the first two figures was disappointing as my painting style simply did not work.

So looks like I need to watch some youtube videos or try some washes instead.


My efforts on my Union troops has meandered through the realms of time and space, but have I have managed to finish my first three.  The left unit is varnished and the other two need a good dose to protect them from gaming, cats and children.

Warflag supplied the Standards and I use some 15mm scale Ancient wire spears for the pole (The spear turned upside down and jammed into the plastic base).

Also some Cavalry have been completed with the bonus of dismounted men and horse holders.

Herzogtum Rechburg

Some years ago now Barry (Baztay in most forums) dragged me into his imagination campaign area of Rechburg. It was  a large island full of large nations of which there were several players though the campaign fizzled out due to some player conflict and the scope of the whole thing. We often fought battles using Napoleonic troops and it was fun, the campaign itself was later changed to Barry's solo effort with myself and Archduke Piccillo playing small parts when Barry needed input. Roughly at the same time Archduke Piccillo purchased a horde of 28mm WSS figures, which of course resulted in my purchase and likewise Barry joining in.

Alas shortly after Barry became ill and before he passed away he gave me his figures with a general (as I recall) guideline of :

"Wife will throw these out when I'm gone, I tried to paint them but they are terrible so you take them, paint them and play with them. Paint a general figure as me and for fucks sake make me look good"

So my I have been working on it ...slowly and after 3 years I have made a good start.

Rechburg, Army of the South 1707. 

Below is his Royal Highness Prince Baztay Constantine of Herzogtum Rechburg at the head of his bodyguard, the Prince Constantine Infantry Battalion.

(I painted the general a long time ago but have finally finished his troops, the rest of the army is undecided as I was going to have my figures as Battle of Almansa Spanish however I have decided to assign a Spanish contingent  to Rechburg (with the Rechburgian natives looking a lot like French).

So in this time of need for the small Nation, his Imperial majesty Charles II had sent a small detachment to Rechburg to help protect his interests in the region. The first unit sent was the magnificent Morados Viejos in a rather splendid garb of Violet\Purple with red facings.

So, more to come as I paint them !

The longest project

Hi,

My plastic 1/72 ACW is the oldest army that I have now (The 1/72 Napoleonic forces are long gone and replaced by something heavier and four time the size). I began playing the Archduke Piccolo sometime in the 90's and I recall had around 12 units and a few guns. The army then survived a decade of storage as I traveled the world but has taken me a good 10 years to sort out. A recent purchase of Airfix ACW figures has also satisfied a wish list item of getting some.

A recent burst of enthusiasm has seen the completion of a decent sized force. 12 Infantry Regiments and a few guns. I still have around another 12 Infantry Regiments, 4 Cavalry and about 8 guns left to do. Simple 90's basing was simple green paint and simple paint jobs and I have followed the same style for the new figures. ( They have that toy soldier look that I always admired in the early war-games books of Featherstone and Grant).

Below - The Current Pile - A mixture of 1990 basing and 2008 Basing (I seemed to change my mind a lot). The flags are all mostly glued on half an hour ago apart from some old hand painted ones done in 1994.

 The Oldest Units - Mid 90s at least. The Esci figures are even older as I recall having them when I was around 13 (I just turned 40).

 The "newest" - Italeri (new figures) and Airfix (second hand).

So a few more hundred to go and then the Union can be finished (But I have already started).

Cheers

Progress

Hello,

I have actually spent some time having spare time !.  I decided to  get back into painting to actually have a break from things and I am going quite well  so far. I have not played a game in since Christmas but so far I have painted around 60 28mm figures but I have been lazy and not taken any photos.

Currently on my list are

• 28mm WSS Figures
• 28mm Napoleonic Prussians
• 1/72 ACW
• 28mm Mantic Elves

 In my free time I have also been increasing my numbers of home cast Prince August figures for my small Dutch army. On the leap day they had a 50% of Sale so I purchased some of their new British Dragoons which don't look too bad. I need to make an appointment with the Archduke so we can test cast some figures. These are new moulds (the previous ones were pretty brutal) so I can see tonight how they come out.

Hopefully once my Prussian army is sorted out I can move onto the Russians and have my two allied armies 100% completed.I have not touched on the other 15 or so "projects" that litter my storage room. However tomorrow I am playing Advanced Squad Leader which should get a taste for some games in.

Painting And Casting

I have been trying to get some painting going but it has been very warm in the evenings so I only did  a little. First on my list is to finish some of the spare Prussians I have as I did complete half of them last year for Waterloo.

 Tonight however I decided to increase my numbers of Dutch and British prince august. They are very basic figures but have a 1970's charm about them that I like.

The casting area.

 First mistake - Clamps in the wrong place, second mistake is to forget lead is hot.

 The finished product -  4 line each and some standards.

As I only have a mold each its a slow process. I might add the Dutch to the Prussians tomorrow to get some of them done.

1/72 WW2 painting tests

In my teenage years I had tonnes of 1/72 WW2 figures  which unfortunately were mostly crushed when I was overseas (Big box places on little boxes). I did manage to salvage a lot but it has been a 10 year process of looking at them and ignoring them completely.

So in these rather blurry days I seem to be having I thought if I can slowly work through some I could at least have enough for some smaller games.The test vehicles below. 2 freshly made Italeri quick build Sherm,ans, a freshly made Airfix Chi-Ha and a 20 year old JgPzIV (plus some 20mm SHQ Japanese infantry to bolster my IJA).

 I undercoated the JgPz and then used black wash to get in all the cracks, hatches and divets. Once that was dry a quick touch of Dunkelgelb and I then did an initial bone colored highlight. This resulted in the below but I was not happy as I felt it needed some camouflage loaded on it (To also hide bad painting)

 Some dabbling of brushes and a highlight later below is the almost completed tank. Hopefully I can scrounge or hand paint some markings to make it look good. The final piece of the puzzle is then the running gear underneath that I ignored completely.

 So, at the best of my ability I quite like it and hope to tidy up some more survivors to someday field a small German force.

One WW2 Theater that I did take an interest in was the Pacific. So far I have several battalions of Japanese infantry, some guns but I was lacking a tank. So as a test I picked up a Chi-Ha and made it in one evening with the result below. Its another "test tank" but once I sort  out the pesky Airfix tracks and finish the thing off I think it will look quite good.

All I need to do is finish some US Marines, Australians  and  KNIL with a view to having some small CD games.

Not a lot happening

Unfortunately I am very busy at the moment and everything has gone on the backburner. Over the last month all I have done is paint about figures and a few Mantic Elves but not a lot of progress to be honest. When I have had free time I have not had the motivation to paint or even get things out so I have read a few books and made the odd map.

 Below are the Fantasy figures I have painted. Most are made by Dark Alliance in the Ukraine (I think) who show the typical Eastern European disregard for intellectual property as a lot of the figure poses are obviously modeled on the Lord of the Rings movies. The rest are a mix of Italeri, Caesar and Strelets.

I have also been seeing how my phone camera functions and I must say it can get a pretty good close up. So close though I think the figured look shabby so I firstly
i) Need to find the right distance and
ii) Get some decent lighting as I usually take photos at around 10pm.


Caesar Wizard (aka Gandalf)

 Italeri Crusaders (Man at Arms "types"

 Strelets Romans - A local Governer and his Bodyguard.

 I also got bored and watched a games workshop youtube clip on painting spare marines, so I found an old 2001 model and gave it a try.

So as free time is at a premium now I'm trying to find something to do, or game that does not take a massive investment of painting time (aka Waterloo) and can lead to some simply but enjoyable games.

I might use the above 1/72 for some simple hack and slash games on paper, as I have some drafting pads spare that can be used to draw dungeons and such.