Workbench, recovered

 So I've had a bit more painting time this week and a bit more of the desire to pick up a brush after powering through finishing an army for Panzerschreck.

 Finishing up last week

I got all the Veterans done, which didn't take long as it was really three bolt pistols, a power fist, a chainsword and a single shoulder pauldron but they are done.

Then, on to the slowgrow. I first added the Attack Bike to my bike squad, which is going to be great fun as it's a new style multi-melta and those are great!

The bike kit is showing it's age a bit at this stage in the proceedings but it still looks good enough and I think I owe Blogger Pooch a serious thank you for digging out an 80mm round base for me as I can't stand the idea that this would have sat flat on the table in a unit with bikes in it! 

And the leader of the second stage of my slow grow, Chaplain Tarquinius, who has arrived on Thracium VII with a Primaris Venator Kill Team to find out what happened to Phobos Lieutenant Athreos.

I'm aiming for dropping in my Spectrus Kill Team and Invictus Warsuit and having the Veteran bikers and the Venator Kill Team ride to the rescue lead by a VERY angry man on a VERY big motor bike. I thought about painting the whole helmet in bone, like I think I was supposed to, but the face came out in bone without me really trying so I decided to leave it that way. Also the Spiritstone technical red comes out SO well with a bone outline. 

MOAR WORKBENCH

I decided it was time to move some other things off the shelf of projects, so I've started assembling some more armour for my TY forces, notably some M2 Bradleys and some M1 Abrams.

The Bradleys are going to be M2A2/M3A2s just because I like the look better but I'll happily play them as M2s as well. Not sure which M1s I'm going to build yet, I've just done the base of the hull at this point. I'm tempted to do the M1A1 (I haven't got the little resin box to make them M1A1HC) just for the look of the thing too. We'll see - if I decide to extend those side skirts, the decision will be made!

Next Time

I'll be finishing up the 1000 point slowgrow army with a couple of Assault Intercessors and an Outrider, or maybe two depending on how the final Kill Team makeup goes. I've also started working on a second winter Grenadier platoon and plotting a possible Flames list for a competition in October that'll require finally buying a bunch of Pumas and some SdKfz 250s. As lists go, it's all sorts of dumb and I'm REALLY keen to play it.

Sunday workbench

 Slowgrow 40K

Bit of a workbench this week as I've started on the next bits I need for our slowgrow 40K that I'll need for late August. 

First off, a munging of an old Apothecary and a Primaris Infiltrator to make a Helix Adept for my Spectrus Kill Team. Given how badly my Infiltrators got munted in our last narrative game, this guy will be joining the narrative to bring some of them back from the dead and find out what happened to Phobos Lieutenant Athreos.  

The slowgrow commander for part II will be a Primaris Outrider Chaplain. I love this model and I decided that he is going to be leading the Venator troops that will arrive to reinforce KT Kallaphrax.

And joining the three bikers that are going in the slowgrow is my favourite of Space Marine vehicles other than the classic Land Speeder, the Attack Bike:

I've still got to add another Outrider and some Assault Intercessors to my second Kill Team but auction sites will provide! 

Early days with mostly just basecoats on but once I get the washes on and then start tidying up the black, these models come together really quickly.

And upgrades...

I decided to replace some of the weapons on my Veterans, notably taking the shields off my Blackshields and giving them more swords but pretty happy with the swap. Most of the rest are getting bolt pistols.

So not a lot going on with them but a job that's been hanging around in the queue for a while. 

Next Time

This stuff will be done and I found my weathering powder, so I've got some PaK40s to finish up too. I've got some repair work on my StuG company where I pillaged it for foilage so I'll get those redone too and maybe, just for grins, paint the 5th Puma I now own. Yes, an odd number of Pumas. Because that means PUMA COMPANY! 

So. Elefants. Yeah.

 The Whole Army

I kind of love how the whole thing came together in the end. Oh, and in a most surprising and ridiculous turn of events, the package of foliage arrived on the THURSDAY night before Panzerschreck. Seriously. I was SO pleased. So the OP and the quads that will remain in the 653 formation got foliaged as well. It was still drying when we put the box in the back to go north!

Panzerschreck?

This photo basically sums up the weekend:

People getting their much faster medium armour on the flanks of our Elefants and mostly, amazingly, whiffing. We lost two Elefants destroyed, two fled and the rest survived the weekend. MVP of the weekend was the Elefant CO who took 7 IS-2s solo to hold a flank to save the one game we won. 

All in all 1 - 1 - 3 for the weekend but the highlight perhaps was we lost game 3. The last six stands of an American ARP ran through a minefield and then all the American armour opened up on the 2 StuGs and 2 Elefants on the objective. We lost both StuGs and one Elefant (shot in the side by failed-blitz, stabilised Sherman 75s on 6s, I might add) and then the two stands that surivived the minefield charged out. The Elefant shot the Bazooka and the one remaining rifle stand shoved the Elefant off the objective. It was a great game to play and a great way to lose that game. 

Thoughts?

The list was sub-par. Okay on paper but also coloured by previous Panzerschreck experiences and not in a good way. If we had our time again, the list would be: 

653 Schwere Panzerjager

Elefant HQ

2x Elefant

2x Elefant

3x Quad AA

Hetzer Company

2x Hetzer HQ

4x Hetzers

4x Hetzers

4xHetzers

Support

3x Wespes & OP Panzer III

2x Puma

Sturm Platoon 

 

We missed an infantry platoon for all the bloody minefields and also getting dudes out of buildings and the StuGs were just outclassed by all the M10s, M10Cs, Sherman 76s, T34/85s etc so Hetzers would give us 50% more hulls for no appreciable change in cost.  

 

Next Time

No idea. I suspect I need to get into the stuff I need to have painted for our next round of slow-grow 40K. I have an attack bike to do, an Outrider Chaplain and a couple of new Primaris to build out a new Primaris Kill Team. I also need to buy some things... 

Pooch's June update

Well, we are now officially over halfway through 2021. That simple fact is ridiculous!

I wasn't too bad with painting this month, managed to get a steady stream of things progressed. So what did I finish then?

1. Finish a table of terrain

In the last club day of June, we agreed that at the first club day in July, we would play some Frostgrave 2, which meant that I had a strong motivation to get more of my Frostgrave table done!

I managed to finish up another of the TT Combat packs, this time it's the Derelict Enclave:

Better picture once I finish more next month!

2. Play a game a month

I played a couple of games this month, including a Necromunda game vs McZ, where the Escher did horrible things to Cawdor....

3. Finish a 1,500 point 40k army

Well, after a very bitsy month last month, this month I did actually get a fair whack of things progressed...

Big ol' box of airbrushing done!

Shrine for the back of the Immolator!

And managed to complete a unit, my Canoness!

Inferno Pistol and Brazier of Holy Fire. Because burninate.

4. Finish armies that I have part started

Nothing new here- after finishing all of that US I haven't made a start on anything new for this goal. I've got a few different things there ready to get working on, but not sure I will get to them next month either!

5. Buy, build and play a new game

My droids are done! Two more squads of B1s, B1 commanders and the Tank completed, which means the whole army is completed now!

The tank is absolutely gigantic, and a really nice model to build and paint too. Apparently according to the internet they are more or less essential for Droid forces. Or more accurately two is apparently a meta list. I've got one, and no desire for a second!

Tank!

Pilot option 1: B1 Battle Droid

Pilot option 2: Tactical Droid (3d print from Shapeways)

One of the squads of B1s got painted as Security Droids. Because I could.... This one also has a radiation gun!

And this is everything I have painted in addition to the tank!

Couldn't resist a quick snap of the three Sith.....

And that's it, roll on July!

Progress is good, but you'd better get finishing those Sororitas!

Pooch

History never repeats. Or does it?

I joined bloggers Scotty and Tank for an epic refight of one of the great naval engagements of World War II - the battle in the Denmark Straig between the KMS Bismark and the KMS Prinz Eugen and HMS Hood and HMS Prince of Wales. Scotty lead the Kriegsmarine and Tank took the Admiralty on the Hood while I commanded the alarmingly unready Prince of Wales.

The scenario had a few special rules - the Royal Navy didn't accurately spot the Bismark in the early stages of the engagement so Scotty would be able to swap his ships at will and manage their damage secretly unless Tank or I passed a crew quality check to spot which ship was which. We decided that we'd only do at at our ship's short range or lower and we would test every time we fired too. A successful test meant we were shooting what we thought we were, otherwise Scotty could apply damage as he saw fit. Further to that, the Prince of Wales' civilian mechanics were still on board so there was a chance that the main armaments of the battleship would fail each time they fired. The scenario also proposes that, unlike history, the cruisers HMS Norfolk and HMS Suffolk would arrive to support the Hood and Prince of Wales. 

The Kriegsmarine turned and steamed towards the onrushing Royal Navy. The game almost replayed history as the Scotty's first shot against the Hood hit, penetrated and caused a critical hit. This lead to much consternation in the Royal Navy and we accelerated to the attack. The Hood turned across the German fleet while the Prince of Wales went full steam ahead to bring it's heavier armament to bear. 

The two fleets closed with the Kriegsmarine bravely threading the gap between the two British battleships. They pounded the HMS Hood relentlessly, leaving the Prince of Wales to happily fire on whichever ship the crew thought was the Bismark at any given time. One by one, her new guns failed until only one of the front six was functional alongside the working rear turret!

At this point the fleets were at their closest! With it's front turrets completely out of operation, despite the best efforts of the mechanics on board, the HMS Prince of Wales crossed the Bismark's stern to bring it's fully functional rear turret to bear and in a couple of rounds of VERY accurate gunfire and some good spotting by the bridge crew, she sank the Prinz Eugen, narrowly evading being torpedoed for her trouble though!

With the Prinz Eugen gone, and the HMS Norfolk and Suffolk on the field, the Bismark was taking an absolute hammering while simultaneously trying to sink the badly damaged Hood and aim for some luck shots on the Prince of Wales' last working turret.  In game terms, at this point the Bismark was miraculously still seaworthy despite carrying about 15 points (of a possible 18) of critical damage but she could mostly sail. So the Bismark's Admiral decided that discretion was the better part of valour and steamed for the southern board edge, hoping to outrun the oncoming British cruisers. The Hood made the same decision, as she was also carrying a dozen or so critical damage points. In the end, the Prince of Wales fired a devastating volley, bringing the Bismark to her knees before the Hood's last working turrets struck her amidships and sank the mighty vessel.

It's a really good scenario - we had to add to a couple of rules to make it make a bit more sense and interpret some of the instructions in a way that made sense to us but we really enjoyed it. Scotty wasn't ever supposed to win it but he came very close to sinking the Hood and would probably have been able to sail away if he had as the popguns on the Norfolk and Suffolk could barely touch the Bismark, especially as by the last turn of the game, the Prince of Wales was down to three of it's original 10 attack dice with it's main guns (and I couldn't pass a repair roll for love nor money.)

I really enjoyed my first game of Victory at Sea and will be super excited to get the Regia Marina fleet painted up and on the water soon.

Panzerschreck prep

SO CLOSE.  Just so close but I honestly can't stop swearing about how enraging the Battlefront SdKfz 7/2 kit is. It's not original Katyusha bad, but aarrrrgggghhhh. So everything else is finished for the army but those last three Quads are still only half done. Oh well, I have a few days....

I need to chuck a huge thank you to blogger Pooch who sacrificed the foliage off his Panzer IVs for my Wespes and Elefants with a view to repaintings said Panzer IVs but still.  As something that genuinely adds to the coherent look of the force, I am super happy. There is apparently a new package en-route from the USA when I will repair the carnage I committed on my Nashorns and Firefly to steal their foliage too and then I'll be getting on with some more LW Flames, probably focussing on getting onto my Grenadiers. 

Next Time

I will take a photo of the whole finished army as there is inevitably a show and tell at Panzerschreck and let you know how badly we lost the five games in the weekend. I'll be glad to put these aside for a bit and go back to some 28mm with our 40K thing moving on in August so I probably need to get the rest of the army painted for the 1000 point round. Should be easy, except for the bits I don't own yet...

Holiday Productivity Fail

 Panzerschreck Prep

Going on holiday does rather dent one's productivity and with Panzerschreck a few weeks away, I figure I should get the army finished.

The foliage appears to be lost in transit somewhere between here and Wisconsin so the team in the US are sending me a replacement order. Fingers crossed it might get here in time - I can imagine spending the night before the comp in front of the TV gluing my fingers to things! 

I haven't got too much more to do but enough that'll keep me busy this week getting everything finished - highlights on the Elefants, cleaning and transferring some old Quad AA guns and then (UGH) painting the last lot of Quads.

BOOOOOOOOOAAAAATTS!

The nerds have got into Warlord's Victory at Sea and I could hardly not play the Italian fleet in this one. The game looks like a lot of fun and seems to want to deliver appropriate outcomes. Some of the pointing seems weird but hey, the boats look amazing. I've promised myself not to get overwhelmed so started with a couple of test pieces: 

The Marcello-class submarines are cute but the goal of that box was MAS Boats and MS Boats. Italian Torpedo Boats are where things are at in this fleet so I'm going to make serious use of them!

Secondly, a battleship - the Vittorio Veneto - and she's a beauty.

I need to go back and redo the dazzle lines as they're really hard to see against the hull and possibly brighten up the highlights on the AA guns but otherwise I'm mostly happy. That bow section hurt me a lot and it's mostly pretty good. The parallelness of some of those lines is a bit iffy but it gives the right impression! 

Next Time

The whole Panzerschreck army! We've also been talking about some Frostgrave 2 for a casual club day so we'll see how that goes. Maybe a batrep for once? Maybe!?!