Thinking on productivity

Inspired, after a fashion, by Tim at Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog and his Warhammer Underworlds stocktake, I started reflecting on the relatively unproductive last few months of hobby time. I've noticed that I've struggled with the weekly pace of getting something finished on the weeks between club days and that's compounded by some really good games recently that I haven't taken any pics of and don't remember well enough to blog properly. 

So I've been staring at the mess that is my workbench and at the associated miscellany of stuff that's sitting here waiting to be done and I've decided I should catalogue it and get focussed on getting some of it done before 2022. So what's left on the list of things I'd *like* to make progress on before I go back to work after the New Year? 

• Finish up painting and basing my Byzantines
• Paint Hummels
• Paint the 25 various 28mm models (some DnD, 40K, Necromunda and miscellaneous steampunk) 
• Finish building my OP Leman Russ for 40K

In a lot of these cases, I'd be happy to bring them up past just being primed. That'd be a good start and then finding the mood to finish them off would be good. 

But I did do a thing!!

Jagdpanzer IV/70s

In the interests of finishing things that are almost done, I decided to have a crack at the dotting for the ambush camo. 

Here's a WIP when I hadn't done the dots on the Middlestone layer:

I really, genuinely almost stopped here. I kind of like how this looks. But I figured it would be right to press on with it and the finished platoon looks like this:

The toothpick method for dotting was pretty solid and aside from having to do a couple of very careful touchups with the brush where I really goofed, it wasn't too bad. Am I super happy with the result, no. Is it not bad for the first time I've ever done it and would I consider painting an entire army of Hetzers like this? Yes.

Next Time

It's gotta be something off that list right? I should really finish my Normans for my Byzantine army as they're mostly just waiting for highlights. So lets say I'll do that.  

Working on my Byzantines

 Having rebased the generals last week, it's finally time to push on with the rest of the Byzantines. 

I've started the hard part now - trying to paint the last models to match the style of my original army. I've started with the two bases of Normans from the list as they're a little less complex and with less like the rest of the army.

 

I've still got a shield to add to one of the knights and some socks and things to add to the horses but I wanted to get them this far partly for this blog and partly to remember how much of a challenge of LBM transfers are. But man the finish is worth it. And the rimmed Norman shields do a nice job helping size them.

I've also done the horses for my light horse (because I hate painting 28mm horses but I can remember how I did them originally) and mounted up the archers to start painting them. While I do those, I'll do the Menavlatoi as they're in the same sort of uniform. 

 

I've also remounted some spare javelinmen into an MI base as well as I had four LI bases and the list only allows two, so an MI base didn't seem like it would hurt. Getting their javelins reattached made quite a mess of the paintwork although this problem isn't unique in this army at the mo.

Next Time

I'm hoping to get up to my friendly LGS some time before Christmas to acquire supplies for the break which will let me do the rest of the basing. In the meantime, I've got some Hummels to do, so they'll probably get started alongside the last of the Byzantines. 

Noodling along

 I played most of a game of Victory at Sea yesterday with Blogger Tank, when the Regia Marina and the Kriegsmarine had some wargames in what looks very much like the Pacific... 

Moments before the Vittorio Veneto launched a full broadside into the Admiral Scheer

This time I got to land both MAS and MS boats (oh my!) and launch a lot of destroyer-based torpedoes. I also got U-boated (is that a verb?) and that went less well. The Tirpitz is a beast of a ship and I shot a lot of torpedos into her and really struggled to get past the torpedo belt.

I also got my Jagdpanzer IV/70s out against Blogger Pel's Desert Rats. He's working hard to make them work in LW and I reckon he's cracked it. We played Scouts Out, a mission that neither of us has played and looked, on the face of it like it would be over super quick.

Jagdpanzer IV/70s in ambush

I expose not just the Jagdpanzer CO's flank but also it's rear armour!!

Totally wrong about that - we ran the game through to 7 turns in the end and had Pel not taken an opportunistic shot on the flank of my CO Jagdpanzer by moving his two PIAT-armed carriers away from the objective and that allowed my 250 OP and most of a platoon of Panzergrenadiers to give his Para platoon what for and win the game. Had he not, he would have taken the other flank with his Stuarts who were definitely giving me hell, having taken out my Wespe battery and the two SdKfz 7/2s left holding the objective weren't going to hold it! 

The Jadgpanzer IV/70s aren't quite done yet, but they're coming along. Pel suggested using a cocktail stick or something similar to make the ambush camo dots and I rather like that idea so will be trying to knock them off this week. I was pretty happy to get all the basecoats and details on to get them to be table-ready! 

Workbenchy things

I've finished the last of the prep for the new Byzantines, epoxying in the last of the lances and spears that needed to be reattached or attached and getting them ready for primer so they'll be hitting the paint table soon. I'd really like to get the basing of the whole army done in one hit so that'll be a fun job coming up. I'm enjoying ADLG and it's nice level of complexity so I'm currently on the hunt for another army. In the meantime, I've rebased my generals: 

Crusaders

Finally done! :) 

 

Now I need a parts order from the UK to get here and I'll be able to finish up an OP Leman Russ I'm working on and should have a new and interesting small Guard army to try out. 

Next Time

I've got some 15mm Hummels on the workbench for my 15mm Flames of War Germans and the massive basing job on the Byzantines. Having played a game of Victory at Sea with Tank's sweet islands, that's got me encouraged to do mine, I just have to finish sanding down the some of the PLA and maybe find some filler primer. 

Doodads and new things!

 Late and not a lot going on. Necessary holidays are necessary, and for once I didn't have time to pre-publish something...

 New Toys

A parcel from Gripping Beast arrived with new toys for many of the nerds. I have started working on mine and doing the things that are slightly more interesting than the challenge of matching my existing light horse. 

First, some Menavlatoi to sit alongside my Skutatoi:

 I really like how these models look - the short, thick-hafted spears and the cool posing on the models will make for a neat additional HI, 2HW base.

Second, the base I'm most looking forward to doing, a Greek Fire Syphon:

 Is it good? Almost certainly not. Does it look cool? Oh yes. 

Progress

 The army has been polyfilla-ed ready for basing, but I probably won't do the basing until after I've painted the new things.

 

You'll see in this picture new doodads from genius Olivier at Battlekiwi. I asked him about making some and he pointed out that he already had one for 15mm scale that he could rescale for 28mm.

Very happy. Very. 

Next Time

I'll be rebasing my generals for ADLG with new bases from Battlekiwi as well and getting stuck into painting those. Oh, and finally finishing those Crusaders. He says. Again.

Pooch's October update

And with that, October is done too! 

I finished up a big painting commission this month, which burned me out a bit on things for myself. But that said, I still made a bunch of progress on things, most notably continuing to paint  a lot of Celts for my ADLG army! 

1. Finish a table of terrain

I have the pieces I need for this started. And have managed to fail miserably about doing anything at all about it. Maybe next month, or maybe December. I just need to do it.....

2. Play a game a month

But wait, there is more Victory at Sea! This time a Cruiser battle between the USN and the IJN. 

USN Cruisers, sailing around a South Pacific island

The first of many USN Cruisers to go down in flames.....

Cruisers vs Cruisers was interesting- the Japanese torpedoes were absolutely lethal, accounting for all of the USN ships sunk. The counter point was that the USN gunnery was far better- but that was really just down to my dice deciding to be incredibly reliable! 

I continue to really enjoy the game, and will likely end up playing more in November too!

3. Finish a 1,500 point 40k army

This month I finished up two vehicles for my Sisters army.

It wasn't intentional, but the posing is very horror movie-esque......

The first a Rhino....

I don't love painting white vehicles

Mostly happy with it however!

The second a Penitent Engine

Because heavy flamers and giant saw blades are necessary.

Next up.... more Sisters of some sort, I have some airbrushed and ready to go, and some I want to assemble and paint. So.... some of that I'm sure!

4. Finish armies that I have part started

My Afrika Corps army expanded from their initial Panzer IIIs, to now include Panzer IIs, and some 8-rad armoured cars! This means that I now have a legal list for Remember December, but I have far more tanks to work through.... not sure what will be next!

The airbrushing on these was a bit more annoying than on the Panzer IIIs, I think beginner's luck was at play when I did my first batch!

Two 8-rad armoured cars

Spot the replacement wheel....

Zvezda Panzer IIs looking cool

The whole army so far!

5. Buy, build and play a new game

More Celts painted, still more to go.... 

How many of them do you ask?

Many.

How many? 119 Infantry, 8 Cavalry so far!

Aiming to finish them all next month!

Two months to go.... better get cracking!

1:1 basing eats hobby time

 Been a busy week around the house here. Spring has well and truly sproinged and the garden was overgrown like you would not believe so hobby time has been heavily curtailed in favour of doing real world things. 

Crusaders

Almost there. Basically the last highlights on the metals and the final coats on the cloaks to do. I have one old metal one of these and the two that aren't Gotfred de Montbard are Finecast and honestly, just go back to metals please. I keep finding little bits of flash as I paint these. It's most vexing.

Catalina

I've finally finished the painting. I had an AWFUL time getting the cockpit glass to fit and it required a bunch of careful puttying around it to make it fit. 

So I'm waiting on the transfers to be able to mark her up as RAAF and then we'll be finished but I'm glad to have the painting done. I've really not enjoyed this kit the same way I enjoyed the AC-130 but it's a nice addition to the Australians.

Next Time

I'll hopefully have the roundels and the Catalina will be done done. I'm also expecting some new shinies for my Byzantines so the first attempts at replicating a 10 year old paint scheme will begin. 

You are part of the Rebel Alliance and a Traitor

We were supposed to have a 500-point Star Wars Legion event but the COVID restrictions on the club meant that it wasn't able to go ahead. So Pel, Scotty, Tank and I played a couple of 500 point games just for funsies! 

In my first game, I had a crack at Pel's rebels, lead by Han and Chewie. Three squads of troopers including one of Pathfinders, and the two Rebel Heroes. I had Darth Vader, a squad of Shore Troopers, a squad of Storm Troopers, a Mortar and a pair of Speeder Bikes.

Pel's Rebel Pathfinders infiltrated on my left flank before I had a chance to deploy anything to stop them.

Pathfinders finding paths...

 They spent most of the game in a firefight with the Shores in which the Pathfinders ultimately emerged victorious. For my turn, I drove Vader up the middle using his special order that improves his deflection capability (which did nothing but convince Pel not to shoot at Vader!)

Fear and Dead Men

 On the turn that followed, I dropped an order of Vader's that places 3 Suppression tokens on all enemy trooper units within range 2 when he activates. Pel's order choice could have made me pick another one, but he elected not to. Mistakes were made.

Speeders drop off the building and don't live much longer....

I threw everything I could at Han and got him up to 5 Suppression tokens. Pel recovered one and but it wasn't enough to stop him panicking and he headed for the base edge. That was a big win for me and was a surprising outcome as I hadn't considered Han was actually a trooper - I wanted to ideally just break the Pathfinders and the Rebel troopers in front of me. Han never really got back in the game.

 

I tried something else new on the third turn and gave Darth a 1-pip order to get him into combat ASAP. Vader advanced into Pel's Rebels and promptly rolled: 

Vader replicates the scene at the end of Rogue One

And then that Rebel Squad went away. I got to trip the power granted by the order and used it to lift Chewie into combat with Vader. In the following turn I had two cracks at killing Chewie and failed, much to my chagrin!

This was my last shot of the game:

Only Imperial Storm Troopers are so precise

Yep. Zero hits. So memeable. This game was also the game where my Shore Trooper mortar, having aimed and shot for 4 turns in a row rolled zero hits. Yup. Zero hits. That whole squad did a sum total of not very much except annoy Pel by making a bunch of saves against Rebel shooting when they should have been shot to bits.

In the end I think It was a 3 - 1 win to me having grabbed the objective with Vader in Turn 2 and then the Storm Troopers in turn 4. Vader is pretty disgusting on the small tables at 500 points and with a deployment like the half circle, he got a long way up the park to start with. I'm keen to get hold of Iden Versio and Agent Kallus as well as they'll be quite a lot of fun in these small scale games. Pel concluded tying up 200 points in Han and Chewie didn't really do what he needed either. While both are effective, they're better in larger games, where the Jedi & Sith are more self sufficient.

And then MORE REBELS

I had a crack at Scotty's Rebels in two more games both of which were staggeringly bloody. The first game was a 1 - 1 draw as Scotty managed to get one dude to my base edge as I managed to get a single Speeder Bike to his base edge. 

 The second game was a 'just kill the other guy' and this game was the first time I have ever managed to claim a bounty with Bossk.   It mostly had to do with dice rolls like this:

On top of the building, my attack roll from the Speeder Bikes at Scotty's infantry. On the basecloth, Scotty's save roll. Yup. That game pretty much went like that. 

Next Time

It's a public holiday weekend and the weather forecast for the Monday holiday is very bad so some painting time should be in the offing. I've got a final wash on the Catalina so she needs some highlights and to have the rest of the canopies fitted. I'm looking forward to getting her done. 

Does watching TV count as hobby time?

I have decided yes as I have finally started watching 'The Expanse' as our RPG group will be taking a bit of a break for a bit. I'm on the fence about the story at the moment, but I will make my way through to the end of season one and decide then how much further I'll take it. It has been good to better understand the universe and I do really really like the universe. Did I do anything else? Yeah....

Flames of War

I finished the Jagdpanzer IV/70 assembly. I really, really like this kit. It's superbly well designed, goes together like a dream and I think they might have some of the crispest seams and joins. I haven't had to break out the plastic putty at all and I've very pleased about that. 

 

I'll get these in the primer with the Hummels and organise a game in November to give me the gentle nudge to get these all painted and have the insane 80 point Jagdpanzer IV/70 list I wrote earlier in the year on the table. 

Limited Palette Wizgang

One more for the crew. I think I'd said I'd paint this with a green palette and honestly, once I put the base green down, I realised it was just all leather other than the kind of bodysuit. So I decided that I'd use the dark green base and see if I could find a complementary brown palette to sit on top of it. It's a mix of browns and highlighted browns, with off whites and bronze for the metals. I kind of like it.  

 

 There's still 10 more models in this little line so I'll keep plodding on with these as a bit of a project. 

Warhammer 40K 

Crusaders! I've had one of these for ages and have since managed to acquire three more. The base work is done here: 

 But there's still lots of detail work required to get these guys finished. It will potentially be a prompting to get the Guard out again. I'm also still working on an OP Leman Russ but that's stalled while I wait for parts from the UK. 

Next Time

I think I'll get the Catalina done just so it can stop sitting on the back of my painting desk looking at me accusingly. I think I'd like to get the Crusaders finished, which should be pretty straightforward, and I'll be painting a new model to use in Expanse.

First game of ADLG

 And it was glorious. Somehow my horsey army was caught at home by the Seleukid menace and they invaded the Byzantine mountains! There was quite a lot of chicanery with impassible terrain and steep hills that left a smaller frontage but still wide enough. 

The Seleukid pike deployed on their right flank, cavalry in the centre and the elephants and medium infantry on the left. Facing them, the Byzantine Skutatoi and Varangians, deployed in an inverted V and the Kataphraktoi in the centre with the Tagmata and light horse on my left. 

 

The Seleukid pike advanced agressively and their Skythian mercenaries exchanged arrows with the Tagmata. We learned a lot about how bad we were shooting at each other when one side is LH and the other is 1/2bow. While the Byzantine light horse did a merry dance with the pike while, in the course of a couple of rounds of combat, the Tagmata destroyed the Seleukid cataphracts. There wasn't much to the Seleukid centre so while the pike finally turned the Byzantine flank, the Kataphraktoi started causing merry hell on the flanks of the Seleukid left. 

Blogger Scotty was forced to split his MI / El line in two to fight my Varangians on one side and my Skutatoi on the other and the net result was me having overlaps on both ends of that line and a base of Kataphraktoi into the side of his elephants. 

 There were a couple of rounds here where Scotty couldn't roll better than a 2 or a 3 and while I was all over the shop in that photo above, I think I had a net +5. And we both rolled 1s. And he still exploded. And then rampaged over the top of the Varangians.

It was a tough game for Scotty - his dice were just consistently bad and he noted that as someone who played a lot of DBM back in the day, I've still got a few tricks up my sleeve that work as well in ADLG as they did back in the old DBM 3.0 days.

Flames of War

Otherwise, I've not been up to much. I started assembling BF's lovely Jagdpanzer IV/70 kit and I'm really enjoying it. They are a beautifully crisp kit that is going together like a dream.

I'm looking forward to getting them painted and literally covering them in foilage. With a bit of luck, I'll get a game in with them before the end of the year. 

Next Time

See last week? I'm more in a mood to paint at the moment so I should get some more shinies off the to-do pile. And I want to get through re-polyfilla-ing the Byzantines and getting the rest of the weapons glued back in and the army based so I can go through and touch up all the paint that needs doing too. 

Getting back to Byzantines

 As Blogger Pooch alluded to earlier, we've moved on from IMPETVUS to L'Art de la Guerre and as such, those of us with existing 28mm armies have started the arduous process (leaving aside Scotty and Tank both smashing theirs out over our recent lockdown) of rebasing. Getting my Byzantines off their bases was....arduous work as every weapon is in an open hand and I broke off SO MANY spears. 

I now have a small collection of spears, bows and javelins (as apparently, way back in the day, I had the foresight to clip the javelins about 10mm shorter than the spears!) that need an awful lot of superglue scraped off and, TBH, while many are still attached, I suspect rebasing these will remove that particular problem and I can do another phase of the project, putting all these spears back in with 2-part epoxy!

I've also found the last of the shield transfers I used in this project and, while I need some more, it's less than I thought so that was a nice bonus. I'm still thinking on what the basing might look like, at the moment I think a lot of flock and probably some flowers and stuff as this army is relatively discrete, I don't mind wandering from many of my sort of stock plans.

Palette Projects

The painting desire has been largely absent this week, I spent a lot of my hobby time scraping glue, filler and MDF off of Byzantine miniatures but I did add two models to the palette projects Frostgrave / DnD collection: 

On the left, a fighter with a predominantly blue palette and the barbarian using almost exclusively browns. The blue fighter was a bit of an exercise in painting a kind of mithril silver armour with a very gentle blue wash over it which was only moderately successful. I don't hate it, but it didn't come out the way I thought it would. I'm much happier with the barbarian which only used two shades of brown (Vallejo Tan Earth and Vallejo German Camo Medium Brown) some brass for metals and a bit of GW Ushabti Bone for highlights. As much as it's a bit 2000BC fur bikini, it's a cool model.

Flames of War

I decided, on a whim this week, that while there's unlikely to be a FlamesCon this year given the lockdownness of Auckland, I'd try and do the army I was thinking I'd like to take anyway so I've ordered some Jagdpanzer IV/70s for that and assembled these:

A purchase from Blogger Scotty, who decided that maybe he didn't need six Hummels after all. They are quite, quite silly but they add in an interesting element to the mix.

The Catalina? 

No pics this week but progress has been made. I snapped the wing off in a bit of a rage about it not being level and re-levelled it while also fitting new struts under the wings. Doing that exposed a couple more gaps that need attending to (ZOMG) around where the wing meets the hull and around the engine cowlings and exhausts. I should get me some shares in Vallejo with the amount of plastic putty I'm going through! 

Next Time

The finished Catalina? Maybe. I really enjoyed doing the two Reaper adventurers so I think I might do a couple more. I have a ranger that I think will be either be a sequence of greens (too predictable, perhaps?) or maybe an autumnal palette that would be like the palette I used on Saskia but different. I've also got a rogue-y thief and I'm quite tempted to have a crack at an effectively grey-scale palette. If the model looks elfin enough I might even go Drow and that would really be a thing....