Chronicling the eternal struggle to reduce the Lead Pile
With my solo campaign centering around the invasion of a newly colonized planet I wanted to have some believable militia/national guard. Thankfully GZG has a great line that fits in with my existing 25mm collection.
The Colonial Milita could easily double as corporate security if you leave out the old veterans and crazy hair.
I picked up a bunch of Ground Zero Games’ 25mm armed civilians from their lines to supplement the Stargrunt Colonial Militia. I’m slowly working my way through them as I batch paint several armies. The first set that I finished are the Partisans, a set of three armed civilians that I’ve done up as two riflemen and one squad support weapon.
I set out this past week to finish off two forces, and start two more. I had the last of my ESU naval troops to finish up in their urban camo, and the last six destroyers for my Kra’Vak fleet that I accidentally washed off the red ink from. I also wanted to start my 15mm GZG Colonial Militia troops and the 15mm murder robots from The Scene that I had to strip the poor paint jobs off of and rebase.
I wanted to paint the robots a metallic red. After seeing a couple of videos on YouTube out maxing your own metallic pants I gave it a try. Unfortunately the robots turned out a pink Pepto-Bismol-ish color that I was most definitely not pleased with. So I took this as an opportunity to test a couple things out since I couldn’t find a metallic red paint I was satisfied with. We’ll see how it turns out and I’ll strip them again and use the best method.
This past week wraps up a very productive month of June, I’ve been tracking my progress throughout the year on my painting log page here.
I’ve been working on my Full Thrust fleets and one of the fleets I’ve picked up in trade and on Ebay is a fairly large Kra’Vak fleet. Being an alien warrior race I wanted to emphasize their zeal and lust for battle with some garish paint jobs. I’ve been contemplating using inks through my airbrush for awhile now and I just got my hands on a Badger Renegade Krome .21mm airbrush so it was the perfect time. I chose a lime green and bright red paint scheme, with the red being airbrushed ink over a white ink base. I was satisfied with my first attempts and continued onto the wash. Well that is when I discovered that the ink will just reactivate and run unless you seal it before washing. Thankfully I only had to strip six destroyers and redo them. Seven other capital ships got finished this week.
This week was mostly prepping Full Thrust and 25mm Stargrunt minis, although I did knock off 10 more colonial militia figures.
The big project for this week was two old school Ground Zero Games Neu Swabian League Der Theuerdank carriers. These humongous pieces of lead were a huge pain in the ass. I got them off of Ebay and they were poorly assembled and filled with putty that didn’t want to come off even in he ultrasonic cleaner. So after several weeks in the ultrasonic cleaner and a couple of times grinding away with a Dremel they were finally ready to be assembled. Unfortunately I think these were some of the last model out of the molds before they were retired, because they’re full of casting flaws and do not fit well together. I have a third one of these that I will be turning into a dreadnought that is infinitely better cast and looks like it will be pretty straight forward to assemble, although to the weight it will still be getting a couple of pins and some putty
I got 10 more Colonial Militia done as I mentioned, including some NCOs which I mistakenly didn’t get painted in the last batch. All three are characters, fitting for militia. One has an orange Mohawk, one is an old man smoking a pipe, and the third is a pot bellied cigar smoking guy. Better photos will follow once I set up my photo tent again.
I prepped a bunch more Stargrunt figs, putting them on bases, evening the tabs out with putty, putting on my basing paste. Doesn’t make for great photos but it’s the dirty work that has to get done.
There’s ten more each of the Colonial Militia (including three primed but not painted), nine more ESU troopers, and twenty one OUDF troops who will be used as a mercenary company in my solo games.
I’ve also been working on figuring out how to mount my Full Thrust ships, preferably on removable stands. I think I’ve finally got something figured out that will work using brass rod and jewelry barrel clasps.
I’m hoping to finish up the colonists and get some work done on my Kravak fleet for Full thrust this coming week.
Well this is really about a months worth of progress it seems. The ‘Rona caught up and some other family crisis’s slowed me down for a couple weeks. I was making some slow progress but I didn’t finish anything until this past week where I made some good progress.
I finished off ten more of Rebel Miniatures Earth Force Home Guard troops, leaving only about 15 more before I’m finished with that particular lead pile and move on to the Rebel Minis Titan Marines.
After a failed legal bid before the Organization of Progressive States to claim discovery of the garden planet Glory, the People’s Republic of China launches a “Liberation Fleet” and starts the first extra-solar system military action in human history. Titan Interplanetary corporate employees and the newly settled colonists leasing land in what will eventually become The Republic of Arden brace themselves for combat. The spark of war ignites as a platoon of PLA troops pushes through Bois de l’écart Foix, a logging encampment set in the Foix Gap. The settlers construct a hasty defense and prepare to repel the PLA troops.
