Addicted to Lead

This week’s painting progress.

I’ve had a productive week, especially after not getting a whole lot done in February. I’ve done two platoons of Ground Zero Games 25mm figures, so I wanted a little palette cleanser, Some variety to break up the monotony.

I keep breaking out my livestock for viking raiding games, so I figured I’d actually get more than a couple cows painted up to join my sheep and pigs. The Warlord Games farm animals are 1:56th scale with good detail, but the seams are ridiculous! I tried using the Vallejo Plastic Putty but it just wasn’t enough to fill them. The Pegasus Hobbies cows are mostly one piece, but 1:48th and have some soft details. The scale differences add some variety and I’m not too concerned about the detail level of a cow…

Not one step back!

Not one step back! Always forward, for the lead pile! Once I paint a figure I have a rule to never repaint it. I don’t spend time striping figures I finished years ago, or spend weeks painting even a character figure. Once they’re done, they’re done! You know, except for the times I go back and strip figures and repaint them…

So I don’t generally revisit minis. I’ll repair damaged minis, put decals on minis long after I finished painting them, and I have some minis who’s bases were never finished and I’ve had to go back and do those. The lead pile is never small enough that stripping a pile of minis and then repainting them because they’re not perfect is a good option.

Painted two years ago, started basing them this week…

GZG 25mm Eurasian Solar Union ‘Heavy’ Infantry Figures

My on going 25mm Project continues with the ESU ‘Heavy’ infantry that were produced in partnership with Eureka Games for quite some time until only a handful of years ago. The Eurasian Solar Union in the Tuffleyverse consists more or less of China, Russian, India, most of the rest of Asia and these troops are clearly meant to mirror the padded uniforms of WWII Soviet troops. In my Tomorrows War games these troops will be used to represent the Democratic Peoples Republic of Glory conscript troops. The DPRG is, more or less, space North Korea. I love the almost retro look to these troops and think they really invoke the image of poorly trained conscripts forced into service.

The sculpts are detailed and the old casts were clean, requiring only a little cleanup. I contacted Eureka in Australia and they offered to spin up the molds for me, but they didn’t have the minis on the website anymore so I had to dig around to find a cached version of the catalog. Shipping is going to make them expensive but it will round out my platoon.

Ground Zero Games 25mm New Swabian League figures.

Ground Zero Games is known for two things. 1: Great sculpts, and B: not having photos of those great sculpts. I bought a large collection of their 25mm figures from a guy a couple years ago and just started painting them up for use in Tomorrows War and solo games of 5150 Star Army. The collection isn’t quite complete so I’ve been adding to it from GZG and also just recently contacted Eureka Miniatures to pick up some of their sculpts too. I also just got some new toys for photography, macro extension tubes, and wanted to play around with them so I figured I’d take some photos of these great sculpts.

The sculpts are pretty good, my favorite so far from GZG’s 25mm. The details are well defined and realistic. The sizes, sculpts and quality are pretty consistent across the entire GZG range and match size wise with several other 25mm range including the West End Games Star Wars figures which I should be tackling later this year. The castings I got with the collection were very clean and the new ones I ordered recently have minor and very easily cleaned up flashing.

Goals, motivation, and progress: The road to 350.

January is seeing some slow but steady progress on my goal of 350 painted miniatures this year. I’ve prepped a bunch of Ground Zero Games old school 25mm Star Grunt minis and started painting a squad while waiting for some 6mm Battletech minis to dry between paints and washes. I’m batch painting both projects so it’ll add up to about 15 miniatures done for the week, which is a good start to the year!

Ground Zero Games 25mm Star Grunt figures getting primed

Sound of the Guns. Nuts! Blood on the Risers Solo mission.

As my ragtag platoon advances towards Saint Mere Eglise it comes upon a cluster of houses that is clearly being used to garrison some Jerry’s. We need to clear out these houses so we’re not leaving enemies to our rear when we get to Saint Mere Eglise. As we ready our assault we run into a lieutenant an eight more paratroopers. We split into three squads and advance to secure what will be our Northern flank.

GZG 25mm Neu Swabian League, WIP Wednesday!

I have a decent sized collection of unpainted Ground Zero Games 25mm Stargrunt figures that I’m planning on using in both Tomorrow’s War and 5150 Star Army from Two Hour Wargames. My plan is to use them to fight out both the first and second Glory War, pitting the DPRG against the combined force of the US Marines and the Republic of Arden.

GZG’s Neu Swabian League’s troops in their hard armor, enclosed helmets, gyro-stabilized SAWs and energy weapons fit well into my vision for the US Marines. They looks tougher than the ESU troops but still just behind the cutting edge like the Marines are described.

The platoon ready to get sealed and a wash applied tomorrow

Thunder and Flash! Nuts! Solo campaign.

One of the reasons I wanted to learn Two Hour Wargames’ system of rules was to play co-op games with my friend Murph. The stars aligned and Murph came down to play a game and catch up, so I picked up the Nuts! campaign Blood on the Risers campaign so we would have something a little more structured than the random learning games I’ve been playing solo. We played through the first scenario and I replayed it again at night.

The campaign begins with my lone lieutenant parachuting into Normandy in the middle of the night on D-Day. A AAA battery and three PEFs are deployed to the table. As my character searches the fields for some equipment bundles the PEFs move on up towards me.

Nuts! Round 2. Solo Wargaming

Game number 2 has my platoon of US Airborne defending a farmhouse from an impending attack by the Germans. I set up my forces, generated the PEFs and started the game.

Not wanting to leave the cover of my stone walls and ruined buildings I waited for the Germans to advance, only shifting one .30 cal team to my right since two PEFs appeared in the woods. As the closest PEF moves into view it resolves into three armored vehicles! Since I have only one platoon with one bazooka I decide that they will appear as three half-tracks, sent in support of the advancing troops. It doesn’t make any sense that they would appear in the middle of the board, so I have them enter the board at the roads to my north.

2020’s Hobby Goals, or: The Road to 350 Redux.

I wrapped up my 2019 goals just in time, breaking the 350 mark in December. I thought I would blow through it and raise my goal for 2020 but I think 350 is fairly easy to achieve, I painted somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 miniatures and about two dozen vehicles if you count the two commissions I was working on, but I won’t be increase it.

So what will my main projects be for 2020? Eisenkern, Terminator Genisys, Kobolds, old school 25mm sci-fi, and Battletech. I’m certain I’ll mix in some D&D, Zombies (both modern and WWII) and hopefully some 15mm stompy robots to mix it up a little bit.