Bad Photography and the Imperial Guard Through the Ages

First of all, an apology. I have been taking all my photographs with my mobile phone's camera (a technological marvel in and of itself!) but they are not particularly high quality (now there's a First World Problem for you).

At any rate, here are the two figures and the tanks that I have completed and the remaining tank that I am still working on:

A sergeant and Forward Observer (Master of Ordnance) from the Karaboudjani XV Kataphraktoi. The sergeant is wearing a dress uniform coat with red arm of service piping, and a Catachan web set, while carrying a revolver taken from a metal Escher figure from the Necromunda range. The Forward Observer is a standing tank commander figure with pink waffenfarb - after all, a regiment like this gets its artillery support from organic self-propelled guns. And it's an excuse to get a Basilisk, eventually.

'Charlie' Squadron, Valachian 1011th Armoured. L-R: Captain Count Geranium of Littlebush and Bigtree's Vanquisher, C1, with three kill rings, C2, awaiting tracks and initial weathering, and C3 with searchlight and hunter-killer missile. The blue square with red 'A' on the sides of C1 and C3 is the Crusade Badge of the Amalthean Crusade.

A note on the provenance of the machines. The turret of C1 and body of C3 came from a kit that I bought from GW Slough in the early 2000s, while the body of C1 and turret of C3 came from a fully-built model that I bought aged 10 from a schoolfriend at West Kidlington Primary almost two decades ago. I paid the princely sum of £5 for a model that had no turret stowage, badly applied detailing, and no fronts on the sponsons! C2 is a kit I bought in GW Leamington Spa in 2003, I think. The new Leman Russ kit has a completely different turret structure... but it's still too small for the crew and gun breech!

And finally, something that you may find interesting:

The Imperial Guard (well, the Cadians) through the ages! L-R: Rogue Trader Imperial Army sergeant from the 1980s, 2nd Edition Cadian Shock Troop Lieutenant from the mid 1990s, and a 3rd Edition Cadian sergeant from the early 2000s. Scale has proved remarkably consistent, although I do still prefer the look of the 2nd Edition Cadians to the modern figures.

For my fellow loons, they represent Sergeants of the Syrtis 72nd, the Rigellian 59th, and the Karaboudjani 15th. I am going to do a post soon comparing the Imperial Guard in each edition of 40K using a standard infantry squad as a baseline. Look forwards to it!

Of Tank Aces and Excuses

Wahey! A post! The world must be ending!

No, I've just finally set time aside to, well, you know, make a post.

Since the last update I have fought three battles of 40K - only two of which were actually completed, the other having to be called in my side's favour at the close of turn three - and painted two figures, and refurbed (to borrow a phrase) three Leman Russ tanks that I have had since I was 10.

Of the three, one had damaged side sponsons and a tank commander figure. So I tore off the sponsons, glued in some hatches to cover the holes, and elongated the barrel of the Battle Cannon with a second example that I had. Et voila, I had a Vanquisher variant Leman Russ! And with a 'Tank Ace' character model as well.

As far as the games went... the first game was a multi-player bash marking the inauguration of the games club I've informally set up, with myself (Guard), SB (Guard), P (Eldar), JB (Dark Angels) and JS (Orks). It should be noted that A and J, his wife, came too, but played Zombie Dice and spectated. This was SB and P's first experience with 40K (although P is an experienced Fantasy Battle player), and they had a great time - thankfully. We won, although we also didn't get past turn three.

Game 1, Pre-Deployment: SB contemplates the madness ahead of her.

Game 1 - Victory! JB and JS hang their heads in shame while P takes the salute.

The second game, I fought A's proxied Necron army with my Guard, and got utterly, horribly, completely destroyed. I killed one Necron Destroyer. One. And lost almost my whole army. In less than three turns? Urgh. Horrible. That was the first time my Vanquisher saw action, too. I didn't bother paying the points to upgrade to the Tank Ace. And I promptly missed with every shot.

Game 2: Turn 1. I have advanced two of my platoons, and there my luck ended.

Anyway, this time round, in the third game, I paid for the upgrade, and killed two Dreadnoughts, a Predator, and an Attack Bike. SUCCESS! I still lost the game though*. Bloody Kill Points. On the bright side I got to paint some kill rings for the vehicle kills onto the barrel of the Vanquisher Cannon, so now my Tank Ace is on the way to actually being one.

Game 3: The first kill (note instantly applied kill ring)! Tank Ace Captain Count Geranium of Bigbush and Littletree punches a Dark Angels Dreadnought off its feet with a high-velocity armour-piercing shell. He would go on to destroy a Predator and a Furioso Dreadnought before ending the game by obliterating an Attack Bike.

Game 3: The End. Here you can see the shattered remnants of my Guard army, and the pitiful remains of the Ork-Marine alliance - three Space Marines, the Dark Angels Grand Master, Ghazkull and two Nobs in a Trukk, a Warbuggy, a Zzap Gun and (off the board) a Blood Angels Predator and the Dark Angels Landspeeder Vengeance. The three Meganobs to the bottom left were dead, courtesy of the Demolisher Squadron.

Game 3: The Victor! Without this Landspeeder fleeing the field and denying me a chance to kill it, I could have dragged the game to a bloody draw (with some luck).

Thanks to Panther Six Actual, I have also been hooked by BattleTech again, and am seriously contemplating purchasing a Lance of St Ives Compact 'mechs to play against my good friend C's Capellan Death Commandos.

In addition to this new interest, I am yet to finish the Hybrid baddies for JB, although they are primed and the first coat of Boltgun Metal was applied yesterday. So I have actually started them.

Next update, hopefully tomorrow, I will post pictures of the tanks, the figures, and the in-progress Hybrid baddies.

Painting Points:
2013: 59 (19x 28mm, 2x 54mm, 2x tanks)

* (Ork) Battle Mission: Cut 'N' Run,  3,000 points of Guard versus three  1,000 point armies: Orks, Blood Angels and Dark Angels. Final kill points: 20-32 in the enemy's favour. I started the game with 87 men, 6 Sentinels, 2 Griffons, 2 Leman Russ, 1 Vanquisher, 2 Demolishers, and 8 Chimeras. I ended it with 2 Demolishers, 1 mobile Leman Russ, 1 Vanquisher, 1 immobilised Leman Russ, 1 Chimera and 1 immobilised Chimera. Meanwhile, 5 of my infantry had fled the board alive.

Game Night

Today, I painted no figures. What did happen, though, was that this evening, my regular gaming partner, A, came over with his wife, J, and together with my partner S, we played two games of Munchkin and one game of Zombie Dice!.

The first game - Star Munchkin - was very fast and frenetic. Lots of backstabbing went on and much laughter was had, particularly with the stackable laser weapons. S won, leaving us all languishing in the dust with the Redshirts and Captain Quirk.

Star Munchkin in full swing. Note my Bananafofanaserbaser (+9!). This got bigger until I lost all my items to a trap.

Then we played Zombie Dice!, which was brilliant. It was fast, fun, and simple enough to pick up in seconds. Actually, S, J and myself played it, as A was preparing a huge game of Munchkin! He has every expansion going, or so it seems, and the resulting game took a very long time, but was the most fun I have had for a long time. We struggled against each other, monsters, and ourselves, as well as the dungeons we were in, and eventually my Half-Elf-Half-Orc Thief won. Because he was part Orc. I celebrated!

Munchkin begins. My Elf Thief begins his/her accumulation of gear...

At this stage we had all had our characters' sex changed. So my Elf was now a female Elf and could wear the pointy bra I'd picked up...

An extra class and more gear! Including a hat I couldn't wear...

Now I was back to being a man, but had become a Half-Orc Elf. This would prove game-winning...

As you can see! I am the naked blonde chick at Level 10, S is the Skaven Grey Seer on Level 9, A the Dwarf Slayer and J the High Elf Noble, both at Level 8. I won by killing a Level 7 Cockroach and defeating it by more than 10 levels, thus gaining two levels and going from 8 to 10 AND WINNING ahahahahaaaa!

Munchkin comes from Steve Jackson Games and is illustrated (mostly) by John Kovalic of Dork Tower fame.

Beyond the Gates of Antares, or, Kickstarter!

So,  the previous post was meant for Wednesday, and it is now Friday, I figure I owe my loyal readers at least one more post. And what better subject than to announce that I have thrown in my feeble financial weight behind Rick Priestly and John Stallard's new wargame concept, Beyond the Gates of Antares. It is a hard-SF setting which the game's backers - yes, me included - can have a say in. The company they've set up, Dark Space Corp, has more details and a forum.

The big attraction for me, apart from the fact that Warhammer 40,000 is my favourite SF wargame setting, and Rick is responsible for, among others things, Necromunda and Black Powder, is that Hasslefree's Miniatures' very own Kev White will be one of the sculptors (and is indeed the man who has made the Kickstarter's unique backer figure, Hansa).

For a £25 pledge, one will receive a hardback rulebook, a special forum badge, a pdf copy of the rules, and the Hansa figure. A bargain!

They have 30 days (or so) to hit a £300,000 target. As of writing they are at £95,066 - so £6,667 a day is required to launch Beyond the Gates of Antares to, well, the beyond! Go - pledge - make wargaming history!

Concept art from the Kickstarter page.

Take Two

So, apparently, despite my attempt to update my blog on Wednesday with pictures of the Confrontation: Hybrid figures that I'd finished... the machine-spirits said "NO" and so the post vanished into the ether. It isn't even showing up as a draft! Oh well.

Anyway, after being slightly mocked by J for not delivering on my promise of Confrontation figures, here they are - the Gryphon Knights of Hod!

Now I need to work on the Abominations. There's three armed and armoured robo-zombie types, four small cybernetic creatures, and a massive great big clockwork/steampunk ogre thing. So far they're built up but not undercoated. I really need to get a shift on with this lot!

Painting Points:
This Week: 9 (4x 28mm, 1x 54mm)
January 2013: 27 (17x 28mm, 2x 54mm)

Inquisitorial Business

I watched Django Unchained tonight, and thought it was brilliant. Not only was it a great film from Tarantino, but it fitted right in with Spaghetti Westerns of old (even if it is a 'Southern'). Superb acting from Waltz and DiCaprio, Foxx putting in a grand turn, and, well, Waltz stealing the show. Brilliant stuff. Made me want to produce Inquisitor characters based on Dr King Schultz and Django, not to mention the scarily violent Calvin Candie.

Anyway! Today I also finished the final - for now - member of Gideon Syme's warband, Hanna Laschalle. Which means that I am free from my bugbear of "current obsession" to do more than dab paint on the Confrontation commission. Expect to see some more Confrontation figures tomorrow.

Here, then, is Laschalle and the triumverate of Syme, Moritz and Laschalle:

Things

In no particular order, some of the stuff I've done whilst being offline...

Grey Knights Dreadknight, painted waaaay back in 2011 when they were released.

Dark Eldar pain tokens and a member of the Archon's Court (the Gyrinx).

Dual-purpose Chaos Cultists: fit for a Word Bearers' army to play 6th Edition with, and also perfect for Necromunda. Fantastic models that paint up wonderfully well.

Hasslefree Miniatures' H4-ML37 (which I named) painted as an experimental US gene-eered soldier-hound. In powered armour. Of course! HOO-AH MARINES etcetera etcetera.

A special character from Rackham's Confrontation: Hybrid - the first completed part of my commission for J... more of those to come soon!

And, lastly, something I've had my eye out for for a long time:

It's the Cluedo dramatis personae! From this edition of the party favourite:

Sculpted, I think, by Mark Copplestone.
Painting Points:
January 2013: 13 28mm figures, 1 54mm figure = 18 PP.

INTERNET ACCESS GRANTED

Mein Gott! I have internet!

And to celebrate, here is a picture of one of the many figures I have painted since October (!) last year:

Susanna Moritz, a 54mm figure from Games Workshop's Inquisitor range.

I have also painted H4-ML37, finished one of the figures for my friends' commission, and done various other figures - notably Chaos Cultists from the 6th Edition 40K starter set.

And now I have gerbils in my flat, courtesy of my partner. Gerbils! Photos of them and the above figures to follow...

...and updates will resume their daily nature, because otherwise I will be soundly biffed around the head.

Painting Points: Lots. I'll work it out tomorrow.

For J, Who Will Explode If I Don't

I have been really lax in updating this blog. Over the last week I have painted three Miliciens, a Jugoslav Communist partisan, 20 more Molgravians, and made good progress on my commission for J. I have also deflashed 36 28mm Napoleonic French and assembled the free figure of H4-ML37 that Hasslefree Miniatures sent me - because I came up with the name.

So here are the pictures:

Figures from J's commission: I still need to paint their webbing, woodwork, and fine detail before I do the faces and hair. About two thirds done probably.

Tito's finest - a female partisan. I think she was originally meant to be a French resistance fighter, but she looks better as a Jugoslavian.

Vive la France! Three Franc-Gardes non-permanente ready to repel the enemies of Vichy. No idea who made these chaps, who are in actuality meant to be FFI or Maquisards. I don't think anyone makes Milice figures, which is a shame.

H4-ML37 in his powered armour suit and carrying an advanced assault rifle (with 'smart' 20mm HE underbarrel launcher). I think I'm going to give him a San Francisco 49ers baseball cap, because my first baseball cap when I was small was a 49ers one. I am tempted to get his companion Smudge to form some kind of ultra-experimental US military unit. A bit like We3 (a brilliant graphic novel, read it if you can find it), perhaps.

And finally, the Molgravian Liebgarde zu Fuss expands up to 32 figures out of the final total of 52 plus Colonel.

Olley Painting Points:
This Week: 21 (and 3 from last week not previously counted)
October Total: 43
2012 Total: 88