TinMan - VSF/Steampunk, Empire of the Dead?

I have been hunting high and low, for this figure for ages. Ever since the whole VSF, GASLIGHT, Empire of the Dead thing took off, I knew he'd be perfect, but in two broken parts, which always seemed to be in different places to each other, I was never able to find both at the same time to effect a repair, until Sunday...

In a fit of tidying, I discovered both parts, at the same time...

The repair was easy and a bit of themed re-basing and, Voila!

TinMan - now Infernium powered!

The figure is a very old Citadel figure from way back in the late 80's, if I recall correctly... he came with a little dwarf engineer with a blow torch ... and were part of a cartoon strip story from the then Citadel Journal, the story involving a Chaos Ogre in full Black Plate armour, called Skragg, again if I remember it right...

The paint job is old, but serviceable, though I may need to touch up the slightly chipped paint on the end of the hammer...

Here he is paired with Professor Erazmus, from WestWinds Empire of the Dead game...

TinMan and the mad professor, his creator?

I'll just have to come up with some stats for him in the game... anyone any ideas, comments welcome below!

Victorian Terrace - WIP 13 - building finished, painting to go...

More work on the Victorian terrace over the last couple of weeks... its good having several projects on the go at once, as whenever you get bored with one, you can do a bit on something else... of course this tends to make you spread your stuff out all over the house! Just make sure you don't upset SWMBO! Dining room tables and kitchen breakfast bars are usually no go areas! ;-)

Plus while the glue or paint on one project is drying, you can be working on something else...

Anyway enough waffle, on with the pics...

First up I finished tiling the roof - thank the Gods for that! Once dry, I glued on the capping ridge.

I then based the building on a sheet of 3mm MDF, to give a pavement width around the front and two sides, but leaving the rear yard wall straight on to alley way. I left a hole underneath to be able to access internal lighting should the need arise.. I clad the MDF pavement in DAS clay again and etched in a pavement pattern.

With the roof done, I added gutters and drain pipes using plastic strut... they are not glued together though as the roof remains lift off for access to batteries for the internal lights...

With building now on a base, I could complete the rear yards, giving them a simple sand surface. More card tiles effected a pathway to rear gate.

The last bit to do is to add the LED gaslamp street lights. I have yet to wire these in to the main house circuit, but am pondering leaving till after painting as I have a feeling they will get in the way, and probably knocked off by accident, during the paint job...

So that's construction complete, just painting left to do... after that I hope to find some suitable Victorian advert bill posters that I can stick on the gable ends of the building to finish the effect... and then perhaps some general junk and detritus to make the rear yards look interesting....

Kerr and King, Pair of Shops, with bombed roof.

I finished another of my Kerr and King Western Europe buildings recently; the twin shop set, with a broken roof...

Twin shop front

...and with 15mm half track for scale.

These have their customary lift off roofs and lift out top floor, so models can be placed inside on both levels.

Must admit, this had a lot of flash to deal with ( I wonder if their mold was getting old?). Took a lot of work with the Dremel to get it in a paintable state, and the usual greenstuff use to fix missing window frames and bubble holes in roof tiles... but its work well spent and finished building paints up well.

I only have one more building from the set that I originally bought from Kerr and King, to go, the Manor house... I'm about half way done... after that I may do some more DIY Russian buildings...

Can't see the wood for the Trees?

Trees, you can never have enough trees, all different shapes, colours and sizes... and yet, go to any model store to buy some pre-made, ready to go,  good looking trees... and they cost the earth!

So being the hobbyist skin-flint that I am I always try and make my own and have tried several methods over the years.

Recently I came across a good article, on the Slave to Painting website... using bottle brushes...

I followed the instructions and was very pleased with the results.

The only problem is sourcing a wide variety of cheap bottle brushes. I sourced these from Petes Emporium in Porirua, where you get one big one and one small one, in a pack for NZ$1.50. I bought 6 packs...  and made what you see here. The biggest brush I tried cutting in half to make two medium size trees, but this was only partially successful as the bristles started falling out from the middle cut point.  I may try sealing them with some spray undercoat first next time before cutting.  Next time I am passing Porirua I'll grab some more...

Trees with 28mm Empire of the Dead figures

Trees with 15mm Flames of War figures

So in summary, take your bottle brush and trim bristles to desired shape.

Spray thoroughly with matt black undercoating spray. A proper undercoat spray still stays feeling slightly tacky after drying... I use Plastikote brand...

Mix up some thin glue mixture, using PVA wood glue and water, roughly 50/50... you want it quite runny... dunk in your brush, and drain off excess, back into pot ( I used an old food jar, tall enough to take the biggest 'tree')...

Liberally sprinkle with fine grade flock material.. Allow to dry.... this will take a while due to water content of glue. Once dry, repeat... two layers of flock work best...

Conceal the wire handle with a layer of DAS modelling clay. Score in a bark pattern before it fully dries. Paint brown and dark brown wash.

Cut out some bases, I used 3mm MDF, and a hole cutting attachment on my drill... but keep the cut out disk!

Hot glue the tree to the base, then flock the base as desired... I used my usual method; first up brown craft paint and PVA glue 50/50 and then sprinkle with brown flock ( I used dried out tea leaves from used tea bags). Once dry use some thinned PVA glue again to glue on patches of Green static grass.

Voila...!

These trees probably cost roughly NZ$2 each to make... last time I was at local hobby store, they were selling packs of two trees for NZ$22.50 !

Your only real commitment... is your time...

PS... for Styx, as requested below... this is as close an image to the ones I bought and used I have found on the web... they are basically a set of babies bottle brushes, one for the main bottle, the other smaller one for the silicone rubber nipple/teet, call it what you will...

It's better with the King...

... or, the Tiger, is dead, long live the King Tiger !

With the Wellington Warlords Call to Arms tournament just around the corner, I was in a bit of a quandary as to what force to take. I knew I was probably going to go with my favoured armoured half track German list, but which support elements to take?

Last year, Panthers were a good choice, as a supporting panzer... but with the release of the Market Garden publication, with its improved Allied arsenal including the upgunned 6pdr and 17pdr AT guns and the upgunned Firefly VC, that thick front armour of the panther is looking decidedly vulnerable... so what to do?

Stick with the game plan and use the panthers, and try not to get hit?,... or drop the panthers and take a whole punch of Panzer IVs for more return fire?,... or continue the arms race, and up the ante with the King Tiger?

Having recently enjoyed a demo game at the KWC, where 2 Tiger IEs in a Midwar setting proved nigh on unstoppable... I pondered trying the same idea in Late War with the King Tiger...

So in a bit of a dilemma, I decided there could be a strong chance I may favour a list featuring the King Tiger, aka; the Tiger II Ausf B.

So I put an order through to Caliver in the UK, who had the boxed set of three at a discounted price...and crossed fingers it might arrive in time... it did, last Friday to be precise... and thus its been a week of frenzied work to get these done in time. I have managed it with a fortnight to go, so might get a chance for a practice game or two in before I must submit my list to tournament organisers.

Tiger II Ausf B

In the game, they are a hell of an investment in points! If I were going with a Schwere Panzer Kompanie, I could field all three tanks for just over 1000 pts, leaving ~700pts for the rest of my force.  But for my mechanised company, I will most likely just go with 2 Tiger IIs as a support platoon, though they still cost about 700 pts...

Still, with an in game range of 40", AT 16 FP 3+, they can kill any tank they hit, and with a Front Armour of 15, will be nigh on invulnerable to the front. Side armour 8 and top armour 2, like a regular Tiger I, is their weakness, so I must keep their flanks secure... and I may have to dodge about to avoid ranged in artillery, stay near woods and buildings if planes are about, and move about if I get smoke bombarded... but hey, if they are soaking up all this attention, the rest of my force will be free to operate unmolested... and if they try to ignore them, and go with the kill everything else approach, they will undoubted keep knocking stuff out turn after turn...

With division markings of the 503rd Heavy Tank Battalion

 The 503rd saw action on both the Eastern and Western fronts, so this seemed a good choice to go with for my platoon.

The 503rd emblem being a Tigers head motif, see above left front mudguard...

After a while, having spent the week assembling and painting them, they begin to seem 'normal', nothing outstanding... its not until you put them next to other similarly scaled tanks that the difference becomes apparent once more... see pics below these are all 15mm scale Battlefront models...

L to R: Firefly VC, Tiger IIB, Sherman V

L to R: Firefly VC, Tiger IIB, Sherman V

The Tiger IIB, truly monstrous...

Fury of Dracula

Some of you may recall this post, some time ago...

Well, No.1 sons 10th birthday came round recently and he got this boardgame as part of his prezzy haul. He's right into the whole gothic horror thing, the movie 'Van Helsing' just about being on permanent loop in the movie room ;-)  He also got the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker too, and is already several chapters in...

I had a read through of the rules the other night and we're going to give it whirl tonight, along with mate Jon, who's a boardgame fan.

I also found a handy link to rules online here.

Looking forward to some vampiric fun... guess who'll be playing the 'bad guy'? ;-)

"I vant ...to byte... yor nik..., ...blah, .. blah blah...*" ! ;-)

*See Hotel Transylvania, for a good laugh!

Victorian Terrace WIP 12 - Roof tiling - half way there!

I feel like I deserve, or at least need, a mini fanfare - I have got the roof tiling half done! Yippee!

I doesn't look like much work, but jings does it take a while, or what...

I have been cutting up thin card into 10mm x 5mm pieces then gluing these on individually, starting at the bottom and working up in overlapping rows...

In the finest traditions of 'rivet counting', I had a quick tot up of the tiles on this one side of the roof; 44 tiles wide and 20 rows, = ~900 tiles, plus the ones on the out buildings.

My work station, mini dvd player keeps me sane! One side done.

Its lengthy work but I hope the final effect will be worth it. Once its done I am going to see if I can add some guttering and drainpipes using Evergreen plastic strut.

Out building roofs done too.

I will be basing the building on a piece of MDF sheet that will effect a width of pavement to front and sides of building, to which I will be attaching  these LED model gaslamps. I'll then need to wire them into the main house circuit, running the wire under the MDF sheet, via a groove cut into the underside.
The Gaslamps are 60mm tall, and sourced from ebay trader; "we_honest".

LED gaslamp and Victorian gent (half painted) for scale.

That's all for now. Back to the grindstone!