Oops...

...this might stymie painting progress somewhat for the next few weeks! 

Been dipping into Witcher 3, not a series in familiar with but damn it looks good.

May Painting Progress

Happy Sunday everybody. It's been a while since I posted but I'm happy to report further progress on the Sudan project. It'll be very tight to get everything done, but I'm comfortable I can put a game without everything: some bits are just icing (or even the cherry on top). 

First up, a bunch more Sudanese Bazingers. This is the Perry command pack. Painted as before - two different colours on the robes, and a fairly motley collection of other equipment. 

Here they are with the rest painted during AHPC V. A bit command-heavy, but a decent sized unit for me. 

I've also done up some casualty/shock markers, using the ubiquitous dice frames. I wanted to do more but have run out of frames, so need a restock. I've a couple of Britsh ones on the paint table now. 

Two are actually converted as the Perry's Sudan range only has Beja tribesman casualties, simple head swaps to replace the distinctive Beja hairdo. You may see that the ones falling in action at the back also have some bullet impacts on the base to add to the dramatic effect - using Curt's simple but effective method.

That's most of the minis I want to get done, but I'm well behind on the terrain. Happily it's a bank holiday weekend here, an opportunity to make some progress, starting with smashing up some rather large bits of cork bark that I picked up. For those of you wondering about the SCW project that I had been making decent progress on, that's still on ice. I've a small batch mostly finished that I may well wrap up if the fancy takes me, but the bulk of it is on hold until next month. 

Salute: The Games

I realise I'm a week late on the Blogoshpere, but here are the games that stood out to me as I whisked around the Salute hall. I didn't take down the details and don't have a programme to consult so few credits here I'm afraid. Having seen everyone else's, I clearly missed some corkers!

The hall before the crowds descended...



...and the crowd - quite a queue snaking in a whole unit.



7TV's lovely Ghostbusters game



An awesome AWI fort game, with six gorgeous ships. It won best in show I believe.

Beasts of War's Assault on Hoth game - looked a bit unfair on the Rebels!

Napoleon's Last Gamble(?) - the Assault of the Guard at Waterloo. A very striking table and lots of very well painted 28mm Napoleonics. 

Wargames Illustrated (easy one to credit :-) ) Simon De Montford must Die!

A striking fantasy naval game: I liked the choppy seas that they'd modelled. 

The Wyvern Wargamers/Kallistra game that I helped to run for the day. Is was the First battle of Ypres, 1914, the assault of the Prussian Guard on the British positions.

And from the German perspective. As the game played out, the Germans penetrated the British slit trench in three places, with much lighter casualties than historically.



Simon Miller's To the Strongest!, table, Bloody Cremona. Great terrain and miniatures as always.

A demo table of Osprey's Black Ops

Two Blitzkrieg Miniatures tables for their upcoming ruleset 'Panzer Battles'. Bit heavy on the tanks for me (what is this, FoW?) really nicely painted though. Desert Rats vs Afrika Korps



And Battle of the Bulge

Hawk Wargames display game - a lot of lead on the table



A VBCW game? Nice scenery

Oshiro Modelterrain's gorgeous Japan table - a highlight every year.

And that's your lot! A good show, but as with most, it feels like there's too much to see. That's for a paying punter, manning a table meant a very long day, though we each managed to get away a few times to whisk around the hall. Worth going once again, thanks to the a Wyvern lot for the offer, I don't think I'd have made it otherwise.

On a separate note, Ray of 'Don't Roll a 1' has a rather smashing giveaway going, so head on over there if you don't like any of the dame stuff as me. 

More Commanders for the Sudan

With the focus on the SCW platoon, it had slipped my mind that I'd offered to put on a game at a Operation Market Larden 3 at Wyvern in early June. Not only that, but I've the esteemed Mr Roundwood playing  one of my sessions. A panicked list of what I should get done in the six or so weeks before that set me off: it was time to get cracking.

I started with a couple of 'nice to haves': two more Commanders or 'Big Men' in Sharp Practice terminology. The first being a mounted Egyptian officer.



Fairly standard stuff and a quick paint, I gave him a darker blue uniform that my officers in units. When I get around to him, the Egyptian C-in-C will wear black.

I'm also a bit light on Mahdist emirs, so fished out another from the lead pile. This was probably one of the original packs that I bought a few years ago, no idea why he hadn't then painted yet. 

Not much to say: he's in a colourful patched jibbeh that's sculpted on the Perry emirs.

Next to paint are some more Bazingers, then I've quite a bit of terrain for the rest of May. I would have liked to finish the highlander unit, but I just can't see me having the time.

After the creeping worry hit, I also got started on the necessary cards and Blinds for Sharp Practice. Using an excellent free texture from borealnz on Flickr (thanks for the tip, Mr Roundwood!) and some era-specific images, voila:





They'll be printed and laminated. I've finished the generic cards, it's pretty quick once you have a template made up. Next up is to make the cards for each Big Man.
​

Salute: The Loot

So another year's Salute finished - what was my haul? Quite an odd one, all in all. 

The big buy was Star Wars Armada, which I've had my eye on and already racked up a few fun games using my brother' core set. It's not cheap and the core box isn't really enough for a game, but with two of us collecting, we should be able to split the new waves of releases between us and keep the cost more palatable. The Troll Trader had it at £55, an excellent price considering the rrp is £80. Even at that price, I'm glad I know what I getting myself in for. 

Three 15mm 4Ground buildings - Wyvern chaps split a preorder which made the max 25% discount, so I supplemented the farm I've already got with the beginnings of a town. I also grabbed more Landmark walls as they are heavily discounted and may vanish off the market. 

Renedra terrain - desert accessories and sandbags. Also a TFL/Warbases chicken coop (I couldn't resist)

Stocking up on paint (replacing some dried up old GW paints with suitable vallejo), as well as bases and tufts. Also some black primer that avoided the photo. 

Some markers for status effects and vehicle damage (the latter in the Troll Trader bargain bin for £1). - always come in useful. 

Just a few miniatures: Artizan Designs 'tea time' colonial officer for the Sudan and Hasslefree 'not Last of Us' survivors. I was sorely tempted by Lucid Eye miniatures simians and cro-magnons, but I just don't have a use for them at 

All in all, mostly hobby supplies and terrain. No substantial impulse purchases. No new projects. Barely any miniatures. Oddly that feels like a good thing - I've enough to paint already!). 

Salute: Bravo...

...Mr Perry and Mr Perry. Their new plastic set(s) announced at Salute were:



Colonial British infantry - yay!

I eked out of Alan that there will be two separates boxes covering the conflicts as above. No ETA, these will either be before or after the HYW French infantry, whichever is finished first.

More photos of some great games when I'm less ruined from a very, very long day.

Chain of Command: First Carlist Requetes

Humm, April. April was meant to have me bursting through the Spanish Civil War project to get some games of chain of Command at Wvvern: most of the club have their forces painted. That meant blitzing a section of Carlist Requetes and then onto some support choices. Then for May I'd be free to focus on some odds and ends for the Sudan to put on a game at the Club's Lardy day, "Operation Market Larden 3: A Bridge too Lard".

I suspect it will surprise few of you to learn that those timescales are slipping, but I do have some small progress to report. Frustratingly, I haven't been able to source a colour that I'm happy with for the Carlists' beige shirts (vallejo recommendations warmly welcomed). I would have used the old GW favourite Khemri Brown as a base, but as it's discontinued and a fairly key colour for the Sudan project, I'm rationing it to essential uses only. 

Still, a couple of the Empress Carlists aren't wearing shirts, like this chap in a natty jacket. 

I settled on grey, which is so 1936, using the gent on the right as inspiration:



I'm also led to understand that the Requetes wore colourful civilian blanket rolls over their shoulders. Further damage to my hopes of a quick job, so I went the whole hog with this stripey number. 

I've also decided to put more effort into my unit markings - something I rarely bother with. But this has turned into a bit of a showcase project for me and as I'm trying to develop my painting, it feels like these touches are worth it. On the downside, they add more free handing (I need to practice, these took a fair while) to each mini. So this Sargento has his green chevron on his sleeves, which is appropriate according to Balagan. I won't fully mark them up, it'll depend the sculpts and me being able to decipher source material on how they should look.

Next up was this chap in a more traditional uniform. So a bit of googling around to figure out what colour I'm after for the  Nationalist uniform: 'greenish tinged khaki', apparently, but I this seems to manifest in many shade in people's collections. Spain-based Miniarons kindly offer the painting guide from the back of their sets on their website gave a vallejo shade: 70.822 US Uniform.



Duly used, but even used as e highlight, it appears to be rather less 'greenish tinged khaki' and more...green. It looks a bit brighter in real life too. Hummmm.

I like it, but it doesn't seem right (or is it?!) for when I move onto the Nationalist infantry on the prep table. Once again, thoughts of those more steeped in SCW and with better reference material would be very helpful.

On the rank markings, may be able to see his two stars (ahem blobs) on his sleeves and 'galetta' on his left breast, ranking him as a 'Teniete'. And what else should a Teniete be doing but scrutinising the lay of the land?

All in all, pretty chuffed with how these two Empress sculpts have come out. But that's just two of 24 done and I've still not got a colour for the uniform of the rest!