Space Hulk Grey Knight Terminator

I picked up the new edition of Space Hulk last autumn and we've had a good fun playing it from time to time. I decided that instead of painting the Space Marine Terminators the classic Blood Angel red that is typical of the 'GW fluff' I would do them up as part of the Grey Knights chapter. I also wanted to try to do a variation of the 'non-metalic metal' finish to see how it worked out. Anyway, above is one of the completed Terminators. The rest are in various levels of completion and will be following along as we play the game. Maybe I'll do a group shot as a follow-up.

Warhammer Fantasy Empire Steam Tank

Chitty-Chitty... Bang! Bang!

I thought I'd move some stuff off the main page to where they actually belong. Here is something completely off the beaten track. This is another golden oldie that I've excavated from the display cabinet and dusted off (literally) - an Empire Steam Tank from a previous edition of Warhammer Fantasy.

I converted the base model to make it reminiscent of something Leonardo da Vinci would dream up - sort of a Renaissance Steampunk Land Dreadnought kind of thingy. The kit was virtually all white metal and almost every part was warped or somehow misshapen.  I think about of quarter of this thing is composed of metal pins and Green Stuff filling gaps and holding it all together. Some of the engineering crew are courtesy of my friend Kevin to which I muddled around with their poses and  harmonized their colours. The model weighs a ton. I can't remember all the whacky stuff that this bad boy could do in the game but I do recall it was pretty darn rude. It got to the point where I felt a little guilty putting it on the table - an emotion I deftly learned to stifle. ;)

I know, like a sail would have any chance of moving this thing - but it looks cool and, really, who can deny a tank with a crows nest?

Another friend, Sylvain, has recently finished building a lovely Wood Elf army which is quite the terror. Now that I look at this thing again I really think his pointy-eared, hemp-wearing, tree-huggers need to be introduced to some Imperial Heavy Metal... Toot! Toot! Parp! Parp!

28mm Covenanters & Highlanders for ECW

Here are a few more photos of some of my older ECW figures. First up are a group of dour Scottish Covenanters manfully manning a frame gun (probably a fire-sale Swedish import from the German Wars). As opposed to the typical Covenanters (you know, the ones 'who don't like sex as it may lead to dancing') - I like to think that my Covenanters represent that small partying faction that we don't often hear about. Anyway, here are some blue-bonneted blokes ready to bang away with a frame gun which was probably more a threat to them as it was to the enemy. Old skool 25mm Foundry castings which are pretty small by today's standards (actually, they sorta look like Hobbits, don't they). 

Next are some charging Highlanders from Redoubt Miniatures. I find the animation on this series of castings is great. Again, pretty large models here - probably close to 35mm in size. I have more of these lads in storage but this gives you a impression of how they look massed up in an irregular formation. 

Many in this series are multi-part models, often with separate heads and torsos so they can provide some variation in their poses. 

28mm Allen Apsley's Regiment of Foote

Breaking away from Napoleonics for a bit. We recently moved and so the past few months have been spent slowly unpacking stuff that has been squirreled away in boxes for years. Anyway, here's an old chestnut from the lead archive. A regiment of ECW foot composed of Redoubt castings which I painted, cripes, oh I dunno, at least ten years ago. I dusted them off, touched them up a bit and thought I'd post a few shots for those who might find them interesting.

If I recall correctly this is Allen Apsley's Regiment of Foote (composed of Royalists from Devon, Dorset, Somerset and Cornwall). These castings are listed as 28mm but are really closer to 33-35mm. They're kinda anachronistic and quirky, but I'm quite fond of them. I've always enjoyed the look of the 'hedge' of pikes, intermixed with loads of company banners, along with the flanking sleeves of shot (now that I look at the pic I see a few wandering Scots in there as well). Years ago I acquired a boatload of Redoubt stuff in an ebay auction and it has remained on the sidelines as one of those distant 'retirement projects'. Seeing this stuff again makes me want to get a few more units done... I'll put up a few more shots of other ECW stuff in the coming days (as I get it sorted and put in the display case).

 

15mm Flames of War British Recce in North Africa

These beautiful photos are courtesy from my friend Tim Brown in Saskatoon. We had a WWII North African game a few years back using 15mm Flames of War castings. In the shots are some of my British 'Cherrybums' light recce and Crusaders doing what they do best. (As another good friend of mine, Sean McWatt, would say, "Recce by Death.") The rest of the models and terrain are from Tim's great collection.

I appreciate how Flames of War has almost single-handedly revitalized the WWI miniature hobby but there are a few things I just can't get into. One is the look of tanks on the game table hub-to-hub. It just seems so out of scale to the vehicles. I know they are supposed to represent around 5 AFVs but it looks whacky. The second thing is seeing heavy artillery on a tactical game table. Even in the scale FOW is operating at these models should be located a couple rooms away. Again, it just looks wrong and plays weird (opponents can conceivably move across the table and actually attack your artillery which would typically be located several miles from the front). I know they just want to sell miniatures but they should have created an abstracted system for having artillery on the table.  But hey, what do I know. Its popular and is getting guys excited about the hobby.