First warmachine figure, Kommander Sorscha.

Ok so I got a wild hair and decided to paint this last night.  My brother some friends and myself have a big set of games planned this coming Saturday and while they will play with unpainted single mini's, much less whole armies, I just can't do it.  So I have begun to paint these when I am not looking for work and here is the first.  I can not believe I am doing this... ;)  Also the pictures turned out poorly as you can not see the highlight's well at all.  Sorry...

Poll: which Napoleonic Rules Systems is Better?

Ok here is the deal, as I do not hink polling is possible on the blog I need comments, which of these 3 Napoleonics rules systems is the best:

Wargames Foundry Napoleon
Lassale
General de Brigade
Age of Eagles

So if you have an opinion and have played the rules system then please leave a coment, I have all for and need to make a decision basing wise.  All of these are compatible with each other basing wise except for General de brigade, hence the question.  Please let me know...



Cheers...

Ummm: Warmachine...

My Brothers friends came over the other night talking about the Warmachine games that they have been playing and saying how it was better than 40k, almost begrudgingly I might add as all of the are 40K fanatics.  Anyway I had been looking at Warmachine for a long time and had some models that I had built but never painted sitting in model purgatory, but was not about to get into it so to speak if no was around to play.  So anyway do not be surprised if I have some Warmchine stuff on here at some point...

Random Ramblings

So as you already know I ordered "General D' Brigade(GDB)" the other day from warweb.com and although it has yet to arrive I have been doing some reading on the net. I found a blog that seems to be inactive at the moment from a guy by the name of "JC" and he has made unit templates for GDB, for the scenario of Quatre Bras.  They are nicely done and I am thinking that either he is connected to that game and or authors of the game, or he really really likes it, as he has put in a TON of work into them.  They were posted in 2006 or there bout's and there has not been any posting for sometime but if he comes back to the game, I hope he does more of these, as they are great for getting the mini's together that you need to make each historical unit.  Another thing that I discovered is that the units are battalions, with several making up a regiment etc. etc. with a 20:1 ratio of historical men per miniature figure, so now you see whay this is a miniature heavy setup.  While it looks absolutely incredible on the table, it will be VERY expensive to build decent sized armies to play, and doing so for all of Quatre Bras for example would probably 2,000-3,000 figures or more on the table for both armies!  See what I mean?  Anyway I will give the rules a read when they come and I will find out if they are worthy of moving forward on.  I do have to say however that the unit format, with battalion being the root unit is something I do like.  Anyway have any of you played it? What do you think?

Cheers...

OG Polish Lancers done! Good enough for the table top

Ok so I took a little bit of time to touch these up and flock them, but I feel their best asset is "distance". LOL  I can not wait for my Wargames Foundry paints to get here so I can paint up some 28mm stuff, I am actually fairly good at painting them.  This little stuff ie 15mm is hard on my "getting old eyes" and my 3yr old prescription for my glasses.  Anyway I just need to let the flock dry, put a flag on them and clear coat them and they will be done.  Next I am doing some Swiss line infantry in French service, there is just something cool about a red coated unit in the French army.  In Lasalle you can not have more than 1 Swiss unit per division of troops, so I thought I would do just one.  I will post pictures on them when finished.

Excitement I did NOT need yesterday!!!

So I was minding my business painting my Polish Lancers and went on the web looking for color plates for them and went to a site that came back from a google search, that when brought up only showed a progress bar and the words "loading".  Now I thought this looked odd and backed out of it but not soon enough I guess, as it put something on my PC like a key logger or something and it copied PW info for all of my accounts that I used that day.  I got a notice from google saying the my account was being accessed from China.  Anyway after running to another PC and trying to change PW info on about 10 accounts, I think I have gotten ahead of them and locked them out. So the PC I was using has been "retired" until I can format it and start fresh and I am using my laptop now.  Anyway here are my Polish Lancers, I still have some more detail work and clean up to do, I hope they turned out ok, I was pretty stressed yesterday trying to fix all of this crap!  I hate hackers!!!  The Morale of THIS story BE CAREFUL out there, you never know what kind of ASS HATS are out there trying to make your life hell!!! Without further ado...  Also I tried to take a little more time with them as this is my favorite unit in the french army...

AB miniatures order!

Well after Galpy kept preaching ;) that I should get some AB minis, I went to Eureka USA and ordered 3 "Lasalle" unit packs.  I only got 3 packs as a test and they are:

French Old Guard pack with 32 miniatures
French Dragoons with 12 miniatures
British Hussars with 12 Miniatures

These all included the command packs, filling the rest of each unit with rank and file troops.  After ordering I noticed that they are on "Holiday"/"Vacation" until the 28th of May and will not be shipping until after that!  CRAP!!!  Oh well I should have them sometime in June...

Ordered some Foundry colors

Well it is not like I can afford this but I ordered 9 sets of Foundry paints and should have them by the end of next week.  I just could not proceed on my English Civil War miniatures to my satisfaction without them. So here are the Wargames Foundry paint numbers I ordered:  Note that each number is a 3 paint set for those that do not know...

4                            10                       28
5                            13                       33
7                            20                       38

With these I should be good to go.  Also I found that for those of you in the "States" that want Wargames Foundry stuff you can get them at "The War Store".  The owner, "Neal" is a great guy and they always have good-great prices.

So much for that idea...

Being the perfectionist I am in painting my 28mm mini's, I started looking at mixing colors to match foundry colors and after looking at RGB codes and paint cross charts and the hassle to mix colors, I have decided to scratch painting ANY 28mm stuff until I have "Foundry" paints.  This is an expensive proposition at $620.00 but I want to paint my mini's to a standard that I would consider right.  The foundry paint system is the closest I have found to "right/perfect".  I guess I need to start saving...  I do not even know if this is available in the states as a set or will I need to go to Wargames Foundry directly.  I have looked at their site and it does state prices in USD so I am assuming that their cart will allow me to purchase in the UK from the US.  They say that there is free shipping as well, I hope that applies to the states as I would hate to pay shipping on $620.00 worth of 20ml bottles of paint from the UK!  So back to 15mm until then...

The last 2 15mm units I am going to do for a bit. I will be Moving onto painting my ECW stuff.

Okay so here are the last 2 units I am going to paint 15mm wise for a little while. I have kinda gotten my fill of 15mm, after having done both of my ACW armies north and south, and then British and French Napoleonics, I need to move on to doing some 25/28mm stuff.  I have been building up my ECW stuff for a bit and also have a lot of 28mm Napoleonics to paint, but I think I will work on my ECW.  I think I need to paint enough to play a game with the rules I have called 1644 by Rick Priestly.  My FLGS had some "left over" Old Glory ECW stuff laying around her shop and gave me a HUGE discount on them, I MEAN HUGE!!!  Anyway I could not resist so I think I have enough to start playing once painted up.  I really like the period of ECW, it is different from ACW and Napoleonics in both painting and gaming.  So without further ado here are the last 2 15mm units to be done for a bit.

British 10th Hussars

and a unit of Polish Lancers

Cheers...

Yet more 15mm French Infantry...

I just finished painting these up and just based them, waiting for the glue to dry so that I can flock them.  They are Old Glory figures and are pretty nice with the exception of the some what exaggerated positions they are in.  There is also one consistent problem I have had with Old Glory 15mm Figures and that is SHORT BANNER POLES!!!  When you have these tiny banner poles you are reduced to TINY flags, which just looks stupid! Anyway That done, I now have 7 French Infantry units done, 1-Old Guard, 1-Legere and 5 Line Regiments/Units/???  depending on the rules you use.   They are based for Lasalle but would work for Age of Eagles or Foundry's Napoleon.  Yes I know that the Napoleon rules are meant for 25/28mm but if you halve the ranges and move distances it should work just fine. Again these were painted more for speed of production than high quality. I will reserve high quality for my 28mm stuff.

Question: The Army Painter Quick Shade

I was wondering if anyone has used either of these "Dips" and the results that they got.  I have the Soft Tone and the Dark Tone, I got the Dark Tone on accident as I wanted the Strong Tone but did not realize that I picked up the Dark one until after I had gotten it home and had opened it.  Anyway at $30.00 a can I was not going to spend another $30.00 until I found of if this "stuff" works or not.  I have not tested it as I do not want to ruin a figure that I have spent time working on.  Anyway if any of you have used any of these "Dips" please let me know how they worked.  I can send you a PM to get picks if you have any.

Cheers...

15mm Old Glory and Essex British Artillery

I finished these before I did the French Cuirassiers but for got to post them to the blog. They are a mix of Essex and Old Glory for the Cannon and Old Glory for the crews.  I tried getting as close as I could with this camera so that perhaps the detail that I did showed up.  I think these turned out pretty good and the combo of the red and yellow on the uniforms with the blue is a striking combination.

15mm Old Glory French 8th Cuirassiers

I just finished these up today, they are the French 8th Cuirassiers regiment.  I have not painted the trumpeter yet as I have conflicting color schemes for him, some say green, 1 said an Emerald Green color and another said that they can/should be the same color as the rest of the unit.  If anyone knows this, please let me know.  The models themselves do not have carbines but I am modelling them for Quatre Bra as that is what I am basing my armies on to build them up.  Anyway here they are...

Again sorry about the crappy pics, I have camera issues - e.g. mine sucks!

Latest 15mm Creations...

Well I just finished up the following units based up for Lasalle at a minimum, they are a mix of Essex and Old Glory 15mm figures.

1 Regiment of British Heavy Dragoon Cavalry
1-Regiment of French Guarde de Honour
10-Misc French Artillery pieces.

Painting Brass or Gold

I just hit on this trick of painting brass or gold onto your mini's and it works good too!  On an area that you intend to paint brass or gold, paint some GW  Foundation Iyanden Darksun(thinned a bit) first and after that dries, paint your gold or brass color over top of this.  Wallah, thats it.  if I had a good camera that could do macro's well I would show you, but I do not so you will have to trust me and try it yourself... ;)

Cheers...

Back to Napoleonics...

While I was working on the Titan, I was painting these guys.  This is the first 2 of 7 Regiments I have to paint along with 2 Regiments of Bavarian' s,1 Regiment of French Guard de Honour, 3 regiments of French Hussars, 1 Regiment of Polish Lancers, 1 Regiment of Cuirasiers, a bunch of  British Cavalry, some Hanoverian and Brunswick infantry as well as Artillery for both sides and then I should be ready for some gaming.  Then I can move onto painting either my 28mm ECW stuff or my 28mm Napoleonics.  Whatever strikes me when done with all the 15mm stuff.  God I will never be done!!! ;)

Forgeworld Commision done!

Well I just finished the Forge World Warhound Titan for my friend.  He wanted me to build it and he was going to paint it.  It was not overly complicated at all.  MY biggest concern is that it is VERY, VERY FRAGILE!  Being that it is built from resin, for me it would be a Trophy queen(ie it would not be transported anywhere!) and stay on a shelf near the gaming table.  I can not imagine driving anywhere with this in the back seat, I would be so worried about it not getting damaged that I would probably get in a wreck or something.  Well anyway without further ado...

Pray that you never have a look at this thing if you are an Ork or Chaos Marine as it will be your last!

New Commision of sorts...

A friend of mine came over last night about 9:30pm with a big box in his hands, after cutting it open I discovered a Forge World Warhound Titan.  He wanted me to build it for him, I had never built one before so I thought I would give it a go. I am doing this for free as he is one of my friends, I know call me stupid, but that's how I am... Anyway I have the feet done and the leg pieces trimmed.  I don't want to go any further as he needs to make some choices on shin armor etc.  So here are some pics so far.

 Above is everything getting sorted out and lining up the foot pieces for cleaning and assembly.

Above are the foot pieces trimmed, cleaned and ready for assembly.

Above is the foot assembled and the leg pieces getting sorted out.

 

Here are the shin armor pieces with the left over injection tubes where the resin is injected into the mold.  So that is it for know.  Off to browse the web looking for a job and latter painting some 15mm Essex Bavarian infantry.

Cheers...

2-15mm French Infantry units done to add to my guard units already done.

Well I have completed 2 more units bringing my French up to 3 units so far and painted in as many days.  The flags are from http://www.warflag.com/napflags/ . They have some great flags there that are scalable and not for just Napoleonics either.  Again I am right now going to fill out force quickly, not Contest winning paint jobs.  So without further ado...

Credit is where credit is due...

I have been painting for a long time, but I am usually pretty scatter brained when it comes to what I do, I usually paint something until something else I have gets my attention and then I paint that for a bit and so one...  Anyway after going to a friend of mine's blog and seeing what he was doing, completing armies etc. it gave me the motivation to paint armies instead of units!  So anyway this is an excerpt of a conversation between he and I, and well the rest is history so to speak. 

A couple of messages between he and I...

Me:
"yea, I am trying to get enough to be able to play.  I have been collecting for a while but never really putting my back into it to get units painted.  Anyway after seeing everything you were doing, you gave me the incentive to kick it in and get some stuff done.  They are not as detailed as your stuff by a long shot but for me right now that is not the point of my painting.  Speed is it right now with a little bit of detail..."

Him:
"That's awesome great to inspire others it's such a great hobby. would be great if you could put this on the blog so that others like yourself might see the comment and might also be inspired . Cheers heaps and keep up the great work"

Here is his blog below...

http://kentspainting15mm.blogspot.com/


So as the topic states, "Credit is where credit is due".  Thanks mate... :)

15mm Essex French Old Guard Done!

Well I just finished this unit of 32 figures, it took me about 4 hours to get them to this point. So this is the first unit/regiment I have done for my French.  I have the flag mounted but I am waiting for the glue to dry before bending it into shape.  Also as usual I have not flocked the bases yet as I am waiting for the super glue to dry... let me know what you think... ;)  NOTE: I am painting these for table top quality, not painting contest quality.  I save the better painting for 28mm or bigger.  Also if it were for commission I would paint to a higher standard as well.  Right now I am building the armies and am just trying to get the field filled.

15mm Essex French Old Guard

Well after finishing up the first 6 units of British infantry, I thought for balance sake and my sanity I should do some opposition.  So I thought since I had started with highlanders for the Brits, I would start with the Imperial Guard for the French, specifically the Old Guard.  I started working on these yesterday morning and had hoped to have them finished them yesterday but then my FLGS called me saying my Warlord Games sakers and 1644 came in so I had to clean those up for painting and read the rules I have chosen for my ECW gaming, 1644.  So anyway back to the Old Guard, I have the tunic base color and a highlight color done. The blue I used on the French, which I thought would be the right color, turned out to be too dark painted over the black undercoat so I had to do a hi-light color. So here is the first unit of 32 so far.