Plastic...................Fantastic?

A while back, Doug Powell gave me a sprue from his box of Victrix Miniatures Later Greek Hoplites. I have finally got around to sticking one of them together, just to see how they would compare with my Aventine stuff.
To be honest, I was pleasantly surprised with how they turned out!!
Right. here's a quick review, and we start the ball rolling, with a few sprue pics! Now I have no idea how many different sprues there are in the box, nor how the figures go together, so this could be interesting!

You appear to get eight bodies on each sprue, a selection of different arms, eight heads and some seperate helmet crests, the spears and shields, a couple of shield aprons, plus some scabbarded swords. I think that certain arms will go with certain bodies, but without any instructions, I can't be certain.
They are nice clean looking models, and have some lovely detail. Some reviews are saying that the models are inaccurate, well they look like Hoplites to me, and to be frank, thats good enough.

I cut off a selection of bits, and made up a figure. There was a certain amount of clean up required, as always with plastics, you will get mould lines, and where the bits are cut from the sprue trees. A bit of work with a sharp knife, and some files, and we were ready for some glue action.
I used my good old Humbrol Liquid Poly, and the plastic responded well, with all the parts welding nicely together.

Here he is, the finished product, with an Aventine Italiote Hoplite, and to my amazement, they actually look just fine together!!
Would I use them in the same unit? Probably not, but I would certainly recommend the Victrix models.

So, the pros and cons of using the plastics: Well, they are relatively cheap, you get 48 figures in a box, and if you shop around, you can pick up a box for £20. The models are very well detailed, and they go together nicely too. They fit in Ok with the more popular metal ranges, but I would not use them together.
One box will get you 4 bases for Impetus, with 12 figures on each base.
Being plastic, there is more work involved, you have to have a level of modelling skill to put them together. Plastic, by its very nature, is fragile, and breakages will happen.
All in all though, I can't really find fault with the figures, and will invest in a box or two, when I get around to building my Syracusan army.

Oh My Word.......................He's Actually Painted a Whole Base!!

Somehow, I managed to get a small amount of enthsiasm together, and finished off one of the unit bases for my Impetus Pyrrhic army!!

An Italian allies base, they could be Samnites, or Bruttians, or any of the various tribes that went over to the side of Pyrrhus.

Bit of a labour of love, as the figures used were not great. They are mostly Crusader Miniatures, and they were a pain to paint. I had to replace all the shields, with A&A Miniatures ones, as the Crusader shields have no suitable transfer sheets from LBMS, and I did not fancy attempting freehand designs. The figures came with seperate heads, a novel idea, but more farting about to get them right. General detail is a bit sof tand very plain,  none of them have a side arm of any description too.

The command figure is from Aventine, he's really a Roman officer, but I quite like the figure, and he could have pinched the kit off a dead Roman.

I await the arrival of the new Aventine models for the Samnites, as they will hopefully be, bloody excellent, then i may feel a bit more inspired to add another couple of unit bases.

Next, I hope to finish off the elephants, and Greek Cavalry

Selling a Kidney

Salute 2013, has been and gone, with the usual selection of shiny toys to tempt us.
I don't go to the show, did it as a trader, mainly because you have to, but it has never appealed to me as a punter. Too big, too busy, too impersonal.
However, its fun to see what stuff gets put out by the companies, and you get that warm and fuzzy feeling inside, when lots of lovely pics start appearing on the various forums.
This year, one release caught my eye, RedStar Miniatures had some very nice 28mm French for Vietnam in the 1950's. Sculptd by Paul Hicks, they looked the part........................and then, I saw the pack price, nine of your very fine Engish pounds sir, and I shall supply you with 5, yes thats 5 shiny metal soldiers!!!! A sharp intake of breath, and a maybe not.
Well ths got me looking elsewhere at prices, and its not a pretty sight

Empress Minis  £7 for 4 figures
Assault Group  £6.50 for 4 figures
Foundry are still looking for a tenner a pack, and number svary from 6 to 8 figures
Warlord Games, wildly varying prices, but £2 per fig seems to be their benchmark!!
Perry Miniatures £6.50 for 6 figures
Crusader Miniatures £9.60 for 8 figures
Artizan Designs £5.40 for 4

There are various offers for unit deals, but as my spending is limited, I rarely get a chance to partake of these.

Luckily for me, I am back on Ancients at the moment, and the lovely Aventine figures are £4.50 for 4, so still not too bad.

Looks like any new projects in 28mm are out of the window for certain, unless I can sell some bodyparts, or have a massive lottery win.

Will have to avoid the trips to the club as well, far too many temptations :-(

Enthusiasm?

Can you purchase it?
Cannot summon a single bit of it, for any of the various things that litter my work area.
Even considering......................shock,horror!! Packing it all in.

Bus Bothering Balls Up

It was all going so swimmingly well. Various bits of plasticard were tortured into shape, and held up to the remains of the the hacksawed diecast model

First mistake, the front grill was wrong!! So a rebuild was in order.

The correct version is on the right, the buggered up version, is in the bin.

then I try the wheels for size, and realise to my horror, I have miscalculated the width of the wheel arch, and the wheels don't fit, the tyre sticks out, and that is a just not on you know!!

So back to the plasticard pile I go, and start the process all over again!!

I may be able to salvage version 1, and use it to make a truck, lets hope so, as its more time wasted otherwise.

Now you know why it takes me so bleedin long to make one poxy model :-(

Rescue Mission..........A Bolt Action Game

I like getting all the kit out of my loft, packing it into the car, and trundling the 40 odd miles over to New Buckenham!!!  It always manages to inspire me to do some more painting, or plasticard mauling, and lets face it folks, yours truly needs a bit of inspiration at the moment.

So, its here I'm off to Sunny Spain, eh Viva Espana, or in this case, Viva El Cristo Rey, Cara al Sol, and No Pasaran!

So here we are, the gang of four, from left to right, Stuart, Andrew, Lee and my goodself at the back, and this is the table set out for the game.
I've cobbled together a daft scenario. the FAI / CNT have picked up a downed pilot, their Column commander realises that the pilot is a German, from the Condor Legion, and being just that bit more "with it", than your average Anarchist, he has stuck him into a local house, and awaits the arrival of some Assaltos to take him back to Madrid.
In the meantime, the Condor  Legion has sent one of their advisors, with a scratch force of Carlist requetes, Falangista, and a unit of Guardia Civil, to try and get the pilot back!!

FAI / CNT

FAI / CNT Milicianos

Columna Commander      Capitan Reg                                                                 110

Standard Bearer       Reg                                                                                        10

Gruppo De Choque   Inx

Delegado

Miliciano with SMG x 2

Miliciano with Rifle x 7

Equipped with AT Grenades (tank hunters)     78

Gruppo 2        Inx

Delegado

LMG team  

Miliciano with Rifle x 7                                                                                            90

Gruppo 3         Inx

Delegado

Miliciano with Rifle x 9 70

Support      Reg

Maxim MMG   3crew                                                                                              50

Naval Somua A/Truck   Dam +7  Inx crew  Turret mounted LMG                          48

Guardia De Assaltos

Reg

Jefe with pistol

Assalto with SMG

Assalto with Rifle x 8                                                                                            103

Truck and a car      Dam +6                                                                                    60

                                                                                                       tot                579

Carlist and Falange

Carlist Requettes

Teniente  pistol Reg  (1stL)                                                                                   75

Cristo Bearer  Reg                                                                                                10

Legion Condor advisor Reg (2ndL)                                                                       50

Requette Peleton 1   Inx

Cabo Rifle

Requette with Rifle x 7                                                                                          63

Requette Peleton 2   Inx

Cabo Rifle

Requette with Rifle x 7                                                                                          63

Falange

1st Peleton  Inx

Sargento

Falangista with Rifles x 7                                                                                     63

2nd Peleton  Inx

Cabo

Falangista with Rifles x 7                                                                                     63

Support

Hotchkiss MMG 3 crew Reg                                                                                50

UNL35   A/car  Turret and hull mounted LMG Dam +7 Inx                                  48  

Guardia Civil

Reg

Jefe with pistol

Guardia with SMG x 2

Guardia with Rifle x 7                                                                                       106

                                                                                                               Tot      591

                                   

                                                                                   

FAI / CNT take up positions in the village, and deploy in the buildings, they have the pilot in the house nearest the camera. They send their armoured truck down the road to try and hold up the advancing Nationalists.

The Nationalist force enters the table at the far end, the UNL35 races up the road to take on the Anarchist lorry, whilst the infantry make their way through the olive grove, and fields.

Rather than a blow by blow account, here is a selection of shiny pics taken on the night, Some of them are mine, and some are by Guy, our resident club photographer, you can see more of his pics on our facebook page

https://www.facebook.com/pages/New-Buckenham-Historical-Wargamers/302874659765417?fref=ts

Falangistas head towards the village

The Guardia take aim

House clearing, Guardia style

The Requettes bog down in the Olive grove

Milicianos spring their ambush

Holding the house

Thats as far as you go

Viva El Cristo Rey

Pilot gets escorted to the car.

No Pasaran

Guardia Civil advance, with UNL35 in support

Lewis team stronghold

Our second attempt using the Bolt Action rules, and we got a few things wrong, mostly forgetting little bits n bobs. To help us next time round, I'm going to make up some roster sheets to use when putting together the lists, and adding reminders, that way we can refer to them to help jog our memories.
We had another good game, and by the end of the game, all four of us had the general jist of how the rules worked.
Next task now, is to start adding all the little nuances that make the Spanish Civil War an interesting period to game.

Now where did I hide all those half painted Moroccans?

I Know, I Know..............................But there is a good reason!!

I've painted myself into a state of complete and utter boredom!!
To come to the horrible realisation that I just do not have the required skill, or patience to paint a complete army. I cannot lower my standards to do a "wargames" paintjob, I've tried, and just keep on looking at the figures, then adding a bit here, and adding a bit there, four hours later I have painted the faces on four figures, and blocked in the uniform colours!
This week has been spent looking at the figures laying about on the desk, and thinking awwwh bollocks to all of this.

So I've gone back to some plasticard butchery, because I have something that just has to be finished. It has sat on the shelf looking somewhat forlorn, but has now claimed its rightful place back on the desk of doom.

The problem now is, do I keep it just for me, or do I ,once again face the morons, who will criticise the scale, the model and everything else, and get the damn thing into a mould, and cast for sale?