Modern combat: The plan!

Hello guys,

my hobby mojo has been returning this month and while I got a minor lead pile yet to paint, I've decided to get a bit more active in my moderns project.

The plan is to game 28mm Force on Force campaign, set in a made up place called Evergreen Island, who's capital city, Evergreen Fields is also a setting for my Zombie Campaign that then never happened.

I haven't quite figured out the exact background for the campaign, but for some reason, Slovenian army would engage in firefights with local insurgents. It would be mostly infantry firefights, as two humvees and a T-90 are all the armoured vehicles I got at the moment, but if I'll ever find a great deal, that could easily change. T-90 will have to be my proxy for any other tank needed, but I'm not too picky.
For the "good guys" I have decided to give it a shot and sculpt Slovenian soldiers. I am at the rifles at the moment (been there for months), but I have already bought two Empress pilots to help me with the size and proportions. At this point, I have to thank Bryan the Savior for letting me have the order sent to him and he has sent it to me, which came out a lot cheaper in the end. I've decided to only buy the two pilots that I'd like to convert into an APC crew...roughly. I didn't want to buy any of the actual fireteam packs, as I would prefer to buy the 4 pack deal some time in the future.

Given I'm sculpting the Slovenes, they probably won't get ever cast (unless they'd happen to be very interesting to someone :D). My immediate goal is to make the weapons and then sculpt two 4 man fire teams. Then I would add the Eureka or Empress UK/US/GER/FRA or whichever, packs, to compliment them with heavier weapons and to boost the numbers where needed. In real life, Slovenes are often attached to bigger nation, so makes all the sense. The primary nation would be Brits, as US are simply too represented and UK range is large enough. Judging only by the looks I like French the most.

Below are some WIP photos. Troops, weapons and heads are all based on Ebob's work. If you are reading this, thanks again!

Hasslefree, EBob based "Slovenian", Empress, Artizan

Hasslefree, EBob based "Slovenian", Empress, Artizan

All four dollies (one in a very bad shape) compared to a ruler and Empress pilot

With their planned heads - bodies need much, much more bulk!

Weapons: RGW90, Minimi para, F2000S GL and 2x F2000S (for red dot and 4x optics)

They look like shit on photos, but I think they aren't THAT bad in RL. Barrel will be 2/3 shorter.

Minimi by Ebob, I've added optics, cloth ammo pouch and "para" stock

RGW 90 or MATADOR, needs some cleaning up

Weapons compared to WGF survivors box. Mind that RGW and M16 are both 100cm long IRL. By lenght RGW is closer to 1/56

As for the "baddies", the insurgent militia, I got a great idea for this one! As my campaign would be set in western-ish word (most closely related to Kosovo and Bosnia I guess), the Wargames Factory Survivor - the men seemed like the best option. The box doesn't have enough AKs for everyone, but I'll just substitute them for some M4s and SA80. Support weapons are a bit problematic. I'd need RPKs, which are just long barreled AKs. I assume I could convert them. RPGs are more problematic, as they are only available in female set. I've got one from Carl, owner of Grekwood miniatures. He has added two panzerfaust from some sci-fi troopers, but they're largely overscale - perhaps they could be a vehicle borne home made anti-tank weapons for technicals? I will try and sculpt the missing weapons myself, but if anyone has any extra RPGs or MG42 (yes, the WW2 german machine gun) laying around, I'd gladly accept them :P.

Insurgets-to-become all stacked up. Some extra weapons Carl has put in a pack for me. Thanks!

 According to the Force on Force quick start rules, I'd need 4 leaders, 17 guys with assault rifles, 3 guys with RPK and 4 guys with RPG. This seems like a good starting force so I'll stick to that plan. I might also make one sniper and eventually, I'll add some heavier machine guns and anti tank weapons to the force.

Forces on modern battlefield also encounter civilians regularly. Force on Force has them in mobs. I've decided to convert some zombies to be more "alive" looking and giving them some banners. They will act as the front row civilians. The mob will be filled with actual zombies I've painted so far to add the masses and to get some dust off them. I'd love a dedicated civilian mob, but that is far down my to-do list.

It has been a bit of a long post, but hopefully photos helped. If all goes as planned, I should have some wips to show twice a week!

Mathyoo

Some conversions

Hello,

to move on with a hobby, I got some photos of what I've been doing lately. I am sculpting guns for my moderns project (more on that in next post) and as each stage takes only a little, little putty, I tend to use the excess on conversions and other, "lesser" projects.

Below are some zombie conversions. One is a Mantic Zombie turned Fat batman. He is supposed to be a cosplay nerd from a convention that turned bad. Apocalyptic bad! Hue hue hue!

Other one is a Studio miniatures sexy shirt-torn guy. You really don't need more than one of those (and even in that case, that is one too many). I have decided to make him a riot policeman or a soldier, but while I was working on his body armour, decided to make a war correspondent. He must have been late to the show, but his puny protection couldn't save him from ending the same way as his "headline news".

Last one is another mantic zombie. It's one of my first conversions, a Tongue zombie from NMRiH book. I have just added some rags to him, nothing overly complicated, really.

 I've also added a small bag to one of my TAG survivors. Nothing special here, but it helps adding character to the miniature.

Below are five bodies I've sculpted over the past few months. They are nothing special, mostly a "putty dump". As I plan on sculpting more now, I've also started working on another five. I have five done and painted, that have proven to be great scenery.

Lastly, here are 4 of Ebob's dollies for my modern project. They break a lot, but then again, that's what makes them easy to pose. The kneeling is broken, as I've managed to throw a book on them during the black out. It sucks, but it's nothing I can't fix with some putty and perhaps some glue.

Thanks for looking,
Mathyoo

Necroleadicon turns two!

Hello,

yesterday was my blog's second birthday! The time really flies by - I made a quick pass through my posts around last year's february and I couldn't believe most of my youngest terrain is a year old already! I am a bit reluctant to build anything larger until I find a job, but I have painted and sculpted quite a lot last year.

While 2013 was more than obviously a Strange Aeons year, I am slowly restarting  a new project for 2014 - modern infantry combat. The project was started months ago (remember humvees?) and I've been doing some sculpting (remember the rifles?). Now I've ordered some miniatures and I am full of confidence and enthusiasm that I hope will stick with me. But more on that in my next post (as usual)!

I actually wanted to post on 1st february and I had (I've managed to delete it somehow) post all written. I took some photos of my WIP sculpts and before I could put them on my computer, it has happened - the black out. Not counting few hours of blackout on friday, we were without electricity from 1st feb until yesterday. Even now electricity is provided by larger portable generators, so the bigger machines aren't working too well. All this included, I might as well dedicate a post to what people here like to call "the worst catastrophe in history of an independent Slovenia". Emphasis on "independent", to make things sound a bit less horrible :D. I might add I had this post written yesterday morning, but our power was cut just before I could publish it!

So, what has happened was frost. Lots of it. We were expecting rain on that first february weekend and I for one was looking forward to it. As any sane man living under the Alps, I dislike snow. But the thing was, the freezing rain proved problematic. Long story short, the electrical lines are mostly damaged, I've heard 40-50% of forests are also damaged (around half of the country is covered by forests) and there has been incalculable damage - estimated three years will be needed to clean it all up, passenger train on a line Ljubljana - coastline won't go anywhere until May, orchards are damage. Just imagine how many companies were out of business etc etc.
As for us, there is no large property damage. My parents had to work from family friend's house as their work can't wait. I am home most of the time either way, so I was reading a lot. And sleeping...but mostly reading, there was enough . We had running water, provided by generator, but it was freezing cold as our heating needs electricity. As do lights (doh), stove, refrigerators, aquariums etc etc. Luckily, we have a fire place that was a nice source of heating for the ground floor - my room is pretty much uninhabitable due to cold. We got a gas stove from somewhere, so food wasn't much of the problem, either. After some days, we borrowed small generator from an extended family so we afforded to watch a film or two every night . I haven't been to bed that early in a while now! So it really wasn't too bad all in all. Just annoying.

I managed to do some limited sculpting and painting, too. I'll show what I've done in future posts, and I'll just post some photos I took to let you know how it all looked like (it all melted in a day or two, oddly enough):

This was our driveway on the first day or so. In retrospective, I'd prefer shoveling snow than breaking ice with a hoe, shovel and a pick.

Add caption

This roof is pierced and it's about all damage we had, not counting the trees

generator providing us with running water

That's an "emergency" pole. I case of another freezing rain, those will all break I suppose

That's how most of the forests look like. Not many pine trees have kept their tops

That's from a town close by. Another town in other direction mostly kept its electricity

That's a generator that provides energy for my sister's apartment block. I heard it uses 300 liters of diesel every hour.

Not much else to add really. I'd just like to compliment the emergency services that were and are working outside in cold rain and snow...from electrical engineers to firemen, policemen, soldiers and all the foreigners that came here. I wasn't too informed as walking outside was literally lethal, but I haven't heard any complains regarding the work of people working 24/7 to make sure people got electricity as fast as possible.

Back to hobby in few days,
Mathyoo

More zombies! Aaargh!

Hey guys,

even more zombies to show today. Same again, 2 male zombies from Studio Miniatures plastics and two female zombies from Wargames factory (okay, it's one and a half). 
Not much to say, they are all straight from the box (and probably last one like that, as I'm already converting some, more on that in one of the next posts!). I went for "formal" black and white colours. I've also put in another jeans as all I do is blue wash over white. I think lots of zombies will have jeans, which is odd as I don't own a single pair of those myself.

So, there is my least favorite sculpt there, the fit half naked male zombie and your ordinary office Joe. That has red on him and looks like someone everyone should know. There is simply no other way to paint a guy in a shirt and a tie.

Female zombies are a bit more interesting, one is a crawler and the other one is an office lady. Her right sleeve was actually painted on, as I've somehow glued a bare arm there. I got no idea, how I didn't notice that. It looks fine, however.
I've decided to put some extra blood on her for two reasons. First, Tamiya Clear Red is probably the single reason I enjoy painting zombies over painting anything else. And second, I figured it would look cool - is that a "smart" zombie, using an improvised weapon or the blood is old this woman was bashing skulls with her yesterday-so-important paperwork? Who'd knew!

In the background you can see some dollies as my moderns project is slowly gaining steam again.


Really nothing else I could say. I got a FOW tournament tomorrow. It should be a blast as I got my favorite army ready. It's not competitive and I haven't played in months but it has pionieres and Stugs, so I got that going for me! Can't promise any photos, but I just might take the camera with me for a change.

Thanks for looking,
Mathyoo

Zombies...gaah...

 Hello guys,

I was hoping I would post earlier, but I really didn't want to put in another filler post, so I have decided I would rather wait until I finish painting the four zombies (that took me way too long to paint).

What I am doing now is painting a couple of WGF Vixens and a couple of SM male zombies (thanks again Bryan :P) - so 4 zombies at a time. This will give me nice variety of male and female zombies and I will actually have something painted. Or at least that is the plan.

I went for red here, which is the worst colour you can paint your zombies in. No blood is visible! Then again, I picked red because of the bay watch zombie (that sucks).

 Not much to say, they are painted horribly, but I am happy I managed to finish them at least. They seem too red when they are together, but once they will be mixed with the rest of the "horde", that shouldn't be as visible. I went for missing arm on the Pamela there, as I would hate it even more if she'd be in a super man pose. The miniatures aren't too bad, honestly, very nicely sculpted. What I don't like is the shallow detail and limited options, so I have to admit the old WGF set is still my favorite. The sculpts are way worse there, but I somehow prefer them to any other plastic zombies I've seen so far. I might want to mention I like how WGF is listening to the comments, first they made females everyone wanted and when doing survivors, they've put a fat one in (is that offensive?). I don't like to have all models in my zombie horde.

One thing I didn't do was convert any, I'm pretty sure I've hit rock bottom on my hobby enthusiasm and I am pretty sure I will buy some cheap 6-10mm miniatures to get me back in, give me sometihng I haven't yet tried to try. I really can't decide on the period, so please do suggest some. I am currently inter debating between late romans (remember roman wall and that battle I was talking about?), WW1 (always wanted to do something about WW1 :D), cold war gone hot (pre-abrams, way more interesting. T-72 was a great tank once in the past!), sci-fi. I don't really expect to game with it, but I would like to do something. Something is fun :D. Now I just can't decide if massive red tide would look better than ranks of sword swinging hordes. I can't even decide between 6 and 10, tbh. But I would like to have a huge miniature town one day. For some reason.


Well, thanks for looking,
Mathyoo

Meet the old couple!

 Hello guys,

I've finally taken time to show you the old couple I've painted a while back.
They are from Hasslefree miniatures and I've mounted them on 20mm slotta bases.

They are a bit smaller than usual figures, which is great. I am pretty sure at least the old man is supposed to be medieval, but as you can see, they are both very universal.

I have to say, while it took me long to get to them, I really enjoyed painting them. The poses are just spot on. I was painting a certain vampire while I was painting those, so I've decided to just go with it and gave them very pale skin colour. Let's just imagine they just saw a monstrosity of a sort.

Not much else to say about them, the old guy is kinda darkish and the old lady is very brightly dressed.

 Below is the usual scale shot and I am still upset that my mat varnish isn't all that mat.

In other news, my other blog is finally getting some shape (I've got marked locations of over 100 bunkers, all in a walking distance!), and I've managed to sell my 15mm FOW german army. I am actually just making some extra barbed wire for the buyer, so I'll take some shots and I'll show the whole army in another post.

Thanks for looking,
Mathyoo