Egyptian / Generic Middle East units

Here are a couple of photos of my 15mm T-62s and a couple of BTR APCs for my 1973 Egyptians / generic Middle East force. I've just got to finish the commander in the leading tank's turret.

The T-62s are from Battlefront / Team Yankee, and the BTRs are from Zvezda. 

Israeli Magach 6 tanks 15mm

Israeli Magach 6 main battle tanks for my 15mm Fate of a Nation / Team Yankee Israeli forces. Two are post-1973 with over barrel 50 cal MGs but 4 have been converted to be historically accurate for 1973. These will face off against Egyptian T-62s, both units need to be painted though. 

New Necron reinforcements - Catacomb Command Barge, Overlord and Scythe flyer

Here are some photos of my new reinforcements for my Warhammer 40k Necron army. 

The "Croissant of Doom" is a flying unit, able to be configured with to a Night Scythe assault transport (with swirling disc of teleportation) or a Doom Scythe ground attack unit (with glowing blue Death Ray). 

The solitary figures is a Necron Overlord with Hyperphase Sword and Resurrection Orb, who my wife calls Senor Supremo. He has a magnet on his base for either a scenic diorama, or he can ride a Catacomb Command Barge (the smaller croissant shaped hover unit). 

The Barge itself can either mount the Overlord or I can attach a Tesla Destructor battery for it to be used as an Annihilation Barge. The magnets and alternative options enable me to get more mileage out of each individual model, and hopefully all of these will significantly bolster my Necron Dynasty. Hope you like the photos! 

More Martian Tripods

Amongst some Warhammer 40k units last weekend I managed to finish the last couple of Martian Tripods for my All Quiet on the Martian Front home made rules.

I have replaced the original heat rays, which look like remote controls, with spare Gauss Cannons from my Warhammer Necrons. The result is a more death ray looking weapon. 

I've done scenic bases for both units - one is a ruined building (possibly church) with a charred, dying human trying to crawl away. The other is a simple graveyard with a toppled headstone, a metaphor for the inevitable death the Martians will bring to mankind.

Now I have a full set of 6 Tripods, one leader, one scout, one with Black Smoke Launcher and three regulars with Heat Rays. The only things left to assemble and paint in the Martian force are 4 Drones (repurposed Spindle Drones, again from Warhammer) and some human (or to the Martians, fresh snacks) storage pods which I'll make from plastic shot glasses and some scenic bases. 

Command Bunker operational again!

After approximately 2 years of my blog on Facebook, I have decided to move back onto Blogger, for a number of reasons. 

Firstly, I get very bogged down in Facebook groups related to my hobby and that impacts the time I spend on blog posts / updates.

I also believe Facebook is having a detrimental impact on my mental health and general communication / emotional availability with my wife. With a new addition to the family on the way and fatherhood beckoning, my hobby time will be severely limited going forwards, so I want to move the blog back onto this, less intense platform.

In addition, I have followed a few warhammer 40k groups having got back into that game in a big way since early 2019, and the volume of negativity, anti-creative sentiment and cantankerous baiting has taken its toll.

However, there have been some positives. Facebook has enabled me to share posts and photos in a wide variety of groups and as a result it has grown to approx 500 likes / followers. Another especially great thing personally was to share my work on All Quiet on the Martian Front with the game's creators and close knit community including the author of the corresponding novels. I hope some people follow the blog as it transfers across to here.

More blog posts to follow soon!!! 

SYW / WAS French infantry and artillery

To round off a trio of Seven Years War posts, here's my first unit of French infantry and accompanying light cannon. These are the white / beige coated soldiers of pre-Revolutionary France, so there's no dark blue to be seen. They were really hard to paint but I'm happy with the way they turned out. I'm hoping to build on my Seven Years War collection to stage a scaled down version of Fontenoy  one of my favourite battles of military history. Led by Maurice De Saxe, the French won a bloody victory against a shaky alliance of British, Hanoverians, Austrians and Dutch, who attacked the fortified French but were unable to break through to relieve the siege of Tournai.

AWI / SYW British infantry and Hessian artillery

Here's some photos of more Zvezda infantry and cannon appropriated from their Great Northern War range.

This time, tricorne-sporting British redcoats advancing with fixed bayonets, supported by a Hessian 6 pounder. I wasn't going to worry about any Hessians for my wargaming armies, but I have just finished reading "1776" by David McCullough, so now my mind has been changed! The number of Hessians sent across for the American War of Independence was astonishing to read about - they numbered in many thousands.

AWI Colonial infantry / SYW Prussian infantry / artillery

It's shocking how life gets in the way of blogging!

Here's some American War of Independence Colonial infantry and cannon, who will also proxy as my ersatz Prussians if I require them for a Seven Years War scenario. Figures are by Zvezda, and are technically Great Northern War Russian infantry, but I'm using all the Zvezda GNW sets to depict other nations. I'm not a stickler for historical accuracy in this period--if the paint job is close enough I'll be happy to use them!

WIP PSC T-34s

After a drought of blog posts I hope to reinvigorate my blog with some new posts.
My latest project has been a trio of iconic T-34 tanks, these made by the Plastic Soldier Company. These kits come with both turret options, enabling you to field either a 1943 version, armed with the standard 76mm gun, or the later 85mm armed version that is still seen in service today. I have used Plastic Soldier Company decals to customise the vehicles with Soviet propaganda slogans. I'll try to get more scenic photos of the finished articles onto the blog this weekend. For Mother Russia!

Team Yankee US forces so far

The below photos show my US forces so far for my 1/72 Team Yankee / One Hour Wargames home brew rules.

I can now call on 1 M60A3, 4 M1 Abrams, 2 Sheridan light tanks and 2 units of Mechanised Infantry mounted in a pair of M113 APCs to defend Western Europe from the Red tide of Communism. God bless America (and their main battle tanks!)

I got a job lot of Abrams in a lucky ebay purchase so I converted one to serve as scatter terrain. After attacking the hull with some pliers and a liberal application of black / brown paint over the damage, I had a wrecked tank to put on the wargaming table.

M10 Tank Destroyers and 2nd King Tiger finished

Going forwards I'm going to try and improve my blog photos with better backgrounds for my finished units.

Starting with my three most recently finished WW2 tanks, two M10s from Armourfast and a King Tiger from Pegasus Hobbies. The latter was customised with PSC tank accessories. I'm really happy with the weathering, and I've managed to play around with the effects on my phone camera. I hope you enjoy the pictures!

1st Armourfast M10 Tank Destroyer

This is my first of two M10 Tank Destroyers for my WW2 late war Americans, made by Armourfast. With its open turret, formidable 76mm gun and distinctive sloped hull sides, it is one of my favourite military vehicles in terms of appearance. Sadly the exposed crew compartment and substitution of speed for armour, in line with American tank destroyer doctrine, rendered the M10 a flawed design.

I followed a YouTube painting tutorial intended for a larger scale 1/56 model but found it really useful.

The link can be found below:

https://youtu.be/KUu-TX7EYOw

The main colours used were GW Deathworld Forest Green for the main body, GW Dawnstone for the tracks, and GW Steel Legion Drab for the mud weathering. The body and tracks were further weathered with GW Nuln Oil and GW Agrax Earthshade Inks respectively.

I used some spare furniture and accessories to create the impression of a busy fighting vehicle loaded with supplies. The two crew members in the turret come from Italeri US infantry set 6120, chopped a little on the bases to fit inside.

I have loads of WW2 armoured fighting vehicles in my collection in need of repainting and customising. By chipping away at one or two tanks at a time, I'm not overwhelmed, and really enjoy the individual revamps.

My next WW2 tank rolling off the hobby table will be my second King Tiger, from Pegasus Hobbies.

A productive weekend...

Life has once again proven hectic so I thought I'd take 10 minutes to get a blog entry done. The first chilled weekend I've had in a month gave me some time to finish off a few projects that have populated my model trays for a little while.

The horsemen are the last of my English Civil War units - a Royalist Cavalry squadron and a Parliamentarian Reiters squadron. The colours are kept simple - red Cavaliers and muted yellow Roundheads.

Hopefully I can try out the One Hour Wargames rules with these lads in the coming months. 

The vehicles are a couple of M1 Abrams for my US Team Yankee forces - one of them is from an earlier post but the one on the right is a new repaint. I managed to get 4 Revell M1s, already assembled, off of ebay at a reasonable price, and one of these now stands ready to stem the Soviet tide.

The middle tank is a M10 Tank Destroyer which will be part of my future US 1944 wargaming army. I followed a painting tutorial I found on YouTube and I'm really happy with the end result. It's certainly worthy of a separate blog post when I get the time!

What's next? I've got another T-55 assembled, and I'm considering painting some Soviet infantry to accompany it onto the battlefield. Onwards, to victory!