WIP: Magnetizing and Rebuilding

I finished the above model way back here, but I wanted to improve the arm joints, magnetize the weapon hardpoint, and rework the centre magnet to hold the torso to the legs better (more depth with deeper magnets).

Not only that, but updating the model will allow me to change out backpack missile pack.

You can see below (click to embiggen) the new recessed arm magnets, and the ball joints that allows for a wider range of movement and posing.

You may remember I broke the original model, which you can see here. Below on the left is the original build, and on the right the rebuilt comms array for the command variant of the CASE-2XC Dog.

So, slow work is slow, but it is what it is when one's joints ache.

Catch you all on the bounce.

MARPACE Platoon

Finally, a platoon of exoskeleton power armour infantry mostly done and dusted, just needing a coat of matt varnish before deploying them for a game. This expands the original six I showed here so, I now have 22 infantry and 12 combat droids to make up a full platoon.

Extra pic from above.

MARPACE stands for Marine Power Armor Combat Enhancement suit.

With the platoon of insurgents shown here I have enough figures to start play-testing the rules I've been working on.

But, in my inimitable manner that few other wargamers fall into, I've gone and taken a step back with two of my mech conversions.

I wasn't happy with the aesthetics of what I thought of as the twin comm booms on the commanders version I'd built. Also, I wanted to bring the first Marine Dog suit up to the new spec with ball joints for the arms to allow for better posing.

The white stuff is foam padding to prevent me damaging both models while drilling and filing them.

Or at least minimize damage so I don't have to do a full repaint on them.

It is what it is.

Mostly Done

And these are nearly done. Just need to put decals on, but as luck would have it (me forgetting to check), I've run low on the necessary duplicates of warning labels etc. So I had to put an order in for more decals from Shiny Games.

I've also finished three new jump-off points too (terrain that can also be objectives for the opposition to capture).

And finally, a GW paint pot holder. Printed by my beloved to prevent the pots from being easily tipped over.

And the decals and a couple of 'mistakes' arrived on Wednesday from Shiny Games (by mistakes, purchases I hadn't intended to buy, but the shiny called out to me. So, now it's time to start cutting out the decals to ready the mecha for the table.

That's it for now. Catch you all on the bounce.

Painting WIP of Current Projects

I've been painting this weekend. I've managed to take these one step closer to being finished, but no matter what I seem to do, my progress is slower than snail snot. Above is the Marine commander's CASE-2XC Dog combat armor suit (what I call the mecha in my novels).

This is inspired by the VOTOMS Burglary Dog variant that I like.

It's converted from the running pose that came in the RAFM Southern Azure Devils. The backpack is from Long Fang Black Mamba, modified with twin comms (red tipped protrusions).

Above is the other Marine CASE-2X Dog combat armor suit I've been working on. Not seen is the ammo chute for the rotary cannon, or the missile pack that will go on the left shoulder.

Below shows the Army Ape CAS-1-Mod-1EV combat engineering suit. Again, not showing the swing arm because I forgot to put into into the picture.

And finally, three red team jump off points.

So, slowly getting there. I hope to get these finished soon, and then begin using them for some more play-testing of the rules I'm working on.

I have lots of ideas, and things I want to do, but time seems to slip by me faster than a very fast thing.

Painting WIP of Current Projects

Here's a series of pictures showing where I've got with  painting this set of models. Above is my running CASE-2XC Mod 2 command Dog.

Below is the rebuild of my CAS-1-Mod-1 Ape that I previously painted, but wasn't happy with. Quelle surprise.

And because I want enough Dogs to form a squad the second basic CASE-2X combat armor suit that will bring my current model count up to three.

My bunch of combat androids is coming along nicely too. Twelve to accompany Ferretti's Buster, or two groups of eight for squads.

And finally, my Toyota Technical conversion of the Peter Pig two door pick up into a four door crew cab variant.

I managed to get a white finish that I can live with, I think. I've already stripped this model back to metal twice, but part of me that now I've mastered how to shade white that perhaps I should strip it again and get a better finish.

OMWB: Combat Androids

And here are the figures for my North American Confederation androids. These are Ral Partha Europe Blockhead mercenaries, which in my mind capture the look of the robots from Elysium.

These are ready for painting, but I want to finish the rest of my current mecha conversions before starting because I only have room on my workbench to make or paint, and I know how to easy it is to spend time clearing models to switch between each.

So that's all for now. Catch you on the bounce.

WIP: Robots Rally!

I got my set of Robot Rally circa 2002. Still haven't played a game either, so these miniatures that come with the game have sat on the lead mountain for eighteen years.

Ironically, I managed to paint the robots below below a friends as a Xmas present in 2004.

So, I'm painting my set in a different combination of colours, because why not? And, who wants to be boring and paint an identical set again? Not I. Which, also probably explains why I'm so terrible at painting armies.

Anyway, all the colours of the rainbow still seems to me to be the right choice for fun, happy robot rally mayhem. So here they are with the base coat laid down.

 

 

I mounted mine on British pennies for weight and for ease of transport as they can be secured with a magnetic sheet in a box. Pro tip right there. But interestingly, for definitions of interesting that may vary, you can see that the moulded round bases aren't.

So, these are a work in progress. Something light and fluffy, painted for fun.

OMWB: Insurgent Improvised Mecha: Obsolete

 

I was just sorting out some Heavy Gear miniatures to send a friend, rummaging around in my spares box, but a moment of m̶a̶d̶n̶e̶s̶s̶ inspiration overtook me and I made some insurgent Improvised Power Armor, inspired by the anime show called, Obsolete.

Having made them I needed a name. So I ran a thread on Facebook that generated the  following list of names:

Ambul Haters

ATSW: All Terrain Support Weapon. Mutated to the nickname, "Ant"

Battle Choppers

CKT-M4A "Cricket"DRGW-21, "Dragoon Walker" perfect dragoons, riding those steeds

Dumpy

Footsloggers

Gunrunners

Gunstriders

Heavy Weapons Tactical Mobility Units better known as "Stompin' Ostriches" or "Stompies"

Highly Improvised Mobility Battle Объект

Islagiatt: It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time.

JICP: Jupiter Industrial Complex Pattern TKY-974 Storm Walkers though more commonly known to the troops as "Turkey Wankers" for how vulnerable they are to enemy fire. Designed by Herbert Bingle. Although being a well regarded engineer will never admit that the idea come around XMas.

Locust LCT-3A: Light Cavalry Transports

Marcher: MG units

Outriders

Piggybacks

Prairie Cat

Tripp(a)ers: Tactical Response Improvised Plantigrade Pod (Armor ) E R

Zoomer's

With so many names to choose from I ended up making a poll:
 

Gunstriders finished first with 30 points; twice the votes of the next closest contender, the ATSW Ant with 15 points, which was three times more than HWTMU Ostrich/Stompies with 5 points. So Gunstriders will be the official name in the upcoming Bad Dog rules.

And to finish, today's post, I found this picture of the game banner for OHMU War Machine, which you can read a review of on Board Game Geek.

That's all folks. Catch you on the bounce!

Mechs and Technicals

I'm almost at the stage, for a generous definition of almost, of wanting to start working on formulating forces for the rules. In a fit of inspirations I realized that asymmetrical combat between first world forces and third world insurgents/freedom fighters could be an option some players might want to have.

Certainly an actual thing in my Gate Walker setting, even if I haven't written any stories specifically about such actions, though the first book does have local Mujahedin assisting the Chinese special forces company attack my heroes. 

Given that thought, and the fact I have a small stash of Peter Pig AK47 15mm miniatures I can make use of them to explore aspects of the rules I hadn't considered. 

These are two Peter Pig Toyota Hilux's that I modified.

The one on the left I lifted and put tyres from a Humvee on to beef it up, and added a Bull bar on the front. The one on the right I made into a heavy version with double wheels/

Both have wheel wells enlarged, gotta keep street legal, to add more character. I also sculpted a wooden floor for the recoilless rifle variant to better hide the figures base.

I've also undercoated some GZG robots for my Marine Corps squad with heavy support, and made up a BigDog from a GZG Quad Transport Walker from Germy's 2mm range, to carry bullets and beans.

I also converted a second GZG Quad Transport Walker, and modified a civilian robot to represent the PetMan BigDog robot exploration team, seen here with a power loader variant of the GZG civilian robot.

For those readers who read my Strike Dog novel, I'm writing a short story about what happened to Romeo Echo Tango Two after they went missing.

And, in addition to all that, my beloved designed and printed up a poseable BigDog miniature. All the joints are articulated.

Okay, that's all folks. Catch you on the bounce.

Relief at Progress

 

Finally, I've managed get the paint on the torso and head to match the work I'd done before having to strip it. Phew. Breathe a sigh of relief at managing this. A first for me matching glazes and washes, made easier using a wet palette and additives.

Just have to do the final assembly, varnish and decal the torso and head to call Ferretti's Buster done.

In other news, I've acquired two Kodiaks and an armored Hunter. The Kodiaks will be converted into Busters to go with the one above. 

No doubt I will tinker with variant weapons loadouts on these.

The Armored Hunter was an impulse purchase that took my fancy. I'm tempted to make it the ride for my CASDA weapons specialist.

These took an awful long time to make it across the Atlantic, and at one point I thought the parcel had gone missing. Much relief now they've safely arrived. All the RAFM Gears are mine!

That's all for now. Catch you on the bounce.

OMWB: Painting Six Combat Armour Suits

Taken with my 7-14mm wide angle zoom.

Another post coming to this blog from a veritable flood of creativity. I've started painting these models using my wet palette, which theoretically allows me to blend the paint. So far all I've managed is plain washes for the basic colour.

WIP taken with my 60mm macro.

Still a ways to go with these, which leaves me with a question...

How Much Time Should it Take to Paint a Single Mini?

 Enjoy, catch you all on the bounce.

Visigoth Tank WIP

   

Taken with my Olympus 7-14mm F2.8 Pro, at 7mm, F8, 1.3 secs, ISO 200. Crop from 64 megapixel Hi-Res shot.

This Visigoth tank from Dream Pod 9 is humongous, so much so that in my mind it better fits my 15mm Heavy Gear force than their 12mm line. It's so large it would have to be a giant Ogre style cybertank otherwise.

So, primed and first colour blocked out.

One step closer, which is going to be my mantra for this years work: one step at a time takes you one step closer to completion.

And, just so people can see how large this tank is, here it is with a squad of 15mm figures.

   

MARPACE Suits

Hopefully you see that I tweaked the standard poses the figures come in to add a bit more variety to the squad.

Again these were a project I started on over the Xmas period, but not quite getting around to taking pictures and posting my progress.  I've also managed to prime these, but currently I'm still in the middle of a Heavy Gear building frenzy so I'm not sure when they'll get painted.

I found the gun barrels were easily bent so I replaced them with brass wire, and though you can't really see it, I've added guitar string to the extended weapon pods to strengthen them too.  It was a bit fiddly to do.

These are a mix of Clear Horizon 15mm Epsilon base and heavy support squads.  I'm using them as infantry for my 15mm Heavy Gear project, which I accidentally started after acquiring some old RAFM era large Gears.  These are really lovely figures full of character and poseable.
  

Somalia AK47 Republic

As I mentioned quite a while ago, I went to SELWG and bought some Peter Pig 15mm figures after playing in a demo game of AK47 Republic. When I got home I couldn't resist playing with the new toys I had bought, and I started sorting them out and basing them up.

Though in the latter case I've gone off message, as I wasn't totally convinced by the basing in the rules. So I've chosen to base professionals as per AK47, but I have increase the frontage for regulars by 10mm and 20mm for militia, which will allow me to put more figures on each base.

Why I hear you ask? Rhetorically that is, because I haven't got spy-ware that allows me to hear anything you say, but you can always leave a comment.

Well, for me, when using miniatures they must represent something more than just being a pretty counter or game token. I'm a firm believer that if you are not encoding information for the game into the figures, and the terrain, then you are missing out on the benefits of using figures in a three dimensional landscape. AFAIC you might as well use counters for your game.

Your mileage may vary on this one, but it's a thing for me that adds to the visual and textural experience of playing a game, which for me adds more than the sum of its parts.