Lots of buildings - click the picture and scroll down

 Well, I've finally finished these off, all ten of them. Scroll down to see the lot;

All of these buildings are in 15mm scale and are resin casts from Hovels. The mounted figures are for scale and are officers from the Lurkio Nine Years' War range, now sold by Gripping Beast.

I am pretty happy with these. I think that they'll be good for everything from the late-17th century right up to WW2. Some clearly suit the Netherlands/Belgium more than elsewhere and a few really need to be used together to make up an urban setting, but others might be OK for Normandy (at a pinch). In any case, I think that these models have a certain charm that you don't get from MDF buildings and I deliberately set out to paint them in a kind of impressionistic way rather than going for a totally realistic appearance.

The backdrop is, once again from a Jon Hodgson Handiwork Games book.

Lots of resin scenic pieces.

And there are quite a few, all 28mm scale pieces. Scroll down to see them all. The first one is from Bad Squiddo, the priest is just for scale);

The rest are all from Fenris Games. Once again, figures are just for scale;

The photo above features that almost-famous archaeologist Prof. Idaho Smith, who is also in the next picture, wondering why that strange altar appears to be glowing green in the centre.

I love this next one. It is a triangular obelisk covered in inscriptions in three unknown languages, like a kind of Eldritch Horror Rosetta Stone. It is probably best not to try and read any of the texts out loud.

This next one includes a bit of scenic scratch-building to put the strange stone head into context;

So, I am really pleased with all of these. I've had them for quite a while and I wanted to get them painted up. I've still got some more stuff to paint with MORE TENTACLES!

The backdrops are, as usual from the excellent series of books by Jon Hodgson at Handiwork Games.

Hopefully, these will get some use in pulp games and for various eldritch horror purposes.

Various entrenchments

 These are all 15mm resin pieces from Ironclad Miniatures.

Above we have some prepared positions with solid foundations lined with ammunition boxes and some smaller roughly dug-out sangars.

Below are sandbagged positions in larger and smaller sizes.

I decided that I would keep the paint jobs to a minimum here, for two reasons. Firstly, so that they could be used for desert and rocky dry settings and secondly because I want them to look freshly dug. Therefore, I didn't use any tufts or flock, reasoning that if they had been assembled hurriedly, grass and weeds wouldn't have had any time to take root. 

These are the kind of basic entrenchments that could be used for tripod-mounted machine guns, rifle sections mortars or guns and would fit into many periods from the American Civil War to WW2. Small entrenchments are required for tripod-mounted MMGs in Chain of Command 2, so the smaller sandbagged positions are going to be very useful.

Egyptian ruins, plus a fountain.

 First, the fountain;

This is another 3D print from Dungeon Scenes. The murky green water has been given a coat of acrylic gloss varnish. I allowed the green paint to go up the walls of the fountain, hoping to create the effect of algal growth. I think it looks OK. The 28mm guy is for scale only.

Next a number of resin pieces from The Square, who can be found at many trade shows. These are all based up for desert-based gaming;

Spot the 28mm guy, he's looking pretty small against these pieces.

These were easy enough to paint; base coat spray, dry-brushing in lighter colours, a wash here and there to bring out the details, a few bits of Gamers' Grass and lots of sandy ballast. Job done.

Hopefully these will get plenty of fantasy, pulp, VSF and eldritch horror use.

I'm going to have to get back to painting actual minis now. Sadly, the painting mojo is still hiding somewhere.

Lots of 15mm scenic stuff

I've not posted anything for a few weeks, but I have been busy, mostly making and painting a lot of scenic stuff for 15mm games. Here are the results. Firstly a bridge and river sections to create a crossing point.

The bridge is resin. I bought it ages ago, at Colours, I think from The Square. It has sat around in a box under my desk for a few years but I decided that it was high time I painted it so it can become useful. The river sections are made from corrugated cardboard with taped edges and just textured and painted. There are more sections to make up a decent length of river;

On these final two sections, you can definitely tell what they are made from! Still, they will do the job on the table.

In total I have roughly 1.5m of river. It isn't perfect, but it was cheap to make and is a lot wider than most wargaming river sections you can buy.

I've also been working on terrain that is going to give me some marshy ground. There is a decidedly wet and dodgy piece and some straggly trees growing on boggy ground.

The trees are railway accessories that I picked up cheap at the club's Tabletop Sale last year and I have loads more left. The bases are once again card, tape and texturing. I'm pretty pleased with these.

Finally, I made a load of road sections, representing rural dirt tracks. I made loads of these about seven or eight years ago, but they appear to have vanished, so I've had to make more. They are cork floor tiles cut into 5cm wide strips and coated with PVA glue and railway modelling ballast. In total there is over 3.5 m of roads. If I ever find the ones I made before, that would give me another 2.4 m of roads/tracks.

All of this stuff is going to be great for Sharp Practice and Chain of Command in 15mm, but only time will tell how robust the cardboard-based stuff is!

I doubt that the bridge would be able to take the weight of armour, but it'll work fine for infantry and light vehicles.

Some resin scenic pieces

 These are all 15mm scale and were bought from The Square, who is a regular at most shows.

The piece above is a large improvised firing position, with the figures placed for scale purposes. It is large enough for a whole infantry section, I think, depending on base sizes. Below are two smaller improvised fortifications.

Next are three piles of rocks or rubble, which are bound to come in useful.

Finally, a more formal fortification, this time a concrete casemate with an earth glacis. The 6-pdr gun fits in rather well, I think.

These were all pretty quick and easy to paint and texture with tufts, flock and ballast. I did all the pieces in a single afternoon. The tufts are all from Gamer's Grass, who are stocked by Bad Squiddo.

Resin McGuffins that I forgot I had

These were part of the Frostgrave: Ghost Archipelago Nickstarter that North Star ran ages ago, in 2017, I think. I bought mine from Bad Squiddo, because Annie had extra figures that I liked.

To be honest, I've never got round to playing the game, it had minimal interest at the club so I just packed all the figures away. I've used a few of the figures for my 7TV Fantasy project but I'd completely forgotten these little tokens. There are all between 2.5cm and 3.5cm in diameter and have some nice little details. The thing on the left is a weird skull, but I stupidly posed it the wrong way round.

 

Wagon loads using Bad Squiddo scenic items

A while ago, I posted about a pair of wagons I put together, initially for Infamy, Infamy, one being an open cart that could carry various loads.

I also posted about the Bad Squiddo resin cargo items I had painted. So, I thought that I should put the two things together and put some cargo in the wagon.

I think that these look pretty good and suit pretty much any period, maybe even up to WW2, although in reality they will work best with Ancients, Mediaeval and Horse and Musket games.

A wagonload of barrels and other containers would be a terrific objective for an Escort scenario.

At last! The sun is shining, Pt. One - resin cargo items.

These are from Bad Squiddo Scenics, sculpted by the incomparable Ristul.

Everything that Ristul sculpts for the Bad Squiddo range is wonderful; detailed, crisp and full of possibilities. 

These items have lots of opportunities to appear on all manner of tabletops, from ancient games right through to fantasy and pulp ones. I was delighted to discover that the smaller pieces actually fit in my open-topped Roman cart, so that is a huge bonus. There will be nice things in the cart for the Romans to escort around, and also be nice objectives for the Romans to loot while out foraging for supplies. I can see these pieces being incredibly useful for 28mm Peninsular War games of Sharp Practice too.

I have had these sitting around since last Saturday, but the weather has been so wet, I didn't want to risk them getting fogged while varnishing them. This morning was perfect for the job.

More 7TV figures - evil cultists

My latest finished set of figures are these excellent Crooked Dice Cultists for 7TV. There are twelve figures in total.

First, here are the basic cult members, both male and female, some with firearms and others with clubs or knives. As well as being Initiates into the Dark Mysteries, they are also the muscle, used to keep prying investigators away from discovering exactly what goes on in that ruined abbey in the woods.

Now, here is the Magister of the Cult, together with his female counterpart and what appears to be a statue of the eldritch daemonic entity they worship, here shown in my Fenris Games Summoning Circle.

Next, here is the Magister and his Magistra again, together with the rest of the Cult's Inner Circle of Adepts and that Daemonic Entity again. The woman with the arcane book and the man with the chalice are Celebrants and the other woman is some kind of Seer or Prophetess, or maybe she is just struggling with mental health issues? Dabbling in the Dark Arts is fraught with all kinds of dangers.

Here are the senior Adepts worshipping Cthulhu. I mean, why stick to one terrible Dark Entity when there are so many available?

And here are the Celebrants invoking some Dark Powers, monoliths from Fenris Games.

I am really happy with these figures. I originally started painting a test figure with scarlet robes, but I wasn't happy with the results, so I went for this darker, more wine red shade, with purple for the Magister and Magistra. 

Hopefully, once lockdown and social distancing are a thing of the past, these will feature in a few games of 7TV.

A few quick scenic resin pieces.

I've had all these 15mm resin odds and ends on my painting table while I've also been painting other things. I always like to have something that I can work on while I'm waiting for the paint to dry. There is quite a lot here, so you'll need to scroll down to see everything. I'm really pleased with the last thing here.

These were all finished on Saturday, so I was able to use them for my games at the weekend. First some hedges and a gate, from, I think Coritani; The house, from Hovels, and the figures, Essex ones from my 18th century imagi-nations Syldavian army, are just for scale.

You'll notice that the gate is damaged. This was because there was a big blob of resin that I was unable to remove without making a hole, so I decided to make the hole a feature. I think that it works OK.

I was going to flock the hedges but they look OK just painted. I also did some walls. I can't remember who makes these. The figure is, once again just for scale.

These can be used to make a complete enclosure, unfortunately without a gate. I shall have to investigate options to correct this problem.

Next, a couple of gun emplacements and lengths of earthworks. I bought these at the club's annual tabletop sale a couple of years ago. No idea what make they are. I didn't use these at the weekend but they are perfect for the black powder era and also for more modern games. The cannon is a 15mm Peter Pig one from my ACW Union army.

Finally, my pièce de résistance; a fantasy barbarian encampment. I spent a lot of time on this, because I wanted it to look like something worth defending in a battle. The figure is again there for scale. She is one of my Copplestone 15mm Barbarica magic users for my Sword and Spear Fantasy Hyborian horde.

Note the campfire, which I made from ballast and tiny stones, glued to a 1cm circular MDF base, which I glued into an indentation I cut into the basing material, a rectangle of corrugated cardboard.

I really like these tents with their embellishments made from mammoth tusks. I bought them from a club member who had them on a Bring and Buy table back at the end of last year when we were running our Alien Squad Leader tournament.

Some more resin scenic bits and bobs.

Following on from the Fenris Games resin scenic items, here are a few more pieces for Horror and Pulp games. These are all from Crooked Dice. Once again, the intrepid archaeologist is only there for scale.

Here is the complete set; three monoliths, a statue of Cthulhu and a pile of skulls.

The monoliths have a lot of detail and therefore, here is a view of them from behind. Are those green things creepers growing from a crevice in the rocks, or might they be tentacles? Just don't get close enough to find out!

Next up, everyone's favourite tentacled abomination from the stars;

Now, here is a statue of some obscure amphibian deity on a blood-stained plinth;

Or is it just a statue? Might it be some kind of unknown inhabitant of the reefs and caves near one of those fishing villages where the locals have an odd, vaguely batrachian appearance? 

Here it is again, off of its plinth, showing the nice carved effects on the surface. This could be used stand-alone as a sacrificial altar.