June 2023 Hobby update

June has been a busy month.  I've been adding to existing projects and getting to a point where they are considered finished, i.e. I have enough forces for both sides to play the games I currently want to play. I've also started on a new project which has got me excited.  It's another long update!

Completed

The only thing I had on the go when May ended was some plastic zombies.  I finished these off early in June and they can be seen in their gruesomeness here. 

Keeping with 20mm and the whole Zona Alfa/neo-Soviet vibe I completed some Elhiem modern Russians and a religious leader.  Lovely figures of which you can see more of here.

Following fast on the heels of those fellas I completed some support for the Legion in Algeria, in the form of a .30 cal machine gun team and an 81mm mortar team.  More of these grognards here.

The last of the completed bits was for my new project the South African Border Wars.  I ordered and completed a selection of vehicles and I'm very pleased how they've come up.  You can read about the start of this project here and see more of the vehicles here.  

In progress

As we end the month and while I work out the forces I need for the South African Border Wars project I've got a few bits to tide me over:

  • 1/300th South African infantry from Scotia Grendel.  There's a few miscasts with these and mostly the same pose so I'll give these a quick paint job and see what else I can mix in with them.
  • From the sublimely simple and quick to the ridiculously involved and time consuming.  I thought I'd turn my attention to my oldest outstanding figures and started on the 15mm Grumpy's Landsknechts I got at the end of last year.   This batch are arquebusiers and musicians.  Having started them I know now why I sold off my Italian Wars figures the other year, although these are for the later half of the 16th Century they're still going to test my will to do.  
  • I also started on a Native American Mound Builder Shaman which came in the same order as the Landsknechts.  I currently have no use for this but liked the look of him and he's been nice to paint. 

South African infantry, Landsknechts, Shaman (top to bottom)

Gaming

I managed to get one game in during June.  I utilised some of the items I've finished over the last months and had a very enjoyable game of Ambush Alley set in Algeria.  You can read the AAR here. 

Research & Reading:

I've read a fair bit this month.  My commuting buddy has been on holiday so I used the extra time to get more reading in.  

First off I finished reading "Roadside Picnic".  As I mentioned last month this was a big influence on Patrick Todoroff who wrote the "Zona Alfa" rules.  Funny little book really, not what you'd call action-packed which surprised me.  The whole feel of the 'zone' and the characters are well done so well worth a read. 

Next I read "Battle on the Lomba '87".  I hinted at a new project last month and it's full steam ahead now.    This is an account from a Ratel 90 IFV commander and his time in the South African Defence Force.  It takes you from joining up, training and finishing with his unit's actions in what came to be called The Battle of Cuito Cuanavale.  It's a good read, Helion of course!

Last of all I read "Two for Texas" by James Lee Burke.  I've read the majority of his works starting on the Dave Robicheaux detective novels, but I have to say I much prefer the historical ones like this.  It's set in the period around the Alamo 1836, which is my preferred era for Old West gaming.  Predictably this has got me thinking about getting the collection out for a game.   

Incoming!

I've been focused this month with the majority of my spending going on the new project.
  • As mentioned above I ordered a load of 1/300th modern AFVs from Scotia Grendel for the South African Border Wars project.  Really nice little models and excellent service from Scotia Grendel.  I'll be buying more of these.  Also in the order were a Chieftain, Scorpion and T-62, so I could continue my comparisons of micro-armour which I started here.  I'll do a follow up post on this when time permits.   
  • My only other purchase was the print edition of 'The Battle of Cuito Cuanavale" from Helion.  I was in the middle of reading  "Battle on the Lomba '87" when the offer for this came through so it was perfect timing.  It's packed with colour photos and a nice selection of plates and has been invaluable when painting the AFVs. 

Right at the end of the month I was looking on www.drivethrurpg.com trying to stop myself buying loads of Conan stuff and noticed Sword Weirdos was reduced.  Now I like Space Weirdos and had been meaning to get the new one.  Even at full price these rules are a bargain, but I couldn't resist it for £3.09.  It also comes with a sheet of tokens and a guide for solo play included in the bundle.  Great stuff.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

City ruins scatter terrain

Image
2024 and 2025 will see the 80th anniversary of many of the great city battles of the Second World War, such as Warsaw, Budapest, Königsberg and Berlin to name but a few.  With this is mind I've been looking at my terrain collection.  My city terrain is centred around some marvellous 20mm MDF buildings I got from Commission Figurines at Salute back in 2014.  I built some rubble piles a few years ago, but when I got it all out of the loft it didn't look very impressive so I decided to make some more. The first job was to sort the base materials.  I used four different materials: cork board; 5mm foam board; old plywood bases and old credit cards.  The cork board and foam board are great materials for this type of terrain proving height, being relatively strong, easy to cut and very lightweight.  I started by pulling apart pieces of cork board to the rough sizes I wanted and then set about the pieces with a Stanley knife and an old screwdriver.  It's very easy to carve irregul
Read more

28mm Victrix Late-Roman Archers and Slingers

Image
When I first embarked on my Late-Roman project a year or so ago, I bought a few sample sprues from Gripping Beast, Wargames Atlantic and Victrix.  The Victrix one was from the Late Roman Archers and Slingers set.  The quality of these convinced me to choose Victrix for the project and I duly ordered up some sets.  After working my way slowly through these I finally went back to this original frame.  These are absolutely lovely models.  There's loads of variety and they go together beautifully.  The instruction sheet which I got from the Victrix website makes a massive difference in this regard.  I really enjoyed working on these.  They were quick to assemble and quick to paint up being in a uniform of sorts.   I only have the one frame, but I took a couple of the bodies from some of the Dark Age Archers that I was working on at the same time ( here ) and added some spare arms to make another pair of staff slingers.  This worked pretty well adding variety to the poses.  I'll do
Read more

More 28mm Dark Age warriors

Image
As a bit of a palette cleanser while working my way through the 15mm Landsknechts, I started on a half dozen Victrix Dark Age Archers.   I'd completed a  first batch of these in January and it was good to get back to them.  The original intention was to use these as Norse warriors for my Ragnarok project.  Since then though I've been looking at making them more useable for a longer period of history.  Therefore, with the exception of the sword armed warrior who is very Viking, I've tried to make them quite generic.  As before nearly all the parts came from the Victrix Dark Age Archers set, with a few extras from the Victrix Viking sprue.  These were used to make the sword and seax armed figures.  There was the usual amputations and other bits of minor surgery to make things fit and that's all part of the fun with these plastic figures.  I followed the same process as before and methodically took notes of what parts I used for each figure.  This helped to make sure that
Read more