Vietnam Guns – in 20mm!

Some fire support for my 20mm Vietnam era Americans…

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


These guns and crew are from RAFM.

Of course now I feel the urge to build a hilltop firebase for these guys to sit on (and for the Vietnamese to overrun!).

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Just finishing up an odd assortment of 28mm stuff – Ancient Greek Civilians, some RAF (or RCAF) fliers, an Ancient Egyptian priest, and a modern contractor/mercenary/etc…

After that I have a few more 20mm WW2 Soviets on the painting desk that I hope to finish up this week, then I think I’ll be back to some Greek Hoplites – I’d like to complete one army before the Egyptians show up and completely distract me!

Longer term…? Hmmmm… I have some Greek Mythology stuff on the way that I’d like to get painted up so I can run some Savage Worlds Greek Mythology adventures for the kids… I was thinking about a HOTT campaign in June… perhaps I should finish up some fantasy armies for that – or some fantasy elements for the already existing historical armies…

I’m not sure about doing Queenston heights in the fall… we’ll see where I’m at in the summer… Right now I feel more like spending the rest of the year working on hoplites so I can put together four or five Early Greek Hoplite armies for a little campaign…

We shall see what we shall see…

WW2 British and Canadians – in 20mm!

A while back I had a hankering to bust out the Blitzkrieg Commander and throw down with some battalion-level WW2 gaming. Mostly the feeling has passed… but during that time I’d dragged out a pile of these 20mm WW2 figures and got to thinking and organizing and figuring out what I’d need to finish up this formation and that formation and how very little I’d need to get ready to play…

Well as I said the feeling has mostly passed, but I was still feeling like painting a few things up and now that I don’t have to be painting all 28mm dark ages all the time to get ready for the campaign weekend… it’s nice to mix things up a bit..

(well… that, and it takes me less than half the time to paint a 20mm figure, but I get 80% of the points in Analogue Hobbies Spring Thaw Painting Challenge… I thought I’d crank these out jus tto make Ray sweat…).

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


This is a company of Camadians. The figures are from old Platoon 20 (that were produced under license by RAFM many moons ago. Actually only seven of these are newly painted – the rest were previously painted and only recently re-based along with those newly painted to meet my New Basing Standards for WW2 and Modern 20mm figures


Some 3” Mortars. I think the figures were from FAA…? Apparenlty I was thinking I’d do an entire Brigade of Canadians at some point (as these stands represent platoons, and there is a single mortar platoon in each battalion – three per brigade…)


Some Forward Artillery Observers – also, I think, from FAA.


An RCA 25-Pounder and crew. The model and crew are from and old Airfix kit that I had kicking around forever. I’m sure it had a Quad tractor and limber trailer, but I can’t for the life of me find them… I’d like to find the limber trailer at some point as I could probably fit it onto this stand…


Five platoons of British (or Canadian) Paras to finish up a battalion. Again these are all old Platoon 20/RAFM castings.


An odd stand of British Commandos. I think they might be SHQ – I picked them up off ebay along with a pile of other stuff a few years back. I think it might have even been a command pack – but lacking any other commandos to COMMAND I based them as a platoon stand and decided they could be a small detachment attached to my Canucks – or perhaps inadvertently drifted into the Canadians Area of Operations after their LCA was crippled by a “too close” mortar round… or something like that…

Also, because it’s WW2 and I don’t have anywhere else to put them…


Some GERMAN Forward Artillery Observers – again, FAA (I think)

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Some Vietnam Artillery...

Egyptian Family

A young family of ancient Egyptian peasants…

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


These figures are from Black Tree Design.

I also recently picked up a handful of Egyptians from Wargames Foundry off a friend of mine that was getting rid of them… and then I was looking at the Foundry website this past weekend and noticed they were having a 20% off sale… so… well… I kind of went ahead and bought enough Egyptians to make a DBA New Kingdom Egyptian army… and… well… a HOTT Amazon army (from their new Greek Mythology line)…

...and this is all in addition to the bushel-load of Foundry Greek mythology minis I’d asked my Friendly Local Game Shop (the Dragon’s Den) to order in for me…

Looks like I’ll be [painting an awful lot of Foundry minis this year… which isn’t a bad thing, really…

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Some 20mm WW2 stuff… if you’re really anxious to se them they’re already up over at Analogue Hobbies. I’ll post them here tonight or maybe tomorrow… after that some Vietnam era US artillery and crew… after that…? I’ve started on a small batch of WW2 Russians…!?

Bringing out the Dead - More Casualty Markers

Here are a couple casualty markers I finished up that didn’t seem like they’d fit in the post about the Hoplites… not that Ancient Egyptians and Brtitish Paras “fit” in a post together… but since there’s only one of each… and I didn’t want to do separate posts for both…

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


This wounded Egyptian is from Wargames Foundry.

The girl has been showing interest in Ancient Egypt… and I’ve been looking for an excuse to build a Ancient ("New Kindgom") Egyptian army for some time… And what better place to start than with a casualty marker? er...

I have a couple stands worth of figures, but I’ll need to pick up a few more things… I think the cheapest way will be a couple bags of Old Glory (ordered through North Bay Games and Hobbies to avoid being bent over a barrel by UPS!?) – one of Armoured Spearmen, one of Archers and one of bag of three chariots (of one sort or another) would put me just one chariot shy of an entire army… If I could find a spectacular model from someone else of a Pharoh in his chariot I’d be set! Anyone have any suggestions? I know Black Tree Design has one, but It looks like the "pharoh" is bare headed...?! Something about that just doesn't seem right... Wargames foundry has a cool looking Ramaeses the Great (if a bit pricey)... But the Foundry currently lists it as "Out of Stock"... Any others out there?

(of course when I get it underway, I’ll need to also make some HISTORICAL opponents, right!?)

Before all that, however, I should probably finish up the undead army… which are all Ancient Egypt/Mummy themed undead…


This poor chap is a dead WW2 British (or Canadian) Para from Black Tree Design.

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Sadly some more 20mm WW2 stuff – just to make Ray sweat….

Hoplites

And here they are…

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


This is a stand of Hoplites (Spear) for an Early Greek Hoplite DBA army. The army may take some time to complete…


The figures are all from Black Tree Design. As I mentioned in the preview in the previous post I had wanted to cram 8 guys on there, but was only able to get seven on in the end… At least I got four across the front and the unit looks sufficiently DENSE!


Their backsides. There are some more nekkid dudes on this stand - but their dangly bits are cleverly hidden by appropriately placed shields - not only to shield their dangly bits from foes - but to shield the eyes for those too prudish (or uncertain in their own sexuality) to look upon another mans genitalia.... or rather a wee model of another man's bits.


Here’s how the BTD (on the left) look next to the Crusader Minis (on the right). While both are great as individually mounted figures, I definitely like the Crusader Miniatures better for putting on stands like this.

Here are a couple more individual Hoplites I also happened to finish up:


The two Spartans on the left are both from Wargames Foundry, the other (with the snake device) is from Black Tree Design.


Here’s their backsides.


Some Hoplite casualty figures from Warlord Games.

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Some more dead guys.

Hoplite Preview

I thought I’d take a quick pic of some of the Hoplites I’m working on before I removed them from their painting stands and stick them on their base. (Because last time a number of the Hoplites shields weren’t really visible after I’d put them on the base!)

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


These are all from Black Tree Design. I did eight of them because my Other Hoplites (made up of Crusader Miniatures) have eight – which I really like the look of. These are considerably more dynamic than the Crusader minis… but I hoped with some creative shield overlapping I might get eight (or at least SEVEN – which is how many Jackson was able to cram onto his stands!).

As it turns out I was able to cram seven on to the 60x40 base. I should finish that up tonight and hopefully you’ll be able to see then on Analogue Hobbies tomorrow, and back here on the weekend sometime!

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

The FINISHED hoplites… then something else… not sure what.

Greek Heroes

As promised, a few Greek Heroes….

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


These are the Spartan Heroes from Crocodile Games Wargods of Olympus line. There’s a King Leonidas figure… but I thought he looked goofy so I didn’t pick one up. These I could live with…


Again with the dirty cloaks....


Perseus from Reaper Miniatures. They also make a Socrates figure that I’m tempted to pick up… I’ve also ordered some Cyclopes from them as well…

Back to taking pictures out in natural sunlight… but still a bit snowy…


This is the back step where I take most of the pictures of my figures. There’s just enough natural light in between the house to get decent pics without glare or harsh shadows. Actually this much snow isn’t unusual in a Saskatchewan winter – what’s unusual is to have so much all at once at the very end of a particularly mild winter… and to have to forecast predicting that it’ll all melt by the weekend!

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

I'm just finishing up a batch of gen-u-ine historical Hoplites… I also have some Dark Age Frankish Cavalry on the workbench… and some WW2 stuff… and some Greek cavalry… Egyptians… all sorts of goodies… Who knows what I’ll finish up next!?