German Trench Mortar

I haven't been terribly productive this past week for… reasons… Largely I spent a couple evenings just taking stock. I’ve been getting distracted thinking about future projects. NEW future projects and I thought perhaps it was time to do a little stocktaking – mostly to shame myself into not considering any new projects for the next year or so… but more on that in another post….

I DID manage, in the meantime, to finish up this little German trench mortar team from Great War Miniatures.

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

Lovely little kit. Very easy to put together.

I particularly appreciate the little details GWM throws in with these kits – the case with mortar bombs and rifle, etc.

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Perhaps another battalion of Great War Canadians…

Or perhaps a bit about the stock-taking I did over the last week. honestly I’m a little embarrassed to post the figures…

Anyone care to guess at how many 28mm figures I have and what portion of them are actually painted?

I tell you what - if I get at least six guesses I'll post the results.  

19th (Central Ontario) Battalion, CEF

And back to the Khaki….

The figures from the 19th (Central Ontario) Battalion, CEF, as with all of the figures in the 4th Brigade, are from 1st Corps.

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

19th (Central Ontario) Battalion, CEF

The formation patch for the 19th Battalion was a green semicircle surmounting a blue patch – the blue patch was for the 2nd Division, the semicircle indicated the second battalion within the brigade and the green was the senior brigade within the division.

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Hopefully the 20^th Battalion… 

More Ancients and Mythological Creatures

So how many “little breaks” do I get to take from a project before I can consider myself “totally distracted”…?

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

Ancient Persians from Casting Room Miniatures (who are currently having a “pre-xmas” 20% off sale on their historical miniatures like these – I did not pick these up in the sale. I’ve had these a while. Though  I’m not entirely sure WHEN I picked them up… probably a year and a half ago when I was picking up stuff for Song of Shadows and Dust.

Thracian Women from Wargames Foundry which is the same guys as Casting Room Miniatures… but a different website – which is SUPER annoying because orders cannot be combined If I want to order 4 packs from one and 4 from the other I have to pay twice the shipping I would if they were all from the same website – actually at 8 packs (combined) it would ship free from one or the other…. (unlike… say… North Star Figures which also sells Artizan Designs and Copplestone Castings and Crusader Miniatures and maintains separate websites for each of them – they all go to the same cart and orders can be combined).

I digress…

Here’s what their backsides look like.

Gorgons! The one that is primarily red and yellow (tried to go for a Corn Snake look) is from Reaper Miniatures, the other three are from Wargames Foundry or Casting Room Miniatures… I forget which… I think they may be the one line that is available through BOTH websites! The Black Snake gorgon I actually painted… um… wow I guess it was over four years ago - but I’ve included her here with the others because… well.. they’re all done so I thought I’d take a picture of the group….?

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Back to the Great War Canadians… no, really… the 19th (Central Ontario) Battalion is the only thing on my workbench and I’m not putting anything else on there until they’re done!

Great War Canadian Vickers Machine-Gun Teams

I just finished up the last of the Great War Canadian Vickers machine-gun teams I currently have (I do need a few more, but I’ll probably be waiting until the new year to pick them up).

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

The new teams, from left to right: 1st Corps, Gripping Beast/Woodbine Design (in back), Wargames Foundry (in front) and 1st Corps again. 

These are all of the teams for the Canadian Corps so far. There will be four per division and represent roughly a company. I need about three more.

Having finished them up I thought I’d do a post highlighting all of them and maybe even taking some comparison shots.

1st Corps

Gripping Beast/Woodbine Design

Wargames Foundry

Renegade Miniatures

Old Glory

Great War Miniatures

Brigade Games

Here are a few comparrison shots..



Top row, left to right: Great War Miniatures, Old Glory, Gripping Beast/Woodbine Design

Bottom row, left to right: Brigade Games, Renegade Miniatures, 1st Corps, Wargames Foundry



Here I tried to line them up from biggest to smallest guns - left to right: Renegade Miniatures, Brigade Games, 1st Corps, Great War Miniatures, Old Glory, Gripping Beast/Woodbine Design, Wargames Foundry.



As above, slightly different angle.



The biggest and smallest. Wargames Foundry on the left, Renegade Miniatures on the right.



The three big 'uns: Renegade Miniatures, Brigade Games, 1st Corps. They are all about the same thickness, but the one from Renegade is clearly longer. (With a statement like that I feel a little like a porn reviewer comparing dicks...)



 Great War Miniatures (left) and Gripping Beast/Woodbine Design (right)



Great War Miniatures (left) and Old Glory (right)



Wargames Foundry (left) and Old Glory (right)

I originally took a few more pics but a lot were out of focus or just didn't turn out, but I think the above does a pretty good idea of showing the differences and similarities. I'm not terribly concerned by them. These will be spread out all over teh battlefield - the differences are really only noticable when you line them up next to each other and critically compare.

I wish I could have gotten the Canadian Auto Car Machine Gun Carrier I picked up from 1st Corps , but alas I haven’t had the time to assemble it…

I realized afterward taking and editing all these pictures that I do actually have a vickers team from Battle Honors - but they're in shorts and Wolseley helmets... I guess they'd do to show relative sizes of guns... Ah well... some other time. 

For those that get anxious about the significance of certain numbers – with these I have finished precisely 666 28mm foot figures so far this year. Well behind where I’ve been at this point in some of my more productive years, but I should bring that up over 700 and possibly closer to 800 by the end of the year, which no one can really say is insignificant…

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

I wish I could say it would be the 19th (Central Ontario) Battalion, CEF, but it won’t I have a few more individual ancient figures I’ve been working on in between units and stuff. I have STARTED the 19th (Central Ontario) Battalion, and hopefully I’ll be posting them later in the week!  Also work has slowed on the 4^th Brigade as I’ve stopped to convert a few spare officers into the riflemen I need them to be! 

18th (Western Ontario) Battalion, CEF

On with the 2nd Division – starting with the 18th Battalion of the 4th Brigade. All of the figures in the 4th Brigade are from 1st Corps. The 1st Corps figures a bit on the chunky side, but I actually don’t mind. I think some of the sculpts are really fun and full of character – and in some poses I haven’t often seen in wargaming miniatures – cocking rifles, reloading and reaching into webbing for ammo, etc. 

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

18th (Western Ontario) Battalion, CEF

I realized, while painting these that a few of the figures I initially thought were infantrymen (because they were carrying rifles) are actually officers?! One was from a pack of Officers and NCOs – I figured the two with pistols were officers and the two with rifles were NCOs. Wrong-oh! On closer observation (once I actually started PAINTING the guys) one of the guys I thought was an NCO is actually another officer carrying a rifle. The THIRD officer in this unit actually came in the “Advancing/Charging” pack. I suppose I could have done some converting… but I was in painting mode and couldn’t be bothered at that point. I’ll have to look at the other battalions and maybe carve off the officer-ish details on the same figures in the other battalions.

The formation patch for the 18th Battalion was a green square surmounting a red patch – the blue patch was for the 2nd Division, the circle indicated the senior battalion within the brigade and the green was the senior brigade within the division.

I hope to get a couple more cracked out over the long weekend –in between playing a few games - so stay tuned.

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

19th (Central Ontario) Battalion, CEF - or perhaps some Machine-guns and mortars…

4th (Central Ontario) Battalion, CEF

I finally finished up the final battalion for the 1st brigade, and indeed the entire 1^st Division: 4th (Central Ontario) Battalion, Canadian Expeditionary Force.

The figures for the battalion, as with the recently finished 1st battalion,  2nd battalion, and 3rd Battalion are all from Wargames Foundry

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

4th (Central Ontario) Battalion, Canadian Expeditionary Force.

The formation patch for the 4th Battalion was a green square surmounting a red patch – the red patch was for the 1st Division, the square indicated the junior battalion within the brigade and the green was the senior brigade within the division.

I was actually short a figure to make this battalion – so I pinched a couple from the 14th Battalion and replaced those with two spare figures I had from Old Glory. that way the entire 1st Brigade is made up of Wargames Foundry Figures, the Second Brigade is made up of Old Glory figures and the 3^rd Brigade is made up of a mix of Wargames Foundry, Old Glory, and home-cast figures. Ideally I’d have liked to have the battalions made up of figures from one manufacturer (and so it bothers me intensely to have the two Old glory figues in the unit of Wargames Foundry figures… but I’ll just have to live with it – because I can’t be bothered to pay $25-$20 just to get one or two more figures).

I’d take pictures of the entire brigade, but while the battalions making up the brigade, the entire brigade is not complete as I have some supporting elements that would be attached to the brigade that I have yet to complete. Same goes for the Division.

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

On to the 2^nd Division – or perhaps some Germans…?

Bronze Age Warriors

Not much work done on the Vimy Project this past week or so. We had a blast of winter-like weather in early October and the rest of the month was chilly, grey and wet and miserable. This first week of November we’ve had a bit more warmer weather and I’ve been trying to get out more – even got out for a little mountain bike ride on Friday (and will probably go for another today!). I did go a bit of assembling of Great War items last week (German mortars – useful for Vimy, and an A7V – not so useful for Vimy… but at least it’s still in the Great War era…). There were a few things I finished up this week – but they had little to do with the Great War…

This fall I started playing in a D&D5E Primeval Thule campaign – the setting is Bronze Age Sword and Sorcery. I recalled that I had these few Wargames Foundry Trojan War heroes that I never got to finishing up when I was working on other Greek myth stuff. The Trojan War – historically speaking – would have been in the Bronze Age, so I painted these guys up with bronze weapons and armour.

I was looking around the Foundry website and got to thinking I might order a few more Bronze age warriors – a mix of European Bronze Age Warriors and Hittites and other Trojan War Heroes to add to this mix, but then I came to my senses and… well.. didn’t… for now.

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

Trojan Heroes. I think that’s supposed to be King Priam in the center, flanked by his sons Paris (one the left - without the helmet) and Hector (on the right), and two other guards.

Detail of those shields. I’m not totally happy with them – they don’t look quite centered to me – it’s like I started the front end leaving a bit of space between the front of the hose and the edge of the shield, but by the time I got to the back of the horse I’d run out of space. And a couple of those front legs look gimpy… I’m not bothered with them so much as to repaint them or anything… but not totally happy…

The Achaeans (form left to right): Odysseus, Menelaus, Agamemnon, Achilles, and Ajax (or at least I think that’s who they were supposed to be…)

We haven’t been getting a lot of gaming in lately either, but we did sneak in a game of Forbidden Island last night. This was our second game so we played at the "normal" level and just barely made it off the island! I'm not sure how anyone could play at the "veteran" or "elite" levels! 

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Great War stuff.. no really…