15mm Wars In Chechnya Pt I, Eureka Miniatures Review

Being huge fans of Ostfront Publishing, Pierce and myself were excited when we found that Tom Jensen had written a set of rules for wargaming the Chechen Wars titled "Cornered Wolf". Giving the rulebook a skim it seemed that both of us could fairly quickly put together some 15mm forces to give it a go. 

I decided on Chechens, and was immediately pointed towards the range from Eureka. Our group has plenty of experience with their figures in 28mm, but it was my personal first foray into their 15mm lines. Needless to say, the figures themselves are just as fantastic as their 28's.

As they arrived.

Painting Invitation From Ral Partha Legacy

Recently Ral Partha (now Ral Partha Legacy) put out a casting call for painters, artists, writers, and more to help revitalize their older ranges that have been out of print for some time - most notably, their Chaos Wars line. Any old-heads in the hobby space know of Ral Partha's history, existing for over 45 years now and producing loads of historical, fantasy, and sci-fi product. Some of their figures were amongst the first I ever painted for D&D before I was even a teen, so the opportunity to get some done up for their personal collection was really exciting. 

As they arrived.

28mm Sci Fi Project, Pt III - Pig Iron Heavy Infantry Showcase

After posting the painting guide I was more than excited to get these guys done up this weekend, and it looks like I finished them just shy under 8 hours - not bad! In line with what I mentioned during my initial review, these Pig Iron figures painted up fabulously. I'm a bit bummed that additions to their ranges look to have slowed down a bit over the years as they seem to be focusing more on head options, so hopefully they'll come out with some more exciting stuff in the future!

I see some AAR's from this force very soon most likely using Tomorrow's War. For now however, I put together what is essentially my first staged miniature showcase to hold you all over until then!

28mm Sci Fi Project, Pt II - Pig Iron Heavy Infantry Painting

Before painting this force, as usual I decided to get a test-figure out of the way to make sure I was happy with the planned scheme. As you'll see below, these Pig Iron miniatures paint up really nicely and have some well defined detail without being too busy. Since these figures will be played with in a unit, I didn't want to go overboard on the paint job, shooting for a tabletop standard with minimal effort. 

See the image annotations for the steps I used to paint this test figure below - I will be using the same steps to complete the rest of his unit.

Mounted on a 20mm MDF base, the tab is covered with a mix of spackle and sand for ground texture. The figure is primed with a light gray and then given a zenithal dusting from above with white.

28mm Sci Fi Project, Pt I - Pig Iron Heavy Infantry Review

If you were an Imperial Guard player back in the early 2000's, chances are you've heard of Pig Iron.

Even today, they hosted some of the best headswaps available to Guard players who were looking to customize their armies. I remember picking up some head variants myself way back in 2004, and remember being very impressed with the quality of their casts and spread of head options. 

Revisiting their website throughout the years, I was always interested to see their other figure lines, and often wondered who used them and why - specifically their Kolony range. To a 13 year old who only new 40k, it seemed odd to me that such a range of Sci-Fi figs existed and seemed so much different than your regular guardsman.

Thankfully now, it is clear to me that multiple rulesets for Sci-Fi exist and are quite good, and these figures fit the bill perfectly. Alas, it was finally time to get my hands dirty and dig into these ranges which I had been eyeing for over 15 years now. 

I decided to pick up the entire Heavy Infantry set from Pig Iron. Shipping was quick, although post-Brexit shipping prices were a bit heavy, and stopped me from adding more (like some of their awesome looking Resin vehicles). Packaging was great, and you can see the figures as received below; 

Simply put, these figures are fantastic. The sculpts are clean, the casting is great with minimal to no flash, mold lines aren't too harsh, and they have a great weight to them. Most importantly though, they look badass.

The one downside I'd knock them for is that the heads are a bit fiddly to get to fit right, which is partially due to the the way they are gated onto the metal sprue they come on. You'll need to be careful removing them and won't want to snip too much off the neck portion. If you have any experience with metal models though it shouldn't be too much of a problem for you. 

With just an hours work I was able to clean them, base them up on 20mm rounds, and get them ready for basing. Currently, we're looking at using Tomorrow's War - a Sci-Fi variant of Force on Force - as our ruleset, but thankfully these figures are generic enough where I'm confident they can fit a wide variety of systems. All in all, I'd definitely purchase these again and am excited to see more from Pig Iron in the future. Keep your eyes on this space for Part II where I'll begin to paint these up.

1/2400 Scale 3d Printed Ships - Impressions

As 3D printing technology becomes more mature and accessible, there is an increasing availability of 3d printed alternatives to resin or metal cast models. Thanks to various Shapeways storefronts such as EBard Models there are a wide variety of alternatives to the typical standbys of GHQ and Panzerschiffe. I took a dive last year and ordered some printed 1/2400 scale ships. Overall I can say I was extremely impressed with the detail and price of these printed miniatures. 

Ghost ship - 1/2400 French Dunkerque class battleship from Ghukeks Miniatures at Shapeways.

Some stores offer either clear, higher detailed resin or less detailed opaque options. The less detailed option is of course cheaper than the clear. Much of the detail comes not from the material selected though but from the base model. Be sure to shop around - prices vary wildly from shop to shop on Shapeways and sometimes the more expensive option is not always the best. 

French ships after being primed - the two ships in the middle were printed with a less detailed option than the two on the ends, but their models were also less detailed.

What was very striking is the availability of inexpensive smaller ships. Its possible to get well detailed destroyers for prices that rival other extremely inexpensive manufacturers. 

Two IJN destroyers - both cost two dollars.

Two IJN battleships, the closest being a 3d print. The rear ship is a modified Panzershiffe model - I added some detail to make it appear less plain. Both cost less then 10 dollars.

Against more detailed metal models the prints hold up as well. Here a 3d printed Yamato and Fuso flank a metal cast Nagato in the center.

There are a few downsides to 3d prints. One phenomenon I've noticed is that there can be, with some prints but not others, a kind of sparkle effect when they are put under intense direct light. This rarely comes up during gameplay as thankfully I honor to tradition of gaming nearly exclusively in basements. If you are some sort of lunatic who wargames under a heat lamp, or god help you, outside under direct sun its something to be aware of. 

Another downside of prints (or maybe more of an upside of metal models) is that there is the need for guns to be supported, while on metal models they can be free-floating. These supports are easy to overlook when playing, but they do present an challenge when painting to try and hide them. This is a double edged sword however, as while they can look intrusive, they do prevent your barrels from becoming walleyed. I suppose it would be possible to try and file down or cut the supports out, but this leads to the third downside of prints.

Structurally the prints have some flex and feel strong, not brittle, but they will snap if pushed too far. When attempting to remove some supports on a seaplane crane, I was too vigorous a file and the entire crane snapped off. While this did make it easier to remove the flash, this is not the ideal situation. Again, if you are the kind of person who has grown used to simple straightening their masts when they get crooked, this is something to keep in mind.

Personally, I think the addition of greater detail at the price point is worth the risks of an occasional break or twinkle in the sun. Going forward I will be including 3d prints into my searches when I feel the need to expand either my Japanese of French fleets. 

Oldhammer Dwarves In Oathmark, Pt I

Welp, it's finally time for Oathmark. 

Since it's original announcement in late 2017, it was an exciting time to get back into fantasy rank & flank since Warhammer Fantasy's destruction just a few years earlier. Kings of War was on the rise as the "signature" fantasy mass battle game, but to me was overcrowded by competitive gamers and lacked a lot of theme and story-driven gameplay. Campaigns being one of Oathmarks key features was enough to drag our group finally into it. 

Although Northstar does create their own miniatures for Oathmark, it's clear the author (Joe McCullough) wrote the rules to be figure agnostic, allowing players to use whatever is in their collection much like in his other system Frostgrave. I've never been much of a fan of plastic kits, and hate to say Northstars plastics are among some of my least favorite - not because of their themes and modularity which I find quite nice, but because of the soft detail on the plastics. 

Hence, I've decided to go the "Oldhammer" route for this Dwarven army I have chosen; white metal figures only, tons of character, tons of history. 

Oathmark makes a point that the world is set in a "dark age", where gunpowder, plate mail, and even technology like crossbows haven't been created. Thankfully, given it's "create your own narrative" type formula, our group has decided not to worry about this and is allowing things like crossbows to be used as regular bows, figures to be wearing heavy armor and the like. 

It doesn't go without mentioning that Oldhammer figures nowadays are increasingly difficult to come by, especially for a large sized force. Naturally we'll see to substitutions.

Reading through the Oathmark rulebook initially I saw there was a lot of promise for spearmen units, although figures of that type were very limited in scope even during the Oldhammer days. From what I can tell, only a handful of variants were ever produced, with the Marauder "Landschneckts" line being one of the most popular and most rare. Seeing these figures online throughout the years I knew this would be a perfect opportunity to get my hands on some and paint them up. With a little handy eBay sniping, I was finally able to find some and make them my own! 

Next, following some solid recommendations from the Oldhammer group on Facebook, I was pointed to The Assault Group for their Imperial Dwarf line sculpted in an Oldhammer style, who had plenty of spearmen in the Landschneckt style - nice!

Assault Group Dwarves

Once my order had arrived the time had come to begin the mass of metal assembly. The major core of the army has been cleaned, based, and almost ready for priming, and I found The Assault Group figures an absolute pleasure to work with. Deciding on colors and a process for painting such a large batch of figures is up next, and I'm excited to get started. Until next time! 

Humble Beginnings for the Dwarves of Oathmark; TAG Dwarves (Left), Marauder Landschneckts (Right)