Pax Britannica - The Cannon and Artillery-Men [5]

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"At Byfleet we came upon an Inn, but it was deserted."

"Is everybody dead?"

"Not everybody. Look! Six cannons with gunners standing by."

"It's bows and arrows against the lightning. They haven't seen the Heat Ray yet."

- The Artillery-Man and the Fighting Machine, 
Jeff Wayne's The War of the Worlds 

* * *

Hey Internet, 

Today we have the last of my 'Martian Empires' British figures - four guns, with gunners standing by.

With my enthusiasm for this project somewhat ebbing, these guys took much longer than they should have to get done - about 3 weeks from start to finish. 

That said, they were nowhere near as painful as the Infantry were. The castings required far less 'clean up', and with no rifles or webbing they painted up rather quickly. 

One oddity is the gunner 'pulling the lanyard'. This figure is supposed to have a turnpike, but for some reason the tool is far too short, being about 2mm off the 'ground'. Given that it would have looked rather strange to have a gunner just sort of holding a stick on each base (and with me being unwilling to bore-out and convert the bloody things myself) I opted to fashion them into 'lanyard pullers'.

I mean, yeah, I know that even a heavy gun's lanyard would be scarcely over an inch thick, and these guys look like they are pulling on a 3" Naval Rope, but - bah! - it was either that or leave them off all-together and have two man gun teams, which would have looked even worse.

With these done, I have only to paint the Expeditionary Force's armoured support and this project will be at an end. Well, at least for the time being.

***

The Lead Tally - 2014

Acquired: +91       Painted: +126          Total: +35

Pax Britannica - Command Stand [4]

Hey Internet,

This week we have what should be the last of the British Riflemen. One of the stands is the Commander of the force, and features an Officer and Flag bearer.

click to enlarge

The Officer was a pig of a model to 'clean up'. It had the some of the worst flash I've ever seen on a model. All of the castings of this 'pose' are just as bad - if I hadn't got these figures off a friend, I'd have asked in strong terms for some replacements!

That said, with more than a little effort with a set of needle files he's ended up looking pretty all-right. He even has a bright white Pith on to mark him out.

The 'Flag Bearer' is a conversion - I snipped and ground away the rifle of a standard infantryman and replaced it with a shortened steel spear. Black Hat do do a British Standard Bearer figure as part of the Martian Empires range, but the flagpole/lance is cast in white metal and so thin that a stiff breeze would destroy it, and despite my best efforts I couldn't find a way to substitute it for one made of stronger stuff. I think it looks rather neat considering. Oh! - and the flag is printed; I'm not nearly that good a painter.

This is the last of the 'basic infantry' for this project, and to be honest it fills me with joy to type those words. They have been absolute pigs to get done; I mean, I did enjoy doing it and all, but I'd have liked it a whole lot more if they had been cast better to start with.

I think that I've ended up with a decent 'finished product', but the pain it took to get them done has left me to glaring at them spitefully now they are done.

Eh!....do you like them?

Four guns, with gunners, and I'm done with bloody Martian Empires! Hurrah!

MM.

***

The Lead Tally - 2014

Acquired: +91       Painted: +106          Total: +15

Pax Britannica - Re-basing [3]

Hey Internet,

Bit of a boring one this time. After feeling no small amount of discontentment with the final product of my recent labours, I decided to do a U-turn and re-base the whole lot.

This proved to be no fun at all. But its done now. And no figures were destroyed in the process.

As it turns out, 100x20mm bases are rather unique to 'All Quiet on the Martian Front', making it quite awkward to use figures based this way for other war games.

click to enlarge

After a rather obsessive and agonising period of soul searching and deep existential meditation, I decided to re-base them, four to a stand, on 40x40x2mm MDF (from Warbases). This makes them quite compatible with Alien Squad Leader, Future War Commander and Space 1889: The Soldiers Companion, as well as All Quiet On The Martian Front.

With a good number of guys at the gaming club interested in 15mm sci-fi, but totally uninterested in goofy Tripods, I hope that they might actually get to see a fair bit of use.

Plus, they make a much better firing line. Wouldn't be British if they couldn't do a good firing line.

***

The Lead Tally - 2014

Acquired: +91       Painted: +106          Total: +15

Black Hat British Infantry [2]

Hey Internet,

I've finally gotten around to finishing my two platoons of Black Hat British Infantry.

All in all, its taken me two weeks to get the thirty of them painted up and based. To be honest, it was quite a chore to get them done.

The painting itself was not bad at all, but the clean-up of the flash and mold lines was really quite arduous.

I got these figures from a friend* who had them around collecting dust, so they are quite old, and given that fact, I have no idea if they are reflective of Black Hat's casting quality nowadays.

That said - and I am loathed to give a bad review - but the casting quality really was awful.

Almost every figure had prominent mold lines - sometimes two sets of mold lines per figure! Some of them also had major 'mold misalignment' issues. There was one 'pose' of figure that was so systematic in the poorness of its casting that every last one of the 'pose' had to be discarded.

After many hours filing and cutting, I got around to painting them. The figures are 'really big 15mm' or 18mm/HO scale, and as such they possess a pleasing level of detail and paint up rather nicely.

After a good deal of 'umm-ing' and 'ah-ing' I decided to go with turn of the century Khaki uniforms rather than the more stereotypical scarlet Redcoat. This made painting them a far speedier process, which was rather a good thing as, to be honest, the whole 'casting' issue had soured the whole modelling project for me, and enthusiasm was in short supply.

I've got some more Black Hat Commanders, Artillery and Gatling guns yet to do, but I think I need a rest before getting back into painting them.

I've got the first of the 'Tanks' on the way, so I'll probably do some of them before boomeranging back into the rest.

Mr. Marx.

* cheers Neil :)

The Lead Tally - 2014

Acquired: +59       Painted: +67          Total: +7

AQotMF British Infantry [1]

Hey Internet,

This week I've painted up a stand of British riflemen for 'All Quiet on the Martian Front'.

"But - what?!" I hear you say. 

"I'm quite sure sure that you said at the beginning of this year that you were not starting any new projects!" you continue.

But "ha!" say I, "I am not breaking my self-set rule! I said only that I would buy new figures for new projects - to put figures I already own to good use is the very intention of the ban!"

"...ah..." you must succeed, "...that's probably all-right then".

So, yeah...

I've painted up five British riflemen for 'All Quiet on the Martian Front'. 

The War of the Worlds has always been one of my favourite books, and something that I've always wanted to game. 

Yet, ''All Quiet" was not a game that I had previously given a second look, as on first glance. I found the tripods goofy and the tanks uninspired, but after a friend bought into it, I strayed onto the games webpage, and soon saw the new models for the BEF faction.

I'm not crazy about the 'official' miniatures - but luckily a friend of mine gave me a huge pile of Black Hat Martian Empires figures. They are the same strange '18mm' scale as AQotMF, so should do nicely.

I've plenty of infantry and a good battery of guns. The uniforms and weapons go against the 'cannon' of the game, but I'm really not too fussed about that. To this little force I'll add probably add some of the Heavy Infantry and a fair bit of armour.

Fortunately, most of the tanks I want don't exist in this scale yet - but between the centenary of the Great War, and Flames of War's new foray into the period, I only expect a short reprieve for my bank balance.

Oh, and one more thing -

Something that all my wargaming friends mock me for is my habit of writing down exactly how I paint everything.

I have a good reason for doing it though - firstly, my memory is a bit 'iffi' nowadays, and secondly, I tend to jump between projects a heck of a lot, and being able to settle back into a project at will is an incredible luxury.

On the off chance that you really like these figures, here is how I painted them;

MM.