first airbrush attempt at camouflage

Here is my first attempt to do the German late war camouflage with the airbrush for my Bolt Action tanks. I've just tackled the Panzer 4 for the moment.

The tanks were sprayed with Army Painter Desert Yellow then dry brushed with a bone colour. This provided a good base for starting the green camouflage. At this point I'm still intending to add the brown, though I do like the green on the yellow on it's own. At a later date, I'll be applying a wash to the tank to accent the detail and help blend the colours.

And some pictures with the skirts put on dry. I'll finish the painting before I glue these in place. 

And the rest of the vehicles. I'm still debating if I'll do long stripes like the panzer 4, or do broader stripes, shorter stripes or patches.

Pikeman's Lament

We had our first game of Pikeman's Lament on Thursday.  Great game.

My friend forgot to bring his figures or rules (he said something about getting ready for Twickenham on Saturday!). But we made do with my Wars of Roses stuff.

The armies were taken from the list put on the website by Michael Leck, one of the authors. We used 30 years war Swedes and Imperialists. The game was a blast though we were learning as we went along.  The big power units were the Swedish gallopers, who if they win a melee, get to follow up and fight again. One unit effectively wiped out two of my foot units. 

I used a unit of trotters, who can roll for a caracole move, of moving half and then firing. Pike units can form a close order that gives them a melee bonus, but neither of us used this.

Another nice touch was the character traits of the commander. My friend rolled on the table and got a 'brutal' commander. His special trait was that if a unit failed a moral check, he could kill one of his men 'to encourage the others' and recover moral.  It was really funny during our game because it saved his units several times.

Overall, another great game, and one we're looking to trying again with Great Northern War figures.

The inspiration of the game also saw my WoR figures getting moved on to paint trays. I'm going to try splash some more paint on them before the next game.    

Some British for Bolt Action

Some of the British got finished. These are my test figures to try our colour combinations before I move on to the rest of the British force. 

First the crew for the vehicles.  There was one for the Stuart and I did 4 for the Sherman and Firefly just to see how they turned out.  I wanted to do two figures in grey berets for the Scots Greys. I don't know if the grey berets were used in WW2 or if it's more recent, but I reckoned it was a nice touch.

And the chap in the Stuart.

The first option for the Firefly. The grey beret isn't too obvious because of the goggles.

The second option.  I might not actually glue the figures in place, but attach them with blu-tak as the mood takes me. 

And the metal infantry with the bases finished.  The transfers on the sleeves were a bit of a nuisance to put on, and I'm not sure if they add much.  I'll debate what to do about transfers on the other infantry.