28 Apr 2013

Sunday afternoon...

The end of the saga of the Pirates doesn't mean that painting has stopped. This weekend I've been doing some finishing off, and a bit of upgrading.


First up are the Scots Highland infantry - a mix of Minifigs, Essex and Peter Pig figures to give me 2 x 8 bases of Highlanders for the upcoming Central London round of the Southern League. Here the chaps are, half Army-Painter'ed (the Dark Tone one, which is quite black - good for the grey coats they often wear) and half yet to be varnished.

I also then got tempted to "upgrade" a load of Medieval spearmen by adding a wash of Dark Tone on some fairly well travelled figures - these are mostly a Mirliton army I won at the Worlds in Rome almost a decade ago. There are also three Forged in Battle Tiger I's, and a handful of other spearmen and crossbowmen from my Teutonic army, which I've been toying with inking for several years. Still haven't done the knights though - but no hurry as they are almost unusable as an army in FoGAM

There are even 2 bases of XVII Century French horse who sneak into the bottom left of the photo. Just waiting for them to dry so I can spray varnish them in Dullcote

27 Apr 2013

The Pirate Ship is now finished...

The Old Glory 8 Gun Barque is now finished... completing the Pirate army








I must admit to being quite pleased with it. Admittedly the rigging is a bit, well, jerry-rigged, but it does allow me to take the masts down for transport and storage - and it allows you to see the deck and crew very well too.

Lots more photos on my Facebook page

23 Apr 2013

Thoughts on Salute 2013

I went along to Salute at the weekend, and was very impressed. The massive numbers of attendees alone would tend to refute any idea that the hobby is struggling or that the internet is taking away from trade shows!

Warlords do a very good job of putting on an event which has a very short set-up time and cannot really afford to put in many of the creature comforts of "proper" events held in a space like ExCeL - for example, carpet would be nice, but would probably add more than 50% to the cost of hall rental, and hence admissions, and a second day of opening would double the costs and also the costs to exhibitors of staying down at the show.

A few people on TMP have whinged about ExCeL, however it is the only place in London with space and availability to host a show of that size, and those who complain about the catering are missing the point - the range and selection of catering is far better than any other equivalent venue, as long as you are prepared to walk along the central boulevard at ExCeL to find the outlet that suits you. Salute also benefits from the presence of the Marathon alongside in this respect, as all the catering outlets are open - this might not be the case if Salute were the only event in the venue that weekend.

My impressions of the exhibitors was that;
  •  Historical, and especially 28mm historical skirmish gaming seems to be having a bit of a renaissance at the moment,
  • Vendors are selling, and gamers are keener to give a try to "one box" solution games where you can get everything you need (rules, figures etc) from one supplier for sub £100 - of course you end up buying more!
  • The market for resin-cast buildings and scenery is shrinking rapidly as the number of laser-cut pre-painted MDF ones explodes. I felt quite sorry for some of the resin scenery exhibitors as their stands looked deserted.
  • Osprey will soon publish every rulebook in the market,
  • Plastics are a now given, to the point of almost a default for some new ranges, and the debats has moved onto whether pre-paint is now starting to be a serious option,  
  • Figure design is really moving onwards and upwards - again like the resin/MDF split some of the companies I once considered "old stalwarts" like Essex Miniatures looked out of place and their stand wasn;t that busy - they may end up being the Hinchcliffe of 15mm without more pzazz injected into the lines and display cases,
  • I have no idea what Foundry are up to right now - for all the talk of a new era of product, branding and marketing they had a rather confusing and low key presence,
  • Traders take note - having a banner to advertise your stand location is a must - there is almost no other directional signage at the show other than the catalogue, and with no reference points it was sometimes hard to see where you were even with the plan in front of you,
  • The Bring and Buy was such a scrum that I didn't even consider going near it. I know the B&B is a staple of wargamiong shows, and makes money, but whether a show like Salute still really benefits from having a downmarket melee in one the corner it is something I'd question - using the space for more traders might now be the sensible option,
  • Turn up at 11am, not 10am - the show is still open for another 6 hours, and it avoids the queues !
I only spent around £50 all in all, but that was mostly because I didn't want to buy anything - I think the £50 went out of my wallet through a form of wargaming osmosis which seems to afflict me at many shows...

   

21 Apr 2013

The Pirates are Here!

My much-heralded Pirate army is now finished - just some ship rigging to finalise and then the whole thing will be ready to take the field in a rather ineffective yet amusing manner.





The whole process of painting them can be followed on my Facebook photo album (Facebook access not required).

The ship is almost done as well, and will make it's appearance online hopefully this week.  

11 Apr 2013

The Maratha In The Southern League

Don "The Don" McHugh organised a round of the Southern League one-day FoGR competition in chilly Clevedon recently and this encouraged me to field yet another new army (made up of rather dubiously morphed old figures) - the Maratha.


Now, in 3 fully detailed and historically accurate match reports you can see how the Renaissance Indians did against Samurai, Jin Chinese and finally full widescreen Technicolor Aztecs.


The reports also feature expert critique and analysis from a new member of the Madaxeman.com Pundits Panel, our resident expert on Indian armies, the legendary General and Indian King Hannibalipuripathi


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