Crisis loot

Well I'm back from Belgium and trying to sort through the backlog of unread blog posts as well as my own images from Antwerp and Crisis. This isn't helped too much by the fact that I'm out of the house for most of this week again... So sorry if I haven't been commenting or anything. I've been limiting myself to just reading through posts to save at least some time :)

Still unpacking my bags I had some time to do a recap of the loot I managed to gather! Pics from the rest of the show to follow soon(ish).

I did end up buying quite a bit and this is just the stuff I bought for myself as I did drag home some things for clubmates too. Well when you travel a few thousand kilometers I guess you have to take full advantage of the situation. And as one trader put it completely mad to travel this far for a wargaming show :) Still he was happy to take my money somehow... Paying was actually surprisingly hard with many of the companies only accepting cash and then some traders using quite outrageous conversion rates between euros and pounds.

The visitors bag included a sprue of Warlord Games Hannoverians and a superb sculpt of the Belgian King Albert I. Apparently they ran out at sometime though as my better half didn't receive any when she came later on to check out the show. I also bought some Westfalia miniatures rude rankers and a Baccus 6mm ACW booster pack to supplement my collection to be large enough for large games of Longstreet and Blackpowder.

I also bought some blisters of Perry Napoleonics. Mainly French command minis to add a bit of variety to the plastics and to give me more command minis as I'm going to build them in battalions of 16 minis instead of the 36 that the Perry box has. I also bought a Hannoverian blister with the intention of building up a battalion from the two gift sprues and a blister, but later on noticed that my better half didn't receive one. Still it won't go to waste as I'm planning to build up 4 Hannoverian battalions anyway and will need extra command minis.

I also got myself quite a few of Foundry minis with both Napoleon and Wellington packs to give me plenty of command minis. In addition to those I had to buy the drunken Vikings pack and some extra Viking command minis for Saga. And finally some WW2 German sentries and other paraphernalia to be used in Bolt Action as some interesting scenario pieces. Very nice except for their extremely high exchange rates when paid in cash. Luckily I was able to pay with a card using pounds as that ended up being over 40 euros less than they said it would have been when paying with cash.

Rules wise I bought myself a copy of the Longstreet rules and the accompanying cardset. They've been fun to play at the club so I finally bought a copy for myself. I also bought a missing set of Saga dice as well as Warlord Games new Bolt Action supplement Battleground Europe.

For 15mm I got two boxes of PSC Hanomags to transport my EW Germans Panzerschützen around the table. I also enlarged my Infinity collection with a box of Interventors and a bunch of Micro Art Studios resin bases. And finally a 120mm version of the Emperor Napoleon himself! I got him for 8 euros in the second hand area in totally untouched condition. This should hopefully prove very interesting to paint up.

And finally probably the heaviest pack with 3 Warbases paint racks and some Sarissa buildings and scenery to spice up my WW2 gaming. The radar station and accompanying stuff should be a nice objective and centerpiece for games.

And that's all folks. Stay tuned for some actually nice pics of tables etc!

Crisis calling!

Well Crisis is looming on the horizon and that means I'll be packing my bags and entering radio silence for a while now as I'm already travelling to Belgium early tomorrow morning (or night actually) and coming back sometime next week. The better half has planned the rest of the trip after I was given Saturday to myself, so it'll be interesting to see what the future holds for me.

Half empty luggage is eagerly awaiting for goodies from the show. I've got some stuff lined up that I want to buy especially from Plastic Soldier Company, Warlord Games and Micro Art Studios. There's also the superb Northumbrian Miniatures Nightfolk that I've been wanting to paint up. They also stock 75mm figures and 120mm Busts so I might indulge on those if some nice subjects like Vikings or Napoleonics show up. And then there is the second hand area too... I already have a feeling that I'm going to go over the weight limit on the way back. Still the missus has graciously agreed to put something in her luggage too to split the weight.

Games wise I'm looking forward to seeing what Burkhard of DHC Wargames fame and his mates have set up as well as the Keren table from Newark Irregulars that has graced other events in the past. I might also try to get in a game of Infinity V3 now that I've finally received my Operation Icestorm box. Looking at the list there seems to be just too darn much to see and do for one day so I have a feeling I will be very busy there.


Painting wise I've started on my Bolt Action Sturmpionier force. Command team and the first squad are on the way as is the crew for their Hanomag that I've had painted for over a month now, but just waiting for the crew. I've been experimenting with painting the Feldgrau and trying to find a good and fast way to paint them up. I was first thinking of painting them Feldgrau and highlighting with Green Gray followed by a wash, but that was maybe a bit too stark of a contrast. I'm leaning towards Fieldgray followed by a black wash and then highlighted with fieldgray and a mix of fieldgray and green gray. Maybe not so striking from a distance, but looks better when looked from a closer distance.

The Napoleonics are also still waiting for basing. Maybe tonight after I've got my bags packed. No games in the near future really does kill the motivation for finalizing these.

Sorry for the bad photo, but it seems to be the best my fancy work Nokia is capable of today... Far gone are the days of glory for Finnish mobile making. I'm just hoping my company would make a switch to Androids or iPhones instead of sticking with Nokia Lumia...

Heavy weaponry for the Devils

I'm back at the painting table and going live with the first finished things! These are actually not the first ones I've painted after the pause, but the first ones I've managed to base up. Two 15mm Prussian battalions waiting for basing as well as a few bases of 28mm Napoleonic Brits.

However here is the heavy artillery for my Red Devils. A 6 pounder for countering those ever increasing numbers of tanks in our games and a 75mm Howitzer for removing any unit that gets too comfortable in a building or the like. This should see the Red Devils finished for quite some time. I still have a few odd minis and an extra squad blister that I got, but they won't be needed in games so I'm going to leave them for later when I'm tired of everything else :)

The broken wall that the 6pdr crew is using for cover is made from crafts foam and scored with a pencil. I'm not 100% sure I like the colour so I might have to tweak it a bit later on. Still perfectly good for gaming and carrying that 'Hard Cover' save around all the time :P

On the howitzer I actually had to do some fixing as the standing crew man was missing part of his arm. A little bit of green stuff and a hand from some Victrix box provided a nice quick fix. It was actually the first Warlord mini that I had any issues with.

Finally one extra PIAT toting man from Artizan Designs and the Warlord rulebook exclusive mini that I got from a fellow club member Juha.

Secret Santa has gone to war

Christmas is closing in and with it came Ian's Secret Santa project again. I've seen it going around the blogosphere previously and decided to jump in this time. The idea is to buy a wargames related secret christmas gift to your assigned fellow gamer for roughly 15 pounds + postage and somebody will do the same to you. Sounded like a lot of fun as with aging some of the excitement of Christmas has been toned down as you end up buying most of your own gifts anyway :) So now there's at least something that should end up being quite surprising!

I was originally planning to buy something from Crisis and shipping it later from home with some Finnish goodies as we are the official home country of Santa :) Alas that was not to be as I'd expect it to cause some issues with customs with the recipient, so I guess I'll have to resort to ordering something gift wrapped and sent straight from some of their local stores. So some research is going to be in need to find a suitable store and gift for Santa to deliver.

I'm not going to list anything too specific here for the Secret Santa, but as is probably quite evident from the blog WW2 and Napoleonics are what mostly makes me tick hobbywise. British and German armour in 28mm and 28mm French Napoleonics for D'Erlons Assault at Waterloo will definately see a lot of action in the future. But then again it's a painting hobby I'm in so anything that looks cool will definately get it's place of glory in my cabinet!

Eventhough Santa is from Finland wargaming stuff rarely comes from here so some sort of tips might be in place. Pretty much the only Finnish wargaming store selling historicals is Fantasiapelit, so overseas is usually the way to go. Still free shipping is usually available within Europe from many locations and for example Caliver Books has been servicing Finland very nicely!