About Me

My photo
London, United Kingdom, United Kingdom
A mythical beast - a female wargamer! I got back into wargaming in the summer of 2011 after a very, very long break and haven't looked back since. I must admit that I seem to be more of a painter/collector than a gamer, but do hope to correct that at some point in the near future. My gaming interests span the ages, from the "Biblical" era all the way through to the far future. I enjoy games of all sizes, from a handful of figures up to major battles (see my megalomaniacally sized Choson Korean and Russian Seven Years War armies).

Tuesday 15 January 2013

Stuck in the middle....




Pics of my Saxons went up on Curt's blog last night (link to post). The 22 figures gave me a base score of 110 points, plus a bonus of 21 points for the hand-painted shields (the standard bearer was shieldless), for a total of 131 points. That boosted me to 12th place between Ray in 13th and Fran in 11th. The question which is the clown and which the joker?

Before I sate your lust for mini-pr0n with pics of 28mm Saxons, a quick update on the late 30YW horse. After posting here last night I did get the washes done. I also applied a black undercoat to metalwork (flagpole finials, pistol barrels) then dry-brushed with Bronze or Oily Steel as appropriate. This evening I have done the saddle cloths (Gold Brown) and the wood (pistol stocks, flagpoles). I'll probably do the holsters and flags before I go to bed, maybe the horse markings as well.I doubt that I'll have finished these before I go to Usk for the tourney and I can't do the basing until I've got hold of the other 6 figures and painted them so it may be a little while before my next entry for the Challenge.

Challenge Entry #4: Twenty Two 28mm Gripping Beast Saxons

And here they are. Can these Soft Southern Saxons defeat those Naughty Norsemen? Only time will tell.

Hmmm, not sure I want to take these guys on

The Eorl and his bannerman

Rear view - the cloak and the windsock each got about 4 or 5 shades and highlights


The Eorl's bodyguard





The rest of the Thegns

A close up to show the rear of the shield. I like the way the wood came out (more obvious here than on spear shafts and axe handles). This came out from a basecoat of Cork Brown, my Brown "magic wash" and the Klear/ink coat.


I started these from a white primer with a black/brown wash for pre-shading, which in retrospect was a mistake. I think I might have been better off doing a black primer then dry-brushing with white as the colours on the clothing came out rather brighter than I'd intended. I'll give that a go when I do the Normans.


Prize Draw

There's still a couple of hours left to enter if you haven't done so already. I'll be posting the winner tomorrow evening.






13 comments:

  1. Ray's always been a clown so I must be the joker, good work as always Tamsin.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think we know the real answer here, don't we????

      Delete
  2. Good stuff I have a hoard of Gripping Beast to paint too, thanks for a bit of inspiration

    ReplyDelete
  3. Great looking band of Saxons. Nice job!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Great bunch and a great song for an intro! The 3 of you will end up in the top 10 because you all have the ability to paint like mad day in and day out. The only question is who wins, who places and who shows. You heard it here first!

    ReplyDelete
  5. With those two you must be the rose between the thorns :)
    Love the shields on these guys, I must practice more freehand.
    Peace James

    ReplyDelete
  6. Those came out looking really good. Nice!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Nice one Tamsin! Great looking figures!

    ReplyDelete
  8. You're not skimping on your brushwork for the contest. Love the free hand on the shields.

    I don't know which one is the clown and which the joker, but I do know the big Irishman is in front of you. So kick him in the crackers and race ahead of him!! Huzzah!!

    (Yeah, I'm on your side in this one).

    ReplyDelete
  9. I really like these Saxons - makes me want to get on with something for Saga as I've resolved to try a new system this year.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Glad you all like them! :)

    @ Fran and Ray - I'll let you fight over who's the joker and who's the clown.
    "Roll up! Roll up! Come and see the Rejects fighting! £1 a ticket!" ;)

    @ Geordie - that's the end of my Gripping beast, but I've got a horde of Conquest Games and Wargames factory figures to assemble and paint still

    @ Monty - if other Ronins' targets are anything to go by, I'll probably place in the top 10 at the rate I'm going, but no way will I make the top 3 :)

    @ JamesB - the trick I've found with the shield designs is to make sure that your paint is fairly fluid, to visualise what you want and then to take your time.

    @ Anne - I see Ray has leapfrogged past myself and Fran overnight, so I might just be able to kick both of them in the crackers if my legs are long enough!
    As for not skimping on the brushwork, what's the point? I want to use these figures for gaming so I want them to look good. For me the Challenge is about focusing myself on completing units rather than how many points I get and where I finish up on the table (although placing high up would e a nice bonus)

    @ scottjames - Saga is good fun, but the rules and supplements are a little pricey. At the club, we've found it works best if you can get several players together for an evening as you can then get 3 or 4 games in against different opponents.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Great looking Saxons! Very nice work on those fierce soldiers!
    Phil.

    ReplyDelete