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).

Saturday 2 May 2015

I'm Just About Recovered

Well, that's a relief! My cold seems to have eased off just in time for the bank holiday weekend. I haven't had the energy to do much in the evenings this week apart from prepping the Bulgar cavalry I picked up at Salute.

However, with all the random sneezing and coughing, I didn't want to take the risk of trying to stick all the bits together until today. And there was a lot of sticking together to do:

all 24 riders needed to be glued to their horses
8 riders were separate torso and legs (to allow some variety of position)
4 of the riders had open hands for spears, swords, axes or maces
20 had separate bow cases to be glued on
all 24 had shields to be glued on

Lots of fiddly work with superglue and bits pinging off all over the place and needing to be found. But I got there in the end after much swearing and cursing. it left me wishing I'd gone with the "Originals" rather than the "New Era" figures.

After letting the superglue set for a few hours, I set up the spray booth and airbrush, then primed them.



I'll crack on with painting these tomorrow. I doubt that they'll be finished in time for Monday's pre-Campaign practice game, but they should be done in time for the weekend.



"The Right Of Way Goes To The Biggest Guns"

You remember when I said "no new armies"? Thank goodness I didn't say "no new projects"!! A few weeks before Salute, I saw a post on a blog or TMP or somewhere about Car Wars. I have fond memories of that game from my teenage years and the germ festered. I had found out that it had been re-released and decided to look for it at Salute, but came up empty. However, I knew that Orcs Nest had it, so I took a quick trip down there on Monday after work and bought a copy. The rules are expanded a bit from the original version with more chassis types, more weapons and with motorbikes included.



Of course, one could stick to playing using the counters and maps provided, but that wouldn't be as much fun as playing with minis.

This morning I went to the shops and had a look for some diecast cars to use. In Wilko I found these:


The single is a Mercedes Benz and cost 90p, the packs of 5 cost £4 as did the truck with police car and chopper (also available as paramedic and fire brigade). A bonus is that these are held together with screws not rivets, so no drilling to do (unless I add turrets or weapons).

In Poundworld I found these:


Ten cars for £1 - cheap as chips, but the wheels look horrible. These might end up as wrecks.


I'm currently soaking one of the Poundworld cars in nail polish remover to strip the paint off (having removed the plastic bits first). This will be a test model.

The vehicles all seem to be roughly 1:64 scale. That is 3 times the size of the counters, meaning I'll have to scale up ranges and bits appropriately and make myself an up-scaled turning device. I'll probably want to get some appropriately scaled figures and weapon bits. I'll also need to make up some "counters" for mines, caltrops, oil slicks, paint, smoke and debris.

Fun times ahead!

14 comments:

  1. Great posting Tamsin, and its good to hear the Salute bug is finally on its way out. Car Wars sounds like a fantastic project and I'm already eager to see your test model. I too have fond memories of the boxed game, so I'm really hoping to be inspired to do something myself. Really looking forward to seeing how you get on :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I hope you feel better soon! Good luck with your Car Wars project! Just in time for te new Mad Max movie?
    I've played the original a few times myself. My copy got lost and scattered due to frequent moves when I was in the military.

    ReplyDelete
  3. What a cool new side-line Vroom-vrooom!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Check out Stan Johansen Miniatures for "extras". Lots of armour, weapons and figures for the Car Wars stuff. There is a fairly active Dark Future group on Facebook that covers similar vehicular combat stuff too.

    http://www.stanjohansenminiatures.com/Road.htm



    ReplyDelete
  5. Car wars was such a good game. New car are a great way to start and with the new mad max film I feel some "Chassis and Crossbow" might be on the cards. Whatever you do with Car Wars I look forward to seeing it.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Not heard of Car Wars???? Sounds interesting?? Glad your feeling tip top again!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Sorry to hear that you've been under the weather, but looks like you've found a new distraction to lift your spirits!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Glad you're back on the mend - looking forward to your blogging.
    Those new era figures are nicely detailed but fiddly - worth it though.

    ReplyDelete
  9. @ Blax - cheers! The initial batch will just be to test out painting and light modding ahead of doing anything with better vehicles.

    @ Ted - I'm kicking myself a bit as a few years ago I had thrown out all my old Car Wars stuff - I had various supplements and expansions, plus the reference screen which would all be useful to have right now.
    As for the new Mad Max movie, that hadn't figured when I got this bug :)

    @ Anne - indeed! "Ladies and Gentlemen, start your engines!" :)

    @ GJD - thanks for the info. I'd already found the Stan Johansen site :)

    @ Clint - hmmm, Chassis and Crossbows...now, that might be a good one for a game at the next Blog-Con if it ever gets organised :)

    @ Ray - it was a fun game from the, errr, xxxties set in about 2030/2040 when a new sport of "autoduelling" has taken off. Cars (and trucks, bikes etc) armed with all sorts of weapons shooting each other up in arenas and on the roads. What's not to like? :)

    @ Michael A - it is good to have recovered and to have something new to distract me :)

    @ Dannoc - I should have remembered from the New Era knights I painted for my Swiss army about how fiddly they are. Very nice sculpts though :)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Good your on the up and up. :-)

    Car Wars! Yeah Baby!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Nice to see you recovering. Car Wars!!! That takes me back to my younger days I had modded several hotwheels then.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I hate colds, although of course we men never get colds but full blown flu every time so it's always a major event. Glad to hear you are recovering though Tamsin.

    Car Wars is definitely a blast from the past and given the upcoming reboot of the Mad Max movie might become even more popular. Looking forward to seeing how you pimp up the cars!

    ReplyDelete
  13. @ Hendrid - cheers! Are you channelling Austin Powers? ;)

    @ Robert - thanks! I never actually modded any cars back then, but did play a couple of games at 4X.

    @ Kingsleypark - thanks! I hear that man-flu is extremely debilitating ;)
    Perhaps the new Mad Max film will spark a brief interest in Car Wars, but the game itself isn't that well advertised - at least not in the UK :(

    ReplyDelete
  14. Car wars sounds cool, it's new to me. Poundland and Wilkos are a great source of cheap useful tat and those cars look a great base to "Mad Max up" - is that a phrase?

    ReplyDelete