Author: Felix

Pre-order: Bolt Action Armies of France and the Allies

The other day I mentioned that Warlord Games had released a PDF for the Italians, what I said then was

Now he will have the rules, not sure about rules for my models though.

Well what I had missed was the announcement that the Bolt Action Armies of France and the Allies was aavailable to pre-order.

Bolt Action Armies of France and the Allies

World War II was truly a ‘world’ war, and many nations joined the fight against Germany and the Axis. This latest supplement for Bolt Action covers the armies of France, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Denmark, Norway, Holland and Belgium that stood against the German Blitzkrieg, as well as the resistance forces that sprung up in the aftermath of occupation.

I think I will use those rules for my partisan band.

Painting the Roof

Though I have used my Sarissa Precision Old West 25mm Buildings in game of Legends of the Old West, I think they could do with some extra work to add more detail. I would certainly like to add some weathering, but I would also like the paint the roof tiles on the shack.

What I am not sure about is how to paint the tiles and not paint out the etching that defines the tiles. What sort of process and paints should I be using? Should I use inks or a wash? Will thinned paint cover the etching? Should I paint each tile individually?

What process are you using to paint your laser etched buildings?

4Ground 15mm Semi Detached Houses

As well as the 4Ground Hotel I blogged about a few days ago,  I also had the semi-detached houses.

Northwest European semi-detached houses, one house rendered green the other is white, these are ideal buildings for any 15mm gaming table.

The back is very similar to the front. Like the 4Ground hotel, the kit comes with very clear and easy to follow instructions.

Like the hotel these went together quite easily, though I had a few issues putting the roof together. I am going to add some details, such as glazing for the windows and posters on the walls. As with the hotel the instructions includes some 15mm scale posters.

Doctor Who: Something Borrowed

As part of the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, there are going to be eleven short novels from famous authors covering (as you might have guessed) all eleven Doctors.

Something Borrowed

The sixth book is Something Borrowed and features sixth Doctor and Peri.

 A wedding on the planet Koturia turns out to be a far more dangerous proposition than the Sixth Doctor and Peri ever expected. It marks the return of a formidable old foe whose genius matches the Doctor’s. Can the Doctor outwit this villain, save Peri and stop the wedding in time?

Get Something Borrowed at Amazon.

Get Something Borrowed at Apple Books.

Similar to my thoughts about the fifth Doctor, I didn’t watch much of the sixth, so this will be an interesting read.

Cybermen

Cybermen were a “race” of cybernetically augmented humanoids. They varied greatly in design, with different factions throughout time and space. The two major groups, from which all other known versions derived, were the Mondasian Cybermen, which originated on the planet Mondas – Earth’s twin planet in the Doctor’s Universe – and the Cybermen created by Cybus Industries, which originated on Earth in an alternate universe.

They attacked Earth on many occassions, providing a lot of potential for gaming scenarios.

These are the Harlequin Miniatures Cybermen from the 1990s. They are the classic era style Cybermen who fought the 4th Doctor onwards. After giving them a white undercoat, I painted a basecoat of Citadel BoltGun Metal.

The next stage will be a black wash to bring out the detail.

15mm 4Ground Hotel

I mentioned in a previous post on my Sarissa Precision Old West Buildings about how much I liked the concept of laser-etched mdf buildings. Though these were the first laser-etched mdf buildings I had made, they weren’t the first ones I had bought. Some time ago I had seen some of the 4Gound 15mm buildings in a display cabinet in Waylands Forge in Birmingham alongside some Flames of War tanks and was impressed, so I purchased a couple of kits. However I hadn’t got round to ever making them up, now isn’t that quite normal for games, buy stuff, put in a cupboard and then do nothing with it… well certainly happens to me, probably too much.

However after making up the Sarissa Precision buildings and finding them very quick and easy to make, I remembered the 4Ground models that I had bought, found them and decided to put them together.

The two kits I bought were a couple of terraced houses and the hotel. The hotel was a lot more complicated to build than the Old West buildings. There were a lot more internal parts and there were even separate window ledges! Despite the added complications and more parts, it was a pretty easy build and didn’t take very long either. The instructions from 4Ground were very clear and easy to follow. The end result is quite pleasing.

I went with the pre-coloured version, so I wouldn’t need to paint it.

It might need a bit of weathering, and it also needs some signage and posters. It’s nice that the instruction sheet does have these, that can be cut out and stuck to the mode.

Overall these are really nice models and very easy to put together. The only thing I have mixed opinions on is that you can place models inside the building on all the different floors. This is obviously very useful from a gaming perspective, however I also think it has a rather negative impact on the look of the model.

Will I get some more? Yes I will. I think I may get some of their Old West buildings and 28mm World War Two buildings for Bolt Action.

Bolt Action Italian Army List

This posting is for Simon, though I suspect he might already have seen this.

Bolt Action Italian Army List

Warlord Games have published on their website a PDF of a get-you-by army list for the Italians.

Update: the PDF is no longer available now the Italian Army book has been published.

The latest in our recent series of ‘get-you-by’ lists in here! Allowing you to field Italian armies of fascist dictator Benito Mussolini this army list gives you the basics of the Italian army during World War II. A full list will be published in the ‘Armies of Italy and the Axis’ later this year but for now this will allow you to take on the might of the Allied forces!

Avanti Camerati!

I am still in the process of painting my Partisan Band for Bolt Action.

Whereas I went for irregulars, Simon went for the Italians. Now he will have the rules, not sure about rules for my models though.

And so it begins…

As was rumoured and eagerly anticipated, Games Workshop have announced (for pre-order) their new Apocalypse rules for Warhammer 40K.

Apocalypse

Apocalypse is a new way of playing games of Warhammer 40,000. Allowing you to field as many miniatures as you like, in any combination. There really are no limits to what you can do.

There are some new models and re-releases of older models (complete with corresponding price increase of course).

For Chaos there is the huge Khorne Lord of Skulls, which looks ridiculous, unless of course you are a Chaos player and like the bizarre and the weird.
For Necron there is the Tesseract Vault or Obelisk, which I do think is a really interesting and different concept. It’s not a tank or a flyer in the tradition sense, it’s something different.

For the Imperial Guard we have the BaneBlade, though I do think we’ve seen that before… 😉

In addition there are some scenery packs. Though I am not sure if these are new releases or re-releases.

Update yes there is new scenery.

As you might expect, slightly disappointed that there are no releases for the Orks, but you never know what might happen next month…

Venturing into the Far East

You may have noticed in Wargames Illustrated and the most recent update to the Flames of War website that Battlefront are venturing into the Far East for Flames of War. In July we will see the release of Japanese tanks.

A bit like I thought about Vietnam I am not sure that this is an era that I would get into. I have always seen Flames of War very much as a tank versus tank game with infantry in support. 15mm scale is ideal for this kind of game. With theaters of action where the main fighting was infantry versus infantry, I have always preferred 28mm (or back in the olden days 20mm). The big difference, was less the scale, much more the models would be individually based.

Both Vietnam, the Pacific theatre and the fighting in China, tanks had their place, but the vast majority of the fighting was done on the ground by the poor infantryman.

What is also interesting is that the initial focus of the release will be the fighting in Manchuria. So if you thought there were going to be Marines, this won’t be happening in the initial releases.

What are your thoughts? Are you going to get the new Japanese tanks?