I was going through my rules collection before Christmas and chanced upon Bolt Action. I do like this set of rules and so decided (present to self) to buy the French supplement and I am so glad that I did as it is a wonderful book-well worth the money.
So with the rules and supplement I dug around to find my French 20mm figures and in between the busy Christmas and New Year holidays I splashed a bit of paint around. It was so relaxing just to avoid people if I am honest and have some quiet time. The end result (or is that the result so far?) are the troops below.
I always run out of bases! For plastic 20mm I now use the mdf penny size from Warbases (excellent company by the way) and so I will have to order many more. The crewed weapons are on 40mm bases, Officers and NCO's on 30mm. To help play the game I also ordered some coloured gems from the Dice Bag Lady....really good service and my little order arrived the next day-amazing.
A few Germans caught some paint but the Caesar box of Germans in great coats is a let down-far too many SMG types and the riflemen suffer from the dreaded plastic droop......really don't bother with these guys.
Zvezda on the other hand are superb! At £3 for the motorcycle and side car you cannot go wrong! Maybe there are a lot of financially challenged war gamers in Russia or maybe this company is just onto a good idea? I fully endorse being able to buy one artillery piece for a few pounds complete with crew etc being poor will not keep you out of this hobby now.
Hat are another fantastic company that have recently been grabbing my interest as regards their pricing, I am torn whether to start a Black Powder Napoleonic army or two (safely based on 3mm chunky bases to protect the figures) or an ancient army for Hail Caesar. These are truly interesting times if one is prepared to go down the 20mm road-I just needed an eye test and some glasses first. No pair of glasses can prepare you for Hats choice of colour for their figures though! This poor French guy was almost an electric blue colour!
Lastly a work in progress, a few months back I purchased the Orion Modern Federal Russian box and it came with what I take to be a drunken crew so I then felt the need to get these guys some armour-Grubby tanks supplied a cheap BRDM 2. So halfway there with the base colours on and no matter what the scenario the little men will be in party mode, great silliness that will add some humour to my dour modern Russians.
Splendid job and great looking minis!
ReplyDeleteThanks Phil, I need some colour on my shelves now! Too much green and khaki at the moment.
DeleteLooking good. I know what you mean about too many unusable poses in a box set. They might be good stock material for conversions, though.
ReplyDeleteThanks AJ. Your right about them being useful for conversions but I seem to have a growing mound of 20mm plastic figures, especially terrorists! In time I will pass them onto someone on here if they need them.
DeleteVery impressive! These guys look fantastic.
ReplyDeleteThanks Roger they were actually easy to paint, black wash helped.
DeleteThat artillery piece looks absolutely stunning!
ReplyDeleteThanks Michael, there were four pieces of artillery and ammo wagons plus crew. Strangely the box also has seated figures and some mounted men, all for around £8.
Deletegreat stuff! I really do like the dirty look of it all. It feels very authentic.
ReplyDeleteThanks Gowan, I like a "lived in" look to my equipment.
DeleteGreat army choice!
ReplyDeleteThanks Legatus, I have a few odd vehicles on order for them as well.
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