Hellooooooooooooo 2017!!

Happy New Year folks,

 
I hope the successes of 2016 are more memorable of the failures...and that 2017 thus far has seen you all healthy, happy, and wise...For me, 2016 certainly mirrored those three themes with their own success and failure rate...but, I am looking forward to the new year and pushing the miniature tin forward.

I do enjoy reading and skimming the various reflective posts that this milestone brings each of us bloggers: I am happy for your successes, I truly enjoy seeing the year in review pics, and I can certainly appreciate some of the pain and angst that some have experienced.

My gaming and online year 2016 was certainly a mix of success and failure trying to balance health, happy, and trying to be wiser, lol.  Looking back at my reflection of 2015, I feel compelled to revisit my list of objectives and take stock of what I hoped and what I achieved:

1. Continue to have more fun!! Always an excellent goal.     For the most part, accomplished...some gaming aspects certainly annoyed me...but I'll chalk those up to having bad days...I still love the hobby very much
2. At the club, we have some Team Yankee coming down the pipe...I managed to pick up the Soviet box at the end of the year, so that will be the immediate goal (accomplished).  My side objective to this is to limit all of my purchases to only Team Yankee related items.  (accomplished ----mostly...somewhat, lol)
3. Continue with my Vietnam Main Force VC...when I need a break from the main projects, the VC will fit in nicely.    Not accomplished...I can't remember getting any Vietnam painting in...instead, any painting voids were filled with stripping away at lead mountain...
4. Get moving on my WW1: Finish off my CEF...I have some artillery and HMGs to go...and get my Germans on the painting schedule.    Not accomplished...BUT I have some success with my CEF 15mm troops...this project unfortunately saw a lot of hurdles to accomplishing and I had a tough time pushing any progress forward.  My hopes for a Vimy Ridge project was successful in terms of research, but not so much in translating the research into scale
5. For Christmas, my wife bought into the Lich King Nickstarter for me...so I would like to tackle some Frostgrave in the new year...paint the cultists...some more of the extras...maybe some terrain     This was a HUGE accomplishment for me...I finished some terrain, yeah, some...a fricking library!! I was very happy with my frostgrave endeavours last year, I painted more figs for warbands/companies...finished a major terrain piece and a boatload of scatter terrain...very very happy
6. Keep working through lead mountain...I have some awesome figs that need to see the world...amongst them my DAK, FJs, and Mr. Harolds awesome Kickstarter...must get these worked on... accomplishment in progress...I worked through my FJ's...fielded some of them, made some progress with my DAK, progress on my Hasselfree figs, finished through the last of my TAG figures...pretty happy with this...did not get to my kickstarter purchases...sorry Mr. Harold...

In terms of raw numbers, you can certainly see the back and forth I had for the year: 

• 135 x 15mm figs painted and based
• 9 square feet of gaming terrain
• 47 x 15mm vehicles and guns painted and finished
• 44 x 28mm figures

All told, this is a decrease from 2015, but still an increase from 2014...so I will take that as a partial success.  My personal goal to make my purchasing more focused was very successful...I have switched LGS and now get by email, a receipt of all my purchases which allows better accountability...so I think this is good...and true to my wishes, the majority of my purchases were either for Frostgrave or Team Yankee.

 

So what is on tap for next year?

 

• I hope to get more terrain work done...I am at odds for theme, 15mm Afghanistan, 15mm Vimy Ridge, 15 or 28mm sci-fi (thank you Rogue Stars), 28mm modern?
• I want to increase my painting output...I have a wall of mountain that I would like to reduce...I'll share that at a later date, but I'd like to reduce it.
• 4 CMBG for Team Yankee...more Russians as well, there are some new great looking models coming...these would work for some First Clash scenarios
• Viking warband for SAGA...first immediate goal of the year for our clubs SAGA campaign
• I think that covers it...keep the objectives limited...and in that vein, my last objective is to keep a closer tally of how my painting progresses (give the Russian internet bots something more to falsely ring my view count up with...thanks Vlad...)

As always, thanks for the views...all the best in the new year.  Take care.

 

A few parting pics...

 

Last vehicles of the year...some DAK support

 

 

A lot of Russians were painted...10 x T72's; 10 x BMP's; a couple of Hinds and some grunts...

 

First figures of the year...I finished 15 infantry for the company...next step is basing...Not sure of the theme yet, any thoughts?

 

My favourite project so far...taking my time on this because I want to definitely get it right...

 

And my biggest success of the year, 9 square feet of gaming goodness...

 

Take care folks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fallschirjager Anti-Tank team and Big Ole DAK 88's...

Hello folks,

Another week gone by, another progress shot...this time I thought I would post some pictures of some elements that I fielded for our clubs current campaign: Operation Battleaxe - turn 1 BUT was able to get completed.

If you've seen the battle report from that turn, you might remember that this is the first time I've fielded a true infantry force...no safety nets, no vehicles.  Although they weren't DAK troops, I nonetheless fielded some of my Fallschirmjager's to give them a chance at hitting the table top.

I enjoy the look of these troops...there's a lot of detail to the fig's with personnel kit and depending on the field of battle you're trying to capture, there's certainly a lot of variance in the painting scheme for their uniforms.  I had originally started my FJ force as a Monte Cassino company, but given the breadth of theatres of action...as well as needing to field one force for multiple theatres...AND needing a handy way of distinguishing platoons I decided to paint the platoons in various themes.

The first platoon I finished was German Fallschirmjager - Monte Cassino along with some company command elements...but since I have completed a Pioneer Platoon and a recoilless rifle platoon that I painted up with Crete in mind...

For our campaign, although using FJ troops, I was using to the company org chart for DAK grunts...so I needed an early war anti-tank rifle team...so...I thought Crete would be a great setting for this team

 

 

 

lately when I'm gaming I seem to have some horrible tendency to clutz it up and drop a mini or two...during Cangames, one of Mike's A-10 fell prey to my clutzery...the warthog has since been repaired...however, on the campaign day...I had one of my boxes of gaming goodies fall and actually crush this team...there was much sobbing...In all truthfulness, my box of goodies was in fact a toolbox full of gaming aids, dice, etc...

 

However, when the dust was settled the two AT riflemen were bent 90 degrees to the base and the NCO, using his experience I guess, was totally fine.

I straightened the two gunners out and had one break off into my hand and the other was balancing precariously on very weak sea legs...so I got home...cursed many things...got the glue out and set about repairing the legs and repainting where needed.  I'm glad these vet's have bounced back and we should see them in action soon...

Thankfully, my DAK 88 platoon did not suffer any catastrophic events...during the game they did fairly well raising hell with Crusaders and grunts alike.  I enjoyed painting these guns up...the bases are from an older box than what is currently available...they're nice, but a little bit of a pain to complete with the pre-formed holes for the troops.  I must admit they did take some finesse and multiple repaints of the base to get figures and bases to blend with each other.

Panzers and Armoured Cars up!!

Howdy all,

It's been a little busy as of late so I haven't been able to make all my posts...until now.  About 2 weeks ago I was able to get my second box of Panzer IV H's finished.  I'll use these to round out the first box I completed to give me a Pz IV company of 2 combat platoons, the commander, and a 2ic.  I enjoyed painting these guys and just like last time, I tried to keep them in good 'working' condition...no factory fresh here.

I hope you enjoy.

Quickly there after, I dug deep into the painting queue and brought this Armoured Car platoon out and was able to finish them up.  I painted them to go with my Deutsch Afrika Korps force and I think I can also make them work for any of the late war Kampgruppe lists...particularly the German Arnhem forces.

Anyhow, here are the pics.

Cheers.

Platoon commander on the right... 

Platoon in line, right profile... 

 

Second platoon in the background, company 2ic... 

 

 

The combat platoons of Panzer Kompanie Jakob.

 

DAK armoured cars...