Warzone Resurrection, Imperial Young Guards / Life Dragoons (1.3rd Entry, 6th AHPC)

And last are some minis for Warzone, to complement my already large Imperial force. In this case some Life Dragoons from the Young Guards Regiment. Since these are the Imperial Serenity (= the head of state) and Imperial is based on modern-day Britain, I felt I should rather go with a classic paint job (both in a historic British sense as well as in the sense that they are depicted this way in all the classic artwork). So it was scarlet jackets and dark blue trousers with red piping.

Young Guards – Life Dragoons

I have to say… this is where the problems began. They are always depicted with black armour and berets, so I kept those. The big problem was, that this made a large area of the minis rather dark and the colors did not really contrast each other. About the only part of the minis to provide some contrast was the gas masks, but they looked rather strange with their large napkin like collars.

Young Guards – Life Dragoons

And it continued with the rest of their equipment. Begin a guard unit that is always depicted in their colorful uniforms even if in the field, I felt that their belts, pouches, webbing and so on should not be green. Them wearing backpacks in white did not seem right either, so I went with a light grey. Which while keeping with the theme, did not really improve the contrast either.

Young Guards – Life Dragoons

But the minis were plagued with other problems from the beginning. They are made from resin and when I bought those three packs the resin with the weapon sprue on all three packs was extremely soft. I contacted the manufacturer and got replacement sprue without any argument. But unfortunately those replacement sprue were suffering from lots of flash. So there was lots of work to put into these in the first place. Another problem is the weapons in the set. Two in five men may be armed with either an automatic shotgun, a mortar and / or a sniper rifle. The set only comes with an optional mortar and sniper rifle and both for the kneeling mini. So some conversion work was required anyway. To men were converted to shotguns (from another set) and one of the standing guys became a loader for a mortar as well. Since I did not like the pose of the trooper spreading his arms out, I converted one of those to a firing pose. And while I was on it, most minis also received bi-pods, optics and laser designators to make them look better geared out.

All in all not the most fun unit to paint and with those many details hidden on the figures it took a good while. 😦 Anyway… here are some close-ups of the minis I like best:

Young Guard – Life Dragoon

Young Guard – Life Dragoon

Young Guard – Life Dragoon

 

Warzone, Imperial vs. Bauhaus

It seems, this is one of those cases where I waited too long posting something. About two months ago I played my league game with Björn. Which means that by now my memory is a bit fuzzy, but I am going to try my best to summarise the game.

It was somewhat special. Since one of the other members of our group and myself were on the team redesigning the factious for Warzone, I had access to the new Bauhaus rules, before they were published. Therefore it was not only a league game, but also a playtest for the new Bauhaus. In addition we decided to play a somewhat larger game, playing 1500 points and a Mega OOC.

These were the forces we fielded (if I remember correctly):

Bauhaus were led by Angelica Drachen and featured four squads of Hussars, two squads of Etoiles Mortants (only one with Rapid Deployment), two squads of Juggernauts, one squad of Venusian Rangers and two close combat Vulkan Battlesuits.

Imperial were led by a close combat Blood Beret Custom Warlord, four squads of Trenchers (one led by a NCO with Imperial Banner), four squads of Imperial Special Forces (two of them Infiltrating Black Berets), one squad of Life Dragoons / Young Guards, one squad of Blood Berets with plasma carbines, one large squad of Blood Berets with Heavy Chainrippers led by  SGT McBride and accompanied by Isaac Alfreds and a single Grey Ghost sniper.

We played on a table with inner city run-ins and rolled a scenario where one side had to control three objective markers along the centre line by the end of turn 3 or later.

Before the game started, Björn was unlucky with his Bauhaus. I had won the set-up initiative and placed my Infiltrating units first. Due to the sheer number of infiltrating units on the Imperial side (four in total) virtually every spot on the table where one could infiltrate was already taken when it was the Bauhaus infiltrators turn. Which meant that the first squad of Etoiles Mortants had to set up in their own deployment zone and the Venusian Rangers could only set up slightly in front of it.

The game started with the two squads of Black Berets that had infiltrated into the centre of the table rushing forward, attacking Angelica Drachen, a squad of Hussars and Juggernauts with their chainswords, rifles and flamethrowers. But they were not too lucky, as Bauhaus losses were minimal and they hardly caused any wounds to the Juggernauts or Drachen. In return they were counterattacked by their Bauhaus adversaries as well as one of the Vulkans. In addition, the second squad of  Etoiles Mortants parachuted in to take them on. Even though one of them was pretty lucky with his Heal Rolls, the last of them perished  early in the second turn.

On the left flank there was a constant slugging match between the Life Dragoons and the Venusian Rangers supported by a squad of Hussars. Due to the heavy cover, both the Dragoons and Rangers were in and their camouflage skills this led only to minimal losses, until two of the Dragoons charged to of the building and fired their automatic shotguns at the Rangers, taking them out of the game.

On the right flank things were even more heated. Even tough the close combat Blood Berets had infiltrated onto the table, they were far from the enemy and took heavy losses on their way in. But once they were close to the enemy, their Heavy Chainrippers made short work of both the Hussars and Vulkan. Even one of the Juggernauts that had charged them through the ruins could not turn the tables and was taken out as well.

If you look at the first turn, things did not look good. Imperial had lost almost a fifth of their points and Bauhaus only two Hussars. By the end of the second turn Imperial had barely caught up. But all the heavy losses in the beginning had paid off. The Bauhaus forces in the centre had taken too long to mop up the Black Berets and on the flanks the situations had stalled enough to prevent a Bauhaus advance. All the time the remaining Imperial units (Trenchers, the other two squads of ISF and the ranged combat Blood Berets) had advanced towards the centerline, while their comrades bore the brunt of the Bauhaus wrath. By the third turn, they secured all three objectives. Out of the Bauhaus forces only a single Juggernaut would have been able to (maybe) contest one of the objectives, but he would have run into a torrent of fire from up to five units. So the game ended with an Imperial victory. And here are the pictures to accompany the story:

Trenchers in the street

Fighting in the Bauhaus deployment zone

Etoiles Mortants taking out the Black Berets

Clash on the flank

Blood Beret taking out a Bauhaus Juggernaut

Black Berets struggling with a Vulkan

 

Warzone games that I never posted

Games wise, this year has been strange this year. I playe a bout a dozen games (everything from SAGA, over Star Wars: Armada and Battlegroup to Warzone) that I played, but did not take photos of and thus never posted. But there are also a few where I took photos. I think now is the time to at least post those. Ithaca been a while since they were played, so the details have become a little too fuzzy for game reports. Hope you enjoy them anyway!

Imperial (Ministry of War) vs. Bauhaus

Bauhaus vs. Imperial

Bauhaus vs. Imperial

Bauhaus vs. Imperial

Bauhaus vs. Imperial

Bauhaus vs. Imperial

Bauhaus vs. Imperial

 
Imperial (Wolfbanes) vs. Bauhaus

Warhounds vs. Vorreiter

Vorreiter firing on the Warhounds

Vorreiter assaulting

Table (Imperial corner far left)

Table (Bauhaus corner far left)

One of only two surviving Blood Berets after the Etoiles Mortants have landed

Oakenfist taking on the Etoiles Mortants

Meet your destiny

Drawn into the Blood Berets

 

Imperial (Ministry of War) vs. Brotherhood 

Valkyrie drop

The enemy is down the road

Table (Imperial side front left)

Table (Brotherhood side rear left)

Mortificator screen

Look who is coming to the party

Imperial firing line

By the village

Brotherhood bastion

Blood Berets advancing

 

Warzone Resurrection: Imperial Special Forces “Black Berets”

So these minis have actually been sitting on my desk done and dusted for nearly two weeks now. So it is time to show them:

These are some Imperial Special Forces (ISF) for Warzone. Or to be more precise on the sub-unit… Black Berets. The Black Berets have always been my favorites in any incarnation of Warzone, mostly because I liked their Black and Grey uniforms. So there was no way for me not to paint  them one more time.

Their main mission is and always has been spacecraft boarding operations. And I think in this incarnation of the rules they are best suited for this. In this edition the rules the ISF got backpack teleportation devices. I think they are over the top on the average battlefield (and for that matter I could have done without them). But fluff wise they are great when it comes to boarding operations. No more docking to an airlock or cutting through the hull, giving the defenders time to mass their security troops there. You simply fly your shuttles close the the enemy ship and teleport into the next corridor. Sealed bulkheads or fortified corridors… no problem you simply teleport past those.

As you may have seen when I posted another unit, The Sterlings, earlier on, these minis are wearing gas masks, berets and diesel powered teleportation devices and those simply will not do in space. The backpacks were easy enough to change… simply remove the exhaust pipes and pistons and call it the nuclear version. While one can always assume their suits to be insulated and airtight (like any modern spacesuit), gas masks simply would not help. So I removed their heads and replaced them with full face helmets from Anvil Industries. Just like I did with the Sterlings, I removed they bayonets from their rifles (stat wise the models do not have them anyway) to give their rifles more of a carbine feel. I also fitted their carbines with a lot of halo sights and forwards grips to give them more of a commando look. The last two soldier got the Gehenna Puker Flamethrower… nothing clears a corridor faster!

So off to the painting table they were. I started off with the black armour and decided to paint their suits in a dark blue, to keep enhance their sinister looks. At this point I was slightly undecided which way to go. Black Berets usually have grey camo on their armour, but I already liked their looks as they were. The biggest problem was, that usually Imperial camo take large amoeba shapes edged in a light colour. But to be honest… every version I tried on these looked extremely poor and turned me off the idea. So in the end, I decided to break with the Imperial norm and go for a pattern of thin branch or lighting shapes. And it worked fine. Up next were the helmets and I always wanted something that enhanced their sinister looks. So a skull pattern was painted on the lower parts of the helmets. I have to say, the first one was OK, after another three I thought “why did I decide to do this” but after the 6th one (when I had found my mojo) they became fun. The visors were painted red as usual. Taking another break from the Imperial norm, I did not want their national insignia to stand out as much in blue, white and red. So I painted them in a subdued pattern of dark grey first, but that made them virtually disappear against the armour. In real life that would be the intention and fine, but here i wanted more contrast. I went for a de-saturated version in lighter bluish grey, which offered a nice contrast. The rest was just the standard fare, except that I did not paint their straps and holsters in green but black.

The last matter to decided upon was their bases. When I started, I had wanted to do the same trench and mud theme, that I have used with the other model for Imperial. Painting them, I realized, that mud would look strange on these and space ship corridors would be much better. Luck would have it, that just the week I finished the minis, my pads from the Basius 2 Kickstarter would arrive. One of the two pads was one I want to use for deck plates when my Alien vs. Predator minis arrive, so I decided to put them to the test. They worked out fine, after a few tests. I have to say though, that they are removed best using pliers to pull them up straight. The thin MDF bases I am using can cause some problems doing that, especially with the water you use as a mould release for the Green Stuff). So some of the bases, it did not work perfectly and the details look a bit soft, but I am still happy with them.

OK… enough talking on to the minis:

Black Berets (1st Squad)

Black Berets (2nd Squad)

Black Berets (2nd Squad, rear view)

Well I imagine you would not want to be in some huge steel coffin flying through space when these chaps come for you… or would you?

 

 

Catching up (second attempt)

So last month, I posted, that I had wanted to keep a steadier flow of posts on this blog. So far so good. Just a few days later we were supposed to get high-speed internet and that was when things started going down the drain. Here in Germany all the telephone and internet infrastructure is owned by one company (the formerly state-owned provider). If you get your services from a different company (like we do), they only rent the cables. If anything goes wrong, it is still the owners job to correct it. In our case the owner wired us up wrong in the last switch box, so we actually did not get a signal at all. But since we were using another provider. they took their own sweet time to correct the mistake, including appointments for the technician to fix things where no one showed up. So after more than two weeks without internet or phone (except on my mobile) we were back. But it is amazing, how many things you actually need the internet for these days. Which created a huge backlog of things. Once I had worked my way through that, German mail ended their 4 week strike and I had to work my way through the backlog of snail mail. Bottom line is… I am only now back on track. So this will be the second attempt to catch up. I actually took a lot of photos this weekend so there should be enough to post for about a week now. So let’s get started with some minis. Again these are for Warzone: Resurrection. Up first is Timothy McGuire, one of the Warlords for the Imperial faction. He hails from a unit called the Golden Lions. Now as you can see on that link, I painted the unit in classic red body armour. Most times they are also depicted with black-grew tiger stripe camo on their armour. Back then I was unsure if I should do that or not, so I planned to try it out on McGuire (better repainting one mini if it goes wrong than a whole unit). But then Prodos published new artwork of him in yellow armour with blue-grey and red tiger stripes. I felt that looked a bit ugly, but non the less wanted to try how it looked on a mini, so the plan was hatched to paint him that way, which I did. I think the results look a bit strange, since I can imagine no place where such a camo would work, but I like him none the less, so he will stay this way. Looking at the photos though, I think I will have to go back and add some colour to the hinge of the right arm and the valves on his chest plate.

Timothy McGuire

Timothy McGuire

Timothy McGuire

Timothy McGuire

Up next is Morten Oakenfist, Chieftain of the Wolfbanes. He is a bear of a man and the mini is huge for a human as well (even larger than MacGuire in his power armour). If you remember Slythe from the previous post, I felt that his colors were  to earthen, so I went classic Wolfbanes on him and went for blue clothing and only did his armour in browns. I really liked that, so my other Wolfbanes will receive blue clothing as well. I also tried some different brown combinations on his armour, but that was not my cup of tea, so the next ones will revert back to what I tried on Slythe. The bigger problem was his tartan. I have now decided, that all my Wolfbanes will have some tartan items, both to give them some colour and to be able to distinguish the basic squads later on. But most obviously, there is no Clan Oakenfist today, so what pattern to pick? Well his mother is a Murdoch and today the Murdoch families is allied to the Clans MacDonald and MacPhearson. But in the Warzone universe the Murdochs have become a clan of their own and a powerful one at that, so they should have their own tartan. I personally liked the MacDonald tartan better than the MacPhearson one (and being a big Runrig fan MacDonald seemed to be a better homage), so I took that as a basis for my Murdoch tartan:

Chieftain Morten Oakenfist

Chieftain Morten Oakenfist

Chieftain Morten Oakenfist

Chieftain Morten Oakenfist

Up next are the Pathfinders. These can be taken either as advisors to squads (essentially making them faster and allowing them to pass through terrain more easily) or as Warlords. The one on the large base is the Warlord, the rest are the advisors. As you can see they are a mix of Oakenfist and Slythe colourwise… blue clothing and lighter brown leather armour. One thing that gave me headaches here were the grenades. As the reader with a keen eye might notice, they have grenade launchers strapped to their right forearm and the corresponding grenades to their right leg (yes I know, they would make more sense on the left legs, since you would have to load them with your left hand). Since they can fire different types of grenades, I wanted to represent that. So some grenades got golden tips, while other had blue or red metallic ones (as in real life). The big problem was, blue did not show up on the blue clothing and red looked strange, so in the end they all got golden tips. They other thing I am still unsure about is their faces. They are supposed to have blue tattoos on their faces, but I did not like that though too much, since I felt it might ruin the character of their faces, so I did without those. On the other hand it does not fit the background, so I might still go back to them, but I guess I will decide that once I have most of the Wolfbanes painted! Up first are one advisor and the Chieftain. The advisor is sporting my Murdoch tartan, while the Warlord wears a pattern based on Clan Munro. Since my unit is based on the Black Watch, I felt that it would be nice to have a Warlord that features the same colors as their first commander. Plus it is yet another homage to Runrig.

Wolfbane Pathfinder (Advisor left, Warlord right)

Wolfbane Pathfinder (rear view, Advisor left, Warlord right)

And another two advisors. The one on the lest is wearing a tartan based on clan Stewart and the right one a Government tartan. Both patterns have a strong association with the Black Watch (the former is their pattern, the later was often worn by their pipers), so these just felt the way to go. All these patterns will feature strongly amongst my Wolfbane forces, although i could kick myself for the Munro and Steward patterns, since they take a bleeping long time to paint!

Wolfbane Pathfinder Advisors

Wolfbane Pathfinder Advisors (rear)

 

Catching up

Live has been extremely busy over the past few weeks. So much to do (both private and work related) that I hardly found any time for the hobby related things in life. I guess not much will change in the near future, but at least I try to update this blog from time to time. And this shall be the start. These are the minis I managed to paint recently, all of them Imperials for Warzone. Not much really, as some of these were painted as much as two months ago.

Michael Farraday and Andrew Drougan

These are two special Blood Beret characters for Imperial. I have to say, I was not too much in a mood to paint these. They are limited edition miniatures from the Kickstarter era of Warzone Resurrection. As such they are noticeably different in style in size from the current Imperial models. Therefore I really hope that they will be re-done in due time and until then I will probably not use them too much (which is also underlined by the fact, that they are pretty expensive points wise). As a result my motivation to paint them was not too high, but I did anyway.

Andrew Drougan & Micheal Farraday

Andrew Drougan & Micheal Farraday

Isaac Alfreds

Now Alfreds was a team member of Drougan and Farraday´s before they became Cartel Agents. He costs as much as the other two, but I like his stats and abilities better than theirs. Plus his model is from the recent models that were created to accompany the Mutant Chronicles RPG rules, so he actually fits the current style.

Isaac Alfreds

Isaac Alfreds (profile)

Gordon Slythe

Slythe is another model from the RPG. I really like this model, since I felt that the pose was quite cool and I liked his resemblance to Ewan McGregor. I got this model shortly before Prodos released their Wolfbanes last month, so I painted him as a test piece for the other Wolfbanes. I actually like the way he ended up, but I am not sure if I went for too much tan and brown here. In the end I loosened everything up by adding a (fantasy) tartan pattern to his cloak. The blood dripping from his sword was a late addition to the mini I made, but I think it really enhances his ferocious looks. Also went for a different basing theme with him (as I will for the other Wolfbanes)… Highlands instead of trenches.

I have to say though, what slightly bleeped me off is the fact that they are using the very same model as part of their Wolfbane Commando pack, which make him less special. 😦

Gordon Slythe (front)

Gordon Slythe (profile)

Gordon Slythe (rear)

Grey Ghosts

The are the first of the new Imperial models I painted, a three women squad of Grey Ghosts. They act as saboteurs and snipers. Their trademark is the dark grey catsuits and I went along those lines. I am still a bit torn about them game wise. They are pretty expensive, but they might also be quite effective. I used them in a game last weekend and while they earned their points, I think you need the right types of enemy troops for them to do so. Lets see how they play out in the long run!

Grey Ghosts

Grey Ghosts (profile)

Grey Ghosts (rear)

Imperial Special Forces (Sterlings)

The last infantry unit for this post is a squad of Imperial Special forces, or in this case Sterlings. There are nearly two dozen different Special Forces units one can pick from. To be honest, game wise they are no different from one another, as they can all receive the same equipment and so on. But they all differ when it comes to fluff or their uniforms. So I bought 6 packs of them and wanted something I could go wild with for the first unit. So it is the Sterlings, which wear desert camo. The plate armour was inspired by the US “Chocolate Chip” camo made famous during Desert Storm. Underneath they are wearing 3-color Desert DPM, although I think I could have left that off, since so very little of it can actually be seen under all that plate. I slightly modified these minis with scopes and laser designators from Anvil Industries.

Sterlings

Sterlings (rear)

My two favourite Sterlings

Offensive and Defensive Sentry Tokens

I have the option to use Offensive and Defensive Sentry Tokens with my Imperials in the game. They are not sure to arrive on the tabletop, since I have to draw the right cards, but if they do they are mighty effective. So I often use them and I always disliked the fact, that I had no designed tokens. So I bought these small robots from Anvil Industries and based them accordingly. The HMG ones are the Offensive ones (since they have stats very similar to an HMG and fire at targets of my choice) the grenade launcher ones are the defensive ones (they react to enemies firing in their vicinity). To give my opponents another method to identify them, the Offensive ones are designated by a small Greek letter Ω, while the Defensive ones sport a Greek letter ∆.

Offensive Sentry Tokens

Defensive Sentry Tokens

Offensive and Defensive Sentry Token (rear)

 

2nd March game of our Warzone: Resurrection League

No do not panic… you have not missed game one (I am still waiting for the write-up on that one), but we are now into the second month of our Warzone League.  And I did not want to keep you waiting too long so here is the first AAR (Imperial vs. Dark Legion). Both forces fielded units that are not seen on the tabletop too often (Golden Lions and a Praetorian Behemoth) and it was actually them who decided the game.

It can all be found here or by going to the March entry for Warzone League menu at the top of the page. Enjoy!

 

Warzone Resurrection: Imperial Greyhound tankettes

So after that small excursion to Mishima I returned to Imperial, namely two Greyhound tankettes. These are ridiculously small one man tanks, used either to fire poisonous gas in a flame thrower type attack (the version depicted here) or as a short-range vehicular mortar. Personally I am not sure if I would have bought them, since a) I find the models a bit ugly and b) for slightly more points I can get a Hurricane Walker, which can do far more!

Imperial Greyhounds

Imperial Greyhounds

Otherwise, I went for the same camo I used on my Hurricanes, although it looks far less effective on these small models, and the same beat up and muddy look as the rest of the army. I also added WWI or WWII desert style red-white-red tank markings to the sides, but these are mostly covered up by the dirty and wear by now.

Imperial Greyhounds

Imperial Greyhounds

Since the unit I play is loosely based on the Black Watch, they both got Scottish town names on the turrets. One is Peairt (Perth) to other Port Rìgh (Portree).

Imperial Greyhounds

Imperial Greyhounds

 

3rd and 4th February games of our Warzone: Resurrection League

Just short note to let you know, that the after action reports for the third and forth February games of our Warzone: Resurrection League are not online, including the table with the standings after the first month.

They can all be found here or by going to the Warzone League menu at the top of the page.

The sub page for march has also gone live, so for those who want to know who plays who this month, you can go there as well. But with the first games taking place this weekend, you should not wait too long for the first game reports anyway!

 

More Blood Berets for Warzone Resurrection (4th Entry, 5th AHPC)

Well, at the beginning of the month, I posted five Blood Berets for Warzone Resurrection. I had originally planned to paint all 15 of them in one go, but had to reduce the initial batch to finish just those I needed for the tournament in Hamburg. Which was a wise decision, since I would not have made it. But little did I know how long it would actually take me to finish them. So many things in the real world demanded my attention that it took me over two weeks to do these (the initial batch had taken about three days). Anyway, these minis will now bring the close combat squad to eight troopers and the ranged combat one to seven. Although this is all a bit fluid, since the rules do not demand the whole squad to be armed the same!

Blood Berets (ranged combat squad)

Blood Berets (additions to my close combat squad)

To add to the minis I also scratch build nine AT-Mine markers. Each squad (or Blood Beret character) can deploy up to 3 of them and i know myself… if I do not have markers for them, I will forget them!

Blood Berets (both squads and AT-mines)