Celtic swirls for SAGA

Scrounging for something quick to paint, I found these resin casts I bough for SAGA's Sacred Ground scenario.  The Fenris Games casts are clearly inspired by Celtic triple swirl rock carvings. The casts are not glued down so I can move them around.  They'll pull double duty as rocky ground or Sacred Ground as needed.   

Tower Games is host a SAGA tournament today and I'm going to run a Strathclyde Welsh warband. I scrounged up a Strathclyde warlord to lead the boys.  My buddy said this would make a great gift for his eldest daughter.  All kidding aside, its a nice bit of sculpting from Gripping Beast and he does have a throwback look.  

I pulled my Norse-Gaels warband out for a head count and group shot. Since I can only field 6 points (about 41 figures) at the SAGA Grand Melee in Chicago, nearly half of these lads will be cheering from the sidelines. As much as I've enjoyed them, I'm ready to play a new faction. I'm thinking of posting these up for sale after the tournament.  I'll also share tips and observations for playing the Norse-Gaels once Adepticon is over.  I've found them a tricky faction to play but once you get on a roll, they can really rip it up.  

You may have noticed my blogging and commenting is getting spotty. That's because I've got a 1,200+ figure West Wind Punic War commission under way. The upside is the new figures are a joy to paint.  The downside is I won't be able to paint and blog with a project this big. To fill the gap, I set up a Twitter account -  Monty Luhmann@TwinCitiesGamer. New to the Twittersphere, I need peeps to follow and to follow me. 

I hope your staying warm and surviving winter.  I am but just barely thanks to my paintbrushes.  

Mustering Sertorius' Lusitanians

Rebel Roman general Quintus Sertorius is one of my ancient world favorites.  He waged a brilliant six year guerrilla war against Rome, at times driving them out of Hispania.  Badly outnumbered, he inflicted stinging defeats on the Romans and nearly captured Pompey. After reading Philip Matyszak's superb Sertorius and the Struggle for Spain, I was primed to paint the Spanish again. Without further ado, here's Sertorius' Lusitanians, version 2.

Lusitanian Scutarii: In L'art de la Guerra, the Sertorius option allows scutarii to be upgraded from impetuous swordsmen (not too good) to impact swordsmen (better!). That reflects Sertorius turning the Lusitanians into a well-drilled army.  In game, the scutarii are better in terrain and fight even at impact with legionaries.  They don't have equal staying power in melee as medium foot have less cohesion to lose than heavy foot. And of course, legionaries armor helps in melee as well.

Large Shield Cavalry: Spanish medium cavalry that can be taken as elite.

Small Shield Cavalry:  Light horse are a nuisance in ADLG, just as in Field of Glory.  Having had my camp sacked by light horse twice in my first two games, I'll field my own as a counter.

Caetrati: Light foot javelinmen have a role in this army.  They'll challenge in terrain, skirmish and then make way for the main battle line.

Burning Carts:  In ADLG, the Spanish can take burning carts, which are treated as Scythed Chariots in combat.  I couldn't fit a cart & team on a 40mm x 40mm base so I used a light chariot instead.  The fire is a bit supersized, making it hard to miss on the tabletop.  I'll field burning carts because they're cheap, look cool and might annoy my opponent.

Commanders:  No ancient army is complete without command stands.  I HAD to sneak a priestess on one of the stands.

Camp: The challenge with a camp is telling a story in a 120mm x 80mm footprint. Over the years, I've gone from dreading camps to having fun with them. Sertorius was famous for hitting the Romans when they least expected it. The fabulous variety of Corvus Belli figures and tree bark made the whole thing go.

The last piece of this army is Sertorius' legionaries.  I'm painting a Late Republican Roman army as a foil and I'll port some of the legionaries over to Sertorius when I'm finished.

If you'd like a quick read on Sertorius, take a look at an old post I wrote here.  If you want a deep dive, I highly recommend Philip Matyszak's Sertorius and the Struggle for Spain.

Speed gluing shields in 15mm

With our moribund ancients group coming alive again to play L'Art de la Guerre, I'm rushing to rebuild my 15mm ancients collection. This requires a bit of work since I sold all my armies last year, save one.  The upside to a collection of one is that I'll double it shortly.  I expect to double it again before the year is out.

After years of painting Old Glory, I'm finding Corvus Belli's ancient Spanish to be a nice change-up. I understand they've shut down so this might be my first and last opportunity to paint from their line. The sculpting on the figures is superb and they have some one-of-a-kind figures.  The downside is I underestimated the difficulty of gluing 200+ tiny shields.  My first go was so slow and messy I almost gave up at the start.  The backs of the shields have shallow dimples so they don't have much to grab onto.  Through trial and error and more error, I came up with a system that might be useful for anyone working with Xyston or Corvus Belli.    

Step 1: I glue my figures on Popsicle sticks, grouping like poses to speed up the painting process. My tools for the job include:

Super Glue-Quick drying version
Accelerator- described as an "instant cure."  It speeds up the curing process on metals to about 10 seconds so it's a bit short of "instant."
Sticky Tack.
Small wooden dowel to prevent fingers from being glued together.

Step 2: Spray a couple of shots of accelerator on the plastic work surface, enough to make a puddle. I resorted to the puddle method because the sprayer puts out way too much accelerator for 15mm.  It was soaking everything.

Step 3: Load up a bit of Sticky Tack on the end of the dowel. Grab the shield from the front.

Step 4:  Dip the back of the shield into the puddle of accelerator.  Holding the dowel + shield upright with your left hand, put a drop of Super Glue on the accelerator soaked shield with your right hand. You've got 10 seconds to get this on the figure before it hardens.

Step 5: Press the shield against the forearm of the figure. Count to 5 and you're done!  Now repeat about 200 more times and you're ready to prime your army.  

Warlord, Wild Bill Hickok and a Fish

I've been logging long hours at the painting table tying up loose ends and rushing projects to the tabletop.  As a result, today's drop is a bit eclectic.

Up first is Gripping Beast's Macbeth.  He's a giant of a man who serves as a hero for a Scottish warband in SAGA.  The 3rd photo down gives you some idea of how large this figure is.  Let's just say he was not impressed by the puny Wild Bill.

Wild Bill and the bank heist figures are for Dead Man's Hand.  I think Bill would be pleased with his sculpt, especially the long and lovely locks!

My dad found a ceramic fish at a yard sale over the summer,  Since it was badly worn, he asked me to repaint it.  It looked like an ideal project for an airbrush so I set it aside until I bought one. Six months later, I still don't have an airbrush so I gave it a go with my brush. I'm not used to working in 1 to 1 scale and the flat surfaces were a challenge. A green wash and a sepia wash helped hide my brushstrokes. I don't think taxidermists have to worry about me cutting into their painting business!

In the weeks ahead, my posts will be focused and fish free. Our ancients group is switching rules and I'm painting up two new 15mm ancients armies as part the changeup.  If I want to see our ancients group grow, I need to have spare armies to lend out or field at demos.  Seeing as how I sold off most of my ancients collection last year, I've got a bit of work to do!  

Paging Mr SAGA

Today's post is filed under "Loose Ends."  First up are 8 warriors to round out my Breton warband. I got tired of painting horses in my fall Breton run so these fellows sat while I rested. Combining my Bretons and Normans, I can field 20 mounted warriors and 36 mounted milites, enough for a Hail Caesar army!

I've meant to paint up baggage for SAGA for some time.  SAGA allows you to base baggage on 40mm x 40mm bases up to a 50mm by 100mm.  You can use livestock, civilians, wagons and/or carts to make up baggage.  Each player in the Grand Melee is required to bring 3 pieces of baggage to the event. With this fire under me, I finally got to painting mine up.  I went for a distressed grey wood and I'm reasonably pleased with how it turned out. Carts and peasants are Gripping Beast, as are the mounted warriors above.  

EDIT: I've had requests for the wood painting recipe. Unfortunately, this time it's a little sketchy.  I didn't take notes because I wasn't sure how this was going to turn out. 

I started with black primer, then dark grey applied with a wet brush.  Take care to keep black intact in the recesses where you can. I did this by using the side of my brush. Drybrush with a lighter grey and wash with Army Painter Strong Tone. Finish with a beige green drybrush & highlights on tips and edges. I think I used Vallejo German Camo Beige but I didn't write it down and I have LOTS of light greens. I hope this is helpful and I will take notes next time!

You'll note my baggage train isn't carrying anything at all.  My thinking is that villains and marauders will pass on sacking an empty baggage train and pursue something more loot-tastic. Let's see how this strategy works down at the club.

Last up is my reworked Norse Gael warlord.  After a frustrating stretch of 4 losses, I decided to tweak my list by running my warlord with a Dane axe.  This lowers his armor class but he'll dish out more hits and get 5 dice with the "Howling Axes" ability.  I repainted his base to match the rest of the warband and added a second figure.  The end result is a nice improvement on the original. In his first game out, my warlord not only survived a number of enemy strikes, he also brought home a win. I can only conclude that Odin approves of this revision.

I love a man in a uniform - done!

These WW II Brits for Chain of Command are done, and just in time. I was getting burned out by the sameness of painting up 100 British soldier. Now it's time to move onto something else.

Infantry Section:  An infantry section plus five riflemen. Leftovers and spares perhaps?   

6 pd AT gun crews #1 and #2: They're single mounted to make it easier to remove casualties from the AT gun.

Vickers medium MG team: This was my favorite set from this run of figures.  The Vickers is a WW I throwback.  

While looking for painting inspiration, I learned something interesting about the Vickers.  It was used for indirect fire at ranges of up to 4,500 yards. Such fire could catch the enemy by surprise and restrict movement.  It was used to good effect against trenches, road junctions and dead zones.  The Vickers had a back sight with an extension for this purpose, as seen in the photo below.    

British at Overloon, Netherlands using plunging fire.  

Some of our SAGA players also play Bolt Action so I'm painting up a force to join them. Here's my first drop of Soviets.  With 2 boxes of Warlord Games plastics, I'll be lucky if I have all my fingers left when I'm done.   My hands look like I was in a knife fight that I lost quite badly!  

Everything counts in large amounts

It's time for a quick look back at 2014. With both of my kids off to college, I was able to paint frequently AND get out for weekly games.  This gaming life is the good one!

SAGA is our game of choice since the epic SAGA Storm game day.  The Storm brought many new players in and I can find a match at Fantasy Flight Games on most Thursday nights. I’m thankful for the new friends I made last year through this hobby.

I’m also thankful for my brushes and paints.  Painting quiets my mind like nothing else and helps me forget my workday troubles.  Painting to audiobooks and podcasts is my favorite thing. I try to listen to something that matches my project.  As I was assembling two boxes of Warlord Games Soviets this week, I listened to Von Lucks “Panzer Commander.”  Luck's stories fired my imagination and carried me through the tedious process of assembling 70 plastic soldiers! 

I'm looking forward to new projects in the new year.  Some of our new SAGA players also play Bolt Action so I'm going to give that a try.  I painted lots of WW II figures last year but they were all on contract. This year, I'll paint a Soviet force that can double under Bolt Action or Chain of Command. With Muskets & Tomahawks in rotation, I'd like to also paint up my first French & Indian War figures.

I have a couple of things I'd like to accomplish this year.  I'd like to slow down and work on improving my technique.  Failing that, I'll trot out Stalin's line that "painting in quantity has a quality of it's own." Or something like that.  I'd like to put the brush down and make quality terrain this year as well. These recent pics illustrate how great terrain lifts up a game.  

My OCD-fueled painting tally shows 434 28mms and 1,271 15mm painted in 2014.   28mm output is down a bit from last year but 15mm is up. The excruciating details of what I painted are below the break.  

Here's to the New Year.  May it bring you great gaming and painting!