Painting

Bolt Action: US Airborne Test Models

/ Alex / Leave a comment

I’ve been into Bolt Action for a good few years now after discovering it at an LGS in a town I was visiting. I’ve played on and off, and collected plenty of Warlord Games’ awesome minis, but as with many other games due to my lack of time these days, my interest has slipped a little. Recently however, a good friend of mine decided to get into the game, and being a wargamer already, he picked up the rules very quickly. Since he decided to play, and subsequently purchased a German force, I decided it was high time that I got around to fixing up my old US Airborne, and so I whipped up a few test models with a fresh paintjob.

These two minis will eventually be the officer and his assistant in the army, and overall, I am really quite happy with the finish. I managed to turn these guys around in an afternoon, which is fairly good going, especially considering that I shouldn’t have to finish too many models in a veteran based army such as the Airborne.

Speaking of the rest of the army, after a quick tot up with the US army book, it looks as though I have around 600pts worth of Airborne infantry models. This provides me with a pretty solid start for an army, especially when I can couple them with my M18 Hellcat to give them some fire support. That will however still leave me around 200pts short of 1k, so once I’ve finished up the models here, I’ll look into making an order from Warlord Games for another one of the infantry box sets!

On a side note, I’m still getting to grips with my new camera, and as such not all of my photos are coming out exactly as I would like them just yet. I tried shooting these minis with a warmer, more yellow light, and I’m still not sure if I like the results or not. For the colour scheme that I’ve chosen on the models though, it does look better than the very white flash of my camera. If anybody has any tips or experience they would be willing to share, then I would love to hear it!

Stay tuned to see the rest of the army as I work on it over the coming weeks…
-Alex

Army Showcase: Warhammer Fantasy Dwarfs

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In my last post I discussed how I would be getting into Age of Sigmar using my old Dwarfs army, So I have decided to share the painted portion of the army here. There is much more of this army in various stages of completion, and I would love to share my progress as I continue to paint them, especially now that Im working towards an army for a new game!

The first unit that I completed, and the core of this army, is a block of 20 warriors. In my casual games I actually use these guys as Longbeards, since the real miniatures for those are far too expensive.

You may notice that the bulk of this unit is made up of the monopart Battle for Skull Pass warriors. I simply love those sculpts, despite there only being a handful of different styles available, each one has fair bit of character, and they are much easier to work with than the multi-part plastic kit, where you often end up with huge gaps between the beards and torsos. I have often considered substantially expanding this unit, but since these minis are now OOP, I have been held back a little in getting hold of them.

In game, I usually accompany this unit with a dwarf lord, acting as my army’s general. I actually use a converted model to represent a lord on shield-bearers.

Also using parts from Battle for Skull Pass, I converted this model initially just for a bit of fun, before realising that he fills the same base area as a set of shield-bearers. Since this old chap may be the only mounted dwarf model I’ve ever come across, I always have a blast using him, especially when the pony (representing the shield bearers) gets chance to attack.

The other character that is currently finished is this Runelord

This guy is usually fighting alongside my Hammerers, however they’re still painted up in a paint scheme that I was never happy with, so I don’t think I’ll post them here today.

The other rank and file unit that I have fully painted and based is a squad of miners. These are also mainly the Skull Pass minis, but since that set only came with 8 miners, there are a few stand in models to make this unit up to 10.

As much as I love the idea of miners, this unit hasn’t ever really performed overly well in any games, so despite them being one of my painted units, they’re often left behind. Unfortunately there seems to be no new profile for them in Cities of Sigmar, so it seems that they may never have chance to see a real comeback.

Finally I have a pair of Cannons, the very same two cannons that made a meal of a high elf dragon in my first ever game of Warhammer Fantasy Battles.

In games of old Warhammer Fantasy, I never write a list without these, especially when I can give them the Rune of Forging to avoid misfires. Despite the dwarf cannon sepcifically being missing from the Cities of Sigmar book, I am hoping that most of my casual gaming partners will be happy with me using these as Hellstorm Rockets from the Ironweld Arsenal, which will allow them to keep performing well in a second game system.

Thats all I have to show you in terms of finished minis in this army. I have many more that are WIP, including a Gyrobomber, which is very nearly finished, many units such as Thunderers, Hammerers and custom Longbeards, and a handful more characters. I have to say I am guilty of having used the unfinished models in games in the past, however I have since decided to try to refrain from that in the future. Comments and criticism on the models (and my beginner photography!) are always welcome, and I will ensure to share the rest of the army here as I make progress on it. Thanks for looking!

-Alex