6mm Desert terrain part XIII "O Sammy special"

Ebay specials plus a O'sammy house from Gamescraft.

The eBay special is all one piece. Gamescraft's O sammy house comes in 4 parts. 

          Originally I was going to use all this shit for my Desert terrain project. Then I started to put it together and paint it. The building, construction style is different. Which made me want to represent the construction difference with climate difference.

         With O'sammy house located, in not "Desert terrain." And having done so much with the Iraq and Sudan theme, I had to ask mates for some photos of green Afghan hills. Not exactly Pakistan, but it will do. I selected the one that fit my mind's eye of the area.

Afghanistan

         Variance; This part of the project will be green-er. I will be sticking with palm trees. Why because I have a shit ton of them and screw buy more trees. Also the sat pic of O sammy's compound show it out in the fields, the town is off the pointy end of the compound. My town will be closer by half the distance. Sammy's compound will sit higher than the rest.

Pakistan

5mm MDF board is used as a backing material. 3.58 from Home Depot for 2x2. The terrain pieces used were warping on me and one of the ebay ones even cracked. So they are now mounted to MDF. Correction the MDF is too thick. I will switch to a plywood base.

 This dude was primed grey. Then angle sprayed white a brown, followed by a tan. The houses were dry brushed with a cream, followed by a white. Two weathering powders were applied, both are secret weapon's shit powders. I have just started picking out the exposed brick work with "Hull Red."

More Gamescraft buildings. They were painted up last year. They will be the little building off the road from the pointy end of the compound.

6mm Desert terrain part XII "pipes"

The pipes are NobleKnight specials. There are, or the only ones I have, a straight and one with a small bend. No curves, turns, or Ts. Nor are there any damaged sections.

I took a mitre box to two them.

Blue stuff for a mold

Wall board paste was used to create an easy workable section. One needs damaged sections!

Tomorrow, I will see what kind of casting I get from the dry paste.

Monthly Epic with the NE group

        I got up to the Time Machine this past Saturday for the monthly NetEA with the Boston group. We drove up Friday night. The Time Machine is about 5ish hours away. 287 & 84 were pretty good, a little construction, but not the traffic they are known for.

My first game was 4k of Iron Warriors Vs my Tau, standard tournament game scenario.
My list;

IW had teli termies
Tau had air drop gun drones, Suits, & Broadsides w/ Stealth suits.

Turn 1
IW win Initiative
IW Demon engine sustains targets center Railheads. 2KIA BROKEN on disrupts.
IW R flank Bassies sustains targets R Flank Railheads. 1KIA, 2BMs
Tau R Flank Railheads Marshal advance up the right flank, 0BMs
IW center Bassies sustains targets Mech FWs & Pathfinders. 1KIA, 2BMs
Tau FWs & Pathfinders Doubles for cover on center Left hill
IW Tacticals Double for center hill, targets recon center. 1BM
Tau Skyrays sustains targets Tacticals. 1KIA, 2 BMs
IW Decimator#1 Doubles targets FWs & Pathfinders. 1BM
Tau Recon C Advances targets Tacticals, 1KIA, 2BMs
IW Hell Talons GA targets Suits. 1BM
Tau Tiger Sharks GA targets Tacticals. 1KIA, 2BMs
Tiger Sharks drop Gun Drones. Drones target Tacticals, BROKEN. 2KIA, 4BMs disrupt
IW Hell Talon attacks Tiger Sharks. 1KIA
Tau Recon R Advances targets Tacticals. 4KIA
IW Dreads Overwatch
Tau FWs & RH Advances targets Decimator#1. BROKEN
IW Decimator#2 Doubles targets Drones. 3KIA, BROKEN
Tau Cuda GA targets Decimator#2. 1BM
Tau Ocra w/ suits GA targets Decimator#2. KIA
Tau suits March
Tau Ocra w/ Broadsides and Stealth suits GA Vindicators. 1BM
     Boardsides targets the R Bassies. 5KIA, BROKEN
     Stealth suits assault Vindicators. 4KIA BROKEN
IW Tacticals and Decimator come back. Bassies & Vindicators remain broken.
Tau everything comes back

In the end of Turn 1 I stopped recording the activations. I had him and focused on the pressure. His Termies Teli to wiped out the Sky rays. The Stealth and Broadsides coordinated smashed the right flank. Retained with the suits, smashed his center. The Iron Warriors suffered. They had 2 Indirects, landing 9BPs. I saved every single hit. 3BMs at the most were collected on one unit. The Talons failed to come in. Then the Tau did Tau stuff and that was it. Middle of turn two the Iron Warriors were finished.

I normally run a detachment of Broadsides. This will change, the increased speed and 6 seeker missiles from RHs with Lance are growing on me. Working for marker lights on Broadsides is a waste. 
Comparison; 6 Broadsides Vs 6 Railheads. 300 points Vs 325. 4++ Vs 4+. 15cm Vs 30cm. Both are purpose anti tank. The Broadsides are static as hell w/ 15cm of movement. RHs seem to take damage more easily and the BS people fear. 

The second game was air drop Marines. I had asked Dave earlier for a tooled up tough "Air drop marine" 3k primer game. "Air drop marines" and Knights are difficult for me with the Tau.

My list;

Dave took Thawk loaded with Dev and dreads, Thawk loaded with Tacticals, 3 Tbolt formations, 2 speeder formations (1 shooty & 1 MW), Mech scouts, Teli Termies and the BTS - Tacticals +SC +Hunter.

         *I blew the Objective positions. I chose a wide spread. As Dave chose the standard triangle pattern. The spread pattern is my normal choice for marines, as I try to prevent them from supporting each other. In this game the spread forced me units either out of position or set them up to be picked off.
         *Deployment; I left a hole in my scout screen! I also failed to take advantage or notice how the terrain would effect turn one. My deployment pattern was good. The air assault dropped in where I thought. The terrain played turn one for me! I need to pay attention.

         *Area denial; In the middle of Turn 2 all of Dave's units were left of the center line. I out numbered has detachments and was up on activations. I had 3 units ready to activate on my right flank. Plus one in the center. It was at this point I should have swept the right flank, creating a massive focal point in the center of the left flank. Thereby providing unlimited crossfire and marklight opportunities.

Turn 1; Saw the Teli terms drop into a gap in my scout screen. They smoked my AA. I dropped my FW onto the BTS and broke it. Then Dave's BTS refused to fail a save.

Turn 2; My Stealth suits save every shot and beat Dave's scouts in an assault. Then the dice gods showed up. My broadsides missed, the recons failed every save, Dave SC failed his saves. Then the dice flipped. If you hit the other guy saved.
          During the turn I had a chance to sweep the right flank to occupy the whole right side. I saw it and never took the opportunity.

Turn3; Dave went full Dave. He made every save and broke all but the Stealth suits. I shot the ever living shit out of a single rhino, his BTS, it would not die. I rolled double 6s to hit, he rolled double 5s to save.

The dice are dice. Dave is the best player in the group. I did expect to lose. In hind sight screwing the objective pattern and not using the terrain were gifts not taken. I need to pay better attention!

6mm Desert terrain part XI

Priming the goodies that were waiting for me in the States. Everything was scrubbed with dish soap and coated with 3 dollar Home Depot special.

 O sammy's compound.

 More middle east/desert buildings

all the above from Gamescraft.

NobleKnight adobe village

After looking for oil pipes. These popped up on Ebay. I have a few of these kicking around in storage.  The old will need to be rebased. After which I should have good coverage on a table.

Stateside

After two days of traveling, we are finally here.

New record.

All three security check points and they never once opened my bag to look at the miniatures. Thats never happened!

Warmaster Weekends "Terrain" part I

         This is maybe the only wargaming table/terrain, that 90% of us represent correctly. Empty tables! A cloth or gaming mat with zero elevation and no depressions. Very few buildings and trees. Maybe your special and have a road or stream or or or teddy bear fur! 

         Some of you and you know exactly who you are; still use cut up pieces of felt. Your table looks like shit. Sorry. A patch work of felt is bullshit. Go borrow terrain, Jesus.

Don't be the guy that brings this to a convention.

looks like shit man, really!

         I know terrain gets in the way, hills are shitty at best, and trees get expensive fast. It is the last thing we think about before starting an army project. 

        Well, lucky me. Ancient battles were mostly fought in the open. Near zero terrain! 

        Armies were designed to march closely or tightly packed. They were huge 5000 legionaries checkerboard or in 3 lines, Phalanx of a 264+ dudes nut to but, shoulder to shoulder. These boys needed space to deploy and shuffle about.          

In any case where the ground was difficult or broken, these men had a hard time keeping the formation together.

       



         Most common feature on the battlefields were a river/stream and gentle sloping hills/depressions. I will be using my huge collection of Geo-Hex. The Geo-Hex will allow me to create the rolling hills, inclinations, streams, sunken roads, and depressions found across battlefields.

        I have enough trees from 6mm to 20mm that will be used for any woods along the edge or clump of woods here and there. I would like purchase 4-5 buildings to represent a town or village.
            Here the goal is to represent area terrain. Think about a true scale palm tree, like 90 feet high. That palm would be 170mm tall. (avg dude was 64 inches, 10mm = 5.3, 90/5.3=17, 170mm) How many times is that thing going to get knocked over during a game. In terms of playability less is more.

          Yes of course battles were fought in the woods, on the beach, in a mountain pass, near a city wall or flat out attacking a city. These are one off games. You really want to spend your time and money collecting terrain for one game? The same game over and over?
          If your were set on one of these examples, what terrain you do have and that which could be borrowed from your mates or club would meet the need.


It all comes down to it. If you don't have terrain, borrow it!

Road to Fall In part VI "IFs and Tau"

With 3 days left until we leave for the states. Work continues on the Tau and Imperial Fists for Saturday's tourney.

 Last 2 Orcas and a boat load of Recon skimmers

No idea what the real name is for these fighters

6mm Desert Terrain part X

Last 6 pump jacks completed

2 more buildings. The largest one is two glue together. I wanted a building a little thicker.

 Con-X boxes and an Oil storage tank.

The road to Fall In "Tau" part V

Wheels up for the states in 7 days. Crunch time.

A lot of eye strain going on here. Either I will go blind in the near future or my light totally sucks surf balls.

Also I must have used a different wash from last Feb?????? Maybe even a different blue. That is what you get for not writing shit down.

HMGS' Fall In registration is open

Sign up don't be left out!

NetEA tourney is saturday. There are limited spots. 

Update; just finished signing up. The epic tourney is not listed as an event. You should contact Kal.

Warmaster Weekends "miniature sources"

         Where to get the 10mm little bastards? Before creeping your way through each, it would be best to get an idea or list of what your planning. Me? hell no! I went straight to eBay. There was next to nothing on eBay for 10mm ancients. Next up was,

Old glory. 

         They were a staple for ACW 15s. I have been a member of their club as the need a raised. The deal there is 40% off for a year if you pay 50 beans. Depending on how much you order or how big your dreams are, it will work out. You need to order 7 packs to break even. Normally 100 dudes are 17 beans, membership get you 100 dudes at 10.20. 

Warstore    &     Pendraken

           You can get your Pendraken thru the Warstore and save on shipping. The Warstore has some issues getting Pendraken to full kit out orders. They also order once a month or so. You get 30 dudes for 7.30ish. They do have some interesting command options.
          Ordering directing from Pendraken is easier and comes in less than 2 weeks!

Magister Militum

          Here you are stuck ordering from England. Shipping will be high, as are the cost per dude. Yet they have the best line up of ancients with characters. You get 30 dudes for 5.8 pounds sterling whatever that is in dollars.

Eureka minis

They have dudes at 0.75 Aussie dollars each???

Steve Barber

Their dudes are 20 for 3.50 pounds. The line is limited in time scale.

NewLine Designs

         Their dudes are 30 for 4 pounds. Newline has sales from time to time. Some of my 20mm colonials come from them. They don't screw you with shipping and it is fast, less than a week from England.

Old Glory being the cheapest option. I will bulk out my armies with Old Glory. Then sprinkle in a few Pendraken and Magister and Newline Designs to break up the clone army look.

Basing options. 

ebay has plastic and plywood at 48 40x20 & 4 20mm circles for 5.99 pounds

Magister Militum has plastic at 50 for 5 pounds

Shogun Miniatures has 50 magnetic bases for 10 dollars. Metal bases are a little less and shipping is USPS flat rate.

I went with shogun minis for magnetic bases.