Skeletal Rat Swarm

Been another busy month despite the forced locked down :( Despite being kept indoors, I haven't had much time to paint. Most of my spare time has been spent on working on the D&Dlite (D20) roleplaying system our gaming group is using. All inspired by Professor Dungeon Master.

On that note. For an upcoming role playing adventure, there is a combat event where the player characters get swamped by skeletal rats. So I looked around the interwebs to see who made this kind of miniature in 28-32mm scale. And there's nothing!

Reaper Miniatures however do make a very cheap rat swarm in their Bones line. So putting my thinking cap on I got to wondering, "What would happen if I painted the rat swarm in black and then painted the skeleton over the top of each rat model?"

Well, it works pretty good. It won't be gracing the pages of any biological text book (and I'm a Biologist!). But its good enough to do the job on the tabletop. And they are cheap too. So you can create a whole swarm of them. Something I will be working on. Cheap AND nasty. Sweet!

WWI Convoy for Victory at Sea

Davco 1:3000 A/B type Merchantmen

Here's the latest addition to the growing Victory at Sea (Age of Dreadnoughts) fleet. These are Davco 1:3000 scale A/B type Merchant freighters. These ones will also be used as colliers. You can get them as part of the Davco coastal convoy here.

Looking at the photos now and I missed just how bad the lighting was. Its dulled the image so that you can hardly tell the different paint on the decks or the green-grey sea colour of the base. Note to self, next time use a flash!

Lets get this convoy moving!

Randalph's Thugs, the Snowmen

Miniatures by Reaper Miniatures

Randalph the Red Nosed Reindeer, who was previously featured in this post, has more than just his Christmas Gremlins (featured in this post) as members of his gang.

Jonas (left), Fredric (center) and Carl (right), the Frosty Brothers

There are also the Frosty Brothers, Jonas, Fredric and Carl who head up a troop of gangster snowman.

They were originally based for another game. Given that they will now be used for role playing, I need to re-base the brothers before the next game.

Group shot. Randalph, the Frosty Brothers, and the Christmas Gremlins

I think these miniatures are by Ral Partha Europe

And here's the rest of the Frosty Gang, just finished. These lads animated by their magical hats. Loose the hat and they become just a normal snowman.

To provide variety of pose, I bent the arms and affixed them at different angles. That simple method made each model more unique, threatening and in motion.

Yes, they are wearing the latest in neck tie fashion

Timber Wolves

I needed some wolves for our role playing game. Fortunately I have had these wolves from Iron Wind Metals (Chaos Wars and their other ranges) and one or two from Reaper Miniatures. So finally got off my backside to paint them. So thought I would share these. Enjoy!

H.M.S Canopus and Windy Bottoms

Over the Easter break I was able to finish off some 1:3000 scale WWI ships. I also began a solo game (courtesy of a little something out of China that has kept everyone locked up of late) of Victory at Sea - Age of Dreadnoughts, which I will post about later.

For now however I thought I would show a few images of some of the items for that game. See if you can guess what battle the solo game replays by thinking of an answer to the following question:

What WWI naval battle in the Pacific should the H.M.S. Canopus have been a part of but was not able to participate in due to its slow speed and aging engines?

Windy Bottoms is a wind direction marker that I have made from part of a Dreadfleet miniature. The windy breath part of the miniature kept breaking off so I ended up using cotton wool to represent the wind.

I used a pin glued to the mouth of Windy Bottoms to act as an anchor for the cotton wool. This provided the frame with which the cotton wool remains supported upon.