Throwback – Lead Belt Nottingham 2010 – Day 2
For the first full day in Nottingham we had the two newcomers on the miniature market on our schedule, Warlord Games and Mantic Games.
Warlord was already in the Lenton Business Centre where they sit until today. But back in the day, as a young and small company, they only rented single offices that were spread across the centre and not the whole wing and own brick & mortar store like today.
The range was already quite broad in terms of historical coverage, but far from the variety of plastic kits as today. The Early Imperial Romans and some Black Powder kits were already available and the first German soldiers for Bolt Action.
A miniature Odyssey – The Gates of Hades…
…have opened and the last block for the Summer Project 2020 is finished. Since I already had some practice with the skeletons from Warlord Games, it didn't take long to paint the last six of them.
A miniature Odyssey – With Spear and Shield
When you think of ancient Greece, you simply cannot help but think of a Hoplite armed with a shield and spear. Logically many Hoplites died in the battles and so it is not surprising that I painted some skeletons with exactly this combination of weapons for the second block for the summer project.
12 years of “professional” wargaming
Due to the lack of conventions and events this year, I had a look through my archives to see if there would be content that would be interesting for a throwback. While looking through the documents and pictures, I noticed that I have my 12th anniversary of "professional" wargaming this year.
(Left: 1999 Warhammer Store Opening in Party in Darmstadt, Germany,
Middle: Mike McVey at Salute 2012 London, UK
Right: RPC 2012 Kick-Off in Cologne, Germany)
What do I mean by that? I am wargaming since 1996, but in 2008 I got a trade licence to run a blog. A trade licence for a blog? Seems a bit oversized, don't you think? Well, it depends on what you're going to do.
Bolt Action SdKfz 251/7 Ausf. D Pionierwagen
A bit of a sneaky release by Warlord Games, with the Campaign Stalingrad book a new plastic kit came along - the Sd.Kfz 251/7 Ausf. D Pionierwagen.
There was a Pionierwagen kit available before, based upon the plastic Sd.Kfz. 251 Ausf. C with a few resin parts added, to create the /7 variant. In this case we have the 251/1 Ausf. D as a base with an additional plastic frame, as we've seen in the kit of the Flammpanzerwagen, Stummel or mortar carrier.
Bolt Action Campaign Stalingrad
The last Bolt Action supplement I've reviewed here was Korea and that was a spin-off, which covered for the first time a conflict outside of world war 2. So considering world war 2 books for Bolt Action, the latest one before that was Operation Overlord released in summer 2019, one more reason to see how Warlord Games covers one of the biggest battles of the second World War - Stalingrad.
So far, the only campaign book covering Stalingrad, yet in a brief way, as Ostfront from the first edition of Bolt Action. Campaign Road to Berlin covers the epoch two years after the Battle of Stalingrad. But this battle and the fighting around it, had such an impact on the war in the east that they absolutely deserve a supplement of its own and Warlord Games spreads that on a very solid 176 pages. This is upper region for the length of Bolt Action supplement, and it stays with the regular price band of 20 GBP or 30 USD. And as often with the Bolt Action / Osprey books, we had an early cover (right) and a changed final cover of the supplement (left), moving from a Soviet soldier in winter gear to a sailor.
A miniature Odyssey – Block 1? Done!
A month has passed and I am really happy that I managed to finish the first block for the Summer Project before the time ran out. Skeletons are a bit unspectacular themselves, so there is not much to tell about them despite the successful completion of this stage.
Black Seas – Schooners Squadron
We've seen the smallest of the ships from the Black Seas range and a third party company this week as well with Hagen Miniatures, so let's take a look at another small to medium sized vessel, the schooners who are offered by Warlord Games in a squadron of six.
A schooner is a type of sailing vessel, that comes in different variants, for example as a two-masted schooner, and can be gaff or top-sailed. Warlord Games went with a top-sailed variant. The origins of the schooner is unclear, but the name appeared first on the eastcoast of North America in early 1700s, and became in the areas of New England and Atlantic Canada popular for coastal trade, as the ship required a smaller crew compared to other ships of its size and still was fast and versatile.
Black Seas – Gunboat Squadron
I want to cover some of the smaller ships for Black Seas this week, and among the smallest models available are the Gunboats. They come with multiple ships per base and multiple base per pack, and are sold as a Gunboat Squadron for Black Seas.
A gunboat was would usually have a single mast and be armed with between one up to three cannons or mortars. They were designed to be used in the near-shore areas, on rivers and inland waters, therefore their compact build. As such they service as support for troops on land in such areas, along with patrol or guard missions. Napoleon ordered hundreds of these to be build for the planned invasion of England and had them armed with howitzers.
A miniature Odyssey – Our arrows…
…will bloat out the sun!!! The first half of the first block is done. I have to say that the whole thing turned out to be more difficult than expected. The first step was still relatively easy, the skeletons were completely washed with Sepia, and partially with Devlan Mud and Black.
After that I tried to emphasize some of the accents with Bone again and then with White. But here I already got to the first hurdle - I just can't paint the same thing for so long and so I had to split the first block earlier than I thought.
Like us on Facebook
Follow me on Instagram
Categories
- events (186)
- fantasy (502)
- General (155)
- historical (585)
- Little Big Adventures (4)
- offtopic (5)
- reviews (449)
- science fiction (554)
- showroom (96)
- work-in-progress (370)
