Dystopian wars: 1:1200 Covenant of Antarctica fleet additions WIP01

Just a quick shot of something that's been on my table for a while, and a welcome break from painting hundreds of 15mm SF.

New additions:
~ long-unfinished Prometheus, going for the final push on this. Still need to insert turret magnets and superdetailing. White on funnels
~ Annonax assault sub. There are so many propulsion units I'm going to have to work on them to make them stand out. Superdetailing.
~ Fresnels. The amplification will need some work. White on funnels. The turrets need magnetising. Superdetailing.
~ Thales'. Superdetailing.
~ Galens. White on funnels, superdetailing.
~ Plutarchs. Superdetailing.

After that, decals for all. Varnishing. More photos.

The Plato at the back and the Diogenes at the front are previously finished miniatures I keep handy to ensure consistency of style.

See you next time.

Dystopian wars: 1:1200 'The Black Wolf'

So the story goes that the Black Wolf is stolen secret technology of the Russians, and other very Red-Octoberish plot details. What better misdirection than painting it a different colour?
Therefore my Black Wolf is green. See what you think.

I hadn't quite done enough coats of micro-sol to take the sheen off the skull and crossbones decal when I took this

Front on

A nice shot from above

The base colour was Secret Weapon washes' 'Baby Poop', with Vallejo 'Smokey Ink' as the main complimentary colour. The hazard decals are from veni vidi vici, the skull from an old Macross 'Roy Fokker Special' kit :)

Dystopian Wars: Covenant of Antarctica - More vessels painted

First up, my Callimachus Orb. The 'lighting' was done with successive dry brushes of white and either the fluoro green or blue. The highlights on the waves are done with a white POSCA marker. I use a 0.05 or 0.03 liner for recess darkness.

Waterlined Callimachus orb

This is my activated Orb. Slice of Perspex rod does the trick...

Activated orb

Also finished is my Drone Carrier. Here it is.

Drone carrier starboard

Drone carrier port

To celebrate its completion, I finally undertook the semi-tedious job of making my tiny flyer drones look half-way decent. Roundels from Dom's Decals, as now displayed on all vessels.

Tiny flyers

A few shots of my older stuff I took at the same time.

Cruisers

Battleship

Frigates

Further additions to the fleet...

Dystopian Wars: 1:1200 Antarctic Base WIP 1

I wanted a spectacular table piece to bring Armour to our naval battles in Dystopian Wars, so I decided to make a base for my covenant forces. As I had the basis of some mountains in the form of some packaging, I collected together various snow powders, ice blue paint, and a bag of mod-roc. Here we go...

I started with a big bottle of PVA and the aforementioned packaging, plus a nice 2' x 2' (roughly) piece of blue foam to base it all on. Let gluing commence!

Once the first layer was down, the more mountainous areas.

I picked away at the edges with a scalpel to try to make it look more natural.

Cardboard box full of cat litter holding down the top layer to ensure a firm bond.

Aforementioned cat litter sprinkled on liberally applied PVA (with a bit of water for covering power. My reasoning was twofold - a) the litter would make the flat tops more uneven, and b) as the mod-roc is soaked in water to activate it and it's being applied to cardboard, I thought it might alleviate some sogginess.

I chucked any other uneven bits on there too

So here's the first layer of mod-roc being applied. This is the same stuff as a nurse would use to plaster your arm. Dip in water, and then lay on.

That's the whole thing mod-rocked. Fags for scale.

Spare cat litter used for rockfalls.

The hangar entrance. Gives it a nice 'Captain Nemo' feel, I think.

Main entrance. I smoothed down the area in front as it would be used extensively.

First dark spray - this is spray on stone (yes, it's real, you can buy it in B&Q).

I kept layering it until I was happy

Spray on stone detail. 

I  popped some covenant buildings on for scale. I'm going to be using these and some firestorm armada bits to make a city. 

Some more work with spray blues and greys, white spray highlights, then various snow powders and pigments added for detail. It's looking ok, but it needs a companion board (so that it covers 1/3 of a 6x4 table, a harbour and docks in the middle, and a city built around it. Quite a lot more to do on it, I'll add pictures as it jostles with the umpteen other projects I have going.

Dystopian Wars: 1:1200 gun emplacements

These have been done for a while actually.

They are, as with all the Spartan stuff, pretty easy to paint.

With rockets...

With ack-ack..

Or with a generator.

Dystopian Wars: Kingdom of Britannia vs Republique of France 1000pts

Concentrate all firepower
on that dreadnought!

Our plucky contestants; the largely undefeated Charles - once again fielding his largely undefeated KoB fleet. The relative newbie Dunc, in his very third game, but fielding for the first time his freshly-painted RoF force.

Look, Mum!
Skimming cruisers!

1000points each means both field dreadnoughts, but no air power other than the obligatory 10 tiny tiny flyers. Both KoB are CAPs, whereas RoF field a Torpedo bomber flight and a CAP.

The objective is to destroy core fleet. And they're off! Minimal terrain covers the Britannian right flank, but the French have a plan to skim over it. This plan is quickly abandoned when the heavy Brit left flank open fire.

Magenta mkI rear view

Here come the Ecuyers

Dunc is eager to try his heat lances and manoeuvres his heavy hitters toward Charlie's dreadnought and battleship.

A fierce exchange of fire over the first three turns bag a cruiser and three frigates for Britannia, but a more impressive four destroyers, a cruiser and a frigate fall under the French onslaught. There's serious damage to the Magenta mkII and the Ecuyers though.

Inexorably, they draw closer

Turn four and things start to get nasty. Two KoB cruisers attempt to board a RoF cruiser, and with a swift exchange of cards are repelled! Meanwhile a line of KoB frigates unleash 20 dice on the Magenta mkI.
The French are feeling the pressure as the Majesty class unleashes 25 dice on the beleaguered Magenta mkII, which miraculously survives on 1HP. This proves extremely fortunate on the next turn when it delivers a critical with its redoubtable heat lance! An unfortunate boarding attempt is easily massacred by the dreadnought's CAP, however.

Massed French

Damage abounds, but the
RoF fleet is holding up.

Dangerous boats

Magenta mkI
takes heavy damage

Th KoB frigates completing
their pincer movement

A final round or two of firing saw two French cruisers down and a KoB frigate but the hour was late. A largely disabled KoB dread (7 damage and two half AD counters) faced a ready-to sink pocket battleship and a RoF dread with one hit, so there was still life in the battle, but a marginal KoB victory was declared as he was much closer to the objective.

All parties had jolly good fun, hands were shaken and North duly faced.

I think there will be more painting of DW models in the near future.

Bits and bobs

It's been tricky getting things done, first myself ill for over a week, then my daughter. So nothing's been finished since my last update.

Here's what's on the table, though:

Here are the Amera islands set, partially undercoated. I'll be doing a step-by-step when I can find a spare hour or so...

My 'activated' Callimachus orbs, still a Work in Progress

This is more WIP on my CoA dreadnought

These are some of the lovely Langton 1:1200 napoleonic buildings. Splendid detail



and   here's a shot showing them against the Covenant Battleship for scale

Work continues on the Imperium sky fortress

A souvenir of London? Perfect for a 1:1200 church/cathedral.

The material they're made from is tenacious though, you can see how little a circular saw has done to this beastie.



Finally, I thought I'd show you this. It's not my own work (I wish it was). It's a display game of dystopian wars from a show called Tactica in Hamburg. A team of dedicated German modellers took two months to build this beast, Very impressive.The blog's in German, but you can follow the progress of how they built it at http://www.hamburger-tactica.de/newsblog/?p=813

In other news, this blog now has over 2000 views, so I'll be making some small changes to it.

More about the Covenant of Antarctica fleet...