More Somali Militia

Some further painting has been done and these are now about two thirds finished, only a few more stands of infantry and command stands to do!

Making Hills

As my weekend game has been called off I've instead made some scenery, I've found there are plenty of guides for making scenery on the internet, however the one thing they lack in my opinion is photos, this is my attempt to remedy this!

Materials
· Plasticard or stiff card (not corrugated)
· Polystyrene sheet or Blue Foam
· Sharp Knife (or hot wire cutter)
· PVA Glue
· Filler
· Coarse & Fine Sand
· Big Pot of Undercoat (Poster Paint or Acrylic)
· Foliage (Flock & Bush material)

Cut the base of the hill from plasticard, this will form the template for your hill. I would advise the use of plasticard over cardboard as the card can warp and leave your hills uneven on the table. Put the template on the polystyrene/Foam and draw round it with a marker, then cut this with a sharp knife. I have used polystyrene sheet here simply because I had a couple of sheets come with a new freezer, the sheet shown below is 1” thick, suitable I thought for hills in 10mm.



Now with your foam block the same size as your base flip it over and carve it with the knife into a rough hill shape, success here is based upon the sharpness of the knife, a blunt knife will make a mess (especially with polystyrene) and not give a clean finish. Alternatively you could use a hot wire cutter.Try to get the sides sloping gently if you want to able to stand miniature on them.



Once you got your hill shape carved, stick it to the base with PVA and leave it to dry.



At this point I like to give the whole piece a coat of filler, to fill any gaps and give a good surface for the paint to adhere too.



I’ve decided for this particular hill to have a ruined building on it as well as a crater both have been stuck on with PVA. You can add anything you want here to fit in with the general theatre, I’ve used trees crashed helicopters, the list is endless.



The addition of some large scatter stones, stuck on with PVA.



And some fine sand again with PVA. If you are making temperate hills I would suggest only putting the scatter material where you don’t intend to flock. After the scatter has had a couple of hours to dry I’ve given the whole model a coat of watered down PVA then given it 12 hours to dry (overnight)



Next day the whole model receives an undercoat (Raw Umber in this case), the colour for this should be suitable for the theatre intended. I’ve used artists acrylic as this can be bought in large tubs pretty cheaply. I’ve given 12 hours drying time for this.

Once thoroughly dried I’ve simply drybrushed the hill to get it the colour required, for this particular hill I’ve gone through six shades of brown/Sand). For temperate hills just drybrush the areas not intended for flock. The building here has also had a quick drybrush and the middle floor painted brown.

Finally I’ve added patches of flock and bush material, this particular look fits in with my basing and the rest of the terrain I’ve built.

This lot took me a few hours over a couple of days

Terrain

I think i'm unusual in that I can only paint under natural light (I've tried daylight bulbs to no avail). This unfortunatley means i'm not getting much painting done during the week, however this does allow me to build terrain!

A rocky desert hill with some roads scaled for 10mm Cold War Commander.

I've got a couple more hills on the go, as well as a fieldworks order due any time which is going to keep me busy, if only I could find a manufactuer of Aleppo Pine or Olive Tees for this scale.

Full Thrust Missile Tokens

I made these as we had none for our previous game, we have been using dice but my recent painting of a number of NSL Missile Boats made this impractical

Pdf sheet link below, feel free to print and use these.

Somali Militia & Technicals

First Batch of Somali Militia for cold war commander

Full Thrust

Finally painted some of my NSL Fleet. (I only bought them 10 months ago!) Only another 30 or so ships to go, what's putting me off is glueing them together, most will need drilling and pinning not something I enjoy.

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Rim Pirates which I painted a while ago. These came in one piece, hence are finished.

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There are no official stats for the new ships Ground Zero have made however there is a great resourse in the form of unofficial lists here:-

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http://fullthrust.star-ranger.com/

Somali Photo Reference - Technicals

I mentioned some of the crazy colour schemes these come in; lately I’ve been gathering photos as reference material. I've reproduced a few here; I particularly like the Islamic crescent that’s been incorporated into the cam pattern on some vehicles. Not relevant to 1993 thankfully, try painting that in 10mm!

I also recommend checking out this documentary:-

http://www.journeyman.tv/?lid=8936

Somali Militia

Finally got around to basing my Somali Militia for cold war Commander, ready for our Black Hawk Down Game. I'm excited about painting the technicals, as that will allow me to explore some of the crazy paint schemes i've seen these in. The 12 stands of infantry are a different story!



A crashed Blackhawk I made, likely to be the objective marker for the first game we play.

A Bridge Crossing in 1967

Played Cold War Commander again this weekend, dusting off the Israelis for another foray in 1967, this time trying to oppose an Egyptian river crossing. I will post a link to the battle report as soon as Big Dave has it up, in the meantime here are a few pictures.

http://baddave.pbworks.com/1967-Game-8

The Fallschirmjäger See Action

After a bout of painting the Fallschirmjäger got a game! We played Troops Weapons & Tactics by Two fat Lardies , the game went well the Fallschirmjäger facing off against some Russians in the snow, the rules seemed ok apart from the force mismatch between elite Fallschirmjäger and regular Russians. Lets just say there were a lot of dead Russians.

Next time we play it will be with a bunch of pine trees(secured in a bargin ebay auction) and we are going to try Rules of Engagement to see if close combat works any better.