Bolt Action Fallschirmjager for Sicily and Mediterranean

 Hello guys,

I am still painting World War 2 stuff for my Sicily 1943 project,  this time, half a platoon of German Fallschirmjager, paratroopers for Bolt Action game, inspired by the new book of Bolt Action "Soft Underbelly"

The miniatures are Artizan Designs, from an out of production line of "Ramcke Brigade" paratroopers in North Africa, but I found them excellent for Sicily too, with their tropical uniforms, in summer shirts are so on.

I have painted six of them so far, deliberately changing the shades of yellow ochre on the different miniatures, in order to give more flavour to the unit.

the other 6 are just primed in brown, waiting in the painting queue ( I hope to paint them soon).

I already have a couple of Panzers of Hermann Goering division and another couple of Italian tanks in Sicily, some standard German infantry (in fieldgrey uniform) with mortar and HMG, but I wanted to add more "Mediterranean" feeling to the army with some Fallschirmjager in tropical uniform, and, in the future, Italian infantry too.

This is the Order of Battle of 1st Fallschirmjäger Division in Sicily:

 - Generalleutnant Richard Heidrich (commenced arriving by air on 12 July; the 1st Fallschirmjäger Regiment was held in reserve at Naples)

3rd Fallschirmjäger Regiment

3x battalions

13th Mortar Company

14th Anti-tank Company

4th Fallschirmjäger Regiment

3x battalions

13th Mortar Company

14th Anti-tank Company

1st Parachute Artillery Regiment

I Battalion (3x batteries 7.5 cm GebG 36)

II Battalion (3x batteries 7.5 cm GebG 36; with the 1st Fallschirmjäger Regiment at Naples)

1st Parachute Machine Gun Battalion

1st Parachute Panzerjäger Battalion (7.5 cm Pak 40 anti-tank guns)

1st Parachute Engineer Battalion

1st Parachute Signal Battalion

Division Services

Bolt Action US airborne for Sicily and Normandy (old miniatures)

 Hi guys,

I am still in WW2 mood,  painting some scenery for Sicily 1943 and a platoon of tropical Fallschirmjager for the same theatre. But in the meantime, I took from the box some old painted Bolt Action miniatures like this US Airborne force from Bolt Action, mostly bought back in the day when the game saw the light.

This weekend I took some pictures of my small US force so far. 

It comprises a platoon of US Airborne, a Sherman tank and a 76mm gun.  The first two units are Warlord's and the latter is Artizan.

I recently bought 2 more Shermans and another Airborne platoon, also support weapons like mortar and Bazookas, in order to have the army more playable.

These were painted a looooong time ago, maybe almost a decade or so, but never photographed.

The infantry is not painted up to my today's standard of painting, these were painted using Quickshade splash on technique and then slightly highlighted, but anyway, I will paint another batch at some point, and expand the army.

The army was thought for Normandy, but I will use it for Sicily, although the tank has the wrong painting scheme and is not the exact version of Sherman... but , you know, it's a game :D

Another member of my Tercio skirmish force

 Hello guys,

It has been a while since last time I updated this blog. In August it was too hot to paint, and also some summer trips abroad prevented me from grabbing my brushes, but here I am again.

These past weeks I am in a World War 2 mood, so I want to re-launch my Bolt Action force for Sicily, Normandy and Far East, but in the meantime, I wanted to finish a miniature from "Tercio Creativo", a sword and buckler man, in heroic 28mm scale, so more 30mm than 28mm... I have a lot of these miniatures and really like its sculpting, but they are little bit too big compared to the rest of my collection, so I use them separately, in skirmish mode.

I painted him using the Foundry Triad system, and then matt varnish with brush... sadly I used a dirty brush (with some plaster from a terrain project) when applied the matt varnish, so there are some traces of plaster in the trousers of the figure :( but anyway, I am happy with the end result.

Now all the miniatures of this range I have already painted, plus Alatriste, from Anno Domini 1666. the difference in size is slightly noticeable.

Cheers!

XVII c. Marksman: sniper for the Tercio!

 Hi guys!

I hope your summer is going fine, despite this terrible hot weather...  now I continue in my Pike and Shot mood, so  I am slowly (as always) building a small warband of  a Spanish Tercio for skirmish games such as Donnybrook, or our modification of Mordheim, adapted to 30 Years War. 

Last month I painted Captain Alatriste, using a miniature from "Anno Domini 1666" miniatures, you can see it in this blog in the last entry of June 2022. And  I also have the standard bearer from "Tercio Creativo", which I will show to you soon, and now I have painted a sniper or marksman, also from "Tercio Creativo".

This brand is a Spanish company which produces some good quality resin miniatures for their sci-fi and alt-historical games like “1650 a capa y a espada” a fantasy game set in an alternate world with some factions inspired in mid XVII C. Spanish and French.

I don’t play that game, but I really like how their miniatures look, and some of them are very useful for historical games 30 Years War style ! 

So this miniature is called “Zurriago” in their catalog, but currently is out of production, but probably will be for sale soon. 

I instantly fell in love with the oversized heavy musket and the aesthetic of the miniature, the sculpt is very good, with no flash or bubles... so with those merits he is now the marksman of my warband or little skirmishes force. 

As you can see, it’s full of little details (very time consuming to paint). I painted him mostly in Foundry paints triads, I specifically like their brownish shades like conquer brown, buff leather, and dark African flesh, also use Vallejo paints, and this time, I resorted to Citadel Rakarth Flesh for the shirt of the soldier. In past times I used only citadel (from 2000 onwards) but their tendency to dry out inside the pot made my change my paint range to other paints.

The varnish is my new favorite matt varnish; Green Stuff World ultra matt varnish!

I hope you like the finish result :)

Battalion gun for Tercio Morados Viejos

 Hello friends,

I hope your summer is going great! After a week off, I came back home and finished an ad hoc base for a Tercio I painted some years ago... a battalion gun or "mansfelete" light gun of Tercio "Old Purples" or "Morados Viejos" for my Spanish army of 1670-90'.

I used an old Phoenix miniatures Spanish Musketeer, cut off his hands, musket etc, and replaced with GW plastic hands of artillery crew of the Empire great cannon! my Warhammer Empire bits box is extremely useful for all kind of medieval, renaissance or baroque miniature conversions.

The other artillery crew is a brand new Reiver Castings miniature from their nice Franco Dutch War range.

The battalion gun itself is a 15mm Napoleonic carriage with a 28mm gun from Blood & Plunder miniatures.

Both miniatures were painted with Foundry Paints and Vallejo, specially Royal Purple paint! 

And now the full unit:

Cheers!

Capitán Alatriste !

 Hello guys,

This time I have painted a miniature that I have special fondness for, "Captain Alatriste", well , a proxy of him by Anno Domini 1666 miniatures.

The Polish company Anno Domini 1666, produces excellent metal miniatures set in the 17th century, with various factions including Poles, French, Germans, Spanish, Ottomans, even generic fantasy ones, for their skirmish game, which I have not tried.

 In my case I bought some French king's musketeers, some Spanish ones, and some loose miniatures.

For those who do not know, Captain Alatriste is the main character in a series of novels by the prestigious Spanish writer and member of the Royal Spanish Academy of Letters Arturo Pérez-Reverte.

The novels deal with the adventures of a Spanish soldier in the first half of the 17th century, born in 1582. The novels are very fun and historically accurate, and the protagonists face Dutch, Venetians, Turks, French, English, pirates and against other swashbucklers, in Madrid and other places in Europe, Alatriste and his mates participated in the siege of Breda in 1625, the battle of Nordling in 1634, or the battle of Rocroi in 1643.

                                        Viggo Mortensen in the film about Capitan Alatriste (2006)

I personally will use the captain alatriste miniature as the leader of my Warband for skirmish games like Donnybrook or a custom-historical version of mordheim.

I painted him mostly with Foundry paint triads, and then an ultra matt varnish by Green Stuff World.

Cheers!

30 Years War French regiment Lyonnais : Part I

 

Hello mates

As I continue with  my 30 Years War mood,  I painted part of the regiment Lyonnais in the last few days, and then "only" the musketeers will be left in order to have the unit completed and playable.

I chose Regiment Lyonnais because it was one the first French regiments of XVII c. and it fought under the command of Philipe de La Mothe, and then Le Grand Condé in the field battles of Santa Cecilia and sieges of Lerida/Lleida from 1644-47 during Franco-Spanish War of 1635-59, all won by the Spaniards.

I used a wide variety of miniatures ; Warlord Games, Bicorne, TAG, Horcata/Empress, Steve Barber and one Old Glory, I think they don't look bad together despite being quite a few manufacturers mixed in the same base.

The flag is from Warlord Games, and the white French flag was free downloaded from the internet.

I will slowly paint the musketeers, that are also from several manufacturers, Perry,  Foundry,  Avanpost, Warlord...

Work in Progress...

I also tried a lightbox, but was unimpressed by the result, I probably did something wrong 😂😂 so I kept my old school white cloth as background .

By the way, the battles of 30 Years War in the southern front, in the forties of XVII c. are superbly explained by Pierre Picouet in his book:

Cheers!

Civilian gun and militia for the siege of Gerona 1684: PART II FINAL

 

Hello guys,

Here is the part II and final of the civilian and milita unit for the siege of Gerona 1684.

I've added an unarmored pikeman from NorthStar 1672, turned into a gunner, painted in earthy colors, in order to give him a more civilian look. Also a Front Rank militiaman, from the "Monmouth Rebellion" range, I replaced his scythe with a halberd, to give him a more military touch. 

Front Rank late XVII c artillery man with a green stuff feather

Civilian Hero

The gabions are 3D printed, the Chevaux de Frise is from Warfare Miniatures, and the fence is resin from a Polish brand whose name I can't remember (sorry!). Regarding the gun/saker, it's a mixture of various brands... Warlord carriage, Warhammer wheels...

These defenders, although painted and modeled to "serve" in the 1684 Siege of Girona, are nevertheless generic and versatile enough to fight in any 17th century siege from 1665 onwards.

In this particular case, they will load the cannon with shrapnel, nails, stones, buttons, or coins to wreak havoc on attackers at close range, plus it can fight well in melee mode and musketry fire, making it a potent unit: entrenched, with melee and ranged attacks!

The other two guys; kneeling musketeer and soldier with plug bayonet were shown in the previous post about this unit, and they are Bicorne and Front Rank miniatures respectively.

I hope you like them!