Stargrave Crew II - first build

 Here is the first figure built from the the new Stargrave Crew II box.

She is designed to be the nominal leader of the party for a Five Parsecs From Home campaign

More crew to follow.

Mantic Zombie Apocalypse bargain box

 As part of Mantic's Summer Sale, they had a Zombie Apocalypse set.

It included a large number of "modern" zombies that looked a bit familiar.

They are sorted by design (there are a number of duplicates, but as this post shows, different colours make all the difference).

Some will receive replacement heads and arms from various sources.

Here they are all mobbed up.

The set also included a hard plastic model truck.

Two weird mortar, crew and creepy crawly piles.

Three largish monster zombies.

And one big Alpha Zombie.

Not sure about the mortar and crew, but the rest will eventually find a home.

Anvil Zombies

 Anvil Industries do a range of multipart/multipose zombies in 28mm size. One of the body types is the Modern Military Zombie. You select your required body type, then add a set of suitable arms. In this case the Zombie Fatigues arms.

The pieces are cleanly cast in a white resin. Minor flash is easily removed and there is next to no moulding lines. I wish some plastic figures were so nicely moulded.

Each body is wearing modern military body armour, in various degrees of damage.

The supplied heads include four with helmets and one bare headed.

Here is the first one assembled. Though there are only five body poses, there are plenty of assembly options plus other heads and arms in the range.

This shot does show some minor mould lines which will need fixing.

Scale comparison with the late and lamented The Walking Dead: All Out War zombies.

This one is shorter than  these two figures, though part of it might be the pose.

The height difference is slightly more noticeable with these two TWD:AOW characters.

One solution will be to add a piece of plastic card over the slot in the base rather than just filling it.

The obligatory William Killian comparison shot.

Some of the TWD:AOW figures are bigger than others.

Stargrave Crew II

 Here is the new Stargrave Crew II from North Star.

A standard cardboard box contains four sprues of five figures each and two sprues of ten Renedra bases.

Clockwise from top left: Hi-Tech carbine; carbine; pistol with extended snail mag.

Top row Hi-Tech carbine; pistol; carbine.

Second row: carbine; rifle; carbine.

Top row: Shotgun. 

Second row -left to right: pistol; pistol/smg; rifle.

Third row - left to right: flame thrower; rifle.

Top row, clockwise: pistol/SMG; adjustable spanner; pistol.

Second row - left to right: pistol.

Plague Zombies

 While backfilling the missing figures for the now late and lamented TWD:AOW, I also ordered a box of Mantic's Plague Zombies.

These will probably used for Five Parsecs from Home and Stargrave games.

The box is the medium sized Mantic box with a printed wrapper.

There are four identical sprues, each of which makes five figures for a total of twenty figures.

Interesting bases are supplied the box - 25mm round but with a indentation that would assist if you are using metal figures with integral bases, or inverted, and use them for housing a magnet.

Here is a comparison of two assembled Plague Zombies and a North Star Quarantine 37 zombie.

A|nd here is the obligatory William Killian shot.

Blotz Spawning Pool in the Frozen City

 The previous build of the Blotz Spawning Pool was for Ghost Archipelago. This one is for Frostgrave.

Skeletons move past the crumbling ceremonial pool, not caring what might have dislodged the stones...

The Blotz 28mm Spawning Pool comes as one medium sized sheet of MDF. It has gone up £1.00 since I bought the last one, also at SELWG.

I decided this should have a story to it. I decided that it would still be full of frozen water, perhaps with broken ice indicating Something had emerged from the inky depths.

To do that, before assembling the pieces, I used a razor saw to cut one corner off of the cap stones piece  that make up the top of the walls, separating the two stones. I also cut away some of the stones that would have been beneath the capstones.

This time I had less difficulty assembling the inner and outer walls, I cannot see any difference in the layout, maybe I was paying more attention.

The edges of the cap stones were bevelled with a file to show age and wear.

Once the main part was assembled, I took a suitably sized Products for Wargamers Scatter MDF base and  bevelled the edges with a file (a round file makes a more natural looking slope). The body of the pool was then glued on top, with sufficient surrounding space to add some additional flag stone fragments made from bits of MDF. The pieces of MDF removed from the walls was then added on top, together with the two separate cap stones.

Oathmark skeletons move past the pool, their unlike not disturbing any lurkers.

Detail of the stones, was it the movement of the ice within, or has something escaped the frozen pool?

Oathmark Goblin explores the ruins.

Top view of the pool.

Between the flagstones and on the other parts of the exposed base, Woodland Scenics cinder ballast was sprinkled over PVA glue.

The whole thing was first sprayed with Halford's Grey Primer, followed by Citadel Chaos Black spray. The whole thing was then brush painted with watered down Army Painter black paint to seal the PVA and fill in where the spray might have missed.

The stones were dry brushed first with a mix of Vallejo Black Grey and Army painter Black, followed by lighter dry brushing of Black Grey, then Black Grey mixed with Vallejo London grey and finally a dry brush of Citadel terminates Stone.

It was then washed with Citadel Nuln Oil.

The pool itself has still to be painted.

Empress M48A3 Patton MBT - further Work In (glacial) Progress

 Continuing the work on the Empress M48A3.

One thing that has been pointed out is the main gun travel lock projects over the back of the hull, for moulding reasons the model has the lock slightly shorter.

So to make a new gun cradle, I took a length of 1mm brass rod and using a specialist set of pliers (business end shown below) bent the end into a loop.

The end after the loop will be given a 90 degree bend and a suitable hole drilled into the travel lock.

The power cable for the searchlight has been shaped and inserted into the hole in the turret roof and the back of the searchlight.

Holes for the three aerials have also been drilled into the roof.

The aerials will be cut from 1mm brass rod and bases made of 2mm plastic tube.