Models and Painting

By Tom Mullane

This winter, my sister got married in a small ceremony in NJ. I served as the minister, and it will have been the 8th wedding I have performed since being ordained in the Ministry of Life Church (certificates available online for 35$— includes parking pass) Every great wedding party needs a wedding cake, even small receptions for family and close friends like the one my sister and my new brother had planned. In an effort to make use of my wargaming skills in a non-wargaming capacity, I decided to make a winter-themed diorama for the cake and desserts my wife Angela was going to make.

By Howard West

Background

My previous article Team Yankee COLD WAR Warrior Revisited the T-55 Tank focused on a Team Yankee player adding a 24-27 point 2nd or allied T-55 tank formation to an existing army list. With the “official” Team Yankee points reduced for this year’s US National events and with the changing META caused by the new NATO books as described in Tom Gall’s recent No Dice No Glory article on chasing the Team Yankee Meta. 

Also, several of our upcoming local Team Yankee tournaments that I will be playing in have the following point levels: 110, 94, and 70. I thought this provided a good basis for a series of list-building discussions for Team Yankee on No Dice No Glory.

By Howard West

Background

With the “official” Team Yankee points reduced for this year’s US National events and with the changing META caused by the new NATO books as described in Tom Gall’s recent No Dice No Glory article on chasing the And since several other upcoming local tournaments have reduced point levels, in the following order 110, 94, and 70.

I wanted to see what a 2nd Warsaw Pact formation might look like and I started playing around with different formations and kept coming back to an old reliable T55/T54 Tank family. Team Yankee represents the T55/54 Family in 20 different tank and motorized infantry formations in 5 different books from the Soviets, East Germans, Czechs, Poles, Oil Wars(Syrians and Iraqis).

By Richard Steer

Many wargamers that I know keep a recipe book, a notebook that is used to record which paints have been used for a particular project. This record is invaluable should the project be put on hold for a time, or ends up being extended at a later date due to new releases, as it avoids the question of “what on earth did I paint those with?”

Model Colors is a free iOS application that I have started using in place of my own recipe book. At its core is a paint library holding over 24,000 products from a wide range of manufacturers, which includes other types of products such as inks, pigments, and thinners. It also has a number of features that mean it can serve as more than just a catalog of the paints that you own.

By Richard Steer

I am in the process of for my Late-War British. The Kangaroos were created in August 1944 by converting 72 Priest self-propelled guns belonging to the 3rd Canadian Division into armored personnel carriers. The converted Priests retained the markings of their original units: the 12th, 13th, and 14th Field Regiments, Royal Canadian Artillery. The are focused on the armoured divisions, with nothing suitable for the artillery units of an infantry division. In order to provide markings for my Kangaroos, I decided to try printing my own using our home inkjet printer.

The specific decals that I wanted were the divisional insignia, the Arm of Service flash for the regiment, and the battery identification markings. I created the images I needed using PowerPoint, while the divisional insignia was downloaded from Wikipedia then scaled to the right size. The big issue was always going to be how to achieve the white lettering in the unit symbols with a printer does not use white ink.

By Kreighton Long

Humans are squishy, fragile creatures who leak profusely when punctured. Knowing this, combatants typically are inclined to hid their more vulnerable bits away from the sharp pieces of metal flying through the air. While the First Industrial Revolution featured columns of well dressed fellas marching towards the sounds of guns and exchanging volleys with equally brave soldiers opposite them, there are instances of trenches and emplacements being used in sieges or to protect less maneuverable artillery pieces on the battlefield.

Moving into the Second Industrial Revolution, the descendants of survivors from the aforementioned battles fully embraced the value of fighting from holes in the ground during World War One. The topic of “digging in” continues to the modern era as any contemporary Soldier or Marine can attest to. On a typical wargaming table, dug in fortifications or emplacements are more of an exception than a rule. Players tend to prefer skirmishes and battles of maneuver rather than a bloody, typically one-sided siege or assault.

By Kreighton Long

It’s not too hard to find decals to add rank patches to your GIs. The Warlord Games set of US Infantry even comes with decals in the box. For those of you who are gluttons for punishment or want the bragging rights of painting tiny lines on your already tiny toy soldiers here are the steps for how I add rank patches to my 29th Infantry Division army.

By Kreighton Long

When playing Bolt Action I’ve run into the headache of trying to find an NCO who fell to a successful sniper or find an officer to see if he’s close enough to a unit to buff their order check. Taking an extra ten seconds or so to find the right model is a minor inconvenience at worst but there are means of expediting this step while adding fun historically accurate details to your painted toy soldiers.

The American GIs in World War Two painted a white stripe or bar on the back of their helmets so that soldiers they were leading, presumably from the front, could identify their leader and follow them into battle. American Officers donned a vertical bar while Noncommissioned Officers sported a horizontal stripe.

Below are the steps I took to hand-paint my platoon and squad leaders for my Bolt Action 29th Infantry Division army.

By Kreighton Long

While window shopping for light artillery models for my WW2 Romanian army I found limited options to choose from. While Great Escape Games makes a fine looking Romanian light artillery piece (one will make its way into my arsenal eventually) I wanted to challenge myself with a bit of conversion work to add variety to my three-light artillery Romanian list for Bolt Action.

For my conversion attempt I began with the wooden spoked wheel variant of the WWI French style 75mm gun as found in the Warlord Games . The crew themselves needed a little customization to make them more Romanian which is where the conversion work was done for this piece. I did attempt to find a way to modify German, Soviet, and American helmets to the point where they would pass as Romanian but the solution alluded me.

By Paolo Paglianti

I really like to have custom bases for my miniatures, as you can see and read here (), here () and here (), I normally try to have small dioramas for my Flames of War or Team Yankee infantry teams. When I began painting my new Iraq army, and I come to the three platoons infantry formation, I wanted something different. One of the three platoons would fight on rocky ground, the same I used for my “Sicilian” bases for my British WW2 Paras. Some great inspirations come from my friend Luca Papisca and his US bases!

For the other two platoons, I chose an “urban street” scenario and a “rural village” scenario, using my new 3D Resin Printer (). I think 3d Printing is a true revolution in modeling and in our hobby: not only because you can print the tanks you need, but especially since you can “create” almost everything you want, you just need some creativity.