Dark Ages Two-Handed Axemen (Minimalist)

Dark Ages Two-Handed Axemen

I've started painting more figures for my minimalist Dark Ages army. This time it is armored warriors with two-handed Danish axes.

Sorry that the close-up is a little blurry!

Front and side views.

It was a moderately complex build, but it required very little modification to the component parts.

Here are all of the components to the figure.

The figure consists of the following components.

• The head and helmet is a button plug, also called a mushroom plug. It is a plug for holes and is used in furniture making.
• The body is a cylindrical, plastic bead. I would prefer wood as the paint sticks better, but I cannot find a cylindrical one that is the right size.
• The feet are a polymer clay 'bead' that I picked up at Hobby Lobby. Because it is a flat disk it works well for adding height, and the polymer clay is very easy to cut with a hobby knife to shape.
• Because I use a lot of toothpicks as spears for my other Dark Ages warriors, I end up with a number of wooden scraps as I only use the pointed ends.
• Finally, I found a smaller, flat, polymer clay bead that, when cut in half, makes a passable axe blade.

If I have any criticism it is that I need to do a better job of trimming the ends of the axe handle so they don't look like the were squeeze cut with wire snips (which they were). Also, I probably need to put shields on their backs, although that is not strictly necessary.

Another Minimalist Experiment

I have a lot of painted Napoleonic miniatures, but they are all 6mm, and to be honest, they are very hard to discern what they are (Nationality, troop type, unit designation, etc.) so it makes it harder for gaming. Forget about photographing them!

Although I like the two component body design I generally use – a round bead or button plug for the head and a cylindrical or square bead for the body – I want a little more height on the figure. So I continue to experiment with designs with an eye of replacing my Napoleonics, or creating a 'imagination' army.

I started with three flat head plugs. Again, these are used for filling holes in furniture, but being flat-headed, they are intended to lies flush with the surrounding surface. What makes them a 'plug' and not a 'dowel' is that dowels are straight-sided and plugs are tapered.

I started with a 5/16" flat head plug for the body. The widest end is at the top and represents the shoulders.

On top of that I glued a 1/4" flat head plug for the head and hat. If you want a shako, put the widest end at the top; put it at the bottom is you want a kepi.

Below the body glue a 3/16" flat head plug for the legs. The widest part is at the bottom, although I could see putting it at the top also.

Finally glue the polymer clay bead to the bottom of the legs. You can use a hobby knife to trim it to size. It will also give more stability to the figure.

I used an all-material adhesive for all of this. When I am done I will cover it with Mod Podge (glorified white PVC glue) to seal the wood pores – making it easier to paint – and giving more strength to the figure. I am concerned about this popping off of a base, however.

These plugs do not have much of a taper, so the idea of using wood, or plastic tile spacers, for the arms seems like it would take more work trimming off some material so it would lie flush to the body. I would probably use simple dimensional paint for the arms. Definitely will use that for the shako/kepi peak or any ornaments like a shako pom-pom. I would probably drill a hole and use a toothpick if I wanted to go so far as to create a shako plume.

By the way, a round head plug – it is what it sounds like – makes a great grenadier bearskin or round helmet. Flat head plugs also make great Crusader helms.

I used to be concerned about pulling these troops out for public games. Not any more. I may get funny comments like "I am glad to see the mushroom heads are getting some play" or things like that, but I have never had anyone say that would not game because they had to use them.

Normans for My Hastings Project

In my last post I showed the start of my Saxon and Norman forces for gaming out the Battle of Hastings, but apparently I forgot the Normans! This led to Matt asking about "how I was going to do the Norman cavalry", which I interpreted as "how are you going to make those iconic Norman kite shields, which were used by both the Norman cavalry and the infantry. (If it pertained to something else Matt, you need to let me know as I am being a little dense.)

I will be honest, my first attempts were rather simplistic, as shown in the figure below.

Basically I took the rounded end of a flat toothpick and trimmed it to get the kite shield shape. As you can see, I did an inconsistent job on the size between the three examples. It was because of these results that I cast about for another solution.

First, I wanted something simple to shape. As I had been using a hole punch with thin craft foam sheets that seemed a likely candidate to try. All I needed was to get the shape right. I searched on the internet for "Norman shields" and came across numerous images of shield transfers that are commercially available. Most are for 28mm scale figures (given the popularity of the rules Saga) although I knew that there were some for 15mm. That said, both were too large for my figures, so buying commercial transfers was out. What I needed were digital images that I could scale. So I found some.

I first scaled the figures to an appropriate length, top to bottom, and increased the DPI (dots per inch) of the image so it would lose as little fidelity as possible. I then printed the images out using my inkjet printer on the brightest paper I had. I did not use photo quality glossy paper, however.

I took the printout and glued it to brown craft foam sheets and carefully cut the shields out with tiny scissors. Those, in turn, were glued to the figures.

With a close-up shot you can see obvious flaws, but not when the figures are at arm's length. I did not even color the paper edge, nor paint the craft foam; I liked it the way it was.

What do you think?

Hastings in a Minimalist Style

 If you follow me on my blog Dale's Wargames you will know that I really like the rules Tin Soldiers in Action. One limitation of them is that they only cover 1650 through 1914. I like the core mechanics, but could not use them for other periods. After speaking with the author he indicated that the did expand the range, to include from ancients to futuristic. He sent me the Hastings scenario which has the necessary rules and order of battle to game the battle.

As it happens I have sufficient troops in 15mm metal, but I am actively trying to decide on how to reduce my collection. Although I have decided to keep 15mm as the scale of choice for mass battles, I am considering selling the painted troops I have and replacing them with wooden miniatures. Why? Well I like the creation process for one, and now that I am retired I have more time on my hands. But more to the point, I am concerned that when I pass I will leave my wife with trying to get rid of my collection and trying to recoup some of the money. (If she gives them away it would not be a disaster as she will be well taken care of, but I would probably roll over in my grave.) However, if they are my wooden creations I would neither be upset if they are given away or even thrown away. (Strange, I know.) Besides, I really need to downsize anyway.

With that morbid thought in mind I decided that the Hastings project was a great start to see if I even have the ambition to carry it out.

I decided that I wanted to use the minimalist style that I started some time ago, rather than the larger, more detailed style Matt used for his Hastings project. (I love Matt's stuff, but can't match his paint jobs.)

If you follow the first link you can see how I build these figures. They come out about 12mm tall, but about the chunkiness of 15mm. They have a cartoony 'big-headed' (chibi) style where the upper wooden part represents the head and hat and the lower wooden part represents the torso and legs. (This is how you achieve that chibi look in such a small scale.

Saxon Fyrd

In the image above, I used a mixture of round beads and round head plugs to represent the upper part, and round beads, cylinder, and flat head plugs for the lower part. The shields are ½ a sphere of clear plastic, to represent the shield. As always, spears are made from a standard toothpick.

More Saxon Fyrd

The above are ones that I made and posted about in 2016. (All projects eventually get finished!) They are all round beads for the upper part and square beads for the lower part. Shields are made from thin craft foam using a hole punch.

More Saxon Fyrd

More figures from 2016 that use a small flat 'bead' for the shield. I could never find one the proper size, so I switched to craft foam hole punch shields.

Saxon Huscarls

To emphasize the metal helmets, beyond simply painting them a metallic color, I used button (mushroom) plugs. Some figures have a 'Phrygian' cap, like the end figures in the second rank. Here is the look I was going for.

The intent was to use two beads and some filler to simulate it.

The light gray bead is a cylinder. Although mine was square with rounded corners, it would have looked better if it were wider than it was tall. The dark gray was an oval bead, very much wider than tall. Finally, the white represents where I put filler, to try and hide the gap between the two beads at the back of the head, but leave it in the front, in an attempt to give it the 'floppy cap' look. In the end it sort of fails because I always have trouble filling gaps.

As a side note I can see using this same technique to represent a beret, with the open gap to the side and gluing the top bead at a slight angle. I may also have come up with a better gap filler: 'sprue goo'. Sprue Goo is where you take plastic sprue from plastic models, and dissolve it in acetone or plastic cement (acetone and butyl acetate). You can use it like liquid plastic which will harden. I used it in this experiment below to make spear points on the toothpicks. (It worked but was too much trouble.)

Some people ask me: why do you spend all of that time making figures? Isn't it faster to just buy miniatures? My response is always: how long do you think it takes to glue two beads, a toothpick, and a hole-punched piece of foam together? How do you think it compares to removing flash from metal figures or mold lines from plastic ones?

The real time savings comes with painting. Because there is zero detail on the figure – it is all shape – you can add or leave off as much detail as you like. Further, exact placement of details is not necessary and further gives your figures a more realistic look in that everyone is not perfectly uniform, in either detail nor pose.

One factor I did not mention, and is something I have been pondering, is 'block painting' versus 'figure painting' versus sub-assembly painting. What do I mean by those terms?

• Block: all of the figures are assembled and then glued to the bases before being painted.
• Figure: all of the figures are assembled, glued to painting strips (typically popsicle strips), and then each figure is painted before being glued to bases.
• Sub-Assembly: the figures are partially assembled, painting each sub-assembly before assembling them into complete figures and gluing them to bases.

Why would you do any of these particular methods?

Block painting allows you to ignore painting details that can't be seen, i.e. if your paint brush cannot reach it, you generally can't see it either, so why paint it? This saves time, but sacrifices quality. (It also cannot be used if you are mounting the figures individually.) The surest way to make this method look good is to prime everything black so that the unpainted portions look like they are in shadow. The 2016 figures above were all block painted.

Sub-assembly painting is the other extreme. This allows you to easily paint everything producing the fewest mistakes (in terms of your loaded paint brush accidentally hitting an adjacent figure or part). It is very easy to paint details that you do want to appear. Hiding the glue spots after painting will be your hardest task. The figures I consider doing this with the most are the cavalry.

Finally figure painting is the happy compromise. You will still end up painting details that might not be easily seen, but will still have color in those hard to see, but still visible spots. Gluing will be covered with paint. All of the figures painted in the last month used this method.

I am curious what you do (or would do) and does it change with scale of the figure?

Japanese Special Naval Landing Forces 1941

Sometimes it is not how long a project takes to complete, but how long it takes to get started. I crafted my WW II USMC/USA 1941 troops way back in January 2017. The idea was to create a small force – one infantry platoon in defense and two platoons in attack – so I could play a test game of Peter Pig's Poor Bloody Infantry (PBI) and see if I liked it.

I love the last line of that blog post:

Next up, the special figures of the USMC and the start of the Japanese SNLF platoon.

Yeah, that was almost two years ago that I was going to start my SNLF project. Like I said, what matters is how long it takes to start a project because making and painting your own figures is quick and simple. Once you start, that is.

The picture above shows the parts that I used.

1. This is a small, strange bead that I found at the local store that was cheap. I imagined that the 'band' in the center could serve as a separator between the upper and lower body, but in this build it did not matter, unless I wanted to paint it as webbing. (I did not, as this is a minimalist build.)
2. This is a classic 'button' or 'mushroom' head plug. Makes for a great head with a helmet. This was used for all riflemen and LMG crew.
3. This is a round head plug. This was used as the head for the standard bearer, who is bareheaded.
4. This is a flat head plug. This was used for the head of the officer. Flipping it upside-down it looks like the jungle cap with apron covering the back of the neck.
5. This is a simple mini-dowel. I use these for the rifles, LMG, sword, and staff for the standard. I prefer these over toothpicks because of the standard diameter.
6. These are 3cm wooden bases for the troops.

You can see the build is really simple for the riflemen. Glue the button head plug on top of the bead for the body and add a 1/2" piece of dowel for the rifle. I use dimensional paint to create the arms and hands.

As you can see – or maybe not, as it is a little dark – the color scheme is very simple. The helmets are a light green (I have seen all kinds of colors for this) and a medium jungle green for the trousers and jacket. Although it might seem silly at this scale (12mm to the eyes, but chunkier) I always try and get the weapons correct. The Japanese Arisaka Type 99 rifle had a metal bolt mechanism and barrel, but the area between the bolt and the end of the barrel was covered in wood.

The Type 99 Light Machine Gun was also made with the dowel, but was 3/4" long and uses a lot more dimensional paint to represent the gun stock, bipod, muzzle, and carrying handle. I do not have the distinctive magazine sticking out of the top. The next platoon I build with have the gunners in the prone position, so that detail will be present. The build for the figure itself is the same as for the rifleman.

The standard bearer uses the round head plug for the head, but the same bead for the body. The flag is from http://www.warflag.com and is simply glued on to the dowel.

The officer uses the flat head plug, flipped upside-down, for the head. A small piece of dowel, shaved flatter, is used for his katana, and the pistol is simply formed from dimensional paint.

Here is the whole platoon, six rifle stands, three LMG stands, and one command stand. I need to make some casualty markers, and of course another whole platoon. Hopefully this time it won't take me another year to start!

Watcher in the Water Tentacles

I finally got a copy of the Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game The Fellowship of the Ring campaign book on ebay for a reasonable price.  First tough part was the title.  It is somewhat generic and when you search on the title you get a zillion listings for the core rule book.  Not what I wanted.  I wanted the campaign book because it allows you to play the entire campaign of mini adventures for the Fellowship of the Ring movie and novel.  This is actually something I can do in my basement with only one other player, but I do plan to run at least some of these at my gaming club.  Second tough part was when I did find it, getting it for a reasonable amount of money.  Some of the prices for this old GW LotR stuff is really staggering for some reason.  Some books they are giving away, others, like this one, are usually really expensive!

What I really want to run for the club is the Mines of Moria section, which is made up of four mini games/adventures, specifically The Watcher in the Water, Balin's Tomb, The Escape from Dwarrowdelf, and finally The Bridge of Khazad-Dum.  Already having the Fellowship figures and goblins and cave troll done, and having done a test run of the Balin's Tomb game, I decided to try and tackle the rest of the figures I would need to do all these games in order.

For The Watcher in the Water game, in addition to the Fellowship figure wise all you need in addition are 6 of the Watcher's tentacles.  So I decided to have a go at making my own Craftee version of the tentacles.  I only need the tentacles for the game, but I'm sure I am going to make a head sticking out of the water as well, just because it looks cool.  But at this point, I've just got the tentacles.

All they are made of is beads of various sizes, from larger on the bottom towards smaller at the top, that are glued together with PVA for strength.  After they are dry, I took a hot glue gun and wrapped bands of hot glue first in the space between each bead, then around the center of the bead itself.  Finally, I used hot glue to make ripples of water on the base (I believe these are 1.25" round precut thin wooden bases).  Then, I just painted them up to taste.  At first I tried to do it all with the hot glue gun, but when you start adding the bands of glue around the beads and in between the beads, the new hot glue heats up the old hot glue that is holding the beads together, and it just kept falling apart in my hands.  So this took longer to glue the beads together with PVA before adding the hot glue final touches, but it was much easier in the long run.

Here is what they look like with some of the Fellowship figures I finished a while ago.  You get a better sense for the scale.  What I don't like about the ones from GW is that relative to the Fellowship figures, although the tentacles are very tall, they look a little thin and wimpy.  I wanted mine to look very thick and scary, clearly capable of taking poor Frodo down into the murky depths.

The four hobbits as well as Gandalf, Legolas, and of course Aragorn.

Closer up just with Frodo, Sam, and Aragorn.

I'm pretty happy with them, I think they'll look good on the table top when I get the rest of the terrain done for the game.  And honestly, they were a piece of cake.

WWII British and Early War USMC Infantry Tutorial Build

Blog reader tradgardmastare asked for some pictures on my latest build, some WWII British infantry, so that he can see the process. Sure! Here you go. Don't be put off by the number of steps. It takes more time to take the pictures and post than it does to actually execute the steps, but it is always good to do to repeat a little bit because new readers do not always go back into the blog and see the previous posts telling how, and I am always refining my process, so it does not always come out as I put out new posts. So here goes, and thanks for the suggestion tradgardmastare.

When I was making my Austrians and Prussians, I started by gluing the figures that I was building straight to the base that was going to be used for gaming. The primary reason for this was:

1. The figures represented formed troops where the men stood close together.
2. When figures are packed in, many details simply cannot be seen by the gamer, especially details on the front of the figures that are in the second and third ranks and the details on the rear of the figures that are in the first and second ranks. Painting those details is often a waste of time.
3. I wanted figures in specific formations on the base in order to visually represent different troop types. Handling the figures often damaged their paint jobs with hot glue.

Because these figures – although they will continue to have multiple figures per base – they will be spaced much farther apart and thus all details will be easier to see by the game. Although I will not be painting a lot more details than previously, those details I do paint will have to be made consistently on all figures. For that reason I have switched to painting all figures separately, off of their bases.

Construction

I start with a craft stick, which is really just a very wide popsicle stick. I glue the cube bead directly to the stick with white glue. I will later pop off the completed figure with a straight-bladed craft knife. (A small dab of superglue will also work.)

 

Next, I glue the furniture (screwhole) plug to the top of the cube bead. For those that don't know what I mean by furniture plug, you can see them in the picture below, highlighted by the red rectangles. These are small wooden parts that are pressed into the holes where you screw furniture parts together. They come in various forms, such as flathead, roundhead, and mushroom or button plugs.

As you can see, the button plugs look like the old 'pie plate' helmets used by the British and Americans in WWI and the British in WWII. (The Americans still used them in 1941, but they were replaced in 1942 with the helmets we are all familiar with.) Because they look so much like them, they make a great starting place for these helmets. As I noted in an earlier post, I think that the headgear is probably the single most iconic piece gear when it comes to identifying what a miniature represents. Get this right and you are a long way towards having figures you are happy with.

I would recommend a small dab of superglue (I like the new Gorilla Glue Superglue Gel) on one piece and a small dab of white glue on the other. The water in the white glue will help the superglue set faster.

Another stock of the trade is a flat toothpick. In case you are unsure of what I mean by that, it is shown in the picture below. It has a blunt point on one end and is rounded on the other. These are not usually found in grocery stores anymore, but can be found in the craft stores like Hobby Lobby and Michael's.

 

I use small snips to cut the rounded top of the flat toothpick off. These snips can be found in shops that support plastic modeling (they are used to snip plastic parts off of sprues), but they can also be found in the beads section of craft shops. This is where I obtained mine. (I keep one set for wood and another for plastic.)

The top will be used for the 'feet' of the prone figures. Not something you have to do, and in fact is something that you could do for all figures, if you wanted. (Especially if you want your figures a little taller. Hmmmmm...)

Note that Peter Pig's Poor Bloody Infantry (PBI) uses casualty markers. To be honest, I always thought casualty markers were a complete waste of money and time. I simply use red glass beads for this sort of thing. But given that these figures are so inexpensive to produce and quick to build and paint, I decided to splurge. These are the start of those markers. Note the 'imperfect' placement of the feet.

I am also going to build a .30 caliber Browning machine gun team. Almost every picture I see has the gunner sitting upright behind it and the loading lying or kneeling to the left. I decide to put some 'feet' in front of the gunner and behind the loader. In hindsight, I should probably have put some 'knees' between the 'body' and the 'feet' of the gunner. Who know? Maybe later.

As my wife will tell you, I don't get rid of the scraps because I will always find a use for them eventually. I use the pointed end of the flat toothpick for the casualties' arms. I normally don't do that for normal infantry (which I will show later), but these seem perfect for casualties.

I am not using two arms for every figure. I am not trying to be morbid, I am just assuming that some casualties will have arms folded under them, at their sides, and such.

Arms at the side of the figure are pretty easy to make, but arms sticking straight out, like with the gunner and loader, is much harder with my normal method. I will use the toothpick stick for these figures also.

Ignore the excess white glue. It will shrink when it dries.

What I normally use for details is a product called E6000 Allure Dimensional Adhesive Paint. It is a thick, glossy, plastic goop that will set in about 15 minutes and harden overnight.

To the business end I attach a fine applicator tip so I can place a finer bead of goop to the figure.

I have applied white gesso to the figure so that it is easier to see the goop. I apply a thin bead to the bottom outer edge of the 'helmet' to make the rim.

Note that the idea of getting a thin bead is thin measuring top to bottom. The goal, however, is to make the brim expand outwards more prominently. The image below left is what you want while the image below right is not. The latter  just won't show after being painted.

 

Everything about figures in smaller scales has to scream exaggeration. If the figures are not 'cartoony', then it is probably too subtle. If you don't like that style, you will probably not like the results of the figures as they will probably be colored blobs to you when looking at them at arm's length.

Of course, you don't want every detail exaggerated. You need to pick and choose which details get highlighted and which are not necessary. For me, the headgear is what the eye of the gamer sees the most, whether viewed from behind (the figures you are using) or from across the table (the figures your opponent is using).

Now it is time to start making weapons. I used a piece of flat toothpick and the snips (above) to make the stock, receiver and magazine for the BAR and a piece of dowel for the barrel.

I do the same for the NCOs armed with the Thompson submachine guns. Don't worry about the gaps as that will be filled in with good, glue or paint.

Glue a length of dowel to the chest of the riflemen. Put it at an angle so that the right 'arm' will drape over the weapon while the left 'arm' will come up under it.

A few wood scraps for the loader of the Browning .30 cal machinegun to represent the ammo box and belt.

Time to start 'making' the 'arms'. More E6000 Allure goop. Two little blobs to show where the hands will be. Do all of the figures this way first, so that by the time you come back to do the next steps, the goop for the hands will have started to cure.

Making the arm is as simple as painting a bead on the figure. Here the right arm is draped over the stock of the rifle, gripping the trigger area.

Again, do all the right arms before moving on. It is so easy to brush across the uncured goop and have it ruin your work so it is best to do one step at a time.

Now paint the left arm on with the good. This is easy, easy, easy and quick.

Guess what? We are done with construction. Unless there is some extra detail you want to put on, like blobs for cartridge boxes, haversacks or gas masks, that is all you need. Me, I am stopping here.

Painting

I am not going to show a step-by-step progression of the figures, but simply go over the paints I used and the order.

1. I applied white gesso on those parts of the figure that were added after applying the  gesso initially. Normally I apply it once, at the end, but I thought it might help you see the bits added during the build if I painted the core figure white at the start. Gesso is important when using unfinished wood as it helps clog the pores in the wood so it does not soak up so much paint, giving it a dull color. On beads that are painted, or are plastic, gesso helps the paint stick better to the material. The E6000 is also very glossy and plastic, so the gesso is almost necessary in order to get paint to adhere.
2. I painted the helmet with Evergreen craft paint, mostly to cover the white and give a dark base. I then dry-brushed Vallejo Reflective Green on top. This allowed the rim of the helmet to pop and gave the appropriate battle-worn patchy look.
3. The main uniform is Ceramcoat Khaki craft paint. I usually use old Citadel paints or Vallejo paints for large areas, so this was an experiment to use cheap craft paint. It took 2 1/2 coats, but I am very satisfied with the color.
4. I use a medium brown color – Citadel Vermin Brown, which is now Games Workshop Skrag Brown – to paint a band of hair on the figure. I used to paint the hair so that it fell above the next, leaving a thin ribbon of flesh. Not this time. I also used to paint the hair around where the ears would be. This time I decided to paint a 'wall' of hair and add the flesh back in to break it up.
5. Next came the flesh color. I used the old Citadel Tallarn Flesh, which is now the Games Workshop Cadian Fleshtone. Basically I just painted the face and hands with the larger brush, then painted a dot for the ears and a line to make a little bit of exposed neck under the ears. This method was much faster and viewed from the tabletop, produces the same result.
6. The rifle was painted using Games Workshop Dryad Bark.
7. The end of the rifle and the bolt mechanism got spots with Games Workshop Leadbelcher (Citadel Boltgun Metal).
8. Finally I finished the figure off by painting the eyes and mouth. Actually, I used a fine pen for the mouth. I used that same pen to put lines around the arms to give it better definition, as all that khaki just blended together.

All in all, I am very happy with the figures. I am still putting the finishing touches on the platoon leaders with their Thompson submachine guns, the BAR teams, and the .30 cal machinegun team. I haven't built the Browning .30 cal either, as that will be built after the figures are painted.

Next up, the special figures of the USMC and the start of the Japanese SNLF platoon.