Street Scatter - Car Accident

 Nothing too special today, readers, but I did finish a bit of Mantic "Street Scatter" I'd picked up at my local game store a few weeks ago. Realizing how well the crashed car and truck fit into each other, I made up my mind to put them on a base together; a quick purchase for irregular terrain bases from Things From The Basement later, I had my base. I coated it in fine model railroad flock and primed over it to give myself a rough texture to paint.

Except it wasn't that easy! Once primed, I discovered I needed to flood the coated base again with thinned PVA to try and prevent the flocking from coming up with each brush stroke. Then I hit it with a heavy coat of spray varnish, then spray primed it again. Now I had a solid surface to paint over! 

I did a couple of passes with drybrushing a medium gray craft paint until I had the cement tone I wanted, and then gave it a very light drybrush of a lighter gray. 

Each vehicle was primed black and given four or five coats of TurboDork metallic - specifically "Redrum" for the car and "Multipass" for the truck - and then details picked out. Windows were just repainted flat black. 

Overall I'm happy with how it turned out; it's not going to pass close scrutiny but it's good enough for the terrain collection. I think it'll be a nice playable piece too; plenty of space for figures to duck behind cars or even stand up in the bed of the pickup. 

I have one more of each of these cars primed and awaiting attention, though they might be left separate or even unbased for more flexibility. Alternatively, they might get incorporated into a permanent "junkyard" piece of terrain...decisions decisions...

Instant Motor Pool for GI Joe

 So as longtime readers will know, one of my on-going projects over the past few years has been 1980s GI Joe in 28mm scale. A few months ago, my buddy Dave (who also printed my current crop of modern terrain) printed out a variety of GI Joe and Cobra vehicles for his own use for the GI Joe RPG, painted them up, magnetized turrets and even put decals on them all. 

Last night, he handed me a tote bin full of vehicles and generic modern military buildings (Quonset huts, hangars, etc), and said, "Here, Bill, you'll get more use out of these than I will."

four VAMP jeeps, 2 Sky Hawk VTOLs, 2 MOBAT tanks and a softskin troop carrier

Four Cobra H.I.S.S. tanks in front of a larger H.I.S.S. Command tank

I'm absolutely blown away by his generosity... and now I need to plan another GI Joe game! 

Speaking of...

Wargames Among the Warplanes puts on two shows per year - June and September. I'm locked in for June to run a modern "gangs fighting in the streets" game with the figures and terrain I've been showcasing for the past few weeks. But for September...I think that's going to call for a game of Fistful of Lead using my GI Joes. 

Pizza Man Open For Business

 Another building finished for my game at Wargames Among the Warplanes in...slightly under three weeks! This is a tiny pizza parlor from Corvus Games Terrain, printed for my by my friend Dave. I bought the STL because it reminded me of a tiny pizzeria that used to be right around the corner from my house - it went through a couple of name changes over the years and realistically was probably a money laundering front. But the pizza was decent enough that it was the main place my family got pizza from until I was in my late teens, maybe even early 20s. I still vividly remember walking in to pick up our order one day and the owner is there in salmon-colored shorts, an undershirt and white canvas slip on shoes, a pistol with mother of pearl inlays on the grip hanging out of his pocket. 

There's no interior detailing or floor to the building - I just don't have time at the moment to mess around with all that right now. 

This leaves me just three more buildings to finish, two trucks, a couple of smoke grenade templates...taking photos of all the figures for the gang rosters...printing everything out...and making sure I have a tote that will fit all my terrain. Easy-peasy...right?

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today's my birthday, and while I took the day off work, I never made it down to my hobby bench - too busy running errands and getting the house ready to have guests tomorrow. I did receive some lovely gifts from my wife however!

Two more modern buildings from Atomic Laser Cut Designs - an Urgent Care and a blank storefront that has a really nice brick pattern over the entire exterior walls - as well as some 3D printed scatter from Bad Goblin Games - some disheveled cinderblock walls, an above-ground swimming pool and most charmingly, an on-fire dumpster that comes with a little flickering LED light and battery, so that the flames actually light up. That is going to be an absolute must to have ready for my game in 3 weeks!

And I think I want to recreate what the Bad Goblin team did for the product image on their site, and put an alligator and some scummy "water" in that swimming pool...

I have to thank Mike over at Lead Legionaries for turning me on to Bad Goblin's goodies. He's painted a lot of their scenic pieces, including a variety of ruined and armored trailers and a stunning water tower, over recent months, and has been putting on some amazing games showcasing them. If you're not following his blog you should definitely check it out. 

Gina was also kind enough to hand me her card and tell me to use it to buy myself some miniatures. By coincidence, Lucid Eye Publications put out a call on their Facebook group for what miniatures people would like to see go on sale this week. I requested their Cro-Magnons, and they were kind enough to do it, so I bought another Tribal formation's worth of warriors, as well as another few characters. 

Since I've ordered more figures, it's time to update the tracker:

Figures Purchased in 2025: 66

Figures Painted in 2025: 85

WIP: The Wolf Clan

 I've gotten a little work in on my first warband for Mana Press' Tribal. These are Lucid Eye Cro-Magnons and Amazons from their "Savage Core" line, all pretty similarly dressed for cold weather (more or less). I do still need to order some more Cro-Magnons to add a third formation to this warband, and since I didn't put my warlord on a larger base as the rules recommended, I'll probably get another warlord figure for a 40mm diorama base and downgrade my current warlord to a Hero. 

Funny how this was supposed to be a no-expenditure side project just using figures already in my leadpile...

So far I've base-coated their exposed skin with Reaper "Dark Flesh," washed all the clothing with GW "Seraphim Sepia" to make sure there's no exposed white primer in the recesses, and went over pants and leggings with GW "Gore-Grunta Brown" contrast paint.

I chose dark skin because I'm a big fan of Bjorn Kurten's 1978 novel "Dance of the Tiger," which deals with one possible way contact between Neanderthals and anatomically modern ("Cro-Magnon") humans could have gone; Kurten's Cro-Magnons are dark-skinned, having only relatively recently expanded out of Africa and not having had time to lose their ancestral melanin in northern latitudes. 

Here we have "The Wolf Mother," a shamanic sort of figure dressed in a wolfskin cloak; underneath it she's dressed like a Frazetta painting, but maybe she's high on hallucinogenics and not feeling the Ice Age chill. Next to her is Menhir Five-Tusks, my current warlord. The raised arm gives him an orator vibe, and I can see him standing on a tall rock shouting encouragement to his followers. Maybe give him the skill "Boast" in games to reflect this?

Next up we have a formation of Cro-Magnon Warriors; they're armed with short spears, almost assegai-like, along with atlatls. In Tribal, they'll be Warriors with Short Weapons and the skill "Throwing Weapons" to represent this.

Finally the Amazons:

These are the most fantastical of the bunch; one is carrying a long stone blade and another has a big bird skull strapped over her shoulder. Second from the left is technically a character model, "Seratra the Foundling" but she's pulling double-duty as a regular archer since I misplaced the other two I had. In Tribal, these would be Marksmen. 

So that's where I'm at with these for now. Work is continuing slowly and not particularly photogenically on terrain for Wargames Among the Warplanes. We've had a bunch of wet days which has stopped me from spraying the last stuff I need to spray. Probably only one or two more sessions to finish off the pizza parlor and then I'll focus on the video store. 

Figures Purchased in 2025: 58

Figures Painted in 2025: 85

Side Project: TRIBAL as a palate-cleanser

 So I'm winding down somewhat with the stuff I need to paint for Wargames Among the Warplanes - a couple buildings that are more or less at the wash and drybrush stages, and a couple of trucks that I need to pick up more spray paint for. And as I'm working on it...I'm starting to get tired of the project, and eager for it to just be done. But with that tiredness, my energy to keep working on it is flagging. 

I think a little bit of a side project might be in order just to reenergize myself. To that end, I pulled my copy of Mana Press' "Tribal" down off my shelf, and pulled out my box of cavemen purchased last year. I'd posted back in March 2024 about the Wolf Tribe, comprised of Lucid Eye Cro-Magnons and Amazons; well, I finally got them into the priming box. 

I probably should have popped my Chieftain off the 25mm base and put him on a 40mm...maybe we'll figure that out later. 

This gives me two formations - Warriors with Short Weapons (and we'll give them the Throwing Weapons skill to represent the atlatls they're sculpted with) and Marksmen - plus a Chieftain and Hero. That's a perfectly fine starter army for me to begin solo-playing with for practice. Dressed in buckskin, leather and furs I'm anticipating them being a fairly fast paint up as well. 

The hero is a shamanic figure, sold on the Lucid Eye site as "The Wolf Mother," and while her face is a little obscured by the wolfskin she wears, I'm kind of thinking I could maybe recreate Darryl Hannah's makeup from CLAN OF THE CAVE BEAR on her...

The Big Terrain Push Begins!

 The weather has finally settled into decent temperatures and some dry days so I've begun the big push to start painting the terrain I still need to finish for my game at Wargames Among the Warplanes next month - less than a month away! 

First up, I've sprayed the "Pizza Man" pizza parlor with Montana Gold "Terra" spray paint, which is a lot more orange and a lot less terracotta than I was anticipating, but nothing I can't work with. Once I'd gotten an even all-over coat and let it dry, I began blocking in the cement trim around the building and over the front facade. I'll probably give that one more coat for full coverage.

Next steps then are going to be picking out individual bricks in a variety of browns, rusts and tans, washing everything with a brown wash, drybrushing the cement with a lighter warm gray and then drybrushing everything with a light tan to tie everything together. Then of course windows, sign, detailing, etc. 

The Video Store has been given a spray coat of bright blue, a little lighter than Blockbuster Video would have been in real life but I'll give it a darker blue wash and see how things look. The "TeeVee Shak" and "PayMore Shoes" are going in the spray box tomorrow - they're both going to be a cement gray color for their brickwork. 

In the meantime, I've also been experimenting with a smaller, 3x3 layout for my game at Wargames Among the Warplanes; I don't have enough buildings to fill a 4x4 table the way I'd want to, and not enough time to print and paint enough to get it filled either. A 3x3 layout also puts the different gangs into direct conflict faster, speeding up play and meaning I can maybe get two playthroughs in at WATW. Or, I can wrap up faster, pack it in, and play other people's games. 

Here's what the layout is looking like; I might tweak a few things but I think this is pretty close to final.

The Jamaicans will begin play in the Bingo Hall, the cops at either end of that street, and the three mafia gangs spread evenly across the opposite table edge. There's enough street scatter that they won't all immediately have line of fire to each other. Secondary missions assigned randomly will necessitate figures moving across the board - "collect the laundered money from the pawn shop and return it to your starting board edge" "make a call from the pay phone in front of the ramen restaurant" things like that. So hopefully we won't get too bogged down with figures just sniping each other from cover all game, there will be movement and interaction. 

So that's it for now, I'll check in in a few days with some progress.