AHPC Post 7 Late Roman Watchtower

 

A cohort of Tungrians mans the ramparts 

I was travelling for 4 days this week, so only a small offering in the form of this 28mm Roman Watchtower.  As with most of my BUAs it is a Sarissa pdf kit which went together nicely and painted up well.

It's not as substantial as a Saxon Shore fort or Milecastle on the Wall, but should be useful in scenario applications or as table dressing.  The whitewash with red brick trim comes from Osprey books on the Saxon Shore forts and the Wall, but is also confirmed by serious history books written by respected academics. 

The interior space nicely fits one of my 60mm square bases.  The top floor removes so that you can access the first (UK) or second (rest of the world) floor.

Interior view.  

I added some minimal ground cover, except that under the stairs looks like a place blackberries would grow.  I also added some grammatically correct graffiti to the back wall.  See this following link for a reference (incidentally when my daughter was having trouble conducting verbs int French immersion I used this clip as a teaching aide)....

Points wise this measures out to about 1/2 a terrain cube. I'd give the math but I don't want to cause pain to Greg, so we'll go with the "here's where the miracle occurs" method common among my students when approaching proofs.

AHPC XIII Post 3: Built Like A Hick Brit's House (20 points)

 

A terrain post for me in the form of three British Roundhouses.  This is a set of three houses sold by Sarissa as Irish houses but would work for many Celtic and similar Northern Europeans in the Ancient and Early medieval period.  They will also fit well in a TTG in my Beowulf DnD Campaign. 

The larger decogonal house.

One of the smaller octagonal houses.  I didn't paint the interiors except to blacken the floor her the door.

With the roofs removed, keen eyes will see that the houses are in fact not round but actually polygonal.  The two small ones are Octagonal and the larger Chief's house is a decagon.  Sarissa may have found that the regular polygons were easier to design and construct or they may have been attempting to estimate Pi by the Ancient technique of inscribing polygonal within a circle.

I had a hard time photographing these buildings and they look much less crappy in person.  I do need to give the roofs a trim obviously

As with all Sarissa kits, they went together easily and painted up nicely.  I added a bit of groundwork, Faux Fur thatching (narrowly avoiding having my wife add googly eyes to the unpainted fur) and smoke.  

According to the formula in text I am using for my MATH110 class they take up about a single terrain cube.  Math is as follows

I painted them in a variety of colours based on the photos from the Butser Hill Experimental Farm.  I have actually been to Butser Hill but it was long enough ago that it was showing off current technology.  I varried the terrascaping a bit for each house.  I figured that the head man's larger hut might be better tended and without weeds around it.

I realize that the attempted play on words may be lost on those who are not survivors of the 1970s.  However, in 1970s teenage lad speak the term "built like a brick sh*t house" was used to describe the figure of a young lady whose curves you admired.  Doesn't make much sense but neither do teenage lads or the 1970s for that matter.  The term hit its Cultural Zenith in giving the Commodores the inspiration for this classic bit of over top top 70s funk (note Lionel Ritchie sporting the Fro and blowing Sax in the horn line).  This video may give rise to many questions (particularly after the 3:00 mark), for which the universal answer is that it was 1978.

Link here in case Blogger doesn't like my insert.

No side duels or Theme Bonus on this, just 20 points straight up

AHPC Dark Age Buildings

 Last post of the day as I clear off my workbench.  I've been to my requite four planets on the middle Ring so can move one.  First stop on the Inner Ring will be Terra and a home theme.

I have an 'humble Dark Age house and barn plus a rather more substantial church.  All are 28mm pdf kits from Sarissa (but you knew that I was going to say that).

First up is the 'humble abode itself.  I need to trim my thatching a bit.

Works for my Arthurian, El Cid and SYW tables.

Next up is a timber barn or workshop.

Every time I use teddy bear fur, my wife threatens to glue big google eyes on it.

Last up is this Saxon/Norman church.  It was intended for the later Saxon era, but does look a lot like the early Saxon churches dating from the 6th century.

It should do fine for El Cid games and for SYW games set in the Saxon duchies too.

I didn't do the interior, but there was a set of inner doors entering into the main church.  These became the gates of my ring fort.

Not much to say here and I've blathered on too much today.  Great kits, they were fast easy and fun to assemble and put together.  My terrain cube-calculator puts the church at just over a cube and the two smaller buildings together at just over a half cube.  Let's say 1.5 cubes for 30 points and hopefully 20 for Terra for a home for the peasants, a home for their animals, and a house of God. 

AHPC Dark Age Ring Fort

 

Advance and be recognized

 

If all goes to plan, this should be the first of two posts from me this week.  Having been thrown way off schedule by my bout of COVID at the start of my teaching semester, I've decided to bin the challenge locations and focus on the stuff I've got ready to paint on the workbench.  

All of the pieces lined up.  Four straight sections, three curved sections, two gates and two end caps.

Backside view of the whole array.

I had two largish modular terrain projects planned for this year's challenge, the modular ruins posted a few weeks back and this Dark Age Ring Fort.  It's a set of 28mm pdf kits by Sarissa Precision. As with all the Sarissa Kits I've worked with it was a joy to put together, an easy hour of punching out, applying glue and clicking the bits together.  And yes there are two camps regarding terrain, those of us who enjoy making scenics and those of us with irrational phobias towards terrain brought on by extreme emotional trauma while in uteri.

My Gripping beast warriors on the ramparts.

This sort of works would protect villages, towns and manors all over Western Europe from the early days of the Roman Empire into the middle ages.  it's inhabitants might be Celts, Saxons Franks, Danes or Scots-Irish, but the basic plan remained constant.  Sloped earthen ramparts topped with a fence or palisade and flattened off on top to make a fighting platform. 

 

Close up in better light to show the kit details.  The wood work was painted with washes of raw or burnt umber over a parchment base.  The ramparts were painted dark earth tones with ground cover applied and bushes to hide major flaws.

Most Sarissa kits come with doors, but oddly the gate houses did not come with gates.  I bodged some together using left over doors from other kits.  I did one gate open and one gate closed.

The roadway and fighting platform are done with fine railway ballast firmly cemented in place (thanks for the tips Curt) and overpaid in earth tones

The pair of gates in the open position are to narrow to full close of the entrance, but modeller's license and forced perspective means that can be ignored.

The kits are marketed as 28mm but the walls and gates seem low compared to my GB figures.    As with most war-games terrain it's a matter of balancing the differing vertical and horizontal scales and looks ok on table.  Anyway, I'm not sending it back!   

I see a ton of uses for this on table.  First off for my Beowulf RPG when we go on TT.  Also it will fit my El Cid armies nicely and can be morphed into other eras easily.  I now have a pretty good tied collection of terrain to cover Dark Age Britain, and so I think that I need to build Sub-Roman armies and enemies to fight over it!

Points wise the ramparts measure 36" long, 3" wide and 2" tall.  That's a perfect terrain cube for 20 points.

AHPC XII: Ruins at Arda

The planet Arda carries a Fantasy theme, so I've gone with this Giant attacking a tower in 28mm.  Just for fun note that the top two levels of the tower are removable allowing me to do this.

In an homage to this classic DnD module...

Ok let's break down the components here.  

First up is the Giant, who is a Wizkids Stone Giant in 28mm scale.  I will note that the figure is about 90mm from sole of foot to top of head and that the tower he's standing next to is 6" high (152mm) for comparison.  I will leave scoring him up to the Snowlord.  In the Beowulf adventures Giants are more generic than straight DnD, but I tried to keep to the Stone Giant Theme.  It's a nice sculpt with facial features midway between an Easter Island Moai and Grace Jones.

Backside view as I am thinking that's the view my adventurers want to see!

Next up are the human foes who are from the Gipping Beast Arthurian (mostly) and other ranges.  I painted the fighters up to represent the Comitatus of a local Warlord, using the red tunics and shields with double headed dragons to provide a unit theme.
.  

I will come back and touch ups he shields but wanted to get these posted today.

The seventh figure is the Merlin figure who has a lot of the age old mystery to him. I love the metal bird on his staff, is it the Eagle of the Ninth?  Seven 28mm figures is 35 points.

These are good solid Beastie boy figures, lots of individual differences.  They can serve in Beowulf adventures as friends, foes or neutrals as required.  I my also do some Sub-Roman Britain skirmish games using Lion Rampant or Dux B.   

Finally we have the Ruins which I am revealing in full glory below.  This is a Sarissa Ruined City set consisting of 8 modular bases that can be rearranged as suits the scenario or decided in to smaller ruins.  I figure it can serve as a Roman ruin in Beowulf, or a generic ruin for other RPGs os Moonstone for later period historical games.  The total set covers an area 8" by 16", and is mostly 3" tall except for the tower which is 6' tall.  My math makes this exactly 2 cubes of terrain for 40 points.

Arrangement 1

Arrangment 2

Arrangement 3

Points wise I cout up

• 35 points for the humans
• 40 points for the 2 cubes of ruin
• ? points for the Giant
• 20 points for the Arda location
• Merlin and the Giant should count against the forlorn hope of the Challenge Duel

Having completed four planets on the Outer Ring, I am ready to explore the Middle Ring and all step on one of the Warp Maelstorms either side of Arda to see where I end up. 

AHPC XII 28mm Terrain

I’m again participating in this years painting challenge  https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/.  Here’s my first post.

I wasn't supposed to be posting today.  I was supposed to be in Halifax, NS staying with my mother in law and doing Christmas with family.  However, we cancelled our tip based on COVID numbers and so here I am.

First up for me is a couple of terrain items in 28mm.  These are 28mm scale and MDF kits from Sarissa.  I've had good experience with Sarissa and these were no exception.  The main piece is a barn or forge.  It is sold in their dark age range but I figure that I can use it for my Beowulf themed RPG games, my El Cid era games and my SYW games plus others.

The other bit is a piece of dock that should have been painted a while back.  I finished up some similar docks and a Viking town for a tabletop RPG game featuring Thigmund the Thea Therpent, but somehow missed this one.

Points wise these measure out to be about 1/4 a of terrain cube so that's 5 points to erase my duck.

We are in the midst of a Prairie cold snap so I'll be hunkered down like this fellow who took up temporary residence in our snow bank

_________________________________________

Be careful Peter, it may look cute, but I hear those have nasty, big, pointy... well, you know the rest.

Nice work on these mate! Sarissa makes great stuff, and these two pieces will be very nice additions to your picturesque seaside Dark Age village.

Well done and welcome back to the Challenge!

And stay warm!

- Curt

Battle in Orkness Harbour

 We fought the conclusion of our latest Beowulf adventure on table last night.  Pictures from the game are below.  Spoiler alert if any one cares to play the Seven Stones adventure.

Thigmund the Thee Therpent swims into the harbour for this full moon’s  sacrifice.

The sea serpent is a 3D print from MyMinifactory printed off by local gamer Jeremy.

The sea serpent and the town.

The town buildings and long ship are MDF kits from Sarissa Precision sold as a Viking Town set along with a dock.

Instead of the town’s sacrifice, the raft carries Alys with a torch and  a barrel of pitch and oil

Alys narrowly avoided becoming gravlaks and substituted the flaming barrel.

The serpent took its revenge with a couple of nasty tail attacks as Alys swims for shore.  Duncan the Old Ways spiritual leader comes to her aid and is killed in her stead.

The final action between the sea serpent and the adventuring party plus followers.  The figures are mostly Gripping Beast except for the four heroes on hexagonal bases. 

The four heroes are by Handiwork games, publishers of the Beowulf RPG, and 3D printed by Curt.

28mm MDF Buildings from Sarissa For SYW

The two new buildings.  The figures were completed before the challenge

La Belle Alliance in the rear, cart shed to the left and farmhouse to the right.

Much to my own surprise I have stuff to post this week, and am in fact holding back on figures that I could post saving them for next week.  Plus I've made in roads into projects for each of the next three bonus rounds.  This happens when one's kid is in grad school; and one's wife is across the country looking after a mother post surgery.

What I am going to post this week is two more of the marvellous 28mm mdf kits from Sarissa precision.  These will feature in my Seven Year's War project for Western Germany

Close up of cart shed, the interior wall is half timbered with brick fill, basically it's a cut down version of the end wall.

First up is the Cart Shed from their English Timber Framed range.  It bears a close family resemblance to the farm house that I posted last week and painted up just as nicely. My only mod was to once again add black card stock to the windows to hide what's inside, although the wide open barn doors leave less to the imagination.  These doors also left me a challenge as the etched detail on one interior wall is clearly visible from outside.  I put the kit together in a wild rush of excitement and perhaps should have painted the interior walls first, but I think I managed to make it all look OK.  

Backside of the cart shed.  Should probably do a quick wash over the brickworks.

Next up is the La Belle Alliance Inn from field of Waterloo, and from Sarissa's Old Europe range .  They've done a number of buildings from Waterloo and I quite fancy the Chateau at Papelotte and the Church at Placenoit for future projects.  My model is both south east of Flanders and in a different linguistic zone, so I have google translated the name to Die Schon Allianz.  No mods other than the black card stock and different colours of paint, although I did include the optional shutters and a sign.

Die Schon Allianz, again needed a wash on the bricks

I ran possible names past StefanK, and he noted that French wikipedia says that the name refers to a marriage between a beautiful young woman and the grumpy old owner.  Meanwhile English wikipedia notes that the woman acquired the ownership of the tavern and two other buildings via inheritance from 3 of her 4 husbands!  I did up the sign on card stock featuring Hogarth print from his Before and After series, it seemed to fit. 

Quite happy with the sign but need to regale bottom right corner

These two buildings were painted from bare mdf with out priming, I find that if I maintain a light touch the mdf gives interesting textures through the paint.  I've also had discussions with Sarissa on the whole prime/don't prime debate.  They say that the detail will hold up unless I apply the primer with a trowel and that they've been known to get a kit painted up badly and then prime it and repaint it without losing details.  Good to know, but I'm not planning to try that!

This shot shows that the roofs lift off and that the two timber framed ones have upper floors that also life out (note the cut out on the upper left corner)

Upper floors lifted out.  The rafter system is very good.  Note that the cart shed's interior wall is only on the ground floor.

I converted the dimensions on the Sarissa sight to king's noses and the math shows that Die Schonn Allianz is 194/216=90% and the cart shed is 98/216=45% of a cubic terrain unit respectively.  The Hessian Erbprinz Regiment was completed just before this challenge and I think started just at the end of the last challenge!  I finally got around to adding unit labels and flags and they have yet to appear in the blogosphere as a finished unit.

Byron and Curt were asking about the scale of the buildings so have two shots with Hessian Erbprinz Regiment to show that they look good with 28s.