Tag Archives: Rebel Minis

Terrain Week

I needed a break from painting my Germans for Chain Of Command, so starting this past Thursday, and finishing today, I worked on terrain.  I planned on making some bocage, but after a trip to the hobby store, I ended up with some strip styrene to make tank traps with.  Then, I saw some great 15mm stone walls on Brookhurst Hobby’s site, so I ordered those.

bocage_start bocage_start_cross_sectionIn the model airplane section of my local hobby store, I found this curved piece of wood, as well as the flat pice I used as a base.  This will serve as the basis of my bocage.  I glued them together, let it dry overnight, then cut them with a circular saw, since I don’t have anything more subtle.  Then I sanded the sharp edges to a slight curve.

tank_traps_start tank_traps_start_2At that same hobby store, I found this strip styrene.  They had all kinds – I beams, hollow square, etc.  I thought it would be perfect for tank traps.  I used superglue to make the tripods, and glued them to some leftover wood from the bocage base.

The mini is a 15mm Sci-Fi soldier from Rebel Minis.  I’ll be using him as a size reference today. For you Flames Of War players, he’s almost exactly the same size as Battlefront’s plastic soldiers.

walls_startThese are the 15mm walls, cleaned and ready for primer.  They are resin, and are made by Peter Pig.

bocage_primed bocage_with_rocks bocage_with_rocks_paintedI primed the bocage black, glued some model railway ballast rocks to it, and let it dry overnight. Then I used some leftover Citadel sepia shade on it, and let that dry.  Last, I dry brushed it gray.  I like the black / brown / gray combination.

tank_traps_primedI used some vinyl spackling mixed with sand to fill in the base of the tank traps.  I talk about that process in several other blog posts.  I let that dry overnight, then primed it all black.

 

wall_primedAt the same time, I primed the stone walls black.

tanktraps_top tank_traps_completeI painted the tank traps and base.  I used the sepia shade on the base to good effect, I think.  I could probably use more practice painting rusty metal, though.

walls_closeup_full walls_extra_closeI’m really happy with how the walls came out, and they were really easy to paint.  A dry brush of gray, followed by a dry brush of white.  Then a green dry brush for the grass, some light dabs of tan, and a tan paint for the weeds.

The gate is brown, with a yellow-brown highlight and a black wash.

bocage_complete_side

bocage_closeup_2The bocage was a lot more work than the rest.  I used Aleene’s Fast Grab Tacky Glue.  I spread it all over the top, then stuck the foliage on it.  I used several different colors.  After it was dry, I touched it up with some more glue and foliage.  When that was dry, I soaked the whole thing in watered down PVA glue.  That took 2 days to dry, but they are pretty solid now.  Nothing is falling off these bocage.

Finally, some static grass on the edges.  I think I need a “greener” static grass.  This is “winter grass”.  I need to get some “summer” grass or something like that.

treesI had originally ordered some Woodland Scenics trees from Amazon when I ordered the foliage, but they turned out to be too small to stick on the bocage, so I based them on the last of the leftover base wood from the bocage in 2 groups of 4.

all_terrain_on_workbench all_terrain_on_grassThe fruits of 7 days of labor.

I’m going to get back to painting my Germans, but at some point I need a lot more trees, some more tank traps, some farm fields, roads, minefields, etc.  The list goes on.

I really enjoy making terrain.  It’s a nice break from painting minis.  Now I can attack my Germans with renewed enthusiasm.

Getting Started in WWII Gaming

A while back, I got the Flames Of War Open Fire! box set as a gift.  There’s 100+ 15mm miniatures in there, as well as the FoW rulebook, painting guides, and more.

Since then, Too Fat Lardies released their excellent WWII skirmish rules, Chain Of Command. Reading those rules, and reading the FoW rules, I quickly decided I’d rather play Chain Of Command.

That doesn’t mean the Open Fire! box set is useless.  Far from it.  The miniatures in that box are of excellent quality, and there are a lot of them.  Chain Of Command is intended for 28mm, but the rules state it can be played in 15mm with no adjustments.  I already play Sci-Fi in 15mm, so I have lots of terrain that can do double duty.  Using the FoW minis to play Chain Of Command in 15mm is a no brainer for me.

So, tonight I assembled a German platoon, as specified by the CoC army lists, from my FoW minis:

Chain_of_command_german_platoon_rawThat’s the platoon command group in the front – a leader with a 2 man panzershreck team.  Then 3 squads, each with a leader and panzerfaust, a MG42 machine gun with 2 crew and a rifleman, and six rifleman.

That’s 39 minis.  This is the core of your force in CoC.

Here’s a size comparison between the the FoW minis and some 15mm Sci-Fi minis from Rebel Minis I have in progress:

Size_comparison_FoW_Rebel_minis_sci_fi39 minis.  I’ve got a lot of painting to do. 🙂

 

 

Basing With Citadel Texture – Rebel Minis 15mm Government Types

I painted Rebel Mini’s 15mm Government Types and I wanted to base them like they were standing in the street or a parking lot.  I decided to try CItadel’s texture paints.  I use Citadel because they are easily available at several hobby stores near my home and work.

I’m pretty happy with how they came out.

painted_front painted_back

Painting done and sprayed with Dullcote – front and back view.  There’s a pic of these in bare metal and with just primer on in my post What’s On My Table – June 2013 Edition.

 

start_of_basing

Spackling, mixed with a bit of water to thin it, applied to the base to build it up even with the figure’s built in base.

 

base_sanded

Then I sanded the spackling flat.  I’ll probably skip this step in the future.  It messed up some of the figure’s feet, which I had to go back and fix, and I don’t see that it really made a difference to the bases.

 

base_with_texture

I then applied the Citadel texture “Astrogranite”.  It’s pretty thick, so I thinned it with some water.  It was still more like a basing material than paint.  You don’t brush it on so much as push it around.

 

rebel_minis_15mm_government_types_RMGT3_complete_1

Then I painted on some road lines and parking space lines.  Then a light gray dry brush. Then a black border.  If you’ve read my blog before, you know the bases are from Litko.net – 20mm around, 0.8mm thick wood base with a heavy duty magnet bottom stuck underneath it.

 

rebel_minis_15mm_government_types_RMGT3_complete_3

Is the guy in the front, 2nd from left, talking on the phone or smoking a cigarette?  I can’t really tell, so I’m going with talking on the phone.  That way he’ll get brain cancer instead of lung cancer.

 

rebel_minis_15mm_government_types_RMGT3_complete_2

 

I like how these turned out – the figures and the bases.  I plan to use them with the Monster Hunter International RPG.

 

Mall Cops

I finished my Rebel Minis 15mm Mall Cops tonight.  Rebel also has “US Policemen”, but the Mall Cops have these awesome mustaches, and I just couldn’t resist.  I intend to use them for the Monster Hunter International RPG, but cop figures have a wide range of uses.

rebel_minis_mall_cops_unwashed

The base coat is done, and they are ready for a wash.

 

rebel_minis_mall_cops_after_wash

After the wash and some minor highlights.

 

rebel_minis_mall_cops_based

After basing.

 

rebel_minis_mall_cops_detail

A select few.  The guy on the left is the only figure of the 8 that has no mustache.  I imagine the rest of the squad give him crap about it all the time.  “Nice job, Frank, for a guy with no mustache”. “You would do better with the ladies if you had a sweet ‘stache like mine.” etc…  🙂

What’s on my Table – June 2013 Edition.

I’m taking a break from painting Dreadball to work on some 15mm stuff I got from Rebel Minis.  I’ve got a Monster Hunter International RPG campaign starting next month, and I want to get some monster minis ready for it.  To that end, I ordered a bunch of werewolves, zombies, cops, FBI agents and more from Rebel Minis and Khurasan.

all_clean

This first batch is from Rebel Minis, since they arrived first.  In fact, I ordered on a Sunday night and they arrived on Thursday.  Now that’s quick service!

There’s a some shipping containers, some sci-fi troops to round out my Earth Force, some “mall cops”, who all have awesome mustaches, werewolves, and government agents.

Here they are after cleaning.

 

primed_and_ready

Here they are primed and ready for paint.  In the back are some minis that have been hanging around my work table waiting for paint for a while now – 2 from GZG and 1 from Khurasan.

 

rebel_minis_15mm_shipping_containers

The finished shipping containers.

 

rebel_minis_15mm_werewolves

The finished werewolves.  They are kinda boring, I think.  Brown on brown.  I tried to get some red on the eyes, but they are too small – I just made a mess that I had to go back and fix.  Same for the teeth.  Anyway, you can tell what they are.

 

In the back of those last two pics, you can kinda see a special order I just got from Khurasan.  More on them and the rest of what’s on my table in a future post.

Happy gaming!