“The Mortars Give Greater Firepower In The Artillery Role…”

“…At the cost of direct-fire infantry support.”

These four plastic 15mm miniatures are sold by “Battlefront Miniatures” and can be found inside the company’s 12cm Mortar Platoon blister for “Flames Of War”. The models consist of a two-piece mortar and four mortar loaders. You actually get four teams in the blister so as to build a full-strength platoon, however I picked these particular figures up off “eBay” as a single sprue.

As with all my other “FoW” German soldiers, the figures were initially super-glued onto wooden strips, before being primed in “Vallejo” German Fieldgrey WWII, shaded using “Citadel” Nuln Oil, and dry-brushed with (more) “Vallejo” German Fieldgrey WWII. Their details were then ‘picked out’ predominantly using “Vallejo” Heavy Sienna, Gunmetal, Buff, German Camouflage Dark Green, Heavy Brown and a series of “Citadel” Shades.

"Privateer Press" WIPs - These three Paladin Annihilators have been primed, shaded and dry-brushed

Disappointingly I was hoping to have also completed a second 12cm Mortar sprue I own, so as to field a minimum-sized platoon. But I still need one more dedicated hobby session with some of them to get the quartet finished and ready for action. However, there’s still enough 15mm figures on this single large base to satisfy my recent two weekly painting challenge targets.

Speaking of my Weekly Challenges, randomly chosen via a deck of playing cards, my seventh goal will be to pigment three 28mm miniatures. To be honest I have plenty of partially-painted models which I could have selected for such an objective, but ultimately went with a trio of Paladin Annihilators for "Warcaster: Neo-Mechanika". These metal "Privateer Press" castings were originally started way back in April of this year, and will help me ‘flesh’ out my starting Iron Star Alliance force rather nicely.

"Mongoose Publishing" WIPs - Three Cleaners from the "Judge Dredd Miniatures Games"

Sticking with ‘groups of three’ I have also been working on some Cleaner sculpts by “Mongoose Publishing” from their now OOP “Judge Dredd Miniatures Game”. These are essentially juve perps carrying a hand-club, and should be ready in time for my next Zomtober entry. All my submissions this year are based around the classic “2000 A.D.” comic strip “Judgement Day”, which contained a great action sequence inside the Romero Block Hopshop where Dredd, Hershey and Spencer saved a group of hapless citizens from some flesh-hungry walking cadavers.

In addition, I wanted to be able to field some minor threat-level criminals for my games of “Judge Dredd”, which could also become the targets of the living dead should the different random hazards crop up within the same game. This actually occurred in one of my most recent battles, where a mob blitzer was suddenly supported by some zombies. At the time we simply had the zeds ignore the gun-toting potential meal so the game could continue apace. But it would be nice in future if the criminals could suddenly find themselves fighting off the living dead, and even seeking the co-operation of the Justice Department against an overriding common enemy.