Penguin Parade

 My penguins first appeared in Arrival of the Emperor in November 2018, a mere 7 years ago.

While creating my Disney Princesses I thought about what I could do with them once more.

Finally some of them have been armed. 15 angry Penguins ready to fight to the last fish. Their shield is cleverly designed to slide on snow. You might think you are safe when they are on a hill far away but thirty seconds later they are cutting you off at the knees!

The Antarctica Guard

Individual designs on their shields.

Swords, shields and spear/standard from Wargames Factory Skeletons sprue. Snowflake designs from the internet. Flag is a semi-official flag for Antarctica (I didn't know they had one either) 

I am assuming once global warming gets going the penguins will get angry. Living in Australia I think we may be one of the first targets.... after New Zealand of course....watch out Keith!

A more respectable parade of Napoleonic's soon.

Butterflies and Disney Princesses

 A random inspiration while perusing a manufacturer's website was  making a small 28mm skirmish force of Snow White and the Eight Dwarves. This was then followed by pondering what other Disney Princesses could be used.

Elsa for Frozen was front of mind as my grand daughter is infatuated with her. Then I thought of Cinderella and a collection of "mouseketeers" with a Fairy Godmother sorceress. Mulan and her warriors and a dragon. Then came the Princess and the Frog as I already had a frog army for my 40k Dangerous Fauna.

A purchase of 15 snowmen was quickly made from Aliexpress for $10 and I already had some penguins with SMG so Elsa's force was complete.

However, unusually for me, I thought "What and when would I use these for?" Having no answer I rationally decided that while these would be fun little projects they were not needed when there were already a lot of other projects waiting for my time.

I searched for an Elsa so the snowmen would not go to waste and found her plus a friend in a packet of two resin elf sorceress. The second one was suitable for the Princess and the Frog so another $12 later I was closing out the purchasing for this butterfly project.

Here are the pictures.

Elsa and her gang.

Inspiration from Disney's version

My Elsa interpretation

Elsa and some friends... sending a cold front to someone

Elsa and more friends

Elsa's heavy hitters  "Reservoir Penguins" *

The Princess and the Frog

Inspiration from Disney

My version with her two froggy princes

The Princess sends out her horde of frogs.   They fear no one except the French.

Well, all in all I got out of that with little expense in either time or money.

This got me thinking about all the projects half done that I have waiting in various boxes. I really do need to concentrate on some of these so the Napoleonic British are going on hold** until I sort everything out and make a plan.

* "Reservoir Penguins" - stolen from Mr. Tarantino's film Reservoir Dogs whose characters hid their identities under colourful names.

** I am sure many of you are thinking that I am just increasing the number of unfinished projects and so making things worse, and, that's a good point.

See you next time with something a bit more rational - we hope.

Fast Terrain

 Sometimes things appear that just amuse me and I am afraid they will disappear if I don't act immediately.

Such was a McDonalds' toy my grand daughter brought home.... a small McDonalds building just about right for 10mm.

Being a good grandfather I decided that I shouldn't steal hers and went online to see if I could buy one. Luckily there are numerous vendors catering to odd souls like me who want a McDonalds toy without the trouble of eating any hamburgers.

So for the princely sum of $12 delivered I received it through the mail a week later.

I also decided that it would need a carpark and driveway for the drive through orders. So a quick sketch on some paper combined with some 1mm thick plastic sheet, a random piece out of the bits box for the ordering machine, some arrow decals from 40k space marines, some flock and I was ready.

The final result. It fits in OK with the buildings on the right that are two stories.

Being defended by the US Army against any commies, zombies, aliens or mutants.

For 10mm a flat roof is ideal as it gives the TOW missile somewhere to hide as well as making it easy to show which troops are in the building. As you can see it is a little small but still looks OK.

It packs away easy, the cars are separate too so we can show it busy or closed and the building can be used by itself.

It even comes ready for skirmish wargames 🤣

I had thought about giving it a new coat of paint but have left it as is for now. Expect to see it on any modern battlefield I make in the future.

Anyway, a very silly thing and a quick project (less than two weeks from thought to completion!) that leaves me more satisfied than a few of their hamburgers 😂

Back to more Napoleonic's soon (sorry Stew)

Project Stew Part One

 Another post that should have been in 2024.

In July 2023 Stew of A terrible Loss of Lead and Wealth ran a competition celebrating his Six Years of Blogging which I won. Hooray for me!!

The prize was a $25 voucher to the wargame company of my choice. Being addicted to 10mm I chose Pendraken. I did not want to just add it as part of another army, I wanted it to be a discrete project that would remind me of my luck (and Stew's blog) I was struggling to work something out when Stew gave me the idea in response to one of the comments on his blog.

So with the project instruction set I just needed to work out the detail.

The Project

It is mid 1944 and the Emperor of Japan calls his generals to a meeting in the Imperial Palace where he makes the obvious point that the war is not going exactly as planned. The generals all shuffle about uncomfortably until one says that the next battle is sure to be decisive. The Emperor raises an eyebrow and states "just like the 30 battles before that. Your incompetence displeases me. Luckily I have a Sneaky Terrifying Exquisite War-Winning plan!"

The Sneaky Terrifying Exquisite War-Winning Plan (STEWW Plan)

The Navy will supply a large submarine to carry a special team consisting of the Court Necromancer and his Ninja guards. The submarine will transport the team to the entrance of James River where a small boat will take the team up the river to  Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond Virginia. The Necromancer will raise a horde of Confederate Zombies to be led by the famous Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart. Once the horde is raised they will march on Washington causing mayhem and dismay, bringing about the fall of the U.S.A. as an unstoppable Confederate Army once again marches.

Its all coming together

Luckily Pendraken produce CSA zombies infantry and Ninjas. USA cavalry will be provided by my existing US army forces and the apocalypse by WW2. Working very quickly in December I ordered Ninjas, CSA infantry, a General Stewart figure and a Necromancer which all added up to just under the voucher amount and so a perfect fit. 

So after a very slow start here are my purchases all poorly painted up.

The Imperial Necromancer and his Ninja Guards

General J.E.B. Stuart and one regiment of zombie troops

A slightly better photo

Another blurry photo

A little bit less blurry.

I have added flags to the standards so they look slightly better.

Next things to do.

Work out a 3 to 4 game campaign where the CSA zombie army fights the US cavalry (who will be riding jeeps) and ends with an assault on the White House and the Capitol Building. 

Rules: Surprisingly there don't seem to be any rules for an assault by Confederate Zombies on Washington DC anytime during the 1940's! So I am going to have to make something up. Probably based on the OHW rules with special effects for Necromancers and Zombies. Shouldn't be too difficult.

Thanks for reading and hopefully the next installment wont take too long.