Well, finally, bucko has moved to sunny San Remo and attended his first official P.I.G.S. games night. It was great to finally have him on board. So for the first and last time this blog is about you, Bucko.

Having talked to us a lot about his Batman game and figure collection we decided to ease him into our illustrious company with a Dr Who game, and guess what – not even a single one was rolled all night!! NOT ONE.

It helped of course that DR Who uses special dice with symbols and not numbers but even so there was not one situation where Bucko’s bad dice luck played a part – a lack of skill and tactics on the other hand………………..

Bucko really got into the game with cries of “exterminate, exterminate” regularly punctuating the otherwise lucid and erudite dialogue from the two Dave’s. That gentlemanly façade quickly faded with Bucko at first refusing to shoot at Donna Noble because of her gender but then a few turns later happily crushing her in close combat under his rampaging “Dalek”.

The game began with the Daleks concentrating fire on the Doctor and Donna causing a wound and under fire marker on each. This proved crucial as the Doctor was unable to clear the under fire marker until near the end of the game seriously reducing his capacity.

The Silence and the Daleks slogged it out for several turns with the machines coming out on top.

Finally, the Doctor was operational and started to threaten the Dalek rear.

Leaving the bloodied Silence to face this new threat the Daleks take down Donna Noble for the loss of two Daleks to the Doctor.

When the dust settled and the points were added up……………….oh the ignominy – the Daleks actually won. Yes that’s right Bucko wins!!!!!

Daleks (Bucko) 7 points (Donna 2pts, Silence Leader 2pts, 3 Silence 1pt each)

The Doctor and Donna (David S) 2 points (2 daleks 1pt each)

The Silence (David K) was silent.

At P.I.G.S. we let Newbs win to encourage them– I just hope in the process we have not created a monster.

Welcome aboard mate.

What a Tanker Painting update:

Step 1 naturally assembly, cutting the parts free from the sprues, cleaning up mold lines and flashing.

I personally like batching the work and painting en-mass – so everything, all forces go through each step together.

Three Forces:

1. 6x Italian Tanks
2. 7x British Tanks
3. 7x German Tanks

Aiming to prepare everything for the Italian campaign 1943-1945 in Italy.

Step 2 & 3 everything gets a brown undercoat of Rhino Oxide and then an airbrush spray of their base colour ontop.

Went with Iraq Sand for the Brisith Tanks, Desert Grey for the Germans, and a NATO Desert Yellow for the Italians, hey its a nice mustard colour!

Step 4 is painting flat details on, tracks are watered down gun metal over the basic yellow/browns.

Decided on no camo pattern for the Italians after reviewing historical photos, and I’ve actually modelled the sand bags, and track extra armour on just as I’ve seen in real photos of Italian tanks, trying to scratch out some extra protection. The Italian flag, Card symbols and regiment/company flag is all fictional just to look good.

British tanks are based off some photos I could find, I have added the rings for good looks and some numbering just to make them less boring.

The Germans get an aggressive tiger style camo pattern and some bright yellow highlights that I have seen in an art’s representation, not sure if its was really used bu it looks great.

This stage is fairly fast and get’s everything to what I call “Factory Finished” just as they were when they rolled out of the war factory, nice clean and new and never used.

Next steps will take care of that.

Step 5 is weathering, wear and tear. My favorite technique and one I learnt off another friend, SS for short is to get some silver and tad it on for bullet strikes and run it very finely along edges where the paint would rub off and corners. When done well its super convincing and the miniature almost immediately like an optical illusion looks like it really is metal with scratches. Next is some messy brown paint tabbed on where dirty is required. Lastly and a new trick is to get some bright orange paint, and dry brush it on to create rust in hard to reach and wet areas, be very sparing but when done well is again super convincing and looks amazing. I always new I’d eventually do a brown wash over these figures and after a …. mistake with a previous army I learnt that the wash stage darkens the figures, so now I compensate and paint them bright knowing the wash will darken them down.

Step 6 Brown wash. Usually in the past I’ve always used black washes and they really define the detail but I’ve always resented how dark the figures got and always wondered whether I preferred them before the wash cycle. So this time I went with a greatly watered down brown wash, using an alcohol based thinner to “water it down”, that’s also how I describe our Friday night gaming drinks. I used a large soft horse hair brush and very wet and washed down the tanks, relying on the wetness and thinners to let the ink wash away.

First time ever have I been really happy with the results, they’re soft, not shinny… I hate shinny, and importantly subtle.

Step 7 is dusting. This is easy with an airbursh, I used a light near white yellow and using focused air, I airbush the lower half of the tracks and wheels, letting the airbrush bleed higher. I also let the airbush go high at the back of the tanks where it would spit up dust and crap on its self, but I go short at the front. This creates a beautiful dust track effect and you can see, brown bits, rust and stuff through the dust effect, giving the wheels and tracks a great worn and used look.

Lastly two I give every miniature a very very light high level dusting, so light that you don’t notice except when holding one tank next to an undusted tank can you tell the difference. The very light dusting effect is just there to tie everything together without hiding or mooting out any of the other effort and colours.

Only thing left is a light spray of matt varnish and we’re done. The below pics are the finished tanks; Enjoy;

That’s is from me for now, with Tanks painted they now need a battlefield to fight on, I guess that’s next…