The Mule is the ubiquitous vehicle of all armies across the GCPS. From verdant jungles to arid toxic wastelands – they have all felt the tread of the Mule’s tyres and the boots of the Marines they carry.

The Mule based and ready for painting.

As the Plague mule comes with additional “bits” to make up their modified version, I used the standard pieces that were left over to uses as a destroyed vehicle or a piece of tabletop terrain.

I will not go through the assembly of the vehicle as this has already been done in a more professional way that I ever could by the Other Ones Vault of The Undead post.

When the Plague successfully destroyed GCPS installations they absorbed not only the population but their military hardware as well, giving their Ghoulish hordes a fast attack capability.

I will add the crew after I have finished painting. Here is a view of the magnificent action pose from the Other Ones Vault of The Undead post. If you are interested wargaming the Undead this is a post well worth following.

Many variants of Mule Transports have been sighted in Plague forces, often crudely modified with spikes, rams, and explosive payloads.

Photo Courtesy of Troll Hoard Games

First the vehicles were undercoated in matt black.

They were then lightly sprayed with Dulux Yellow line marking (this dries flat) paint.

The vehicles were then washed with GW Seraphim Sepia.

The fiddly bits then painted.

Medium and dark rust added.

Vehicles light brushed white highlight

Bases painted and rocks added.

Dry brushing and bushes added to complete the models.

I will add crew when I paint more of the 3A Ghouls.

Today in Australia we have a public holiday for Lizzy’s birthday!

Now before you monarchists get up in arms, us colonials know that her “real” birthday is on April 21st, and that it is celebrated on the Second Saturday of June because it is too bloody cold in the “old dart” to have a trooping of the colours in April! True!

So many Britains toy soldiers.

As far as I know the only 28mm miniature of the old Lilly Beth is from Space Vixens and appears in the middle of a range of aliens – maybe they know something we don’t.

The closest I get to in models is Queen Victoria from Eureka Miniatures.

Bad Squiddo do have a great model of QE1 delivering her Tilbury Speech

“I know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman; but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too, and think foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm: to which rather than any dishonour shall grow by me, I myself will take up arms, I myself will be your general, judge, and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the field.”

Stirring words indeed.

It should also be said that the Bad Squido model can be found in the same space as a Ghoul Queen, a Pirate Queen and its Iguana companion, a Bandit Queen, an Ice Queen, with the only saving grace being Cartimandua Queen of the Brigantes. However even she sided with the enemy and had a tight allegiance with the Roman usurpers!

Now don’t get me wrong I respect the office and I respect the individual even more but if you haven’t gathered by now Guru is all in favour of an English queen, just not one that is Australia’s head of state!

Maree, on the other hand, has a large collection of “Royal” porcelain figurines. We don’t disagree on much but on this SWBO is a firm royalist (we all have our faults).

Oh well. I guess Lizzy’s saving grace is that she has stayed around for so long that we will not have to put up with the “big ears and huge snot locker” for very long!

Rule Britannia – but leave Australia alone.

Von Lettow-Vorbeck’s Masterpiece

For those who know me, the French Indian Wars and this WW1 campaign are my favourite periods. I have been hanging out for this one from Osprey for some time. Unfortunately it is not available until the end of this month.

A fascinating, beautifully illustrated study of the daring war in East Africa waged by German colonial forces under Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck against the wide array of colonial and expeditionary forces of the Allied Powers.

The East African Campaign in World War I comprised a series of battles and guerrilla actions which began in German East Africa in 1914 and spread to portions of Portuguese Mozambique, northern Rhodesia, British East Africa, the Uganda Protectorate, and the Belgian Congo. German colonial forces under Lieutenant-Colonel Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck attempt to divert Allied forces from the Western Front. Despite the efforts of the Allied forces, Lettow-Vorbeck’s troops remained undefeated at the end of the war.

In this fascinating work, David Smith (not this David Smith) documents how a wide array of British, Indian, South African, Belgian, Portuguese and local native forces invaded German East Africa and slowly ousted the German forces, a process made tortuous by Lettow-Vorbeck’s masterful management of the campaign. Among the events covered in this work are the Battle of Tanga, the scuttling of the Königsberg, the German railway campaign, and the battles at Salaita Hill, Kondoa-Irangi, Mahenge, Mahiwa and Namacurra. Colourful period and specially commissioned illustrations bring to life a wide-ranging and eventful campaign in which a high price was extracted for every inch of ground given up. Osprey blurb.

It seems to cover all of the major events of the campaign, but it will be interesting if it covers Hippopotami rampaging through the British camp and overturning boats at a river crossing; or large cats stalking one of the battlefields picking off the unwary.

I am looking forward to my pre-order arriving in a few weeks time.

Poseidon, in ancient Greek religion, god of the sea (and of water generally), earthquakes, and horses. He is distinguished from Pontus, the personification of the sea and the oldest Greek divinity of the waters.

Neptune, Latin Neptunus, in Roman religion, originally the god of fresh water; by 399 bce he was identified with the Greek Poseidon and thus became a deity of the sea. His female counterpart, Salacia, was perhaps originally a goddess of leaping springwater, subsequently equated with the Greek Amphitrite.

Although Greek Gods are arguably better known, Greek and Roman mythology often have the same Gods with different names because many Roman Gods are borrowed from Greek mythology, often with different traits. For example, Cupid is the Roman god of love and Eros is the Greek god of love.

Greek Gods and their Roman Counterparts

Greek God (English name)	Roman Counterpart	Domain
Aphrodite	Venus	Goddess of Love
Apollo	Phoebus Apollo	God of the Sun
Ares	Mars	God of war
Artemis	Diana	Virgin goddess of the hunt, wilderness, wild animals, childbirth and plague. In later times she became associated with the moon.
Athena	Minerva	Goddess of wisdom
Demeter	Ceres	Goddess of grain/crops
Dionysus	Bacchus	God of wine
Eros	Cupid	God of love
Hades	Pluto	God of underworld
Hecate	Trivia	Goddess of witchcraft, crossroads, and justice
Helios	Sol	The sun God
Hephaestus	Vulcan	God of fire, and the forge
Hera	Juno	Queen of the Gods
Hermes	Mercury	Messenger of the Gods
Nike	Victoria	Goddess of victory
Pan	Faunus	God of woods and pastures
Poseidon	Neptune	God of the sea
Zeus	Jupiter	King of Gods

The Romans more commonly used the name of their own God but it was not uncommon to see in literature and art the Greek form of the name.

I wanted one more centrepiece for the Roman seaside village of Stabiae. I was hoping to find a small Roman statue that I could use but ended up with this Alabaster one of Poseidon for a few dollars in a car boot sale.

Poseidon is slightly larger than I would of liked but still looks OK.

After all he is a GOD!

Today it was SWMBO’s birthday today. I promised I would not tell anyone her age, but she is one year younger than me.

We had a nice lunch and came home and crashed on the sofa.

Last night we went to our eldest son’s house for dinner as we do every Tuesday and celebrated the birthday. The usual happy birthday stuff (without the candles as we didn’t want the cake to collapse and the grandchildren surprised Nanna by singing her a song “Down by the Bay”, which they are singing at their first recital on Saturday. The eldest surprised us with his powerful and tuneful voice, the other…………. well, only a grandfather could love!

This made her night. The boys cleared the table very quickly because they new grandpa had brought along something new from his collection. An Aptosaurus and a Spinosaurus for Comp chomp Chomp!

“See I rolled a five ! You lose”

We played three games each game ending when someone had killed three dinosaurs. Everyone won at least one game except Grandpa.

I hate gardening!

Despite this I went to the garden centre today to pick up some lettuce and spring onion seedlings.

Whilst hunting around something caught the corner of my eye. What do we have here?

Three Spanish style house pot plant holders!

They are quite detailed and made out of a plaster or cement. I few years ago I had been given something similar full of chocolates for Christmas by a gaming mate which I turned into a gaming centre piece.

I will need to place a new roof on top of this one.

With this one I will place a floor in the tower to make a defensive position for the inhabitants.

I will need to do the same thing with this one.

They are quite detailed for a pot plant holder.

Some 28mmm French figures for a size comparison. The only problem is the small door at the top of the stair which I will have to glue another door on to resolve the problem.

At around AU$5.00 each they were a steal amigo!

I think I can like this gardening thing after all!

Thanks to Pinterest for the Cartoons.

With this lot finished I now have enough to have a small game of Deadzone. I need to put together their opponents. What came with the Deadzone box was Veer-myn a sort of plague rat army, and the Galactic Co-Prosperity Sphere or GCPS (who said Capitalism was dead).

The GCPS are your standard Marine force and will fit in well with the Halo Spartans I have already done so these will be my first opponent, but more of this in about a week’s time

I came across this set of rules the other day from a subscription I have to the Games Vault website.

The Nordic Weasel game “Shoot people in Space” can be downloaded for US 14.99 from them directly. Games Vault.

The game is intended for two player play and perfectly suited to multi-player chaos but can also be played solo or cooperatively with two players teaming up against the bad guys.

The typical gaming army size is from 8 to 15 figures, making the game easy to collect and build for. If you already have figures for games like Stargrave, 7TV Pulp or Five Parsecs you can probably sit down and play right away.

Game play is heavily inspired by early sci-fi games like Bryan Ansell’s 1980’s game Laserburn still available from Alternate Armies), and the 1981 Games Workshop Spacefarers game in spirit, though it uses different mechanics than either of them. A detailed review on Spacefarers can be found HERE.

Battles are fought in phases with alternating activations: In the action phase your figures take turns carrying out one action (moving, firing, doing something else) while in the firefight phase most figures can fire (potentially shooting a second time).

Combat uses a simple 2D6 table with several unexpected factors built in: Firers can fumble or inflict critical hits and the use of a separate Threat die can cause surprise reactions such as the targets diving for cover or firing back. Gun battles plays out quickly and chaotically. 

The rules also provide an additional element of liveliness by troops occasionally going out of control: As a result of combat, they may be running away, holding a position or rushing at the enemy and will continue to do so until they are brought under control.

The usual slew of extra options are included including things like blowing up terrain and blasting through doors.

Troop types include 3 figure teams of infantry (squaddies), single characters (heroes) and bikes (including “drifter” hover bikes) with additional rules included for combat robots, random giant monsters and more. You can select from 11 species taken from the Unified Space game setting and pre-configured load-outs are available to make army building time as short as possible.

A points system is included for one-off games.

Shoot People In Space is designed for head-to-head play with a variety of scenarios and objectives to pick from, but there are rules non player forces and a random unit generator. These work well for Solo play.

They also introduce the concept of persistent play, used in a variety of games, where you can build a roster of units and when you use them in battle, they will be able to level up or die in the process.

There is also a “Mercenary mode” which focuses things by restricting players to a single force that they have to use over multiple games while trying to achieve bounties. 

The rules have some great concepts that could be used in whole or part and are worth the download if you are interested in the genre.

Thanks to Nordic Weasel Games for part of the content.

The walking husks of the Plague have their minds scoured by the infection until their only drive is to kill. Zombies shamble into battle for the alien virus that robbed them of their humanity.

When the Plague attacks an outpost the most fortunate are those that die in the initial assault. Those that remain are instead infected by the Plague and find themselves transformed and remade.

Their souls and their personalities are lost, taken over by the aims and ambitions of the Plague itself.

The plague seems to mutate and adapt to new hosts at a remarkable rate. Infected creatures (because that is all they are now) exhibit symptoms within an extremely short space of time.

Some humans infected by the Plague become hideous monsters the size of a combat walker and they seem to act as the control hub of Plague forces.

Zombies are the cannon fodder of the Plague as hundreds of them descend on an outpost to try and overwhelm the defenders before the more offensive mutations are unleashed.

In the next few days I will try and finish the terrain and put together some of the vehicles.

Today seventy eight years ago, Allied forces launched the largest amphibious invasion in the history of warfare. Code named Operation ‘Overlord’, the Allied landings on the beaches of Normandy marked the start of a long and costly campaign to liberate north-west Europe from Nazi occupation.

The majority of troops who landed on the D-Day beaches were from the United Kingdom, Canada and the US. However, troops from many other countries participated in D-Day and the Battle of Normandy: Australia, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, France, Greece, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and Poland.

The Australians who supported the D-Day invasion included between 2,000 and 2,500 RAAF airmen in Australian squadrons and British Royal Air Force units, and approximately 500 members of the Royal Australian Navy serving on Royal Navy vessels, as well as a small number of Australian Army officers and merchant seamen. The army personnel and thousands of Australian airmen also took part in the subsequent Battle of Normandy between June and August 1944, and an RAAF fighter squadron operated from airfields in Normandy.

Throughout the campaign, Australian airmen provided direct support to the Allied ground forces by attacking German military units and their supply lines, as well as forming part of the force that defended the beachhead from air attack and manning transport aircraft. Australians also indirectly supported the campaign by attacking German submarines and ships that threatened the invasion force.

No 464 RAAF Squadron

Our nation’s main contribution obviously came in the air, where approximately 1,000 Australian airmen flew with Royal Australian Air Force squadrons, and a further 1,800 operated on attachment to the Royal Air Force. On top of this, 10,000 Australians waited in training and reserve pools, ready to join operational squadrons as the campaign’s casualties mounted.

Fourteen Australians, two members of the Royal Australian Navy and twelve members of the Royal Australian Air Force, were killed on 6 June in Operation Overlord, and hundreds more were killed over the course of the campaign while flying in support of the ground forces in Normandy.

Australian members of No. 196 Squadron RAF with one of the unit’s Stirling aircraft in the background. This squadron towed gliders to Normandy on D-Day.

In fact, in terms of total casualties June 1944 was the worst month in the history of the Royal Australian Air Force. RAAF forces that were involved included Nos 451,453,455,460,461,462,463, 464,466 and 467 RAAF Squadrons.

The 13 Australian Army officers who took part in the campaign filled a variety of roles in British units. These officers had been posted to the UK to gain experience in planning and conducting large-scale amphibious operations, which would improve the army’s procedures ahead of Australian landings in the Pacific.

This offensive to land the veteran 7th Australian Infantry Division at Balikpapan was the largest amphibious operation conducted by Australian forces during the Second World War. Within an hour some 16,500 troops were ashore and pushing inland, along with nearly 1,000 vehicles. Ultimately more than 33,000 personnel from the 7th Division and Allied forces were landed in the amphibious assault.

Although our contribution was small in comparison to other nations we can be proud of those who served on this day seventy eight years ago.

Thanks to Wikipedia and the Australian War memorial for some of the information contained in this post.

Winter is upon us and I think I am on the wrong bloody side of the wall!

Grey, wet, dark and its snowing only an hour away. Brrrrrrrrr and this is Oz.

And according to our out going PM climate change doesn’t exist………………………………….

LIKE “@#$%*+&” hell it doesn’t!!!

Oh well I will just have to change my “nom de plume”!

The day went from gale to ” grumpy” as I decided to put together some of the Plague vehicles for Deadzone/Firefight. I have the old Warpath (the figures haven’t changed) Plague Reserve Force which consists of 2 Plastic Striders, a Mule transport, and a Hornet Gunship – all very nice models.

I opened up the box with eager anticipation but there were no instructions. Just lots of little bags full of pieces with nothing to show even what bags go together. This is not unusual as lots of companies these days only supply instructions on-line. Not deterred I went to the Mantic website expecting to find them and NOTHING.

So a very Grumpy Guru penned an email politely asking “where the %$#@ are they”? Actually I was polite!. Being Sunday I did not expect a reply but received one almost instantly. I was even more surprised when it was a real person and not an auto reply. They replied that unfortunately Mantic do not supply instructions. I very politely replied “WTF”! No not really but I did start writing an Email to point out that not all of their customers were experienced gamers or modellers and that those younger might find it difficult.

Whilst I was typing this my eight year old grandson was tugging at my arm saying, “look at this Grandpa”.

Assembling the Mantic Games Plague Mule Transport

A post from fellow WordPress blogger The Other One’s Vault of the Undead that would solve my problems. Needless to say I felt a little inferior. I was pleased to note that he too was thrown a bit by the lack of instructions as well. Phew not that dumb after all (leave it alone guys)!

Enthusiasm had now waned and the pieces went back in the box and I decided to finish the other five 3A plague Ghouls and woofer instead. Boring I know but at least I know what I was doing with the paint brush and I would leave the Mule for another day.

All of the 3A Ghouls are equipped with rifles, Woofer just has his teeth.

At least something was salvaged from the day and Guru learnt some valuable lessons:

It’s called a cursor not a curser!

When your computer tells you to open a new window I now don’t have to worry about the rain getting in!

Backing up your computer has nothing to do with reversing!

See ya tomorrow unless I hit Format C: accidentally.