Springtime for Martians and 15mm ey!

I did think that with the painting this project was going to be over, then got to thinking now I’ve painted them what should I use them for.

I remember when the Kick starter for this was originally announced, I wondered why they didn’t just bring out rules and the Martian side, and let the people buy for available 15mm WW1 ranges or even WW2 15 mm ranges to play the 50’s movie.

What I didn’t know was there was a series of books planned on the Universe by

Scott Washburn

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Scott-Washburn/e/B01BJYXPOS?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1591618874&sr=8-1

They are a pretty good read  and now you can get the original 3 set in  America the as one volume and I’ve just recently read the one set in Europe, and intent to read the Texas one soon.

Despite above have no real plans to game that particular take on it even if it re-appears now someone has brought the licence ( I had heard it separately to Gerry on Sats Weekender )

I had brought them over a year ago to Game in the Gaps as Gerry eloquently put it (I have a feeling I will be buying the GW Necron ones as well) really planning to play against my WW2 FOW units.

Even during the D-day boot camp didn’t actually play the game, mainly as I was having to much fun painting stuff. But also had originally planned to use the armies for the Two Fat Lardies IABSM.

I still haven’t got round to playing FOW, but have recently had ago at Team Yankee playing solo.

I am no real fan of I go You go systems and prefer random activation, particularly at moment with having to go solo which is how I did the my first Team Yankee game.

One of the advantages of Team Yanked and FOW though is they now use pretty much the same game engine and produce very nice unit cards for both which are very easy to use as game aids. There are more detailed armour games with similar cards (the old board game Panzer for one) but dont actually need complicated armour rules for this type of game, as the heat ray the martians use will either kill nor not kill the unit in question.

So my current plan is to use the base game mechanics of the Battlefront system with all the cards for both WW2 and 3 era cards so either the classic %0’s movie or the Speilberg less classic!! era can be played with the Tripods. There will need to be other tweaks to the rules which I will go into later as I’m not sure if I will stick to Iabsm/Bolt action random activation for go for ED Texira’s system from Two Hour Wargames at the moment .

At the moment I’m drawing up a FOW/TY data card for War Tripods , and this is how far I’ve got so far.

A few thoughts on above so far movement is basically that of a Challenger, based on descriptions from Washburns books, the tripods are described as not being much faster than horses across country.

Given them a sheild roll to increase suitability , though not as impenetrable as in films with its defensive ability going down dependant on size of gun . This also fits in with Washburns take on Martian armour.

The multiple hit points follows above, but a hit in cockpit will kill easily as in the original book and the Washburn Sequals.

As for special abilities , hopefully any on reading this with more FOW/TY experience can come up with ideas.

The Scouts were painted pretty much identically, as can be seen with photos on earlier entry It was easier on these to do the 3 lens  martian eye.

To finish them off I decided to do a bit of work on the bases , way back I had started with putting some barb wire on a couple of bases and had done no more.

Now I added GW textured paint some cork rubble and a bit of gravel with no real plan, but it worked.

As a bit of an afterthought and you can just see them on base above I painted rough stick men images of humans vaporized by the heat ray.

For the scouts a little more planning went into the bases and I left odd bits on base bare for roads and building interiors,  and a bit more planned layout of cork. On two of them I dug out hulls and turrets leftover in my WW3 modelling and put them on bases as destroyed and partly melted human forces.

And that is them finished, another little idea from the depths of hobby time , now tabletop ready to fight the minions of earth be it WW2 Germans   WW3 Soviets and British or on 28mm buildings vs Victoria Artist Rifles (another forgotten project)

I started with the built and base painted Bigger War Tripods.

Firstly I gave them a coat of Army Painter Dark Tone with added Airbrush Flow improver after a tip from John on one of his live hobby blogs. I usually find it patchy and prefer GW Agrax Earthshade but have been running low during the lockdown  so took Johns advice and it works.

This was followed by an overall dry brush of Army Painter Gun Metal.

The ridge on the hood, the face ‘nose’ and the heat sinks( or whatever) on the sides were block painted GW Retributer Armour, also the ridge of hood on the command Tripod and other odd bits of detail.

The Rest of the face and the inner bits of the upper legs were given two coats of GW Reikland Fleshtone  and this was also added to the previously painted Retributer Armour areas for shading.

These parts were then highlighted with GW Auric Armour Gold.

The nose bits on the face I wanted to give a look of the 1953 film martian eyes . A layout also used on their probes.

This I tried with varying success on both the War and later Scout Tripods

I then just put a red circle and painted a rough yellow star on the heat ray muzzle and the model was finished.

As usual I’m late for the party  but when Spring clean was announced I has just started my World War 3 British Army, and my Reichbusters pledge had turned up so Spring clean never entered my head.

When I was in the middle of my post Flames of war bootcamp project :

The Road to Falaise Bobs on going 15mm WW2 Adventure

I posted a little sci fi bit for Warren with my ‘All Quiet on the Martian Front   Martian Tripods.

Brought a few years ago, not for that game, but thought they looked cool  and I could use them as 28mm baddies in numerous games.

I got 3 of the main walkers ready built of ebay  which had a bas paint job  and 4 scouts   2 had been built, but none painted.

As was my want, I did a bit of a trial wash on one and then they were left for other projects,and last year was dragged out as alternatives to Warrens UFO’s. Then got put away and forgotten again.

Anyway, whilst looking for some bases for my 15mm Soviets I found them again and thought what the hell. BEen feeling a bit under the weather with IBS , so not able to spend more than odd half hour spurts in hobby chair, and this seemed the ideal little project to break up the boredom.