The Old Red Fort of Rhanzlistan (Part 2)

I've spent the day off and on progressing the Supreme Littleness Designs MDF Fort kit. Having coated it in Basetex 'Dried Earth' and gritted the base with my usual basing mixture yesterday I left it all to harden overnight. The first stage is to paint the entire structure, I use Crafter's Acrylic Burgundy Rose as the base colour on all my sub continent buildings, and to was the base to match the figures, again using Crafter's Acrylic 'Country Maple' ~

When the Base coat and the ground wash are dry I next dry brush heavily with Artiste Acrylic 'Burnt Sienna'. It's really necessary to dry brush this coat heavily to help the desired end effect ~

The second dry brushing needs to be much lighter handed and its best to do two light coats rather than one thickish one I've found. For this stage I used Artiste Acrylic 'Clay' and you get this rich orange brown look ~

The final stage of dry brushing is the lightest you'll find. I use a dry brushing of Anita's Acrylic 'Cream'. The effect is to wash down the whole colour while highlighting the edges and texture. The effect produces this look on my Rhanzlistan buildings ~

I've painted the few pieces of exposed wood simply Foundry 'Bay Brown Shade' for now. I'll tinker with that tomorrow probably. Adding dark green static grass, dry green and dark green grass tufts and 'weeds' from various coloured clumps allows the ruin to be dressed and lifted ~

Well,it's pretty much finished now and should blend in well with my other buildings in next month's Rhanzlistan game here in GHQ.

The Old Red Fort...

...or at least it will be red when it's finished! I'm taking a break from figure painting for a couple of days and adding a new terrain piece to the collection for use in our next Rhanzlistan game next month. It's a Supreme Littleness MDF kit which I bought on impulse at Claymore in August. After assembling the kit and leaving the glue to harden overnight I've textured all the building's surfaces with Basetex and the groundwork with my usual basing grit mix. I've added rubble, rocks, bricks and such to bring the whole up. I've also built a small well from rock pieces in the courtyard of the ruin. I'll build a wooden cover for the well later on and add some pots and such from the bits box. Here it is as it stands at present anyway ~

The rubble on the right is the punched out MDF pieces from the various lug holes and window features.
The metal rocks are from a Craft Store via Kevin!

I've added the ladder detail from my spares box. The trapdoor is simply the MDF punched out piece from the access hole to the roof.

The well in the foreground is made from rock pieces glued in place layer by layer. More Craft Store metal rock pieces filling the void in the wall as rubble. It all needs to harden off overnight now before I can start on painting it, red of course!

Bhurpa Gold

Earlier today Phil and I played out the latest game in our ongoing Tales from Rhanzlistan, our imaginary setting on the North West Frontier in the early 1920's. The game would be played using Bolt Action rules over six turns, with an optional seventh turn decided by a dice throw. Phil's S.P.I.F.F. had the task of looting a defended Bhurpa village in the foothills of the mountains of Rhanzlistan. Three objective markers represented the loot, worth respectively 5, 10, and 20 victory points as they were located further from the enemy. The Bhurpas, lead by the worthy if unmilitary Imran Bhykli, scored one victory point for every member of S.P.I.F.F. they killed. The Bhurpas defended their village, determined to repulse the infidel ~

General Robinski organised his S.P.I.F.F. forces and began an assault on a wide front to feel out th strength of the Bhurpa positions. Imran Bhykli had chosen to defend the village with three large groups of Bhurpas, to maximise casualties on the enemy in the later stages, supported by long range artillery, and a MMG located in the foothills to the village's left flank. An 80mm mortar was located in the courtyard of the Headman's house ~

Clearly speed in the assault would be vital for S.P.I.F.F. to achieve its objectives in six or seven turns, so Robinski sent his armoured car directly down the road to the village, spraying the defenders with the fire from its twin turrets ~

Despite several rounds of mortar fire, no hits were scored on the armoured car, though the S.P.I.F.F. artillery did come under Bhurpa fire and their supporting MMG was destroyed by the Bhurpa machine gun team. Meanwhile, the defenders in the village were coming under serious threat from advancing infantry ~

With the Bhupa machine gun team out of action their left flank was suddenly open as the enemy's infantry dashed forward. Assaulted directly in their front the other two groups could not support the remnants of the third group to their left ~

While the central group enjoyed some success in a fire fight with their opponents, the group on the Bhurpa's right flank were heavily pinned by fire from the armoured car, a MMG and the infantry to their front. With his left flank collapsing Imran Bhykli lead his personal retinue in a desperate charge to repulse the enemy  ~

Fighting fiercely the superior numbers of the enemy were sent packing. With their blood u th small band of heroes now rushed the flank of an even larger enemy infantry group. Fighting was brutal and bloody, but one by one Bhykli's guard were cut down until only our hero remained ~

His fate was sealed as the overwhelming odds were too much even for his mighty frame to resist ~

The end of turn 6 saw the Bhurpas ahead on points but clearly so weakened that in any extra turn they could not resist the advance of the enemy's armoured car, which would give them possession of the final objective and victory by a narrow margin. Tension was high in GHQ as the dice was rolled:  wold have an extra turn! Sadly it proved all too much for the remaining Bhurpas and the armoured car rolled unopposed into the courtyard, securing the objective and winning the game for Phil!