Dust Battlefield – An Archive For The Steinberg Shed Space Blog

eBay Purchase – A Project For Later In The Year (Score So Far +6)

It couldn’t last now could it… Six points up on the tally means I’ve managed to keep my focus on the plan for a few weeks straight…

It was inevitable that some ‘shiny’ thing would draw my attention away!

In this case it was an eBay auction that caught my eye after our last Dust Tactics game. Coronasan and I were discussing the possibility of building a set of airfield scenery. Mainly so that our collection of fliers for Dust could be used as scenery or objectives when they were not being used in the actual game.

Coronasan has a mind to build an old style control tower in MDF but I will let him get into that one over on the Loft Full Of Lead…

That leaves me to populate said airfield. And what better than a HUGE transport plane to do that…

This is the result of that eBay auction. It cost me only £2 and cost twice that to get it posted to me…

A simple childrens plastic toy (the lights and sounds no longer work sadly). It appears to be a good scale for most 28mm(ish) games figures and vehicles.

She looks mighty fine alongside the other Dust Tactics planes I have as well.

I will be shelving her immediately so that I don’t get distracted (that’s if I have a space on the shelf that is big enough for her to fit into).

Definitly not on ‘The Plan’. However, as its not going to be touched until summer (or at least until Coronasan gets a control tower built), I am not going to score myself down.

Score for post 0 points / Total score +6

Dust Tactics – USMC vs Blutkreuz (Score So Far +4)

Well, all that USMC painting finally paid off. We got our, slightly delayed, game of Dust Tactics played and a good time was had. This time Coronasan fielded his newly painted Blutkreuz Axis forces. So newly painted that we had to have a cup of tea to give his Laser Grenadiers last ink wash time to finish drying. How very civilised of us.

His force consisted of a full platoon of Gorillas, a full platoon of Zombies and a small platoon of Heavy Infantry with Laser Grenadiers (heavy and light). He also brought along a Horten ‘Blitz’ laser cannon toting plane for air support.

My usual USMC force hit the table with support from a newly painted, rocket armed, P-48X plane. They also rolled out some heavy support in the form of two up-gunned Wolverine tanks.

The table was setup with only a light amount of scenery which allowed the planes to gain free reign over the enemy half of the table.

Playing flyers was new for both of us and we soon discovered that to fire machine guns at targets (at only 20cm range) you have to get uncomfortably close…

Thankfully only a few units had the ability to return fire so the flyers were able to cause some effect before being shot down.

We played a game using scattered reserves meaning we rolled to see where our reinforcements came on. Which was not always where we wanted. Recoilless guns are very powerful but cannot target flyers sadly.

Ambling zombies, on the other hand, do not like the attention of HMGs and rockets.

In the end Coronasan managed to whittle my left flank down, and was pleased to see me have to deploy my last few units on my right flank. This prompted him to make a last mad dash along the side of the table and claim an objective allowing him to win the game. All this while I tried to scuttle back over the table in vague hopes of stopping him…

This game was planned and on the list so I now find myself at a very healthy score for the end of January.

Score for post +1 / Total score +4

The New Year Plan – Progress Report – Dust Game Played (Score So Far 0)

So, although I lost a point by painting up a model that was not on my New Year Plan, today I get to win that point back again. I am pleased to say that we recently played a game of Dust Tactics, a game we have neglected for about a year. (edit: In fact the last game I can find recorded on the blog was back in June 2016…)

I have not been out of love with this game, it remains one of my firm favourites, and we always seem to return to it with as much interest and enjoyment as when we started playing it. It is, in fact, one of the reasons Coronasan and I became reacquainted after a number of years in different gaming circles.

The plan was originally to get this game in before Xmas. With the holidays, and a number of ‘real life’ changes for both of us, we missed more than a couple of opportunities to get this played. It actually resulted in me having time to paint up the last few units of my USMC force over the new year break (each cancelled game gave me a few extra hours of painting time).

My USMC managed to hold Coronasan’s Gorilla and Zombie heavy Axis force at bay and we settled on a draw in the end.

This game was one that we did propose for the New Year Plan so counts as a success for scoring purposes. We hope to get another game of this in, in about 2 weeks time, so should win me some more points soon if all goes well…

Score for this post +1 point / Total Score 0

The New Year Plan – Scoring My Success And My First Amendment (Score So Far -1)

Coronasan has suggested that I give myself a score out of 10 at the end of spring to see how well I have managed to keep to the proposed plan… Well, I suspect that score would be quite low, but in the true spirit of the thing I propose the following:

Not to score my success at the end of spring with a 1-10 score, but to keep a running tally!

+1 point for each time I post something that IS on the listed plan.
-1 point for each time I post something that is NOT on the plan.

If I manage to remain above zero in the end I will call this a success.

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So, starting as I am sure I will go on, I present a Dust Tactics Fighter Bomber.

This was a model I bought on eBay. Part painted and slightly worse for wear after its travels through the English mail system. This has never been a major issue as our Royal Mail generally does a sterling job of getting things to me in one piece. This one came boxed in what resembled an accordion on its arrival. Someone tried really hard to flatten it to its thinnest.

Thankfully the seller did well to package it and only a few parts needed reattaching. In my case it actually made it easier to complete the paint job.

A couple of areas just needed touching up and, as I liked the initial colour scheme, it only took me an hour or so to get it dome. Getting the Perspex off the base so that I could spray it black and then reattaching it later may have taken just as long as the model itself.

I have to say, I am quite happy with the results, and as we are trying to get a game of Dust Tactics or two under our belts before the end of spring it will be useful to have it finished.

However, it was not on the list… I already have twice as many points of painted Dust Tactics Allies (USMC) than I need to play a game, so I should have really left this alone and focused on ‘The Plan’.

Score for this post -1 point / Total score -1

Dust Tactics – Up To Date. Yes, I Am As Surprised As You Are…

So the last unit for my Dust Tactics Allies force has been completed. These guys are ‘Force Recon’ and designed to act officially as artillery observers.

I suspect that with an MG and a bunch of Shotguns I will be tempted to use them in an anti infantry capacity more often than I remember to fire my mortar using their activation. A full unit throws 30 dice in attack (granted at only 20cm range).

Not sure why the ‘Sarg’ came out with an odd skin tone as he was done exactly as the others were.

I wonder if he had a rougher base coat or undercoat when I started him… I may go back and darken him further by giving him an African skin tone to hide the difference.

Anyhow, that’s all my USMC painted at this point.

Dust Tactics – 2 Out Of 3 Aint Bad

The second of my Dust Tactics units has been on the painting table this week. About the only thing that has it would seem.

Life, in the run up to Xmas, has been quite busy for me, and it would seem that it has been the same for everyone else that I know as well. These 5 guys are all that got painted over the last 7 days of inactivity on the hobby front.

These are a unit of ‘Hot Shots’ and they feature a couple of antitank fellows that should be able to target the odd Axis walker. If they fail to do that, they might just draw a few shots away from other units before they die. The light weight class 1 infantry do die very quickly in Dust 1947.

The unit appears to be fairly flexible though as the three non-antitank members of the unit are each toting BARs to help keep those pesky Axis infantrymen in order.

Only one more unit is left to go and I will be up to date on Dust Allies again… We may even get that game in soon…

Dust Tactics – A USMC Fully Painted Army In 2 Easy Steps

Anyone who has been following my blog will know that Dust Tactics is one of the lasting games we play in the shed. We have probably played more games using this ruleset (or one of its variants) than any other.

I have a LARGE Axis force (still not completely painted…) but have become slightly tired of these boys. So lately I decided to build an Allied force and slowly paint it up.

On eBay however, I found a cheap deal on a USMC starter force. All boxed and including a heavy walker, 2 medium walkers and assorted infantry. The best part… It was a Premium painted set. The startlingly fine paint jobs and weathering on all of the pieces puts my painting to shame.

Throw in a diecast prepainted halftrack and I was well on the way to being finished. And with no effort taken.

Then another Premium set came up on eBay. This time with Heroes and alternate turrets. I was, all of a sudden fielding a full force with no effort other than clicking my mouse.

What to do with my primed figures. I cannot paint as well as the guys at Dust Studios that’s for sure. It would mean painting a few modles in a very different style to my usual methods. I have said before that darker tones are easier for me. But as I age my eyesight makes all my mistakes less obvious and I guess I could make them look close enough matches.

Not too bad if you look from far enough away.

So,

Step one buy most of what you need ready painted (setup an eBay alert if you are lazy like me)…

Step two don’t buy too many new units unless they are not available as premium painted units…

Dust Tactics – Decal Dilemas

A while back I finished the Flack version of my Heavy Axis Walker for Dust Tactics.

The heavy anti-tank guns for this vehicle have then sat on my paint table for the last few months, in a half finished state. Barrels were done, the breaches and ammo loaders were not…

They are now though. One small problem however, is that when I varnished them, using my usual spray, some of the decals blistered and have partially lifted. I wouldn’t have minded if the whole decal lifted, but as the remainder is under varnish in this case I cant get it off without damaging the paintwork…

Do I just leave it and call it weathering?

Either way this is a huge beast of a walker. Especially when compared to the tiny tank in the photo (one of my Horizon wars figures managed to photobomb the first shot, the walker is so big it hid the little guy…)

Overall I like the look of this brute. In the end I wont probably do anything with the damaged decals, so from here on in we shall state for the record that it was done on purpose, to depict battle scaring from a hard life…

Dust Tactics – Final Painting Push.

The final few troops have now been painted so that they can feature in my next Dust Tactics game. That game is now 3 weeks behind as work is proving hard to avoid and getting in the way of our planned session. Missing the game has allowed me to get more done though so I now have no excuse not to field a strong infantry force.

The last full unit I painted are these grim looking Sturmpioniere. Slightly orange tones to their shoulders and a simple picking out of metal and leather were all they needed as they have no flesh on show with those gas masks.

The last 2 men were conversions, as I needed a couple of men to become observers for my medium artillery walkers. A second set of observers will allow me to target 2 different areas with my artillery instead of deploying them in the wrong place and watching them die as they run to where I really needed them…

I may get some more done in the next few weeks but the next new thing looms over us…

Dust Tactics – Painting Queue Jumpers

The Dust Tactics painting marathon (yes I have bitten off more than I can chew) continues. As expected, the Axis Rocket Troopers have jumped up the painting queue. They are the latest purchases for this game, and have managed to get themselves painted before figures I have owned for 2 years…

Simple paint jobs are the best way to paint Dust models I find. Being sold ‘pre-primed’ in grey, they are ready for paint without any preparation. A few colours (flesh, black, silver and a couple of browns in this case) are all that are needed to get an acceptable table-top finish. I have seen these painted very well by others. That is something I never seem able to do as well as I would like.

I have also added a MG squad and an anti-tank squad so feel I am doing ok at this point (it helps that our game has been delayed a couple of times due to mine and Coronasan’s work commitments). Extra painting time always helps.

The anti-tank squad comes with an alternate figure so you can add some firepower at the exclusion of a different figure.

I decided to add a couple of alternate medium walker weapon options to the paint queue. This would allow me to field 2 artillery walkers in the same game if I felt I needed to.

The heavy walker is a real beast with gun barrels longer than its frame on both of its weapon options.

Part way through the painting process I managed to drop the cab and break off not one, but both, of the hull mounted MG barrels! 2 full minutes of swearing was followed by 20 minutes of very careful drilling and inserting of 1mm steel tube…

While I wait for the game to be rescheduled, I may get a few more infantry done, but even though I am not finished, I feel I have done well.

15 men, a set of artillery tubes for a medium walker and a whole lot of heavy walker…

She’s a pretty fearsome beast. Lets hope Coronasan sees her as such and overthinks his game as a result!