Rangers of the North WIP, an AdG battle and the Topkapi Palace

   Since I bought the miniature of Halbarad Dunadan in 2013, it stayed unpainted inside a drawer. It is time for him to find some followers and see some action.

   I had four warriors of Rohan with bows that I didn't need. So I decided to convert them to Rangers of the North. 

Halbarad and the Rangers

 Back in 2013 I used a little rock and a piece of blue foam 

to make this base.

   Recently I bought some nice Forest bases from Micro Art Studio and I replaced Halbarad's previous base with one of them.

Halbarad on his new base

   For the conversion of the warriors of Rohan I used Soviet WWII heads, Norman archers' left arms with bows, Colonial militiamen's tomahawks and Orcs' quivers! 

   I cut in half the orc's quivers and glued them on the warriors' ones but not before I had removed the arrows from the later. I needed longer arrows for the Normans' bows.

  At that point I tried to make hoods  from green stuff for the four Rangers but I failed. So, in order to have the appearance of a unit I removed their hats and left them bald. Now I have four bold but bald Rangers! I also added fur to their cloaks.

The family photo as WIP

   The other day a friend invited me to watch a game, that they played using L'Art de la Guerre rules. The rules remind a lot the DBM rules I think. The two opponents of the battle were Byzantines and Germans. My friend doesn't really bother to follow historical accuracy. None of the miniatures are mine.

The battlefield

Byzantines left flank,

center

the Emperor,

and the right flank.

The Strategos

The camp.

The Germans

left flank,

center,

right flank

and the camp.

The knights' charge

The clash at the center

The shooting

The clash of all flanks.

   The Germans finally won! Frankly, it was a nice and well balanced game. 

   Some more photos from my latest trip to Turkey. In particular, these are from my visit to Topkapi Palace which in English means "The Cannon Gate Palace".

The Gate

The entrance of the Gate

The Throne

The Library

The fountain

The view of Bosphorus strait

The model of Topkapi at its entrance.

And the model of the whole complex. Topkapi is at the center.

A part of the outer wall of the complex.

   That's it for today! Stay tuned for more!

Shades and Hagia Sophia

   For those who asked me what I would do with the remaining two Myrmourn Banshees, since the first two I used as barrow-wights, this is my answer: conversion to Shades.

The two Shades

   I already had two original Shades miniatures, so I painted the new ones with the same colour scheme. I had one problem though! The bases of the Banshees are 30mm but those of the Shades are 40mm. Since I wanted to use the original bases because they were very nice, the only solution was to make a hole in the 40s and glue the 30s as you can see below: 

 

   After that I added some putty and sand to the rings around the 30mm bases.

Shades and bases ready for painting

Shade A

Shade B

   Recently my wife and me, we visited Constantinople, the European side of the city.

Hagia Sophia

The Blue Mosque

Bosphorus Bridge

Haveran Sultanahmet Cafe

Tavuk (chicken) with fries and rice

and EFES beers.

   That's it for today! Stay tuned for more!

Lord of the Ring Battles

   Recently, I played a couple of Lord of the Ring battles with two friends, "newcomers" to the game. The first was a free, no scenario - no points game while the second was a "To the Death" scenario game with armies of 500 points for each side. We had a great time and definitely we will play again soon!

   Photos of the first game:

Evil force on the up right corner, Good - up left and down right

Evil force

Haldir and elves

Elf force

Wood Elf Warriors

and Legolas (unpainted)

  

A lethal force

   Regarding the second game, we played Mordor vs Lothlorien. Celeborn, Haldir and 23 elves against Shagrat, Gorbag, two trolls, 7 Black Guards and 6 trackers. 

   Photos of the second game:

The battlefield

Evil force

The attack of the Trolls

Fight

Celeborn is down

Celeborn is dead

   In case you wonder why, please see Celeborn's dice roll below. He rolled the green dice!

Three 1s!

A panoramic view of Chania, Crete

   That's it for today! Stay tuned for more!   

Soviet sailors part 2 (Чёрная Смерть)

   This is the second squad of Soviet sailors. Like the first squad, it consists of an officer, a NCO and naval troopers. One of the sailors has a Degtyaryov anti-tank single-shot rifle (Противотанковое однозарядное ружьё системы Дегтярёва PTRD-41), two sailors have LMGs, i.e. Degtyaryov's infantry machine guns (Пулемёт Дегтярёва пехотный DP-28), while the rest have SMGs, i.e. Shpagin machine pistols (Пистолет-пулемёт Шпагина PPSh) or rifles.

Trooper with PTRD, officer and NCO

Troopers in white shirt called formenka (форменка)

A trooper in telogreika (телогрейка), in blue shirt called flanka (фланелевка, фланелька, фланка) and in a naval pea coat called bushlat (бушлат морской)

   My wife, me and my daughters in the Athens Officer's Club. No cat photo this time!  

   That's it for today! Stay tuned for more!