2020 Review Part Two: Painting

Just as the Covid19 outbreak affected my gaming in 2020 it also allowed a lot more painting time and finances to be devoted to new projects in part just for something to do during the various lockdowns!

This review will look at my painting over the year by ruleset:

ADLG: Not much effort put into ADLG armies this year, though I did manage to paint an entire new HYW English army that had been sitting unpainted in the lead pile for several years!

King Edward III:

One of the three foot Battlegroups:

I'm quite pleased with the way these came out considering I put relatively little effort into painting them! They are not a great army under ADLG but may be improved in the upcoming V4 of the rules!

American War of Independence: Another two armies that had been in the lead pile for years, 15mm Essex British and American armies for the AWI.

American Militia:

British Regular Line:

The British look nice, the Americans less so as I just painted them quickly. As I have a large number of 28mm AWI figures and no one at the club plays AWI in 15mm I'm not sure what use I'll get out of these especially as there are not really enough to make up each army and I have little enthusiasm for adding to the numbers!

Black Sea's: The year started off with more additions for the Spanish in the form of three 3rd Rates followed by a couple of merchant ships that I painted as Spanish as well. These were followed by the Spanish 'Third Rates of Renown'. After this I bought and painted up a British Fleet box plus HMS Victory to provide some opposition. 

The Spanish Third Rate 'San Francisco':

The famous HMS Victory:

I've really enjoyed making and painting the Black Sea's fleets, very pleased with the results but not entirely sure how much actual use I'll get out of them! Still they do look nice!

Blucher: The interminable 1806 Prussians finally got to a playable state though there are still more to do. I didn't manage to play a game with them (other than as proxies for King of the Battlefield) and I'm not sure when/if they will get an outing! More productively probably I added some 1806 Saxons which can also be used as French allies and a small Swedish force.

1806 Prussian Hussars:

Swedish Infantry:

Saxon Infantry:

Chain of Command: In a revival of an (very) old project I painted up some WW1 Germans and French I had bought many years ago from Renegade Miniatures. I did find some later WW1 rule adaptions for CoC but haven't yet managed a game with these figures. For the WW2 collection all I added was an SU-76 and a few officers for the Russians.

The SU76:

Dead Man's Hand: Some refurbishment of the old gang's I'd painted including the Cowboys and Tuco's Banditos. Two new gangs were added, the Law and The Hole in the Wall Gang.

The refurbished Tuco's Banditos: 

The Hole in the Wall Gang:

FoG-R: A unit of Scots Lancers in 15mm, if I start playing the Oxford competitions again they might even get a run-out!

Infamy, Infamy: a new ruleset for 2020 which resulted in the purchase and rapid painting of a 20mm Early Imperial Roman army and a matching Ancient British army to fight them.

Roman Legions in all their glory:

The Ancient British Panzer Division:

Rommel: More additions for the Soviets to enable the army to be used for early and late-war, mainly in the form of some extra tanks. I also did some new buildings for the Eastern front from Timecast. For the Germans I added some Fallschirmjager and a few extra tanks.

It's a monster! The mighty T-35:

Eastern Front buildings:

The Fallschirmjager

The Men of Company B: One of my major painting efforts for the year saw more figures added for the US and VC/NVA together with some additional scenery and an entire firebase so I could play the firebase scenario from the rules.

The Firebase:

A Huey plus some medics and casualties:

The Men Who Would Be Kings: A small force painted up to oppose Gordon's Boxer Rebellion force consisting of Austrian sailors and US Marines.

The Austrians pretty much on a one figure represents one man basis:

The US Marines:

So all in all quite a few additions to the collection over the last year! I've definitely got the most use out of the Vietnam collection and to some extent wish I'd put more effort into paining them!

What is on the horizon for 2021 (yes I know 1/3 of the year has already gone!)? 

I have already bought some ARVN and some 'Ruff Puffs' for the Vietnam period so will hopefully be starting on them soon. 

For CoC I've invested in more Home Guard and more figures for the Operation Sealion collection inspired by my club mates recent pint sized campaign which should be fun to paint. I also bought an Afrika Korps force but the trial figures didn't come out well so that project got shelved for the present.

Apart from the above I just have a few more Swedish Napoleonic's to paint up and am awaiting fresh inspiration to do something else!