Showing posts with label 28mm. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 28mm. Show all posts

Saturday, September 5, 2026

Knights, Danzig, and an Emperor’s Pet Elephant: A Crash Course in Impetus

Not too long ago, Max and I received an exclusive introduction to Impetus at the clubhouse of "Zamgwürfelt" in Munich, hosted by Bernhard and Bernhard, who also provided the miniatures. We played a 400-point game fielding Imperial Germans against the Teutonic Order, the latter reinforced by a contingent of allied troops from Danzig.

True to tradition and ancient custom, the German princes have always preferred to beat each other over the helm with great enthusiasm. Exactly what the dispute was about could no longer be recalled by anyone involved afterwards—only that it crashed and banged thoroughly, leaving more than one rather dented helmet behind on the field of battle.

We were far too busy grappling with the new rules to produce a proper, detailed AAR, so today we are making an exception with just a few photos and commentary.

I promise to do better in the future!


The deployment—Imperial Germans at the bottom, whose left flank I am commanding, and the Teutonic Order at the top, whose left flank Max is leading (in this case, the Danzig contingent).

My command, consisting of light cavalry with crossbows, a unit of crossbowmen, infantry, and two heavy cavalry units.


That lot rolling straight toward me, including heavily armored knight-brethren on horse and on foot... this is going to be so much fun ... 👀

The men of Danzig march up with flying banners and standards.


Center and right flank of the Imperial Germans—perhaps a bit dry to look at, but solid blocks of infantry and cavalry. The elephant is the Emperor's pet and did not participate in the fight 😂

I try to maneuver into favorable positions to prevent the knight-brethren from deploying their full force and to weaken them with ranged fire beforehand; otherwise, things promised to turn quite ugly for my troops.


Meanwhile, the units in our center and right flank are deploying as well.


My cavalry secures the hollow way through which enemy cavalry can only approach single-file. My crossbowmen are supposed to drive the skirmishers out of the wheat field so they can target the dismounted knights, while the heavy infantry provides cover.

The Danzig forces charge headlong and recklessly straight into our infantry...

... and pull off a breakthrough!


The cavalry on our right wing immediately finds itself in trouble as the Danzig troops ruthlessly exploit their success.


The knight-brethren charge; I counterattack and manage to push them back, but that’s about it. One of my cavalry units is now in a rather awkward position, currently wondering how on earth they managed to get themselves into such a spot.


Somehow our cavalry manages to stabilize the situation, and the Danzig troops run out of steam.

The overall situation—we are holding firm on the left, while the center and right flank, though thinned out, managed to turn the tide and are now advancing victoriously against the rest of the Danzig forces.


The skirmishers are chased off the battlefield, the Order's light cavalry doesn't dare advance, and I succeeded in pushing back both the dismounted and mounted knight-brethren! At the same time, the Order's center and left flank completely collapse, and the remaining Danzig troops flee the field. Consequently, the Teutonic Knights are left with no choice but to retreat as well to avoid total annihilation.


Conclusion

The game and the rules were an absolute blast! A big thank you once again to Bernhard and Bernhard for providing the brilliantly painted miniatures and introducing us to the Impetus rules.

Unfortunately, we’ve really caught the bug now. Especially since another interested player joined us during the match—we’ve all agreed to launch an escalation campaign: the Peloponnesian War. More details on that will follow here on the blog very soon 😉

Thursday, March 12, 2026

Stones & Skirmishes: 28mm Balearic Slingers

Today, we're taking a little detour back to 28mm and diving into Antiquity: Balearic Slingers by Victrix. These miniatures are individually based, making them perfect for skirmish systems like SAGA and others.

Every now and then, I try to revisit and finish old projects, even if I don’t plan on expanding them further. I use these opportunities to keep training my "painting eye" and, more importantly, to clear some much-needed space. That’s exactly the case here: once finished, this unit will be heading to a new home as I'll be putting them up for sale shortly.






Friday, January 16, 2026

Painting: Civilians and animals for 15mm and 28mm

In order to continue adapting to the new circumstances after my eye surgery, there is only one thing that really helps: practise, practise and practise some more.

As I still had a couple of civilians and animals on my to-do list.
Since these mostly serve to decorate the gaming table and therefore tend to remain in the background, they seemed to me to be the most suitable objects for practice.

I tested different colours and techniques, focusing primarily on training my spatial vision – let's see what ultimately proves to be the best long-term solution for me.

Fleeing 15mm civilians with a really big dog to guard them!

A shepherd whose dog is currently grooming itself 😎

15mm cattle

Pigs and piglets for 28mm - the piglets can be used as pigs for 15mm too!

My shepherd at work.


Monday, June 9, 2025

Terrain work in progress: Scratch building an Oasis agriculture - last update 29.6.2025

One of the intended uses of my newly painted palms is to depict an oasis agriculture - usable for settings in North Africa and the Middle East, especially in the Levant for ‘Operation Exporter’ (Palmyra etc.).

In my case, it will be a well oasis, of which I want to schematically depict the well itself, a water collection basin directly adjacent to it and the distribution via canals to the individual fields.

In order to be able to use the fountain in different eras, I will build both a wooden water crane and a small stone platform next to the fountain on which I can place a housing for a diesel engine for more modern times.

Update 29.6.2025
Moving on with growing even more plants for my rising oasis 😎




Update 25.6.2025

My desert oasis starts taking shape




Update 24.6.2025
Scratch built some more vegetables:

A few Citrus trees

Tomato shrubs


and a few pumpkins modelled out of Greenstuff



Update 23.6.2025:

Prepared some plants that together with the already finished palms I will use to represent the three-layer farming system. Made from cheap China plastic plant I completely re-painted them using my airbrush.


Update 22.6.2025:

The stones of the water channels are set and painted, to depict the water I use ModPodge Glossy, which now has to dry for 48 hours.

Well and water basin made from Styrodur.

Bucket for the wooden water crane under contruction ...

... and finished.


The centrepiece of my planned oasis is finished and waiting to be painted: the fountain, water collection basin, wooden cradle and the bucket for the fountain, as well as the water pipe.

For size comparison with 28mm and 15mm figures.

My oasis starts taking shape slowly but steady - centre piece is the water distribution and on the right the first fieldd to grow fruits and vegetables, grass to feed the goats and so on.



Pictures and information regarding some background of my completed Oasis can be found in this post:


Thursday, May 29, 2025

Terrain work in progress: Palm trees for 28mm and 15mm - Updated 29.5.2025

As I want to depict an oasis cultivation and need more palm trees in general and need more palm trees in general, it was time to paint the ones I had ordered from China some time ago.

However, of course I don't want to use them as they were delivered - apart from the unnatural plastic shine, the colours are also anything but true to the original.
Accordingly, all of them will be completely repainted using an airbrush before I base them.

Here are the stages of the repainting - I will update this post accordingly.

Trunks basecoated, pre-shaded and repainted using different inks.

Treetops are just basecoated with a dark Green from below and already look not too bad now.

Basecolours done, followed by 2 highlights.

Trunks and treetops have received their final drybrushs each and are now ready for basing.




Wednesday, May 21, 2025

Terrain: A mediterranean house in 28mm

For our 28mm project, which is set in the Levant as part of ‘Operation Exporter’, we naturally also need suitable terrain.
While the trees and palm trees I built for the 15mm games can also be used in 28mm without any problems and I still had a few suitable stone walls in stock, the situation was different for buildings.

Fittingly, I had kept some MDF kits from Micro Art Studio from an old Freebooters Fate project, which fit perfectly into the Middle East setting. This one is called "Cabana Maduro".

As I was under a bit of time pressure to get everything ready by CONflict Rhineland 2025, I'll add the little details that bring a scene to life later: Barrels, sacks, clay jugs etc.









And some more pictures from the WiP stage: