T-34 Identification

I recently purchased this 10mm T-34 off of eBay. It was described as being Pendraken code SVV4 which is the T-34/85 variant. Does the turret look like a T-34/85? It appears to have a single hatch in the center of the turret roof. 

Any insight is appreciated. The plan (if it is in fact SVV4) is to clean it up and include it in my Chinese force for North Korea. 

UPDATE: I have been informed that I have a T-34/76 M1941 or M1942 model with 76mmL41 gun. It's a bit of a downer as I was planning to use this with my Chinese PVA forces and apparently the Chinese did not use the 76mm variant. I ended up ordering a T-34/85 and a Japanese Ha-Go tank and will use one or both for my Chinese PVA forces. 

Big Battle Ravenfeast Norman infantry

With the Vikings and Anglo-Saxon armies complete, I have turned my attention towards the third and final army of the 1066 campaign, the Normans of William the Bastard. 

Unlike the other two armies, the Normans have a rather decent sized contingent of cavalry. They also have some crossbowmen and archers. The Normans have a much smaller infantry core: 6 Norman infantry stands and 3 stands of Flemish infantry. 

Here are the completed Norman infantry, I opted to use Old Glory's heavy infantry (SVN-304) which have chainmail in addition to helmets, shields and spears. I will use the medium infantry for the Flemish. 

Side view of the stands to show the armor details. These were very easy sculpts to paint and even the shield designs went quickly. I have a feeling the Flemish/medium infantry will be a bit trickier. 

Frozen Chosin...

Or is that the Frozen Chosen? Any matter, when I went attended the Claymore wargaming convention in Edinburgh, I had the pleasure of chatting with Leon from Pendraken. I had placed a small order for pickup in advance but as I was standing there, I had pounds in my pocket that needed to be spent and lots of tempting miniatures on display. 

I opted to buy Korean War Americans and Chinese army packs in winter kit. It was completely impulse, I had never really considered collecting, painting or gaming the conflict (not entirely true, I think I purchased a pack of 15mm Chinese a few decades ago and maybe painted a couple and then sold them off, but I digress...). I told Leon I would paint some up for the competition with snowy scenic basing. 

Being a man of my word, I embarked on this project. I would initially paint up a platoon of Chinese with some support weapons. The army pack included infantry, officers, radios (alot of radios in fact) and 3 mortars with crews. I placed a small order for some additional support weapons and figures for both the Americans and Chinese. Hopefully that arrives in time for me to get them painted up as well. 

Here are my completed Chinese thus far. The uniforms were painted with a watered down, 50/50 mix of VMC 70.914 Green Ochre and VMC 70.821 German Camo Beige WW2. Green bits were Vallejo Game 72.145 Heavy Grey (which is actually green). 

Basing was accomplished with Golden fiber paste to create texture which was painted with Americana Dark Chocolate craft paint, given a wash of AP Strong Tone then drybrushed with CMC 70.843 Cork Brown. Brownish yellow static grass was applied and then GW Valhallan Blizzard (a very effective product). The reason why I am being descriptive with the paints and techniques is because I will invariably forget how I accomplished the look so I can use this as a reference later on. 

Here is a close up of an infantry base (representing a section) and the platoon command stand which includes an officer in an overcoat. 

Overall I'm quite pleased with how they turned out. I photographed them on a frozen tundra gaming mat that I purchased on sale from Cigar Box. I imagine I will paint up some snow covered hills and outcrops for additional scenery. I will have to do some research on the battles to get some good inspiration for scenarios. 

Sardaukar!

I managed to paint up the Pendraken figures that are my proxies for the Dune (1984) inspired Sardaukar Terror Troops. 

Here's the front view to see the green facial screens on both the figures and the movie.

A side view, I decided to give them a small bit of color so I painted three yellow gold striped on their right shoulder pad in homage to the Padishah crest of a lion and the stripes on the white armor of the Sardaukar in 2021/24 version of the classic. 

Being all black-clad in a desert environment, there is only so much you can do with the painting. I might do some additional drybrushing of the base to lighten it up. I used Army Painter Speedpaint black and Fanatic paint for the green screen. Basing was GW's Armageddon Dust (which I was underwhelmed with if I'm being honest). 

I plan to enter these fellas in the Pendraken painting competition's fantasy/sci-fi category because it's not often that I find myself painting 10mm sci-fi. 

Ravenfeast Anglo-Saxon Army

It was a bit of a slog but I finally finished off my Big Battle Ravenfeast Anglo-Saxon army...a total of 30 bases. With this force, I can game Fulford Gate, Samford Bridge and Hastings. 

Pictured above is the entire army, almost entirely Old Glory 10mm with some Magister Militum cavalry (or perhaps mounted infantry?). 

First up are eight bases of general fyrd. I went with muted figures for these fellas. This is probably my least favorite strip of figures in the Old Glory 1066 range. I think it's the shields (I'm not so sure about the convex oval one) and the fact you can't really cut this particular sculpt apart to get a little more dynamic pose. They are fairly easy to paint. 

Here we have the select fyrd, also eight bases. Same sculpts but I went with a bit more colorful shields and even some designs. Their clothing has a few more borders and such on them. 

Here is the rear view of some of the fyrd. Not much armor on these guys. 

I also took some photos of the three bases of  archers but managed to accidentally delete them...anyway, if I still had them they would be here. Tthey will give the army  a (very tiny) bit of a ranged combat ability. Some of these sculpts may be Norman archers but I figured there probably isn't much difference in appearance between various peasant archers of western Europe. 

Here we have the mighty Huscarls. Reputedly some of the finest infantry in the world at the time, these sculpts are heavily armored with axes and kite shields strapped to their backs. I enjoyed painting these sculpts. 

And here is the rear view of them. I painted curved cross designs on some of the shields to break up the monotony of solid colors. Fairly pleased with the results since I didn't really lavish a whole lot of effort in painting this army. 

And next up are the three command bases with draco standards and heroic looking leaders. The red draco is Harold Godwinson and the others are his brothers. 

Lastly we have the mounted huscarls which are an option for Samford Bridge. I believe there's some dispute if they actually fought mounted but I figured I would paint up the option for completeness' sake. 

I'm glad to finish this army, it was a bit tedious to paint but nowhere near as much of a slog as the Vikings. I can now play the first two scenarios of the 1067 campaign. The Normans will probably wait just a bit as I will want to take a quick detour to paint up some other small projects before returning to complete this project with William the Bastard's army. 

Saudakar idea...

February is approaching faster than I realize and one of the things that happens in February is the Pendraken painting competition. I typically throw my hat in the ring but only the historical categories...with Pendraken's recently released sci-fi range, I saw a pack of miniatures that sparked an idea. 

These little fellas (FWC-COL2 Human Collective Power Infantry) made me think of the Saudakar soldiers from the 1984 version of Dune. Ever since I first saw the movie, I was intrigued by these elite "terror troops". 

The 1984 movie depicted the Saudakar in what appeared to be black rubber uniforms with a head covering that had a clear green face shield. 

I'm thinking of painting the Pendraken sculpts up using a light primer with some type of black contrast paint that will show the depth of the sculpting and a neon green face shield to make them visually pop. The basing will be some kind of desert look that is evocative of the planet Dune. It should be a simple project but heaps of fun. 

Some Scenery Additions

While miniatures purchases always make my heart flutter, I am sometimes guilty of neglecting terrain and scenery. No matter how much time you invest in painting up your toy soldiers, how good will they look on a barren game mat devoid of scenery?

As previously mentioned, I managed to make it to the Claymore and Fall In wargaming conventions and I managed to make some purchases of scenery to enhance my wargaming tables. In between painting up batches of 10mm Saxon fyrd, I decided to tackle these scenery pieces I purchased at my last two conventions. 

At Fall In, I picked up some 28mm rocky outcrops and shrubs from Monster Fight Club. Since I typically game in 15mm, 10mm and 6mm they will be used as mountains and wooded areas. Here you can see examples of these pieces with a base of 10mm Saxon fyrd so you have an idea of scale. 

Next up are some islands and castles from Iron Gate Scenery. These were picked up at Claymore and carefully packaged up in my checked luggage. I anticipate using these for Man O' War which is what imagine they were designed for. They will probably be used for other naval games to include my renaissance galleys and maybe even my 1/3000 pre-dreadnought fleets. In this picture, a 1/3000 French ship of the line sails past to give you an idea of their size.