I did some mass undercoating yesterday and today, occasioned by the arrival of some Warhansa figures from Russia. The plastic is a little rubbery and the swords a bit bent, like the old Conte figures, so I used the boiling water and ice water to straighten them. They aren't cheap but they are lovely sculpts. The other figures are tribal AIP recruits for my Fezian Renaissance army or Sudan War etc etc.
The AIP Dervishes I undercoated black. I could have gone equally for a white undercoat. The advantage of black is lines can be left for black lining or black equipment although I am not big on overdoing black lining, which can look over done nd ugly - 'grey lining' is better. Most likely the only black part of these figures will be the hair but the skin will be brown so black will work. The first undercoat was plastic spray undercoat for cars.
There was a little drama here as we in Victoria have entered another lockdown which is just now easing for regional areas where the handful of Covid 19 cases did not present. The Premier is trigger happy with lockdowns for the entire state. Anyhow, unlike previous lockdowns Bunnings was closed to the public and only open to tradies unless an item was ordered on-line for pickup. So I groaned, returned home and next day gave Bunnings a call to see if they stocked the spray. Yes, they did but it could not be ordered online and picked up because it was regarded as a hazardous material. 'Can't you make an exception as I have no other way of getting it?' No, not a goer. Sweet reason is having a vacation. Boo hiss. Anyhow, I had another search at home and found a much depleted can which insisted on 'spraying' like a firehose, even when I switched the sprayer from other cans. Next I decided to spray into a container and then paint it on with a brush. Success.
So I could have used Modge Podge as an undercoat but noticed some bubbles appearing, not too badly but I didn't want to take a chance with $10 figures (the Warhansa, which may have even worked out as more than that with postage). And the AIP figures are made from a shiny plastic so I wasn't taking chances.
Below, black coated AIP Dervishes. I use GW sprays as the best acrylic spray undercoats even if around $30 a can. For some reason they don't provide white ones anymore but the bone spray also does the trick.
You can see a large fantasy knight there too - he goes into my Chaos unit.
AIP WW1 French. They are going to be painted khaki and the black left for equipment. Khaki French can serve as WW2 French or WW1 colonial troops, or later WW1 Belgians. These ones are most likely enter service with Syldavia against Borduria in the 1920s or 1930s. The figure on bottom extreme right looks like an air ground crewman loading a machine gun ammunition. He is made in China, I think, but probably a copy of Marx or something. He looks like 1.35 scale.
Some AIP horses are also there and they will be mounts for my AIP 18th century (supposedly AWI) cavalry.
I placed an AIP figure next to the Warhansa for scale. He looks significantly smaller but he is slightly crouching.
The Timpo Arab doesn't look much smaller.
Blondie, 'The Man With No name' at left in poncho...
SOME THOUGHTS ON THE WARHANSA FIGURES
These are great sculpts and mostly look like who they depict. The Van Cleef character (the Bad) looks less like who he depicts. In fact, a certain Dulcop cowboy intentionally or unintentionally looks exactly like him, with hooked nose and gaunt face. When I get around to painting these I'll add in the Dulcop for comparison).
The female gunfighter reminds me of the female android gunfighter in the newer Westworld series but that gun! I was tempted to add some bits and pieces to make it into an SF weapon because it is enormous. It looks more like an elephant gun than a Winchester. I could have cut it down to a carbine or replaced it with a more to scale weapon but in the end I left it. Apart from that she looks great. If I really wanted to stuff around with her, though, I would have added a dress because wearing trousers for women was almost taboo in that era but I guess there were some maverick exceptions. And she may well be used in a steam punk (where all kinds of anachronistic things are accepted) or some other SF setting.
For me, just placing figures on a shelf to look at doesn't do it for me. I want to play with them so all these figures will be based. I envisage that Xena and Conan will sneak into my fantasy world campaign wargames as what Chainmail rules call Super Heroes. So they will be super skilled and hard to kill even than other heroes. I am wondering if I make Xena slightly faster in combat than Conan but Conan as, obviously stronger. They won't necessarily be on the same side. And next Western game will also see some new blood.
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