Weird War II - Dust - The Axis, Part 2

Along with my Allies powered armor, I was working on my Axis powered armor for Dust.  For the Heavy Grenadiers I painted all the armor plates Vallejo German Grey.  The flexible undergarment was painted Vallejo German Camouflage Beige. 

Then for the winter camouflage, I thinned out some more Camouflage Beige with acrylic floor wax and dabbed it on the armor plates.  Then I used Vallejo German Splinter Camouflage White and did the same thing, however using varying degrees of paint/floor wax mix to give some spots a heavier white area and other spots a thin 'see-through' white area.  The splotches would go on over the beige and white splotches in overlapping layers.

 

Other details like rubber treads on the boots and pipes routed under the armor plates were done with P3 Coal Black.  Ammo pouches were done with Splinter Camouflage White, with Pure White highlights.  Weapons like the Fliegerfausts were painted Vallejo German Reflective Green.  Ammo belts on the Heavy Recon Grenadiers was done with Reaper Tarnished Brass and Blackened Steel, followed by a coat of P3 Armor Wash.

 

After finishing all details on the models.  I then applied decals from some Flames of War decal sets.  German balkencruze on the right shoulder pad of each of the PA suits and a red cross on the left shoulder pad of the medic in the command squad.  From the decals I got from Dust Models, I applied a small skull decal under the left shoulder pad for each squad leader.  After the decals were applied, also using Microsol to make sure the decals fit the shape of the surface, I sealed them with a coat of Dullcote.  Next I went about weathering the armor with some dabs of black, grey, and Blackened Steel along the edges of the armor on the high wear areas.  Then finished off with a black ink wash and another coat of Dullcote.

 

For the schwer lasers with the Laser Grenadiers, I painted the inside of the barrel black.  Then put a small dot of Reaper Polished Silver in the center and then filled the open end of the barrel with Tamiya Clear Red.  Under a flash this appears very well as a red laser dot.

 

 

 

 

I also picked up some more Grenadiers, including some of the command squads that are necessary to play Dust Warfare.  Also some specialists like the Sniper / Observer Teams and some Heroes. 

I painted these in the same manner I painted my other Axis Grenadiers. 

 

Now the bases that all of these Dust models come on, are hard plastic 30mm stylized bases unique to Dust Models.  They have a neat diamond plate texture on the base and some bolt heads around the periphery.  As a means of unifying my whole collection, I paint them all the same colors (Axis, Allies and SSU).  This way they all look like they're fighting on the same terrain.  These bases can be obtained separately from Dust Models and also come in a variety of textures.

 

I start with painting the base with Vallejo German Grey.  Then I will dry brush some black and Reaper Blackened Steel over some of the diamond weave surface and along the edges of the base and over the bolt heads.  Then along these blackened areas I will dry brush some rust over these worn areas, to make it look like the paint has scratched off and the metal below has rusted.  For the rust colors, I'm using Life Color Dust & Rust weathering set.  I start with using Rust, Light Shadow over the area, including outside of the darkened area.  Then I use a lighter application of Rust Base Color over the central area, and include some run lines along the vertical surfaces.  Then a very light application of Rust, Dark Shadow over the very tops of the surfaces.

 

After the black ink wash of the whole model and allowing the ink to dry for about a day.  I'd then mix up some white PVA glue with water and apply dabs of that along the base.  I'd sprinkle on some Woodland Scenics White Stone Ballast and Snow on the base.  After all the figures are done, I'd blow off the loose particles and then seal the rest with the final coat of Dullcote.

 

 For the heroes, Stephan here was painted much the same way as the other Grenadiers.  He's essentially the flamethrower specialist in the Sturmpioneer Squad body with another head.

 

For The Totenmeister, I painted her coat Reaper Pure Black with P3 Coal Black highlights followed by several thick black ink washes.  The harness was Vallejo Green Grey.  The Blutzkruz was simply Reaper Blackened Steel over black with some Fluorescent Blue over white for the glowy bitz.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Angela the Axis Assassin posed a bit of a problem.  As skinny as she is, she was a poor choice for this soft plastic material these Dust models are made of.  She was all bent up and contorted.  The whole figure seemed to be a compromise.  The original green and concept art of her simply was armed with an automatic pistol.  However she got upgraded to a 20mm Solothurn Sniper Rifle.  The rifle seems a bit awkwardly posed and the long skinny barrel was all bent to hell like her legs.  Furthermore, she had some sort of material build up on her left shoulder that looked like a flaw in the mold.  Also the features on her face seemed a bit shallow, more so on one side.  Overall, I wasn't too pleased with this model.  I'm glad I didn't spend the full $45 on the Dust Tactics Operation Cerebus.  However the modular building pieces that come in the set are a pretty good deal.

 

I was able to fix the bendy legs issue by applying a thin coat of cyano acrylate glue along the upper parts of her boots.  While holding the figure in the upright pose that I needed her to I sprayed accelerant on the glue, now freezing her legs straight and stiff.  I did the same with the gun barrel.  The material on the shoulder was removed with an X-acto Knife using a brand new blade.  However I had to be careful enough to carve it in such a way that there was some definition between her T-Shirt and shoulder. 

Painting her, I started by painting the whole figure with Reaper Pale Flesh Shadow, followed by Pale Flesh and Pale Flesh Highlight.  Then finishing off with P3 Flesh Wash thinned with Acrylic Floor Wax.  The T-Shirt was Reaper Pure White.  However to give it a shear look, I started by painting the tops of the folds, where the shirt was furthest away from the skin with Pure White right out of the bottle.  Then I'd gradually add floor wax to the mix and work down from the folds until I'm applying a translucent white over most the t-shirt. 

 

I went with white stockings rather than black, I thought the contrast was better than the black stockings in the concept art.  I used Vallejo White Glaze and thinned it with floor wax again.  Next I painted the skirt, boots and gloves Reaper Pure Black.  Dry brushing some German Grey over the highlights and then applying Citadel Baadab Black Glaze.  Belt was done with Testors Gloss Black with Reaper True Silver for the buckle.  The Solothurn was simply Reaper Blackened Steel with P3 Armor Wash.  I finished her off with a decal from one of my Flames of War decal sheets.  I didn't have any iron eagle like on the concept art, instead I used some SS Panzer division insignia.  It looked close enough.  This required lots of Microsol, to get the decal to conform to the shape of her shirt.  Then I sealed it with Dullcote and finished off the rest of the model.

 

Despite the shallow and uneven features molded into the face, I was able to paint the eyes in and still get a decent look out of her.  The hair was done with Reaper Golden Blond with Citadel Gryphonne Sepia Glaze.  Overall I was much more pleased with the end results of this model then I was when I got her out of the box.

 

 

 

Now Grenadier X is an Ubertotenmensch, or sentient thinking zombie, who can lead squads of Axis Zombies.  Armed with a power saw, he's pretty nasty in close combat.  I painted him using my usual zombie painting techniques, however I cut back on the gore and stuck with more pale flesh colors as he's not really been recently chewed up or anything.  He's painted using Vallejo Fieldgrau for his jumpsuit with a Green Grey harness.  The fuel tank for the saw is German Reflective Green and the hose is P3 Coal Black.  The saw is Citadel Sunlight Yellow with Reaper Honed Steel for the blade.  Now no zombie would be complete without gore, so I added lots of blood to the saw blade and make sure it got splattered all over the shield, jumpsuit and around the base.

 

So now I'm pretty much caught up with my Dust infantry models.  Next is to start working on the vehicles.

 

 

 

 

 

Weird War II - Dust - The Allies, Part 2

Finishing up my Allies army for Dust, I had all the power armor troops, heroes and a few more sets of regular troops I've accumulated since I did my first batch of Dust Allies.

For the Heavy Rangers I painted all of their powered armor in Vallejo Brown Violet.  The rubbery areas, gloves, boots, hoses and joints were painted with P3 Coal Black.  The Rocket Punch fist was painted with Citadel Golden Yellow. 

Each of the power armor troops either had an Allied Circle Star or an ASOCOM insignia originally on it.  I so after painting all of them I replaced the Circle Stars with some from a Flames of War American Decal Sheet.  For the squad leaders I gave them some chevrons on the shoulder pad from a Dust Models Decal Sheet.


For the British Paratroops and the Allies hero Action Jackson, I painted the berets Reaper Red Violet and then hand painted a winged insignia on the beret in Reaper Tarnished Brass.  The Phaser Guns were painted with Reaper Blackened Steel while the barrel was then treated with a thinned glaze of Reaper Gunmetal Blue and acrylic floor wax.  The end of the barrel was painted with Reaper Scorched Metal.  Inside the barrel I painted it black with a dot of Reaper Polished Silver in the center, then added some thinned Vallejo Fluorescent Blue.  This makes a nice effective blue glow effect, that shows up real nice under bright lights.

Unfortunately some of the phasers, particularly Action Jackson's, suffer from the Dust Models Bent Barrel Syndrome.

For the Allies Heroine Master Sergeant Rosie Donovan, I really didn't want to buy the Operation Cyclone Campaign set because I prefer to play Dust Warfare (the true miniatures game) and not Dust Tactics (the board game played with the same miniatures).   The Campaign set comes with  2 figures and some tank traps that are for use with both games but the rest is for Dust Tactics.  I couldn't justify the price, so I went about looking at making my own Rosie.

Master Sergeant Rosie Donovan is a mechanical genius, who helped implement the new alien technology the Axis acquired into Allies equipment.  She's also an expert tank killer and is armed with a customized bazooka.  She's inspired from the Rosie the Riveter propaganda poster.  Ironically, the concept art started as an Axis character called Bianca.




I started with the Reaper figure, Rosie, Chronotechnician.  The figure comes with an optional rifle or giant wrench.  Since the Dust Rosie has a giant wrench, naturally I had to pick that.  For the customized bazooka I started with a plastic bazooka from the Bolt Action plastic American Infantry.  The rocket magazine is from a Starship Troopers Mobile Infantry Rocket Launcher and the sight is some gun shaped bit I found in my bitz bin.  The ammo box is a resin case for some 1/48th scale WWII diorama and the loose rocket is from a 1/48 Tamiya US Infantry Set.



 























I then painted her to match the colors from the concept art as close as I can.  The denim overalls were done with Reaper Templar Blue, with a dry brush of Rainy Grey.  To simulate the oil stains I splotched some Citadel Baadab Black and Earthshade glazes on her clothes and gloves.

I acquired a number of Rangers since I did the first batch as well as a Sniper and Forward Observer Team.  I painted them the same way.

 

The hero Johnny One-Eye I painted the same as the other Rangers, as he's simply the Victory Gunner with a different head.

Weird War II - Dust - The Sino-Soviet Union

I've been working on my Sino-Soviet Union forces for Dust lately.  The SSU are the latest faction for Dust Tactics and Dust Warfare.  In the Dust history, Stalin, angered by the Allies attempt to negotiate peace with the Axis, forms an alliance with the communists in China and declares war on the Allies as well the Axis.  The SSU makes great strides in fomenting revolution throughout Asia, South America, and Africa.  By 1947, they even launch invasions into Alaska and Florida.

 

The uniforms of the troops are extrapolated from actual WWII era Soviet uniforms, including some body armor.  Weapons are extrapolations from existing WWII weapons.  The big thing is that the SSU introduce helicopters, adding a whole new dimension to the game.  The SSU is behind the Axis and Allies in mecha designs, relying on captured German mecha and refitting them with Soviet weapons.  Furthermore, they lack powered armor troops, like the Allies Heavy Rangers, but they make up for it with mecha sized KV47  Walker heavy powered armor suits.

  

My collection of SSU so far has been all the releases from Operation Zverograd up to the SSU Heroes, except for the KV47 Walker.  Like the Axis and Allies, I've focused on the infantry first before starting on the vehicles and mecha.  Overall, I really like the sculpts of the SSU over that of the original Axis and Allies figures.  They seemed more realistically proportioned and dynamic.  Also the figures were not made with the socketed waist, so there was no gap filling required there. 

 

I found the glue that held the heads in place seemed to be holding only at the very least.  Whatever glue they used, reminds me of rubber cement, is clearly the Post-It Note adhesive of glue.  This is both a blessing and a curse.  Curse as in the heads were falling off as soon as I started handing them outside of the box (a warning to those of you who plan to play with these right out of the box) and a blessing as it allowed me to reposition the heads (and even do some head swaps if I wanted to).

 

I found these figures had a higher amount of flash on them compared to the original Axis and Allies figures.  With this soft plastic these figures are made of, cleaning up flash is actually more difficult than doing it with hard plastic or pewter.  You need a very sharp razor to trim the flash and even then there are little straggly bits that just won't come loose.  Another common problem with this soft plastic is bent weapons.  The SSU's weapons are a bit more realistically sized than the original releases, which pretty much means longer and skinnier barrels.  The Widowmaker Sniper Rifles and the DP-28 Machine Guns were pretty bad.  I had to fix them by applying a thin amount of cyano acrylate glue (super glue) along the barrel and hold the barrel straight.  Then spray some accelerant on the glue to freeze it instantly in place.  I recommend using the thinnest CA glue you can find, the stuff you would normally use for wood and not plastic.  The thicker CA glue can fill in all the ribs on the DP-28 and simply leave you with a gun that looks like the barrel was dragged through the mud.  Unfortunately some of the weapons, particularly the PPSh-48s were bent in such a way I could not correct them.

 

For the paint scheme, I painted the basic troops jumpsuit using a WWII era Soviet camouflage scheme called Amoeba Pattern.  The base color was Reaper Khaki Shadow and the amoeba blotches were Reaper Olive Shadow.  However, since the rest of my Dust figures have been painted in a winter scheme and these figures appear to be sculpted in a cold weather kit I added some amoeba shaped blotches of Reaper Khaki Highlight to lighten them up.  The helmets and body armor were painted using Vallejo Russian Army Green, but I added a white wash of Vallejo Panzer Aces White.  Just like my Axis armor, I'd thin some of the White with acrylic floor wax and with a messed up brush (bristles bent in all directions) and just dabbed it around on the armor in layers.  This simulated a white wash field applied camouflage and again lightening up the colors of the troops.

 

Gloves were all done with Khaki Highlight.  Hats and regular uniforms were done with Vallejo Khaki Grey with Reaper Phoenix Red piping and stars.  The combat webbing is Vallejo German Beige.  Boots were black with a dry brush of Reaper Walnut Brown and a Citadel Baadab Black Glaze.  Hand grenades were done in Vallejo Russian Uniform.

For each squad leader the figure came with a decal of a Soviet hammer & sickle on the body armor of each model.  I happened to have purchased some decals from Dust Models which are simply great for finishing off your Dust models, and helpful in giving a little extra Weird War II flair to any of your regular WWII model kits.  One of the sets has these same hammer and sickles.  The white decal shows up great over the white wash over green pattern and makes a nice subdued "I'm the squad leader!" designation.

 

 

 

For the Chinese Volunteers Squad I used the Soviet Airborne insignia that came with the decal set as they came with the Mil Mi-45 Transport and the unit has the Air Cav trait which allows them rapid deployment from aircraft.

The Falkyeli Close Combat Troops are armed with shotguns and molotov cocktails and supported by a Sulphur Thrower (a nasty flame thrower that is even more effective against vehicles).  These figures came with their gear separate, which was different from the other Dust models.  The gear consisted of the entrenching tool, an ammo pouch for a sub machine gun, and a molotov cocktail.   I noticed the sculptor for this piece clearly didn't get the memo as the ammo pouch is curved to match the PPSh-48 sub machine gun (an interpolation between the PPSh-41 and the AK-47, but looks like an over sized MP-5) and not shotgun ammo.  Furthermore the part in no way fits any of the figures.  I was able to correct this by cutting each piece between the entrenching tool and the molotov cocktail bottle.  Then gluing the separate pieces to different sides of the model.



 

 The Drakoni or Commissar Squad I had painted differently.  They are all dressed in the iconic quilted jacket with peaked hats, jodhpurs and jackboots.  They also have what appears to be a newer less bulky breast plate for their body armor.  I painted these guys based on some photos of some NKVD Commissars.  The dark blue pants and hats are Reaper Breonne Blue.  Details on the hats are Reaper Phoenix Red and Tarnished Brass.  The jackets are Vallejo Khaki Grey and the body armor is Russian Green.  Boots were done with Testors Gloss Black.

 

For the heroes, I painted Nikolai in the same manner as the Commissars. However his helmet I left without a white wash and I finished him off with a small red star on his helmet from my decal box. Yakov was painted in the same manner as the Falkyeli Sulphur Thrower, as they have the same body, just a different head. Red Yana was done with Khaki Grey pants a white t-shirt with blue stripes and the jacket was Reaper Stone Shadow with Citadel Delvan Mud Glaze. The had was Khaki Grey and the Fur was Reaper Walnut Brown. Koshka was done in an all black uniform inspired by Soviet Tanker uniform. Overall black with Vallejo German Grey highlights and then a coat of Citadel Baadab Black Glaze.   Boots, belt, gloves and holster were done with Testors Gloss Black.