Shanty Town Watch Tower

I have been adding some more bits to my African Shanty town slum scenery. This time I built a watch tower on top of a small hill.

The shanty is set into the hill, and topped with a watch tower, giving the militia a commanding view of the whole town. A fence stretches across the hill, restricting access to the town. Luckily enough for the attackers, there is a storm drain that runs right under the watch tower, allowing stealthy access to the shanty town.

I built the hill form foam card and covered it with Modrock and then I sanded it and added bits of corrugated card, match sticks and balsa continue the junk feel. The fence is built form balsa and aluminium mesh, and is designed to link up with the other bits I have already built.

Like the other bits of scenery for the shanty town I have built this with function in mind. The shanty roof comes off, so I can put figures inside, and the storm drain means that attackers will have a choice about taking out the defenders or sneaking past- Very Call of Duty!

Wrecked Car for my African Shanty

I thought my African Shanty town needed a few beat-up old cars hanging around to 'modern' it up a bit. I looked around for a source of suitable models, and came up with a surprising find.

Modern 28mm civilian vehicles are a bit of a rarity. You can find Hummers and Toyota pick ups in some ranges, but they are expensive. for this project I wanted something a bit different. I have had plenty of experience converting die-cast cars into wargaming pieces, having done it for my VBCW and Battle Cars collections in the past. The trouble is that most die-casts are not in '28mm scale', which is about 1:56. It was by chance I stumbled on the fact that Disney's Cars die casts are something close to 1:56 scale, although there is some variation across the range with some of the small cars being undersized for comic effect.










I thought I would start with Tow Mater, the tow truck. I bought him on eBay for about £5. I drilled out the bolts underneath so I could take it apart. I took the mouth piece off the front, and removed the tow hook thing on the back. I used a bit of card to build up a new front, and built a scenic base to fit in with the rest of the shanty town scenery. I also cut down one of the tires to make a flat tire out of green stuff.

A quick bit of paint, a bit of rust effect stippled over the top and plenty if GW washed to add a lot of weathering, and hey-presto! A suitably wrecked piece of war gaming scenery.

Here's a shot with a 28mm Russian (I haven't got any Africans yet) for comparison. Bear in mind, this isn't a Toyota type pick up typically used as 'Technicals', but rather an older 1950's Chevy type, which was a bigger beast. Scale wise, I think it's about right. I have also got a nice small salon car (I think it might be an old Skoda) and a VW camper to do next.

More Shanty Town Scenery

Ho ho ho! Amongst all the festive foolishness and Christmas tree construction I have managed to get a few more bits of my African slum scenery finished. It's building up into quite a collection now, but I would like to add a few more buildings, and may be a big centerpiece too.

First off, a couple more shanty shacks, being built in the same way as the previous ones. This one has a balsa wood ladder up the side. Gaming access to the flat roof increased the gaming potential.

This pool of contaminated water was made from card and DAS modeling clay. I made the office chair myself, from some left over Fimo. The toxic waste barrels some heartless multi-national company has dumped near the slum are made by Fenris Games (I am not implying Fenris Games are a heartless multi-national company by the way).

The barricade/rubbish tip is made from bits and bobs of things I made or found. I made the settee and the green foot locker from Fimo. There is also a telly and a bin bag, but you can't see them so well in this picture. The rest of the stuff is by various manufactures, or just junk and off cuts left over from other projects, or from building the shacks.

Here's a close up om my settee. I am rather pleased with it.

Christmas Madness 2011- Return of Bad Santa!

Never let it be said that Bad Santa is not persistent. Despite his defeat at the hands of Good Santa and the Pulp City Superheroes last Christmas, he has returned once more to cause some festive mischief.
This time Bad Santa was trying to steel the Christmas Spirit to wreck Christmas for the citizens of Pulp City. Luckily, Good Santa and his Superhero allies have banded together to try to stop him.

Leon's excellent and quirky battle report can be found over on the Pulp Citizen blog. Put down your mince pies and mistletoe and go and check it out. While your there take time to admire the bespoke Christmas Spirit markers I made for the battle report.

Christmas Madness 2010 Redux

Pulp Citizen has posted a jazzed up version of the Christmas Madness battle report form last Christmas over on his excellent blog. Here's a link.

http://pulp-citizen.blogspot.com/2011/12/christmas-madness-2010-redux.html

It's well worth a read if you never saw the original battle report. The Christmas Madness 2011 report will be on it's way soon, so 'be good, for goodness sake'!

Captain Max Strong and the Rocket Rangers

Ready to right wrongs and defend the free world from the forces of tyranny and fascism, the Rocket Rangers! Captain Max Strong, their fearless commander, might lack subtlety, but no one can say he gets results.
I found these lovely models, made by Pulp Figures in a bag of hand-me-downs from my old mate Leon, who decided he wasn't going to use them (Cheers Leon!). You can't beat them for pulpy nonsense.
Work is still progressing on my slum shanty town. I haven't been distracted yet, but I thought you might like to see a bit of heroic pulp stuff- Not four colour, but damn heroic anyway.

Sierra Leone Slum

If you have followed my blog for any length of time you will know that I have a habit of getting totally distracted from my current project and stating a new one completely on a whim. I am sure I am not the only wargamer who has this problem.

OK, that said by way of an explanation, it's time to announce my latest distraction/project. Having played COD:MW3 far too much of late, I have been particularly taken by the level fighting in the slums of Sierra Leone, and thought "I would love to do a wargame in a slum". Without more thought as to exactly what wargame I would play, and totally lacking suitable armies to fight over it, I broke out the foam card, balsa wood and corrugated card. This is what I have made so far. ..

This is the first shanty I made. Basically I made a box with foam card and stuck bits and bobs to it. All the buildings have lift off roofs, so I can get my (currently non-existent) miniatures inside. The shanties are bigger that they would be in real life- some might say palatial in fact- but that was so I can get my big clumsy fingers in. I haven't bothered painting the interiors.

I had a lot of fun experimenting with painting the rust- I used various techniques from stippling to inks, and I am generally pleased with the results.

I made this mattress myself from Fimo- great fun and easier than you might think. The rest of the stuff is bits of balsa wood, match sticks, tooth picks, resin barrels by Fenris Games, gravel out of the garden and other similar bits of junk. The fences are made with aluminium mash used to repair car body work- available from Halfords in the UK for £1.99 an A4 sheet.

Coming soon- More shanties, more fences, a hill of rubbish and a polluted stream. I might do a little market place too, and may be a Church or some ruined colonial buildings too.

As to what I am going to do with this terrain, who knows: Force on Force seems an obvious choice, given its origins in COD:MW3, but equally it would be useful for Necromunda, AE Bounty, and 40K. I am open to other suggestions too.