From The Vault: Neo-Soviets

Joe got my nostalgia all a-quiver with his recent blog post about some of our past wargaming exploits. I dug out some figures I must have painted about a decade ago that I still had knocking around in a box somewhere at home. While I was shocked at how I used to paint (it's so bright!), it did galvanize me into taking some new snaps of some old figures, so here begins an irregular series of wargaming retrospectives: From The Vault.

First up, Neo-Soviets...

I think these saw a single gaming outing (not unusual – I tend to paint more than I play), a game of Savage Worlds Showdown, if memory serves, probably Weird War II or something. They're nearly all Copplestone Castings, which are an absolute joy to paint.

The Command Group

The command group includes one of my favourite SF figures – the commissar-type aiming the pistol (at left in the photo above). This is the third time I'd painted the figure – I have the (vastly inferior) second iteration knocking around somewhere, but the first has long since gone AWOL. The flag is a bit of printer paper, torn rather than cut to appear a bit ragged. Looking at it now, I wish I'd used scissors...

The Infantry

I'm sure I had every intention of painting more infantry, and cannot remember why I didn't, but here we have four basic infantry. I do love the SFed AK-type assault rifles.

The Support Weapons

Two LMGs and two tankhunters to accompany four infantry is a cracking ratio, and made for two incredibly potent four-man fireteams.

The Snipers

Ah, the snipers. These were my favourite part of the whole force, thanks solely to the ghillie suit effect I achieved by gluing static grass to them. It was a pretty terrifying prospect, having painted the minis to what I deemed at the time to be a decent standard, but I'm still pleased that I overcame my last-minute nerves and slapped on the PVA. The one on the left has an overall-style suit, while the one on the right has a cape.

The Mech

This is the only piece in the force that isn't Copplestone – it's an old Warzone Bahaus walker of some description with a Soviet Head from... somewhere. Looking at it now, I see I missed one helluva mouldline on the gatling gun. Oh well.

The Yetis

I cannot recall why these appeared in the force, but there they are. More Copplestone figs, and my favourite 'hairy hominid' miniatures, bar none.

So there we have it. An odd little force, but one that I did enjoy painting. This might also be the first force for which I used polyfilla for the basing – it's certainly one of my early efforts (I moved away from the dirty grey basing to a more generic brown – I can't remember why exactly, but I do like the contrast it offers).

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