"Are You Ready for Your Probing?"

Despite everything Real Life ©® could throw at me, I have finished painting my Grey Aliens from 15mm.co.uk.

I'm really happy with them.  They were a pleasure to paint, full of "cute" character and interesting poses, and were very clean castings to boot.  And yet, they are oddly menacing....

This completes the two armies I bought that came pre-tailored for ASQL 2.0 (also from 15mm.co.uk, see here), so maybe now I can finally get a game in.  Maybe?  Ahh, who am I kidding?

Anyway, one way or another The Greys will see battle with my Human Imperial Army, using one rule set or other.  I've got a long list of rules I want to try out (see The List for an inkling of what I am up against).

I think my next big challenge is thinking up a background and history for my forces, and better names than simply calling them my Human Imperial Army.  Cool-sounding suggestions are accepted and appreciated.

I've already started filing away at my Retained Knights.  There is not a lot of flash or mold lines, just a normal amount.  Considering that they were cast in 1994 (as seen on the bottom of their bases) they have held up very well.

I enjoyed these Grey Aliens so much I wanted to show them from the front as well as the rear (and no probing jokes!).  I went with very bright colors, partly because I felt Grey Aliens would have better fashion sense than to dress in greys, but mainly because I like them to "pop" on the game table.  These guys have lots of sparkly shiny bright colors because these particular Greys don't have the fashion sense to not dress like that.  I also put the Commanders in bright purple cloaks to make them stand out better; that's the inherent problem with 15mm, it all looks the same from standing-height.

Below are the Robotic Scout Drones and Commander pointing, General with large headset and cape, Grey with Pysker Amplification gear and Grey with distance viewing device.

Below is part of the Grey Science Team:  Grey with Atomic counter gear and Grey with info pad in hand.  Yes, I painted "info" on the info pad.  No, you can't read it, it's in Grey Alien language.  Sheesh!

Next comes the rest of the Scientific Team:  Grey with heavy cases and slung weapon, Grey with capture claw probe.  Obviously the one Grey with the different colored claw is a specialist.  (A specialist at what, you ask?  Why, probing, of course!)  And the two Greys carrying the cases are totally different.  Paraphrasing Bele from Star Trek's "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield":  One is purple on the left, the other is purple on the right.  Totally.  Different.

Next come the "heavy hitters" of the Grey army.  Four Grey Soldiers with energy rifles and one with the dreaded "Death Ray Projector," and six massive, scary, tall Robotic Servants.  Not a lot to look at in the rear view, just Grey Alien derriere (unless you're into that sort of thing; I'm just sayin').

Finally the Flying Saucer, seen here in convertible mode ('cause every Grey Alien likes cruising with the top down, feeling the wind in his...hair, er never mind).  I went with plain Jane silver, no special effects (unlike on the 15mm.co.uk website [link] ) because I wanted that true-to-life, straight out of the history books look.

Thanks for reading!

Reinforcements Have Arrived

I've almost finished painting The Greys I ordered from 15mm.co.uk a while back, but Real Life (c)(tm)(r) has a way of sticking its nose into my business in such a way that I have not finished painting them yet.

It hasn't stopped me, however, from purchasing more great figures from 15mm.co.uk.  I saw they were having a sale and pounced on the opportunity like a cat on a string laced with catnip.  My order was small, though, as I only had $22 to spend (don't ask), but luckily after the (horrendous) exchange rate it came out to $24 and change.  I can accept that.

I now have in my greedy mitts four ten-man squads of Retained Knights from the HOF range, one of each type of squad they offer.  http://www.15mm.co.uk/Retained_Knights.htm  As I don't plan on building an army to fit any given set of rules, I instead usually buy what I think looks cool, as well as hopefully giving a somewhat useful set of troops.  This gives me forty figures, more than the armies I got that were ASQL specific, but lacking a vehicle.  That's alright, I can scrounge one from somewhere if needed.

Here are some pictures of the raw troops.  The first is HOF1 Retained Command; 5 poses, Officer, Comms, Runner, NCO, Trooper.  (I'm still trying to figure out which is which.)

Next is HOF2 Retained Knights; four poses of Troopers with Rifles.

Third we have HOF3 Retained Heavy Weapons; four poses Support Weapons and Loader, with assorted heavy weapons.

Lastly, below is a picture of HOF4 Retained Assault Troops; four poses, Rifles and Melee weapons.

HOF 4 is the only one of the four that I am not crazy about all the figures.  I've never really cared for prone figures, unless they're casualty figures.  Yeah, he can be a sniper, but to me it loses a lot of energy that way.  Plus, what's a sniper doing in the Assault Trooper squad.  Say, huh?  It's no biggie, really, I'll just trade them out with a couple of the rifles from HOF2 or 3.

Also, HOF4 included the only figures with much flash on them.  Every figure had some mold lines, but these two were the worst, and really they're not bad at all.  I'm much more pleased with the quality this time around.

I mentioned in a previous posting how the Human Imperial Army figures were pretty rough around the edges:  old molds, lots of flash, rough detail.  The Greys, as I've also mentioned, are very clean and characterful (as soon as I finish painting them I'll have pics up).  These Retained Knights are pretty clean too, but I don't know how old they are as a miniature line.  They're nice sculpts, mostly flash-free, and I'm really digging the old-school look.  I love those huge bayonets ("Those ain't bayonets, boy, those are space bayonets!")

Anyway, I hope to have them painted soon.

Thanks for reading!