The (White) Russians Are Coming!

 Inspired by Balkan Dave's recent post about a Russian Civil War book, I finally took the plunge on a box of WW1 Russians from Wargames Atlantic.

Ever since I got a Count Casimir variant sculpt from Pulp Figures, I've been thinking I should make a White Russian emigre faction for him to lead. As mentioned in the blog post above, the anti-Communist side of the Russian Civil War was politically and temperamentally very much in the same ballpark as the silver shirted and white robed factions I've already assembled. Historically, after losing to the Bolsheviks these jerks mostly relocated to the future Axis powers, and would participate in WW2 in both the German and Japanese armies. But some did end up in the US, including Boris Brasol who became buddies with Henry (*spits in disdain*) Ford, so this is a plausible faction for my interwar US setting even if it's not strictly a historical one. "Cossacks" also make an appearance as henchmen in an early Batman comic, so there's some "authenticity" from the fiction side as well.

Thusly untethered from the iron grip of historicity, I decided to have fun with the uniforms. I've got the RCW White Armies book by Osprey, so I basically painted a sampler of those uniforms. I guess the idea is that when Brasol or Bermont-Avalov or Vonsyatsky calls up them to join the big reactionary alliance, each one just gets his old uniform and Mosin-Nagant out of storage and reports for duty.

 

In both Pulp Alley and my homebrew system, antagonists can be single miniatures or groups of five. So in addition to "fire teams" of four rifleman and one sword-wielding officer each, I have also assembled a few "specialists": a sniper and spotter, a mad bomber, a submachine gunner and a melee expert, to provide some tactical variety and pulpy feel. The Pulp Figures guy is here too, in the white jacket.

 

 

The minis are mostly the aforementioned WW1 Russians, but I mixed in some partisan bits from the same manufacturer, some Gripping Beast hairy heads, and a handful of Warlord Games WW2 bits (eg the katana arms, and both binoculars). Finally, there are a couple German and a couple US bodies, reflecting how the Whites were often supplied by foreign powers.

 

A pretty intimidating bunch, all told! I'm still trying to decide what to call them in my game. The Russian All-Military Union (RAMU) and the Russian Imperial Union-Order (RIUO) are both appropriately sinister-sounding real orgs, and there were also a couple of explicitly Fascist Russian emigre groups if I want to be especially on-the-nose with it. But I can always make something up instead.

Minions and Molds

 A couple of months ago, I bought a silicone and plastic mold-making kit, so I could sculpt and cast my own miniatures. Since I'm not that great of a sculptor at this point, and also new to casting, I started with some casualty figures for my 1600s wargaming. That way I could do a simple one-piece pour mold, and also avoid sculpting a face. Those were successful, so I wanted to do a standing figure for the next step. But ideally, a simple figure, and maybe not one with a face if possible.

So it occurred to me, I have some Pulp Figures evil minions, but they could use some back-up. So I sculpted a generic minion, without a right hand because I have tons extra from various sprues.

I definitely learned lessons to apply to future molds and casts, but I'm really pretty pleased with how these assholes turned out.

Because, as you can probably tell from the paint jobs, I have in mind for these to represent a very specific sort of evil minion. I'm not gonna name them because I don't want to even risk that kind of traffic, but Superman famously fought them in his radio show, and they work well with my 1930s setting, and my theme that superheroes don't need to go overseas to punch right-wing extremists. This had the added project bonus where I wasn't too emotionally invested in the figures turning out well, or even in the original surviving the process at all.

 

I think they mix well with the Pulp Figures, and also the kitbashed ones I made from medieval Arabs and whatever else. It helps that my goon-level painting isn't very precise!

Godlike

Godlike is the title of a table-top roleplaying game about superpowered soldiers in a WWII setting. It's been very influential in planning this whole project, although I will probably use its less-constrained successor Wild Talents for the actual rules.

Godlike is also an apt descriptor for these four, probably the most physically powerful characters that will exist in this campaign. Hercules might be available as a playable character since superhuman strength is his *only* power, but the other three are just as strong and can also fly and do other stuff as well, so they are all strictly NPCs. Fighting even one of them would be an epic encounter...

Bonus: another Superman vs Namor staredown vignette, using custom Chicago scenery (more on that later)...

A wizard is never late, nor is he early...

...he arrives precisely when he means to.

Here is a quartet of golden-age magic characters, arranged in order of ascending sartorial flamboyance:

The first is Doctor Occult. I could not find any actual minis of him, but since he's just a dude wearing a fedora and trenchcoat, I painted up a heroclix "Maggia Goon". He's definitely reaching for his mystic talisman, not a handgun.

Next is Zatara, golden-age father of the much more famous Zatanna. He's a heroclix Zatara, but fully repainted and with a bowtie I made from paper.

After him is Sargon the Sorceror, not to be confused with the ancient kings or fascist youtuber named Sargon. Another converted heroclix, the original model had an absurdly tiny head, so I replaced it with a plastic medieval Arab head from a historical kit.

Finally we have the Ancient One, washed and highlighted but not converted at all. The character was not invented until the 60s, but would have existed in the 30s, much like Howard Stark and Vandal Savage.

two more NPCs: Mr. President and friend

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt with a scientific advisor, Howard Stark.

Stark's kid won't invent the Iron Man suit for another three decades, so I wonder what's in the red suitcase?

Howard is (perhaps obviously) a Tony Stark repaint. FDR is a Professor X mini, with hair added and face resculpted a bit.

Interwar test figures

One thing that always helps me buy into a superhero scene is the presence of capable, competent non-superhumans backing up the superhero in their fight against evil. From the Avengers battling aliens alongside NYC cops and National Guard, to Wonder Woman spearheading an assault across no-man's-land, the involvement of soldiers and/or law enforcement (or even civilians, though that's a good bit rarer in our militaristic culture) helps add some weight and scope to superheroic do-goodery.

So with that in mind, I've grabbed some WWII plastic kits, with an eye towards building some late 1930s troops. With head swaps and a bit of conscientiousness about their weapons, I've made and painted my first marine and first army infantryman (with an unconverted Pulp Figures gangster for comparison).

Both soldiers are made from the appropriate Warlord Games kit. The marine has a head from the AWI Continental Infantry kit, with the crown of the hat cut down a bit to look more like a campaign hat. The army man has a brodie-helmeted head that I bought from Anvil Industries. I don't know if the rest of their kit is strictly accurate for 1938, but I think the heads do a good job of signifying "not 1942 yet!"

I rather like how these two turned out, so I will be painting the rest of their squads soon.

We Three Kingpins

A few weeks ago, I found a Kingpin mini in a $1 heroclix box at the local gaming store. The Kingpin character himself isn't going to be in this campaign, but it occurred to me that a big chunky bruiser in a suit might still be a good mini to have for this campaign, so I bought him. I added a "fedora" (17th-century floppy hat with crease filed in) and repainted him in non-kingpin colors, and he turned out great. So I bought two more Kingpin clix online, mildly converted and repainted them too.

Warlord Marine and Pulp Figures cop for scale

I love how the sculpts are different enough that they look like entirely different big dudes, and not just palette swaps of the same character. They will probably not represent specific NPCs, but rather "the big guy" within a group of thugs/minions. The Pat Roach of a given combat encounter, if you will...

League of Mid-Tier Heroes

These are the ten heroes I've painted up to be pre-generated characters, for anyone who doesn't feel like inventing a superhero from scratch. Some supers are off-limits for being too powerful (e.g. Plastic-Man, Wonder-Woman), and others are in the right power bracket, but I want to reserve them for plot-important NPCs (e.g Captain America, Batman). So here's what's left:

Phantom Lady, The Atom, Mr. Terrific, Blue Beetle, Green Arrow

Hawkman, The Bulleteer, Aquaman, Hawkgirl, the Crimson Avenger

About half are full repaints, with the other half just being washed and touched-up.

PS. modeling-wise, Green Arrow is the only interesting story here... the only golden-age version I could find was Starro-possessed, so I bought another one just to steal its head. I do have plans for the briefly-headless silver age Green Arrow mini though.

Heroclix touch-up test

I won't be doing a complete repaint of every clix mini I get. Some of the pre-paint jobs already look pretty good, and many have decals or other fine detail work that I would rather preserve than try to replicate. So I took a few non-essential minis* and just added some shading with washes, and follow-up highlighting where needed.

They need some additional touch-ups, but overall I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out, so I took the same approach with a character that actually does matter.

*by "non-essential", I mean that these characters are not strictly from the "Golden Age of Comics", nor are they required for the plot of my campaign, but they are thematically relevant enough that I may shoehorn them in somewhere anyway, depending on what specific subplots develop.

Heroclix civilians and cops

Most of the non-super miniatures will be from metals from Pulp Figures, but I've picked up a few "supporting characters" from heroclix bins as well. Also, purse lady is a model railroad accessory.

First Heroclix Repaints - Mad Science!

After a lengthy hiatus, I've made a bit of progress on this project. Here are the first of at least a couple dozen heroclix minis I'll be repainting to at least some degree. I wanted to start off pretty simple, so here are my four mad scientists.

The repainting isn't because I think I'm any better than the original factory painters. I just want the minis to match the rest of my collection. Honestly, these probably look worse now, not the least because I may have left them in the acetone a bit too long. Oh well, live and learn.

I do think the varying proportions through the heroclix line are pretty remarkable. Also, why are mad scientists always bald? I don't even have the Ultra-Humanite or Lex Luthor here!