6mm fantasy Martian Alliance project complete

As you may see above, I have at last finished the terrain board and the Olympian faction. Here they all are. This was by far my most ambitious and complicated project yet, but it looks splendid. Although not up to close inspection, the mass effect is right.

Closer up on the Crater dweller airboats, crater hordes, crater panzers and, to the right, Olympus mons and some of the Olympian flyers, with their big ticket beasts at bottom right.

Olympus mons and the Olympian dragons - best fantasy dragon ever, microworld - technocrats and tech city to the right.

technocrats and Olympians from above

Crater dweller heavy infantry to the left, Olympian cavalry to the right; better view of the crater panzers and their big ticket beasts.

The crater airboats - most complicated miniatures I ever did; Here you can see my idea that the air units use the energy rivers coming from Olympus mons.

The crater dwellers have the least technology, but there are lots of them and they are mean.

More of a focus on the Olympian cavalry; ram beasts to the fore and centaurs behind.

The Olympian big beasts, with cerberus hounds in advance.

centrepiece Olympus.

More of those airboats

crater people again

Olympians

top down technocrats; notice the different surface of tech city and the more ordered feel of these chaps.

The whole shebang.

do you come here often?

daleks! exterminate! the technocrat hordes in their home city.

I love this perspective view; reminds me of massed Napoleonic cavalry.

which of course, the crater panzers are.

Another impressive angle. Can't wait to unleash this army.

6mm Martian Alliance technocrats complete

At last I have finished my technocrat faction for the Martian Alliance. i used a magnifying glass for the majority of these and this has improved the overall standard of painting, but I will never approach pro levels - i remain a proud amateur. Close observation will show imperfections, but the look of massed units at a distance is good. I can't take better pics at this time, as I am moving on immediately to finishing the Olympian faction and making the terrain board.

This is the whole faction, with skirmish units in the front and aerials to the rear.

focus here on the technocrat riders -  two bases each of bikers and speeders; both from onslaught miniatures

assassins or lurkers or sneakers; five bases of them. Players have also used these bases as heroes.

technocrat knights; really happy with these - painted ages ago without mag glass.

a better shot of the sneakers, but the real focus is a close up of the technocrat beasts; onslaught OTC drones and handlers.

Focus on the technocrat hordes; irregular non daleks with onslaught avian handlers. Very happy with these; I made 17 bases.

not a great shot - my hand in the way - three bases of shooters

another look at the shooters, with spears and hordes as well and giant golem robot behemoths in the background.

close up technocrat blades, with spears in support.

I love this base, which wasn't intended. I ordered 24 German WW1 tanks as extras for the crater dwellers and irregular sent me an armoured car and a staff car as samples. I used them for a technocrat hero. 

The other technocrat (aerial) heroes.

techncrat magicians, with flyers in the background.

I am not sure if this is meant to show the behemoths or the airboats.

Or airboats and behemoths. Kindly note the non dalek escorts as point defence for the behemoths.

The whole faction. Wow! only the Olympians to go. I might actually finish this thing.

Martian alliance crater dwellers completed

Here I post the finally complete crater dwellers faction of my Martian Alliance army. Actually, there are several units, including one airboat in other posts, so I won't show those as well. I am boxing them up for transit, as I intend them to debut at my HOTT club next week, before I have done the terrain board.

above are the remaining five air boats

the air boats again; They took forever and are a combination of uncharted seas my imagination and the fantastically planet of the apes type wildlands alliance from Microworld games.

All the remainder of the crater dwellers. Quite an imposing little force.

close up on the behemoth rising out of the Martian crater sand at the urging of his were elephant leader hero.

Legionary like simians. Sort of weird alternative universe Roman legionaries.

Were elephant warband

The hero and his big follower.

Hordes and tanks here they come.

The crater dweller panzer division, revving up for action.

A better shot of the panzer division. This came about because I had done some dwarf tanks four years ago, using British WW1 tanks. I had also bought four irregular German A7Vs. I did two bases for the crater dwellers, using all four tanks. This is because I like cavalry and the wildlands alliance don't have any. So I made my own. I liked it so much I did another 12 bases and I think they are wonderful. They won't stand close scrutiny, as I am an amateur, but en masse, they look right. What you see there is, I believe, 3.5 times as many tanks as the Germans actually made. Can't wait to get these knights of Mars into action. When Microworld bring out their new apocalypse stuff, I intend doing lots more of these.

Tanks for the air cover chaps.

yeah baby, yeah. Come and get some.

From above.

The lot again. Next up in a few months will be the Martian Alliance technocrats.

Martian Alliance 2nd batch

I post the 2nd batch of the Martian Alliance. This time I include the big ticket beasts for the crater dwellers, their unique and excellent airboat and a home-made cavalry unit for them. I also show the remaining types for the Olympians - dragon, aerial hero, flyers, blades (2 types), behemoths, riders.

These are knights. They are microworld wildland orang-utans riding on irregular ww1 German A7v tanks. I needed a cavalry unit for the crater dwellers and microworld's wildland doesn't offer one. By chance, I still had 4 irregular tanks left from 3 years ago, when I did a dwarf tank unit, using British ww1 tanks - because they fit and the German ones didn't. Anyway, as soon as I did these bases, which I had never planned, I knew I would love them and have ordered enough tanks to make 12 more of these knights.

I love the unfinished, crude look of the German tanks - which is historically accurate - but I didn't even cut off the flash, because, being their first tech unit, the crater dwellers should look crude.

My favourite unit this last week and possibly of all time. It's an uncharted seas balloon, topped off with wildland heroes and other hangers-on. This doesn't show the detail on the underside of the unit, which is exquisite.

Slightly different perspective. I have another five of these to paint. The crater dwellers must not be cannon fodder. This just  looks right.

Crater dweller hordes

more crater hordes.

This is the crater dweller behemoth one - a wildlands great dingonek - fresh from the microworld imagination. I usually like to put escorts and point defence people for the big units.

Crater dweller behemoth two. a wildlands emele Ntouka. Those two big units look great 

The crater dwellers from this week. A great looking little mini-army.

This week's Olympians all together. Another lovely little mini-army. I do love that dragon - in my opinion, the best fantasy dragon I have ever seen.

Olympian beasts (for HOTT), driven on by a fallen. Look closely and you will see that these are Cerberus dogs, with three heads, just as in Classical myth.

Olympian blades type one - microworld blade demons.

Blades type two - cyclops demons.

Riders! Microworld demontaurs. These are brilliantly characterful miniatures. I like cavalry, so I bought lots of these.

As always, I spend time on the back views, since I will see it from my side of the table more often.

Superb miniatures, if not equalled by my amateurish efforts at painting them. These are microworld abyssal crawlers, topped by a basket of flame demons, escorted by abyssal juggernauts (who I conceive as acting like deputies) and escorted by assorted Olympian infantry.

My favourite dragon, in his Martian colours. I have four more of these to do. I cut off the existing dark alliance general and stuck on the alternative general from the Abyssal crawler, who is a sort of flame demon (or energy demon in my theory). 

Olympian aerial hero (it's a pit lord), escorted by imps. I bought only two pit lords, but loads of imps. I am glad, for I am beginning to like the imps.

Flyers - imps, led by a fallen.

from another angle.

Notice the new style of flying base. The one I did last week for the technocrats did not please me. This style is way better, but it was a tricky one to do. It's miliput supported by lolly stick bits and a paper clip.

Finally the fruits of this week's labours. I had planned to finish this army within three weeks from today, but it is clearly going to take longer and I want to give it the time it needs. I would say October is looking more likely (alas! I return to work on September 1st).