PROJECT 60: Preparing Dead Man's Hand Wave Two

Wave Two of miniatures for Dead Man's Hand

With Matt having done such a splendid job painting up my first batch of miniatures for use with the Dead Man's Hand skirmish game (and possibly other games), I thought it was time to rustle up a second wave of figures for Matt to work his magic on.

This new collection includes a complete gang (The Plains Indians), some heroic figures (Butch and Sundance, Rooster Cogburn), and some other miscellaneous miniatures (including a woman in a tin bath that will find a spot in the upstairs accommodation of my saloon).

I've already got another gang - the religious zealots of The Family - to lead off a third wave of figures, but I'm trying to break up my spending on Dead Man's Hand material throughout the year.

The Family were originally going to be in wave two, but having been watching random episodes of The High Chaparral I was persuaded to pick up The Plains Indians (although the Apache depicted in The High Chaparral were most definitely not Plains Indians, but Great Escape Games don't - yet - make Apache miniatures).

Hopefully, as the weather is turning brighter and hotter, I'll get myself down to our garden "craft room" to do some basing, build some rocky terrain etc But I'll need to sort out those old "bitz 'n' pieces" storage boxes first, to find out what I have and what is still useful and useable.

I might even start painting my nameless saloon!

PROJECT 60: Settlers Are Arriving and The Town Is Growing

My first collection of painted gunfighters for Dead Man's Hand

PROJECT 60 - and particularly my plans for the Wild West skirmish game, Dead Man's Hand - is really gaining momentum now.

Today, I received back my first batch of painted miniatures from my painter, Matt. You can get a taste of what they were like unpainted here and check out the pictures in this post to see what an amazing transformation Matt's skill with a brush has brought to them.

They are posed outside my latest building acquisition: a completed and painted MDF Western blacksmiths (with stable), a great purchase from eBay.

This will sit nicely with my nameless saloon, and the other buildings I have yet to build myself (those that came in the Dead Man's Hand Redux starter set and a couple of others I was unable to resist).

I'm pretty certain I already have enough buildings to create a small town, suitable for play.

I just need to boost up my number of miniature gunfighters - and innocent civilians - and (once again) tidy up the games room, so I can display all this material and do it justice.

Luckily, I am already assembling a second wave of miniatures to dispatch to Matt as soon as possible, but there are so many lovely 28mm Western miniatures out there that it's easy to keep getting distracted.

In the front we have Cullen Bohannon, Jonah Hex, Timmy The Flea, and The Man With No Name 

Beside The Man With No Name, we have Django (complete with coffin) and General Custer

Beyond this fantastic development, I've also been tinkering in the garden room, rebasing some old Western miniatures in my collection with the flatter Great Escape Games bases instead of the chunky Games Workshop ones that were my default setting more many decades.

A quartet of characters in the process of being rebased

I also need to summon up the courage to start assembling a couple of gangs from the multipart gunfighters that came in the Dead Man's Hand starter box.

I have ideas for themes: one based upon my own Hole-In-The-Head Gang, led by Timmy The Flea, and another based upon the main characters of The High Chaparral TV show.

I'm just slightly reticent because of my stroke-addled lack of manual dexterity and the minuteness of the parts for the figures.