Navwar

[Oly]

Hi,

I'm new to to this forum so a big hello to everyone.

I played the demo of VaS at Dragonmeet the otherweek and bought the game afterwards.

I had a look around on here to see what people were doing for miniatures and checked out some of the companies mentioned. I was pleased to find out that Navwar was relatively close to me and the prices were really reasonable.

Anyway I went down there on Saturday (the shops a bit odd, only open Saturday afternoons) and grabbed myself the ships for the Battle of the River Plate and Bismark at the Denmark Straights. Following a chat with the owner (more of which in a bit) I also picked up HMS Cumberland who would have been involved had the Graf Spee tried to make a break for it. Anyhow that came to a total of 10 ships (Exeter came with York in a double pack) and the price for the lot as about £11. Considering I'm not going to be a heavy gamer that sort of price seemed ideal to me.

As for the owner well he was a very helpful chap. He kept me waiting a bit as he was chatting to someone else who was there before me. A bit annoying but he did apologise and then I got the benefit of his time when he was finished. He was incredibly helpful and really knew what he was talking about. I wasn't just another customer and he wasn't keen to get me out of the shop so he could get back to casting more miniatures. So if you go to the shop go with some time on your hands and it'll be well worth it.

As for the quality of the models well they don't seem quite up to what GHQ are producing but that's fine with me. They're going to be gamed with on a table and for that they're more than adequate. They're so much cheaper than GHQ so I was very pleased.

Anyhow I've painted up HMS Ajax. It's the first time I've painted anything in about 5 years and the first time I've handled anything on that scale for about 15. It's come out quite dark but all things told for my first attempt I'm quite please.

I'll try and post some images below. The ship's been based on a regiment base as sold by Games Workshop. Plasticard seems quite hard to get and the base seemed a great time saver too.

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[Lord David the Denied]

That's some nice painting, there. What scale?

 

[Oly]

That's some nice painting, there. What scale?

They're all 1:3000, Ajax is about 5cm or so long.

 

[Ben2]

You've based a cruiser on a regiment base. Do the battleships also fit comfortably on regiment bases?
And how big are destroyers and subs? Would they fit on a 20mm square base, or if you join two such bases together (giving about 45mm of basable length)? This could be done using thin plastic as a bottom layer without unduly messing up the height.
You've painted it very neatly, which is all you have to do for this scale. If the base water effect or has it been varnished?

And the nametag on the side, was that printed out and taped on, or something else?

Looking at this, I would base my fleet like this, my concern is destroyers/subs and fitting them on suitable bases, as I don't want them to vanish on a base or look disproportionate.

I'm pretty much decided on Navwar now for my fleets, the fleet packs for £9 make this extra easy.

When you say you went to the Navwar shop, do you mean you went to the chap who sculpts and casts them?

And you have the game already? Lucky git.

 

[Soulmage]

Wow! Very nice! My wife and I have been discussing basing options, and GW regimental bases were mentioned. However, I'm using 1:2400 scale Panzerschiffe miniatures, and the big battleships are unlikely to fit.

Although, as someone suggested, maybe I can put 2 of them together to make them long enough.

 

[Oly]

Ajax is based on a GW small regiment base. The biggest ship that I've got is, I think, the Bismarck. That won't fit on a small base but it will fit on a GW large regiment base.

Below should be a photo of Ajax, Bismarck on the bigger type of base and a ruler.

I can't say how big the smaller ships might be, Ajax is the smallest that I have right now.

The bases have just been painted, dry brushed to highlight, washed and the given a couple of coats of gloss varnish. They come with a texture already on them which while not as nice as those who've actually made proper sea looking bases seems to do the job well enough for me.

The name tag on the side was 8pt text printed out onto a piece of paper and then sandwiched between two layers of varnish.

Yes I did actually go to the Navwar shop in Seven Kings. The guy certainly does some, if not all, of the casting there, somewhere "downstairs". Well that's what he told me anyway....

Sorry I hadn't realised the the book wasn't out yet. I paid £20 for a shrink wrapped bundle of both book and counters.

 

[Breten]

It's a shame that it would cost me just as much to buy Navwar models as it does to by GHQ. I haven't found a North American distributor.

 

[DM]

Are you sure? Bismarck is £1.50 (approx $3). GHQ's model is $12 (approx £6). I didn't think postage from the UK was that bad

 

[Breten]

Yeah, but then there's the fact that I don't have a credit card (evil things), and then getting hit with import fees. I'm sure it actually would be cheaper, but the convenience of popping into my LGS helps.

 

[Wulf Corbett]

Ajax is based on a GW small regiment base. The biggest ship that I've got is, I think, the Bismarck. That won't fit on a small base but it will fit on a GW large regiment base.

Generally speaking, I can't stand GW.. but, damn, they make handy bases!

Wulf

 

[Wulf Corbett]

Generally speaking, I can't stand GW.. but, damn, they make handy bases!

OK, I'm confused now... I found the entry for those Regimental Bases on the GW website, but the entry doesn't seem to say how MANY you get in a bag...
Are they £1.25 each? So what do you get in the bag for £4.00?

Wulf

 

[Oly]

Are they £1.25 each? So what do you get in the bag for £4.00?

In the bag of "Small Regiment Bases" I got 17, the bag of "Large Regiment Bases" has 16. The bag of large ones was definitely £4.00, I think the other one was the same but I'm not 100% sure.

I actually popped back to a different GW store tonight to grab some different paints and did a job of selling Navwar to the manager who's into Napoleonic naval war games.

 

[DM]

If he's a Napoleonic naval fan you ought to get him sold on Rod Langton's 1/1200 models. They are much better than Navwar's and not that much more expensive. All of my 1/1200 Naps (with a few rare exceptions) are Langton or Skytrex with Langton masts, although one of the exeptions is an old Navwar 74 which I keep for sentimental reasons (that ship and I ahve been through hell and high water together )

 

[Wulf Corbett]

In the bag of "Small Regiment Bases" I got 17, the bag of "Large Regiment Bases" has 16. The bag of large ones was definitely £4.00, I think the other one was the same but I'm not 100% sure.

Oh, that's MUCH better, thanks. I shouldn't need too many bags then (hah, sure, I said that about ACtA...)

Wulf

 

[Renny]

Hey Oly

Love what you've done. I'd been fretting about how to base the ships and hadn't even thought about the GW stuff. Thanks for the idea. I've just placed my first order for Navwar ships.
Can I ask how you settled on the ship colours. I have no idea how to pick colours for the ships and would be grateful for any advice.

Cheers

Renny

 

[Oly]

Can I ask how you settled on the ship colours. I have no idea how to pick colours for the ships and would be grateful for any advice.

I just made a guess....

The ship was painted with GW paints, they're the ones I used to use years ago so I wanted to just stick with what I was familiar with handling. I'm sure that there are more authentic military acrylics out there and I'm equally sure someone on here can point you in the right way if that's what you want to do.

The hull is codex grey, the deck's snakebite leather and the sea's midnight blue. The ship got a black wash once the base colours were on and was highlighted with a codex grey and white mix. The sea was highlighted with midnight blue and white and then a progressively lighter mix was used to dry brush on the wake. Once that was done it was given a wash of midnight blue to blend it all in.

As said though I think the ship looks a bit too dark. I've now got some fortress grey for the hull and scorched brown to try washing the deck in a richer brown rather than just with black.

Hopefully I'll get another few ships painted up this weekend, I'll try to post up some photos of how they go.

 

[Soulmage]

My wife uses nothing by Vallejo paints and gets excellent results with them.

Here are some more pics:

http://s129.photobucket.com/albums/p220/dont_panic_1/

 

[Ben2]

Also placed my first Navwar order and bought some bases. I offered to let other people at my wargames society order some fleets on it, but I had no takers, so when they come crying to me in a month because they've got no painted fleets I'm going to make them be the Italians.