15mm Moongrunt Project from GZG

Well this is what I've been up to hobby-wise, instead of painting Plains warriors and Seventh Cavalry troopers. But now I'm done this and can get back to the Little Bighorn project. But let me talk a bit about this one first.

I posted a couple weeks ago about how visiting the Museum of Brands in London, England got me onto Space:1999 and the Eagle spacecraft, and how buying one of those got me back into 15mm astronaut combat, and this post is the culmination of all of that. I wrote about how I'd bought and painted some astronauts in EVA suits from Ground Zero Games, but together with that order came two "armies" from GZG's "Moongrunt" range - a Chinese PLA space force and some British that will stand in for NASA astronauts - I just liked the look of the British models and their suits better than the GZG Americans. The NASA gang I've painted from the GZG British is shown in these photos.

The GZG models are sold in packs of six, and I wanted a decent platoon on each side, so I ordered four packs, in this case three packs of "riflemen" and one heavy weapons pack. These I divided up into three sections of seven models each (fve riflemen and two with rocket launchers), and a platoon command section comprised of the platoon commander and two flunkies.

The models were painted pretty simply, with heavy overbrushes of Celestra Grey, Corax White, pure white, Nuln Oil wash, then pure white again. Guns were Leadbelcher with Nuln wash, and I painted a red armband on the platoon commander and blue ones on the squad leaders.

I also built and painted a vehicle and passengers for the force. This is a pretty cool little 8-wheeled buggy that carries driver, squad leader, and six passengers. 

I used some Lunar "NASA" decals on the vehicle.

You can remove the passengers. I superglued them together in groups of three (one on each side of the compartment) to make that easier.

I also added some weathering on the vehicle hull. I suppose that dust and tiny micrometeoroids would weather stuff on the moon.

Here is the opfor - the Chinese People's Liberation Army Space Force.

I organized the force the same way as the other one, but the Chinese have more heavy weapons, so they get four in each squad of seven men. I know that eight is an even luckier number in Chinese culture so I might either reorganize the force or just buy another pack of these guys.

First squad. The leader has a red stripe on his helmet. I first heavily brushed the models with Celestra Grey, then painted the suits Mephiston Red and Evil Suns Scarlet, then finished the helmet, boots and gloves with Corax White and pure white. Guns are Leadbelcher with Nuln Oil.

Second squad, contains two heavy rifles and two rocket launchers.

Here's the transport - a rocket-powered hovering sled. I made a base for it using magnets on the support post and underneath the vehicle.

So when the vehicle lands, you just take it off the flying stand.

Of course the passengers are removable (they are all superglued to the central seating construct) and the vehicle can be used as a cargo transporter!

I did a rough job on some cargo for the bed.

Well that's this project finished for now! This will let me get back to the Little Bighorn and I'm trying to motivate myself with some new reading - "Hokahey - A Good Day to Die" by Richard Hardorff, that chronicles the Plains warrior casualties of the LBH battle.

Anyway the next thing to do with these models is have a game of some kind. I also have to get a larger terrain mat, probably 4x4 feet. If you have any suggestions please put it in the comments!  

Space: 1999 Eagle and GZG 15mm EVA Suited Astronauts

OK so there’s a bit of a backstory behind this one, bear with me…

On my recent trip to the UK I stayed in Notting Hill at a place that just happened to be up the street from the Museum of Brands, a very cool little museum of… retail brands, that had some very cool stuff in it, including lots of old board games and toys. Here are some of my favourites:

If you say "it's popular," it's popular!

Not exactly Formula De I'm thinking

Frightening

"Hey who's up for a game of Sanctions?"

Well whoever decorated Goering got his armband on the wrong arm, for starters...

My absolute favourite. Mum is obviously drunk

Anyway the other very cool thing I saw at the MoB was their special exhibition featuring toys and collectibles related to two Gerry Anderson properties: Thunderbirds and Space: 1999. All the stuff in the exhibition reminded me how awesome a ship the Eagle was!

So I thought to myself, I should get an Eagle model to game with - it would fit great into the Lunar game! A few years ago a company called Round 2 designed a 1:48 scale Eagle (22 inches long!) that I figured would be great for Lunar. So I sought out and found a built and painted example on eBay. Unfortunately when it arrived it was definitely not the 1:48 Eagle as it was advertised to be - it was ancient MPC model, purportedly 1:72 but actually closer to 1:96 scale.

After getting a substantial refund from the seller, I pondered what to do. Hmmm, I thought, this Eagle is pretty close to "15mm scale"… I wonder if anybody makes 15mm astronauts? Well it turns out that Ground Zero Games makes lots, and I promptly ordered a bunch. These are the first of them - astronauts in heavy EVA suits. They look good with the Eagle don’t they!

Pretty simple paintjobs on these models. They were "overbrushed" with Celestra Grey to begin with, then Corax White. I used Agrax Earthshade to tint some specific parts of the suits, and then highlighted the white parts with a heavy drybrush of pure white.

 

I also painted six armed EVA-suited astronauts. Ironically after painting these models I started looking through a bag of 15mm SF stuff I had been holding onto for years... and found these same two packs of models. No harm though as they are easy to paint and I can always use more of these guys.

Paint style was similar to the other astronauts, I used Coelia Greenshade on these suits and I like the look.

I really like the look of the Eagle with these models and it'll be great "terrain" for 15mm lunar gaming. Of course the Lunar rules themselves are a bit too involved for larger games but I did find a mod for Bolt Action on the Internet that might be worth a try. And if we have a game with 20 or 25 models a side maybe we use Kill Team, Necromunda, Rogue Trader, or even good ol' Lord of the Rings as a basis for the game. Of course there needs to be some specific mods for low-G and suit penetration but that can be figured out.

I also bought a ton of GZG's Moongrunt models to paint up for a larger game, and am pondering what kind of 15mm "structures" to buy for lunar terrain. As you can see here I've already got a bunch of craters so that's covered, but some little domes or industrial structures would look good in a game as well. Suggestions in the comments please. Also I'm still on the lookout for a 1:48 Eagle or 3D printed model in that scale. I still think it would be awesome to see on a Lunar game table!

Spartan APC for 30k Thousand Sons

A Spartan carrier for the XV Legion Astartes.

Well, it's been more than a little bit since my painting flurry of the recent Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge concluded. My brushes have been busy, but other distractions have come up and dented my hobby time, so I have been delinquent in terms of getting stuff finished, and even more delinquent in terms of getting some posts up on the blog even when I have managed to complete something. Let's make a dent in that today...here we have a serious armored reinforcement for the Space Marines of the XV Legion Astartes - this is a Spartan, the big scary troop carrying tank of the Horus Heresy setting. This is a multi-part resin model from GW's Forge World studio.

A giant slab of armour, and tons of guns...just full-on 30k silliness!

Yes, you read that right...even though GW has had a multi-part plastic version of this model available for YEARS now, here I am, in the year 2026, still finishing off painting one of the old resin Forge World version of this kit. Needless to say, this thing has been in the "pending pile" for a LONG time - and sure, I have a nice assortment of excuses: moving several times sure didn't help, and the usual distractions of other periods, settings, scales and figures have all taken their right and proper place...but still, even for me, this is a monument to hobby delay/procrastination... 

A close-up of the beast! I added some extra light rocket launchers on the cupola, because why not?

I was going to "paint it during the Painting Challenge" (the justification for many a project!). I even got started on it January, painting the quad-lascannon sponson weapons (the part of this model I found the hardest to paint, because oddball hobby reasons). But I just couldn't get around to finishing the rest of this beast in time to include in my Painting Challenge production. 

One of the quad lascannon batteries on the sponsons. For whatever reason, I just can't stand painting those things...

In fact, I was more-than-half-tempted to even "leave it for the next Challenge", but that was a bridge too far, so I just buckled down and finally finished it in April. 

Why so slow? Well, I think we all have subjects or specific models that turn into a real drag, for whatever reason, and this was no exception. I have also found that I just have trouble finding the motivation to paint big 28mm-sized vehicles in recent times. Finally, I have to admit that the 3rd edition of the Horus Heresy rules have just not landed well with me. To put it simply, playing HH 3.0 just feels like work. I still love the story, the setting and the figures (or, nearly all of them), but these days I am just not motivated to play the game and this has materially slowed my motivation to paint more 28mm sized 30k figures. 

Lovely decals from the Forge World decal sheet help provide the necessary "crazy ancient Egypt" vibe for the tank.

But for all that, this beast is at last over the line! And I'm sure the Sons of Magnus will be pleased! I've been adding a number of units to my XV Legion collection in recent years, but when it comes to vehicles, well, they've been stiffed! Their motor pool to date consists of a single Rhino APC - useful, sure, but not exactly a sign of armored might! Well, that all changes now...

Ready to roll!

The Spartan is a bonkers AFV, just absolute peak Horus Heresy. It is armed to the teeth. It has the heaviest possible armour ratings you can have on a vehicle in the game. And it carries more than 20 marines on board - enough for a great big tactical squad, or a big terminator squad, AND some flunkies. Even Space Wizards like to ride in style, after all!

Khorne Bloodthirster!

Well here's another massive metal model from the before-times... a Bloodthirster of Khorne. This one is definitely a must-have for my 40K Khorne army.

                                                    

Assembling these metal models can be tricky due to parts fitment. Fortunately this one wasn't too bad, it was painted (badly) when I got it but stripped down a treat as they often do. The model was assembled with superglue but no pins (I hope I don't regret this later) and it needed a bit of greenstuff work on some of the joins.

The wings are massive pieces of metal aren't they!

Cheeky as always! That chain-thong looks fairly uncomfortable. Khorne cares not from where the chafing flows!

Colours used were the same as the Bloodletters. Skin is Khorne Red - Mephiston Red - Evil Sunz Scarlet, horns, nails and hooves Kantor Blue - Thunderhawk Blue, wings highlighted with Dark Rubber.

The Bloodthirster is a big boy, even when sat beside a metal Bloodletter, itself a decent sized model!

I'm glad I've gotten this one done for the game coming up. In the 5th Ed. Chaos Space Marines codex all of the greater daemons have the same stat line and cost 100 points. Of course they are summoned onto the battlefield and actually take the place of a unit champion or character model. But what would you rather have on the table, a Berzerker champion with a plasma pistol, or a Bloodthirster?? It will certainly be fun to find out in a few days. Might even get a couple Rhinos done before that too!