Painting the French in Dystopian Wars

Okay, I'll admit it, I can be a lazy painter sometimes.  I can easily paint the first ship/tank/soldier in a new project rather easily, but finding enough motivation to finish an entire force can be challenging at times.  Some of this I can blame on game companies like Spartan Games or Battlefront Miniatures. I barely get the models open and on the painting table before the next new exciting models are released.



I've really dug the Dystopian Wars range and was excited when I saw the French forces. A great steam punk aesthetic and who couldn't love a flying battleship?

In the past I've reviewed the French Sky Fortress here
And most of the initial French Range here

 For the French I went back and forth on how to paint them. I finally decided to riff off the box art and go with the "official" paint scheme, or at least as close as I could manage.

My Goal was to paint these as efficiently as possible and get a playable force ready in a couple of weeks time. I wasn't looking for a "Best Painted" quality fleet here, rather something that looks good at tabletop distance.

My first challenge was the wavy camo pattern on the French hulls. This striking blue and white pattern looks great in the box art.  Hand painting the wavy lines would take forever so I decided to mask the ships.  Tape masks would not work so I would try something I've wanted to try for a while, masking with clay.

First Step.... You have to start somewhere. for me it was the base coat. I decided to go with off the shelf blue spray paint from Lowes... ( I know, I know... the blasphemy!)

Basecoat applied to a French Battleship

I applied the base-coat to all my ships at once in order to save time.

Next up was the masking. I pulled a block of modeling clay from "Ye old hobby drawer". It's amazing what I find in there sometimes!

aforementioned block of clay

Next up my lovely wife assisted me in the masking process. It's good to get the family into your hobby. While my wife doesn't play miniature wargames she's always liked looking at the Dystopian Wars stuff. It's the steam punk fan in her.

Starting on the Vauban... this will take a lot of clay!

The process of applying the modeling clay went quickly, especially with two people working on it.
After half a block of clay and several blue stained hands later we had the fleet masked.

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Now that the ships looked like they had some really bad fungus we spray painted again, this time with a  flat white.

Carrier with wide Stripes

My Wife got all artistic on the Dreadnought

Masked for painting or is this an Ika Squid attack?

No came the worst part of the project. Peeling off the modeling clay mask. Most came off without any problem, except for the few spots I pushed a little too hard to get it to stick. I had several tiny, annoying pieces of clay that just would not come off unless attacked with a toothpick, or sculpting tool.

Dreadnought with Masking removed

Once the Clay mask is off the model the arduous task of painting the decking begins!

I wanted something simple. I picked GW Bestial Brown as I wanted a good dark wood color to contrast with the light colors of the cammo.  The downside to this part of the project is the difficulty in painting the brown decks and getting in all the groves, decks and balconies without marring the work so far. I would need a few touch ups and I may have missed a few places, but hey, who's to say they didn't paint some of their decks blue? right...?

Once the brown is dry I hit it with the new GW Agrax earthshade (brown) wash. It does a good job of darkening the color and give good lines between the deck planking. I may go back and highlight the decking, for the larger ships at least.

left has wash applied, right brown base coat

Okay, now we a starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. With the Hull and deck done it's on to the weapons emplacements. Since this is steam punk I wanted to introduce some bright brass to the models. The Weapons are good candidates as it makes them stick out at a distance. The Stacks are also painted brass so as to stand out.

 Once the Brass is dry I give it a coat of GW Sepia Wash. I love this stuff. At this point I have a perfectly acceptable playing model.

There are still further details to do however now I have something I can play with on the table and still work on the models. Detailing the weapons, adding detailed highlighting to the hull and painting portholes are all on the to do list.  However the nice thing is they are not needed right away.

I hope you enjoy this and if you have any ideas on painting your ships I'd love to hear it!