War Junk

Amphibious operations are second only to airborne enterprises in terms of difficulty, complexity and risk, so naturally I would want to plunge into them in a campaign that involved Korea and the Mongols. Nobody makes Chinese war junks in 15mm at anything close to the price that I want to pay (pennies), so I started rooting through my scrap box.

As any proper wargamer would, I kept some interesting -looking honeycomb cardboard to make the base for a war junk and supplemented it with a Betty’s Fat Rascal box, and when that ran out, some proper art picture framing card stock!

Hot glue fixed the card in place, then seams were sealed with masking tape. If it is pressed down well with a fingernail or burnishing tool then it will stick pretty much permanently. Two coats of Dulux panzer grey (Stormy night or some such) were topped by acrylic craft paint Sandstone Grès by DecoArt. Red detailing finished the job off, together with some hand painted heraldry to break up the monotony a little.

A large and small junk paired will fit roughly half a DBA army nicely and the Empress is very pleased with her new fleet. The largest ship is one that I have had for ages, originally built last century for 25mm medieval games using Slim Mumford’s rules. It was made from matchsticks (glued then filed to profile) and card stock. Madness, but the hull shape is very realistic!

Planking detail was drawn in with an HB pencil. The original painting that provided the inspiration can be seen above. It is obvious that I have simplified and  Chibi‘d the models á la Cordery. This means that any DBA faction that fancies a sea invasion can hitch a ride.

The picture above is captioned as a Mongol ship, but it looks suspiciously Chinese to my eyes. Of course, this could just be because when the Mongols overran China, they helped themselves to the Chinese fleet as well.