Blood for the Baron!

It was previewed on another thread, but thanks to some of the members of this board emailing me links to Ebay auctions I finished it, and now have some decent pictures.

Enemy Hovercraft







I've had a rethink about names for Enemy vehicles. I've actually done three more new customs, but everything is packed away for a few months as I'm moving house, so the remainder will be public mid-summer. Anyway that got me thinking about the names of Enemy vehicles. Apart from the Hyena, all vehicles were made up of two proper words (ShadowTrak, Laser Exterminator, RoboSkull, Escape Armour), so I've decided to follow that convention (and am considering changing the name of the Hyena to match - maybe Hyena was the name given by Red Jackal (who is predominately black!) to his own personal vehicle, rather like Steeler and the 'Goddess - anyway I digress whilst digressing!)

Therefore my original repainted Snowcat is now the RocketScorpion (Thanks to Quickfire for the inspiration), so although the repainted hovercraft was originally labeled as Red Jacare, I am thinking up something else. Answers on a postcard......

Ta for the nod Jimbo. Again, the hover is a fantastic custom which seems to work ok with the original and best AF universe.

Can only suggest a few names, Red Griffon (Black Major nicks the design from RM supplier of the same name), Red Pike, Red Hover Attack (hmm... shouldn't that be something else), Red Marine Attack (thinking along "Escape Armour" lines here), Red Azimuth (hmm... that could be a few things), Red Shock-Marine, Red Shock-Craft... ?? Red Killer-Whale??

Perhaps another option is Red Swamp-Rat, but that seems too GI Joe, the dialectic of Shad-obscurantist freakery and matter-of-factism remaining unsatisfied and thus eminently un-Shadesque.

Still need some names for the Shad versions of the Red Water Moccassin, Red Moray Hydrofoil, Red Soviet Attack Craft (Bloodhound vintage - when someone builds one) not to mention the Red Hind (ditto). Perhaps Red Eels and Lampreys would figure here.

Maybe the Hydrofoil would be good as Red Shark? Red Stingray (jeez, would be okay if not for the puppet connotation)? Red Hydro-Attack?

Alligator and Croc don't seem to work for any of them.

The Moray Hydrofoil "?Lamprey" and Cobra "Red Wolf" figures could do with some names too for their repainting and manning of various craft.

Anyway, guess I'd go for Griffon or its analogue Griffin, the mystical creature which was, from its depiction on a nomadic-turkic grave good found in Crimea, assimilated into the Tsarist heraldry by Potemkin and initimately associated with not only the conquest of the territory but that maritime combat associations of the island from its colonisation by ancient Greeks, much later Venetians and their allies, through the Crimean war to the WWII siege of Sevastopol on to the huge regional infrastructure created by the Soviets to secure it as a forward Black Sea base and electronic intelligence station. The Russo-Soviet element would continue the AF association of everything from the Baron's insignia of choice. And the Black Major's codebook of course. On that note, wasn't Red Jackal a Ukrainian? He would have been born in the era when Khruschev "gave" Crimea to Ukraine. Also loads of Soviet Marines based in Sevastopol, same place as those landing ships from Op Bloodhound, Black Major might like the association alongside that of half-inching stuff from his alma mater.

Griffin, Griffon, Gryphon - all Greek to me anyway.

Anyway, digression over, BTW Jimbo, what are you calling your hovercraft pilot-repaint?

Jimbo,

WOW mate nice to see this again mate

The colours work so well with whale. Plus having The Black Major on board just seals it,after all he`ll have played on the old RM Hovercrafts before his turning

So adds to this so much IMHO.

Outstanding work mate.

ja
Steel Bonnet

That's awesome !! Something the Shads definately need some amphibious assault !!

JIMBO! Where are you? Still moving house? Hope to see some more customs.



PS. Where da fk is someone else? Holidays? How come I don't get some R&R??

Very nicely done custom jimbo. Q-Force beware, that hovercraft has more firepower than anything they can put to sea! And I don't envy SAS Force in their canoes and fast attack boats, if they come across one of those on a river somewhere.

Absolutely, can u imagine Stevie Gerrard's absent Father meeting that thing of a Friday evening on his way up the river in his ye olde Boat Patrol on the way home from the Bootle Bar midway through a bout of PTSD just as he conflates the ferry on the Mersey with a Red Shad landing craft in the Galapagos....

"Xst all fuggin mighty, 'tis his Nibs, the Nutter!!!"
"Dodge this."

Tak-a-tak-a-takka-tat

"It's ok, deus ex machina is invoked."

Etc. etc.