Clever Hans - part 10 (Volksgrenadiers, Hanomag, Flame Thrower and Observer)

Finding time to paint of late has been tricky, but this weekend my wife had a hair appointment and a shopping trip so out came the painting station and I got to work on some more WW2 Winter Germans in an effort to get that project done and ready for the gaming table!

Covering the medic previewed in my last post as he helps get the injured to the half-track. 

First up a closer look at the platoon's Sd.Kfz. 251D half-track. These armoured transports were iconic and the Germans used them throughout the war, with other nations utilizing the design for quite a bit after the war's end in their own armed forces. Featuring an MG42 machinegun both fore and aft of the vehicle, they not only were splendid for transporting troops where they needed to go on the battlefield, but also could provide suppressive fire support once the troops offloaded at their destination. Sadly, in the Bolt Action rules set these things are a bit naff, costing far too much points-wise for how survivable they end up being on the tabletop - but they are iconic, so I had to include one in my force!

What's missing from these pics? That's right, markings. For now. Decals to come at a later date when I have more time to get back to hobby.

Tried to make it look a little dirty/muddy on that flooring.

This is a Warlord Games plastic kit. Went together relatively easy and was VERY happy to only have to deal with single piece track sculpts! 

Tried to show wear on the paint work from where passengers likely clambered in and out from. I mean, there's doors at the back, but who uses doors?

Doors and mud and snow and more wear. Forgive the focus being out on this pic, phone wasn't playing ball at all.

After the halftrack I got on with the next part of my plan, a 10-man Volksgrenadier squad. Volksgrens (For short) were a type of unit created by Hitler's orders to help bolster his then retreating armies in the later stages of WW2. Whilst they got spiffy new uniforms and were outfitted with the best kit (Read, LOTS of Panzerfausts and Assault Rifles), they were far too rushed to the front lines and received equally rushed training. Their creation was more of a propaganda effort than anything else and their exploits in the field were very mixed.

The first two of my squad are the squad's sergeant and his mate who's about to toss a primed potato-masher grenade.

Both Warlord Games metal sculpts of a very nicely detailed set. Not Winter theme'd though, so expect more white-painted helmets and trousers from future posts in an effort to make them fit in with the rest of my Winter Germans. 

This is the first Warlord metal squad where rank badges weren't sculpted onto the figs. I'm of half a mind to leave the sergeant's uniform bare of them as it's pretty obvious that the only pointing bloke in the squad MUST be the leader, right?

Not wanting to get bogged down painting all the Volksgren's at once, I then moved on to a support team for these frosty fellows, a nice flame-thrower duo. Another Warlord Games effort, this time from their Winter line. Am very much loving the sculpts and as they were mostly "Greatcoats" as far as painting was concerned, they were relatively swift to get done.

Flame-Thrower packs were heavy kit in general. German ones were apparently heavier than most. No wonder this poor bugger is having a rest before having to muster out to BBQ his next victims.

Another pointing sculpt. But not a sergeant seeing as he's holding a rifle and not an SMG, so he obviously doesn't count. Obviously.

Last up for today's post is an Artillery Observer/Spotter. A fun pose where this "camouflaged" chap is doing his best to stay hidden whilst he gives the artillery crew the co-ordinates for their next barrage into a portable field radio.

Not that one should have an Observer in a position to require him to have to actually shoot a gun in-game, but just in case he should need to, I stuck a spare Soviet SMG on his base for the job. 

Snow covered bushes to help hide him. Not sure they'll do a very good job tho.

Getting these six things finished up keeps me on track for my personal pledge of a minimum of 2 a week with it being Week 15 of the year and my total of fully painted models up to 30 now. Good stuff.

And that's it for now. Easter weekend will be a family affair and I'll have no time to myself for more hobby so not sure when I'll have anything new to show off. 

04/12/2022, week# 15 - 30/100 mini's done

Five Give Up the Booze - a silly business

Those astute enough to follow events around these parts will see that it’s been a little while since my last post. This is because I’ve been on holiday to visit my sister and her family in Trinidad and soak up “Carnival” whilst I was there. I had a bloody lovely time and saw so much feathered lady-flesh that I’ll have good memories (And plenty of pics, of course)for years to come. :)

Since my return my hands have not been exactly idle at my hobby desk. Whilst nothing’s been finshed, I’ve been gluing and slapping paint about different things.

1. In April I’ll be co-demoing some Regimental Fire & Fury ACW with my mate Stewart and so have started painting up the remainder of my outstanding 15mm Confederate infantry for the day. It’ll be a large game, set to take some 5 or 6 hours (I hope my neck can stand up to that sort of punishment…) with 6 players and we two as GM’s. Stewart has a modified scenario to run through and know’s all the details, I think I’ll just be there to supply Reb’s and my pretty self. No pics yet cos who wants to see boring primed minis with blue trousers? More on these later.

2.  Last year I was lucky enough to win a raffle on Facebook that involved the Bolt Action community. The proceeds went to a lovely chap, Damon Andersen so that he could afford a pricey surgery for his young daughter in the US. The prize ended up being a lovely box from Warlord games that included their new “Band of Brothers” starter set, black set of order dice, the Tank Wars supplement and some cool looking german officer with an SMG. Thus far I’ve put together and primed the German Half-track that came with the Starter Set, but also got to start work on the Hetzer tank hunter that I’d purchased almost a year ago. Project Winter Germans is on it’s way!

Half Track is a re-purposed Pioneer 251/D as shown by the storage bins along the sides. I just liked the look with them, than without. Considering adding a canvas cover over a frame for the passenger area seeing as it'll be a Winter theme'd vehicle. The cork is sporting a German Tank commander, he's just primed ready for when I actually have a tank able to stick him in. I'm thinking a Panzer iii or an 8-Rad might be in my future?

The Panzer 38T-Hetzer tank Hunter is my fav German tank. Ugly little bastard that packed a wollop though suffered terribly from unreliable mechanics and thin armour that barely stopped machinegun fire. Add to that Late War fuel shortages and how awfully cramped these things were inside and it was not a very liked machine. But much like ugly dogs, it really appeals to me. Bit shiny in the pic as it's currently drying from a coat of gloss varnish, prior to decals being added and then weathering. The red barrel is to represent that this tank is not that far from the factory floor - they didn't have time to paint it!

3. Spurred on by this jump-start to my painting mojo, I also started looking at other things, #1 were my old 3^rd Edition Blood Bowl Orcs which got scrubbed clean of that old paint job, mold lines removed and glued to new bases. Also after being tempted to jump in on the new Relic Knights Kickstarter project (And consequently reminded by self that I’d not played the original version in almost 2 years, much less painted more than 98% of the Relic Knights minis I already own…) I pulled out Betty and Lug (To be previewed at a later date) and started base colours on those. Sadly, this led me to discover that my much prized old pot of Blazing Orange had completely dried up! And so very sad, I threw that old horse (Brought all the way from the UK no less) into the bin.

That just leaves my Dark Angels Green remaining from my "old" Citadel paint collection. :(

Some more work was done on the Wintery Eastern Front buildings too, but of course, I forgot to take pics. Again, at a later date. 

Forgive me if I haven't commented on your blogs in a while. I'm trying to make my way through all of the posts backlog, but it's taking a while and those bloody things do pile up QUICK! 

In conclusion, I hope to get a new post up by the weekend so if you're so inclined, watch this space!

Zomtober 2014 Part 5! (The Finale!) & 6MMRPC 2-Month roundup!!!

It's 50 minutes into the Day of the Dead, but this will still count by my reckoning as my last post for Zomtober. So lots of pics, an AAR and a few other things. Here we go!

I'll start off with an AAR for a game of Flames of War I played on Saturday against Densmol to get some practice in with my Canadian Armoured list for the D-Day tournament on the 22nd of November.
We played at 1500 points with Densmol fielding a Mechanised Panzergrenadier list out of the Atlantik Wall book.
We rolled for Mission and came up with Breakthrough, which was a good one to practice on as it seems to come up more often than not at tournaments.

Me: 4th Canadian Armoured
CT
HQ - 1iC and 2iC Shermans with .50cal MG's +1 Extra Sherman
Armoured Platoon - 3x Shermans and a Firefly
Armoured Platoon - 3x Shermans and a Firefly
Armoured Car Platoon - 2x Staghound, 1x Daimler Dingo
Self Propelled Anti-Tank Platoon - 4x M10 Achilles 17pdr
Full Lorried Infantry Platoon (With no lorries....)
AA Gun Platoon - Cmdr, 2x 40mm Bofors AA guns
Artillery Platoon - 2x Cmdr, Staff team, OP, 4x 25pdr Guns

Densmol: Panzergrenadier Company who's name I can't remember
CV
HQ - 1iC & 2iC infantry command stands (Think they got half-tracks too?) and I think 2 Panzerschreck Anti-tank teams too.
Panzergrenadier Platoon - Cmdr with Panzerfaust, 6x MG Infantry, 4x half-tracks
Panzergrenadier Platoon - Cmdr with Panzerfaust, 6x MG Infantry, 4x half-tracks
Light Armour Platoon - 3x Panzer ii Luchs
Light Armour Platoon - 3x Panzer ii Luchs
Self Propelled Artillery Platoon - Cmdr, 3x Hummels, OP
Heavy AA Platoon - Cmd, 2x 8.8" Guns
Panzergrenadier Heavy Platoon - 2x HMG's, 2x Mortars + OP


Pictures are shady, but the lighting in the garage is suspect at the best of times.

Setup: I was heading into the opposite diagonal corner, to the far church. I held the M10's, infantry and Anti-Air guns in reserve. I placed an objective pretty close to the corner where they would come on and so wasn't worried about having to travel far to be able to contest later in the game if need be.
I stuck the Artillery in a well protected corner and loaded up my tank platoons for an armoured strike toward to the opposite corner using the buildings and smoke as cover.

Densmol was annoyed as this mission used the Mobile Reserves rule and so was left having only his 88's, one platoon of Luchs and an Infantry platoon to deploy (Minus it's halftracks.). He also combat attached out his mortars and HMG's to the infantry.
The infantry hugged the tree line along the long straight road that followed the river, had his 88's sat with good fields of fire in the opposite corner and a lone platoon of wee (SO CUTE) Luchs to defend the objectives my boys were going after.

Turn 1: The 2iC and his sherman pal decided to move off to provide covering fire as the rest of the shermans headed off toward the objectives, hugging the buildings for cover against 88 shots.

That git Densmol got his Hummels like Turn 2 to start horrible bombardments far too early in my humble opinion.

Tanks are ready to roll across the ford. Please take note of the lack of 88's in this picture - they died horribly to a withering hail of MG fire.

The poor brave Luchs start taking fire. It's only my typical poor dice rolls that leave them down only one tank though.

Densmol starts getting a little frustrated as I get reserves and roll on my M10 Achilles tank destroyers to help secure one objective.

That little black tank next to the bridge is the Hummel battery's OP. It sees all of my poor advancing shermans. :(

Densmol gets reserves (2nd Luchs platoon and another infantry platoon in 1/2 tracks.)! My poor Armoured Car recce lads take it in the bum with the last car buggering orf. Wisely.

Shermans at long range typically kill what they aim at. Good bye krauts.

And we'll take this objective too, though these jammy gits didn't run away even though they had one dead and the other two bailed.

Infantry and Luchs toddle over to try to take out my 25 pounders. Sadly he had his half-tracks go through the slow going of the plowed field..... 4" a turn is grueling at the best of times...

Whilst the Shermans and Firefly send shots down to try to take out the Hummels, the M10's finish off those stubborn Luchs. The 2nd objective is mine!

You see that tank on the left, next to that building? Yeah, that the 1iC. He finished off stuff very valiantly.

With me holding the objectives safely and Densmol managing to take out my poor Recce platoon, I won 5-2. Not bad. Made some mistakes, but otherwise I feel that this list can do exceedingly well against a Mechanised infantry force. Now, if he had brought a King Tiger or some silliness.... I think it might have been a different story.

Things I learnt:

1. Trained Artillery is shite. Horribly so. I tried to range in/hit on five different occasions andonly got one barrage (Smoke or otherwise.) ONCE! 4-guns only for me.

2. Playing aggressively is not typically my forte, but this game I tried to step out of my comfortable Defensive-playing slippers and it paid off. Mostly. Some better placing and remembering where the opponent's reserves deploy and this may well have ended 6-1 instead.

3. Semi-Indirect fire is super fun. :)

After this, we got in a second game, this time with Densmol playing the actual list he plans to take to the tournament. 13 Luchs!!!! (And two Tigers and 3 Jagdpanzer iv's and some other stuff.) It was a good game and a lot closer than the first. In the end I think he won 4-3. I think. No pics though as by then the wine was flowing freely.

On to hobby stuff.

I put together these!

One resin and 5 plastic German 1/2-tracks from the latest Panzergrenadier boxed set. The Plastic models went together really well with only a little clean up. Not sure when I'll get to painting them, but at least they are ready for primer and paint. Speaking of my Germans project - I decided I didn't like my airbrush jobs on my Panzer iv's and so stuck them all in a bath of Simple Green. We'll see what different scheme takes my fancy in the near future.

The post title says it and so it must be true, Zombtober is over. (Officially it ended last weekend, but I felt that with Friday (Yesterday) being the last day of October, that I could squeak in a last post before I call it quits. So the final 2 zombies of my collection got some paint slapped on. I hope you like.

The fellow on the left brought a snack it seems, whilst his erstwhile companion on the right may well perform an impressive nosedive from a standing position any time now...

A family pic. Say.... "Brains!"

Thought I'd add in this fun pic of the brave Paladin of Greyskull, defending holy ground against the vile necromancer and his summoned deathless horde!

Lastly, I'd like to babble a bit on the whole 6 Month challenge I've been stumbling down. I've been doing rather well I feel, having still not spent any funds on new minis to add to my unpainted mountain. I will admit though to using a birthday giftcard to picking up a Serpent Priestess for my Relic Knights Noh Empire faction; but I think that keeps me good. 2 months now almost done and I'm feeling rather proud of what I've gotten painted. Tanks, zombies, roleplay minis - not bad really.
Now Zomtober is over I aim to get some more Flames of War Desert Brits done and get working also on my Germans project. Then there's also some Dreamforge Eisenkern Stormtroopers that have been grabbing my attention... Lots to do still. Too much.

Hope everyone had a fun Halloween - Happy Day of the Dead!