Tuesday, January 3, 2012

New ATGW for the Chemical Commies

"NATO tanks sighted dead ahead.."


I find miniature companies fascinating and baffling all at once.  Fascinating, because the skill of the sculptors and casters is amazing (or, amazing at most companies) and they create awesome stuff that we enjoy painting (or at least saying we'll paint) and gaming with.  And baffling for the way in which they will casually miss the mark with make-up of their collections. 

Trusty AK on hand for back-up use against NATO infantry.
Eureka is a company like this - home to all sorts of amazing products, but companion ranges that don't always mesh, exactly.  The Soviets in NBC gear are a great example - you would imagine they would be a perfect OPFOR to the West Germans, and now US, in NBC gear as well.  And yet their special weapons are bafflingly out of date - old Sagger missile systems going up against the MILANs and automatic grenade launchers of the West Germans.

The base is a 60mm round weapon team base from GW.  I never have enough of those...
Fortunately, one easy conversion gives my commies a bit of an up-gun on the ATGW side.  The modern ATGW systems used by the Soviet Union/Russia looked very similar to the MILAN (I'm sure there are key difference in components, switches etc. but at 28mm scale, I don't think it matters).  Eureka kindly sells the MILAN launchers as separate pieces, so I hacked up a Chemical Commie Sagger crewman and gave him a MILAN instead.

Top view of the figure.
The end result is a reasonable representation of a Soviet trooper in NBC gear using (or more likely, trying to use) a modern ATGW system, like an AT-4 or AT-5 launcher.  I doubt those things are easy to use in the best of conditions, much less through an NBC suit made by a Belorussian collective farm, but at least we have a serious AT missile to fling at the NATO lackeys.

The original Sagger model is on the right - I couldn't quite match the groundwork, but it's not too far off.
This didn't do much to help me in Curt's painting competition, where some fellow with the handle "KentG" is obliterating all of us by painting like 300 28mm Romans just for starters.  But the Commies are always pleased to see the efforts of the motherland yield new weapons systems for their use.

I have some other conversions in the hopper to up-gun the Chemical Commies and get them on par with their Bundeswehr and US counterparts. 

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