West German Infantry for "Team Yankee"

15mm Panzer Grenadiers from Battlefront

More "Team Yankee" painting - these are Bundeswehr Panzer Grenadiers (two platoons), a company command team and two Fliegerfaust teams.  This is enough infantry to equip a Panzer Grenadier Kompanie in Battlefront's Cold-War-gone-hot game "Team Yankee".  The panzer grenadier platoons are small formations, so these units paint up quickly!

Blue bushes used to indicate command base for the zug

Another view of the grenadiers - I love the MG3 teams in particular!

The models are from Battlefront.  Fortunately these castings were pretty nice to work with, and overall these guys were a lot of fun to paint.  I liked them so much I am getting some more figures with the intent of basing them individually in skirmish games like "Chain of Command".

Shoulder fired SAM missile teams for the West Germans

When you have Gepards, I'm not sure why you would need these fellows, but it's fun to have a complete force...

Of course, actual panzer grenadiers are mounted in APCs or infantry fighting vehicles. I have yet to get any new vehicles painted (have run out of a critical hobby supply related to that process, and resupply is four weeks overdue, likely being re-sent - cue venting story about Canada Customs...).  So for now, these guys are on foot, content to hitch a ride in vehicles painted by others!  No worries, as Dallas is rolling along nicely on that front!

Soviet SU-25s for "Team Yankee"

1/144 scale SU-25s from Battlefront carry out an attack on the dishes in my kitchen...one way to handle housework :)

More "Team Yankee" material - a pair of 1/144 scale Soviet SU-25 "Rook" ground attack aircraft.  These planes are known more commonly among gamers in the West by their NATO code name - "Frogfoot".  While the US A-10 "Warthog" gets somewhere between most and all of the ground attack love in fluff like "Team Yankee" and "Red Storm Rising", the Frogfoot is a scary beast, armed to the frigging teeth with a 30mm cannon and a bunch of rocket pods and air-to-ground missiles.

Ground attack aircraft should be ugly and intimidating, and the Frogfoot fits the bill.  It has a lovely inelegance in the odd proportions of the airframe and its broad pug nose.  What an ugly, yet beautiful aircraft. Seems like it shouldn't fly, and also looks hard to shoot down - nice work! 

Heads up! Here comes the Soviet air support...

I would have preferred the models to be in 1/100 scale, consistent with the tanks and vehicles on the table.  This would mean the aircraft would be quite large, but I'm good with that - (I love involving all arms in a "cold-war-gone-hot" game, but aircraft should be a pain in the @ss to have on the table for a tactical game, in my opinion).  The Soviet player in Team Yankee can bring as many as six (!) of these bad boys to the table in a single formation...which is kinda bonkers to me (and leads to other silliness like huge NATO AAA formations attached to a single company - but I digress).  Two of these is plenty in my view...

Check out the nose cone at the front...not even close to fitting properly, but from two feet away, meh...

These aircraft models come in two core parts - a small soft plastic/resin nose cone, and then a single piece resin casting of the body, wings tail etc.  The weapons - rocket pods and missiles - are separate pieces, and also cast in soft plastic/resin. Assembly is straightforward (for you, that is - I still f*cked up with the magnets, because that's what I do, but you won't have any issues).  I painted the weapons separately from the aircraft, and recommend you do the same - it makes painting the underside of the wings very easy.  The magnets are great (and again, easy to use unless you are clueless like me - see the photos) and there is a nice decal set too.

Soooo...be careful with superglue and magnets, kids - if you are impatient like me, you'll end up gluing BOTH magnets together in the flight stand, which is not how it is supposed to work *cough* - hopefully Dallas can spot me another magnet to sort this out...

The proportions this aircraft seem out-of-whack, and it looks...beautiful! Love this plane

I do appreciate how Battlefront is making an effort to bring all of these models out.  For someone who has always enjoyed modern gaming but struggled to find a reliable and complete collection, "Team Yankee" has been fantastic, but once again Battlefront disappoints on the quality control front, and I have to rant a little about it.

The sculpts are lovely, but casting quality is very dodgy.  The nose cones were clogged with flash (still a lot there, after quite a bit of work to sort them out) and did not properly fit the nose of the aircraft bodies - it's quite pronounced, depending on the angle that you see the models at.  Several of the weapons were badly miscast, which is why the planes are not carrying full loads - even the missiles which I managed to half-salvage have some pretty ugly lines and blobs, but you don't notice them too badly tucked under the wings. One of the aircraft main bodies had a warped wing, which is still a little warped.

Ready to paste the NATO position with cannon fire, missiles and rockets...ouch!

Are models going to have little flaws? Yes.  But Battlefront charges premium pricing, and if they are going to do that, they should improve on the lowest-bidder casting quality, and give more of a sh*t about the stuff going out the door.  Why is it that Peter Pig, or Jez at Old Crow, can get the casting done so well, and an operation with the marketing resources Battlefront brings to bear cannot? Come on, guys! I love the setting, love that you are doing these models, love the sculpts, but cast them properly!

OK - rant over.  I'm looking forward to sending this pair on a sortie against the NATO lines at a Fawcett Avenue gaming table in the near future.  Those Kh-25 air-ground missiles should be handy against those Leopard IIs and M1s...

US M901 ITVs for "Team Yankee"

M901 ITVs in 1/100 scale from Battlefront

Still more "Team Yankee" reinforcements for the US NATO contingent.  These are M901 ITVs...I'm sure that acronym stands for something...but anyway these things shoot fancy TOW missiles at enemy tanks.  And of course TOW is also an acronym...I don't know how real military people sift through it all...anyway, it is a guided anti-tank missile.  Takeway is that these are pretty deadly if you are a Soviet tank.

Anyway, TOW missile launchers + lame M113 chassis = very useful AT vehicle for US mechanized infantry forces. While the US will count on the M1s to blow away everything in sight, there will be times where the infantry needs some dedicated assistance to deal with (or at least slow down) enemy armour, and these M901s will do the trick, allowing the crew to zap TOW missiles while the M113's "armour" protects them from (most) small arms fire and (supposedly) artillery bombardment.  The elevation of the box launcher also allows the M901 to seek out hull-down type positions while limiting the actual exposure of the vehicle to return direct fire. 

TOW missiles are pretty nasty, but they seem to be a fiddly bit of business to use properly, so all the protection counts and helps the crew concentrate on their role in (relative, for a battlefield) safety.

Hunting WARPAC armour at a distance...

Like the M163s, the M901 models from Battlefront are relatively easy to assemble, and thankfully I didn't screw up too much on the parts, trimming etc.  As before, I did my best impression with the MERDC camouflage pattern. 

While I don't care for the M113 chassis, I have to admit these M901 variants have a kind of spooky look to them...something about that launcher...certainly looks ominous to me, without being directly scary...what could be in that box? Oh...yes...whoosh!  The little trio of lenses in the front of the launcher make it look like a robot of some kind...

Thankfully the conflict portrayed in "Team Yankee" is fiction, but TOW missiles have seen action in real conflicts.  I believe the US first used them in Vietnam against NVA armour.  The IDF may have used them in the Yom Kippur War, and I believe they also saw use in the attack into Lebanon. I'm sure smarter folks will know if they have seen other use as well - please don't hesitate to chime in below!

Again, very nicely done kits from Battlefront - I hate plastic models, but you will like them

Weapons like these are one of those things I find tests the mettle of the "Team Yankee" as a ruleset, for two reasons. The first is the range.  As with so much modern hardware, "if you can see it, you can kill it" and it can be a challenge to make the engagement ranges "appear" reasonable on a 6'x4' table in 15mm.  Not impossible, but a bit of a challenge.  Weapons like the TOW are a particular challenge for this, as they are meant, I believe, for a somewhat longer "stand off" engagement range.  I find it totally possible to imagine a situation where tanks with 125mm high-velocity main guns end up practically knife-fighting due to battlefield conditions, maneuvers, fog-of-war etc. But I'm not sure the TOW is much use in that kind of circumstance.  So like I said, a bit of a squeeze for the game.

The launcher looks...kind of spooky...has a bit of a pre-Sky-net look to it..

The second has to do with cost. Western military equipment is generally noted for valuing quality over quantity, and these TOW things are probably not cheap.   I find the narrative progression of stories like "Team Yankee" or "Red Storm Rising" assume a high effectiveness of these sorts of weapons, such that the Warsaw Pact advance is of course imperiled by these circumstances where a few troops with a launcher are easily delaying the vast Soviet armoured columns.  This thinking takes for granted that lots of these TOW missiles (and MILANs and others) are stocked up - but if the actual shooting war had started, how many missiles would have been on hand?  Sure, in the first few days, Team Yankee would have all they need, but I wonder how much ammo the M901s would have had handy after one week, and what that would mean for the mechanized troops who count on them...thank goodness we never had to find out for real!

But blah blah blah - this is just toy soldiers, so enough drivel! On to more reinforcements...stay tuned!

US M163 Vulcans for "Team Yankee"

M163 VADS in 1/100 scale from Battlefront

The "Team Yankee" painting run continues.  Following on the M113s from last week, here are some M163 VADS vehicles to provide some essential AA cover for the US formations in "Team Yankee".  The models are 1/100 scale plastic kits from Battlefront.

Making the skies a little less friendly for Warsaw Pact types...

I have to hand it to Battlefront - their "Team Yankee" rules are a lot of fun.  Not perfect, and it took me a while to get used to them, but overall a lot of fun. A big part of that (for me) is the ability to have a lot of involvement from helicopters and strike aircraft in the game.  The Soviet Hind helicopters are real beasts! I can remember the first time we tried the "Team Yankee" rules, the games didn't even make it past three turns, in part because the Hinds blasted the NATO fellows off the table. 

I generally hate plastic model kits - but I must compliment Battlefront, lots of detail on these

So where I often see AAA units as really optional - and often kind of silly - in a "Flames of War" game (unless a specific scenario has been devised or you are talking very late war, where German AA formations often found themselves on the front lines), you sort of really need them for a game of "Team Yankee" to get a flavour for the setting in my opinion - YMMV.

Watching for Hinds...

These M163s were decent kits to put together, and I generally despise plastic kits, so I bet normal people will find these to be a real breeze to work with.  As before, I cursed the MERDC camouflage, but it's my own fault for not thinking things through at the outset, so I did the best impression I could with the plain old paint brush. 

My model skillz were not too sharp with these kits, and when you observe the photos, you'll see some gaps in the frames where I thought I was cutting away excess flash, but was in reality shaving the sides of the top and side plates (whoops!).  I wish I had some bed rolls or something to cover those little gaffes...maybe in the future...but from two feet away, it looks good enough :)

...but in reality, hoping to light up a motor rifle company...

While the AAA vehicles of other nations, such as the ZSU-23-4 or the Flakpanzer Gepard have a certain notoriety among gamers and geeks interested in the setting, the M163 is kind of an unkown for me. I thought this was an IDF vehicle at first, and I did not realize it was part of the US arsenal.  Sure seems deadly, though - and like all gamers, while I want to protect my vehicles from air attack, what I'm truly hoping to happen on the table is for these things to have an opportunity to rip open a column of enemy BMPs...because Vulcan rotary cannon...

More "Team Yankee" stuff is rolling off the painting table...stay tuned!

US M113s for "Team Yankee"

1/100 scale M113s from Battlefront

The "Team Yankee" painting roll continues, switching over to some US stuff I had sitting around in the ol' pending pile for months.  These are M113 APCs from Battlefront, required in order to mount up some US mechanized infantry for action on the gaming table. 

View of the rear detail on these boring machines

To put a US mechanized company on the table in a game of "Team Yankee" you need at least two mechanized platoons.  I had painted two platoons of infantry, but only one of them had any APCs. The M113s took forever to arrive from Battlefront, and by the time they did, I was off into other projects...but now that the Team Yankee bug is back, I thought I should get them painted. My second US infantry platoon now has some tracks to give them a lift in their next scrap!

A soldier popped out of the hatch, ready to give some covering fire with the .50 cal...

My feelings toward the M113 remain "meh"...whatever its merits as a military vehicle - and full disclaimer, these may be considerable, as a civilian I have no idea - as a gamer this is one of the lamest models out there.  We all have models we dislike mixed among gaming settings we enjoy, and the M113 is one of those for me, just a stupid box with some treads.  Maybe only the British FV432 is lamer...

Look! Boxes with treads...

I also find this MERDC camouflage to be a real pain in the @ss.  I so regret doing my initial vehicles in this pattern, but I feel like I'm kind of stuck with it as I would like the whole force to match together.  To do the MERDC properly I should really use an airbrush, but life is too short to bother with that hassle on these models, so I tried my best to follow the helpful templates that Battlefront has on their web-site, and did my best impression with the plain old regular brushes.  As with camouflage on infantry models, I'm aiming more for an overall impression than a precise, Tacobat-level recreation.

My new M113s from Battlefront posing with the dismounts from Peter Pig which I painted back in March

So that makes two mechanized infantry platoons available for the US forces now.  On to some support options...and then more Soviets and West Germans and...who knows...?

Bundeswehr Infantry for Team Yankee

Bundeswehr Panzer Grenadiers in 15mm from Battlfront

A few more bits for Battlefront's "Team Yankee" have rolled off the painting desk.  These are West German Bundeswehr Panzer Grenadiers, 15mm castings from Battlefront.  Compared with some of the drek Battlefront cast up for their Soviet motor rifle packs, these castings were very nicely executed - a couple of warps on the MG3s, but nothing like the miscasts and crap lines seen on my Soviets.  This is pleasant, but also reinforces frustration that Battlefront cannot, it seems, give enough of a sh*t about casting to do it consistently well across all metal products...but I digress.

These castings were a real treat to paint

Compared to the great mass available to Soviet Motor Rifle companies (where one unit on the table can have something like 21 infantry bases), the infantry units in NATO are of course a lot smaller.  So it is with the Bundeswehr Panzer Grenadiers. The platoon is three stands with MG3s and other goodies, and two MILAN guided anti-tank missile teams.

Company command base

The small-three figure base is meant to represent the Company Commander - since I am assembling a Panzer Grenadier company, I'll need one of those :)

MILANs will be critical to stopping the Soviets on the table

These figures are fun to paint, hopefully the first of a healthy-sized batch of Panzer Grenadiers for "Team Yankee".  They will need Marder IFVs before they can start doing anything on the table, but those are still in the "pending" area while I wait for re-supply on some of things I will require in order to get the Marders going...

I put a tuft of blue flowers on the base to represent the platoon commander

Stay tuned for more "Team Yankee" - and maybe some Napoleonic stuff? Who knows...

Back to Team Yankee - Soviet Motor Rifle Infantry

15mm Soviet Motor Rifle infantry from Battlefront for "Team Yankee"

My painting meanderings return to "Team Yankee", the 15mm cold-war-gone-hot game from the folks at Battlefront (based on the novel by Harold Coyle).  I had initially painted some forces back around the release of the game (nearly a year ago) during Curt's last Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. The recent release by Battlefront of a range of West German troops has prompted me to go back to my collection and start to round it out a little more for some larger games.  This has also happily provoked Dallas to start collecting a West German force of his own...always nice to see fellow Conscripts diving in!

Battlefront's box is very complete - you get everything you need to make the largest possible motor rifle company

To represent Soviet motor rifle troops I initially used 15mm modern Russian figures from Eureka. Battlefront's new releases often take a long time to arrive here in Canada, and the Russian infantry they had "released" were particularly late - but they did eventually arrive!  I want to add a second motor rifle company to my Soviet forces, so I thought I would start with the infantry, and I cracked open the box from Battlefront.

Battalion command base

The Soviet Motor Rifle infantry box has quite a bit for you - a very comprehensive pile of metal! The Soviet player in Team Yankee can vary the size of their Motor Rifle from small (and close in size to the NATO infantry platoons) to very large (with 21 bases total), and you can bolster them with a base of troops carrying shoulder-launched SAMs. This box has it all! No complaints on the selection of contents...but...

AK-74 teams - the base with the flowers serves as the company command base

Battlefront's sculpting of infantry can be quirky at times, but I generally like it.  What I find very frustrating about Battlefront is how uneven the quality of their casting can be, and this was certainly the case with this box! You expect to be cleaning up a few mold lines and removing tags, but among these figures were several absolutely brutal castings, with particular weakness on things like the magazines and barrels on the AK-74s. This was disappointing, and I wish Battlefront would do a better job on the casting process.

RPG-7 teams - you can see some of the bonky casting in the helmets

All the same, there are so many figures in this box that weaker castings can be lost among the decent castings, with dark paint and groundwork helping to overall cover these sins, and at the end of the day, we have another Motor Rifle Company ready to mount an assault on the West!

Another view of the AK-74 teams

For now they are really not "Motor Rifles" - just "Rifles" - until I get another batch of BMP infantry fighting vehicles finished.  As soon as I can get a shipment of bases in from the good folks at Warbases I'll get started on that.  Until then, I'll move on to some other Team Yankee projects.  My US mech infantry needs some M113s and other bits...

PKM MG teams - mounted on larger bases

If you are considering "Team Yankee" (and you should - it's fun!), I would still recommend the Eureka Russian infantry over the ones from Battlefront based on my experience with this box.  It's not a perfect solution - Eureka has no Russian infantry with the shoulder-launched SAMs - but they are very nice over all and you can leave the anti-air duties to the ZSU-23-4s.

Another view of the PKM MG teams - with the SAM team also visible in the back left

Another option for 15mm Soviet infantry is Khurasan (lovely sculpts - and they have incredible vehicles too), but availability of those figures is a bit hit-and-miss as the frequent "maintenance halts" leave the web store closed.  If you get through to Khurasan, be sure to order all you need!

The whole group - bring on the running dog lackeys of NATO!

Overall, it's great that there are options out there for 15mm modern gamers, so whether you go with Battlefront, Eureka, Khurasan or others, all the best with your painting projects!

Team Yankee Test Game - Holy Hind!

Firing positions! Ivan on the way!

Between work and racing to finish a final few entries in Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge (which has concluded now, even if winter itself hasn't - be sure to check out all of the amazing work here) I have been slacking at blogging of late, but will try and catch up a bit.  Up first, a belated battle report of a test game for "Team Yankee", the new cold-war-gone-hot rules from Battlefront.

NATO dupes in position...little do they suspect...

Conscript Curt was in town a few weeks ago for a visit, and together with Byron we took my newly painted "Team Yankee" models out for a spin.  The scenario was extremely basic, and I apologize, as I only have a fuzzy recollection on the points used (would have been about 60 or 70 per side, tops, based on what I have painted).

"The Plan" - WARPAC advances from the lower right, while NATO awaits on the top left

Curt give an enthusiastic thumbs-up to the Soviet advance - he's a big fan of the Hinds

I thought the game would be quick.  But oh man, I underestimated that.  We played TWO games, and each one lasted two turns!! I had read about that experience online from other folks playing their initial games, and wow, it's really something.  The game is murderous, which is in many ways a fair reflection of the (thankfully fictional) conflict it is looking to simulate.

Soviet T-72s encounter from fire from M1s

Curt took command of the Soviets, and Byron played the US side. In the first run-through, Curt's Hinds made short work of the M1 Abrams tanks, who shot up a few T-72s, but otherwise were quickly overwhelmed.  Curt didn't even need to deploy the motor rifle company!  Talk about Soviet efficiency! Promotions all around!

Hind makes a kill...

More Hind carnage...

Comrade Curt is loving the Hinds - he poses here near the smoking wrecks of Byron's M1 platoon...

In our second run through, we stowed the over-powerful Hinds to see how it would play.  In this iteration, the M1s managed to knock out a lot more Soviet stuff (many T-72s and BMP-2s were full of holes), but the mass of tanks still overwhelmed the M1s - and again, it took two, or maybe three turns at most.  Wow!

T-72s open fire!

Soviet battalion commander plays it safe...meanwhile, the motor rifles move out (behind the forest)

So for now, no more "Team Yankee" (or at least, no more with helicopters) until I get some AAA stuff painted for both sides, especially the US.  The Hinds are total murder - and I think that's fine, they bloody should be! But some M163s will be needed for the US players to have much chance in the game. The US Cobra helos were a lot less scary, we found, so we could probably play without Soviet AAA stuff, but still, it would be nice for the players to have it a bit balanced.

M1s engage - they made short work of the BMP2s...

My take on the rules? Well, maybe I'm just crusty and getting older, but I still find Battlefront is excessively fond of fiddly little special rules.  A top level skim of their rules is always reasonably straightforward, but when you sit down and start to play, your head hurts with every little exception you can attempt.  This is particularly pronounced with the "orders" for movement Battlefront has introduced, which are different from their prior "Flames of War" game.  I want to recognize and compliment Battlefront for trying something different, but in the end it keeps making my head hurt.  "I moved, but I count as stationary, but, but, but, etc" AAARGH! Enough with the damn special rules! And get off my lawn! Grumble, grumble etc.

Cobras try to help...

Another weakness is the "IGOUGO" aspect - generally I'm okay with that approach, it's simple, easy to remember, but in some situations, it kinda mucks the game up, particularly games as murderous as "Team Yankee".  I think an alternating activation would be much more enjoyable.

"Maybe we'll be safe here from the Hinds..."

Motor rifle carnage

Tough night for NATO

But will you have fun with "Team Yankee"? Yes! Tanks on fire! Helicopters! Cool! I'm cranky about some aspects of it, and I hate plastic models, but it's still very entertaining overall and what a neat way to have an engaging, flaming-tank-filled battle on the table in (very) short times! I'm confident the games will start to last a few more turns once I get a bit more stuff painted...I hope to get these out on to the table again for the Conscripts soon.