Final Painting Challenge Submission - 10mm FPW Bavarians

10mm Bavarians for the Franco-Prussian War. Figures from Pendraken.

The tenth edition of Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge has concluded. I had big plans to finish AHPC X with a bang, some big-time entries but world events have not cooperated, as work has been a bit of a scramble running into the final hours of the Painting Challenge (it ended at midnight last Friday).  But I did manage to finish these little fellows - these are 10mm Bavarians for the Franco-Prussian War.  The figures (and flag) are all from the excellent Pendraken.

The sculpts from Pendraken are really incredible...I just can say enough good things about them - I wish I had ordered more before the government "shut" the borders...

Infantry in cornflower blue tunics. You can't miss the Bavarians!

When war broke out between France and Prussia in the summer of 1870, the Kingdom of Bavaria sent a major contingent to join the forces of Prussia and the North German Confederation.  From the initial battle at Wissembourg through the seige of Paris and many battles against the stubborn French Republican regime which replaced the fallen government of Napoleon III, the Bavarians played a major role in the Franco-Prussian War.

Command group in the middle...depending on the system, each base could represent one battalion from the regiment...or the three bases together could represent one battalion...all depends on the rules.

In terms of approaching ways to game this period in any scale, I would like to start out "small". The Battle Wissembourg fits that bill, in the sense that it was one of the smaller encounters in the War.  It was also one of the first battles. A division (and more) of Bavarians were part of that engagement. These figures are meant to represent part of that force, representing a regiment of infantry and a regiment of cheveauxleger cavalry.  There are two individually-based mounted officers as well to represent relevant layers of command, depending on the rules system being used.

Chevauxlegers - Bavarian "light" cavalry.

The Battle of Wissembourg saw an understrength French division hold off elements of one Bavarian and two Prussian corps for the better part of a day.  Had any of the nearby French forces come marching to the sound of the guns, the engagement may have turned out differently, but the lethargy shown by the French command would turn out be the rule, not the exception, in the summer of 1870...

Again, these could represent one regiment, two regiments...it all depends on the rules being used.

There are several different sets of rules for gaming the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 at larger scales.  I am hoping to use the "1871" rules, and will probably also try "Black Powder", and maybe even "Polemos".  It will still be some time before we get to the table, as even the "small" Battle of Wissembourg still calls for something like 44 bases of infantry, nine bases of cavalry and 21 bases of artillery...the war in 1870 was short, but the battles were big!

Mounted officers to serve as command markers.

The Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge was a lot of fun - I should not here that moth Mike F and Byron M also participated, painting lots of really cool stuff.  I encourage everyone to head over to the AHPC Blog and scroll through the entries to check out their work!

Certainly current events may now allow for more time to paint, even though the crippled economy may not allow for much money to buy paints or figures (not that I "need" any more figures)...I'm fortunate enough that my job is still holding up for now.  But I know Thousands and thousands of others are not so lucky, so I hope everyone out there can stay healthy and safe, and I hope our collective governments get their sh*t together in time.

Cheers, and stay tuned for more "social distancing" painting efforts...  

Painting Challenge Submission 18 - 28mm Byzantine Skutatoi

A Byzantine tribute to the Snow Lord masses in my kitchen...

The conclusion of the 10th edition of Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge is almost upon us - it will end at midnight this Friday.  This submission is therefore making it "just under the wire". Here are two new units of 28mm Byzantine troops. These are skutatoi, tough spearmen of the Byzantine empire.  These two particular units are armoured, and carrying kite-shaped shields, which would place them in the later spectrum of the Byzantines' long period in history.  There are 24 spearmen in each unit.

You will see behind each unit there are two small groups of four archers...it was often the case that Byzantine spear units had the direct support of archers (or troops with javelins) mixed in the unit.  Rather than mix the archers in among the spearmen, I opted to go with these small groups at the back.  This allows some flexibility - to remove the archers, or swap them out for troops with javelins or slings or other things.

When Curt gave me this specific goal - while in his guise of the "Snow Lord" of the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge - he noted, two years ago I launched a new project, and while there is no need to reprise the background here, it was one that was long overdue - see here for more on that.  I thought back at the time that I would indeed move ahead with a 28mm Byzantine collection, but after that initial burst of progress 2018, my efforts stalled and the prospect of painting more Byzantines faded...I have not painted a Byzantine since finishing that heavy cavalry unit back in AHPC 8.

When I saw the new format for Challenge X take shape, and I saw various Challengers receive their specific tasks from the "Snow Lord", I had little doubt as to which undertaking would come my way once I made my own attempt on the great peak in the centre of Challenge Island.  This premonition sharpened further once I saw Curt unveil his new Ottoman project...I pulled the old box of Byzantine bits from the pile in anticipation, even as I worked to finish more and more Winter WW2 Germans.

The "Snow Lord" did not disappoint, tasking me with completing two new units of 28mm Byzantine troops.  I suppose I could have squeezed a bit, and done a unit of skirmishers (six or eight models), but I always remember Curt saying to me "It is a painting challenge, after all" and I thought this would be the time to put a good foundation in place for my Byzantines: two main infantry units - the skutatoi - that would serve as a solid base for the force. It would be a big chunk of work, one that was out of step with my current brush whims, but I thought I was up for it.  And it was early February, there was still tons of time left in the Challenge, and I can paint pretty fast when I feel like it, right?

What is that saying about biting off more than one can chew...?

Fireforge Games

Fireforge miniatures make up the red unit.

I thought this was the perfect time to crack open the boxes of Fireforge Games' plastic spearmen - they had been released a few years ago, and looked quite sharp - for plastic models.  Fireforge had even released command kits to go with the units. What a great chance to give them a go! Yeah...

The plastic figures do not mix well into a unit with narrow frontage.

The bases are 50mm square...the figures barely fit, and don't work well together.

The basic spear-armed infantry have plastic tabs under their feet.  That is not unusual - a number of plastic figure sets do this.  The problem is that, first of all, it is not consistently done - the command figures don't have the same thing, and neither do the archers.  The second problem is that these plastic tabs are rather spacious, and would block the figures from fitting together on the narrower frontage I was hoping to achieve.  So I had to waste a lot of time cutting up the stupid plastic tabs off of 21 plastic spearmen...

Just to be clear, f**k plastic and f**k spray cans. 

And...well, we've all had the occasional encounter with bad primer and bad plastic.  Thankfully this was limited, and I was able to cover these sins with some paint, but still...f**k spray cans and f**k plastic. 

Then we have the command group.  These are NOT plastic, but rather a soft plastic resin, managing to combine many of the worst features of both materials.  The "restic" is super bendy, and the details are very soft, many of them fading beneath the base coat of black primer. Why do figure manufacturers use this useless material? Why?

Archers at the back...these are also multipart plastic figures from Fireforge...

The final issue with the Fireforge figures is that they don't mix very well together as a unit. Some of the poses are fine for close ranks, but others certainly are not, and it was a terrible thing to come up with a way to fit them on the bases.  I like spear units to appear dense - the soldiers close up for protection and maximum effectiveness.  I wanted a frontage of a little over 15mm for each figure.  It was a hell of a thing to make that happen with these Fireforge figures.

I can't get over the size of the musician's horn...presumably he can summon Cthulu with that thing...

Anyway, this very first unit of Fireforge plastics will be my last.  I think they would make great figures for individually-based skirmish games like "Lion Rampant" (and this is the plan I have for the second box of plastic Byzantine spearmen I have from this company).  Getting this bunch painted, built and based took way more time than I expected,but I got this one unit done...and hey, I still had several weeks left in the Challenge...

Crusader Miniatures

Crusader Miniatures Byzantine spearmen.

Crusader is a well-known miniature brand in the gaming hobby, so I was looking forward to this.  First of all, the figures are metal, and we all know that metal > plastic.  But Crusader has a number of frustrations too, ones that I did not expect.

First of all, they don't include spears, but sell them separately.  This is a terrible habit - when you sell spearmen, you should include spears, full stop.  I don't care if they are available separately...they should be included in the pack too, no exceptions. 

It was also tough to find the right sort of metal or steel spears for the figures...many of the steel spears out there these days are so skinny and thin that they look, at best, more like javelins than long Byzantine kontarion.  Curt helpfully suggested getting some steel pikes from Wargames Foundry, and just cutting them down slightly, so I did this for the bulk of the spearmen in this unit, although there are a few soft metal spears from Gripping Beast mixed in.

As with the other unit, a group of archers at the back, providing direct support.

Having found weapons, I then discovered that getting the figures to hold the spears was quite the obstacle in itself.  The right hands were cast poorly, and I found I had to carve/hack each hand in order to create a "channel" of sorts so each spearman could hold the spear.  The results were uneven, and in some cases the spears appear to almost be levitating near the hand, as opposed to actually being in the grasp of the soldier...even now, many of the spears snap loose easily, and I have re-glued a number of them several times...they won't last on the table.

There are a few metal spears from Gripping Beast, but most are cut-down steel pikes from Wargames Foundry.

The final obstacle to enjoying the Crusader miniatures is the shields - they mix up the shields! Why, why, why? First of all, it makes it very hard/impossible to use shield transfers and second...it's just stupid! Let me pick one style and use it consistently! F**k.

You can see the variety of small differences in the shields...this, in my opinion, is NOT a feature.

And so for weeks the Hobby Gods have mocked my hubris and overconfidence, and something I thought I could knock off with ease has taken more than a month of hard slogging.  Throw in travel challenges and work demands (which are OK - I like work, because it pays for figures!), and it was starting to look like I might miss the deadline all together.  Some late nights this past weekend helped me close the gap...and these units are now ready for action on the tabletop. 

For God and the Emperor!

There were a lot of hobby headaches finishing this bunch, and yet it is a painting challenge after all! I probably would have just moved on to something else at another time of the year, but the Challenge held my feet to the fire. Now that the headaches are over with, I'm thrilled to have these finished - and to have made a major contribution to my dormant Byzantine-collection ambitions! The next steps, when they come, will seem a little easier I'm sure. 

Thanks for looking...I hope all folks, friends and family are safe and healthy, and that these challenging times might allow for some hobby time to take the edge off...

Paiting Challenge Submission 17 - Random 20mm WW2 Items

20mm WW2 odds & ends - AB, SHQ, Elhiem, PSC.

Early in this edition of Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge I had been finishing off some long-delayed 20mm WW2 projects which had been sitting on the side of the painting desk for too long (years).  As I work to complete the task set before me by the Snow Lord, I am also trying to finish off a few of the odds and ends which had been sitting on my painting desk back in December when Challenge X got underway. The assortment of 20mm odds & ends in this submission is a product of those ongoing "side efforts" - might as well collect the points while I can!

Random 20mm German Infantry

This small collection of German infantry here covers three different figure manufacturers. The German NCO is from AB - an excellent casting, as always.

German NCO from AB Miniatures...great sculpt as always.

The MG42 team is from SHQ.  When I first opened up these packs of figures, I was kind of disappointed...I thought they were a touch skinny/small.  But now that I have painted a few of the SHQ figures, I am warming up to them a lot, and will probably add more SHQ castings to the collection.

MG-42 team from SHQ miniatures.

The SHQ sculpts have really grown on me...I quite like them.

The German sniper is from Elhiem Miniatures.  The sculpts from Elhiem have a lot of character, and this fellow is covered in all sorts camouflage, including a canvas mask of sorts...I tried to make the colours pop a bit - something the actual sniper would not want, but I wanted this fellow to stand out a little bit from the muted colours seen elsewhere among the German infantry.

German sniper from Elhiem Miniatures.

Lots of little camouflage features on this sculpt...very nice.

He'll provide some scary marksmanship in 20mm WW2 games to come. 

Raupenschlepper Ost

1/72 RSO kit from Plastic Soldier Company.

This little plastic model kit is a 1/72 piece from the Plastic Soldier Company - it comes in the same box as their PaK40 AT guns.  I painted one of those back in the fall, and I thought for fun I would paint up one of these little "RSO" vehicles to transport the AT guns around the table.

Lots of room to carry ammo, spare parts, fuel and other supplies - or troops.

One can see how this little vehicle would have been important while fighting in the vast and challenging eastern front of WW2.  They towed guns, carried supplies and even troops. Naturally there were never enough of them available, but the Germans built thousands of these things and so I thought it would be a nice addition to my 20mm collection.  It was also good to keep in practice painting non-winter German WW2 vehicles.

SU-76 

1/72 scale plastic SU-76 kit from Plastic Soldier Company.

Over to the Russian army now, here is a 1/72 plastic SU-76 assault gun - another little gem from the Plastic Soldier Company.

The Russians built boatloads of these vehicles, using them for direct fire support, anti-tank efforts and mobile indirect fire in support of Red Army formations.  It seems the vehicle was difficult and uncomfortable to operate - nearly every set of hobby rules refers to how this vehicle was nicknamed "bitch" by its crews.  But getting a 76mm gun into action never hurts, and this vehicle was able to bring the weapon into frontline action in difficult conditions.  Given how many of these were built, it made no sense not to have them on the table, so I thought it was time to get one done.

Crowded fighting compartment in this vehicle...have to paint the crew and gun seperately.

It's a great little model kit - complete with interior detail and options for crew.  Certainly the compartment is cramped and so I suggest you will need to paint the crew and the weapon seperately and complete final assembly when you have finished painting them.  But it all worked out pretty easily, and this is another great kit from Plastic Soldier Company.  I still have two more vehicles from the box, to put an entire battery on the table.

The USSR built thousands and thousands of these vehicles during WW2 - so good to finally have one available for my 20mm Russians.

That's all for now - thanks for reading, and stay safe out there! I hope to be able to share some more Painting Challenge submissions later this week - the 2019-20 edition of the Challenge will conclude at midnight on Friday, and everyone will be doing their best to get a few more entries in under the wire.  Be sure to check it out!

Bolt Action Cold War! Chemical Commies vs MOPP-Suited Yanks

A couple weeks ago I set up our regular Thursday game as a "Cold War Hot" battle pitting Conscript Greg's and my Eureka Soviets in NBC gear (the infamous "Chemical Commies") against my own platoon of Eureka US Army troops in MOPP suits.

For everyone's convenience we decided to use Warlord's "Bolt Action" WW2 rules with some suitable updates for the 1980s. The scenario was pretty straightforward - the Soviets were on the attack, and the Americans were making a last stand in the downtown area of a nameless West German city.

The Americans fielded a small platoon with transports - three M113s from (the now defunct?) Baker Company.

The Soviets attacked with a strong platoon transported in BMP-2 carriers.

Soviets pushing forward along the street. There was a strong American squad with AT weapons in the building at top right.

Infantry deploys from their BMP-2.

Over on the other flank things are getting hot as the Soviets push through a destroyed apartment block.

Brewed-up vehicles burn themselves out in the street...

A point blank duel between a BMP-2 and M113 ends as you would imagine it would!

M113 crew thinks twice about driving down the street.

I "think" the Americans managed to hold off the Soviets, this time. However, the thing with Soviets in WW3 is "there's always more where those came from" and any NATO tactical win seems like just staving off the inevitable.

Anyway, we had a lot of fun with this game. Bolt Action works great for an infantry-heavy game no matter what the period, and only took a few minor tweaks to reflect modern weaponry (I should have made the 30mm autocannon on the BMPs hit a bit harder though!). It was certainly a blast to get out the old Chemical Commies and MOPP-suited Yanks for a spin on the table, too.

'Til next time! 

Painting Challenge Submission 16 - Pico Panzer Regiment Bäke

The Tiger Is of Schwere Panzer Regiment Bäke - 1/600 models from Pico Armor.

Hello everyone - my blogging pace dropped off suddenly towards the end of February.  I have been busy with work, and then a specific hobby project has been taking a fair bit of time as well.  But the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge continues, and I'm still making submissions - this one is a small (haha) project that I have been working on for the past couple of months and I thought this would be a good time to share and end my recent blogging drought.

These are 1/600 WW2 German figures in winter kit - and while figures at this scale they could represent almost anything, in this case they are meant to represent Schwere Panzer Regiment Bäke in games of "Spearhead", the classic division-level WW2 rules by Arty Contliffe.

The whole group.

Panzer Regiment Bäke

Heads up...here come the big cats...

As catastrophe overtook the German army on the Eastern Front in 1943, the overstretched German forces would make use of "fire brigade" type formations in order to stem the various crisis arising from the Red Army's overwhelming material and manpower superiority and countless breakthroughs along a huge front line.  Schwere Panzer Regiment Bäke was one of these "fire brigades", and a potent one at that, combining a battalion of Panthers, a battalion of Tigers, a battalion of combat engineers and a few other assets (artillery etc) which represented a terrifying concentration of fighting power.

Tiger Is in 1/600 scale and winter paint.

Under the command of Franz Bäke, a panzer commander of some renown, this formation was formed in late 1943, and fought through the winter into 1944, racing from crisis to crisis. Equipped to such a level, the formation is reported to have racked up fantastical kill totals in a number of armoured engagements. I am skeptical of these sorts of kill-total reports, but this formation certainly made a major impact wherever it was deployed on the front.  And yet the Eastern Front was enormous, and in the end formations such as this could not turn the tide or reverse the broader strategic circumstances that would see the Red Army triumphant in the east.

With each base representing a platoon, we have a Panther battalion in 1/600 scale.

As a wargamer I love tank battles, and I very much enjoy painting armour, and I'm drawn to the Eastern Front as a setting (and the middle east, and Team Yankee, etc. etc.).  It's a lot of fun to represent these "fire brigade" type formations in WW2 games.  The trouble is that many tactical-level games provide players on the German side with all of the benefits (veteran crews, amazing kit) while struggling to represent the downsides (ammo and fuel shortages, being massively outnumbered, dire strategic situation etc).  You can try to make allowances for these things of course, and many well-intentioned game designers look to assorted points systems to create some balance or handicapping in a game where Panthers and Tigers are present.  But this is hard to do...don't get me wrong, skirmish gaming with "big cats" is great fun, but I like to find games that give players on the German side the problems as well as the benefits when it comes to these sorts of units.

Play these rules! They are fantastic!

So that is where a magnificent game like "Spearhead" comes into play.  Yes, your Panther battalion is terrifying, and will blow up a lot of sh*t. But the Soviet player(s) will have infantry to slow it down, artillery to blast it, air strikes to hammer it, AND waves of T-34s to send towards it.  You might blow away clouds of T-34s and still end up trapped in a pocket, with half your Panthers out of action, and in no position to seal up the breach in the front lines. No rule system comes close to "Spearhead" for giving players on the German side these sort of up-ended "I-feel-like-I-won-but-I-still-lost" gaming moments.

The combat engineers...a "Stuka Zu Fuss" battery is at the front...

In "Spearhead" each base represents one platoon.  The round bases represent command elements - small ones for battalion commanders, larger ones for regiments etc.  The "Spearhead" scenario book "Where The Iron Crosses Grow" has a scenario featuring Regiment Bäke that we tried back in...2009! Wow, that was quite a long time ago!

Another view of the engineers - the armoured engineer platoons are at the front - they have their own Hanomags to ride around in.

For the scenario in question the Germans have a battalion of Panthers, a battalion of Tigers, and a battalion of combat engineers.  As units go in "Spearhead", these are all pretty scary...but in the scenario they will face a vast amount of Soviet armour, and they will have a difficult mission: escort the remnants of some shattered friendly units out of a pocket and back into the German lines.  The German players will have fun blowing up tanks with their elite panzers, but the command challenge in the scenario is a tough one...it will be played on a big table, and those panzers can't be everywhere...

Another view of the Panthers.

I had, at one time, a large 6mm collection of WW2 figures based for Spearhead. That is no longer with me...since I was starting from the ground up once again, I thought I would give these 1/600 models a try. I've been experimenting with them here and there for a long time (see example here), and have used them for the "Modern Spearhead" variant - they really are fun.

Regimental command - with a SdKfz flak unit on the left, and a 234 recon unit on the right.

These figures are all from Oddzial Ozmy, available in North American from the fine people at Pico Armor. I never thought I would enjoy 1/600 stuff...but the sculpting is incredible.  The infantry is still hard to do, and the bases will need labels so the players know what is what, but these paint up fast and are a lot of fun.  I also really need to up my game when it comes to ground work etc (check out Curt's 1/600 stuff to see what I mean).  But since I had all of the winter colours out during this edition of the Challenge, and Panzer Regiment Bäke was in action during the winter, it was no big deal to crank these out in winter colours "on the side" as I went along painting 28mm stuff.

Another view of the 234 - recon elements are critical in "Spearhead".

Some people who play 1/600 scale will take the opportunity to make their platoons 1-to-1 creations, putting a whole group of three or four tanks on each base.  I experimented with this, but decided against it in the end.  Crowded command bases look neat, but the tanks in the general combat platoons all look too crammed - you just end up with the same "hub-to-hub" look that ruins so many "Flames of War" games, but just at a different scope.  I kept it straight up, using the prescribed base size from the "Spearhead" rules, and used either one tank to represent a tank platoon, or one group of infantry to represent an infantry platoon.  The armoured engineer bases include a group of infantry and some 251 carriers on the same base - in "Spearhead" mechanized infantry is based together with their fighting vehicles.  

There are only a few weeks left in the tenth edition of Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. I hope to have a few more submissions to share before it concludes for the year.

Thanks for looking, have a great weekend!