Command Decision WW2 - US Infantry and German Parachite Infantry.

So in a short break between restoring\painting ACW armies I spent a few days kick starting my ww2 command decision armies. I am planning to have forces for Utah Beach\Cherbourg area as there is a good mix of units on both sides and as the German Divisions in that region were badly equipped, I can use a lot of different vehicles. I have kept these guys pretty simple - paint and a wash really, with a very simple flock base. Thought it better to get the units done than mess around on too much detail.


6th Parachute Regiment.

I had painted some German's a while back. Here are a few of the Para's that I based along with the Americans.

  1st Battalion, 8th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division, US Army
Old Esci US Infantry with two old trucks a brand new Italeri Quick build Jeep and  Grubby Tank 57mm gun. The gun and jeep need finishing off and I should really repaint the trucks but I will finish the new stuff first.( I glued the prone figures tot he bases before flocking - what a mistake )

My plan is to complete one battalion at a time per nation so I can use them in smaller games solo at home.

I'm off to Auckland for work for a week so in that lovely spare time in the evenings (no dishes, no bedtime stories, no garden watering) I plan to finish another 4 Confederate Regiments.

New ACW 20mm Regiments and clearout.

Merry Christmas and New Years to everyone.

My daughter fractured her elbow on the 27th so the holidays have been slightly underwhelming for her but all in all she has been in good spirits and pain free. I have not had a war-game in a long time but painting has restarted as I no longer wear the wrist brace.So I have been working full time in getting my ACW Union troops ready for some small skirmishes (using Archduke Piccilo's solo campaign as motivation.).

I finished the figures and then use Matt Gloss spray on them , leaving them to dry in the garage. As the sun caught the figures it was a brilliant view -  Long lines of gray, sky blue and red all based and ready to go, I was quite chuffed  to be honest and I am not sure if it is simply having finished a large batch or my love of bright colours.

The figures are a mismatch of makers  and I painted one from each maker, with perhaps another 8 other units to complete (Mostly Airfix and Italeri). I have not named any units yet as I was too busy painting them.

 Revell Infantry Regiment.

 Esci Regiment.

 Airfix Artillery Battery. (I have not separated the single bases yet)

 Airfix Generals. (From Artillery Set I recall).

An Italeri Zouave unit and a good old Airfix Regiment.

A little tidy up to do and then straight into the box to make 7 Infantry Regiments ready. I will then varnish and base the Rebels up and have a small game.

Motivation is abundant here at the moment as I am also working on Command Decision 1/72 WW2 figures - more to come !. But I have also finally decided its time to clear some stuff and make room and fund other needs.

Most likely to go will be the Mantic Elf army I purchased 1 year ago (and painted 20 figures), my 6mm WW2, most likely 15mm Colonial (Unpainted) and a pile of space marines I have gathered over the years.

Cheers

Finished Units

I actually finished some units in the last few days which has been a good morale boost. I seem to have gone for so long without actually completing anything that I found myself preferring to read books or play computer games.

So to inspire myself I pulled out 24 Hat Saxons and promptly painted them as Spanish Infantry. I have toyed with creating a small force of 1/72 Figures in order to try Big Battles \ Small tables for the Peninsular war. I have the figures already and they are lighter than my 28mm horde so would fit nicely in a box and can play on my "table" (which is a bed). I have enough Spanish, French and English to re-fight any battle but they just need painting.

At the time the HAT Spanish were not available so I purchased the Saxon's to fill in and they do a reasonable job if one does not look too closely.

I also has two days off sick last week due to a heavy cold so I was able to finish the basing on my completed WSS Unit. I am glad I finished them but pretty unhappy with the unit as a whole due to a series of mistakes I made since putting them together. Its an imagination unit of the Rechburgian army, the rest of my figures will be French.

• Figures pose selection was awful - I don't know why I included 4 firing figures in the mix.
• Wrong officer figures for the unit.
• Painting groups at a time and not using the same colours (I am not making the same mistake with my Spanish)
• Missing steps - The faces are really bad I am actually redoing them. They have eye sockets that I may have to paint as eyes.....goldfish eyes of course.

20mm and 6mm WW2

I am slowly getting back into painting on a regular basis with a greater effort being made to organize my projects and my paint supplies. I have wandered from project to project though, but that has been for more motivation purposes than any other reason.

Below is my painting desk that I use at night, clearing the whole lot up at the end of each night. This has been a pain to be honest, I cannot leave figures anywhere handy or stack them up easily. For some reason they get knocked over or crushed (well the spears bent) ...the source of this  mayhem is yet to be unmasked.

I recently visited the bring and buy and picked up some Matchbox 8th Army, as well as some Italian tankettes from Stan. These shall contribute very well to my North Africa 20mm forces that I have slowly kick started into life. Below are some SQH Tropical Italians and an Italeri M13 "quickbuild" that is nearing completion.  They should round out a small Italian force to compliment my DAK for some early war games against my Desert Rats and Australians.

I have had some thought of using Megablitz or Not Quite Mechanised for larger games, however I face the same problem in any ruleset. Support vehicles and trucks are simply not enough in numbers so I will base the North Africa forces for Command Decision and then simply see what happens if I use any other ruleset. 

However I did drag out my 6mm early war figures to see is they could be used for Larger actions, below is an initial test (on a poor photo) of the 7th Armoured in 1940. I am still missing a bit but of kit but have plenty on hand to make up the numbers. In 6mm I can at least field the one Armoured and two infantry divisions, the DAK and a two Italian infantry divisions. (Painting them a different colour from the base colour will also help)

The source of my storage frustrations soon became clear. Someone or something has taken a liking to sitting or investigating my things.

 

It does not matter how high or secluded a spot I place boxes , I find the tell-tale signs of white fur and knocked over figures.  It appears the cat likes to sit in the painting box (On the newspaper I place on top), I dreaded her thinking it was a litter tray but luckily she prefers to go in other, less suitable places. Alas our cat is deaf  and a little bit thick and so stays inside the whole time. Next door's cats (of which *someone* has 4) like to taunt our cat from the windows. So she likes to protect our house by mixing her scent with ours, which means.........(yes you guessed it)  weeing over clothes, desks and anywhere we frequent on a regular basis. Countermeasures to the other cats have since been planned, a blitzkrieg type of offensive might upset the locals so guerilla warfare consisting of water pistols, sprinklers and 6 year old in full charge will possible make a more peaceful solution.

The longest project

Hi,

My plastic 1/72 ACW is the oldest army that I have now (The 1/72 Napoleonic forces are long gone and replaced by something heavier and four time the size). I began playing the Archduke Piccolo sometime in the 90's and I recall had around 12 units and a few guns. The army then survived a decade of storage as I traveled the world but has taken me a good 10 years to sort out. A recent purchase of Airfix ACW figures has also satisfied a wish list item of getting some.

A recent burst of enthusiasm has seen the completion of a decent sized force. 12 Infantry Regiments and a few guns. I still have around another 12 Infantry Regiments, 4 Cavalry and about 8 guns left to do. Simple 90's basing was simple green paint and simple paint jobs and I have followed the same style for the new figures. ( They have that toy soldier look that I always admired in the early war-games books of Featherstone and Grant).

Below - The Current Pile - A mixture of 1990 basing and 2008 Basing (I seemed to change my mind a lot). The flags are all mostly glued on half an hour ago apart from some old hand painted ones done in 1994.

 The Oldest Units - Mid 90s at least. The Esci figures are even older as I recall having them when I was around 13 (I just turned 40).

 The "newest" - Italeri (new figures) and Airfix (second hand).

So a few more hundred to go and then the Union can be finished (But I have already started).

Cheers

20mm Command Decision WW2

Happy New Year to everyone. I have been very busy recently painting, just haven't been too fussed about taking photos as well as I seem to struggle to take pictures late at night. So a day off today on "Daddy day care" so I took some pictures in the sun (And still struggled due to Arabella trying to grab everything).

I have drafted 5 blog posts on the other projects I have going so I can add more detail as to what I'm doing instead of having one mega post. Todays post is 20mm WW2 !

The above figures are A Company, 1st Battalion Royal Fusiliers,  5th Indian Brigade, 4th Indian Division.
(My grandfather's unit)

One of my favourite periods, and such a good source of memories from my teenage days fighting Ion - Desert WW2 British, Italian and German (....and Japanese).  Below are some platoons of115 Shutzen Regiment, 15th Panzer Division. A mix of Airfix and Italeri DAK figures.



I am painting a company at a time of each country, just to make it varied and interesting aswell and so far it has been fun.Painting plastic 1/72 figures brings back such memories, being 13 or14 watching the World Series Cricket on TV3 while painting ww2 (And most likely high as a kite on the fumes from Humbrol Enamel paints). In the garage I have a large box full of ww2 models (Made and unmade), figures and resin vehicles and I plan to have 5 "Armies" so I will make a company at a time, I have no fixed deadline, but as 1/72 paint quite easily I'll just plug away at them. So on a tray I have - 1 company each of Germans, British, Japanese and Italian and I'll just work my way up.

The Forces

1941 8th Army (4th Indian Division)- Airfix and SHQ Infantry and a mix of Resin and plastic Vehicles.
D.A.K (115 Schützen Regiment and 1/8 Panzer Bn, 15th Panzer Division 1941. - Airfix, Italeri infantry and all plastic vehicles.
1941 Italian - (60th Infantry Division Sabratha)-Airfix, SHQ and Waterloo Infantry and Resin vehicles
Japanese - I have tonnes of them for some reason so what the hell ! I do have some Americans somewhere, but I've never been to fussed on painting Americans for some reason.

Below some Japanese infantry of the Saipan Defense Force.





Cheers