From DaveX: Winter Americans [Under Construction][Limo] (85 points)

For the under construction theme, I have had a group of winter Americans sitting on my desk for so long that were three quarters painted, they had dust and cat hair gathering on them! What a perfect opportunity to get them finished and snag a bonus 20 points. I have a very very very slow grow late war Winter Project for the Ardennes Offensive. I have mostly painted a few squads of Americans and done the odd German unit. My US Forces needed a HQ so I used the awesome Warlord Games sculpts. Their Winter German and Winter US ranges are beautiful. I also had a bailed out tank crew that was in the same state.

Lovely Sculpts by Warlord Games

NCOs, Radio Operator, Medic and an Officer

The bailed out Tank Crew

An Officer, always lost or always pointing

A Sergeant, the greatest rank of all, the backbone of any organisation

A Winter House, not included for points but some eye candy

More eye candy, no points, just some Winter Fallschirmjager I put together. A few conversions here and there.       

As I needed to use Lady Limousine to unlock Under Construction, I painted a Female Sci Fi Pilot by Crooked Dice.  I thought she was most fitting. She has those retro organge vibes.

So that is this weeks entry. 

We have 9 x 28mm Miniatures = 45 Points 

Under Construction Bonus = 20 Points 

Lady Limousine = 20 Points

Grand Total of 85 Handy Points (I think) :D

Huzzah. 

See you next post. I have now unlocked two studios, I need to plan what I will unlock next... hmm.

Dave

From TeemuL: Thank you Dave! Those Winter Americans look great and they nicely fit your frosty terrain. The Sci-Fi pilot looks like she knows her way around the Studios, so you arrive safely to your destination. Please note, that when plotting your route, the Western Studio is in the blue zone in the official version of the map, it was green initially, but changed quite early on.

From GregB: Pico Panzer Regiment Bäke (35 Points)

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

Greetings all - sorry to have been absent for much of the past couple of weeks.  I have been busy with work, and the Snow Lord's task has been taking a fair bit of time as well.  But here is a small (haha) project that I have been working on 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 I have always wanted to run for our gaming group, and this submission contains the bulk of the German forces for the scenario.

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, 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.  

I have no idea how many points this is.  The relevant minions will figure it out! But there are 31 vehicles, and about 12 strips of five infantry figures, all in 1/600 scale, in this submission.

Thanks for looking, have a great weekend!



OK, so scoring this is a bit of a poser as I think the points per base for 3mm stuff assumes earlier periods with formed units of infantry or cavalry. 

Tell you what, I'll count the infantry as being equivalent to a "stand" (= 12 points) and the 29 (you seem to have miscounted) vehicles as half a point each (=16.5 points) plus some rounding and general bonuses for the great look to this regiment.

TamsinP

From GregB: German WW2 Hanomag APCs (80 Points)

1/56 scale Hanomag APCs - models from Warlord Games "Bolt Action" range.

Well, I now have some marching orders from the Snow Lord himself. But as I set myself to that worthy hobby challenge, I want to finish off some of the pending things from projects familiar to the fellow participants and visitors of AHPC X - namely, my late WW2 winter Germans.  I have painted up a nice basic force of infantry, but they will need some vehicles to get around the gaming table.  These Hanomags should do the trick - they are 1/56 scale plastic kits from Warlord Games "Bolt Action" range (and I think Italeri is involved somehow too).

Seated plastic figures to be used showing some troops are embarked.

When I started this project, one hobby quirk I needed to make peace with is the use of 1/56 scale models in 28mm gaming.  I laugh at how consistently the gaming world insists that 1/56 scale is the "proper" scale for 28mm figures. So many manufacturer go to the length of adding "1/56" right after "28mm".  And yet, even the most cursory observation on any gaming table shows the link doesn't hold up.  A better scale would be 1/50 or 1/48...

The 28mm infantry look huge compared to the 1/56 APC...oh well.

And yet...while 1/50 and 1/48 options exist, they are either too much fuss (complex model kits with too many parts), too expensive (the rare Solidos) or made of puke-laced resin (#flakegate).  1/56 is the least-bad option, and because so much of the hobby industry remains committed to this group hallucination, 1/56 scale offers the most options in terms of available vehicles to choose from. Thus I swallow the blue pill...1/56 scale is perfect for 28mm!

AA MG mounted on the backs of two of the APCs. 

The Hanomag is an iconic piece of German WW2 kit.  They built thousands of these things, but there were never enough to meet the enormous demands created by all-out war on two fronts. They would typically be found among one of the battalions of the Panzer and Panzer Grenadier divisions, and among "favoured" units.  These are 251/Ds, later models of the half tracks, apparently easier to build.

Bring on the winter muck!

Don't look too closely...the license plates all have the same number. I wish Warlord would vary their decal sheets...

I suppose one can go too far when it comes to weathering vehicles, but when it comes to winter AFVs, as far as I'm concerned one cannot go far enough. Winter is beautiful, but the pristine white snow lasts for so long as you stand still and never move...winter conditions are somehow still muddy, dirty and - yes, it's true - somehow even DUSTY.  I know this, I have grown up with it. I have been blessed to live in peaceful times in a city with concrete roads, and yet in the winter my red truck turns grey about 72 hours after any snowfall, and a grey-brown about 15 minutes after any thaw.

Vehicle 412, ready to roll out.

Another view, showing the optional embarked infantry models.

These vehicles would be driving through mud, on dirt roads, then snow...seeing snow, dirt, and even rain (it happens in the winter, after all).  The white-wash would have been applied in a hurry, at a depot, probably with one eye on escape as the Russians could arrive at any moment...I want my winter German AFVs to "look the part", and so I have mucked them up here.

Tried to put some muck and snow inside the halftracks.

Open-topped vehicles are always an extra challenge in large scales...after all, you can see inside them! I tried to muck up the inside a bit. I also painted a few of the seated infantry figures that came with the kits, so as to use as markers to show when an infantry unit is aboard the APC.  I see that Warlord sells winter MG-34 gunners for the Hanomags...wish I had thought to order some.  Oh well.

Out for a walk in the forest with my dogs - it was so nice to see the sun!

These three vehicles, plus the four seated troops, should total up 80 points. Up next...just a bit more WW2, before I move the clock back a little further...

By Paul:  
A lovely trio of iconic German vehicles and you've done a cracking job with the snow camo too- looks spot on.  80 points well earned Greg

Not sure my Beagles would like walking in that snow though! 

From GregB: Winter WW2 German 8cm Mortar and MG Team (40 Points)

28mm WW2 Germans in winter kit - figures a mix of Warlord's "Bolt Action" range and Offensive Miniatures' "Elite" range.

The 28mm Winter WW2 project continues to move along. I continue to "round out" my initial German forces with some additional support in the form of an 8cm mortar team and an additional MG42 LMG team.  The mortar team are 28mm figures from Warlord's "Bolt Action" range - the mortar and crew are all metal, while the spotter is a plastic figure. The LMG team are 28mm metal figures from the "Elite" range produced by "Offensive Miniatures" (these are awesome figures, although the name of the business is unfortunate and not ideal for Google searches...)

8cm Mortar Team

Great weapon team from Warlord Games.

On-table mortars and artillery are a bit iffy when in comes to 28mm gaming, but the models are fun and the presence of an 8cm tube is at least somewhat plausible (as opposed to, say, a 12cm mortar).  This is yet another fine piece of sculpting from Warlord's range of metal "Bolt Action" figures.

The crew crowd around, ready to fire another round...

As always, Warlord's winter WW2 German figures have a lot of character.

Love the fellow at the back, pointing to his map - "Are we sure about these coordinates?"

It is often the case in different rules that a spotter of some sort is required in order for the mortar to fire indirectly on enemy targets. I had one figure that would probably do the trick already from the Platoon Command pack, but I wanted to give some of the Warlord 28mm plastic infantry a try, so I put this fellow together - he could act as a spotter/commander for the mortar team, or just a late war German NCO generally.

NCO/spotter - plastic 28mm figure from Warlord.

Not terrible, considering it's a plastic historical figure.

Useful as a commander for the mortar team, or just an NCO figure generally.

I have a generally dim view of plastic historical miniatures, but the plastic WW2 Germans in winter kit from Warlord are not too bad. The selection of poses available for LMG teams in the plastic box is terrible, but for regular infantry and officers, not too bad at all.  The weapon loads definitely skew to late war, which is fine for my project, but if you are looking for winter of 1941 or 1942 they might not be so good.  They paint up OK - not as nice as proper metal figures of course, but they are OK.

MG 42 Team

Snug in winter parkas, ready to bring the MG42 into action.

When I decided I wanted to dive into this project, I naturally had wasted invested much time in many online searches for different figures I might use.  I had seen these "Offensive" miniatures advertised many times, and thought I would give them a go - the sculpts look neat, with a lot of character.  The range is fairly complete - and there are no prone LMG teams, so, a win!

Lots of nice details on these sculpts.

Sadly, they took a long time to arrive in the post. The combination of Canada Post and the Canada Customs agency is a potent force for delay...toss in the Christmas holiday, and it was going to take a long time to arrive.  So by the time they did get here, I had already painted several units of figures from Warlord's Range, leaving these other ones on the back-burner for now.  Still, I am short on LMG teams, and I did want to at least try some of these new ones out, so I pulled this LMG team out of one of the squad packs.

I always enjoy an LMG gunner carrying belts and belts of ammo...

These are very nice sculpts - 28mm for sure, although not as large or heavy as Warlord's "Bolt Action" figures. I also found the faces lacked some of the definition and character you get on the Warlord sculpts.  But overall, these are still wonderful sculpts, and I highly, highly recommend them to folks looking for 28mm late-war Germans!

In terms of points, we have six 28mm infantry figures and one 28mm crew-served weapon, which should be good for 40 points. Thanks for looking!

***
Guest minion Byron checking in today, to help out Greg by minioning (that is a verb right?) his entry for him, so he didn't have to post his own.

Another great entry Greg I love the overall look and feel of this project.  I find it amazing how well all these veried and dark colours actually blend into the winter tables you put together.  I find it very counter intuative that dark colours would work in the winter, but man the figures almost disapear against any kind of mixed terrain on the table.

I also find it funny how we all have our preference of material for figures.  I constantly hear Curt, Dallas, and yourself go on about preferring metal over pretty much everything, and sometimes hear about resin, however for myself, plastic is my favourite due to the simplicity of working with it and how forgiving it is (less chipping of paint, less risk of warping like resin, etc).

Keep up the great work though, all of these figures look great, especially with your basing scheme here.

- ByronM

From GregB: WW2 German Infantry Support at Piper's Peak (60 Points)

German WW2 infantry support elements in winter kit - 28mm figures from Warlord Games.

After a smooth and sparkling-wine-filled journey on Lady Sarah's Balloon, I have arrived at Piper's Peak.  No absurd floppy-hatted demands to be found atop this fine, cloud-topped mountain vista. Rather, we have a few hobby approaches we might take, such as figures "taking a peak".  This gives me the chance to add further to my winter WW2 project with a group of German platoon support elements - all 28mm metal figures from Warlord Games' "Bolt Action" range.

Sniper Team - Taking a Peak

"Have we escaped that absurd Sandhill?"

This pair is the core of the submission for this Challenge Island location. There are two snipers/marksmen - one "taking a peak" through a pair of binoculars, the other "taking a peak" down the sights of his rifle, drawing a bead on an unfortunate battlefield opponent...

Great sculpts from Warlord games.

Generally I dislike prone figures in 28mm, but given their battlefield roles, having these guys prone makes sense. They are great sculpts and castings once again from Warlord.

Panzerschreck Team

AT support for my German infantry.

Another important addition for any late-war German WW2 infantry force, the Panzerschreck will provide some important anti-tank capability.  While many of the infantry will be carrying one-shot Panzerfausts, this Panzerschreck has better range and capability, and this two-man team can focus on taking out enemy armour while their colleagues fire and maneuver on the battlefield.

Mind the back blast of exhaust...

I tried to get some cammo peeking out from underneath the reversible winter smock...

Whether moving through the forests of the Ardennes or the hills north-west of Budapest, my winter WW2 Germans will need the support on the tabletop.

Flamethrower Team

"Don't be hasty"...apparently the motto of this flamethrower team...

This little set is...odd. As you might have guessed, I have a low opinion of prone figures in any miniatures sized larger than 15mm...but sometimes, it makes sense (like the sniper team).  But a prone flamethrower team...I don't get it. Usually one sees flamethrower miniatures moving forward with dash and determination - after all, it was a very dangerous assignment.  But these fellows are...sitting on the ground. So, I tried to imagine some kinds of stories happening with this flamethrower team...

"If we wait here, the enemy will come to us!"

Maybe they know how few flamethrower crews survive action, and so they are taking it easy, and not rushing forward to precipitously? Or perhaps they have cooked up some kind of Wile. E. Coyote-level ambush plan using their flamethrower to hit the bottom of a vehicle or enemy patrol?  It's a different take on the usual action-oriented pose, that's for sure.

Another location visited...looks to be some sort of Tower in the distance...might have to check that out...

For scoring purposes, we have six 28mm figures here, although two are prone, and so get clipped points-wise.  Add in the points for visiting the magnificent vistas of Piper's Peak, and that should get me to 55 points for this submission - and past the half-way point toward my 1,000 point goal!

Thanks for looking all - happy painting!


More of your lovely winter Late War Germans here Greg, and with the snipers you have met the requirements for my island location!

As for the prone flamethrower, it seems eminently sensible to me - if you were carrying several litres of highly flammable liquid on your back, wouldn't you want to present as low a profile as possible?

Anyways, given your lovely paint jobs with the camo I'm going to score the prone figures as not prone, so that'll be 60 points in the bag for you.

TamsinP