Last War 1. Only the dead have seen the end of war...

Before:

Mission 0. The Pals- Roll-call.

Now...

A heavy fog blanketed no-mans' land, cutting down on ranges. The Germans were completely taken by surprise. I had a few lucky rolls and my concerns about the viability of 15mm for skirmish were assuaged. I'll have to decide what to do with my loot and XP.

The Mud Ghouls were made from some tiny boardgame zombies I had lying around, slopped liberally with mud texture paint. The crates are HO/OO railway scenery.

Mud Ghouls

To be continued!

CanCon CoC- France '40

I had my first game of Chain of Command at CanCon. This was a participation/ demo game run by Trailape. My opponent was Gorillamo, running the French.

The French mission was to destroy two caches of supplies before the German blitzkrieg captured them. The French have a platoon with attached engineers and a 25mm AT Gun. I had a platoon with an attached Pz I.

I deployed one squad with a 50mm mortar on the low brushy hill to the bottom right, who covered the advance of the remaining squads on the left. 

Germans cover the buildings

Some French rifle fire near their first objective was hit with a fusillade of return fire, including a very accurate mortar blast. Unfortunately for me, the mortar ran out of bombs and was never able to resupply!

Suppressing fire!

The other squads advance through the fields towards the French cache.

My moving squads became bogged down under fire despite covering smoke.

More French slow down the German advance

My Pz I trundled on and was immediately destroyed by the AT gun! My force morale was crumbling rapidly and my squads weren't advancing.

25mm gun fires down the street...

... and destroys my little tank!

The French engineers destroyed their first objective, and ran for the second- a disabled tank.

Kaboom! Cache destroyed, and a French squad withdraws under withering fire.

But the engineers were caught by devastating MG-34 fire and were destroyed before completing their mission.

Twin MG-34s fire down the street

The French engineers are unable to blow the second cache. 

It was a fun game which could have gone either way. Trailape was engaging, the terrain was appropriate, and the accents were outrageous. I liked the variable turn lengths, the patrol phase, and the inability to micromanage every soldier. I'd play again, but I don't think I'll be jumping into a new period...

SFx with LensFx iOS app.

WW1 15mm specialists

I painted some WW1 'specialist' troops for PSC's Great War. These are a soft plastic and came with the French Army expansion. I've rebased them on 15mm washers.

British

Lewis Gunners, Elites, and Marksmen

Officers and Spotters

Ammo bearers and Engineer

German 

MG08/15, Marksmen, and Elites

Officers and Spotters

Ammo bearers and Engineer

Flamethrowers!

I made the flamethrowers the same as my French one- with some clump foliage soaked in black paint and glue, and heavily drybrushed white/ yellow/ orange/ red.

The German helmet camouflage was painted over black in a green, a reddish brown, and sand, leaving the black showing between the gaps.

PSC Battle of Britain

What ho, Squiffy! Bally Jerry, pranged his kite right in the how's-your-father; hairy blighter, dicky-birded, feathered back on his sammy, took a waspy, flipped over on his Betty Harpers and caught his can in the Bertie.

Translated from banter:

PSC shot themselves in the foot during their crowdfunding campaign to re-release Richard Borg's Battle of Britain game. After significant delays in the Chinese factories, the miniatures released did not meet some consumer's expectations due to a softer plastic resulting in significant warping. Here are some of my 1:300 planes:

This one is the only moulding failure

Warping is common to any soft plastic boardgame miniature, and quickly settles with the hot water treatment. I fixed mine in about 20 minutes and am very happy with how they turned out. I like the contrast between the cheerful RAF and the utilitarian Luftwaffe camouflage patterns. I handpainted all the markings- the crosses and swastikas were a bit of a headache, and I'd consider decals despite the artisanal charm. On the table, I think they look great.

Spitfires

Hawker Hurricanes

Bristol Blenheim

Gloster Gladiator

Boulton Paul Defiant

Heinkel 111. Love the canopies!

Junkers 87 Stuka

Messerschmitt Bf 109. These are the smallest planes, and the markings were harder.

Junkers 88

Messerschmitt Bf 110

Dornier 17

Unfortunately, combined with some poor communication, PSC caved to pressure and has announced they will send out hard plastic planes to everyone. They're already quite fine miniatures, and a snapped tailfin will result in more wailing and gnashing of teeth than some easily correctable warping.

I got a game in of the first 4-round scenario. The RAF cracked out a win, but it would be interesting to see how they fare against attrition by the late campaign.

Game set-up

Cabbage crates coming over the briny

Pevensey radar station takes a hit!

It's grim up north

Work in progress- WW1 German artillery

I don't often do Work In Progress blog entries, but I haven't had much new painted recently. These are 15mm 10.5cm FH 98/09 from PSC, painted but unbased.

I painted one last year:

I did these ones a much lighter grey, to better match my beloved early panzers. I'm thinking about putting them on a 40mm round base (compared to the 50mm rectangular), but I'm not sold on that yet.