Gunbird invades Peleliu - Bookkeeping finished

 After using my free time to crunch some numbers, I think i have it all noted down.

Japanese Scenario 1: 

• Infantry - more than enough, plenty of spares from the Army Box alone. The LMG's will come from Peter Pig (in stock) but I am lacking 2 so added a pack to my order.
  
• AT-Guns - enough in the box for the scenario, loader teams will come from Peter Pig (in stock)
• HMG - same
• Sniper and Spotter - Peter Pig (in stock)
• Off table 81mm - I can pre order this blister that has 4 teams of 81mm and a Observer team (always useful in Battlegroup). available from July 5th so I will wait.
• Grenade L. battery - Enough in the Army Box and I have spares from Peter Pig

Japanese Scenario 2:

•  Infantry - still enough left overs in the Army box, and a few from Peter Pig so ok
•  Rifle and Mortar spider holes - enough spares to cut a few apart, no worries
• Snipers - more in the Peter Pig pack
•  Timed Mortar Barrage - use the models as counters
• HMG - sorted
• Type 90 75mm gun - 2 of these in the Army box so sorted. 

 So besides chasing down a blister of 81mm mortars I'm ok for the Japanese.

USMC Scenario 1:

• BAR - I have 9, I need 18. Noted this for a order with Peter Pig
• Infantry -  I need about 60, there are 25 normal joes in the army box, the rest is NCO etc. I need to go over my Peter Pig USMC stash again for this, but I am coming up short.
•  Forward HQ - sorted
•  60mm mortar teams - I need 3, I have 2. So added to the order for Peter Pig
•  30.cal teams - 2 in the box, just what I need and i have spares from Peter Pig
•  LVT-2 - will be 3D printed
• Bazookas - Box has 2, I need 6 - Added to Peter Pig order 
• Demo man - just sculpt the charge bags on the models. 

USMC Scenario 2:

• If I have painted all the infantry for Scenario 1, I just need to add 3 BAR's and 9 more men, so added those to the PP order
• Forward HQ - sorted
• 30.cal teams - sorted
• Captured Type 92 - already working on it
• 2 Corpsmen - I'll use spare loaders suitably painted.
• Captured Pillbox - I'll reuse 2 from the previous scenario and modify another to be more American
• Barbed wire - I'll knock those out in an hour, easily sorted
• LVT-2 - I'll use the one from the previous scenario 

 

Now....let's get it on :)

Marine Woodpecker WIP

 No, not some weird mythical creature. Would be fun though :)

No, for the 2nd Scenario in Battlegroup Pacific the USMC get's a Captured Type 92 HMG with 3 man crew. Right...no one makes that. But I can :)

I picked up a pack of USMC 30 cal teams and a pack of Japanese HMG's. That gives me 1 spare team each for later, or to rebuild into loader teams. Who knows.

I removed the Type 92 from the gunner but kept his hands and feet (sounding like a slasher movie now) on the gun. The hands cause they will need to connect to the USMC gunner cause those have to go, as he he has his hands on top and behind the gun on the paddles instead of the lower grip.

Yes, I know it's a 15mm model, but hey, it's what I like. And I only ever will need 1 team.

I removed the hands and gun from the USMC gunner, saving the gun for later. Sanded down his base a lot cause there is a difference in size between the 2 models.

That brings me to the Type 92. The model is very compressed compared to the original, so I took off the the rather short barrel and replaced it with a longer bit of paperclip after some very dodgy drilling. Sadly I can't fix the back end. Well, I could, but then I might as well build a full new gun

Gunbird invades Peleliu - The planning fase

 Right - O.

PostNL just dropped off the Battlefronts USMC and Japanese starter armies, I checked those and put them aside with the rest of the 15mm Pacific collection.

Unlike the Stalker project, I need this to be much more organised to prevent burn out, so....check list. 

Check what I have and mark that off.  

Build what I have and mark that off.

Paint what I have and mark that off.

A bit schoolish, but it works if I want to get a project done.

I'll be using Battlegroup Pacific and playing the following scenario's:

• Scenario 1 - Getting "The Point" - Peleliu, 15th April 1944
• Scenario 2 - Holding "The Point" - Peleliu, 15th-16th April 1944

 That means build forces, build scenery, prep table, game. I'm giving myself 12 months cause I habitually keep doing stuff in between :)

I made checklists for all.

Scenario 1 - Japanese Forces

Scenario 2 - Japanese Forces

Scenario 1 - USMC

Scenario 2 - USMC

For both armies, the 2nd Scenario has plenty of duplicates, so I don't need to paint it all again (thank God!). Tomorrow I'll go over my stash and sort what I have for this, and see what I still need. As far as I can tell now I'm short a USMC 60mm Mortar team and 4 Bazooka teams

And that's it for today. Long day. Tired.

Edit - and tired I was, I accidentally tripled the amount of USMC I needed. Modifed 10/5/2025

15mm Pacific (cause we all need more distractions)

 With the upcoming release of Battlefronts Pacific 42-43 (with a lot of dubious stuff purely put in there to sell tat) I've pre ordered the Marine and the Japanese army deals. I never pre order stuff but in this case it felt warranted.

I've been looking forward to the Pacific for a long, long time. I don't have much in stock for it, a couple of 70mm guns, knee mortars, LMG's and infantry for the Japanese. So, with a few child free days on the horizon, why not start cleaning and basing what I have. Fortunately, the 70mm guns are the old blisters, so they come with extra command and spotter figures that are perfect for Battlegroup. I'm guessing those figs will be sanitised in the new edition (higher cost, less figures....shrinkflation much) so I'm happy to have them. I'll look at Peter Pig for additional gun crews for loader teams, casualties etc.

I need to make something to hold these figures when I sand down the bases though, I've noticed my hands cramping up even quicker so I need a work around. 

And I thought my IG18's were small guns!

I need to get some detailing done, ammo containers etc but this photodump will help me with that :)

Past and Presents

First up: thx guys. I appreciate your comments on the previous post, it means a lot to me. I'm looking forward to my new job, I hope to sign the paperwork next week to finalise everything. Scared shitless, but hey.

Hobbywise, I'm really pushing myself. I received 2nd hand Britannia WW2 japanese, dug out my lot of once bought Taliban, unpacked my latest order from Grubby tanks of 2 bags of Soviet and Yugoslav partisans and cleaning, sanding and basing the lot of them. I just want to get them all cleaned and based before my new job starts.

 Partisan all based and sanded, Japanese all based up and ready for filler on the bases, and some Taliban already sanded. I'm using mostly 1 euro cents, but the comms unit and the HMG are getting 2nd choice MDF bases....I can always drill in a hole later to mount a magnet.

 Ol cast Britannia tank (but even that has a few bubbles on the running gear that I need to fix) and my first fully based HMGs. Crew is seperate for casualty removal.

 Taliban waiting their turn for filler and sand.

Everything I fillered tonight, now in the process of adding sand, all Taliban that one, including some Tier 1's.

And in the mail yesterday, a gift, stickers for the Gaslands dice:

...so I put my blank dice to good use. Now to build more cars.

So far I've found 3 interested locals, trying to arrange a date soon for a playtest. Good for motivation.

Also good for motivation was this....a local chap was selling over 100 kits in one go, I sent him a wanted list and I managed to get almost everything I wanted, bar 5 kits.

4 T-72M1's for my Republican Guard, 1 T-55 for a roadside, wheelless wreck that I will make as generic as possible, M60A3 for reasons, Anti tank on=bstalces for Normandy, Caesar SiG-33 for my germans, Zil-157 for use as a civillian truck, US 2,5 ton truck in a bag on top.....most likely a late war captured one for my Germans, more boxes of bombs, racks and gunpods, 2 boxes of 105mm British Light Field Guns, for again, reasons,  and several ICM kits, some to become civives, others to become command and militia vehicles. I have another big box to pick up next week, trading old GW tat for that. Also in the mail is a 1/720 Prinz Eugen (to get proper naval artillery support for a future Kurland book perhaps?), a 1/700 Japanese Destroyer for reasons and finally, my first Revell T-55 which will be modded quite a bit.

So busy, so much to do but really enjoying myself. Stay tuned for more!

Japanese fortifications: Focus on the 8 inch gun - Wake Island example

Since I want to make some proper Japanese defences to fight off the inevitable US invasion on the wargames table, I've been googling ( as I have no books on this subject matter) the various Japanese held islands. I'm doing this in no particular order, and I'm starting off with Wake Island as it is pretty limited defence wise.

Wake Island as it is now:

Bit of Wikipedia here:

Wake Island (also known as Wake Atoll) is a coral atoll located in the western Pacific Ocean in the northeastern area of the Micronesia subregion, 1,501 miles (2,416 kilometres) east of Guam, 2,298 miles (3,698 kilometres) west of Honolulu and 1,991 miles (3,204 kilometres) southeast of Tokyo. The island is an unorganized, unincorporated territory of the United States that is also claimed by the Marshall Islands. Wake Island is one of the most isolated islands in the world and the nearest inhabited island is Utirik Atoll in the Marshall Islands, 592 miles (953 kilometres) to the southeast.

 On December 11, 1941, Wake Island was the site of Japan's first unsuccessful attack on American forces during World War II when Marines, Naval personnel, and civilians on the island repelled an attempted Japanese invasion, sinking two destroyers and a transport. The island fell to Japanese forces, however, 12 days later in a second attack, this one with extensive support from Japanese carrier-based aircraft returning from the attack on Pearl Harbor. Wake Island remained occupied by Japanese forces until the end of the war.

 Fun fact: From then on the Japanese called it Otori-Shima (大鳥島) or "Big Bird Island" for its birdlike shape.

Not so fun fact: The Japanese captured the remaining defenders, civillian and military, and deported most of them to POW camps, retaining a small amount of civillian labour.  And later in 1943 executed the remaining 98.

So, never recaptured during the war (just repeatedly bombed), what good is a review of their defences? Well, I got to start somewhere...

Google Wake Island and you'll see quite a few pictures of this:

  Japanese (well, technically British) 8 inch gun on Peale Island. These were obsolete guns dismounted from ships Japan had bought from the UK before WW1. This you will see on many of the Japanese held islands. It's in a really bad condition, most of the rear superstructure has rusted off, and it is mounted on a either a concrete mount clad with steel plates or a full steel box mount.

Wikipedia tells us:

 The American captives were ordered to build a series of bunkers and fortifications on Wake. The Japanese brought in an 8-inch (200 mm) naval gun which is often incorrectly^[14] reported as having been captured in Singapore.

Just one gun.(though I have other sources telling me the Japanese brought in 4 of these guns, like this source: www.navweaps.com )

Studying Japanese coastal artillery, and in particular the common 8-inch gun, I found this page very helpful: 8-inch Coastal Defense Guns by Dirk H.R. Spennemann  even if it focusses on Micronesia, it shows all of the types of 8 inch used and the styles of cover they used and their mounting positions, mostly in pairs.

Using the indegionous Japanese made variant of the British Elswick gun, the 20.3 cm/45 Type 41 naval gun. This is it:

Dimensionally, the barrel is 9.114 metres in length, so in 1/72 that is 126mm

For Wargames purposes, I think I should build 2 guns of the fully enclosed type as this cuts down on the amount of details needed, magnetised base, with a few different baseplates depending on the location of a future game (if that ever happens). The look I will go for is the Sapuk #1 or #2.

 Sapuk #1 (left) and Sapuk #2 (right)

They are not terribly elaborate shapes, easy to make in plasticcard. Openings will be plated over with a spacer and painted black. For the barrels I will need to either find a suitable gun shapewise and modify it or find someone with a small lathe and woodworking skills. The closed shape and generic paintjob will make it suitable for what-if conflicts as well. EDIT: another very cost effective methos is using a 1/35 scale 10.5cm LefH18 tuned barrel. They only cost 3 euros a piece and are a tad short, but part of the barrel is inside the turret anyway so that is sorted. I can add the fluted end with some Milliput and some minor DIY lathe work.

And that's enough for today. The first VC have been cleaned, based and a few barrels upgraded to metal pins for safekeeping (mostly the M3 Grease Guns) and put in their holding box. Next up is the bag of Taliban.

Impact 2017 - great times.....

Just got back from Impact 2017. The venue was well packed with a diverse selection of traders and display tables, and I might be wrong, but with 6 euros entry it was cheaper compared to last year? I could swear it was 7 euros then. (though a few traders or clubs will be in for a nasty surprise as I spotted a few cars beside the venue that had been ticketed for not paying for parking - 63,50 euros each. Ouch! ). This year, you got a few tickets with your entry fee that would be used for the raffle, and every hour they announced new numbers for a free item. Really nice toutch! Als the goodie bag was well stocked with little items. A few candybars, a free mini from Warmonger Miniatures, some fliers for shows and discounts, a Warlord 28mm US Marines sprue and a nice sheet of pre embossed styrodur. And a resin base as well, but I forgot who made that (I gave it to some friends from Tilburg who actually use those).

Beautiful weather too (which can be a good/bad thing for a show) and with Kim taking the car and the kids to my parents, I took the train to Eindhoven and walked to the convention centre (it would be daft to have gone by car anyway, a trainticket costs as much as 1 hour of parking in Eindhoven, with fuelcosts on top..... ).

Anyway, a well packed venue, with shops in the outer ring and games in the middle. There seemed to be a bit of everything, with most popular games well represented by the shops but with loads of other stuff as well. After picking up the things I had pre ordered first, I browsed the shops for a bit and after that, the smallish Bring & Buy, which turned out to be the place where I was to spend the most dosh. After that it was nothing but pure eyecandy, lots of effort being put in the games and tables.

I had a nice and long chat with Sander at the bar, who had his 6 year old son with him, with a fine discussion over a Belgian beer (and a iced tea for his son) and some swapping of purchases and freebies as some of our interest overlap. When he went to get some final bits I had a lengthy discussion with his son about how Sander paints and how he actually paints quicker then his father, though not always with the desired result. Brilliant, if I can half of that chat with my girls when they turn 6 I'd be happy as a clam. After that they left for a trip to Eindhoven and back home again.

I then had a long chat with Ferry and his son Maarten about Gaslands, games development, the hobby online and how expensive life is :D Maarten left after a bit to join the scrapheap challenge, and after a bit we both had another small tour of the show, discussed the game Tanks! as being a nice game for him and his son and then we parted ways. I feel I will have to organise a evening event in Tilburg in the near future just for Gaslands, as Ferry and a few others are very interested in it.

Since I really suck at remembering peoples names if I only see them a couple of times a year chats can be a bit akward, as i never forget a face so I know he or she, I just can't put a name to them. It's nice to hear people have no problem remembering me or my name, my Blog and my work, so I must be doing something right. People were quite impressed with the Japanese buildings, which was nice, so I need to get that tutorial up next week.

I cut it short at around 14:30 as I really need to study for tomorrows exam, hence I'm now blogging at the ungodly hour of 17:00 with a sandwich at my side.

Right, the haul. Again, I have foccused purely on what I want to use in the very near future, and some bits I can resell or swap/trade with others. In the end, after expenses, I spent just shy of 40 euros, and when I sell what I don't need right now that should balance out nice enough.

In no particular order I bagged (and my apolagies for the odd angles of some of the pictures, these are all taken with my phonecam and those pics and the Paint software seem to be at odds with each other. I can save a picture straight up and it will show on its side or inverted when I upload. When I correct it in paint and upload it again it sometimes works, sometimes does not. Quite annoying but I don't want to shit here all night editing, sorry! Also, some pics are fuzzy, thats 100% my fault :D ).

 <Freebie> Warlord US Marines sprue > Going straight in my TNT bits box for repurposing in conversions

<Freebie> As most of my friends do no scratch build, the free samples of Styrodur all ended up in my bag. I'll put them to good use, want to have a stab at finishing the Japanese shrine monday or tuesday and these are perfect for that.

Shitty pic, sorry about that. Hans bought some zombies off me and gave me this skinned teddybearfur as a freebie to try out. Enough here for a small house and then some left over bits for some experimenting. He did mention though he prefers to use cheap towels for this as they are easier to work with. We'll see how this works out....

Second hand purchase - 1 out of a lot of many partially assembled/disassembled Star Wars fighters - this one came closest to 1/72 for me so I bought it. Landing gear is ripped off so will need some TLC, new bits and a new PJ.

Damn you Paint program. Anyway, 2mm I beams to make Czech hedgehogs with. I've seen L and I beams used and I think the I beam is just a tad stronger in scale. Not sure how to bae them yet, in groups or seperate......

Second hand purchase - 2 Matchbox Panzer IIIL new in box. Will make excellent wrecks/parts donors.

Second hand purchase - Ehm, late WW1 truck-thingie? Will be built as is and used as scenic piece for Pulp games in 20mm.

Second hand purchase - 28mm Perry Japanese porters. Now all I need is a merchant to go with them and they will make a great objective.

I don't think this needs any explaining..... Miniature SM dungeon you say? Nope, for adding to the front of tanks of course.

 <Freebie> A goblin coming out of a pot and a shield. I traded the shield away and I'll cut the goblin from the pot. The goblin will then be sent off and I will keep the pot.

Very fuzzy pic (sorry about that) of a Copplestone spy, and a Northstar Police Oficer and 3x the Yakuza muscle for Big Trouble in Little China Pulp. All 28mm.

A cowboy with a rifle and one with his hands up. Just....because? I want to see if I can paint a cowboy. Just for funsies.

I think these are 28mm Japanese Foundry Officers? Well, they will now become statues in Hong Kong, for Pulp reasons.

28mm Norhtstar and others Monks and a Samurai.

28mm Terracotta warriors. Either I'll use these for Hong Kong Pulp, or put them up for sale as they are OOP could help me with the finances. Not sure yet.

 28mm GW Praetorian casualties. Picked these up purely for resale tbh.

 28mm GW Tyrranid Red Terror. Beastie for Frostgrave, Sci-Fi and Pulp. Strip, build, paint.

Resin 28mm scatter scenery. A box of porto potties is actually 4 pcs but I traded 2 with Sander. 2 is enough for a table, or as he said it, you are not having a rock concert. I'm rally liking this TT Combat stuff. Well priced, excellent resin and well cast too. Barrels are from Baueda.

<Freebie> Anvil frag cannon.....also going straight into the TNt box for future conversions.

 And that was it. I saw plenty of other stuff, but it's a few more months till the next show and I want to try to get most painted before that (famous last words....). Well, at least the scenery anyway.

A day well spent, not too expensive, plenty of chats with friends and people I know or follow me on my Blog or Forums, also plenty of eye candy and ideas. Yes, a day well spent. Now, off to study.