More 15mm vehicles - a British recce troop

More models I've had for a while and finally got round to finishing off.

This is a British recce troop, part of a Reconnaissance Regiment in a British Armoured Division in the later war period.

The Troop consists of two Daimler armoured cars and two Daimler Dingo scout cars. The Troop commander is in one of the armoured cars. The troop would probably have operated in pairs, each pair being an armoured car and a scout car. 

These models are from Flames of War and are nice and simple to put together and paint. The box contains options for 2 pdr guns with Littlejohn squeeze bore adaptors, but I left them off, because it appears that the squeeze bore shells provided extra punch even when fired from a standard 2-pdr gun.

These are a nice addition to my 15mm Late War British and I've already put them on the table in a recce force scenario, where the armoured cars suffered heavily from Panzerfausts fired by their Volkssturm opponents.
 

Finally got the camera and lightbox out.....

 ....so that I could photograph some completed things. Here are some tanks. First a really silly Soviet monster;

The T-35 couldn't be called a success in any meaningful way, but it has a certain WTF? quality about it. This is a 15mm Zvezda kit and I'm not sure how or when I might get it onto the table, except maybe as a broken down vehicle that could be an objective. I think I've painted it up a bit pale, the green really ought to be darker, but my excuse is that the factory that produced it only had a lighter batch of green paint available.

Now, three more sensible German AFVs;

From left to right there are: the Czech CKD LT vz. 38 which, as the Pz 38(t)  was a useful (and much needed) addition to the early war Panzer forces, the workhorse Pz Kfw III Ausf. G with the 5cm Kwk 38 L/42 and the Sd Kfz 222 with the 2cm KwK 30 autocannon.  These are also Zvezda kits and will work nicely for the invasion of the Low Countries and the Battle of France and also for Barbarossa.

My two final Soviet tanks

.... well, final for now. There may (i.e will) be more later on.

 These two are also Zvezda 1/100 scale models. On the right is the later T-34/85, which entered service in 1944. The version here is the M1944 model with the ZiS-S-53 85mm gun. 

Around 84,000 T-34 tanks were built during WW2, with 49,000 being armed with the 85mm gun.

The other, larger tank on the left is the IS-2 with the powerful D25-T 122mm. Derived from the earlier KV series tanks, nearly 4,000 of these monsters were built during WW2. The D25-T gun was adapted from the 122mm A-19 M1931/37 and its AP munitions could penetrate the frontal armour of a Panther at 2,500m range and could knock out a Tiger I at around 1,000m. Demonstrating its origins as a heavy artillery piece, the HE shells fired by the D25-T were devastating against infantry and could also knock enemy tanks out because of the massive explosive force generated. 

I've chosen to paint these two tanks in a battlefield condition, with plenty of mud. I've also given them the white aircraft recognition stripes on the turrets, again looking a bit irregular and hand-painted as with the one I did on my earlier T-34/76. Looking at various photos of Soviet tanks in action, these stripes always look a bit scrappy and temporary.

A couple more Soviet tanks

 These are also Zvezda 1/100 scale kits. The tanks are both KV-1 heavy tanks from the early war period.

Yes, they look pretty much identical but they are actually different.

The tank on the right is the earliest production model, the KV-1 M1939, equipped with the L-11 76.2mm tank gun, which was also fitted to the earliest model of the T-34. This version was prone to mechanical problems and only 141 were built.

The left hand version is the KV-1 M1940 with the F-32 76.2mm which was also used on early T34 models. Later models of both tanks were given the F-34 76.2mm ZiS-5 gun, which had a superior performance to both earlier guns.

The only visual difference here is the shape of the gun mantlet.

When painting these, I chose not to paint any markings on the tanks, which was quite common on real-life Soviet tanks. I also chose to make them look quite muddy. I like my tanks to look used and battle-worn rather than suitable for victory parades in Red Square.

I am thinking that these will be useful support options for Barbarossa-period games.

I've also been working on some more later tanks, which I'll post separately.

Most of my time has been taken up with buildings, though; cheap 15mm MDF ones that I bought on ebay and have been zhooshing up so they look presentable on the gaming table. I'll do a post about them separately, too.

My Soviets have a tank!

A T-34/76 to be precise.

The paintwork could be a lot neater on the turret above, but perhaps the painting on the actual vehicles was pretty slapdash?

The model is a 1/100 scale (i.e. 15mm) Zvezda one, and I bought it ages ago from the shop at the Bovington tank museum. I had assembled it and put it away in a drawer for safekeeping and pretty much forgot all about it. I was only because of a comment on a previous post that I remembered it, so I found it, gave it an undercoat and finished it off late yesterday afternoon. I varnished it with Humbrol Matt Spray this morning and I think it has come out OK.

It is a nice simple kit and has enough detail for a wargames table. My only criticism is the absence of external fuel tanks.

I undercoated it in PSC Russian uniform and gave it a bit of a dry-brushing in Vallejo Brown Violet, followed by another dry-brush with German Camouflage Beige to bring out the angles and curves. I did the tracks with Vallejo Panzer Aces track primer and then touched up the edges of the tracks with Oiled Steel while the primer was still wet. Then I did the stars and white stripe on the turret and did the steel cables with oiled steel mixed with track primer. There is also a small amount of rust effect paint around the exhausts and on the cables.

Then the whole vehicle got a dry-brushing with Vallejo Tan Earth, followed by a wash of Citadel Nuln Oil.

I am so pleased with this that I've ordered a couple more Zvezda tanks online; a T-34/85 and a KV-1. 

 

Soviet Rifle Platoon

You'll need to scroll down to see all the troops. 

This is a WW2 Soviet rifle platoon in 15mm, using Peter Pig figures and the platoon organisation in the TooFatLardies Chain of Command rule book.

The platoon is made up of three squads;

According to the TFL rules, the platoon is led by a Leytenant (senior leader) with a pistol, who is with the middle squad in the pictures above, and each squad is comprised of a Serzhant (junior leader) with a PPSh-41 SMG, a two-man DP-27 LMG team and seven riflemen with the Mosin–Nagant 91/30 rifle.

In the pictures above, the serzhants are wearing pilotka caps and are mounted on 2cm bases and the leytenant is wearing a peaked cap with a red band and is also on a 2cm base. The LMG teams are on 3cm bases and the rifles on 1.5cm ones. In reality, the serzhants would most likely have been wearing helmets, but the pilotka and larger base makes them stand out for gaming purposes.

In CoC, the Russian infantry squad cannot be broken down into two separate teams, unlike the Germans, British or Americans, although two riflemen can be split off to create a small scout team.

These were a pretty quick and simple paint job. I spray-coated all the figures en masse with Citadel Zandri Dust, which is a pretty reasonable basic colour for Soviet uniforms and then added in the details with Vallejo paints. The helmets were done with Brown Violet and the pilotka cap with Green Ochre. I used German Camouflage beige for packs etc, saddle brown for the wooden parts of their weapons and gunmetal for the metal parts. Finally, everything was given a wash with the water-soluble Army Painter Strong Tone that comes in dropper bottles.

My first post of 2022 - the start of my Soviet project

OK, this is my first post of the year, almost three weeks since my last activity on the blog.  I have been busy, though.

My priority has been working on my 15mm WW2 Soviets for Chain of Command. These are required for a game I will be running at Winter Wonder Lard at BIG in February. I have pretty much completed everything I need, apart from all the terrain items I am planning to use, so I'll be posting a number of posts over the next week or so with where I am.

First, here are a couple of Soviet vehicle choices. A SU-76 and two BA-64 light armoured cars;

These are Skytrex models and I think they are very nice too. I have two BA-64s because they are sold as a pair, but I am pretty sure I'll be using both of them. I am very pleased with the SU-76. It is a really nice model with a lot of crisp detail. It comes as the hull, two sets of running gear and the 76mm Zis-3 gun, plus three crew members, so a spot of super glue work is required. The BA-64 models come with separate wheels and turrets, so glue time there too. I am happy to report that everything goes together cleanly. I painted the crew separately and stuck them in afterwards. 

I will do separate posts covering the various infantry and support components for my Soviet forces.

Some What A Tanker! action

Last Sunday we had one of our occasional all-day sessions at the club. Although I had something planned for the afternoon, my diary was empty for the morning. Therefore, I grabbed my WaT folder and a few tanks and bunged them in the car.

The tanks I chose were Western Desert 8th Army and DAK ones. I took the four DAK tanks I painted up some time ago, as seen here and here, plus some British ones that I bought ready-painted at our Tabletop Sale in 2018. 

Doing this turned out to be a good idea, as Matt, a recent new member needed a game, so we played some WaT. Given the option, Matt chose the Desert Rats, picking a Matilda II and a Crusader II, both with the QF 2pdr gun. I decided on two PzKfw III tanks, an Ausf. H with the shorter 5cm Kwk 38 gun and a Ausf. L with the longer 5cm KwK 39 gun.

The scenario was pretty simple, an encounter in and around a small oasis.

I decided that I'd get the PzKfw IIIL into cover, where its superior firepower might give me the edge.

I then sent the PzKfw IIIH around the other side of the oasis.

Things were quite cagey at first, bit I did inflict a bit of damage on the Crusader which decided to go to ground in some partial cover.

I was horrified when the Matilda managed to brew-up my main strike tank, the IIIL pretty soon after it had sustained damaged gun optics from an earlier shot of mine.

The rest of the game was all about my remaining tank dodging the two British ones, while taking potshots whenever possible, nibbling away at their effectiveness and eventually knocking out the Crusader in a tense exchange of fire across the limpid waters of the oasis.

Eventually, I also managed to take the Matilda out, despite my tank having taken damage to both gun optics and running gear.

All in all, a fun game, which reminded me of what excellent rules these are. Once again, well done the Lardies!

Two more tanks for What A Tanker!

Here are two more recruits to my Afrika Korps tank force for the TwoFatLardies What A Tanker game. On the left is a Panzer III with the longer 5cm KwK 39 L/60 gun, which means that it is  a Panzer III Ausf. J, although the ones with the longer gun were later reclassified as Ausf. L variants. The smaller tank on the right is, of course a Panzer II, armed with the 2cm KwK 30 L/55 cannon. As it has five road wheels, it is an Ausf. F variant, produced in 1941/42, rather than the earlier Ausf. C, so ideal as a vehicle serving in the North African campaign.

Both of these are Battlefront 15mm resin models. Although I am a big fan of plastic tanks, I think that for WaT resin models make more sense to me, because I don't really need to buy a box of five PSC models if I am only going to need one or two. I quite like the extra weight of resin vehicles for WaT.

Of course, when I eventually do something about my CoC in the desert project, these will be perfect for that too.

A couple of Afrika Korps tanks for What A Tanker .....

...... and not only for WaT, either. 

I have plans for building up some forces for Chain of Command in the North African Campaign in the 1940-42 period, but those plans will probably have to wait now that the TooFatLardies have announced their Blitzkrieg handbook is available for pre-orders. The CoC priority now is going to be switched to BEF and German forces, with French to follow later.

Anyway, having bought some already painted 8th Army vehicles at the club's Tabletop Sale back in May, I always planned to get some German opposition. I'll look at getting a couple of Italian tanks later, which will also come in handy for Desert CoC.

For the first time, I looked away from PSC box sets and decided to get a couple of resin tanks. The ones I chose were Battlefront ones, a Panzer III H and a Panzer IV F1. I did want to get a Panzer II as well, but they were out of stock. I'll probably go back later to get one.

These were pretty straightforward to paint. They were given a base coat of Army Painter Desert Yellow spray and then the detailing was built up with drybrushing, first with some unmixed Vallejo Natural Steel (if you don't shake the bottle too much you get a graphite sort of colour with only a hint of metal) to show wear on the desert colour and then with Iraqi Sand, which is a massively useful colour for all sorts of things. I used black for the rubber rims on the wheels.

I think that they have turned out pretty well. Oddly enough, it was only after I'd bought these that I remembered that I have a couple of Zvezda kits of exactly the same tanks. I made them up and compared the two for size. The two Mk IIIs are an almost perfect match, but the Battlefront Mk IV is slightly longer. I'll paint them up one day and that will give me a couple more tanks. Of the two, I have to say that I prefer the Battlefront models, though.

Alien Squad Leader - The Soviet Armoured Fist rumbles on.

I was keen to get my Second Global War Soviet army back on the table again, so a game against Nick's Alien Enslavers at the club yesterday was just the ticket. This was a 200pt battle, so I got an opportunity to deploy my Super Heavy Tanks, unreliable experimental technology but packing a massive punch because of the Primary Weapons system on each tank.

The battle we were fighting was Breakthrough/Rearguard Action, Scenario 6 in the rulebook. I was the attacker, and to win I had to get two units across the table and exited. I'd played this before and managed a win, but I was less confident this time, because of the inherent unreliability of my tanks. Also, I was worried about the psychic powers of the Enslavers.

The table was set up with a river cutting it in two. Luckily I was able to reposition the built-up area nearest to the forest to give my troops some useful cover.

I had a plan, but it all depended on using my long-range firepower to whittle away at the Alien hordes. The Heavy Tanks were on my right and the Super Heavies on the left, with mobile rocket artillery and field artillery in the centre  to launch hopefully devastating barrages.

The infantry were always going to be secondary in my plans, but I deployed them on the flanks to prevent the Aliens from getting around and attacking my vulnerable artillery.

Supporting my armour I had a stand of Mechanical Scientists, inferior infantry defending Mechanics who could repair damaged vehicles.

The Alien Enslavers were a truly bizarre force. Giant tentacled brains. eldritch vehicles, fearsome-looking beasts and hordes of psychically-controlled Thralls.

Supported by floating heavy weapons, the alien tanks and infantry occupied the village on the Alien right.

My tanks soon began to hit their targets, causing damage to the Alien armour. The white figure is a Subject Telepath.

The Alien centre was packed with Thralls, but indirect artillery fire began to thin their ranks. Getting these out of my way was crucial to my plan.

I was also keen to drive off or destroy the Alien armour in the village. 

This force on the Alien right worried me. I didn't want to have to divert forces to fend them off, but I didn't want them coming over to my side of the river either.

I got my vehicles into cover as soon as possible. I didn't want my defensively weak mobile artillery destroyed by Nick's Beast of the Air.

My super heavy armour came under attack, sustaining hits, but my Mechanical Scientists were able to effect battlefield repairs and kept their threat very much alive. I also lost some infantry, but my core force remained intact.

One concern was my Sniper, who was generally unable to trouble the enemy, missing with about 80% of his shots. Re-education in the Gulags beckoned.

Slowly, the enemy forces were thinned out, but I was still not going to commit my forces to advance until they had overwhelming force. 

Finally, with the alien tanks on my right destroyed, the time came to get some troops over the river, my tanks sweeping aside the much-reduced screen of Thralls.

I was still worried by the Psychic threat, though and I concentrated my fire on the command stand on the hill.

These guys were also a concern. I took time to try and weaken them as much as possible.

My centre remained solid. both the indirect artillery and the tanks were causing damage to the aliens.

One tank was lost due to psionic attacks, but my advance continued. 

I ordered more armour to cross the bridge, once the aliens were weakened to such a degree that the threat was becoming negligible.

I sent my mainly-useless sniper into hand-to-hand combat against the Master of Thralls. Almost inevitably, he lost and his death meant that he wouldn't suffer at the hands of my NKVD goons in one of my dungeons.

However, this was just a minor setback as my armour and infantry poured forwards  to gain that all-important breakthrough, with two units leaving the table, with more to follow unopposed.

So, a resounding victory for the Soviet Armoured Fist. I am really beginning to like this army a lot. It isn't fast and it does suffer from unreliability, but The Stubborn characteristic means that troops don't suffer command penalties if pinned, so choosing to be Pinned instead of Falling Back makes a lot of sense.

The opportunity to re-roll shooting dice with tank guns upgraded to Superior Firepower is also useful. It gives you a second chance to score hits on targets you have missed with the first shot.

I've been the attacker twice with my Soviets now. I think that overall they are probably going to be a better defensive force, but they do offer an all-round threat from the massive firepower they can deploy.

Alien Squad leader - the first outing for the 2nd Global War Soviets

Last Sunday was the club AGM, but there was some time for games afterwards, so Alex and I played a 150pt game of ASQL, as we had discussed a week before. I was keen to get my Soviets on the table and Alex wanted to see how they would perform.

Here is my force;

From left to right, starting at the back, there are;

2 stands of suit wearers (power-armoured infantry)

2 unarmoured light transports with rocket artillery

3 heavy tanks with superior weapons (allows a re-roll)

4 stands of crewed weapons (heavy weapons)

1 political commissar

4 stands of veteran regular infantry (2 upgraded to command stands)

I chose this force before we chose the mission, which turned out to be Scenario 2 - Meeting Engagement, which meant that the defender has been out-scouted and the attacker may deploy certain troop types on the table. Everything else is off-table and must enter the game from a previously-placed deployment point. I was the defender.

Alex's army was a Rebel Alliancce one, with Birdmen flying infantry, Human troops and a few characters, including two warrior monks with inspirational leadership and considerable fighting skills, plus a medic.

The table looked like this. I would start on the left-hand side.

Immediately, a limiting factor emerged. Crewed weapons can only move 10cm per turn. This made their deployment a painfully slow business and they never managed to do anything at all useful during the game. Clearly, their role is much more suited to a game where they don't have to travel any distances to get stuck in.

My armour and mobile rocket artillery would be my main threat, and soon one of my tanks forced Alex to withdraw his only vehicle with a long-range weapon. I advanced my power-armoured troops and a commander into the woods, where the commander would be able to call down indirect artillery fire onto Alex's Human troops. This proved to be immediately successful and he began to sustain a lot of hits. Unhappily, I was unable to keep this artillery fire going due to poor command rolls and his medic was quickly in action healing the hits. Then, his annoying flying infantry appeared, causing me to withdraw a command stand that had sustained a hit. My power-armoured troops proved to be pretty hopeless and after a few rounds of combat, including against the Jedis warrior monks, they were utterly wiped out. I really cannot remember ever having much success with the 5+ saving roll for power-armoured troops.

Elsewhere, my tanks rumbled forwards, shrugging off fire from Alex's Human defenders and making sure that his guys kept their heads down.

Here is the unhappy demise of the power-armoured troops, plus the commissar and the regular veterans.

 However, elsewhere my main forces slowly moved into strong defensive positions where I am sure they would be hard to assault.

Unhappily, we ran out of time before we could reach a result. Totalling up the score, Alex had caused more damage than I had managed, but the result was a draw, albeit one that went against me. Overall, the rwal deciding factor in this battle was Alex's group of characters, who pretty much won the battle in the woods and mitigated against my early artillery success.

So, what conclusions can I draw from this battle? Well, here are a few thoughts;

• Power-armoured troops are not really that good
• Crewed weapons move too slowly in a mobile environment
• Tanks rule the battlefield against lightly-equipped forces
• I should have taken more tanks instead of the power-armoured guys
• Indirect fire artillery can be devastating
• I hate flying infantry