Point 213 in 28MM

So,

About ten years ago Drunkensamurai and I had this grand idea to play a historical scenario for the battle of Point 213 during the Normandy campaign. The Battle was the German 101. Schwere SS-Panzerabteilung of four Tiger 1's against the British 4th County of London Yeomanry with at least 17 tanks. The battle in a nutshell had the four Tigers ambushing the British that had stopped along a road in column to conference since they did not see any German activity all day. This however changed as the Tigers unleashed hell on them and surprised the British column virtually wiping them all out.

It didn't help that Battlefront put up a PDF of the battle for Flames of War with a nice map and detailing of the armored units that fought in the battle. So Drunken and I both agreed that this would be a cool game to do in 28mm on a 8'x8' table. At the time though, there were not many good WW2 vehicles on the market in 1/56th scale. So we decided on using Tamiya 1/48th scale tanks, they fit in better with the mostly Black Tree Design forces we had, so off we went buying tanks.

Tamiya 1/48th Firefly

Tamiya 1/48th Cromwell

I got as far as collecting the two tanks above, Drunken had a couple of more tanks then me, but right about the time we were buying these vehicles is when Japan had the serious earthquake and tsunami. This caused problems for distributors and it became tough to get Tamiya models at a good price. So we shelved the project for a later date and knew we would come back to this project. Well as these things happen, we never did anything with it and just kept the project shelved until earlier this year.

You see, earlier this year I decided that it was time to liquidate my 1/48th scale armor for more of the 1/56th scale plastic armor kits that companies like Rubicon and Warlord have out. It made it tough to mix 1/48th tanks with 1/56th tanks of the same type, so I sold off all my 1/48th scale stuff to a local friend. With the funds I decided to replace all my existing models I sold in the new scale along with a few other kits. That's when Drunken and I started talking about reviving the Point 213 game again. He committed to replacing his tanks to the new scale and we started talking about doing this project once more. But we were looking at least 23 vehicles and that was a bit steep in pricing for us when your talking $30.00 a tank. So we happened to be talking to another friend and he said he would help out with the game by purchasing some of the tanks for the game.

Drunkens British armor

  So now with another sucker lucky gamer joining us, we set out to acquire all the models needed for the game. Each one of us would build one build at least one British troop of tanks being one Sherman VC Firefly and three Cromwell tanks. Drunken and I purchased the Tigers and Drunken picked up a couple of other vehicles and tanks. All of the vehicles are Warlord kits, I had picked up a Rubicon and Warlord Tiger, but will be picking up one more Warlord Tiger to keep it all Warlord models.

Rubicon Tiger and Warlord Tiger

So with that goal in mind, my wife got me a belated birthday gift of one Warlord Firefly and three Warlord Cromwell's. They arrived last night and I jumped straight in to assembling the Firefly, which I have to say was a great little kit to put together.

Warlord Firefly!

So with that, we are only missing three tanks (Cromwell CS tanks) that Drunken will be picking up in the very near future. So last weekend we got out what tanks we had at the time and play tested the game in our local shop. The response we got to the play test game was amazing, people were blown away by the number of tanks (which was only half!) we had on the table. One Flames of War player thought we were playing Flames in 28mm and absolutely loved the look of the table and the idea.

8'x4' table!

Cromwells running away from the Tigers!

But one thing that we both realized after the play test game, we need terrain, lots and lots of terrain, specifically Bocage! We are estimating we will need at least 48 linear feet of bocage sections, each section will be 6" long, which means about 96 pieces of terrain! Luckily another friend of ours just did up a few bocage pieces for our local shop and we will be using his technique of using insulation foam, Woodland Scenic course ground foam and lots and lots of glue!

So there you have it, another big project lined up for 2017, so stay tuned...

TK
 

Band of Painters December Installment (Early)

So,

This is the last installment for the Band of Painters Challenge that a few of us set out on back in August. To recap, we were suppose to build 250 points each month to build up a 1000 point armies for either Konflikt 47 or for Bolt Action. So here is my last batch of models for the challenge.

German Veteran Infantry with Assault Rifles and MG's

My last batch of plastic Late War Germans, most armed with Assault Rifles and a few with MG42's. I also added in a few Panzerfaust as well.

German Heavy Infantry

Here are ten German Heavy Infantry, eight armed with Assault Rifles, two armed with MG-42's. These are really nice models and will work perfectly for many Pulp games when I need some Pulpy Nazi's!

So with that, I would like to point out a few things that I learned on the way during this challenge. First up, not all the armies are out yet for Konflikt 47, the Russians and the British is just now starting to be released, so two of the people in the challenge have suffered when it comes to having much K47 stuff in there armies.

Secondly, the K47 rules are just the Bolt Action 1st edition rules with a few K47 rules added. This made it tough in the beginning when we played games because the FAQ and errata were not out. Clockwork Goblin just recently got out a FAQ, which was the Bolt Action 1st edition errata, why they did not include those updates for the game is beyond me. But it did cause some issues during game play for new players that were not versed in Bolt Action.

Thirdly, the rules are going to pretty much stay like the 1st edition Bolt Action rules, which is going to make playing K47 hard with the 2nd edition Bolt Action rules. I see many people, myself included, mixing up the two sets of rules or trying to use previous/new rules in the games. This had lead a few folks to not wanting to play K47, because the rules are different enough but the same, know what I mean? I foresee myself playing less K47 and more Bolt Action 2 and as I get more familiar with BA2, probably dropping K47 from the main rotation of games I play. Its not a slam against the game, but having two sets of rules that are so close is going to be a pain to try to keep separate.

So is K47 a bad game, No it is not, in fact I like all the pulpy elements to the game. If you ever wanted a game that has Wolfmen, Robots, Tesla cannons and just a cool look of alternate WW2, this is the game for you! And some of the new releases coming out are awesome looking and I will pick up a few every once in a while. As I stated about the German Heavy Infantry, these models will be perfect for any sort of Pulp game!

I hope you enjoyed these installments, I am planning on a new army that is on the way as I type, will be doing a Imperial Japanese Army and will be building this for the Second Edition Bolt Action Rules. This will also be the first army that I will build exclusively for the Bolt Action Rules, all my other armies were for other WW2 games. So stay tuned for some more Bolt Action, it is coming like the Rising Sun!

TK

Band of Painters October Submission

Well,

Another month down on our little Band of Painters Challenge and I decided to take the easy route this time and work on the Panzer IV X tank that came in the starter set. This tank comes in at 230 points as a Regular crew and I paid +10 for armored side skirts, so total is 240 points.

Panzer IV X for Konfilkt 47

 The Panzer IV X kit is just a plain old plastic Warlord Panzer IV kit (it is a complete tank kit) as well as a resin turret-mounted Scherefeld Projektor which is cast up rather nicely with minor flash or issues.

Construction of the Warlord kit is pretty straight forward with an exploded diagram on the starter box. As a side note, there are no instructions on how to assemble the turret, but having put together many tank models in various scales, it was pretty easy to assemble it without instructions. Also this kit went together faster than a standard Rubicon Panzer IV, that's just an FYI.

Panzer IV X in Ambush scheme

I decided to paint up this vehicle up in the Ambush camo scheme like I did for the walker I did last month. I figured the Germans would use this on all of their vehicles in 1947 and hey, its a Sci Fi thing and alternate WW2 thing now!

Panzer IV X searching for a target!

So there you go, another installment of Band of Painters completed, next up will be a few German Heavy Infantry in Heavy armor.

TK

A Tale of Two Kitties

So,

Last week Robert over at Drunken Samurai Painting Blog, pitched me an idea for a big game that he would like to do sometime next year. It is sort of a top secret game but what I can tell you, it will require a few tanks in 28mm and use the Bolt Action Rules (I'm not going to spill the beans just yet). So with that said, I needed to start picking up a few vehicles. About two months ago, I started selling off all my 1/48th scale armor kits and started to switch over to 1/56th vehicles to be more in line with 28mm figures.

One of the kits I picked up was the Rubicon Models Tiger I Ausf. E tank to replace my Tamyia Tiger. I love the Rubicon kits and have a few now, so it was a no brainer that I would have this kit. In fact I was so excited that once I got home, I built up the kit! Now with this secret project, I knew I was going to need another Tiger, but after talking to Robert, I decided to pick up the plastic Tiger from Warlord Games this past weekend.

So last night I had some free time, so decided to build up the second Tiger to see how it matches up to the Rubicon kit. Now I have to say, if your in the market for a Tiger model, either one of these great kits will work and you will be satisfied with the results. I will be reviewing each kit below, but hear me on this, both kits are very well done and I really can't say which one is better than the other.

So first up is the cost of each kit:

Warlord Games Tiger = $32.00
Rubicon Models Tiger = $37.00

Now you can get both of these kits cheaper if you go online, but these are the suggested prices for both.

Next up is assembly, the Warlord kit gives you two plastic frames, while the Rubicon comes with three plastic frames. Each kit took about 45min to put together. Now the Rubicon kit allows you to build three different versions (early, mid or late variants), while the Warlord only allows you to build a late version. The instructions for both kits are easy to follow and pretty straight forward if you have ever built any sort of model kits in the past.

Now it is worth noting that the Warlord kit comes with zimmerit paste already sculpted on, which the Rubicon has none.

Another thing you get with the Warlord kit is a commander figure, while the Rubicon kit dose not come with a commander. Now this is not a big deal, but it is always nice to have a figure to add to the tank. On the Rubicon kit, the tracks have no real detail to them but the Warlord kit has actual track detail (you can see the track links and such). Once again its a minor issue, but not it was something I noticed when I assembled the kits.

Overall size of the kits is pretty good, but the Rubicon kit is just a hair larger than the Warlord kit. I noticed it with the gun barrel sizes, the Warlord kit is shorter than the Rubicon kit (and we all know barrel length is important, sorry!). But overall you could easily run both of these kits together on the tabletop in the same platoon without seeing an issue.

One other thing I would mention is that the detail on the Rubicon kit seems much crisper than on the Warlord kit. I am talking about the molded on detail like the tow cables and track equipment rear deck detail. Its minor and once the model is painted it will not be an issue. Both kits do come with decals, although the Rubicon decals are the same ones you get with the Panzer III & Panzer IV kits, would have liked to seen a different set of decals. The Warlord model has a generic set of German numbers and cross' which is nice.

So which one is better? Well I don't know, both kits have their strong points and low points, but as I said at the beginning of the post, these are very small issues. With saying that, I like the Rubicon kit much better since I have the option to build three variants as opposed to one version. But I think I will be buying another Warlord kit for our super secret project since the Tigers would have zimmerit on them and I do not want to green stuff up the Rubicon kit. I hope this little review helps you with deciding on a Tiger to purchase. Stay tuned for painting these big kitties.

TK

Bolt Action 700!

So,

Today a few of us met up at Imperial Outpost games to play some Bolt Action games. All of us (Myself, Robert, Howard, CJ ad Randy) are all playing in the Bolt Action escalation league being run in the Valley of the Sun at the local shops by the Warlord "Sarges", which is the Demo teams here in the states for Warlord.

Anyhow, we showed up to play some games, Rob brought his Fallschirmjager's out and I brought out my US Airborne. Everyone else brought out regular Americans (it seems the Americans were doing training today!). Rob wanted me to bring out my Desert buildings so that meant my Airborne were the 509th vs his Fallschirmjagers. The mission was Maximum Attrition, which is basically a kill them all sort of scenario.

The Desert Table

My force was pretty simple, three 10 man squads, one 8 man squad and a two man HQ. Rob ran small 5 man teams with double LMGs, had a Artillery Observer and a Medium machine gun as well as his HQ. Things started out good for the airborne, but by turn three, I was feeling that loosing feeling creeping up on me.

Paras advance thru town

By turn 5, the Americans started to fight back and by turn 6, it looked like the Americans would have the wind, which they did. Rob and I learned a lot during this game, especially moving into buildings, shooting from and at buildings and more importantly, Rob learned that assaulting a building is hard, damm hard by the way! Here are a few more shots from the game.

Paras advance down the street

And thru the palm tree groves

The American Paras in the south end of town.

Hey, are those guys with us up ahead?

Nope, here that distinct sound, its a MG34!

Paras in the buildings

It was a great game and we both learned a lot. Once again we got a nice compliment on how the table looked, in fact we get compliments every time we set up our stuff in the shop. As Rob says, "Okay painted figures, look better on a great looking table". I would agree!

 Now onto some items I have been working on over the last few weeks. Now some folks know, I have been doing 28mm WW2 gaming for about 13 or so years. So I have a huge collection figures. A couple of weeks ago, I decided that I needed to re base my Germans. I had some models that were painted well over ten years ago and a few that were painted a few months ago and one thing that stood out was the basing. Ten years ago I had a system for basing, but as I get older, I seem to have forgotten how I did it. So I started one night with unifying the basing and I am about half way through.Oh and I wrote down the colors I am using (Americana Burnt Umber, than Americana Mississippi Mud followed by Americana Mink Tan. Static grass is Army Painter Steppe Grass). So here are a few shots of my Germans.

Squad one, Crusader Miniatures

Squad Two, Crusader Miniatures

Squad Three, Black Tree Designs

Squad Four, Black Tree Design/Crusader Miniatures

HQ, Crusader Miniatures

MMG's, Crusader Miniatures

Medium Mortars, Crusader Miniatures

Flame Throwers, Crusader Miniatures

Captain, Black Tree Designs, attendants Crusader

So here are a few with the older basing that are waiting to get the new treatment, I also included a few pictures of some of the 1/48th scale tanks I use with the Germans.

PaK40's, Crusader Miniatures

Panzer Shrek team, Black Tree Designs, Engineers Crusader Miniatures

New Millennium Panzer IV

New Millennium 38T

Flak Panzer, New Millennium

Early Production Tiger, Tamiya 1/48th

Scale shot with Black Tree Design miniatures

New Millennium Panzer IV with Crusader Miniature for scale.

 

German painted left overs waiting for basing upgrade

Just FYI, the New Millennium tanks came pre painted and ready to go. I have been lazy in not weathering them up, but they are waiting for the elements to do there magic on them. These models were purchased about six years ago at Wallmart for $5.00 each! Between Rob and I, we must have about 30 of the vehicles, we went crazy for picking them up!

So there you go, a little Bolt Action update for you...

TK

First Installment Done!

Well,

The first installment of our little paint challenge is complete, as you may remember I am doing US Airborne and this first group is all Artizan Design figures. I have to say that these figures were fun to paint, they have just enough detail and they just seem to paint up quickly. So here you go, first up is my HQunit.

Next up is the 10 man squad of veterans, once again all these figures are Artizan Design figures.

Here is a shot of the whole group, all 249 points worth in all their glory!

 So with the first installment done, time to think of the next batch, so here is what I will be painting for this next month.

So I will be painting two more airborne troops with BAR's (36 points), one airborne troop with SMG (16 points), a 60mm light mortar team (46 points), a 75mm Howitzer (60 points) and lastly a 57mm Anti-tank gun (90 points). The 75mm Howitzer and the 57mm Anti-tank gun are from Warlord, the rest are Artizan Designs. So stay tuned until next month on the paint challenge.

So besides my first installment, I have been very painting. I am working on a large Chaos commission over at SPS and in the last week I completed 21 Plague Marines, 10 Obliterators, 20 Chaos Cultists and  Agis Defense line. I also completed these seven stand of American Bazookas for my Flames of War American mid war army (Here you go Robert!)

So there you go, January is in the books and I would say I am off to a good start...

TK