X-mas Eve manoeuvres

Hey,

X-mas just passed and because my brother came to vist once again there was a chance to confront US and German armies. Both bloodthirsty, both fully painted!

After setting the battlefield we randomly picked Top Secret scenarion:

long story short the plane crashed in some western Europe village, whole crew died but there was still a briefcase containing top secret documents to be retrieved. Most probably V3 rockets plans or something. Both sides need that stuff and need it now!

The battlefield:   

Round 1:

It was retrieve mission so both sides tried to bring in as many units as possible from the very beginning. Big surprise was German infantry squad mounted on bikes which got dangerously close to the plane in the very first round!
The only thing I could do was bringing Hellcat into the game: luckly for Uncle Sam my destroyer hit the nazi bikers both with big gun and machine gun, sending 5 of them to Valhalla and forcing the last one to flee. 

Most of US forces also reached the positions: 
infantry squad moved into building supported by medic and veteran sniper, on the other side of the road arrived the commander, bazooka team, mortar and air force forward observer. 

At the same time Germans brought medium mortar and spotter, infantry squad and truck loaded with another squad + force commander.
Those damn nazis dismounted reaching the plane! Disaster! 😤

Round 2:

Germans started the second round by bringing the biggest nightmare of any US commander: Flakverling! From the hill it had clear view on the most of the battlefield! 🥶

Before the gun crew left transporter I tried to reach it with bazooka but the target was an inch beyond the maximum range.
At this point I had no other choice then calling an airstrike on infantry next covering the plane.

German MMG and infantry opened fire to Hellcat giving it 2 pin markers:
which was just enought to make it fail order test and eventually - useless to the very end of the game. In responce my GIs left the building and fired at enemy machine gun:

11 shots at close range was more that enough to take it down. Still the Hellcat wasn't worth it.

German commander grabbed the briefcase and started falling back covered by infantry. 

My mortar  and HQ squad missed so shit got really thick right now...

Trying to cut off German commander Dodge packed with infantry squad and Jeep moved from the flank but they reached only the hedge line. Seeing that German commander moved the truck in front of my wheelers which opened fire at my Jeep pinning it.

Germans brought another medium machine gun to stop my flanking action, they also tried to take down my sniper with mortar fire but luck was on my side this time.

Round 3:

Suddenly US airplane came down from the skies aiming for German infantry squad but Flakverling did it's job right: plane pilot didn't even see the target before flak fire torn his machine into bits of scrap. The battle seemed to be over but in act of desperation another airstrike was called - this time on Flakverling itself.

Seconds after pieces of burning junk fell down from the skies Panzerkampfwagen III flanked my cars destroying Dodge and forcing the squad to emergency landing. PzIII also took down 3 GIs advancing nearby. Actually there were 4 casaulties but medic did his job.

It wasn't much better on the flank:

Kubelwagen rolled in trying to take down my mortar and then - lieutenant, bazooka team or the observer (all easy targets). But it missed all shots!

Seconds later my commander and his sidekick moved between trees and fired the invader - a perfect shot just under the line of Stahlhelm was just enough to get rid of mobile MMG.

The briefcase was now almost behind German line...

US assault squad tried to storm machine gun in the back but failed order check.
Germans put some more pin markers on the Jeep so it looked like the game was over. 

US commander ripped army list to pieces and prepared to pack the toys and go back home...

Round 4:

Since the game was practically over and we were bit drunk already decision was made just to solve an airstrike pro forma:

tha plane not only arrived but evaded all shots from Flakverling and second later there was no more German flak!

US commander had to take pieces army list from the bin trying to assemble it...  

There still was some hope!
I didn't manage to bring the other truck in the previous turn but it arrived now just from behind the hill. The driver fired at enemy commander but didn't even make a scratch.
Engineers did better: 

after jumping of the Dodge they gunned down Axis lieutenant and tried to torch the squad nearby but it was out of flamethrower's range. Gulp! 😬

Germans didn't take a risk:

they put on the bayonets and charged US engineers killing 5 and giving 2 in return. 
Without any US units able to pick up the briefcase nearmy the game was definitely over. 
Looking forward for rematch.

US infantry (winter war) #1

Looks like I've finally made it - the entry for Strategie painting contest is finished!
Was bit worried before entering, because after finishing painting the army I was barely pissing olive green. Painting lots of stuff with the very same colors is just damn boring and demotivating. After getting army done allI wanted was painting anything red 😁

So to make things little different I washed some models and gave them fresh paints - this time winter themed. The idea is the winter came suddenly (not  much snow on the ground) and GIs haven't got proper, winter clothing. 

I am pretty satisfied about artificial snow, it makes really nice contrast with greens and browns of uniforms. I also like placing team weapons on single bases - not very smart for gaming purposes but looks way better.

Time to repaint some vehicle...

FULLY PAINTED Bolt Action US army

So looks like it finally happened:

after few years of gaming my US army is fully painted and ready to spread democracy among gaming tables, with fire, explosives and air raids!

I had little somthing to write about every unit in the force but now, looking at them presenting together I am just glad whole project is finished. 
Can't remember I've been taking army pics every before but really like that crawling mass, reminds me good old Sudden Strike RTS. If anyone's interested buildings are from Black Grom Studio. And if you want some close ups check the labels under post or on the panel (there's 200 letters space limit under posts).

Hope you like the family shots:

And some pics from the painting station. Finally got the reason to clean it up...

I wonder if such a mass is sellable at all...

"Hurricane": Dodge 3/4 (second take)

And here's another victim of COVID-19 madness.

In fact, this one has been painted like a week before the Hellcat, but decided not to post it earlier because my local opponent is also checking updates of the bloggy...

Bolt Action intelligence is also running it's wars ;-)

Anyway I needed another transporter for infantry. Deuce and half is just too big (I'd never put 24 men there, so it'd be a waste of points), and Warlord Games nor Rubicon Models sell truck for 12 men.  Given the circumstances Dodge is just perfect:
fast, cheap, armed with machine gun and carries full squad of engineers!

Just like in case of Hellcat I decided to paint it rather dusty than muddy. Also tested new dark undercoat, which is just supercool for chipping paint (dark tone contrasts nicely with).
The previous Dodge was painted almost exactly last year for Road to Berlin 2019 gaming, the new one was painted with hope to be used during Berlin 2020 planned for April - which was cancelled for obvious reasons...

Oh well, the infantry should appreciate new wheeler anyway.
Here're my maxi taxis:

And the new one:

As for the model next to the wheeler it's another piece finished "thank to" that damn virus (hope it lasts long enough to get Rangers done ^^ ).
Warlord Games provides only one metal flamethrower (the winter one is out of my interest) so decided to build my own. The assistant is from West Wind - there's really cool Berlin or Bust line of US soliders. Ther're same scale but are bit smaller compared to Black Tree. Nevermind - look great in a mob and smaller is better for sneaking with burning death...

The torch operator is Black Tree Design piece - that's really underrated line. Sure, some models look kinda clumsy but the offer is really big: thank to this I got whole infantry metal with no doubles!
The guy was carrying standard right which I cut off and tried to file the middle part so it looks more-less like a pile. The battel is just piece if anything - just tried to make is as thick as the middle part. The flame is placcy ork haircut ^^
Tanks come from oldie sentinel but I made them just shorter to fit the model. Ta - daa!

The team was made to test some colors for Rangers squad - there're almost the same as rest of army but I still want to make that unit differ: trousers are green instead of standard khaki, boots are brighter, helmets will be even darker, belts are white instead of bright olive. Looking forward to see them on the table...

o/

Painted 1200 pts US army

There's been quite a lot about making terrain for Bolt Action battlefield recently, so it's time to turn the tide, back into stricte miniatures.

For recent "Road to Berlin" campaign each or participants had to prepare 2 army lists: 

1200 points from the same selector. I think the idea was to fit the army to specific scenario's conditions (attack/defence, capture markers or whatever).

So here are mine.

Quite a rare occasion to show fully painted battleforce actually...

The first one is anti-tank group:

Local players like heavy armour a lot, in fact it's nothing unusual to see 2 tanks on 1000 pts games. Therefore I became tank allergic...

Sure it's fun to use large squads but when confronted with German armour, my infantry melts like snowman in March...

So the remedy is solid anti-tank punch:

- 2 bazookas,

- Hellcat and Greyhound (light AT gun but still counts),

- AT atrillery,

- air support,

- flamethrower (in case shit gets really thick and REALLY close).

In my opinion it's solid and reliable force but during Berlin game had not much chances to show what was it worth because scenarios' specific conditions. Nevertheless these work just fine in local conflicts:

The other one is something way more funny: 

the core is almost the same but AT vehicles were replaced with nasty Jeep and Sherman Calliope: really like that model and it brings lots of randomness to the game. And sheer terror...

The other thing is mounting 2 infantry squads on transport vehicles - also really nasty thing especially if the scenario allows outflanking...

What next?

I'd like to deal with remaining infantry (paint them or sell) and one more tank. In the future I'd also like to add one more anti-tank gun (this time heavy) with a tow. We'll see.