28mm Late-War British Weapons Teams (2)

Here are my first completed figures of 2020. Sixteen figures making up a Vickers HMG .50-cal gun, two 2" light mortars and four two-man Bren gun teams.

This is a true mixed bag of manufacturers. The Vickers MG is from Warlord Games,  the 2" mortars are from Crusader Miniatures, and the Bren gun teams are from West Wind miniatures. It's fantastic how well all three of these figure lines work together. Additionally I've had equally good luck matching up Artisan 28mm WWI British into this mix of manufacturers.

These were a straight forward paint up done on my Twitch stream over two full and two partial sessions. In addition to my normal block paint and wash, I added some flesh highlights and some highlighting on the gunmetal parts of the Bren teams. I wanted to 'pump up' the quality, but not so much that these figures would look out of place with the rest of my previously painted British WWII figures.

Subject matter on my painting table right now is all over the map as I try to work up a portfolio of painted figures on my Instagram page to show people what things I like to paint. Next up on the painting table are some Roman principes and velites.

28mm British WWII Engineers

This month I'm running a WWII skirmish game at my club using some house rules added on to Iron Cross to aid in faster multi-player game play. The game will be a British assault to capture a bridge defended by a German garrison and a pillbox. Think Pegasus Bridge with a much more modest bridge. The action is set around the dash from Carentan into the heart of France.

With a pillbox as a primary terrain feature, I really wanted the British to have tools to assault with. To me, this means some engineers and primarily a flamethrower team. This is Warlord Games pack WGB-BI-49. Nothing particularly special, with the paint job. It is my normal block paint with sepia wash. Quick and dirty, finished just in time for the play test tomorrow night. They still need a coat or two more of flat varnish to cut down the sheen. They're likely to get that after Friday night's play test game.

These will count as five figures in my annual painting totals. Painting has slowed to a stop for me during the spring, as I coach high school pole vault. Now that track season is over, and the summer heat wave has hit, I expect painting to resume to it's normal (aka slow) pace. Next up on the painting table, 16 crusades spear-men to act as warriors in my Saga crusades army.

More WWII British Infantry and Support Weapons

These will likely be the last figures posted for 2017. The year started off well with me doing quite a bit of 28mm vehicle conversions for WWII skirmish gaming, but personal events kept me away from the painting table for most of the year. With a game to put on tomorrow, I found the motivation to base up these figures which have been languishing on the painting table since late spring.

The infantry in the force consists of ten rifle-armed infantry, two Thompson-armed NCOs and a crouching figure suitable as an officer or forward observer as needed. In addition to the grunts, there is another 3" mortar and a 'Six-pounder' anti-tank gun. All figures are West Wind figures (from Old Glory here in the USA) with the exception of the two NCOs which I believe are Artisan. They are block painted and finished with my home made 'magic wash'. Grass tufts are Leadbearer's tufts which I highly recommend. I'll count this as 21 figures for this year's painting totals counting each special weapon as a single figure.

More 28mm Late-WWII German Armor and Big Game Preparation Update #2

Here are a portion of the AFVs that were previewed earlier in my "Too Much WIP" post. These are the completed vehicles that aren't waiting on crews to be painted. Hopefully those that are waiting for crew figures to be painted will be completed soon. This is a mix of no less than three different manufacturers.

First up are two vehicles from Die Waffenkamer Miniatures. This is an SdKfz 121 Panzer II Luchs. The casting on this model was quite good. I did have to replace the barrel and muzzle break with a scratch-built one made of steel wire. Likewise, I chose to replace the antenna with steel wire with the kit-supplied birds nest antenna affixed on top after some slight modifications. I also chose to add magnets to the turret to help secure it during play. There were some slight bubbles in the tracks, but nothing that wasn't forgivable once weathering powders were applied.

The Kubelwagen was another story. The casting on this was much less acceptable, with many air bubbles in the resin. After filling some, I gave up and painted it as-is. They look a bit like battle damage, but honestly they mostly look like crappy air bubbles. Moral of this story is buy these at a shop or trade show so you can look over the castings. When the casting is good, they're excellent models.

 Next up is a Flakpanzer IV Wirbelwind from West Wind's "Berlin or Bust" line. These are listed as 1/60 scale, and to be honest that's pretty accurate. They're a touch smaller than the Warlord and Die Waffenkamer models which are 1/56 scale. It's enough of a difference that I'll probably have to not use the Wirbelwind on the table at the same time as Panzer IVs or Stugs from the other manufacturers. This is probably an acceptable trade off for such a unique model. I may still add some foliage to this model similarly to how I added it to my 15mm ones. The four barrels were cut off and replaced with scratch-built ones made of steel wire. I'm starting to make this S.O.P. with anything I feel won't stay straight when used on the tabletop. Better to do the work now than after they break off!

 Last up for the newly-completed armor, a bog-standard Warlord Stug IIIg. Considering how common these and Panzer IVs were in the German arsenal, I think every collection should have at least one of each. I've chosen to leave off the schurzen but added some additional stowage to make up for the lack of 'stuff' on the sides. I just like the looks of Stugs without the schurzen a lot more than those with. I wasn't happy with the barrel of the gun after I cleaned it up. To fix this I cut off the muzzle break, drilled it out and replaced the lead barrel with one built from brass rod. I turned each end of the rod to the correct size by chucking it into my rotary tool and using a file on it at high RPMs - the poor-man's miniature engine lathe!

In addition to the above armor that I painted. I also added the finishing touches to 17 more German infantry that I recently purchased from the Veteran Painting Service on Ebay. Not much to say here that wasn't covered in my post from my previous purchase. I'm not sure I needed these for the big game. I purchased them well before I scheduled the big game because they were a good deal and I recently had some free hobby money from selling off some un-used 28mm ACW lead.

 Last up I laser-cut, assembled and painted up fifty (50) movement trays for the big game. I'm pretty sure I won't be using all of these, but I'm not exactly sure of how many of which I will need, so I cut up a bunch of each just to be safe. Time is getting short, so economy of scale is important. Below a quick shot of one infantry unit in a tray. So my total for tonight is four vehicles completed, 17 figures touched up for play and 50 movement trays cut, assembled and painted. Not a bad night's work!