2021 Basing & Re-Basing Part 3 - 28mm Finnish WWII

The third installment of the 2021 Basing and Re-Basing series consists of figures that I've painted for my 28mm Finnish Continuation War & Lapland War army. These are mostly Warlord figures with some Artisan figures mixed in. For rules these will likely be used in Iron Cross, Bolt Action, 1-48 Tactics and Chain of Command games. For WWII Skirmish our club is all over the map as far as rules go. Thank goodness none of these rule sets have much in the way of requirements for basing. 

The Boffors 37mm AT gun was a staple for the Finns starting with the Winter War. Due to shortages they continued to use these throughout the conflict. Ineffective against anything much heavier than a T-26, the Finns still found them useful. I'll also be including additional German-supplied AT guns later on in the construction of this army. I modified the sitting loader figure by putting an ammunition crate under his behind instead of trying to cram him onto the gun's trails. 

The LMG gunner and his assistant. This figure is carrying the Lahti-Saloranta M/26 LMG. It's a nice touch that Warlord includes this figure in their Finnish infantry pack instead of a generic MG-34/42. Cheers to them for that. I can always supplement the LMGs in this force with German figures from my dead lead collection as the Finns received plenty of helmets, webbing, canteens, etc. from the Germans during the Continuation war. A figure unique like this one is much harder to come by.

The Lieutenant and his runner/assistant. The Finnish junior officers preferred the rifle to an SMG, unlike other armies. SMG gunners were considered to be 'assault' role soldiers. These two figures are place holders for now, and will likely end up being regular riflemen as the force continues to evolve. I'm sure I can find a figure with an appropriate uniform and hat down the road.

 

 

Infantry squad number one. Lapland and Continuation war Finnish squads had 2-3 SMGs with the balance being riflemen. I'm including one rifleman with a Molotov Cocktail in each of these squads. This squads figure comes from the Warlord Finnish Infantry boxed set. Ideally I will eventually want to find a rifleman waving to be the NCO in each squad, but for now the SMG gunner to the right will do as the NCO for this squad.

 

Infantry squad number two. Another SMG figure that sure looks like he's the NCO. I might just have to roll with this, we'll see. The Molotov Cocktail rifleman is a re-purposed French resistance fighter. Based on period photos, regulation headgear wasn't strictly enforced and uniforms in the field often were improvised. He'll do just fine for me.

 

Next up in the re-basing project are over 180 Macedonian pikemen that I purchased on Ebay. That update may be a while further down the road before it's ready to publish. For now this will be the final installment of the re-basing updates. Hopefully my next post will me more games, or newly-painted figures.