Flames of War German Grenadier Company 300 pt upgrade: Stug Platoon and 88s

At last!  Some big guns for my tiny Huns! 

 8.8 cm Flak battery...

 I had no idea of what the hell I was doing with these...just winged it with the camo scheme...

 Nice models, though , and fun to work on.  An extremely effective counter to enemy air support in the game, and also good for picking off tanks, of course!

The Battlefront boxed kit has lots of nice peripherals, including extra crew stands, shown here...

...and prime movers for the guns, even a staff car for the command team.  Also included were a set of trailers for the trucks.  I didn't paint those, since you don't really need them for the game, I'd lost some of the pieces and anyway my patience with modeling non-essentials has its limits...sometimes.

Stug Platoon!  Over the last two or three years the Stug III  has become one of my all time favorite AFVs.  Not as glamorous as say, the Tiger or the Pershing, but a tremendously versatile and survivable fighting machine... 

...one of a very few German AFV's produced from the very beginning of the war to the very end.  The Germans built more Stug IIIs than any other tank-type vehicle. 

One of my Flames of War pet peeves is that Battlefront does not provide stands for most of their vehicle minis like they do for most of their infantry and artillery models.  In 28mm this might not be a big deal, but with 15s it means that your infantry tower over their tank support in a galling sort of way.  In real life, tanks are big and scary, and I feel that they should get the same bases everybody else so they can look appropriately intimidating, so I add bases to all my tanks. 

 The added height won't do my Stugs and Shermans any favors when people are shooting at them on the tabletop but what do I care?  I don't play in tournaments or anything like that anyway.

Grrrr....belching fire and metal, farting blue fumes..the Stugs crawl forward in support of the grenadiers...

The horde so far...Company HQ with anti tank section, 3 Grenadier platoons, Pak 40 platoon, mortar platoon, 88s and Stugs...900 points...almost finished with my company! 







Flames of War: More Grenadier Guards (300 point upgrade)

Just finished up the latest addition to my FOW British armored squadron:  the company's fourth and final Sherman tank platoon and a motor platoon. 

The Shermans are pretty much the same as the other platoons...2 mark Vs and a Firefly...

I like the British infantry models a lot, and painting them was a lot less trying than working on the German infantry models.  There's a lot more in the way of fiddly details with the Germans...bread bags, gas mask canisters and the like...that the British don't have.

The motor platoon is small but well armed, with command stand, PIAT, light mortar and 3 machine gun teams, not a lot of staying power, but enough firepower for smaller jobs... 

 And they look cool riding in amongst the tanks, which is important too.

The platoon's transport are four American Harvester M5 half-tracks.  No machine guns, unfortunately.  Pretty much anything looks better with a machine gun on it, but the British seem to have preferred to use theirs for other purposes.

 I love half tracks!  German, American, even French...they all look great! 

  Some time back I bought some Bolt Action German h-tracks, intending to convert them to transport for a Rogue Trader Imperial Guard force.  Haven't gotten around to getting started on them, though...so  many projects, so little time.

The Squadron so far...1200 points!  The next 300 points will be a lorried rifle platoon and a heavy mortar platoon.  After that, I just need to add 4 command Shermans, 1 for each platoon, and a fighter bomber.  That will push the force out to 2,000 points, which is as far as I'm going with my FOW armies.

War Walks: Operation Goodwood

Flames of War German Grenadier Company 600 point Force Part 2: Pak 40 AT guns, Mortar Platoon and 3rd Rifle Platoon

About one hundred and thirty years or so ago, I started work on two armies for FOW; A British Grenadier Guards tank company and a German infantry company to fight them.  The project was interrupted by Afghanistan and a baby and petty stuff like that,  but now I'm finally getting back around to it.

Here's the Pak 40 platoon, ready to wreck some Tommy tanks. 

They're not spectacular or anything but I think they came out ok...

I was a bit annoyed at the quality of the crew figures on these models.  They were smaller than Battlefront's infantry figures, and not very well detailed.  I ended up replacing some of them with figures from other kits.  The guy with the shell on the gun to the left is a spare figure from the 8.8 flak gun kit.  Shell's a little over large for the pak 40, but hopefully he will still pass inspection somehow.

The command team..."See zem?  Blow zem up!"

The third and last rifle platoon, with Panzerfaust of course.

Not much different from the first two platoons...

The mortar Platoon...two sections and two observer teams...

I am partial to mortars.  So useful. Wish I had my own real life mortar platoon.

One of the observer teams.  The spotter peeks around a helpful shrub while his buddy pulls rear security.

The other observer team.  I'm terrible at painting the camo smocks that some of the minis are wearing.  Hopefully I'll get better with practice.

The finished 600 point force.  I had originally intended to include a platoon of three Stugs instead of the mortars and 3rd rifle platoon, but it didn't work out that way for whatever reason.  The Stugs and a pair of 88 flaks will make up the next 300 point block.

I have some old college pals coming out next week for a couple of days of marathon gaming.  I was hoping that I'd be able to get 1,000 points each of Germans and British finished by the time they got here, but I'm beginning to think I won't be able to get it done.  Still, made some progress on the army at least.  'Til next time...

Flames of War German Grenadier Company 600 Point Force Pt 1: Company HQ and Rifle Platoons

As night comes down over Normandy, a battered company of Grenadiers make their way toward the front...

I've been working on these guys all summer.  It's taken a long time to finish them.  Painting these 56 infantry figures took a hell of a lot longer than painting my first 600 points of British did, but that was only eight tanks, and this is less than half of the 600 point starter force of Grenadiers that I have planned out.

I'm fairly pleased with them, though.  Here is my company commander.  I wanted the commander model to stand out, so I gave him an Alsatian from the Partisans and Police set.  Also gave him a panzerfaust.

Here's the XO or 1st Sgt. Tried a camo smock on the fellow pointing over the XO's shoulder.  Came out really dark, though.  Will try to go lighter next time.

The army list I'm using is from the Atlantik Wall book.  An anti-tank section is available to this version of the Grenadier Company in the form of a double panzerschreck team or as a puppchen.  They cost the same amount of points.

 The panzerschrecks have twice the number of attacks but half the range of the puppchen.  I thought the puppchen model was fun, so I painted up both options.

Second platoon, led by a tough old Sgt...I made both platoons Panzerfausty for an xtra 10 pts each.

I painted pretty much everything in Reaper paints. I did buy the German infantry paint set from Battlefront, but the colors came out so dark that all my little Grenadiers came out looking like black blobs and I had to start over.

Army so far:

Company HQ:  Commander with Panzerfaust, XO and anti tank section..........................65 points
1st platoon:  2 squads with Command Panzerfaust team.................................................95 points
2nd platoon: same......................................................................................................95 points.
 Total:.................................................................................................................... 255 points

The other half of the force will consist of an anti-tank battery of 3 Pak40's and an assault gun platoon with 3 Stug III G's.  The force is very anti-tanky because their first opponent will most likely be my Grenadier Guards armored company, currently at 900 points.  Hopefully the support choices won't take as long to paint as the infantry have....

"Angriff!!"

Grenadier Guards Again (Flames of War 300 point upgrade)

Nothing super exciting tonight.  Just been working on building up my Flames of War British Armoured Squadron...I've miraculously managed to stick to my plan of building up the army in 300 point blocks for exactly one block so far. 

With the new 300 points, I've just bought another platoon of 3 Tommy Cookers and a platoon of Bren Carriers, but I'm kinda pleased with how it all looks, so far. 

Old Stuff:  (585 points)
HQ Platoon:
2x Sherman V:  + AA MGs: 135 points


Combat Platoons:

1st Platoon: 
2x Sherman V & 1x Firefly VC + AA MGs:  225 points

2nd Platoon:
2x Sherman V & 1x Firefly VC: +AA MGs:  225 points

New Stuff: (310 points)

 3rd Platoon:
2x Sherman V & 1x Firefly VC: +AA MGs:  225 points

Slopped on more mud, this time...

Brigade Support Platoons:

Scout Platoon:
3x Universal Carrier: 70 points + 1 extra MG per: 85 points

Would have preferred Daimler of Humber armoured cars for my recon platoon, but the Carriers were pretty cheap compared to the armoured cars, and they've grown on me.  I actually like them quite a bit, now.

I might eventually recruit some Daimlers to act as recon for my tanks, and use the Carriers to support an independent rifle platoon.

So...Good fun, so far!  Next I'd like to go for some motorized infantry and self-propelled guns, but I'll probably just knock out the last platoon of Shermans, since I've already got them, or maybe add the rifle platoon and strengthen my command platoon with 2 extra Shermans...

So, there's 895 points.  Back to my German Grenadiers, who are taking a lot longer than I imagined they would...the infantry stands are proving pretty challenging...

...til next time!