Flashpoint Minis' 15mm ARVN Platoon

All,

Continuing my saga in 15mm skirmish gaming, I've really lost my mind and can't seem to stop.  I've been working on a big Vietnam project (coming along VERY slowly, US Marine Corps vs North Vietnamese Army in the Battle of Dai Do), and I needed a few terrain bits, so I popped over to the Flashpoint Minis website (which is where my USMC troops are from).  I perused a bit and spotted some stuff I needed, then I gave another look back at the figures and saw Flashpoint had put out a new rifle platoon, one for the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, commonly referred to as ARVN, or "Ahr-vinn."  I looked at the pics of the figs and I just couldn't help myself, I had to have some!  So I threw them in the cart and the rest is history.

Now, I have no project plans for these troops, I really was just tackled by a case of the 'ooh, shiny.'  And so without having a project in mind, I didn't really know how to paint them up.  I've seen early war pics of ARVN in plain green with dark green helmets, I've seen pics of ARVN in 'duck hunter' camouflage, I've seen ARVN Rangers with their crazy-ass yellow, striped helmets with the black panther on the front, I've seen ARVN Marines in woodland camo and tigerstripe camo.  The possibilities are almost endless; as my buddy Jimmi (proprietor of Flashpoint Minis) said, ARVN troops were spotted in "...a bewildering array of different uniforms."  I have sort of daydreamed about doing some ARVN stuff, usually Fall of Saigon, or the Laos incursion, or some Vietnamese Marine Corps during the Easter Offensive, and I figured, 'why limit myself?'  So it might seem a little goofy, but I basically did all the above, painting the platoon up in a bewildering array of different uniforms.  Hope you like'em, I do, I'm very happy with how they turned out.

The entire platoon, 48 figures (including one casualty figure).  A very big force for me; if you follow the blog you've seen me turn out a tremendous amount of forces, usually pretty quickly, but that's because I'm usually doing around 15 to 20 figures.  So the sheer size, combined with the tremendous variation in the uniforms, really took me a long time; I think I spent a total of about 9 hours to clean, prime, paint, wash, and base these guys, which is a lot of game time I missed out on.  So I need to get these guys on the table and make up for some lost time ;)

A few words about the figures themselves: first, the sculpting is fantastic.  Very good proportions, though a few of them look a little too well fed for your average Vietnamese ;)  But the weapons look great, with only one in the whole pack that is not immediately identifiable (you can tell the type, just not the model), and the gear all looks fantastic.  But there are two things that are fantastic; 1) the sheer amount of different poses available (out of 48 troops, there is one pose with five guys, four with four guys, one with three poses, and the rest of the poses are ones and twos); and 2) there are quite a few poses which which I would guess were taken straight from photographs of real life ARVN troops in the action.  I always think that is great; I mean, I'm looking at the guy and I'm thinking "I've actually seen that photograph, and it looks just like that."

But enough yakking, let's get to the photos.

First up is the boss, the "Dai Uy."  If not taken directly from a photo, it certainly is very close.  I did a bunch of different colored berets in the force, and here you start to see the differences in uniforms.  The guy on left is in Tigerstripes, while the guy on the right is in the plain green US jungle fatigues.  He's got a .45 pistol in his right hand, and a shoulder holster for it on his chest.  You'll also see a lot of the figures are wearing scarves; I went only with red and yellow, probably should have mixed in green and blue as well.

Reverse, where you can see he's wearing a fanny pack on his utility belt, but no H-Harness (fitting an officer).

Next up his RTO (radioman), and I believe this pose is taken from a photo.  Guy on left has a helmet with no helmet cover, guy on right has the distinctive Ranger helmet.  Guy on left is wearing woodland camo, guy on right wearing jungle fatigues.  I love the pose; he's got the handset in his right hand and his rifle (M-16) in his left.

And the reverse.  The details of the radio don't look right if it's a PRC-77, but I don't know that that is what it's supposed to be.  But it's immediately recognizable as a radio, and the gear looks good, particularly the rifle (it looks so natural).

Another set of RTOs, with woodland camo (left) and Tigerstripes (right).

And reverse, where this radio is definitely a PRC-77 on a frame.

Now to the real men, a couple M-60A1 gunners, humping The Pig.  Woodland camo with Ranger helmet at left, old (olive drab) fatigues and helmet coverless helmet at right.  In real life, all the photos I've seen of ARVN with no helmet cover shows them really dark, looking almost black.  I couldn't get it right, so I stuck with a regular dark green.

Reverse.  I think the gun looks great, and I love the ammo belt.

And two more machine gunners in a great, very natural looking prone firing postion.

Reverse.

Two assistant gunners, one in jungles (left) and one in the old fatigues (right).  Sorry, very subtle differences in color...

Got a fanny pack and belt of ammo; no spare barrel though.

Two scouts, left with no helmet cover and brown-side out duck hunter camo, and right in three-green US helmet and Tigerstripes (think Martin Sheen from Apocalypse Now).  It's been hard to see due to my jungle grass basing, but I put the bulk of these guys in US jungle boots; you can just see the OD green canvas sides of the boots on the guy at right.  This is the one guy who's weapon is not immediately apparent; you can definitely tell it's a submachine gun, but I'm not sure if it's supposed to be an M3 Grease Gun, or a French MAT-49.  Or maybe even a Swedish K?

Reverse.  Both guys have small packs with bedrolls.

Next up is the Doc (left) and a a rifleman (right), with Doc in old fatigues and with no helmet cover, and the rifleman in brown-side out duck hunter and beret.

Reverse.  On right you can see the rifleman' ALICE pack, with three external pouches (looks great).

One more so you can see the Doc's Unit One.

Two grenadiers with M-79s.  The guy on left is in jungle fatigues and green-side out duckhunter camo (with a bandage on his helmet).  The guy on right is in Tigerstripes and US three-green helmet cover (and smokes on his helmet).

Reverse, you can see jungle boots on right.

On left we have an NCO-ey looking guy hollerin' at the boys in old fatigues and 3-green helmet cover, while the guy on right is a sniper (with M-1C), wearing jungle fatigues and green-side out duckhunter helmet cover (hell, he could pass as WWII or Korea US Marine).

Reverse.

Three riflemen with M-16.  From left to right we have (uniforms) jungles, old fatigues, and Tigerstripes, and (helmets) no helmet cover, 3-green, and Ranger.

Reverse, we see they're wearing old-style packs.

Three prone riflemen; this is another pose that is definitely from a picture.  Guy at left is no helmet cover and Tigerstripes, guy at center has 3-green helmet cover but can't see the uniform, and guy at right has the Ranger helmet with Woodland cammies.

Another shot.

Four more rifleman, another photo.  I love the proportions on this guy; so thin, with the helmet looking over-sized.   You can figure out the uniforms yourself ;)

Figures mixed up to give you a look from different angles.  You can't really see it, but the two guys not in cammies I painted olive drab flak jackets on.

Close up of the guy in Tigerstripes.

Four more riflemen with M-16s.  I believe I've seen this pose in a photo, though the figure looks just a little chunkier than the photo.  Third from left is in brown-side out duckhunter.

Figures mixed up, you can see he's toting an M-66 LAW on his back.

A closeup of the guy.

The next four riflemen in various uniforms.

Also carrying a LAW.  I love the fact there quite a few LAWs present.

Closeup.  Looks like the panther on the right-hand guy only has one eye...

Four more riflemen with LAWs, and this is absolutely from a picture I've seen from the end of the war, I want to say fighting near some sand dunes up near the DMZ.

Figs mixed up.

A close up.

And five grenadiers with M-79 Thumper (or the 'bloop gun').  A like the pose, but he looks just a little big; again, I believe this is from a photo, but he's just a bit thicker than the real life guy.  A great pose, I'm just comparing it to the photo (I remember, or think I remember).

Figs mixed up.

And the closeup.  The gun itself is very well done, to include the leaf sight.

And now some action shots, just to show the guys off a bit more.

The LT (right) waving to the crowds while Big Sarge (left) tells the guys to bring the Cadillac convertible around, and the RTO (center) complains to his buddies on the company net.

A gun team and grenadier move up.

Another gun team, this time in action.

A few riflemen moseying around.

Doc sprinting to a casualty.

Oh, I forgot!  Here's a look at the casualty figure in the sun...

And in the shade.

And last pic, a Scout (left) moves up while the sniper (right) scopes the treeline.

Well, that's the whole force.  Please leave a comment somewhere to let me know what you think, and I'll see if I can't get them into action in the near future.  I've got plenty of troops ready for The 'Nam, but I'm still lacking some vehicles and haven't got much further done on my terrain tiles...

And I spent all weekend painting these guys (and some others I'll post soon) up, so I didn't get any games in, though the boy and I did playtest Two-Hour Wargames' "Hell Hath No Fury" rules.  We really liked them, so we plan on playing a co-op campaign following a German tank platoon from the 13th Panzer Division from Barbarossa to Berlin; we'll see how far we make it.  I've recently become aware that I might have too many projects going on...

V/R,
Jack