Eureka Minis 15mm US Marines for Early WWII

All,

Switching gears, I haven't forgotten about WWII, and continue to add to that collection as well.  I've been working on US and Japanese troops for a campaign (actually, a series of campaigns) in the Pacific.  I had planned on beginning the 'war' at Guadalcanal in August 1942, but when I found myself over on the Eureka Miniatures website looking at Modern Australians I stumbled into something else: US Marines for early war.  They're actually titled "Wake Island," but that doesn't work for me as I plan on following a platoon of Gyrenes through the entire war, and many of the early war battles were battles of annihilation, all US troops being captured or killed.  So I'm not quite sure where I'll start, probably make up some scenario for the Philippines where Marines are involved on the Bataan Penninsula but end up being ordered out or otherwise escaping to live and fight another day.

In any case, that is for the future; for now, let's look at these magnificent little sculpts.

The whole force, 17 troops from several different packs.  I bought a pack of two leaders, two BAR men, a two-man M-1917 water-cooled machine gun, a pack of three Marines with Thompson submachine guns, and a pack of eight riflemen armed with the venerable '03 Springfield.  I painted them up in early war khaki, with sand leggings and load bearing gear, and dark green 'pie plate' helmets.  Did grassy bases for the jungle.

First men up is the leader pack.  I painted them up as an officer (left) and a senior NCO (right).  You can see a 'stache and rank insignia on the officer's helmet, and I tried to paint stripes on the NCOs sleeves.

Reverse.  I really like the sculpts.  Good proportions, natural looking poses, got some good heft to them, raised detail to make it easy to paint.

The officer's helmet and moo-stache.

The Sergeant's stripes.

Next we have our three men with M1928 Thompson machine guns, still chambered for .45 ACP (as opposed to the later M-1 Thompson chambered for .30 cal).  My only problem with this entire range is these guys (don't misunderstand, it's nothing I can't live with): their Tommy Guns should be a bit longer (the barrel), should have a foregrip, and were much more likely to have utilized the drum rather than the straight, 20-round magazine.

Tommy Gunners coming at ya.  Again, nice proportions, no one is flat.  I painted stripes on each of these guys, figure they're Corporals.

Reverse.  They have the early war, all leather, pouches for their magazines.

Backside.

The two Marines of the BAR pack.  Looking good.

Reverse.  Apparently, somewhere along the way, I scraped the guy on the right's barrel.  Need to fix that...

The two-man machine gun team manning the M-1917, complete with tripod, box for the ammo (attached, as well as another with the A-gunner), and water coolant.  Yay!  The gunner actually has a pistol!  I put stripes on the gunner too.

Reverse.

Comin' at ya.  I will point out that each guy is on kind of a half-base, they're meant to base together right next to each other.

Backside.

Another look.

And one more.  Excellent sculpting.  I keep coming back to the sculpts for this reason: I'd actually seen these on the Eureka website quite some time ago, but I was a little leery of purchasing them as the pics on the website make them look a bit weedy.  In my humble opinion, Eureka Minis is doing themselves a major disservice with the photos on their website, the figures are so much better than the pics.

Now we get to the riflemen, the first two Privates with Springfields.

Reverse.  You get a good look here at their long bayonets.

Two more rifleman poses.

Reverse.

Next two.  Awesome, classic marksmanship poses: a good 'off-hand' on the left, a good 'kneeling' on the right.

Reverse.

And the last two rifle poses, a kneeling and watching and a prone rifleman.

Reverse.

Another look at the prone pose.

And one more.

So, there they are, my next latest force for 15mm skirmish gaming.  Dammit, I can't wait to get these guys on the table, I just don't have time to do all the stuff I want to do!!!  I'm sure this is the eternal lament of the wargamer, but it's killing me nonetheless.  I highly recommend these troops for some early war US action, they're absolutely fantastic.  Meanwhile, I need to get back to my Cuba Libre stuff in the Middle East, coming soon.

V/R,
Jack

Eureka Minis 15mm Modern Australians in Universal Cam

All,

More modern skirmish troops, this time from Eureka's 15mm line of Modern Australians.  These troops are really magnificent, just great sculpts with great poses and great detail in their gear.  You may recall that I've previously painted and posted up Modern Aussies on the blog; with them I took my first shot at universal camouflage pattern. It looked pretty good (I thought), but didn't look 'right,' if that makes sense.  I've also posted that I took six of them and painted them up as modern private military contractors (PMCs).  Well, not being in love with the camo I did on the first platoon of Aussies, I sold them off, bought some more, and gave it another go.  This time I'm much happier with my attempt at universal cam, think I did a pretty okay job.

The whole group, sixteen troops.  I bought the rifleman pack, the SAW (Minimi) pack, the standing and the kneeling command packs, the prone machine gun team, and a prone sniper team (in regular uniform, not the ghillie suit).  All the troops from all the packs are not here as I stole some and made some more PMCs, but that's for another post.  Being in universal cam, the point is to operated in desert and temperate climates, so I did my best to base them where they'd fit in either.  I also have some that I'm going to paint up for Arctic climate, but haven't started working on them yet.

First up is the standing command pack, a leader-type and his RTO.  I put them in universal cam, to include their vests and gear pouches, and they're all wearing gloves.  I also did my now 'normal' three skin-tone variations that I've come to know and love for post-WWII troops.

Reverse.  The gear and weapons look fantastic, and I dig the poses too.

A close up of the universal cam; basically, I just softened all the colors.  I used three colors (olive drab, dark tan, and khaki) for the underlying camo, about a third for each color, then dotted with sand and dark gray.  It still may not be perfect, but I'm very happy with how it turned out.

A kneeling leader on the right and a rifleman on the left.

Reverse.

Two more riflemen.

Reverse.

Two SAW gunners.

Reverse.

Two men with grenade launchers (now referred to as 'UGLs,' somehow).

Reverse.

The prone machine gun team; I'm actually not sure what the Aussies call it.  I know some Europeans call it the FN-MAG, the Brits call it the MAG-58 (or simply 'Jimpy,' for General Purpose Machine Gun), and the US calls it the M-240.

Reverse.

A prone SAW team.

Reverse.

And the sniper team.  I absolutely love how the spotter is leaned back, all casual, on his patrol pack/camelback.

Reverse.

Another look.

And one more.

So there's my next set of modern bad-asses, ready to hop into the (tabletop) fight.  Not sure where they'll see action, but almost assuredly it will be something continuing my 'Cuba Libre' story.  More stuff to post, and I'm working on a modern Middle East batrep (for which I used Ambush Alley's "Lawyers, Guns, and Money" scenario pack).  Stay tuned.

V/R,
Jack

QRF 15mm Modern French Infantry (Temperate)

All,

Back to modern troops!  Continuing my fascination with, and desire to get them on the table, I proudly present some QRF 15mm Modern French infantry in temperate camo.  I bought five packs: command, rifles firing, rifles advancing, rifles with AT-4s, and rifles with FELIN gear.  I also bought a 4 x 4 VAB armored car, though it's not finished yet.  I painted up half the troops from the five packs (presented here), and the other half I'll paint up in desert colors.

I ordered direct from QRF (in the UK) and received them in about two weeks; so the price and the speed of receipt were both things I was pleasantly surprised by.  Regarding the sculpts themselves: size and heft-wise they are a bit slighter than Battlefront, fitting in nicely with Peter Pig.  The sculpts themselves can be just a little soft on detail, but you buy them in packs of 8 figures and there are three different poses in each, so a good deal there, and the poses themselves are pretty damn cool.  Pretty dynamic, pretty distinct, good proportions, and it's easy to see what the weapon is and what the guy is doing, so overall I'm very happy with this purchase.

The whole force, twenty guys.  Again, I did them up in temperate camo, something I've struggled with for the French.  I think I finally got the colors right; the pattern has been tough for me to pull off for some reason, I think I did an okay job with it.  They're all based using static grass, on US pennies, as I find myself doing purely skirmish fights in 15mm.  Let's get to the poses.

First up are two guys from the command group, an officer/NCO type on left, and an RTO on the right.  The leader has a pistol holster on his chest (little hard to make out in the photo, but looks good in real life).  You get a good look at the camo, which looks decent; I did the gear and body armor in Italian Green, which I think looks okay, used khaki, dark green, Italian Dark Brown, and black on the camo.  Both guys are armed with the FAMAS rifle, which looks good, and I really like the poses themselves.

Reverse, you can see the radio on the back of the right-hand guy.

The third pose, another officer/NCO, from the command pack.  You can see he's got some sort of optic on his FAMAS.

You can see I did my usual three different skin tones; all the guys are wearing gloves and have goggles on their helmets (almost all have goggles, not quite all).

Reverse.

Two poses from the FELIN rifle pack.  Both guys have optics on their rifles, which I think is pretty cool, and looks like NVGs on their helmets.  The barrel for the guy on the left is a bit short, but I think that is a casting issue rather than a sculpting issue.

Reverse.  I like the gear; no packs, but they've got a decent amount of gear on (and you don't really see French infantry with packs a lot in the 'real life' photos in any case).

Last pose from the FELIN pack, I like it.  Rather then goggles, looks like the guys have NVGs on their helmets.

Reverse.

Two guys from the firing rifles pack, guy on right has an optic on his rifle (looks like an aiming dot).

Reverse.

The third pose from the firing rifles pack.

Reverse.

Two poses from the advancing rifles pack, optic on guy at left.

Reverse.

Last pose from the advancing rifles pack

Reverse.

And now we get to the AT-4 pack, two guys firing.  I love the kneeling pose, looks really cool to me.

I turned them so you can see they're sculpted in 3D, not flat.

Reverse.

And the last pose, two riflemen carrying AT-4s.  Not sure why, but I really love this pose, just looks cool to me.

And reverse.  I just can't help but put yellow on anti-tank weapons, throw a little color in their.

Well, that's the next force added to my modern skirmish collection, already got a plan for an operation (5 or 6 fights) to get them on the table.  I've got more modern forces to show ya, so stay tuned.

V/R,
Jack