Wargaming In An Exceedingly Poor Manner...

All,

Believe it or not, despite limited wargaming time, I've actually been quite busy using up every minute I could spare.  I just haven't used it in a intelligent manner...  Once again I have found myself in a gaming void, lacking motivation, then gaining motivation but then lacking proper miniatures, gathering proper miniatures but then lacking appropriate rules, or having my motivation for whatever project I was working on superseded by another, new project.  I've been spending time and money like I'm independently wealthy, which, I assure you, is not the case...  I've had so much going on that I need to break this post up into sections (should really be separate posts, I suppose, but I'm feeling too lazy for that at the moment).

On a side note, the switch from 10mm to 15mm has perhaps resulted in more aesthetically pleasing miniatures (at least I hope so, or what was it all for? And that is certainly not meant as any slight to 10mm), but it's really changed me.  I've become what can only be described as a 'finicky wargamer.'  Whereas with 10mm I was constantly gaming and spitting out batreps, my gaming production has taken a tremendous dive since the move to 15mm.  While some of that dip owes to collecting forces, it's more than that; previously I was satisfied with a 'close enough'-type approach to miniatures.  Don't have 10mm Poles, meh, just use 10mm Soviets.  Don't have 10mm French trucks?  Just use 10mm German trucks!  The move to 15mm has COMPLETELY cast that attitude aside, and I'm convinced it's not for the better...  So much of my gaming motivation has been stomped on by the "I have XX-type of troops, but not in the correct uniform," or "I have XX-type of troops, but I need three more stands of them," where in the past I would have said "damn the torpedoes" and dove straight into some gaming, regardless.  Anyways, let's take a look at some pics.

Massive additions to my massive forces for WWII North Africa:

A whole bunch of tanks, guns, and infantry, representing forces from seven nations!  From far left, down, to right, up to far right, we have Yanks, Brits, Australians, Indians, Italians, Germans, and French.

A slew of British (perhaps Commonwealth, too) vehicles.

Some Matilda Is; not sure of the manufacturer, they're some sort of plastic or resin, almost look homemade, and I threw a Battlefront tank commander atop a couple of them.

Another look.

Some Battlefront Vickers Mk VI light tanks, which I bought painted.  All I did was re-paint the TCs (they needed a little work, plus they were wearing red berets?) and put a wash on them.  I love the camo.

Some 2-pdr Portees.  The vehicles and guns are from Gaming Models, the drivers are Battlefront, and the gun crews are Peter Pig.

A horribly fuzzy pic of some Valentines from Battlefront I picked up painted.  You'll see another pic of one of them down below.

Some Quad prime movers from Battlefront that I picked up painted.

Some Battlefront Churchills painted by my buddy AJ.

Then I did up a 3" mortar, a command stand, and two platoons' worth of Aussie Diggers, all from Battlefront.  Turned out a bit too dark (of which I have a very bad habit of causing)...

A closeup, love the hats.

3" Mortar.

The command stand, or FO maybe.

And since I got some Aussies I figured, why not get some Indians, too?  Four rifle platoons, a CO, a Vickers MG Platoon, a 3" Mortar Platoon, and 1 6-pdr ATG Platoon.

A closeup of the commanding officer.

A look at some of the rifle and platoon commander stands.

More.

Machine guns.

Mortars.

And guns.

Then I figured I should add to my American forces for the desert.  A stand for the CO, a platoon of engineers, a platoon of scouts, and a couple water-cooled .30-cal MGs.

I am quite proud of my command stand for the Yanks, which will carry them from Morocco to Tunisia, through Sicily, and up the boot of Italy.

Another look.  You've got a Zero (far right) pretending to be in charge, an RTO to his left, a bazooka assistant gunner behind him, and an NCO actually running things (bottom center).  If you look at the standing gentleman in the M-3 Scout Car you can see the pearl handled .45s ;)

A look at the other side, where a young lad is toting a bazooka strapped to his back.

A closeup of gentleman in the scout car; pretty cool ;)

The two .30-cal MGs; I did them at different times, which is why one has static grass on it and the other has clump foliage (to match the entire rest of my Med/North Africa forces)...

I picked up a platoon of engineers from Eureka, put a couple flamethrowers on each stand, pretty cool sculpts.

The Engineer Platoon command stand.

And a platoon of scouts.  Not sure why I did these up; well, yeah I am, but you'll laugh.  Back in the mid- to late-90s I used to play a TON of the video game "Close Combat," particularly the second, third, and fifth versions ("A Bridge Too Far," "East Front," and "Normandy," respectively), and in those games each country had units of scouts, which were small, quick, and armed with SMGs.  Simply put, I wanted some ;)

You may not be able to tell in the previous photo, but I actually cammied these guys up in 'Duckhunter,' like 2nd Armored Division in Normandy.  The figures are old Battlefront metal paratroopers.

And then I was like, "hey, the French were involved in North Africa (both Vichy and Free), I should have some of them, too!"  So I did...  They're kinda half-assed; that is to say, they're not Foreign Legion, or Goums (and it really pisses me off that Joe has Goums and I don't), they're just 'regular' old French infantry that I painted and based for the desert, but they'll do.  On a side note, these guys came from Forged in Battle, and I must say I'm a fan.  FiB was reasonably priced, very quick, very helpful (I customized some items in my order), and the castings themselves are really nice.

A look at the French command stand; an officer with a drawn pistol, an NCO with short carbine, and a rifleman.  Again, they're meant for the Fall of France, but with some desert yellow thrown on for uniform colors and dirt, they look alright, I hope.

A look at the French rifle stands.

The French 81mm mortars.

The French Hotchkiss machine guns.

A pair of French 75mm field guns.

And then an outlier: FiB doesn't make the French 25mm ATGs, I had to buy them from Battlefront.  I only painted up one, plan to use the other two (and a bunch of other FiB French) for some 'regular' Fall of France forces.

I bought some already painted French armored cars, but then re-did them myself.  I don't claim to be a great painter, particularly of vehicles...  Not sure of the manufacturer here, just know that they're metal.

Then I bought some resin R35s that were 3D printed, very happy with their quality, none of the striations you have with FDM (or whatever it's called).

Then I made some additions to my desert Italians, with Bersaglieri on the left, paratroopers (Folgore?) on the right, and a pair of 'normal' Italian infantry ATGs at top center right.

The Bersaglieri command stand.

A look at some of the rifle platoon stands.

Even got some of those 45mm Brixia light mortars.  Not sure where they're supposed to fit in TO&E, so I just threw a stand in with each of the rifle platoons.

Bersaglieri 81mm mortar teams.

And machine gun teams.

The two 'normal' (i.e., not Bersaglieri or paratrooper) ATGs.

I picked up a Battlefront platoon pack of Italian paratroopers, not really because I wanted Italian paratroopers, but because I wanted Italian engineers and the paratrooper pack had flamethrowers in it, so, I have Italian paratroopers.

The paratrooper engineer command stand.

A look at two of the engineer stands, each with an NCO, flamethrower, and a couple riflemen.

Another command stand.  I dig the honcho there, he's cool, but I'm not sure I'm happy with how I did the camouflage on the Italian para helmet covers.

A look at some of the Italian paratroopers.

Then I added to my Afrika Korps!

A couple more rifle platoons (for a total of six).

Another MG-34, another 80mm mortar, and a couple engineers lying around, laying mines (they were just extras I had sitting around).

A 7.5cm Infantry Gun from Plastic Soldier Company.

A couple 'heavy trucks' from Battlefront that I bought painted.

Then I decided my Afrika Korps should have some engineers, so I went and got some, put a flamethrower on each stand, everyone else has MP-40s.

A closeup.

They're commander is soooooo cute.  This is what I wish all my Afrika Korps troops look like, I used too pale of a green on all the other infantry...

And then, back to Close Combat, a platoon of Aufklarer (or however you spell that), German scouts, nothing but MP-40s.  I put them in camouflage smocks to help differentiate them from the 'regular' Afrika Korps infantry.

And then I was thinking, "I've got a bunch of Fallschirmjaeger, but no Fallschirmjaeger engineers," so I had to rectify that.  

You see?  This is a sickness, I just can't stop!  And then it got a whole lot worse...

And my FJ needed some panzerschrecks, too.

A closeup of one of my 'regular' Afrika Korps rifle stands.  They're handsome, but I'm just not happy with the pale green I used on their uniforms.  Actually, I don't mind it for the battles in the Western Desert, but they just don't sit right with me for use in Tunisia, Sicily, and Italy, and I have big plans for Tunisia, Sicily, and Italy.  I'm not about to re-paint all six rifle platoons, plus support weapons and command stands, of my Afrika Korps troops.  I started looking around the internet...

And I found this!  I immediately knew what I had to do, no matter how stupid it was...

I painted up ANOTHER desert force for the Germans, this one more suited to Tunisia, Sicily, and Italy, at least in my mind...

The new desert German force's commanding officer.

A closeup of one of the rifle stands.

Again.  I basically just copied the four dudes on the box cover, over and over.

How 'bout one more?  Yeah, three more rifle platoons, another MG platoon, and another mortar platoon.  Didn't do any new ATGs, though.  Probably need to do that ;)

A panzerschreck team.

I didn't have any 80mm mortars laying around, but I did have some 120mm mortars, sooooo...

An MG team.

A platoon command stand.

There's all my forces for the Mediterranean theater, packed up.

Individually based 15mm troops for Company-level action

I've long been a fan of the "I Ain't Been Shot Mum" rules, but I've never played them as written.  There are several reasons for that, but the issue we're focusing on tonight is the idea that I've always played them with troops based in elements, rather than troops based individually, because, who's got a reinforced company's worth of (or two, if you're a solo gamer or otherwise have to provide both sides of every era/theater you game), right?  Well...

I now have a TO&E-built company of US Airborne infantry (left), plus some extras, plus a company of German infantry (right), plus some extras (and enough MGs to play as 'regular' infantry with one MG-42 per section, or panzergrenadiers with two MG-42s per section).

Here is the entire US company command element, with the CO, XO, 1st Sgt, and various comms, intel, supply, operations, etc..., NCOs.

A closeup of the CO and XO.

The XO's backside.  Oh, before I forget, pretty much everything is from Forged in Battle, though there are some specialists from Peter Pig.

A TO&E US Airborne rifle platoon, with the platoon command element (top), two 12-man rifle squads (middle), and a seven-man mortar squad.

A closeup of some of the poses.  You can see I did US flags on the right arms and 82nd Airborne divisional patches on the left shoulder.

A BAR gunner.  Yeah, the 82nd Airborne was fond of BARs ;)

An M-1919 machine gun team.

A 57mm ATG and crew from Peter Pig.

Ze Chermans...

I really like the poses of the FiB German infantry, so I'm just going to share some of that.

Another.

I love when sculptors do this: we've all seen this photo (though in real life he has his sleeves rolled up).  Of course, I just did a quick Google image search and can't find it...

Another.

An MG-42 team, in action.

And one on the tripod.

And a PaK with crew from Peter Pig.

So yeah, I don't just have US infantry and paras, and German Afrika Korps, FJ, and HG that are element-based, I also have a few hundred singly-based troops...  I put them on a desert basing scheme because my plan is to follow a company from the 82nd Airborne through a (fictional) campaign in Tunisia, then on to Sicily, Italy, Normandy, Holland, and the Bulge, even drew up a roster where I named every single soldier of the US rifle company...

A False Start with Kampfgruppe Klink

And don't think I didn't play any games.  Some of you saw me give Steve's Biazza Ridge scenario a try (three times actually), which was fun because I got some youngsters involved as well, but then I had a hankering to get back to KG Klink and get them rolling into Operation Barbarossa.  But I've had more problems sorting out how I want to do it (i.e., at what echelon, had been playing company-level fights and was seriously considering making the kampfgruppe actually be kampfgruppe-sized and play rules set at a higher echelon) and which rules I wanted to use.  I've been giving the "Combat Headquarters" rules a long look, but Joe got me excited about the action roll concept from the "Battlefront WWII" rules, so the boys and I gave those a try.

We used the Battlefront WWII activation concept but kept the 5Core combat and morale mechanics, with each base representing one squad, weapon, or vehicle.  For those not familiar with the BF WWII activation concept, it's pretty nifty, where each unit rolls a dice and applies modifiers based on its quality, commitment, morale, and tactical situation (i.e., a veteran unit for whom this fight is not particularly important is currently suppressed but with no enemy forces in small arms range), which then tells the unit what it can or must do (a great roll could net you three actions, while a horrible roll could see that unit flee the battlefield, and everything in between).

Somewhere in occupied Poland, the Germans are attacking the Soviets on 22 June 1941.  The Soviets will have strongpoints on each of the three hills (top left, center, and bottom right), while the Germans enter from the bottom left, the victor being the side that has the village at top right.

A big lesson I learned from this game was that, unlike with my old 10mm, I can't pile on the same amount of troops I'm used to on a 6' x 4' table, it ges real crowded real quick...

The opposing forces, with Reds on the left and Germans on the right.

The German assault goes in, with Landser following the panzers, though the poor infantry are soon coming under concentrated mortar fire.

"Keep moving, keep moving, don't stop in the kill zone!"

The southeastern strongpoint falls...

But the Soviet mortars keep pounding away.

Colonel Klink sets his jaw and motions his men forward.

As Soviet T-26s enter the fray, looking to support the northwestern strongpoint (top right).

But the German Panzer Company Commander (bottom left) and a platoon of Panzer IVs quickly move to counter the counterattack, easily seeing the poorly trained and equipped Soviet tankers off.

This was how far the Germans got before it became clear the Russkies didn't have a chance.

So the activation system is cool, but it does add quite a bit of time, especially with having so many units on the table.  And the qualitative difference meant that the Soviets needed about twice as many MORE forces.  I decided that these weren't the rules I wanted to use for KG Klink in Russia, followed quickly by my wargaming motivation taking me elsewhere...

You know what's even worse?  I reduced forces a little bit, moved the Soviet positions back from the German start line a bit, and tried again using "I Ain't Been Shot Mum," but it took about five hours and wasn't much fun, though I did actually finish the fight.

False Start With Chain of Command

I wanted to re-energize my "Blood & Guts" campaign, where I was following a platoon of US GIs through WWII.  I had planned to use a variant of the Battlefront WWII rules for this, but then I read a bunch of really cool batreps using Chain of Command (The Lead Poets Society: 29 Let's Go! The Probe at La Cambe (Turn4) Map 1), so I gave CoC another try.

Tunisia, near Hill 609 (the British called it "Longstop Hill").  Playing solo, I didn't use the 'Patrol Phase," I placed the Germans on blinds (you can see in the ville at center left, bottom right, in the trees at right, and atop the hill at top right), while the Yanks would come on from the left table edge.

A closer look at some of the blinds, which you can see are labelled as type-A, B, and C, as from Joe's "Platoon Forward."  I didn't wait, I rolled up the blinds (so that all German forces were on the table) and kicked it off.

The American Platoon Commander got up into a good viewing position (atop hill at bottom center) as one of his squads (left) approaches the village (far right) from the north, with US artillery falling on the treeline (top right) to the east.

With 3rd Squad coming in from the north (top left), 2nd Squad and some attached engineers (bottom center/left) advance on the village from the south.

But a Marder is skulking in the trees across the river...

And it quickly ends the Valentine's career...

The Marder, flush from victory, steams on up to the bridge, but the Yanks managed to get an ATG into action which held it at bay, forcing it to take cover in a cluster of huts in the southeast, out of lie of sight of the American gun.

The American NCOs get their men moving again.

But the Germans have a machine gun team in the village and casualties begin to mount...

But the doggie NCOs get their men moving and push a flamethrower team up to take the MG-42 out!

Yeah, those are US Marine engineer figures, I didn't have any Army ones when I played this game, which is what drove me to order some from Eureka.  I hate soiling my magnificent Marines by having to pretend they're... *gag*... Army.

Seeing their MG team in the village (top left, atop building) in trouble, the German commander pushes a rifle squad out of its positions on the riverbank (bottom right) and into the open ground between, intent on reinforcing the village...

The Marder and another MG team in the southeast (bottom right) shoot them in...

And the vulnerable German rifle squad actuallymakes it to the village!

But Sergeant Hackett says, "oh know you don't!"  Seeing the emerging threat, he grabs as many of his troops as he can and pushes them through the orchard, up to the stone wall, where his men open fire at point-blank range...

Absolutely decimating the German squad, whose survivors raise their hands and yell "kamerad!"

SSgt Smith rushed to Lt Pelluer's side: "I'm glad you're here, Sergeant, call 1st Squad forward and let's prepare to advance!  What?  What's that face for?"  "Sir, we're done for."  "Done???  What the heck do you mean?  We've taken the village, the enemy's beat down, and we've still got 1st Squad that's not even been kissed yet!"  

SSgt Smith stroked his stubbled chin, looked down, kicked a rock; "Sir, you're right, we need 1st Squad up here, but only so's they can help us secure the village and allow 2nd and 3rd to regroup and evacuate our casualties, of which we have EIGHT.  But that's not even the real problem," SSgt Smith stated flatly, pointing east, "the real problem is that there's a hundred yards of dead-ass open ground to cross and the Krauts still have at least two o'dem Mg-42s sited in out there, plus that damn Self-Propelled Gun running around, which our little 37mm pop gun can't see and probably couldn't knock out even if it could, and without dem (jerking a thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the furiously burning Valentine), we got nuthin' for it."

"But, but, what about our bazooka team," stammered the Lieutenant.  "Sir, the bazooka can't reach from here, and you'd just be tossin' away the lives of two men if you sent them out there hunting that SPG."

"But the Colonel wants to eat breakfast on Hill 234," the Lieutenant whined.  "Sir, we ain't crossin' that open ground without arty and some more tanks."  Now it was Lieutenent Pelluer's turn to push his helmet back and stroke his chin, deep in thought; "I suppose you're right, Sergeant.  Have 1st Squad come up and take up defensive positions to relieve 2nd and 3rd, and make sure they're out of the line of fire, no sense in taking unnecessary casualties while we're just sitting here.  Let's get the casualties looked after and evacuated, and I'll go let the Colonel know what's going on.  I'm proud of the boys, that was a heck of a fight, we did well this morning, and wowsers, what the heck got into Sergeant Hackett!!!???"

The fight was entertaining but, once again, CoC failed to scratch my itch.  It just has a bad habit in my games of causing some very weird, unnatural interactions between opposing forces.  I've had a lot more fun with it when I used it at higher echelon, with element-based troops, as in my KG Klink campaign in Greece, but it always just seems to feel funny to me with singly-based troops.

Back to the Air

So, what do you do after you've bought tons of 1/600 scale aircraft, painted them, played with them, sold them (and I just found a bunch more in box, unopened), then bought it all again in (approximately) 1/900 scale (AKA "Tiny Air Combat")?  Well, once you see that Warlord has put out Blood Red Skies and you're an imbecile and have no discipline, you forget all about it and start spending tons of money and time recreating it all again in 1/200 scale...

Here's what I have so far.  The only aircraft I've actually finished are 6 x P-38 Lightnings, 6 x Ki-61 Tonys, and 6 x Bf-109s.  Yeah, blasphemy, I know, having done Army before Marines...

Proof that I have a bunch of Marines and Navy.  Wildcats, Hellcats, Corsairs, Devastators, Dauntlesses, and Avengers.  Yeah, all stuff I already have.  Everything is from Warlord except the TBF Avengers, which are very nice models from Armaments in Miniature (AIM).

A bunch of unfinished Japanese: Zeros, Vals, Kates, Nicks, and Bettys, all of which are from Warlord except the Bettys, which are from AIM.

In the "Europe" box I've got Spitfires, more Bf-109s, Ju-87 Stukas, FW-190s, Soviet Yak-1s, Ju-88s, P-40s, P-51s, and B-25 Mitchells.  Everything but the B-25s are from Warlord.

A look at one of my finished P-38s.

A look at one of the Ki-61s, which is a Japanese Bf-109 built under license.

And an actual Messerschmidt, painted up in a simple desert scheme.  

How 'Bout some Royal Marine Commandos?

I've been wanting to play some Commando games in WWII, but I didn't have any commandos, so I decided to remedy that.  I bought them painted from a dude in China, but I wasn't a fan of some of the color choices so I ended up doing quite a bit of painting myself.  Oh, and they came element-based, but I was thinking to do skirmish gaming with them so I pried them off and stuck them to pennies, before deciding I'd rather they were element-based and prying them off the pennies and putting them back on FOW-style bases.  Which needed to be done anyway so I could build desert and temperate forces anyway...  So I built two different forces, then had a spare Mortar and MG team which I tried to base in a 'middle of the road' scheme that could be used for either, but they turned out too dark (the two bases at top center)...

Here is the desert force.  Both forces consist of a CO, XO, 3" Mortar, Vickers MG, two PIATs, a 2" Morar, and eight rifle stands.

The same view of the temperate force.

The two extra weapons stands.  They don't look quite as dark up close.  Let's get to some closeups.

Here's the desert command stand.  Pretty sexy, no?  Good figures, well proportioned, with nice weapons and poses, and those beautiful green berets.

Lots of Tommy Guns for these guys.

A better look at the whole desert force.

Closeup of some rifle stands.  You can see a prone sniper figure at top center (behind the lounging NCO); I didn't have enough figures, so I had to use him as just another rifleman to round out the rifle stands.

Another closeup, see a Bren Gun in this one.

A look at the desert Vickers MG and 3" Mortar team.

The two PIAT teams.

And the desert 2" Mortar team.

I suppose we'll now do the same for the temperate Commandos.  Their command stand.

Another look at the command stand.  I like the RTO at left.

A broader look at the temperate force.

A close look at some rifle stands.

Another.

The MG and mortar teams.

The PIATs.

The 2" Mortar team.

And another look at the 'mixed' MG and mortar teams.

Waffen SS

Yes, I know they are evil, and yes, I know some wargamers find them so repugnant that they don't wish to even wargame with them, but I'm a historical wargamer and they're part of history, so while I abhor Nazi ideology and all the atrocities that went with it, I see no problem with owning them and playing with them.  Hell, I've already played wargames fighting Al Qaeda, the Taliban, ISIS, Imperial Japan, the Soviets, and modern Russians, none of whom are any less evil, in my humble estimation.

So I have this force and I'll look forward to getting them on the table, just like any of the other enemy forces I play against.  I'll primarily look to use them for the brutal fighting in Normandy and during Market Garden; they certainly have their place on the Eastern Front, as well, but I can't say I have any campaign plans to see them in that direction.

These were all painted for me by my buddy AJ, who's quite the talented artist.

The whole force, consisting of:
Commanding Officer stand
4 x rifle platoon (Platoon Leader and three rifle stands)
1 x MG Platoon (Platoon Leader and four MG-42 stands)
1 x Mortar Platoon (Platoon Leader and six 8.0cm Mortar stands, the short tubes)

1 x ATG Platoon (Platoon Leader and 3 x PaK-40 7.5cm anti-tank guns)

1 x Infantry Gun Platoon (Platoon Leader and 2 x leIG18 7.5cm infantry guns)

A closeup of the German commander.

Reverse.

The four rifle platoons.

A closer look at some of the rifle stands.

Again.

And once more.

How 'bout a closeup?

Another.

And one more.

Organic crew-served weapons.

Closeup of a tripod-mounted MG-42.

Another.

Closeup of a mortar team.  I love the fact the dude feeding rounds is double-fisting it ;)  You can see the short tube on these sculpts.

Again.

The attached gun platoons.

A closeup of one of the PaKs.

And one of the howitzers.

And one more to close it out.

Pretty cool, AJ really did a fantastic job painting and basing these guys.  When will I find the time to have the Canadians grind these fellas to dust in and around Caen?

Modern (Cold War) US Infantry

As usual, I didn't really need these (given all the modern US troops I already have), but when I spotted two platoons, painted and based, for $30, I just couldn't pass them up.  These are two of the Battlefront Tam Yankee US Marine platoons, so they've got not just the rifle and Dragon stands, they've also got M-60 machine guns (my first love ;) ), SMAWs, and 60mm mortars.

Once again I found the paintjobs to be decent, but not quite what I was looking for, and the basing was pretty nasty: the poor dude had gotten basing sand all over the guys, and then made some pretty strange decisions with regards to what weapons went on the different bases.  For example, the pack is actually set up so that you put a standard four-man fireteam consisting of a grenadier, automatic rifleman, and two riflemen, on each base, but this guy didn't understand that, so you'd pick up a base and it would have three SAWs and a rifleman on it, and the next one would have three grenadiers and a rifleman on it, etc...  Well, that wasn't going to do for me, so I pried them all off their bases, scraped the basing sand off them, glued them on new bases, and completely repainted them, opting to do half in desert tricolors and half in woodland camo.  It all worked out ;)

The desert force, consisting of a CO, XO, two M-60 MG teams, two SMAW teams, two M-47 Dragon teams, a 60mm mortar team, and nine rifle stands (fireteams).

Same goes for the temperate troops.

A closeup of the desert command stand.  I probably got too much brown on the cammies, making them look more like "Chocolate Chips" than "Tricolors," and after much deliberation I decided to give them the yellow 'desert jungle' boots, rather than black boots (that a lot of Marines deployed to Desert Storm and Somalia with).

Backside of the command stand, showing the RTO's PRC-77.

Let's look at some rifle stands!  As you see here, each stand has a Corporal (Fireteam Leader) has an M-203, a Lance Corporal (Automatic Rifleman) with an M-249 SAW, a PFC (Assistant Gunner) with an M-16A2, and a Private (Scout) with an M-16A2.  One of the two riflemen in each team is carrying or firing an M-72 LAW.

Actually, one rifle stand in each force has one stand that is missing a SAW as each pack apparently only came with 8 SAWs for some reason...

More rifle stands.

The two SMAW stands.

The 60mm mortar stand.  I saw it done in combat, but I absolutely hate the fact the tube is being 'free-handed' (rather then properly set upon its bipod and baseplate) nonetheless... 

The two Dragon teams, one seated firing and one strapped across his back and on the move.

The two 'Pig' teams.  Heavy metal, baby, Guns Up!

Having said that, I started on the M-60E3, and clearly these are M-60A1s ;)

A look at the temperate force's Skipper.

Again.  Pretty happy with how my woodland camo turned out.

A look at the rifle teams.

Another.  

The sharp of eye and sharper of mind will recall that I actually bought a pack of the Team Yankee US Mech Platoon troops, painted them up, and sold them, several years ago.  Yup, that's me, that's how I roll.  As I said, Wargaming in an Exceedingly Poor Manner...

The SMAWs, getting to see a different angle on them.

Opposite angle on the 60mm mortar team.

And the Dragon teams.

We actually still had Dragons when I joined the Corps, but I never got to fire one as they were quickly phased out not long after I got to the Fleet.  They weren't replaced until the Javelins came out years later, so we didn't have any real AT capability at company level, it was all at battalion level (where the TOWs were part of Weapons Company).  Sure, we had AT-4s, which had replaced the LAWs, but...

The machine gun teams.

So badly would I love to see castings of the three-man MG teams set up the way we were taught: all three men are prone, loader on the left, right arm over the gunner, gunner in the middle (with the gun on a tripod), and team leader on the right, with left arm over the gunner, all armed with pistols (I forget what year they started issuing service rifles to machine gunners).

Deeper into Vietnam

Not new stuff here, but I re-based some stuff, pulling it off of pennies and sticking them on FOW-style bases.  On the left is a platoon of ARVN from Jimmi at Flashpoint, while on the right is a platoon of Americans from Battlefront.

A closer look at the ARVN; nine rifle stands, a command stand, and some dudes left on pennies to act as small unit leaders.

Closeup of the ARVN command stand.

And some rifle stands.  I still laugh at my attempt to paint up the Ranger helmets (the yellow with black tiger stripes and a cat's face on them).

More rifle stands.

One more.

And a look at some of the leaders I left singly based.

The American platoon; nine rifle stands, a command stand, a 90mm recoiless rifle (that I'm not sure anyone ever used, and it's prone, no less!), and a Doc (actually a model from Flashpoint) based individually.

The American command stand.  

Again, with RTO holding the handset out for the LT.

A look at the rifle stands.  Great poses, and I really like the MG teams.  Not so sure about the prone NCO signaling with his rifle like that, but what the hey.

Pretty cool pack, lots of variety in poses, great mix of M-60s, M-16s, M-79s, and LAWs.

Again.

I love the M-60 pose here, but man is that dude a stud shouldering that weapon like that (in a kneeling stance, unsupported).  At top center is a grenadier with the Thumper broken down, reloading.  Not a fan at all of the prone LAW, though.  Good luck with that!

And if I was going to re-base my ARVN and Yanks, well, there was going to have to be a re-basing of my VC and NVA as well...

I really regret having done this as now I don't have any VC/NVA left singly based, though I do still have plenty of Americans singly based, for skirmish gaming (like my 'Two Brothers' campaign).  Now I'm going to have to buy more VC/NVA and base them singly...

I've got nine rifle stands of NVA in dark green, with some weapons (MG, 82mm mortar, and a recoiless rifle), as well as some singly based small unit leaders.

And I've got a similar setup for the Viet Cong, dressed in black pajamas, though they only have six rifle stands rather than nine.

A closeup of the VC/NVA command stand.  

Most of my VC and NVA are from Peter Pig, but these guys are from Flashpoint.

Reverse.

Closeup of the NVA rifle stands.

More.

The three NVA weapons stands.

And a look at some leaders.

Closeup of some of the VC rifle stands.

Another.

And the basic VC weapons.

But wait, there's more ;)

This is a Peter Pig ZPU-1 with crew from Flashpoint.

Again.

And this is a Dshk 12.7mm HMG from Flashpoint Minis.

Again.

And these are VC snipers from Peter Pigs new (revamped?) range.  Noticeably thinner than their old sculpts.

And a lonely MG on wheels, great for weapons caches or showing captured weapons.

Then I re-based the Indigs, my Montagnards.

Tribal folks that have been trained and equipped by the Americans, they can be used for a variety of different forces I suppose, particularly CIDG and Mike Force/Hatchet Force-type stuff.  Lots of BARs, M-1 Carbines, and Swedish Ks.

Another look.  These guys are also the newer, slimmer sculpts.  Pretty attractive fellas.

One more look.

And then their American advisors.  These sculpts are super, super cool, wish there were more of them (just one pack, so far at least), though they really are small when I set them up next to Eureka, Flashpoint, or Battlefront troops.

But dammit if they ain't sexy!

Reverse.  The eagle-eyed amongst you (and better lighting wouldn't hurt) will spy that I actually painted these gents up in 'green-side out' camo.  Which only adds to their sexiness ;)

Not supposed to show you this, but I've got some more troops for this force planned, just gotta get 'round to finishing them.

If you had any idea of how many tubs of half-painted troops like this I have lying around the house you'd probably shit yourself and pass out...

But on to the stars of the show, and the real point of this exercise (for this section of this post, I mean)...

ARVN, fousands of 'em, Sir!  Spurred (once again) by the indomitable, imperturbable, yet somehow still indescribable Joe Legan, I have once again jumped into an era/force that I previously had no real interest in.  But you're confused; "Jack," you remind us, "you've already shown us ARVN above."

Indeed, I have.  But those are later war ARVN, with M-16s and M-60s.  See, Joe's been doing early war ARVN, say around 1961, before the US became directly involved, and now I want to do it, too (though I've no idea when I'll actually find the time to jump in).  But the M-16 wasn't a thing back then, and the ARVN didn't have M-60s, they had M-1 Carbines, M-1 Garands, BARs, and M-1919 MGs, so I needed some like that.  But no one (at least so far as I'm aware) makes ARVN like that, so what to do?

Well, these are Peter Pig WWII-era US Marines, and they seem to work just fine.  M-1 helmets, Garands, Carbines, Tommy Guns, BARs, mostly trousers unbloused, close enough for me.  About thirty of these guys actually started out as WWII US Marines, but I pulled them off their pennies, grabbed a bunch more, and set to making a fairly sizeable ARVN force.  I've got a CO, an XO, an FO, twelve rifle stands, three combat engineer stands, six platoon command stand, a water-cooled .30-cal MG stand, three air-cooled .30-cal MG stands, a dual-based (two tubes) 81mm mortar stand, three single-based (one tube) 81mm mortar stands, four bazooka stands, two separate flamethrower stands, and a stand of Docs (Corpsmen!).

I painted these guys up plain-Jane green so I suppose I could use them for generic US Army in WWII or Korea, as well.  

The commanding officer.

Again.

A look at the rifle stands.  Lots of Garands and BARs, pretty cool, eh?

More.

More.  Now you can see a couple Tommy Guns.

The engineers, with a flamethrower on each base.

A look at some heavy weapons.

81mm mortars and air-cooled M1919s (which are actually from Battlefront, not Peter Pig).  Hell, I think those mortar tubes are from Battlefront, too, though the crews are Peter Pig.

Then I put a couple M-1917s on a stand and a couple 81mm mortar tubes on a single stand (those tubes are from Peter Pig).  Not sure why, exactly, but okay...

A bazooka team and a couple flamethrower teams.

A look at the backside of the flamethrowers; nicely modelled.

The FO peering through his field glasses, RTO nearby.

The Docs.

And now onto the heavy metal!  These are old Battlefront resin and metal models, a real pain in the ass to find!  I painted them up and gave them a wash which, as usual, turned out way too dark, so of course I set out to rectify the situation by giving them a light drybrushing.

But anyone familiar with the blog knows that I am utterly incapable of conducting a 'light' drybrushing, so I drybrushed the hell out of them and made them look goofy...  But too late now, I'm not stripping them and repainting, I swear...

Then I got a boatload of M-113s, all the newer Battlefront plastics.  I bought about half of them built and painted but, once again, went ahead and repainted them anyway as I was going to be able to make the other half (which I'd just purchased new) match them.

Another issue with the 'used' tracks was that a lot of them weren't built correctly (see the top model, which has the top for an M-163 but has a normal cupola, rather than the Vulcan turret), so I did a lot of prying apart and trying to fix them with extra pieces from the boxes of new models I had.

Apparently I only took a picture of three of them, but I actually have six of the ACAVs.

Then I built an M-163.

And a track with a recoiless rifle.

Please note, if you're thinking the skin tones on these guys is a bit dark, and you're wondering why some of the TCs are wearing berets, it's because these models are intended to be used primarily as ARVN.

And an M-106 mortar carrier.

French IndoChina

Back to the 'not new' stuff, I re-based my French and Vietminh, prying them off their pennies and sticking them on FOW-style bases.  French on the left, Vietminh on the right.

A look at some of the French rifle and platoon command stands.

Another.

French heavy weapons (60mm mortar, 75mm recoiless rifle, and .30-cal MG) and their XO.

The French CO.  Can't believe I picked a helmeted dude for the CO...  I probably won't be able to stand it and will pry one one of the helmeted guys off this stand and replace him with the boonie hat-wearing guy from the XO stand.

The Vietminh commander and XO.

I keep thinking that I am absolutely going to use these guys for the Korean War, too.

A look at some weapons stands (top), rifle stands (right), and platoon command (left).

More.

More.

And still more.  That always seemed to be the problem, right?

So, there it is, a glimpse into the never-ending void of my wargaming mind.  Can't say I haven't done anything, just haven't done much in the way of gaming.  As my buddy Shaun says, I'm in peril of becoming a 'collector,' having lost my 'wargamer' status.  Believe it or not, I am actively attempting to rectify the situation; my plan is to basically transfer my KG Klink concept to the Americans.

That is, I'm planning to take a fictional, stylized US "Combat Command," but sort of 'bathtub' it down to battalion size, with a company of tanks, a company of mechanized infantry, and supporting ATGs, MGs, mortars, SPGs, TDs, armored cars, and engineers, with each vehicle commander and small unit leader as a named character, and follow them through the entire war, tracking their campaigns, wounds, and medals for valor.  My plan is to start with Operation Torch (thus the need for some Vichy French), then into Tunisia, Sicily, and Italy.  At some point they'll leave Italy and go to France; not sure yet if I want to do the breakout from Salerno then go to Normandy, or do Anzio and then Operation Dragoon.  Either way they'll end up pushing into Germany, going to hit Hurtgen Forest, maybe the Bulge, and then all the way to the bitter end.

Any minute now ;)

V/R,
Jack