3mm Israelis and Aircraft

All,

So, it seems I'm a liar.  Not intentionally so, as I intended to game, but instead I ended up painting.  If you haven't noticed, I've been on a tear lately, knocking armies out left and right.  I, like everyone, hit painting ruts every now and again, so it's not that I don't want to game, it's just that I'm on a painting hot streak right now and don't want to waste it.  Actually, it's more than that; I actually want to paint more than I want to game right now.  Don't worry, it never lasts long.

Today I went to work on my Pico Armor 3mm stuff, getting a total of 10 tanks and 10 aircraft finished (from scratch).  I went to work on my two Israeli armored platoons, then worked on all my 'airborne' aircraft.  What I mean is, I am going to model a number of my helos 'on the deck' so they can depict dropping off troops, and, unfortunately, my basing system doesn't allow me to show them in flight and on the ground, so I have to have 'doubles.'

First up is the Israeli M-48 platoon, five tanks mounted on pennies.  I timed myself: doing the paintjob took me about 12 minutes each, the basing another five (not counting the time to allow the sand to dry before painting it).

 Side shot of the M-48s.

Rear quarter shot of the M-48s.

 Closeup.  I'm right proud of the tac marks on the turret (both sides on each vehicle).

And now for the platoon that makes all the ladies' hearts swoon, or at least all the Brits: the Centurion (Shot K'al) platoon.  Again, five vehicles.

 Side shot.

 Other side shot.

 Closeup (sorry, that's blurry).  Again you see the tac marks on the skirts.

Now let's get to the air side.

The composite air wing for my MEU: a Predator, two AH-1 Cobras, a UH-1 Huey, and three CH-46, hmmm, I dunno, we always called them 'Frogs.'

 Lower look at the same set.

 The Predator.

 Opposite.

 The Huey; look in the door, whaddaya see?  That's right, a doorgunner.  In 3mm!

 Huey, opposite.

 Scarface.  I really like the look of these.

 AH-1, Opposite.

 Close up of a 46.  I hopped quite a few rides in these things...

 CH-46, opposite.

 All three 46s.

 Cobras on the prowl.

Even in 3mm these send a shiver up my spine.  I know it's outdated, but to me the Mi-24 is, hands down, the meanest helo around, and a pair of these popping over the horizon would have been a Marine's worst nightmare.  During my time overseas I was quite fortunate to never see one in the air.

 Closeup.

 Hind opposite.

 The pair of Hinds on the hunt.

Now for some friendlies.  This is a PAH-2 attack copter to go with my reunified, reenergized Wehrmacht, who will be refighting the Eastern Front, except in the late 90s or early 2000s.

 Close up.  The glare on the nose and helo mast area is terrible.  I painted this thing in the German dark gray that I intend to use on the Wehrmacht armored vehicles as well.  Going old school to make a point ;)

Opposite, still a little glare on the nose.

Well, that's a wrap, folks, thanks for looking.  Hopefully I can talk myself into a game tomorrow, but, believe it or not, I still have a mountain of unpainted lead lying around, and my painting hand's hot...

V/R,
Jack

Don't Ever Sell Anything, AKA, My Fun With PicoArmor

All,

First off, please understand these are a work in progress, not finished troops, but I was so excited by how they're turning out I felt like hanging them here to show everyone.  So, I'm starting a new project, this time in 3mm.  I know what you're thinking: Jack, you have all those beautiful (yuk yuk) 10mm armies, why on earth would you ever want to use a different scale?

Well, as it turns out, Mrs. Jack is over halfway pregnant, with another little Prince on orders to report in this summer.  What does that have to do with 10mm and 3mm armies?  Well, I could be wrong, but more than likely these developments mean I will be spending a lot less time painting and playing, and when I am playing, odds are that stepping upstairs for 3 to 5 hours to my playroom probably won't go over very well.

I don't have everything figured out exactly, but my plan is based on the very successful "drawer gaming" of my good friend, Mr. Shaun Travers.  My plan is to have a 2' x 2' playing area and two armies, assorted terrain, dice, rules, etc..., that I can play on my living room coffee table and store in a drawer of said coffee table.

I haven't figured out what I'm going to do about rules yet.  I'm pondering using my "Insurgent Commander" rules, a variation of Cold War Commander, a variation of IABSM, a variation of Chain of Command, or using my (as yet) unnamed (and unpublished) rules I was using for my "All Americans" campaign.  Knowing me, the rules will end up an amalgamation of all of them.  What I do know is the games will be modern, small (maybe a dozen stands per side), solo (as always), and 'skirmish' level, meaning one vehicle is one vehicle and one infantry stand is a 4-5 man rifle or weapons team.

Regarding the statement, "Don't Sell Anything," my very first miniatures purchase was from PicoArmor.  I bought quite a bit of modern US and USSR for some "Team Yankee"-type games, and my father and I got in quite a few games in the garage using a modification of Blitzkrieg Commander.  I then bought quite a bit of WWII stuff, and we had a few games of that.  Then I got into 10mm (I'm purposefully leaving out my first and second forays into 15mm, which cost me quite a bit of money and is sitting, uncherished in the garage), and all my Pico Armor (minus my sizeable collection of aircraft) sat in the garage.  Someone on TMP was looking for some, and so I sold off my 3mm collection.

Then the pregnancy happened and I began thinking of how to do something portable.  I started looking around in my various boxes of odds and ends and. lo and behold, I found five M-1 tanks, 10 T-72s, and 15 BTR-60s (not sure how these escaped the load I sold off).  I painted glued them to pennies, sprayed them black, then set about painting them up, and I like what I see!  Convinced I was on to something, I put in a pretty decent sized order to John at Pico Armor, and just received them in the mail today.

So, what do I have/plan to do?  Mostly a bunch of hypothetical stuff, with a tiny bit of historical thrown in.

1.  I want to do some 'what-if' stuff with a Marine 'super' MEU set during the 90s.  My very limited background is that, following the Gulf War the US military did an even greater draw-down than occurred in real-life, so there's only one USMC MEU floating around (as opposed to the usual three at any given time), so my guys will be reacting to various catastrophes, cataclysms, and earth shattering events, worldwide.   I bought tanks, AAVs, HMMWVs with TOWs and HMGs, infantry, CH-46s, a UH-1, and two AH-1s (I already have F-18s if I need them, would really like a couple AV-8s), will paint half in NATO 3-color and the other half in desert colors.  I got a bunch of T-72s, BMPs, BTRs, assorted AA/SAM/Recon/ATGM, then a few Technicals and armored cars for Third World/asymmetric to run against them, both 'green' and desert.

2.  I want to do a 'what-if' of Germany vs. USSR, not a NATO vs. Warsaw Pact, but kind of a "Germany goes it alone against its historical enemy," with Leopards, Marders, Fuchs, Gepard, etc...  Bad guys will be the 'green' Warsaw Pact equipment above.

3.  Then I decided for a little historical stuff, but still in a goofy/fun way: I bought five M-48s and five Shot-Kals (Centurions), and my plan is to play some Arab-Israeli stuff during the Yom Kippur War, with a friendly little rivalry between two Israeli platoon commanders to see who can take out more Syrian and Egyptian tanks.  I know it's goofy, but it's mine.  Bad guys will be 'desert' Warsaw Pact equipment above.

Okay, you've waited long enough, here's some pics.  Again, these aren't perfect/finished, just some test jobs I did to see if I liked the look.

A platoon of five M-1 Abrams.  I love it!  24 inches by 24 inches on the coffee table, with little tanks popping off at other little tanks, it's gonna work like a charm.

And did I mention that's 3mm!  I won't say I'm a good painter (obvious by the white showing on my ballast), but this proves I'm a much better painter than I use to be.  Sorry, just a bit too proud of myself.

Pic from the fore.  Again, you can really see the ballast that I failed to get with the paintbrush, but overall I like the effect.  I glued the minis to pennies, spray-painted the whole mess black, painted the minis, white-glued ballast on, then painted it (you can see I used different shades of green, think I like the back left one the most).

Another look.  Sorry for pics of the same stuff, I don't have that many in suitable condition for photo-ing.

A T-72 (right) and BTR-60 (left).  I like the basing, and the camo turned out great.  You can see I use a dot of light blue for windows and sensors/optics, and silver for machine guns.

Another look.

Another 'green' version of the T-72, though I haven't put the light blue or silver on this one yet.

Opposite.  Well, I actually painted up a T-72 and BTR-60 in desert colors, and I think they look pretty good, too, though I apparently didn't take any pics of them...  Don't fret, this is just my first 'WIP' set of photos, I'll get proper photos up when they're done.

Stay tuned, I'm looking to do less painting and more gaming this weekend.

V/R,
Jack

For My Dear Mssrs Ronan and Le Manchou

All,

This is the last of the armies I have finished, though I do have a work-in-progress that I'm going to photo and hang here tomorrow.  So, without further adieu, here is my latest army; and what are they?  They are Early War French, circa 1940.  What was the inspiration for this army?  I must tell you that I previously had very little interest in Early War, and even less interest in having a French force.  But my friends Ronan and Le Manchou have been putting on a campaign featuring France vs. Germany in 1940, using the Lardies' Chain of Command rules.  I've really enjoyed reading the battle reports Ronan has posted, which piqued my interest in Early War.  To be honest, I still wasn't particularly interested in the French, figuring any attraction to them was strictly due to the fun and interesting batreps.  But I began reading up on Early War, and the more I read the more I saw the French troops are generally given short shrift regarding their fight against the Germans, and that, contrary to popular belief, there was actually some very heavy, pitched fighting that occurred.  Well, that was enough for me, so I must give a hearty "Merci Beaucoups" to my friends across the ocean for sparking my interest.

As always they are 10mm, and this particular force is 100% Minifigs.  It's funny; pretty much everything I own is either Pendraken or Minifigs.  I have a good amount of troops from both, and in some cases, I happily mix the two.  Most importantly, I've found Leon and Dave to both be great guys that go out of their way to help you out and get you what you need.  So, the funny thing is, whenever I post a new army I always feel a bit self-conscious if the force in question is available from both companies.  There's no problem if I get something from Pendraken that Minifigs doesn't have, or vice versa; the internal stress comes when I buy something all from one company even though both companies have troops to offer.  I guess what I'm trying to say is, I love you both! ;)

Having said all that, I went with Minifigs' French because my Early War Germans (as well as Soviets, Japanese, US Marines, and Brits, for that matter) are Minifigs, whilst my Late-War Germans (and US, Brit Airborne, Brit 8th Army, German Afrika Korps, US Ardennes, and German Ardennes) are Pendraken.  My moderns are mostly Minifigs, largely due to Pendraken just now getting around to the Post-Vietnam period.

The entire force: armor on the left, with a single Char B, two Somuas, and three R35 tanks.  Heavy Weapons and HQ in the center, with five officers, a 75mm gun and horse-drawn tow, two 25mm AT guns, four MGs, three mortars, and three AT rifles.  On the right are the infantry, with my customary fifteen stands of riflemen.

The armor force, with R35's in the front, Char B at top left, Somuas at top right.

Another view.  I'm not in love with my camo job on the Char B...

But I like the camo on the Somuas...

And I love the camo I put on the R35s.

This photo reminds me that I lied...  It's not 100% Minifigs, because I put a Pendraken tank commander on one of the R35s and on the Char B.

Closeup of Somuas.

The Char B.

Showing off the tank commander, which is actually a Brit.  I put brown on them, trying to make it look like the leather jackets and helmets they wore, but I'm not sure it worked very well.

Heavy Wpns and Officers.

The French '75.'

25mm ATGs.

French MGs.

AT rifles.

81mm mortars.

The French officers.  Not sure what color the kepis should be, I used a sand color.

The infantry.  Five platoons of three squads.

Another view.

Opposite.

Some closeups.  This one really irks me; the gent second from right (with binos) was meant to be an officer, but I was one rifleman short, so he went on a rifle stand...

More rifles.

And another set of rifles.  I really like the poses, and the castings are fantastic, very crisp, detail is great.  I'm really proud of these little guys.  I won't say they're the best paint job I've done, but I sure spent a lot of time on them, using quite a few colors, despite them not even having camo uniforms!

Well, one more set of photos to go, then I need to get some fightin' in this weekend, so stand by for more!

V/R,
Jack