Many Rivers-Turn 4-Farm and Forest

Myself and Graham got together at his place last Sunday week for the next game in the Many Rivers campaign. We finally had moved on to another table, this time playing the Swift to Support scenario from the 1940 Handbook. As you can see I was extremely lucky with my support roll get 19 support points. Graham ended up with 9. Both platoons were in good shape but I should note that my other 2 platoons are pretty shot up.

Forces

Guards Platoon #2 (missing 1 man)

FR 0, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (9)

AAMG 1

Infantry Section 4

4 Emplacements 4

Schützen Platoon #3 (missing 4 men)

FR +1, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (19)

Shabby Nazi Trick 1

Red Dice 2

Smoke Barrage 2

le.18 IG 4

Stuka Attack 4

Pioneer Squad 6

The Game

I got boxed into a corner with my JOP's. Graham stayed well back. The Stuka Attack resulted in the large barn being in ruins which was a significant advantage for me as this is solid cover for the British with a good LOS over the hedges.

This photo is from pretty late in the game, as I had forgotten to take photos as usual. I held off with the smoke barrage which landed right on target until I had my troops ready to advance rapidly forward. I also waited to see where Graham was to set up his defence. He eventually placed all 4 sections behind the hedge on his right flank. I used my large Pioneer Squad as the main advance. As you can see above they got quite shot up. I had a strong firing base on the hill on my left flank.

Base of fire with SL, IG, squad and 5cm mortar.

As you can see the British suffered quite a few casualties and shock from my firing base with at least 2 teams routing. Graham decided he had enough and withdrew. Game over!

Summing Up

German Platoon #3

Platoon Leader Outlook: Happy

Men’s opinion: 0

CO’s opinion: -1

German Platoon #3: 3 dead next game

German 1st Platoon has lost 5 dead , 5 missing for next game

German 2nd Platoon has lost 8 dead, 4 missing for the next game

British Platoon #2 

Platoon Leader Outlook: Happy 

Men’s opinion: +1

CO’s opinion:  -1

British Platoon #2: 2 dead, 2 missing next game

British Platoon #1: 5 dead, 2 missing next game

Next Game

I have decided that I will use a Blitzkrieg to attack the next table using my same force. The 5cm Mortar will be out of ammo and we decided that it would be unreasonable for the Pioneer Squad to be intact as they lost 6 figures, so using the casualty table they will be down 5 men for the next game.

Norwegian Platoon and 2025 Gaming Plans

My last partially completed figures, that I wanted to complete by the end of 2024, were my Norwegian platoon for WWII Chain of Command ruleset. These figures are almost all 3D Printed in resin. You can read about their manufacturer, organisation as well as painting scheme in 2 previous posts. I had painted almost 2 squads but I had all the Leaders, Supports and two more squads to paint to complete the platoon. I finished these on December 31st but by then the New Year festivities were starting to catch up with me, thus the delay in putting them on the blog.

Complete Platoon, the newly painted figures have yet to have snow on their bases.

Colt M29 MMG Team

Medic, Forward Observer, Sniper, 2 Senior Leaders and King Haakon!

Well it has been a pretty successful painting month, I have been isolated in the United Sates for the last month with another 2 weeks to go before I can get back to my native country. I am working on various playing aids/terrain pieces now, including for CoC, WaC, Midgard as well GdA.

2025 Aspirations

I usually do not do this, as really I play too many different rulesets now, have too many armies and warbands and have too much terrain. I have been really starting to thin things out so I basically have been subtracting rather than adding but there are some forces I would like to paint and rulesets I would like to add.

Vietnam

Still have not decided on a ruleset here, I already have several but I am looking at 2 that are still in development or I have yet to receive. A Vietnam version of CoC is being developed by John Savage, the author of What a Cowboy. He really does first class work, I am not sure if this version will be ultimately official but it looks like a lot of fun. I am waiting to receive Battle Group's latest ruleset Nam 1968. It sounds interesting and I have a sense that it is aimed at squad actions rather than platoon sized games. I am more attracted to the smaller actions but I will have to see. I still have to paint maybe 15-20 figures for a Platoon sized force for Vietnam but it is a nice project.

Midgard

This is an exciting new game which covers both historical and fantasy battles from the Classical Period to the late Middle Ages. I have a lot of figures that I can use for this including the Dark Ages in Europe as well as the Crusades. My LoTR figures which will be good for fantasy. I am also putting together a Sengoku era force for the game. Semi-official force list are presently being developed for Warring States gaming with the ruleset. This will be a long term project, as I have quite few figures to paint but I am attracted by the uniformology and well as the tactics of the period. I have printed off quite a few movement trays which the ruleset requires and am just terraining them now. 

SAGA Age of Chivalry

We should be receiving the rulebook within the month. I still have not decided on a warband or painted any figures but I see many of the players in our club already have several armies, so I am hoping to borrow some in the short term for gaming.

Gaming

I am going to try restart some games with rulesets I have not played for a while, almost exclusively from the TFL stable of games. These include Picketts Charge, Kiss me Hardy as well as Algernon Pulls it Off. 

I will of course continue CoC, GdA, WaC , M&T, Congo and SAGA as well as the Alternate History games I play including Pulp Alley, Draculas America and Carnevale. 

That should keep me busy for 2025!

Caesars Camp-Counter Attack at Villiers

Last Wednesday myself and Graham got together to play Turn 7 (and last) in our Caesars Camp campaign set in 1940 France. We had played 6 turns, so far with the British winning the most, however I should note that Turn 6 was a cliffhanger with some luck at the end Turing what seemed to be a German victory into a loss. This was the first time that Graham got to attack in the game and he had a fresh platoon. Victory here would allow the Germans to prevent a Major British victory. Because of the complexity of the terrain we decided to play at my place. I should both that we were both -2 of our FM rolls to start the game. 

German Attackers-217th Infanterie Regiment (FM8)

2nd Wave Infantry Platoon #3

2 Senior Leaders (Leutnant CR 6")

3 squads of 10 men, lead by a JL's, one squad with a MG08/15

Supports 16

Stuka Attack

Extra squad

MMG Team

Flamethrower Team

Sniper

Scottish Defenders-The Cameron Highlanders (FM8)

British EW Infantry Platoon (A Company)

2 Senior Leaders

2" Mortar Team

3 sections of 10 men, lead by Junior Leaders-(minus 3 men)

Vickers MMG Team

Supports 9

Anti-Aircraft Artillery

Pioneer Section w/ 2 entrenchments

Vickers MMG Team w/JL

The Game

Unlike the previous games this game was fought over a fairly densely populated area. We had checked google maps before the game and in the schematic provided in the campaign booklet the church was oriented north to south and it should have been oriented west to east so we changed that. Otherwise I tried my best to duplicate it.

The German approach into the village

Patrol Markers

JOP's

Effect of the Stuka was somewhat muted with most of the hits north of the battle line.

The German attack initially seemed to centre on the British left flank

Also a squad approaching from the right, I put my engineers down on OW.

The German attack is definitely coming from the left with 3 squads now attacking on that side.

The battle got interesting here, but no photos unfortunately. The Germans dropped a Flamethrower Team ambush causing the Brits behind the house to fallback but they then became pinned. They were also able to push a squad into the house denying the JOP to the Brits, thus they were unable to reinforce. It started to look pretty dodgy for the Brits and their FM was now down to 5........

...........I did have an ace up my sleeve though with my MMG section yet undeployed, it was now or never. I had designated the church as my "Keep" at the beginning of the game and warned Graham as such. The Keep functions as a JOP and is Bunker cover. I deployed the squad at the top of the Steeple and they were able to rain 20d6 on the attacking Germans. A lucky double phase came up and I was able to drive the attackers FM down to 0. A British victory!

Well another campaign played out, I must have at least 10 under my belt by now and Graham's first. He played quite well and the last 2 games were quite close. I would not rate this as one of the top campaigns I have played but it was fun. There were a couple of discrepancies or missing pieces in the booklet. I wonder what we will play next. I have a sense that Graham is interested in the Many Rivers campaign as he is building a Dutch platoon.

Norwegians for Chain of Command

As most of you know, I am really quite interested in the central and Eastern European theatres in WWII. I also like winter wargaming. The Lard Magazine put out a Narvik campaign in the 2023 annual and since that I have been tempted to paint up some Norwegians. Actually, I have been tempted to paint up some Norwegians for a much longer time that that as there is also the Road to Dombas campaign in one of the terrain books put out by Pat at the Silver Whistle. My friend Graham had recently put in some orders to EWM and added a pack of Norwegian infantry for me. I have been quite good recently, in respect to my lead pile, and had no unpainted primed figures sitting around. I cleaned up the figures, primed them black and then slap chopped them with white.

There was a bit of a challenge to discover a painting guide for them but I have found when you cannot find something check the Flames of War site and you will find it. I also got some very useful help from a Norwegian CoC player Olve Kroknes who had written the Narvik campaign for Lard Magazine. 

In photos are prints the Norwegian Infantry uniform looks greenish but most written descriptions describe a grey-blueish tinge to the cloth. Olve suggested a blue wash, and I was quite pleased on how this worked out. I initially did the wash after the first uniform colour application and then dry brushed it but I found that the blue wash should be the final step. Once I got this down it ended up being a pretty simple paint scheme as follows:

• Slapchop
• VMC German Field Grey-Uniform
• VMC Flat Earth-Leather
• VMC Khaki-Canvas Bags
• VMC Green Grey-Anklets
• VMC Black-Boots
• Followed by highlights of the same slightly lightened with VMC Stone Grey or Khaki
• Washed with Citadel Drakenhof Nightshade
• If overcoats you can do them VMC Dark Prussian Blue
• If there are anoraks you can do them VMC Green Grey

In respect to the EWM figures, they were Ok. I am not overly fond of their sculpts but they have improved over the Chasseur Ardenais figures I got from them some years ago. The poses were good and varied in the pack and all the necessary weapons were available for a basic platoon, I also have to be cognisant that EWM does do a great job of putting out figures for minor nations in WWII which no one else does.

Some confusion also about Norwegian platoon structure, but I eventually came to the conclusion that I would go with the following structure. Always happy to be corrected, as I do appreciate that this is not the alternate platoon structure described in the Narvik campaign.

Platoon Structure

Platoon HQ: 2 SL (Captain and Lieutenant) with Pistols + JL (Platoon Sergeant) with a rifle

Sections x 4:  9 men (1 Corporal with a rifle, a 6 man rifle team and a 2 man LMG team with a Madsen m/22 LMG)

Alternate Structure

Platoon HQ: 2 SL (Captain and Sergeant) with Pistol and Rifle Respectively

Sections x 4:  8 men (1 Corporal with a rifle, a 4 man rifle team and a 3 man LMG team with a Madsen m/22 LMG)

I have decided to try to do a better job on terraining. The biggest challenge is to decide to go with "Full Winter" as I have done with the Finns or "Snow on the Ground" as I have done above. I have decided to go with the latter for my Soviets as they have all just been rebased but not yet terrained.

Terrain-3D Printed

I bought a new FDM printer a couple of months ago and I have to say it really works well for me. My friend P-Y had bought an Artillery Sidewinder X2 and I was blown away how quiet it was. My Creality CR10S is really a piece of junk and I just threw it out. I am sure the 3D print enthusiasts who love to tinker with things (you know the type, the ones who offer advice on the product FB pages.....the psychos I mean) enjoy the Creality printers but the Artillery Sidewinder has just worked immediately when I took it out of the box.

Anyway, I have been recently using a matt PLA which I really like and have been printing a number of different things. I have also been throwing a lot of terrain out which I have had for years, which I am just not happy with. Because of this, I have had to do some replacements. First up is some hedges for Chain of Command in 20mm. The hedges I have are in hard resin and are quite nice but in 28mm and really have not worked that well for my 20mm games. I had a look and found these on Wargaming 3D. It is odd as they say they are for 6/10mm but I find them perfect printed as is for 20mm. It might be that they are packaged as bocage.

From the top using a matt PLA from Polymaker. Then washed with dark green (equivalent of Citadel Camoshade). Dry brushed successively with VMC Dark Green, Olive Green and Deep Yellow. Bases are painted with Dark Umber, and dry brushed with a Mocha Brown followed by a Medium Brown Ballast and some green flock.

I will need some more pieces as this is only about 15' so far.

My Friend Luis sent me these STL's, I believe they are free on Thingiverse.

I might have used a darker brown weather powder, but I have a hard time resisting colour.

Might add some lighter flock.

Single Culvert for Winter gaming

Double Culvert for regular terrain.

I do have a couple of more 3D printed terrain pieces to paint but my my biggest project recently is mdf terrain in 28mm mostly for Pulp Alley. Still have 2 more buildings to assemble and paint but I am getting there. 

Some 3D Printed Finns

 

I have had these figures on the painting table for over a year now, they were 3/4 finished but just seemed to languish there. My first retirement project was to move them off.

They are all 3D prints from Just Some Miniatures, they really are fantastic figures. I would have liked to print them in 28 mm but I game in 20 mm. My present Finns are all metals from Warmodelling and Eureka and these were an excellent match scaled down proportionally unlike the Soviets I had printed. I am not 100% sure but I scaled at either 70-72%. These figures are from the Jakarta, Finnish Officers, and LMG packs. I think the only figure I did not print was the figure with the Molotov, I already have too many of those. Looking back I might of missed one of the officers as well. I would have liked to see more NCO's Officers with rifles, as well as a figure with a MP-18 but that is about it. As you will see I finally got a figure with Lahti-Saloranta M/26 LMG, until now all my Finns had been armed with DP-28's

All my Finns are in all white so I continued with that theme. 

From left to right: LMG team, JL, Rifle team and SMG team.

Warmodelling on the right

I got a bit out of control printing the SMG's, there is also a figure with a MP40 as well as another leader.

I also had some Russian guns that I had to finish up as you can see.

M1942 45mm ATG and M1936 76mm Divisional Gun

I should note that Propylene F. has added many more figures to his Finnish range, including some cooks, a flamethrower team, interchangeable infantry, skiers, ATG crews etc. etc. He also has a Soviet range as well as a Polish range. I am hoping he will do a Norwegian range soon. Finally I should note that he has a very interesting kickstarter with Finnish transports that finished up within the next 24 hours.

Soviet Infantry-3D Prints

No, I have not started to print Space Marines on my Photon Zero!

I first got my resin printer about 16 months ago in a Black Friday sale, it was $100! I felt there was little to lose as my main focus was to print vehicles that I could not find in hard plastic for my 1/72 WWII wargaming. I am not a big modeller so precise detail on the models was to critical to me but I was finding that my FDM printer although good for buildings was really not the thing for small scale vehicles. I had seen that you could do a lot of post processing to improve things but that would have defeated the purpose of pumping out tanks so I could play games. There are no end of fairly good STL's for free and once I got the trick of placing supports, things were going well. I was expecting to stop there.

And then along came this STL designer, Propylene Foliescu who was putting out the most amazing looking infantry figures for the Winter War, a particular area of interest for me. I knew had a pretty dated printer but I said why not give it a try. I first printed up a bunch of Finns that came out quite well but I already had a lot of Finns so I shifted my focus to the Soviets which I was short one section for a full platoon. 

I went ahead and purchased what he had on Wargaming3D, and made some adjustments to the scale and off I went, I really had a problem with only a single model of the Soviets but when I had a look at the actual models I could see I had a problem. The bulk of my Winter Soviets are from CPModels, these sculpts are really quite nice, anatomic and ...tall. When I compared the 28mm models scaled to 70%, they looked like dwarves. One of the great things about 3d printing is that you can mess around with the scale. I played around and came up with a print where I scaled down the model to 70% and then increase the vertical scale to 80%. They were near perfect as you can see below.

The CP/TQD model is on the right, it still looks a little taller but that is because it has a base, proportionally they were quite similar.

So, I went ahead and printed a batch of models, the Photon Zero has a tiny build plate but it was pretty easy to print 12 models at a time. I was really quite pleased by the result. 

A Soviet section which is quite variably sized through out the course of the war.  there are 15 figures here, with 13 rifled armed troops, a JL and a 2 man LMG team.

Some SMG armed troops to use as supports, there were only 2 different poses.

One thing I was really lacking was guns, here is a Gun team with a SL and  a  m1936  76mm gun as well as a m1937 45 mm gun. 

The guns are from Night Sky Miniatures 

I finally got some troops to put in my Quad Maxim Gaz Truck.

A Soviet Field Kitchen from Night Sky Miniatures

I now have a complete Soviet platoon for CoC, I had been using a unit of NKVD as my 4th section but I am now good. I will try to get the Finns I printed some time ago painted and post them.