It's a Tiger!

Got the Tiger I and the halftrack finished and based up...that Tiger is pretty ferocious looking! It's Wittman's, from Warlord Games. Can't wait to see them on the table! Maybe Sunday afternoon...maybe...

More 1/56 WW2 Vehicles

Was able to complete a few more of the Warlord Games 1/56 WW2 vehicles. First up we have a Soviet armored car. It is only armed with a machine gun, but should serve its purpose well: scoot around, scout, cause a little high-speed mayhem.

Next up is the ubiquitous Panther tank. I thought I had some German national marking decals, but I did not, so I need to order some.

Then, the classic, late-model PzKpfw IV. Again, needs some national markings (soon).

Lastly, a Soviet SU-100. Anyone who has seen the classic images of armored vehicles moving through the high grasses of the Steppe - leaving a set of tracks behind - can see the effect I am going for with this basing. I am just not sure about how it looks. Your thoughts?

Some Abysmal Evening

Well, not exactly. The title of this post refers to two things: (1) We played a FoB2 battle in which both armies had Abysmal decks and commanders and (2) the Austrians performance in the battle.

Yes, we played game two (of three) this past Saturday night of the 1809 Austrian Napoleonic campaign. And, yes, the Austrians did not do well.

We actually had a plan, and in hindsight, should have stuck to it - but we didn't. We won the "Deployment" roll so strongly that practically the entire French army was deployed before any serious committal of Austrian soldiers. The trouble was that the French deployed where we did not expect them to - and we had to amend our deployment plans on the fly - which did not work so well for us.

I have to tip my shako to Greg Rold and his team's excellent plan, deployment and execution. That channel of terrain was well screened by the town and protected your flank attack and Terry got the job done! If we Austrians had done "the box" after all, the battle may have ended up differently - so, we actually have a "what if" in our tabletop history now!

The highlight of the battle was something we don't often see: two grand batteries and a large cavalry battle!

The French grand battery was taking a good toll on the Austrian infantry and even destroyed an Austrian battery. It was during this time that the Austrian grand battery was maneuvering into position. Once there, they broke up the French grand battery destroying two thirds of it.

The French cavalry, sensed an opportunity to sally forth into no man's land and perhaps take out the Austrian grand battery - using the shadow of the hill for cover in the final approach. Naturally, the Austrian cavalry had to counter this threat. So we ended up having seven cavalry units (3 Austrian and 4 French) fight multiple melees. Each side had its moments, but in the end, after some tough melees, the French horse prevailed. I am not sure if Greg would have sent the battered cavalry forward towards the grand battery, especially after the battery fired upon them and forced them back after the end of the horse-on-horse battle...but...it sure would have been fun to see!

With both sides a little hamstrung by the Abysmal ratings in command (and deck) it was a little interesting. Each side had 6 Lull cards, so there was a lot of opportunity for snatching a free card during the battle. Commands didn't always move as fast as desired. For me, I liked this and think of it as a strength of the rule system - reducing your ability to control things!

Even with all that, and the low-rated commanders, the battle did not drag on - the game was not slowed. We completed the fight in right around 3 hours of actual gaming. That's with about 50 units in play and two Abysmal decks too!

Anyway, thanks guys for the battle - here are some pics of you all and the miniatures.

 

 

A Couple of my Favorite AFVs

Was able to complete a couple of my favorite armored vehicles. These are the excellent Warlord Games 1/56 scale vehicles. The majority of these models are resin, just the guns and hatches are metal (The exception being the motorcycle, which is all metal).

I am a big fan of the Hetzer. I mean, it just looks cool to me. Sure it is only a short 75mm gun and lightish armor (on par with the PzKpfw-III)...but it is well sloped and a sleek looking machine.

The Puma is my all-time favorite armored car. 50mm gun and a lot of mobility! And bad-ass looking too!

As for the motorcycle, I thought it would make a nice little recon team...you know, just the type of unit that can sometimes be a pain in the butt but not a real threat. Could also be used as a "messenger" type of unit.

Fun stuff...more to come.

Puma

Hetzer

Motorcycle Recon/Messenger

Busy, busy, busy...

I have been pretty busy since the last post...besides work, I have been laser focused on a couple of Microsoft certifications. My downtime from all of that has been pretty free of gaming but I have still managed to paint more 28mm Three Kingdoms Chinese and get about ten or so 28mm WW2 vehicles into various stages of paint.

Regarding the WW2 vehicles, I got a few of Warlord's excellent 1/56 scale vehicles. Germans and Russians. Americans in a future order. When finished, I'll get some images of those up.

About the only gaming I have done has been working on a 28mm variant of WW2 rules based upon the Song of Drums and Shakos engine...but not individual soldiers...squad level. I am really enjoying the mechanic, feels really skirmishy to me...but at the platoon level of skirmishy!

I am basing the miniatures the same as for Brent's WW2 game, so that I get double usage from them. Of course, Brent's game is in the far future with respect to a timeline. I am good with that, I really want to get into Pulse of Battle!!!

Matt came over Sunday and we managed to play a game of this experiment, and really had a good time with it. I'll toss some photos up below. We staged this battle in Estonia in 1944 - Russians on the the offensive.

This Saturday evening, the Austrian Napoleonics campaign continues at Brent's...very much looking forward to that! I'll post again on Sunday about all that...

I took these photos with my iPad, and edited them using SnapSeed. SnapSeed is a really awesome app! The user interface simply rocks! Give it a try! I used some of the groovy effects to try to get a little drama in the shots...

Soviet Armor rolls up with infantry support

Big fight in the town

Intense firefight - small arms, tanks, mortars and at-guns!

I made some markers. "Activation" and "Hits"

Estonian Home Army forces assault the Soviets