More Bolt Action

Early this year, I sold off a chunk of my Soviet Bolt Action army. I didn't play the game often and when I did, I didn't play it well. Then Jason Meyers (of the Der Feldmarschall blog) started running quarterly Bolt Action events. His superb events and the great players who turn up for them have lit a fire.  I recently finished a Trenchworx T-28, White Scout car, and a twin turreted T-26.  Every one was a superb model so bravo, Trenchworx! Bonus, I'm finally getting the hang of my Badger airbrush. I also painted up Warlord Games Scouts and Engineers because...why not?

My Soviets have been in heavy rotation since summer.  I've used them in What a Tanker, 2 Chain of Command campaigns and 3 Bolt Action tournaments.  In the tournaments, I landed Best Overall General, Best Painted, and Best Allied General. Enough bragging.  I'll finish with a few pictures from my Bolt Action games.

Bolt Action & Chain of Command

Fellow blogger Jason Meyers aka Der Feldmarschal is running a sharp looking Bolt Action event this weekend.  This set a fire under me to finish my Rubicon T-34/76. I had trouble with my airbrush splattering on my last highlight.  To cover it up, I had to go over everything a 2nd time and wiped out my panel highlights.  Ah well.

I put my 1000 point Soviet force out on my battle board for pictures. Now I need to read the rules a time or two and I'll be set for the big game day.

In other East Front action, my friend Hugh and I fired up a Chain of Command Citadel campaign. We finished the 1st campaign representing Gross Deutschland's attack at Kursk with his German's nudging out a minor victory over my Soviets.  The scenarios featured the early German attempts at a breakout. The Germans fielded a Tiger tank in 3 of the games and it was a monster!  In one, I stopped it only by popping an ambush with a flamethrower at short range.  The Tiger panicked and withdrew.  In another, my ZiS-3 and the Tiger traded shot after shot. The Tiger wised up and moved out of sight behind a building.  My crew manhandled the gun forward until they could take a shot at the beast.  And brewed it up. Epic! I was too engrossed in our games to get many pics but here is the showdown between the ZiS-3 and the Tiger.

We're going to start Part 2 of the campaign. After fighting Round 1 with no tanks, I'll be painting 3 T-34s for a scenario where I can field up to 4 of them.  Should be great fun and I hope to report back "The Tigers are Burning!"

Campaigns are the best.  I love the color, narrative, and story they bring. TooFatLardies always does a great job with their supplements.  I had only one platoon to see me through my first 5 engagements. I had to play conservatively to keep my force intact and that after all is the whole point of a campaign.  Bonus, this gave me the impetus to paint up a platoon of Black Tree Design Soviets to replace my Warlord plastics.

I love a man in a uniform - done!

These WW II Brits for Chain of Command are done, and just in time. I was getting burned out by the sameness of painting up 100 British soldier. Now it's time to move onto something else.

Infantry Section:  An infantry section plus five riflemen. Leftovers and spares perhaps?   

6 pd AT gun crews #1 and #2: They're single mounted to make it easier to remove casualties from the AT gun.

Vickers medium MG team: This was my favorite set from this run of figures.  The Vickers is a WW I throwback.  

While looking for painting inspiration, I learned something interesting about the Vickers.  It was used for indirect fire at ranges of up to 4,500 yards. Such fire could catch the enemy by surprise and restrict movement.  It was used to good effect against trenches, road junctions and dead zones.  The Vickers had a back sight with an extension for this purpose, as seen in the photo below.    

British at Overloon, Netherlands using plunging fire.  

Some of our SAGA players also play Bolt Action so I'm painting up a force to join them. Here's my first drop of Soviets.  With 2 boxes of Warlord Games plastics, I'll be lucky if I have all my fingers left when I'm done.   My hands look like I was in a knife fight that I lost quite badly!  

I love a man in a uniform #2

Round 2 of the British project is officers, specialists and HQ. Figures are a mix of Bolt Action and Artizan.

PIAT team,  2" mortar and and medic.

Forward Observer, Platoon and section leaders. Last week, I posted up pictures of the British sections but I forgot to include the section leaders. They were a bit shy but I managed to get them in front of the camera today.  Leaders are mounted on larger bases.

PIATs, mortars, minesweepers, engineers, Brens and flamethrowers. I think I'm required to add an "...oh my!" 

The Brits are all block painted and washed with Army Painter Soft Tone. Selective highlights were applied.  Painting neat, I kept black intact for shadows on backpacks, straps and other gear. Flesh was done with Vallejo hull red as the base followed by Foundry Flesh 5A, B and C.  

I got in the second game in our Arnhem campaign game.  I muffed the patrol phase so badly that Hugh advanced his Paras through the woods unopposed. In game 3, I have the option to call on reinforcements (including armor) for a German counterattack.  My force morale is pretty brittle compared to the Paras but I'm going all in.  I hope to make a game of it and include a full report!

Below are pictures from our reset.  The area south of the road is woods.  The area north of the houses is wooded also. The Brits didn't want to go house to house so they concentrated on a thrust through the woods south of the road.  It was a very short and sharp engagement!  

I love a man in a uniform

Today's title is a straight lift from one the more clever songs of the 80s.  +5 points if you know the band and yes, I'm keeping score! I've got a large drop of British under way for Chain of Command. This platoon is all Artizan Designs.  When a figure is modeled as well as these, I assume the sculptor is also a painter.  I used a basecoat, wash and selective highlights to give these some pop.

The photos start with each section, and then pics of the  teams that make up the section (or squad as we say in the US).  British sections were made up of a Bren gun team plus a rifle team.  Three sections make a platoon, including a HQ with a PIAT and 2" mortar team.  Specialists will be featured in future posts.

First Section

Rifle Team

Bren Team

Second section

Third section

Hugh and I started the CoC Market-Garden campaign found in Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy #74.  The campaign is 4 linked battles representing the British 5 Platoon's spearhead for 3 Para’s advance on Arnhem. I ran the German training/replacement unit blocking the Para's advance. Thanks to some white hot dice and great generalship (tongue in cheek!), I beat Hugh's Para's quickly and soundly.

We reset and replayed the battle as the British must win to advance the campaign.  In our rematch, I got a beat-down before I withdrew off the table. My force morale plunged as a result and the next campaign battle just got exponentially more difficult for the Germans. Ouch!