Best And Worst Of My 2013 Gaming!

I thought I would take a quick look back at 2013 and put this year to rest by picking out a couple of my highlights and low lights!

Best Moment: Fate Of A Nation
Watching Phil, Mike and Wayne working on their projects is a real privilege as you see how the sausage is made and sometimes you close your eyes and hope that things work out okay, and other times everything seems to just come together like magic. I was a little apprehensive when Phil started work on FOAN as I was so passionate about the project and sometimes it is hard to put your own feelings aside and let the guys just do their thing! FOAN worked out so much better than I could have expected and the finished product is awesome and I cannot wait till the next time we visit the Sinai Desert and Golan Heights!

Honorable Mention: DUST
DUST is just cool, simple as that! I've enjoyed meeting Paolo and Olivier and chatting to them about their game and the products and are looking forward to what comes next. Of course and excuse to add cool toys to my collection is a definite bonus!

Worst Part of 2013: The Year of the Trollbloods (and not the internet type!)
I was so looking forward to tackling my Warmachine Trollbloods army this year and thanks to a couple of (by my standards) large FOW painting projects it got shelved. I would say that 2014 will be the year but I have already worked out that this will not be the case, so hopefully 2015, The Year of the Trollblood!

Dis-Honorable Mention: X-Wing
Such a cool year of X-Wing products and somehow I think my last game was in February or March. Going to have to remedy this in 2014.

DUST Christmas Comes A Little Late

With the FFG sale earlier this month, the guys in the Studio banded together to purchase a few things... today they arrived with me... hohoho. I had a quick look through all their nice toys and then left them on their desks so that they could have a nice surprise when they come back to work in 2014!

Now with a small pile of "back catalogue" items I think we will see some armies coming together! I figure I need to go and do a little research on the 179th Steel Guards Battalion (supported by the 26th Zverograd Tractor Factory Armoured Company) and their exploits - thats the fun part about alternate history games, you get to write your own!

SSU Steel Guard Ready for the Production Line!

The guys in the BF Studio have been getting quite excited about DUST ever since the announcement that we would be working with Paulo, Olivier, and the rest of the DUST team. The agreement to take over distribution of the DUST range started with the Wave 8 releases, leaving product a little thin on the ground if we wanted to get in and start building armies immediately (although the recent FFG sale has resulted that excitement building as the guys ordered some stuff to get armies started!). Luckily for me I was really interested in the release of the new Steel Guard figures (they reminded me a little of Battletech Clan "Toads") and was able to grab a couple of boxes to start building a small force.

I'd decided I wanted to paint the army, but I also wanted to make sure that I was not going crazy and spending too much time on a per figure basis so I decided to go with a primer red, straight out of the Zverograd factory look. I airbrushed the figures with Tamiya Hull Red, and then did a little highlighting from the top with a Hull Red / Dark Yellow mix. As you can see from the results I ended up with a some nice highlighting of the top surfaces that (I thought) looked really cool. I then varnished the models (and was a little disappointed at this point as the varnish really flattened out the highlighting!) and pin washed them with a MiG Productions Dark Wash. The guns was painted Vallejo Black Grey with a highlight of Oily Steel, the springs in the legs were also painted Oily Steel. The uniform and bed roll were painted English Uniform, given a quick wash with some black paint, then re-highlighted with English Uniform, and the whole model a quick (light) drybrush of Buff.

For the bases I glued on GF9 basing grit, undercoated it black, and then drybrushed on Green Grey, Stone Grey and a little Sky Grey (letting the drybush of this go over the feet and lower legs of the figure a little. Then glued on some "bricks" from the guys at Secret Weapon Miniatures just to help reinforce that Zverograd feeling.

I am pretty happy with the finished model and although there are a couple of things I am not entirely happy with, I was able to complete it quite quickly meaning I can get a small army on the table and play some games over the Christmas break! The rest of my force is undercoated and ready for the pin washing and detail work, with the HQ section currently on a plane somewhere between our factory / distribution hub in KL, and New Zealand. Once these figures are done I am definitely looking forward to painting a couple of the massive SSU tanks as well!

Taking Desperate Measures

When Mike finished working on Desperate Measures I spent a lot of time trying to work out what I list wanted to build from the book. Normally I find a list in each book that really excites me and like most wargamers I end up stashing some lead for when I am “definitely going to paint this!” This time I found it hard to find that one list that I had to make. I like the lists in the book and I own armies for both the Germans and Soviets so it should have been easy to pick something.

Looking through the book I started to narrow it down a little:

The Soviets

• Tankovy Batalon – I have something like 40-50 T-34s painted and whilst I need to do some of the support units (like artillery) it didn’t feel like a painting project when I was only painting odds and ends – that is more of a “two weeks before a tournament” project.
• Motorstrelkovy Batalon – I really want a massive Soviet infantry army…. But I am not sure about committing to that amount of painting given my magpie painting habits.
• Medium Self-propelled Artillery Regiment – okay, this one is low hanging fruit and will definitely hit the painting table… but I thought I would wait for the plastic SU-100 and I wanted to paint something now!
• Hero versions of the above – these are very exciting and was lucky enough to run one in a WI battle report. Running non Hen & Chicks T-34s is a liberating experience after playing Soviets for so long. Plus you do not need to paint as many figures, but the issues I had with the non Hero versions carried over to these companies too.

The Germans

• Panzer Kampfgruppe – I have no painted German tanks that I am happy with (with the exception of Kampfgruppe Bake, but they are white!), so this list was a chance to do whatever I wanted, plus it had all the toys. If only I could settle on a list…
• Panzergrenadier Kampfgruppe – PzGrens in 251s are on my “armies I must repaint before I die” list…. But not right now…
• Panzer Ausbildungs Verband – see my thoughts on the Panzer Kampfgruppe
• Panzer Ausbildungs Abteilung 500 – Crikey! Discounted Tigers and King Tigers thanks to the lack of Stormtrooper and the vehicles being unreliable…. You had me at discounted Tigers and King Tigers!

Looking through the PAA 500 list I did notice that it is a pretty tight list with a small number of support options. Normally this would run the risk of putting me off a little, but in this case I wanted something fun and compact that I could paint as a small self contained project. I also saw it as a gateway to start painting figures for the other German companies in the book. For instance if I took a pair of infantry platoons this would get me the start of my PzGren infantry as well (especially given the announcement of the plastic Sd Kfz 251). Tigers, Panthers and King Tigers always have a use in other lists! As for the AA, it did not matter which option I picked as you always need a cheap platoon of AA to round out a force.

In the end I settled on a couple of lists that I knew would cover my bases.

1500 points

HQ Platoon

1 Tiger I E    155 points

Combat Platoons

Schwere Panzer Ausbildungs Platoons

2 Tiger I E    280 points

2 Tiger I E    280 points

2 Konigstiger (Porshe)    445 points

Weapons Platoons

Panzergrenadier Ausbildungs Platoons

3 Grenadier Squads with 6 Rifle/MG teams and Panzerschreck team    130 points

3 Grenadier Squads with 6 Rifle/MG teams and Panzerschreck team    130 points

Support Platoons

Luftwaffe Light Anti-aircraft Gun Platoon

3 3.7cm FlaK43    65 points

1750 points

HQ Platoon

2 Tiger I E    310 points

Combat Platoons

Schwere Panzer Ausbildungs Platoons

2 Tiger I E    280 points

2 Tiger I E    280 points

2 Konigstiger (Porshe)    445 points

Leichte Panzer Ausbildungs Platoon

4 Panzer III N     180 points

Weapons Platoons

Panzergrenadier Ausbildungs Platoon

3 Grenadier "Sniper" Squads with 6 Rifle/Panzerfaust teams and Panzerschreck team    190 points

Support Platoons

Luftwaffe Light Anti-aircraft Gun Platoon

3 3.7cm FlaK43    65 points

So, I have achieved the “fun” part of Theory-Flames, now I need to work out how I am going to get it all painted!