Combat Mission Afrika Korps

Not much painting going on but lots of PC Wargaming. Combat Mission Afrika Korps is a brilliant game for wargamers. This version covers Crete, North Africa and Italy. Each 3D unit on the battlefield represents a rifle section, heavy weapon team, gun or a vehicle/tank. I have been playing the Crete campaign as the Australians. Sound effects are great. My Aussie teams run around the battlefield yelling stuff out in an Australian accent. At the end of each battle you get the battle stats of KIA, MIA, Wounded etc. I love that detail. A special bonus is the 3D maps which have given me some great ideas for 28mm skirmishing.

To The Last Round

The Battlefield.

Australian Infantry defending on the left. German Afrika Korps attacking from the right.

Three victory locations are located on the hill at the top of the picture, the centre house and the southern house. 2 to 1 attacker/defender ratio.

Germans in the scrub.

Australian "Man Alone" with two pin markers. The sole allied survivor of the battle.

Played a game of Disposable Heroes against Guido today. I used the "To the Last Round" scenario found on the Iron Ivan yahoo group. To the Last Round is based on the true life Battle of Hosingen during the opening of the Battle of the Bulge in 1944. The Americans being ordered to delay the Germans, fight to the last round of ammo and bug out.

I adapted the scenario to the desert. The Australians fighting a delaying action against Rommel on the road to Tobruk. To win the Germans need to take two of the three victory locations or wipe out the defenders. The Australians need to hold two victory locations for six turns or wipe out the attackers. I am playing the defender.

A brief overview of the battle :

Turn 1 - Australians deploy, spread out and thin on the ground to cover all possible attacks. The Vickers MMG is in the centre house. A bren gun team is placed on the hill with the victory point location. Germans deploy out of the palm tree grove concentrating on one side of the board only and attack the hill victory point location. Germans take the hill in turn one killing 4 Australians to 1 German.

Turn 2 - Not much goes on other than a shootout. Australians loose 1 man, the Germans loose 2.

Turn 3 - Germans begin coming down off the hill concentrating on the northern house. Both sides loose their HMG's this turn. Australians 2 dead, Germans 3.

Turn 4 - Germans prep fire on their intended targets causing 4 Australian causalities to their 1. The Australian platoon commander is killed which is a major moral causing problem.

Turn 5 - Germans bayonet charge into contact with the defenders. No quarter is shown by either side. The Australians are wiped out. One man is left alone in the scrub pinned down. Germans fire at him causing him to rout off the battlefield.

Total German victory at the end of turn 5. This is the exact result of the real battle at Hosingen in 1944. I loose, Guido wins.

I have not played Disposable Heroes for about 6 months. It was good to get a game in. I really like these rules.

Unboxing a Battlefront 15mm Huey Slick

Hi all. I thought I would post some images of unboxing the best miniatures release of 2009, the Wargames Illustrated/Battlefront 15mm Huey Slick. The first thing you will notice is the excellent packaging. The product presentation is top notch. The box is 100mm x 150mm. It look like a nice box of chocolates. The back of the box says "Designed in New Zealand, Made in Malaysia."

Opening the box you find the usual Battlefront plastic blister set-up. Everything is nicely packed and protected.

Tipping out the contents (and checking all the bits are in there - you all know what I mean) you will find all the above items including two 15mm door gunners, a choice of plastic in flight rotors or metal rotors, a plastic flight stand and a couple of magnets to attach the chopper to the flight stand. The instructions look clear and concise. No decals in the pack. You will note the plastic bits look like they are made of wood. But their not. It's a protective covering over the plastic.

And finally a close up of the door gunners.

Overall a great model. It's really well made. The hull is resin and the little fiddly parts are metal. Detail is superb. 2 thumbs up Battlefront and Wargames Illustrated.

A special message to Dom at Dom Decals. I need 15mm Royal Australian Airforce decals. PLEAAAAAAASE!

Anzac WWI Vickers MMG Section

I wrapped up my painting for 2009 by finishing two WWI Vickers Machine Gun teams for "The Great War". They will support my 1000pt Anzac Battalion. All I have left to paint is my 18pdr Gun, five crew and a forward observer and the army is finished. Figures are 28mm Great War Miniatures.

2009 Painting Stats, Awards & Thank You

As 2009 draws to a close and I get a year closer to 40 it's time to reveal my painting stats and the most fabulous Wargamer Blue awards of 2009.

This year I painted :
46 x 15mm figures (exactly the same as last year)
8o x 28mm figures (one down from last year)
1 x 28mm tank
21 x 1/3000 ships

Overall I painted far less than 2008.

My award for the best ruleset of 2009 "Black Powder" by Warlord Games.

Best new miniatures of 2009 "15mm Huey Slicks" from Battlefront Miniatures

Big thank you to my regular readers and to the regular comment posters who have encouraged me to keep painting. Especially my blogging friends

Helen aka Tank Girl
Monty aka Monty's Wargaming
Steve aka Steve's Blog
Chris aka Confessions of a Wargamer
Secundus aka Iron Mitten

Big shout out to my gaming buddy Guido who will hopefully get his 10 year old daughter to show him how to blog and put his awesome painted figures on show in 2010.

And finally Neil at the Meeples and Miniatures Podcast. Great show mate, getting bigger and better all the time.

I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas and have a safe New Year. I should have a picture of a couple of WWI MMG gunners up shortly. I just need to paint the bases.

Cheers
Paul aka Wargamer Blue, Rat of Tobruk (TMP), and pbeccas on everything else.

Games Workshop Goes WWII

The December 2009 issue of Wargames Illustrated contains an interesting little announcement on page 4.

"Warhammer World 24-25 October.......attendees were treated to a bonus surprise appearance when Warwick Kinrade of Forgeworld demonstrated the forthcoming Games Workshop World War II game.

Warwick ran through a game in which a British Battlegroup stormed a German held position in Normandy - the British sector in Normandy being the focus for the rulebook. The game is designed for 20mm figures although it will work equally well in 15mm. Interestingly the game seemed to owe little to the well know Warhammer game system.

The game is still a work in progress with a release date of "next year - hopefully early on" planned. The core rulebook will be supported by further supplements, which will include more army lists and more theatres of war"

The article is accompanied by a photograph of a tall lanky man in desperate need of sun moving a column of Brit tanks up a road into a French village.

From those that witnessed the demonstration - it is based on an old school wargame rule set called "Sandskrieg" from the 1970's.

Bring on something new in 2010.

Great War Australian Command

I have finally finished the Battalion Command for my Western Front Anzac 1000pt army. Just two Vickers teams and a 18pdr Field Gun to go. Figures are 28mm Great War Miniatures.

Black Powder Napoleonics

The Prussians


Hand to Hand, French Top, Prussians Below

I had another bash at Black Powder last night using 15mm Napoleonics. My opponent was Jonesy, and Guido umpired. Simsy was meant to turn up but cancelled at this last minute for something he called a "booty call." This time we used two Brigades a side and added two cannon per side to give the artillery rules a whirl. Nothing special about the terrain as these are learning games.

Artillery seemed easy to use. Range of artillery depends upon the gun used. In this case we used Smoothbore Foot Artillery which has a range of 48cm in 15mm. Distance decides if you throw 1,2 or 3 dice to attack. You get to use 1D6 if the range is over half, 2D6 if the range is up to half, and 3D6 if the range is up to 6cm. There are some modifiers to add in depending upon enemy formations etc. A roll of a 6 always disorders target.

The target needs to roll to save any hits. The usual 4+ save needs to be modified by -1 if hit by artillery at long range, or -2 if hit by artillery at medium and short range.

During this game artillery was charged by a regiment of infantry and the hand to hand result was as expected. Artillery die easily.

The rules cover artillery, howitzers and machine guns (for later wars).

An enjoyable game. Jonesy took line honours by inflicting more damage than I did. Sorry about the poor photos. My camera is not up to scratch for low light. Jonesy took a couple of pics with his super camera and I will post them if he sends them to me. Next game we try out cavalry.