6mm MG nests - for either side.

 

I have been looking at what I would need to create a Westwall battle. It turns out I need bunkers. I have found some online that I might buy, but I also went to Facebook to see if there were some other ideas for scratch building them. A few examples were given. One was for MG nests built using cocktail sticks - something I had already contemplated. For the past two evenings I have sat down and given these a go. All of them are based on a 2p coin. 

In Battlegroup you can pay points for an MG emplacement as a defender and I wanted to actually be able to give these a go. Playing in 6mm leaves a few things sort of abstracted. These MG nests won't actually have a miniature in them, but I prefer it that way. I might go the same sort of direction for ATGs in emplacements, unless that is better represented by an extra base that I can slip under the original base. Unclear.

Step one was to chop up some cocktail sticks. My first attempt had them glued to a piece of card and would then later be attached to the base. Chose not to go that way. Second idea was the example on the left. NO base texture yet. Third idea was to just attach the cocktail sticks that represent walls into the base texture to hold it fast. That worked a treat. I then heavily lathered the roof cocktail sticks with glue and left it to dry over night. 

I then primed them white and painted the ground a light sand colour. 

Then I painted the cocktail sticks Vallejo Beige Brown. I gave the build up earth a bit of Vallejo German Camo Brown, then washed the whole thing heavily with Citadel Agrax Earthshade.

Once dried I gave it a drybrush with Vallejo Desert Yellow, then applied various flock and foliage. I am super pleased with how they have come out. 

These just open up my possibilities in terms of what I can field as a defensive force. Next stop: bunkers. I am also looking to getting some British and US paras for some Market Garden games...even though I have sort of missed that boat this year. 

Battlegroup Stat Cards - Homemade

 So I made a PowerPoint where each slide is a stat card for a vehicle, ATG or man-portable AT weapon. Printed them out in colour, four slides per page, then laminated them in groups of eight, and finally chopped them up. All while watching a YouTube video about how no-one makes disaster movies anymore. 

I chose to laminate them so I can write on them with a whiteboard pen for keeping track of ammo and casualties in gun crews. Although in my experience a gun crew rarely survives taking any casualties.

I went to The Tank Museum

 I saw neither David Fletcher nor David Willey. I also didn't see any of the younger guys making YouTube content. It was a shame. I did, however, see a bunch of cool tanks, some of my favourites, and see 50 students aged 13/14 enjoy themselves looking at tanks. Some of them got scared about there being a tiger and a panther there... not sure if they were serious or not. As part of being there on a school trip they allow you to sit in a small group inside a Mark IV male tank. The guy gave a really engaging talk about what conditions were like inside. It was awesome. 

Here is a bit of a photo dump.

 First two photos are the view from walking up to the cafe and school group area.

Action shot of another WW1 tank.

I love the Matilda 1. Such an awful vehicle, but a good example of what an early tank was supposed to do - a moving bunker. 

I had forgotten that they have a land battleship there. The Independant - such an utterly insane idea. Looks amazing though.

I think I prefer an A10 cruiser, but an A9 will do with its stupid extra turrets. I have an old Airfix guide about British tanks of WW2 and the pictures of A10s excited me. Something about the shape and suspension just spoke to me. I love them.

My personal favourate. When I rounded the corner and saw it, I had to snap a photo. I loved seeing this vehicle. I love it so much. The shape, the gun, the story. 

FT17s are just cool. End of discussion. 

I feel like we were just awful at designing tanks between wars. What a dreadful looking machine. 

First tank model I ever built. Matchbox Panzer II, along with a Wespe. I remember handing over £10 pocket money - each kit was £2.75 or something. Those were the days. 

One of the last 20mm kits I made. Such a cool shape - dreadful though as a tank.

I always wanted the Matchbox/Revell double set of this tank and a smaller one. 

Tiger 131 - most famous tank in the world. I couldn't not take a photo of it. 

Saving Private Ryan.

Panzer III is probably my favourite actual tank of the war. I like the size and shape. 

Beautiful. 

I built a Fujimi Valentine and I messed up the road wheels, meaning they stick out a little. Still, a cool tank to be fair. 

I have a few Cromwells knocking around. In the early days I always wanted to have one as they had pretty solid stats for a British tank. But I couldn't find a kit of one to save my life. Now - Airfix do a decent one. Armourfast also used to make a pair that were servicable. 

All in all, a good day out. I highly recomment. I didn't get to see even close to everything I wanted. 

Flooring from table dressing.

 Ten years ago I bought two red, square place mats to protect your table from hot plates. They had the texture of sci-fi flooring. I have used them only on a couple of pieces of terrain so far and they have travelled with me through three house moves.

Below you can see the two different textures on the landing pads. I prefer the top one. However, with them being bright red, paitning them was a pain and there are times where I think you can see it sticking through. 

This summer I found some grey place mats in Aldi probably. Picked them up for maybe £1 each. I genuinely feel like they need a dry brush and that is all? They will do as is. I am loathe to even cut them up. Pictured below with some 6mm figures, a 28mm(ish) Star Wars Miniature, and some mech from some 3d printed prototype game. 

 

Bulking out the ranks - Soviet LMGs and ATGs and British support weapons.

 A while back I bought some assorted figures and vehicles that were missing. Notably Soviet LMG teams and British platoon support weapons - Bren teams, 2 inch mortars and Vickers HMG teams. They have been sitting for a few months partly painted. This weekend I decided to smash them out. 

The British are painted a different colour to the rest of my brits, but I don't mind too much. I am pleased with how they have all come out.

I wanted 3 45mm cannons I needed more LMG teams so painted up like 12 of them.

I actually think I prefer these British. They are nice and light so don't look like brown blobs.