Bolt Action - Somewhere in Normandy.

After boning up on the rules, I decided to get on with it, and play a game. I changed venue, to the dining room, which would be less painful for the back. Unfortunately, the table there is only 5x3 feet. To combat that, I decided to make my game only four turns, with an optional fifth. This would remove the first turn of entering the board and getting into position. Blood was spilled on the first turn.

Terrain rules: Farmhouse is hard cover. Hedgerows are soft cover. The big hedges also block line of sight, unless you are adjacent to them. This meant squads on opposing sides of the road, still can't see each other. All ground is open ground.

Scenario: This farm sits on a road junction in Normandy. After a failed attempt to capture it earlier in the day, the British have regrouped and are going for it again. There are two objectives, the farmhouse, and the small emplacement next to the burning sherman. Having successfully defended the area, the German armour has gone elsewhere to fight, but since movement on the British lines has been seen, Fritz called for help again.

There is a German squad sitting in the farmhouse, the commander is just behind it. A machine gun team is covering the road, with another squad sitting on the other objective.

The British get a  couple of squads on, one up the right flank, supported by a 2" mortar, and one up the centre. They were hoping to get up close and distract the house occupants, while another squad flanks from the left.

The squad in the farmhouse open up on the approaching Brits. A casualty is taken, a pin marker received. This might not be so easy!

Armoured support arrives to block the road.

A Cromwell comes onto the scene, takes a shot at the Panzer IV, hits, but only stuns the crew. A decent start for his first time on the table.

The Germans set up in ambush, and the Panzerschreck comes on to get into position.

The British get all their forces onto the table, note their squad trying to outflank the house. I guess that German squad will have something to say about it.

Turn two begins with the Brits pulling a dice. Immediately the Cromwell is ordered to fire, and brews up the Panzer IV!! With that worry now removed, the Cromwell can go on to shell the infantry.

In retaliation, the Germans covering this flank are in position to unleash some lead upon the flanking force.

The British take some fire, a casualty, and a pin marker. It might be time for them to rethink their situation. However, they themselves manage to advance, and catch the German commander in the open. Yet, somehow they managed to score zero hits! Also visible is a pin marker on the house. This has been caused either by a 2" mortar, or the squad facing the house.

The Panzerschreck gets into position to ambush the Cromwell. Also visible is the Vickers team, and the now useless PIAT team.

This is the right flank at the end of turn two.

This is the left flank.

Turn three begins with the Vickers team opening up with a decent volley against the house. The German squad is down to five men.

And then the hero Cromwell strikes again. Rolling D6 hits for his light howitzer, he rolls 5. Bye bye Germans! The farmhouse is now empty (probably useless anyway now) and ready to be taken.

This is the state of the right flank. The British just cautiously advancing. Germans waiting. They see no need to leave their cover, and get caught in any crossfire on the road.

The British left flank take more casualties, and spend the turn hunkered down.

This is the situation on the left flank at the end of turn three.

Turn four begins with an effort to contest the second objective. The Germans, lying in wait open fire, and fall just short of forcing a morale roll. This was not the best idea this squad has ever had.

The Cromwell races up to take the main objective, and gets ambushed by the Panzerschreck...who rolls a 1.

The game ends at turn four. The Cromwell has taken an objective, with the second one being contested. Also, the Germans have lost their armour, and their centre has been penetrated. They decide to withdraw and regroup. But with the British flanks having taken damage, it was probably a closer game than it felt. 

Upcoming Bolt Action Game.

Tonight I started setting up a game of Bolt Action to play with myself. I decided my bed is big enough to fit a 5x4 table comfortably on it. However, after choosing forces (wow, German Panzerschreck is expensive!), I realised I have forgotten how to play. Thus, I have taken a photo of my set up, so I can put it back together during the day next week again. I am excited for this.

I have decided to have only two objectives, the farmhouse and the burning Sherman, leftover from a previous failed advance. 

My forces are roughly 830 points. The Germans are all Regular. I have:

1x Oberleutnant + SMG armed runner.
3x Heer Squads of 10 men each.
1x MMG team.
1x Panzerschreck team.
1x Panzer IV.

The Brits facing off against them are all regular too, and consist of:

1x First Lieutenant and Runner.
3x Infantry Squads with 10 men each.
2x 2'' Mortar teams.
1x PIAT team.
1x MMG team.
1x Cromwell.

The British have more order dice, but their stuff tends to be more fragile. I guess we will see what will happen, probably on Wednesday.

Armourfast T-34s.

These are the two T-34s I used in my dry-brushing lesson. After going over them myself, here is how they look.

Here it is being taken on by a Panzer IV.

Last PSC Germans in action.

Aside from a couple of almost finished mortar and MMG teams, I have finished my PSC Germans. Oh, and some LMG teams in firing positions need to be painted. But apart from those, I am done. I have some Fallschirmjäger to paint, along with some Pioneers, but they will require different colours. No more boring Feldgrau.

I thought I would post some pictures of some of the latest batch of infantry, who have been completed with my latest, and probably final basing method.

Here is a Panzerschreck team getting into position...

...ready to ambush some filthy Reds.

The NCO and grenade-thrower are figures I had actively avoided painting. I don't know why. But they will prove useful in the upcoming struggles against for the Fatherland.

Dirt Roads.

 I have finally gotten around to making a post about my roads! After an exchange with another blogger, I decided to follow his basic concept for road building. I ran to ASDA and picked up a packet of A4 sized felt sheets for £2. Cutting some of these into strips, I decided to experiment by just putting one layer of bath sealant over them. This is tough on the old hands, as I squeeze the sealant out, but on the flip side I finally get to play with one of those gun looking things.

For my first batch, I decided to just paint onto the one layer, and hey presto, they look good. No need for other layers. I scored some wheel ruts into them using the knife I applied the sealant with. 

The paints are just some generic craft acrylics I picked up at the works. Some sort of burnt umber colour, and a lighter shade with no name.

Below you can see the detail. Most of this is just naturally how the sealant formed. 

You can also see how flexible they are. I can bend them over hills if necessary. The only problem is that you can still see the felt colour on some of the edges. I try to cover this up, but it doesn't always work. 

I now need to make some curved sections, and intersections, to give me the variety needed for dirt roads in WW2 Europe. I am sure their little lanes weren't a grid system.

Hedgerow Hell Part 3.

Laziness led me to stop using cat litter on my hedges... that and the disappointment with some of the rocks falling off my first batch. Deciding to omit cat litter has made the process of hedge making faster. I have another six feet that will be finished by tomorrow morning. 

I wanted to show the difference between my first and second batches. Due to my own decision not to write my recipe down, I accidentally bought the wrong base size. As you can see, it is thicker. This has made for some wider hedges.

I am still very pleased with them though, and they don't look too bad when lining a road.

StuGs Part 2.

Stowage is added. I have made some canvas rolls our of green-stuff, thrown on some jerry cans, and a box from my model railway days. On the StuG on the left has some left over foam board covered by a green stuff sheet.

StuGs.

Having picked up some StuH 42s at Salute, I decided it was time to get to work on my StuG IIIs. So I threw together three of them, and now they are ready to be primed and painted. I can't decide whether to attach Schürzen before, or after most of the painting is done.

Salute 2014 Haul.

The best laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft a-gley. This seems apt, because things did not go to plan on Saturday. Yes, I still made it to Salute. No things didn't go exactly as I had thought. The original Salute 2014 plan had been to join the queue and get in for 10am, pick up the goodie bag, spend a couple of hours there and get back to Westham for my brother's birthday party. Life, as always, threw a wrench into the works. Due to procrastination, oversleeping, and a hearty fry up breakfast, I didn't leave for the Excel until 11:45am. I arrived to find no goodie bags left, meaning I don't have the 2014 dice, or the figure.

BUT, my fiance came with me, which meant a lot. I got to expose her a little more to my hobby. She was surprised at how many people were into it. She was also surprised to learn that we follow rule books for games, and don't just line our soldiers up and make shooty noises.

I came away with:

• Armourfast StuH 42s
• PSC 6 Pounders and Loyd Carriers
• Pegasus KV 1s for Barbarossa
• Valiant German Paratroopers, which I am having fun putting together right now.
• Some sort of Meadow Green Mat from the Arcane Scenery bargain bucket.

The next thing I need to pile up on is StuG IIIs. I think I need about six of them to start with.

 

On the Bench.

Another 15.5 feet of hedgerows on the way. Some German support weapons almost finished. A couple of T-34s and Shermans just waiting for me to finish weathering. Going to keep me busy.