Late War French for Bolt Action Pt. 1

I use the Late War French list from the Battle of the Bulge campaign book quite frequently but I am usually using my Indochina war French figures and recently I've wanted to actually start playing with late war French miniatures. I took stock of what I could maybe double up from my Indochina stuff and was incredibly disappointed to find that a lot of the WWII surplus they used in Indochina they did not use in the later stages of WWII. In fact it was mostly just some armor that I had in WWII markings that are incorrect for Indochina that I can use. I sat down and started scouring the internet for sources of figures that would be good for conversions and was incredibly disappointed. Uniform wise French troops were in American uniforms by 1943 but there weren't enough M1 Garands to go around so French troops were usually issued with M1903 Springfields or the M1917 Enfield and nobody makes American figures armed with either rifle except for some early war Phillipines campaign stuff which wouldn't be correct for 1943 and I don't want to use the old Warlord plastics because they just aren't that good of figures which drastically limits what I can do. I started with a somewhat unusual route for the start of my forces. 

 

I picked up some dragones portes from Ceusader miniatures and added some US ammunition pouches and on one NCO I removed his arm and used a spare plastic arm from I think the Perry US box and then painted their uniforms in American colors but I'm not too happy with the result but they work in a pinch. I need to find a way to get some decent looking American figures with Springfields to replace these guys.

I also have some legionarres that I painted a while ago when I was going to start this project and then a couple of newer figures I painted up alongside the guys above and I can't make much of a squad out of this either.

I painted up a foreign legion officer who doesn't have to be a foreign legion officer necessarily, red is just the color for infantry forces and all types wore kepis. 

There were some French forces that did get issued Garands and one of those was the Batalion du Marche du T'Chad which formed the infantry component of the French 2nd armored division which landed at Omaha and liberated Paris so I painted up some random Garand armed figures that I think came out great but aren't very unique because the only French thing about them is the anchor painted on the helmet. They would be more unique of I could find figures in tanker coveralls since that look is what first drew me to the idea. I know, I'm picky.

For my armor selection I'm in good shape, I have an M5 stuart platoon in 2nd armor markings and an M8 Scott. 

I also have 2 Shermans and 2 half tracks in markings for 1st army so I have a couple of directions to go for my forces when I can cobble together better, more accurate infantry. I have some stuff in the pipeline that may work so stay tuned for a hopefully good looking and reasonably accurate late war French force.

Gaddis Games M6 heavy tank

I got a good size box in the mail today from Gaddis Games containing my kickstarter rewards which included their new American M6 heavy tank. The concept for the M6 began in the interwar Era and was quickly accelerated as Germany began rampaging through Europe. By the time the design was considered good enough for production it was dropped by the army ad it was decided that the M6 offered no particular advantages over current available armor that various design flaws didn't cancel out. Of course none of that matters for alt-history where all the paper tanks can come out to play. Lee please bring us a SARL 42 to go with this alt history goodness.

I'll start the review with the box, it's definitely nothing flashy but at least you know what you're getting and I guess I haven't been paying enough attention but it would appear these vehicles are being made by Company B who make some good stuff.

I didn't take a picture of the box right when I opened it but it was this bag and like 3 or 4 packing peanuts which makes me somewhat nervous to open it. Interestingly it looks like the track and hull are just one solid piece so assembly will be a breeze.

Yeah assembly will be real easy. This isn't technically 4 pieces, the 2 pieces on the right broke off on shipping, they are part of the track guard. I don't know how easy a fix that will be because they are quite flimsy I may just trim up the remaining bit of track guard and paint it like it was never there.

There were some bits thrown in, an MG and some stowage, but to really be an American tank some additional stowage will be needed to just pile on this bad boy.

The turret fit on kind of snug but a little sanding will solve that. The sides have some odd texture that seems to come from 3D printing and I'm not sure if paint will cover it or not but I'll find out down the line.

Here is a Gaddis dragon portes and a warlord US GI for scale. I honestly thought this would be bigger, it had a crew of like 6 or 7 but maybe it's a cost saving measure. It's a good looking kit, needs a little cleanup but I'm sure it will come out nice in the end. Unfortunately I recently moved house so all my paints are still packed away, which is also why I haven't made a post in some time, but I hope to be up and running properly soon. In the meantime I'll be doing a photo dump from bugeater and reviewing the 2 player starter set I got for empires fall so loom forward to those soon.

Review Gaddis Games Battle Box

 

Something exciting came in the mail today, my mystery boxes from Gaddis Games. I have no idea how long Lee has been offering a mystery box but I was completely unaware of it before about 2 weeks ago so I thought I would get one and do a brief review of it. Actually I bought 2 because you get the option of Allies, Axis, or Mystery so I ordered 1 Allied and 1 Axis to see what to expect from either.

As you can see from the pictures they aren't huge boxes, about 10x10x2 but that is 200 in^3 volume to fill with goodies. I randomly opened on and it was the Axis box so I'll go over that one 1st.

Upon opening you'll notice that this box is full! The first thing you'll find upon opening is a thank you note from Lee for ordering a battle box, which is nice.

So I thought this mystery box was going completely random in its contents but there was a bit of a theme with 3 Italian units which is great since I do have an Italian army and I have been wanting the new Rubicon M13/40. Also included were some D10s and tokens for their games Empires Fall, Shattered Crown, and GUARDS. I have a copy of Empires Fall coming from the recent KS so those will also come in handy. Even if I didn't have that coming tho D10s are always useful and this whole box was 36 US dollars which made it good value just with the models.

Box 2 is also packed full with and topped with a thank you note.

 

There was less product in box 2, the Allied box, once again we have a nice Rubicon model, in this case an M4 Sherman with a 76mm gun which took up most of the box, and there was also a US MMG team and some of the new 761st tank battalion tank crew which look spectacular.

If I had to pick a favorite box it would probably be the Axis one just because it had more stuff  but when you buy you sign up for a monthly delivery so it will be different every month and they're a good value so maybe next time the Allied on might be the better of the two. I highly recommend this box and plan to keep my subscription up for as long as Gaddis Games does a monthly Battle Box and if you want a random selection of good stuff I recommend you get in on this too.

 

Review MB1 Armoured Walker

    Earlier this year I backed a Kickstarter from Machination Studio for there steampunk walker and cavalry. The Kickstarter ended in late February and I received this box just a few days ago.

It's not a huge box being about 4" per side but it was packed well enough that all of the pieces survived intact and boy are they nice. The resin is crisp and the detail is excellent, and there are 2 options for the main gun, the turret armament, and even heads for the crewman who is also exceptionally detailed. The main gun options are short or long barrel 75mm guns and the turret options hotchkiss machine guns or SA-18 37mm guns.

    Clean up and assembly didn't take much time at all, I built this in an afternoon. There were no instructions included but the assembly was pretty intuitive. I went with the long barrel 75 and turret MMGs and am debating between the wireless or the fin. As I began to build it I noticed on a few of the pieces that the mold wasn't aligned quite right so what looks like a mold line is actually much more pronounced but the areas that had that effect were easy to hide so they required no real correction. The biggest problem I encountered during assembly was that the 2 halves of the hull weren't flush. I tried the usual trick of warming up in hot water to try and make the resin pliable enough to correct the problem but that didn't work. As pictured below it is extremely noticeable and it prevents what ever piece you choose for the top from fitting properly. Had this gone together as plan I probably would have painted it before making a review but as I don't have any gap filling material handy that can wait for a later post.

    I'm going to give the benefit of the doubt and assume that most of these kits will go out with hull sections that fit properly and give this model 9/10. It's quick and easy and I think its going to paint up well when the time comes. All I backed the Kickstarter for was one physical kit for the MB1 but it was made available as a digital file for those savvy in the arts of 3D printing and by going that route the hull alignment issue would probably be entirely non-existent. I've already been considering investing in one myself, maybe this will give me the kick to do it.

 

Review: Gaddis Games Dragons Portes

 Back around Black Friday I picked up some of the Dragons Portes miniatures from Gaddis Games. I've really come to love the miniatures Lee Gaddis sells through his shop having painted a USMC platoon made up of his miniatures a year or two ago and these French troops continue to meet the standard I have come to expect. The sculpting is excellent with only a minor issue here and there where a couple of poses were only sculpted with one of their two ammunition pouches and the NCO has a rough patch on his right shoulder joint but those are small issues easily fixed or just not really noticeable on the table at all. All the troops wear the mechanized troops helmet, a very unique helmet which I like more then the Adrien helmet and all the troops are in standard uniforms without the greatcoat which I personally love since I don't care for the greatcoat look. All the riflemen are armed with the MAS-36 rifle which is another thing I really like about these figures because the MAS is one of my favorite rifle but I do wish a few of these guys had the Berthier carbines and maybe MAYBE a MAS-38 sub machine gun but I digress.

When I bought these on Black Friday I got a platoon deal which included three squads of ten men, a medium mortar, and an HQ section. There are 10 separate poses that make up the rifle squad, NCO with a rifle, 7 riflemen, light machine gunner with FM 24/29 and an assistant with a rifle. The HQ had 4 men but one of them who has what looks like a man portable radio at first glance more likely has mortar ammunition as France did not have a man portable radio at the platoon level like the Americans or British and as such he has been moved to the mortar section appropriately. As I said I really liked these models and they paint up beautifully but they do suffer the same fate many metal ranges suffer and that is variety. That 10 man squad is the only one available and it would be nice to see some prone figures but the only ones available are operating a light mortar (not pictured here) and the only other figures I don't own are the light mortars and a Hotchkiss machine gun team. Hopefully this part of the French range will be revisited and expanded just a smidge but in the meantime there is a whole ton of other models in Lee's French range including Alpine troops that I may use to make a French platoon for Narvik.