4ground walls and a Paratrooper

It can't be avoided the recent explosion in MDF products, buildings, scenery etc. which is swamping the wargame world. Having purchased from Warbases (still be best for bases) and Sarissa (great buildings) I finally made a purchase from 4ground. Nothing to large but some of their MDF damageable walls for 28mm. Though I actually picked mine up from Northstar.

I had first nearly bought a set at the Alumwell show earlier in the year, but decided against it at the last minute. Well having spent the last week or so assembling and painting them. I can say they are GREAT!!!

Like similar products they come 'flatpacked' and after breaking them off the sprue, you have to glue the two separate halves together and mount them on the supplied bases. It is dead easy. There are little tabs on the bases which you have to break off to be able to fit the walls together, a design feature I quite like. So here are the finished pieces...

The two end pieces are missing from this picture, but not from this one...

I've used 4grounds own base render on the 'smooth' part of the wall. I had used this before on one of the Sarissa buildings I did earlier, but this time I followed the directions which come with the kit and are available on their website as a PDF.

It is good stuff and a little goes a long way. I found it was easiest to add a watered down layer first then leave it for a few minutes then add a slightly thicker layer and leave for a minute or two and then stipple the render for the desired effect. Now as mentioned above the set does come with instruction sheet, but I did not completely follow this. As described earlier I did build the walls then paint once assembled.

For the render colours I used Decoart craft acrylics (reasonably cheap, picked up mine from Hobbycraft). I used 'Tan' as the base colour, then dry brushed 'Cornfield Yellow' and finally 'Antique White'. The brick was painted using a very old pot of GW 'Terracotta', then washed with 'Ogryn Flesh' and then 'Devlan Mud' but mainly in the recesses, the mortar joints. I also used 'Devlan Mud' on the lower part (but not exclusively) of the render. The gate pillars were painted GW 'Codex Grey' and then the bricks and pillars were drybrushed DecoArt 'Sandstone'. The wooden gate I did not paint. NB I did not apply a base coat to these models. This meant particularly when applying the terracotta that the amount of paint applied would decide on the level of stain to the MDF, so if some of the bricks look lighter its probably because I used  thinner paint on that section.

To give an idea of height. Here is a section of the wall with a 28mm figure. A Bolt Action US Airborne Paratrooper....

And from the side...

As all ways the figure is mounted on a 2p coin.

I have another set to build, the damageable short wall set (the above is the long wall set). I have glued the damage sections in on this set and probably will on the next one too.  I will probably get at least one more set of these MDF walls, which I may 'damage'.

The figure is another recently completed US Para to add to my growing collection. Once again a very nice figure from Warlord..

 

Five Paratroopers and an Injun....

Just to prove I've not been I complete slacker here are a few things I've completed recently (very few).

Woodland Indian

Fallschirmjager with FG42

Fallshirmjager with Kar98

US Airborne with M1A1 carbine

The Woodland Indian is from Conquest (now available from Warlord). The Fallshirmjager are Artizan and the US Airborne trooper is from Bolt Action (aka Warlord).

The Bolt Action US Airborne are absolute beauties. Packed full of detail, in fact so much detail it is easy to miss some of it. But they are full of character. Mr Hicks did a sterling job on these figures and I'm only now getting round to painting them.

I have actually painted more than this and I'm still working on a project which I intend to complete before posting anything on here. More to follow....

Escape to La Barquette revisited

Put on my little scenario for 'Troops, Weapons & Tactics' by the TOOFatlardies once again. The Secret Wargamer couldn't make it, something about a rendezvous in a car park and involving his dog, strange thought I he hasn't got a dog?!  Anyway he sent along his lovely assistant the Secret Wargamers Friend with strict instructions not to lose. Honour was at stake.

The scene is set;

The view from the American end of the table.
 

    American Blinds advance.

Surprise, surprise the German blinds advance.

And they just kept on going.

Not wanting to be caught out like before. I decided to take two of my squads off blinds. The Germans are awfully close.

The first Fallschirmjager appear. The second half of the squad has occupied the cafe building accompanied by the platoon leader. I see trouble ahead!

The two American airborne squads are left milling around in the centre of the table . The blind in the bottom of the bottom of the photo is my third squad, which has fallen for a cunning bluff by my wily opponent.  

The Americans start to take casualties. Return fire is rather ineffective.

My third squad comes off its blind to deal with a German blind sneaking down the table edge. But its a bluff. The other German squad is on my left flank not my right. I've been had! D'oh!

Some fortunate cards mean I can shake off the wounds and start advancing. I need to dislodge the Germans from the cafe.

Darn' it. I spoke to soon.

I think their happy!












So the game ended in draw which meant I won. Hurrah!

I kept the brief simple since S.W.F. had not played these particular Lardie rules before. Once he had picked up a few of the ideas mooted in this set, a very enjoyable afternoon was had. Yet again the rules gave at times a tense and in my opinion realistic simulation of a small unit action (without any one actually getting hurt). This re-play was not so bloody with the US Airborne suffering 4 casualties to the Fallschirmjagers 1.

The forces deployed were small, and represented units from the 3rd Battalion, 506th PIR, 101st Div., and 1st Battalion, 6th FJR. attached to the 91st Airlanding Div..

The Fallschirmager consisted of two squads each of eleven men, 2x 5man LMG teams plus a lvl 3 big man. The Platoon leader was a lvl 4 big man. I rated them as Good for morale purposes with an EDNA rating of 3 for hand grenades. I classed the jager was Good rather than Elite to represent the large number of new recruits which made up 6th FJR at this time but with good NCO's/Officers.

The US Airborne consisted of three squads; 2x 9man, broken down into a 3xman LMG team, a 5xman rifle team and a lvl 2 big man as squad leader, the other squad consisted of seven men; a 6xman rifle team plus a lvl 3 big man. The Platoon leader was a lvl 4 big man. I rated the Airborne has Elite, to reflect the elan of the paratroopers but with less experienced leaders overall. They had the same EDNA rating as the jager.

The original game can be found here escape-to-la-barquette.

Next time I'll bring in support weapons and try some of the national characteristic cards.