Blogging Awards! The Liebster Awards

Hi All

I had seen the Liebster awards on a few blogs and thought it was a nice idea. It wasn't until Vladdd309 over at Too Much Free Time, gave this blog one of his awards! I was quite flattered that anyone would think our crazy ramblings were worthy of reading let alone an award! So as we had been honoured I figured it was only fair that I handed out a few awards of my own. Now there are some rules to this but they are not to restrictive.

1. Copy and paste the award on your blog linking it to the blogger who has given it you.

 2. Pass the award to your top 5 favourite blogs with less than 200 followers by leaving a comment on one of their posts to notify them that they have won the award and listing them on your own blog.

 3. Sit back and bask in the warm fuzzy feeling that comes with knowing you have made someones day!

 4. There is no obligation to pass this onto someone else but its nice if you take the time to do so. In no order here are some great blogs to check out and are my nominations to pass it on!

So my 5 winners are:-

Stromtrooper Move - A great Flames of War and Star Wars costume blog. Rob's Germans are beautiful and the high standards of this Star Wars costumes (while not my thing) are really great and inspiring!

Corner of a Foreign Field - Another lovely Flames of War blog. Very well written articles and lovely painted models. Also lots of pictures from historical conventions.

The Wild Host - Khairul's Blog with everything from FOW to 40k to Warmachine. Khairil and his group in Malaysia play in some really great campaigns and do it in the right way in that they all collect new armies for each campaign.

Six Twenty Eight - Braxen's great FOW blog, he paints lovely armies and is a great blog for getting ideas from.

Covering Fire! - Coming from Canada a blog filled with loads of FOW goodness with more AAR's than you can shake a stick at!

Well there you go, my award winners (for what it's worth anyway). Honourable mentings to Too Much Free Time, Kampgruppe Engel, Fencing Frog and Frozen Gamer AK. It was hard picking the final 5 but there you go I had to make a choice.

Thanks and until next time Ben

Adam's Breakthrough Assault Tournament AAR

Hello All

So at the weekend I played in my first FOW tournament Ben's Breakthrough Assault Tournament. I was quite nervous but I had a plan, having seen the number of infantry lists coming, I thought that I may be better off at times choosing to use the British Night Attack option. I tried it out against Winner Dave and it seemed to work well. I will apologise in advance as I seem to have lost my notes, also these are from my recollections, and may differ from what happened - remember the famous Babylon 5 quote 'truth is a three edged sword, my side, your side and the truth'.

Game 1 vs Matt Finch - CV Volksgrenadier


First mission was breakthrough, I elected to attack. He placed his Platoon with assault rifles ready to ,move to the objectives, his MG platoon on the edge of his deployment area on my short side, and his HMG's on the long side. He also deployed commandos to harass me. I deployed my artillery, mortars, 1 set of 6pdrs and 1 para platoon with frost near the MG platoon. With my spearhead move I advanced to within assault distance when coupled





with my turn 1 move. My assault succeeded and I wiped off the platoon turn one. With the mortars and 6pdrs hitting the HMG's, Frost went on a long march around. My reserves foiled my opponents commandos and deployed near the objectives. Despite hertzers and Sturmies appearing my paras managed to pincer the remaining infantry squad and claim the objectives.

Game 2 vs Dave Payne - Herman Goering Division

My second game was against the eventual winner, again I had a really enjoyable game against a nice opponent, though maybe I was an arse when things really didn’t seem to want to go my way! It was again infantry on infantry, this time against the HG dividsion, backed up by some tigers. Again I elected to attack, and learnt a thing or two about artillery, and also that my spotters need to eat more carrots. I genuinely thought’s I pulled off a win, but some bad dice rolls led to an assaulting platoon being pinned and despite trying to come up with some ne plan, I was outplayed in an enjoyable game.

Game 3 vs Robby - Grenadiers

My third game was against someone who it transpired lived about 5 minutes away, he was playing a grenadier list, and had a whopping 10 platoons! The terrain we played on was amazing, with a church dominating one quarter. I won the role to attack and elected to defend that quarter – though him mentioning having tanks with bunker buster did make me think twice about garrisoning it, and in the end only an artillery spotter decided to hide in the



highest point. It was a slow march by my Para’s across the table, whilst artillery rained down on my opposition, I gradually got closer to the objectives, before a platoon of StuG’s tried to take down my second para company, some bad dice rolls saw all of the StuG’s bailed or destroyed and with that the mission was mine.



So all in all three enjoyable games, against three lists I’ve never played before. It was odd being the attacker, as most of my opponents are mech or tank, and so I’m usually defending. However I think the |British Paras are good on the offense due to lots of smoke, an the dreaded artillery! I think if I was to have any thing to chance for Ben (related to the tournament, I have plenty about him in other regards) it was that we could have done with more time, as both my 2nd and 3rd games were rushed by the end (though my 1st game was the 1st to finish).

The other nice thing is that this has really rekindled my tournament bug. At my last 40K tournament, I was slightly disheartened as you played GK’s lots and they were just too good for my poor elder. But this was far more fun, the scenery made the games look epic (and thanks to everyone who brought scenery, it all looked great) but there were no blazing argument I heard and there was never any game which I saw which looked completely 1 sided, there always seemed a fighting chance. And I also finished 4th equal – not too bad I think for my first attempt.

Role on Brighton!

Thanks Adam.

Breakthrough Assault Tournament 2012 Write Up

Hello All

I have just got back from my running my first ever Flames of War tournament, The Breakthrough Assault Tournament at Triple Helix Wargames in Westbury. It may seem even more mad that I have yet to play in a Flames of War tournament, so I ran this one almost blind you could say!

So 20 brave gamers (and I mean brave there were flood warnings in the area over the weekend!) arrived Sunday morning for the tournament. The format was 1575pts with 3 games, the game choices were, Breakthrough, Fighting Withdrawal and Dust Up.

A big thanks to Tim Harris for providing the tournament software and 2 tables worth of terrain. Also a big thank you to Steve, Ian, Dave and the Reading group for 5 more tables worth of terrain.

The Results-

1st) Dave Payne - Herman Gering Infantry - Overall Winner
=2nd) Roddy Trimple - British Paras - Best Allied and Best Painted
=2nd) Mike Lock - Fallschirmjagers
=4th) Tim Harris - US Paras
=4th) Adam Cox - British Paras
=4th) Andy Scott - Panzer Lehr
=7th) Alex Hamitlon - Stelkovy Batalon
=7th) James Blagden - Reich's Grenadiers
=7th) Ian - 101st Airbourne
=7th) David Green - Reich's Grenadiers
11th) Darren Cox - Soviet Heavy Assault Gun Batalon
=12th) Toby - Grenadiers
=12th) Mike Parker - Indian Rifle Company
=14th) Nigel Emsen - Soviet Partisans
=14th) Steve Bowmen - 21st Panzer Grenadiers
=14th) Roger Comber - US Engineers
=17th) Dave Cooper - Fallschirmjagers
=17th) Davie Shaw - British Tank Squadron
19th) Matthew Finch - Volksgrenadiers
20th) Ross - Tankovy Batalon

Well done to all the winner and a big thank you to everyone who attended.

I was very happy with the event and it seemed everyone enjoyed themselves. One of the biggest parts I enjoyed was the lack of arguments, this is something I'm not used to at tournaments but that might be because of my the GW gaming background!

I have learnt a lot for the next tournament. For one a different scoring system would be a good idea as using the standard FOW scoring system means you get a lot of tired scores, I will be looking int this for the next one. Slightly longer rounds is a must as the 2 hour and 15 minute rounds weren't quite long enough. I also want to run a two day event next time as more games is always better.

My plan for the next tournament is to do a themed event. I'm currently thinking basing it on September to December 1944 Western Front. So basically the Bugle Books and the new Market Garden books that are out in January.

Anyway thanks for reading and here is a a lot of photos from the tournament.

Ben

European Houses: Dunkirk House - Overview

Hello All

After missing a building last month so they could get more building painted up, Battlefront has released the Dunkirk House this month. As I said on the last review for the Carentan House, I'm not going to do an in depth review as the houses are pretty similar so 12 identical reviews would be a bit pointless! So this will be an overview of the building.

Now I was a little surprised when I got my building this month as it didn't match the one on the Battlefront site. The closest one it matched was the Antwerp building, in fact the picture on the box matches it perfectly. Below are the two pictures from the Battlefront article on the 12 buildings. As you can see the Dunkirk building is white in the pictures were as my building is grey.

 

I haven't seen anything posted up about the building being a different colour and if I'm honest it doesn't bother me as long as when it comes to the "Antwerp" building I don't get the same building twice. I guess this may have been done because Battlefront went back and painted up new batches of the first three buildings, so it would be easier to paint up the forth building the same colour. The only real negatives from this is aesthetics when I play as 3 out of 4 building being grey isn't as nice looking as 3 different coloured buildings, also it's a bit odd that Battlefront still did a spot light with the white building, but I guess they are done months a head before it was changed (if thats the reason for it) but otherwise no big deal.

So back to the building. It's pretty much what you expect from the Battlefield in a Box range. It's well painted, good quality, well made and sold for a pretty good price. I'm a big fan of the Battlefront terrain, in fact almost all my Flames of War terrain is Battlefront terrain.

I'm still really glad I got the sub deal and I'm looking forward to next month when I get the Bastonge Church along with building number 5 and have a small village!

As always thanks for reading Ben.

Preparing For Tournament - British Paras

OK so getting my Para's ready for the Breakthrough Assault Tournament in a week...

See I'd been playing them for a while and thought I knew what I needed.

1) Core Choices (obvious I know)
2) Frost - I love the 2+ motivation, the bonus immediate ambush and also his rules for keeping guns alive more.
3) Smoke - as much smoke as possible
4) Airlanding battery with medium support - great weapon to pop smoke, and also when you get the second hit, FP2+ AT5, + re roll saves...
5) An even number of platoons, I'm usually defending so it makes sense.

So I kept playing with this

Platoon	Qty	Unit	Points
Headquarters
Parachute Company HQ  p.15	2 3 1	Cmd SMG team PIAT team Warrior and Higher Command team Lt Col John Frost	190
Combat Platoons
Parachute Platoon  p.16	1 1 6	Cmd Rifle/MG team PIAT team Rifle/MG team	230
Parachute Platoon  p.16	1 1 6	Cmd Rifle/MG team PIAT team Rifle/MG team	230
Weapons Platoons
Parachute Machine-gun Platoon  p.17	1 4	Cmd Rifle team Vickers HMG (no bombardment)	160
Divisional Support
Airlanding Heavy Anti-tank Platoon  p.26	1 4	Cmd Rifle team OQF 17 pdr gun	265
Airlanding Anti-tank Platoon  p.21	1 4	Cmd Rifle team OQF 6 pdr gun	160
Airlanding Light Battery  p.27	3 1 2 8	Cmd Rifle team Staff team Observer Rifle team M1A1 75mm pack howitzer Airlanding Light Battery Medium Artillery Support	340
Company Points:			1575

It was fun - played a couple of matches against some Strelkovy and some US armoured rifles - won both, but then I noticed as i was printing a new lists the 'Know your enemy update' - KYE: Each Gun Troop operates as a separate platoon for all purposes. The Command team and the Staff team from the HQ Troop must be attached to Gun troops at the start of the game (see Independent Command on page 248 of the rulebook).

So an odd situation, as I now was odd units, - so I then came across Frost's other rule, the reinforcement platoon - this could work! I could get a platoon of mixed HMG's and para's, great of defending an objective. I gave it a couple of goes, one was against a German Panzer Gren list by the wonderful Robin who spanked me and it was the dawning of the one thing I've been so reluctant to admit - 17prds may not be worth it.... They are easily avoidable, hard to place to ensure they get concealment and vulnerable in assaults. After a bit of a chat I decided that for this I'll go for two sets of 6pdrs. So the following list was born!

Platoon	Qty	Unit	Points
Headquarters
Parachute Company HQ  p.15	2 2 1	Cmd SMG team PIAT team Warrior and Higher Command team Lt Col John Frost	170
Combat Platoons
Parachute Platoon  p.16	1 1 6	Cmd Rifle/MG team PIAT team Rifle/MG team	230
Parachute Platoon  p.16	1 1 6	Cmd Rifle/MG team PIAT team Rifle/MG team	230
Weapons Platoons
Parachute Mortar Platoon  p.17	1 1 4	Cmd Rifle team Observer Rifle team ML 3" Mk II Mortar	145
Divisional Support
Airlanding Anti-tank Platoon  p.21	1 4 4	Cmd Rifle team OQF 6 pdr gun Jeep	165
Airlanding Anti-tank Platoon  p.21	1 4 4	Cmd Rifle team OQF 6 pdr gun Jeep	165
Airlanding Light Battery  p.27	3 1 2 8	Cmd Rifle team Staff team Observer Rifle team M1A1 75mm pack howitzer Airlanding Light Battery Medium Artillery Support	340
Air Support  p.29	3	Sporadic Air Support Typhoon	125
Company Points:			1570

Frost - ready for war

I've not had much chance to test it out, but I think it should be good, I can split the mortars to give two separate smoke templates, and also a nice big artillery battery and a good mix of infantry and Anti-tank to defend objectives. So should be fun to try out in the heat of a tournament...


Adam

Preparing for the tournament Part 3

Only 1 week to go, I've grabbed every spare hour I can find to paint, which really isn't that much.

Here's a very blurry image of 2ic, 1st platoon and the Stugs

A close up of the Stugs

 And a close up of first platoon

I used the new airbrush on the Stugs, it was such a different experience to using the cheap chinese copy.  So unbelievably smooth and able to operate at much lower pressures.  Only problem is it's so sensitive, I pull the lever back as small a movement as I can and the paint is coming and its coming fast leading to a lot of times when I had a splodge of paint in a small area.

I started to get the hang of it and hope it's just a muscle memory thing.  I tried some modulation, but in my haste I applied gloss varnish before the sepia wash had fully dried. Damn!

The troops are really basic - tabletop level only..but that'll do for a tournament.

Still to go...I have 1st platoon, HMGs and the plane, which is had an accident :(

More to come...

Dave

US M4A3 76mm Sherman Platoon

Hello All

I got around to painting my first platoon for my US army, a platoon of M4A3 76mm Shermans.  This was my first attempted at painting US and I'm happy with the results. This platoon is part of my plan on painting up addition US tank platoons and other support to go along side my 101st Airborne Winter Challenge army. I hope to get at least an additional platoon a month painted up, next up some M18's.

The Shermans still need a matt vanish, but with the way the weathers been in the past few days I haven't been able to spray them.

Can't wait to get a game in with them.

Tank Teams

Name	Mobility	Front	Side	Top	Equipment and Notes
Weapon	Range	ROF	Anti-tank	Firepower
Tanks
M4A3 (76mm) Sherman	Standard Tank	7	4	1	Co-ax MG, Hull MG, .50 cal AA MG, Detroit's Finest, Protected ammo, Tank telephone.
M1 76mm gun (late)	32"/80cm	2	13	3+	Stabiliser.

Thanks for reading and until next time 

Ben

Preparing for the tournament Part 2

Okay, it's now 6th November exactly 1 week has passed, since I wrote the first post.

I've managed to break my 3 golden rules of painting...

1. Paint bases before painting figures
2. Don't add static grass until after the figures are painted
3. Don't try out different painting techniques when you're working to a deadline

So all infantry are based...there's some touching up to do and the edges.

1st Platoon got an first coat of dark colour, over which I was intending to paint a second lighter colour and continue up in layers.

Whilst 2nd Platoon got an undercoat of white with a black ink wash, which I intended to use as pre-shading.

Both platoons then got flesh colour added.

I don't usually paint this way, normally I paint the main colour, ink wash, re-establish original colour, then a highlight and right now I'm wishing I stuck to this method, but I guess if you never try anything new then you'll never improve.

So far the tanks and plane haven't been touched and I'm still sorting ut in my head how i'm going to tackle them

More to come.....

Dave

Preparing for the tournament Part 1

Today is 30th October, it's exactly 26 days until I attend my first ever tournament and I don't have an army :(

Ben and Adam are probably sick to death of me talking about army lists but I reached some basic criteria

1. I need to already have the models
2. They need to be painted

Part of my problem is that I placed an order with Maelstrom games just before their "warehouse move".  As a result I've not heard a thing from them and I'm down 8 Panzers.

Onwards and upwards as they say, fortunately Ben decided to donate me some fallschrimjager and I've recently come to the conclusion that flames of war loves infantry...well in my hands I can lose with any army but we'll see.

So here's what we have using the fallschrimpioneerkompanie pdf on the flames of war website

 

Fearless Veteran

Fallschirmpionierkompanie Parachute Engineer Company

German Late-War

Platoon	Qty	Unit	Points
Headquarters
Fallschirmpionierkompanie HQ p.3	1 1 2	Cmd SMG team Cmd Panzerfaust SMG team MG42 HMG	135
Combat Platoons
Fallschirmpionier Platoon p.3	1 9	Cmd Pioneer Rifle/MG team Pioneer Rifle/MG team	345
Fallschirmpionier Platoon p.3	1 9	Cmd Pioneer Rifle/MG team Pioneer Rifle/MG team	345
Divisional Support
Heavy Tank Platoon Confident Veteran Allied Platoon p.7	1	Tiger I E	215
Assault Gun Platoon Confident Veteran Allied Platoon p.8	3 1	StuG G or StuG IV StuH42	380
Air Support p.14	5	Limited Air Support Hs 129B	155
Company Points:			1575

www.EasyArmy.com

Source document: Fallschirmpionier PDF

 

It's small and it's elite, i've been on the receiving end of tank assault 4 more times than I care to mention.

Small means I have less to paint, which is my main concern at present.  Here's how that looks as I write this....bad

4 Basecoated Stugs, 1 mostly painted but i'm kinda unhappy with it Tiger, 1 primed plane, 1 platoon with base coated trouser and smocks, 1 unpainted platoon and the command team in various states.

Before writing this I basecoated 1st platoon's smocks, last night I basecoated their trousers.

More to come...

Dave

Airborne Museum 'Hartenstein'

This summer whilst on holiday in Europe, having left Trier we headed to Amsterdam, but on the way decided to stop near a town called Arnhem...

We (myself and my significant other) decided to visit the Airborne Museum (actually in Oosterbeek!) there, which is in the hotel which served as Urquhart's HQ during operation market garden.

The first thing you notice when we took the turning to Arnhem was how much September 1944 had left it's impression! We were there in July but already there were signs about events in September to commemorate it, and a rather imposing memorial.

We parked up the car and had a stroll around to begin with, in the grounds were some 6 and 17 pounders as well as a Sherman, and some walks you could take with names like lion, leopard etc.

The museum itself was a really moving experience, you started off with a briefing about the events and plans for market garden, before moving onto exhibitions where there were artifacts from the soldiers and civilians in the local area, as well as interviews with the people who had fought or lived through those days.

Personally there were a few of those interviews where I found myself quite emotional, and watching recordings if meetings between the old adversaries, whilst listening with my German girlfriend really made me realise how far Europe has come in 70 years.

It was also the humanising stories, fighting for friends and comrades, not for Germany or Hitler.

After the artifacts there was a walk through about being part of the Airlanding forces, the sounds you would have experienced, and then exhibitions on the contemporary media and the other roles the museum had.

We spent maybe three hours there before we had to leave for Amsterdam, but I'd recommend this to anyone it was unique, interesting and moving.