British OQF 25pdr

Hi all and I’m back with another painting post for my expanding Empire army – I’m going with empire as I’m certain my forces will end up representing Britain and many of her dominions eventually.

So the model itself, well I picked up the box off Ebay and also 8 of the desert ones as well (for something like £20) – whilst I don’t write many army lists which need 8+ 25pdrs I like to have the option, and for that price I won’t argue with half the guys being in shorts and topless, thankfully they’re not wearing sandals!

The ones from the box though are a very nice sculpt and I’m also quite a fan of the resin bases they come with too. With the miniatures fitting in to the gaps well with only a little filler needed to sort out the gaps.

I’ve tried to stick with the same pallet as with my other brits to keep the unified feel of the army, and with this even the topless guys look like they belong! The men I sprayed with the PSC British khaki before highlighting with Vallejo Khaki, and then picking out details in Grey green and Russian uniform (and some other colours too but those are the main ones). The bases are German Dark brown camo, with flat earth highlights from drybrushing

The guns and OP carrier were sprayed PSC British Armour, and again highlighted with a mix of Russian uniform and khaki. Once I picked out all the details on both the infantry and guns I painted on Army Painters Dark tone and left to dry before using testors Dullcoate.

I really enjoyed painting these guys, though in retrospect maybe only 4 guns at a time as opposed to 8 would have left my slightly more sane.

In game terms I think the 25pdr is one of those guns which has a real sense of history and purpose about it. The Wikipedia and battlefront articles on it and it’s variants are brilliant and I’d suggest everyone to give them a quick read. But it’s useable in both MW and LW, it’s direct fire stats are not too shabby in MW, but leave a little to be desired in LW, but have a RoF of 2 is a big thing vs is peers like the german 10.5 with it’s RoF of 1. What it does lack though in comparison to it’s peers is it’s firepower. Direct it’s only 3+ (and range 24) whilst in a bombardment it’s only 5+ - this is it’s biggest weakness as a lot of similar guns are FP 4+. It really sucks when used in a combined bombardment with the BL 5.5 as you’ll get a (assuming 4 25Pdrs and 2 5.5’s) a AT5 FP 4+, whereas if the US combine their guns it’ll be AT5 FP 3+ - boo! They also lack the breakthrough gun rule as well which is more annoying.

But I see the 25pdr as really having 2 roles, smoke and pinning. Even with Mike Target I don’t see it doing lots of killing unless you have the doublewide template, and even then I’m not expecting miracles. The 25Pdr is a very british gun in my head, I think the brits work best when you have infantry at the core and other units support them. And as far as smoke and pinning go (and a little direct defensive fire maybe!) the 25pdr does it well.

Anyway thanks for reading and until next time.

Adam