56 Wheels later.....

 Time for another model update.  Today I finished 7 OT-64 SKOT Armoured Personnel Carriers.  This was a Czech/Polish jointly developed APC that these countries would use in-place of the BTR-60, 70 and 80 series and were considered to be better in many ways to the Soviet designs.

The models themselves come as STL files from Matt Hingley (of Elhiem Figures) and can be found at MyMiniFactory for the very reasonable price of $8USD.  I can't speak highly enough of them.  They are extremely well designed, robust, hollow and simple to print.  They are also very versatile as I hope the photo's below will attest. 

Matt's files allow you to print the following variants:

SKOT-2A

This version of the SKOT is fitted with a BRDM-2 turret with a 14.5mm HMG and co-axial 7.62mm MG.

SKOT-2AM

This version of the SKOT is fitted with the same BRDM-2 turret with a 14.5mm HMG and co-axial 7.62mm MG but is also fitted with 2 AT-3 Sagger ATGM on the side of the turret, protected by an armoured plate.

SKOT-2AP

This version of the SKOT is fitted with a new high-angle anti-aircraft/helicopter WAT turret with a 14.5mm HMG and co-axial 7.62mm MG.

All the turrets fit the same vehicles - so by printing additional turrets you can get a variety of forces with the same models.  I printed 7 SKOTs and here's some combinations I came up with:

This is the simplest and probably most commonly field option.  2 Platoons of 3 SKOT-2A and a Company HQ in a SKOT-2A.

Similar set up to the last set, but in this case the Platoon CO's vehicles and the Company HQ vehicle are SKOT-2AP.  I understand they were typically limited to one SKOT-2AP per platoon.

In this last set I've replaced the Company CO's vehicle with a SKOT-2AM.  Again I understand that these were fairly rare vehicles and the Polish ARmy Lists allow you to take them as a Platoon Support vehicle.

Perhaps I need to print off at least 1 more of these...  maybe next summer.

Painting wise I took a slightly different tack to my usual approach and tried something new.  I sprayed them with a black undercoat, then gave them a base coat of Vallejo US Olive Drab froma spray can.  I like the fact that they are a slightly different green tone to my standard Soviet stuff.

I then dry brushed them with a couple of coats of VMC USA Olive Drab lighted more with each successive coat.  Now the new bit.  I then used AK Brown and Green Camouflage Paneliner as a kind of pin wash.  I then took much of that off with White Spirits leaving what you see in the pics.  Next time I'll ventilate the room better as I was left with a massive headache! I then applied a mud/dust wash with some pastels and again took most of that off with Vallejo airbrush thinner. Finally I gave the whole vehicle a very light drybrush with Citadel Zandri Dust.

I'm quite happy with the result and I think it took less time than my normal approach.

So I love these Elhiem SKOTs - they went from zero to complete in pretty rapid time for me and give my Poles a really unique look they deserve.  Now if Matt could design an OT-62 TOPAS my Polish dreams would be complete!

Specialist Artillery Munitions

 Hi Everyone.

Time for a bit of bonus material - something to get your teeth into - to get everyone interested in this game talking, suggesting, offering praise or constructive criticism.

Please see attached the new Specialist Artillery Munitions section of the revised Unoffical Airland Battlegroup Rulebook. It covers:

• Illumination Munitions
• Thermobaric Munitions
• Chemical and Biological Munitions
• Nuclear Munitions
• Dual-Purpose Improved Conventional Munitions
• Area Denial Artillery Munitions
• Precision Guided Munitions
• Smoke Munitions

Thermobaric and NBC munitions are not discussed in detail in this section of the rulebook. Sorry.

But...

I imagine that there will be the greatness interest/controversy around the rules for smoke munitions - something standard Battlegroup has always steered well away from, argiung that this is covered well enough by the observation rules and some scenario specific rules.

I've never had an issue with this for the WW2 game, but for WW3 I could see some value in more detailed smoke rules. So that's what I've tried to do here.

As I said earlier this is an opportunity for you all to have a look at what I've done and let me know what you think. I know it's pretty wordy - that was just me trying to cover all the bases I could think of.

I'm also really interested to see if you think smoke rules are needed at all? Argue either way and if you think my ideas are wrong/too much/to restricting/too loose or whatever - again - let me know.

Anyway - enough from me - here are the Specialist Artillery Munitions rules in all their glory!

Specialist Artillery Munitions

Hope you enjoy

Richard

Hasegawa Norwegian F-5A(G)

 Well, well, well - once again it's been a while.  It's not like nothing has been going on - but still I've been slack with the blog.  So today I plan to rectify that with a completed model.  The first model of my planned Norwegian force which bizarrely is a Northrop F-5A(G) jet fighter. Just because...

So here it is:

This all started a month or two back when it was a nice day and I had a bit of black paint left in my airbrush so I decided to try something new (with aircraft anyway) which was well beyond my skill level.

So I black attacked a couple of planes I had sitting around with my shakey hands!

Obviously I decided the one that would get actually painted was the plane that required just one colour - the F-5.

So on the next nice day (few and far between here back in January/Feb) I got out my Vallejo Model Air colours and did this

And then added decals

Then I took all the stuff out of the cockpit

And now some fun shots:

Thanks for looking.  Hopefully the next post will be a bit closer than 3 months!

Richard

British AFV Data Cards - An updated version

 It's taken a while but I've finally finished an updated version of the British AFV Data Cards that should cover all of the vehicles in the 4 current British Army Lists.  (I do have plans to add at least 2 or 3 more...)

It was fun to add in a bunch of new vehicles - some were simply missing, some were slightly older vehicles which in my thinking could have been pulled out of storage and prepped ready for some kind of use, some were only ever prototypes, some are purely speculative but worth including because your imagined Cold War Gone Hot timeframe might be slightly different to mine.

So here is the link

British AFV Data Cards

I'll also put the link into the Data Cards tab at the top of the page and on the AirLand BattleGroup page on Facebook.

As I always say, there may be the odd mistake in these cards - I hope not, but it's quite likely.  If you spot anything, let me know and I will make the required changes.

Also if your favourite British Army vehicle is somehow missing - let me know and I'll see if I can add it.  There are 3 spaces available on the last page for anything I forgot.

The extra keen eyed will also not I've changed the AP values on the Scorpion, Saladin and Centurion 105 AVRE.  I've not been happy with the changes I made earlier so have updated them again to hopefully better reflect their lack of a kinetic AP round and reliance on HESH rounds.

The Scorpion and Saladin Data Cards now look like this:

While the Centurion 105 AVRE looks like this:

So that's it for now.

Thanks

Richard

New Year, New Opportunities... on Facebook!

So after doing this blog for 15 years or so with a little bit prompting I've decided to expand my online presence (ha ha!) by starting a new Facebook group specifically for my completely Unofficial Cold War variant of the WW2 wargame rules "Battleroup".

You'll note I have called the group "AirLand BattleGroup" rather than "Battlegroup Something".  This is to, with any luck, protray the period - the mid to late 1980's when the AirLand Battle doctrine was being implemented and the game - Battlegroup, in one slick heading.  Well, that's what I was hoping anyway!

I classify myself as a reforming luddite so I made several mistakes in creating the group.  So you might find a second group called "Airland Battlegroup" - a slightly different style to the page below.  Just ignore it!

You can find the real group here on Facebook and it looks a bit like this for now:

Yes - with 2 whole members - one of whom is me!  The other is a non-wargaming mate who tested the group for me to see if it was working!

There a couple of innocent questions to answer and then you to can be counted as one of an elite number of group members!

Over the course of the next few days I'll be adding a lot of the files from this blog onto the Facebook Group.  Also a bunch of other documents I've found over the years from various places - including other Facebook groups - but at least I can have them stored all in one place rather just than sitting on my laptop.

Hopefully the Facebook group will become a useful resource and maybe help drive the game forward a bit faster - giving me the kick in the pants to work on some new stuff with your help.

I'd also like it to be used to test new ideas, start useful discussions, answer questions etc.  I want it to be a fairly dynamic situation where we test ideas and rules and see what we can do to make the game better.  I'm keen to see what other people think.

So please join the group, let people you game with or are aware of who are interested in the Cold War and Battlegroup know about it as well.  I'm sure it will be a slow start, but let's see where this goes.  You never know - if there turns out to be enough interest maybe PSC will see a way forward to publish an Official Cold War variant of Battlegroup.  Fingers crossed.

This blog will of course continue - it will just be more closely linked to the Facebook group.

Thanks as always

Richard

 

Joyeux Noël

 Merry Christmas everyone - this time with a bit of a French flavour.  It's taken quite a while to put this all together, but today I've uploaded the all new French AFV Data set.

You'll notice straight away that there are a few vehicles here not currently found in any of the French Army Lists.  That will change at some point in the future but for now you'll have the stats to include these vehicles in games if you so choose.

A few new vehicles in the French AFV data cards includes ( but is not limited to)

- Leclerc Tank

- AMX-30B2 Brennus

- AML 60-20 Serval

- AML-20 Eclairage

- Panhard VBL

- AMX-10 RC Surblinde

Many of these vehicles are listed as "Speculative" under the rules, some as int he "real" world they only came in the early 1990s, but prototypes were around in the late 80's - others because they were export vehicles or prototypes which did not necessarily see service in the French Army.  I've included these for fun, as i could easily imagine the French deciding maybe not to send those armoured cars to Africa as planned, now they're involved in WW3 in Europe!

You'll find them all here and they will also appear in the Data Cards section of the blog accessed at the top of the page.

As always, if you find any errors, please let me know and I will make the required changes.  If your favourite obscure French AFV is missing and you'd like it included, again - let me know and I'll see what I can do.

The last of the original Data Cards that needs updating is the British AFV set and they're next on my list to do.  Then we'll start working through the East German, Polish and Czech Data Cards.  Then maybe the Swedes and the Finns, who also require Army Lists...  Still so much to do. 

Thanks everyone.  I hope you all have a great Christmas break and I'll see you in the New Year.  

Richard

The Hummer Horde continues to grow....

 I'm not exactly sure why it's been such a long time since I posted here - it feels like the last few months have been a bit of a blur.  Anyway - I'm rectifying that right now with some additional HMMWVs I recently finished.  Well... finished to a point - no crew painted as yet - but I'll post them up when I get them done.

Here's the latest group

There's a range of models in the photos.  The HMMWV with the slightly different camo is actually a Dragon diecast where all I've done is add a Mk-19 automatic grenade launcher.  All the rest were made and painted by me.

Some close ups

And now the little horde as it currently stands

Pretty happy with that progress - but still a few more Hummers to go before I've finished with this lot.

Thanks for looking

Richard