Forums Terrorist posted:

use both, do some of them in one colour and some in the other

spectralent posted:

I had assumed the title was a joke given in 1942 most vehicles would still be dunkelgrau.

Commissar Canuck posted:

Crossposting from the terrain thread:

Warlord Games is having a diorama contest with the theme of "hostile, harsh terrain," so I decided to go for a French Resistance ambush on a German patrol.







I hope I was able to capture the tension I was striving for when I was brainstorming this one

Serotonin posted:

Real nice. Gripping Beast? Using it for Saga?

Ensign Expendable posted:

Just a wee bit late for Valentine's Day, it's a Bronco Valentine Mk.IX! I've been working on this thing since mid-January, it's the most complicated and (at $70 CAD) the most expensive kit I've put together to date. Prepare for lots of pictures and lots of words.





This fucker has a lot of hatches, and thankfully, enough interior detail that you might want to show most of them wide open.





Driver's compartment, probably the most detailed part of the tank. You get the seat, all the levers, two Mk.4 periscopes, and the control panels. Looking at actual reference photos, there are still bits missing, but this is easily good enough. Sadly I can't get a good photo of the driver's station despite the deceptively large hatches. The driver's viewport also opens up, but you can't really see anything through it.





The turret is less detailed. It contains the gun breech, three periscopes, and the radio set. The hatches here are smal, so it's harder to see. The turret ring is fully detailed, and the turret clicks into it and rotates freely, but the fit on the two locking pins is tight enough that I couldn't get it out again to show off the underside. Interestingly enough, one of the three turret periscopes is listed in a separate instruction step than the other four, but I can't tell the difference.



Sorta artsy shot through the pistol ports. The pistol ports look like they can open and close after assembly, but I glued them in the open position since I doubt I could get them open again if they closed. This shot also shows off the excellent casting texture on the turret.



You can see the tracks here, easily my favourite part of the kit. They click together and remain movable after assembly, although the pins are a wee bit too weak and the track can tear due to handling. Thankfully less than a dozen pieces broke during assembly, and a few glued in links scattered throughout the flexible track aren't that noticeable, I hope. Also, the springy suspension works very well with these tracks if you want to display it on some kind of rough terrain diorama.





Trying to get a closer shot of the smoke grenade ammo box. The kit includes a decal sheet for these boxes, with these incredibly tiny and annoying to apply labels. I had to get them out of my water bowl with my left hand, since the shadow cast by my right made them impossible to see.





The transmission compartment, the only completely detailed part of the tank. For some reason, reviews claimed that the engine compartment is fully detailed, but the engine compartment is actually completely empty, without even a firewall to separate it from the fighting compartment. This was kind of disappointing, as all of the engine hatches can be glued in the open position and have interior details.

I have one complaint about the assembly process here: the fuel tank that has to be aligned with that hole on the right side is glued in about a dozen instruction steps prior, with no hint that it has to be aligned with anything or any markings on the compartment floor where to put it. Thankfully you can't really see it behind the radiators anyway, but it's a bit annoying. I decided to slap on a few figures for a "gently caress it, not again" mechanical breakdown scene.





The other side's smoke grenade box. For some reason it's a different shape.

Side view to complete the set:



Now, for the overall impressions. The kit has a shitton of parts, but not all are used in the assembly. There are four painting variants (two Soviet, two British in the desert) and each one has its own set of fenders. There are also two gun barrels included, two variants of upper front plates, two transmission cover options, two headlight options, and a bunch of optional bits to hang off the sides. You really need to study the manual carefully and figure out what your desired tank looks like, since a lot of the time there are zero hints in the manual as to which option matches what variant. This is probably heaven for Valentine enthusiasts that want a very, very specific kind of Valentine Mk.IX, but I'd rather they eliminate all this extra stuff and use the parts that freed up to spice up the interior a little more. At least put in a firewall or something so the interior doesn't look so barren.

The decals come in two sheets, one with the tiny stencil marks for the smoke grenade boxes, and one with ones for the tank. Since I was painting my tank to be a specific unit (16th Independent Tank Brigade) I used my own. The Soviet decals provided are rather uninspired anyway: one Guards unit (with improperly done Guards insignia, I might add) and "Unknown Unit" with a small and boring white tactical number. As always, the British desert options are much more visually interesting, both in terms of camouflage patters and markings.

The aforementioned manual is very high quality, printed on gloss paper in colour... but contains a ton of typos throughout. Bronco's English is not their strong point, unfortunately. Thankfully all the typos are in words instead of part numbers, and assembly is, for the most part, painless. The box also comes with a small poster of the box art included in the kit.

Coincidentally, I built another Valentine somewhat recently, and it ran me exactly half of what this kit cost, so a comparison is mandatory!



The other kit is a VM Valentine MkIV. From the front, you can see the superior detailing on the headlights, far better gun barrel, and better tracks on the Bronco version. The VM version also has a much more basic driver's cabin with no interior details or opening hatches.



Despite the lack of movable suspension, the VM Valentine's wheels are just as nice as the Bronco, aside from the drive sprocket. The VM muffler didn't have an opening, and also no photo-etched grille, but you can't see it on the Valentine anyway, since it's covered by a solid sheet of metal. The VM Valentine's engine hatch handles were also ridiculously brittle and all shattered when I tried to get them off the sprue, so I covered it up with all the extra track links. Seriously, they give you a ton of track links. The Bronco kit has like 6 spare links. Here you can also see the one thing that the VM kit does better: the shovel. The Bronco kit covers it up with a fuel tank, anyway, but I really like the molding on the VM one.

If you look closely, you can also see that the Bronco turret has a subtle rough casting texture, whereas the VM turret is perfectly smooth.



Rear of the tanks. You can see the simpler engine compartment cover of the VM kit. The entire top comes in one piece, like we're all used to, compared to the Bronco one that has almost a dozen separate assemblies that make up the top of the hull, making painting the interior a bit of a pain. You can also see the added value of the Bronco kit here, as it comes with two fire extinguishers.



Other side, showing off more of the tools that are omitted in the VM version, and also the pistol port in the turret, which does not open.



General side by side comparison. The two tanks are a slightly different colour for some reason, even though as far as I remember they were both painted with P3 Battledress Green, the closest colour I've ever seen to Soviet 4BO.

The verdict: is the Bronco kit better than the VM one? Definitely. Is it twice as good? I don't think so. Too many fiddly bits and the pain in the rear end multi-part upper hull makes me think that I should have gone for the slightly simpler MiniArt Valentine. The kit actually made me burn out a little bit, so I put together the Tamiya Jackson while making it. On the other hand, this is a Mk.IX, which I don't think anyone else makes.

With this, my British Lend-Lease collection is almost complete. Sadly my local hobby shops have a bunch of Tamiya Churchill VIIs and AFV Churchill engineering tanks, but not a single Mk.II, Mk.III or Mk.IV in sight, which were the only versions shipped to the USSR. And yet there are like 50 Tiger variants in ever store, there is no justice in this world

Grey Hunter posted:

So, A quick question, and one I'm pretty sure doesn't have a correct answer.

Whats is the proper green for German infantry in WWI?

Because I've been looking at some pictures and I can't decide if I need ot use Vallejo "German Uniform" or "German Field Grey".

This is for the 6mm figures above, so I'm not going to be able to do anything special like layering, so I need one base colour that will work. What do you lot think?

Commissar Canuck posted:

Crossposting from the terrain thread:

Warlord Games is having a diorama contest with the theme of "hostile, harsh terrain," so I decided to go for a French Resistance ambush on a German patrol.







I hope I was able to capture the tension I was striving for when I was brainstorming this one

Commissar Canuck posted:

spectralent posted:

Every time I read that it makes me want to play CoC more than the, like, once that I actually got to

Endman posted:

I know how you feel. Nobody plays the good wargames where I live either it's all Warhams and Warmahordes.

Just gotta keep painting wicked historical minis until I can convert someone.

lilljonas posted:

Our Chain of Command campaign continues into turn 3!



Both Italian and Soviet Captains are having nervous breakdowns, Oberfeldbewel Ohme talks about flanking tactics and the terror of Maxims, and somewhere, in a small Russian hut, a poor cavalry Leytenant is having an awkward debriefing as we blur the lines between AARs and playwriting. Let's just say that things are getting positively narrative at casa Kriget Kommer:

http://krigetkommer.weebly.com/stalino-1941-blog-ww2

Endman posted:

I know how you feel. Nobody plays the good wargames where I live either it's all Warhams and Warmahordes.

Just gotta keep painting wicked historical minis until I can convert someone.

muggins posted:

"historicals" is a four letter word to some of my bros =( they'll play horus Heresy but not a "historical". They'll play groggy as poo poo star trek stuff but not historicals

I just want to shake them and say THIS IS BETTER. BELIEVE ME. JUST DO IT

muggins posted:

"historicals" is a four letter word to some of my bros =( they'll play horus Heresy but not a "historical". They'll play groggy as poo poo star trek stuff but not historicals

I just want to shake them and say THIS IS BETTER. BELIEVE ME. JUST DO IT

BeigeJacket posted:

Have any of you guys gone for Team Yankee?

Never cared for Flames too much, but I really like what they have done with the tidy up of the base rules, and the unit cards. Just a better system overall.

Serotonin posted:

Or Saga? With Vikings? Coz come on, Vikings. Who doesn't like Vikings? Apart from Christian monks in remote coastal monasteries

JcDent posted:

The answer is to go 6mm for TY. Sure, the turret rule is BS with tiny, flimsy 6mm turrets, but what can you do.

spectralent posted:

I have but while it's tidier I have struggled to actually understand one or two rules, though I believe there was one clarified in the FAQ which I can check. Also, I preferred daisy-chains; "stay in 6" " is much more of a pain and I find it leads to more car-parks than is usual for FoW. Also I'm not sure Hinds literally can stick within 6", past 2 of the things.

spectralent posted:

This would be cool but everyone plays in 15mm.

BeigeJacket posted:

Sorry if I'm being dim but what's a daisy chain?

Parking lots always bothered me - it looks like one of those parades in red square!

One of the reasons I'm psyched for team Yankee is that it requires fewer models. My 80 point US list had a whopping 7 tanks, a few support vehicles and air support. Soviet mech platoons will be silly tho.