AHPC 16 - Terrain - Winter Trees and road.

 

I'm not sure if this is a first or not but today's Terrain entry is actually from two Challengers. You may have seen on our respective blogs, that me and Lee got together a few weekends ago and spent the day making and finishing some Winter terrain for our Retreat from Moscow shenanigans, now of course this can also be used for our new Winter period, the Russo-Finnish War.

Here are 2 boxes of trees, that we winters over with a spray of white paint and also a flick and drybrush, with a very large 3 inch brush.

We also had to sand, paint, drybrush, add grass tufts and finally add the snow mixture 

\we are both pretty chuffed how they all came out, there are a total of 76 basses of trees, some smaller trees have 2 or 3 trees on them. The bases are 70mm circles from Warbases.

I have no clue how Byron will work out the points for these???

Next up we have some road, or trackways.

This is how we left them after our days terrain building.

And here's how they ended up!

They were painted twice with our earth brown mix, then drybrushed white before adding our winter snow mixture.

We cut out some different shapes and bends, but stupidly forgot a T-Junction?!?!

The straight long lengths measure 15 inches long and 3.5 inches wide, all in all the measure approx. 17.5 feet in length.

Once again, I'm not really sure how Byron will work this one out??

But as its a 2-Man project the points, whatever they are will be split down the middle, half for Lee and half for me!

Byron was very kind and gave us 120 points, giving us both 60 points.

AHPC 16 - Russo-Finnish Winter War - Finnish 37mm Bofars - Oh Rats!

For my next entry it's back to the 1939-40 Winter War, the figures are once again from Parkfield Miniatures, great range packs WWF33 the Bofors and WWF34 the crew. You get 5 crew in the pack, but only need 3 crew in Bolt Action, but I thought It might as well paint them all up. The base from Charlie Foxtrot and is a spare from my Retreat from Moscow French.

The 1939 Finnish 37 mm Bofors anti-tank gun was a highly effective, Swedish-designed weapon that played an important role during both the Winter War and the Continuation War. Originally developed by Bofors in the early 1930s, it was intended to provide infantry units with a lightweight yet powerful defense against armored vehicles. Weighing only about 370 kilograms, the gun was easy to maneuver and could even be towed by a single horse in Finnish service, making it well suited to Finland’s rugged terrain and mobile tactics.

In combat, the gun proved accurate and reliable, with a practical rate of fire of around 12 rounds per minute. Firing a 37×257 mm cartridge, it could penetrate approximately 40 mm of armor at 300 meters—more than sufficient to destroy most light Soviet tanks such as the T-26 and BT series encountered during the early stages of the Winter War. Its semi-automatic mechanism automatically ejected spent shells to speed reloading, while an optical sight and protective shield enhanced both accuracy and crew protection.

Finland relied on both imported Swedish-made guns and domestically produced copies, with roughly 355 Finnish-built versions manufactured under the designation 37 psv.K/36 or VTT37-36. Although the weapon gradually became obsolete as heavier Soviet tanks like the T-34 entered service and thicker armor rendered the 37 mm gun less effective by 1943, it remained a dependable and durable asset. During the initial phases of the conflict especially, the Bofors 37 mm was a critical component of Finland’s anti-tank defences.

For the points, there are 5 figures, one of them is laying down - 22.5 pts

1 Crew served weapon - 10pts

Plus whatever Dave wants to give me for the base?

Next we have some Rats, that will fit into either the Winter War or the Retreat from Moscow.

I'm sure they didn't starve unlike the poor French and Allies, I guess they were the breakfast dinner and Tea!

I bought these at the Warfare Show last November and can't for the life of me remember the company I bought them from????? I know they came in a little round tine, with Body Parts written on it??

Anyway the 25mm Rats will add a little discomfort to our snowy game, there are 20 rats all in all, 3 are based on 25mm circular bases while the bigger horde is on a slightly larger irregular base.

I'd guess at 2pts per rat, as they're roughly the size of a 15mm horse?

But again, I'll leave that up to Dave!

Battle Chronicles - Retreat from Moscow - Batrep - Bridge of Ice & Smoke - Game 4

Paul, Lee and myself got together mid week in Posties shed to playtest the last scenario in the up and coming Battle Chronicles - The Retreat from Moscow book, we ironed out a few problems, added and took away bits and pieces as the game went on. 

At the end of the evening Lee took home a few of my figures and some of our terrain and posed some figures, for pics in the ruleset. The pic above is one. I have to admit, it looks Good!!!

Obviously, Lee took a million photos during the game.

The idea of this game was to get the French survivors and any civilians they picked up on the way in the first 3 games over one or more of the 3 bridges on the tabletop, avoiding any Russians, the red rings are wound markers, each French figure has 4 wounds. Our wounded are in a bad way, they will move slower than the fit and strong. 

Do we leave them behind?

Do we sacrifice them for the good of the company?

Will they drag us down with them?

Will they sacrifice themselves?

What to do?

Two of the bridges on the far side of the 4 foot square table top.

The 3rd bridge, off to the French right.

Inevitably, with some Cossacks on the hunt. 

My initial plan was to move diagonally across the table to the bridge on the bend of the river.

But now with the Cossacks on our right, I decided to hug the left side of the table. Which I didn't really want to do, as the green arrows are possible Russian entry points onto the table.

A close up of the third bridge on the right of the French.

And the main bridge, which the French will now be heading for.

Here come the Cossacks!

They are looking rather angry!

And very pretty too!

Lee sure made a good job, painting these.

Russian Infantry, make it on the table.

A healthy Frenchman can help along their wounded friends, but we've started to break up already.

And it doesn't help that the Cossacks and Infantry are hot on our heals either!

Its looking chilly out there.

The Cossacks can smell blood!

They move up there full move of 14 inches.

To make matters worse, Russian infantry appear on our flank.

We deal with two of them, but one still remains and the group scatters.

Some have decided to leave their friends and run!

The bridge isn't far away now, but is it safe to cross?

The French dispatch the lone Infantryman, but more appear in front of them.

It's a race against the elements and time.

More Russian's enter the table, on our flank once again. It's a throw of a dice where they enter the game and Lee was throwing well!

I had to try and remove the threat, but this would slow me down again.

Mean while, I'd reached the bridge. It didn't look good, there was a danger it might collapse as I crossed. The more who crossed the worse it would get. For every person who crossed at the same time gave you a minus 1 on a D6. So if all 5 went to cross I'd need a 5 or 6. I didn't like the odds, so 1 man crossed to safety.

 

Another group rushed to the second bridge on the corner, they made it to the bridge, I was running out of time so took a chance for all 4 to cross at once, it was a disaster, halfway across the bridge collapsed and all four fell into the freezing water, none made it back to the shore.

In a cruel twist, the four wounded Frenchmen we're left behind, to cover their friends escape.

They we're cruelly cut down to the man, but everyone else escaped with their lives and the French had won the battle and the campaign.

Look out for more of these battles, we will be playtesting them again soon. Here's a few more shots of some of the figures to finish this post.