Modern armies Feb/March 2017 – Modern French and Chinese

A couple of months ago I started to paint 20mm miniatures of modern armies. 

As I explained in another post this project is a kind of joke. I don’t like to paint 20mm miniatures but I was interested to see if I was able to reproduce different mimetic uniforms and so I did some experiments.

Below some pictures of my Modern French soldiers. 

A company that is moving in an urban scenario ...

… some soldiers that cross a river under the cover of a sniper. 

All soldiers have as personal weapons the French FAMAS rifle but the sniper has a FR-F2 … I think … details in 20mm miniatures are hard to find sometimes.

There aren’t many poses in the box so I decided to paint them in different way. I was inspired by the uniforms used by the Foreign Legion in Mali but I changed the colors of the tactic jackets and bags

Miniatures that I painted are produced by Caesar and the box includes some Chinese soldiers too. In the following photos I thought that French and Chinese troops could participate to a joint operation …

… to understand better what means the 20mm scale I took two photos of the same position

To be honest the miniature in the center with the rocket launcher is a French trooper but I decided to convert him as part of Chinese army … This is the correct version ...

For these miniatures I decided for a grey-blue mimetic instead of the standard woodland. Below a Chinese company near a crop field …

All soldiers hold a QBZ-95 rifle and below one of them is launching a grenade in a winter scenario.

The level of details of these photos is intentionally very high even if, under my point of view, a 20mm miniature does not justify it. Unfortunately I found very few photos for 20mm modern figures and to paint them basing on youtube video is hard. So I hope that these photos can help someone who want start my same project. 

Bolt Action Birmania – March, 27 2017

Last Saturday, Giancarlo, Enzo and Riccardo organized another bolt action battle with their 28mm miniatures.

Ezio prepared the table.

The scenario they played sees a group of British commandos that enters into a Japanese village to kill some officers.

Below some battle details

A Burmese guide indicates the way to the British commandos

Below one of the Commandos’ obj

The Commandos are coming

The attack starts …

... but the Japanese troopers are ready

A mortar team and his observer start to hit the enemy. The observer is covered by a Type 99 (Kuku-shiki keikikanjū)

The British commandos continues to push …

… but a sniper and …

… a Japanese marines company of reinforcement create holes into Commandos lines

Two other moments of the battle

TMWWBK – March, 27 2017

Last week-end my club prepared a couple of scenario. Ezio, Maurizio and Aurelian played a TMWWBK scenario while others occupied the remaining tables.

A bird’s view of the camp before the battle

The scenario was simple: three British companies, supported by artillery and cavalry, attack a Zulu village.

Zulu warriors come out from the village under attack

The British companies line up

The village is under a strong attack

The British cavalry is waiting before to charge the village … 

... in the meanwhile, on the other side, a group of Zulu reinforcement arrive on the field

… and finally two photos that I can call “a different point of view” :)

Alligator Creek – Bolt Action – March, 18 2017

Last Saturday my club members played a Bolt Action scenario related to a battle between the Imperial Japanese Army and the US troops that was fought on the Guadalcanal island.

This scenario is included into the supplement “Empires in flames” and it is part of the WWII Pacific campaign.

The battle was an assault of the Ichiki Japanese regiment against US Marines. Underestimating the strength of American  forces on Guadalcanal, Ichiki's unit conducted a nighttime frontal assault on Marine positions at Alligator Creek. Japaneese’s assault was defeated with heavy losses for the attackers. The Marine units counterattacked Ichiki's surviving troops after daybreak, killing many more of them. All but 128 of the original 917 of the Ichiki Regiment's First Element were killed in the battle.

I want point out that:

-          the field was prepared by Ezio

-          USMC are painted by Ivano

-          and Japanese forces by Riccardo

Below a couple of maps of the Guadalcanal campaign and a detail of Alligator creek section. In the Map B it is possible to see where Ichiki regiment was deployed during the Allies landing (near Lunga point)

(All rights reserved www.westpoint.edu)

 

An overview of the scenario with images of the real battlefield

The American trenches and the initial Japanese bombardment

The Japanese start their assault

Two Japanese assault waves …

… and the Marines that will push back the enemies.