Review - Warlord Games M10 & Churchill

I took advantage of Warlord Games' recent "Wheels of Steel" offer and god myself a new bunch of tanks. Sadly I ordered early and could only chose from the limited selection - bad move to open up to every plastic kit at the end... The only reason I got the M10 was because I needed to add a third kit, and I would be way happier with a Firefly. So next time I will think twice before ordering a special offer from them...

Anyway, I am not sure yet if I want to convert the M3 to a Satan for my upcoming USMC or a Stuart Recce for my Desert Brits. So today I'll just talk about the M10 and the Churchill.

First the tank destroyer. a pretty simple kit, but nevertheless they managed to mention parts in the instruction which are not on the frames... I assume a copy/paste error from the M36 kit? There are several other wrong numbers, too, so be careful. Nevertheless, quite embarrassing.

Overall, the instructions could do with some more sub-assemblies since it was not always clear what would be the best order to put things together. Details are good, but the contact area for the threads is pretty small which makes it quite a pain to get them on.
The only choice you'll have to make with this kit is if you want to use the American or the British crew. I actually had to look up if the M10 really had a 5 man crew - the turret is ridiculously crammed!

Anyway, the final result seems to be alright:

 Color-wise I will go for this pattern from a British unit in Italy in 1944:

Picture: http://www.tanks-encyclopedia.com/ww2/US/M10_Wolverine.php

For the Churchill, I had the ambition to build it in a way that allows to field it in as many different configurations as possible, and I managed 5 - not bad!

The kit comes with a bunch of unit cards and material for damage markers. The cards are pretty much useless and I don't know if I will use the other stuff.

I went for the Mk III hull to make it suitable for King Force (also I now realize that those tanks should have the front guards on the tracks...), and build the turrets to be able to play Mk III, III CS, IV CS, AVRE and NA75:

Sadly, the 6 pdr of the Mk III won't fit into the cast turret, so no Mk IV for me.

Since the kit only comes with 2 antennas, each turret is missing one. maybe I'll try to find some plastic rods to fix that. I also should build a straight-edge turret box for the Mk III, and add the one from the kit (with cut-off corners) to the cast turret.

This one will get painted in Kingforce colors, which is of course somewhat inappropriate for the AVRE and NA75 to say the least, but I don't really mind:

Picture: http://www.tanks-encyclopedia.com/ww2/gb/A22_Churchill_Tank.php

Here are some additional pics of the two:

And because it is freaking awesome, I leave this here, too:

Desert Terrain WIP

It has been a while again...

But I haven't been procrastinating - well, not all the time at least. I started to build up my terrain collection, especially pieces that will fit onto my desert table. For this I bought an oil derrick and two nodding donkeys from Fenris Games:

 Very nice kits, both of them. Sadly, both nodding donkeys were missing several piece - i.e. the ladder sprue and some of the tubing. I tried to contact Fenris Games but to no avail... I don't know, it is kinda telling that both times exactly the same parts were missing - I would assume a rushed job. That;s a shame because otherwise it is a very cool and unique piece of terrain.

The derrick is better, complete and a very nice construction, but several of the sheets were not completely lasered which made assemble unnecessarily difficult:

Yeah, so there was some disappointment, but once you have the finished pieces in front of you it's mostly forgotten and forgiven :)

I also built a storage tank out of a can and some bits:

Now I need to paint everything and then I want to make some mine fields and barbed wire obstacles. Hopefully it won't take taht long again to show you new pics!

Ghost Recon Wildlands Beta - First Impressions

Aloha,
After a couple of hours of Ghost Recon Wildlands I am ready to share my first impressions.

For those with little time: This is much more Far Cry 5 than Ghost Recon.

Don't get me wrong, it is a decent game and fun so far, but it is not a Tactical Shooter. The gameplay is very much like Far Cry 4, with some good new additions I'll mention later.
But enemies and missions feel sadly familiar.

My biggest worries so far:

- The story seems to be non-existent. Yes, there is a lot of lore about the cartel, but I don't expect any depth or even surprises during the game. This is not telling a story.

- For god's sake, if I am supposed to be the best of the best on a black ops, don't drop me in a foreign country with nothing but a MP5! That's right - you start with 1 (!) weapon load-out, and you have to unlocked everything else. Including the customization parts. You get a sniper rifle after the first mission, but still... Not cool.

- Talking about sniper rifles - if I put a bullet from a  dedicated sniper rifle in your face, I expect you to drop. But some enemy heavies take to high-powered shots. Tactical shooter? Yeah, sure...

- Side missions are do-or-die. If you mess one up, there is no second chance. That's fine, but if the mission is "shut down this antenna" don't throw a " now shut down the second antenna that was never mentioned before 1 klick away within 90 seconds" at me.

- While I can see that this game will be heaps of fun with a group of people you know, the single-player is sometimes frustrating. Your team is usually better left behind while you scout, and the very limited orders make them useless for any kind of stealth approach. There isn't even a "cover me"-command!

- Enemy AI is not very good, either. They don't care much about people being dropped within line of sight, but once they are alerted, they call for reinforcements. And there is close to no chance to stop them. Just Cause 3 gives you a couple of seconds to drop the guy with the radio, but here, no way. Then reinforcements show up exactly like they do in Far Cry, and that's it. I tried to escalate a fight, but reinforcements seem to be unable to call for more reinforcements. Weird...

- You can free imprisoned rebels in enemy bases, but all they do is grab a gun and start a firefight with the guards, blowing your stealth and get reinforcements being called. Yep, just the kind of " help" I need. *slowclap*

- Oh, and Bolivia has a helicopter density like an airshow - there must be well over 20 just in the province you are allowed to play...

So, what about the good stuff?

Well, if you look at it more as a military RPG, it is quite good. What I mean i, if you embrace the premise of being an operative deep in enemy territory, you can get that feeling.
Also, the addition of interrogations is pretty cool, and the Intel actually opens up different approaches to story missions (a grain of salt here - I have not checked if some Intel is mandatory to make story missions playable).
The world looks much better than I expected, and it feels pretty fitting. I am actually looking forward to seeing the other climate zones.
The beta gives you only a very tiny idea of what you can do to mess up cartel operations. There are 4 different "departments", and I am sure  if you put a lot of effort into going after supply, I hope that you can actually start an internal conflict within the cartel by going after production or public relations.

All in all, it is not what I hoped for, and much more what I expected. Nevertheless, I like it so far.
But I can't really see myself buying this over Mass Effect Andromeda.

Review - Airfix 1/48th Bedford MWD

I needed another truck for my Bolt Action British, so I picked up a 1/48th scale Bedford MWD from Airfix.

First a couple of words about the original:
The Bedford MWD was the ubiquitous 15cwt truck in British service - over 200.000 have been produced during the war and it served in every theater. Also only 4x2, it had a powerful 72 hp engine and reached a top speed of 95 km/h with a range of over 400 km. It could transport a 10-man squad or up to 800 kg of material.
The early version had only canvas doors and tiny screens for the driver and passenger, earning it the nickname "pneumonia wagon". In 1943, the design was updated to have half doors and a proper windscreen, together with some changes to the engine covers and instrument layout.
In the desert they were also used as 2pdr ATG portees.

The Airfix kit comes with 95 parts on 3 grey sprues plus one clear sprue for the windshield.

It allows to build both the early and late version and several canvas configurations, so you'll have a decent amount of pieces left after you finished:

You could even further reduce the number of used parts by omitting the engine parts and some of the interior that might not be visible in the version you want to build.

The kit comes together without any issues and I only encountered two small pitfalls:
First, the tires are flattened on one side so be careful when you assemble them to make them fit correctly.
Second, the instructions skip one step when it comes to the steering wheel, but it is quite obvious how it should work.

The final product is a fine little model:

I found several pictures of MWDs in North Africa, and it seems to have been quite common to remove the side covers of the engine, so I left them off my truck, too:

I also left the hood separate to allow easy access to paint the engine:

Size-wise, it fits quite well with 28mm miniatures, mostly because the MWD is such a small truck. A Company B driver doesn't look out of place at the wheel (apart from his missing legs...):

And next to some Perry Miniatures 8th Army soldiers it still looks good:

Even in direct comparison to a Warlord Games 3-ton Bedford the scale difference isn't outrageous:

Just to put the difference between 1/48th and 1/56th scale into some numbers:
This MWD is 1.3 cm too long, 0,6 cm too high and wide.

And with a coat of sand color it is almost ready to roll!

All in all, this was fun to put together and the kit makes a very nice looking model. The scale is acceptable in my mind, and I am looking forward to finish the paint job soon!

Book Review - Ghost Fleet

I just finished the World War 3 novel "Ghost Fleet" by P.W. Singer and August Cole and thought I might share my thoughts with you.

The Story of Ghost Fleet is set about 30 years in the future and pretty simple: After a coup that topples over the Communist Party in China, the new technocrat regime decides that it is their time to become the dominant world power. In a surprise strike the PLA invades Hawai'i and defeats the US military through deception and sabotage. Basically, they sneaked backdoors into some of the microchips they sold the rest of the world, and suddenly all your high-tech gimmicks are not actually doing what they are supposed to do.

The main set-piece of the story is the USS Zumwalt, the only completed and then prematurely retired US "stealth" ship, and there is another storyline about the occupation and resistance on Hawai'i.

I knew P.W. Singer from his very good non-fictional "Wired for War" book about drone warfare and was quite surprised when I found this novel with his name on it. So it is no surprise that this book heavily features autonomous robots and a lot of technology DARPA dreamed up. And while the action feels right and mostly well-paced, the narrative is kinda worn out. Nobody will be surprised how it all ends, and who dies and who lives. It seems to be a movement in this genre to move away from the, let"s say "holistic", style of Tom Clancy (covering everything from the commander in chief to diplomats to boots on the ground) to a more cinematic narrative. And while David Suarez largely succeeds in this (see Kill Decision), Singer and Cole deliver a mostly uninspired story.
At this point I have to mention some not very well crafted pop culture references and some plot points that seem to be attempts at some kind of comic relief, but they don't work very well (but to be fair, this part of the story gave me the best "Oh no they didn't!" moment in the whole book).

Another slightly annoying thing is that a lot (and I mean A LOT!) of events are mentioned in the book, but never explained... Well, while this is usually no big deal and just a way to make the fictional world more real, it becomes somewhat annoying in this book because I felt like I am missing pieces of history that led to the starting point of the book. Even major events like the break-up of NATO is just fed to the reader as a matter of fact without any further explanation, and that happens within the timeframe of the story!
 The lack of political "bigger picture" story also makes the end somewhat disappointing, but I don't want to discuss this as it would be a major spoiler.

So this book is no Red Storm Rising (for me still the benchmark for a WW3 novel), but it is also not a piece of pure Cold War propaganda like Team Yankee. The setting, although feeling somehow familiar from mostly FPS video games, is fresh enough to make this book worth reading. I got through it in just over a week (which is tremendously fast for me at the moment), so I guess the story sucks you in quite good.

All in all, it was an interesting read, informative and entertaining. If you are interested in near future warfare and can forgive the lack of an elaborate story and characters you should give it a try.

Review - Heer46 Russian B-4 Howitzer

Time flies when you have a real job to do - my apologies for the long gap between posts...

Anyway, today I have a look at Heer46's massive B-4 howitzer.

The 203mm howiter M1931 B-4, nicknamed Stalin's sledgehammer, represents the heaviest artillery used by the Red Army in significant numbers.It entered service in 1933 and was used as division and corps artillery until the 1950s. During this time the "Bolshevik" factory produced over 800 of these guns. It was mounted on wheeled or tracked carriages, both without their own engine. Overall weight was close to 20 tons with an overall length of 9.3 m. 15 men were needed to achieve a nominal rate of fire of 1 round per minute. Every shell contained 100 kg of high explosives and had a range of 18 km.

The Heer46 kit comes in just 7 parts and assembly is pretty straight forward. No additional work beside a good scrub with soap water  was needed and everything can be put together easily with superglue.

The only major issue I have with the kit is that it can only be build in transport position. It is not possible to elevate the barrel and the tail is just one piece.

There is also no crew available, so I've built mine out of Warlord Games's Soviet Infantry (Winter) box.

Here are some pictures of the partially painted version (together with partially painted crew of 5):

And last but not least, a size comparison with the T-26:

Taken together, the B-4 is a nice model and a good addition to every Soviet army. It is definitely exotic and an eye-catcher, and I can't remember how many times I was asked if that is a 40K gun ;)
Anyway, an option to build it in firing position would be great.
The prize is 23.5€ (~ 26 US-$ or £20), which is okay considering that it comes from a small company and is the only way I know to get this particular gun.

Next time (and hopefully not again a full 4 weeks in the future) I will have a look at some infantry sets I recently received from Black Tree Designs.