Well the last couple of weeks have largely been a write-off due to illness - some horrible combination of flu/chest infection/consumption/the plague has meant even thinking about painting sent me off on a coughing fit, and it has only been this weekend that I have managed to summon up the energy to pick up the brushes (obviously not made of the same stern stuff as Tamsin!).
Anyway, I thought it was time to notch up another squirrel point, so decided to make a start on some WW2 Germans that have been languishing deep in the lead pile. They are AB Figures - beautiful sculpts but to be honest I did not think I could do them justice. In addition, wanting to have a go at various patterns of SS camo was even more intimidating, so they have sat untouched for a long time. However, an article in a Too Fat Lardies Special not only gave some fairly easy to follow guidance, but it was illustrated with pictures of AB Figures, so I thought I'd give it a go; this is the Painting Challenge after all!
This first squad is in a mixture of Oak Leaf Autumn and Oakleaf Spring pattern and I decided to do the bases with autumn clump foliage to distinguish them from ordinary Wehrmacht figures, who will be based with a more summery flock/clump foliage blend, like on the MG team below. The figures themselves are actually from the Wehrmacht range, but I was inspired by an old post on The Guild forum (now sadly defunct) which painted Wehrmacht as SS. As AB only do two squad packs of SS, this gives me a lot more variety.
First up are the 5-man rifle team. These will be for gaming Operation Market-Garden, and reading the excellent 'It Never Snows In September' there is a mention of SS troops arming themselves with Sten guns, so the figure on the left is carrying a captured British SMG (the figure is by Battlefield/Blitz).
Next we have a three-man MG42 team.
For a change of pace I also did a PAK 40 - AB crew and a Grubby/Britannia gun.
Finally, some Wehrmacht fire support in the shape of a tripod mounted MG 42, done largely to give me from a break painting little camo dots! I am doing a Wehrmacht section to accompany them and that might get finished for later today.
So one Squirrel point and 48 points (I think - not sure if you count the figures on top of the 16 points for the guns, so I didn't) for the Germans.
Sorry to hear you've been ill, nothing kills productivity like manflu! Seriously though, its hard to motivate yourself when all you want to do it crawl under a blanket and sleep it off. This is a great bunch of figures to get back in the groove. For Crew served weapons the crew are scored as well as the gun so you've sold yourself a bit short on the points. 15 infantry and two guns will earn you a tidy 76 points.
Lee
