From MattW: Chassuer Ardennais heavy weapons battalion (64 points)

 Chasseur Ardennais support elements MattW

A follow up on last weeks entry support elements for my Chasseur Ardennais. In the majority the figures are Early War Minatures, some battlefield/blitz and FAA. EWM artillery and Anti tank gun. Each Belgian Infantry regiment had three battalions of Infantry and one battalion of heavy weapons, this battalion was split into three support companies, this in turn was allocated to support the rifle battalions as required. 

Artillery and antitank 

Bofors mountain gun, cannon 75mm model 34 infantry support gun.

Fonderie Royale de Canons (FRC) 47mm anti tank gun coy 

A interesting development of this gun, it used the same carriage and trail as the 76 FRC canon. The Chassuer Ardennais carried two barrels on their vehicle the 47mm anti tank and the 76mm IG on the Vickers carrier or Alvis Straussler Hefty so they could be swapped out as required. 

Fonderie Royale de Canons (FRC) 76mm mortar gun coy 

Medium machine gun coy 

Maxim 1908 MMG

Colt 1914 MMG 

2x 20mm guns @ 10 points 20 points 

12x 20mm crew @ 4 points = 48 points 

Total 68 points 

Cheers

Matt

TeemuL: 20mm guns are only 8 points, but otherwise your math is right. Some nice firepower for Belgian infantry, should help fighting back the invaders. I very much like your basing, too, it creates a nice backdrop for the gun crews. The green berets look cool, I guess they were actually used at that time?

From MattW: Belgian Chasseur Ardennais (155 points)

 Chasseur Ardennais 

Another WW2 project this year is to complete my Belgian light division. In the last ten days I have completed transport, artillery and heavy support elements for them. The figures are a mix of Early War Miniatures range and the old Battlefield/Blitz range. The trucks, Vickers  and AT and Artillery are EWM. Markings are hand painted. 

Three FN trucks + 2 drivers 

Two Vickers tows with light gun and mortar 

Alvis Hefty (fully scratch built last year) two crew 

6 x 20mm vehicle @ 15 points = 90

2 x 20mm guns @ 10 points = 20

10 x 20mm crews @ 4 points = 40

2 x 20mm 1/2 crew @ 2 points = 4

Total 154 points 

Cheers 

Matt

TeemuL: And we have a hattrick from Matt today! Another beautiful project. A scratch built vehicle? Vehicles rarely seen? Hand painted markings? Excellent brushwork? Nice backdrops? We are spoilt. I'll round it to 155 points for you.

Edit: 20mm guns are only 8 points, but I added more bonus points for the awesomenesses listed above, so 155 in total.

From BenF: Big Cats and Swimming Wagons (80 Points)

With the imminent release of an Operation Market Garden supplement from Toofatlardies, along with an even-more-imminent trip planned to Arnhem, I feel like some Market Garden related gaming is on the horizon. To that end, I've decided to start refreshing my British Paratrooper and German Waffen-SS and Heer forces for Chain of Command. As with all of my Chain of Command forces, I've gone down the 20mm route due to the availability and range of vehicles and the superb sculpting of some figure ranges. I've also been dabbling with some Battlegroup at the local club, and my 20mm forces would work equally well for that. 

Up until now, my WW2 collection has focused on the Normandy campaign, and so rather surprisingly I've avoided collecting some of the most familiar of German tanks, a Tiger. While I had a Panther, it was an older resin sculpt which suffered from 'bendy barrel' syndrome, so I've replaced the whole thing with a more suitable Dragon diecast.

My first part of this entry is a few Waffen-SS crew figures. I think Crew really add something to armoured vehicles, however it does sometimes look a little odd to have crew sitting atop a knocked out or burning tank on the game table, to say nothing of a regular cycle of knocking off and regluing command figures. To that end, I've magnetised the open turrets and figures using some rare earth magnets which I've got left over from a 1/300 aircraft project. I think this is a pretty neat solution, as it allows variety and, in the event that a tank is knocked out in a game, the commander can easily be removed before a burning marker is applied.

These five figures are from Battlefield/Blitz, and are sadly no longer available. As with all of Andy's sculpts, I like that they give the feel of movement and action while maintaining lifelike proportions and easy to paint detail. Happy to hear that Simon's Soldiers has commissioned Andy to sculpt many more figures to be released soon, so I'm hoping to bend Simon's ear into getting a pack of crew figures for my British forces sculpted up.

This lot are painted up as Waffen-SS tank commanders, suitable for Normandy through to the end of the war. While the SS was a reprehensible organisation, I must admit I do like the variety of camouflage patterns you can use when painting them up. 

Next up, it's the big cats. This Tiger I ausf E and Panther ausf A are both from the Dragon range of prepainted WW2 vehicles. While I do try to avoid having a Tiger on the table in platoon level games, the attacks of Kampfgruppe Hummel on Frost's 2nd Parachute Battalion around Arnhem Bridge would make for an interesting game. I made some minor modifications to these which consisted primarily of sitting open the hatches. I then painted both of them, looking for a relatively generic set of schemes so they can be used for Heer or Waffen-SS vehicles.

Next, it's a little Schwimmenwagen, painted up as an SS vehicle. I'm not sure who the make of this one is, but I think it could be a Hasegawa model which came with a 1/72 scale Focke Wulf 190. The driver is from AB.

Finally, it's a brace of Sd.Kfz 251 halftracks, a troop carrying 251/1 variant, and a 251/10 37mm armed vehicle, often used by platoon commanders. Both of these are the excellent offerings from Plastic Soldier Company, with stowage from the same kit, and foliage from Noch.  I've got one more to do, which I think i'll build as a 251/9 75mm armed support vehicle.

Well, that's it for this entry. That makes it 5 20mm vehicles, (60 points) and 5 crew figures (20? points) for a grand total of 70 more towards my goal.
Next up will be some 15mm ancients.

***

Great job Ben - always nice to see 20mm, and always nice to see some Big Cats come off the painting table.  Great work all around here, but I'm particularly impressed with the 251s...and even more impressed that you managed to get any of these PSC kits, I've been trying to get some for months... 

For points, the crew figures are halves, but I'm still adding a few bonus points for nice camo patterns and the interiors of the 251s, always a pain in the arse to paint.  Great work. 

Greg B

From BenF - 20mm British Para Support (40 Points)

This entry is a few more figures for my Chain of Command British. Nick and Rich have been working on a supplement covering the Arnhem campaign, and so I thought it about time to add some missing bits and pieces to my Paras, as well as another PIAT team for my British. After 2019 being a year of many projects started, and none completed, a few mates and I have decided that 2020 will be 'consolidation year'. This means that we are currently having a focus on Chain of Command, and besides having three pint sized campaigns on the go, each matching up different players, it has given me a bit of focus to get some long term projects completed.

First off, here is a British Para .303in Vickers medium machine gun team. These are Britannia figures, and I did a small conversion by head swapping one of the figures. I do like the characterful Britannia sculpts, and feel that they do actually fit in fine with the rest of my force, which is primarily Battlefield/Blitz.

Next up, it's a forward observer team, again from Britannia. I've had a crack at painting a map with gridlines in the observers hand. This lot will be calling in some 3" mortar support in a chain of Command game soon.

Next, some snipers, two of which are required for a chain of command Para platoon. The chap with the hood is Battlefield/Blitz, and the other one is another Britannia sculpt. Another map for the hooded chap, just visible behind the tuft. I've gone for a dioramic approach for basing these, using some of the excellent taijima tufts and small shrubs.

Finally, the extra PIAT team. This is one of the superb new sculpts from Simons Soldiers. As with the other British infantry I posted, these are painted up as the 49th (West Riding) Division, with the polar bear shoulder insignia. Simon has been pumping out some brilliant new sculpts, particularly some late war Fallischirmjager and 1940 French. Some of his Volkssturm are on the painting bench, and I've just finished off a German grenadier gruppe for my Late War Germans. Short of an anti tank gun team, that should finish off my 1944-45 Brits, though I have been toying with the idea of getting a few sections worth of the new Adler British infantry in windproof smocks, for those 1945 scenarios.

So far as points, this should net me another 36 points (9 x 4 points).

Next up, it'll be a few 20mm German Landsers and a Volksturm commander for my late war Germans.

***

Great work Ben, I've got a ton of respect for anyone who can manage the camouflage of the British paras in any scale, particularly this nicely. Well done. 

For scoring, I (ab)use my minion powers to add extra points for crew-served weapons and tempting sanity by painting British para camo. Let's make it 40 points.

GregB

From BenF: Der Kommissar at Sander's Sand Dunes (38 Points)

I've been busy the last few weeks, and have completed a load of figures which I'll be posting over the next week or so. We've got a large fall of rain which means that many of the fires which were menacing Sydney and the Central Coast of NSW are now in hand, thanks as well to the superhuman efforts of the Firies, and the volunteers of the Rural Fire Service.

For my belated first entry to the infamous Challenge Island, I chose to make landfall at Sander's Sanddunes and embark on the path of History. The theme of Red worked quite well with several projects I'm working on, but I settled on this pair of committed communists from the RKKA, better known as the Red Army.

They are the first of what will be a platoon sized force of WW2 Soviets for Chain of Command, a project inspired by my visit to Russia in 2018. I've based both on hex bases, which I use to quickly identify leaders in Chain. As with my other Chain forces, the Russians will be in 20mm, and these two are from Battlefield/Blitz.

The rather portly chap in the blue cap is a political officer, better known as a Commissar. I liked the sculpt, as it portrays the stereotypical apparatchik, getting fat of Stalin's regime while many go without.

The bloke in the green cap is an officer of the NKVD Border Guards. While part of Stalin's secret police organisation, with all that that entails, I do have a soft spot for the border guards. Highly motivated communists tasked with policing the border of the USSR. This task meant they were among the first to face Hitler's invasion of 1941, fighting bravely, often suicidally so, as was the case in the siege of Brest fortress. Many border guard regiments served throughout the war, even fighting in the Battle of Berlin.

Anyway, this pair should net me 8 points, plus the bonus for my first Challenge Island step.

My next entry, which is the Curtgeld, will be up in a few days.

***
Great work Ben - as a long-time WW2 gamer (and general political dork) I had always known of the Commissars, but I had never really given a thought to the NKVD Border Guards, or the fact that Border Guard Regiments continued throughout the war! Learning these neat little bits of history is always one of the best parts of the Painting Challenge - that, and the great brushwork.  Well done. 

That will be 38 points for you. 

GregB