With the new release of the Flames of War Eastern Front looming on the horizon, and the only recent release of the Bulge Germany book, I wanted to work on something different. Using the Bulge American book for some crazy Lend Lease/ What If army, or in other words: just play a army painted in the wrong colors.
With all models (or at least the vehicles) I did go for my usual Russian green, and not a maybe more fitting olive drab, as I did not want them to mix up with my more or less historical correct Lend Lease vehicles I already got.
For the most part I did choose to use exactly the units as needed, and not go too crazy with count as proxies. To keep things from getting too confusing on the board.
First up my Stuarts from Battlefront and Plastic Soldier. To make the formation HQ stick out somewhat I gave the two vehicles the cutters.
And the M8 I added because they are pretty nice looking little cannons, and it would be a shame to not have at least three of them. No matter if they have been delivered to Russia, or not.
As my usual Russian Flames of War lists contain a good two handful of T34, I wanted to have a lot of Shermans for that American Lend Lease one. Starting here with the M4A1 as one of the command cards requires some downgraded Shermans.
Later I will add the M4A2, and the 76mm but also some Firefly's as they are one of the coolest Sherman variants out there. Jumbo and Easy Eight are too much for me, and so I will leave them out of my lists.
M8, and M20 simply because I really like them, and need them to do some recon work. I have thought about the one or another proxy model, but did not really want to got for something as 'normal' as a B- 10. I hope I can come up with some more pulp like solution, but until then I am pretty pleases with those.
The jeeps are just fine, and I will have to add two closed ones later.
While I did not really plan to use the M10, I really could not pass up the chance to get and paint some.
I am not 100% happy with the covers I used, but now its too late to change them. And this way the unit leader sticks out pretty good.
The Pershing's are just placeholders. I do not like them, as they kind of stick out way too much from the Lend Lease project I have in mind. I wanted to replace them with IS3 at first, but those are a good deal smaller. So I might got for something like a KV with a 107mm gun. Something What If.
M3 with mortars. Cannot really not have them in Flames of War as they are dirt cheap, and good. They also fit in nice with the many M3 I already have, as anti aircraft guns, and troop transporters.
When it comes to infantry I will use what I already have as proxy, because I do not feel like as if I gain anything from making new infantry. PPSh, and Nagants seem to be a pretty decent count as for any submachine gun or bolt action rifle.
However I did not want to simply do the same thing with the special weapons. So I made new medium stands for the M1919, using Peter Pig US miniatures, and some Russian heads.
Same goes for the Bazooka teams, only that here I did not even had anything that could have worked as a proxy. My anti tank rifles are all on medium stands.
And a new army means new planes (of course)! I did not even bother to look at the book before buying those, as I wanted to have some Bell P-63 Kingcobra for a while, and this seemed to be just the right excuse to buy me some.
As this really is only a small project, I will not go too far with it. Just the 100 points I need for a solid list, and maybe something here and there to switch out.
Then putting in a proxy for units that will not be too confusing, like the Pershing's or maybe the M8 Greyhound. I did not want to use a lazy proxy for this list, like T34 I already own for the Sherman's.
03 February 2008, 10:36:45 AM