Modern wars in 1/35- project log

[Freddy]

So I have a topic for my ww1 1/35 project
https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=139011.0
also for the ww2 one
https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=138659.0
now its time for the post-ww2 times. The concept is the same, 1/35 figures on 30mm bases for individual skirmishes and they can be put onto movement trays for base-based (does this expression exist?) games. I also have a lot of vehicles, and use 1/72 planes as the air force. This collection is more widespread/less focused as the other two, so lets go in alphabetical order.

Afghanistan+Arabs
My collection of irregular warriors, I mostly use them as Afghans, but there were a lot of foreign legionaries in the Afghan wars on the Afghan side. The collection of Arab guerillas is for now without a concept (Arabic imagination?), as the Afghans are more-or-less focused onto the Soviet-Afghan War, the Arabs go from 1970s Palestina to the 2020s. Most of them are factory models of various manufacturers, a few of them my sculpts or kitbashes.

My first batch of Afghan warriors:

They are from the same ICM kit, but with some new weapons:

My favourite set of Afghans (Verlinden, easy to assemble, easy to paint)

This one (Trumpeter) I did not like, weird poses:

He was a driver, but I can use him better as a gunman.

This one I can play as with AK and with M-16 too:

This guy with a cool sniper rifle:

The first batch of my Arab guerilla collection:

This guy with a red shoe just wants to do it:


For the girl I was thinking about a hand mirror, but then she got a fancy phone.


They also have some tanks (two Syrian and one Afghan)


Also some of their own civilians (+a prisoner)


Africans
If the Arabs are a little generic/imagination-esque, it is 1000 times true for these African guys. I tried to paint them to various colours, to be generic guerillas anywhere below the Sahara. They were made by the company Trumpeter, the guy with the arm braces is my sculpt.

I also sculpted them this shaman guy, a characteristic leader, maybe he pushes things a little bit into the pulp direction, be it modern or colonial Africa.

Also this general, not painted yet, your classical “African general in Hollywood movies” style. Sorry, white FIMO is hard to photo.


Civilians:
These first two pics we had in an other topic, just here for the sake of completeness:


Also some hunters. Those guerillas really want to buy this cool Toyota Hilux:



I sculpted this generic civilian, one of the hunters was also mady by using one resin copy. The original one has a remote controller, and I used a Revell mini plane for his model plane.

A street thug, a ballas gang member from GTA. I count him as a civilian, maybe a tough guy, but we are playing with tanks here.

Hungarians
My focus here is the 1965M uniform set, with small modifications it served to the late 1990s, so covering a long period. These figures are my sculpts and kitbashes, seemingly no one else does Hungarian Peoples Army figures in 1/35.







In the lighter green there are some wearing the early 50s uniform, this one came in the greenish colour of the ww2 Hungarian uniform, but otherwise it was the same as the late ww2 soviet uniform- I can literally just repaint ww2 russians, ok, I shall place the rank markings onto the neck piece. In cold war gone hot scenarios they will be mobilized reservists.

Some more in desert uniform: Hungarian soldiers in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars wore these.

Hungarians are the faction profiting the ost of my 1/35 vehicle collection, I do not want to post them all, maybe just this T-55, this is my favourite modern vehicle model. +my uncle served on a Hungarian peoples Army T-55 as a tanker in the 70s.


Israelis
A small batch of figures, there is some more unpainted. Plastics.



Mercenaries.
Here I am going more for the modern pulp and action movie stuff, on the table they are the most versatile faction. they can be, well, mercs, but also bandits, sicarios, or part of the US forces, but usually they simply just flesh out underpowered factions, on my tables they fought a lot against the Russians as Chechens or Afghans.





This one is more on the bad guy side:

[Freddy]

...part2, since it apparently was too long for the forum motor.
I like this faction because I can go a bit crazy with the colour schemes. A GSG-9 operator gone rough:

Also I can include here some action movie stuff like this minigun. in the game it is a crew weapon, so needs another guy to shoot long bursts, no one is able to operate such a weapon alone. But it looks cool this way.

They also have some girls too.




This one would look weird in an other faction, but the Merc army is just the place for booty babes posing with serious weapons:

I also conscripted this guy ar a merc leader:

And do not forget this one. If Bennet needs to let off some steam, you also call the Merc army.


Soviets/Russians
A big batch of older models, mostly plastics from various manufacturers. I will need to make some system here, some of them are wearing the chaotic Russian uniforms characteristic for the 90s (Chechen wars), the others represent the 80s, so the Afghan war.





They also have some armour of renovates old models:







Even a Gatling bear. Some 3D model maker wanted to be funny and I cloud not leave it unpurchased.


USA
This is maybe the biggest army, the largest part of them is waiting to be finished. They are plastic kits, representing the early 90s uniforms. I painted them for this chocolate chip cookie DBDU desert pattern: it was introduced for the public during Desert Storm, but it is used since the early 80s, so can be Cold War, but, as a desert pattern, it does not look too out-of-place in a post-2001 Iraq or Afghanistan setting+no wargamer is able to follow the newer and newer US uniform camo patterns introduced there almost yearly.






Tankers:

Truck drivers:

Ok, I also have this mortar from the Vietnam war.


Vietnam
4 Vietcongs, I liked to make the bases with all the jungle foliage. Not sure how I will incorporate them into my games since I do not plan Vietnam war for a while. Maybe going with cold war gone hot into the Red Alert direction and playing battles on various climates.


Yugoslavians
This is the smallest batch, with only 2 figures. but there were some Serbian mercs in Chechnya.


With this collection, I now have some options to play. Apart from my own rules, I like to play Cornered Wolf:




...and Hind&Seek. Yeah, I still need some proper terrain.

[CapnJim]

2 things....

1.  I've long gotten out of 1/35 stuff.  I had a pretty extensive collection of then-modern armored vehicles in 1/35 in the late 80s and early 90s.  i even had a rendition of my M1IP tank in Germany.  I ended up donating my built models to my Ohio Army National Guard unit (a tank battalion, in which I was their S3 at one time) for display purposes in the lobby of their armory, and I sold the unbuilt kits to a hobby shop here in Michigan. 

2.  But being out of the 1/35 loop, I had no idea of what was available.  Your collection is quite impressive, both in scope and look!

Okay, 3 things...

3.  Of all your stuff, I particularly like that shaman.  It might be a bit pulpy, but you can certainly use him for some historical-based scenarios, for sure...

In any event, well done!

[Rick F]

I really like your collection mate, lots of different scenarios. What rules are you using with them, I do 40mm gaming and don't make any changes to any rule sets for them.

[Freddy]

Thank you!

I've long gotten out of 1/35 stuff.  I had a pretty extensive collection of then-modern armored vehicles in 1/35 in the late 80s and early 90s.  i even had a rendition of my M1IP tank in Germany.  I ended up donating my built models to my Ohio Army National Guard unit (a tank battalion, in which I was their S3 at one time) for display purposes in the lobby of their armory, and I sold the unbuilt kits to a hobby shop here in Michigan. 

While technically each piece of my 1/35 display model collection can be fielded in the game (and I also made stands for my 1/72 planes), the game pieces shown above are my old, forgotten models with a little updated paintjob- 5-10 years ago I thought I will never need them, but now they are very useful.

But being out of the 1/35 loop, I had no idea of what was available.

This scale was nowhere near this tempting in the early 90s. Back then you could maybe build a ww2 German army (even that with large white areas for example in the artillery topic), all the other themes you were lucky to have 1-2 boxes and usually no infantry at all. Then, in the late 90s a bunch of Ukrainian and Russian companies came and they started fleshing out the Soviet theme, both in ww2 and in modern, and they made great money on people being bored of Normandy 1944 and Battle of the Bulge King Tigers. Then the internet came and everybody started to look for niche topics since with the world being the market, a lot of stuff suddenly became investment worthy if done well. And now we see the dawn of 3D printing, when investment need is even lower for a model manufacturer.

Of all your stuff, I particularly like that shaman.  It might be a bit pulpy, but you can certainly use him for some historical-based scenarios, for sure...

Thanks! The idea came from a book of Kálmán Kittenberger (a great hunter, who wrote books about his African safaris in the 1900s-1920s), he wrote about a village where the people were terrorized by a demon hyena, later discovered that it is the local medicine man who is killing the villagers with a jaw-like iron tool.
I gave him a Mauser rifle, this way he fits from pre-ww1 times until novadays. Sculpting era-agnostic figures like this usually comes with lots of scrifice on the "characterful" side, but in modern African militias anything goes, there is no brake on the weird train:
https://africancivilwarfashions.tumblr.com/
Some more pics:

[Freddy]

I really like your collection mate, lots of different scenarios. What rules are you using with them, I do 40mm gaming and don't make any changes to any rule sets for them.

Thank you! Basically I have my own ruleset, a simple d10 based system, but sadly it is not available in English. Maybe someone can read the original:
https://makettekeswg.blogspot.com/2021/02/98-wargame-szabalyok.html

As mentioned above, there are two particular rulesets I really like, both from Tom Jensen/Ostfront:
-Hind&Seek is about the Soviet-Afghan war, and it has a really good mechanics for hit&run ambushes, after 1-2 games you really understand the problems the Soviets faced there. It is a squad/base based game though.
-Cornered Wolf is about the Chechen war, a couple dozen figures per side (+a few Russian vehicles), simple mechanics about a very deadly and chaotic urban combat situation, also a great introduction for beginners.

I also wanna try Black Ops from Osprey.

[fred]

Another very impressive set of figures - I really like them, and your conversions work really well!


But as I’ve said before, you need to get some better terrain to set off the figures better!

[carlos marighela]

Nice work!. Sculpt and cast some of those Hungarians in 28mm and you'll have yourself a customer. Sculpt some Hungarians and Soviets for the '56 uprising and we can triple the order.

[Freddy]

Another very impressive set of figures - I really like them, and your conversions work really well!

Nice work!

Thank you, guys!

But as I’ve said before, you need to get some better terrain to set off the figures better!

Yep, Concrete Box City, the capitol of Aquariumfoliageland saw a lot of action from the early 20th century up to the 41th millennium, my terrain collection needs some more theme specific pieces. And/or a club with proper terrain.

Sculpt and cast some of those Hungarians in 28mm and you'll have yourself a customer. Sculpt some Hungarians and Soviets for the '56 uprising and we can triple the order.

Never say never, but sadly I can not promise this happening soon. The closest I ever got to do modern era in 28mm was when I made some Hungarian Peoples Army themed conversion bitz for my 40k Imperial Guard:



-------
To make conversions easier, I made some of the support weapons own versions to cast. While the supply of  AKs and M-16s are neverending, some weapons are rare to find in my bitz box.
RPG-7 with the ammo backpack. More, than 40 little pieces of plastic

PKM machine gun:

And this two-barrelled shotgun:

[Freddy]

Found some closer pics of the Russian Alfa team. I had to sculpt new heads for these, the original ones were really bad.

Also some kitbashed/sculpted Soviet drivers waiting for their trucks to be completed.


And a new one, Soviet decontamination team. Basically Chernobyl liquidators, he company ICM has a whole range of Chernobyl themed sets (injection plastic), they are from one of those kits.

[trev]

These are very nice and something different too.  Bravo!

[Freddy]

These are very nice and something different too.  Bravo!

Thank you! I am still thinking about how to incorporete the decontamination team into the game- maybe as an objective marker? Or, in bigger games, since it needs a little abstraction, a unit to be able to cleanse poison gas?

[Freddy]

A civilian guy. Smoking, drinking beer and wondering wtf is going on.


My sculpt from FIMO, here unpainted:

[Freddy]

The town signal from Pripyat, a resin kit (by kit I mean one huge piece of resin, plus the plastic base I made for it )

[Freddy]

A couple more US soldiers.