Bolt Action: Operation Sealion Minis

[carlos marighela]

Ask yourselves a question. If there were so many weapons just laying about in school armouries and the like, why did the government go to considerable lengths and expense to purchase non-standard .30 calibre rifles from the US to arm the LDV? Surely they would have picked up serviceable, indeed service rifles in a standard .303 calibre? The regular army was short of weapons, more so due to expansion than losses and that necessitated buying second rate rifles like the Ross from Canada (in .303) and serviceable but non-standard calibre P-17s from the US.

Why did the early LDV parade with shotguns, pikes and all manner of odd items, including pilfered/ requisitioned museum items until the P-17s, P-14s and Ross rifles were issued? Surely the cadet rifles would have gone to a desperate LDV first, if not the army, navy or RAF.?There were attendant issues with issuing the P-17, first and foremost adequate ammunition supply and of course the safety issue of a non-standard round that required the P-17s to be marked with red paint.

[Arlequín]

Exactly.

Evening all.  

Equipment losses due to 'France' varied around 50-60%, so there was mostly enough to do another BEF's worth, but not the 55 division target. The U.S. weapons were originally for the Army, but one bright spark obviously pointed out that a logistics nightmare was in the offing, hence the switch to .30-06 weapons for the Home Guard for the most part and .303 to the Army.

In the likely invasion 'crust' areas .303 was retained when possible. Priority was also given to the main areas at risk elsewhere too. Capturing shot-down airmen in Bally-go-backwards could usually be achieved with shotguns and soft fruit however.

That said the image of HG wielding the WD half-pike owes more to expansion shortages in 1941, than to any in 1940, a period where for a time even 2" mortars became a 'company-level' weapon.

The Navy and 'fleet' RM units, along with the RAF, received surplus Lewis Guns and SMLEs; some ships had begun the war with Lee-Metfords still in their armouries.

[carlos marighela]

Yeah, the pike bit was a bit of a flourish I'll admit but there are numerous accounts of the LDV/ HG drilling with wooden rifles. Point being, there wasn't really a ready pool of weapons available for Blackshirts, fictitious IRA gunmen or particularly militant members of the Fourth Rotary International.

Alas for Warlord and their Blackshirt figures wielding what look like P17s, fascists and members of the communist party were both banned from the Home Guard.

Enough of being a killjoy. If it floats your boat, field it.

[joroas]

Like VBCW, it is a What If? fantasy WWII, difficult to argue historically about that type of game.

[carlos marighela]

Like VBCW, it is a What If? fantasy WWII, difficult to argue historically about that type of game.

 Yeah, I think we all get that. I suppose it's more of a conversation about the historical parameters of suspending disbelief.

[Stu]

My box 'Royal Navy Section' arrived today, having a brief peruse over morning smoko three things stood out - Molotov Cocktails, why? my figures are heading for the Back of Beyond so grenades would have been more useful, still that's what files are for second - no bayonets, a little odd but I can live with (or without) them. Third shouldn't the P.O. have been armed with a Lanchester instead of a M1928?
Petty gripes perhaps and it won't stop me from using them, just my first thoughts.

[Arlequín]

First contract for the Lanchester was June 1941, but there were some Thompsons in use in 1940. How many and who with I don't know. You won't struggle to find a publicity pic of a PO and three Ratings all carrying M1928s. Normally a PO would carry a pistol.

No bayonets is quite an omission and certainly the Navy wasn't short of No.36 Grenades.

Like VBCW, it is a What If? fantasy WWII, difficult to argue historically about that type of game.

Yet if you suggested 'your troops' might all have BSA-Howell converters and trench mags for their SMLEs, some VBCW players might become awfully clingy about history and what's believable.

 

I'll happily contemplate a VBCW/Sea Lion scenario, even one based almost verbatim on LOTR's 'Cleansing of the Shire', but I don't see why 'historical' equipment or organisation etc., becomes such an issue for some.

How much is 'too much' history? When did 'research' become a dirty word? 

[joroas]

Down at a local club they call Bolt Action 1940K, perhaps this gives you an idea of part of Warlord's plan. Many players of BA have no interest or knowledge of history, this has become an abstract game. There is a good reason that BA spends the fist tranche of the book to a history of WWII. No other rule book I have does that.

[Stu]

First contract for the Lanchester was June 1941

OK, That I did not know, now I have a little knowledge I'm happy, as my guys will be fighting bandits, Warlord Chinese, Red and/or White Russians, Germans, Turks, Dinosaurs, The Undead, Genestealers and anything else I can find it's not a big deal in the long run.

[carlos marighela]

My box 'Royal Navy Section' arrived today, having a brief peruse over morning smoko three things stood out - Molotov Cocktails, why? my figures are heading for the Back of Beyond so grenades would have been more useful, still that's what files are for second - no bayonets, a little odd but I can live with (or without) them. Third shouldn't the P.O. have been armed with a Lanchester instead of a M1928?
Petty gripes perhaps and it won't stop me from using them, just my first thoughts.

Bugger molotovs, they should have cutlasses!

Actually, for the storming of the Altmark in 1940, they were issued to the boarding party. Might just have been the last recorded use in action.

I always marvel at the things wargamers and manufacturers miss whilst focussing on exotica. I was converting some figures a few weeks ago and it occurred to me that I had never seen a representation of the EY cup discharger, used to fire Mills bombs from the SMLE. Not an uncommon item in either the Great War or the Second World War.

[Kommando_J]

Its funny us arguing over the accuracy of unit during a what if scenario indeed...but  I find the historian in me likes an element of what if...but thoroughly grounded in reality at the same time.

I think the thompson is a better choice in that the lanchester dates the fellow and makes him unusable for earlier scenarios set in the interwar etc. I find it odd out of all the patrol list that the BUF seems to have access to the widest variety of equipment, firearms, improvised mortar, machine guns on vehicles and stolen anti-tank rifles...out of curiosity would the uniform that the command squad officer(pic related) be usable in a different scheme?

I ask after several ideas/observations coalesced into one, the buf uniform is based off fencing/training oufits, we talk about officer training/cadet units and then I see this scene...() why not make up a force based on a training academy?

[Arlequín]

The officer looks quite usable for quite a few options, standing collar jackets, jodphurs and riding boots were pretty universal.

The Lanchester is the SMG most related with the RN and it was based on the MP-28, so not really much of a stretch all things considered. I originally thought they had them well before the war until I learnt better.

With most of the Home Guard heavy weapons also dating to 1941, allowing them but not Lanchesters and Stens, is a bit odd.

Mutton Chop actually do figures specifically for this military academy:

 

The EY cup discharger was still on the infantry WE in 1940-42, 3 per platoon and an additional 13 in the battalion HQ company. One guy in each section was still designated as the 'bomber' and supposedly expert in their use. I've never seen a figure with one.

British Infantry could and did mass their Brens in one ad-hoc gun section on occasion, you would also presume they might do the same with their rifle grenadiers, which would still leave a rifle section to assault. It's what they had done in 1917-18 after all and 'battle drills' were still formulated by individual regiments before 1944.  

[carlos marighela]

The EY cup discharger was still on the infantry WE in 1940-42, 3 per platoon and an additional 13 in the battalion HQ company. One guy in each section was still designated as the 'bomber' and supposedly expert in their use. I've never seen a figure with one.


Like most things obsolete, the Australians used them through until 1945. Views varied as to their efficacy in the jungle. Fortunately it's an easy conversion. Glue section of suitably sized plastic rod or metal tube to end of rifle. Paint in the brass wire reinforcing to the forestock.

Interesting bit of kit the Lanchester. The crabs, the people for whom it was originally made hardly used any and substituted Stens when they became available. The navy liked them so much they kept 'em on up until the late '60s/ early '70s. I was slightly disappointed that the TARV boarding party came with Sterlings rather than Lanchesters.

[Bullshott]

My uncle (who joined the navy in 1944 at age 15 and rated as Boy, 2nd Class) was issued a Lanchester for use on shore parties  policing Indonesia in 1946. He was issued this weapon rather than the standard SMLE on the grounds that, during training, he had obtained his marksman ticket. The idea was that he was issued a SMG rather then a rifle because, being a marksman, he would be less likly to accidentally harm someone with his patrol's automatic weapon!

[Stu]

Some years ago (decades now that I think about it) I managed to get the RNZEME museum Lanchester going again. It was much more fun to fire than Sterlings.