15mm WW2 British Platoon

No games to share after the holiday so far so I'll post some progress on the painting queue.
As an addition to our 28mm games we have been thinking lately to scale down to 15mm and or 20mm for our platoon and larger games.
There are many reasons like time to paint, storage, availability of miniatures or cost but my main reason is it just seem to look right for the size of games we play. Or is it just that we are the average wargamer with a constant need to change and add things...   So 20m or 15mm was the big question we needed to address . I will spare you details on how our group came to a verdict but in the end I'm staring at my desk stacked with 15mm as well as 20mm miniatures. How convenient.

Well, I decided to start with a platoon 15's so I could mark those off and be ready to game Chain of Command and, together with Cromwells of the 7th armoured division I painted long ago, we can try the Battlegroup Normandy system for larger games.  One of the obvious advantages of going smaller is the reduced amount of time and this time I was once more surprised that I could finish those in under 2 weeks spending just six evenings or so. Probably four times quicker than 28's.
Next up will be some 20mm AB's, Normandy as well. We just could not resist the stunning AB models and the availability of so many models to spice up the table. So while we mostly reuse 15mm, the 20's provides a great opportunity to paint up some great models. Oh, and some terrain of course...

These miniatures are from the Plastic soldier company with the exception of three or four figs from Forged in Battle I put in just because I had them and wanted to feel the difference between the plastics and metal. Just as in my previous post I liked painting the plastics better. Much, much easier and due to their chunkiness they made me think of them as small versions of Artizan miniatures. So that's the second plastic box I like, one day I might become a fan...
The box itself is quite good. Enough variation in poses and with some head and arm swaps you could even get more. The weakest poses IMO are for the sten armed officers unfortunately. With just two different models I changed some arms to make them look a bit different. Also, the uniforms on some of the figures do not seem 100% correct. I do not claim to be an expert but the equipment seem to be on the wrong side at most of the figures.
Anyway, did not bother me to paint up these nice figures:

Section 1

Section 2

Platoon HQ

15mm WWII US Infantry 'The Big Red One'...part 2 and a few game pics

This week the second part of the American Infantry company and a couple of gaming pics.  Finished a Mortar and HMG platoon, a sniper and bazooka team. Thought I was done for now but I realized I'm one command base short. Kind of dumb, I can't even count. So paints back on the desk and will post them in the final part together with the recon troops and the Thunderbolt. I will leave the armored stuff for the future. The others in the group have tons of it so first a couple more games and see if it sticks.

Some pictures I took from a few Normandy games we played over the last weeks. Minis and terrain all from Marc and Rob Suchet who are responsable for my return to 15mm flames of war..Thx guys

15mm WWII US Infantry 'The Big Red One'...part 1

A couple of the guys here are heavy into 15mm WWII and they managed to get me excited to the point that I actually started painting a new company. The last few weeks I played about five games of Flames of War and while I was initially a bit sceptical I can report here that I actually liked every single game. Now of course I have good company but a long as you avoid the 'car park' scenes you sometimes see and don't get hung up over points  it works fine for me.

So with my renewed interest I decided to try to paint this infantry company as quick as I could with the nice side effect it would also earn me some points in Curt's Painting Challenge, While I do have two other armies from my previous wanderings in 15mm ready to game, nothing beats the excitement to start something completely new.

Today I'm posting the Rifle and Weapon Platoons, support will follow soon after they appear on the Challenge pages at Anologue Hobbies. Complete gallery with many more pictures: LINK 

7th Armoured Division in 15mm

Couple of pictures of the 7th AD Battlefront box painted back in 2008. I played two or three games but was bored with them pretty quick. Lot of tanks and little infantry.
After weeks I finally got inspiration again and started some painting. Next week, some fresh troops will arrive...

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WWII 15mm desert game, IABSM3 and a bit of Crisis

Another week without painting unfortunately. With Crisis11 next Saturday most of my spare time is spent on Google investigating new projects.
About two years ago I spent several months painting a 15mm DAK army while Jake took on the task of painting the British. I had so much fun painting these but since only part of the group joined the project they never got action until recently. Jake was visiting, we had only two hours but we decided to unbox our troops to get them on the table. With limited time it wasn't much of a game. We deployed and when we started turn one we looked at each other...How does Fow actually work? Is it You Go I Go?  We had forgotten the mechanics.

IABMS3?
As a fan of Lardies rules I ordered this new ruleset. I now have the iPad version and waiting for the hardcover book and playing cards to arrive. My plan is to give them a go and replace FoW since I feel they better reflect our playing style. My only concern is if we can simply use our FoW style basing. I noticed IABSM 3 uses campaign strength sections of 8 figs while some of our FoW armies are five on a base. Anyone experience with this or suggestions?

Crisis
Next Saturday our group will be at Crisis making friends with some of the traders and bartenders. Should be good as usual with some nice demo games as well. Anyone else going?

Anyway, some pictures of our desert game. The terrain boards are from Encobertura. We bought lots of those two years ago and they got their first game as well. Nice boards, especially for 15mm. The houses we picked up from Last Valley at Salute last year. We just need some palms trees and other bits to liven up the table.