Latest Pico Armor Order

My next round of East Front reinforcements just showed up from Pico Armor. It is another pack of MiG-3 fighters. This will give me more than a squadron of fighters for the Soviets. In researching the version 2 of the Ustilug supplement, I am looking into the air campaign portion as well. Over Ustilug, the Soviets of the 14SAD didn't have any MiG-3s sadly. They were largely equipped with the I-16 and I-153 fighters and some SB bombers.

I have a single pack of I-16s (8) and a pack of SB bombers (6). I believe that I have a pack of Tumbling Dice I-15s laying around that I had ordered but are just in a drawer somewhere. I should have enough to get started for the Ustilug air campaign. May want a few more of each aircraft that I currently have. I wet ahead and placed a Pico Armor order for a pack of He111s (bringing that total to 8 aircraft, a pack of SB bombers (bringing that total to 12) and another pack of I-16s (bringing that total to 16).

While I do not have enough He111s for a full Staffel (8 of 12), it is enought to get started. I will need to play test some bombing missions. For the Soviets, I have a full squadron of 12 for the SB Bombers and more than a squadron of I-16s. This will perfectly match the aircraft of the 14 SAD.

According to http://niehorster.org/012_ussr/41_oob/kiev/air.html, the 14th SAD had the following:

As can be seen by the numbers, the strength of each unit could vary wildly at this point of the war. There was a modernizzation effort underway and it is possible that newer aircraft were coming to replace the older equipment at the start of Operation Barbarossa. On the German side, V FliegerKorps had three different groups of bombers and a single group of fighters. I have the Bf109Es but do not have any Bf109Fs. I think I will go with the E Model for now and pick up some Fs later. I have some spare Ju88s that a friend had 3d printed for me. I have 3 metal ones from Pico Armor and some upscaled 3d printed one That the original model was in 1/900 scale. If thesa match well enough with my existing models, I may look at doing some others. V FliegerKorps not only had Ju88s, they also had He111s. With the mentioned purchase above, I will have 8 total. That puts me one pack away from having a full staffel.

The next part will be how to represent bombing targets. One thought would be something drawn on felt. Use the overall shape of the hexes and cut out something that would lay on top of the mat. In Bag the Hun, it mentions ships as targets. That Nick used 1/600 scale aircraft and 1/1200 scale ships. I may try that as an option.

I need to wrap up my current campaign first though before I paint anything for Operation Barbarossa.

Monday, June 15, 2026

Weekend Painting

It was nice to have some time this weekend to get some paint on miniatures. I focused on the Bf110Cs for the desert. I managed to get two schwarms of 4 done, which is good as that was all that I had. I only need to buy 4 more to complete the staffel.

I think I had posted this earlier but I had finished a Ju52 and three Ju88s for the desert as well.

I got some Ju88s from Wargaming3d and had a friend print off some for me. These were originally 1/900 scale that were increased to 1/600 scale. I should pick them up tomorrow. He printed way more than I had asked for. I will have more than enough to have an entire staffel for the desert and enough left over for a few for the Eastern Front.

I have been making some really good progress with my desert collection. Here is everything I have so far. There are a number that are primed but not painted yet. But that number is far less than it was.

With what I have finished, I will have my desert forces done by the end of the summer, I think. That means the fall will be back to the Eastern Front.

Friday, June 12, 2026

Operation Battleaxe - Day One Afternoon actions Game 5

Somewhere I lost my notes on who was flying what. So for Game 5, the 3 SAAF will be flying a patrol over the front. They will intercept a a flight of incoming Germans and their dive bombers. So far, the SAAF has 3 aircraft out of action. Two aircraft are damaged. Another was a total loss with the pilot killed.

Unit	Location	Aircraft
HQ	Rovno
17	Lyubitov	26x I-16; 26x I-153
46	Dubno	56x I-16 & I-15
52	Ovruch	45x SB
89	Lutsk	71x I-16
253	Rovno	14x I-153

Pilot	Status	Kills	Campaign Missions Flown	Flight
Major Zayden de Beer	Veteran	1	0	Red I
Captain Adiel Hertzog	Regular	0	0	White I
Lieutenant Androw FitzSimmons	Regular	0	0	Yellow I
Lieutenant Francois van Wyk	Regular	0	0	Red II
Lieutenant Bertie Morgan	Sprog	0	1	White II
Lieutenant Wincuf Pinckney	Veteran	2	0	Yellow II
Lieutenant Luca Hanekom	Regular	0	0	Red III
Lieutenant Archie McKenzie	Regular	0	0	White III
Lieutenant Josh O'Brien	Sprog	0	0	Yellow III
Lieutenant Stephen Reynolds	Sprog	0	0	Red IV

In the center of the table will be a British Lysander that is returning from a reconnaissance mission.

Pilot Offier Smith, Regular Pilot, Blue I

At the same time, a Staffel of German aircraft (not the player staffel) are escorting a reduced staffel of Ju87s.

Fighters:

Schwarm	Pilot Status
White I	Jr Ace
White II	Regular
White III	Sprog
White IV	Veteran
Black I	Regular
Black II	Veteran
Black III	Regular
Black IV	Sprog
Blue I	Jr Ace
Blue II	Sprog
Blue III	Sprog
Blue IV	Sprog

Dive Bombers:

Schwarm	Pilot Status
Blue I	Veteran
Blue II	Regular
Blue III	Sprog
Green I	Veteran
Green II	Regular
Green III	Sprog
Yellow I	Regular
Yellow II	Regular
Yellow III	Sprog

This will be the largest game I have run as a solo Bag the Hun game. I think I have all of the stands prepared that I will need. I have cards for these as well. I will have to take dillegent notes or i will be lost in short order. After this, there is one more game with the German Scwarm taking center stage. After that, I will have to see who is left to fly for the second day.

New Paint Sets

My wife ordered some paint sets for me for Father's Day. The Soviet Paint set came in earlier. Yesterday, she gave me two Luftwaffe sets, one for the desert and one that I can use for the Eastern Front. I broke out the paints and got to work on my remaining Germans. The "SandGelb" in the set is a bit darker than that of the previous aircraft that I had painted up. The blue for the undercarriage looked about the same. I started work on three Ju88s, a pair of Hs126s and the first two Bf110Cs. I might be able to get these knocked out over the weekend. I have some good reference pictures and it looks like I can get away withe minimal camo on these aircraft. That will probably only be for the better.

Anyway, very excited about getting these moving. Knocking out these last few Germans should be stright forward. For the Italians, I have 3x Cr32s left to paint, 8x Cr42s, 7x G.50sand the 3-6x Sm.79s. The British need a pair of Lysanders, and some Blenheim Bombers to go. I think I will also paint up my remaining Hurricanes and Tomahawks. By the end of the summer, I should have all of my desert aircraft painted (that I currently own). Having no self control, I may end up ordering more. I am trying to see if I can order some individual aircraft but I am not holding my breath.

Distractions

I got a notification of a Humble Bundle Deal for some Free League Publishing games. I really like Twilight 2000. It had the module that I have never played before - The Black Madona. It also had some DragonBane content that I never had seen before as well as other RPGs. For the price ($25) it seemed a great deal. So I purchased it. I started looking through my haul and the Forbidden Lands rpg has caught my attention. Like Twilight 2000, it has a solo play component. The game has been fascinating and I have spent a ton of time reading it and looking up podcasts featuring the game.

I would like to get in a few solo sessions of this game to get the feel of it. I am trying to run it on Roll20 to streamline some elements and the possibility of playing the game with my former college roommates as well.

Minor Painting Update

Spent the weekend recovering from a cold. But still tried to get some work done. I got some paint on an Ro37bas. I started work on two others but came to the conclusion, how many observation aircraft am I really going to have on the table at a time? I may paint up a second one. This time, I tried to get something like the three fasces. I didn't do that great but at least it is not just a dot. In the picture, you can see a fourth Ro.37 that is undercoated but will likely not be completed.

I am looking at the collection at the moment.

Western Desert

84Hs1268431

Aircraft	Completed	Unpainted	Want
Germany
Bf109E	12	0	0
Bf110C	0
Ju52	0	1	0
Ju87	8	0	4
Ju88	0	3	0
0	2	0
Italy
G.50	0
Mc.200	0	1	0
Cr.42	8	0	4
Cr.32	0	3	0
Ro.37bis	0	2	0
Ca.310	4	0	0
Br.20	3	0	0
Sm.79	3?	5	4
United Kingdom
Hurricane	8	4	0
Tomahawk	8
Gladiator	0	8	4
Blenheim I	0	4	8
Blenheim IV	0	3	0
Maryland	3	0	0
Lysander	0	2	0

The goal is to have a complete Squadriglia/Squadron/Staffel of 12 aircraft for each fighter unit and a few bombers. I don't think I will have a full squadron of 12 bombers for anyside except for the Sm.79s. I am looking for the right paint scheme. I am actually hoping for a simple one. For Bag the Hun, I still need to finish up the first day of the Operation Battleaxe game. I have 2 more games to run for the day. One will be for the German Staffel and one for the South African's, I think. Hopefully, I will play those soon. I think I will have the Germans escort the Ju87s again in one. Not sure what I will do with the South Africans. Depending on how fast I can paint Lysanders or Blenheims, that may impact the mission.

I was also given some early Father's Day presents. My wife gave me a VSS paint set for Operation Barbarossa. And some cornfields. These may be a bit big for 15mm and will likely be used more for a garden plot rather than a large field. But who knows how I will use them.

Very grateful for these. I am still holding out hope for some Luftwaffe paint sets but will patiently wait.

I managed to undercoat some British Blenheim bombers as well. Hopefully those will get some paint soon.

More Painting This Week

While fighting a cold, I managed to get downstairs and do a little more painting. I focused on my Italians while I wait on the new Luftwaffe paint sets. I had 3 partially painted MC200s left of the six that I had. The trouble was going to be matching the paint that I had used for under the fuselage. Fortunately, I found it. There were three old jars of Poly Scale that I had used years ago. This gave me additional base coat and undercoat as well as the yellow for the noses of the aircraft. The yellow may be more appropriate for Italians in Russia late 1941 but that is what I had for the first six. So those were easy to knock out. But I needed a color for the camoflauge spots. Using the Miniature Painter Pro phone app, I snapped a picture of the existing aircraft and it gave me a match with a color I had on hand. I really love that tool. One of the aircraft was missing its magnet and that had to be glued on as well.

I also worked on some Italian Biplanes. I finished the assembly of four Ro.37 observation aircraft and glued the magnets to them. These are now ready for some primer. Also I assembled what I thought would be four Cr32s. However, the top wing was missing from one of the models. So I am left with just three of these. These too received their magnets and are reay for base coating. These are both Tumbling Dice miniatures. The Cr32s were bought many years ago and the Ro37s were a recent purchase.

I have not yet glued magnets to the Cr42s that I have cleaned off of the supports. I was fortunate in that I was able to remove the supports without damaging these small and fragile models. These are Pico Armor sculpts. Even though I was disapointed that they were resin and not metal, I am pleased with how they look. I will need to figure out how to match them to the three that I already have painted. I think I prefer the Pico Armor models as they look cleaner but they do have some gaps in their line that Tumbling Dice have. I have picked up some 3d Models from Wargaming3d recently in hopes to try to print some of my own aircraft. These would be for either the Romanians or Hungarians. But I am not there yet.

On the Italian to do list, I have seven G50s that are waiting for magnets and priming. I need to get some plastic tweezers. The small magnets I have for fighters, I am struggling to be able to fix to the models. Even the larger ones that you see on the Ro37s above I struggled to get on. There are probably half a dozen magnets on my floor that I have not been able to find because of this. Maybe a trip to Hobby Lobby is in order. I also have three Sm79s that are undercoated. I have three others that have a rudimentary paint job that I am unhappy with. I may search for different paint schemes and redo them. I am a fan of the Sm79. The tri-motor design and the look of the Italian aircraft have always interested me. I want to do a better paint jobs on these but I am not a good enough painter to do the more complicated paterns. i can just barely pull off the spotted ones.

That puts the Italians close to completion. I have an order out with Pico Armor that will include a replacement for the G50 that broke as well as some additional MiG-3s. I have a few aircraft left for the British. A pair of Lysanders, four Blenheim Is, four Blenheim IVs and then I have some spare P40s and Hurricanes that I need to look at to see if I actually want to paint them. I'm not sure at this point. I have 8 of each painted. I should probably do 4 more of each to complete a squadron.

The Germans need the most work. I have a Ju52, three Ju88s, eight Bf110s and two Hs126s that have been undercoated with no magnets. I also still have two Ju87s that have an undercoat and a base coat but no other paint. I would need two more to complete out the staffel. I would need four more Bf110s to have a complete staffel. There really is no point of a full staffel of Ju52s as they were primarily transports and they would be a lone target that the Germans would be trying to protect.But the Ju88s, a complete staffel would be three more packs of them. I may do that at some point.I do not believe I will paint He111s or Do17zs for the desert. While they would be nice, I need to get to an East Front project at some point.

Weekend Painting - Prepping for the next Operation Battleaxe Game

Had a chance to get away over the weekend and break out the paints. I managed to get some Italian Caproni Ca.310s painted. I used the app Miniature Painter Pro on my tablet to get some paints sorted for these. It has a really nice feature where it will save your palate with the picture so you don't have to remember what you did before. The camo scheme is loosely based on some that was able to find with help from Google. I'd like to paint the white facces on the black circles but I am not sure I have anything fine enough pointed nor hands steady enough to do so. So I am leaving them just black sircles for now. The pictures below are on the new desert mat that I picked up off of eBay.

I also managed to finish a bunch of flight stands. Each has a dice holder and a bead to indicate the unit (color of bead) and plane (Roman Numeral). I have enough for 9 groups of 4 planes. I have also pealed the backing off of all of the bases as well.

I am awaiting some paint sets that I ordered. I bought three paint sets from Vallejo. The VSS pack, the early war Luftwaffe pack and the Desert Luftwaffe pack. I will wait on painting my Desert Luftwaffe until those show up. I have three Ju88s, a Ju52, two Hs126s, and eight Bf110s ready for painting.

For my Italans, I have 5 more Sm79s to paint. I have three primed. But I really want to update the paint jobs on the three that I have already done. I also clipped seven of eight G.50s off of their sprues. They are 3d prints form Pico Armor. The last one had a wing shatter as I was removing the supports. I reached out to Pico and they are sending me a replacement with my next order. I am really happy with the service from them.

I also prepped a number of Cr.42s. I have nine of them prepped. The photo below only shows six of them. The others are older metal sculpts that I already had that needed to be glued together. These need to be primed along with four metal Ro.32bis models from Tumbling Dice.

If I can get the Cr.42s done, I may put them on the table escorting a pair of Ro.37s. I'll probably wait until I get some more German Bombers painted up. I am trying to decide if i want more than just Ju88s for the desert. I have packs of He111s and Do17zs as well but I bought them for Operation Barbarossa. I think Ju88s and Stukas will be enough for the desert.I think I want to have a full staffel of each German Aircraft type. I am over half way there for the Stukas and the Bf109Es. This would be 12 aircraft per staffel. The Bombers in Kette of 3 and the fighters in Schwarms of 4.

Eastern Front Bag the Hun - Floating some ideas

While I am finishing my desert forces for Bag the Hun, I have been reading the Bergstrom book on Operation Barbarossa. I really like to research the early war period across all of the fronts. The equipment and tactics are still evolving. The planes are either cutting edge or hopelessly outdated. This makes for interesting match ups.

I looked at the spare aircraft that I have. The Germans have a head start. I found that I have 12 spare Bf109Es. This will provide me with an entire staffel of fighters. Which will be probably the largest amount of fighters I would have on the table at once. In addition, I have two Hs 126s. These came four to a pack. However, I can't see having a scenario with more than one or two on the table at once. So I intend to paint 2 for the desert and two for the Eastern Front. But what else would I need? The main need will be bombers. I am looking mostly to Pico Armor to supply these. A pack of 4 He111s, a pack of 6 Do17s, and probably a pack of Ju 88s will be needed. I am not sure if I want to do a group of Bf110s. I have some for the desert but it is not one of my favorite aircraft. I will grab a pack of Fi-156s for reconnaissance as well. They are neat little planes. Pico Armor has a Do217 which was used as a long range reconnaisance plane. But I think that won't see much time on the table.

But what about the other Axis Allies? Romania had the largest airforce of the three allied powers that went in with the Germans. They had a unique mix of aircraft. They had their own home grown aircraft: IAR 37 and IAR 38 - both biplanes. The IAR 39 that was an observation aircraft and the IAR 80 which was a modernish fighter. I found a 3d model for this on Wargaming3d. It is in 1/200 scale and would need to be shrunk to 1/600 for my needs. The others are no where to be found. The Romanians also had some British Blenheim I bombers (Pico Armor), Italian Sm79 bombers (Pico Armor), German He 111s, Bf109s (Pico Armor for both) and He 112 (Wargaming3d), French Bloch 210s (Wargaming3d) and Petez 633s (Tumbling Dice), the Polish PLZ37 (Pico Armor) and even the US Fleet F-10g. These would present some different looking aircraft on the table.

The next largest force was that of the Hungarians. They had Italian Ca.135s, Cr.32s, Cr.42s and German Ju 86s and He 170s. They had no modern fighter aircraft. Then there was the Slovakians whose aircraft didn't even register on the Niehorster site on the orders of battle for Operation Barbarossa.

I have some spare Sm79s. I am looking at my miniature collection and think that I could get a few of these together to use for the Romanians. I have downloaded the aircraft files that I could today from Wargaming3d. I can see making a small contingent of Romanians. They would provide something different for the table top.

* Quick Note - I just got a email that the Wargaming3d site is closing in July 2026. Aparently their parent company is going under. This is sad news as they hosted some excellent sculptors.

For the Soviets, I think I will go with Pico Armor's models. The plan I outlined earlier still stands. I will pull them in slowly. First I am planning on buying some early war paint sets. AK Paints seems to have some on Amazon that look interesting.

Books and Mats

So I was pleasantly surprised that Noble Knight games delivered my battlemat for the desert three days early. In addition, Amazon delivered my copy of Black Cross, Red Start three days early. The mat is 6'x4' with a very apparent hex pattern. The reverse side is plain. I may be able to use both sides depending on how my desert and cowboy terrain looks on it. The felt is fairly heavy and the hex pattern does not go all the way through. Very excited about these two purchases.

The book looks to be in great shape. I couldn't justify the cost of a new copy and instead reached for the used, very good copy. I am glad I did. Other than a former owner's name in the book, it looks perfect. There is lots to dig through. The first chapter is on the air doctrine of the Germans and Soviets. I am really looking forward to reading this. The book is much larger than I thought it would be.