Slow Week

Hobby time has largely been placed on hold. I am still having issues painting with my arm and I am waiting on some new paint to be shipped. Typing isn't easy with the splint on my arm and right hand. I am getting some more Flank March Miniatures printed. That was the extent of my hobby week last week.

Cold War Minis

I received my 3d printed FV432 today. It is a nice crisp model that looks like it will match well with the existing miniatures that I bought off of eBay. I just need to figure out how to make them match.

I looked at the unpainted infantry platoon that I have. I am thinking of selling these and buying some painted ones from Gajo Miniatures. Probably sometime in August... Maybe.

I was not able to paint at all this weekend. I broke my arm a few days ago and am having trouble wielding a brush. Hopefully it will heal up and I can get back to work.

I am looking forward to getting a game on. I need to get some paint on the new minis that I had printed. I think I am good with the Soviets. I am still uncertain about painting the woodland camo for the US Infantry. Still waiting on some paint to be delivered to work on the Merdec camo for the US vehicles.

Cold War - New Minis

I got back my Flank March prints that I had done. They came out great. In addition I had some Berstrom (Might have that wrong) vehicles printed. The vehicles are a pair of BRDM-2s and two of the rocket mounted versions which I can't remember the names of. The other vehicle that I had printed was a FV432 to finish out the platoon I bought. I hope I can match the paint.

I have a few other things ready for priming as well. You can see the turret of an M60A3 there. I also have an M113 command track (I forget the actual designation) and a T-72 as well.

For the infantry, I have cleaned the supports off of the models to get ready to prime them. I need a new can of black primer.

For the Soviets, I had printed three troops with RPG18s, a pair of medics, a pair of officers, a radio operator, and three engineers (wire cutter, mine sweeper and Demolitions).

You can make out that the Medic figure dragging the casualty is a partial failure. The casualty is missing part of its leg. I can probably work with that. There is another guy on the back row next to the officer with raised pistol that has a bad arm. That figure I may discard.

For the US, I have a pair of officers, two senior NCOs, a radio operator, a Mark 19 with two crew, an M40AI with crew and three engineers (same types as soviets).

Somehow this picture came out clearer. I still have to glue the Mark 19 in place as well as the recoiless rifle. Both should be straight forward.

Operation Battleaxe Day 1 - Game 6

For the last battle of the afternoon, it will be the German Staffel against a British squadron. Only the Germans will be a player force.

Thus far, the player force has been very unlucky throughout the campaign. The German Staffel's first action left one pilot dead and two others walking back to base. And Another plane damaged (Gebhardt). This gives us the following available:

Pilot	Status	Kills	Notes
OberstLeutnant Grun	Veteran	1
Leutnant Edgar Masing	Regular	0
Feldwebel Fritz Lips	Sprog	0
Feldwebel Jacob Staudenmaier	Veteran	2
Unteroffizer Stefan Kellermann	Regular	0
Unteroffizer Jacob Kindl	Regular	0
Unteroffizer Christopher Schulberg	Regular	0
OberFahnrich Benedict Stoltenberg	Sprog	0
OberFahnrich Karl Gebhardt	Regular	1 (0)	Character Card

This is nine eligible pilots. There are two walking back to base and the Staffel commander has critical damage on his aircraft. Note that I promoted Gebhardt from Sprog to Regular. He both had scored a kill and had brought a damaged aircraft back to base. I will also make him a character for the next game.

These guys will go against a flight of Hurricanes and two flights of bombers. I will use three Blenheim Is and three Blenheim IVs proxied as more Blenheim Is. The action will be over German territory.

Pilot	Status	Notes
Flight Leader	Jr Ace	White I
Pilot 2	Regular	White II
Pilot 3	Regular	White III
Pilot 4	Sprog	WHite IV
Flight Leader II	Veteran	Black I
Pilot 5	Regular	Black II
Pilot 6	Regular	Black III
Pilot 7	Regular	Black II
Bomber Leader	Veteran	Blue I
Bomber II	Regular	Blue II
Bomber III	Sprog	Blue III
Bomber Leader II	Veteran	Yellow I
Bomber IV	Regular	Yellow II
Bomber V	Sprog	Yellow III

I need to clear the table of Cold War stuff to get this on the table. Maybe I can do that tonight as I am waiting on paint to finish that up.

SAAF Squadron - Operation Battleaxe Results

Way back in May, when the first game was played with the SAAF, they suffered badly as well. Of the 4 aircraft, one pilot was killed, another shot down and the other two planes were damaged. I am guessing that Lt Parker didn't make it back to base in time and that was why he didn't fly in this mission. As it stands, the squadron is down to three aircraft and eight pilots of which 6 are still trying to make their way back to base. This effectively takes them out of the campaign.

Pilot	Status	Kills	Campaign Missions Flown	Flight	Notes
Major Zayden de Beer	Veteran	1/1	1	Red I	Shot down, OK, 1 kill in mission
Captain Adiel Hertzog	Regular	0	2	White I	Shot Down, KIA
Lieutenant Androw FitzSimmons	Regular	0	1	Yellow I	Shot Down, Survived.
Lieutenant Francois van Wyk	Regular	0	1	Red II	Shot Down, KIA
Lieutenant Bertie Morgan	Sprog	0	2	White II	Survived
Lieutenant Wincuf Pinckney	Veteran	2	1	Yellow II	Shot Down, Survived.
Lieutenant Luca Hanekom	Regular	0	1	Red III	Show Down, KIA
Lieutenant Archie McKenzie	Regular	0	1	White III	Survived
Lieutenant Josh O'Brien	Sprog	0	1	Yellow III	Plane hit, Survived
Lieutenant Stephen Reynolds	Sprog	0	1	Red IV	Shot Down, Survived
Yellow IV	Regular	0	1	Yellow IV	Shot Down, Survived
White IV	Regular	0	1	White IV	Shot Down, Survived

The Germans did much better.

PILOT	Status	Kills in Game	Notes
White I	Jr Ace	4	Dominated the game
White II	Regular	0	Hit Red III, Aircraft Damaged
White III	Veteran	0
White IV	Veteran	0	Aircraft Damage
Blue I	Jr Ace	0
Blue II	Sprog	0	Temp Loss of Control, Aircraft Damaged
Blue III	Sprog	0	Hit Yellow III
Blue IV	Sprog	1	Kill Red II, Temp Loss of Control
Black I	Regular	1	Kill White IV
Black II	Veteran	0	Damaged Red I
Black III	Regular	0
Black IV	Sprog	0
Bombers
Blue I	Veteran	0
Blue II	Regular	0
Blue III	Sprog	0	Temp Loss of Control
Orange I	Veteran	0	KIA
Orange II	Regular	0
Orange III	Sprog	0

There is one more game for the afternoon. This will pit our player German Squadron against the RAF squadron. I still need to roll up the scenario for this. I hope to do the mission this week. We will see how that works out.