Frogs and Trucks

At Hotlead I sold off 24 Great War Miniatures WWI Early war French miniatures I had purchased the year before on an impulse.

Over the past year I have decided early war isn’t something I will get into so had them bookmarked to sell.

I’ve been looking at Brigade Games WWI French as they come equipped with Adrian helmets as opposed to Kepis. I’ve had them in my shopping cart several times but failed to pull the trigger.

Imagine my elation when I chanced upon some in the Hotlead B&B. There were about 47 figures and had a retail price of about $110USD. I snagged them for $50CDN.

I based them yesterday. Now just a long wait until they go off to be painted.

I also received an eBay order of 4 models of yesteryear trucks. The 1918 Crossley was the one I was after. The others are a little late for RCW gaming but will work for WWII.

The 4 trucks cost £7.00 altogether but shipping was a princely sum of £12.40 which worked out to £19.40 or $33.10 CDN.

Maybe I’ll flip some of the trucks at next years B&B.

So $175.09 plus the trucks equals $208.19.

Kickstarter, 28mm Germans and terrain build

As stated in the last post I needed some more metal washers. A quick trip to Home Depot got me sorted. 8x 1-1/2” and 4x2” washers and now  I have a small surplus  going forwards. But I saw some 1”x 2’x2’ insulation boards. I have long since thought of making some modular terrain boards using these. They are just shy of $8 each. Which is a lot considering a 2’x8’ board is about $16 (double the cost). However my local places only have shiplap sides instead of a butt end so it is worth it for me.

I picked up 6 boards (enough for. 4’x6’ table).

I also bought some black duct tape to cover the edge to prevent chipping/dents/damage. The washers, tape and insulation cost $73.03. I used up all the tape to line 3 full pieces and 1/2 of a fourth. 

I need some more tape before I can crack on.

Around this time I also backed the Hero Realms Kickstarter for 99 USD which was roughly $134.00

This brings my 2023 hobby budget from $67.48 to $274.51. Yikes. I was doing so well.

Lastly I based the last of the Germans.

I decided to pull out all of the Germans and take an army on parade photograph.

Here’s a few close ups of the army.

Here’s the unpainted 3rd Platoon, a flamethrower team and some casualties.

This is the first platoon, cavalry wing, field gun and machine gun. 

At the rear are an anti-tank rifle, mortar, 3 snipers, another machine gun and an anti-tank gun.


Lastly the HQ group, a mortar, 2nd platoon a tank, assault squad and another machine gun.

Lots of variety to field a number of options. I think I’m March I’ll be dropping off my WWI British to be painted before the unpainted Germans so I can get some games in.

Bases and buildings

My oldest has a 24 hr bug that caused him to miss a really important soccer game today so what better way to spend the day than to plug away at the piles of shame.

I also took the youngest to practice as there is a Home Hardware nearby. I needed some larger metal bases 1-1/2” and 2” widths so the casualties, snipers and heavy guns.

So I spent another $5.15 on metal bases. However I had a gift card so I’m debating whether that counts. I’ll count it bringing the 2023 Hobby expenses total to $67.48. 

Anyways I picked up 4x 2” washers and 4x 1-1/2” washers. I got home and quickly realized I probably need another 2-3 of the 1-1/2” size.

I based some of the figures.

I put a bit of plastic down first as there’s some type of chemical reaction that occurs between the glue and washer hole apparently that leaves marks on the table. That was a fun discovery last go around.

Pictured L to R top to bottom are the grenade launcher and 3.7mm TAK anti-tank gun, the casualties, a sniper and the machine gun. I left most of the crew off of the weapons teams for east of painting.

I have 1 sniper, another flamethrower team and an antitank rifle left to base.

I also put together four sprues of Warlord Games’ plastic ruined hamlet I got before Christmas. I had tested out one building so now have the set done.

Shown are two sprues worth. I opted for 6 pieces of ruins to allow for various configurations.

The weather was atrocious this week but it’s finally warming up. Hopefully I can prime these ruins quickly.

Ze Germans are finished

Well, not really “finished” per se but I’m at a place where if I never bought another WWI German, I’d be fine with that.

That being said 😂 I have plans to add another Heavy machine gun, a grenade launcher, a sniper and a small unit (10) of Cavalry.

The miniatures are a combination of Great War Miniatures, Brigade Games and Copplestone Castings.

There are two platoons. One with plain helmets and the other with a camouflage pattern.

Each platoon is led by a 3-man command element.

There are three ten man squads.

Squads 1 & 2 have a Sgt, 8 rifles and a light MG

Squad 3 has a Sgt, 7 rifles and a flamethrower team.

The Camo squad three have grenades to indicate they are bombers/grenadiers.

There’s a 4 man high Command, heavy machine gun and a field gun rounding out the force.

For rules I have GW Historical - The Great War. However, Chain of Command is a great rule set and I’m super interested in the WWI variant.

All miniatures were painted by Karl Friedrich of Kura Creative. 

Now I just have to finish the terrain boards I started last year. And buy the opposition forces...