Wargames Illustrated 322 - The Great War for Flames of War

I stopped doing a monthly look at the wargaming magazines I was buying a while ago, I can't really remember why even, but like many things it slipped by the wayside, but this month I'm bringing it back as a one off to look at issue 322 of Wargames Illustrated.  This is because I was really impressed with it and wanted to recommend it to my readers, especially those with an interest in gaming WWI.

The big news this issue is the release of battlefront's Great War Flames of War supplement and the magazine come with a 36 page booklet which provides all the rules for playing this new version of flames of war.  This means of course that the main magazine also has some articles around the background of this supplement with a look at some of the myths of gaming WWI and a look at great war tanks, which lets be honest are of course the main attraction when gaming in 15mm scale.  What I've always liked about wargames illustrated is that although they are promoting the latest flames of war release there is always plenty of other varied content as well.

The magazine also features a couple of Napoleonic articles, the first a fascinating overview of the Polish armies of the era, the second a look at one groups take on the battle of Quatre Bras.  Some eye-candy is provided courtesy on the salute 2014 painting competition.  The other stand out articles were on the history of the Russo-Japanese war and it's implication for WWI and a look at the new 'The Crescent and the Cross' which is the expansion of the 'Saga' gaming world into the era of the crusades.  I haven't played any Saga, but it's something that I've been keeping my eye on for a while, maybe one day.

The booklet that comes with the magazine takes the familiar flames of war rules (which you will still need a copy of) and gives them a new twist.  It starts with a brief overview of the great war and then moves onto all the special rules for fighting in this era and for using the great landships.  There are then late war lists for the British and the Germans and finally three scenarios to play.  This supplement is of course for the western front in Belgium and France from 1916 onwards, I'm hoping the French with their FT-17's will get added at some point as well.

I haven't decided if I will be buying a flames of war WWI army yet, but I have to admit that I'm very tempted.  the other option that I'm considering is using the rules in the booklet, but using all the 1:72 scale figures and tanks that I already have lying around.  Only time will tell, but I do want to do some WWI gaming over in the near future and I now have a ruleset that I could make a start with.

Emhar 1:72 Scale Whippet MKA WWI British Medium Tank

On my recent trip to the tank museum at Bovington I inevitably came away with a model tank kit, this Emhar 1:72 scale Whippet.  The WWI tanks at Bovington were my favourite part of the museum, which ultimately led to the selection of this kit.  This is the first Emhar kit I've ever made and it compares favourably to the WWI airfix kits I've built, one slight niggle is that it's in 1:72 not 1:76 scale like my other WWI tanks, not that that's Emhar's fault of course.

Assembled

 

painted, but before decals

I thought the Sprues were good quality, hard plastic, and with little flash.  It was a very easy build, with only the machine guns providing a small challenge.

One thing this kit does differently to other manufacturers is the way the tracks are made.  I've had some problems with the tracks on tanks before, often they are really hard to get right, Airfix have this horrible rubber track method which requires heat(I hate it so much that I try to avoid Airfix kits with tracks now), matchbox have a better rubber track system that you have to link together, but still isn't great and revel 1:72 tanks require you to build the tracks piece by piece, which works well, but is fiddly.  Emhar have just made solid single piece tracks moulded onto the wheel sections.  At first I thought it was to simplistic, but having built the kit I think it works rather well with a minimum of fuss.

Bovington's Whippet

The kit comes with a good decal sheet with decals for a multiple of paint scheme, which includes 3 different British designs as well as Japan, German and Russian designs.  This was a pleasant surprise and certainly adds to the versatility of the kit.  One of the decal schemes was actually for Bovingtons example, so it was an obvious choice.

I'm really pleased with this little kit actually, and will probably get the Mark IV and German AV7 they do in the same range at some point.

My WWI tank collection

Bovington Tank Museum

The weekend of the great storm found me in Dorset and finally making a long overdue first ever trip to the tank Museum at Bovington.  I'm sure many of my readers have been there themselves, but to those that haven't you really should make the effort, it's a fantastic place.

Bovington is the museum of the Royal tank regiment and is (according to Wikipedia) the largest collection of tanks in the world.  the main building consists of 4 areas, the tank story, the WWI experience, the discovery zone and Battlegroup Afghanistan.

The best and most important hall is 'the tank story' which traces the history of the tank all the way from 'little willie' in 1915 upto the modern day.  It includes tanks from WW1 (a mark II, a whippet, and a FT-17) before moving into the interwar period and then of course into WW2.  The WW2 section includes the worlds last surviving working Tiger tank.  There was a chap doing maintenance and he let us climb up on top of the tank to have  look at the engine and inside the turret, which was a nice surprise.  There is also some cold war tanks and a couple of modern ones.  It's quite open plan and it's well done with lots of great information about the vehicles and about the development of the tank in general.  It's about as good an overview of the subject as you could get from a gallery.

Next we headed into the WWI hall.  It starts off with a mock up of a trench scene, starting in a damaged town, then a British trench and then onto a German one.  Although it was interesting seeing the differences between the British and German set-ups I have to admit I'm not a fan of these fake trenches that seem to be popular nowadays, there's no way they can really give an impression of the trenches, but perhaps I'm in the minority here and other people get something from them.  After the mock up there is a gallery of WWI tanks, which I absolutely loved!  It contains 5 different varieties of British heavy tanks (two of which you can go inside) and a German A7V.

The Discovery Zone is a very large area crammed full of tanks and armoured vehicles, and I do mean crammed.   Mostly WW2 tanks, but also a good selection of postwar main battle tanks as well.  Some of the highlights included a Centurion cut in half and a King Tiger, but there's just so much there it's difficult to pick out individual tanks.  One tank that did really strike me though was the TOG II, an absolutely massive British tank prototype from WW2 that is heavier than any of the later MTB's.

The last area is Battlegroup Afghanistan, it's smaller than the other areas and gives a look at the vehicles and conditions from the recent war in Afghanistan.  Again it's very well done, the mock-up camp and multimedia information make it a nice little addition to the museum.

Across the car park is the vehicle conservation centre which is a large hanger which houses the overspill from the collection, tanks and armoured vehicles not on display from the main hall in varying conditions.  You can't get down in amongst them but can only view them from up on a viewing platform.  It's an impressive sight and hopefully one day they'll be able to renovate and display them all properly.

And finally I was also really impressed with the shop, lots of interesting books and a fantastic range of model kits, some manufacturers and ranges that I wasn't even aware of.  It was perhaps inevitable that I came away with a model tank, which will be appearing here in the very near future.

Matchbox/Revell 1:76 Char B.1 bis & Renault FT.17 & Airfix 1:76 Mark I Male Tank

Ok so I know that's not the most pithy blog title ever created, but at least you should know what to expect!  I have indeed constructed and painted two model kits containing three tanks.  All in 1:76 scale.  I haven't gone with any official colour schemes for any of these tanks, just painted it how I like them.

The first kit is the matchbox (although I believe revel have issued the exact same kit) Char B.1 and Renault FT-17 with scenic base.

Oddly the sprues come in two different colours for the tanks, which makes them look a bit odd before painting.  The kit also came with a couple of French soldiers which are supposed to be on the scenic base, I didn't bother with these though, they just seemed like they'd be in the way.

As the title suggests I've also finished an airfix mark I male tank.  The WWI British tank design is my favourite design for any tank, I think they just look fab.

This kit was a birthday present, and it's actually the second time I've built it, below I show the new version with the original, where I tried to do the scheme on the box, I much prefer this new version.

Finally a quick comparison with the contempory FT.17, look at the size difference!

Why I Love The Works....

My local town is pretty rubbish for shopping, we have a Games Workshop, and a hardware shop that sells airfix models, but that's about it gaming wise, no decent proper bookshop or even a HMV or other DVD shop.  The shop I think I actually spend the most money in is the Works, which is a discount bookshop, but sells other bits and bobs as well.  A lot of my books, and in particular History and Nature books have come from here.  I popped in today as I was waiting for the bus, not especially expecting to find anything (the gems are always hidden behind piles of rubbish), but find stuff I did, I came out having spent £15 and feeling very happy.

The most exciting thing they had today was a pile of new board games, of what I believe are termed the 'eurogame' variety.  There were 4 games in all, all priced at £7.99, I only bought one, entiltled Ming Dynasty, a game of political intrigue in ancient china, it all looks very pretty, even if I would have prefered plastic sculpted pieces, these types of games traditionally have abstract wooden pieces.  No idea about gameplay yet, but will post on it when I get a game in (unfortunatly the way things are going that won't be to the new year, damn real life and a dull job in retail at christmas.)

I also got a pair of military history books, 'A Tidy Little War - The British Invasion of Egypt 1882', and 'Haigs Command - A reassessment'.  I'm particulary looking forward to ' a tidy little war', the egypt campaign is one I only know a little about, but almost preludes the Sudan campaign's that I've been painting models for, the danger is of course that this book might be the start of yet another painting project.

Overall I'm really chuffed with all of these, I'm trying to resist the urge to buy the other eurogames they have, but with the christmas season coming up I need to be good.  But I love this shop, I was only looking to waste 15mins but came out with some totally unexpected cheap little gems.

Airfix HMS Warspite

My latest finished project is an airfix model of the Queen Elizabeth class Battlesip HMS Warspite in 1:600 scale, this is the fifth WW2 Royal Navy ship I've built in this scale (see the others here).

HMS Warspite was a famous ship, serving in both world wars, and earning the most battle honours ever awarded to a British ship.  These battles included the famous battles of Jutland and Matapan.  She also held the record for the longest range hit on a moving target from a moving ship on an italian battleship at a range of a whoping 26,000 yards.

An enjoyable kit, seemed like less parts than the HMS Belfast that I did recently even though it's a bigger ship. There was a lot of flash,  but nothing that couldn't be dealt with easily.  As I always do with these kits I had problems with the little boats hanging over the side.

This picture ahows the relatove sizes of a few ships from my 'fleet' from top to bottom we have the light cruiser HMS Belfast, the Battleship HMS Warspite and the carrier HMS Ark Royal.

I remembered to take a few work in progress pics as I was building it this time:

I have an urge to do another battleship now and I'm torn between a HMS Nelson and a HMS (technically a battlecruiser I know, but close enough).

Imperial War Museum

After I finished at HMS Belfast the other day I then headed over to the Imperial War Museum, probaly the only big museum in London that I've not been to before.  So does a museum on British warefare from 1914 to the present have anything of interest to the wargamer/painter/history enthusiast?  Yes of course its full of interesting & relevent (to this blog) things.  The entrance itself is impressive with its two 15" guns (taken from the battleships HMS Ramillies and HMS Resolution), having just come from HMS Belfast and being impressed with its 6" guns the sheer scale of this was quite awe inspiring.

Going inside you walk into the large exhibits hall which is full of tanks, feild guns, rockets and planes.  This is the best bit of the museum, I'll be honest I went to see the tanks really.  For me the highlights of this main hall were:

A British WWI Mark V tank

A Grant tank used by Monty as a command tank in north Africa.

A Sopwith Camel (see my airfix version here)

A Polaris Missile, for years the source of the UK's nuclear deterrent.

The basement has the galleries on British warefare from 1914 to the present, understandably focusing on the two world wars, but it does cover all the conflicts upto gulf war one.  The history itself is a very general overview and to be honest I didn't learn that much, but the galleries are stuffed full of artifacts, loads of uniforms, models and weapons amongst over things.  It was all very dark though so made photography a pain.  It's an interesting place to mill around though and there are some impressive large scale ship models.

A model of HMS Warspite.

The other thing that impressed me was the Lord Ashcroft gallery at the top of the museum housing 210 Victoria Crosses.  Each medal is presented with the story of why it was award, I didn't read all of them, but there were some truly astounding acts of bravery.  I got all the way to the end of the gallery (the Chard VC awarded for Rorkes Drift actually) before realising I'd not actually looked at a single medal yet and had been captivated by the stories.

Like most big state run museums in the UK the Imperial War museum is free to visit, if your near London you really should go pay a visit, I'm not sure why its taken me this long to go.