A VBCW adventure

I mentioned in a previous post that I had brought 4 vehicles, two tanks and two tankettes but actually it's more like a tank, a self propelled gun and two tankettes.  These vehicles turned up a couple of weeks ago but I have yet to get them primed or painted. The weather is currently hovering around 0 to 5 degrees and damp most of the the time. Hopefully I'll get a chance soon to get them primed at least.  The vehicles in question are the L15\42, the Semovente 75\34 M43 and two CV33's or CV35's (basically the same vehicle).  The L15\42 will be the forces main tank. Now it's not a great tank by any means, with only a Light AT gun but it does have 4 MMG's which is pretty good. I did consider the the P26\40 instead, with it's medium AT gun and Armour 9 but the extra 45 points don't really make it worth while. It is only really my son's Tiger that will cause me issues but most other stuff I play against is armour 8 or 9, so can be dealt with by the light...

 So over on my main blog, (the 40k one) I write down my resolutions for the the year and I though that I should do something similar here. I thought I'd title it slightly differently though, as my aims and objectives for the year.  So what are my aims and objectives for Bolt Action \ VBCW this year? Well there quite simple actually, as having just brought everything I want for my Italian army and I have no plans for further expansion, I'll be just concentrating on playing a few games. I would like to play every couple of months, maybe get half a dozen games a year played, which I think is reasonable.  Having just mentioned buying everything I need for the Italians, one of the main focus for the year, is getting it all painted up. So far I have four tanks, (or two tanks and two tankettes), four weapons teams and half a dozen infantry to paint but there will be two artillery guns and about another half a dozen infantry to add to the list soon. Getting them all painted is hi...

 So, I finally caved and decided to bite the bullet and buy the rest of my Italian army.  As you can see, I've just gone and done it in one lump sum. Most of these are cheaper 3D prints and I have no idea about the quality but I'm not overly worried, as long as they are usable it's fine.  The light mortars are Warlord Games models and so will be fine.  The vehicles are all from one eBay seller and should give me everything I need, with a tank, a self propelled gun \ tank destroyer and two light armoured vehicles. I had thought about getting some other vehicles, namely an AB41 and a S37 or two. I'm hopeful that the vehicles will be scaled correctly as it's hard to tell from the pictures.  Lastly, I have bought two artillery pieces, one anti-tank and one howitzer. This will give me all the support I need, along with the two light mortars. Again I might get some additional artillery at some point, maybe a heavy howitzer or an AA auto cannon, but I really don't need...

 Lastly we have the support platoons, the Heavy weapons and Artillery platoons. The Heavy weapons platoon is almost complete, it is just missing a mortar the artillery platoon currently consists of one miniatures, which is not a gun. Heavy weapons platoon Platoon commander Spotter While I have built a spotter, I don't yet have a mortar to go with it. I do plan on getting one at some point but I'm in no hurry. The two guns are the same, the standard Breda M37. Now, I think I have mentioned this before, in game they are going to be standard MMG's, however, in real life the gun was considered the standard heavy machine gun. I don't know if I will be able to play this as a heavy machine gun when the army book comes out, but we shall see. If I can that would be great, but I suspect that it will still be classed as a medium gun, as the calibre is more of a medium, especially compared to the American .50 Cal guns. The artillery platoon is currently formed of just this one offi...

 This is the final lot of infantry. These don't form a full platoon, they may one day but not right now. They are some of the more specialised units. The remaining infantry  Platoon commamder This is an Alpini commander built mostly because I felt like it and I wanted something to go with my Alpini squad. Alipin squad This squad was built as a result of being on the wrong end of my son's German SS twin LMG squad. This has the two LMG's plus a Sgt and are purely a support unit.  Bersaglieri snipers Lastly, we have the Bersaglieri sniper team, because who do you want as snipers? your sharpshooters obviously! These are the only two Bersaglieri in the force and will probably not get any reinforcements. The only thing about this model I may change is the grenade, which is currently red but I may well repaint it to yellow. Why, red = explosive, yellow = smoke. So, I imagine him getting ready to throw a smoke grenade should their location be discovered before they can extract th...

 The next platoon is another rifle platoon! Although this one is a bit more specialised. This platoon is formed of two Paracadutisti squads and a commander. "Rifle" platoon  Commander with SMG The commander is carrying a SMG the same as the troops. All the Paras have hard hats and googles. I have no idea if this is realistic or not, most of the pictures I could find they had hard hats on and I suspect a lot.of them.would have goggles if they could, plus it marks them out as different. The squads themselves are a little different from expected. Each is actually a five man unit, not seven as in the pictures. This is because each has two Panzerfausts, for some (short) ranged anti-tank. For in game purposes, I have built extra models to swap out when the rockets (or recoilless gun??) have been fired. This means I will be able to track who's shot and who hasn't. Panzerfausts  Second squad All these guys are armed with SMG's for close range assaults. I should probably l...