Felix's Gaming Pages – warhammer, wh40k, flames of war, bolt action, aeronautica imperialis, star wars, models, news, views and stuff

Boomdakka Snazzwagon

The roar of overcharged engines and the crackle of blinding flames herald the chaotic arrival of the Boomdakka Snazzwagon, an iconic favourite among Ork Speed Freeks. Stripped down for maximum velocity and clad in little more than hastily welded scrap armour, these light-built speedsters fishtail, skid, and leap madly across the battlefield to evade incoming fire. While a single direct artillery hit will instantly vaporise the fragile vehicle, its blistering speed and unpredictable manoeuvres make targeting one a nightmare for enemy gunners. Clinging to the chassis is a gang of howling Burna Boyz who gleefully pelt the foe with volatile burna bottles and blast them with heavy mek-flamers. The resulting firestorms are just as likely to incinerate the Snazzwagon’s own crew as they are the enemy, but the cackling Orks are far too entranced by the noise, heat, and spectacle to care.

Vickers Armstrongs Mark E

Alongside their work for the British armed forces Vickers-Armstrongs produced military equipment for export to foreign armies. Their earliest commercial tank designs failed to sell but in 1928 they produced a masterpiece. Known as the ‘six-tonner’ it was a remarkable design, with a rear-mounted, air-cooled engine driving to a gearbox and track sprockets at the front of the tank. There were two main variants; some tanks were supplied with two machine-gun turrets (Type A) while others carried a larger single turret (Type B).

Following trials the British Army turned it down but the tank was a major export success. It sold all around the world, from South America to Japan and was even studied by the United States Army. It was licensed by the Soviets as the T-26. It was also the direct predecessor of the Polish 7TP tank and influenced tank design in many other countries.

The Bovington Tank Museum exhibit, a (Type B), is displayed in the fancy camouflage style adopted by Vickers for their commercial offerings; it is seen at a mythical army equipment exhibition some time in the thirties.

More photographs of the Vickers 6-Ton tank and another photograph of the Vickers 6-Ton tank from earlier visits to the Tank Museum.

You can imagine in A Very British Civil War scenario, the Vickers factory ramping up production and making these tanks available to one of the armies for fighting the civil war. They could be used as the core of an armoured thrust in a major battle, or they might be used to provide security in cities.

Blood Angels Legion Medusa

One of the heavy artillery units available to the Legiones Astartes is the Medusa, which carries a short ranged but extremely powerful siege mortar capable of breaching all but the thickest walls. When a breach has been secured, the Medusa will then rumble forwards to support the assault, levelling buildings with a single shell.

Vickers Medium Mark II*

Introduced in 1923 the Vickers Mediums were the first British tanks to see service fitted with a sprung suspension and a rotating turret. Designed to fight on the move, their high speed of 30 mph restored mobility to the battlefield. The hull was riveted. The engine, an air cooled Armstrong Siddeley, was mounted in the front of the tank, alongside the driver. Originally described as a light tank, the advent of even smaller tanks weighing about five tons, resulted in the Vickers’ design being reclassified as a medium tank.

This is the Vickers Medium Mark II* at the Bovington Tank Museum.

It was the main British tank from 1923 until 1935.

The Medium Mark II was completely obsolete by the beginning of World War II. The survivors were used for training during the first few years of the War. Some were issued to combat forces to make up their strength after the loss of most British first line tanks during the retreat from France in 1940. Others were sent to Egypt as training vehicles and were pressed into service with the Western Desert Force. They were buried as fixed defences at Mersa Matruh and Tobruk.

Vickers sold 15 Medium Tanks to the Soviet Union in 1930, they were used for training. Rather surprisingly, the Finns captured half a dozen of these relics from the Russians in the autumn of 1941. At least one other went to Australia, while a single example of a developed version, the Mark C, was sold to Japan. This vehicle formed the basis of the Japanese Type 89 tank design. A single example of the final version, the Medium Mark D, was sold to Eire where it remained in service until 1940.

These would be the mainstay tanks of any A Very British Civil War scenarios

Blood Angels Legion Sicaran Arcus Strike Tank

This Blood Angels Legion Sicaran Arcus Strike Tank was on display at Warhammer World.

Once the Arcus strike tank was one of the most advanced support platforms available to the Space Marine Legions, but for reasons long since lost to the past, the Adeptus Mechanicus holds the pattern as a slight against the Omnissiah and refuses to produce or repair such vehicles. Without the specialised knowledge of the Machine God’s adepts, the advanced launchers of the Arcus have slowly failed and been replaced with more common rotary launchers and stocks of its rare warheads have dwindled. Now it is used by the Space Marine Chapters that retain examples of this rare pattern as a fast strike tank, racing it forwards to saturate a target area with incendiary devices of a more commonplace provenance and using its renowned speed to escape unscathed, enabling them to clear otherwise redoubtable bunkers and fortresses with brutal efficiency.

Panzer II

The Panzer II was the common name for a family of German tanks used in World War II. The official German designation was Panzerkampfwagen II (abbreviated PzKpfw II). Although the vehicle had originally been designed as a stopgap while more advanced tanks were developed, it nonetheless went on to play an important role in the early years of World War II, during the Polish and French campaigns. By the end of 1942 it had been largely removed from front line service, and production of the tank itself ceased by 1943.

This one was on display at the Bovington Tank Museum.

When they first appeared, in 1936, the Panzer IIs were regarded as platoon commander’s tanks. They were also employed to give fire support to the Panzer I in combat with enemy tanks. However by 1940 they had been outclassed and were relegated to the reconnaissance role. This exhibit, an Ausfuhrung (or Model) F featured improved armour and was introduced in 1941.

This tank was captured by British forces in North Africa but it is shown in the markings of 1st Panzer Division at the time of the invasion of France in June 1940.

Vickers Crossley Armoured Car Chevrolet

This Vickers Crossley Armoured Car Chevrolet (Indian Pattern) was on display at Bovington.

In 1915 the British Army started to use armoured cars in India, particularly on the North West Frontier, to relieve troops needed elsewhere. They proved so successful that this soon became standard policy. Shortly after the war the Indian Government purchased 16 Rolls-Royce cars to a new design but these proved so expensive that subsequent orders were placed with Crossley Motors in Manchester who made a tough but cheap 50hp IAG1 chassis. Substantial numbers of these cars were supplied between 1923 and 1925.

The body design, which was very similar to the Rolls-Royce version and built by Vickers at Crayford, had a number of interesting features. These included a dome-shaped turret, with four machine-gun mounts, which was designed to deflect rifle shots from snipers in ambush positions in the high passes. A clamshell cupola surmounted the turret for the commander, while side doors opened opposite ways on either side so that a crew member could dismount safely under fire. The crew area was lined with asbestos to keep the temperature down and the entire body could be electrified to keep large crowds at bay.

By 1939, when the Royal Tank Corps in India had handed most of its equipment over to the Indian Army, the Crossleys were worn out. The bodies were then transferred to imported Canadian Chevrolet chassis, with pneumatic tyres, and in this form served with Indian forces in the Middle East in the early years of the war.

From a previous visit, photographs of the Vickers Crossley Armoured Car Chevrolet (Indian Pattern) and from another visit, more photographs.

You can imagine in an early Very British Civil War scenario in the early 1920s, the Vickers factory making these armoured cars available to one of the armies for fighting the civil war. You would have to think about some rules for allowing the entire body could be electrified and the impact that this would have in games.

Megatrakk Scrapjet at Warhammer World

A beloved menace among Speed Freeks and grounded Ork Flyboyz alike, the Megatrakk Scrapjet is a roaring, rocket-propelled war-rig that brings the frantic thrill of aerial dogfighting directly to the battlefield floor.

Built around the salvaged fuselages of crashed Ork aircraft, these scrap-built monstrosities allow former pilots to relive the glory of low-altitude strafing runs, and the devastating point-blank collisions that grounded them in the first place.

Powered by a thunderous rocket engine, the Scrapjet hurtles toward enemy lines at terrifying speeds, using a massive, thrust-driven nose drill to grind through heavy armour and infantry.

As it charges into the fray, a fearsome array of welded, bolted, and lashed weaponry unleashes total carnage, unleashing a barrage of rokkits and missiles into enemy armour while a cackling Grot tail-gunner blazes away with a chatter of big shootas to keep pursuers at bay.

Little Willie

Constructed in late 1915 by William Foster & Co. of Lincoln, Little Willie holds a monumental place in military history as the world’s first completed working tank prototype. Developed under the auspices of the Admiralty’s Landships Committee and engineered jointly by Sir William Tritton and Major Walter Wilson, the 16.5-ton vehicle, originally dubbed the Lincoln Machine No. 1, was built using unarmored boiler plate to test the feasibility of a tracked, armoured war machine.

Driven by a 105-horsepower Daimler engine and fitted with trailing rear steering wheels, it demonstrated that an internal combustion engine paired with tracks could carry heavy armor across difficult ground. However, its low-slung, boxy hull and high center of gravity gave it poor trench-crossing capabilities, while its planned overhead gun turret was abandoned to lower its profile. Although Little Willie never saw combat, its fundamental lessons directly inspired the iconic rhomboidal design of the successor prototype “Mother” and the subsequent Mark I tank. Today, as the oldest surviving tank in existence, Little Willie is preserved as a flagship exhibit at The Tank Museum in Bovington.

Ork Rukkatrukk Squigbuggy

Born from the greasy ingenuity of Snakebite Orks with a canny eye for battlefield economics, the Rukkatrukk Squigbuggy wasn’t initially conceived as a weapon of war, but rather a mobile snack bar for the speed-addicted Speed Freeks. Imagine ramshackle, rattling pens on wheels, teeming with edible squigs, keeping pace with the thunderous advance of Warbikers, buggies, and Trukks. Above the din of engines, the Squigbuggy crews, all toothy grins and booming voices, would hawk their squirming wares.

For a hefty bag of teef exchanged mid-chase, a lucky (or perhaps unlucky) customer would have a choice squig launched directly into their waiting hands – or even their cavernous maw – courtesy of the vehicle’s ingenious Squig Launchas. However, legend, thick with the pungent aroma of squig and Orkoid mishap, whispers of a pivotal moment. It was when a particularly ferocious Attack Squig, mistaking the launcha for a new burrow, was accidentally fired into the face of an unsuspecting Ork. In that instant of unexpected carnage, the true, brutal potential of this mobile menagerie of mayhem was violently unleashed.

Now, the rumble of a Rukkatrukk Squigbuggy signals more than just lunchtime. These ruggedly built vehicles, instantly recognisable by their bellowing engines and the chaotic mass of squigs and Orks clinging to every surface, now muscle their way to the forefront of any Speed Freek advance. They unleash volleys of their living, close-range artillery, turning enemy ranks into a squirming, panicked mess. The Squigbuggy, once a purveyor of battlefield snacks, has evolved into a fearsome engine of destruction, proving that even the humblest beginnings can lead to gloriously violent ends.

Rukkatrukk Squigbuggy on my workbench.