Felix, Author at Felix's Gaming Pages

Operation Unthinkable

One of the Clash of Steel Starter Sets have been on my wants list ever since I found out about them at the beginning of the year.

I ordered Operation Unthinkable boxed set containing the British and German tanks.

Operation Unthinkable was the name given to two related possible future war plans developed by the British Chiefs of Staff Committee against the Soviet Union during 1945.

In the box, as well as the rules, counters, and dice, are seventeen tanks.

For the British you get

- - Two Tortoise Super Heavy Tanks
  - Four Centurion Tanks
  - Three Comet Tanks

The Germans have

- - A Maus Super Heavy Tank
  - Two King Tigers
  - Two Tiger Tanks
  - Three Panzer IV/70 Tank-hunters

This was the main reason for buying the box, I wanted some Centurions and the Tortoise. Getting the other tanks was just a bonus.

Here are the sprues from the box.

I am not sure what I will build first, but looking forward to constructing and painting these. This is from the back of the box.

Thinking I might get the USA versus Russian starter set as well.

This is the Operation Unthinkable Workbench.

On the cover of Miniature Wargames this month was a free sprue of SneakFeet from Wargames Atlantic. Of course in any other place these would be space hobbits or halflings. Another place calls them Ratlings.

I recently ordered the Provisionally Prepared miniature from Games Workshop, which is a great model. I did then think about getting the new Kill Team supplement, Brutal and Cunning, this contains a Halfling Ratlings squad. However I have seen it has sold out online, everywhere it seems. I will probably have to wait now until the Ratlings are released separately.

Having said that the free SneakFeet sprue gives me a chance to make up and paint some space hobbits, oh and a frying pan with eggs in it, second breakfast and all that.

Imperial Guard Chimera Transport

The Imperial Guard Chimera is an Infantry Fighting Vehicle, an infantry transport designed to transport men to where they need to be, then provide support fire and cover behind its armour.

One variant of the Chimera is the Hellhound flame tank.

See more photographs of Chimera transports.

Winter Fallschirmjäger

These Bolt Action Winter Fallschirmjäger were a free sprue that came with Wargames Illustrated. I am intending to use them in Operation Sealion battles, on the assumption that if the German invasion was successful then there would be fighting in the winter of 1940 and early 1941.

January 1941 was dominated by bitterly cold easterly winds with frost and some snow. The minimum on the night of the 15th/16th almost fell to minus 6°C.

Napoleonic War French Line Infantry

This was one of those free Warlord sprues from the cover of (probably) Wargames Illustrated, though I don’t recall which issue.

When I put together the recent werewolves I did come up with some scenario ideas.

Another idea for a scenario. During the Peninsular War the 95th Rifles are on the move to hunt down a French spy in a Spanish village. However unknown to them, the village is cursed and there is a full moon.

Well I thought, as well as the 95th and the werewolves, why not throw some French infantry into the mix.

There are four infantry figures on the sprues with a choice of heads, there wasn’t any bases.

They were really simple to put together, a body, a head, and a back pack. Taking the cue from the werewolves, I based them on some two pence coins.

I then used some Citadel Sand, using PVA white glue to adhere it to the coins. I also used some slate as well.

The next stage was to give them a white undercoat.

Now onto the base coats.

Legio Custodes

This Legio Custodes Caladius Grav-Tank Annihilator was part of the displays at Warhammer World.

Based upon the technology of the Coronus Grav-carrier, the smaller Caladius grav-tank is designed to utilise the firepower afforded by the heaviest elements of the Legio Custodes’ arsenal on a highly mobile, protected platform.

Given the fusion of advanced systems and weapons, the Caladius is perhaps the most powerful battleline armoured unit of its size in the Imperium’s forces, utilising technologies and materials derived not only from the Dark Age of Technology, but from developments made as a result of the Great Crusade’s two centuries of warfare. A particularly powerful variant was the ‘Caladius-Annihilator’ which featured an enhanced capacitor-fed Arachnus blaze cannon potent that is enough to pose a threat even to super-heavy armour.

There were a number of Legio Custodes vehicles in a huge diorama display of The Burning of Prospero.

The Burning of Prospero, is the name of the full-scale invasion and planetary devastation of Prospero, homeworld of the Thousand Sons, by Imperial forces that mainly included the Space Wolves Legion, the Adeptus Custodes and the Sisters of Silence.

This is a Legio Custodes Caladius Grav-Tank.

The principal armament of the Caladius is the double-barrelled Iliastus accelerator cannon, an advanced weapon which was to become the precursor to the main weapon of the Legiones Astartes Sicaran Battle Tank.

There was also a large Orion Assault Dropship.

Created as a dedicated assault dropship for the Legio Custodes, the Orion can carry a full task force of the Emperor’s Talons into combat. Protected by frontal armour superior to that of the Legiones Astartes Thunderhawk Gunship, its Arachnus heavy blaze cannon and Lastrum bolt cannon can swiftly clear a landing zone of hostile infantry and armour with brutal efficiency, allowing the units within to deploy before it soars back into the sky to unleash death upon any foe who dares approach.

Constructing the Old World Orc Warboss on Wyvern

On a recent visit to Warhammer World I purchased the boxed Orc Warboss on Wyvern for Warhammer: The Old World.

I never had this (originally) metal kit, this version is resin and I did like it. I did think about using it for my Feral Ork army. Though I might paint it for an Orc and Goblin army for The Old World.

The model comes in a plain Forge World box. The original version of this model was metal. This has been re-released as a resin model. The castings were excellent. I washed the resin pieces which I then cleaned up.

I removed the extraneous resin and cleaned up the mould lines. I then put the model together. The model comes with plastic wings, the rest of the model is resin. The original release of this model was in metal.

There aren’t that many pieces and it has been well designed to fit together. I think it works better as a resin model than it did as a metal one. The body consists of three parts and a leg. In addition there are separate horns for the head.

The positioning on the base was similar to what GW had done with their model. The wings affixed really easily and certainly look the part.

The rider is a large orc and looks great. He has a separate shield, and there are three horns to add to his helmet. I kept him attached to the resin sprue for ease of painting.

There is lots of great detail in this model.

After putting the model together I added some sand and slate to the base.

I bought my pot of sand years ago, but as I was running low, I realised I wanted another tub, but Games Workshop had stopped selling it. I was lucky in finding a tub on eBay. I like the sand, as it also contains small stones, which enhances the bases.

The slate was from the Urban Basing Kit. This was released as part of Cities of Death. The box set contains 2 pots of slate, 2 pots of resin details and 1 pot of razorwire.

I saw that there were some gaps where the parts joined together, so I used some Green Stuff to fill the gaps.

Next step will be a white undercoat.

Tallarn Imperial Guard

I’ve always liked the Tallarn Imperial Guard and have over the years bought some of the models. I have even painted some.

These Tallarn Imperial Guard were on display in the cabinets at Warhammer World.

The Tallarn Desert Raiders are a regiment of the Imperial Guard raised from the Desert World of Tallarn. The soldiers of the regiment are highly skilled at desert and mobile armoured warfare.

Starting on the Legions Imperialis Rhino Transport Detachment

I have been thinking about getting some miniatures for Legions Imperialis since it was released. So was pleased to get the Legions Imperialis: Rhino Transport boxed set as a present last Christmas.

The Rhino is the most widely used armoured personnel carrier in the Imperium. Based upon ancient STC technology, the fundamental design is robust, reliable, and easy to maintain, with an adaptive power plant that can run off a wide variety of fuels. Within the Space Marine Legions, the Deimos pattern was the most widespread, serving as the basic armoured transport available to the Legiones Astartes and the foundation on which a number of other war machines were based.

In the box you get two sprues that can be used to construct ten models.

I am thinking I will paint these as Imperial Fists.

The first stage was constructing the models. Unlike the older Epic models, which were a single casting, these are multi-part kits. They were not as fiddly as I thought they would be, however there are quite a few parts, for example all the exhausts are separate parts.

I constructed five of the models.

You get various options when modelling these in terms of the hatches.

I have constructed one as a command Rhino.

The detail on these small models is quite amazing. It will be challenging to do them justice when painting them.

I think it would be great if there were conversion kits for these models from Forge World, but that isn’t going to happen. Thinking about the other five models in the box, if I might do something else with them, but I will probably paint them also up as Imperial Fists Legion Rhino Transports.

The next stage was to give the models a white undercoat.

The next stage will be the base coat.

Mechanicum Ordinatus

The Mechanicum Ordinatus are massive weapons of destruction that the forces of the Imperium use when faced with unprecedented enemy forces. Essentially they are Titan style weapons on tracks.

In the time of the Great Crusade the Ordinatus macro engines were rarer than even the Battle Titans of the Legio Titanica, and only a handful of Forge Worlds had the resources or indeed the doctrinal blessing and religious authority to produce or maintain such embodiments of the Omnissiah’s divine wrath. Such was the sacredness of these machines above all others, that an entire subcult of the Mechanicum was devoted to their worship and propitiation.

We first saw these vehicles in Epic, and then Forge World released 40K scale Horus Hersey versions of these massive vehicles.

The Ordinatus Ulator is a rare and truly arcane weapon system of huge power. Its primary weapon is the Ulator class Sonic Destructor.

Another version is the Ordinatus Sagittar, similar to the Ulator, it is armed with a Volcano Cannon.

These are nice models, but I am not really a fan of them. They look very vulnerable to enemy fire, there is no armour to speak of. They also don’t look very mobile (despite the four tracks). What do you think?