flames of war Archives - Felix's Gaming Pages

Constructing the Tortoise Heavy Assault Tank

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.

There are 17 tanks, two of which are the Tortoise heavy assault tank.

The Tortoise heavy assault tank (A39) was a British heavy assault gun design developed during the Second World War, but never put into mass production. It was developed for the task of clearing heavily fortified areas such as the Siegfried Line and as a result favoured armour protection over mobility.

This is the GF9 finished model.

This the sprue.

Constructing the model was quite simple, though initially I wasn’t quite sure about how to affix the tracks.

I did think about adding some extra weight to the model, but couldn’t find the weights I had bought in the past for this purpose.

The next stage will be a white undercoat.

Constructing the ISU-130

I decided I would add to the game by ordering the other Operation Unthinkable set, which contains American and Soviet tanks.

The ISU-130, is a tank destroyer based on the IS-2 chassis armed with an 130mm S-26 gun.

This is the GF9 finished model.

This is the track sprue.

The kit also allows you to build the ISU-122 and ISU-152 variants as well. As there are five kits I think I will mix and match the different variants.

Firstly I went with the ISU-130. The kit was relatively easy to construct.

The next step will be a white undercoat.

Basecoating the Maus Super Heavy Tanks

The Maus was a German World War Two super heavy tank that was completed in late 1944. Five were ordered, but only two hulls and one turret were completed before the testing grounds were captured by advancing Soviet forces It is the heaviest fully enclosed armoured fighting vehicle ever built at 188 metric tons. It was armed with a 128mm gun and a coaxial 75mm gun. The Maus was intended to punch holes through enemy defences in the manner of an immense “breakthrough tank”, whilst taking almost no damage to any components.

I have been constructing two 15mm models of the Maus Super Heavy Tank. One from Zvezda and the other from Clash of Steel. Having given both models a white undercoat I gave them a base coat of Army Painter Desert Yellow Spray.

This is the Zvezda model.

This is the Clash of Steel model.

I sprayed the tracks with Mechanicus Standard Grey Spray, though I think they will be painted a dark brown colour eventually.

The next stage will be painting the tracks and the camouflage. I am going to go for the similar pattern as on the GF9 Clash of Steel model.

Though as I don’t have an airbrush I am going to have to do this by hand with a paintbrush.

Another Maus

This Maus came in the Operation Unthinkable starter set for Clash of Steel. One of seventeen tanks in the box.

This is the sprue.

The model was a relatively simple build.

I kept the tracks off the model to paint separately.

Having recently constructed the Zvezda Maus, it’s interesting to compare the two models.

They are pretty much identical.

However from a modelling perspective, the Clash of Steel version is much easier to put together.

I then gave the Maus a white undercoat.

The yellow of the plastic can still be seen, but I wasn’t trying to do a thicker base coat, this was about setting a primer for the sand base coat later.

Next step will be painting the model a sand colour.

Constructing and undercoating the Maus

I’ve always been impressed with the 1/100th scale models from Zvezda as well as being good quality plastic miniatures they are also reasonably priced. I was intrigued to see that my local model shop had the German super heavy tank Maus in their range of Zvezda kits.

Zvezda Panzer VIII Maus

I think it might have been priced wrongly at £3.50 as similar boxes (i.e. the bigger boxes) were £7.00. So I bought two for potential objectives or models for alternate history games set at the end of World War Two.

The model comprises two plastic sprues and look detailed and I think it will capture the feel of this monstrous tank.

Zvezda Panzer VIII Maus sprue

The sprues have sat around for a while, but having recently purchased a similar 1/100th scale 15mm Maus from Battlefront I was intrigued to see the comparison.

The next stage was to construct the models, even though it says snap-fit, decided to glue the model together. I was going add some weight to the model too, so give it some heft and ballast. I think a super heavy tank, even at 1/100th scale, should be “super heavy”. However, I didn’t have any weights to hand. The model was not as simple as I thought it would be to construct, I had issues with getting the gun the right way around, but got there in the end.

This is a large 15mm model, as compared to the M18 Hellcat in the same scale.

The next stage was a white undercoat.

15mm M18 Hellcat

I have the Operation Unthinkable boxed set containing the American and Soviet tanks. The GF9 Operation Unthinkable boxed set, the American versus Soviet, contains 21 tanks. Two of these are the M18 Hellcat.

The M18 Hellcat is a tank destroyer used by the United States Army in World War II and the Korean War. Despite being equipped with the same main gun as some variants of the much larger Sherman tank, the M18 attained a much higher top speed of up to 55 mph by keeping armour to a minimum, and using the innovative Torqmatic automatic transmission.

This is the GF9 finished model.

This is the sprue.

The model goes together quite easily. I like how the track sections are complete parts.

The turret was a little trickier, but got there in the end.

I gave the model a white undercoat.

The next stage was to paint them, using Army Painter Army Green Spray.

The next stage will be painting the tracks.

More Operation Unthinkable

I decided I would add to the game by ordering the other Operation Unthinkable set, which contains American and Soviet tanks.

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

For the Americans you get

Two T28 tanks
Two M18 Hellcats
Three T29 heavy tanks

The Soviets have

Six T54-1 tanks
Three IS-3 heavy tanks
Five ISU-130 SPGs.

Here are the sprues from the box.

What I didn’t realise was that the T54-1 model can also be made up as a T44 or a T55 as the different turrets are included. This gives even more flexibility over just using them as T54-1 tanks.

I thought that these would make ideal models for gaming scenarios from the Hot War series of books by Harry Turtledove.

This is the Operation Unthinkable Workbench.

Early-War Monsters

I was pleased to hear in the Battlefront preview video about their new releases. Back in 2011 I wrote this after the release of the Mid-War Monsters.

I do hope that we see future “monsters” for Flames of War, there are some nice concepts and ideas out there for both Early-War and Late-War.

Well here we are thirteen years later and next year we are going to see some Early-War Monsters.

In the Battlefront preview video (see below) it was announced that Battlefront would be producing some Early War ‘Eavies. The preview included glimpses of the British TOG and the French Char 2C.

There was also mention of a German super heavy tank, but it was not identified in the review, I suspect it might be the Großtraktor that was built by Krupp and entered service in 1935.

More a medium tank than a heavy tank, the other option might be the Eckard Extending Panzer.

Anyhow, I had been thinking about getting some 15mm Char 2C models (3D printed versions), but I think I will wait now for the Battlefront model, I have been waiting over ten years, so what’s less than a year between friends.

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.

Vickers Mk VIB Light Tank

The Vickers Mk VIB Light Tank was a British WW2 light tank, crew of 3, powered by Meadows 6-cylinder petrol engine, armed with two machine guns.

This is the one at the Tank Museum in Bovington.

The Mk VI Light Tank was the sixth in the line of light tanks built by Vickers-Armstrongs for the British Army during the interwar period. The company had achieved a degree of standardization with their previous five models, and the Mark VI was identical in all but a few respects. The turret, which had been expanded in the Mk V to allow a three-man crew to operate the tank, was further expanded to give room in its rear for a wireless set.

The British Army lost 331 Mark VI light tanks in the Battle of France of 1940.

The Mk VIB was mechanically identical to the Mk VIA but with a few minor differences to make production simpler, including a one-piece armoured louvre over the radiator instead of a two-piece louvre, and a plain circular cupola instead of the faceted type.

The Mk VIB was also used in the North African campaign against the Italians late in 1940 with the 7th Armoured Division.

In A Very British Civil War scenario, you would expect to be using a fair amount of these tanks. When the Battle of France began in May 1940, the majority of the tanks possessed by the British Expeditionary Force were Mark VI variants.

Here are some 15mm Flames of War Light Tank VIs in the Flames of War Miniatures Gallery.