Tanksgiving, finally. Bolt Action armor follies

 Don't get me wrong, it is just the anticipation of the mayhem coupled with some very busy prep on the vehicles.  

I did want a late war focus and a unified command. Last year's game was a catch all force with a Char bis, R35, and two BT7's.  Fun, eclectic but basically a come as you are force, not for lack of trying, but basically outgunned in most match-ups. 

This year USA all the way. A Pershing, Chaffee, Hellcat, and Priest.  Still deciding on how to squeeze in the Four tanks (by event definition they all qualify as tanks,  i.e., they have a gun and armor. ) into the 1000 points allowed.  I hate this part. 

The Pershing , as veteran,  is 484 points, 

 

the Chaffee is 200 points with the 'recce ' option I wanted. This leaves the M18 Hellcat and M7 Priest to adjust for the remaining 316 points. 

 

 

The tank destroyer at veteran is 192 points (with recce)

 

 

 

 which leaves the M7 with 124 points.  So the three veteran units are backed up by an inexperienced rated SP gun. 

 

 

Did I mention that 3 of the tanks were purchased the Saturday prior to Thanksgiving?

So  besides assembling the plastic Hellcat,  the three resin models were also put together and all four kits painted.  I decided very early in the process that the painting was to be very work in progress in order to use the models.  Also, not all the modeling will not be done when they are used. This especially affects the M18, which suffers the most from basic kit syndrome, for all the missing fiddly parts add character. 

Basing and weathering will have to wait as well.  Basic olive drab it is.  I was by far not the only incompletely painted figure pusher.

 

Like in an old war movie, the clock spins, the day and night cycle is shown a few times.   Then, Tanksgiving arrives. The scene is chaotic as seven players deploy T34 flame tanks, a Panther a Sturmgescutz, a Jagdtiger, a Churchill., .as well as Greg's Chaffee, Easy 8 Sherman, and Pershing.

Rounding out the field near me was a Churchill and Eric's collection of two Hellcats and a Maus.

Yep, you read that correctly. A player with a 3D printer in the house spent 15 hours last week printing up the Maus. Stats were just a little better than a Pershing.  The model lot bigger and in a deep blue resin.  See photos below.

 My band of US Armor. left to right Hellcat, Pershing,Priest, Chaffee.

Eric of the 3D printed Maus...Squint and you can see

 the Maus hidden behind the burning Hellcat.

Actually I had the first casualty, my Hellcat.

Farther to the right, You can see a lot of action where flamethrower T34s met US armor.

Another flame T34 at work.

 

 

 My opponent with the Maus soon learned --

about putting all his eggs in one basket.

 

I kept be-deviling the Maus with smoke to blind it, HE to increase its pin marker count.

 

In the middle right of the photo, my Pershing closes to normal range and hits the rear armor of the Maus....and I rolled a 6 to hit and 6 to penetrate and enough damage to destroy the Maus.

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Farther up the road the immolation and explosions brought the tank count down to six from a dozen....but two of these were immobilized.  We called the game after nine turns and three players completely out of tanks. 

Good fun all the way around. Great way to spend a post Thanksgiving afternoon

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Friday's game is the first in a series of Badgers and Burrows. First outing, it should be hilarious as it will be a first use of the game rules. By any of us.