Color Choices - Part III

The third part of an irregular series that provides the base colors used on a variety of projects.

Wake Atoll

• F4F Wildcat/F2A Buffalo - For the Wildcats and Buffaloes (the Wake Atoll project) - I used Faded Photo Reconnaissance Unit (P. R. U.) Blue (71.109) on the upper surfaces, with Light Grey (71.298) for the lower. I really like this color combination.

Darwin

• A6M2 - To reproduce the ame-iro color used on shipborne Japanese naval aircraft I went with Imperial Japanese Navy Ash Gray (71.311). It seems to capture the gray, green, and tan hues well. NATO Black (71.251) on the cowling. These Zekes will also see time over Wake.
• P-40E - Typical early war United States Army scheme of Dark Olive Drab 41 (71.316) over Neutral Gray N43 (71.051). 

 Second India-Pakistan War (1965)

• F-86 - The primary Pakistan aircraft received an overall scheme of Aluminium (71.062). 
• Folland Gnat - Another plane that had a natural metal finish, so once again I used Aluminium.
• Mystère - Why yes, I'm glad you asked - Aluminium was indeed the color of choice.

Works in Progress

As I become older I find that painting is actually becoming a bit of a calming release for me. Oh sure, my wife will tell you that on occasion she hears me spout out an expletive from the den as I fiddle with getting a decal in place or paint canopy frames, but overall I am starting to enjoy painting my own planes. Now, that being said, I am only working on simple schemes - more complex brushwork will still be sent off to Miscellaneous Miniatures or I-94, but of late, after having some success with 1/144 Great War planes last year, I have been working on a few 1/285 scale aircraft with some success and not a lot of swearing.

Before I forget, I do have an update from Kevin at MiscMinis on some commissioned work he is doing for me - here are the nearly finished Americans for an Aleutians scenario. 

Okay, now here are a few I have been working on.

The above are all Flight Deck prints. At the bottom are a Curtiss Hawk III and a P-26 (known as the Model 281 in Chinese service), painted in the base color for China in 1937. They need another coat of green, and I will need to add details such as tires, engine, and the tail stripes (the white is in place but needs another coat before adding the blue), and then Chinese roundels.

In the middle are the beginnings of my Wake Atoll collection. I decided that 1/600 is just too fiddly for my fingers to handle, so have transitioned into 1/285. The Wildcats and Buffaloes are complete, other than decals. Then I will need to start collecting a variety of Japanese aircraft. 

The top row are gap fillers. While I have a decent Korean War collection and can host numerous scenarios, I needed to buy more planes to run games involving the Yak-9P and the Shooting Star. The blue on the Yak is probably a hair too dark, but I like how it will stand out on the tabletop. The F-80, after priming, has a base coat of Vallejo aluminium which really looks great. Both of these types need details painted in, and then decals. 

Wake Island Atoll - Trying a New Scale

In 1/285 scale, this could get expensive

Many Check Your 6! scenarios call for a lot of bombers, which is not something I am really into, from both a price and playing perspective. Bombers can be expensive (price perspective) and most players do not want to push around a bunch of bombers (playing perspective). However, for the Wake Island scenario booklet I am working on, several G3M Nell bombers, even in reduced numbers to enhance play balance, figure into several scenarios. Therefore a couple of years ago I dipped my toe into 1/600 by buying dozen Nells, eight Wildcats, and eight Buffaloes from Pico Armor (Oddzial Osmy). And for the last couple of years those 1/600 planes had been sitting idle. Recently I got them out of the gaming closet, cleaned up the castings by cutting off the extra metal bits, and primed them in preparation for painting. 

One thing about 1/600 miniature aircraft, whether they are from Pico Armor or Tumbling Dice, is that they are very affordable. Pico has Nells at $1.50 each, while their American fighters come in at seventy-five cents per miniature. Tumbling Dice are even more cost efficient at $1.00 for the Nells and fifty cents for the Wildcats and Buffaloes. The latter castings are not as detailed or as properly scaled as the offerings from Pico Armor, but the price point, before shipping from Old Blighty, is better, and Tumbling Dice has a more comprehensive offering of aircraft.

Image from Pico Armor website

Image from Tumbling Dice website

Wildcat, Nell, and Buffalo, primed and awaiting a paint order to arrive

As for painting - normally I send off my planes to Miscellaneous Miniatures or I-94 for painting. They both do fine work at an affordable price. But, as the planes I am working on for Wake Atoll are fairly simple in paint scheme, and I should be able to handle the chore of applying national insignia decals, I will be taking a stab at painting the Wake Atoll planes myself. I seem to do decently well with my 1/144 World War One projects, so tackling 1/600 should be workable. I foresee a couple of issues - one is the small nature of the planes which might be a fiddly aspect when trying to paint, and the other is applying a magnet that won't overwhelm the miniature to those tiny fuselage bottoms.

Once the paints have arrived, I will paint up the Americans first, just to see how the planes look in their early war scheme, and to see if I enjoy painting such a tiny scale. More to come!

French Surprise After Action Report

After the first turn, two Vichy taking off while another pair come in to assist

For some time I have been wanting to do this small introductory scenario found within the Check your 6! rules. Today three of us were able to put the scenario on the table. It was a fun game, although my buddy Bill had to run four planes (I usually try to keep my games at two planes per player). It was not a good day to be Vichy French.

My skilled and green pilots coming in from the west

The setup required a five hex airfield, which I only have a two hex version, so we used five anti-aircraft markers instead. Due to previous attacks on the airfield there was smoke that covered the five hexes up to TAL 3 (the scenario takes place at Surface Low CAB).

A pair of Wildcats have just completed a strafing run, while two D.520s are just taking off. Another pair of Vichy French planes are coming into the action, as are pair of Wildcats coming down from high cover.

Let the dancing begin

Robustness rolls seemed to be the main issue early in this game, as the French kept failing to save, and started taking damage. Their veteran pilot suffered an airframe hit, and next turn tried to pull off an extreme maneuver - and one failed aircrew check later caused the destruction of the Frenchie. Another D.520 took a hit, then another, causing another French loss. In the meantime I had taken an airframe hit with my of my Wildcats, but was able to successfully extricate that damaged Grumman off of a friendly edge. The last D.520 took an airframe hit but has a chance to build speed an exit. 

I had miscalculated the number of hexes the French could move, which resulted in the sole American damage

By the time Bill was hitting, especially with that cannon in the D.520, the Americans started making their robustness rolls. Final score was 16 to 1 in favor of the Americans...let's call it a torching of the Vichy!

Scott's Wildcats coming in over the airfield, with my skilled pilot lining up his best shot

This was a fun little scenario to host and play in. I hope to pull off several more Operation Torch scenarios in the future as I am putting together a little scenario "booklet" on the American portion of the campaign.

Planes - Raiden Miniatures

Mat - Hotz Mats

Updates on the Wake Project

Art by Marc Stewart

I am slowly moving forward on gaming Wake. I have now worked up six scenarios that are a mix of historical and what-ifs that will need a little playtesting. All will feature the newly painted Wake Island Atoll piece that was made by Fight's On, but seemingly no longer available. The scenarios also feature a variety of aircraft types - for the Japanese one will see the Nell, Mavis, Zero, Kate, and Val, while the United States Marines have Wildcats and at least one scenario with Buffalos. I am also looking at a couple more possible scenarios to add in to the mix. Once the scenarios have been completed and playtested a bit I plan on putting together a pdf with the scenarios, plane data, a bit of a background, and a listing of manufacturers.

The full mat will look like this - one can barely discern the hexes

I have ordered a cloth sea mat from Deep Cut Studio, using their waterworld file. The mat should turn out well as their other products I have ordered are crackin' good and their service is stellar. Deep Cut is located in Lithuania I receive my mats within 7-10 days. The Fight's On piece should blend nicely with the mat.

The finished Fight's On Wake Atoll terrain piece

I still need to collect Japanese aircraft, which is a bit of an issue. Buying a dozen Nells does not thrill me, and one can add in a couple of Mavis flying boats to that cost, let alone the Kates, Vals, and Zeros, none of which I own. Luckily I have gaming buds that have the carrier-based planes needed, but when doing a project I do like to have all sides covered. I also need to send off my Table Top Flights Wildcats and Buffaloes to Kevin at Miscellaneous Miniatures for painting. While I do have Nells, Wildcats, and Buffaloes in 1/600 scale (Pico Armor), I think adding magnets to such small fuselages would be an exercise in patience, which I am in short supply when it comes to such chores. However, it would be an easier way (meaning cheaper) to put together all the aircraft needed. And while Pico Armor does not make the Mavis, Tumbling Dice does.

Torched - After Action Report

Yesterday at the local game store (well, not that local, about a 50 minute drive) I hosted my hypothetical Operation Torch scenario. The event assumes that both Vichy French and American aircraft have violated Spanish Moroccan airspace, and the Spanish have responded in kind by scrambling Heinkel He 112s. This is a three-sided affair, with all three sides vying for victory. It is designed to be used as an introductory scenario to teach those new to Check Your 6! the game system. 

The combat takes place a Low CAB. The starting locations and TAL are determined by die rolls. Six players, two for each faction each running two aircraft, with each faction having one each of the four pilot skill types (ace, veteran, skilled, and green). Each section of two planes roll to see which edge they begin, so for example the Spanish players might start at Edge 2 or Edge 4, based on their die roll. Ironically each faction rolled such that both pairs of fighters started in the same area (for their faction). TAL rolls were interesting, with the French and Spanish players being widely dispersed, while the Americans started at TALs five and six.

The French forces maneuvered in Area F, heading generally towards the oncoming Spanish who were in Area D. The Americans made a beeline towards the French, with the Yanks starting in Area C. As the forces closed in, deflections shots reigned, and rained, but the French D.520s did some excellent work, knocking down the green and skilled American Wildcats. It was not looking good for the remaining Americans, as the Spanish split their sections, one focusing on the reduced Americans and the other swooping in behind the French. But the Americans held on.

The Spanish lost the next plane to the Wildcats (if memory serves), with two others taking various damage. The French continued to dance with the Americans. It was looking like a French victory, but the Americans continued to fight, their veteran and ace pilots swirling about. Then a French fighter took damage, and then another fell out of the sky. The Spanish ace splashed one the D520s, but ran out of ammo and had to leave the dogfight. With no Spanish left to to take out the Americans, and the French having troubles of their own, the Americans pulled out a victory.

I rather enjoyed hosting this game. All of the players had gamed CY6 in the past, so that made running the game rather easy. You can find this scenario on the Downloads page above.

Planes - Raiden and MSD Games

Mat - Hotz Mats

New Check Your 6! Projects

Ah, the latest batch of toys have arrived from Chris Geisert of I-94. I have three World War Two projects with this grouping - a hypothetical Operation Torch threeway battle, a late war "what if" featuring the Ryan Fireball, and a Swiss/German encounter, based on an actual battle in 1940. The turnaround time for the planes to be painted was less than two weeks from the time I shipped them until the time they returned back to my door. I went with Chris as he did all my Korean War planes so I knew he would do a nice job. The schemes were taken from various plates found on Wings Palette. The tones are a bit dark in the pictures, but look very nice in person. All I need to do is to get magnets on them and they are ready of the tabletop!

To start us off we have German Bf.110s vs. Swiss Bf.109s.  

MSD Games Bf.110 and a Raiden Bf.109. Cool Swiss markings, yes?

Then off to North Africa for a three sided affair.

Raiden De.520, Raiden F4F Wildcat, and MSD Games He.112

And finally to the Pacific for some very late war what could have been.

MSD Games Ryan Fireball and a Raiden Ki.100

I pretty much have the scenarios for all three projects worked out. Time for some playtesting!

Wake (Not Woke) Island

Cool artwork by John Shaw!

Well, I am probably safe to say that anyone who is "woke" probably doesn't know Wake, but as for me, time to get another little Check Your 6! project knocked out! And this time, I am going...small! I ordered a few 1/600 scale aircraft from Pico Armor because I did not want to buy a slew of bombers in 1/285th for a one off sort of project. While I picked up Wildcats and Nells, the Nells were only part of the earliest air attacks on Wake...other attacks on the atoll were delivered by Mavis flying boats and carrier based aircraft. I have a list of dates, types of planes, and numbers, and was hoping to run a small campaign, but I really do not want to buy a bunch of Mavis's because even at 1/600 scale they are still three bucks a piece.

Once these little birds arrive I will be sending them off to Chris Geisert of I-94 for painting, along with several 1/285th selections. Kevin Hammond of Miscellaneous Miniatures simply does not have the time to paint commission projects any longer, which is a shame because I've enjoyed using his services, but I am very glad he completed the 1948 Arab-Israeli project for me.  Chris does nice work as well...all my Korean War aircraft are done by him.

As always, more on this in a future post!

Cat and Mouse Over Wake - Artwork by Marc Stewart

Torched

Today I received two orders for planes for yet another project, the background setting being Operation Torch. I love doing odd periods, or odd pieces of common conflicts, and I like odd or lesser known aircraft. One of my favorite planes is the Heinkel He.112. Why? I like the sleek look, the fact that the prototype was faster than the Bf.109, and that it was in service with Romania, Spain, and Hungary. I've been planning on buying some of these planes for a couple of years now, but only MSD Games seemed to make a quality version, even though MSD seems to be more 1/300 than 1/285. And I was going to buy them to use as Romanians to fight against Soviet I-16s. But other voices got inside my brain, so I have come up with something a bit different.

I also like the paint schemes of United States Navy aircraft for Torch, and was going to buy four Wildcats and four D.520s for the scenario that appears in the Check Your 6! rule book. But I also really like those Heinkels, so I have come up with a three-sided scenario that I can use to teach new players, using Spanish Heinkels as the third party. The Spanish did have some encounters with both the Americans and the Vichy French, so it wasn't a huge stretch to create this intro scenario. So along with my MSD order for four Heinkels, I also ordered four each of the Raiden F4Fs and Dewoitines from I-94.

While the basic parts of the scenario have been written, I still need to add a bit of background, and also figure out national move order for the three sides. If you are interested in an MS Word file of what I have completed thus far, leave a comment and I'll provide my email address to you.

Check Your 6! Updates

A bit of a summary, mostly for my own later reference, but some of the projects I am toying with for Check Your 6!

Spanish Civil War - I have a few Heinkel He 51s, Bf 109s, and now with my friend's collection, some CR.32s. I need some more bad guys to go against them.  I do have four I-16s painted up, but in Soviet markings.

German-Czech What If - Just got my order for eight Avia B-534s from MSD, and I plan on buying some early mark Bf.109s to go against them, but I still need to find a few period German bombers to add in. Most of the German bombers on the market that were round in 1938 are later period versions, and so a bit incorrect.

Romanian-Soviet Front - I like the Heinkel He 112, a lot. While there were only a few made (less than 100) it is still a cool looking bird. There is a neat encounter in June, 1941 in which Romanian He 112s are strafing a Soviet airfield while the I-16s based on the field are taking off. Turns into a hairball of a fight, with a dozen Heinkels facing upwards of thirty Ratas. Rating the He 112 is a bit of a bear, seemingly a tad slower than the Bf 109B, less agile, but more maneuverable, I think I would rate the 112 as follows:  A4+1, with a robustness of 1, and armed with FF: 2xLVC, 2xLMG. This would make them a tad better than the I-16, with a better punch for armament, which should help a bit with the number disparity. I already have four I-16s painted in Soviet colors, but would need to order some Heinkels from MSD along with a slew more of the Ratas.

American Volunteer Group - I've always liked their story, and with the addition of several scenarios in one of the Check Your 6! books that was released recently, there are now something like fifteen scenarios published that include the Tigers. I have no aircraft for this project.

Wake Island - Another one of those stories that pull me in again and again. However, while I look the look of those Marine Wildcats at Wake, after the initial Japanese bombing attack, only four remained, and they faced Mavis flying boats after the initial attack. I can't see buying a ton of flying boats for one project - they are expensive! Perhaps I can do something from the Cactus Air Force scenario book as I do like the look of those early Wildcats!