Tank Goodness: WW2 Armour for Bolt Action/Konflikt 47!

I’m back! It’s been an absolutely insane last few weeks, limiting my blogging output by a great deal. I’ve been desperately missing it. In the second week of January I accepted a job in nearby Chesley, Ontario, a very small town with a lot of history and character, and also incidentally where my local gaming group resides. While I’ve been apartment hunting for a place closer to my new job, I’ve been poring over as much Konflikt 47/Bolt Action content as I can.

I’ve fallen back in love with the Weird War game in particular. It appeals to a much broader audience at my local hangout, as many eschew historical games but are much more game if it’s not straight history anymore. My British have been dusted off, and even added to. The most recent additions were two sections of late war Commandos, armed with Vickers K machine guns and as many Thompson’s as I can grab off the sprue. I even painted some!

But this was months ago. In the dreadfully unpredictable Canadian winter, which is currently on the nasty side of the scale, I cannot paint anything I had not already primed. And I had begun to amass a truly outrageous backlog of 28mm WW2 kits. I have currently unbuilt a British and Canadian Army Starter Box, an additional British and Canadian Infantry box, and while I got them done today, I had also an LVT-4, A34 Comet, and a troop of Stuart’s to build. I was able to put at least a small dent into this backlog as of this evening.

I started by building one of the three Stuarts I had gotten. Now the Stuart in Bolt Action has a mixed reputation; in most configurations it is a merely above average Light Tank, but the M3 model has the option to have 5(!) medium machine guns. This paired with its cheap points made it an absolutely lethal choice in tournament play, and the reputation of the tank suffered as it was used by the ultra-competitive crowd. Interestingly enough, this is the reverse of history as most times the machine guns were removed in these early variants in actual combat usage.

But for Konflikt, this option doesn’t exist. The Stuart available to Konflikt 47 British armies is the M5 and onward version, which had a different powerplant and more modern appearance. It still features hull, pintle, and coaxial machine guns, along with the 37mm main gun. As a solid light tank to deal with hordes of zombies and such, it does nicely.

Next up on the docket was an LVT-4. This was a gift for Christmas from my friend Ty. For the Crossing of the Rhine and the Battle of the Scheldt in both systems, the LVT-4 is very useful indeed. In Konflikt it can transport an 8 man unit of Galahad Heavy Infantry quite well, as its 30 man capacity and the Galahad’s costing two slots means I have room to spare still. Warlord does a serviceable resin LVT-4, but after how boring a build the Centurion from them was, I was quite happy to receive the plastic Rubicon Models version.

The build on this was finicky, not overly difficult, but fairly time consuming. A lot of thin parts and shallow keying on the connecting points meant it took a great deal of finesse to build!

Last up was the A34 Comet, a Christmas gift from my friend Chris. This late war British tank was everything the Cromwell was meant to be, with a lethal 77mm gun derived from the 17 Pounder. It was fast, decently armoured, and would have been a great tank even post-war…had the British not simultaneously invented the Centurion! In Konflikt both of these tanks are available, and I own a Warlord Centurion. The Comet gives me a cheaper(just!) option with similar stats from the front. While in our timeline they only managed to equip the 11th Armoured Division entirely with them, in Konflikt I can see them seeing much wider adoption. Perhaps I will even kitbash a Tesla option…despite that being a downgrade in the rules from the Super-Heavy Anti-Tank gun it has!

The Tank Workshop today was definitely fun! I still have two more Stuarts to build, as well as a lot of infantry to work on. I have my work cut out for me over the next few weeks!

I haven’t gotten around to what unit my infantry will be modeled as. I have two friends who play Canadians in Bolt Action and Konflikt 47, so while I have a lot of Canadian pride I may paint up a British unit instead. I have in my mind a Bridge too Far, and have this plan to build them up as XXX Corp, specifically the Irish Guards. The Guards Armoured Division has a little bit of everything, and the Konflikt 47 timeline lets me expand upon that in new and interesting directions. The infantry will be versatile in either direction I choose. The vehicle choices available means I will probably need to grab some Shermans. Annoyingly, the Konflikt 47 rules only allow Sherman V’s and Fireflies in a Canadian selector, but I may just…ignore that. My local group doesn’t really mind, and it lets me build a Bolt Action list at the same time.

In other news, my new job is fantastic. I’ve never done woodworking before, and it’s definitely a new experience. The factory I’m at was built in 1906, and the dichotomy between old and new in the plant is breathtaking.

The town of Chesley is winning me over too. A classic slice of small town Canadiana, it’s got its rough edges, sure…but the history is everywhere.

I will probably be posting more build progress on the weekends, as those are my days off. I miss blogging immensely, and with Konflikt 47 getting a shot in the arm recently with the new comic series in the works as well as the promise of a consolidated rulebook on the horizon, it is a great time to be a Weird War fan. As for my move to Chesley, it’ll mean some changes in lifestyle but I look forward to continuing my online presence, come hell or high-water. And I really hope to keep the job going, it’s the best one I’ve had in years.

But, that is all I have for today. I’ll see you folks in the next one! In the meantime, I’m going to watch A Bridge Too Far(again!). Happy Wargaming wherever you are, and have a great day!