Recruiting new super cheap troops to the collection

In most countries, but Norway, the spring time seems to be 'the season' for toy soldier markets, swap meets, toy soldier conversions and so on taken all the different adds popping up on Facebook and reviews posted on blogs and YouTube. As earlier mentioned in this blog, this is not a big business or market in Norway anymore, so 'finds' are rare and often 'over-priced'. So I was really surprised when visiting our local toy shop earlier this week and saw they were offering super cheap bags of army men. They are clearly 'china-copies', but not to that worst sub quality often found. I decided to grab a couple of different bags to have closer look at them.

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Bag 1

For only £5,2/ $6,4 or €6 you get 100 army men in 2 different colors (50 each side) close to 54mm size in 8 different poses. Enough troops to form 4 Platoons or a Company. They are molded in fairly hard plastic, and the details are fairly crisp. The mold lines are not disturbing and there are no flash. They are not as 'flat' as many 'china copies' often are, but the 'sculpts' are typically china-copies though. Anyone recognizing the originals?

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The army men seems to decipts 'modern' US soldiers with 'old' kevlar helmets. They are armed with AR-styled rifles, and one has a SAW machine gun and one seems to have a shotgun (with magazine?). One rifle is undefined, and a couple of the troops looks to have older paratrooper M1 helmets.

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Bag2

For only £2,2/ $2,75 or €2,6 you get 72 army men in 2 different colors (36 each side) in 40-45mm size in 12 different poses. Enough troops to form 3 Platoons. They are molded in the same color and fairy hard plastic as their bigger counterparts, and ok details. These are more what you can expect from cheap Chinese copies and are flater, stranger propositions, have larger mold lines and more flash, and have useless bases. Due to their size and they're are so skinny, they feel small. They have clearly poorer quality than their bigger counterparts.

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They clearly decipts some kind of modern troops of more generic type. They're mostly armed with some AR-looking rifles and there are no heavy weapons in this set either. One is armed with something appears to be a 'butter knife' (!). What's nice about them is that of the 12 different poses 4 are equipped with boonie hats, 4 with caps and 4 with kevlar helmets of the old type. I have not seen these poses before, so I wonder if any recognize these origins as well?

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Conclusion

I'm currently busy with other modelling and gaming projects, and have no plan how to use these figures yet. -But as the availability in Norway are very limited, not buying them for this reasonable price was actually not an option. 
Time will show....

An easy modelling project to create replaceable loads to your rollingstock

By this time I have more LGB-cars than my LGB-locomotive can haul, so I actually don't need to add so many more new wagons to the rake. But sometimes, I think it would be nice to be able to carry around different loads or sometimes with no loads at all instead of being limited to permanently fixed loads or empties. Sometimes members in my MRC, Gleng Modelljernbaneklubb, arrange running-sessions on their garden railways with different themes, and then it would be nice to be able to temporary load my existing cars with a another and themed load.

To be able to change different loads between my existing LGB-wagons, I've been trying out different ways to secure my loads without permanently gluing them down, so they can be easily replaced with new ones. Here I'll show some few ways I use to temporary secure different loads to my G-scale wagons.

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Tacky putty

This is originally a product for hanging up posters etc. It's Tacky and can temporary lightly attach smaller objects and loads.

...-no, he did not shit himself...
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String

This is a waxed string for jewellery I bought in a craft shop. It can be used as a 'rope' to secure medium loads. It's simply wrapped around your load and tucked in between the stakes and stakeholders on LGB wagons. Trim with scissors for neat cuts.

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Elastic bands

Almost everything I've been buying at the local Dollar Store has not worked as intended. -Except for these elastic hair bands. They works great for securing larger loads. It can either be wrapped around your load and wagon unmodified, or it can be cut and have a hook added in both ends. The hooks them selves are made by just bending links from a larger chain for jewellery from the craft shop. I found inspiration for tis method in this YouTube video

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Chains

In the craft shop I also found chains for jewellery in different sizes, which also can be used to secure your loads.

Here the chains are combined with wheel-blocks, which is again attached with tacky putty. It's very easy to remove the carload if desired.
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Deck

Another way to change larger loads is to make new decks/floors for your wagons with different loads attached to them. The wooden sticks are again from the craft shop. 

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Does it work?

I wanted to give a friend a gift as he let's us run trains on his garden railway monthly, and thought I should bring the gift as a car-load. The load was so heavy, unstable and had such a high center of gravity that it would be challenging to secure it properly, so this would be the ultimate test if the techniques works. I had to use almost all og them; I 3D-printed a cradle for the bottle and attached the cradle to the wagon with tacky putty. The bottle it self was secured with both strings and elastic hair bands with hooks. It wouldn't look so good if the gift fell off and broke, so I think this is the proof that this works and will secure your loads too without permanently fixing them.

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A prequel 'Planet of the Apes' wargame - The Initial Confrontation

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Last summer saw the release of some ElastoWitt 54mm Planet of The Apes figures (I think) from the original movies. At the same time, I saw several reviews of these figures on other blogs and Facebook groups. I'm a huge fan of the Planet of the Apes series and I've been planning to do a 'fantasy' and 'sci-fi' gameplay, so a POTA-scenario would be ideal. -But as with all miniatures and soldiers; These Planet of the Apes figures are just impossible to get in Norway, and the shipping costs, rising prices in general and bad exchanges rate can't justify it.

While writing the blogpost on prehistoric warfare, I found information that chimpanzees not only went to "war" and fought other chimpanzees, but they were also found using very simple weapons such as simplified "spears" for hunting. Chimpanzees have also been reported to have attacked both humans and gorillas. Chimpanzees are very territorial, about 4 times as strong as a human of similar size, and they can reach speeds of 40 kph/25 mph.

This got me thinking if Planet of the Apes could not only be a good sci-fi story, but with some liberties and artistic licenses could it really have happened somewhere in 'The Darkest Africa' for example? At least for a fantasy wargame scenario?? Just "What-if"???

Records show that soldiers have been attacked by wild animals during conflicts in the past. One of the most famous attacks was from World War II when reports claim that hundreds of Japanese soldiers were attacked and eaten by crocodiles during the Battle of Ramree Island in 1945. Could such a thing have happened if soldiers encountered a group of enemy chimpanzees armed with spears in "Darkest Africa" ​​defending their territory ? It's probably not very likely, but it makes an interesting scenario for a skirmish wargame; one side with ranged weapons vs. the other side that doesn't, but that is faster and far more superior in close combat.

Creating an Ape Army

Since I wasn't going to buy the POTA figures from ElastoWitt, or from any other manufacturers either, I had to look elsewhere to build my 'budget ape army'. On Thingiverse I found some free Planet of the Apes files (#2 and #3) that I decided to resize, repositioning and print on my new (and upgraded) 3D printer, a FlashForge Adventurer 3. -It's still an FDM printer though (with all it's limitations creating miniatures...). Some step-by-step photos of creating the ape army can be seen in the 'March Workbench updates'.

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The human army is simply made up of regular army men I've painted and used in previous wargames.

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The Rules

For this little skirmish game I wanted to use Thor Sheil's OMOG - One Man, One Gun rules in combination with OMOK - One Man, One Knight rules. They are very 'similar' (just for different periods) so I use OMOG for the 'human army' due to their ranged weapons and OMOK for the ape army because of their pole arms.

To keep it simple, I used the quick reference sheets created by Steve Snark, which can be downloaded from the OMOG Facebook group's files section.

However, some house rules seemed necessary; Since Chimanzees are very fast, I let them move twice as fast as a "human move". They have brutal strength, a strong bite and deadlier teeth, so I think they will be far superior to humans in hand-to-hand combat, so they get an additional +1 in melee for their physical strength.

The Scenario

To keep this related to the Planet of the Apes, I have placed this scenario to the same period as the original POTA book La Plaète des singes was written by Pierre Boulle in 1963. Wild chimpanzees are only found in West and Central Africa. Fortunately, I already have miniatures covering that region and period. During the Congo Crisis, troops from the newly independent Republic of the Congo, the Armèe Nationale Congolaise (ANC), were sent into the South Kasai region to fight the rebels there due to a rebellion and insurgency there in the period of 1960-63.

Some time during this campaign, a lightly armed squad (among several) of 8 soldiers from the ANC was on a search and destroy patrol at outskirts of the jungle in a very remote area of ​​the South Kasai region in 1962 to look for Kasai rebels there. To be able to move quickly, they were lightly armed, only with rifles and a submachine gun. The squad fights as 2 fire teams with 4 members in each.

The ANC squad is totally unaware that they are moving into territory claimed by a group of 15 hostile chimpanzees armed with simple thrusting spears. Unlike the human army, they have no ranged weapons, but are superior in hand-to-hand combat. The 'ape army' is not 'organized' but fights as 3 groups of 5 each.

The Game

The ANC search and destroy patrol...

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...are totally unaware that they are about to enter territory claimed by a pack of hostile Chimpanzees and that they are being watched doing so.

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Suddenly groups of Chimpanzees armed with spears came rushing out of the bush, screaming, towards the ANC squad...

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...the soldiers are taken by surprise but some of them managed to open fire (before it became too late), and kill some of the raging Chimpanzees...

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-But the Chimpanzees didn't care if they lost some fellow members of their group, and just kept storming into the ANC squad and entered hand-to-hand combat... 

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...and clashed into a brutal fight...

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...even if some of the soldiers managed to kill a couple of Chimpanzees in this nasty close combat...

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...they just didn't have a chance against the Chimpanzees. The rearmost soldiers tried to retreat when the rest of their squad was wiped out...

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...but the raging Chimpanzees were faster and kept following the retreating soldiers...

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...until the last man standing were surrendered and killed.

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Even if they lost about half their members, this was a victory for the apes as they managed to take out all the intruders of their territory. 

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When the remains of 'the lost patrol' was later found by others, it was clear that the casualties had injuries matching both Chimpanzee-attacks and spear injuries. The apes was gone for now, and so was some of the rifles from the eliminated ANC squad..... (did the Apes take them?)

When these observations was later reported perhaps that inspired Pierre Boulle to write 'La Plaète des singes', the book which the later films of 'Plante of the Apes' was based upon...

Conclusion

This scenario took just about 10 turns and 20-30 minutes to play, so I actually had time to play it 3 times. In a fight between someone with firearms and those without but having better close combat weapons, it's clear that those with firearms are only effective if they manage to keep their opponent at a distance for a time. In such a scenario the side with ranged weapons does not have a lot of time to use them and their advantages, before being in close combat, where other weapons are more effective.

Some updates on Thor Sheil's OMOG and OMOK rules

At the time it looks like the late Thor Sheil's  salvaged army men website are 'down' again, and so are the links to his free wargaing rules. I'm not sure if his website will be online again this time, so I'd thought I'd share some links where you can still find several of his free wargaming rules:

• At the Facebook-group 'Wargaming with Toy Soldiers and Army men - Everything Free Wargame-rules' I've uploaded a lot of free online wargame rules in the file section, including some of the rules earlier found on Thor Sheil's website.
• The Facebook-group 'Shambattle and OMOG Toysoldiers Games' are created by Thor Sheil himself and dedicated to his games. In the groups filesection many of his wargame rules are uploaded. This is an open Facebook group with few members, so in courtesy feel free to sign up as a member when using the rules.

If Thor Sheil's website doesn't return, I must consider to update this blog's link sections and replace inactive links to his rules with my own downloads. Updated: Already done thru Waybackmachine with those few URLs which were saved there. Too bad not all of them were.

An April Workbench update - Bombs Away! (Mostly 3D-prints)

As I've been away for almost a month there hasn't been much time for wargaming, modelling or to generate so many new modelling-projects for April. Now I'm back again, so I'm slowly starting to get something on the workbench again by preparing new modelling-projects by firstly making parts for them on the 3D-printer.

A friend and a member of my MRC was inviting other friends and members for a running-session on his garden railway this Easter, and I wanted to give him something back and an item for an 'Easter egg hunt' in his own garden and within my rake. Not making the gift too obvious it needed to be camouflaged into something that could be loaded on my military garden trains. Some few more pieces were 3D-printed. 

Assembled on a bottle of beer it becomes more obvious what kind of load I'm turning the gift into. Bottles of beer are usually best served cold, and they have a shape that can vaguely resembles grenades. That's why I usually just call them "Kalde Granater", which would translate into something like "Cold Grenades", and is a Norwegian jargon for practicing grenades. Despite being an aerial bomb, considering the scale, this is pretty much literally a "Kald Granat" I think.

To make it look like a load which belongs in a military train it needed some further cover. I decided to use the same technique I used when Covering a model not looking so good by adding tarpaulin to it.

I used gladpack between the bottle and tissue-paper when adding the diluted pva glue, so the tarpaulin could easily be removed from the bottle again and uncover the real load. It lifts of easily as a lid and can be reused several times.

Mounted on flatcar I think this looks pretty acceptable. Keeping in mind that the railcar is 1:19 scale, this must be a really big aerial bomb. 

 

This is another 'project' I've recently printed currently working on, and shows the different stages from a 3D-printed model into an assembled and ready for paint:

Some models needs to be divided and printed in smaller parts due to my 3D-printer which limits the maximum building size to 15×15×15 cm

They needs to be removed from the raft (base) and be cleaned for supports. Then I dryfit the parts to see that they fits each other and adjust if necessary 

I use CA-glue to attach the parts together. When fully cured I use filler in the cracks and sand them...

...To a smooth finish. This model is printed to a 'standard' resolution and have visible print lines. If you want to remove them you can keep on sanding the model...

...or use car filler from a rattle can. This is how smooth it gets with 3 layers. You can sand between the layers, but I didn't do so, and like how it turned out.

Due to work anf 'every day life' this project is still ongoing, and will return in a future blogpost when ready.

Please follow for updates

Since Alan from  The Duchy of Tradgardland showed his 'workbench clutter', I was inspired to show some of mine and reveal a hint or two of what to expect in this blog in the future...