Schnell, Schnell, Normandie!

Hey Guys,

Jamie here; and this is the beginnings of my 1st SS army! I think Andy and Jez really set the BAR (see what I did there,)  high for me and Brian this week: so be sure to check out their posts if you haven't already.

I thought I'd use my first post to take you through  the inspiration for the army, how I went about deciding upon a list and finally show my first unit. The first, and always most important, aspect of an army I look for is theme. I am not a power gamer, and the rich history of WW2 is what really gets me passionate about a project. I wanted to do a unique army that perhaps we do not see much of on the table. Warlord and Italeri were kind enough to oblige me with a theme with the recent release of the plastic Puma. This beautiful piece of kit was used by only a small number of units in Normandy, which is my primary interest after studying it at University. As I wanted to paint figures that would both push my skills and be fun; I decided on the recon regiment of the 1st SS.

So with this in mind I quickly opened my Armies of Germany and set about creating a list I thought would be both thematic and fun to paint. You can view it here! I've already mentioned that I prefer painting AFVs so everything in my army has space within a transport; and I couldn't resist adding a kubelwagen to really give it that recce feel. I made one unit within my army pioneers due to my research indicating there would be elements of a pioneer company within the reece regiment, and also because I didn't want my themed army to be totally useless on the table! Smaller units mean my short attention span shouldn't be too stretched. The next thing was ordering my army, I went directly to Warlord due to their high level of customer service, as well as quick dispatch time! A couple of days later I had the following (quite scary for a slow painter like me) piles of resin, lead and plastic waiting for me! There's a few spares in there incase I mess up, as well for if I expand later on.

And here is my first; humble, contribution to the blog. It's the unit of five guys with panzerfausts painted in a mixture of camo. There are two duplicates within the squad, however by painting them different camo, basing them different and also taking advantage of the warlord figure head system I think I have evaded my squad looking like something out of the clone wars. This unit is in my list for one simple reason: tank hunting. My main afv only has a medium AT gun, so I am hoping 4 panzerfausts will equal the playing the field. I see them as half of a squad, with the other half being my Assault Rifle unit.

I'm really bad at taking photographs so I am sorry about the poor quality. I have a new camera on the way which will hopefully help with this. I will also be able to take some video show cases of each squad; but this will wait until I have something more substantial to show. These guys have been abit of a learning experience for me. I have been forced to accept that for a force it is better to concentrate on units rather than individual figures; in the immortal words of fellow beardy, Andy Volleyfire;

"Dude you're painting a force stop worrying about minor things, stop stripping figures."

                                                  And from Jez;
"Dude you have a deadline, stick to it, no excuses."

As I scrambled about for stripper, and also an extension. I also have some wisdom of my own to share; I have recently taken to using cellulose thinners to stop metal figures. Do not ever do this on resin and plastic! I now have a melted kubelwagen, as I learnt this lesson the hard way. I have really enjoyed painting this unit though, and experimenting with bases; also I have found mixing colors individually for each figure means that each figure has slightly different shades. I like this; as it it shows different ages on the uniform. As the 1st SS in Normandy were a mixture of new recruits and veterans from the eastern front.I am also enjoying mixing camos to really capture the look and feel of an SS unit in battle.


My next installment for this SS force will be in a fortnight; I hope to have a couple of more interesting things to show you then. Maybe a hanomag, Definitely some some more SS infantry. But with me, who knows? Hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year!


-Jamie