From ChrisP: 28mm Taliban & Modern Americans (193 points)

This time from me, we have the Taliban Insurgents to be an OPFOR (opposition force) for my Modern US I sent through recently. Primarily they are Empress sculpts, with a few additions from the Eureka range. 

The bones of the force is made up of 8 soldiers with AK-47s (or derivatives thereof), in addition to one having a Light Machine Gun. These are all Empress sculpts.

The firepower for the basic guys comes from three insurgents with Rocket Propelled Grenades (RPGs), again cheap, seen all over the world and incredibly nasty.

The insurgents also have a "dicker", which is a British term for an observer with a phone, who might be calling in troop movements or mortars or the like. I like to think he is actually just on the phone to his mum, "But mum, all the other kids are allowed out to fight the infidel...."

Heavier firepower comes in multiple forms for this Taliban force, ranging from very accurate in a marksman with an SVD sniper rifle, to a two man machine gun team, to a DsHK heavy machinegun, right up to a recoil-less rifle or even a Stinger Anti-Aircraft Missile!

Lastly we have a unit of 4 Insurgents, these guys are a bit more hard core with better assault rifles, body armour and camo. One even has a ski mask! They must be hard core. Or off skiing. Perhaps in a Bond Film.

I am pretty happy with how these have turned out over all, I used a reasonably limited colour palate to keep them a bit more unified. I plan to add a few more bits and pieces to them hopefully before the painting challenge is through.

As for the Americans, they needed a cool way to get to battle. Option number one, is to ride in a HMMWV, armed with a Mk 19 40mm Grenade Machine Gun. This is a 1/48th scale Tamiya kit, built exactly as the box said. The soldier has been put in there for scale. I am really happy with how this turned out, and am already planning another!

Perhaps driving isn't for you? So for those who rather aerial insertion, I converted two MH-6 Little Bird helicopters. Starting with an Academy kit, I cut off the doors, built bench seats and gave it a swish black paint job ready to represent the helicopters from Task Force 160. I am really happy with the conversion, and the painting of the pilots (hence the close up), but my big fat thumb decided it wanted to have the last laugh, and put smudges all over the canopies of both helicopters. Much swearing later, I have accepted my failings and have moved on. Will I replace the canopies in the future? Possible.

Last, but surely not least is a 1/144th scale LaGG-3 fighter aircraft from Zvezda. This is going to be part of my Soviet Tank force (last seen here a month or so ago) for a competition at the weekend. The paintjob came straight from googling the LaGG on the internet, nice and simple!

I need to get back to clearing my painting table, I have too many half done things so I am trying to get some things actually done now.

Holy crap that is a shedload of excellent toys Chris! That HMMWV is a particularly fine piece of work and compares very nicely with 28mm figures.

This great assortment of figures and vehicles will give Chris 193 points to add to his first place lead. Well done!