Painting 20mm 1940 BEF

1940 BEF Rifleman

With my French forces painted, I wanted another force to face the Germans and of course the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) seemed like a natural choice, especially as I wanted to run the Many Rivers to Cross PSC with them.

I had backed the Studio Historia Kickstarter For King & Country: Britain at War Vol 1 BEF (1939-1941) so I had the models I needed. I recommend these models but printing at 20mm presented its own challenges as some of the modelling is a little over detailed resulting in some very thin parts of the model in 20mm. I replaced the rifles to get rid of the flimsy rifle straps, thicken up the bits I needed to print and spent way too long trying to get the damned Norton motorcycle squad to print (a personal nightmare). I also edited a lot of the STLs to make them standing and more to my liking, all in all these models took a lot of tweaking.

My required list to play the PSC and also permit me to fill out most of the Support List with is:

Basic 1940 Regulation Platoon

• Senior Leader or two and a Platoon Sergeant
• 4 sections each of Junior Leader, 3 man Bren LMG, 7 riflemen (I will probably do extra rifle men as well)
• 2 x 2" mortar team with three crew
• 2 x Boys Anti-Tank rifle teams of 2 men 
• Medical Orderly
• Engineer Teams 
• Thompson SMG options for Leaders
• Sniper Team
• "1 pounder" 25mm Anti-Tank gun (I can use the French one for this from Colonel Muller)
• Engineer Section (a throw back to the v1 rules, a Junior Leader and two three man engineer teams (no flamethrower in 1940) and can be equipped with Explosive Charges from the Support List.
• Vickers MMG
• 2 pounder Anti-Tank gun
• Forward Observer for fun

Of course any 1940 BEF force had lots of Blanco, in fact Blanco No.97 Khaki Green (Medium) is the Blanco of choice. The standout feature of these early war troops is their green webbing and I wanted to try and get it right if I can.

Painting Guide

Largely based on the excellent Painting Panzer's guide... 

with a few tweaks by me:

• Undercoat with 70.601 Vallejo Grey Primer.

• Paint uniform with 70.921 English Uniform.

• Paint the skin using 70.815 Basic Skin Tone and then apply two washes of ArmyPainter Quickshade Flesh Wash to bring it to life.

• Gas mask bag on chest, helmet chin straps and any rifle straps 70.988 Khaki

• Blanco webbing, water bottle straps, backpack, shovel case and gaiters in 70.924 Russian Uniform WWII.

• Water bottle body in 70.880 Khaki Grey

• Rifle woodwork and small bedroll in backpack with 70.875 Beige Brown.

• Bayonet, rifle metalwork and boots with 70.862 Black Grey.

• Helmet and Gas Cape with 70.887 US Olive Drab.

• Officer belts, straps and pouches in 70.846 Mahogany Brown

• Officer "cavalry" trousers in 70.988 Khaki

At this point all the dull stuff is done and you will feel disappointed that it all looks a bit pants - time for the wonder of washes!

Give it a wash of 50% Army Painter Strong Tone all over thinned with of 50% Vallejo 71.361 Airbrush Thinner. I usually do two washes as sometimes just one wash isn't strong enough for my liking but each to their own.

Now to the fun stuff that makes the figure really shine. When highlighting I basically repaint back with the original colour and then a highlight colour diluted down so it isn't too strong , some people mix paints but I am too lazy and just dilute with a dab of thinner.

• Highlight uniform with 70.921 English Uniform and then further highlight with 70.824 German Camo Orange Ochre.

• Highlight the Blanco with 70.924 Russian Uniform WWII, and then 70.891 Intermediate Green and then final touches with 70.885 Pastel Green. I found this really makes the early war webbing pop in a lovely limey green.

• Gas mask bag, helmet chin straps and rifle straps with 70.988 Khaki, then highlight with 70.884 Stone Grey

• Water bottle body with just 70.880 Khaki Grey

• Rifle woodwork and small bedroll in backpack with 70.875 Beige Brown and then further highlight with 70.843 Cork Brown

• Helmet and Gas Cape with 70.887 US Olive Drab and then on the helmet a dry brushing of 70.891 Intermediate Green

• Highlight noses, cheekbones and knuckles using 70.815 Basic Skin Tone.

• Officer belts, straps and pouches retouch in 70.846 Mahogany Brown and then highlight with 70.818 Red Leather

• Officer "cavalry" trousers in 70.988 Khaki and then highlight with 70.884 Stone Grey

Cpt. Cholmondley-Warner is judging your painting!

To help identify figures on the table, I have gone for painting edges of the bases 

• Senior Leader in dark red

• Junior Leader in orange

• Bren gun teams in grey

• Riflemen in plain black

Section almost finished with just the basing left to do

I hope you have enjoyed this guide and happy painting the sea of beige and khaki!

I will post some more pictures later of more finished figures.

Blitzkrieg! Scenario Explained

Connoisseurs of the early war period and devotees of the TFL "1940 Blitzkrieg 1940 Handbook" will doubtless be aware of the scenario Blitzkrieg! and it's rather confusing victory conditions and support qualifications.  

I caveat this statement with the fact that I found it confusing, it may be crystal clear to many but to me I was playing it the wrong way for several sessions until a post on the CoC Facebook page led me to take a second look at it. 

In the spirit of sharing my thinking and hopefully helping others to understand the scenario I thought I would share my thinking and explanation. I do not claim to understand Rich's design thinking, this is my interpretation of the logic behind the scenario and how to play it on the table.

So let us start with the source of my confusion, in the Objective for the Blitzkrieg! scenario:

The Blitzkrieg! Objective and source of confusion!

So I interpreted this as:

• Defender choses their Support choices
• Defender may not deploy any of their Support choices until they have played two full Chain of Command dice
• Attacker can use their Chain of Command dice to delay this by spending three points
• Attacker wins if they get two units off the table

This inevitably led to discussions around would some of the defender's Support choices appear before two CoC dice were played? Think of "Pre-Game Barrage", "Roadblock" or "Minefield" - do these not appear until two CoC dice are played by the defender, that doesn't seem to make sense as they are present at the start of the game usually? 

Usually this resulted in some of fudge and a feeling of something not being quite quite right. Players would eye each other nervously and agree to never play this scenario again!

Top minds at work on deciphering the true meaning

However, the scales fell from my eyes when I took another look at the scenario and it all became clear to me, well, at least, I think it has!

Let us look at the narrative behind the scenario, this is Blitzkreig! The enemy, usually German, is pushing aggressively forward and seeking to breach enemy lines, to exploit weakness and push further on in to the rear areas of the defender. The defender seeks to delay them and stymy the advance until they can call upon their reserves to plug the gap, halt the blitzkrieg and prevent the break through.

In this context, let us take another look at the mission Objective.

With context this time

The objective of the attacker is clear - push on aggressively and exploit the advance and get two units off the defender's table edge. Time is the key here, push on fast and drive deep in to the rear echelons of the enemy before they can organise a defence. Drive fast and drive hard and don't let the defender's get the chance to recover. The playing of their own Chain of Command points represent the delay to the defender's attempt to reorganise.

For the defender this is a different story. They need to marshal their resources and try and halt the blitzkrieg until their rear echelons can organise and block the enemy thrust. This is represented by their playing of two full Chain of Command dice. 

Unlike the "Swift to Support" scenario, which explicitly states that the defender cannot deploy support until Turn 2, the Blitzkrieg! scenario has no such restriction. The phrase "call up support" in this scenario refers to a specific narrative victory trigger. 

The defender wins the game instantly if they can successfully play two full Chain of Command dice before the attacker exits two units from the table. In effect, the playing of two full CoC dice represents the defender successfully alerting higher headquarters and bringing the "main body" of their force into the area, effectively ending the attacker's chance for a rapid breakthrough via blitzkrieg. 

The attacker can delay this by using one of their own full Chain of Command dice to reduce the defender's accrued Chain of Command points by three. 

So the defender can deploy their support choices from the beginning of the game, with a sort of "ticking clock" mechanism of two CoC dice being played for their victory which the attacker can blunt and delay by using their own dice while racing to get two units off the table.

I hope this helps those players who have been confused by this scenario, I know I was!

Panzerknacker in 1940 for CoC²

Panzerknacker or is it "Geballte Ladung"?

With the advent of Chain of Command² rules there is the addition of the new German National Characteristics of "Panzerknacker":

"Where a section has three hand grenades available, it can convert them to a compound charge with which to attack an AFV or APC."

The Army Lists in CoC² represent late war forces circa 1944 onwards, so I wondered if this Characteristic was also present in the early war period covered by the Blitzkrieg 1940 Handbook?

First of all, let's be clear, we are talking about an adhoc improvised explosive device here and not the later war Panzerknacker or Hafthohlladung. Whilst Panzerknacker just means "tank breaker", it is an all encompassing term for any explosive charge used on enemy armoured vehicles.

The German Army had a long history of using ahdoc grenade based explosives, even using them in the 1st World War as bombs dropped from aircraft.

Cover of the 1936 Luger/Stick Grenade manual

According to the 1936 dated manual "Die Stielhandgranate 24 und ihre Handhabung" ("The Pistol 08 and its Handling, the Stick Grenade and its Handling"), a compound charge or "Geballte Ladung" could be made of any number of grenade heads, just so long as they were firmly connected to each other.

Apparently there's clear evidence that there was an early use of such cobbled together weapons in 1936, but was there any documented use in the early war period?

The Osprey book German Pionier 1939–45: Combat Engineer of the Wehrmacht (drawing on period imagery and manuals) illustrates that Geballte Ladungen were formally part of German combat engineer German Engineer Training Manuals (Pioneers) and their doctrine. 

There is a documented used of Geballte Ladungen by Pionier-Bataillon 12 der 12. Infanterie-Division when destroying the door of a French bunker.

In the Military Intelligence Service, War Dept, Washington D.C. Special Series No. 14 German Infantry Weapons, May 25, 1943 the use of grenades in an antitank role is explictly described;

Given that this document is dated 1943 it is reasonable to assume that it describes the use of German weapons since the beginning of the war. Whilst a majority of the evidence is primarily focussed on their use in a demolition role it is also mentioned in an antitank role.

And as if more proof was needed, a video of someone in Ukraine fashioning a modern equivalent using Polish grenades but also covering the history of the use of Geballte Ladungen. Sadly there is a need for these items even today.

In summary, yes the Geballte Ladung or in CoC² terms a "Panzerknacker" is appropriate for the 1940 setting as a National Characteristic, use it at your own risk though!