"State of the Hobby update"

Working on some major blog posts, with some real content that should be up this weekend, but here's a little one to keep you guys in the loop.

Flames of War

WWPD have started their global campaign (although if you didn't know that, I would be impressed at your ostrich level of head burying!), and myself and the Guildford boys (Freddie, Justin, and even Soviet Paul!) are looking to both play normal FoW games using the new Italy books, but also tying it into an 'Infantry Aces' campaign. This works doubly well as we have one or two possible new recruits to the FoW 'Habit' (as we all know this goes beyond a hobby). Might also see if the Breakthrough Assault guys want to come up one Monday night for an Italy themed special.

I'll most likely be painting up my Late war FJ's for the Aces campaign, and then swapping lists to use all the new nice toys out of the Italy books for the larger ones. I've been gluing together the 'new' BF Panzer IV's, which are lovely kits, even if I did stick the rear bulkheads on upside down. After I've done this I'll try and fix that.....

Random Hobby:

As I'm quite handy with gluing bits together, I put together a Tamiya 1/350 scale King George V battleship kit that Justin is painting up as a gift for his old man. This thing is a beast, and took a whole weekend to put together. Justin's happy though, which is the main thing. That's a 15mm Tiger (1/100) for scale!

After spending all that time building someone else's toy, I spoilt myself with some random construction of my own, resulting in this mini review:

Warlord Games Plastic 28mm M4 Sherman

This was an unexpected bonus from Salute this year, and the first kit labelled as being done in partnership with Italeri

Mmmm, Hobby Crack. Lovely looking box!

What you get for your £18. Reverse of flyer has warlord games promo material

The Sprues. Quite a bit of wasted space on the right, would be nice to have baggage or other options (crew perhaps?)

Why no building pictures? No time, this thing fell together.

Its a nice looking tank

The pre-moulded track sagging is my favourite feature

Think I'll paint the back of the tank really really well, and leave the front, It's the only side I get to see during a game....

The sherman was a breeze to build, the only part that took a minute to figure out (or be careful with) is the tracks - the front sprocket/track interception is moulded on the drive sprocket, so there is a chunk 'missing' from the track. This makes the join seem-less when completed, but would be a real pain if you didn't think about what you were doing. That, and which way up the loading hatch (on turret, pictured above) goes as its a separate piece)

The only faults are the headlights had a bit of flash and loss of detail, however for the price point its a great wargaming model.

5/5 Tommy Cookers.

Thanks for reading,

Fez