Posts made by Redleg13A

@Tall:

@Redleg13A:

Knocked these out last night…Starting to build some momentum! A question for you more experienced guys…how to you make super straight lines or perfect seams for things like the base flags or national identifiers on things like aircraft wings?

––If you’re asking about national ensigns, alphabets, numbers, or stripes…
NOTHING is as sharp, crisp, and STRAIGHT as a DECAL.
––I can heartily refer you to I-94 ENTERPRISES for there line of WW2 decals. If you go to their “SCANS” page of their website you can see actual scans of the decal sheet and what is included on each different sheet. I highly recommend this company. Let me know if you need a “link” to them.

Tall Paul

Thanks for the advice, go ahead and shoot me that link. I have a feeling that decals might be the way to go for me.

I’ve lost momentum over the past couple of days, I had to go out of town the past couple of days and then while I was out of town I got a massive boil in a VERY inconvenient area that brought me to my knees…DAMMIT! I’ve got less than 2 weeks to really hit this up before I have to leave for 6 weeks to Ft Knox…AAAARGGGH! Patience isn’t one of my virtues lol.

Knocked these out last night…Starting to build some momentum! A question for you more experienced guys…how to you make super straight lines or perfect seams for things like the base flags or national identifiers on things like aircraft wings?

I can’t download anything on my work computer (military) and all I have at home is an iPAD. So it can be complicated.

I just went through this whole thread again and on top of being inspired by the pieces I bought from you to get back into painting…I can see that I may have lost a step or two in the last 15 years lol…The pieces you’ve demonstrated on this thread are just amazing and I’m hoping that I can get to that level eventually. As you can see from the thread I started, I am painting again…but I sure have a long way to go before I get to your quality of work. Well done and just know that you’re quality of work is now on my front sight post!

I would seriously be willing to pay any one of you to have one of these made for me that has worked with a proven print shop that will do quality work. I’d pay (in USD)for the expenses of having it made as well as a little extra for the effort…OR put me in contact with a print shop one of you has used that’s proven and I can make some phone calls/emails and knock it out from there. Any takers?

I decided to use those stripes on all the sea vessels (besides the carrier) since they were so distinctively Italian. I tried to do the Italian insignia on the bomber but I got impatient and applied the black paint a little too soon and it smeared a bit…I’ll have another go at it tonight.

I WANT ONE! Wow, these look fantastic. I also like how you set it up like an infomercial lol.

Another angle.

Some more stuff I finished just a few minutes ago.

The feedback was overwhelmingly positive and they had a fantastic time throughout the whole process.

There were MANY “aha!” moments throughout the process. The scenerio I demonstrated on here was one of them. The NVA player had basically a perfect set up to lure the Americans into their prepared defenses and then destroy them in detail by overrunning their landing zones once the Americans were ambushed away from their LZs. The NVA commander had fantastic luck on the first turn and had an entire NVA company show up right at the southern drop zone. Instead of waiting to deploy them when they could be supported better by their other forces he attacked immediately and did in fact overrun the LZ…for a while… He then got tunnel vision and decided to attack all around the Americans because they seemed on the “brink” of being overwhelmed. The problem was that as they moved closer to the LZ’s they had to move out of the protection of the jungle and move into the more open elephant grass…which is a problem since the Americans can, at that point, employ massive supporting arms WHILE they maintain an open supply lines close to their LZ. He basically gave all his advantages of sitting and waiting it out, fighting the Americans on his terms and attacked prematurely to overrun the LZs, opening up himself to massive firepower by fighting on the Americans terms.

On a previous one they learned that if you leave orders to be interpreted, then you should probably expect interpreted results from your subordinates. This scenario was an airborne drop in Sicily where they Americans needed to secure a town so that reinforcing units from the beachhead can link up and move on. The American commander wasn’t clear on where he wanted his drop zones to be, so his sticks got badly scattered all over the board. He got lucky and had a sherman platoon show up the first turn available and issued an order for them to move up to help the airborne troops. In the mass of information that they sent to the “referees” (their platoon leaders) that order either got overlooked or ignored. A turn later they figured out that their tanks weren’t in the right spot and they wanted me to have the referee move them to where they should since they did in fact issue the order…my reply was “Did you check to make sure your order was followed?”…crickets…my next question was “Do you think that when a unit is in contact the radios might get a bit busy?”…crickets…then finally “What’s your job as a leader?”…crickets…they realized that in the real world things get confusing very quickly and getting everyone on the same page is quite difficult…They never made that mistake again.

There’s all kinds of examples I have of these types of incidents and the great thing about all this is that most of the cadets that participate are first year cadets…and the ones who come every week are now outperforming not only the other “firsties” but many of the 2nd and even 3rd year cadets…It’s all starting to “click” on the hows and whys!

@CWO:

@Redleg13A:

I think the question is going to be now…how much patience will my wife put up with lol? I want to do this non stop until I have sufficient pieces to play a global game with all forces represented which will take up quite a lot of time as one can imagine. I can just imagine her standing with her hands on her hips saying “you’ve got three seconds to put that crap down and come hang out with me and the kids” !

The optimal solution would be to recruit her and the kids to help you with the painting, under the pretext that it would be a fun family activity.  This will not only stop the complaints from your wife, it will also enable you to get your pieces painted faster.

Absolutely. Unfortunately that’s a few years off since my children are 18 months and 5 months old respectively!

BUT, in a few years time I plan of having at least the children try it out as a dad/kids activity.

I’m going to “try” to paint the symbols lol. If it becomes too complicated then I’ll probably go with decals since they’re nice and uniform. The pieces I posted still have some touch up work that needs to be done. I quickly realized the room I was painting in didn’t have adequate lighting so I ended up using a head lamp. I also realized that my eyes aren’t as good as they were when I was 15 LOL.

Yep, these are 2nd edition ones.

I think the question is going to be now…how much patience will my wife put up with lol? I want to do this non stop until I have sufficient pieces to play a global game with all forces represented which will take up quite a lot of time as one can imagine. I can just imagine her standing with her hands on her hips saying “you’ve got three seconds to put that crap down and come hang out with me and the kids” !

And here’s what it looks like “on the ground”

Here’s the order of battle and how the NVA commander set up their defenses.

NVA, VC OoB.zip

We would issue the cadets these products about 5 days before a battle. They would have to use them to plan their missions (one for BLUFOR side and one for OPFOR side). I would assign a commander, XO, 1SG, etc and they would have to work as that team and assume those roles throughout the duration of the operation. For instance, if the platoons were sending up reports that kept track of their ammo and water but the XO failed to send up his report to me in what we call a “BLUE 2” report, then after 2 turns all platoons in that company would only be able to move half the distance normal and shoot at half their normal rate of fire.

All actions by each side were simultaneous so we could take out as much war gaming as possible. The opposing sides were also fighting each other from different rooms and using a facebook page function(Tactical Decision Making is the page) to issue orders and receive feedback. The actual battlefield and pieces were 350 miles away where “referees” would move the pieces and report back casualties, enemy contact/disposition, terrain, etc

The commander never has a clear picture of what the enemy is doing or what their plan is. They also can lose track of their own units if they don’t “battle track” their platoons and sections on the field.

It was quite an enlightening experience.

NVA Operations Map-Old French Mission-1.zip
NVA OpOrder.zip

So, I haven’t posted here in a while but I have been doing the additional instruction throughout the semester. Here are some pics and products of what we’ve done. We started with Axis and Allies and moved our way down to flames of war but without them being able to see their pieces.

Nope, it was the fighter that came in the Italian box, a Fiat G55 I believe.

This one too…

So, I bought the painted set of A&A pieces that Spitfire38 was selling (Spring 1942 edition) and am quite pleased with the pieces. I set it up on the 1942 board and it sure adds a whole new dimension to the game!

But, I have global and as you all know there are quite a few other nations that are represented there that aren’t in 42. So, I started to paint my Italians to see if I could get it close. Understand, these are works in progress…and it has been 15 years since I picked up a paintbrush…At the same time, it’s nice to have paint stained fingers again. Anyways, without further ado, here’s what I have so far…

Brains all the way.

First of all, I don’t measure my place in the world based off of what women think of me. I measure my place in the world based off my own expectations and my own goals, not anyone else’s. Looks aren’t nearly as important to a woman as they are to a man anyways. A woman who is overly concerned with looks, both hers and yours, is probably not the type of woman I could even have a conversation with in the first place.

Secondly, as others have mentioned, looks go away while your brains don’t.(mostly)

Thirdly, I tend to have the idea that if anyone doesn’t like the way I look and disregards good ideas or achievement based off of those looks…f*ck em! I don’t need or value their input anyways.

Lastly…I’m married, so the ball is already attached regardless of my looks.