"who games WW2 in 54mm?" Topic

I have seen John Lander's excellent "A Bridge too far" game (although only in pictures.) I have also seen impressive work on the San Diego Toy Soldiers web site here

link

Last year at Tripples I saw some gamers playing out a large WW2 skirmish complete with scratch built buildings.

In terms of equipment you can get figures and vehicles from airfix, classic toy soldiers, Toy Soldiers of San Diego, BMC, Italieri, MATCHBOX, WESTON, MARX, HAT and Forces of Valor and others.

For those of you who game WW2 in 54mm, what figures and vehicles are you using and which do you find the best?

Forces of Valor are incredible for vehicles. But particular models are all the same, which turns me off. I think they have a 251 variant which is painted for winter. That would look bad along side all your other vehicles for spring/summer/autumn. I am not sure that Forces of Valor would work with any other vehicles because they are so detailed by contrast. Does anyone game with forces of valor? I have seen that they have a remote control laser tag type game.

Is anyone gaming Command Decision in 54mm?

Hi. I game in 54mm, 1/32 and 1/35 scale. I use Airfix, Conte, BMC, TSSD, Tamiya, Dragon, New Ray, Ultimate Soldier, Monogram, Zvezda and some others. My building are either scratchbuilt or made from paper mache buildings from Hobby Lobby that I modify a lot. I have run about a platoon of tanks with a few platoons of infantry vs smaller defending forces. I use my own 'Company Commander' rules. I can't see anyone doing CD games in 54mm.

Love the scale!

Thanks,

John

I use old school Army Men from Tim Mee, MPC and others to play miniature wargames outside in my yard. Most of the figures are 30 to 50 years old. I use vehicles from then too. Some of the figures and vehicles are re-casts that are not as old. I have fielded as many as several hundred figures and a couple dozen vehicles at one time.

Mike "Bunkermeister" Creek
bunkermeister.blogspot.com

I didn't realise Dragon did anything 1/32 or 1/35.

Who makes the most detailed infantry models? I realise that part of the magic for some people is recreating boyhood battles with unpainted, simple, plastics.

I found myself getting excited looking at the GIANT eastern front play set here

link

I think I've gone strange

Wow, that playset is awesome. Given that I only do WWII in three scales so far, maybe I should branch out….

Thanks for the nice comments Chortle, as you know I game a lot of 1/35 WWII, using Crossfire rules, these are perfect for 54mm gaming as they have no ranges or move rates to 'scale' them. I use a lot of the Dragon 1/35 infantry figure sets, but this means a lot of assembly time. I also have used some of the classic Airfix 1/32 ranges, much beloved of our childhood. Some of them are actually 1/35 scale, more or less, and some of them are still fantastic sculpts, the British Paras, and Afrika Korps figures, to name but two, with the short boots, fieldcaps of the Afrika boys, doing very nicely for Normandy Germans. I personally don't mix 1/35 with 1/32, but the classic Airfix British infantry support group, was too nice to not use, so I have Vickers, and 3" mortar teams from this set. CTS do a lot of the ready made Airfix soft plastic vehicles, again in 1/32, and a lot of there own stuff, which is not so nice, and a bit small for 1/35, even. The T34/76 and 85, are, however, really good, and spot on 1/35, The Churchills and Crocodiles are also good, but a liitle small, I still used a lot of them, though, as I don't mix them with 'proper' scale versions. They also do a Buffolo, which gives me worrying visions of a Rhine crossing game!
There are a lot of great figures here;
harfields.com
The ready-made, soft plastic route is no poor relation these days as there are some great figures about, and having just finished Sherman number 30, the ready-painted Valour stuff is excellent, as is 21st Century Toys.
I think I need a bigger gaming shed!

John

I have my own set of rules that I have written. I have taken games to Origins in the past but it has been a few years. The biggest problem I have had in the past is the painting process. But John Leahy has provided some pointers for me. I use 21st Century (Forces of Valor) vehicles and a Tamiya model here and there. Really when you are dealing in 54mm it is best to do a handful of vehicles per side. Since 54mm soldiers are around 2 meters high (roughly)I go with a scale of an inch = 1 meter. So movement for the Infantry is 12 inches a turn. Then most armored vehicles should move about 30-40 inches. An M1 Garand should be able to shoot out to 500 inches at extreame range. I actually had a rules lawyer go off on me once because I did not have the MG42 firing past 1000 inches. I explained to him there was no reason to have it fire past 1000 inches because the table was not even 1000 inches long. After that I adjusted the scales and gave the MG42 3000 inches at extreame range. Someday I would like to see that measuring tape. :)

Issue #19 of Battlegames Magazine has an article titled 'Supersize Us' that may be of interest to you.

I've been collecting for a few years and have played a couple of small games. I use Dragon, Tamiya, FoV and some others. My biggest problem with vehicles is that I have a hard time not buying them since they are generally so reasonably priced and already painted and assembled. I've got at least 13 Shermans, 10 half tracks, plus a load of German AFVs and trucks, etc. I've spent a lot of money on preassembled model railroad buildings, and like John Leahy, have been buying some of the paper/cardboard buildings at Hobby Lobby. I love the scale. I'm sure it has something to do with pleasant childhood memories of getting bags of plastic armymen and having the whole livingroom floor to play on.

By John 54,
Any step by step available on how you built the bridge? It is a beautiful piece.

We play Disposable Heroes in 54mm. Lots of Century 21, I think, and Conte buildings. Walls from the Christmas buldings accessories. Pre painted Conte figs.

I do Moderns and WW2 in this scale. I'm gearing up to drag some of the locals outside this spring for some rumbles in the back yard. Depending on how serious you like your games…throwing in some "Imagi-nations" can be a lot of fun. It lets you make better use of what gear you have on hand.

Thortrains has a lot of resources in this scale. You can find printable buildings and such on the main page:

thortrains.net

And here is the Army Men page:

thortrains.net/armymen

I find that a lot of the purpose built rules for 54mm WW2 gaming either have little depth or too much. I am going to be giving Tankplank a whirl here soon. It looks fast while retaining some tactical choices and the like:

PDF link

and a few supplemental rules:

PDF link

I still have my 54mm stuff from playing the old Paragon Skrimish rules back in the 70s. Figures are all Airfix (naturally) vehicles mainly Tamiya 1/35th. They haven't been out to play for a while but the paint jobs (all enamels on unprepared plastic) are holding up quite well.

brittonpublishers.com

Check out there youtube video reports and AARs.

Seventhcav, the bridges were made using a hardboard roadway, then the superstructure was made using 'L' section plastic girders from a hrdware shop (B&Q, in the UK) these were hot-glued together. It was quite quick and painless really, which was just as well, as I had to make Arnhem, Grave, and Nijmegen bridges, all very distinctive, and the latter was some 6ft long!

John

Hi John,saw your game at Salute a couple of years ago…incredible!!! Are your rules avaliable at all?

That is the main size I game in. Use the Forces of Valor and 21st Century vehicles and some of the soldiers. I also paint up TSSD, Conte, Airfix, Marx, etc figures. For rules I use the Forces of Valor rules along with some modifications from Larry Brom's K-Bar and Bayonet and Donald Featherstone's Solo Wargaming. Running a Battle of the Bulge game at Cold Wars using these rules.

Mike

John uses Crossfire pretty much as written with a few minor armour changes. As he says above they are a (the?) perfect ruleset for larger figure scale games because there are no ranges, so no rule-lawyer conflict.
When we played the Market Garden game, it was really 4 or 5 seperate games which John (as umpire) fitted together as conditions required when the different areas came to interact.
The lack of ranges can be tricky for some players to get their heads around. I recall 1 German players shock (and my own glee) when I whacked a panther in the flank with a 17pdr from about 20 feet away (Tee-Hee).

I love Crossfires mechanics and concepts. The game pics I have seen of the games are simply incredible. But it seesm to me that 54mm is perfectly suited to a 1:1 scale game. Not sure I could wrap my head around the scaling up issue with 54mm.

Thanks,

John

I do.

Home Brew rules.

Based on Feathertone and oddly enough old school battletech for mechanics and dice conventions.

>>Who makes the most detailed infantry models? I realise that part of the magic for some people is recreating boyhood battles with unpainted, simple, plastics.<<

Imo that would be Conte .

link

link

Here's a link to the home page:

conteco.com/default.htm

Yeah, Conte are quite nice. They paint up well too. Just wish they were a tad smaller and had a wider WWII variety.

Thanks,

John

>>Yeah, Conte are quite nice. They paint up well too. Just wish they were a tad smaller and had a wider WWII variety.<<

I agree. Considering the great sculpts from his company so far I'd love to see him produce Pacific War Marines and Japanese. That's highly unlikely though as he has a pretty full plate with his upcoming playsets and painted metal figures. I spoke to him at a toy soldier show in New Jersey recently and he told me that he's probably going to do a "Tombstone" set with plastic figures. As you've probably seen, he finished the Earps and "Doc" sculpts, and he has "The Cowboys" in the works. He said that he is also going to finish the "Magnificent 7" set of seven figures, but that they would in painted metal.

I wish that TSSD would also release more WWII stuff. It isn't Conte but it is pretty nice. it's also a harder plastic.