"Common Armor for Western Desert" Topic
11 Posts
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| Prince Alberts Revenge | 16 Nov 2025 4:58 a.m. PST |
I plan to order some micro armor tanks to use for Dan Mersey's Armored Storm rules for the Desert War and I need some assistance. I don't know much about the Desert War, my resources are all in storage and my internet sleuthing has been ineffective. I will need 3-5 tank companies per side and I'm trying to figure out plausible generic OOBs for British and German/Italian tank forces. I realize this isn't a precise question but any advice is appreciated. |
 The Nigerian Lead Minister  | 16 Nov 2025 5:18 a.m. PST |
What time period are you looking at? 1940, 1941, and 1942 all had different tanks as the technology moved in great leaps. |
 ColCampbell | 16 Nov 2025 5:48 a.m. PST |
Germans started out with Pz-II, Pz-III, and early mark Pz-IV, but gradually got later mark Pz-III and Pz-IV. And if you get into Tunisia then they can add a small unit of Pz-VI. The British were all over the place, from very early mark cruiser and infantry tanks through late marks of the same and then the American supplied M-3 lights and M-3 and M-4 mediums. Jim |
| Griefbringer | 16 Nov 2025 5:48 a.m. PST |
At micro armor scale, how much do you want to differentiate between the different tank variants of the same basic model? For a German panzer battalion in North Africa, you would primarily need a bunch of Panzer III, supported by Panzer II and IV. For a British armoured regiment (part of armoured division) in North Africa, you would primarily need cruiser tanks, some of which could be Close Support (CS) variants – typically two per squadron. For a tank regiment (from tank brigade), Matilda II should be quite safe choice for North Africa – again two tanks per squadron would be armed as close support variants. |
| Martin Rapier | 16 Nov 2025 6:09 a.m. PST |
In micro scale you can basically get away with the same models for the Germans. Light Panzer companies had three platoons of short barrelled Pz III (G/H/), and a platoon of Pz II. Medium companies had three platoons of short barrelled Pz IV (D/E/F1) and a platoon of Pz II. That will do you from April 1941 until El Alamein, maybe throw in a couple of platoons of long barrelled Pz III and a platoon of Pz IV lang for 1942. You will also need various types of Marder or Jagdpanzer Is and the usual wheeled recce. So I'd do two or three light companies, one medium company and a couple of platoons of SP guns. Sadly the British are all over the place with vehicles coming and going in great profusion. Vickers Lights, all three types of early cruisers A9, A10, A13 with both gun and CS variants, then Crusader 1s, 2s, 3s…. M3 Stuarts, M3 Grants, M4 Shermans and even a few Churchill IVs plus of course Matilda IIs and Valentine infantry support tanks. The armoured cars are even worse, start with Rolls Royce and Morris and end up with Daimlers and Humbers and a load of Marmon Herrington types in between. I've got three times as much British stuff as German just to keep up with the variety. Having said all that, as Grants and Sherman came along, the British adopted mixed armoured regiments with squadrons of various types, so perhaps one approach would be three squadrons of 2pdr Crusaders, 3 squadrons of M3 Stuarts and one squadron each of Grants and Shermans. Maybe do a mixed squadron of all the early junk and a squadron each of Matildas and Valentines and just ignore the Vickers Lights unless you want to do pre Operation Crusader in late 1941. That is still ten squadrons, but perhaps more manageable than trying to cover everything. |
| Prince Alberts Revenge | 16 Nov 2025 8:10 a.m. PST |
Thanks for the insight gentlemen, I'm thinking the period between Operation Sonnenblume in February 1941 and Battleaxe in June 1941. I like the look of the iconic Crusader tanks so I'd like to order some of them. Not sure what to pair with them (Mathilda IIS?) and German tanks should be in the mix. |
| Griefbringer | 16 Nov 2025 9:10 a.m. PST |
Crusader tank to my understanding first saw action around the Operation Battleaxe in June 1941. So not that great choice for the earlier months of that year. Matildas, being infantry tanks, would normally be assigned to tank regiments, while Crusaders and other cruiser tanks went for the armoured regiments. Doctrinally, these had quite different roles so would not be expected to show side-by-side (not that this has ever stopped enthusiastic gamers). As for Italian armour in 1941, the M-13/40 should be pretty safe choice – and might even have a fighting chance against the British cruiser tanks with their 2 pdr guns. |
| Martin Rapier | 16 Nov 2025 9:47 a.m. PST |
What Griefbringer said, early 41 you are looking at early cruisers and Vickers lights plus Matilda IIs. There was such a shortage of cruisers due to losses that as a temporary measure two Regiments of Matildas were assigned to 7th Armoured Div as an ad-hoc armoured brigade. If you can, try and track down a copy of Frank Chadwicks 'Benghazi Handicap' which gives armoured unit holdings for various periods. Briefly flicking through, in April/May 41 7th Armoured Brigade had only two 'Regiments', 2nd RTR had two squadrons, one with A9s and A10s, the other with A9s, A10 and A13s. 4th RTR had two squadrons of Matildas. 3rd Hussars had a single squadron of Vickers Lights. 3rd Armoured Brigade in Tobruk had 1 x Matilda Squadron, 1 x squadron of Vickers and 1 mixed squadron of A9/10/13. Crusaders appeared as a single Regiment for Battleaxe (3 x squadrons). For a laugh there is the short lived 2nd Armoured Division, where 3rd AB had 3rd Hussars had two squadrons of Vickers and one of captured M13s. 8th Hussars had three squadrons of Vickers and few A10s. 1st RTR had three mixed squadrons of A9 and Vickers. Almost all these tanks were lost to breakdowns without engaging the enemy. 5th Light Div and 15th Panzer both had two battalions each of two light companies and one medium company, organised as I outlined above. Chadwick says 5th Lt had Pz IIIG while 15th Pz had Pz IIIH. All the Pz IV are E. The 605th Panzerjaeger Bn was attached to 5th Light with three batteries of Panzerjager 1s. It also had a towed AT battalion. |
| robert piepenbrink | 16 Nov 2025 10:11 a.m. PST |
Concur with Griefbringer. Generally, you should have Germans predominantly Pzkw III with a smattering of II's and IV's, Italians in M13/40 and effectively two British forces--a cruiser regiment for exploitation and Matilda II's for infantry support. Beware of being so fussy you have to build three versions of each desert army. |
| Frederick | 16 Nov 2025 12:41 p.m. PST |
Great thread – when I did Western Desert I in 1/285 scale I had a German force with a bunch of long barreled Panzer IIIs, a few Panzer IIs and a few Panzer IVs – some short barrel (IV-Ds) for early, a few long barrel (IV-Fs) for later on (after May 1942) For the Brits I had a bunch of Matilda and Crusaders with some A-10s for early on and some Honeys and Grants for later on – we mostly gamed with the Crusaders and and Matildas Good times, good times |
| rmaker | 16 Nov 2025 2:04 p.m. PST |
Don't forget the Italian M13/40's. |
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