I'm wondering if anyone else is using pre-painted 1/144th scale miniatures for Tide of Iron?

Over the past year I've been slowly switching out my ToI vehicles for pre-painted 1/144th scale minis, just to give my games some added pop. Unfortunately, it's proven to be a bit harder than I imagined. So far I've managed to get most of what I need from two companies - World Tank Museum and 21st Century Toys (New Millennium / Classic Armor). Anyone else giving this a try? Have you been successful?

Here's what I've got so far:

WORLD TANK MUSEUM

x12 Shermans

x6 Panthers

x4 Jagdpanzer IVs

x4 King Tigers

21st CENTURY TOYS

x2 US 2.5 ton trucks

x4 US M3A3 half-tracks

x4 M18 Hellcats (using these as M10 Wolverines)

x4 M7 Priests

x4 Panzer III tanks

x6 Sdkfz 251 half-tracks

x6 SdKfz 7 prime movers (using these as Opel Blitz trucks)

I haven't been able to find any Stug IIIs so I'm going to use the 21st Century Stug IV with sideskirts - close enough I guess. I also have to decide on a company for the Panzer IV and Tiger, as well as any ATGs. My preference is for WTM, especially for the Tiger, but that might prove to be tough as FFG is no longer carrying any WTM products. I've checked into Dragon's Can.Do Pocket Models, but I'm not sure I want to put a 3rd company into the mix no matter how nice their paint jobs look. Things might appear too mish-mash.

And for a related note on World Tank Museum and FFG...

When FFG launched their new site I noticed they took off any info regarding WTM models. I emailed them about it and they said FFG was no longer the distributor for WTM. They also didn't know if Arclight USA had picked up anybody else. Drat. I remember reading on the old forums that FFG had dropped the unpublished World Tank Campaigns game in favor of using WTM minis to support ToI in what they called "reinforcement packs". It looks like that fell through. I'm still hoping Arclight will find another partner in the States, but until then I guess I'm stuck with ordering from Hong Kong via ebay. Yuck.

Yipe said:

Not so much pre-painted, but painted in my case... I use mainly Flames of War minis, infantry and vehicles. I also use Axis & Allies Miniatures.

I probably shouldn't have been so specific regarding pre-painted minis - I forgot about FoW. How do they work out size-wise? What about your AAM stuff? Are you using the old scale models?

I originally wanted to use AAM pieces for ToI as my friends play that game, and it seemed like one of the only companies that had pre-painted British vehicles (especially the Bren Gun Carrier, though they don't make the Matilda II which is baffling), but I'm not sure...

I do have a large number of v2.0 US and IJA units (and some v1.0 Japanese AFVs as well) but they seem too big for the ToI hexes - even the older Japanese tanks which were small to begin with. For example, my friend loaned me an old scale Panzer IV and it takes up an entire hex by itself. There's no way I could squeeze in a second tank or 2 other squads of infantry. I'm curious if you've had any stacking problems with them?

Sincerely,

Yipe

eBay seems to be a source for them, especially the PZ4s. I've got a lot of the original release of the A&A minis that are almost the right size (a little bit bigger in some cases) and I've got a friend sending me up a bunch of stuff which apparently includes tank traps and barbed wire (must have missed those in my packs) so I'll probably be looking at adding those if I can get enough. Clearly the biggest issue is getting enough of the proper unit types for whole sale swap outs.

Yipe said:

The FoW minis and the A&AM minis have the same scale. I use the new scale models of A&AM because the vehicles are in the same scale as FoW vehicles.

Stacking can be tricky at set up, but up to now I have always managed to position vehicles and squads so that it is clear which hex they are in. After the first couple of rounds, this is no longer a problem as my units tend to disperse under fire.

sloejack said:

I have 1 original release Panzer IV. It works out well for "At the Breaking Point" as there is only 1 tank involved in that scenario. For games with more vehicles though, such as "Operation Crusader" from Days of the Fox, I'm not sure it would fit side-by-side with another model. That's the main reason I'm sticking with 1/144th scale stuff. Plus the 21st Century Toys models are pretty cheap (around $2-3 each).

Regarding the AAM barbed wire, tank traps and bunkers - I have quite a few of each. They were released in the D-Day set (old scale). Honestly, they are just so-so in appearance (the tank trap is the best out of the bunch) and I actually prefer to use the cardboard markers from ToI. Perhaps if I flocked their plain black bases, which look really out of place against the ToI boards, they would look nicer. It's too bad because I think a 3-D pillbox or rolls of razorwire would look fantastic.

Which leads me to a few questions about 3-D terrain:

Does anyone here use 3-D terrain pieces for ToI?

What scale is suitable for ToI 3-D terrain? I'm guessing somewhere between 6mm (for larger pieces like buildings) to 10mm / N guage (for barbed wire and mine fields), but I'm not sure.

Does anyone recommend a particular brand or company?

KlausFritsch said:

Stacking can be tricky at set up, but up to now I have always managed to position vehicles and squads so that it is clear which hex they are in. After the first couple of rounds, this is no longer a problem as my units tend to disperse under fire.

Dispersing under fire is definitely a good idea, but sometimes there are bottlenecks, objectives or tactically superior hexes were I will load up 2 vehicles and maybe even a squad of infantry (particularly an MG or mortar to keep it protected from assaults).

I guess I'm just disappointed that FFG dropped the WTM line as it worked perfectly, and the pieces I need (like the ATGs and Panzer IVs) are hard to get on ebay in the quantity required for ToI. Oh well.

The ATGs from the A&A Minis have bases the same size as a squad hex and are of the right variety.

sloejack said:

Thanks for the tip! While I have a decent-sized US and IJA army (around 600 pts each), I purchased all of my models as singles or received them as gifts (I never bought any booster packs) so I have little experience with other pieces in the AAM line. I'll have to go to AH's website and check out what they look like.

Sincerely,

Yipe

From the Base Set (because those are the ones I scraped from Gen Con a few years back in their swag bag) I got lucky and had 4 of each of the following:

UK 6-Pounder

For the German FLAK 36 I'm using the German PAK 38 figure

For the US 57MM I'm using the Japanese 47MM

In the SET II minis there is a 57MM AT (soviet) [if I can find four of these I'll swap out the JAP 47MM]

As well as the American 3" gun and the German PAK 40

The scale changed in 2007 to bigger minis so anything that came out in the 1939-1945 set is bigger than the base set minis (same models, just bigger). So the sets you might want to keep an eye out for are:

Base Set, Set II, D-Day, and Reserves. D-Day had some obstacles in it:

Just wanted to follow up on this thread. Fantasy Football was good to me this year so I treated myself to some 1:144 scale minis:

12x M4A1 Shermans (World Tank Museum)
8x Panthers (WTM)
4x Jagdpanzer IV (WTM) [i'm not sure if the IV is the right model but it came with a set of other tanks I did want so I'm hopeful]
4x King Tiger (WTM)
4x Panzer III (WTM)
6x Tiger I (WTM)
6x Panzer IV Ausf. G (Dragon Can.Do)

Most of these I got from www.armoryhobby.com ... Well I got it from their eBay store but their website is new and if I had known about it before I would have probably saved myself a little money and gotten a little more to them as well. Oh well, next time, as there's clearly still some bits I need:

6x M3A1 Half-Tracks
6x SdKfz 251 Half-Tracks
4x Matilda II
4x Crusader
4x StuG III
4x M10 Wolverine
6x GMC CCKW 353 Trucks
6x Opel Blitz Trucks
4x Bedford OY Trucks
4x Bren Gun Carriers

In doing some web surfing last night I had found some upcoming releases of trucks and half tracks that looked like it would fit the bill but in the light of day I can not remember what the makers were. I want to say 21st Century was coming out with them but I can't be sure. I did see the Pegasus had a german halftrack and some pretty good models of it to that I'm concidering. If anyone has some leads or suggestions for filling out the rest of the wish list as it were please let me know.

I found the site that mentioned they were coming out with halftracks and a US truck that looked like it would fit, and I guess I was right. It was 21st Century.

http://www.21stcenturytoys.com/area21/articles.asp?newsID=325