But First, a Slight Diversion

In December the club is holding a themed FOW one-dayer in memory of Nick Garden, who passed away last year. I have taken a slight detour from my preparation for ValleyCon in order to put something together for it.

The theme is Italy in 1943, at 1000pts. This is a huge challenge, mainly due to the price of armour. A lot of the tanks you would expect to see at this stage of the war (British Shermans, Panzer IV H, StuG III G) are all 150+ points each, making them prohibitively expensive. The exceptions are the Americans and Canadians, who both get 115pt Shermans. I expect this will lead to seeing mostly infantry companies, with a lot of lightweight armour: Stuarts, M10s and Marders. There may be a few StuGs, though, as they can be bought in pairs. Hopefully some armoured cars, too.

Without the time to research, acquire any new models and build a force specifically for the event, I decided that the best approach for me to take was to spin the infantry teams I am painting for ValleyCon into something out of North Africa, bolting on other platoons from my existing collection, so that in the process I'm still working towards what I need for January.

My first instinct was to put together a Rifle Company and Night Attack my way through the event, but while it's a solid option it didn't seem like a whole lot of fun and would have required painting up a large number of additional teams. So instead I will be taking a Motor Company, because this just requires two PIAT teams and two extra Bren teams over and above the teams I am already working on, adding some kits from the stash and repainting some of my older models to suit. And for some illogical reason I have decided that it absolutely must include a 440pt platoon of Shermans...

British Motor Company (Italy) - North Africa (2016 Revision)

Company HQ, 35 pts

Motor Platoon + PIAT, 155 pts

Motor Platoon + PIAT, 155 pts

Scout Platoon, 105 pts
   3 x Universal Carriers + Extra MGs

Motor Anti-tank Platoon, 95 pts
   2 x 6pdr Portee 

Armoured Platoon, 440 pts
   3 x Sherman III

Total Cost: 985 pts

It's an awful list: five platoons, with nearly half the points tied up in three average tanks, no templates, truck-mounted anti-tank guns with no HE, two small six-stand infantry platoons, and a bunch of trucks that won't feature in any of the games. Should be good times.

I had the necessary transport for the CHQ and infantry platoons in the stash, which I have painted up in Light Mud/Blue Black camouflage and markings for 1st Rifle Brigade, 7th Armoured Division, and based to match the infantry.

And I have refreshed an old troop of Sherman IIIs to match, with markings for 5th RTR.

I still have the portees and carriers to repaint, plus the infantry to finish, but this shouldn't be too much of a stretch with three weeks to go.