I Know Nothing! No-Thing!

Hey folks! Finally managed to get this objective finished.

As you may be able to tell from the title, if not the figures contained within, this is an objective marker attempting to imitate the good old Hogan's Heroes show. I had a Morris CS8 that wasn't needed laying around, and since on the show they often had this truck take part in various schemes and antics (not to mention, ruses) I figured it'd be fun to combine it with two or three random figures I had laying around, and remake a possible scene from the show.

Here, we see Hogan himself, 'caught' in the middle of one of the plans, being confronted by Col. Klink, as Schultz in the background finds Newkirk in the back of a truck that was supposed to be empty! (Or at least, not filled with a Newkirk.) Also making an appearance is the ever-useful tunnel exit from the camp through a hollow stump.

Modifying the various models was fairly straightforward, and luckily easier than I feared. Schult's model is a Winter Grenadier figure that has epoxy putty to expand his waistline. Klink is another figure from the same blister, with more greenstuff to make a monocle. Newkirk is actually all German as well: A Panzer IV turret commander, plus the cap from a German Dismounted Tank Crewman. Luckily with a different paintjob, and the fact that it's just chest-up, Newkirk's famous Corporal's outfit, (and dashing sideburns) are enough to sell him.

Hogan was the one that scared me the most as a conversion. The base model is Jock Campbell, which my friend and I noticed was a good head shorter than most other British desert figures. This was harder on my friend, as the real Campbell, (between 6ft and 6'1") can't be based with other British figs or he looks like a child.

For my part, I had bought the blister to use his truck for my Sonderkommand Dora group, and had the gentleman himself sitting around waiting for this. Wondering how I was going to bring him up to proper height, I discovered the original cast is, for some reason, just too short on the torso/waist region. I delicately sliced him in half, cutting in such a way as to not sever the arms, and then used putty (and pins) to properly expand his height, sculpting a new butt, and properly-high waistline. he now stands as tall as Klink as he did in the show.

Hogan is also, of course, smirking. I don't think there was really ever an episode where Hogan didn't get to enjoy a smirk of satisfaction, so in this narrative it suggests perhaps this 'capture' was on purpose as well!

Also slightly painful to my rivet-counting ways, I had to intentionally paint these guys 'wrong' in a sense. The truck doesn't have standard British-In-German-Use markings, but a painted-on German army flag. The gear used by some of them is painted as best I could to the show, not history per se, and the snow is intentionally very fake looking, as befits a show mostly filmed in locations where none falls.

Why this objective? Other than now having two funky "Hollywood Objectives", it also is a generic enough one that it could be used for any allied force, or even any German ones! (Who knows how wild their antics would have gotten!)

Kfz. 252 for Blitzkrieg

Another conversion from my Early-War force I'll show today, as I finish up a few more things on the T16/6pdr build is my Kfz. 252.

In the earlier StuG platoons, the commander rode around in a Kfz. 253. Battlefront's platoon includes this vehicle as the commander of the platoon, but does not make models for, nor include the Kfz. 252. This was an ammo carrier for the StuG. It makes sense to not have them, because they were not combat vehicles, but all the same, it's a funky model I decided to convert for the sake of an objective.

Here you can see the process of shaving down a Kfz. 250 for use in this madness. I have a jeweler's saw, which I can not recommend enough! I also narrowed the front end. For some reason Battlefront makes their 250s have a kind of tombstone front, and doesn't bevel them in at all. Next, it was cut and insert the back end, putty to smooth out the joins, and plasticard for the rear doors. The trailer is from pieces of a Kfz. 10/5 trailer, cut apart and glued with plasticard. The crew are leftovers, some from the desert, some from generic guns replaced with desert figures. I didn't end up having three, because there just wasn't the room.

The final painted vehicle is slightly different in layout (more space efficient), and depicts two crew from the 252 laying out StuG shells in preparation for a StuG darting back from the front lines to get more ammunition. They're laying them out to speed up the process since, as a battlefield objective, they're not exactly far from fire themselves! The paintscheme is, I know, a rare use splattering of brown mud over the grey paint, but I figure of any of them, the Kfz. 252 would want some extra camo.

This angle shows the interior. It's not converted in any specific way, as the interior already pretty much matches. It's painted white, as most vehicle interiors at the time were, with door and hatch interiors painted to match the exterior, so they wouldn't act as big targets. You can see the extra detail thrown on the trailer, with a piece of paper and leftover strip of plasticard for the lid, and modelling wire for the trailer hook.

The crew are painted in standard Wehrmacht colours, and given the red waffenfarbe of the Assault Guns. It's meant to be a force fighting in either Poland or France, so they still have the national symbol and Wehrmacht symbols on their helmets.

This was a fun model to start my Blitz painting with, as it let me test colour schemes on a model that would be out of place a bit regardless.

Happy New Year by the way!