1940 French support

It's been a busy couple weeks in the hobby for me. I attended Torcan and Raycon a week ago and received my hotly anticipated Perry order on Monday last. I had run out of Carlist War figures to paint and had mis-timed my order. Usually I try to get my orders here before running out of stock but there was unexpected benefit from the wait. During the three weeks that I was waiting for the Carlist figures, I pulled out my 1940 French and started to work on them (you can see some of them here). Nothing unusual about that. What caught me by surprise was the spark it ignited in me again for World War II gaming. Those who know me also know that I sold off a fairly large 28mm WWII collection some years ago. I had played a lot of games with various rule sets and, frankly, had burned out on the period/genre. Over the last five or six years since the sale, I've been waiting patiently for the interest to return. When I pulled out the Frenchies and put brush to figure the park was re-lit! Yesterday, Steve, John and I played a game of Disposable Heroes at the club on Steve's fabulous terrain (of which we neglected to take any pictures at all...doh!) and this has just fed the flames for me. Admittedly, we played with the modern supplement, so not exactly WWII (but close enough to add fuel to the fire). So the first addition (of two) to my collections over the last week are some support teams for my French platoon and the beginning of the platoon command.

French infantry platoon command, missing the platoon sergeant and rifle grenadier (Crusader figures).

French 80mm mortar team (Crusader figures).

French HMG (Crusader figures).

French 25mm AT gun team (Crusader figures).

Second up are more Carlist infantry for my FCW project, this time of a Valencia battalion. Not considered to be the best of Don Cabrera's troops, there were nonetheless "light and agile and useful for sudden attacks and skirmishing" (The First Carlist War, Conrad Cairns).

I chose to model this Valencia unit in the greatcoats more common to the Northern Army but not unseen with Don Cabrera's forces. I've also mixed in a few with red trousers. This will hopefully help distinguish them from the Aragon and Tortosa troops.

Next up for the Carlist Wars: more Carlist cavalry (this time in sky-blue tunics), a Carlist mountain gun, and more Carlist skirmishers.