You may have seen our post last week where I mentioned that Dave and I had bought a box of toy soldiers each for use in Warlord Games’ Bolt Action.
For those who haven’t heard of Bolt Action, it’s a tabletop wargame aimed at skirmish level games set during World War 2. It has a unique turn sequence where a blind draw is used to determine who acts with their unit.
Our aim was to build and paint the squad over the course of a week and then have a couple of very small games to see if we liked the ruleset.
Background to Soviet Airborne Squads
The Soviets were visionaries in the development of airborne troops and tactics, first forming a brigade-sized airborne unit after successful trials in December 1932. More units followed and by June 1941 five Airborne Corps existed in the Soviet order of battle, undoubtedly the strongest airborne force in the world. However in the desperate fighting of the early campaign these formations were pressed into service as regular infantry and virtually consumed.
– Warlord Games
Airborne troops were finally dropped in battalion strength during the defence of Moscow during December 1941 and January 1942. An entire corps (the 4th) was dropped operationally in February 1942 but while it survived for six months in the German rear, it failed to achieve its objectives. The crisis at Stalingrad then pulled in all available airborne troops to fight as regular infantry again.
Soviet airborne troops always fought with tremendous courage and elan, but lacked heavy anti-tank weapons and were badly supported in every operation they attempted.
How Much?
If you’re buying this set through Warlord Games, then it’ll set you back £25. Which works out as £2.50 per metal model.
However, you can get them cheaper through our affiliate link with Element Games, where they’ll cost you £22.50.
What’s in the Box?
Inside you’ll get 10 metal miniatures consisting of:
- NCO with SMG
- 4 Paratroopers with SMG
- 3 Paratroopers with rifles
- 2-man LMG team
- Plastic bases
Model Quality and Ease of Build
These couldn’t be easier to build. All the models are single piece metal models. There are no additional parts to glue on, such as heads, arms, or legs
They are metal, so you’ll find quite a bit of flashing that you’ll need to remove, and there were some heavy mould lines that I had to file down.
Other than that, it was just glueing them to their bases and priming.
Painting
I tried to follow the box art as closely as I could with Citadel paints and used the below recipes.
To save a little time I used Geek Gaming Scenics Base Ready Patchy Plains.
Overall, the unit took roughly 5 hours to build and paint.