This was something of a whimsical purchase, as I didn’t really need most of the miniatures; impulse control isn’t really one of my strong suits, however, so now I have a box of brand new shiny miniatures! Having said that, you can never really have enough Panzer IIIs, or infantry, and I don’t have any of the Hornisses or Mark IIIs modelled in the “Late” style, so no harm, no foul.
As usual, I picked these up from Wayland Games, my go-to hobby store for discounted miniatures.
Contents
When opening Battlefront’s bundle boxes (which I’ve done many, many times in the past few years) I’ve always wondered how on Earth the packers manage to get all of the stuff in- once taken out of the box, I can never manage to fit it back. This set in particular is like this, and I honestly think that the staff at BF must be using some kind of clown car physics here!
As you can see, the box contains a lot of sprues, most of which can be used for both Mid and Late War gaming. The build is based around a Panzer III Tank Company, with a focus on anti-tank support, and a handful of mechanised infantry thrown in for digging in on objectives. The box contains:
- 7 x Panzer III Tanks (buildable as either early, late, or uparmoured versions, with multiple weapon calibre options: short and long 5cm, and short 7.5cm)
- 4 x Panzer IV Tanks (short- and long-barrelled 7.5cm gun options)
- 2 x StuG Assault Guns (early and late options, short- or long-barrel 7.5cm guns)
- 2 x Hornisse Tank Hunters (with optional assembly as Hummel self-propelled artillery, but not enough hills for a Hummel battery)
- 4 x Sd Kfz 251 Transports (options to build as standard APC, 3.7cm AT, and Mortar Carrier versions, including specialised crew)
- 7 x Infantry Teams (1 formation commander and 6 MG Teams)
- 1 x Complete A5 Rulebook
- 1 x German “Start Here” Booklet
- 2 x Decal Sheets
- 11 x Unit Cards (but only for the build options illustrated on the box)
- 15 x Tank Commanders (in 5 different poses)
A couple of things to note here. Although the box states “All Plastic,” the crew for the Sd Kfz 251s are in that odd brittle resin which Battlefront produce. Also, there are far more infantry included than are necessary for the platoon here, leaving you with 21 spare guys- that’s enough for five more bases of troopers if you don’t mind that not every one has a machine gunner. That’s enough for an extra platoon (the smaller 5-Team sized one, although sans transports, obviously), so it’s definitely worth bearing in mind, although you’ll need to source some bases from somewhere.
So, with the contents it’s possible to put together between 102 and 149 points worth of miniatures for the Mid War period, depending on your build (I haven’t done the numbers for Late War, but it’ll be significantly lower). That’s a respectable total by anyone’s measure!
Summary
This is an excellent value boxed set for anyone looking to build an Eastern Front-themed German army, featuring a decent mix of infantry and tanks. You might need to grab some artillery or mortars to make it a properly balanced force, but this can be done for a minimal cost, getting you a viable force on the table at a price well below that of many other wargames.