My humble recommendations for WWII Germans in 1/72

Ben2

Mongoose
As WaW hits the stores, peoples thoughts will be turning to what models to use in constructing their invincible German panzer armies of death. !/72 scale is an excellent scale for this, as you can get over 2000 points for less than £25.

Italeri produce two german sets worth looking into for 1944 European theatre, and buying both gives you a full platoon plus support choices. I would recommend buying the standard Italeri German Soldiers box and the German Elite troops box. This gives you a good range of models, as the Elite troops has a captain figure with MP40, a much nicer panzershrek and a panzerfaust model, as well as a sniper, 3 chaps with MP40s to use as NCOs and three StG44 assault rifles. You get three frames of this, so combining the two sets gives you enough NCOs with SMGs for four full squads plus a command squad. Plus all the rifle armed infantry you need, plus a couple of anti-tank teams and a sniper team. The mortar chaps are a disappointment, but the excellent Pegasus mortar set is available.

That gives you your platoon, for about 9 quid.

For tanks you are spoilt for choice. Italeri do quick assembly tigers and panthers for £6 for 2, and Armourfast do Stug IIIs at 2 for £5.50.

That gives you a platoon as 4 armour choices for a little over £20. If you wish to stick absolutely to a £25 budget, you've got enough to get either the Italeri Pak 40 set, giving you two field guns, the Italeri German guns set, giving you two field guns and an AA battery, or you can get the pegasus mortar set.

I've gone with the above, though I'm nicking a Stug and some of the elite infantry to go with my Finns.
 
Personally I'd go with the valiant models figure packs

Hard plastic, and in the case of the Germans lots of choices in weaponry

You can have Stg44's for 8 figures if you want

Plus 4 figs carrying MG42's
4 MG42's on Tripods with a gunner
4 Panzershreck
4 Panzerfaust
4 81mm Mortars

64 figs in all

All for £8.99

But for armour I'd go along with Ben2 the Armourfast kits take some beating

I've got them all based now I think, so I'll try to take a pic of them before I ruin them by trying to paint them! :)
 
Valiant models are really great, they give you almost a GW plastic box feel.
8)
HOWEVER - bear in mind that these minis are NOT 1/72! They are m´closer to 25mm!
They will not fit to any other mini line and look too big when standing next to 1/72 models.
That was the reason to sell my box...
 
I picked up Revell armoured infantry box and Caesar's Late War Germans.
I'm gonna buy some Italeri Russians.
I haven't decided whether i'll use pre-paints for the tanks yet or make them myself i.e. armorfast.
:)
 
Well yes the figures are a little large, but as I don't see any need to mix any others in I can't see a problem, after all most of the time they will be too far away to matter.

OK the vehicles will look a little small, but they always seem to.


Curse you for making me take up another new/old scale!!!

:D
 
Itkovian said:
Well yes the figures are a little large, but as I don't see any need to mix any others in I can't see a problem, after all most of the time they will be too far away to matter.
OK the vehicles will look a little small, but they always seem to.
Curse you for making me take up another new/old scale!!!

:D

You are sooo welcome! :)
 
Scale was why I didn't mention Valiant. Also at eight or nine quid a box you get more figures with a bigger variety of poses buying two different boxes.

Another manufacturer to mention is Pegasus. They not only do a pack of 2 Opel Blitz trucks, but two nice packs of SS, Germans in Berlin (some gret minis in that one) and 1939 blitzkrieg German troops. On top of that there is a pack of mortars, with a variety of 120 and 81mm mortars.

The thing they are short on is chaps with MP40s and MG42s, which you need for putting together your platoon.

Pegasus are putting out a Russians in Berlin set soon (scheduled for this year), and hopefully that will be their usual standard, and provide lots of SMG arms for using for Finns.

Germans are the best served in 1/72 scale and there is a ton of variety to be had. I recommend pooling buys for multi-kits with other people in the club as there are mortar sets with 5 mortars, Pak 40 kits with two guns, a variety of tank kits with two tanks in. If you have two german players, and lets face it if you have more than a handful of players, you will, than pooling kits like this is a good idea.
 
I'm too scared of plastics. I've heard the horror stories of the paint cracking off and it would kill me. I bought some Valiants, and the plastic is perfect. Just like GW. HOWEVER, they are HUGE in height and girth! Super soldiers, maybe?

Anyway, I'm going to pay the cash and swim back into familiar waters.

http://www.warmodelling.com/

The Fantassin minis seem to be better (waiting on a squad in the mail) size from what I've seen at Historicon, and I'm very familiar with metal. Plus, not a half bad selection of types. I try to keep with the same company as much as possible.

Anyway, my 2 cents
 
I've found with plastic that the paint only cracks through hard handling......very hard.......like bending.
If you treat the figures with respect i don't find it a issue.
:)
 
JayRaider said:
I've found with plastic that the paint only cracks through hard handling......very hard.......like bending.
If you treat the figures with respect i don't find it a issue.
:)
Same with my minis!
 
You have to be careful with the Revell sets as quite a few of their vehicles are the old Matchbox moulds. Nice but 1/76th rather than 1/72nd. Most if not all of the Airfx vehicles are to the smaller (model railway OO) scale as well.

For AFVs Hat introduced their Armourfast quick kits a few years ago, a box of two M4s with seven parts each. With each subsequent release the number of parts has crept upwards but they are still simple but well proportioned kits. The only downside is the simplified tracks. Italeri and Pegasus have jumped on the bandwagon as well – the Italeri Pv V and VIs are lovely and if you have the Pegasus E-25 it comes with IR gear that could find its way onto a Panther. I have only just got my first box of Pegasus German lorries (Opal Blitz I am pretty sure) and have not assembled them yet but they look promising except for the transverse seating which looks wrong to me but they come with tilts so that is not a problem and it should be easy enough to convert them to carry other load beds. Certainly much easier kits to assemble than those excessively detailed ones from the Russian and former Soviet Union manufacturers which are quite nice kits but a nightmare if you just want toys for the table.
 
I've just recently picked up my first Armourfast kits (Panzer III) and love how quickly they go together and paint up. There's not a lot of detail, but enough for a wargames table. I don't mind the one piece tracks too much. Beats bulding them link by link as with other manufacturers. I agree, those Russian or Yugoslavian kits (Ace Models) are a bear to put together :roll: .
 
I myself got the Italeria german infantry and elite infantry, and they go really well and compliment each other nicely.
 
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