A review (of sorts) of the Games & Gears D6 Generation brush set

I am calling this a review of sorts because I am in no way qualified to judge higher end paintbrushes but I do want to talk about why I bought them and how I feel about them now that they have arrived.

For the past month or so I have been painting quite a bit after a long dry spell over the summer and I was considering getting one or two good brushes. I had my eye on the Winsor Newton System 7 brushes because I had heard good things about them and they carry them at the local art supply store so I could see them in person before buying them.

Shortly after I had begun considering this purchase, I head on the D6G podcast that were promoting a set of brushes from Games & Gears. At 45 pounds for 5 brushes they were a little bit less than the cost per brush for the Winsor Newton ones but I was really only considering getting 2 of those (one around size 2 and one around 0 or 00). I did a bit more research and was leaning towards the Games and Gears brushes and then figured that if it was a limited run of 250 it wasn't really worth the effort of the hosts of the D6G to completely sell out for such a small gain so they probably could be trusted on this one!

I finally decided to go for it and just when I was about place the order, I got a call from my Mum saying she was going to send me some money for Christmas and coincidentally it was almost exactly the amount that the set with the D6G Brushes and the DLB technicals was going for. So in a moment of madness I bought that.

About a week and half ago the brushes arrived. They looked really good and the feel and weight of them was good and they went together well when you took them apart for storage.

I wasn't really sure what to expect when I started to use them (to be honest, I was dreading that there would be a huge moment of buyers remorse) but they are very good. I don't know that I could say that they make my painting that much better (though I think they do a little bit) but they do make the experience of painting much better, the brushes keep their point much better and for longer than the brushes I was using before and they hold the paint better. When I paint with very watery paint it "stays" in the brush better. I can paint for longer without getting annoyed and frustrated.

The 0 00 and 000 are much more useful than I would  have imagined. Although they come to a very fine point there is still enough "bristle mass" to hold a decent amount of paint so you don't feel that you are painting with a toothpick. If these brushes last for a good long time (and I have no reason to think that they won't) I will be very happy with this purchase.

I haven't done anything with the Technical set of brushes yet, I will likely give the drybrush brushes a go soon and will try the "katana" on some free hand shield work (not really much hope of success there since my drawing is awful with a pencil and I don't think there is any reason to think I will do any better even with the best of brushes).

So the final word is that I have come to realize that having better brushes will make my painting more fun (and perhaps a little better) and that these are definitely better brushes. I can't say that they are better (or worse) than other higher end brushes but I can say I am quite happy with them and would recommend them to anyone looking to move up in the brush world.

Review of Nachtjaeger and the Battlfoam 1520XL

This weekend I picked up the newish Nachtjaeger book for Flames of War and my new Battlefoam bag arrived on Friday so I thought I would give my impressions of both.

I didn't really think I would be super-excited about this book, I was afraid it was going to be all Nazi uber-tech and not much else. There is a little bit of that but the lists in it are actually pretty good and the rules for the night vision stuff aren't terrible (though I have to say I have no desire to actually play with those rules)

The British get 3 lists, 2 Tank and 1 Infantry. The first list (11th Armoured Division) is for a Tank Company equipped with Comets. The Comet is a pretty good tank (both in the game and in real life) but it only saw combat in the last few months of the war so I can't imagine many people will really want to rush out and buy and paint a dozen of them -- I know I don't.

The second is for the armoured recce regiment of the 11th Armoured (15th/17th Hussars) which didn't get the Comets but does re-arrange its Cromwells so the Challengers are all in their own platoon. This is a list I would play given a chance.

A platoon with the 3 or 4 17 pdrs with ROF 3 is going to make even the heaviest of German tanks stop and think (and you can take 2 platoons if you happen to have 6 or 8 Challengers -- I just have the 3 pictured).

The third list is for infantry which has all the cool stuff the British get in late war like APCs and Crocodiles but on my quick read through there was nothing new and exciting.

The Germans also get 3 listts. The first 2 are for Panzerdivision Clausewitz which have a mix of Pz IVJs and and Pantthers (as well as STuGs, PZIV/70s and Jagdpanthers). They are rated Reluctant Veteran so they should be quite interesting to play -- and makes them cheap enough that you can have a variety of late war German armour in your list.

The last is a Marine-Grenadierkompanie which is also interesting. They are rated Fearless Trained (the fearless part seems a bit of a stretch) and can have a variety of support units. The infantry stands all have assault rifles and panzerfausts so they are quite powerful -- though they are really only better than normal Germans rated as MG teams when they are attacking and that probably isn't happening much in 1945. The really interesting part of this unit is they can take heavy-AA on railroad cars, I think they are likely to be borderline useless but they will be cool figures and I will definitely pick up some when they come out (if they come out, I don't see them mentioned on the FOW web page)

Some of the German units have the option to take IR night fighting gear which may be good but I probably won't make any effort to figure out the rules for it until I actually face someone who takes them.

Overall this book is an average FOW supplement. The lists are somewhat interesting even if the campaign they fought in isn't particularly interesting to me.

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About a year ago I decided that I should get some Battlefoam trays to carry my Hail Caesar figures. I managed to fit the Romans and British into two plastic tubs but it wasn't ideal and they did get banged about a bit.

I decided on 3 tray configurations with the units already arranged on their movement tray. One for Cavalry:

One for Infantry:

And one for smaller units and command

Because of the height of the standards in most of the units, I went for the deepest trays available. When I got those back I decided that they worked reasonably well and that I should order some more and another bag. I had originally thought to get another bag like I had now but the thickness of the foam doesn't divide nicely into that bag and it seemed it would be better to have just one bag so I ordered the bigger 1520 XL.

This bag is certainly big -- it has suitcase wheels and a handle as well. The big drawback is that it opens on the side which means that you have to slide the trays out which requires a bit so space if you are going to do it carefully -- of course if this bag is needed it is likely to be a big game so there should be some space.

I was a bit disappointed that Battlefoam had changed the colour of their bags so they are all black now. The olive colour of the old ones wasn't all that wonderful either but I am not really a huge fan of back. Overall I am quite pleased with this purchase, it means that I can run a Hail Caesar game at Cangames or at the club and not have to worry about transportation and that I can store my figs in it at home at least until I get the basement sorted out (or paint up more Romans -- which to be honest, is likely to happen before the basement gets tidied).

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I did manage to assemble my PzIV/70s so I will start in on them this week along with the PzIV Js and some Romans.