German Heer Pt.11- More MG42s

A German army needs plenty of MG42s. I read that in an wargaming article somewhere, and completely agree. As the war for Germany swung onto the defensive for the most part later on, the MG42 showed its true value as an area denial tool. In the Bocage country of Normandy whole fields could be blanketed and turned into killing zones. German army doctrine focused on an infantry squad supporting the LMG as its primary tool, rather than the LMG supporting the rest of the squad- and this made sense as the MG34/ 42 was a fine weapon that did its job superbly. So, on the tabletop, I wanted to have more of them!

Team 1

I already have an Artizan Design MMG team to support my reinforced platoon, but I have always liked the models produced by Empress Miniatures. I have a few things in my army by them- a Panzerschrek team and my HQ officers, but I'd always planned on including more.

I like this team a great deal. I like the mixture of uniforms they're wearing which means I can use them for my grenadier or volksgrenadier platoons. Paul Hicks' sculpting is always superb, too- I'd buy all of the Empress WW2 models if I could, but that would definitely break the bank... I like the team's poses- hunkered down and watchful. Their low profile does have an impact on the table where Bolt Action's Real Line of Sight rule can make them that little bit harder to spot if placed well amongst cover.

Team 2

This team allowed me to add a bit of variation from the usual '3 men in a firing position' MMG team that you always get. If you play WW2 Americans, you can have a similar mixture of 'firing' and 'deploying' MMG teams as the USA can field multiple teams per platoon. I wanted something similar here. Fortunately, Empress Miniatures supplied another excellent set of models to help me do that.

Interestingly, or annoyingly, the deploying MMG team comprised of only 2 men- the gunner carrying the MG42 and his assistant in the greatcoat lugging the tripod. I included an ammo carrier from the LMG/ 2-man MG42 pack to make up the third man, and his pose complements the other two guys nicely.

I mount this team on a 3-man sabot base on the table, mainly to identify them as a fixed weapon team rather than just 'three men in a small group'. I don't like mounting teams on a single 50mm or 60mm round base, as I find that I can't get them into certain bits of scenery- and teams really want to get into cover where they can! Similar to my Soviet 'deploying' MMG team, the yellow line on the base represents where arc of fire is measured from as there is no barrel to work with. I have put one beside each of the three positions on this base so that the gunner can be placed in any of them depending on the particular scenery that the team is placed within.