Post a Comment On: Fawcett Avenue Conscripts

[Image]Not too much painting going on nowadays at Conscript Towers but I had time to crank out some Soviets for Team Yankee - a set of their Motor Rifle Weapons Teams. The set is cast in Battlefront plastic/resin - a much superior material to the dreadful Warlord "restic" in my opinion. The Battlefront stuff holds fine detail well and requires little to no cleanup. Good stuff.  
[Image]Anyway, the blister pack contains three large team bases and figures to make three heavy weapons teams: two AT-4 "Spigot" ATGW teams and one AGS-17 "Plamya" automatic grenade launcher team. There's also two cards with stats for use with the Team Yankee game.
[Image]Above is the AGS-17 team. Three grenade launchers and operators, and three riflemen. The AGS-17 automatic grenade launcher went into service in 1971. It fires 30mm high-explosive grenades from a belt, at a cyclic rate of 350-400 rounds per minute. Enough to bring some hurt. Apparently the Soviets intended the AGS-17 to address the expected "human wave attacks" of the Chinese in a future Sino-Soviet conflict (!) 
[Image]The blister also includes two AT-4 anti-tank guided missile teams. Fortunately NATO adopted the designation "Spigot" rather than the Russian designation "Fagot" (bassoon). The AT-4 is wire-guided; the launcher tracks the position of the missile from an incandescent infrared bulb on the rear of the missile and transmits guidance via the wire. This is SACLOS - semi-automatic command to line of sight. The operator keeps his pip on the target and the launcher guides the missile to that point.
[Image]Anyway, there you have it - three new weapons teams for the Motor Rifle Battalion. Price tag on the blister was a nickel short of ten bucks which I reckon is good value. Fun and easy to paint and most importantly, represents movement of figures from the lead pile to the painted army drawer.
Hope you're all keeping safe.