Bolt Action - Old Man Morin's Commonwealth Indian Army Showcase

By: Old Man Morin

It is Australia Day week Down Under and that, for countless war-gamers, means one thing. The pilgrimage to Canberra and Cancon! While just about everyone else in the Bolt Action Alliance crew is off playing for fun and glory in this year's, 42-player event, I am holding down the fort back in Melbourne town. As this was the army that won last year's event, I thought it would be appropriate to pull it out for a few army showcase pictures.  

The infantry in the army was painted by The LRDG's own phenomenally talented Warlord Tobu many moons ago. The models themselves are a combination of the Artisan Designs Indian range and Warlord Games miniatures (using their optional Sikh heads sprue). The Gurkha Squad is from the Assault Group's Britain in the East Range. Though my infantry come from a fairly diverse range of companies, the models really come together as one coherent force once painted and based. I painted the vehicle and artillery models for this army and as the pictures appear I will mention which model ranges they were pillaged from to find the right match for this project. 

There are quite a few models shown here that I did not use in the last year's event (the Gurkhas and the Stuart for example). I included their pictures here anyway as they are part of the pool of models that I can draw from when building an army for a game. Speaking of the Gurkhas...

The truck behind the Gurkhas is a Warlord Bedford truck. For being such a large truck, it is incredibly sturdy. I am a massive fan of this model! I made the driver using the Indian Head sprue and a plastic Warlord British rifleman.

The army was built around the backbone of 40 riflemen, 5 LMG's gunners and 6 guys carrying SMG's

The backbone of the army (in my opinion) is the Mark 1 Lee. The Lee and the Stuart are Blitzkrieg Miniatures. These two vehicles took a grand total of ten minutes to clean and assemble COMBINED!  This gave me more time to paint them, which I really appreciated and enjoyed. 

I used two prone Sikh machine gunners to man my scratch built Blacker Bombard launcher. A unique and fun addition to the army that really helped give this force a character of its own. You can find out how I built it here. 

Likewise, I used the same crew to make this sniper team. 

Speaking of unique units that help give the army its personality, I built the entire army because of these bad boys.

The Indian Pattern Carrier is in essence (rules wise anyway) a wheeled universal carrier.

The models are made by Mad Bob Miniatures. I loved them so much that after I had bought and built one, I bought three more! Again I built the crew out of Warlord plastic British Riflemen with Indian heads. I have sadly broken the LMG pintle mounts (you can see the holes in the carriers' holds) and need to replace them soon. I think I should also paint up four gunners to really give these transports a unique feel. Have I mentioned how much I love these things?

Another rifle squad. 

A Medium Mortar

As Monty was famously not very fond of his Indian troops in the Desert War, Indian troops were often commanded by white officers. I have two leaders for the army, this white officer (who I usually use as my Artillery Spotter) and a Sikh officer, who in my haste to photograph this army was accidentally placed as part of the 25 pounder crew (I was wondering why I had an extra crew model).

Another rifle squad.

And another.

My 25 pound gun. The gentleman on the right is my usual LT for this force. He is actually a crew model make by Company B for their Indian Pattern Carrier model. 

And last but not least... More riflemen!

When I built this army I really wanted to do a British force that did not look like the commando and generic armies that I was seeing played in events. I wanted something that looked truly original. In the process, by adding historically accurate models, like the Indian Pattern Carriers, the Lee and the Blacker Bombard... my force started to play differently as well.

This army was a bit of a labour of love to collect, build and paint but I could not be happier with the end result. I eagerly look forward to seeing if Indian troops (Sikh or otherwise) get any special rules or additional units in the forthcoming Duel In The Desert theatre book.

Until next time....

Survivor of a thousand game systems, a thousand podcasts, a thousand journeys, and a thousand years, 

Old Man Morin... 

Is... 

Well... 

Salty and experienced.