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I love the smell of a new edition in the morning, and for Bolt Action one is right around the corner. As a US Marines player I feel just like America suddenly thrust into World War 2 by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour - woefully unprepared.
Bolt Action 3rd edition is finally (almost) here after 8 years of us grumbling about but continuing to love second edition. Hard not to with its minimal annual FAQs, unfathomable level of bloat, sometimes ambiguous rule descriptions, and undeniably fun times. While already billed as more of a 2.5 than a third edition, BA3 is shaping up to be a refinement and strategic pruning of BA2 which suits me just fine. Afterall, don’t fix what isn’t broken …that badly all things considered.
So how does one prepare for a new but not so new edition of a beloved wargame? Well I will be adopted one of the oldest adages of military strategy deployed to great success by legendary generals through the ages such as Alexander the Great, Charlemagne, Francis Drake, and Shaka Zulu - Bring more tanks. I have been feeling like my Marines have been short a big gun lately especially as I often play against Germans so it’s pretty easy to feel outgunned. That considered, I think it’s time to introduce the iconic M4 Sherman into my roster.
Brief history lesson: The Bolt Action M4 Sherman chuggerchuggerchuggered onto battlefields in 1942 and quickly became the mainstay American medium tank. Somewhat equivalent to the German’s Panzer IV, the M4 saw service with the USA till 1957 and was only finally retired from service by Paraguay in 2018 after almost 50,000 were made. This bubbly looking boy has been featured in countless warflicks, video games, and wargames because this thing is a flippin’ icon.
Because of its legendary status there are plenty of options when buying a model for the M4 ranging in scale, complexity, detail, and price. Bolt Action is intended for 28mm scale, AKA, 1/56 scale, so that helps narrow choices down. I opted to go straight to the source and picked up the Warlord Games version. This version comes with just enough detail to keep things authentic without constituting a thousand pieces that invariably snap off by the dozen when it first hits the tables in game one. All that, and at a price point I am very happy with.
Rolling out of the box I am immediately surprised. This ain't my first Warlord tank kit rodeo but I was a little taken back at how few components come on the M4 sprew. Yay I guess? A quick once over of the sprew and I am a happy lad though - it’s numbered! And in a logical sequence too! It seems like such a small and obvious thing but I am amazed by how many miniature manufacturers miss either of these two steps which adds a lot of tedium to the build process. The instructions come on one double sided sheet of A5 and depict 8 multistage steps. All seems good thus far.
As I get the nippers going the M4 quickly starts taking shape. The tracks are a little fiddly to line up but nothing drastic. The chassis goes together nicely and before long I am onto the smaller components that sit atop it. That’s the lights, armour plates, spange-buckets, armoured war-gazebo, and greater crested spice gibbon. I am going to level with you. I know a bit about tanks but I don’t know a lot about tanks. I am half-remembering/completely making up some of this but you get the jist. Lot’s of hooks and loops and bits of metal that add visual detail to drybrush later on. Make sure you use tweezers when applying these. If you are a stubborn dumb dumb like me who prefers to use his sausage fingers instead then prepare to elongate the build process by 20-30% and be absolutely miserable about it. Also, pro tip, when assembling any model kit it is highly recommended not to do so in a room with a grey carpet.
It’s also around now I notice a minor issue with the instructions. The black and white images show the current stage of the build as well as which components to add next. What it doesn’t show you is exactly where to add them, instead opting to have the components floating somewhere adjacent to roughly where to glue the piece, as if to say “see this hoop thing? This belongs on the tank” why thank you Warlord. Often it’s made obvious by a nearby hole that fits the piece perfectly but if you struggle then try looking ahead a few steps to see where the piece is sitting on future diagrams. Again, not a major issue made merciful by the limited number of overall pieces in the kit and far more problematic on bigger kits.
When you get to turret town you have the option of not using glue to allow you to turn that cannon in a 360 arc, and to remove the turret. Useful for those who want to paint it separately or like to signify a tank has gone bye bye during a game by removing the turret. I am in that small camp of people who likes to glue theirs on to keep everything secure and sturdy. It is atop the turret however that I encountered great sadness. Piece no. 32 is a small searchlight mounted by the turret. It goes in without issue and then 30 seconds later I put my thumb on it and snapped it. Huh. I won’t fault the kit for this because at that scale the searchlight is going to be delicate, and my right thumb is notoriously unwieldy. I filed and smoothed out the remaining stump and I simply include my failure as a cautionary tale. Speaking of bespoke modifications, I snip and file the ariel right down simply as this will allow easy storage via my preferred method - 4 litre really useful boxes. With the ariel intact I wouldn’t be able to close the lid. If anyone asks it got shot off by another tank.
Build rounding off I mount this bad boy on a rectangular base that comes in around 100X50mm. Heresy to some - convenient to magnetise for others. 1 hot glue gun and some iddy biddy mini magnets later and she is ready for painting.
I blast the Sherman with Vallejo Olive Drab primer for a no fuss (that means lazy) undercoat. Next the tracks get a couple thin coats of AK Rubber Black. Then I portion up some Smokey Ink, Beastly Brown, and Dark Aluminium Vallejo colours onto a palette and cut up a sponge from an old mini booster pack. Using tweezers I lightly dab the colours over the tank to represent chips and mud splatter. This is a great technique when you don’t actually know what you are doing. In mere minutes it’s starting to look sort of like a very small, but almost real, tank. I tie everything together with a sepia wash, slap on a premade basing mix and bring it full circle by rimming the base with Olive Drab. There - just enough effort to call it done. I’m a happy lad.
So how does the M4 Sherman play in Bolt Action Third Edition? I have no idea it’s not out yet. Warlord have given us a release date of September 2024 which is now so er… I guess they think of release dates as more of a vibe I guess? Still, when the new edition manifests itself, be prepared for the forthcoming barrage of my opinions about it, starting with the Sherman M4 - Brad Pitt’s favourite tank.