German Late War Gepanzerte Panzergrenadiers

Continuing with basing and photographing my miniatures collection, I present my German Late War Gepanzerte Panzergrenadiers. This is a single platoon pictured, but I have a full, three platoon company available.

The half-tracks and infantry were painted by Dragon Painting Services in Hong Kong. I bought all three platoons from them on eBay, using their Best Offer method, so got a (slight) reduction from their normal price. I found out that the catch was that they never seem to sell the Panzergrenadier company headquarters, but they would be more than happy to paint that separately, at full price of course. I opted to paint those myself. (Pictures of them later.)

The quality of the painting is superb, and well worth the price to me. Their basing of infantry is consistent (I purchased other German platoons and they were the same), even if they are not the same as what I use. The only complaint I had is that the painters appear to be exact, in that all three platoons had the same numbers on the half-tracks (211, 212, 213, and 214). So, I can tell the half-tracks within the platoon apart, but had to devise a means to tell the platoons apart.

I decided to base my vehicles – in this case the half-tracks are on 3" by 1 1/2" bases – and use the basing as  the consistent component between painted units I purchase. Unfortunately, I have not re-based the infantry (or tried to make them consistent), so they look a little different. I may paint the outer band around the base the same green color as the half-tracks and leave it at that.

When the Earth and Steel book came out for Flames of War I noted that the Panzergrenadiers for Panzer Lehr had one Tank Hunter team per squad, so I had to go back and add them. (Pictures of them later.) That is when I discovered that matching the basing of the DPS bases was going to be a challenge. So, if I decide to paint the outer band it will be all or nothing.

I have played these troops for about a year now and I like them. The mobility and incredible machine-gun firepower makes them impressive. The three Tank Hunter teams per platoon make the Panzer Lehr version pretty beefy against armor in assault. The ability to combat attach a half-track with a 75mm cannon (from the Heavy Platoon) means that the platoon has an armored Tank team, thus enemy infantry must roll Motivation to assault. Combine all of this with the German's Mounted Assault rule and you have a pretty good unit.

The important thing to remember about this unit is that it is not an Armored Tank team, but is a Transport team, thus it can be pinned and it can be assaulted by enemy Tank teams.