To keep my hope of starting the Barbarossa to Berlin Chain of Command campaign series alive I am finishing bits and bobs for the early Soviets. An integral part of an early war rifle platoon is the four man light mortar team. I used the Warlord Games 50mm light mortar team which comes as a two man crew. I then used the Warlord plastics to make the other two crewmen. I made one spotter type with binoculars, as is tradition, and the other a junior leader type with a sub-machinegun. The two plastic crewmen will join my pool of crew for various support weapon teams.

The Warlord 50mm mortar comes paired with a two man flamethrower team. Armed with the ROKS-2 flamethrower the operator is ready to assault any German entrenchments his platoon comes up against. The ROKS-2 is an interesting weapon as it was designed to look like a regular Mosin rifle in order to not attract attention to itself. Due to their terrifying use the flamethrower was a priority target for anyone who saw one coming their way. At this point I have only painted the flamethrower and not his assistant as I have plenty of extra riflemen and submachine gunners to form the team. I will get to him at a later date ^TM.

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The cat is out of the bag about the new Iron Dice Gaming studio project. I had not planned on setting up a permanent studio in 2023 but when the opportunity arose it was a no-brainer choice. The whole team is really stoked about having a place to be creative and make sharing our love for the hobby easier and more attractive. One thing worth saying is that this is a passion project and while the fire is there the time to work on it fulltime is not. We are fortunate to have the resources and support of the whole IDG team, but we all work full time jobs. It turns out hobby, to no one’s surprise, doesn’t pay the bills. I will also offer the usual cliche, We have a lot of good stuff planned ^TM. I still don’t want to spoil any surprises.

The studio started as an old decommissioned men’s room that had been pretty much forgotten by time. We spent a few hours clearing it out, removing hardware, and washing the walls and ceiling. I was pretty busy so I didn’t take many photos but it went from a pretty sketchy room to a space ready for new electrical outlets, bathroom facet removal, paint, carpet, and sound treatment.

One of our main goals was to bring people along for the ride as we turn a turd into a painted turd. We will continue to provide updates as we make progress. I hope you enjoy the ride as much as we do.