A Second Look at Battlefront’s Flexible Plastic Infantry

By Tom Burgess

With Flames of War moving back to its Mid War desert roots, this seemed to make this year a good time to for me to build an 8th Army force to oppose my existing DAK German force. Even better, from my perspective, was that I’d be able to do this new force, even the infantry, in plastic. The announcement of this caught me off-guard as I recalled an earlier WWPD interview with Pete that indicated that Battlefront was steering away from plastic infantry. This was due to the fact a hard plastic infantry sprue took up the same time and effort as three hard plastic tank sprues. So I was caught quite by surprise with these new figures becoming available and I was excited that I’d get to move forward with an all plastic Battlefront 8th Army force.

Later we learned that these new plastic British infantry were not hard plastic, but instead a new type of flexible plastic. This immediately raised concerns with many Flames of War gamers. Many thought the paint on these figures would chip like it does on 1/72nd scale Arifx type soft plastic figures. A notable concern, as I also had experienced the same problem with painting Arifx figures back in my younger days. However, I had more recent experience with 15mm figures from Axis & Allies line which were also made of a flexible type material.

Some Axis & Allies flexible infantry and vehicles that I painted up in 2007

These Axis & Allies miniatures came “pre-painted,” and I noticed they retained their paint completely, even with some very rough handling. So for use in my Flames of War games, I re-primed and repainted these figures and based them appropriately for Flames of War.

I created several platoons of infantry and guns for my German army over eight years ago, using only Axis & Allies miniatures. They have retained their paint superbly. Interestingly, though the painted figures have held up fine, the bases have become noticeably worn and chipped. I have no idea if the old Axis & Allies figures and the new Battlefront flexible materials are the same, but if the Battlefront figures retain paint as well as my eight-year-old Axis & Allies figures, I think they’ll do just fine on durability.

 

10 years of use, much of that loaned out to new players, and still not a single chip!

The next issue that arose, as we got more information about these new figures, was the nearly featureless faces. Yep, the unpainted faces have barely any discernable detail. The large number of negative reactions from the community, as well as what I could see for myself, made me think twice about adding these figures to my new force. I also heard that the Plastic Soldier Company might eventually be doing 8th Army figures in hard plastic. At that point, I thought it might be best for me to put my project on hold and wait for the PSC offerings. That was until I saw Panzer Schule’s YouTube video “”.

The sample 8th Army miniature as painted by Panzer Schule looked fine just fine to me. Much better than anything in my collection anyway. So then I went back and looked at my old Axis & Allies German infantry. They did not have much in the way of great facial detail either, but yet I’ve been happily gaming with them for more than eight years.

Then I examined my other metal Battlefront figures, sure they had much better details on their faces but I had not really painted them any better. My personal painting skill maxes out before I get to good face details. So with some extra motivation, thanks to Panzer Schule, I decided to pull two packs of    off the rack at my LGS and try them out for myself.

 

 

The first step I had to deal with these figures was to straighten them out. There was a fair degree of bending, even in the main part of the sprue, which needed to be straightened out. I ran some hot water out of my Keurig coffee machine into a glass and then submerged the sprues in the hot water for about a minute. They straightened right out. I didn’t even need to apply gentle pressure on some of the weapons.

A bit of sprue bending that was easily fixed

The next step was to trim away some of the flash. A sharp knife made this task fairly easy, but after I primed the figured I noticed more flash that I had missed. It might be worthwhile to give the bare figures a light wash before priming to better help show the mold lines. Even after a second round of trimming flash, I still found these figures as easy to prepare as any of the metal Battlefront figures I’ve worked on previously.

Some mold lines do appear, wash or drybrush the figures to help them stand out for removal.

With the figures cleaned up, it was time for priming. Usually, I base my figures before priming, but with these, I thought I’d experiment with priming and painting them while still on the sprue. I used black Rust-Oleum Camouflage Ultra Cover 2x. It’s relatively cheap, and dries very flat. It says on the can “also Bonds to Plastic” which I thought might help with these figures. Priming on the sprue was a breeze and I found that all areas were covered well. No areas required an additional brush primer application into the undercuts and recesses, as is often needed.

I painted these figures rather hastily following the guide painting guide on pages 42 and 43 Desert Rats. I went for speed over detail as these were going to be gaming figures that I wanted to get into the fight quickly.  I used Vallejo paint equivalents of the Colours of War range. I stopped at after the wash for which I  used the suggested Rommel Shade wash. This was the absolute fastest and easiest that I had ever painted 15mm figures. I was not particularly careful on the block painting of the base colors since I knew the shade wash would hide a lot of errors and add details for me. In the end, I got a very pleasing result very quickly with techniques that a novice painter could easily emulate.

 

 

The other sprue from BR 753 after painting

After separating the figures from the sprues, I glued them to the bases.  I used Vallejo’s  Sandy Paste 26.215  to give a nice textured appearance to the bases. I then painted them with some cheap acrylic hobby tan paint and gave them a simple dry brush of Vallejo 819 Iraqi Sand. Next came some sparse application of Battlefront’s desert flock (that came with terrain pieces) and the addition of a few Army Painter BF4207 Mountain Tufts. This further enhanced the already nice looking figures and really made them fit into my desert force.

After the based figures were game table ready I compared them to some Late War British Infantry which I recently completed.  These LW figures were Battlefront metal figures from . I was equally pleased with my results on both sets of figures.

 

I thought these figures were certainty game worthy, but I was not expecting them to ever win Best Painted army in a major tournament. I still don’t think they’ll ever win best painted on their own, but they did not keep me from winning Best Painted at the Historicon 2017 Flames of War Mid War Nationals as part of my force. In that tournament, I ran a Crusader Squadron formation and a Motor Company formation, the later using the platoon highlighted in this article. Later I won another Best Painted at a smaller local tournament, again using these same figures. It was mostly the tanks that carried my force in the painting competition, so don’t expect these new figures to carry to a Best Painted award. They won’t. But they might not hold you back as part of your force from winning either as in my case.

In the end, these figures are not really all that well detailed, but after nearly twelve months of gaming with them, I’d say they are more than detailed enough. They are not for everyone to be sure. Even though I did manage to nab an occasional Best Painted award with them, there are many, many painters whose ability far exceeds mine. I could understand why they would prefer other options.

 

I am thankful that Battlefront has produced these figures. They may not be for everyone, but I believe they are a great option for the new players that Battlefront has hoped to bring in with Version 4 of  Flames of War. These figures are less expensive, extremely durable, and can get good finished results very quickly with basic techniques. They are great infantry figures for a new player to start with or for even a veteran, like me, to quickly add a new force to his collection.

 

Finally, I recall Battlefront’s first foray into hard plastic tank kits with the Open Fire boxed sets a few years back.  There was a great outcry then about poor detail and bad fits on those, especially the Sherman tanks. I recall many bellowing how BF needed to ditch the idea of doing plastics altogether and just stick with the metal and resin. I think it’s now quite safe to say that we are very fortunate that Battlefront chose to not heed those recommendations and instead drove on to eventually give us the many excellent plastic tank kits they offer now. Likewise, flexible plastic infantry is early in its development. It appears to me that Battlefront has increased in detail quality with each new expansion of them. To me, the figures are more than good enough now for general gaming purposes, but I am very excited to see where Battlefront goes with these new figure types and how they continue to improve them.

Onward to Victory!