Hans! Hände hoch!

Another entry to the Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge by yours truly:

A last stand you say? Well, if there’s been one iconic last stand in WW2 than it must clearly have been the Battle for Arnhem during Operations Market and Garden. Of course there were others too but this one instantly sprang to mind and coincidentally I'm slowly collecting a force of Paratroopers for it.

Paras on their way to the bridge

It took me a while to finally finish the figures for this location as (rather unusually for me) I simply couldn’t stay focused. I'm used to jump between projects but it's usually only when I've finished a unit that I start on something different. At the moment however I'm pretty much focused on WW2 (as always) but can't, for the life of me, seem to finish a whole unit. So instead of waiting I decided these 5 figures should suffice.

The three British Airborne are Warlord Games Metals while the two SS actually are DAK casualties by Artizan Designs. Given a period appropriate Erbsentarn camouflage they fit perfectly for Arnhem in late '44. At the moment I'm not yet decided if I stick with Artizan DAK for the SS or if I'll use some other manufacturer.

Speaking of the Waffen-SS, it has caused me some headaches but I've finally decided to not use regular Heer as stand ins but collect a dedicated force exclusively for Market Garden. My personal misgivings about the SS aside it somehow didn’t feel right to 'change' history just because I'm not comfortable with one of the forces involved.
Either do it proper or don't do it at all! But one thing is certain, these will be no StG'44 toting Uber-Soldiers.

The prone casualty figure instantly reminded me of the picture below and originally this was the scene I wanted to recreate. Needless to say I didn’t pull it through as the whole bridge and stuff seemed a little too intimidating even if compressed a little.

Haven’t quite finished the basing yet, but for the moment it should do. Need to order me some new tufts first.