https://wargamesatlantic.com/blogs/news/bef-decisions-decisions-help-us-pick
BEF Decisions!
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Hudson Adams Moderator
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@Hudson Adams Actually, while I am not personally invested beyond wanting this done so Chinese can be thing I looked it over and wrote an essay suggestion which should be in the comments but might be easier to read here (and I did move the paragraphs around):
I would look at cutting back on the heads first (particularly any heads options you can get from other British WW1/2 sets you guys do already, you don't really need to add repeats particularly of helmets). Even just cutting them in half so its so its three of each hat type would work since they would likely have had mixed headgear in the field (this is true particularly for the Homeguard, just pick the heads that look the most fun and keep those).
You could also try getting rid of a body in addition to cutting down on the headswaps. Its a shame but it would cut down on a lot of parts needed right there and make this a more doable set for both home guard and BEF (if you decide to ditch the 2 inch mortar as suggested later on, the prone body would be my pick for removal, otherwise likely any of the standing bodies would work, but if there is a way to cut down on needed parts further by keeping certian bodies and ditching others, do that).
Doing both of the above would likely let you add at least the gear and maybe some of the rifles you need.
Likewise you do not need that many automatic weapons, particularly the 2 LMG options. You should get rid of one of the Berns and I recommend having that be the firing bern (probably the ideal option for sprue removal since the carry bern is good reprsentive of Dunkirk, where the BEF lost a good chunk of them), either that or swapping the firing Lewis gun out for the carry one that way you get more sprue space to play with (point is you only need 1 of each since they both work for BEF and the Home Guard only needs one Lewis). While I personally like the BARs, I have to agree with others you only need one for Home Guard and you should cut down on the Tommies to 2 at most maybe even go down to just 1.
Now as to Home Guard (which kinda of should be the secondary option in the kit), in real life they were so under equipped they used everything they had and never had enough weapons to go around till stens where introduced later on. By 1940 they had 1 "machine gun"(SMG,LMG,BAR,etc.) and a civilian shotgun to every 2 rifles and that would likely be the default base squad makeup up to that point, possibly along with some guys armed with melee weapons and pistols of varying degrees of reliability. So I would only add 3 rifles at most for the Home guard angle since that is more a kitbash army project (ie, someone buying this for home guard is likely also going to pick up at least a couple sprues of your WW1 British and Partisans just for guns, but also keep that in mind with regards to the extra parts like the scarf).
I am not really sure if the 2 inch mortar and Boys Anti-Tank Rifle are both real needs for this sprue. Honestly, I kinda of agree with others that it might be better to add at least one or both to a future heavy weapon set instead and replacing them with an anti tank grenade or two in this set (or even just that sticky grenade from earler preveiws), but if anti armor is a must cause "Boltaction" I would go with ditching the mortar and keeping the anti tank gun (more flashy, doesn't need two figures to setup, and is actually more useful for scratch building).
Also while it is not realistic to life per say, instead of missing out on having tools/weapons in favor of a lot empty left hands, just divvy up single hand weapon/tool poses evenly between the left and and right arms.For example you don't need the rifle strap hold arm you have on the sprue as much as pistol or a grenade arm particularly since it is a right arm unless your grenade throwing arm is a lefty or you been thinking of getting rid of one of the two handed firing poses you have in favor of it (which you might want to do anyways), but if it were a left arm it would actually be generally useful and could be swapped in for a lot of stuff.
Finally you don't need the pointy right hand every WW2 set on earth seems to have, they are not actually needed gameplay wise (for most rulesets with decent player bases anyways) so just keep that off, its a true waste of sprue space.
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Please do not remove bodies. They are by far the most important element of a figure's identity, and the thing we are buying your kits for. I doubt a single person who wants to buy this kit would be happy with that, and I bet many more people would buy it if it had more bodies. That's overall my main critique of the kits I have purchased (Persians and Irish), as low body variety results in very similar hordes if armed the same.
I can't quite tell, but it looks like you have two identical bipods on the sprue. I don't think anyone would need more than one bipod-equipped weapon in a unit. It also looks you have a bit of extra space in the L7 L1 R1 / R9 L9 L6 Row, as well as the L10 L3 L2a row. I think one out of L1 and L16 could be left out, and I doubt leaving out the mug on the sidelines would make anyone mad. If you moved or tilted R8, you could fit an arm there. I'm not sure what the difference between the rifles is, but if one is home-guard specific, you could probably cut 1 of that rifle, since home guard would probably be deployed in groups of less than 30, or with BEF weapons. I can see the scarf going. Both machine gun rows seem to have extra space. by flipping R10 180 degrees (from the persective of the sprue photos), you could fit a rifle there by moving it closer to the other gun. same with 18. you could fight an extra drum or a pouch between 81 and 3. Heads 52-57 look very similar to 47-51, you could probably remove 4 and fit in the over-the-shoulder chunky machine gun.
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@Estoc they didn't do that and I was merely suggesting removing 1 (count it 1) body from the frame, cause that would cut down on the number identical weapons, pouchs, etc. needed to equip all the bodies.
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