Bolt Action: Western Desert Boot Camp Live Blog – Friday

It’s nearly time. A grudge match of epic proportion is happening this weekend.

Warlord’s Charlie has arrived at OnTableTop HQ. He’s here to kick ass and paint models. And he’s all out of models.

Be sure to check in on Sunday at 11:00 BST for the Live Let’s Play of Charlie vs John.

Welcome to Day One of the Bolt Action Western Desert where we’re going to be having fun with Warlord Games, building up awesome armies and taking them to the tabletop to show off a good old-fashioned clash between the British and the Germans.

Win Prizes

We have some great goodies to give away over the weekend. Each day you’ll be able to snap up an El Alamein Starter Set + A Panzer III & M3 Stuart.

All you have to do is comment on the Live Blog AND on the individual posts to be in with a chance of winning.

Make sure to get involved and find out more about both hobbying AND gaming during the Western Desert campaign in WWII.

We’ve got a great competition in the works for you this weekend as Warlord Games are going to be giving away some awesome goodies!

You can win yourself an El Alamein Starter Set + A Panzer II & M3 Stuart.

There will be ONE given away each day and you can get a hold of it by commenting on both the main live blog AND the individual posts themselves.

If you’d like to check out more you can view the individual components with the El Alamein Starter Set, Panzer III and M3 Stuart sets here.

Which side are you going to play as?

Jeff has been tearing on getting his British army ready to play for Bolt Action.

Taking advantage of the different head options provided in Warlord’s plastic kit, Jeff has decided to make a force based upon the Sikhs who as part of the British army in World War II.

We’ve got all of the Boot Campers sitting down and working through their armies, building up the plastic and metal components for both the British and the Germans.

We’ve got a great idea that we wanted to share with you! To get you guys involved at home we wanted to give away some spot prizes to those who create some Bolt Action based projects using our Project System.

Make Bolt Action Projects & Win £20 Warlord Games Vouchers!

This can be anything Bolt Action based, be it a unit of soldiers, a commander figure, tanks (John loves those!) or even some pieces of terrain. It DOES NOT have to be desert themed either.

Make sure to select this option when you’re putting together your projects!

We can’t wait to see what you’ve been working on and the kind of things you share with us.

The armies of the German Afrika Korps have fallen behind the British in terms of speed of assembly, but our Boot Campers have a few tricks up their sleeves for them.

Andy has already broken out his brushes and started painting, while Mick gives us some tips on basing Warlord’s metal booster pack miniatures.

The tables at boot camp look amazing this year! Looks like all that hard work has paid off. Forget sunny beaches, we like our sand mixed with kerosene!

The conflicts of the Western Desert are a fascinating period of WWII. John and Charlie sit down to take us through the two Bolt Action forces facing off at this Boot Camp Weekend.

First, the German Afrika Korps head out to battle and we find out what sort of kit they used to claim victory in the desert.

We go behind the scenes and scope out the team’s eating habits!

As you can see, we’ve got the fuel to keep us going for the weekend!

Continuing our introduction to the two forces of the Bolt Action Western Desert Boot Camp, Charlie and John have a talk about what the British 8th Army is taking to war.

Time to check in and see how our hobbyists are getting along with their Bolt Action armies!

It’s all looking good so far – can’t wait to see these painted!

We’re chatting with John about the different tabletops that we’ve created for the Boot Camp. We have a variety of different terrain options for scenarios which include more rural areas and others which are distinctly more urban.

It’s not all hectic hobbying – sometimes it’s nice to just sit and have a chat and a catch-up!

Per has also been working on the British 8th Army, working on turning them into the Commonwealth forces sent over from New Zealand.

Everyone is really impressed by the new Bolt Action plastics and it is interesting to see the variety in approaches people are taking to their armies.

Some of our first-time boot camp participants – Don’t worry guys, we promise to be gentle!

We’re really excited to have so many new faces with us, and you guys following on the feed at home.  It’s going to be an amazing weekend!

Bob takes us through his experiences with the new Bolt Action German Afrika Korps plastic kit.

Everyone is finding them much easier and faster to put together and Bob is even trying his hand at some light conversion work.

Here at Beasts of War, we’re fortunate to be part of a talented team and partner with awesome hobby companies to make fantastic events like this, but we want to hear from you!

What would be your ultimate Bolt Action cinematic battle?  Tell us where you would set it, what miniatures you would choose and how you would design the best battle royale on the tabletop!

John takes us through some of the different tips you’ll need to bear in mind if you’re going to be painting up your Bolt Action armies with us this weekend starting with a look at how to get those Germans looking desert body ready…

What tips do you have?

We’ve done all the building prep, now it’s time to get our men suited and booted for battle!

This is really exciting – we can’t wait to see how these guys look on the tabletop tomorrow!