I have a question for you guys.What is the big hype about modelling German stuff?Everywhere I go its German, this German that.Is there like a hidden message in these models or something?No offense to real Germans here but I mean c'mon,anything that has to do with WWII Germany(other than thier x-planes)I cant stand.I go through a list of figs for sale and 80% of them are German models.So someone please tell me what is going on lol?

well as for me i happen to like the german stuff

I can't speak for everyone who is a fan of German armaments. I like the variety of vehicles that Germany used. The US and Britain had a pretty narrow inventory of vehicles compared to Germany. Also, some of Germany's vehicles/tanks just plain looked neat. I for one find a Panther tank or Tiger tank much more intimidating than the Sherman. In the realm of tracked fighting vehicles(battle tanks excluded) the allies did not have anything that could spit out the death that a FlakPanzer Wirblewind could. That thing is just dang awesome in my book. The closest the allies came to that was the M16 half-track with quad .50's.

I doubt my post answers your question but that is my excuse. #:-)

hi zach,
the reason why is.........they have the best looking stuff, the most aestetically pleasing stuff to look at. all those great camo schemes, better than khaki(American), khaki(British) or Khaki(Russian). The armor and vehicles are better looking too, and so many types to do also. and the legends the German forces built during the war too, the battles, the great victories and defeats.

Chris Pig no.1

Zach ,

I really share your opinion .
I think there i TO MUCH German stuff on the market these days .
In my case i have a hard time to find al the neccesary US soldiers for my Point du Hoc diorama .
The choise is limited for these figures and when i can lay my hands on a set the price is mostly sky high .
But when i look for Germans ...........i tremble over these figures .
Even the good Resin manufactures mostly produce Germans .
I think that the variety for these German Tanks is unlimited as for the figures .

So i hope that the Manufactures read these messages too !!!!!!!

CREATE SOME MORE U.S. SOLDIERS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Doesn't matter if they are Resin or just simple plastic BUT JUST DO IT !!!!!!!!!

And this is what i have to say ...

Eric

Hola,

Why build German stuff?

I dont do early German vehicles for an example, why not? Because they are boring, and not so apealing. Why dont I do allied vehicles so much? Because they dont apeal to me. Late german armor (after 1943) are simply the coolest vehicles around, to me that is.
For the figures, much like Chris, I like the uniforms, variety of options in paint schemes, both on the camo, equipment and weapons.

I and Im sure that Im speaking for everyone, dont do Germans because of what they did during the war. Although, who came up with the blixt kreig, which lead to how modern day tank warfare is fought today? Who started using camoflauge as a norm? Who had the best trained army in perhaps the 20th century? Who came up with all new technology, in armor and in aircraft? Thats right the Germans did, so not everything they did was terrible.

To Sgt sauer:
The quad .50 1/2 track was not the closest thing to the Wirblewind that the allies had....Canada invented a Sherman conversion called a Skink....it had a turret with 4 20mm guns mounted in it.....talked to a vet once who witnessed a skink taking down a house that hid a sniper....let's just say it was better than a wrecking ball.

To Zach:
Could it be that everyone likes to vote for the under dog.....look at the amout of CSA figures on the market compared with Yankee figures....I for 1 am an Allied builder...but I do love the Confederate figures I see. So maybe I might start rooting for the under dog of that war....but for now...I'm with you on the amount of German stuff out there.....do we really need all these different Panthers....and stuff that never even saw action....was just on the drawing board??? Let's see some more of the cool armoured cars the allies used or an Archer or a Sexton.
Ron Volstadt who does the designing and the art work for the Dragon figures once told me that the best selling Allied subject sold worse than the worst selling German subject....go figure.

Hola Again,

I just read my post again, almost sounds like Im some kind of nazi, but Im not Just wanted to say that its not the political side of a subject that makes me want to paint it, Ive even painted der fuhrer him self once. Its just purely the want to recreate their awesome uniforms
On the other hand, I can agree with you that there just isnt that much allied stuff out there, especially british. However, I do think that more and more Allied subjects, mainly US, is growing more popular. Atleast on the figure side.

Edited:
Was cruising the Red Lancers website, for you non german fans here is a bunch of very nice allied subjects.
http://www.redlancers.com/minilistout.asp?subcat=811&mfg=358&page=6

Nice models they have there Anders.

Hey Grant don't worry about rooting for the under-dog in the Civil War.I lived in the South half my life so Im used to it.Only thing is these darn Rednecks are getting worse every year lol.

German AFV's from WWII represent a diverse body of work. The camo, the sub-species of one or another. The big'ems - Tiger I & II, Maus, Sturmtiger, Pather, Jadgpanther, JadgTiger - the million or so varients on halftracks, light tanks, trucks etc, etc, etc.

Allied stuff is BORING - one color - Green, few varients, and not a whole lot of 'sex' appeal.

Don't get me wrong, I love allied WWII stuff, but I'll take a fully tricked out Pather G with zimmerit and night vision over a M4A3 Sherman any day.

Well, as one who does a lot of ACW figures, you're looking at much the same in interest. Other than Zouaves, most Union troops after 1862 really are uniform in appearance and this was pushed by Union brass. The basic uniform is sky blue pants and navy blue everything else. That could get real old real fast.

The confederacy started out with a variety of uniforms, some based on state militia as welll as sponsored regiments. Their attitude of state independence reduced the likelihood of a uniform uniform. When Union "sponsored" regiments mustered in, they were stongly encouraged to adapt, e.g., the 79th New York Highlanders quickly lost kilts and tartans for Union blues.

Meanwhile, the South was also running out of supplies. Scavenging Union clothing was common, dyes faded (Louisiana's Wheat's Tiger Zouaves started their brief career with blue jackets that almost immediately faded to brown and were clad in pantaloons made of striped bed ticking), and the common troops wore whatever they had on hand. This was even more pronounce din the west.

Figures from the Confederacy, therefore represent a much more colorful series of projects than their Northern counterparts. Politics has nothing to do with it.

My two cents
There are so many variants in German AFVs. The style of each is very different and unique. Also the variety of paint schemes that were used adds a layer of variety to it also. I can see where from a manufactures stand point it would make more sence to produce an entire kit of a variant vs say an entire kit of a Sherman variant. From a manufacturing stand point producing a AM addon/conversion for a Sherman is easier.

One thing I would like to say is - Build more US troops Please

I am an exclusive German AFV builder as well (well, I had ventured into A/C lately, and today bought myself a Bismarck, but...) The main thing I like about German AFV is as others here had said, the varieties. For every new model I build there is something different, even if I am building another Panzer III or IV, you got shorter gun, longer gun, gray, camo, zimmerit, or no zimmerit, more fun...Allied stuff just kinda boring... #:-)

Ahhh yes but what you must consider is that at the time the allies didnt have much patience to deal with paint schemes on AFVs,etc.They just wanted the things to wrok properly and get it to win the war.

Yes Zach!!!! Mark up another win for the Allies....not pretty....but damn did it work!!!
I think you got it right......paint it all green and don't worry about all the different colours....get them out and blast the HELL outta all those pretty painted tanks.......good going Zach and all us Allied builders!!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAW!!!! #:-)

I like modeling US armor because I don't have to worry about what zimmerit pattern to use. But when I am building a diorama, thats when the German tanks and figs come out. Hell, I can dry dry olive drab... :-)

Demodellbouwer:

Zach:

Hey guys, don´t bother the traders. As US- economy told us: "everything is o.k. when the earnings are o.k.", it is the customer who rules the market. Why should they produce allied or other items, when they are not sold as much?

Hi guys...I love to build WWII vehicles. I build everything that interests me whether it a Sahara Diorama from Heller or an M4A1 from Italeri or a Famo from Tamiya. I must say though..the German stuff is much more interesting and diverse than the Allied stuff. I do wish the manufacturers would make more British vehicles and figures(injection molded). The Germans just had cool looking stuff (from a modellers standpoint). I'm sure if you were on the business end of an '88 you would think differently. As far as it goes with building prototypes and vehiles that never saw combart...I think there's a little bit of science fiction and "what if?" factor involved here. You need a great imagination to be a modeller! It all boils down to your personal preference. And the way it seems.....a whole lot of people prefer to build German armor and figures..otherwise the manufacurers wouldn't be putting out so many German kits. Long live Tamiya , Dragon, and Italeri. I can't wait to build the Marder III (m)............Jeff

I'll build German, Modern, figures whatever..... But German stuff sells and the companies know it. A bout a year ago I sold off all my DML figure sets and I still have a few allied ones around. It was feeding frenzy on the german stuff, but no one wanted the allied stuff. I pretty much took that as a sign (on a small scale) of how this industry works.
I like German stuff, I think the Tiger family is the "coolest" WWII tank out there, but I do think there needs to be more parity with allied equipment. But I will commend Tamiya for their Drangon Wago and the new Pershing, GMC 4X4, Jeep etc... at least we have the base kits (and in the case of the Drangon Wagon an exeptional model) to work with. All-be-it the German guys get every variant of everything made. DML future release "Jagdpanther: the one in the blurry photograph in the Adennes with a dented front fender" --- I guess that extra work to dent the fender would make it "Imperal Series," right?)

Have Fun guys,

NATE
Wisc. USA

Great thread guys,

Ya know it's funny, the very same factor that makes the german armour so much more appealing to us modelers (diversity and variety) is the very same factor that lost them the war!

IMHO

Tread.

:-) Absolutely.........too many irons in the fire.......not enough standardization.......a lot of logistical problems........and voila.........you lose the war.........THANK GOD! Otherwise we would STILL be building German armor.....but not because we wanted to! Jeff

What can I say??

I've built loads of WWII 1/35 german vehicles. My favs are thr SdKfz 250 andSdKfz 251, because of there diversity in marks and colours.

But a strange thing has happened to me WWII British armor, flicking through one of my many books I saw an A9 and I thought, skinny tracks, skinny armour, but it had a look about it. I bought more books this time on British WWII armour and another world has opened up to me. But do I want to spend just under £70 for a kit each time, well maybe if I was a millonaire. Thanks Tamiya for the Matilda II, Churchill, Centaur and Cromwell. Thanks Italeri for the Crusader. Please someone, make the other cruiser tanks. And don't forget to give me the Tommy's to go with them.

I agree with what has been said about the number of variants the Germans built. I been modeling for many years and still find pictures of tanks and halftracks I,ve never heard of or seen before. Then there is the lines and design profiles, they just seem to appeal to the eye. The legends of the great battles, the tank aces themselves that fought on even when they new it was hopeless. The stories of panther takeing hit after hit and still attacking. I think all this has some sort of appeal to the modeler.

mkctanker

I sounds to me like a majority of modelers pick an area that they like to focus on and then mostly stick with it. I am more of a modeling "slut" compared to the majority. I'll build Soviet, German, Italian, Japanese, British, US, modern, etc. stuff. As long as I like the looks of the vehicle, I'll build it. My absolute favorite stuff is early WWII Soviet, German, Polish, and British stuff, but currently I am building an M4A1 Sherman (76mm variant).

Personally I like the Tiger-1, And have built one before as well as the Stug-IV. Another one that I have built before. BUT I have also built some U.S. Armor as well. And Like some here. I too found the US Stuff boring and simply plain. I currently bulid mostly Modern Armor
And have built American, German, British, Israeli, Russian and a Japanese MBT's. in the past. All of which I am doing again. Establishing an ARMOR CORP. i.e. TEAM BRAVO. So hopefully I will be posting pictures of this New Team here some time early next year.

DAGGER-1