Early War Miniatures Polish - Review

As alluded to in previous posts, I am getting quite keen on 20mm world war 2, specifically using the Battlegroup rules that have sprung from the Battlegroup Kursk book (and Kampfgruppe Normandy if you go back far enough).

I decided to start with an early way Polish force. Casting around on the web and Early War Miniatures seemed to have a comprehensive range so I ordered a test purchase of one infantry squad, one cavalry squad and a heavy machine gun.

So, first off, what did I get? The infantry squad was a pack of infantry about 10 strong. I was disappointed to find that two of the riflemen and worse, the light machine gun/BAR man all came in the prone position. Now this first point is not a criticism of Early War Miniatures, but is a matter of personal taste. For weapons teams I have no problem with prone models (there is one in the HMG team). However, I don't like putting them into normal sqauds. Don't ask me why, it's probably something to do with the look of the squad being ruined by having one or two members on different sized bases. So I won't be using those guys, which means I shall be needing to source my BAR's from somewhere else.

Pose wise they are ok models. The cavalry don't suffer as badly due to being cavalry, but some of the infantry are a little bit wooden. The grenade throwing guy in particular was so bad he won't be getting used either. He's the only one I won't be using, the rest make it into the squad.

Now I've rewrote this last part of the review because originally I was quite unkind. However, having now painted a few of the infantry (blog coming soon on that), and started on the cavalry, I think these are decent miniatures for gaming. They do have enough detail to paint up very quickly, which is always a positive, without being too fiddly. I also can only really compare them to 28mm as that is what I am most familiar with, and I think that is why I was initally a bit down on them.

Overall, I will be ordering more of these. The posing issue is a minor one, and since you can order individual poses it's a simple work around. I've also received some polish infantry from Capitan games and think they will be a good mix. And with a single Polish platoon coming in at about 60 men, before support options, I'm going to need quite a few. I'm currently working on some of the cavalry, which are coming along nicely and will feature soon.