Converting Winter Germans

I've covered the review on the German infantry in winter gear a couple of days ago and already opened up on the possibilities to convert them, by adding parts from other sprues and kits. Due to the way the miniatures in the Warlord Games kits are cut, it is quite easy to use parts from other sets within the range. With the Winter Germans two of the most interesting kits to swap parts with are the Soviet Infantry Winter and German Grenadiers.

Before the Winter Germans were released in April, a couple of people used the bodies from the Winter Soviets and added German weaponry and heads. That is quite easy to do, as the Soviet kit is from the older design pattern, where you had open hands and separate weapons. The cloaks have a different design to the German ones, but with some backpacks and the weaponry in front of them, you barely notice or it is repurposed clothing. That works at least for Ostfront armies.

As the German sets don't have a lying MG team, I used the bodies from the Soviet sprue, one lying and one kneeling, along with the open hands. The MG42, the ammo crate and binoculars are from the German Grenadier sprue. Just cut the pieces at the wrist to swap them. A bit of gear from the different kits helps to give them a more living look.

And the converted MG team with German Helmet. As you can see I went with the spare barrel and ammo crate backpack from the Winter kit.

With these two I went with looted gear. So I used a body from the German Winter kit with a pair of arms, the PPSh-41 SMG and a fur hat from the Soviet and another one just using the Russian cloak. It gives you a bit more variety, as you have more poses to choose from.

Building a sniper is possible as well. If you have one of the older German weapon sprues you can use one of these sniper rifles, I went a bit lazy with the sniper rifle from the Russian weapon sprue. The kneeling body could be used from either Winter sprue, but as I used the open hands from the Russian sprue, I thought it might be easier to get the distances right by using the matching Russian body. I wanted to combine the head with the scarf over the face with a German helmet. So a lot of carving plastic later and using a spare helmet from the Grenadier kit, I managed to get this result.

In the German war movie "Generation War" (Original title Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter - Our mothers, our fathers), the commander wears thick and excessive winter clothing during the operations on the eastern front. I wanted to capture this by using the Russian body with the thick boots, combining the German officer cap with the heavy scarf head from the Soviet Sprue.

As for the MG Landser, the Winter kit is more focused on the early to mid-years of war, so I used parts from the Grenadier kit to convert this guy into carrying the MG42 incl. equipment. Once again simply cutting the parts at their wrists.

Still needs some putty or green stuff to clean up some of the gaps, but I'm quite happy what I was able to achieve by simply combining a few bits and pieces from different kits.

If you keep an eye out on the Warlord Games page, they often offer sprue sales, so you can cheaply get your hands on 1-2 individual sprues to boost up your projects, without the need to buy a whole box just for a handful of conversions. Especially around holidays they combine those with bargain deals (like 50% or free shipping).

I hope I gave you some ideas, as this does not just work with the Winter kit, but you could combine the US Infantry with the US Marines and the old Infantry for maximum "extravaganza". Have a great time tinkering and building your kits.