1:32 German mountain Troops WWII

The men of the mountain regiments

The mountain troops were a caste of their own from their training onward: climbing, skiing and movement in terrain where any kind of equipment fails. The recognition marks were the cap of mountain cut with the metal edelweiss badge and the cloth edelweiss on the sleeve. Their deployment reached from Norway through the Balkans and the Caucasus to northern Italy, so one set of figures covers an unexpectedly wide choice of possible scenes.

Rock instead of level ground

Rocky groundwork can be made from pieces of cork, from polystyrene covered with filler or from real stone, which behaves plausibly at a small scale. The key is the layers: rock has a direction, the cracks run parallel and it never looks like a random lump. Fine grit is poured into the crevices, with dry grass and low growth between them. Height matters more here than area, so it pays to set the groundwork on a tall plinth and play it out on two levels.

How to get movement into the scene

The group looks best when it is climbing. One figure at the top holding out a hand, a second leaning on a pole, a third carrying a load bent under its weight. A rope of twisted fiber, a load on the back or a pack animal are worth adding. In color a gray-green shade with lighter edges fits; leave the leather straps warmer so that they stand apart from the cloth. The metal edelweiss on the cap is painted at the very end with a fine tip.

It pays to lay the groundwork out before you glue the figures down for good. On sloping terrain the need almost always arises to sand the feet of one of the figures slightly, so that it stands naturally.