Hind Helicopter Expansion For TANKS The Modern Age

A closer look at the Hind helicopter expansion pack for "TANKS The Modern Age" by Galeforce 9. This game is the follow-up to "TANKS", set in a fictional ww3 in the 1980ies.

This expansion offers one plastic 1:100 Hind kit, also usable for "Team Yankee", a flightbase, the unit card and some crew and equipment cards for the game.

First let us take a look at the kit:

The kit comes nicely casted and almost flawless, there is minimal flash to remove, neither sinkholes nor visible ejectormarks were found on the sprues. Also there are virtually no mouldlines. As other kits from Battlefront Models, the quality is top.

The flightbase is casted in good quality, gives you two height options and offers the choice for magnetization, but it works fine in my Revell Cobra/Hind helis without magnets. With a small layer of tape it also fits in Battlefront helicopters without using the included socket piece.

Compared to the 1:100 Revell Hind kit, there are almost no panel lines on the Battlefront kit. Except for this, the grade of detail is nice for a gamepiece.

After a look at the plastic let us check out the cards. First we have the card for the unit.

The Mil Mi-24 Hind is a beast, with 5 hipoints it can take some hits. Sharing an initiative of 7 and 3 armorpoints with all other helicopters, its special strenght is the Predator ability, where you must move each turn but you can ignore the "shooting on the move" rule for missiles, AND you can reroll 2 attack dice each attack. The additional Rapid Fire ability offers 5 dice against unarmoured vehicles and helicopters.

28 points without any equipment or crew may seem quite high, but this thing is worth its price.

4 cards for equipment/doctrines are included, first there is the missile armament for the Hind, the "AT6 Spiral" missiles for 4 points are a must-have because of the Predator ability.

The "UB-32 Rocket Launcher" seems pretty useless, for 3 points you gain the ability to attack all enemies in close range with 2 dice when you discard the card. All targets only throw their base defense dice. This may seem pretty weak but if you attack a bunch of Marder or M-901, there is a chance to erease them all.

As also included in the PAH and the Cobra expansion, "Countermeasures" and "Defense Maneuvres" cards included in this box, both are very useful for defending attacks, worth 2 and 3 points this equipment may save your helicopter in critical situations.

The next cards included in this expansion are 6 cards for crew members.

Two Soviet heroes are included, first there is the pilot "Vasily Popov". Not only he gives you points 2 additional initiative points, he also adds an additional attack dice versus heavy armored tanks.

Beside him comes "Alexander Gagarin", who pushes the initiative in the shooting phase, he also grants the ability to exchange two hits for a critical hit. For 4 points this is a good gunner for your helicopter.

The rest crewmembers can be used by all nations, the gunners could be used in tanks too.

The "Ressourceful Gunner" may be useful with the UB-40 rockets, and the "Assassin", useful to get rid of enemy crewmembers, are nice additions.

Last but not least there are two pilots in this expansion, the "Risky Pilot" gives you a bonus if you attack at close range, and the "Daring Pilot" lets you reroll one defense dice if you are not in cover. Both cost 3 points and may be good additions depending on your playstyle.

In the next days I will prepare some last closer looks at "TANKS The Modern Age" expansions for the moment, a closer look at the PAH and the LAV expansions are almost finished.

The kit built and painted. Building this thing went on without any issues. As usual the model was painted with Revell Aquacolor paints.The main color is Sand with Leatherbrown (or Dar Earth) spots, the bottom was painted Light Green. Most decals were taken from the Revell Hind decalsheet, the "33" was taken from the Zvezda 1:72 Hind.