Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Plus, when you flop down because you're a pansy-arse actor instead of a hardened soldier, the bedroll makes a perfect pillow for your power nap without taking the backpack off!

 Purifier wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
I think it's strange that they put the entrenching tool on the backpack at all. It looks like it would be a PITA to get off without the help of a buddy. Maybe it's because it'd be hard to model a shovel on the belt?

Trust me, you're not gonna dig a trench while wearing your backpack anyway. You don't need it to be combat ready. I've stripped down to my tshirt digging a trench in -10 celsius.

Too true. All you really need is a canteen and a bunch of ammo to be combat ready. If I was an Imperial Guardsmen, that heavy looking backpack would be the first thing I'd leave behind. I would just find another way to keep the shovel with me, like tucking it underneath my belt if it was short enough.

I wonder why infantry kits aren't supplied with belt mounted e-tool bits in the first place? Too hard to sculpt?

As for the bedroll thing, it doesn't make much sense to have it on top vs. the bottom. It's harder to get off when you want to get to sleep and it gets in the way of getting your stuff out.

 washout77 wrote:

everyone has put the bedroll on the bottom. The whole bedroll on the top comes from Hollywood, because admittedly it does look better.

Yeah, my experience on how it "feels" is taken from movies, certainly not real life. I'm not the outdoors-sleeping in a bag kind of person >.>

 TheCustomLime wrote:
I wonder why infantry kits aren't supplied with belt mounted e-tool bits in the first place? Too hard to sculpt?

Probably this. I know our folding e-tools (entrenching tools a.k.a. a shovel) come with a hard plastic case that would hold it folded up and had the old style clips that allowed it to be clicked onto a ruck or your LBE or pistol belt. We later got issued a newer soft cover one but same idea. If something like that was modeled on a 28mm scale, most people probably wouldn't know what it was as it would just look like some random slightly larger pouch thing.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
As for the bedroll thing, it doesn't make much sense to have it on top vs. the bottom. It's harder to get off when you want to get to sleep and it gets in the way of getting your stuff out.

Also this. Some reasoning as to why the Boy Scouts and military have the bedroll/sleeping bag on the bottom vs. the top: At least in my experience with both, our bedding had a way of either being tied down or clipped to our packs such that you didn't even need to mess with the pack itself to unsecure your sleeping stuff to get set up and to bed sooner. Another reason being that when packing a ruck, you usually have the stuff you might immediately need packed on the top or near the top for ease of access. In both cases, this was usually wet-weather gear of some sort. Having to first move out of the way or otherwise hamper your access to the opening of your pack by a bedroll on top would defeat the purpose of packing said items of necessity near the top in the first place. And probably a wetter you.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
Plus, when you flop down because you're a pansy-arse actor instead of a hardened soldier, the bedroll makes a perfect pillow for your power nap without taking the backpack off!

Mind blown...

"Welcome to the guard, here's your laser gun, your body armor and your wood handled shovel, now go make me a proud Commissar!"

I havent bothered with the backpacks on mine, I dont like how they look.

All the extra pouches and ammo and stuff however....

I saw this thread, and immediately went to fix my Heavy Weapon Team backpacks.

I always thought there was something off, I just never put my finger on it. (in my defense, it takes no converting to do that, it's really easy to glue in either direction)

So thanks guys, it makes me happy to know my army is just that little bit better because of Dakkadakka

 washout77 wrote:
The whole bedroll on the top comes from Hollywood, because admittedly it does look better.

Incorrect, I'm afraid. German soldiers during the Great War & Wehrmacht soldiers of WW2 had their bedrolls on the top of their packs, as did British infantry during the Napoleonics. If you spent some time looking into it you could probably find many examples from history of the bedroll being on top.