Painting style changes

Like your choice in clothing, hair style, heck, even type of underwear, your style of painting can change over time. The latest new army I painted is a "Anglo-Saxon" Dark Age. With all the hype for contrast paints recently,  I went that route but even more so in just using inks to do the job. I primered light grey, dry-brushed heavily in white then applied the inks. 

deployed for action in a recent game at a fellow gamers house.

The figures are Old Glory 28mm (love em or hate them...) which I picked up on a good sale and which provided a 24 point Lion Rampant "task force". Thinking of the printer ink cartridge concept of using only blue, yellow and red colors which, when mixed can provide most colors one would want (yes, yes, excepting white which, would be limited in the dark ages - pun intended or not...) I went about as quick as possible to create this tabletop collection. From primer to completion of basing was only 10.5 hours so c.10 minutes a figure. As this is not my usual wargaming era, so not that much wasted time completing this collection. However, I very much like the effect, and while not my usual style, my "contrast style" works with these figures quite nicely I think. 

With the idea of new styles of painting, I took a picture of some of my very first wargame figures I painted including a Minifig 25mm Duchy of Nassau (Napoleonic) of 1976 and a 25mm Minifig Parthian in the glorious gloss c1981. You can contrast these to current figures in my collections seen below in a recent game. 

As my eyesight goes, I will probably be more and more careless about the preciseness of it all and go for the easiest of styles, but it is interesting that there is quite a few different ways to paint the little buggers.....

HYW 3-way(ish) scenario

French with mounted knights approach from the west, the Dunkirque contingent from the bottom, the English longbow on the hills near the village. The tower is just visible on the top of the photo.

Miniature wargaming is, well, a game.  Yes, it can represent a historical battle with surprise attacks, mismatched forces, and lop-sided results; however, in the usual games with friends at the end of a hard week at work, a frustrating "That was un-winnable!" scenario is probably the last thing desired.  Mine you personally I don't have a problem with those...and my dice rolling usually give me that result anyway!

The mismatch is all the more difficult to remove should there be only three players. Most (All?) battles are one side vs the other.  Therefore, how is the simple army vs army be done should the evening have three participants?  To give enough per side to get a game in and everyone have enough to command is a challenge.  Thought must be given to other considerations of terrain restrictions, defensive works, command abilities of the rules to provide a more even combat abilities for each side.

Decided to bring out the Hundred Years War (Crecy era) collection and provide the English (PeterM) with enough units to command in a central defensive position to fend off myself attacking with the Dunkerque contingent and a force of French under CraigM.  The French had a cannon on the far side, pounding the English tower with a cannon and defended by a small group of men-at-arms.

the village with the English defenders and the bridges across the stream.

Do you, the reader and sometimes gamesmaster,  get any pre-game discussions which start with, "what about the terrain?, what is light woods and which are heavy?, is the river crossable?, at which points?, are the fields open or rough ground?" sent to you in rapid fire questioning at the start of every game?  Obviously some need to be discussed but the question of fordability has always been one of those sore points with me. When a player asks about the, say, eight feet of river sections on the table stretching the entire table, would the army even know?  I would say "I don't know, find it yourself"; and getting, yes, the inevitable response of " Umm, how?" In this case I had the player disperse one of his units, the Bidower Woodmen, to sections he wanted to cross and roll for success. This unit would be lost to him due to this deployment.   He did the difficult rolls sucessfully to allow a portion of his army to cross rather than the bridge to his front.  As a GM, make it difficult, time consuming, and troop costly for the player to obtain such information, as just in real-life.  Lots of battles are a result of unknown terrain influencing affairs.  For example, American Civil War Corps commander Burnside kept feeding in troops to cross a well-defended bridge not knowing there was a crossing point of the Antietam Creek only a short distance away from which the defending force could be outflanked.  Tell that location in advance to the player whose army has never been to the location ahead of time certainly changes the subsequent action in the game.

Nevertheless in this game the French had a crossing point in addition to the obvious bridge.  The tower was improbably destroyed early with Craig's remarkably high dice rolling activations [ gunpowder cannon are not in the Lion Rampant rules,  so I would have the cannon activate on ever more difficult activation rolls theoretically limiting the number of shots during the game but his lucky dice allowed him to have successive firing rolls quickly gaining the pre-determined but unknown amount of hits to inflict upon the tower to bring it down. I allowed the number of dice this hidden amount would be based upon to be known, and Peter, ever the statistician, worked out exactly when to move out of the tower with a hidden(*) unit before this might occur. - note to self: keep unknown rolls unknown! 

 Interestingly we rolled to see how the tower would collapse: points of the compass with a d6 and if any 6 rolled per each figure would result in its demise.  Only one of Peter's troops was killed by a falling stone.  It was suggested that if I made the pip number a 1, he would have lost far more.  All game long, Peter and I were competing for the 'poorest dice roller' award.  We did agree however that he won that dubious honour.  

Mid-battle and the French knights are taking a scenic route to the tower, the knights are out of the tower minus one of their number (top of image), and the clash for the hill position has begun with my Dunkirque mixed weapon foot units (lower right)

(*) the tower (see previous post link) has a removable roof and I endeavoured to hide some knights within for Peter's use.  Craig, rather clumsily, knocked it over, revealing the hidden troops.  Well done reconnaissance or perfidious fortune?  Oh, that,  and the resultant "how YOU are to prevent it getting knocked over in the future" engineering discussion.....

Another unrecorded event…

The Bridge at Trabazos 

Long story short; I have been tasked to provide the battle narrative for an ongoing Napoleonic campaign - in other words, play out the battles with miniatures.

The Anglo-Portuguese commander wants the bridge destroyed, the French commander expects to deploy north of the town getting there via the bridge over the Druro River as part of a larger Peninsular War fictional battle.

Not really having the ‘proper’ troops for this engagement, I went small scale by using my ~40mm Flintloque figures to play out this portion of the battle as a very minor skirmish.

I gave the French two fine “companies” of infantry to approach the bridge while the British Engineers prepare to blow it up.  Each turn the Engineers roll a d6 until 16 is reached and it will be wired for detonation (and upon a die roll, of course!)

Defending the Engineers are a ‘company’ of the 9th Foot of the 5th Division. While a veteran regiment, the Captain is a martinet hated by the ranks. (a bad roll for his ‘personality’)  Alone in an isolated village away from the army commanded by an officer who had no idea what he was doing, with the temptation for loot and discovery of drink it was too much for the soldiers who, despite the efforts of their sergeant, left their post by degrees.  However the captain, excited by his first meeting of the Napoleon’s army (he had purchased his position and had absolutely no military experience), did not realize about the desertions.

The 'martinet' of the 9th. Note the sergeant with the halberd to the left of the officer already turned around to chase after the would be looters. 

However some defence of the town came from a small band of Guerrillas defending their homes who were of sterner stuff and fired upon the first company of French halting them and mortally wounding their officer.  This confident action (rolling 12(!) for activation) and subsequent roll of 6, activated a small contingent of Portuguese.

The  "Portuguese" 

Early in the action showing the French. The 9th Foot is across the river, the British Engineers on the bridge.

Meanwhile, as the French advanced, the 9th’s Captain marvelled at the French Colonel’s uniform and his flowing hair astride his charger galloping on the bridge in the glory of war. “Fire!” he yelled.  The loud percussion he expected was met with silence. 

“Now, sir?” was the only sound. The single trooper left with him looked up from his knelling position in a questioning frown.

The Guerrillas switched focus to the stagnant first company to the company lead by the mounted officer, but these French did not react to the resulting casualties. Ensconced behind a shielding wall, the raw soldiers of Portuguese remained in place and unwilling to engage in gunfire. But the large Engineer sergeant, a huge Irishman, declared to the oncoming French officer, “You be not stopping us you Froggie bastard!” and using a rusted shovel as a club, engaged with the Frenchman.  Seeing the following French soldiers, he looked over his shoulder and exclaimed, “Work faster!” to his fellow engineers.(my dice rolls were good but still 1 short!)

The Engineer sergeant on the bridge

Alas, his heroism was in vain, the horse evaded the shovel and a well-placed sabre met his brains. A following French soldier toppled an engineer into the water below and another used his hanger blade to cut the cords to the barrels of artillery powder suspended under the bridge. The Guerrillas and Portuguese then melted away.

Of course this story will never make it into the history books.  All that may indeed be mentioned is…the French IV Corps, 1st Division crossed over the Druro and deployed north of Trabazos…. 

Actually my "Calabrese Legion" troops.  Converted from Flintloque figures into something resembling the proper Napoleonic War troops..sort of... Full of 'character' they are.  ~40mm scale (ish). So outrageously cartoonish as to be cute.

No ordinary evening, WaT with The Wife!

So we were having a nice dinner when my wife says “I know I suggested we could play cards tonight but let’s play a wargame”

I sputtered, bits of food came out of the mouth, my jaw remained slack, my brain unable to compute. I just stared at her in numb confusion. 

“Yes, really” she merely confirmed.  “But something simple.  I don’t want to spend the entire night for you setting it up.”, she said with a grin.  

The rest of the meal, I was trying to think of simple rules, simple scenario, easy set up. After finally settling on the game and stating so, she says,”Perhaps What a Tanker?”  I had not even thought of THAT one!  Brilliant suggestion. I then had an inner voice debate on how the heck she came up with that.  I thought she never listened to me as I rambled on……

Dishes cleared, I put down my ashen snow mat and a couple of terrain pieces on the table.  “Dictatorial Fascist German or Dictatorial Communist Russian?”, I ask her.  So I brought out a nice Pzkw III for her, and a rather poorer T-26 for myself.  

To compensate for her confusion about which dice are for which action, her dice rolling was very good as each turn’s rolls usually had a good combination including the always useful ‘6’ Wild.   While a bit frustrated with the jargon (“Two d six? You just said I need a seven!”)  she began to be more tactically aggressive. “Yes, I want to shoot you from the flank.  Better yes?” she would state.  “But if you do not roll high enough to reach that position, you will need to turn your Wild to a Move dice thereby not able to change it into a Reload for another shot at me”, I dutifully explain. “I will do it anyway”, she firmly confirms as she then rolls 11 on the dice gaining the position easily; fires her two shots into my side causing my Command Dice to run out and thus my crew legs it, abandoning the shot ridden Russian hunk of junk.  

Earlier in the contest, my poor T-26 had a nice flank shot but....couldn't roll enough for it.  The Wife had no problems with the dice or Command.   

Losing My Head(s)

a quick retelling of the head(less) unit of plastics… 1. I had 9 Perry Napoleonic French plastics as a unit ready to paint primed in black….but then I tweaked to the Portuguese Legion in Russia used a version of the Bardin lapel and had crossbelts for all members AND were in the unique brown uniform. Cool! .....so off with their heads and new ones glued on.... 2. But I already have the Portuguese well represented in my big-battle army, and they were only in Russia and if mounted as a skirmish scale unit, does not solve my need for an opposition for the dismounted dragoons. Looking at the picture books of uniforms, I spot the Neapolitans. How about representing the “elite” unit to be beside my existing Neap. Lights in the big-battle collection? Excellent. ....so off with their heads….and new ones glued on...... 3. Whoops, further research shows that they did not wear the shako with cords - the selection I had glued on. ....so off with their heads.... [the French guillotine didn't chop off this many heads, did it?] 4. The Neapolitan heads are now with covered shakos - so I didn't need to depict their shield shaped badge! I even did a color list for this unit. But then I saw an illustration of the Nassauers at Waterloo. My mind raced. If I used the ones I have already have for the big-battle games, re-basing them and adding these nine, I could get a decent number to make a “Rebels and Patriots” force and face them against my dismounted dragoons! .......so, yes, off with their heads, once again........ 5. But hold on, the numbers don't quite work. I am missing one to make a complete unit. Darn. However, I thought, I do need a commander and the opposing French commander is mounted. So, find a spare mounted figure. Luckily I had been gifted a sprue of Warlord British heavies. With no small amount of scraping, a new pistol carrying arm and a new hussar fur-cap wearing head leader. I had my unit done so no more removing of heads and this time I actually painted the buggers. The photo shows the Nassauer grenadiers with the new figures blended in.

Does anyone else do this or do you plan everything in advance? {smile} -------------------- Edit note: as Blogger has changed its interface and I am having technical difficulties trying to understand how to do what new to do [I am currently using the limited time 'old school version' which is why it reads so bad] I may end up quitting on this blogging thing. If I do, I hope you have enjoyed my personal recording of the recollections of my wargame activities.

Bringing a ‘faust to a tank fight……

“What a Tanker!” is a unashamedly tank vs tank game.
However, wargamers being wargamers,  can’t leave well enough alone and many have done much work to expand upon the original premise to include anti-tank guns and anti-armour infantry weapons.  While I have done so, I was surprised to discover that even the Two Fat Lardies authors have also done their own version!  [ LARD Magazine 2019 ]  Their rules had the panzerfausts/bazookas stationary while I have gone the 'more traditional ' route and play the mobile infantry carrying blasters of tanker hell more in tune with the original rules.

As a play test, WillB was given my 3D print Matilda II - a Lend-Lease provided by the British,  while I played the late war Germans. These are Warlord plastics painted by me recently and armed with the always popular panzerfausts for hunting the lost tank in a Russian village.

Because of the need of certain dice at certain times …and that not happening… it does mean the infantry don’t necessary have free reign and indeed at times became the hunted.  At one point the Matty rounded the corner of the church almost running down one of the Germans who was frightened stiff with fear (he did not get any ‘move’ or even ‘fire’ dice at the time).  The tank could not move any further unfortunately and the German finally turned and made his escape.

It gives me the opportunity to have the late war enemy tanks on the table without the need for me to build an additional tank model to face them ;))

a 20th C. Roman infantryman....

Inspired by a friend’s inventive mashup of Landsknecht armed with a MG34 WW2 machine gun (!) and images of modern soldiers with very Imperial Roman looking armour of which I have always wanted to create,  I have done my own plastics mashup of a Imperial Roman (c. 100 AD and an Imperial Japanese infantryman WW2 (c. 1940) both by Warlord Games.

Obviously the armour - the famous Lorica Segmentata must be shown - heck, not Imperial Roman without it - as would the helmet which I smoothed of details to get a slightly more modern look.  Steel colour was used but a more modern dull green could be effective for more current looking soldiers.  Two more quintessential Roman items are the ‘caligae’ [army sandals] and the ‘baltea’ [ the dangly straps in front of, well, the dangly bits ]. Both these were kept, but the main uniform is early 20th century.  The Japanese uniform has a long tunic covering the rump which was about the same length as the Roman one thus I painted in a dull red which is over the long sleeves and trousers painted a modern dull colour. As this uniform is from the 1930’s/WW2, I did not go for a baggier camouflaged version and so left the puttees which are painted in buff so giving a leather bound look instead (something picked up from the barbarians in the intervening years?).

Fun little project.

The large amount of plastic Romans I have might still be “amended”.  Looking toward making them the “Lost IX Legio”.  Lots of skeletons, mangled limbs, dead flesh and rusted armour. That could be an army.  Now to get some bits and parts.

I have cheated a bit and already created a ballista crew from the few skellie bits I had at the very bottom of a box for some reason….

US "Pony Wars" Cavalry

Awhile back I found a small group of Dixon US dismounted cavalry of the mid 19th century and decided to quickly do them up.  No, I don't have any opposition for them but that is a minor detail...

More recently a friend decided to open up his imaginary 1920's "East Indian" campaign i.e. that of the sub-continent of Asia, to those locals interested in playing (eventually).  As humour, I offered the following "historical" explanation to how a bunch of American c1870 horsemen became involved in a war fifty years and half a world away:

From: General Waywronge , US Army Public Relations Department 

To: Military Allocation and Transport Department, Washington DC,

Date: 3 May, 1920 

Regarding:  Transportation of United States Army Historical Reenactment Troop,  Fort Cheyenne circa 1876. 

Destination:  Northwest Frontier Settlement Theme Park

Request:  Transportation of said troop plus horses, arms and ammunition, to mentioned location with all due haste for annual ‘Red Indian Days’ in June of this year.

———

“Sergeant, where is North West Frontier?” asked the two week old replacement;  he was confused upon reading the request.  The First Sergeant of the Military Allocation and Transport Department, already frustrated by the constant questioning by what he considered to be a halfwit - even by Army standards - did not even bother to look up from his reading of Gunga Din.  “Well it is in India, you idiot, in the North-West part, hence the name.”

 “Got it! North West India.” 

The sergeant, to his pleasure, heard a muttered muttering from the clerk,  “Oh yeah, that makes sense, ‘Indian Days’!

After many minutes of scribbling of orders the sergeant

engrossed in his Kipling book, had to respond to yet another question.

“ Sergeant that's a pretty big area on the map. Can you narrow it down for me?”

The sergeant replied,  “Try Jhamjar.”

“ ‘Jhamjar’, Sergent?”

“Jeez a’ ”, cursed the Sargent, “J…H…A……..”

It was thus that a small troop of US Army re-enactors in bluecoats and armed with old colt revolvers found themselves not pretend-fighting Red Indians in the plains of America but actually fighting Indians with machine guns several continents away

AWI in plastic

My collection of AWI is in its third incarnation. The first was old Minifig true 25s.  The next was, and still but only with my AWI French,  Front Rank.  And finally now Perry metals - for the most part.

 But I finally broke down to buy a box of Perry plastic Continentals while I await a Perry metal order  delayed due to Covid.  I thought they would be compatible.  Surprisingly for Perrys they sort of aren't; at least to my old eyes.  The plastics are much thinner and a bit taller.  Really nice, Beautiful. Would have liked shooting poses but as marching, nice.  Now of course seeing the transformation of the Perry sculpting to this much better human proportions, better proportioned weapons particularly in plastics compared to their early lines which included their AWI range, I probably should have been patient and await them*.   I nevertheless painted 6 for a small Loyalist unit 'King's Loyal Americans' which accompanied Burgoyne into the Albany Valley to Saratoga .  The remainder must stay in the box for now.  Should I later get excited about a Southern campaign I might be led to create a large unit of South Carolinian continentals - the spare hats included in the box have that distinctive cap worn by those colonialist. Or more probable, get traded or sold....the usual.

I picked up a base of the unit and took this quick pic. I hate the macro lens as it shows off all the minor issues of the painting when a more steady hand, better eye (or use of the mag lens ) and certainly more patience would be useful. They are not "El Mercenario" standard ( examples of his painting ) however for about 21 minutes per, OK for the table.... but I really need a longer arm!

edit*  Funnily enough the day after composing this post --they came in the mail!

The Army of Major Might

Will Bailie, a wargaming buddy of mine has his focus on the Indian/Afghan area for some time now and has created his own imagiNation world of a Indian Sub-continent land called Jhamjar (yes, like jam jar... so lots of "food you put on toast" puns possible among others).  He put out a call for local fellow gamers to add a contingent should they wish within the confines of era and geography.  (Link: Jhamjar explained )

 As I had some Boers laying about "without a home" , I decided to quickly base them for the task.
The following is my contingent's tongue-in-cheek backstory:

  
Major(recently retired)V.G.Might, late of the South African forces stationed in the Sinai at the end of the First World War, did not want to go back to Pretoria.  He felt many of his (former) command felt likewise.  Victor Might was dissolutioned fighting an ‘Imperial War”.  A dreamer and reader of grand adventures in the back and beyond of Asia and one morning, after a much gin-fuelled read of “The Chalice of Hunn-Nee”,  began his recruiting drive.  He found a large body of men armed and looking for adventure and offered them images of riches and exotic lands.

Courtesy of his ‘procurement officer’, a rather daring individual who boarded commercial ships as they transversed the Suez Canal, asked for their shipping manifests (often at gunpoint) and removed whatever would be useful.  One such vessel was transporting suits of men’s civilian clothing. “Can’t be wearing our old khakis can we?”  To the Major’s liking, as they were of somber tones; to these were added bandoliers and, of course rifles, by far the easiest to obtain. Razors were rare however, much to some of the men’s delight.

The army was given its employment the day when the Major’s second, Piet Rasponse “Rasp” Berry asked scratching at his growing beard, “So where do we find this chalice?”
   Might did not look up from his worn atlas of Asia, “Well, Rasp, the Huun Nee is thought to reside in the Bai Lie Temple somewhere in the Imagitush Mountains.”
   “And how, pray tell, do we get to this ‘Bai Lie’ place?” asked Rasp.
    Pointing a finger somewhere on the old page, Might responded, “Through this Jhamjar region it appears.”

…So there is my backstory to why a bunch of Second Boer War figures would be in a remote section of Asia. But how they are to be deployed, whose side are they on, and their quality is yet to be determined.

Photos of Might's 'Army' on the trail to Jhamjar

Mon du, this water is cold!

Napoleonic French Pontoonier/Engineers

I came across a small bag of rather roughly cut nude torsos whilst digging in my boxes.  These were remnants of the re-attaching correct torso to the legs of a large group of Ancient Celtic warriors.  Found in the club's B&B,  the seller had obviously randomly glued bodies to legs not realizing until too late his mistakes and then gave up on the endeavour.  Some damaged torsos from my cutting of the offending bodies was the result.

But now I took a second look and thought they could be used.  The attached heads of some were removed, the torque neck chain scraped off as were any wrist bracelets, etc. The hands were utilized if possible, or removed and replaced with ones holding various construction implements and some with muskets from spare Zulus arms, among other sources.

The rather exaggerated wide-arm pose of these ex-Warlord ancients was kept but justifying the posing was challenging!  Much far reach of the mallet or shovel.  Waist high in water and not wanting your 'powder wet" the figures seem to be wishing to keep them dry, their cartridge boxes are bits of sprue frame and paper belts.  I added some more belting to be held to one of the musket men as my wife thought he was holding a purse!  I agreed sheepishly, so needed to do that alteration.  But she does enjoy their manly physiques.

To make them ‘Napoleonic’ I added some of the many spare heads giving them mostly French forage caps.  These now can be added to engineering units building a bridge across any contested river.

a dark and snowy tale

The inventory guy says, “If you are interested in the mat, you should buy now as the next shipment will be over 30% higher due to our tanking dollar.”   Does one need any more encouragement than that?

So I took it home, laid out my new neoprene(mousepad) mat and thought, “Oh dear, there is more ‘ash’ dust on this than what was showing in the packaging…”   Clearly I would need to decide on “the look” of my two winter projects - What a Tanker, 1941 and The Retreat, 1812 -

I decided to separate the two as the re-painting of the bases of the Napoleonics would be a challenge.  The Retreat would remain with the bright white sheet, with the snow covered church while my burnt out buildings, tank traps, trees and fences basing will get a darker treatment.

So with a sigh, I attempt to blend in my terrain to the mat’s coloration of spotty extremely dark patches.  While it was trying, the result is now a more self-contained game; a more dark and less white almost dystopian in nature but was not the Eastern Front at the time like that?

40K Battle of the Comm-Tower

ChrisO having run a game of the Lord of the Rings the month before (the poor boy can only afford the time for one game during a month with work, wife and kids and their sports) converted Warhammer 40K stats to that for a favourite LotR rules so to have a go with our old 'veteran' 40K troops — four of us providing the troops not having brought out these guys for some 20+ years!

the defences with my Russian looking Valhallans (the effort was deliberate!) ready -but the dice not willing - to shoot up the oncoming Space Marines

Interesting scenario but, as usual, the dice rolling made things a bit one-sided as the Imperial Guard ‘patrols’ were not as effective,  not allowing the defenders of the communications tower to start shooting earlier and not having our reserves did not enter at an earlier turn;  and that, due to poor dice rolling (especially by me… as usual…) we could not hurt the oncoming Space Marines.   [Yes, it was a  40K “good vs. good” engagement.]

my depleted numbers vs 'the monster tin-can" ( photo by ChrisO )

the comm-tower to defend

I was happy to get my Valhallans (Russian looking chaps) on the table together with the slightly more recently painted plastic Cadians who I made into futuristic-ultra-modern  “United Nations Peacekeeping Force”  by scraping off all the Imperial Eagle logos and painting the armour bits in bright blue over camouflage uniforms. ( you can see them in the photo above ).  Can’t take this 40K stuff too seriously…….

my squad of dismounted tankers

Happy Waterloo Day

To everyone,
Happy Waterloo Day!!
the two hundred and third edition.....

a photo from the perhaps ninth game (!) of the Battle of Waterloo (1815) with deployments per the historical example on a element = brigade level. Very hard for Napoleon to win in any event.  In all those games (and most had excluded or reduced the Prussian involvement) only once did the Allies lose and only because the "Picton" player did a very foolish thing and charge over the ridge and into the grand battery AND again the Prussians did not arrive.  While a French victory it still could have gone either way; so hard one for the French to be victorious.

my 28mm Napoleonics - mostly Perry Miniatures

Anyway the 'Battle of La Belle Alliance' (as it SHOULD be known but Wellington was, of course, SO obnoxiously British....) is always a favourite to play.

Hussar Rampant action post Waterloo-ish

Hussar Rampant fictional action somewhere in southern Belgium, post Waterloo?

The French needed to get the wagons pack and moving. They also needed the squadrons active to counter the Allies horse attacking them.  They could not do both at the same time.

French wagons quickly (too quickly for the Allies) packing up and moving.  Perry metal horses (team separated) with Warbases MDF wagons.

….However, both Allies players (myself and ChrisP) failed our first activations even though Chris had accurately predicted his starting position (closer to the bridge to the French’s rear but harder the roll to do so but of which he was successful)  Because of the wagons/non-activation problem for the French, I gave them quite the points advantage which they used the numbers and tough cuirassiers to counter each of our attacks.

My badly handled 4th Dutch-Belgian Light Dragoons showing the new 'blown' markers - hussar pelisse left on the ground

Jim's cuirassiers verses my British Light Dragoons (left) and my converted Dutch-Belgian 5th Light Dragoons (right).  The fight to cross or defend the bridge lasted the entire game.

Though much of the discussion of the rules could be clarified if I could remember them (!) or remember to look them up (!) I guess they survived.  But combat over the wooden bridge was controversial to such a point that I exclaimed, “Note to self - no more bridges in scenarios!!”

"Illegal" formations made by ChrisP due to my rather poor instructions about river crossings and requirements for combat .
This was corrected but poor ChrisP never did cross the river to assault the retreating wagons due to the attentions of JimF.  

SteveA came over to have the rules a go and give them a tough 'tug'.  His very young step-son was given the command of the two squadrons of French Chasseurs light horse.  While the kid's rolling for all of dad's combat was quite good, he failed ALL of his own activations so thus these horse remained inactive for the game.  The good thing for the French were that they were really not needed! In the background, the cuirassiers were doing yeomen service forcing off my D-B attacks.

You may note in the photos the use of a new version of our “blown” marker - a discarded hussar’s pelisse in light blue with some of the units during the game.  With the number of Perry plastic hussar boxes I have used in the past while, I have a lot of them left over which I decided to put to good use.  These can be used in conjunction with our normal ‘horse-head’ markers. Any marker would do, but these have a nice aesthetic look.

My Dutch-Belgian Carabinier heavy horse.  Perry plastics converted from dragoons and modified.  The two pelisse markers does suggest the front squadron is in trouble!

Humorous event from the game:  poor JimF was lamenting about the lances he manages to knock off his metal figures each game.  Well, surprisingly he did not knock off a single lance this affair - it was instead the eagle standard off the cuirassiers to much amusement of the other players.

...at least the broken piece was not a lance!  (Jim's French 13th Cuirassiers in 'Spanish brown' and the broken piece)

My little frankensteins

OK, Mary Shelley I am not.   However, I do feel similar to her character, Dr. Frankenstein.   He of the famous fictional novel created life and horrified by what he has made ( the low-key button-counter in me). And like in Frankenstein, this monster was a composite of parts grafted together from cadavers of various abandoned plastic sprues.  It is with these that I have created these... ahem….Napoleonic Hungarian Militia.

my original prototype

They are, of course, an abomination from the historical but perhaps close enough to act the role.

The list of body parts:
Legs: Warlord ancient Celtic warriors (c.1st century BC)*
Torso: Warlord War of Spanish Succession (c 1700 AD)**
Arms: Perry French Dismounted Dragoons (c 1809 AD)***
Hat: extras from Perry box

Cartridge Box: cut from discarded sprues

Canteen: cut off from previously altered Austrian infantry (c 1809 AD)

author notes:
*I had picked up a bunch of these half-built ancients from the B&B but were left with lots of legs remaining.  Very odd posing due to excessively bent knees and the top of the hips at a 45 degree angle - or more!  The creations certainly have a Games Workshop Orc-ish pose look to them.  Monsters indeed!
** These torsos are offered as a few alternatives within the Warlord WSS boxes. Luckily a group of us collected enough to allow me to have sufficient amount of one type to make 24 of these in total.
*** These Perry arms are one-part with both arms/hands attached to the weapon so specific to their dismounted dragoon body.  I happened to try these onto the extra Warlord WSS torsos and they fit surprisingly well and thus unexpectedly launching this whole project.


I loosely describe them as Hungarian to justify the ankle-tight trousers of the Celts. The Hungarians were known for similar attire.   Unlike official or parade ground proper uniforms, reality would be a different story with unfulfilled supply especially to the lower rungs of the military establishment.  It is my thinking that Hungarian militia would be very low indeed on the priority list and so liberties in their equipment could be made.    Yes, the corsehut hat was probably not worn by any Hungarians but so very definitively Austro-Hungarian as not to use!  As fashionistas say: the headdress makes the outfit!

I think I will go the 'traditional' red-brown tunics, light blue tight trousers of the Hungarians, and black belts to have them "blend in with true Napoleonics". The heavy cavalry gloves (too much of a pain to modify) will be painted as red cuffs and flesh coloured hands.  As the saying goes: a layer of paint hides all sort of imperfections!

So my existing French Dismounted Dragoons ( link ) will eventually have an opposition in my little frankensteins

WAT the heck am I doing?

I ask myself, "What the heck am I doing?"   "Well", I answer myself, "having fun, and besides, you already got some tanks do you not?!"

The why and how is of course the all-tank game "What a Tanker" which has been nicely promoted by Craig within The Club for the past months. He set up a very nice looking game at the local hobby store last week with a lay out of a town and hill for the Shermans and PzkwIIIs to roam around.   Interesting choices based on your dice rolls.  I managed with my little 'ol Sherman to come up behind a German PzkwIII within the streets of the town to blast its backside and later played a very, very close dance with another German.   So close that he could not shoot at me as his barrel could not rotate enough in the small street!
He backed up, I hit him well, but not sufficient to render him hor-de-combat and with only throwing two command dice, got exactly the right combo of rolls to take me out. Sigh.

Stoked by the game,  I immediately thought of gaining my own model.   Interestingly I already have models I bought very cheaply a few years ago at the B&B and planned to use the KV-1b as a Leman Russ for my small 40K contingent. I spent a bit of time yesterday refurbishing that model to have the commander either in a open hatch or with a cover for buttoned up - which is an important distinction in the rules.

I also have a T-34 but not a great model and a previously built (by others)  Panther but it is not painted. All models are 1:56 scale as is played at club.

Generally I don't play in WW2 games as the rules tend to be complicated, the size of game way too large to play safely in an evening and I have no interest in expanding my collections in that direction.  But with these rules, one tank is all it should take to have a fun lengthy game -  assuming you don't run into a big gun with hot dice early!

My refurbished KV-1b with (ahem) a MDF wooden base as the commander's hatch cover.  Dodgy construction and painting but it was cheap enough at the B&B.

with commander in place (yes, yes a 'Valhallan' 40K model but close to the part), the ad-hoc hatch cover (it has to be thick enough to vacillate easy removal if needed), and the "required" color-matching dice for Russian command rolls!.