The Second New Project...

...is currently the Russo-Japanese War as you may already know. When recently checking through the contents of my recent Red Cross package from Aly I realised that I had not fully sorted through the bags of unpainted Russian and Japanese figures while the painted figures were a different tale. I had sorted the Roosian infantry into two regiments ~

The Japanese infantry I had sorted into three regiments. For both sides each regiment has three bases, each of 6 or more figures. The first task was to see if there were spare figures in the bags of Japanese to provide figures to fill three obvious gaps on the bases of painted figures. Three suitable figures located and Phil volunteering to match the paint job equalled the best expected result! Here are the Japanese, see if you can spot the 'new' figures ~

Sorting out the bags of raw metal figures seemed to have provided the basis of other units, but there were several gaps which needed filling before any preparation was considered - though there is a Roosian field gun and crew along with a machine gun and crew too. Time spent perusing the relevant sections of the Empress Miniatures website eventually produced an order which did not cause too many palpitations in the wallet! The result is the following units to be prepared and spray undercoated - if this rain ever stops that is ~

Japanese Infantry Firing Line

Japanese ammunition mule train.

Japanese High Command

Roosian High Command 

Roosian Infantry Firing Line.

Dismounted Roosian Cossack Cavalry 

Roosian Cossack Cavalry 

In addition to the Empress/Tsuba figures there were two packs of Japanese infantry obviously by another manufacturer as they were noticeably larger figures as well as having separate heads and packs ~

Some research on the web thingie showed they were 11 Oshiro Miniatures VSF figures. Being noticeably bigger and differently posed they would need further figures ordering. No go though, they don't seem to be on the relevant web page! I'll hold on to them and see if any more come up as they'd  obviously make a good Guards regiment.

There still remain assorted figures to incorporate into the collection, notably the Roosian band! There are elements which could provide a further Roosian and Japanese infantry regiment. There is no Japanese artillery - I hope to acquire these later in the year at Partizan - nor Japanese cavalry - which might have to wait until The Other Parrizan. The Roosians might get a second field gun set too. I have little on the way of earthworks here in GHQ, but have seen very affordable and appropriate pieces from Any Scale Models. They will need to be ordered at some point after the wallet has had a lie down in a darkened room to recover. So, lots to do, if this apocalyptical rain ever gives over that is!

Battle at Northycote Farm

For our most recent encounter here in GHQ, and keeping faith with facilitating the appearance of periods/armies/rules less seen on the tabletop battlefield, I set up a fictional ECW game which I named after a local farm and country park which has core buildings going back to the C17th. Phil provided the farm buildings, PMC Buildings from Caliver Books,  while the rest of the terrain is from my Last Valley collection. My armies are mostly Foundry and Perry Miniatures, though the guns might be from other sources, I forget! We used Pike & Shotte for the rules, though no doubt were playing Black Caesar & Shotte! Whatever, we had a happy two or three hours or so. On now to the usual annotated photomontage to hopefully carry you down into the action ~

The Parliamentary army of Obadiah Bykleigh,  gentleman ~ but military incompetent! His objective, the stores and treasure currently stored at Northycote Farm awaiting collection by the arch Royalist, Sir Marmaduke Robinson.

The Royalist army of Sir Marmaduke Robinson drawn up at the end of Turn 2. You may notice in the distance the Dragoons of the Parliamentary army have reached the hedge line and can threaten any movement on the objective. The first two turns had not been kind to either army, but particularly towards the Royalists.

Obadiah's Dragoons proved the exception to his army's lethargy, reaching the hedge line and effectively stymying the Royalist movement on their objective of recovering the stored supplies and treasure.

While the Dragoons hold off any premature Royalist advance on the farm Obadiah advances Foote and Horse in their support, seeking to take advantage of Royalist lethargy. 

As his Foote deploys into fighting formation the first clash of Parliamentary and Royalist Horse develops on their left flank.

As a second melee of Horse develops on the flank of the first, Royalist Dragoons dismount and advance on the hedge line held by their Parliamentary opposite number.

The two melees of Horse are brutal and conclusive. Sir Mattias Bykleigh's Horse are routed by their Royalist foe while Obadiah Bykleigh's Horse thrash their opponents. The Royalists rally back, threatened by musketeers out of shot, while the Parliamentary Horse sweep onward in support of their Dragoons.

On the opposite flank further elements of Horse are clashing in brutal, swirling combat! The Royalists are lead by their general, a move proving decisive in ensuing combat.

Parliamentary losses are too much to bear, the Horse's morale collapses and they flee. Fortunately their second line is ready to meet the threat!

Spured on by a little know East Anglian by the name of Cromwell Sir Martyn Bowland's Horse charge home against further Royalists! Will his brave leadership prove telling or empty bravado?

Back on the Parliamentary left flank more fighting between both army's Horse continues. The Parliamentary Foote might find life too hot for their liking if their Horse is defeated.

As feared the Parliamentary Horse is defeated by their foe and the remnants flee! Fortunately for the Parliamentary Foote the Royalists are Shaken and so retire fearing a devastating volley from the Parliamentary musketeers!

On the Parliamentary right disaster strikes the Royalist regiments of Horse. In bloody, decisive melees they are shattered by their foe and the remnants sent fleeing from the field! Suddenly the slow moving Royalist Foote finds its flank fatally exposed.

Despite serious losses Cromwell's leadership has proved decisive and the Royalist cause is fatally wounded. Mark my words, we shall hear of this Cromwell fellow again before this sad state of affairs in our divided kingdom is resolved.

The victorious Parliamentary army advances all along its front as the Royalists begin a slow withdrawal.  The supplies and treasure will be removed from Northycote Farm to a safer location in nearby Rushall Hall. The Royalists will rally their forces back in Bushbury and regroup ready for the next phase, whenever that maybe. Cromwell meanwhile moves on to greater things...

A fine game resolved in eight turns and almost exclusively decided by the Horse of both armies, the Foote being hardly engaged and only the Parliamentary gun getting a shot or two off! Command dice were far from kind to the Royalists who fought well despite everything going against them! Dour and dependable, the plodding Parliamentarian army proved the victor.

An Old/New Project

As my regular readers will surely recall I recently sold off my Late Roman collection to Aly Morrison. Well, rather that is I sold off most of the collection. I kept back several units as I thought I might like to delve into Sub-Roman Britain, with Arthurian and Saxon overtones! These are the figures I kept back ~

The core of what I hope will eventually become my Sub-Romans/Britons These are all Foundry figures of course bar the Aventine slingers from their Early Byzantine range.

The core of my Saxon force, again all Foundry figures bar the Gripping Beast army command stand and the lone Champion, a Wargames Illustrated Giant in Miniature I think.

I've already ordered some figures to add to these army cores, not only from Foundry but also from 1st Corps and from Gripping Beast. From Foundry  I added a pack of Saxon Archers, but I will need to add figures to the Saxon Skirmishers' bases with two further packs from the Enemies of Rome range. In addition for the Britons I added a Command pack and a pack of infantry attacking. {I'll need a second pack of those, old age 👴🏻 leading to misordering I fear!}

 From 1st Corps I took advantage of their New Year Sale and added a Sub-Roman and a Saxon Warband from their Saga listings, the former including a second mounted unit alongside the Pedyts. From Gripping Beast I added the Wolftails and their Command figures and some Early Saxon characters. I'd hope to add to these at 'Ommer'ead in late February with a couple of pre-orders! None though are even cleaned up yet, so don't get your hopes up, I'm still plodding slowly on with my Foundry Crimean War Roosian Cossacks at present. Three are done so far, seven to go!

I do plan to add figures to this project from other manufacturers in due course, especially if I find figures I know and like or figures from manufacturers I have not previously used. In the former category I'm much taken by Phil's Footsore Miniatures collection so might get some later on, while in the latter I came across Newline Designs and Essex Miniatures both of which might be worth a look in the future for the odd figure or two. There will naturally be no plaaaaastics included in this project.

Henry Tudor

I honestly believed I had done painting figures for my Wars of the Roses project, at least for the foreseeable future! Then sorting through my latest Red Cross package from Aly - see an earlier post if you missed this - I found three figures for a Command Stand featuring Henry Tudor, soon to be Henry VII! Well, they had to be painted didn't they? And here they are ~

The figures are all from Perry Miniatures, as is the Standard I sourced via a web search; the base is from Warbases, who else? Next across the painting desk to endure their time under the Brush of Doom will be some Foundry Cossacks for the Crimean War collection. I guess they will take a while...

In the meantime,  Sue and I were out in Market Drayton on Wednesday last and while exploring the market and town centre came across this commemorative battle of Blore Heath plaque.

And this commemorating the battle of Trafalgar too! As I noted a couple of years back on a blog entry, our history really is all around us. Meanwhile, its back to painting those cossacks now though...

Punic Wars archers

The latest figures to endure their spell under the Brush of Doom and muster into winter quarters in GHQ are a dozen Aventine Miniatures archers from three different packs: Command figures, archers wearing hats and bareheaded archers. They are a really useful addition to the collection as they can mix with the existing bases and serve in the forces of either Coronus Cunctator or Haztrubal Bicca! Versatile you might say! Like all Aventine Miniatures figures they are cleanly sculpted and cast and thus seem to love the paint and scrub up nicely with very little difficulty ~

On the down side its taken me the best part of a week to get these done due to my persistent hand issues! Next in the queue now are three mounted figures for the Wars of the Roses project, from Aly's latest Red Cross parcel, Henry Tudor, his Standard Bearer and a second mounted knight for my Lancastrians. They are underway, so I'd hope to share them with you in not too long...

Heart of Darkness

While we are on the theme of forgotten armies/collections I've recently been thinking over the fate of the remnants of my Darkest Africa collection. As the jungle effect terrain was out recently for the Burma '43 game I thought, why not a Darkest Africa session? Change the buildings and rearrange the rest of the terrain and here we are, somewhere on the Dark Continent in the 1890's, will it prove to be the white man's grave ~

The collection is not large, as I've previously sold off various elements, but enough remains for a small action where terrain and superior numbers will play against British organisation and pluck. Can Watson of the River bring Mustapha Sihx and his ally King Bykalaizii m'Tubi to heel? Or will they jungle silently cover his remains?

Watson of the River leads his expedition forward bringing the benefits of civilization to the locals. Whether they want that benefit, or not...

Mustapha Sihx's rather swish residence and base of operations. He's an honest trader...well, sometimes he is!

King Bykalaizii m'Tubi, surrounded by his favourite wives, his fortune in ivory and his trusted advisors, plans how to keep hold of it all...

...whilst keeping his more questionable activities profiting from slavery hidden from the prying eyes of B'wana Watson, the all seeing bringer of the Queen-Empress' swift justice, dancing at the end of a rope!

The question of rules is important in a game of this scope and limited figures: too big for a skirmish, more a small battle. In younger days I might have tried Astounding Tales or even tried The Men Who Would Be Kings. But nowadays I prefer the familiar, so I settled on an experimental mash up ~

The Order and Nature of movement using Bolt Action dice, options and distances.

Firing using Black Powder. All units being Small with 2 dice, Tribal muskets having to reload between volleys, hence firing every other turn. Casualties Saved or not in the Usual way, similarly Disorder, Shaken and Rallying lifted wholesale from BP. Officers/NCOs & War Leaders are able to Rally elements they are with, not just a CinC.

Hand-to-hand fighting lifted from Hail Caesar, with Sikhs & European units firing before charging as well as having Closing Fire. European, Sikh and Maiden Guards having a Clash of 9 and Sustained of 7, while Warriors had a Clash of 9 but Sustained of 5, representing weaker discipline if not winning the initial combat. Tribal Musketmen had a Clash of 5 and Sustained of 3!

As an aside I have a couple of units of Pygmies with bows. We gave them separate dice, with their actions chosen by whoever had the previous dice drawn. It provided much hillarity, except perhaps when they shot at Paul's Askari from the rear! 

The Slave party, whose liberation was Watson's second objective similarly had a distinct dice that when drawn saw their action determined as for the Pygmies. I would try to move them from the native village to Mustapha's residence and embarkation, Paul to halt, deviate or retire then even. Now though an annotated photomontage to show how it all played out on the tabletop battlefield ~

Groups of warriors armed only with stout spears and shields move out from the village intent on destroying the incursion threatening their King.

Watson orders his stalwart Sikhs to advance on his left, directly threatening Mustapha's palatial residence!

The Sikhs' mountain gun makes rapid progress and deploys to open fire on the residence!

More groups of warriors are making for the fray, supported by the King's Maiden Guards. (They have the Ferocious Charge special rule from BP while the Warriors are Tough Fighters).

Mustapha Sihx has organised two groups of natives armed with obsolete muskets, strengthened by a small cadre of loyal Arabs from his Household. (They must spend a Turn Down after Firing to represent Reloading).

Both groups take up defensive positions taking advantage of the abundant natural cover. They hope to blunt the advancing enemy, allowing the native warriors time to hit the enemy's flank.

The first group of warriors burst from cover but fail to reach the Sikhs advancing down the jungle path! The Sikhs give them a close range volley and charge with fixed Bayonets!

The Maiden Guard are held in reserve, hoping to deliver the decisive blow when the Warriors have bloodied their spears!

The martial skills of the Sikhs proves too much for the Warriors who break and flee in the second round of fighting! (Don't even think of asking about my dice throws🎲🎲🎲🎲🎲🎲)

The Sikhs don't pause to regroup but smash straight in to the first group of native Musketmen. They are caught Unloaded by the Sikhs' charge and soundly beaten! 

Wisely Mustapha Sihx has taken refuge in a solid house from where he can direct his defenders more readily. More Native warriors are seen rushing forward on the advancing Sikhs.

It proved all in vain though as the victorious Sikhs, supported by the Askaris, swept all opposition before them!

Leaving Mustapha Sihx to await his inevitable dance with death at the end of a rope. Whilst King Bykalaizii looses both his slaves and his ivory, but not yet his life.