Finished items.

Finished the French chateau that I started months ago (with the help from my son) and used it straight away in a couple of games of Bolt Action (which he smashed me in). Unfortunately I forgot to take some photos of the game. 

 It comes apart allowing figure placement in the different floors which is useful when playing Bolt Action.

 This is my command base for my ancient Germans. These are Wargames Foundry figures. I've nearly completed a cavalry unit but WW2 figures have taken over recently. I forgot to photo the squad of Russians  I just completed.

 And this lot I picked up on E-Bay. I intend to rebase them but dont know when that will happen.

Cheers.

First German Warband

One down, lots to go. All figures are foundry I believe, Based on 60mm x 60mm bases.

I may have got a wee bit carried away with the floral arrangements, might have to add a few more casualties or logs in the next lot.

I will probably stick with this 3 layer flesh for the foundry figures but I have bag loads of Black Tree minis so may change to using washes for bulk results.

 Anyone have any suggestions for figures to represent commanders and heroes?

A small cavalry unit up next.

Ancient Germans

Yep, I' back already.
I thought it was about time I made a start on these. Foundry ancient Germans at present.

I’ve decided to base them on 60mmx60mm bases which will give me 3 bases to a unit. Thinking of TtS rules set (At this stage).

No set number of figures to a base, whatever looks good, which will probably be between 5 to 8 depending on the figures and maybe a few casualties later on. 
I thought the figures looked better with a bit of spacing between them.
 

By painting a base at a time the lead pile doesn’t seem so daunting, as I purchased a truck load from Black Tree during their Christmas sales. (Seemed like a good idea at the time as I had already purchased a heap of Romans the Christmas before)

Cheers.

Pyrrhic V's Republican Roman (Polybian)

Pyrrhic V's Republican Roman (Polybian) 

I ordered a couple of gaming mats from Simon (aka BigRedBat) the other month and decided to have a crack using his "To the Strongest" rules utilising 28mm figures. I have tried with 15mm quite a while ago but I wasn't quite convinced as I had predominately used these for DBM.

I had all good intentions of taking a series of photographs showing the battle as it unfolded, BUT....... more people turned up than expected. So between the wargame, World of Tanks in the background, beer drinking and watching the footy match between West Coast and The Hawks I did manage to take a couple of photographs. And believe it or not we did reach a conclusion, which goes to show that the rules are very good for undisciplined and slightly intoxicated crowds. Definitely a major plus in my books as I see wargaming as very much a social event.

Anyway........the game.

As mentioned earlier, the armies have been set out on two marked (20mm square) 6’ x 4’ gaming mats from Simon which look fantastic. The marked squares are quite unobtrusive so maybe the mats could also be used for a general board cover, WW2 for example.

Simon also sent me a couple of his ragged edged bases, thanks Simon. The bases look great, although my ancients are pretty much based, I do have a few ‘War of the Roses’ figures that need basing so I am already formulating yet another army. (Looking a finishing it by 2020 if I’m lucky). Sorry, I digress. 

Pyrrhic army. Army list used was provided free from Simon's site.  bigredbatshop.co.uk

Roman army.

I pretty much used all the figures I had which gave 147points to each army. We didn't use heroic general, heros or camps in this game as we were still learning the flow of the rules.

It was easy to get carried away with advancing which is all well and good until the other commands fail to follow orders. In the game both center commands were reluctant to advance (through failed orders).

The Roman left wing was soon crushed but they caused enough casualties that their opposition would later break.

The Pyrrhic center consisted of veteran pike so the small units of Romans kept their distance for as long as possible. The pike units can take 3 hits before they break where as the Romans can only take 1 as they are listed as small units in this army.

The Romans crushed the right flank swinging around behind the Pyrrhic centre and the rest was history. Unfortunately this was where the photos stopped.

The game flowed well, although we made a couple of stuff ups with the rules. After the game we checked the forum tothestrongest.yuku.com. and soon sorted them out.

Great set of rules Simon.

  

Dark day

Dog day afternoon

Had to put the old girl down this afternoon. Rocked up to the vets with the family, wife had to take her in.
Didn't know an old fossil like me could get so emotional.  Tried not to blabba in front of the kids but bloody hard, must be age thing.

Going to miss her.

See ya in the next world Jessie.  (12yrs) whatever that is in dog years.

Whats on the painting desk

Winter is heading our way, days are getting shorter, nights are getting cooler and beer is changing from wheat to dark lagers.
Hopefully these means more gaming as I prefer to sit in the pool and drink when the days are 35 and above.

Anywho .......... whats on the desk at present...................

A 28mm laser cut French Chateau - just needs to be painted up.

15mm trench/dug-in markers for "Blitzkrieg Commander". Was going to purchase latex or molded trench systems but thought I would try making some myself. 1/4 round wood cut into assorted lengths and covered with ballast. We'll see what they paint up like.

2 x 28mm Carthaginian commanders and starting the last unit of Carthaginian troops.

Cheers, Guido.

40K Apocalyptic Game

40K Apocalyptic Game

Just to carry on from the last post re 40K, my son arranged a small 40K Apocalyptic Game between his associates and mine. As it turned out it was 5 V's 4, mind you the 4 would be well fortified with beer and whiskey. (I know, looking at that shirt you can really tell this would be a serious game.) 

The good guys (us) were Imperial Guard, armoured and infantry companies,  Marine Raven Wing and Necrons. Yeah I realise Necrons are usually bad guys........But!!!

The board was set out using two 6 x 4 boards connected by a 2 x 4 "bridge". Actually it was a good excuse to get a huge amount of figures on the board. I was going to give a turn by turn account of what occurred, (lots of arrows and inserts)(see picture 1) but this is 40k after all and not real war-gaming!! 

Anyway, the good guys deployed and moved.

Then all hell broke loose, as we thought we had run out of beer!!!. .....err I mean the evil Grey Knights conducted a 'deep strike' behind out forces. I think they lasted two turns.

Don't ask me about the head wear, obviously an English and South African thing!

 Back to the game, Eldar, not to be outdone by the Knights also landed troops in our rear zone and quickly spotted a brave Imperial Guard commander hidden in the shadows. (It was in shadow before the flash of my camera revealed him)

 Lucky for him an Imperial tank drove onto the board and dispersed the evil blue feathered creatures.

 The Tyranids tried the same trick but were also vanquished.

 The Orks couldn't help themselves and stormed the crossing presenting a perfect target for the Imperial artillery. Meanwhile in the skies overhead raged multiple dogfights between the fliers.

 All I could say was "I glad someone knew all these rules!!)

Imperial aircraft lining up for strafing runs. The goodies were having fun.

 Yep, I even got to use the Imperial Baneblade to smash a few more Orks.

A great night had by all with a heap of laughs..............I think we finished about 1.30 in the morning with a win for the good guys.. Not bad for a 4 o'clock arvo start. After going over all the photos this lot were the least offensive.

Probably a good thing that this ran dry.

Cheers.