Blog-Con after the Buzz and Project Quatre Bras

So it's Tuesday night and Blog-Con whilst not a distant memory is certainly over but the buzz is still there. Next year will be a MUST for me as I had great fun. I had planned a nice set of images and post on the whole day I did make but unfortunately so few of the images were worth showing I have given up on the idea of using them. Instead I will wait for others to post pictures and will relive the moment there. It's a shame in a lot of ways but as the game never got so far as both Lee and me gossiped like old men (that we are) and my taking pics was more or less as the day wound down has left me feeling I could not do it justice and safe in the knowledge I really do need to get a new camera.

So all I really can do is say again how good it was and that I am really glad James looks to have next year sorted and we will have another great event to look forward to.

So with little to show you on that front I think I need to show you something else. Whilst the figure painting has slowed down some at least the work on Project Quatre Bras has continued. We are at the moment a little light on French Infantry, nothing at all to worry about but still not all ready..........yet. The Dutch Belgians need a fair bit more work, to the tune of about 20 Battalions I think but Lee is confident that come the day we will be well supplied. So the only thing we need is some place to fight over. 

It was mentioned in the practice game that it was hard to guess what we were fighting over with no hills or other terrain showing (other than trees and houses) so we have now added the hills which represent the larger and more important hills. These are not 100% accurate but give a fair representation of the area and will add a few wrinkles to the playing area and tactical challengers.

Here is a single battalion of Russian infantry (those AGAIN?) the hills are large enough that you can get a feel for the  sometimes rather steep hills whilst still being practical to fight over. A couple of the hills are also higher than the others as they were in the battle.

I will be fighting from the left and Lee will try and stop me forcing the hills on the right. You may be able to see the large pond in front of the bottom right hand hill and the streams progress towards the hill in the middle whilst that poor lost Russian Battalion sits all lonely in the central board.

Another Russian battalion climbs to the top of the hill and is possibly like me wondering what the hell he is doing in Belgium. Well at least he gives scale to the hills. These by the way started as polystyrene sheets that have had a cheap filler applied to and sealed with cheap paint.

Well the filler was actually added last, here we look at the area from the other side, I am now going to arrive from the right. The hill with the figures on will also have a large forest covering a large part of the hill and in the real battle and our first practice saw a lot of action with the French driving the Belgian's out of the woods in the French area but always finding more resistance and seeing the central area change hands a number of times.

The hills don't form the usual pattern you would expect on a wargames table, rather that some of them happen to be positioned in not the most helpful of places. We have two valley like sections that will inconvenience Lee or myself at points in the game. Once the forests are added back to the boards then it will become clear we will have to battle each other and the table.

Lee hard at work preparing to add the roads to the boards. These form a cross roads at Quatre Bras and cut the boards into four unequal sections. The total playing area is 5 feet wide and six feet across. This will be teaming with troops come the day and will have about fifty trees added to the finished model and over twenty buildings, both figures subject to change up or down depending what looks the best. Now we have started again I expect we will soon get to doing the adding sand and texture to the whole board and then it's painting and drybrushing them to get the final playing surface.

Of course this is all practice for building the Waterloo boards that will remain six feet wide but over three times the width at about 16 feet, that's a lot of filler!! I think we will have to get the Waterloo boards all done in about three to six months after the first playing of Quatre Bras to allow us to plan out the starting positions and make the required adjustments. Maybe, just maybe we are that mad, especially when you consider all this is being done by just the two of us.