666 The Number of the Post - Chatter Behind the Bike Sheds

As this is the six hundred and sixty sixth post I thought it should have something demonic about the post but having no imps, demons or devils to paint I have had to come at this from a different angle, lets deal with my own personal demons shall we?

Wargame Demons that is. Is it just me or are wargame rules way more expensive than they used to be? Am I just a tight sod? The thing is that whilst all the photo's are really nice and illustrations and artwork plates all add to the rule set but I would have all these bonus items trimmed back if it would be replaced with clear easy to find references and rules that are actually better than the old ones. Field of Glory is a prime example of rules tossed into a book with to little thought going into the order and relevance making it a difficult set of rules to look up answers to problems.

Figures have so moved on from my first incantation Well some have whilst others are the exact same ones I was not buying due to being poor quality, now you can add historically inaccurate to the list for a good number. How come we still except poor figures when often they are the same cost per pack of the better ones.

Rules that require something special. Or in the case of Saga, Flames of War and Boltaction something (I'm thinking dice here) not special at all. The tremendously overpriced average at best dice that have been designed into the game for ripping off the paying customer adding something to the game. Is it just me or is this a weak ploy just to get yet more cash out of the customer. How many slag off GW but then happily throw their coin in the direction of the respective supplier who is merely following GW lead for ways of making a fun bucks . Saga catches my eye at the moment as I will have to spend £24 on dice for my son and me if I want to go down the route of doing it right. The jury is still out on that one I can tell you.

One old demon nicely exercised I am happy to say is the terrain imp. In my last incantation I was happy with a plain table or at best one painted green and using whatever came to hand for buildings, no matter that they were the wrong scale or period. Now it would be a distraction to use buildings a few hundred years to early or late. Fortunately we have a lot more choice these days such as resin or the new super product MDF. Tomorrow I will look to buy some MDF products such as wagons and water buts to add cover for the cowboy games, I know I need to get some buildings at some point but I have to sort out extra space first.

Given that I am having to rebase all my old figures for new rule systems I don't have the problem of trying to work a better system in with an older one. Well that WOULD be true if not for the fact that a good chunk of my 6mm French are based using flock and the rest with scatter. I know I should rebase them but right now I can't face THAT particular demon.

Anyway thanks to all of you who have followed this blog, especially those from day one, next target will be 500 posts!

Adler Prussian 5th Dragoons

The third cavalry regiment to be painted in May was another Prussian, this time the 5th Dragoons and another regiment that was part of the Ist Corp 1st Cavalry Brigade. These again are Adler and leaves me with just the one more Dragoon Regiment for the Prussians to paint up.

Again lovely animation and the usual mix of two slightly different poses helps give the imprecision of movement. I have been adding ten figures rather than the usual nine on the last three bases but will go back to nine from here as it is a bit cramped.

Lots of detail as always from Adler and really well defined. The clean up was not too bad and this time basing them was not too difficult as they stood up better, possibly because I spent a bit more effort on filing the bases in clean up?

Again this regiment had mounted Jagers attached adding a nice green to the light blue of these Dragoons. I was really happy with the results on this base as they were done reasonably quickly and the black base coat really suited these figures. Painting over the shako's with Black Grey leaving some of the original black showing really worked.

Whilst the command figures have not all been fully finished I have still managed to paint up three French Battalions and finally started two more Zulu regiments for Matt. I still have two days left in May so should make a deep indent into some more figures before the month is out.

I Got Liebster'ed

I have had the honour of being nominated by two blogs in the last 48 hours for the Liebster. These being Scotty's Wargaming and Dartfrogs Adventures in 6mm two blogs well worth checking out if you have not yet discovered them.

As part of the award we get to nominate others and this time answer some questions so first lets lake a look at the blogs I think you may be missing out on, in no particular order we have

Very Tiny Wars just discovered and what a hidden gem, if your into 80-90's Modern period this is the site for you.

Rear Guard Action quite a varied blog with good book reviews, at the moment Napoleonic books are in the lime light.

Blunders on the Danube has already been nominated but for me the award is about pointing followers to blogs you feel they should take note of so check this one out, despite the title you get more than just Napoleonic's here. 

Fidus et Audax A mix of Si-Fi and Napoleonic subjects are the majority of posts. Tim has took a five month break from blogging and painting but has just come back with a post on 6mm Si-Fi.

Gothridge Manor I break the rules somewhat here as Tim has over 400 followers (supposed to limit to 200 to give the award) but as this is a Fantasy Adventure blog and is outside my normal subjects want to break the rules.

Lead and Paint http://leadandpaint.blogspot.co.uk/ Another blog that really has too few followers for the quality. You get a good mix of subjects though Steam Punk and Fantasy are the main subjects.

Figurine Passion Captain LOL is one of the best painters out there and it's worth following just for the reminder of just how good it gets. Being a full time painter (I believe) we get treated to lots of posts and finished projects all the time. Mostly busts and 54mm+++ figures.

Dots of Paint mostly Napoleonic in flavour though other subjects are covered. Excellent AAR's and fantastic figures, again the number of followers is far lower than one would expect.

I could give more but will leave it there, so onto the questions

Why Dis I start blogging? My wife has her own blog and she encouraged me to have a go so I started a ASL blog which I still update on occasion. When I came back to figure gaming I thought it would be good to do the same.

If I could change one thing about wargameing what would it be? The exposure of the hobby to generate a larger following and improve the perception of those that do it. Would be a real boost to the hobby and it's suppliers. I think Flames of War have done this to an extent.

What is Best in Life? Having got through the hardest two years on my life I have to say wife and kids who have been great whilst I got better.

Fame or Fortune? Fortune, though I am not Mr. Poundnotes, better to have enough than far too much. It would be nice not to ever have to worry about rainy days.

What miniatures am I most proud of painting? The ones on my banner at the top of the blog were from when I was last painting well over 20 years ago. More recent would be the deluxe sniper reminders and some of the 6mm work I do.

How do I deal with burn out? Not really suffered it yet. Been to tired after work to paint recently but back in the grove now. I think working on lots of different periods and scales help. I always play music when I paint and that also helps keep me at it.

Why is a Raven like a writing desk? I have no idea.

Star Wars or Star Trek? Trek? Why have a phaser when you can have a BLASTER

If you could buy from one manufacturer who would it be? That's really hard but if forced it would be Adler as I love their poses and the extra time to paint them up would not matter given the ban on others.

Favourite Take-away? Chinese by a mile.

OK that's a wrap, hope you enjoyed it.

Baccus Soon to be Released French in Greatcoat Command

At Triples Peter at Baccus gave me a command stand for the soon to be released Napoleonic French to have a play with. Unfortunately I was not feeling the urge to paint them as soon as I got them as I was tired and not really wanting to paint. Fortunately that mood has passed and last night I stormed through the three French Battalions on my desk and also worked on this stand of figures.

Due to poor light and drizzle I can only take shots inside. Hopefully they do good enough justice to get the Naps fans queuing up to get their hands on the packs as soon as they are released. I am looking at getting at least one 12 Battalion Booster though I will buy a few more once the Waterloo French are finished. I will be looking at getting the Waterloo infantry as soon as they come out as well.

I added the flag to finish off the stand and will use this with my first battalion I paint up once I have the pack so these will have to wait for them. All depends on the date the new French will be available to what infantry I paint next. I have three French cavalry regiments already prepped so these will be slotted in, especially the Guard Light Cavalry as they will be needed for Joy of Six in July so need doing soon!

As you can see from the images above these are really nice looking figures and I look forward to getting a good number of Battalions of these painted as I think the mass effect will be very effective.

Anyway I am off to Partizan this weekend so hope to see some of you there. I will have both kids at this one and we are there to play more than buy as I have finally decided to try and rein in the spend by keeping a record of bought V painted starting with May, though at some point I will go back through what I have on hand and add those to the mix, watch out it's going to get ugly.

Very Tiny Wars Blog, Go Check It Out

I guess the title says it all but a little more information first. This is not a new blog but it sure has been hidden from site. It's 6mm for the most part and far more Modern wargames than anything else but it's a great blog well worth following as it has lots of interesting posts about this time period.

Very Tiny Wars is ran by an American History Professor and Professional Researcher, need I say more. I was the eighth follower which is amazingly low to say how many posts this guy has done. If your into modern and not 6mm it's still worth a trip over for the historical information, seems that his preferred period is 70-80's though that's an uneducated guess.

Prussian Adler Ulan's Project Waterloo

Apologies for the lack of posts this last week, been really busy with work and the painting and blogging monkey has been hiding somewhere. I had started three French Battalions and did not have the energy or drive to do much, I did try a couple of times but just did not have the urge so put the brush down and read instead. I am happy to report that I got back at it again Saturday and worked deep into the French though yesterday was a all day ASL playtest so my son spent the day painting his Saga Anglo-Danes :-)

I did have these fellows finished though, just not photographed and I wanted natural light. Here we have two Ulan Regiments for my growing Prussians.

These are the 1st Ulan's of IV Corp 1st Cavalry Brigade and these finish off the 1st Brigade with only four more Landwehr regiments of Cavalry to finish off all the cavalry for IV Corp. I still have 22 battalions of Infantry to paint for this Corp as it is the one that has had little done, so will feature heavily in the coming months.

Again these are Adler figures as all of my cavalry are for the Prussians. I changed my method this time as I sprayed them black and was rather surprised how well the colours came out on the black. The horses especially seemed to benefit from the black base. Best of all the painting was faster on a black base, expect to see more of this style, especially on the cavalry.

This regiment had a detachment of mounted Jagger's who seem to have also carried Lances with a green and white pennant rather than the dark blue and white. I like the addition of the two green painted figures on the end of the line, who said painting Prussians has to be boring?

Next up is the 3rd Ulan's part of I Corp 1st Cavalry Brigade and finishes off this Corp. Well I have to assign four guns and two limbers already painted to them i.e. base them. I still would need to do another fourteen battalions mixed over line, reserve and Landwehr to complete the Corp's for the sake of completeness but these are not needed for Waterloo so will be done some time after the big game.

Here they are charging past a French gun's wheel, hopefully not a portent of things to come when we play the game! It is kind of strange painting up such a large force knowing it will not be me playing with them. At least they will get future play with me in command.

The close up shows these figures to be very well detailed and this time were not too bad on the cleaning up. Dark blue and yellow for the pennants this time but no Jagger's this time.

I guess this will be the only time you will see the two regiments together given they fight in two different Corp's but maybe in other battles they are side by side. 

I have the cavalry for both the Prussians and the French well in hand for Waterloo and expect to have them all finished before this year is through. Same with the Artillery which I have still to base up the Prussian gun's I bought painted at Blog-Con 1. I have ten guns and four limbers to base up in total and one command stand, once these are done I will have based up all the bought figures I will need for Waterloo from the bought figures just leaving the Poles, Early French and Brunswick's to be based all of which will wait for when I have spare time.

Command for the Prussians is another matter as I have finished just a few bases but I have almost finished five bases worth so that will help. As for the whole project I feel I am in a good position to get my quota done on time. I plan to have a few mega sessions when I paint up large chunks in one go which will make break the back of the infantry. I will paint up nine Baccus Landwehr Battalions which will not be the majority of what's left but I will follow that up again with Adler a couple of months later.

As for the French I should get the new Baccus Waterloo French within the month, I plan to paint up three Battalions to show them off as soon as I can then I will paint up the other nine straight after. I will also paint up three of the new greatcoat infantry with the Waterloo ones but the other nine can wait as I will probably not paint these up for Waterloo but other battles. This will just about finish off the French infantry, just need a few more so I can turn my attention to finishing off the Prussians. 

Lee has started work on the boards and these look to be ready in plenty of time and we may get a few chances to play a few scenarios on board sections to see how the space works for us.

Building of the Week - Doing Them Again

I have tackled most of the Leven Miniatures buildings shown below at least once but here they are again though in all cases I will be basing them at some point in the next few weeks. I have to come up with a few biys to add to their bases so they are more interesting.

This is an old favourite of mine but this time I went with red roofs. I have based the two buildings with another for a larger farm, these will be finally put onto a 60x120 base with room to spare for a few bit's to one side.

I went with a full wooden extension to FAR01 Farmhouse (£2.00) but all the doors were treated to a lick of colour paint rather than the boring brown I would do normally, obviously this farmer is a bit better off.

FAR02 the stable block (£2.50) looks plain enough but closer attention shows the stone work is not 100% even, looks like someone has done some repair work to the corner of the wall nearest. I know I bang on about the texture of these buildings but these have had a basic grey paint job followed by a ink wash that I have pooled in some areas and swept really thin in others. The level of detail really helps this work and gives great results for reasonable effort allowing me to put the extra time into the base work when I am ready.

Granary Store FAR03 and Storehouse FAR07 each £2.00 are nice basic buildings that could be placed on a base with the farm for a less prosperous farm which would fit on a 60x60 base with no trouble. True it would be a bit cramped but that would add to the look I would want from them and yes that's for another time.

Instead these will be used for a workshop and wood store for my town and will sit next to the burning building at least some of the time. Again a fairly basic paint job but dry brushed before applying the ink this time.

Nice simple structures that don't cost an arm and a leg allowing you to build up a reasonably priced collection that are not all eye catching main buildings and so bring more realism to the wargame table. Fortunately Leven also do the centre pieces as well. Actually I don't think any other supplier has a wide a range of buildings in any scale as Leven.

Another building for the town, something all towns need, a brewery. IND09 Small Brewery (£2.00) can of course be used for plenty of other industrial uses but I plan to make a load of barrels so that my town's folk can get hammered right and proper!

I do like the chance to do brick sections to stone buildings though this building would look rather nice with different coloured stones held together with thick slap of mortar, that can wait for next time when this building will be a metal workers or something.

Here for scale we have some Prussian Ulan's that are almost finished, almost. All five buildings were finished by Sunday morning but I really did not want to post about them before the Triples loot post.

Triples '14 Swag, A Tale of Two Spenders

As mentioned two posts ago I took my son to Triples. First let me thank everyone who took time to make him welcome. To a seven year old longlegs actually showing real interest in them is a big deal and he is positively straining to get to another show.

First stop was Baccus to grab some of the last new French Napoleonic cavalry that has been released so far. Others are in the pipeline for later this year but these have been out a few months so I wanted to pick them up and get started on them. These are Lancers and Elite Light Cavalry. I need two bases of the latter for the Quatre Bras game even if they may yet not get to be used. These will hit the painting table next month and it's a bit scary to consider that the following month it's Joy of Six and my first display game.

Peter also gave me a stand of figures that for now I will keep to myself but will reveal in about a week so stay tuned. I also got a run down of the French release schedule and if all works out well we should see something new in the next 2-4 weeks and other items following at a reasonable pace through the rest of the year. It is possible we will see the whole range finished this year, exciting stuff.

Next stop was Warbases where I picked up enough 60x60mm bases for 80 Battalions of infantry. Not that I will be using them for just this purpose as I also base single and double buildings on this base size as well. At the back is another 24 bases for my Sniper Reminders, all told the most expensive spend of the day but I have been told that consumables do not count so I guess that means it's the cheapest shop of the day LOL

Three Battalions of Adler Prussian Line Infantry and one regiment of Dragoons. This see's the last of my purchases for the Prussians until Project Waterloo is finished. Not the same can be said for the French who I will still be getting another 24-36 Battalions of infantry before the dust settles.

A late on purchase was a set of Shield Transfers as now it seems I am building a SAGA force as Lee and my son happen to be!!! At least I have the start up figures for it in the box of Hirdmen Matt traded for painting figures. I just think they will be better with these slapped on them.

Not shown is a single pot of paint and the Warbases Saga measure set and tokens that I also bought as I happened to be on the stand at the end. Certainly a much lower spend than normal. Well until you know that my daughter was at a party that afternoon and had had two new dresses and a pair of shoes for it (two????) so I was kind of matching my wife's spend to be fair, on the understanding he did not just grab stuff.

He had some money of his own and wanted this Baccus 6mm House, he loves to see me painting buildings but I think he wants to do this one himself.

He also wanted some cowboys, these Dixon's don't have shotguns though. I should have two on foot that will match them from my stash. I bought the mule for him to go with them, always useful these.

At lunch after looking around a lot of stands I asked what did he want troop wise. English said he, so Lee immediately saw an opening and said, Anglo Danes then, and that friends is how the SAGA diversion was cemented. I had already met up with Loki and Gary Amos but bumped into Gary again. We had been looking for some Danes, asked Gary if he knew were any where and he replied yes my loft!

So with a very kind heart Gary has offered to send him some through the post but as a 7 year old likes to see his metal in his hand at the end of the show I bought him a pack of twelve to get him started, these are second hand from Colonel Bills and are Renegade Miniatures.

Kev from Kev's Cabin fame gave him a limited edition figure from a rule book he had just bought for his leader of his Danes and by chance whilst I was buying the Saga templates he got himself one of the Warbases new figures, a dog which will go on the base with his leader.

He also bought a few odd items just because and overall he had a great day. He did me proud as he was so often forced to stand waiting whilst I spoke to friends but he behaved well and just occasionally asked if we could move on, no moaning, no pouting just a good lad. We did get a game in, predictably a cowboy game and it would have been great to go back again but maybe just maybe we will be at Partisan in two weeks.

The Manor Selfie

I could not resist doing a selfie with the latest Manor that arrived today. Had just enough time to read a bit of all the content and it looks a lot of fun.

You can pick up a copy here, it has adventure hooks, mini adventures and idea's to slot in to any generic fantasy setting. I have used a number of these in my campaign from previous The Manor's and there is a few bits I will use from this one as well.

The cost including postage to the UK was under £5, don't know how he does it but it may be because he is a poopy head :-0

And so it begins......

Triples is just round the corner and last night I spent time working through my list, not that it's that big and due to Baccus not quite getting the new French infantry finished it just got a little shorter. No hardship as I will get them sent as soon as they are ready which will be fairly soon.

No the inspiration for this post it not my list, not even Lee's list if he has one. I got home from work yesterday to see my son with pencil in hand and a puzzled look on his face. "What you doing son?" "Making a List says he" "what for I ask" "Triples" comes the reply!

I had asked him Monday morning before going to work if he wanted to come to the show as his sister has swimming in the morning and a party later, both of which he would have to sit through. He was more than happy to come along as I knew he would as the whole hobby fascinates him and he often watches me painting or asks about the games and he wants to get more cowboy games in.

Now he is only seven, still too young for some of the games I play but plays a mean game of Bonnanza and has been playing German or Euro games for a couple of years. I see us actually taking part in a few participation games and if you see two kids one big and another rather small, please come up and say hello, he may even show you his toys.

Orc's!

Painted these up a couple of weeks ago but only did the finishing touches last week. These will be some of the bad guys the party will be coming across in a game session or two in the near future dependant on how they fare in the next session.

The tough guy who will be used as a leader IF the party get to come across a larger group of Orc's. His whip is of course is enchanted making it a fire whip. I am guessing that the odd heat critical could be delivered. Best stay out of his way. The original figure was missing it's sword so I drilled a hole into his fist and added a length of barbed wire. After priming in black just painted the yellow and red (adding both whilst the other was wet) to mix in a bit of fire. Added the smoke effect once fully painted, yet more toy stuffing nicked off the wife.

The lot all together, I wonder if the party can manage eight tough orcs at once? These were meant to be a quick paint so got treated to a black primer followed by dry brush of steel varying in amount based on the part of the figure. The black grey painted over the cloths and hair. I used red leather for the flesh and then went over that with Chestnut Brown ink to get a orc flesh colour I liked.

Two of the three polearmed troops needed conversion. The one on the left I added a blade as the spear point had broken off whilst the one in the centre was a present from Jonathan from The Inevitable Spark. His blog is still worth a good look at and he is back after a break brought to us by Real-Life.Com. Jonathan gave me a mixed box of Fantasy figures all of which will find use here at some point. The figure originally was carrying a standard and I thought I could make use of him with a big spear instead. I simply removed the Hand from the end and filed to a point. I also put the figure on a MDP resin base as the feet were at different heights and this was perfect for the job.

I really like the figure as he is that bit different from the plastic older figures (he is a GW Lord of the Rings metal). His base sets him apart from the others but that's OK as the other seven orcs I have on the painting table bases don't match either.

The distinctive swords on this figures really shout LOTR films at you and seem perfect for orc's. Certainly better than the oversized swords that are almost the only other option these days. The large amounts of armour and skin make a great contrast to each other with little details like leather straps being less obvious until you take a closer look. I really like these old figures.

I wanted the shields to look metal without the look of shiny, this meant going easy on the metal colour and I was pleased with the final look. I wanted these to look brutal, mean and ready for a scrap time will tell if they are up for the challenge.

This is my favourite pose, he is leaning in and I could see him as part of a large group trying to force the orcs in front through a shield wall or maybe just on his own trying to force a door open so as to be able to chop up an adventurer into little bits.

Another view of him. I painted these up on rural bases as they will be most used in the wilds I think. At the moment though they are outside the city trying to get in, but that is another adventure.

Another good sword pose, I have to say that GW really did a great range when they did these plastic orcs and the goblins that went with them. I also have some of these to paint up and will do so in the next month or so.

Final shot of the old lad with that whip, just got to love an orc with an attitude. Just four days to go till Triples and whilst for the most part I know what I am going for I will still look for a few other figures, especially old Fantasy figures that will go with the campaign I am already running. It's very possible that I could add something to a campaign just based on seeing a single figure.

Winter War Picture Archive

Over at Gamesquad on the ASL Forum one of the regulars posted a link to the newly opened Finnish Winter War and Continuation War photo archive. I thought it might be of interest to those of us who either bought into the Baker Company Kickstarter or have bought the Warlord range. 

The images are not really suitable for putting on a blog but can be used for inspiration or extra painting guides etc. Of course they are fine for just taking a look through.

The site also has search facilities and even has video's so it could be useful. I have yet to have a long look at it but as it shows more than just military images I think I will enjoy the site even more.

25th Reserve Line Regiment Adler Prussians.

1st Battalion 25th Reserve

Got back to the Prussian's again, these are Adler and from the original mail bomb I ordered about two years ago. I actually have a lot of Landwehr and a good number of Reserve Battalions, though from here it's mostly going to be Landwehr, both Adler and Baccus as I have loads but still have about 21 Battalions to paint up so I might be looking forward to finishing them off.

2nd Battalion

This regiment is really interesting to paint as 1st and 2nd Battalions have black uniforms whilst the 2rd has the typical Prussian Blue colour. Again I did not have the 25th Regiments flags but I did have some that were white only. This allowed me to add the green and orange to the flags to give me the correct colours.

3rd Battalion

Typical with Adler the figures were packed in detail and well posed. The cleaning up was not too bad as well, though I had selected the figures with care out of what was available from my supply. 

25th Reserve Regiment

As you can see I have put two Battalions in Column and one in three ranks line as it was the only way to get all of the figures on the base. I could have managed two ranks if I had cut each figure off the 4 figure bases but that is really fiddly. 

1st & 2nd Battalions

This is the last Reserve Regiment I will be painting for some time. Probably for well over a year as I need no more for the Waterloo game and when I am finished with all the French and Prussians for Waterloo I will be moving onto either Polish or Spanish, well as it stands I will.

These three battalions are a mix of two different packs as some have a backpack and blanket roll whilst others have the iconic wrapped blanket diagonal over the body.

Here you can see how I mixed them in, separating them into two's to break up the clumps of each type of figure. It was fun to get back to doing some Adler Infantry which is a good job given the amount of them I have in my collection awaiting a slap of paint.

I tried a new way of painting this time, as two of the three were wearing black I used black primer and found to my surprise I could work that way. I have since started work on three Prussian cavalry regiments with the same approach. I like it but won't move 100% over for 6mm but it sure speeds up the process and in this case I think helped make them look better so what'snot to like.

Only the 3rd Battalion had the red and white shoulder pads on the drummer so I did not have to go through to much trauma LOL. Anyway that's another three battalions done, and another 24 needed for the Prussians and 20 for the French, if I can get three of each done a month I will be able to take a breather at the end. It's a bit sobering to realise that in a years time we will be laying out the troops on the table ready to kick off the battle. Funny but it seemed sooo far away when we started and now it's knocking on the door, still lots to do though.