Another Club Night

While I was transferring photos from my phone to my laptop I found these shots of a Napoleonic naval game we played during my blogging hiatus. Recollection of events is hazy at best so these are presented merely as eye candy rather than a batrep.

All the ships are 1/2400 from Hallmark and the rules used were Grand Fleet Actions in the Age of Sail which have taken over from FLoB II as my go to rules. Keith and Barry played the Royal Navy and I think John and Tom looked after the French (?)

 The French windward squadron...

... and the leeward squadron.

The Royal Navy advance in fine style, Keith leading.

First fire...

Keith brings his squadron alongside the crapauds...

... achieving remarkably little!

Here comes Barry...

He ignores the unengaged French squadron and crosses the T of Keith's squadron, totally blocking him!

Emergency turns and collisions ensue!

The general melee.

At the end of the session things were pretty balanced. The melee was breaking up as squadrons broke out and reformed in preparation for a second pass at the enemy. Unfortunately I was ill the following week and in my absence the table had to be cleared for another game so we never finished.

I believe Vice Admiral Barry was court martialled and executed...

Strange Aeons.

Well eons have certainly passed since I last updated this blog. Sad to say I fell off the wagon and succumbed once more to my World of Tanks addiction. Wargaming continued apace with regular games on Fridays, just no blogging (and precious little painting or modeling either.)

Still, I have now kicked the habit once more and have started to resume my hobby activities. I've started a few new things that deserve their own posts, more on those later in the week, and resurrected a few old projects.

My mate Sean has been more active at the club lately so we've been Peter Pigging it occasionally. I've joined the PBI play test group and have plans for a Square Bashing set up in 10mm.

First shot, PBI - Germans v. Americans in 1944. Second shot, SB - Germans v. French in 1914.

Armies of Arcana has taken over the fantasy side of things at the club with almost everyone abandoning Warhammer. We started small with a couple of Dwarf v. Elf games without magic, worked our way through tournament sizes games up to 4000 point multiplayer games. Next stop, filling our 11' x 6' table with all the toys we can fit in?

A few shots of our escalating AoA games in no particular order because I can't make my tablet put them in the right order... (If you want to see these games done justice then checkout Stoke Rogue's blog in the side menu; he started blogging more or less when I stopped.)

There were many more games from Saga through Epic Armageddon to Black Powder and Warmachine, etc, etc, but when I stopped blogging the photos stopped too so all record is lost. I did manage to find a couple of photos on my phone that are worth posting though. One shows that FoG games in our group are not actually a myth, 15mm Carthaginian v. Republican Romans; the other is of a large battalion level Battlegroup Overlord game that the lads in the backroom at the club ran for us. This baby ran for weeks and was gorgeous, Brits v. Germans in June 1944.

More soon, ie. not in 12 months...

Mystery Figures

Anyone able to identify the manufacturer and range? I think they're 25mm 14th Army. They have magazine rifles and seem way to large for 20mm.

Scatter Terrain II

I got in from school today and finished the second batch of terrain. It's my first time with rubberised horse hair. Wow! It is SO easy to use and I think it looks very effective too. Sorry Last Valley but I don't think I need you any more...

Some shrubbery with palms or rocks.

Just shrubs.

Everything so far this week. Four evenings work.

Super macro!

I'll be doing more when I can get hold of the MDF cut outs. In the mean time I'm off up the woods with my secateurs to collect the raw materials for some nice new trees. Hopefully I'll be using my own cold dyed flock to make them.

Saga Dark Age action at the club tonight which means I'll have a back log of FIVE (!) Club Nights to post as well as the latest Mbogo progress. Soon...

Scatter Terrain

I have shamelessly neglected my blog this last month or so but now I'm back with a vengeance and a backlog of stuff to post...

A year or so ago at a show I picked up a bunch of laser cut MDF 'shapes' intending to produce some scatter terrain for placing on larger templates and I finally got around to starting (and finishing) the first batch this week.

They'll be used to represent terrain in the Mexican-American War, Spanish Civil War and Mbogo. Not all of them will work for all three theatres. The Sudan is possible in the future and western gunfight / Cavalry and Indians too maybe...

First up, the least useful items, patches of saguaro cactus. I'll use these pieces for Mexico and ignore the fact that saguaro would only have featured in the California campaign which I'm not going to cover...

 

Next up, rock formations and a welcome oasis.

 

 

Finally, some long grass ready for Palo Alto.

 

I've nearly finished batch two; scrub and brush / mimosa. I've used rubberised horse hair for the first time. Fingers crossed, more MDF is on the way for batch three.

 

Mbogo's a go-go!

I found a few hours here and there this week to get the Mbogo ball rolling. I've cleaned up and undercoated all the East Mbogo regulars and finished the first squad.

Fire team A. NCO, 2 rifles and SAW.

Fire team B. 3 rifles and LAW.

All together...

 

I've assembled a little support for them in the form of an M48 tank and a V100 Commando armoured car. Their attack copter is still unassembled.

 

I'm thinking Mbogo will launch in June. I've done a little map work and a lot of background / history. The E. Mbogo army list is half written in the same format as the lists in the Bolt Action book. Oh yeah, the first two scenarios are written too!

Club Night 26th April / 3rd May - Man O' War

The 26th was the night of the AGM for Stoke Wargames Group so we knew we weren't going to get much game time in and needed something quick to set up. Off to sea!

Keith agreed to put a game of Man O' War together for us and turned up with his lovely Bretonnian and Empire fleets as well as a gazillion boxes of accessories. Matt and I took the Brets., Tom and Ryan the Empire. The Brets. had a Galleon, 3 Corsairs and 6 Buccaneers and the Empire had a Greatship, 3 Wolfships and 6 Wargalleys. Our MoW was 'heavy timbered' and theirs had a 'crows nest'. We both had a wizard.

We only managed a handful of turns on the first night but it wasn't a good start for us Brets. One of us (I'm not naming names, but it wasn't me (I made all the other mistakes)) turned our Corsairs into the wind and they took a pasting while they struggled to turn back out again. Bizarrely, MoW has no tacking rules...

I hadn't got my camera so a few phone shots will have to show how things were at home time.

In the South things looked OK. A plunging Buccaneer catapult shot sent a Wargalley down to the bottom of the sea and our Galleon was moving up in support.

Things were 'grim up North' however. You can see our paralysed Corsairs and in the distance our mostly dismasted Buccaneers. Oh dear...

Seven days later. Ryan couldn't make it so Tom took sole responsibility for slaughtering the remaining Brets.. In the close quarter fighting the Empire ship's oars and forward firing guns gave them a huge advantage. We took a few with us and had the satisfaction of sinking their Greatship but by the end of play all we had left was our Galleon; crippled, toothless and on fire. (Oh... and one Buccaneer heading for home!)

 

Good game. Thanks, Keith.