Those men on grey horses are terrifying

I have had a squadron of Scots Greys on my painting table for a while now.  So this weekend I took a break from my 15mm WW2 and finished them off.

I got these original Hinton Hunt figures a few years ago and the previous owner had made alterations including docking the tails.  They needed a bit of work particularly on the swords which were fragile. The trumpeter was made by a transplant from a Newline figure.

I decided that I wanted a variety of grey horses.  I googled different images and then painted each horse trying to match the pictures. 

The figures themselves took some to complete. The detail was hard to see and  the red, yellow and white needed multiple coats of paint to build up the depth of colour.

I have another 6 figures undercoated awaiting their turn in the painting queue.

Rapid Fire Reloaded

I have a fair amount of WW2 in my collection including some old 1/72 which I built in the early 70s.  I still have the rules I used at the time at the Richmond Wargames club, hand written, in a school exercise book.

Over Christmas I got a copy of the Rapid Fire Reloaded rules and liked the look of the changes made to the original RF rules. They have an old school feel.

So over the last few weeks I thought I would get my old 15mm Western Desert collection out and have started fix up broken bits and rebasing them.

Here are a few of the British I have done so far.

In RFR each vehicle represents 5 and 3 AFVs make up a company.  Here as a company of Crusader 2s.

A company of Honeys.

3 motor companies on the move.

A motor company consists of a carrier platoon with Boyes AT rifle and 3 bases of infantry in a 15cwt truck.

Over the remainder of the month I plan to complete rebasing the rest of my British and Italians ready for a small game in February.

Ayton Wargaming Weekend

I have been away this weekend in East Ayton, near Scarborough, for a weekend of wargaming with the LAOW 

I arrived on Friday and joined in an ACW game using a set of rules based on the Perry's Firepower set.

I commanded two union brigades and faced three brigades of rebels. 

My first brigade looks across the field at a mass of yelling rebs intent on overthrowing our lines.

My second brigade had already been in action and retired to recover and reform. I managed to rally some of the men and re order the ranks. Before sending them forward into the cauldron of combat.

The Confederates were massing their third brigade to take the theimportant crossroads in the centre of the table. But for some unexplained reason the brigade failed to move forward any further failing 3 activations in a row.

On Saturday morning I put on a game using my classic Napoleonics using the classic Charge rules, with a few of my own amendments. The game featured the French facing a combined Anglo-Prussian army. Although out numbered the French had a central position and had the opportunity to beat the British before the Prussians could force a defile and capture the village in the valley.

The game played fast and furious with the Prussian initial attack on the village being thrown back. The Russo German legion slowly advance through the hilly woods.

The French bombard the British, successfully destroy one of the guns, and slowly advance. The British launch the Lifeguards in an attempt to slow the French however the French stand firm and easily repel the British Cavalry.  

In the centre the British Fusiliers move forward and are supported by the Brunswick Cavalry who clash with a regiment of French Dragoons. The melee see saws backwards and forwards before both sides fall back to recover. 

The British Infantry are still holding the ridge and with the French Infantry strength reduced Bonaparte decides to break off using his still intact cavalry to cover the retreat.

After a spot of lunch I spent the afternoon playing a 24 point game of DBN with Alex T one of the authors of the rules. The game was an 1813 engagement between Austrians and French.

The game was set up with the Austrian  attacking the French. The French had garrisonned a built up area and non linear fortification. As this was only my second game of DBN I decided to attack both.

The dice gods were with the Austrians who successfully captured the BUA and NLF  and turned and destroyed the French right.  The French quickly reached their 12 unit loss break point and the Austrians claimed a victory.

Sunday morning dawned cold with a touch of snow. We gathered and set up the group game of shiny toy soldiers using the 'A Gentlemans War' rules.  In all we had 12 players and we werre split up with our own00 section of table and opponent. 

The game was set as an invasion of Albion by a coalition of various european armies, both real and imaginary. I was on the side of the invaders and was up against Mr H, seen here in the green shirt.

My forces deployed at the start of the game.

The British slightly outnumbered me so I decided to play a bit more defensively rather than my normal aggressive tactics. My brave boys take up their positions ready to pour murderous fire  on the British.

The Brotish lead unit of Scots win the prise for the best troops on the table with those rather natty looking trousers.

My initial volleys damage the advancing Scots and the Post Office rifles seen with the white pith helmets in the background.

The British are however able to deploy their Infantry and either the extra numbers start to take a heavy toll of my army.

With the British cavalry successfully defeating my cavalry on the flank it was time for me to concede.

In all a jolly good weekend.

Scots Greys progress

I am now down to working 3 days a week and should in theory have more time to spend on painting.

I have made progress on the first six Scots Greys. The horses and main colours are done and I now need to finish the detail and tidy them up. The full unit should look rather nice once I get them completed.

One of the reasons why these are taking longer is that I have got side tracked into rebasing my 15mm Napoleonics. This collection is hardly used and must be over 20 years since I first started this collection.

With my 20mm classic collection built around the battalion and used with battalion scale rules and formations I have decided that the 15mm collection should be used for higher brigade level games such as Blucher and DBN with one stand representing a unit.

This week I started rebasing on larger 80 by 50mm bases and rather like the way they look. I only had a few mdf bases of this size so I am now cutting my own from a piece of mdf I had using a Stanley knife. 

A Russian Brigade using AB figures. I have also gloss varnished these figures as it really makes the colours pop.

A French Cuirassier brigade again using AB figures.  AB are by far the best figures although I also have Essex, Old Glory and Battle Honours.

And finally an Italian artillery unit. I am unsure who made these figures but they required a little extra card board on the base as they are smaller than my others figures.

Soldering Iron

 As I while away the last few days of work before I retire I realised I had few points  left in the company rewards programme.  Well I thought I better spend them so perused the online catalogue. Normally I end up getting stuff for the wife and kids so I had not great expectations that this would be any different.

Well I found something useful for me for once and got one of these.

The soldering point looks like I will be able to do some fine soldering and the variable heat control should allow me to apply a low heat without reducing figures to gloop.

I will try a few practise runs before I try any repairs on a Hinton Hunt figure.

Back to Napoleonics

I have been having a break since June from painting classic Napoleonics. However I am putting a participation game at a small get together in late November and I  really need another alied cavalry unit to balance the armies.

I have quiet a few unpainted units to choose from including Austrian, Prussian and British.  In the end I decided to go with a unit of one piece castings of the Scots Greys.

I got these figures a while back and the previous owner has altered some of the figure positions to make the unit more  animated. The horses have all had their tails docked. The figures have been painted some time in the past as there is still some red left on the uniforms.

Originally I was going the repair the tails but I have decided to go with the docked look. One figure had no hand or sword so I decided to graft on a bugle cut from a Newline figure. Some of the swords were a bit weak so I covered them with a thin layer of super glue at the weak points.

I used gorilla super glue to a fix the bugle hand to the figure as I have found this is a strong enough bond. As a change I will be using a grey undercoat rather than my normal black as I hope this well speed up the painting time.

I have also be doing some more rebasing and refurbing of my 28mm ACW collection.  

About 50% of the collection is done and I hope to complete by the end of the year. 

The vast majority of the figures are by First Corps and painted about 25 years ago.  

Altar of Freedom

My interest in the ACW goes back to my very first Airfix figures.  I have a fairly large 28mm collection but as my gaming table is limited I was looking for something in a smaller scale.

Last year I bought the  Altar of Freedom rules and over the last few weeks I have been adding to my 10mm AOF collection. I have been basing the figures with between 12 and 14 figures per brigade base. The figures are mostly Blaze Away with a few of the old Pendrakens mixed in to add variety. I have also done a few head swaps.

I have also being making fences and trees. I need to get some more tree armatures as I am going to need a lot more trees. 

I have another 6 brigades on the go and just need to paint the command to finish them off. I also have 4 command bases undercoated.