The ACW Project

A couple of years ago I bought two boxes of Perry ACW Infantry. They sat in my lead/plastic pile for a long time. After starting to paint some Victrix and Perry Napoleonics I became a bit daunted and so took out the ACW's.

I have now managed to paint four boxes of the plastic infantry figures, half as federals and half as rebs. I like to have paired armies, then I can play games at home with no need for anybody to bring along figures.

Here are a few pictures of my first brigade of confederates:






I am planning to use "They can't Hit an Elephant..." from Too Fat Lardies.

I have painted some brigadiers and will post pictures soon. Next on the list are some Perry artillery for both sides, then some confederate cavalry and lots more infantry.

The plan is to have about 40 stands (4 figs each) of infantry, two brigadiers, 1 divisional commander, 2 or 3 guns and a 6 stand cavalry regiment (of 2 figures each with separate dismounted stands) for both sides. Hopefully I can get this done by the end of 2009.

Painting Valiant US Infantry

Last month's Wargames illustrated came with a sprue of Valiant GI's. I have already painted up a box of these lovely figures and some more were very welcome. The sprue has 16 figures. I assembled them and decided to try and paint them to a good wargame standard as quickly as possible. I took pictures as I went along.

First off I spray painted them with Humbrol Dark Brown (29). The aim here was to start from a shade that was in keeping with the uniform as a whole.



Next I painted the jacket and gaiters in GW Foundation Deneb Stone, followed by GW Foundation Talarn Flesh.



Next the helmet was painted with Revell Olive Green (35) and the trousers with Revell Olive Brown (86)



The metal parts of the M1 rifle were painted with GW Foundation Charandon Granite whilst the shoes, scabbard and wooden M1 parts were painted GW Foundation Calthan brown.



The whole figure was washed with GW Washes Devlan Mud



16 Figures took under 2 hours, I would say about 10 an hour. Standard - will not win any prizes but look good in a game. Finished results shown here.



Thanks for looking.

Uncharted Seas and Salute

Last Saturday we went to Salute. After a horrible journey involving 10 changes of public transport (from one side of London to the other, should only have been 4) arrive 2.5 hours late. Show seemed smaller than usual (or in a bigger space?).

Shopping involved some Victrix French, 1st Corps Roman and Celtic generals, Valiant Germans in Normandy and some Celt cavalry from Magister Militum. Final purchase of the day was a copy of Uncharted Seas and two starter fleets.

I managed to play a full game of Lost Battles. This is an ancient battle simulation system that I have been looking at for some tims, I have had the book for over a year now. This was my first chance to play. The game was Zama, I played the Romans (with alot of help). The Romans won after moving Masinissa's Numidians around the Carthaginian right flank and passing three rally tests. I enjoyed the game alot and I will try to use the system more.

The big hit for me and Charlie has been Uncharted Seas. I started painting the 20 ships of our Dwarf and Orc fleets on Sunday, I finished them on Tuesday night. This is a record for me. We had our first game last night, we got a great chunk of the rules wrong but had a lot of fun. I got completely stuffed. Charlie played Orcs and bludgeoned his way through my fleet. I think the Dwarfs need a bit more finesse !

Here are a few pictures of the painted ships. I hope to play a couple more games this week.

Wargames Factory Celts

Here are a few shots of my first stand of Wargames Factory Celts for Impetus. This particular group are intended as Roman Auxiliaries so they have Roman sheilds and have all turned up fully dressed. In Impetus they do not have any of the ferocity of their "wild" brethren so I tried to reflect this in their appearance.




Painting is a simple block and GW wash. I experimented with a mid-brown undercoat on these guys and on some of them I applied the wash directly. I am still trying to make up my mind if I like the way it looks.

It's been a while

I have been feeling a bit guilty about not blogging for a while so here are a few items :-)

I am well into painting my second box of Wargames Factory Romans. When done I will have 8 units of legionarii for Impetus. Hopefully the Wargames Factory Celts will ship in the next week or two. I have two boxes on order. As these look to be less dynamic than my Warlord Games Celts I plan to use some of them to make Ligurian Auxilia for my Romans. The idea is that these guys will look more sober and ordered than the wild Celts from further north.

Charlie (13) and I have constructed a home made "Space Hulk" set from bits found on the Internet and some Plastic 40K models. This has been great fun. Rumour is that GW are re-releasing the game this year so may get that one. In the same vein I downloaded the Incursion beta rules tonight. Similar idea to Space Hulk in an underground WWWII setting. Looks interesting.

Finally for now. Just played a "refight" of Issus with the lad. We used the Neil Thomas Ancient and Medieval rules. This was the first game that we have had with these were things really made sense. They seem to work if you think big, so eight blocks of figures is 60-100,000 real men. The game was fast and fun and looked good. We got the historical outcome but it was pretty hard fought with Persian levy types passing morale rolls very well (they need 5,6 to do this in the rules and my 2 units only failed one test). The Levy held up the Companions longer than they should have (all through good dice, no issues with the rules) which kept the rest of the Persians fighting for longer than they should have.

My painting has paused for three weeks as I have been away on business but hopefully next week will see me getting Romans painted so that they are out of the way when the Celts arrive. The schedule will all go to pot after Salute (if I get there) because I will not be able to resist the new Warlord ECW plastics.

Enough for now. I will update on the painting next week and hopefully post a few pictures.

WW II Skirmish

We played a small WW II skirmish game this afternoon. Used a set of rules called "Achtung, Achtung" that I picked up at Salute in 2004. They fit onto 6 sides of A4.

The rules use a card activation system that removes the usual IGOUGO sequence. Each unit (Squad/vehicle) has two cards, each side has a "wild card" and a joker is added to the pack. Units are activated as cards are exposed, the joker causes a reshuffle of the deck.

The game was US vs German - 1944. Started off with 2 US armoured infantry squads in M3 half tracks tasked to check out a ruined house. The house contained an MG42 and a nearby wood held a german infantry squad. As the half tracks moved towards the house a tank appeared. I placed a Tiger model on the table. At its first activation my son rolled a dice to determine what actual tank type it was (all German tanks are Tigers !). He actually got a Panther. It rolled forward and promptly broke down (dice roll per move for Tigeras and Panthers, break down on a 1 - house rule). The closest half track went rapidly in reverse and then a Stug III appeared. The crew of the half track jumped out only to be sprayed by the MG42 in the house and suppressed. The Americans were reinforced by an M5 Stuart, a Sherman and an M10. The M10 took out the Stug only to be blown apart by the Panther. A Panzershrek and the Panther took pot shots at the Sherman, eventually disabling it and cuasing the crew to bale out. The first US infantry squad was wiped out and the second squad piled out of their half track and into another ruined house.

The panzershrek was killed by the Stuart and the MG's on the half tracks suppressed the MG42 in the ruin. With their infantry support failing - the squad in the wood rashly charged the Stuart and got machine gunned - the Panther crew bailed out and headed for home. An American victory but a costly one.

The game was immense fun, mainly because the card activation mechanism gives a narrative feel to the game which is hard to achieve with turn based systems. We have tried a more complex card based system before (Operation Overlord) but that led to a very slow game. This system is very quick, our game lasted about 90 minutes.

I think that I will use these rules as the basis for a home grown set. We will also try the same unit activation method for Warhammer 40K (5th ed) as I find the fixed turn sequence in those rules tends to rather predictable games.

I took a few pictures of this game. The figures are Valiant plastics, the Stug, Sherman and M10 are HAT, the Panther is Dragon Armor (lovely model).