Apart from the flag, my little 'unit' of Toy Town soldiers is done. I really like these. These evening they paraded to salute the evening sun..
I just need to finish off the gun and crew, and a couple of lancers now. I have no idea what I'll do with these really. Far too pricey to buy proper 'armies', nice as they are, but sometimes you've got to just do stuff because you like it. Missed most of Partizan on Sunday due to a poor night on Saturday, but did pop down for an hour or so and caught up with a few friends. Yesterday had a very enjoyable first game of 'Bag the Hun' with Scrivs.. I can see me painting teeny tiny planes in the near future! Simon Miller also pointed me toward Tom Fuss blog 'Skull and Crown' where he describes his up and coming galley rules and pretty special wooden ship models - this looks like fun!
Something a little different this time. I do occasionally post videos relating to model rail stuff.. However, this evening whilst I had my Romans out for a little box-shuffling, I thought I'd video them..
If productivity (hobby-wise) comes in peaks and troughs, my wargaming activity of late has been somewhere on the valley's side. Just one of those things, I think, I'm somewhere in between bouts of inspiration. In fairness, I've also been fairly busy lately starting a new day job and cracking on with a model rail project. Anyway, one little project I managed to get finished off today, is the painting and basing of a selection of generals and heroes for my Republican Roman army.* *I say 'finished', although of course, seeing cruel close up photos means that there are still some finishing touches to be done!
Too many chiefs?
I already had a few 1st Corps mounted generals on round 60mm bases, but thought it might be good to have some commanders mounted up on square bases to represent 'Attached' generals when playing To The Strongest! (and use the circular based chaps for 'detached') The foot command figures here are Aventine, and despite my worst efforts to paint them, I think they are bloody lovely figures, full of character. I selected figures that look to be attired in a slightly more exotic 'Allied' look.
1st Corps figs
Aventine Heroes
I've done some Aventine Roman and Allied cavalry too, so I ought to post some pictures of them next!
"Glory Gives Strength" I honestly don't know whether that is the actual proper Hogg family motto.. but the internet says it is, so it must be true! I've been waiting for some pending commercial and fancy-shmancy genuine shield transfers to become available .. but that doesn't seem to be happening. I put off tackling anything myself, because I knew that as soon as I did, they would appear in the web-shop, so today I am testing that theory! Recently I remembered that I had a sheet of transfer paper that I'd bought from eBay some time ago, (turns out that was 'clear'. You can get 'white' transfer paper too). I put together a graphic of the shield pattern that I wanted and printed off onto my inkjet. The quality of the print is not brilliant, but not bad. A couple of passes of a matt sealant and these were good to go. This afternoon I nervously prepared my desk, cut out and dunked the first transfer, wondering if the ink would lift off the paper. It held just fine and went on to the shield better than some commercial products I have used in the past.
So, despite mis-calculating and not quite printing off enough, I now have my Lion Rampant retinue properly 'badged'. Once these are really dry, they will get a coat of varnish and then some touching up to blend the transfers in where necessary. Not up to professional standards, but I have the pleasure of making something myself, and a retinue which now bears my own family crest. Pleased.
Haven't been painting or keeping the blog up much just lately .. mostly because I've been quite busy playing with trains.. Last week Ade and Quint joined Scrivs and I for another Punic game of To The Strongest! The Romans sadly reverted to their original brittle state and promptly lay down in front of the Carthaginians. Much as I am enjoying Simon's rules, it is becoming a bit of a theme that the Romans fight a desperate defence from the start and I mostly try to lose with grace rather than consider the prospect of victory. I'm not sure that means that anything needs changing, it's just as likely that I'm not using my troops properly! Last night I had a very enjoyable introduction to "Field of Battle' Horse and Musket rules, guided by Steve and using his amazing collection (just a small part) of 'traditional' toy soldiers. Sadly I have never rolled so many 1's and 2's in one game before! Considering we were using a variety of dice, up to D20, I think I rolled an 8 once, otherwise pretty consistently below 5. A little frustrating for Steve, who was trying to demonstrate the rules and these rolls kept bringing up rather extreme results. Also seeing his newly painted Russian grenadiers leave the table on the first turn due to some pinpoint Prussian artillery fire didn't help! Despite that, I thoroughly enjoyed being able to play with these beautiful 40mm home-cast figures. It felt like a game straight of one of the war-games 'classics' that I used to borrow from the library as a teenager. The rules seemed a lot less complicated than at first impression too, and have some nice mechanics. Not great photos as I was using my phone, but you can see a lot more of these on Steve's site.
At the back of my mind as I've been putting my Roman army together, has been the need to provide some baggage, or camp. We haven't used these in our games at all yet, but perhaps ought to. On a practical note - it's a good place to keep your spare ammo chits and perhaps victory medals for To The Stongest! I thought I'd start with a single camp 'unit' which in TtS! is a 'deep' unit. I knew that I would want to fortify this (we are Romans after all!), so decided to combine the camp base with three sides of fortifications. I had considered building the two parts separately, but figured this would be more practical and I can always make up some more field fortification pieces later. The base, therefore, was a piece of hardboard cut to size - 180 x 150mm. This will fit fairly neatly onto the 150mm grid we use. In best bodgy blue peter style, I took a sharp knife and glue to some foamboard, a load of cocktail sticks, applied wood filler and paints and finished up with this. The groundwork is painted up to blend with the arid look on the rest of the army.
I think field fortifications cost 2 points per grid edge, rather than per square, in which case this would cost 6 points, plus the 1 point for the camp.
it does remind me of a DBA camp element.. in fact I'm sure I have one just like this in 15mm somewhere!
Last week had a great game of To The Strongest! with Scrivs.. I say 'great' because it was a very rare and very convincing victory for my Romans. OK, in hindsight there was a lot of luck involved and perhaps we tweaked the small units rules a little which gave my lads a fighting edge they were lacking.. but anyway..it were good! I didn't take any pictures but Scrivs did and posted a write up on his blog. One thing we did was to try the new TtS! 'chits' - (Thanks Simon). These are an alternative to using playing cards. They certainly look better on the table , although I have to confess to missing the experience of using cards.. somehow flipping a card and hoping for a lucky number seems more dramatic than drawing a chit from a cup! Speaking of cups.. I casually mentioned to my better half that some kind of bags would be good, as long as they could stand on the table, rather than using tea mugs.. next thing I know, she's knocked up a couple of very suitable little chit bags from a pair of old jeans!
On Sunday I paid my first visit to Vapnartak, the wargames show at York racecourse with Mr and Mrs Scrivs and Mansfield wargames stalwart Steve. Much bigger show than I anticipated and quite interesting.. one or two nice games on display - Trev and John had a Dux Britannium game with Curteys minis that looked great, and tucked away in a corner was mountainous Afghan 1919 game using Bolt Action rules which was a looker too, Upstairs was an impressive 18th Century bash going on too, sadly can't recall the club or the battle, but it was very pretty. I hadn't got a shopping list, but came away with a copy of 'Blood Bilge and Iron Balls' as it was on offer, look like pretty simple rules, first impressions suggest a lot of tabletop rammel though - record sheets and cards and templates etc.
I'm making a start on a base of baggage for the Romans - most likely with a fortified perimeter, Scrivs and I split a bag of Renedra tents from Gripping Beast. I also picked up a couple of the MDF wagon kits from Warbases. I put these together last night and I have to say they are really good.. so easy to assemble, just fine enough for wargames and a great price too. I dare say they'll get painted, but it's tempting to leave them as they are.
