#Terrain Tuesday: Barrage Miniatures Kickstarter Goodies Have Arrived!

 I'm not a big Kickstarter guy, but th offer from Madrid-based Barrage Miniatures seemed too good to pass up - modular resin/rubber terrain for the miniatures tabletop.   

In backing the KS, I chose a green river, almost enough to cover the width of two of my tables, plus enough shore sections to line both banks.   

That river was just crying out for some boats, so I dug out my 1/600 Thoroughbred Miniatures ironclads and my instincts were correct, it all looks great together!

Hammerin' iron!  The nice thing about this system is that I could only line one side of the river mat with shore sections, creating a bay or shoreline, or I could use the modular bits to decrease the width of the river as needed by the scenario or scale - perhaps a 6mm version of Aspern Essling!

Here are some of the other pieces that came with the KS.  Cropped and plowed field, multicoloured sections to mark out woods and to depict fallen leaves, a desert mat for the farmyard, and stone wall sections.  Lots of round green grass sections that blend in nicely with my GeekVillain mat.

The elevations here are old T-shirts rolled up and placed under the Geek Villain mat.  Again, the green resin pieces are useful for hiding the creases in the mat where it falls over the t-shirt hills.

Of course, now that I've laid out this table, I need to get some troops on it.  It all looks Civil War-y, so ...

Cheers and blessings,

MP+

Perry Brothers Command and Artillery Figures for Upper Canada/Alt-ACW

I’m happy to have finished another batch of figures for my alt-ACW project, all from the Perry 1860s British Intervention Force range.   

Command figures from set BIF 44, which are modelled on figures of the period such as Garnet Wolseley.  They’re painted using the Foundry tri-tone paint system, which I may slowly become a fan of.  The blue of the uniforms came out quite glossy, but the dullcote finish toned it down nicely.

 

“I say, chaps, it says here that we lost the Euro Cup to Italy!  Damn bad news, what?"

Bossy foot types.  Chap sitting on the stump is writing “Dearest mother, Canada is full of swamps and mosquitos.  Any chance Uncle Bertie can get me back to Horse Guards?"

 

Command stand for a second unit of Canadian militia.   The flags are from Adolfo Ramos from his Crimean War range.  The battle honours might seem a bit spurious for a Canadian unit, but I can always say that this is a militia battalion affiliated with a famous British regiment and therefore entitled to carry its colours.  Or something to that effect.  At any rate, Adolfo’s flags are brilliant.

 

Finally, the Royal Artillery expand their presence in Upper Canada with a second Armstrong Whitworth gun and crew.   I think this uniform is incredibly smart, though the pillbox cap doesn’t look very useful for keeping the sun or rain off one’s hand, or for staying in place while operating a cannon.  Fun fact, Royal Military College of Canada cadets still wear this type of headdress as part of their ceremonial uniform.

The barrel looks a bit odd elevated off the carriage but I can’t figure out any other way to assemble it.

 

Hopefully I’ll get these chaps into action soon.   Thanks for looking and blessings to your brushes!

#ThursdayNapoleonics, SPI's Wellington's Victory at 1:00pm

Wanting to finish the latest batch of minis has taken my eyes off the game lately, but the monster awaits, in the cat-proof gaming room, and so we have started the 1pm turn.  Here’s the overall view:

D’Erlon’s I Corps took a bit of a beating in the last half hour.  Three of his four divisions are battered and intermixed, but are continuing to put heavy pressure on Wellington’s left wing.   Currently the British cavalry of Vivian, Vandaleur and Ponsonby are buying time.  Two of Ponsonby’s three regiments charged successfully, routing 1600 French troops and dispatching the crew of D’Erlon’s 3d Div artillery, which was rashly pushed forward.  However, the French have managed to capture Papelotte, and have just cued up three cavalry charges in a bid to turn Wellington’s flank.   About to do the morale checks for the Allied units within the triangles of the blue charge markers.

In the centre, bands of French skirmishers are starting to lap around La Haye Sainte and have evicted the King’s German Legion from part of the orchard.   French cannon have started to bombard the Sandpit.  At 1pm, Napoleon commits the Old and Middle Guard and orders them to move forward.

 

Episode Three of The Canadian Wargamer Podcast is Published!

 

Click here for Episode Three of The Canadian Wargamer Podcast: 

Here are the notes for this episode of the podcast:

The Canadian Wargamer Podcast With Our Guest, Curt Campbell of the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge

July 21, 2021

In the interview, we speak to Curt Campbell, the Sidney Roundwood of the Canadian wargaming scene, the Snowlord himself.  Of course, we talk about the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge which has become an international community of over 90 gamers and painters.  We also talk about running a games store in the heroic early days of Games Workshop, the gaming scene on the prairies, and why quirky, eclectic games like Moonstone are so much fun.  Finally, Curt doesn't disappoint us by making 5(!) deposits into our Virtual Library.

After the interview, during our patented Canadian Content Corner, Mike and James discuss the Canadians in Italy and Normandy.  We then ask the burning question: just why are Bavarians are so sexy right now?  James reports on his experience of VirtualLard6, and a new set of rules, Packing Heat, that will have all the gun mooks and their molls all jazzed up.  It then gets rather Napoleonic.

Show notes for Episode 3 of The Canadian Wargaming Podcast, July 2021.

Part One:   Our Guest, Curt (“The Snowlord”) Campbell

Curt’s blog:  http://analogue-hobbies.blogspot.com

The Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge:  https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com

Curt on Twitter: @analoguehobbies

Prairie Con Gaming Convention:  http://www.prairiecon.com, https://www.facebook.com/PrairieCon

Fawcett Avenue Conscripts Winnipeg Gaming Club:  http://wpggamegeeks.blogspot.com

Moonstone: https://moonstonethegame.com

Curt’s five book pics for The Canadian Wargamer Podcast virtual library:

     Fredrik Logevall, ‘Embers of War: The Fall of an empire and the Making of     America’s Vietnam’

   Craig Symonds, ‘World War II at Se: A Global History’

  Tim Willcocks, ‘The Religion’

  Christopher Buckley, ‘The Relic Master’

 Joseph Boyden, ‘Three Day Road’

 

Part Two: Canadian Content Corner

Alex Fizgerald Black and Brad St. Croix discuss Operation Husky: The Invasion of Sicily: https://youtu.be/xkiWFlDpD9w

Dr. Lee Windsor, The View From Point 67: Canada's Killing Zone in the Second Half of the Battle for Normandy: https://youtu.be/vWf2pUT8dLE

 

Part Three: Hobby Natter

James’ report on Virtual Lard 6: http://rabbitsinmybasement.blogspot.com/2021/07/packing-heat-at-virtual-lard-6.html

Osprey Publishing, Absolute Emperor  https://ospreypublishing.com/absolute-emperor 

 Boyd Bruce, author of Absolute Emperor, talks about his rules: https://youtu.be/lkT-OoH5_LY

A Soldier for Napoleon: The Campaigns of Lieutenant Franz Joseph Hausmann: 7th Bavarian Infantry, by Franz Joseph Hausmann, ed. John H. Gill.

Fighting For Napoleon: French Soldiers’ Letters 1799-1815, ed. Bernard and Rene Wilkin.

The Iron Marshall: A Biography of Louis Davout, by John G. Gallaher.

Contact Info:

James' blog: http://rabbitsinmybasement.blogspot.com

James' email: jamesmanto@gmail.com

James on Twitter: @jamesmanto4

Mike's blog: madpadrewargames@blogspot.com

Mike's email: madpadre@gmail.com

Mike on Twitter: @MarshalLuigi

 

#FantasyFriday: Oathmark / North Star Goblin Wolf Riders

Ready to storm out of the mountains and pillage the vales of Men, here is a unit of fifteen horrible 28mm goblin wolf-riders to add to my Middle Earth collection.   I’m not rally sure how a bunch of nasty ferocious wolves would consent to being hidden around by an even more horrible pack of smelly loutish goblins, nor for that matter do I understand how the goblins can ride them without saddles, harness, reigns, etc.  Maybe that’s the tradeoff.

Shooty types.   I like how the North Star Oathmark kits come with a wide variety of weapons and gear, and assemble easily.  Likewise the wolves are simple two part models and go together without too obvious joining lines.   They painted up well enough with some simple drybrushing.

Stabby types with their Sacred Skull of Whatsit Standard.  

Chopper types.

Quite pleased with them overall - generic enough for simple fantasy points battle, but atmospheric enough to be in the empty of either the White Hand or the Lidless Eye.   Maybe there’s an Osprey book, “Mordor’s Minor Allies”, to be written.   They should give the Rohirim cause for concern.

Thanks for looking.  Blessings to your brushes!

MP+

 

#TerrainTuesday: 6mm Timecast Napoleonic Buildings

For this week’s Terrain Tuesday feature, I am happy to show off these two completed terrain tiles for 6mm Napoleonics gaming.

The large timber frame building on the right is by Timecast, and is a lovely model, full of detail.    To flesh out the terrain piece and give it the sense of being a village or part of a town, I found two antique metal GHQ building castings in my hoard and painted them up quickly.

Trees are also by Timecast.  The terrain tile also functions as a four way road crossing, making it a potentially significant objective for hard marching marshals, foragers, and other ne’er-do-wells.

This gray building is also a Timecast model.  I based it individually to suggest an inn or estate house out in the country.

I find a huge satisfaction in working on the scenic aspect of 6mm gaming.  Buildings are relatively inexpensive, a little busywork effort goes a long way, and the finished result adds immeasurably, not dominating the table as a 28mm terrain piece might but adding just enough flavour to evoke a real world location.

This morning I threw a few other pieces on the table besides these newly created models and was entranced by how quickly a scenic view came together.  This visual aspect of small scale gaming is a huge reward in itself for me.

Cheers and blessings to your brushes!

MP+

More Perry Brothers Victorian Canadian Militia

Recently I finished five more bases of Canadian militia from the Perry Brothers Intervention range for my Alt-ACW project.   They are based in the usual groups of four, and the two NCOs are based singly for skirmish games like Sharpe Practice.

These fellows represent some experiments with painting.   For their red tunics, two are done in simple Army Painter Red with no wash; two are done in GW Contrast paint, and the rest are done using the tri-tone Foundry paint system.  I had recently ordered the Foundry ACW paint set as an experiment, and since it includes red (presumably for Zouaves) as well as blue, browns and metals for muskets and black for equipment, I thought I would try them out with these lads.

Asking around on wargames Twitter (pretty much the only part of Twitter that I enjoy these days),  learned that the preferred wisdom was to apply the Foundry paints to a black undercoat.  Unfortunately, my rubbish eyesight has troubles picking fine details out of the black, whereas if I prime the figures with  with Citadel white bone spray (or whatever they call it) and then give it a bit of a go with a darker Citadel wash (flesh or brown, whatever’s handy), then I can see the details and the white undercoat is muted and is easier to cover.   The finished result is pleasing enough to me.  I'

l’ll still use black primer for smaller figures (15mm and 6mm) but for 28mm I think this works best for me.

These militia figures with their tall shakos are quite attractive, and since I have no plans to do Napoleonics in 28mm, they are probably the closest I’ll ever get to painting Naps in the big scale.

I’m quite pleased by the final result.   I have a militia colour party as well as another British gun and crew and some senior officers, so we should soon see some alt-ACW gaming on the table.

Thanks for looking.  Cheers and blessings to your brushes!

MP+