Tag: wargames

Categories
Scenery wargaming

Season of Scenery Challenge II – process and creativity

Crikey what’s going on?

Like most wargamers I guess when you stop and reflect upon your hobby, your traits often pop up.

In my case I am more process than creative perhaps more risk averse as well. So that’s the wargaming general who gets his logistics sorted before attacking – and maybe never attacks as a result 😂 queue heap of unpainted figures and of course scenery.

You could of course burrow into all this personality assessment-briggs myers style. Anyway this is a long intro to justify this!

Scenery explosion

So instead of carefully planning my scenery making I just dug out any thing I could find and started building – note, no painting.

Of course one item is self coloured so it’s done! Dating from the days of the USSR and the DDR it shows there is nothing new under the sun – even back then modellers fed up with the painting step were catered for.

Three years ago I made a tower one summer after discovering Dave Stone’s challenge. Last year it prompted me to trawl my bridges and defences pile to excellent effect. Heck I have even managed to game them!

This year the reaction to July’s starting gun has been a frenzy of building – in fact anything I could find. And especially those “I will make this when I have time to do it justice”.

So I have

An italeri church

An italeri railway station

A warbases church

Two warbases cowboy town buildings

A vero (1980’s) 1/87 scale model railway church ready coloured

A blotz starter pack for 20mm Bronze Age fortress.

No idea when some paint will get sploshed on them……

Thanks Dave 😉

Categories
wargaming

Le siège de Rome 537

La production de figurines, malgré les progrès immenses de l’impression 3D, est étrangement en déclin. Cela s’explique évidemment aussi par la guerre…

Le siège de Rome 537

If you need an english version it’s not too much to foto the five text sections which are conveniently sized and then select scan and translate options in your smart phone.

Also Chariobaude has an excellent WordPress blog which I discovered way back in 2017 covering fantastic painting of late Roman miniatures.

Categories
Scenery wargaming

Season of Scenery Challenge

Fortunately John over at “just needs varnish” reminded me that Dave Stone’s challenge started at the beginning of July.

Last year I had a very fruitful time in fact my challenge ran into the end of September! It did not do my figure painting any favours though.

Yet I had so much scenery waiting to be done it proved to be a rich vein.

Well this particular ore vein is still rich.

Loads of possible scenery opportunities accumulating 😆
Always read the instructions!
I nearly chucked away the ridge tile – look carefully
Some nice detail on my first mdf building
Some clever design made construction easy
I found this mdf model easier than the italeri church

So far that is two churches and a railway station finally out of their boxes and just about built.

Painting may be a stumbling block – I get quite hesitant about colours. Cold north or warm south…..

* Could be I have drawn loads of early pacers who then fade away……..

I wonder what else will come from the pit of scenery?

Categories
wargaming

One Hour Wargames and 2 more Sneedens

The thing about one hour wargames is it’s genuinely “pick up” attraction. If you want to throw dice, move figures and get that war game with a purpose feeling for minimal preparation, then I find it’s a winner.

Yes, the mechanisms are abstract but you have to compromise somewhere and Neil Thomas rules generally offer that blend of compromises I like.

These battles were prompted by my reading atlas of the civil war and discovering Robert Sneeden – a Union Cartographer. https://thewargamingerratic.home.blog/2025/06/05/a-game-wow/

In the first game the Royalists held the hill with some rookie blues and grays in action
The royalists divide their forces to hold both enemy objectives
The royalists include this new blue unit
Royalist artillery hold the town road
The royalists are none other than Danes
Danish volunteer horse make up the royalist cavalry
More Dane’s this time by Hat
Strelets Danish Royalist Guards
Everything hung on the defence of the town

Rebel forces enter the fray

A mixed brigade of cavalry
The rebels mass their infantry before the town
The royalists are caught out
The rebels quickly assault the town
The royalists seek to outflank the rebel attack
The rebel cavalry attack the rookie blues royalists

Rebel victory

The rebel attack on the town is overwhelming
The rebel cavalry destroy the royalist right wing infantry
The rebel cavalry move on the second objective – the hill
The royalist defence stiffens around the town
The rebel cavalry are destroyed
Rebel infantry struggle in the town
The royalist cavalry rush to aid their compatriots in the town but it is too late

So the second battle ends in Royalist defeat. It’s all square and all to play for…..

The royalists needed to escape through the town and up the great road……

Rebels held the river line woods
The rebel cavalry brigade – lucky toys and hat miniatures
Irregular miniatures garibaldeans
More irregular miniatures garibaldeans
Strelets rebel sharpshooters hold the town road
The royalists pour forwards
The royalists choose the remote river crossings on their left wing to make progress
The royalists are peppered by the rebel skirmishers
The royalists attack the town
The royalist left wing cavalry lead the way
The rebels abandon the river line
The royalists begin to make progress
The rebel cavalry are swept away
The rebels are fleeing pell mell
Some royalists race up the great road
The royalist cavalry take a beating getting to close to formed infantry
The royalist cavalry break
The last few royalist units must make good their escape up the great road
Again the rebel infantry shoot well
The last royalist infantry are driven away

And so victory to the rebels in the action and also the short campaign.

Today of course saw the end of 3 days of fighting at Gettysburg – the great Union victory which along with the capture of Vicksburg saw the war finally turn against the Confederate Southern States.

Categories
Mythical Realms wargaming

A Rugian seaplane cruises down the east coast…

I was gifted this seaplane in a poor state. It was found in a clearance box at a car boot sale.

Some minor repairs to the floats struts plus my first ever plane support – magnet and all, then my current favourite background thrown in for good measure.

Fauxterre 1930 is my “nearly mechanised” campaign – long in the planning with little progress on the armies.

Essentially Rugia is under attack and their coastal command have had to draw in naval resources to cover potential invasion activity by their arch enemy Gombardia.

No idea about the kit or the plane modelled. I thought about a repaint but for now it’s fine for my solo campaigning – only my eye is offended if at all.

Who knows I might even actually build another plane after last year’s (2023/24) inaugural camomint 1939 reconnaissance spitfire in AHPC14.

https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2024/01/from-lorenzo-reach-for-sky-camomint.html

Onwards and in this case upwards!

Categories
wargaming

A Game Wow!

When I think about it this first half of 2025 has like 2024 been dominated by AHPC – analogue hobbies painting challenge. By contrast I managed only two shows yet one yielded one of the few games I have played.

That was a cowboy shootout using homemade rules…..

It’s was fun – quick and lethal
Sparse yet effective as were the rules!

Not surprisingly it was Hammerhead at Newark.

Then I had a game of “what a cowboy”. My opponent loved “what a tanker” and reasoned WAC should be as enjoyable. Well that proved not quite the case. We will play again but it has slipped down the list.

Actually there is no list and until today my gaming had been quite limited.

Then I had a spur of the moment, moment no doubt brought on by quite a bit of reading about battles fought.

In this case ACW – I am reading western theatre actions at the moment.

I also have been reading my Colorado purchase – a soft cover book of maps showing the whole ACW war.

In the book are some contemporary maps by a certain Robert Knox Sneeden. He was a Union mapmaker who not only spent time as a confederate prisoner but was also a watercolour artist. Clearly he had a good eye! And by good fortune his maps and diaries have survived.

https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Map_showing_a_battle_ground_at_Kelly%27s_Ford,_Virginia,_17_March_1863.jpg#mw-jump-to-license

So taken with his work was I that I simply made an entry for today’s game in his style.

I played using one hour Wargames book, rules and scenario plus solo options for set up. Figures were what I fancied fielding!

Categories
miniatures painting wargaming

AFV April – What a mess

Jumping on the back of John at just needs varnish and Zauberwurfs duel over some mechanised models I determined to follow up my AHPC15 logistics Lorries.

https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/01/?m=1

Well it seems experimentation is the order of the day. Instead of just painting some vehicles in plain military colours I seem to have drifted into a look at contrast colours, and it’s a right mess. I had no plan – just paint a lighter base colour and let the contrasts do the rest.

A case of too dark base coat for the contrast- this model had a dark green undercoat first.

Not the best outcome since I undercoated in grey or white then the Vallejo olive green seems to be quite translucent. End result is the shading is just highlighting my poor main colour work.

This contrast looks promising even if my lazy base coat work is a disaster
The nuln oil looks well oily while skeleton horde would be ok on the right base colour! Black undercoat was fine though…..

Ho hum.

Categories
miniatures painting wargaming

The Painting Portrait 25i Fauxterre 1930 gets some guns

An AHPC15 entry again and this time it was in pursuit of one of my pet projects. Fauxterre 1930 is a catch all for my 20th century escapades. I started with ww2 but have inexorably been drawn to an earlier time period. Basically I want the look of armies from the 1930’s. So thats most of the kit available in 1939 but also kit that went out of service after 1930 as countries mobilised for impending conflicts.

My recent lorry posting covered the origins of this project.

https://thewargamingerratic.home.blog/2025/04/13/the-painting-portrait-25f-logistics/

In this “later” between the wars period 2pdr guns were fine as were 37mm Anti tank guns – the bofors version being the subject of this entry.

You get 2 guns in the first to fight box
As you see these are actually bofors as corrected by John @ just needs varnish! Thanks John!

First to Fight make a lot of kit I can find a use for and these anti tank guns caught my eye. They are slender and making them is not as easy as the few parts you get suggests. Complete with figures – I particularly liked the prone gun aimer?

Fauxterre 1930 remains a slow burn project not least because it started out as a “bricks and mortar” project – buy things from real shops by walking into them.

In this case these AT guns came from Monkbar Models in York, North Yorkshire.

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&sca_esv=7736002987c1e4d1&sxsrf=AHTn8zpZL5vb59wU8O3DtCidKT_rs_sqEA:1744732019597&q=monk+bar+models&udm=2&fbs=ABzOT_CWdhQLP1FcmU5B0fn3xuWpA-dk4wpBWOGsoR7DG5zJBpwxALD7bRaeOIZxqOFEngykkUFPIfSG95hVJ80h7fwUu6EMmBKSWWi08kac6zK5TZKzbCqWqHpzv_yRXg8RuHXbOJF08P4hwwRASzXevtUn4rOuIYAMx1JwDHsfCLtO0gB6-DTOLZI0vr-mhijyp0PxBbFpaReezPtKmXsqHDG10bMWqg&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiok4aisdqMAxWwSUEAHU0wFwIQtKgLegQIEBAB&biw=1166&bih=763&dpr=2#vhid=iydLDv04agxWHM&vssid=mosaic

Also from the same shop – the venerable airfix 6pdr with Bren carrier.

Bren carrier and 6 pdr A/T gun
Categories
miniatures painting wargaming

The Painting Portrait 25h Klim class intra planet trader and patrol craft

During AHPC14 I got into modelling instead of painting and specifically building models from household recycling – cardboard and plastic. The net is repleat with simply magnificent models done this way. I thought why not have a go.

Skinflint Games was an early discovery….

https://skinflintgames.wordpress.com/2023/08/08/hau-nau-haunebau-diy-flying-saucer/

https://skinflintgames.wordpress.com/2024/10/

Anyway back in October 2023 I started off my SciFi adventures on Fauxterre….

https://thewargamingerratic.home.blog/2023/10/18/painting-pedestal-23x-tacfos-the-game-episode-3/

I started to collect bits together for some spacecraft only to see the idea fade during AHPC14 as WW2 models took centre stage including a white reconnaissance spitfire – my first aeroplane kitbash in years.

https://thewargamingerratic.home.blog/tag/fantasy/

Well AHPC15 rejuvenated my modelling again. And so the scrapheap challenge spacecraft arrived – in fact two!

A Klim class rogue trader 036

First up was my take on the Red Dwarf TV series red spaceship – now mine is a “klim” class space freighter often used by rogues.

https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/02/from-johnb-filthy-lucre-or-wheres.html

Second was my Policing vehicle – a space customs machine in blue. Again its basis is a “klim” class frame!

An A7 404 DiVoc patrol craft

https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/03/from-john-b-abyss-violence-oi-their.html

Into the bargain I managed to paint up some magazine “freebie” dwarves and hobbits. AHPC15 as with AHPC14 drew me away from my projects and regular painting. While that meant less progress with my chosen periods the change was as good as a rest – as they say.

Indeed I have tended to use these APHC challenges to experiment with painting and modelling methods. Also the AHPC participation has certainly speeded up some of my painting habits. And that must be a good thing for a slowcoach like me.

Categories
miniatures painting wargaming

The Painting Portrait 25g Space Warriors of the Puls

Another entry from AHPC15. This time I was preoccupied with the challenge theme – Dantes Comedy where you had to descend each level into the abyss. Gluttony was the theme.

This is the link to my AHPC15 entry

https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/01/from-john-b-28mm-space-marines-of-puls.html