FPW French

At last painting some blue after what seems like an eternity painting red uniforms I finally got a chance to paint something different. These are the first additions to the French III Corps, III Division under Mettman at Borney-Colombey. The figures are all from Outpost and the flag is from the Warflag site.

I've now got another infantry regiment on the painting table along with an artillery piece. I'm hopeful that I'll get these finished over the weekend. When I get the rest of this division finished I'll go back to the WSS British and finish those off. After this I am looking for a new project to start, Possibly a FPW Bavarian division and a French Guard division or a total change back to ancients. I have a hankering to try out the Hail Caesar rules but in 10mm scale, re fighting some of the battles of Hannibal and Scipio. I think a little research is in order on manufacturers.

Elf Ranger, companion and asteroids

I bought my daughter this Elven Ranger figure to represent her character when we get around to playing Warhammer fantasy role play. She particularly likes the model due to the accompanying panther. She has named the figure Galadriel and the panther Quirky! My daughter picked out most of the colour schemes though changed her mind on the blue leggings to red after I had painted her up.

Galadriel

Galadriel

Galadriel and Quirky

After putting in a few games of X wing I've decided to purchase a second box set to get my hands on another 3 ships. This proves much better value than buying the 3 ships individually, especially as I already have 1 each of the xwing and Tie fighter expansion sets. Also to add a little scenery to the game i decided to make up some asteroids. You do get card templates with the game but they lack a bit of realism. So far I have made up 6 asteroids. I got a pack of flight stands from Black Hat miniatures, enough for 20 asteroids. The asteroids themselves are made from some off cuts of high density polystyrene leftover from when I sculpted the Viking raid terrain boards. Taking a Stanley knife to each piece I created a more irregular shape before giving them a coat of burnt umber. Before the umber had dried I gave them each 2 further highlights of varying shades of cream. Think they turned out okay. Now just got to make some more.

Asteroid belt

Asteroid

Asteroid

Asteroid

I've also just finished basing up my first regiment of French for my 3rd Division for the Franco Prussian War, I'll post some pictures over the weekend.

WSS progress part IV

After spending a bit of time putting together the last of the horse and command figures, i thought it was about time I did some more work on the infantry. I managed to paint up 2 more battalions, bringing the total up to 14 battalions, leaving only 4 more to do. Both these battalions are from Mini figs, slightly larger figures than Dixon or Warrior, but fine in their own units. Must say I was a little disappointed in these compared to the Mounted officers I had. They were listed as British infantry and came in a marching pose. There was quite a bit of flash that had to be removed and not just a simple scrape of a scalpel. The command figure I like, especially the officer but the marching pose of the infantry left me a little cold. Still they painted up okay. but I don't think I will use any more of this particular pose and will probably use Dixon's to finish the rest of the infantry.

Next up some photos of the 2 battalions, Dalrymple's Cameronians and Godfrey's. The flags are as usual by Warflag and the bases from Warbase.

After spending most of this year painting red, I've decided a little change is in order. With a game at Mick's coming up in May for the Franco Prussian War, I thought I'd make a start on a 3rd Infantry Division for my French. And with me being the one who is organising the scenario I know they will get used, always useful to a little focus on getting things done. I also have a couple of 28mm figures to do, the rest of my SWAT figures and an Elven Ranger for my daughter.

In search of Marlborough part II

Well I think my search for some suitable figures to represent the Duke of Marlborough is at an end. Firstly a thanks to Steve from http://steve-the-wargamer.blogspot.co.uk/ for pointing me in the direction of Black Hat miniatures as they produce some figures for Marlborough's runners, one pack duly purchased. I also received a number of recommendations on the Mini Figs general packs, so again a purchase was made. Below is the results.

Overall I am very happy with the way they all turned out. the Mini Fig horses are  a lot better than I remember them from a few years ago. My only issue is the riders are rather small in comparison to their infantry range. Luckily I had a spare standard bearer available just so I could add a flag to the base. The picture below is what I was using for inspiration.

I also painted up another 3 of the runners to use as messengers during our larger games. Mick always insists that changes in orders must be written and then delivered to the relevant commanders. You can just see one of the runners behind Marlborough in his blue and white coat.

I also wanted to once again thank Alan from http://dux-homunculorum.blogspot.co.uk/ for his prize give away. I am now the proud owner of some French Napoleonic troops.

WSS British Horse

Had these painted up for a while and thought I better get around to posting them on here. The command pack arrived from Old Glory UK so I set to work. I completed the last two regiments of horse that I required to complete the British Horse contingent for the battle of Ramilles. First up is Schomberg's horse with black cuffs. The figures are all from Blue Moon and the flag from the Warflag site.

Next up is Wood's regiment of horse, again at a strength of 2 squadrons. For these i decided on the drummer in reverse colours. Trying to find accurate details for the musicians within the British troops at this time is rather problematic. The figures are all Blue Moon.

A finally for your viewing pleasure here are a couple of photos of the completed British horse and dragoon regiments. The figures are a mix of Blue Moon, Dixon's and Warrior.

In my continuing search for a suitable Marlborough figure for a command stand I am awaiting an order from Minifigs for their named figure. I have received some figures from Black hat for his runners so I am envisaging a base with Marlborough plus 1 other mounted officer and probably a runner and a foot ensign.

I'm a Winner!!!!

A competition was run by Alan over on his blog Dux Homunculorum after he had reached 200K page views (take me years at my rate to get to that tally). He had put 3 prizes up for grabs (very generous). they were a SAGA unit painted by himself, some Eureka/AB Napoleonic figures and the Disposable Heroes rulebook. So I decided to enter and opted for the second prize draw for the Eureka figures. Imagine my surprise today when I actually won!!!!!

Why did I choose the Napoleonic figures, bit of an impulse really. Never painted anything for this period and just had one of those itches to try them out. So just wanted to say thanks to Alan for a very generous competition, and if you haven't already seen it, check out his blog, he covers loads of different periods and paints up some exquisite figures.

X - Wing

My wonderful other half bought me this game for Christmas, the first time she has ever bought anything wargame related for me. So far I have managed to get in a couple of games, enjoying the game so much that I have already started to collect some extra models. So far I have added an additional X-wing, Y-wing, Tie Fighter, Tie Advanced and now a Tie Interceptor with a further Y-wing in the post. Also fortuitously Tom at the club has become hooked and bought a starter set and additional Tie Interceptor. This will give us a good selection of models for some larger club games.

Last week myself  and John another run out of the rules. This time we used all named pilots to try out their various abilities and upgrades. It is these that I feel add an additional dimension to the game allowing players to customise ships for particular scenarios.

The rebels controlled by John was made up of the following Pilots
X wing - Wedge Antilles
X wing - Garven Dreiss
Y wing - Dutch Vander

Myself with the Empire had the following (I love the names of the Imperial Pilots)
Tie Advanced - Darth Vader
Tie fighter - Dark Curse
Tie fighter - Howl Runner
Tie fighter - Mauler Mithel

In summary I paired up Darth with Mauler, a mistake as I had given Mauler the Squadron Leader ability, useless with Darth. These to moved off to the right to try and get on the flank of the Rebels. Dark Curse and Howl Runner went left, but ended up running straight into all three rebel ships. In a very uneven contest Howl Runner was shot down and Dark Curse got a bit of a hammering before the other 2 ships could turn back to help. Darth though is the main man. Once he is in the fight the use of his extra action gives him quite an edge. The highlight for being when he combined with Dark Curse to get Wedge in a cross fire and shoot him down before going on and accounting for Garven as well.

Darth and Mauler race to the rescue

Close in dog fighting

Rebels re group after downing 1 Tie fighter

Outmatched Tie's concentrate on evading

Sorry for the picture quality but the gloss effect on the game tables reflect the light badly for photos. Overall a very enjoyable game that went down to the wire before victory for the Empire. This week at the club I have a Revell plastic Millennium Falcon that I want to try out, Han Solo anyone.....?

In search of Marlborough

John Churchill the Duke of Marlborough, probably Britain's greatest General. I know he is my favourite, so with the chance to paint up the English and Scottish regiments for Ramilles I had the chance to paint up the great man himself to lead them. Finding a suitable figure has proved slightly problematic. There is a particular figure in the Generals pack from Essex that looks suitable, but I dislike ordering single packs due to postage costs. I do know that Mini Figs do a figure for Marlborough, but there are no pictures on their site, a shame these days. So trawling the Internet I remembered Irregular do a range of serviceable figures. So I decided to order a couple of their Generals and an artillery battery to justify the postage costs.

So far I have done 2 versions. The first is accompanied by a spare kettle drummer I had, while the other is with a Cornet, took inspiration from the old Osprey cover of Marlborough's army.

As can be seen the Irregular figure is a little rough but paints up okay. Now I can't decide which I like best . So here are a few extra pictures of each.

Now the more I look at these, I'm happy enough with them, but....they are not quite right for me. I think will continue my search, these chaps look like they will be getting relegated to the role of Divisional commanders. Also I would like to try and get a figure to represent one of Marlboroughs' runners, though not sure if anyone out there makes one, may have to try a conversion, but I hate doing that with 15mm figures.

As an aside I did manage to paint up the artillery as well. My only complaint was one of the gunners snapped at the ankles when I removed him from the painting stick. Luckily I had a spare Roundway figure to press into service.