28mm Republican Romans - Project Complete!

Well, it's taken me a long time, but I finally completed painting up Mike's 28mm Republican Romans from Crusader.  I should have been done a long time ago, but between other gaming distrations, real life, and just plain not being in a painting groove for so long I just kept putting off finishing the painting.  The good news for me is Mike is very patient and I hope he likes how these came out.  Now we can get in some games of Clash of Empires!

48 Roman Princeps/Hastati

 Close up of Roman Infantry

 15 Roman Cavalry

 Close up of cavalry

So, what's next on my list?  Well, it's completing another 28mm ancients force that has been languishing incomplete literally for years!  I should have it done in a week or so and will post at that time.

Tom O

Flames of War Additions

Here are a few additions to my Flames of War German DAK and British 8th Army forces for North Africa.  I have a good selection of options for both of these forces for the mid-war period, but when the early war books came out for the game I realized I was short a few stands for both forces to give me some options.  I purchased some Peter Pig 15mm troops and had Tim K at Saguaro Painting Service paint them up to match the existing figures in the armies.  I just had to base them up and finally got around to it this weekend.  There are 4 AT Rifle stands & 2 light mortar stands for the Brits and 2 AT Rifle stands & 2 light mortar stands (actually just weapons crews minus the mortars) for the Germans.

Up next I'll be posting on another project I completed this weekend!

Command & Colors Ancients: Epic Battle of Chaeronea, 338 BC, in Miniature

Today I had a great time playing an "Epic" game of Command & Colors Ancients using 28mm miniatures.  There are several of us locally that really enjoy the boardgame, and a few of us have considered building armies for it using 28mm miniatures; largely due to the efforts of Neil.  Neil was the first in our gaming group to take the steps to play the game in miniature instead of a board; including building his own mat, basing troops so they are easily identified, and building appropriate terrain pieces for the hex mat.  Well today he took things a step further and put on a game of the Battle of Chaeronea, 338 BC in "Epic" scale.  The regular sized game is impressive enough, but I think it really shined in "Epic".  This was the first time I gamed using his rule variant; ideally each side has 4 commanders (one Commander and 3 generals for each sector) and the Commander doesn't move troops, but rather delegates cards and tries to orchestrate the battle with little, if any, communication.  Today we had 3 players on each side so the Commander also ran the center sector.  The first game was very close with the Thebans doing heavy damage to the Macedonian left before running into Alexander; the result was a very close 11 banner to 10 banner victory for the Macedonians.  We enjoyed it so much we reset the game, had the players switch sectors and played a second game; in it, the sides were tied at 7 banners each when suddenly things went south for the Greeks and they ended up on the losing end 12 banners to 7 or 8 I think.  All in all, it was a great time and Neil's armies are very impressive.  Thanks to Neil for putting the game on, the other guys playing, and Imperial Outpost for the table space.

Battle Deployment:  Greeks on left and Macedonians on Right

Chaeronea

View from the Macedonian Right

End of Turn 1

Theban advance on the Macedonian left



Theban breakthrough on the Macedonian left

Alexander facing the Thebans

Athenians motionless

Game 2 - Battle lines close

"The Black Brigade" - Better Pictures

So I ran the "Black Brigade" at a local FOW tournament yesterday for the first time.  It was a learning experiance as most of the armies there were tank-heavy and I think, though being "mechanized", I had the largest infantry contingent present.  I had 3 tough, yet enjoyable games against good opponents. The results were a 3-3 tie, a 1-6 loss and a 4-3 loss.  I learned a few things about this force in FOW:  the 75mm artillery is better in direct fire, and don't forget the "bypassed" rule prior to deployment!  I look forward to playing the army again.

I really didn't like the way the pictures I rushed taking a few days ago came out, so today I broke out my photobox, my extra lights, the tripod and took some time on getting the settings right on the camera and took pictures of most of the infantry again, and most of the vehicles for the first time. The results are much better IMO. I still need to work on getting the lighting set up better, but I think these are fine for what it's worth.

Polish 10th Motor Cavalry Company 1

 Polish 10th Motor Cavalry Company 2

 "Highland" Company

 Heavy Machine-Gun Company

 Anti-Tank Gun Platoon

 Artillery Battery

 True North Fiat 508's

 True North TKS Tankettes, aka "Chiclets"

 Vickers Tank Unit 1

 Vickers Tank Unit 2

Building this nice, themed army around a specific unit for FOW has me thinking that this is something that I will try to do going forward for new forces I build for the game.  There certainly are a lot of specific, unique forces out there to chose from.

The next thing you will likely see up here is some more 28mm Republican Romans...stay tuned...

Tom

"The Black Brigade" Marches!

The Polish 10th Motorized Cavalry Brigade, aka "the Black Brigade" had a storied history during WWII and it has long been a force that I'd like to see on the tabletop.  Fortunately for me, Old Glory purchased the "True North" line of 15mm World War II figures some time ago and when Battlefront came out with the "Blitzkrieg" book for Flames of War and this unit was in it, I knew it was my opportunity to get the figures and be able to use them for a game I enjoy.  Well, that was over a year ago...or was it two?  Anyway, I have been trying to play in the local FOW tournaments and I found out that the one scheduled for May 19th would be for the early war period I had my motivation.  I could have taken the easy route and used one of my desert forces and not had to do anything, but instead I challenged myself to get the Black Brigade done; that was approximately 6 weeks ago.  With Tim K from Saguaro Painting Service enlisted to assemble the guns and trucks (they are multi-part models with "fiddley" pieces that I don't have the patience for and Tim is a master modeler IMO and he did a great job on them) I got to work.  I thought of taking pictures along the way, but I think that would have slowed me down; instead I plowed through painting and basing (and I hate basing in case you didn't know) 204 15mm infantry, 4 75mm guns, 4 caissons, 4 37mm guns, 1 motorcycle with side car, 3 combat cars (Fiat 508's), 8 trucks (Fiat 621's), 10 TKS tankettes, 4 Vickers A tanks (dual MG turrets) and 6 Vickers B tanks (47mm gun) in 6 weeks.  That is my best painting production in such a short time in a number of years. 

The force I built consists of:

HQ - Commander, 2IC, 2 x 81mm mortars, motorcycle and Fiat 508

2 x Motorized Cavalry Company - Commander, 2 platoons (4 stands each), 2 AT rifles, 1 Fiat 508 and 4 Fiat 621 per company

AT Company - 3 x 37mm AT guns, Commander

HMG Company - 4 x HMG,  Commander (and the HMGs can instead be bought as part of the Motorized Cavalry Companies if I so chose)

Artillery Battery - 4 x 75mm guns, Staff Team, Observer and Commander

2 x Vickers Tank Platoons - 3 x Vickers B and 2 x Vickers A each

2 x Reconnaissance Tank Platoons - 5 TKS tankettes (2 upgraded with 20mm FKA) each

Piechoty Company - Single platoon with 12 rifle stands, AT rifle and commander

Here are some pictures of some of the infantry that I took quickly this afternoon.  The camera that I used for years died on me, so I'm using my wife's camera and I need to work on getting the settings and lighting right with it; these pictures aren't the best as a result.  I'll work on it and hope to have more pictures up by the end of the week.

Motorized Cavalry Company

 Artillery Battery

Piechoty Company - The majority of the figures are actually "Polish Highlander" figures representing the specially trained mountain troops; there are some dismounted cavalry and regular infantry mixed in.  I thought it would be a bit different to represent an cut off infantry force using these troops.

Motorized Cavalry Company

 Now I'm on a roll and have to keep the momentum going!

March...where does the time go?

How exactly is it March already? Where does the time go? Ugh...

Ok, so I haven't posted anything yet this year until now...because I haven't completed anything like I planned to. I've picked up the brush a few times, but haven't finished anything. The only good news is that I've managed to get in quite a few games! So far this year I've played Might of Arms (huge Mongol -Russian game), Napoleon's Battles (refight of Waterloo, another huge game), Combat Commander Pacific (great boardgame), Flames of War (2nd edition tournament...still haven't played 3rd edition), and Lord of the Rings (using the new lists...finished 3rd place in a local tournament). So at least I have been gaming even if I haven't been painting anything. I hope to end that soon and get into a painting groove that I haven't been in for a few years it seems. Today I did get some painted figures...Joe is painting up a 28mm Carthaginian army for me in trade and he gave me the first of the figures and I really like them. His son, Joey has turned into quite the painter and did a great job on the shields! Figures are Gripping Beast with a couple of 1st Corps figures mixed in I believe.

Looking Back & Looking Ahead

It’s that time of the year again…a time to look back on the year that was, and a time to look forward to the new year ahead…

Looking back, I have to say that 2011 was a “mixed bag” on the hobby/gaming front. It had several positives like:

Finishing 2nd in the Gathering In The Desert LOTR tournament which earned me an invite to the GW sponsored Throne of Skulls event in Vegas

Getting in a lot more games than the previous year. In 2011 I played a lot of Lord of the Rings and also a significant amount of Flames of War. I also played 15mm ancients using Might of Arms, got my feet wet with Clash of Empires using 28mm ancients, played some 28mm American Civil War, played Warmaster fantasy, 15mm Napoleonics, and a fair number of Command & Colors Ancients and Combat Commander board games.

Playing in my first Flames of War tournament using the 2nd edition rules (and now 3rd edition is on the horizon), and actually finishing 2nd which qualified me for the US Nationals; I will be going to Adepticon in Chicago in April to play in the Late War Nationals.

Contracting out some painting work to help clear up some of my pile o’ lead resulting in me having a large 15mm Mongol army as I posted on this blog and a really nice 10mm Orc army for Warmaster, both painted by Tim K at Saguaro Painting Service (with pics of the Orcs on that blog), as well as a nice 15mm German Panzer Company painted by Robert as documented on his Drunken Samurai Painting blog.

Clearing out some armies and misc. hobby stuff that I know I’d never use again.

On the negative side of the “mixed bag” for 2011 are the following:

As of yet not finishing the 28mm Republican Romans I’m painting up for Mike; the good news is that I’m working on the last of the infantry and have the cavalry all prepped & primed and ready to go.

As of yet not finishing the 17 chariots for the 28mm Mitanni army I’m working on; I had Tim K at Saguaro Painting Service base paint the chariots and horses for me and now I just need to go through and add some extra detail and color, mount the crews and do the basing and they will be done…after years of languishing…

Throne of Skulls LOTR tournament; as I previously posted, I like seeing a lot of the regular LOTR players, but really was disappointed in the scoring, the scenarios, and some of the cheese-ball army compositions that were there.

Not posting as much to this blog as I would like to; I would like to do more battle reports and post more pictures of stuff I have.

Not deciding upon a “Tom Project”. Let me explain this one…at one point in my gaming life I had a couple of projects that were mine…I could bring everything needed for the game from terrain to all of the painted figures needed to play, and I could host multi-player games in doing so. I can still supply both sides and terrain for games like Flames of War or LOTR or 28mm & 15mm ancients, but none of these are unique to the group of guys that I game with most frequently. I spent quite a bit of 2011 looking into various projects such as Eastern Renaissance/TYW, 10mm or 15mm WWI, 10mm or 15mm Russo-Polish War, and 15mm modern “what-if” or ”imagi-nation”. Maybe I’ll finally decide on one of these in 2012.

As for the year ahead, I think it’s going to be a good year. I hope to continue to game on a regular basis like I’ve been with the games I’m going to focus on for the first few months of the year being: Flames of War (with the new edition coming out and having to get some practice in for the Nationals in April), Clash of Empires in 28mm (I want to play more often and get some more of the locals interested if possible), Command & Colors Ancients – Miniature (several of the guys are giving serious consideration to doing 28mm forces to convert the board game to miniature and I’m jumping onto this and will be doing a Greek army for this project), and 28mm American Civil War (once I get the Rebs based up and ready to go I plan on getting in more games of Action Front and give Black Powder consideration too). After spring has come and gone, I’ll see where I’m at and take it from there; I have a lot of armies started that I need to finish as well as armies that I haven’t started that I would like to, and then of course there is always terrain to do…it never ends. As for acquiring new stuff in 2012, I’m sure I’ll pick up figures for at least one more project with the leading candidate right now being 28mm Napoleonics; I purchased the Waterloo set of rules and want to give them a try. Another possible candidate is doing some smaller fantasy games using 15mm minis with a set of rules like HOTT or Basic Impetus - Fantasy or ??? Only time will tell what I end up accomplishing in 2012, but I'm fairly confident it will be at a minimum the same amount as I did in 2011...