The Long Road to Fugitives' Drift - 2nd Playtest

Over the course of this weekend, I play-tested the 'Fugitives' Drift' game a couple of times. The first time I learned a lesson or two which I applied to the second - primarily it was about British strength and to remember that the British were meant to be fleeing and not fighting! The scenario was pretty much as posted in my previous. I'll post up the rules I used soon. They are basically a one-page convention set that we have been using and modding up for the past 7 years. The current version has been re-jigged for the Zulu wars as a grand skirmish set.

 The 24 British soldiers start in the centre of the short edge of the table whilst two units, each of 10 Zulus come from each side.

It's a long Road to Fugitives' Drift

 The game was played down the length of a 3' by 6' table. Each cork tile is 12" square and represents a Zulu Deployment area.

The Zulu Leader - The Fat Induna

The first couple of moves saw the British moving in steady 4" moves down the table. Their fire was particularly effective at this point, killing 13 Zulu figures in the first move and another 11 in the second. The Zulus attempted to form large units bu mobbing up the units that were coming on as the British moved into the second 'Zone" of the table.

Zulu Reinforcements

 Poor initial rolls for reinforcement allied with the slow British advance meant that Zulu numbers were initially quite low.

More 'reinforcements'

 The British have taken no casualties at this point. The British player, seeing an opportunity took his next two moves as full 8" moves with no opportunity to fire. The Zulus continued to bring on only moderate amounts of reinforcements, however, the further unit id Zulus was starting to wax dangerously large, reaching 17 figures by the end of the fourth move.

 The British reverted to shot moves to allow some firing

 It was effective

 But it did seem the Zulus had a plan.

 A cunning plan.

 Although the British continued to move/fire, they were far enough down the table thatthe Zulus were now able to get substantial numbers of figures onto the table. The British lost heavily in their first round of HtH and never really recovered.

The last of the 24th succumb...

As British numbers waned, those of the Zulus waxed mightily and although they displayed all the pluck in the world, it was no match for the now massively outnumbering Zulus who enveloped them from all sides.
Only a few men survived to tell the sad tale . As to the fate of the rest of the 24th, perhaps it is kindest to simply draw a curtain...

Fugitives' Drift

Just a brief follow up from my last post.

Here's how I'd do the nuts and bolt of a Fugitives' Drift skirmish game.

Quite a small table, say 3-4 feet by about 6 feet long. 20 assorted British figures have to get to the Drift. Game would be played down the length of the table. Aim is to get as many Brits off the far edge as possible. 

Zulus would enter from each table side as the game progresses. I imagine half a dozen entry points on each side that would activate as the retreating figures 'trip' them by entering each successive zone. Randomised numbers of Zulus then enter 1D6 per entry point. Except for the first where 10 Zulus enter from each of their table edges.

Give two of the British figures superior HtH stats to act as line-breakers.

The Zulus would move slightly faster than the British, or would having to engage in HtH slow them down enough?

What do you think? 

Isandalwana - a few thoughts should I ever do it as a Convention game.

This post is more a note to myself in case I ever need to go back to this. It's been inspired by the reading I have done around Rorkes' Drift. Apologies if it bores anyone, but this is more so I can get my own thoughts in order.

Rough OOB:

No 2 Column

Durnford

Natal Native Horse - 25 Figs

Natal Native Contingent - 24 Figs

No 3 Column

Pulleine

Battery represented by 1 gun.

1st-2nd/24th Regiment of Foot - 80 figs

'Colonial' Cavalry and MI - 6 figs

Natal Native Contingent - 80 Figs

Throw in a handful of figures for Engineers, cooks, camp followers and so on.

About 200 figures in total.

Need at least 300 Zulus with casualty recycling.

Note i have dispensed with Durnfords' artillery and the rocket troughs. They had no effect on the battle and seemed pretty derisory to me anyway.

If ever this all came onto the table, I would picture a game of three parts:

1. The engagement and overwhelming of the firing line, which is where the OOB above would come into play. Since throwing down that OOB, I have learned that only half the infantry were in the firing lines as the rest were packing the camp up. Perhaps as few as 50 men per company. Maybe 300 infantry in the line Companies in total.

It'd look something like this.

2. The life-or-death struggle in the Camp. The remaining half of the infantry plus supernumerary figures fighting back-to back in a large skirmish game among tents and wagons. The goal would be to attempt to defend the camp or failing that to exit in good order towards Fugitives' Drift. Defenders ought to be outnumbered by three-to-one prima facie with casualty recycling.

3. The pursuit to Fugitives' Drift. 10-20 assorted British figures. Game would be played down the length of the table. Aim is to get as many Brits off the far edge as possible. Zulus would enter from each table side as the game progresses. I imagine four entry points on each side that would activate as the retreating figures 'trip' them by mofing parallel to them. Randomised numbers of Zulus then enter - perhaps 2D6 per entry point.

#1 would be a large scale game. #2 and #3 would be large and small skirmishes respectively.

A Tough Day on the Firing Line, Zululamnd 1879

 Stadden Zulu War British.

24 down and 24 to go.

Stumped! Or, the value of older, overlooked books.

The tricky (troubling, challenging... pick a word) part of building such obscurities as the Brandenburg and Swedish armies is of course references.

I have managed to develop what seem to me pretty fair visual references for Brandenburger flags and uniforms; the Swedes are a more difficult proposition. The only decent volume I know of (Scanian War 1675-1679 Colours and Uniforms. Lars-Eric Höglund) seems not to be in print at the moment and is only available at ruinous prices on the secondary market. Oh well! What to do? Surely one can't go too far wrong with blue coats and yellow facings, right? Right?

Kannick - image pinched from Barry Hiltons' Blog.

Idle fancy took me to Kannick last night, and as I stook there in the shedio*,  gazing at the one plate of any use, my eye fell upon my copy of Knoetel, Knoetel and Seig. Well, duh. Of course. I opened it, flipped quickly to page 414 and there it was, a list of coat and turnback colours for the Swedish Army circa 1675.

Not a single blue coat with yellow facings to be seen, but at least a couple with blue-faced-red.

It's a start.

*Yes, the Shed-cum-studio is finished. It's slightly magnificent and I couldn't be happier with it. Pictures to follow in another post.

Painted Samples

Junior Officer, Pikemen and Senior Officer of the Leib Garde

Pikeman of the Kurfurstins' Regiment

Some rather hypothetical Swedes!

Painted wet-on-wet with some washes and layering.

Project for 2016-2017

More important politically than militarily, the Battle ofFehrbellin (June 18, 1675) will be the focus of a new project here in the Duchy of Alzheim.

Pinched from Wikipedia

I have admired for quite a while the Willie late 17^th Century figures (Monmouths’ Rebellion, Tangier and so on…) and had been looking for an excuse to paint some up. This will be the excuse!

Pitting a well-balanced Swedish force which is attempting an orderly withdrawal under pressure against a Brandenburg army which is mostly cavalry, it is an interesting battle between two small armies of differing capabilities.

The Brandenburg army was somewhere in the region of 30 Squadrons of horse, slightly more than a regiment of Dragoons, 1350 infantry drawn from various regiments and 14 guns. The Swedes disposed of a similarly sized force but with a better balance between infantry and cavalry as well as a marked superiority in artillery. I do not have a precise breakdown of the Swedish force so I shall guesstimate somewhere in the region of twenty squadrons and about 2400 infantry along with 25 guns.

I will be using the Beneath the Lily Banner (2nd Ed) rules which seem pretty well right for the fight. For those of you who are not familiar with them, in BtLB2 an infantry unit is three stands of six figures. Another smaller stand of pike may be added  (decoratively and as a designator) behind the central stand for nations other than the Swedes. For the Swedes, the Pike are considered to be a part of the central stand. A squadron of horse is represented by a single stand of 2-3 figures.

What does this mean for me? If I went for a representation of each unit involved, then for the Brandenburgers I would be putting two units of foot (say the equivalent of two 600+ man battalions) on the table and 30 squadrons of horse as well as 2-3 guns on the table. The Swedes would get in the region of 5-6 units of infantry, 25 Squadrons and 5-6 guns. Were I to bathtub things, I would reduce the numbers of units by half and plan my ground scale accordingly.

Now, if anyone was able to get me Swedish Uniform and Flag references as well as a decent Swedish OOB for the battle, I’d have it made!

Pictures as I paint figures will be forthcoming.

Bit of an Idea for a Late 17th Century Regiment of Foot

Consider if you will the following:



       N         P P P P P         N
MMMMMM P D P D P MMMMMM     GG
MMMMMM P O E O P MMMMMM     GG

N = NCO
M = Musketeer
P = Pikeman
O = Officer
E = Ensign
D = Drummer
G = Grenadier

I'd base the musketeers on 4, six figure bases and the pike block on a single base. The grenadiers would be off on their own ready to be stuck in some Folorn Hope.

Heckenfeur - It's on us; real world consequences

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-03/green-it's-on-us:-the-real-world-consequences-of-our-politics/7375436

Now, under the Australian asylum seeker regime someone's gone and actually doused himself with petrol. And burned himself to death.

So proud of my country. So very proud.

Normal service will be resumed shortly.

Wither Wargaming?

Some news.

 There is a bit of a building project afoot at chez moi.

The end result will be along the lines of a three metre by six metre studio-cum-man-cave for yours truly.

I am reasonably secure in the knowlege that this will only take a minimum of pruning (especially of books and plastic kits of various kinds!) and I ought to then be shoe-horned into a reasonable space with everything in the one place. I have dreams of a reading chair, a lamp and a kettle.

Until now, the greatest barrier to my fully exploiting the possibilities of the hobby has been the lack of a place where I might actually have a game or leave one set up for a few days, so, the fingers are crossed.

Now I might actually have to have some sort of a game with all these toy soldier thingies I keep on buying!

Da Wallz Uv Mektown

What's a GorkaMorka game without some big, orky-looking terrain?

Da Wallz Uv MekTown

A chum and I are preparing slowly for a GorkaMorka demo game at the end of May for Little Wars, Melbourne.

Not to give too much away, but we are looking at getting a tanker Trukk full of XXXX Fungus Beer (Old Toady qv) from Da BrooHaus to Mektown along a rolling track with 2-3 factions attacking to win the prize of bringing 'er 'ome for Da Big Wun; look, let's just say it's one huge Orky Kultcharal Festivul and leave it at dat.

Like Orktoberfest, but wiv more Gunz.

Anyway, here are the fruits of my labours on the weekend with corrugated cardboard, masking tape, gloopy glue, paint, water and plaster powder. The result seems pretty robust and just needs a lick of paint.

Job's a good 'un. But does it need spikes? The question of our age.

UPDATE - Oh what the heck, let me inundate you with Orky imagery.

A few uv da Boyz. Groink!

Trukks wiv Boarding Plankz. Raaarrrrrr!

Trukkz wiv Roll Cagez - an unushual vencha in OH&S for da Ladz

 

French Line Gunners - Foremost

Will I sound self-satisfied if I remark that I am very pleased with how these fellows turned out?

I suppose I need a gun, now.

Next up, I'll be starting work on some RHA. Already cleaned and primed.

Foremost Gunners - WiP

Hinchcliffe/Foremost Gunners.

These are rather nice figures and not incompatible with the Bicornes in the last post. Perhaps just a smidge taller. That's mostly due to the height of the bases though. heir anatomy is fairly natural and the sculpting simple, but not to the point of naivety. I do like the combination of smooth surfaces and shrply-incised detail which works well with washes. Likewise, I am very enamoured with the ability to add 7-8 figures to a single gun crew.

Lovely.

These miniatures are currently drying out their intermediate matt varnish coats in this picture. I often apply varnish to miniatures in the middle of the painting process if I think the paintwork will need protecting as the show goes on.

Help Me; I'm painting Napoleonics!

Well. at the Duchy of Alzheim we are busy packing things up as our renovations seem likely to re-commence next week. This is a good thing as it will render us with a more civilized amount of that unutterable luxury - more living space. In my personal case this will also mean a dedicated hobby space that I have taken to calling a 'shedio' - part shed, part studio and wholly man cave.

However, before this is to happen, current hobby activities need to be reduced to the size of a paining tray again and so I am now just painting - in dribs and drabs - just a few Napoleonics.This isn't really a problem as I am deciding on a few long term projects at the moment and deciding whether I can face painting a few hundred fairly gaudy troops will be a deciding factor. And just to complicate matters a little, I seem unable to choose between Spain and Egypt and so am plumping for both. I also am entertaining a horrible suspicion (based on starting to re-read Marbot) that I may also get stuck with the French and Austrians in italy in the 1790s.

Anyway, that's another kettle of fish and I have hopes of some inter-operability at least among the cavalry and the guns.

Here's today's issue. What's wrong with this picture? I started painting the line infantryman on the left initially thinking he's an elite company bod. Look at that plume! A Voltigeur, surely. Then I noticed he's got no epaulets. Uhh. Ok. A fusilier then. The chamois collar became red. That's right, I thought. But then there is that plume. Did they wear them? I always was under the impression that he ought to have a pom-pom (I'm thinking of the 6-company structure...). His shako is rigged for full dress, though, so perhaps a plume is plausible?

Then there's the officer. Is his plume OK if he's with the light company? Or ought it be white?

This is what Napoleonics do to a man.

The figures themselves are Bicorne and lovely. The officer was very easy to paint, the fusileer less so due to his strapping nature, but we got there in the end. Each took a painting session each to get through. More have been purchased.

Next up are some Formost 30mm Line gunners which look very dishy - technically for 1812 on, but I won't tell if you don't. 

Why We Fight

 A few shots of the climax of the raid on Fickmuhlen.

 Much happiness here with regards to the look of the thing.

 von Browne's Foot in reserve under the watchful eye of the general himself.

 The Dragoons, awaiting their role as spoilers.

 The damned, useless guns.

Many, many thanks to Ross and Stokes for helping make this battle possible. Happy New Year to us all.

Long Live Borduria!

For some time I have been rather curious as to what went on in Alzheim in that period between the wars.

And I'll admit, rather inspired by this.

At the same time too I have accumulated a reasonably-sized force of Slovak troops along with a few Hungarians and Romanians, all from the Raventhorpe  ranges and whom I have been looking to put to wider employment than they currently have been.

I also have a liking for the old KP kits of 1/72 aircraft, especially those of the interwar Czechosloval air force.

So I think we can see where this might be leading. I’m imagining a small conflict between Alzheim and another party in about  1930. The issue would be over the possession of a small stretch of the border country in order that some group of lost brothers and sisters be reunited with their brethren across the border as they had been since time immemorial. This was I believe the fashion of the time.

I’d probably use the Rapid Fire rule set.

I regard this as an opportunity to build up a few kits in the stash and have a little Tintinesque fun.

UPDATE: I was poking about last night and found the following pictures.

Noble Alzheimer Tanks

Alzheimer (even nobler) infantry

Vile Bordurians

Vile Vordurian Armour

Never Sell Your Toys

For you shall someday want them again.

About three years ago I had a large pile of plastic Spencer Smith ACW Infantry, Cavalry and Artillery.

There was probably enough of everything to build complete armies for the Union and Confederate sides. With sufficient leftovers to do things like staff groups, crews for paddle steamers, fortress gunners, engineers and all that.

Naturally I sold it all off as I had decided to do ACW with my Tradition 25s. At the time a difficult decision as I had really liked the look of John Preece's collection shown in The Wargame Companion and absolutely agonised over the choice.

Now of course I've gone and looked at the pictures again and thought well, you know what, I'd really like to do a few.

Learn from my sad example.

La Marseillaise

Experiments with Flats

I've recently been playing around with an idea for a war game inspired by Harry Pearson's article in MW after the change in management.

As you can see, I've been trawling about on German eBay for flats.

I'm not getting too hung up on figure ratios and all that sort of thing. As far as I am concerned, one stand is a squadron, battalion or battery. To my eye about four cavalry look good, as do a dozen infantry or a single gun.

Things are not too far along at the moment; I'm really just playing around with the aesthetics of the thing. That said, I envisage using mini dice to record combat attrition. I also envision using written orders that may be deviated from through the expenditure of initiative tokens. Different armies might have different numbers of them to expend per turn. I would expect the Prussians to have more than the Austrians who, in their turn might have more than the French.

Any feedback would be highly valued.

Valiant Miniatures Fallschirmjager

 I have a deal with my nephew.

I give him figures. He assembles them. I paint them and hand them back.

Here's the latest batch. Rather enjoyable to paint in the old wash and line technique. But I should have painted their chin-straps... And I wish they had more riflemen options and replaced at least some of the MG42s with MG34s

A Diversion

Due to some home renovations severely impacting my available hobby space (!) I've consequently downsized my hobby efforts. This state of affairs ought to last until about Christmas.

So, then, i needed something o occupy my hands and mind but which needed to be quite self-contained. I have had a small collection of 54mm knights from the first "Knights of Agincourt" Britains range that have been nicely recast by Dorset Soldiers. These are pretty suitable for painting one at a time out of my small painting tray.

So, of I went and here's the first fruit. Sir John Chandos.

A Glorious Cavacade (and a small Cannonade)

 Not all has been connoisseur toy-soldier nobbling and John Garrett reading, oh no, no, no! Here in the Duchy of Alzheim, we believe in the virtues of hard work, buckling down to it and of course, getting on with things. So, in that vein, a small reveal of the fruits of my various labors.

Starting with the freshly-mounted CR#5, you may note that I have splashed out and bought the riders in from another painter with some money I was fortunate to receive for my birthday back in March. Well done Rich from DPC. I am well pleased with his tiny troopers as they sit astride my own horses. I have no fears they will not fight for me as those I myself have painted. My own generalship is far more likely to let me down.

My current butterflies have led me to the 7YW for the now, and thus I am inspired to get on with my Prussian Cavalry arm. Here (along with the Cuirassiers) we have the current state of affairs. HR#1 and HR#5 both provisionally complete but for a single wretched casting I was short for each. Nonetheless, close enough for now.

 The artillery has long needed limbers and so I have cranked a couple of out. I am just painting up another team or two to draw them as we speak (so to say) and am waiting on the first wash to dry before i paint their manes and harness.

 They do look the part, do they not?

What's next? hard to say. I have a regiment of dragoons who need a bit of a spruce-up before I will be happy t add them to the order of battle and a further half unit of von Kleists dragoons likewise in need of a little tidy up and a small reinforcement. That will bring me to two each of dragoons and Hussars and a single unit of Cuirassiers. I guess one more of Cuirassiers is in order and we might be about done for the Prussians. Although...

Alec Harrison

 I sometimes think that with two large 18th Century armies, a large Colonial army, various WW2 forces, quite large Ancient armies and so on and so forth if my days of building huge forces of 7-800 figures a side might be drawing to a close. Obviously this is nonsense, but if it were ever to happen (and there is yet time, I am but a mere lad of 47 years) then this is one diversion for my declining years.

 I was leafing through my old magazines over the weekend. What better way is there to pass the time these bitter cold winter nights, I ask you? Anyway, in between glasses of Shiraz, I came across these articles featuring the work of one Mr Alec Harrison of the BMSS in the March 1988 issue of Military Modelling and the inestimable Practical Wargamer of January/February 1994

His work is utterly charming in my eyes and has the advantages of using 30mm Willie figures, all converted to one degree or another yet retaining that certain poise of the originals. It has been a fun process trying to work out the original figures and I am tempted to say that much that may have been in the original catalogue may not now be there. I am lookng especially at the Gensdarmes above, although they have since turned up again as remastered figures in the Tradition Catalogue. The wheel turns again.

I would like to try my hand at this kind of thing at some time in the no too distant future. I just need to lay in a stock of lead foil and learn how to solder.