Friday 30 December 2016

Wargaming presents, New Year objectives

Hi!
Another first!
My son bought me some wargaming presents this Christmas. He hasn't actually done that before! Birthday and fathers day yes, infrequently. I am rather pleased.
He bought me a Blackhat (blackhat.co.uk) 15mm Asiatic Horde, one of the army deals. This consists of mainly light horse, either bow or javelin armed, with command and a heavy and medium cavalry pack.
I guess I will have to fit it into the painting rosta, which I haven't made yet! I was rather hoping to restart the Napoleonics or ECW figures I have yet to complete. There are rather a lot of them.

My younger sons bought me the Vikings TV series I asked for. It had good reviews so I'm hoping for some quality TV for a change. It tempts me to look at Saga or Glut of Ravens or some such. Yes, another 40 figure skirmish small project! The Ronin are currently at 45 with more armed peasants, villagers ashigaru and sundry other figures needed. Like a lord, traders and a small number of samurai. That should take it close to 100 figures. An army worth of skirmish figures. Not including more buildings.

So. A plan for the new year.
Primary aim:-
1 division each of French, Prussian, Austrian and  Bavarian.
That is a lot of painting. A division every three months so it will be hard work to keep going. As I'm going to Cuba for a month in February I will take some to keep me occupied when not out and about. I don't usually take figures when going to Cuba but having such a large number to paint I can't afford to miss so much time. Having said that, I don't know which rules I will be using and what size bases to use. I was thinking Blucher. My old units are of my own size and I don't know if they conform to any rules. I was using 'To the sound of the guns' and happily so. But a new dawn rises and it's time to move on. I just paint until I run out of figures and worry about the basing later!
Luckily, for reference, I have the collection of Delprado figures and booklets that were on sale weekly around 10 years ago. Also, other various Napoleonic reference books such as:-
Napoleonic Armies by Ray Johnson. Invaluable.
Armies of the Napoleonic Era by Otto von Pivka
as well as Men at Arms by Osprey (osprey) for various army branch and unit types

Secondary aim:-
Paint some ECW (English Civil War) units to match the armies of the Polish and Turks I have.
I actually have enough for two ECW armies as that was my original aim. But one will be enough for this year unless I have time.

Third aim:-
To paint the Asiatic Horde.
These may be easier to paint as they are the great unwashed so I feel muted browns and earthy colours. I will research before painting.

All the figures, except the Blackhat ones, are H&R (heroicsandros.co.uk). A few cannon are Irregular Miniatures (irregularminiatures.co.uk), I feel they look better than the H&R cannon for the ECW.

So, A plan for painting. Let's hope I find time to wargame also!

Sunday 18 December 2016

Wargames Christmas list

Hi! everyone.
It's that time of year when we give our families a list of all the juicy wargames items we would like to have for Christmas. Usually my boys totally ignore my list and give me none wargames items. Occasionally I ask for money to put towards my preferred presents as at least it defers the cost of the hobby. I did that this year for fathers day and my birthday. I used it to offset the costs of the Ronin project. The last purchase for Ronin has been the village elders house by 4Ground (4Ground). As I've stated before, these are really excellent buildings. I also bought the carts to add to the village life scenes. I also want some other village scenics to add visually to the games.

On the list this year are:-
The Wargames Annual 2017
Frostgrave rules and figures.
Trust me, that's plenty!
The Frostgrave game has been something of a fascination for me. It reminds me of the games of Heroquest I played with my eldest son some years ago. Indeed, they were the years of Titan Legions and Space Crusade. Space Crusade was also liked by my younger sons with whom I painted their names on the sergeants banners.

Will my young Santa's heed my wishes? Only time will tell.