Lend-Lease

I had long planned to add some Lend-Lease fighting vehicles to my 20mm Soviets, a flash sale by the Plastic Soldier Company was a prompt to get on and do it. Cue.......

76mm armed Shermans, crew figures from Wargames Foundry and the bases from Warbases. Painted and weathered with products from Abteilung 502, AK Interactive, MIG Ammo and Vallejo.

Followed by a Valentine IX for the reconnaissance element.

Despite my misgivings about finishing another figure unit before the year end I managed to finish a small unit of Paraguayan dismounted cavalry for the Triple Alliance collection. These are currently being based up.

Until next time............

TTFN & KBO 

28mm Late World War Two Additions

Some light refreshnent after your festive indulgences. Empress Miniatures recently added a 6pdr anti-gun and crew to their 28mm World War Two range, some much needed Platoon support arrived at last.

Around the same time Rubicon released their RSO towing vehicle adding to their World War Two German vehicle range. I built this on the run up to Christmas and finished it Christmas Day morning, it can built up as two different variants 1 or 3 mine being the third iteration.

I hope you all had some hobby related gifts, none here but I do have the following on pre-order for January delivery printers permitting.

Having got a better grasp of airbrushing using my Bager Patriot 105 I have decided to step up a notch and pre-ordered the new Harder and Steenbeck Evolution CR2024.

Back to 20mm next time with some Soviet Lend-Lease vehicles as a change from all the T34s.

Until then......

TTFN & KBO

Merry Christmas!

Best wishes for Christmas to all my followers, visitors and especially those who have taken precious time to leave kind and encouraging comments along the way. Hope you all have a splendid time and that Santa fills your stockings with gaming goodness.

TTFN and God bless you one and all.

Soldiers of Don Carlos

For this week's game I gave the First Carlist War collection another run out. For this game we would be using the Soldiers of Napoleon rules, I knocked out some troops stats based on on what I have read about the forces involved, gleaned mainly from Conrad Cairns articles in WI and his book published by the Perry brothers and Edward M. Brett's "The British Auxiliary Legion in the First Carlist War" I should also mention that Mr. Cairns has a Wargamers guide to be published by Helion, due out in the New Year.

As we are still getting to grips with the rules we did not use the tactical advantage and deployment faff prior to the game. We did however use the How Went The Day part of the rules to determine who had the initiative, this went to Dave commanding the government forces, who also gained two Victory Points due to rolling triple the Carlist score.

I unfortunately didn't take enough photos to do a coherent annotated picture report, here are some photos anyway, and if you are not bored, at the end of them a brief description of how the game went.

On the Carlist left flank both sides cavalry brigades faced off one another for most of the game, with the tide turning against the Carlists elsewhere in the field the Ontario hussars attempted to charge the Isabelino line cavalry and failed.

In the centre both sides advanced cautiously while over on the Carlist right their newly raised volunteers hotly contested the advancing British Auxiliary Legion advance, both sides losing battalions a calm came over that side of the field with neither having the strength to attack one another further. While this was going on the Royal Marine rocket battery was giving the Carlist cavalry some nuisance fire, I should really have dealt with them. After the break for lunch the tide turned in the Isabelino 's favour, the Carlist hussars finally charged and came off worse and the Carlists fruitless attempts to rally gifting the enemy victory points. The disruption points piled up breaking two Carlist battalions in the centre in turn five giving the government forces victory.

Until next time........

TTFN & KBO 

Another Year Over?

Well nearly. Although I now only do commission work for existing customers they are keeping me rather busy, well into the New Year at least.

Consequencely painting this month is and will be rather slow, the only unit likely to muster out from under the brush is the second French battalion for the Peninsular project.

All Perry metal figures on bases from Warbases naturally, flag from GMB painted almost entirely with GW Contrast paints. It is back to the Triple Alliance and 1940 projects with what remains of the month.

The last game here at OHQ will be a First Carlist War game using Soldiers of Napoleon to see if they work for the period and to help us further our understanding of how the rules work. 

Until next time...........

TTFN & KBO