Games Night!

Friday's game night we were playing Chosen Men. Not historically accurate but it was my British vs my friends Irish rebels in a meeting engagement at a bridge in an abandoned village.

The battlefield

We were learning the rules so we were probably going to get a few things wrong. We deployed our forces on the table edge.

My British are in the bottom of the picture, the Irish rebels in the top

My British

The Irish Rebels

I won the first intiative roll  and started the battle. Each unit has a TAC value this is how many actions your unit can do (different actions cost different TAC, Fire is 1, on the double move 2 etc ).

British Light Infantry advancing

My light infantry advanced across the open field area.
The Irish Cavalry trotted out from their deployment area.  Next up were my line infantry.

Line Infantry form up

They formed a line formation ( to take advantage of 2 rank fire rule) and set off toward the bridge.
My Rifles on the right flank moved forward to the side of the light infantry.
The Irish cavalry moved towards the bridge having the same idea as the British.

Irish advance

My right flank squad of rifles fired taking out the officer in charge of a unit (normally you can't do this but Rifles have crackshot which means you can). The Light Infantry are charged by the Irish cavalry!

Caught in the open!!

Desperate fight!

The survivors of the charge flee but are cut down

Now I thought I could weather a charge with a 10 man unit. .....turns out I was wrong! !  Cavalry in Chosen Men are devastating in a charge!!! They charged my light infantry and after a brief fight my infantry lost the battle and fled. Unfortunately the cavalry ran the infantry unit down!
In the centre ground my line infantry made ready to launch a volley into the side of the advancing Cavalry as they went over the bridge .

Make ready!!

My rifle squad on the left flank sneaked around an abandoned house and engaged some irish troops on the other side of the river

Sneaking around the building

The Irish cavalry come across the bridge and the line infantry loose a volley of musket fire

The Irish cavalry charged across the bridge and through a hail of musket fire and slammed into my colonel and his aide de camps.

My colonel is in trouble!

The charge took out the aide de camps leaving the colonel!

The cavalry crashed into my colonel killing his aide de camps leaving him to fight alone. Unfortunately he lost and fled where he was ran down.
Back on the right flank the surviving cavalry charged the riflemen.

A swirling melee!

Again the cavalry's devastating charge against infantry ment the destruction of my riflemen. The initiative wasn't mine so the cavalry that had destroyed my colonel managed to charge line infantry while they were in line formation!!! (Check out the episdoe Sharpes Waterloo for why this is bad ha ha ha) my unit immediately became broken which means their melee value drops to 1 which is not good.

Cavalry charge into my line infantry!

The cavalry won the melee and my unit leaving a few survivors.

The survivors fight back

My surviving models fought back but could not do anything and fled but crucially this time they put ran the cavalry! In the recovery phase they ralliedand turned and faced the cavalry.

They could only to rally and make a last stand

Using the TAC value of my surviving captain I managed to fire at the cavalry bringing them all down to one wound and put my troops in hold which means they can fire at moving enemy or charging enemy.

But the Irish cavalry were wise to this and held back and fired with their carbines causing a casualty. Next turn came round they charged. Their initial blows left just the captain standing who with his melee weapons potentially could take the fight with some very good rolls as all the cavalry were on 1 wound but alas no he took one down but was forced to flee and was run down.

All this happened in the final turn. I was only left with my rifles on the left flank who were covered from the cavalry by an building and had been dueling with some irish soldiers on the other side of the river.

The rifles in the shadows

The game ended with a decisive Irish Victory. Had the game continued I could have holed my rifles up in the house and forced the Irish to flush me out but it would still be a loss . What I failed to mention (mainly as I couldn't remember the exact details) was how well my rifles performed at taking out enemy leaders. Their crack shot skill negates the normal procedure that ncos and officer die last and if your independent officer is within 6" of another un it he can't be targeted but the stars of the battle were the cavalry by far. Their charge was utterly devastating.  They have  a skill called devastating charge which adds D6 hits to their total before you even add their own stats and they always strike first so leave units utterly shattered before they can hit back.  Counters to this. Well my own cavalry is the easiest option but make better use of terrain and pay more attention to who has initiative the next turn so I can get my hits in first. 
Great game overall !

95th Rifles

This week I've been working on the 95th Rifles from Warlord for my Chosen Men force. They are lovely sculpts. I think I did them ok. 

On the bases

First up was to stick them on bases. They don't come with bases in the box this I believe is because of the variety of ways people made Napoleonic stuff. I wanted square bases in case I decided to get them in line formation. Some of the models are laying down so they've had to have rectangle bases.

Got the base green done.  Not the historically correct colour but hey it's all I have and it looks ok. Next up I added all the other base colours. I made a mistake of doing the whole box so this took longer as I did 14 greens then 14 Brown's.  I need to remember to break them into groups of 4 or 5 as I find it harder to paint on large numbers.

Major has a few more details on.

The models have little details on that my talents just aremt good enough to pick out so I always aim for the 3ft rule.

Love a good flocking

Flocked and based painted next.

All done and I think they look ok. Will have to get a photo of all my Napoleonic forces up soon.

Easter been and gone.

Been awhile but I've been off with the kids over the half term. Had a lovely time in Wales at the cottage we regularly go to. It's just outside Dolgellau and about 3 miles off the main road so quite remote!
Obviously while we were there we visited Porthmaddog so I had to go to the model shop there. (If you are ever nearby I recommend a visit to the town and this shop to support a great little business). They stock models galore, warlord stuff and boxes of soldiers from all manor of eras. Plus plenty of  vehicles for displays, midel train stuff and Amera Plastics! I had a good rummage through the selection (some is for airfix models and not 28mm scale) I located a water fall and a couple of river sections.  Now I've been after a waterfall for a while from Amera as I'm a bit fussy and like my water to start somewhere on the battlefield other than just flow through the board. So a bit more terrain to the collection.

Waterfall section

River section

I also found in a little tub Airfix model plane stands! These are around £6 on the internet where as the one I bought was £1.50 !

Now my Typhoon has a stand woo!

Before the holidays I managed to finish of my Napolenic British Infantry (with much stabbing myself on their bloody bayonets!)

I like these so much I may ditch my cavalry unit and have extra line infantry ☺
Also I've managed to do another gaslands vehicle. Using a hot wheels buggy i added a home made machine gun using Bolter drum magazines and a sten from bilt action.

Idris Buggy

The buggy will be sponsored by Idris  (cult of speed ) so obviously it's red as red cars go faster!
I've acquired the right got wheels mustang to begin work on the Mustang from the Death Race films.  I ordered and recieved some 15mm mini guns to add to the Mustang. 

Mini guns for maximum carnage

Have a great day folks!

The week that was

Hello! This week after completing my night shifts  I've managed to prime all my miniatures that I built last month and can now start painting them! First up I grabbed several British Napoleonic line infantry.

Red jackets!

Using the box art and some Google images I tried my best to get as close as a representation as I can.

You'll notice 2 Brown bases in the group this is because I ran out of green paint! Turns out I preferred the brown so I repainted the lot brown added some flock and tufts. 

First group done

I think they look really good (well for my standards anyway!).
Also mentioned in my last post my new game rules Gaslands.  Using an online car builder I've come up with 2 teams. I have acquired 4 hot wheels cars and need 1 more for the teams to be ready . In Gaslands  you use cans to buy stuff and the usual team is 50 cans. So I have a team sponsored by Slime  (angry violent youths mainly) which has a pick up truck and car. The pick up truck has got a HMG and a machine gun plus a ram and nitro boost. The car will have  a rear machine gun.

Slime Pick Up truck

The ram is made from old chaos chain axes and chaos monster horns. The rear extras are from random bits of old dreadnought in my bits.  Now to find a car to complete the slime team.
The other team is sponsored my Idris, this team worships speed so I needed rapid cars for this. I also wanted the Mustang from the Death Race film . A very kind person in the Facebook group who has already done this car sent me there wip photos to help me. To back up the Mustang I've added 2 buggies to the team. Lightly armoured and equipped but lightning quick. One has a machine gun the other has a caltrop dropper.  The mustang will be the heavy hitter of the team with a mini gun and oil dropper. I've completed one buggy. It's It's little bit out there but get its a post apocalyptic game so I can go crazy.

The Hot wheels car is a good buggy with a huge engine! I added some mesh across the doors and again using bits of old dreadnought I made a caltrop dropper which fitted very nicely in the golf bag holder.
The the other buggy as of last night has a machine gun on it andnis ready for priming. The mustang was a bit tricky to find as I needed the correct model. After a few unsuccessful searches in the local you shops I found my 4yr old son had one under his bed! After a hard negotiation I acquired the Mustang (fear not my son got 2 New hot wheels cars so he was happy ). This will be quite a test for me as I have to make the armour plates as close to the real thing as possible.

Mustang in the film

Mustang hot wheels car made by Kevin Cecil in the Gaslands group.

Obviously the car will not look as good as the one above but I'm going to try my best. 
That's it for now, hopefully this week I'll get more like infantry done and the other buggy painted.
Have a great day folks!

Update!

Sorry I've been so quiet, I have  been writing writing blog post for a game's night which was cancelled but other things have been happening. My friend had acquired the osprey book Chosen Men. Which gives me a great excuse to scratch my Napolenic war itch!
He helped me plan out a little force. From what I gather chosen men is on the smaller scale of battle not full lines of soldiers firing volleys at each other but smaller sections.  As I'm a massive Sharpe fan I predictably went for British.  I had some riflemen (95th obviously!) from Warlord games as a Valentine's present from the the wife. This box contains 16 metal miniatures and a metal dog as well to follow the riflemen.  Also managed to pick up a box of  British Line Infantry as well. This box contains 20 plastic regular infantry and 4 metal command models, though I had six in the box which was nice (Captain, 2 standard bearers, drummer, sergeant and a dude with an axe not sure on his role). The standard bearers really tested me as I had to drill through their hands to slide the standard pole through but in the box are cardboard flags so I haven't got to faff with making a flags. My chosen man force requires only 10 models from this box set so plenty of potential. The last unit is some light dragoons so I need to buy them at some point.

95th rifles from Warlord games

These are really nice sculpts

British Line Infantry

I also picked up a box of bolt action regular late war British troops. Looking at my army lists and the vague historic background I had chosen (I best write a blog up about that! But basically I've chosen Operation Clipper. An allied attack into Germany, part of that attack were the Worcestershire regiment possibly supported by the SAS on anti sniper duties though this may not be true.) , looking at my forces I only have 2 regular squads of infantry so about 20 regular Tommies. Currently I have 2 squads of airbourne as well so am capable of putting out a force already but I've been listening to a lot of bolt action podcasts recently where lots of people have been getting a historic slant on their forces so I decided I needed more regular Tommies. The box contains enough miniatures to make a small first platoon (great purchase for some one starting out. I got an officer, light mortar team, PIAT team and 2 8 man squads from my first box.) But I wanted just soldiers to add no officers or special teams. I made up 2 bren gunners with their loaders, a couple of Sten carrying soldiers and the rest were riflemen.

My SMG man charging into melee spade swinging

I tried my best to vary the poses of the soldiers. I think I did ok glued my fingers together several times though! My favourite is the man swinging his spade in melee.  I hope the pose works
So thats what I've been upto now after snowmeggedon has gone away I'll get undercoating and painting. H
Stay safe!