Still Here

House move done.

Wargames room, known locally as 'The Office', sorted.

Episode of food poisoning now recovered from.

Nursery nearing completion.

Baby only a few weeks away.

Just back from a round country trip. Weymouth for Samurai battle day. Bristol for a night out. Luckington to see Lisa's cousin Martin and his wife Vicks. Barmouth Wales for a few days with my family. Home.

I think that covers the last few months since the last post. Not much wargaming, either painting or playing. But with everything else going on no surprise there. No presssure this year to hit targets or beat last years total. Get some in as and when and relax.

Missed C.O.W. due to aforementioned food poisoning. Cross fingers for next year now. But with bambino that may need adding to the agenda for the next round of negotiations with Lisa.

Plodding on with AWI painting having picked up some of the new figures from Peter Pig whilst down in Weymouth. Also spurred on to paint figures for Squarebashing for which playtesting is about to start in earnest. Whilst in Barmouth soaking up the grey skies I read Norman Stones 'Workd War One, a short history'. Very digestable account of the war in its entirety with some interesting points on the eastern front.

Thats all for now, but a full report of the Samuria day will follow.

More soon...

Ups and downs

Living as we do in a small terraced cottage has its advantages. In the morning we open the curtains and look out across fields, in which as I sit and type are half a dozen horses grazing away. We are in an ideal location, with a village cricket ground next door to us and woods behind. But it does come with its downside.

If I want to spray paint or varnish my figures it usually takes some planning as I have to wait for warmish weather and then dash out to my garage which is behind our house or else do it in the rear yard as I have just done. I normally wait until I have a tray full of figures to do rather than on a unit by unit basis. Unfortunately whilst doing so this evening I left the back door open and the resultant odour drifted into the house. Much to the dismay of Lisa who is now nearly 19 weeks gone with our first child. Fortunately she has gone out for a 'horsey meeting' at the local, leaving me with the windows open hoping the smell will be gone by the time she returns.

We are on the verge of a house move to a considerably larger property with attached double garage. Negotiations are at a critical phase over which bedroom in the house will be the study (read wargames room) and which will be bambinos nursery. Unfortunately the fields woods and cricket club will be replaced by other similar properties on what the estate agents choose to call an 'executive development'. Exciting times but it does mean that I need to take advantage of what time I have free as it will be in short supply come late summer/early autumn.

I am continuing to add to the AWI collection with a unit of American Light Infantry on the block next whilst tidying up a few bits a pieces across my other collections. The Sudan is calling to me at the moment for some attention.

More soon...

Imaginations and AK47

There is a current trend across the internet to create 'Imagi-nations' based typically around fictional 18th century nations as a basis for table top battles. These harken back to the like of Charles Grant and Peter Young and encouraged building units of 40 or 50 individually based figures almost in a toy soldier style. Of course back in the mid 90's when the first version of AK47 came out you were encouraged to create your own country, giving it a name, a flag and a name for the army such as the Freedom Party for Democracy and Truth. Very much in the 'Imagi-nation' theme. In fact there were tables on which you rolled dice to come up with original names and flag designs, going as far as to encourage you to get your crayons out to draw your new flag. This theme continue in AK47 Reloaded.

Spurred on by the excellent AK Day last weekend, I feel like creating my own Modern Africa 'Imagi-Nation'. I know of only one dedicated blog on a similar theme, set in the ficitional country of Bongolesia. I may create a seperate blog, or just put the occasional post on here. I'll use it to link some games of AK and explore my creative side, whilst hopefully not crossing any boundaries of taste and decency.

More soon...

Weymouth Battle Day

Ralph Ashdown with his trophy. Well done Ralph!

Friday saw me travelling down to the south coast for the Peter Pig Battle Day in Weymouth. AK47 Reloaded was the order of the day. Martin at Peter Pig had kindly agreed to put me up for the night and take me down to the 'Levellers' club night for a warm up game.

On arrival Martin greeted me and we settled down to some wargames chat, before the arrival of Rob Roriston for some tea with the rest of the Goddard family, Julie, Rachel and Grace. Following this we took the short drive to the club where two games of Reloaded were played to blow away any cobwebs. Myself and Martin took on Paul and Lee. Having performed poorly in the pregame we found ourselves with very few on table forces, but managed to hold on to the objectives somehow and won the game despite Lee's attack helicopters causing havoc for Martins armour.

We left our stuff at the club ready for the following day where battle would commence in the Church next door. It was again back to Martins for more shooting the breeze over a cup of tea. I also got to look at a pre-release copy of Washingtons Army. Unlike recent RFCM rules they will be spiral bound which I think is a good idea for the longevity of the book. It was then bed with a 7.30 alarm call, breakfast and then back down the road to the Church.

The Peter Pig Battle Days are organised by Stewart Meecham in Weymouth or Miles Milton in Bournemouth. Both have a similar passion to me for friendly games where there is no emphasis on crushing your opponent , just a fun few hours rolling dice and pushing around toy soldiers.

Although only a handful of us were there, it didn't matter a jot. For me so long as I play a couple or three games, preferably against different opponents in the right spirit, it doesn't matter whether 6 or 60 turn up. In fact the more people that turn up, the more stress for the organiser!

Anyway some pretty pictures of the games.

A nice day had by all. I came 6th which is some kind of record for me. I think my first top ten finish in one of these things!

Ralph was a deserved winner even if he did shoot my militia in the back as they were running away! We had a great game in the true spirit of RFCM games. My game against Miles was much closer and could of gone either way. Miles will tell you he won 39 points to 35, but the book say it was a stalemate and I'm sticking with that! Again played in a spirit, just how it should be.

We had a lovely dinner too, fish and chips for me. I think with less chatting and more urgency we could have fitted three games in but, in hindsight, two was enough and allowed me to get on the road early enough to get home around 8pm. So well done to Ralph for winning and Stewart for organising and the Goddard family for putting me up. Certainly as long as these events are run I will support them.

Easter Sunday

Having considered the comments about my Towton game from Alumwell, I may just run participation games in the future. I feel the demands of a demo game maybe beyond the time and efforts I am able to put into them. I stand by the game I put on, and feel it looked good as a club style game (ie a game you might expect to see on any given club night). It was a solo effort with all figures and terrain by me. I admire clubs that can put on demos with 1000+ 28mm figures on beautifully sculpted terrain. But such efforts are beyond most and for newcomers at their first show these games must seem baffling much like the Blenheim game at Warfare back in November.

Next Saturday sees me in Weymouth for the AK47 day run by Stuart Meecham. As I am travelling down on the Friday I am also booked in for a game at the Levellers club in Weymouth. I am busily preparing a few bits and pieces to take with me.

This site http://www.warflag.com has been around for a while but Warflag really is very good. I have used it for my burgeoning AWI armies, and intend to make it my first stop from now on.

So many plans at the moment with little time. We have sold our house but the house we were buying has fell through so we may be facing a short time with Lisa's parents. With impending fatherhood too, I can see my work/life balance changing somewhat! Still, upwards and onwards.

Out in October and set during the American War of Independance. Cornwell has clearly jumped onto the bandwagon with the forthcoming release of of Peter Pigs Washingtons Army rules and the anticipated upsurge in interest in the period!

After Show report (WMMMS)

Had a great day down at the West Midlands Militairy Modelling Show in Wolverhampton today. I took my 'Towton' game down which uses the Bloody Barons scenario. Drew some nice comments from Martin and Stewart at Peter Pig and some kind members of the public. However my first effort at engaging someone who appeared to be interested fell flat. When asked if he played Bloody Barons, his reply of 'Hate them' caught me off guard. He was clearly unimpressed with my 600 odd 15mm figures on a 5x3 table. At next years show he is putting on Towton with 1400 28mm figures on a 12x6 table, using Poleaxed by the Lance and Longbow society. Clearly a superior form of wargaming!

John B, Tom B, Ben and Jon fought out my version of the battle and a good time with many laughs was had by all. Some very poor dice rolling led to John swapping to the brand new green Peter Pig dice which saw a change in fortunes for the Yorkists as they did very well with Edward and Norfolks command against the Lancastrians, but less well with Fauconberg. Tom B did well with the Lancastrians in the centre under Somerset and pushed onto the hill held by York (helped by Ben charging off the hill into him!). Young Jon showed excellent dice rolling skills in making numerous saves agaisnt the odds using Nevilles command.

Running a demo game does help stop the spending, as I had little time to trawl the stands. The Osprey on Philadelphia 1777 was a good buy at £5. A few of the new American Light infantry from Peter Pig to add to my preorder plus the new green dice meant I spent less than £30. Not too bad I think!

In the rush to get to the show I forgot the camera but will trawl the web as I know several picutres were taken and I will be playing the game out at home at some point so will put some pictures up then.

More soon....