Action at Angamos

I've been at work but also under the weather health wise over the last few days, so there has been a bit of a hiatus in wargaming related fun that I'm hoping to resolve this weekend. The plan is to run the Dahlgren and Columbiad scenario for the Battle of Angamos that I worked out a few days ago, with the ship record sheets now filled in ready for action. It will be interesting to see how the Huascar manages against the two Chilean broadside ironclads, or at least for how long she manages to stay afloat. In the scenario, if the Chileans do sink or severely cripple the Huascar they will lose anyway, so they will have to try to win without inflicting too much damage. Thus far, all of the games I've played using the rules have given a fairly historical outcome but who knows what will happen this time round?

Number One Son's Space Marine Squad

The boy has painted up some Crimson Fist space marines for Warhammer 40K and, bearing in mind these are the first 28mm figures that he's painted, I think he's done a pretty amazing job. He's now deciding how to texture and paint the bases, with an urban theme which will finish them off really well. A really cracking effort!

Norway 1940

The Norwegian Campaign is a long term interest of mine, from a naval, air and land angle, so I'm reading this at the moment. One of my ideas for next year is to scale back my projects to manageable proportions, so instead of producing the entire Kriegsmarine fleet, foro example, I just focus on the destroyers and merchant shipping for the first battle of Narvik. I think this might be a way to stop a log jam developing and enable some games to be played out in a relatively short timeframe?

Do you want ships with that?

I was planning to switch my project focus to sci-fi wargaming next year but I've had a change of heart and have decided to stick with naval wargaming for the fourth year in a row. This is mainly due to having several naval projects on the go, with boxes of assembled and based models queued up for painting, so that my project to 'do list' is very much undone. I also really enjoy naval wargaming and despite the backlog have had a lot of fun in the process, even if I'm currently a bit behind. 

To move things along, I'm going to re-jig my objectives for next year, moving some projects aside to make space for some new ones, while revisiting other projects that have been overlooked. One of the reinvigorated  projects will be Cold War modern naval, for which I've just ordered a carrier battlegroup worth of 1/3000th scale French warships from the old Davco range. I've got several more ideas up my sleeve but it's early days yet, so there's plenty of time to work it all out for Give Us The Ships 2021.

Comus Class Corvette

I was wondering what to do with my surplus to requirements model of the Independencia, so did a bit of research into contemporary warships of similar dimensions, rigging and hull profile. The best fit I could come up with was the Royal Navy Comus class corvettes, which are am almost perfect match in both dimensions and appearance. The end result is a useful model that I can add to my later Victorian ironclad fleet of the 1880's, which as yet doesn't feature anything equivalent. I may go back and swap the main sail for a smaller sail set, as the one supplied with the model is a bit too large, but I'm pleased to find a useful role for the model which will neatly fill a bit of a gap in my project. 

Independencia Comparison

I was asked to post some comparison photos of my converted Tumbling Dice ASV45 Armide with the new model of the Independencia, which is bundled with the Huascar in the ASV61 pack. As you can see, I've based and started to paint my converted model, but you can see the comparison between the two even though the ASV61 model hasn't been assembled yet. 

Small Scale Actions for Broadside and Ram

I have been thinking of adapting Broadside and Ram, which is designed for fleet sized games, for use with small scale, ship to ship scenarios like the Battle of Angamos. I really like the simplicity of Broadside and Ram and the fast play aspect of the game, so it would make sense to try it out with two or three ships a side but with a few tweaks to make it work better. 

In the rules this would normally involve designating ships as individual commands, meaning that they do not require AP's to move or turn. The change I'm thinking of trying out is for each ship to roll an AP dice at the start of the turn, allocating pips for movement, turning and repairs. I may consider making basic speed cost a single pip and maximum speed an additional pip, but I'm not sure that's necessary. 

I also thought I might fiddle the initiative system by determining the order of activation each turn using the AP roll but again I think this would overcomplicate things, rather than keeping it simple. I will give each ship's commander an AP rating rather than the overall admiral AP rating, as that seems more appropriate, while I will also allow ships to form squadrons under one command, as the rules stand. 

I will try out the tweaks over the weekend to see if they work.

Back Issue Blast from the Past

I was up in the loft the other day in search of old wargaming magazines, when I discovered two CD's with Issue 1 to 50 of Wargames Illustrated. I bought these years ago to fill some gaps in my magazine collection and to get hold of specific articles, although what they were I can't remember. They ended up stashed with my old wargaming magazines and then I completely forgot about them, so it was a nice surprise to unearth them again. I'll enjoy having a browse through both discs over the weekend!

Back in the Day

I started a thread over on the Wargames Website as a nostalgia trip to my wargaming epiphany in January 1983. It cheered me up!

https://www.thewargameswebsite.com/forums/topic/january-1983-2/#post-146690

Cruisers and Camouflage

I've been reading this very interesting book over the last few days, even though the subject matter isn't really on my current wargaming radar. I've read a couple of the author's other naval historical and counter factual books, which were written in the interwar period, so I thought this would be a worthwhile addition. Despite its vintage, it is eighty one years since first publication, it is an exciting, well paced account of various WW1 cruiser actions, most of which will be familiar but one or two being relatively obscure. 

There's a lot of scenario potential here, not just for historical actions but also to be translated into other periods including the Victorian ironclad era, for example, by simply 'camoflaguing' the opposing forces as earlier ships and shifting the scene of the action to similar but different locations. I remember reading an article in an early Miniature Wargames by Andy Callan, where the charge up San Juan Hill was converted into an ACW scenario titled the Battle of St James. A simple idea but it really works!