Parthian Horse Archer Painting

 

I've prepared and undercoated four bases worth of Parthian Horse Archers today, which didn't take long, but the actual painting probably will tie me down for quite a lot longer. I will start by painting the horses in different horsey shades, to add some variety, then go on to painting the riders in various blue, red and green colours, with different colours used for their funky hats. As you can imagine this might be a bit fiddly in 2mm but I'm taking it slowly as it will be worth it for the overall look. I'm off work this week due to isolating, so should get the horses sorted tomorrow, although I also want to play that ironclad naval game that I couldn't squeeze in today.

French Ironclad Fleet Reinforcements

 

I was sorting out the ships for the Battle of Cap Blanc game this morning and also doing a stock check of my 1/2400th scale ironclad collection. I have painted nearly all of the available models in the Tumbling Dice range for my 1870's Royal Navy fleet, give or take one or two duplicates, but my French fleet has been understrength and under represented for far too long. I have therefore decided to assemble and paint some reinforcements, which I've had in the lead pile for ages but never got round to completing. 

These are the six remaining Provence class ironclads - Gauloise, Heroine, Survellainte, Valeureuse, Magnaneme and Savoie - bringing the fleet up to full strength, together with the two Gloire class ironclads - Invincible and Normandie, both of which I didn't bother with before as they were broken up in the mid-1870's. This lot will give the French a fighting chance in a fleet engagement with the better armoured Royal Navy broadside ironclads and also allow me to run some proper fleet sized actions. 

I have some other things to do for the moment but these models will be on the workbench as soon as I can clear the decks.

The Battle of Cap Blanc - A Broadside and Ram Scenario

I banged together a quick scenario for Broadside and Ram that I'm planning to play tomorrow, possibly outdoors if the weather continues to behave itself. In this scenario, a French naval squadron based in Bizerte is lying in wait for a Royal Naval squadron that is patrolling the coastline near Cap Blanc. The French commodore is an experienced commander, screening his ships behind the headland, and has a +1 AP rating. He can decide to sit tight and wait or at any time, order his squadron to full steam ahead, at which point the smoke from the ironclads will be immediately visible to the British, even if the ships themselves are still obscured. 

The Royal Navy commander is average, with a +0 rating, reflecting his underestimation of the enemy and the element of surprise. At the start of the scenario, the Royal Navy squadron cannot change course until it is in visual line of sight of the hidden French squadron, but must steam ahead at CS only. Each turn the Royal Navy can spend 2AP to make a lookout roll, requiring a 6 to spot a wisp of steam from the stationary French warships hidden behind the headland, which if successful allows the commodore to beat to quarters and go to MS if desired. 

On paper the Royal Navy squadron is better armoured but the French ironclads are faster, better armed and have a 4:3 advantage, the fourth British warship being a sloop. The fort may or may not play a role in proceedings, apart from acting as a lookout for the French, as it has a limited AF and DF of just 3 being armed with obsolete smoothbores with a range of only 6'', so pretty useless. The French objective is to cripple or shatter at least one of the Royal Navy ironclads then escape via the Eastern edge of the table, while the Royal Navy must cripple or sink at least one of the French ironclads, before steaming away to the West, either side being allowed to pursue until the enemy exits the scene. 

Parthian Cataphracts Completed

 

Thanks to *******  isolation, I have had some time free to wrap up the Parthian Cataphracts for Strength and Honour, along with a third early Imperial Roman Legion - Legio II Trainana. These took a little longer than I expected due to work and a packed weekend but they are now done and I can move onto the four horse archer units that will be the core of the Parthian army. I was tempted to try to add some kontos with brush bristles, following a suggestion from Mark B. but sanity prevailed and I have left them without lances. I did paint tiddly little legs on the horses though! 

Parthian Painting Plods Along

                           

It's slow progress with the Parthians at the moment but I have added some variations to the armour with Vallejo Brass, so that they don't all look silver. I'll block off the lower half of the horses with black then add legs to the outer figures in various horsey shades next. After that I should be ready to gloss varnish them and attach the blocks to the already prepared bases. They will be nothing flash but will do the job and look suitably cataphracty like from arms length. 

Topping Up

 

Peter Pig are having a price rise at the start of next month, putting the basic cost of a pack up to an eyewatering £4.10, so I decided to get in first and order some top up figures for my Nationalist army including some HMG's and infantry that I am a a pack or two short of. I was also intending to get some Carlists for the Nationalists but instead I ordered enough figures in berets and pasamontanas for an International Brigade battalion, mainly due to the fact that I really don't like fascists. With the ever increasing costs of metal figures this is probably the last order I'm going to put in for the For Whom The Dice Rolls project, although I may well be able to pick up some stuff second hand if I'm lucky.

Victorian Gunboats

 

Only this morning I was thinking about digging out the 1/2400th scale gunboats that I have in the painting queue, left over from my abandoned Battle of Jasmund project, when this popped into my inbox. I pre-ordered this digital book last year and forgot all about it, so it's obviously a sign that I should finish painting the dozen or so large and small gunboat models that are otherwise surplus to requirements but already based and undercoated. 

A couple of the small gunboats I painted before.

The small screw gunboats can reinforce my French coastal and harbour defence forces, while the larger Crimean style gunboats will go to the Royal Navy for various uses including as dispatch vessels. It will be good to finally shift them and, as they don't take long to paint based on experience with the Chilean and Peruvian fleets, I should get them done in no time. I may do a bit of work on the larger gunboats first, however, as they look much better with some spars on the foremast.

1/2400th Morro Castle

 

I finally got the Tumbling Dice shopping cart thing to work for me today, so have now ordered a resin model of the Morro Castle in Havana, that has recently been added to the 1/2400th accessories range. There are no pictures on the website so I'll take some photos when it arrives and post them here, so that you can see what it looks like. It's an impressive fortress and will make a good centrepiece of a scenario or two, both for my Victorian ironclads and any age of sail games that I get round to as one of the naval projects this year, specifically the Mad for War Anglo Dutch project.

Ironclad Ram Action

 

I found this photograph on a FB page this evening, the French ironclad ram Tigre fitting out in 1872, and it made me realise that I haven't had a game of Broadside and Ram for ages. I have a less busy weekend ahead, so I am planning another 'What If?' scenario for my French and British ironclad fleets, including a few of the French coastal defence rams that have featured in some of my previous games. They are great fun to set off as independent commands and have wreaked havoc with the Royal Navy on more the one occasion, although nearly always being blasted to pieces at close range by a full broadside from their victim. I'm  bit rusty with the rules but they always give a fast and exciting game!

MPL'I Starter Skirmish Scenarios

There's an interesting Q&A thread on the Mourir pour l'Indochine FB page all about how to start off with the rules, with the author, Shawn Taylor, suggesting a gradual approach building up the complexity as you go but starting small. His suggestion is to run a simple scenario on a 2' x 2' board, involving a patrol of a single squad of French troops on the hunt for a Vietminh sniper. I thought this sounded very much akin to the ideas I had for a section to platoon level set of games using No End In Sight, which I've had kicking about for several years. 

Jim's Wargames Workbench: French Indochina War Skirmish Starters (jimswargamesworkbench.blogspot.com)

I really like the concept of making some bespoke terrain, which I actually had a go at before, and using the 15mm Eureka figures that I have, although possibly also cutting some corners by using my hexon tiles as a quick fix. As it's such a small scale and scope, I don't think it would be a massive effort to do either, with the bonus of being able to scale up to larger engagements over time. This is all very much my cup of tea and may well be a project for a holiday at some point this year, now that there is a dedicated set of rules to use alongside No End in Sight.