Raiden Miniatures at Minibits

Some excellent news from Minibits in that they are now stocking the entire Raiden Miniatures range of 1/285th scale aircraft. You heard it here first! This is a big boost to my plans for a Winter War project using the Bag the Hun supplement, Blue Swastika Rampant, for which I could do with some extra Russian and Finnish biplane fighters. It also opens up some options for post war games in something other than 1/600, specifically for the Falklands, as I've always fancied doing this in 1/285th. Happy Days!

http://www.minibits.net/raiden-aircraft/

Blotz Acrylic Markers

The Sergeant Major would be proud!

The acrylic laser cut markers that I ordered from Blotz arrived yesterday, which was very quick, so I have been unpeeling the backing sheet from hundreds of the little **&^%* today, so that they can be used for some practice games with my unpainted figures. As you can see, they're all in clear acrylic so that they don't stand out too much against the underlying terrain, which means that they shouldn't be too obtrusive. Incidentally, my skirmish bases haven't arrive yet, so the Beja are looking uncomfortable on some close order bases that I'm going to use for my plucky British units. I quite like the acrylic discs, even if I prefer to have more scenic markers or none at all, if possible. It's a good product at a good price, so I'm another happy customer.

Rebels and Yankees

I was given a second hand hardback copy of The Battlefields of the Civil War yesterday, which a friend of the family thought I'd be interested in. I have the boxed set of the three books in this series but as this one is a hardback, which I prefer, I was very pleased to receive it. A very nice surprise!

18 Today

It's my son's eighteenth birthday today, so I have given him a bonus present of my Star Wars Legion boxed set and extra bits, as he's a big Star Wars fan and has also recently converted to the Dark Side of wargaming. I was given the core set last year as a birthday present but never got round to using it, so I'm hoping he'll get more out of it than I have. Happy Birthday. I am your Father.

Markers for The Men Who Would Be Kings

I have bought a whole set of 20mm round laser etched acrylic markers for The Men Who Would Be Kings from Blotz, so that I can track orders and unit status in my games. I would prefer to use more arty farty counters, with casualty figures, broken or abandoned weapons and so on, but in the meantime these will do very nicely. I've chosen clear acrylic for these ones so that they are less obtrusive on the table top and have gone for the whole smorgasbord of options including Pinned,  Leaderless, Gone to Ground, together with Volley Fire!, Stand To and Skirmishing, amongst others. You don't need all of these for the game but I thought I'd get them anyway! You can never have enough bits of shiny plastic to scatter all over your accumulated desert terrain and carefully assembled colonial units after all?

Fleet Action off Cape Sable Island - The Battle of The Hawk

I remembered today that I'd forgotten to play the final scenario in my trilogy of 'What If?' ironclad naval games, based on a fictitious war between the Royal Navy and United States Navy c1871. I've located this final battle off the South East tip of Nova Scotia, Cape Sable Island, where there is a wide beach called The Hawk. This sounds like a splendid title for a naval battle, so I've relocated the game from the approaches to Halifax itself to a point off the coast of Cape Sable Island.

In this scenario, the Royal Navy fleet will intercept the US Navy ironclad fleet as it steams toward Halifax from Boston to reinforce the naval blockade. The Royal Navy commander knows that the US fleet is on its way, thanks to the secret British spy network inside the US administration, so has altered course to intercept it before it gets to Boston. I'll work out the details later and, hopefully, play the game at the weekend.

A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition” ― Rudyard Kipling

I'm now re-reading this aptly titled account of the Gordon Relief Expedition by Colonel Mike Snook. It's a very well thought out narrative, which alternates between the deteriorating situation in Khartoum and the different elements of the military campaign, both from the direction of the Nile and from Red Sea. It's very well researched and clearly written with some authority, both in terms of the historical source material but also the geography. Excellent!

Charlie Foxtrot Skirmish Bases

I normally get all my laser cut basing materials from either Warbases or from the ever reliable East Riding Miniatures, but as they're both  temporarily closed at the moment, I'm going to try the Charlie Foxtrot option. 

I've bought some terrain pieces from Charlie Foxtrot before and they're very good, so I'm confident that his skirmish trays will be high quality too. He's also a really nice bloke, having had a long chat with him at Colours a couple of years ago. 

I'm also going to order one of his Really Useful Box storage tray inserts for the 1p based Beja army, so that they have a safe place to be kept, and some casualty dial bases for use as pinned markers, adding some wounded figures on top for visual effect.

Beja Unit Three Built and Based

I completed the assembly of the third unit of sixteen Beja today including half a dozen rifle carrying figures. I hadn't originally intended to use these but in The Men Who Would Be Kings, they are assumed to be an element of Tribal Infantry units, so I decided to sprinkle some over the four units, with about two of three per sixteen figures. 

I have also decided to use the two boxes of metal rifle armed figures that I have, alongside a few plastic ones to make a fifth, four point unit for the field force which I can alternate with the captured field gun. This will be an Irregular Infantry unit with fieldcraft but poor shots, representing some skirmishers to harass the enemy at slightly longer ranges than 6'', although without much chance of success! 

In Death in the Dark Continent, the Beja army list also has a couple of units of rifle armed skirmishers as one of the options, so this would neatly kill two birds with one stone. In the meantime, I'm moving straight on to the fourth and final spear and sword equipped Tribal Infantry unit, with a couple more of the rifle armed dudes in the mix.

Boom Bang a Bang

It's week two of my The Men Who Would Be Kings / Death in the Dark Continent project, with two units of sixteen Beja assembled, based, textured and undercoated, plus a third now on the workbench being glued together. I decided today to make use of the drummer parts on the command sprues to make four drummers, one for each of the tribal warrior units. These are just for visual effect and also so that I can identify each unit on the table top. I was even thinking of using them to represent the leader figure for each unit, rather than having a specific leader model, so that they are easy to spot in the throng of spear and sword waving loonies. It would be a simple way to make casualty removal straightforward but I do like the idea of making some characters out of the leftovers on the sprue, so I'll keep it as a possibility rather than making it a sure fire thing.