Where have I been?

I'm sorry for not posting in a while. I've been wargaming, but my blog has been neglected. I'll return to posting photos of my WWI figures as soon as possible. Next up to show are some great French figures in my collection painted by my Uncle that have found their way into my collection through a mutual friend of ours.

Until then, here's a video of another one of my projects. A flying 1/48 scale P47d Thunderbolt. Weighs 4.5 grams (about the same as two paper clips):



More photos are available on my R/C page here: http://pease1.sr.unh.edu/aew/rc/classroom/P47d/

Carnage Convention '07

Here are photos of my Freeman's Farm game as I hosted it at the Carnage '07 Convention as part or the Northern Conspiracy's participation in the Centuries of Conflict, 18th century theme games. I didn't win any prized for beauty, as my convention games are built for portability and gaming enjoyment, but everyone had a great time.

This was a re-play of the test game I hosted last month at our club's game night. The game night game saw the British thoroughly demolishing the Americans in good order well before the German right flank even reached the table. In this re-fight, the Americans drew first blood and kept the pressure on the 'Thin Red Line' throughout the game returning the earlier damage in spades. This go-around was a complete American victory. I'll put this scenario down as 'wargame balanced'. Another one I can pull out knowing I've got the forces balanced just about right. One of the great things about Volley&Bayonet is that you can fight a battle of this size, with gamers new to the rules, in under 3 hours. We played this scenario to completion, at Carnage, with 3 people who hadn't ever played V&B before and finished the game in three hours. About an hour into the game everyone was running their own tables and playing the game pretty much un-assisted by the GM.

Congratulations and thanks are due to everyone who participated in the Centuries of Conflict, supporting this great continuation of our old Tricon Convention. Next year's theme will be 19th Century: Napoleonics, American Civil War and the like. For many more beautiful photos of the wargames from Carnage, please see the Northern Conspiracy events page for the convention.

Freeman's Farm Game

Here are some photos of a Volley & Bayonet game I hosted at the Northern Conspiracy this past month. The scenario was Freeman's Farm (First Saratoga) with a slight historical variation. Historically the General Gates committed precious few troops to the Freeman's farm battle to the dismay of Benedict Arnold. Of course we all know what happened later in October when the full American force was applied. This scenario features an order of battle that has Arnold getting his way, convincing Gates to commit a larger portion of the forces from Bemis Heights. The end result is a much more evenly matched wargame.










This refight saw the Americans have early success both in withstanding the initial British charges as well as giving the Brits plenty of trouble from musketry with the Americans even knocking the British grenadiers out of commision early in the fight. These early successes were not long lived as eventually the American's luck turned and the British had their way with the Americans in the center of the line.










American reinforcements late in the battle were too little, too late and couldn't turn the tide before the Brunswick reinforcements decended on the American right flank. All in all it was a well fought battle by the players on both sides and a fun game to host! This game was a play test of the same game which I will be hosting next month at Carnage 10. More photos of this and other games that were hosted at the game day can be found on the Northern Conspiracy web page gallery for the October game day.

American 'Minuteman' Militia

With the summer winding down, wargaming season is just starting to get into full gear. Although my wargaming club games all year long, with my other hobby being flying R/C airplanes, my primary season for painting figures and gaming is fall-spring. Coming up over the next six weeks I'm going to be hosting a Monmouth Courthouse game at our club game day in October and the battle of Freeman's Farm at Carnage 10 in November. With both of those games to motivate me, who knows? I might actually get the unit of British line I have on my painting table finished up and posted here instead of posting more of my previously-completed units!

These stands are a couple of my American militia 'minutemen'. Living only an hour from the Concord and Lexington battlefield (Battle Road National Park) painting American militia is somewhat of a religion. These stands have that 'just run out of the house with what you had on' look to them. A small note about my face painting technique. In the close-up photos it looks quite overdone, almost cartoon-like, but on the tabletop the exagerated colorings really bring out the facial detail when the figured are viewed at arm's length. I have between 15 and 20 of stands such as these who pose as any or all American militia as needed. I will probably only post a few of them as they mostly have a similar style to them.

Tooting My Own Horn

I'm going to toot my own horn a bit. I'm pretty excited about this and have to share. Look for a mention of my Spandau and Lewis gun kits in the September issue of Flying Scale Models magazine. Peter Rake's WWI modeling article specifically mentions my Spandau and Lewis gun kits. This is quite a thrill for me, being a very small business and getting this kind of press. Peter's always been the premiere authority on electric-powered scale WWI models and it's a thrill to have caught his ear.

On the scale WWI gun front, I have just released yet another of my kits, the Central Powers Parabellum observer's gun. Hopefully this one will also interest Peter and Flying Scale Models magazine.

American Rifles

These are my American Rifles. They've been painted genericaly to represent just about any American rifle unit, or unit in hunting shirts so that I can use them in many of my games. Mostly I use them to impersonate Morgan's Rifles and Dearborn's Rifles in games I put on featuring troops from the Saratoga campaign. They're the centerpiece units in my Freeman's Farm / First Saratoga game, each of the skirmish stands representing one of the above mentioned units. The formed stand in the back can be used to represent both units formed up, or to represent either of the smaller units at smaller figure scales.

I painted this unit over five years ago before I decided to varry my uniforms within units a bit more. I do have plans to paint a dedicated unit for Morgan's Rifles in the future with additional variations in coat and legging colors. These are Old Glory figures and the Flag for the unit is a commercial offering, but since half a decade has passed since I based the unit, the brand of the flag has since left my memory. The officer figure uses a hand-hammered and file-shaped brass wire in place of the lead sword for durability.

Hosting a Blue Max game at the Northern Conspiracy

These are a few photos of the Blue Max game I hosted at my wargaming club, The Northern Conspiracy, last month. WWI Air Combat is one of the other periods, in addition to AWI, that I run games from fairly regularly. This was a fun game to run and I was happy to have a lot of players, many of who were experienced with the rules. This was a late-war 'furball'. Just good-old dogfighting fun. More photos of this and all of the games from last month's game night can be found in the July '07 gallery page on the club's website.

I'm sorry I didn't post any Historicon '07 photos. To get to Historicon from my home is about an eight-hour drive and five hours into the drive my wife and I realized that we each thought the OTHER person packed the camera. I'll try to make up for this error in judgment with some additional AWI figure photos from my collection soon.











P.S. For the curious that's me in the white shirt with the green collar.