British North Africa Transport (1)

These two jeeps are more of the figures I obtained in the OOP "Sting of the Scorpion" box set I bought from a local friend recently. Originally intended to be armed to the teeth with .50 cal and Lewis machine guns, I've converted them for unarmed transport use. One will be the ride for my staff and command teams for my 25 lb. Royal Artillery Battery I finished last week.The other is currently unclaimed but could end up being transportation for the company HQ for a commonwealth rifle company or a battery of towed 2 lb. AT guns, whichever I need them for first.

The passenger figures for these Jeeps are SAS raider figures, but with the exception of having white covers on their head I think they can pass for pretty much any other type of British empire figures. In the desert who's going to blame a chap for trying to beat the heat by covering their head in white?

Next up is another installment of transportation converted from the SAS vehicles: eight (8) Chevy trucks overloaded with supplies and stowage plus one portee Breda 20mm AT gun. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the latter, but it seemed silly not to paint it up while I was working on all of the rest of the vehicles.

Desert Objective Markers

We're just wrapping up a short mid-war North Africa campaign, and soon will focus our attention on an early-war North Africa escalation league. Considering these two facts I thought it was wise to invest the time into painting up some desert-themed objective markers for Flames of War. What's more important in the desert than fuel, water, ammo and supplies? With nothing to scrounge from the land or the residents, ammo and supply dumps are the king of all desert objectives. They also have the added benefit of being country-inspecific so I should get years of service from these with any armies I should paint up for desert battles.

The right objective marker is a stock Battlefront piece I received in an OOP "Sting of the Scorpion" box set I picked up from a local friend. I mostly wanted it to use the cool Chevy trucks that come with it as transport for my British desert infantry but it also included the nice supply depot objective base and some very neat SAS raider figures which I'll be mixing into my desert infantry units to add some extra character. The left objective marker was made up using a bunch of smaller supply markers also contained in the box set. I glued these up together on a large base and flocked to represent generic North Africa desert ground cover (i.e. sand). I think the pair makes a very serviceable set. Next up will either be some Australian infantry with their characteristic floppy hats and some of those super-neat SAS raider figures mixed in or the previously mentioned overloaded Chevy trucks. I'm not going to win any battles in the desert with only Crusader tanks to fight with. I need some boots on the ground to seize and hold objectives!

Royal Artillery 25 lb. Battery

This is a British Royal Artillery 25 lb. artillery battery with staff team and quad tractors to tow it. They are painted up for use with my mid war British armor force but are also viable candidates for use with the new Flames of War Hellfire and Back early war desert book which I'll probably be forming up a force for using my Crusader tanks.

The figures guns and vehicles are all Battlefront brand models. These are my first non-tank bases for the desert so I'm not entirely sure I like my basing scheme yet. I may add some other coloring and or some dead grass clumps at some point in the future.

Northern Conspiracy Game Night - August 2011

Last Friday night I was able to attend our monthly club game night. I played in an excellent war of 1812 game run by my friend Mark using Volley & Bayonet rules. Mark ran this game using the wing scale optional rules which really give V&B a different flavor. He also had several interesting scenario-specific rules. When I say I played, I actually helped two of my guests with the rules as neither had played Volley & Bayonet before. Both of them did great and the British eeked out a win, although the Americans made a strong push during the middle of the battle. Had they not run out of steam things would have gone a lot differently. Both sides played very well and the game was a lot of fun.

The other two games were a Ruso-Turkish War (1877) game also using Volley & Bayonet and a WWII Americans vs Vichi French in Morocco game using Battlefront rules. There are a couple of photos of each below and more can be found on our club's photo gallery.

New England Aviation Museum

 During our recent vacation we also visited the New England Air Museum in Windsor Locks Connecticut. The museum has a good collection starting with a Wright Brothers original engine and ending with artifacts from the Apollo space missions. They have an extensive collection of WWII and helicopter artifacts including a complete B-29, B-25, P-47, Corsair, Hellcat and another Hellcat currently under restoration. Their WWI exhibit includes two replicas (Fokker Dr-I and Sikorsky S-16) and an original Hispano Suisa V-8 which was uset to power the SPAD fighters flown by the Lafayette Escadrille. Lori and I enjoyed a wonderful day at the Museum and I highly recommend it to any WWI, WWII or aviation history enthusiasts.

Old Sturbridge Village - AWI Buildings

Old Sturbridge Village is a living history community / museum located in western Massachusetts. It serves to educate and preserve the way of life in 1850s America. As such there are several buildings in their collection that are ripe fruit for the picking when it comes to modeling buildings of the American Revolutionary War. My lovely wife and I visited there on holiday this past week and included in this post are some photos of some of the buildings that would be appropriate to model for the AWI. To the left the collection's 'small house'.

 Quaker meeting house (church).

 Above rural farmhouse, barn and out building. Note the natural unpainted wood siding. To the left corn drying shed for the same farm.

Large family home. This one might be a bit too 'modern' for AWI due mostly to its size.

 Tin smith's shop.

Lumber mill.

Napoleonic Campaign Games

 Last night we played three battles in a Napoleonic campaign that my friend Charlie ran. The campaign was centered around the peninsular / Waterloo campaign with a French force trying to eliminate a Prussian and a British force each about 2/3rs of its size. The photo of the left is the first battle to make it to nightfall on the first day. Since it started late in the afternoon the British (lower army) and French (upper army) both established their lines right as darkness fell on the battlefield. Off screen towards the bottom of the picture is Waterloo.

The next battle was the battle of Ohain which started mid-day with a smaller French corps (top army) against a larger Prussian armeekorps. A few hours later the French received reinforcements in the form of a cavalry corps. The photo on the left is a few turns into the game after both armies had settled into their engagement deployment. On the right their locations at the conclusion of the night turn. 

The last battle to start was the Wavre battle. This was the largest battle which started with a French Corps facing off against a larger Prussian armeekorps. During the battle which started at 07:00 and ended at 19:00, both sides received steady reinforcements. The French in the form of an additional corps each of infantry and cavalry. The Prussians received an additional Prussian armeekorps and just before nightfall a British infantry corps with some attached cavalry arrived. The photo to the left shows the early action with the French pressing to gain the Prussian side of the stream with both sides doing a bit of  'pinwheel of death' maneuvering. The photos below show action late in the day just before the British reinforcements arrived.

The campaign produced a good evening of gaming but at the conclusion the French decided that the uneven odds were too much to overcome so we called the campaign at this point with hopes to take another swing at it at a later time.