Pike & Shotte Rules – Warlord Games

Finally got around to trying out P&S in anger last night, using my 15mm ECW figures. I know it’s been out for ever, but I get distracted….OK?

Having loosely read them through, Two issues seemed odd to me.

1.       The splitting of infantry into separate musket and pike units

2.       The use of the “Hedgehog formation”.

Firstly, every ECW rules I’d ever encountered had combined infantry units (Pike & Shot together) and secondly, I’ve not read anywhere of the use of the “Hedgehog Formation” during the ECW and wondered how historically important it was?

So to this end we adopted combined units as per those advised on the Wargames Design blog.

I see that the new “To Kill a King” P&S supplement has finally introduced this option too.

The idea of the game was to become familiar with the rules mechanisms rather than test the skills and tactics of the players! So we just went for a straight forward encounter game, with both armies facing one another. All units assumed to be “Normal” in size and 2 Battalia per army with artillery support.

Early on my renowned dice rolling got me into a pickle with units failing to get off the starting blocks whilst others raced ahead breaking the line.

The main action took place in the centre where my semi-armoured Cuirassier pushed back my opponent’s infantry unit despite taking a casualty from the closing fire.

I decided not to follow up this with  a further charge and paid for it with an enemy counter-charge from their supporting cavalry, during their next move.

The demise of my Cuirassier started with them firstly having received a single casualty by fire from the pushed back infantry unit. As this was on a score of six, the Cuirassier became Disordered.

Then receiving a charge (even with delivering Closing Fire first) my unit failed to win the HTH and as they were Disordered, were destroyed. Harsh but probably fair……I should have followed things up.

This leads me to one issue that confused us all evening. The score of a natural six leading to Disorder. If that hit is later cancelled out by a Morale Save, does the Disorder still stand???

Anyone know?

All-in-all an enjoyable evening’s gaming. I think P&S’s mechanisms will be easily learnt as we play more and I think an exercise separating out those rules relevant only to the ECW would help there.

I think we will return……

TT Combat MDF Church

Pleased with my TT Combat 15mm Ruined Town set, I decided to add their Church to my collection.

Once again, assembly was quick and straight forward. I sprayed the walls grey before I started. I had to leave the building secured with rubber bands overnight to allow it all to dry correctly.

You can see from the pictures that the roofs (all 5 of them) all come off to allow figures to be placed or to simulate damage, I guess. You can also see how bloody big it is!! Look how small the 15mm Comet appears alongside!!

Its more like a Cathedral/Minster than a church, and is clearly based on the Church in St. Mere Eglise in Normandy. It's therefore ideal for anyone wanting to game this action and would make a splendid backdrop.

At about £12 to purchase, thoroughly recommended.

TT Combat MDF Buildings

I saw these on Facebook of all places, part of a GF9 Tanks group, and decided at £10 delivered they were worth a look.The set was for 6 partially destroyed 15mm detached houses.

I've since discovered that they are stocked by Firestorm Games in Cardiff, and that they are the same company that made the 28mm Wild West buildings I featured a couple of years ago.

The assembly instructions were printed on the packaging and looked pretty straight forwards,

Each building was on one sheet/sprue of MDF. Nicely etched with tile & brick detail and cleanly cut through, especially around the window detail. Before I started I decided to spray paint the walls in white primer and the base & roof in grey primer to speed things up later on.

Assembly as expected was straight forwards. I used normal PVA Glue throughout construction. The roofs are assembled separately and remain detachable so figures can be placed inside.

Once assembled I washed the inside with black paint to simulate the house being burnt out and then started the laborious job of painting all the window frames, door frames and touching up the areas my primer didn't reach!

For rubble I used a course artist's textured paste I bought from Lidl many moons ago. It dries exposing the textured lumps which are simply painted black before dry brushing with brick coloured acrylic paint. Finally the buildings were given a "dusty" dry brushing and a coat of Anti-Shine matt varnish from Army Painter.

There are three styles of building in the pack, each one duplicated. I added a couple of matchsticks for fallen rafters and a little flock around the outside of each building. Altogether a nice little project which has given me six very robust terrain pieces for WW2-Modern gaming.

Thoroughly recommended.

My New Wargaming Room

Our new house has a detached garage which had already been partially converted to an Office. I've a feeling that it was probably the show house on the estate and that this was the sales room.

It is split into three, a small storeroom 1.6m2, a lobby area 1.6m2 and an office 2.9 x 3.6m.

To keep everyone happy the lobby area has been configured to hold the tumble dryer, freezer and recycling paraphernalia.

However the storeroom is mine! and is now floor to ceiling, full of wargaming stuff.

The main office area has become my library/painting room/wargaming area.

The pictures will tell the story.

And I've just produced my first output since finishing the garage.....two FOW Western Desert Jeeps

I'm Back Again!

Well after a somewhat traumatic two years travelling 60 miles each way to work and not having time to even pick up a paintbrush or D6, we've finally moved to sunny Wales and I now have my very own Wargaming Room!

More to follow.....

Zvezda Stuart "Honey"

I see that Zvezda have brought out (or are bringing out) a shed load of new 1/100 Art of ataxic related AFVs thus year. So far I've seen the Tiger, M3 Medium and M3 Stuart in our local model shop, but am looking forwards to the Soviet SP a Guns and Elefant. I was disappointed to see that the Tiger was priced at £6 like the Cold War Vehicles. This doesn't make it particularly good value in my eyes when compared to the alternatives.....

Simple to build, the instructions are on the back of the box.

The model is moulded in sand coloured plastic like many of the recent additions. The boxes no longer include the stats cards. These are now available to download on line.

All the 12 parts are on a single sprue and are easy to remove with side cutters.

The lower hull is assembled first. This fits together leaving a slight gap visible behind the track units. I filled this with a bead of polystyrene cement.

The upper hull is in one piece including the very finely moulded bow mg.

The turret is made from four pieces, but Looks the part.

The completed model is tiny, but is detailed and strongly made. This AFV can be used in so many theatres of action, ii is extremely flexible.

I chose a simple finish. Vallejo Russian Green substituting for British Bronze Green. Then a Sepia wash and finally dry brushing lightened Russian Green. I went back to my old way of painting tracks, light grey with black wash followed by flesh wash to simulate rust. Finally I based it on mdf and sprayed varnish to protect it. Just a few white allied stars finished things off.

Great little model.

Battlefront Pershing - finished article

Painted in Olive Drab, before sepia wash and then lightened Olive Drab dry brushing.

The decals were from QRF. I bought a couple of sheets  for a few pounds years ago. They seem to last for ever!! The vision blocks picked out in light blue to represent reflected sky light.

The model welcomes dry rushing with Iraqi Sand as there is so much fine detail to pick out. I based the model on mdf coated in sand and painted with cheap earth brown acrylic paint. After spraying with Army Painter varnish to protect the finish, I added some static grass in patches.

There you are, ready to go and take on the Tigers and Panthers!