Blucher, Painting and missed another Devon Wargames meeting

It's that time again, time for me to post a pointless report of my attempts to do anything either productive or entertaining.

Productive.  Hmm, well I have managed to paint up a 28mm WW2 Russian platoon with some support options.  These are now on eBay and will hopefully sell to fund my next purchase. They were quite nice to make and paint, their faces are a lot less "cartoony" than some of the other Warlord plastic figures.  The British espescially always make me think of Captain Hurricane out of the old Valiant comic.  

28mm Russian Platoon

All told there are 46 figures, enough to do a full platoon with several support options for Chain of Command.  HMG, mortar, AT rifle and a sniper team, enough to give a decent game.

Entertainment wise, I have managed a small amount of gaming.  Monday night was spent doing a roleplay Pirate game run by Zob.  We managed not to sink, run aground, get captured by anybody or get anyone killed, which makes a change.  I am also in the process of fighting the Blucher "Hundred Days" campaign with Nathan.

June 15th, French invade and humbug the Allies

 All we have managed so far is the map moves, done over skype and leading to several battles.

June 15th saw the French move up with 4 columns on the right and 6 on the left.  The Prussians held behind the river in the southeast, while more Prussians and the Allied forces pushed down to block the bulk of the French columns.

Things are getting crowded on June 16th

 June 16th dawned and the French pushed ahead, moving in and scouting several Prussian and Allied columns, who returned the favour to the French.  Many forces spent the night camped dangerously close to their enemies and the men could sense that a battle was in the offing.

All hell breaks loose on June 17th

June 17th and 3 battles were declared!  War has certainly broken out in Europe again.  In the southeast(K and L 16, 17 and 18) 18 French units(C, D, F and I) will face off against 23 Prussians(M, P and Q).  The center (H,I and J 11 and 12)sees 28 French(G and J) advancing on 24 Prussians(N and O) and the western battle(H and I 8, 9 and 10) has 16 French(A, B and H) facing off against 17 Prussians(K and L) and 14 Anglo-Allies(R and S), with more Allies(T) hoping to arrive before the battle ends.

We were meant to do the first battle, selected by Nathan to be the one in the center, on Saturday at the Devon Wargames meeting.  Sadly I was sick on Friday night and didn't get to sleep until 6am, so couldn't make it.  Sorry Nathan, I would rather have been playing than sleeping all morning mate.

Anyway, that's been the sum of the game related activities this week.  Hopefully things will improve now and I will get in a game of Blucher at some point.  Have fun folks.

Warhammer Historical

Due to their half price sale on rulebooks I spent a few quid with Warhammer Historical over the Christmas period. First up was Gladiator, which seemed like a good plan as I had a few figures.

A lovely piece of eye-candy, the book is great to look at. Nice pictures, painting guides and ideas for campaigns. It all looked great until we played it. One thing that came to mind immediately was that it was a bit random. The strength and toughness of gladiators has little or no bearing on the fights. Weapon strengths are fixed and only armour has any effect. Then we come to the deadliest gladiator of them all, the retarius! He is a killing machine, with no opponent having a chance. He throws his net with a 2 in 3 chance of hitting, if he hits there is a 2 in 3 chance of entangling his opponent. If he misses it doesn't matter as he can throw it again next turn, with a range greater than his opponents move.

House rules will make this game work, but it would have been better if they had play-tested it a bit more first.

there also seem to be bits missing from the campaign rules, like the cost of a gladiator! Oh well, it was only £10.

The other set was Waterloo. Not that I plan to play it, but because it was pretty and useful for painting guides. Although, having read them they do look like a fun game.

Another shiny book, with some beautiful pictures of peoples figures and wargaming rooms. Only £18 as well, which is nice.

Ah well, off now to take some pictures of ships and gladiators.