"Serrez les Rangs!"

¡La Emboscada! The Battle of La Mononguela, 1812

2012-01-22T21:07:00.001+09:00

Our first Napoleonics game of the year! It ended up being another somewhat ad-hoc affair, but nevertheless we achieved a clear conclusion, in a game which saw some interesting swings in fortune during the course of the action. A very enjoyable afternoon's entertainment, especially if your sympathies lie with His Britannic Majesty's forces in the Peninsula.

This game was not the one we had planned for. Our collections are growing, and as we now have two GW grass mats, my original idea was to try a "road movie" scenario, with a French column in the Peninsula escorting a small convoy of gold, rations, ammunition, dispatches, and fine wines from one end of the table to a strategic walled town on the other. Blocking their way would be a well-situated and fortified- but small- Allied force who is tasked with holding up the column long enough for incremental, but eventually overwhelming, reinforcements to arrive.

If the French could have pushed past the blocking force and get to the walled town with the goodies before the Anglo-Allied horde swallowed them up, they would win. If not- well, it's would be a few bottles of fine Medoc Grand Cru to be served alongside Milord Wellington's celebratory supper this evening.

I had worked out distances, forces, victory conditions, even some very-nicely done (if I don't say so myself!) chance event cards, not to mention some wagons and buildings. I was really looking forward to this one.

So what happens? It turns out that that Matt- who has the lions' share of British and Allied troops- couldn't make the game after all, as he has to take his wife to the maternity clinic for a routine scan. Shoganai, as they say in Japanese- it just can't be helped, and I'm sure Matt was as disappointed as we were. So it was back to the drawing board. Merde!

A quick muster among the rest of us showed that we had just enough units for another small game, and so we decided to give it a go anyway. The French outnumbered the Allies by a few units, and they had a unit of guard lancers at their disposal, whereas the Allies had no cavalry at all.

So we decided on an ambush scenario, with two allied units visible and another two using hidden placement. The French would be the unwitting victims, entering the table in column of march. They would have more men, but no inkling of what was awaiting them.

Anglo-Allies:

30th Foot (Cambridgeshire)
44th Foot (East Essex)
detachment, 95th Rifles
1 9pdr. section, Royal Artillery
1 10pdr. licorne section, Russian Horse Artillery (secretly sent by the Tsar as a goodwill gesture- bear with us here)

French:

1/5e légère
1/28e légère
1/17 de ligne
2e régiment de chevau-légers lanciers de la Garde Impérial
2 6pdr. sections, French artillery

Rod was the commander of the Allied forces, with Giovanni as his 2nd in command. Sada and I directed the French.

This was Giovanni's first time to play Napoleonics and Black Powder, but he soon picked up the basics and got well into the flow of things (in fact, he's now working on some Bavarians for a future game!).

As it turned out, the game ended up once again taking a lot longer to play out than we thought it would, and once again, Black Powder demonstrated that it is not a rule set that requires hordes and hordes of troops in order to provide an entertaining wargame.

So, on the report. Lots of pictures in this one!

July, 1812, and the British are on the move in the campaign that will culminate in the Battle of Salamanca. Unaware of the presence of the British, a French brigade is marching in column of route destined for Ciudad Rodrigo, as part of an attempt to recapture the fortress which was taken by the Allies earlier in the year.

The journey takes them through the village of La Mononguela, where the French are looking forward to spending an evening of well-earned R&R after a long, hot and dusty march. They are blissfully unaware that les Rosbifs, part of an advanced guard of Gen. Leith's 5th Division had already beaten them to it, and were waiting for them.

"Nice place for a picnic, n'est-pas?"

The French had the 1/5e légère leading the column, with the 1/17 de ligne and a section of 6pdr artillery under the command of Gen. de Sade. The remainder of the force brought up the rear, under the command of Général Victor-Eugène Bouillon-Cantinat, who was suffering from heat exhaustion that day (with a command rating of a lowly six- this was an attempt to balance out the force disparity for the game, but ended up giving the allies too much of an advantage as I think I managed to pass a total of three command rolls all day!)

Great was the surprise and consternation of the officers and men of the Fifth, as out of the hazy distance appeared the red coats of the 44th Foot (East Essex) Regiment, firmly placed across the road leading into La Mononguela.

But these gallant veterans of Wagram are used to the din and danger of combat, and gamely advance towards the foe. "Vive l'empereur!!!"

After a long march through the heat and torpor of the Spanish summer, the French are slow to respond. The Fifth find themselves unsupported while the remainder of the column stands stock still, like so many deer frozen in the British headlights as their officers frantically try to assess the situation.

The Fifth tardily form line, but another nasty surprise is in store as yet another British battalion- the 30th Foot- appears over the crest of a hill, almost directly upon their right flank.

"Nom d'un chien!"

The only saving grace for the French is that the British infantry, in their haste to get at the enemy, manoeuvres within the Russian licorne's arc of fire, preventing it from firing. But the situation is bad enough for les bleus.

Hit markers courtesy of "My Little Pony", it seems...

Taking fire from two sides, the casualties soon start to mount up. But the regiment holds on tenaciously, and passes its first break test.

The rest of the column tries to shake itself into some kind of order. But in their excitement and confusion, the men are slow to respond to the contradictory and confused bellowing of their officers.

"Order! Mon Dieu, get the men into some kind of ORDER! Those are cannonballs, not turds!"

"All I know is that the fighting's up there, and we're stuck back here! Time yet for a clay pipe, lads!"

The 17e de ligne manages at last to hasten forwards, attempting to form attack column and to support the hard-pressed Fifth. But they are slowed by an annoying inability of the French command to roll for more than one action at a time at best.

Being in column of route, the 17e, de ligne are in a position to make at least some progress towards the enemy. In Black Powder, units in column of route get at least one action, even if they fail their command roll. And the French were not having much luck with the dice today!

But just as they were about to deploy, men start to fall all around them as from out of the woods on their right, well-aimed rifle fire tears into their flanks.

It's the dreaded 95th Rifles, who on appearing from behind cover, surge forward and infiltrate the woods. There they promptly pour a devastating volley into the flanks of the hapless French infantry.

Simultaneously, the battered 5e légère, after having taken numerous casualties from the two infantry battalions and the Russian licorne, finally collapse under the pressure and flee rapidly to the rear. The odds are getting better for the British.

The 17e -remarkably- pass a crucial command roll, and are able to disengage from the riflemen on their flank. They then immediately move off towards the left to deploy in line in a gap between two small hills. The French artillery move with them at the gallop, to set up their gun on the far hill which overlooks the allied position.

A volley into the woods causes the 95th to fall back, but casualties are minimal.

The situation appears to be improving for the French, but it remains very much touch and go. Rod and Giovanni consult on their next moves, while Frank, visiting from a miniature painting club here in Tokyo, looks on.

The French artillery unlimber and prepare to fire.

Sada did a great job on modelling this Perry Miniatures artillery piece. The barrel and carriage are separate, and can be configured either firing or in transit. When the gun is in action, he replaces it with the caisson.

The caisson lid can be opened. The visual effect is superb, and it drew a lot of admiration from the other players and from onlookers throughout the afternoon. It really added a lot to the game!

The French deploy into firing line, but are already taking hits from the Russian artillery. That Russian licorne has earned a fearsome reputation for accuracy on the battlefield over the last year, and this game was to be no exception.

The 30th Foot begin an advance towards the French line, taking the opportunity to shoot at the artillery along the way.

The 30th then pour a volley into the 17e at close range. Ouch! Many men fall, giving their lives for France. Four hits, but the regiment passes its break test.

However, a second volley has them retire back in disorder...

...while the licorne also succeeds in disordering the exposed French artillery. Beset on all sides, it fails its subsequent break test; the crew quickly limber up and ignominiously head to the rear.

"Run awaaaaay!"

Gen. de Sade, his command reduced to a mere one battalion, makes good use of the "Follow Me" order and rallies the shaken 17e de ligne. They regain both their composure and their courage, and once more enter the fray. "Vive la France!"

Meanwhile the rest of the French column finally finds itself engaged. The 1/28e légère forms attack column, and sends its skirmishers to clear the riflemen in the woods, while a section of 6pdr. guns and the lancers move to the flank in support.

"Zis is not Hollywood, you mad English officer-type!"

"Go away, you blond Yorkshire-accent-speaking types. We break ze garlic-fuelled wind in your general direction!"

The voltigeurs take on the tenacious riflemen, and with the support of a couple of well-time shots from the 6pdr, make the woods too hot a place for the green-clad devils to hang around in.

Back to the trials and tribulations of the 17e. They close again with the 30th Foot, and in a sharp exchange of fire...

The 30th Foot is broken! The French rejoice in their first real success of the game. The British are now reduced to the 44th East Essex Regiment and the licorne, as the 95th have been seen off by more artillery fire. Could this be the turning point?

Alas for the reputation of French arms, t'was not to be.

Now came one of those occasions in military history where a regiment was to achieve results well above and beyond what anyone would have expected. Think of the 20th Maine at Little Round Top in 1863, or of the Bayreuth Dragoons at Hohenfriedberg in 1745, and this was the kind of reputation which the East Essex was to earn this day.

Before the 17e has had time to catch their breath, the 44th fall upon them. This time the gallant Frenchmen, having had passed numerous break test in the face of all odds, have finally had enough, and melt away towards the rear like snow on a hot stove.

"Sauve qui peut!"

Emboldened by their success, and by the inability of the French to throw anything near a decent command roll, the English commander issues a "Follow Me!" order, and promptly finds himself rewarded with three actions. He hurls himself against the 28e légère.

This unfortunate regiment had earlier suffered a command blunder (the only one of the game), and had fallen back towards the edge of the table. They manage to survive a volley of the 44th, but on attempting to counter-charge suffered devastating closing fire. Failing their break point roll miserably, they are unceremoniously sent packing.

And then there were none... almost!

In an insane act of bravado the English, again under the (very useful) "Follow Me" order, promptly wheel and advance to close range of the French lancers, and give it a rolling volley. They fail to inflict any hits, but are able to form square in response to the inevitable French counter-charge.

At this point the frustrated French called it a day. Cavalry unsupported by infantry or guns are helpless against squares, and with the artillery too far away to support the cavalry before they would be whittled away by enemy musketry, it was apparent for the French command that the day was irretrievably lost.

A credible performance and well-earned victory on the part of the Allies. The French could take comfort in the tenacious performance of Gen. de Sade's command, especially that of the 17e de ligne, who managed to survive numerous break point rolls before finally succumbing to the inevitable.

Another great game, and as I mentioned it lasted a lot longer than we expected it would given the size of the forces involved. With hindsight, we penalized the French more than we need have done given that although they outnumbered the allies, they were being surprised in column of route. It's been a while since our last game, and we forgot just how unforgiving low command ratings can be. Giving the overall commander a pathetic rating of six made it almost impossible for them to react in any coherent way. The allies had the initiative from the get-go, and never really lost it.

Next time I think we will increase the command values across the board, least of all to avoid frustration. They way Sada and I were rolling, even a command of nine would have challenging enough!

It is pleasantly surprising just how well Black Powder plays with small forces, but we are itching to play larger games. Hopefully next month the planets will line up, we'll all be available to play with new units to take the field, and who knows; maybe we'll finally be able to start using the brigade morale rules.

Looking forward to February 27th, our next gaming day! Maybe I'll get that convoy scenario in after all.

Napoleonics, Kiwi Style

2012-01-12T19:59:00.000+09:00

Over the last few months, I've been putting up pictures of some of my old buildings, models and miniatures that I have been working on, having brought them back with me to Tokyo from Vancouver when I visited the family last summer.

In a comment he made on one of my posts, Paul (of the popular Napoleonics in Miniature blog) asked me- presumably in jest!- the following question:

"You didn't happen to find any 15mm AB Naps you want to get rid of when you were back home ;0) "

Well...in fact, yes!

While burrowing through my old closet at my parents home, I came across a weighty cardboard box full to bursting with 15mm Napoleonics.

These were Russians, Austrians and Prussians, including at least some AB Russian dragoons for sure. There were also some Russian Minifigs, but most of them were from the Men-at-Arms range of Napoleonic 15's from a company in New Zealand, Military Miniatures.

These look very much like Minifigs; enough so that I believe that there was some stink or other over copyright, but I really don't know much about it.

MAA Austrian types; line officer and infantryman, jager bugler and officer. Got my doubts about that tall plume on the line officer, though!

The figures were okay, the worst feature being the cast-on flags and a rather limited choice of poses. But this was the 1980's, when the popularity of (much-missed) 2nd-generation Minifigs was at its height, so they fit the bill nicely.

Military Miniatures are still around in Auckland, although they do not do 15mm Napoleonics any more. They now go by the name of Battlefront Miniatures, a name which may be familiar to most of you!

I bought a whole load of these when the local retailer, Sentry Box West, was clearing out the line. They were very reasonably priced at the time, and on top of that I got them at 50% off. That's 50% off on top of the sticker price you see here, which means this Prussian 6pdr. gun cost me about 62 cents Canadian!

I didn't have the time while I was there to take anything like a proper inventory, but if memory serves there are Russian infantry, artillery + limbers, crews, cossacks, dragoons, Austrian infantry, grenadiers and cuirassiers, and Prussian artillery. Most are stil in their packs.

I ended up with a lot of command packs, and where I needed more infantry, gun crews, cavalry and the like I had intended to flesh the collection out with Minifigs.

However, as is the way of things, our group drifted from 15mm Napoleonics to 25mm SYW, and my 15mm Naps have remained in their box- along with some 15mm terrain pieces- to this day.

They are still in Vancouver, too, as I didn't send them over this time. I was already smarting from having spent $500.00 on posting other stuff over here, and had to draw the line somewhere. We are not currently gaming 15mm Naps, and are unlikely to do so, so back to the closet they went, although this time packed and labelled properly!

I did manage to bring a few samples over with me out of interest, and these are the ones you see here. The next time I go back, I'll throw the box with the rest of the miniatures into my suitcase for the return trip. Once they are here, I'll decide what I want to do with them all.

Finally, here they are again in front of what is bound to be a familiar building! No, I'm not getting into colonials, but after some architectural wizardry with plastic card, foam board and filler, this kit I had lying around of Airfix's venerable Fort Sahara will be turned into some kind of monastery or chapel in time for our next Peninsular War game.

Under the Spreading Apple Tree

2012-01-10T23:11:00.002+09:00

The village smithy stands. Or it may be a chestnut tree, but I don't have a lot of confidence in my arboreal knowledge.

Neither am I all that sure it's a blacksmith's, it's probably just a barn of sorts. What's most important is that it is another building finished and ready for the next game.

This is another Resin Building of Unknown Origin that I picked up in Vancouver back in the eighties.

The more I look at it and at the last building I completed, the less I think that they were actually Gallia models. I also have a two-story timbered cottage that I know for a fact is Gallia, and the moulding was a lot cleaner than was the case for these two.

This one was covered in bubbles, oozing resin eruptions, chips, and scars; it took a lot of work just to make it look presentable.

Still, when placed on a base and decorated with a GW tree, a barrel and spare wheel, and a pile of cannonballs painted up as a supply of (overripe) fruit ready for plundering, it looks decent enough for the tabletop.

Rear Window!

I'm glad to get these done, as it leaves considerably more room on the painting table to work on miniatures.

There is one more building I need to work on for scenario I have in mind for the upcoming game on the 21st, and this one will be considerably bulkier! The good thing is that I'm getting considerably better- and faster- at making buildings.

This Old (Resin) House

2012-01-08T14:44:00.003+09:00

My eyes needed a break from close-up painting work, so yesterday I treated myself by painting up some buildings. I managed to finish this well-known tavern, La Belle Alliance, so that at least the boys will have some refreshments available when waiting for their turn to slap around Matt's 74th Foot.

When I was back in Vancouver earlier this year, I had taken the opportunity to sort out the closet full of wargaming items still in storage at my parents' place. In the process, I came across a bunch of resin buildings of what are pretty much unknown origin.

Definitely useful for our games here, so I promptly had them shipped back to Tokyo. I bought this one at the old Sentry Box West gaming store many, many years ago. It may be an old Gallia model, but I wouldn't swear to it.

Regardless of provenance, it was designed for (back then, true) 25mm figures, and is on the small size for 25mm at that. As such, it actually scales out very well for both our 20mm and 28mm games, as for the latter it does not take up such a large footprint on the tabletop.

It had been very simply block-painted for fast service on the tabletop, and was in this state when I bought it back to Japan. Since then we've used it for both Napoleonic and WW2 games.

You can see it as it used to be in the centre left of the picture below, from a game we had last autumn.

Basically it is still a good model after all these years, so I decided it was worth tarting it up a bit. So I gave it a fresh new coat of paint and placed it on a wooden base, taking the opportunity to go for a new blue slate tile roof instead of the original dull red. I thought this would make a nicer contrast with the brickwork.

Attaching it to its new MDF base proved more difficult than I anticipated as the model did not sit flat on the table. But I used lots of epoxy and a sand/ PVA mix to build up the baseboard and to fill in any gaps that appeared along the bottom edge. Worked like a charm. I then painted the base in a raw umber and flocked it in.

"Alors, right now a glass of claret would go down well, mes amis, Non?"

Oh, and when working on buildings and terrain, I go through paint like a frat party goes through cases of Schlitz. I really appreciate those Ceramcoat craft paints, which remain very economical for this kind of work.

All told, I think it looks great, and Bob Vila and Norm Abrams would be proud. I have a few other buildings which need the same treatment, too. I'll be working on them between my miniatures.

Command Cadre of the 2/28e Légère

2012-01-04T16:45:00.002+09:00

I've made the first significant progress with the second battalion of light infantry I've been working on.

However, a few changes were necessary. The original plan was to model the 1/6e Légère, under the recently-painted Major Guillaume Vendredi du Bonton.

However, I discovered first that the horse really wouldn't fit on the bases I had to hand, and secondly that I actually didn't have a first battalion flag. I think I will simply promote the good major to a brigade commander at some point in the future, as I really like the horse and think he deserves a base of his own.

So, I used a second battalion flag for the standard bearer, and the long-since finished (but hitherto unemployed) Hippolyte-Garçon de Vallée suddenly found himself commissioned Chef-de-Bataillon of what will now be the 2/28e Regt. Légère.

I won't work on the base yet, as I prefer to do that once the rest of the battalion ready to go.

The rest of the battalion is still being worked on, but I find that the having the first stand ready to go feels a step in the right direction, and does make me more motivated to get their comrades all done.

A tip of the shako to Henry Hyde and Neil Shuck, as one of the reasons I've made the progress I have so far was that I remained task-focused to the accompaniment of past episodes of their conversation on all things wargaming in Neil's production View from the Veranda. Thanks, gents!

Finally, I have made a start on my new Front Rank Wurttembergers as one of the tasks I set myself for the la Bricole painting competition. These are seriously nice miniatures, and should paint up both quickly and beautifully.

I'm pleased to say that I'm really getting a lot of pleasure out of my hobby recently. Looking forward to another game, hopefully on the 21st depending on everyone's schedule.

Prosit Neujahr!

2012-01-03T16:21:00.000+09:00

Bonne année et bonne santé, あけましておめでとうございます, and Happy New Year!

Today I started on prepping the first of my Wurttembergers. I'll begin with what will be either some skirmishers or part of an infantry firing line- I haven't decided yet, in large part because I'm not sure how the Wurttemburg line infantry organized their skirmishers.

Being organized on a four-company model, the Wurttemberg line infantry didn't have a light company unlike some of France's German allies, so I'm unsure whether they called out men from the third ranks for skirmishers, relied instead on their own light infantry and jager regiments, or whether they had a different system altogether- or no skirmishers at all.

I haven't been able to find any concrete information on this, so if anyone out there can shed any amount of light on the subject, it would be much appreciated. I've posted a query on TMP, so hopefully someone out there knows something!

Work on my French light regiment also continues apace. The first complete stand should be ready tomorrow. Also today I varnished the backs of the Litko bases, a necessary step to prevent warping once the bases are textured (especially once the rainy season sets in here during July).

Here's a photo of the train wreck that is now my painting table, and you'll just have to take my word for it that there is some finished work emerging from all that chaos...

Sapeur Postma

2011-12-30T13:56:00.003+09:00

Painting, painting, and painting. I'm beavering away on a light infantry unit I want to get finished before I start on anything else.

Yesterday evening and this morning I spent long hours on getting this one finished, as he is quite a bit more complicated than the rest of his comrades in the battalion.

Sapeur Garrin Postma, who, as a young blacksmith's apprentice in Lille, ran away to join the light infantry after Valmy, and whose strength and ferocity on the field of battle was legendary. Very handy with an axe whenever a gate needs beating down (or heads, in).

His colonel was clearly a fan of les Habitants.

This was a tough one to photograph. Lighting wasn't what it could be- too bright or too dark, and the reds and blues came out much brighter than what they actually are. The colours are really a lot deeper than this and the shading more subtle, especially on the apron.

But it will stand out well enough on the tabletop, which is where it counts.

A Front Rank miniature, of course, and a remarkably clean and detailed sculpt. It was a real pleasure to paint.

Grand Strategy

2011-12-28T10:05:00.000+09:00

Hope all of you who do celebrate Christmas had an enjoyable one. Mine was very relaxing, with good food and (of course) wine.

I've already posted my painting target for the la Bricole painting competition on the forum, and I'll share it here. It's a fairly tall order, too- at least for me. Three separate tasks to the project, which means trying to get about one done per month.

I'm almost sure that getting all three done by the end of March is unlikely to happen. But if I can get at least two out of the three finished and out of the way, I'll be satisfied.

TASK #1: For the French, more cavalry- the 4e Regt. Chasseurs a Cheval. These are in the 1812 Bardin regulation uniform, and are very nice figures. Along with my 7e Regt this will give me two regiments of light cavalry (not including my Guard lancers). They will look sharp in dark green with yellow facings. Twelve miniatures.

Painting cavalry (especially the harness) is always a laborious task for me, so including these as part of the painting target should give me the motivation to grit my teeth and get on with it for the sake of achieving a personal victory over my perennial foe, procrastination. I mean there are only twelve of them, right? How hard can that be?

TASK #2: Wurttembergers! These excellent new figures from Front Rank will be the painted as Regt Nr.4 (von Franquemont). Four stands of seven figures, with three stands of two skirmishers. I've yet to order the bases and flags, but no immediate hurry on those yet.

These hard-fighting fellows will be sporting the latest in fetching pink facings! Which should make for a great looking unit, especially as they are to be brigaded with the 1st (Leib) Regiment in their yellow facings.

The 1811-pattern uniform for the 4th Wurttemberg infantry is on the right.

(Image clipped from the Histofig plate.)

I've added a new page to this blog where I will post uniform, flag and other related information about the Wurttembergers.

TASK #3: Not related to the French, but I thought I would post it here anyway. I really need to get moving on my battalion of Nassau-Ringgworm Freikorps. Never heard of them? Not surprising, seeing as they are completely fictional!

You can find their "history" here, with that of their leader, the Black Landgrave. This is to be their flag, which I modified from a design provided from Not by Appointment, David Linienblatt's excellent blog on 18th C. flags.

They are actually Lützow's Freikorps figures from Calpe Miniatures, with some metal Warlord Landwehr thrown in the mix. They have been cleaned, primed, and undercoated for about a year, but as the allies have been outnumbering the French, allied troops have been put on the back-burner.

However, all those figures mounted on bottle caps really take up space, and I really need the more room on my painting desk. Therefore I want to try and get them finished in the coming months.

They are all in black with orange facings, so what could be simpler? Well, they're not so easy to do convincingly. Some time back I had painted a test figure, but I wasn't really happy with it; since then I haven't been quite sure how to approach painting black uniforms.

'La Bricole' Painting Competition Launched!

2011-12-23T14:03:00.000+09:00

First of all, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all of you out there. It's been a pleasure chatting with everyone over the last year, and being able to take part in sharing the enthusiasm we all have for this wonderful hobby.

This season marks a number of milestones for me. As I mentioned, I celebrate my fiftieth birthday on Christmas Eve; and if memory serves, it is now forty years since receiving my first plastic Airfix Napoleonic figures as a present from my parents back in 1971.

This month also marks the end of the first (tumultuous!) year of my stewardship of the La Bricole miniatures forum, having taken over from our honoured founder, Iannick Martin. The good Archduke had gotten the whole thing going as part of his Clash of Empires blog.

Last but certainly not least this happens to be my 100th post on Serrez les Rangs! Let there be rejoicing, followed by the copious consumption of turkey, stuffing, fine wines, and mince pies.

And of course, what better way of celebrating all of the above than by the official launch of the La Bricole Painting Competition!

If any of you out there feel inclined to participate, please do, you'd be very welcome. Starting Christmas day, the contest closes March 31st, so hopefully that will leave plenty of time for everyone to get their entries in. The theme is common-and-garden line and militia units, so a good opportunity and incentive to add that solid and necessary "meat" to your wargaming army.

Although I obviously won't be contending for the prizes, I'm looking forward to it. For my part, I'll most likely be entering some French cavalry and Wurttemberg infantry, which you will be pleased to know are still untouched in their box (largely because I haven't had the time to open them).

Bratwurst and Glühwein with Christmas Dinner this Year!

2011-12-21T18:34:00.001+09:00

If there are any other things out there as certain as death and taxes, it getting an order shipped promptly from Front Rank and getting it delivered equally promptly- and in one piece- by the Japan Post Office.

My Wurttembergers are here! Only seven days after I placed the order, and six after they were sent, despite the seasonal volume.

However, being a present, they are destined to remain in their box and under the tree, away from my grubby digits, until Christmas Eve. I'm chomping at the bit to open them, but why spoil the fun- and anyway I've lots of other stuff to do in the run up to the holidays and beyond, including finishing some more command figures.

Note the festive wrapping paper?

I have been trying to develop a quicker painting strategy for rank-and-file miniatures, which so far seems to be working. I've given up trying to speed up the painting on drummers, sappeurs and the like- I simply enjoy painting them too much. Once I get a bit more time (holidays start on Friday here, the Emperor's birthday*), I'll take and post more photos of what I've been able to do.

*The Emperor of Japan that is, not that Corsican Chap.

France's finest...

2011-12-18T19:07:00.001+09:00

Got some time in this weekend to finish painting my converted mounted officer of light infantry, Major Guillaume Vendredi du Bonton. Here he is, ready to lead his battalion into combat against the enemies of Napoleon.

I like the way the horse turned out. Various shades of browns and flesh, judiciously shaded with GW brown ink. As usual, the blue has turned out brighter in the photo than it is when seen under natural conditions.

He is a man of fashion, and, he wears the green gloves that are the hallmark of light infantry officers in his brigade.

He will spend a few days perched on the bottle cap waiting for the paint to cure, followed by a coat of matte varnish, while I paint up the rest of the command stand.

Pour la France, l'empereur, et Stuttgart!

2011-12-15T22:20:00.001+09:00

Of course I needed more miniatures like I need a hole in the head.

From Front Rank's newsletter

However, when Front Rank announced the release of their new range of Wurttembergers, the temptation was enormous. The fact that Front Rank also announced that there would have to be a price increase in January also made me think that it might be a good idea for me to get a couple of battalions before this would take effect.

I mentioned this to the Geisha-in-Chief (she being a bit of a history buff herself). And as this December 24th happens also to be my 50th birthday (ouch!), she suggested that said I could go ahead and order them as my birthday present. So with no vestige of guilt remaining to be reasoned away, order them I did!

Front Rank has always been among the best as far as mail order service is concerned, and these tough Teutons are now winging their way towards Tokyo as I type.

The contingent will be based on the order of battle for the Russian campaign in 1812, and the first brigade will consist of the 1st and 4th infantry regiments. Light troops are scheduled for sometime in the first half of 2012, and I'll be getting some of them as well. I'll be ordering the flags from GMB Designs as usual.

Wurttemberg troops had a very good reputation in the Napoleonic Wars, and easily meet my requirement for a contingent that can be used to fight for or against Napoleon, as the gaming situations and scenarios dictate.

I had first thought of going down the Bavarian or Saxon route.   But Bavarians, however, could never quite turn my crank. Saxons certainly did, but I fear it will be some time before Calpe get around to expanding their so-far limited range, seeing as they intend first to re-model their Prussians and have their hands full with their (excellent!) French releases.  At least with Front Rank, I know that the range will be completed within a reasonable time.

Wurttembergers, like Swedes, Westphalians and Saxons, have always been one of the more underrepresented nationalities in 28mm as far as figure manufacturers have been concerned, so these are a very welcome release, and will make for a relatively unique wargaming force.

"By God sir, you've lost an arm. And a head!"

2011-12-10T22:49:00.001+09:00

In between the rush between trying to meet year-end deadlines at work on one side, and preparing for the holiday season on the other, I managed to sneak in some painting and modelling time this week.

Some French infantry are now sporting natty overcoats and habit-vestes, and I was able to texture the base of an artillery piece. But a sudden- and, these days, rare- creative urge flew in through the window from out of nowhere, and perched itself on my usually lethargic shoulder.

Before it had a chance to take flight again, I quickly took out the razor saw, pin vice, epoxy putty, and some wire in order to do some converting.

This is to be the chef de bataillon of another regiment of French light infantry I've been working on. He was converted from this Front Rank mounted French officer.

A nice miniature, but unarmed, and as this unit is to be modelled assaulting its enemies with ferocious élan, I wanted something more dashing and more evidently eager to inflict some serious GBH on his foes.

I like my French officers to be unrepentant dandies, so this one is sporting a colpack, with a flamme waving behind him in the breeze. Both were modelled from epoxy putty, and I used a filed-down shako as the frame for the new colpack, texturing the "fur" using a sewing needle.

I added a plume that I had lying around, left over from a previous conversion done some time ago. I swapped the arm with that of a figure waving a sword, re-positioning the angle of the hand so that it looked more natural given the pose of the figure. After some judicious work with a rat-tail file, I then added epaulettes, a new collar and a gorget, all from Tamiya epoxy putty.

Not Perry sculpting by a long shot, but I really like the way he turned out.

Tomorrow should be clear and dry here in Tokyo, and he will get a coat of primer.

I have decided on which task I would set myself for the La Bricole painting competition, part of which you can see in the photo above. On the agenda next week is trying to set aside an hour or so every evening on the necessary- if tedious- task of removing the flash and cleaning up the moulding seams.

I like green uniforms, I do...

Update: the weather cooperated, so here it is primed and ready for painting, once the primer has had some time to cure.

"En avant!!"

Appelez la Cavalerie du Garde Impérial!

2011-12-04T11:36:00.001+09:00

This one will take some people here by surprise!

Voila, Le 2e régiment de chevau-légers lanciers de la Garde Impérial.

My first unit of "mercenaries", in that I didn't paint them myself- although I touched them up quite a bit.

When I was back in Vancouver earlier this year, I was at a game at Walt's place where my old friend Dave was selling off some professionally-painted Napoleonics that were surplus to his requirements. Among them being this regiment of Imperial Guard lancers.

This was not a planned purchase, the 2e régiment de chevau-légers lanciers having to my knowledge no place in any order of battle with or alongside the 8th Division. In fact, I had no intention of including any Guards at all in my collection, having always preferred to get the job done with good 'ol line units.

But the price was very good, and like most of my collection they were Front Rank miniatures, so I snapped them up. Besides, any addition to the French army in our group right now is a good one, seeing as how badly outnumbered we are by the Allies. And Guard lancers will go some way towards redressing the imbalance!

Now, when I say professionally painted, I would use that term loosely. We are most definitely not talking talent anywhere near the likes of Giles Allison or Sacha Herm here. Think more of a very inebriated Blind Pew given a paint roller, and you'll be closer to the mark.

On close inspection, I realized that:

bits of flash had not been removed from manes, lances, etc. Not a major problem, but why not do this before painting the figures?
lances, riders, and horses had been assembled using two-part epoxy seemingly applied with a trowel...
some riders had been glued to the wrong horses, for example a lancer on a trumpeter's horse, and vice-versa
The flag was...unique. More on that later.

Dave is very much a wargamer first and a painter/ modeller/ uniform buff second, and these painted miniatures he had commissioned met his requirements nicely. But for a more anal collector like me, there were so many problems with this unit that I came close to deciding to strip the paint off and starting over again.

However, that would have defeated the purpose of buying a painted unit in the first place, as the reason I bought them was to be able to get units on the table as fast as possible. And as they say, you get what you pay for!

So I decided I would do my best to try and fashion a silk purse out of what was very much a sow's ear, and here is the result. I'm rather pleased with how they all turned out in the end.

Before heading back to Japan, I had taken them off their (long-warped) cardboard bases, and for those which had been placed on the wrong horses, I separated them from their mounts. I did the same with the lances and riders where the join was weak, or where the epoxy had dribbled down like lava. I then packed up the whole lot and sent them on the long voyage home to Tokyo, for what would clearly be a major refurbishing.

I got back to work on them just after our last game, where it had become painfully evident they were very much needed! It took me about an hour's labour every evening for a week to get them where they are now.

I can't speak for accuracy, as the Garde Imperiale is not one of my areas of expertise. But I've a hunch here that the less I know, the better. Otherwise the errors will leap up and gnaw away at the grognard in me. Nevertheless, while they still won't bear too close an inspection from an expert eye, they will certainly look a lot more presentable on the tabletop now, especially after having been properly based.

The first thing I did was to replace the broken-off lances using superglue, and trimmed off some of the offending flash as much as I could where feasible.

After gluing the horse and riders back together, and mounting them all on their new 60mm x 60mm Litko bases, I then turned to seeing if I could take the paintwork up a level.

I had decided that I would at least touch up those areas which were more visible when seen on the tabletop. The paint job was very basic, and not too much attention had been paid to avoiding the paint from slopping over belts and the like.

The red paint had bled through the white crossbelts, so I did these over with white in those cases where it was more glaringly obvious. I also took the opportunity to retouch the trumpeter's uniform along the way.

The miniatures had been block painted in solid colours, with no shading whatsoever. The horses themselves really were basically done, and oh-so-blah. So I added highlights and drybrushed the manes and tails. This had the immediate effect of improving the look of the unit considerably, as did highlighting the blue of the shabraques, plastrons and collars.

The last thing to fix was that flag. For some reason (quite beyond my comprehension) someone had attached a Thirty Years' War cavalry flag! Off it came, to be replaced by a spare dragoon flag I had lying around (the word "dragon" having now been conveniently removed by a cannonball!).

Note strategically-placed battle damage on the standard.

Now, I suppose I could just have replaced the offending drapeau with one from GMB Designs, and I probably will the next time I get around to ordering from Grahame. But honestly, there is already so much wrong with this unit as regards authenticity that paying the price for a high-quality GMB flag may well just be putting pearls before swine.

At least they are carrying a French flag now, and from the right war!

Once the bases were textured and painted in line with the rest of my collection, the final product ended up looking a lot better than I had ever hoped it would. Certainly they will look quite acceptable on the tabletop, which was the target I set myself. I'll just have to squint to avoid noticing the remaining imperfections- and there are still quite a few.

Most importantly, they are ready to enter service, and should make their tabletop debut at our next game sometime in January.

And their arrival on the field should cause the Allies to sit up and take notice. In Black Powder, Guard lancers are a real force to be reckoned with; a hand-to-hand factor of 8, morale rating of 4+, and they get the special rules Reliable, Marauders, and Lancers. The Lancers rule means that any hits scored on the enemy while charging or counter-charging are inflicted with a -1 morale save if they are cavalry, and -2 if infantry or artillery.

Potentially an extremely lethal regiment, given the opportunity and a bit of luck with the dice!

So should they end up skewering some irritating British riflemen, or seeing off Matt's pesky regiment of light dragoons, I'll readily forgive them for not being as well dressed for service on le champs de Mars as they could be.

And having broken the "no guards" policy, I'm now wondering just how cool it would be to have some Polish lancers with which to brigade alongside their Dutch comrades.

Next up some artillery.

Muckin' out...

2011-12-03T13:45:00.000+09:00

Today is games' day at the West Tokyo Wargamers, but for the first time I have decided to give it a miss. Just too much to do this weekend for me to be spending the better part of a whole day gaming. I'll miss my "fix", but that gives me until January to get more miniatures and buildings done.

November had been a busy month on the home front. First I had to spend an inordinate amount of time giving the kiss of life to the La Bricole forum, which, except for a nagging refusal to remember passwords, is back to normal. Then, what with the cooler weather arriving here in Tokyo, the Geisha-in-Chief and I took the opportunity to reorganize, clean house, and to go on a "possessions diet". This meant throwing away or sending off to the recycling depot all those useless or seldom-used items that accumulate over the years. We also discarded and/or replaced old furniture, and just generally arranged things so that life can be run that little bit more efficiently.

It was amazing the amount of crap which had accumulated, and as the bags of garbage on the curb started piling up ever higher and higher, the neighbours had begun to assume we were about to move out.

The "Great Purge" included hosing out the Augean stable that my hobby room had become, and I've never been more organized that what I am now.

While it still looks a cluttered mess, it is an organized cluttered mess, with everything put back where it should be.

The results were immediate, and I've been finding myself sitting down and painting Napoleonics again. What's more, I've been enjoying it!

*****

The voting on what theme we should choose is now over, so I've been working on threshing out the details for the La Bricole painting competition.

I've been thinking about what my entry will be. One thing for sure, it will be painting figures I have rather than ordering anything new. That lead mountain is distressingly high.

I've a number of posts to make over the next few days, including some reinforcements for the French.

Competition ideas!

2011-11-19T14:38:00.001+09:00

This coming January will mark the 1st anniversary of my taking over the administration of the La Bricole Napoleonic wargaming forum.

To celebration the occasion of its rebirth- and of its resurrection after it's near-meltdown at the hands of the Forumer techs in October- we will be holding our 1st Painting Competition in the new year.

Before the competition rules and glittering prizes are announced, registered members of La Bricole first get to vote on the suggested topics for the competition. (New members, of course, are welcome!)

These poll be found here. Everyone gets two votes, and the poll runs until the end of the month.

Once the theme is chosen, I'll officially launch the competition around the end of December.

Somewhere in Russia, 1812...

2011-11-18T14:30:00.000+09:00

And a small force of French, far from home and hearth, find themselves in a life-or-death struggle against the army of... the Duke of Wellington!

Close combat! (Click on any picture to enlarge and see the gory details.)

Let me explain.

We had a Black Powder Napoleonics game on Sunday, our first since Achilleas heeded the call of the Hellenic Sirens, and headed back to the tranquility of life in Greece- taking his French army with him. His departure left only my few units of French with which to stem the scarlet and rifle green horde that is Matt's British army, recently reinforced by Rod's own growing force of redcoats.

Les Bleus could at least count on Sada's very talented (and speedy!) brush, and he was able to provide a much-needed boost to French arms in the form of a battalion of Perry French.

Sada has gone in for Napoleonics in a big way now, with a veritable tsunami of metal and plastic goodies from Perry Miniatures having hit Tokyo; about 300 figures worth.

I have, rest assured, been working on painting more figures, and in fact we had originally thought to delay the next Napoleonic game until December so that we could get more units finished. In the end, however, we couldn't wait that long- we needed a Black Powder fix, and needed it now. Junkies all.

So we decided to just grab what we had available and put on a "come as you are" game rather than no game at all, even if it meant unfinished units (but no bare metal/ plastic. We have standards).

Why Russia?

My Western European buildings are "off-line" at the moment, as I'm in the middle of giving them all a makeover. Just as with their 1/1 scale prototypes, wargames buildings get their share of wear and tear. So I've been putting them on bases, repairing damage and taking the opportunity to repaint them to my more recent standards.

However, I'd recently finished a bunch of Russian farm buildings- plastic kits by Pegasus Hobbies- for our WW2 Eastern Front games. While designed for 20mm gaming, these excellent models are on the large end of the scale, and do very nicely for 28mm. Hence Thomas Lobster's new adventures in the steppes. Suspend disbelief, and imagine the forested mountains in the Pyrenees may indeed have featured buildings constructed from logs.

Rod also bought along some terrain, some very nice hedges and walls that you can see in many of the photos.

Given the amount of British in their Peninsula uniforms, I suppose we really should be thinking about getting ourselves some Spanish/Portuguese style buildings as well. In honesty, I'm a "central Europe" guy so they are not a priority for me. But if any other member of our group feels so inclined, go for it (hint, hint).

The French Hordette

Another look at Sada's 17e de ligne. Nice, crisp paintwork, with the promise of more- a LOT more- to come!

	Above can be seen the woefully outnumbered French force. My 28e légère in the centre behind our 6pdr gun, Sada's new 17e de ligne on the left flank, and the (barely presentable) 7e chasseurs a cheval on the right. Behind them, but ashamed to be seen in public, are the practically naked 69e de ligne.

GdB Boullion-Cantinat orders his men into the village to forage for food, water, and fine spirits for the officers.

But the Allies have other plans!

For this game the Rod and Matt as the Allies were joined by Derek, who had dropped by the club for the first time. This was also his first Napoleonics game, and he quickly got into the thick of things.

Rifles and infantry are ordered to advance...


*Their brigadier talks the talk, but the men clearly don't want to walk the walk!* *This brigade, apart from the 60th Rifles, stayed pretty much immobile the whole day.*

Meanwhile, the French occupy the village.

Not much else they could do in the face of the Allied onslaught!

British Light Dragoons, and Rod's recent additions, the 44th Foot & 95th Rifles. What's wrong with doing some second-class line troops, guys, huh?

The game's afoot, and Derek orders Matt's Brunswickers forward in an attempt to storm into the village

Such exquisite painting and stirring poses...

...only to be unceremoniously seen off by a brisk fire from one of the village buildings, and from a successful charge by a decidedly under-dressed 69e Regt. de ligne!

Verdammt! Oh, the ignominy...

As luck would have it, the only unfinished unit of French infantry would be the one that performed the best on both sides throughout the game. The dice care not for sartorial splendour. In fact, the battle was notable for there being no real acts of heroism and derring-do on either side!

Meanwhile, the 17e smoke their pipes, play cards, and twiddle their thumbs, all the time waiting for the British to finish their annual brigade picnic on the left flank.

Things are far more active on the French right, where the French artillery shoot up the Light Dragoons despite fierce British counter-battery fire.

The Light Dragoons charge in! Twice they cross swords with the 7e Chasseurs...

But are defeated! The French are so far holding their own.

British guns leapfrog forward.

Over on the French left, the 60th Rifles have finished their cucumber sandwiches and petit-fours. Having packed away the silverware and linen, they eventually decide to return to the business of waging war.
But where has Monsieur Crapaud gotten to?

Bored by the inactivity, the 17e had decided to move to where the action is, and made a flanking charge into the British line.

Looks as if the French are going to clean Rosbif clock, right? Wrong! The charge was a disappointing failure.

Now, Sada is a real credit to the club; a very skillful painter and modeller, and the epitome of good sportsmanship in our games. But dice as a species, apparently, just simply hate his guts. He consistently rolled high when shooting, and low when break tests were required.

Rod's 44th Essex Regiment prepares to advance against the now veteran 69e de ligne

And are seen off! Cue Gallic taunts of triumph.

Things are getting nasty...

And the 60th Rifles, putting aside all inconvenient notions of chivalry and fair play, climb over the wall and gleefully start taking potshots into the backs of the French.

Things are looking grim for the 1er Empire, while the 88th and 45th British foot finally decide to move forward...

Only to fall back again as the result of a command blunder. Clearly not in the mood to shed blood today, especially their own!

It was only a matter of time before the French succumbed to the onslaught. The tenacious 69e were the last to go. But they retired off the field in good order, taking their general with them ready to fight another day.

Despite the unequal forces involved, it was a fun game. We played it so that only the Allies are subject to command blunders. And certainly the French gave as good as they got.

Having said that, having to game on a steady diet of last stands will lose it's lustre fast, so we need to get painting! As time goes on, we should see a steady increase in the number of Eagles being waved over the tabletop. Sada is proving to be as prolific a painter as Achilleas was, and we reached a consensus on ordering some ready-painted troops from Mabuhay painting service, so I need to get cracking on that this weekend.

*****

During the game, Sada was showing us his newly-acquired copy of the new Waterloo rules from Warhammer Historical. This is one gorgeously illustrated book- the pictures really took my breath away.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I am a sucker for excellent eye candy, and I think I've found a good Christmas present for someone I care about very much- me.

Sound the "All Clear"

2011-11-04T12:24:00.004+09:00

I hope!

It looks like the permissions issue has been cleared up, so La Bricole is functional again. Just a few minor glitches from an admin side- mostly cosmetic, but nothing significant.

Let me know if there are any issues I may not be aware of.

Now, back to painting! There are sixteen old Hinchliffe miniatures I'm in the middle of refurbishing, some post-1809 Saxon infantry. They are looking better than I would originally have thought.

La Bricole est retournée! (sort of...)

2011-11-01T19:21:00.000+09:00

Repairs continue, but at least our little forum is back and running. And with all the posts, data and photos intact, from what I've seen so far!

I'm not impressed with Forumer to say the least. four weeks (at least) is a hell of a long time to be down to switch servers, and why they didn't test it ahead of time beats me. I've been badgering their users forum regularly while it was down, but bar a few posts by admin staff the silence was deafening. Still, better late than never.

The only casualty has been the appearance, which has reverted to the standard style setting. But this is no real problem, and I can fix that later this week.

Anyhow, La Bricole is functioning again, so... feel free to contribute!

EDIT: some problems persist with settings, so if you are getting the message "this board has no forums", it's bollocks- they are there! It's a permissions issue that is proving irritatingly difficult to fix, and I've reported it to Forumer.

If it's not broken...

2011-10-14T11:22:00.001+09:00

...please don't try to fix it!

As those of you who follow the "la Bricole" forum are probably aware, the site has been down for about a week now.

Although the site had been running just fine, Forumer, the people who host La Bricole, decided that they would migrate their forums to a new server, and La Bricole was among the first batch to move.

Well, it appears that those responsible for doing it have had more than their share of problems trying to get it up and going.

Forumer hasn't been all that communicative about what exactly the problem is, or when we can reasonably expect the site to come up again. But clearly someone in the tech team must be a descendant of the guy responsible for keeping that bridge up for the French army to cross during their retreat from Leipzig.

Anyway when- indeed if- it is ever up again, I'll post it here.

*****

In other news, for those who haven't noticed yet Sada has posted the first pictures of his Perry plastic French, and very tasty they look too! What with the new plastics on or coming on the market, and the recent releases in metal by the Perry twins, he also seems set on doing Russians.

We have already been tentatively discussing the possibility of a Borodino scenario for the bicentennial in 2012, and a scaled-down Salamanca re-fight is also a definite possibility.

Battle Report, and Heavy Losses

2011-10-09T16:15:00.004+09:00

I've been keeping my hands full over the past month or so with a number of projects on the gaming front. Since my last post, our club has played both a Napoleonic and a WW2 game.

Today I'll post a belated report for the the Napoleonic game, a real nail-biter that once again saw us merrily ignore the brigade morale rules and fight bitterly to the last unit.

This time I was playing with a Russo-Prussian contingent, and along with the British we managed to beat off a superior French force assault on a town. But only just!

The scenario was forced upon us by the fact that Matt had called that morning to say that he would not be able to make it as he was feeling ill, so that left us without all his British/ Allied forces.

Fortunately, Rod had shown up with his first painted units for Napoleonics, some very nicely done British infantry along with a company of the 95th Rifles and a single gun. Achilleas- our brushman extraordinaire- had bought his French horde along with a unit each of Prussians, Russians and British. I was able to throw in my Russian horse artillery battery, so I took command of the Russians and Prussians defending a village on the right with the British aligned on the left flank.

The French we had available to us would have badly outnumbered the allies, so we decided not to field my 28e Légère (no doubt still smarting from losing their Eagle last game), and not to give the French any artillery. This was to make their prospects of victory immeasurably more difficult.

The French objective was simple, to take all the buildings. Pete and Achilleas were the French, Rod and I the Allies. Rules were, of course, Black Powder.

We had Pete's gorgeous buildings to fight over, along with some resin models I had brought back with me from my recent trip home to Vancouver. I bought these back in about 1985, so it was nice to see them getting some use again. They are smallish 25mm, so work well both with our Napoleonic games and with our 20mm WW2 games.

One thing I didn't bring was my trusty new camera, so I had to resort to the less-than-ideal camera on my cellphone. That, plus poor room lighting that day, means the photo quality isn't what it could be.

The French enter the field. They were to dice to see when they arrived on the battlefield. To the horror of the allies, both forces came in on turn one!

Frenchies coming out of the mist.

The forces of Liberty and Freedom deploy. The Prussians on the right were to garrison the buildings, and held out against Pete's assault for far longer than I dared to hope. The Russians were to prove the battle winner!


"My word, Carstairs, there are* rather a lot of those garlic-munching chappies out there, what?"*

Pete goes straight for the jugular, and moves quickly up the village (he rolled well and got in an extra move- gulp!)

The French grenadiers try a flanking move...

They are in a position to attack the flanks of Rod's British, or to wheel left and get the Russians.

They go for British, leaving the Russians free to exact dreadful retribution! First blood to the Czar.

Meanwhile, on the Allied left...

The battle on the left was a real see-saw action, and saw the French thrown back once before bravely giving it a second try...

The immortal 57e de ligne plunge into the attack..

...only to be routed, taking another two battalions with them. This was the first ray of hope for the otherwise extremely hard pressed Allies!

Back to the village, and la marée française washes up against the stone barn and tower.

The barn was held by the Prussians, who managed to throw back at least three separate assaults.

The Russians were in reserve, ready and willing to die to the last Pommeranian.

Finally, almost out of ammunition and having had taken heavy casualties, the Prussians break after an epic defence.

Their flight exposes the Russian licorne whose crew is soon shot down.

But the French have been exhausted in the fighting, and the Russians do what they do best- go in with the bayonet! We play it so the Russians automatically pass their first break test, which makes them an army to be reckoned with.

The battalion sweeps away the Swiss, and manages to stave off defeat in the village as the supporting units pull back.

"URRAH!!!"


On the left flank, Achilleas found out how useful the "Follow me" rule could be! The British lose one battalion but not before destroying the French cavalry.

At this point, with fewer and fewer manoeuvre units to worry about the game started moving very quickly, so that there was no time to take many pictures! It ended with the sole surviving British- an artillery piece and the commander- racing towards the right flank where the Russians had holed up in the chateau. The British gun was great at slowing the French advance due to disorder hits, and without artillery themselves, the French found it hard to deal with infantry in the buildings.

Steady attrition and failed break rolls saw the French reduced to a single unit, which made two assaults on the chateau. On a third attempt, they too finally broke!

For Czar, der König, His Britannic Majesty, and Freedom!

An Allied win, in pure Don Featherstone style with a handful of survivors still standing. "A close run thing" doesn't come anywhere near describing it

*****

Now, I did mention heavy losses. The biggest loss is that we are losing Achilleas. After long consideration, he has finally made the decision to move back to Greece.

Achilleas has been a real prime mover in our group, and has been all you could ask for as a gaming partner. Of course, he is an amazingly talented painter (as pictures both here and on his own blog have testified), and like the rest of us he really values the aesthetics of wargaming.

On the tabletop he always plays for the win (usually at the cost of a legendary wastage of horseflesh!), but above all he is a great sport and a real gentleman who knows what gaming is primarily all about- the enjoyment of shared interests with like-minded people.

Thanks, Achilleas, and best of luck for the future. You'll be missed, and should you ever decide to return there will always be a place at the gaming table waiting for you.

As can be imagined, this sparked a crisis here with the West Tokyo Wargamers (Napoleonic Branch), as his collection has accounted by far for the largest share of the French army.

However, all is not lost. At this point it's looking likely that the rest of us are going to chip in for a painted brigade from Mabuhay Painting Service (MMPS), which will give us a decent nucleus of a French force while we can slowly add extra units at a reasonable pace. Rumour has it that Matt is even to work on Neapolitans!

Also, it looks as if Sada- he of the exquisite Napoleonic ships posted here a while back- is about to jump into Napoleonic land warfare too, and he has been working on a box of Perry French. He already has some amazingly painted 15mm Napoleonic miniatures, and given his superb modelling and painting skills, these will be something to look forward to, I'm sure. And it will be great to have a Japanese gamer on board.

So rest assured, Napoleonics will continue to flourish here in Tokyo.

Last Stand at the Chateau Pignon, 1813, Pt. 2

2011-08-15T21:58:00.050+09:00

Or, size isn't necessarily everything! Continuing on from the last post.

Outnumbered, surrounded, a once-in-a-lifetime target, and you roll three "ones".
Don't you just hate it when that happens?

The small French garrison at Chateau Pignon has already been described. The 28e Légère is deployed to the rear of the redoubt in column, with a small unit of skirmishers on its right. In the redoubt is the French 6pdr. To the left of the redoubt is the 69e de Ligne in column, although it soon formed into line.

The much more numerous British had the following forces at their disposal.

Division Commander: Lord Benjamin Breeg (Command 8) - Matt

Darling's Brigade: Lord Henry Darling: (a coward! Command 5, Timid and Hesitant) -Matt

45th Foot (Nottinghamshire Regt)
5th Foot (Northumberland Fusiliers
60th Rifles

"Is that you, Darling?" Matt's 5th Regt. of Foot- some very nice conversions with Perry and Victrix figures

Strongbow's Brigade: Gen. Sir Septimus Strongbow (a very decisive leader rated 8. He could re-roll failed command rolls, but if these in turn failed, they would count as a blunder) -Pete

74th Foot
88th Foot (Connaught Rangers)
Royal Artillery (1x 9pdr. gun)

In reserve, the 14th Light Dragoons under direct command of Lord Breeg.

The 14th Light Dragoons. These were to enjoy a simply capital spot of hunting today, eh, what?

With numbers like these, victory was only a matter of time. The challenge of the British players was to see just how long it would take them to overrun the French position.

The British sagely avoided the meadow in the centre of the table, and which was protected by the guns of the redoubt.

The column on the left advanced slowly under its hesitant commander, and most of the time it required a direct order from the general to advance them at all!

"Move, Damn your Eyes, Sir"

The 5th Foot led the advance. This was their first time in action, and they were not to disappoint their commander.

Meanwhile, the British right advances steadily along the right side of the table. The 74th Foot- a consistently unlucky regiment- led the advance over a hill-dotted terrain, while the 69e de Ligne waited patiently behind a hill that rested on the left of the redoubt.

All the while the 5th & 45th regiments of foot continued to advance oh-so-slowly up the left side of the valley, while the French piquets- a small detachment of voltigeurs- attempt to enter some woods so that they can snipe at the flank of the British advance. However, they fail to reach the woods in time, and the 60th Rifles get there first- and in greater numbers.

The Rifles opened a galling fire on the picquets, who hung gallantly on in an exposed position before grudgingly giving ground, eventually retiring inside the redoubt.

At this time H.M's 45th Foot, a regiment with an illustrious record in our games, clearly decided that it had done its lion's share of the fighting for a while, and that it was time for the new boys of the 5th to earn their spurs on their own. They pretty much stayed put for the rest of the battle.

The 14th Light Dragoons were ordered to advance through the infantry to take a position at the top of a hill next to the Chateau (each unit needed a roll of 4+ on a D6 to avoid disorder, and bugger me if they all passed!), and they soon found themselves in a position to charge down on the flank of the French position, set on seeing off the French cavalry.

The 14th's bugler sounded the charge, and as they launched themselves down the hill, the regiment was promptly charged in turn by the 7e Chasseurs à Cheval. This was the start of what was to be a see-saw battle that saw both sides draw off only to charge each other again.

All this horseflesh milling about perilously close to their flanks forced the 28e to form square behind the redoubt, as the last thing the French wanted was to have the Light Dragoons in their rear.

On the right, the British continue to advance slowly through difficult terrain towards the 69e, and there is some ineffectual skirmishing as the 74th reaches the top of the hill. the 69e advances to close range, and gives them a volley that causes few casualties, but disorders their formation.

As the 74th fall back, the French choose to retire behind the safety of the hill. The commander is very aware of the British 9pdr. that is attempting to deploy at the edge of the meadow.

Disaster for the French, as the 7e Chasseurs à Cheval once again counter-charge the by-now-rabid 14th Light Dragoons, but this time, having received hits beyond their break point, they are forced to take a test- and fail.

Wipe that grin off your mug, Matt!

This leaves the French right flank exposed to a combined attack from both infantry and dragoons.

The action intensifies on both flanks. The 60th Rifles attempt to charge the redoubt directly from the woods, but are held back by their hesitant commander. The 5th Foot advance to the hill from where the dragoons had charged down into the French flank, and await their next orders.

Back on the right, the 74th are the victims of a command blunder, which sees them ordered to form up to the left of the wooded hill where they had been engaged with the 69e. This leaves space for the 88th Foot to advance and to attack the French infantry, but it also directly exposes the wretched 74th to the waiting guns of the redoubt.

The French artillery are thus presented with a fantastic target at close range...

Oh, boy, oh boy, oh boy oh boy (drool)....

...and promptly roll three "ones". Merde! Meanwhile, after an exchange of volleys with the 88th Foot that saw casualties on both sides, the 69e charges the Irishmen. They fail to break the redcoats, but once again both sides retire to lick their wounds. Still the French hang on...

On the British left, all hell breaks loose. There is confusion over an order to the 5th Foot; as he becomes increasingly frustrated with his cautious brigade commander, its colonel chooses to interpret one of Darling's characteristically vague orders for a tardy advance as an order to charge the enemy at once!

Now off the leash, the 5th charges exuberantly straight down the hill right into the hapless 1/28e, who are still in square as the 14th Light Dragoons reorganize themselves after routing the French cavalry.

The melee between the two is vicious. Despite all the disadvantages of having to fight in square (two dice against six), the French make a fight of it in their efforts to prevent the redcoats from entering the redoubt.

Things are looking grim for the French, but they enjoy some success on their left. The 74th decide that the best way out of their exposed position in the meadow is to charge the redoubt directly, but blasts of canister from the French gun proves too much for the weary Glaswegians, and they break.

But the end is in sight. After a heroic struggle and heavy casualties at the point of the bayonet, the 28e breaks...

"Sauve qui peut!"

They leave behind their dead, wounded, and the regimental Eagle which is seized by a plucky young officer of the 5th. Thus to the victors, the spoils: a French Eagle, the ultimate battlefield trophy, and a badge of honour unique for a regiment celebrating it's combat debut. So much for "newly painted unit" syndrome!'

"For Good King George and Merry 'ol England!"

Shortly afterwards on the French left, one last bayonet charge from the 69e is also repulsed, and they too finally break and leave the field. This leaves the British field gun free to open up on the redoubt, causing casualties to the crew and disordering the gun.

The last act in the sorry drama is performed by the ubiquitous 14th Light Dragoons. They charge into the redoubt, cutting down the hapless gunners there and taking the French commander, GdB Bouillon-Cantinat, prisoner.

"Okay, we'll call it a draw..."

The British are successful, but the French went down fighting! A small, but hard-fought and memorable engagement for all concerned.

Here is the second part of the letter that Général de Brigade Victor-Eugène Bouillon-Cantinat wrote while in captivity to his friend, Gen. Nansouty;

The drummers beat the Assembly, and in a short time both battalions had taken up their positions. The cavalry had mounted and was formed up on our right. The gunners in the redoubt were well supplied with ammunition, but sickness had reduced their manpower. I sent off the piquets to engage the enemy in the woods, but they soon returned, having encountered superior numbers and taken grievous casualties.

We are always hard-pressed to deal with the English riflemen, who both outshoot and outrange us.

I was taken aback to see that the English had succeeded in sending cavalry up the mountainside, and indeed they were well positioned to attack our right. I immediately instructed the colonel of the 7e Chasseurs à Cheval to drive them away. They were just moving into position, when in an instant the English fell upon them with terrible cries and howls.

I need tell the truth that some troopers broke and ran immediately, but the regiment held firm and met the onset of the English blow-for-blow. But the English horsemen were well mounted and evidently fresh, and saw off our cavalry, although without being inclined to follow up too closely. Upon rallying, we turned about and charged them in turn. I lost count of how many times the horse clashed, but eventually the English gained the upper hand, and at last the 7e fled back up the road, never to return.

This alarmed me considerably, as I was thus compelled to order the 28e into square lest the victorious English fall on them. Hence was I unable to support the 69e on our left, which was evidently becoming involved in a increasingly fierce firefight with the English to their front. They were on their own, and would have to trust to their own courage and prowess at arms.

At about this time, there was an attempt by the English to charge our redoubt directly from the front. A brave but foolhardy action, which was soon put to flight by some well-placed canister rounds.

The din of combat was indescribable; the cries of the wounded, the sound of musket and cannon reverberating off the mountainsides, and the shouts of the officers to fill up the increasing number of gaps in the ranks. Nevertheless, we were all startled by a sudden roar and beating of drums, and within minutes a wall of redcoats had came down on our right flank from out of the smoke. They headed directly toward the square of the 28e, and before our soldiers had time to shake out into a proper line, the English were upon us.

Then began a brawl, the likes of which I had not seen since the fighting at Aspern-Essling. It was an affair of bayonets and musket-butts, and our brave young boys sold their lives dearly. Being in square formation, every English bullet and bayonet found its mark, and I had tears in my eyes as I saw dear, familiar faces fall under the onslaught. But still the men stood their ground, and the English were not to have an easy victory.

At about this time, the enemy was able to bring a cannon up and start firing at the redoubt. This caused casualties among our gunners, and destroyed what remained of our brave piquets. I myself received a splinter wound across my forehead, as well as a severe contusion behind my right shoulder, which pained me considerably after the action.

Inevitably, superior numbers took their toll, and at around 9:00 AM, the 28e finally broke. I saw brave Lt. Verlez, ensign, run through by a pike as he was holding on to the regiment's Eagle, which was instantly seized by an English officer. A desperate attempt to recover it came to nought when an English cannonball, overshooting the redoubt, carried over and smashed to matchsticks about eight of our men who had formed a party determined on getting it back.

Next I remember was the earth shaking, and out of the dust, gore, and smoke again rode in the English horsemen, sabering our unfortunate gunners and those of the fleeing infantry that they could reach with their wicked swords. I stood with those who remained of my staff, sword in hand and prepared to sell my life dearly for France; I was, my friend, quite convinced that my time had come.

At that moment an English officer of light dragoons, whom I learned later was Major Ranulph Fetlock-Withers, Lord Nosebridle, rode forward with his hand raised, and ordered his troopers to lift the points of their swords. He then doffed his shako, leaned down from his saddle, and offered me and my companions quarter. Which, as there was nothing humanly possible left to retrieve from the situation, I gratefully accepted on condition that my men were granted all the honours and rights due to them as prisoners of war.

This was readily agreed upon, and after having a surgeon dress my wounds, I was taken to the English commander. This was Lord Benjamin Breeg, who treated me with great courtesy. I wished him the joy of his recent success, and he was most effusive in his praise of our defence in a most disadvantageous situation.

In due time, I was called on for an audience with Lord Wellington himself, who greeted me with kindness and respect in light of the reports of the action. Having given him my parole, His Lordship personally returned to me my sword. He then generously ordered that I be given a purse of 100 guineas to cover any expenses I should require until such time as I could expect to be exchanged.


"The fortunes of war, I assure you. A bottle of champagne and some light refreshments await you in my quarters, Monsieur."

*****

What a game! The only change we would have made to the orders of battle would have been to add another infantry battalion to the French side, so as to give them at least some kind of reserve. Maybe an extra gun, but I think just the one extra infantry unit would have given the flexibility I needed if not to avert catastrophe, at least to delay it's arrival.

Another problem for the French was just having one commander. When I failed a command throw, that was it! Having a second commander present, raising the command to nine, or allowing a re-throw of failed command rolls (with the risk of a blunder, as was the case with Pete's commander) would have been appropriate.

Matt had classed his unit of British light dragoons as line cavalry, with a ferocious charge (re-roll failed charge dice). I had chosen to make the 7e Chasseurs à Cheval lights, so as to confer them marauder status. This meant they weren't subject to penalties for being distant from the C-in-C. At the time this seemed a good idea, given I only had one commander. But it also meant they had only six dice in melee against Matt's seven, and it made a difference. As I was playing my cavalry fairly closely to the infantry, it would have been better to increase their hitting power instead.

One thing we could have done was to set the number of turns the British players had in which to turf the French from their position. We didn't, simply as we expected the French to be swept under in three or four moves at most! That they didn't was testimony to how well the rules can deal with "fog of war" issues. If we were to do this again, five moves would make a good milestone, with points given to the French for each move over that they are able to hold out.

I can see similar scenarios working for battles like Hochkirck in 1758, Champaubert and Fère-Champenoise in 1814, or the churchyard at Gravelotte- St. Privat in 1871.

All in all a great game, lots of nail-biting moments, and proof that a Black Powder wargame can be fun and challenging even without needing hordes of figures! I wouldn't mind doing something like this again some time in the future.

NB- the scenario was cobbled together the day of the game, but as I was laying out the table, I found myself ever-so-loosely basing it on the situation in 1813 at the beginning of the battle of the Pyrenees. I was re-reading my Oman a while back, and remember thinking at the time that it would be fun to do something like this.

However, our game had the roles reversed. Historically it was Soult forcing the passes, but this time I had the British on the attack. Chateau Pignon is an actual place, and all the towns and features referred to in Bouillon-Cantinat's description in his "letter" are historical; I merely took them from Oman's map of the battle which I referred to again when I got back from the game. Just to add to the flavour!

Last Stand at the Chateau Pignon, 1813, Pt. 1

2011-08-15T11:18:00.022+09:00

"The Roland of the Empire"

A letter written by GdeB Victor-Eugène Sardanapalus Bouillon-Cantinat, 13th Marquis de Sangfroid (1775- 1866), and dated Aug. 7, 1813.

Found among the Bouillon-Cantinat Papers, it now resides in the collection of La Bibliothèque Nationale de la Lorraine (carton #3204D). It is reproduced here with the kind permission and cooperation of Messers. J. Poinard and R. DeBrouiller, Directeurs de la Science Archivistique.

To: Gen. le Comte de Nansouty.
Aboard H.M.S. Sheldrake, off the mouth of the River Loire.

7e Août

Mon très cher ami,

I write these words aboard the British man-of-war Sheldrake, under Lt. the Hon. James Marlinspyke, in whose company I have had the pleasure of dining since my exchange was negotiated last Monday. He has been a most cheerful and considerate host, and the voyage has proved pleasant and uneventful, save the appalling damp, which troubles the wound I received in my arm all those years ago in Austria.

This evening shall see me ashore in France once again, and I hope to obtain passage to Paris once I have had opportunity to dine and refresh myself with a change of clothes. How I yearn for a decent Pinot Noir!

I am sure those scalawags in Paris under the machinations of M. le Duc d'Otrante [Joseph Fouché, Duke of Otranto and head of the Empire's secret police- Ed.] have already begun exercising their malevolent tongues in an attempt to poison the ear of the Emperor, and he will without doubt show me his wrath at the loss of the Eagle of the 28e.

But you, my dear friend, know of my unswerving loyalty to France, and will readily recognize the hopelessness of the position in which I found myself, as well as the bravery with which the men conducted themselves against overwhelming odds.

Fortunately, I was able to accept my fate in the glorious manner which has always been associated with the House of Bouillon-Cantinat, and I was always mindful of the spirit shown in adversity by my most revered forefather at the crossing of the Main at Seligenstadt in 1743, in the dreadful aftermath of Dettingen.

My tale runs thus.

It was in the middle of July, not long after the victory of Milord Wellington at Vitoria and as the English were laying siege to the city and garrison of San Sebastián. M. le Duc de Dalmatie, [Marshal Soult- Ed.] was in the midst of reorganizing what has remained of our army in northern Spain, and that part of the English army not involved in the siege was thought to be in need of a period of rest in preparation for a renewed offensive.

During this apparent lull in hostilities in our sector, my brigade was called upon to garrison the paths leading north from Roncevalles, parallel to the River Nive, which stretched north to St Jean Pied au Port.   I was to be entrusted with reporting on any movement of the enemy, as well as to prevent raids, incursion, or any such attempt to turn our line of defence.

This news pleased me not at all, as in the course of the recent campaign my command had found itself woefully depleted, being much in need of rest and refitting. I was further dismayed when a quick study of the map made it clear that the brigade would have to be dangerously dispersed in order to cover all possible approaches.

We were perilously exposed to the English lines; while les Rosbifs could be upon us in mere moments, it would take some hours for us to concentrate our forces, much less expect timely reinforcement.

Despite my numerous protestations, I was assured by my Divisional commander, General Tallon, of the support of other brigades in the division. However, given his exertions of the last few months he had prevailed upon our marshal to grant him a temporary posting along the Mediterranean coast, where he would be well distant from the coming fight.

Thus I found myself compelled to comply with my orders as given. Of course, what could a professional soldier in the service of France do, but to serve? I made my dispositions accordingly.

I established my headquarters at the the Chateau Pignon, situated in the shadow of the precipice that was the Leicar Atheca. At the village of Los Carlos to the west, I stationed Colonel Louis-Jean-Baptiste Cornebise with the 16e Légère and the 1/40e de Ligne.

At Loverdo, some distance southeast of the chateau, I posted the 2/28 Légère and both battalions of the 6e Légère under the capable command of Colonel Francois-Louis Zaepffel.

M. le Marshal's staff were confident in their intelligence, which indicated that that any attack would be most likely to take place along this route.

At the Chateau, (a place which, I was further assured, was unlikely to attract the attention of the English due to the forbidding nature of the terrain), I billeted my battalions most in need of rest and rebuilding; the 1/28 Légère and 2/69th de ligne. We also had with us a 6 pdr. section of the 2/8e Artillerie au Pied, and the 7e Chasseurs à Cheval. The latter had just received a number of new and evidently unwilling recruits, such being the decay into which France's cavalry has fallen since the dreadful campaign in Muscovy.

To make matters worse my trusted subordinate, Col. H-P Debroullier of the 28e, had fallen ill as a result of an ill-judged encounter with a woman of evidently easy- and generous- virtue in the days after Vitoria, and Dr. DeLancette informed me that this gallant officer would be incapacitated for a fortnight at least. This was grievous news, as it left me with no officers of experience who could assist me in the coming action.

It was with this small contingent that I would find myself taking the brunt of the English attack.

I had the foresight to order the construction of a small redoubt next the Chateau, overlooking a mountain meadow and the path that stretched to Roncesvalles. The ground was broken and hilly, in many parts covered in trees and brush.

It was in the early dawn of July 17th. I had just awoken to write some tedious report or other to M. Tallon, when a picquet of the 28e reported breathlessly that he had seen enemy troops, formed in assault columns, advancing inexorably up the sides of the mountain pass. Despite his agitation, he was a soldier of considerable experience in such duties so I immediately mounted my horse and rode out down the meadow, along with my ADC, Lt. Delalande, to see for myself what devilry the English may have put afoot.

My worst fears were realized when I saw the English army coming at me in force- two brigades at least, with supporting cavalry and artillery.

French arms had been caught in a trap of our own making, and my small detachment was to pay the price. Like Leonidas in ancient times, I determined to hold the pass for as long as I could, secure at least in the knowledge that posterity would judge the worth of our sacrifice. Vive l'empereur! Vive la France!

*****

After an almost two-month break, Matt, Pete and I had another game of Napoleonics using Black Powder. Achilleas wasn't there this time, as for some weeks now he has been hard at work soaking up the sunshine in Crete (a tough job, but what can a man do but his best). This means that most of our French forces were not available. Brits and Brunswickers were abundant, but French were in short supply.

So the question was whether Black Powder would be workable with so few troops on one side. Well, it was! We had a lot of terrain, so we set up a scenario based on the fighting in the Pyrenees during the closing stages of the Peninsular War. We used 3/4 distances for movement and firing, gave the British one fairly useless commander, but otherwise made no significant changes to the rules.

We had originally thought that the scenario would be a quick one, and that we would even get through a couple of games during the day. But as it turned out the game lasted for some hours, and although a French defeat was a given, it was a lot tougher for the British to pull off than I had dared expect.

The dice rolling had its ups and downs for both sides (I managed to roll three "ones" on a critical throw at one point- groan!), but the rules proved very much up to the task of making for a challenging, yet fun, game.

You'll have to forgive the use of unfinished units. As I am pretty much the terrain guy for the Napoleonic games, I have mostly been working on trees and buildings, as Achilleas' phenomenal output has seen us more often than not outnumbering the Allies in our games anyway. As a result, I myself only have one fully painted unit of French, with a cavalry unit almost done and only one battalion of the 69e de Ligne that was mounted on bases- many figures in the unit have been painted and are finished or near finished, but they still mounted on plastic bottle caps for ease of painting and varnishing.

I must also confess to having lost some painting "mojo" recently, as the heat here in Tokyo is really nasty, especially in my hobby room.   So while I would would have liked to have fielded all painted units, it wasn't to be. Shoganai.

I'll post the rest of Bouillon-Cantinat's "letter" later today, along with some more photos, some notes on how the game played and comments on the scenario. Suffice to say that Matt's new 5th Foot came out with flying colours- one of them previously owned by the French!

Wooden Walls

2011-08-06T14:38:00.007+09:00

Fire as she bears, Mr. Pullings!

Some of you may have noticed that I have been having issues with bandwidth running out my Fileden account. The good news I guess is that more and more of you seem to be checking out my blog(s), so clearly I am doing something right! Either that, or else some robotic bandwidth thief has been at work.

Of course the downside is that if this happens again, I'll need to consider upgrading my Fileden account (i.e. pay some money!) I'll see how it goes.

*****

Right, to business. Last Sunday (July 31st) the West Tokyo Wargamers had its monthly games day, with a much better turnout than expected given that it is the height of an extremely humid summer, with the children on summer holidays and many people on vacation.

Matt and Achilleas were both unavailable, so no Black Powder this month (anyway I had a good fix of BP when I was in Vancouver). Instead, Sada bought his amazing collection of Langton Miniatures' 1/1200 Napoleonic sailing ships, and I watched him and Rod fight out a small engagement using Warhammer Historical's Trafalgar rules, as you can read here.

Sada's dedication to the era is impressive, and it shows in his project. Boxes and boxes of completed models, each taking a full five days of work to complete.

Aside from his considerable modelling and painting skills, it must be remembered that English is not his first language. Sada painstakingly translated the rules into Japanese for easier reference. I cannot begin to think of how difficult this must have been, given the specialized jargon.

It was a gorgeous game that moved quickly and was a lot of fun. The seascape he created was very simple, but very effective. I can see more maritime madness in the future, and while Sada probably has all the ships we would ever need, I can see myself building a few islands and fortresses for the games.

For the most part I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves. You can click on any picture to enlarge it.

My favourite shot! French frigate starts to burn.

Note the effective sea- blue cellophane on a blue cloth. Cheap, too!

"Enemy in sight!"

Sada ponders his next move.

Santissima Trinidad, 130 guns

Oh, and the battle ended up a victory for the Royal Navy. But it was close!

Wine, women, and...

2011-07-17T10:55:00.137+09:00

Samurai!? Something completely different today for a change.

View of the moon rising from our hotel

Just came back from a few days along the gorgeous Izu peninsula, where we could relax with good food and lodgings, washed down with a few bottles of fine wine. A really great place to chill out.

It is always a good idea to pamper the Finance Minister from time to time- preferably before the next credit card bill comes in.

On the way back, and most likely of much more interest to wargamers, we stopped off at Odawara to visit the castle there. Odawara-jo (castle) is a reconstruction of the massive structure which existed there and which was the home of the Hojo clan, until they were defeated and absorbed into Hideyoshi Toyotomi's growing empire.

The Hojo on the march.

The Hojo used to control the area where I currently live, and in fact I live a few minutes by train from the site of an engagement fought between the Hojo and the Nitta; the Battle of Bubaigawara, which was fought in 1333.

Although a 20th C. reconstruction, Odawara Castle really is impressive and enough of the original foundations exist to make it worth the visit for those interested in such things.

(Click on any photo to enlarge)

close-up detail of roof ornamentation

Fortuitously there happened to an exhibition of samurai armour running at the time within the castle itself, so lots of great resources should I ever get that samurai army I keep thinking about.

In Japanese of course, but loads of pictures in this museum guide!

Much of the armour was representative of the more "decadent" styles found from mid-to-late Edo times, but there was enough period armour and weaponry on display from the 16th Century, along with some interesting examples of "ammunition" armours for poorer samurai and ashigaru, to make it well worth an afternoon's browsing.

On the way back to the station, we also came across the tomb of two of the Hojo family, Hojo Ujimasa and Hojo Ujiteru, located in a small plot right in the middle of the bustle of Odawara city near the train station. These gents paid the price for failure, and were forced to commit suicide after Toyotomi's victory. As you can see, people still bring offerings of food and flowers, and light incense sticks in their memories.

My favourite castles in Japan (of those that I've had the chance to visit so far) remain Hirosaki-jo in Aomori prefecture, which is one of the few originals, and Shiroishi castle in Miyagi prefecture. Shiroishi-jo is a reconstruction, but was built using original plans and building techniques.

Still, I enjoyed our visit to Odawara, and on my return found myself taking a second and third look at David's excellent range of Kingsford Miniatures samurai!

click to enlarge

The above photo shows some really nice units of Kingsford's samurai in Vancouver wargamer Steve Knight's collection. This was from a Korean War (1599) game I had in Vancouver earlier this month with the North Shore Gamers. We were using an unpublished rule set called Daimyo, that have been used successfully for well over twenty years now. David, the owner of Kingsford Miniatures, was there for the game but found himself commanding the Koreans that evening!

Samurai surge forward; the Korean commander is clearly not worried. With me appointed as his Ming Chinese "Ally" general, you'd think he'd have cause to be!

Part of the Korean Horde: some excellently painted Perry Miniatures in the collection of the other David there that evening; my old friend Dave Smith, who was hosting the game that night. He also wrote the rules!

All the foregoing has absolutely nothing to do with Napoleonics, but I hope that some people out there may find it interesting nevertheless. Napoleonic diehards take heart- my next post is on that Black Powder Napoleonics game we played in Vancouver. I just need to format the photos first.

Across the Pacific and Back

2011-07-14T10:33:00.022+09:00

Back from the land of moose and Mounties, where I had three weeks to relax (more or less). It was good to meet relatives and friends both old and new, to do some shopping, and even to get in some gaming!

I was able to take part in three games with my old club (now the North Shore Gamers). These included two games using Black Powder; an Austrians vs. French Napoleonic scenario and a scaled-down refight of the Battle of Rossbach in 1757. There was also a Samurai vs. Korean game using our old Daimyo set of rules written by Dave Smith. Lots of fun all round.

Foundry Napoleonic French about to be snotted by the Austrians. The shame...

A mouth-watering unit of Samurai- Kingsford Miniatures.

1757, and the Prussians and French go toe-to-toe without any pesky skirmishers in the way.

The Vancouver area has always had a strong gaming community, and even has a very well-stocked source of models, miniatures, rules and accessories in the shape of Imperial Hobbies in Richmond. Richmond is right next to Vancouver airport, and also happens to be where my family now lives. So of course I dropped by the store a number of times to browse and to pick up a few items that caught my fancy.

Francis Munroe, the owner, is into Napoleonics himself, as part of the White Rock Gamers (which includes Chris Leach who was closely involved in the development of the Shako rules). So unsurprisingly, there were lots of things Napoleonic on the shelves.

I snapped up a few boxes of the HäT 28mm hard plastic Napoleonic Bavarians. Now these are not Perry quality, and are at the smaller/ more slender end of the scale, but they were inexpensively priced. With a bit of care, they should make decent enough battalions which could see service with or against the French as numbers and gaming scenarios dictate. Among some wargames magazines I bought was an issue of Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy, which fortuitously included some very nice Napoleonic Bavarian and Russian flags in 28mm.

Other items I ended up with included a pair of 20mm Rafm M5 light tanks to complete my WW2 US tank battalion, and a copy of Mongoose Publishing's Age of Dreadnoughts. I wanted a quick set of rules for use with my collection of 1/2400 WW1 Austrian, French and Italian fleets, and this set looks likely to fit the bill. While I was at it I picked up a blue Hotz felt mat to replace my rather tatty piece of mauvish-blue cloth which I currently use for our naval games.

Aside from new purchases, I went through my own collection of books and figures which has been languishing in a storage cupboard since I left Canada for Japan some twenty years ago, and took the opportunity to sort through the lot. This meant trading off or discarding unwanted items and sending others back to Japan. Among those about to get a new lease of life on my side of the pond is a sizable Indian Mutiny collection, some more 20mm WW2 models, some old Citadel Vikings, and a number of resin and plastic buildings.

One surprising find was a battalion of 25mm Connoisseur late Napoleonic Saxons, which I can't even remember buying! I'd even painted them, although they need some touching up and proper basing. Although very "long in the tooth", these look a lot better than I would have expected for such old models. They have a undeniable charm, and while an individual figure can in itself look rather "gawky", I find that they actually look very effective as a unit- a case of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. Certainly not "State of the Art" miniatures but I will have no hesitation in placing them on the gaming table.

At present they are buried deep inside one of three big boxes that are on the long voyage to the Far East, and when they get here I'll post a few photos. Back then we were gaming with units of 16 to 20, so I need to order some more in order to have a full battalion for Black Powder. They will be a nice little addition to our games, and maybe I'll later get myself a few battalions of the Calpe Saxons in order to make up a full brigade.

Next up I'll post more about the games we played, including some neat ideas that were floated about and tried out for Black Powder. But first I need to get over some vicious jet-lag.

Stand down & fall out...

2011-06-20T09:07:00.002+09:00

Off for three weeks home leave back in Vancouver starting this week, so no posts for a while.

Aside from the usual R&R activities, I may get some gaming in with some old friends, and a trip to Imperial Hobbies for some more plastics is on the cards too. I'll be bringing back some more books from my (fairly extensive) collection as well, including that old favourite, Bruce Quarrie's Napoleon's Campaigns in Miniature and the Osprey books on the Prussian Army just to name a few.

First Shots from my new Canon!

2011-06-13T22:28:00.010+09:00

And no, that's not a spelling mistake!

Lots to juggle these past few weeks. I'm off to Vancouver for three weeks home leave starting next Monday, and the amount of things that have to be taken care of before I go would have taxed all of Berthier's powers of organization, let alone mine!

No time for much painting, but we did have a rollicking game of Black Powder on Sunday, and I was able to try out my new digital camera. A Canon S95, and I'm really happy with it so far, even though I'm still learning the ropes as to all its features. It has a great macro function, and I also bought a tripod to go with it so hopefully I can pull my cellphone camera into reserve, and post better pictures.

For this game, though, I simply made use of the zoom function for close ups, and didn't play around much with the white balance. Still, I was very happy with the way they turned out, especially given the generally crappy lighting on the day of the game.

Here are a whole bunch of them, to make up for a lack of recent posts. Click on any picture to enlarge.

Rod made some great disorder markers, using printed out paper flags and toothpicks. They really added to the game.

Johnny Crapaud et cie. arrayed in serried ranks. Rodney and Matt were the Allies, Achilleas and myself were the French. You can see Achilleas' version of events here, although I wouldn't put it past him to "doctor" the reports to deflect some of the emperors' wrath when he finds out the butchers' bill!

General Tallon harangues his staff.

Position of Shame on the left flank, my unfinished cavalry. Units that are not fully painted receive a morale penalty in our games. That way we get the numbers we need, but also have an incentive to get them painted!

The Allies consisted of British, Brunswickers, and Russians. My formidable horse artillery licorne is now joined by a battalion of infantry as well.

Achilleas did a great job on his first unit of Russkis. Of course, the Church Militant (eastern branch) was there in support.

GdB Bouillon-Cantinat sends his command forward.

Achilleas laughing maniacally at the sight of the imposing Gallic Horde. Matt, as usual, lounges unimpressed at the notion of even more potential fodder for the prison hulks.

Matt's British. He recently increased the size of his units, and they look very nice indeed.

En avant!! Sound the "old trousers"!

This is one of Achilleas' nicest units. Perry metals, here going off on their merry own way after another one of Gen. Tallon's trademark command blunders.

Gen. Tallon has always been a very aggressive cavalry commander, and this game was no exception. In fact, the rumour among the cavalry is that he really hates their guts. Here are Achilleas' beautifully painted hussars. in their all-too-brief battlefield debut.

New unit syndrome, of course, and his Swiss also fell victim again to the cruelty of fate and Brown Bess.

Things heat up! The scenario was childishly simple. The side who has the most troops in good order and left on the opponents side of the table by the end of the day wins. The chateau and the woods created a funnel which didn't help the French, although they considerably outnumbered the allies.

"Alphonse, do you smell borscht?"

The 28e legere scored well on their command roll, and pushed the 60th Rifles into the woods, passing alongside the Russian licorne battery in the process.

Puleez, let the Russians fail their next command roll! Puleeeeeez?!? Pretty please?

No chance, pal: ka-boom! What goes around in Black Powder, comes around. This wasn't pretty; seven hits and the unit breaks in a puff of smoke. Howitzers normally have a minimum range of 6". but the Licorne had a direct fire capability too. Merde...

Russians and French going toe-to-toe. We opted to give the Russians an automatic pass on their first break test, as a way of reflecting their legendary tenacity. This made them a very tough proposition indeed, and the French were repulsed- taking their supports with them! Grrrr!!!

Clergy and rifles rejoice...

The game ended in a technical French victory, but things were clearly going the Allies' way and had nightfall not come it would have been a real debacle for the French. So honour was satisfied for both parties, and the game was a real hoot.

As I said I had nothing new painted for the game, but that was in part because I got distracted making putting together plastics! Warlord Landwehr and Perry French. During the game Matt gave me a box of Perry Prussians that he had ordered for me in exchange for me giving him a bunch of Baccus 6mm Austrians, part of a stillborn project that I just couldn't get into.

The Prussians are exquisite, and are a little larger than the French. Which is fine, as they will go very well with my Landwehr and Front Rank Russians.

Black Powder Roster

2011-05-14T12:20:00.006+09:00

The day before the game, and I'm painting my fingertips off trying to get the cavalry and artillery finished!

I did manage to find the time to put together a unit roster for the Black Powder rules, which I heavily adopted from one that was posted in the Black Powder Yahoo! Group files.

click to enlarge

I just have the two more units to finish, and this brigade is complete.

A few evenings ago I starting putting together my first plastic units- Perry French infantry and Warlord Games' Prussian Landwehr. While the Perry offering is the best of the two, I've been enjoying working on both. The Warlord models will be very simple to paint, and I'm getting to the point where getting units painted and on the table quickly is a much, much more important consideration that any amount of detail on the individual figure.

I also realize that less is more, in that this time I'm not going crazy with different shades of greatcoats on the French. Less variety "works" better visually, and the eye has enough to take in what with the elite company frippery, facings, and all that kind of thing. Keeping things simple also speeds up painting time!

Over the Hill.

2011-05-12T21:03:00.000+09:00

I finished a trio of hills and rough ground to go with the trees for this Sunday's game. I wanted them to be quite rocky, as it makes them more interesting visually. That, and I was running out of (pricey) flocking so I didn't want to cover them completely in "grass".

They are simply carved pieces of foamboard, covered with a sand and PVA mix, with cork chips and small pebbles added as boulders and rocky outcrops. They were then sealed with a final coat of brushed-on undiluted PVA, and then painted using artists tube acrylics. Static grass was again glued on using- you guessed it- PVA.

I tried to make them generic enough to pass muster in battles ranging from the Peninsula to Russia, but also with an eye for a future project we are thinking of where something along the lines of Gettysburg's Devil's Den may prove very handy.

I had fun doing these, but I'm ready to get back to working on miniatures again after a refreshing break. God knows where I'll store all these, but I'll find a way.

Out of the dark woods at last!

2011-05-08T13:15:00.004+09:00

It has been spring vacation time here, and I spent a few days in Sendai with family and friends. Sendai city itself is very much on the mend, and while a few buildings remain damaged or shuttered up due to the earthquake, things are otherwise getting back to normal, with well-stocked shops again.

However, to the east of the city- the port side and the areas all along the Pacific coast- they are still dealing with the huge task of cleaning up from the tsunami.

Natori, a suburb of Sendai, a photo taken by a reporter not long after the tsunami. Much of the area still looks like that now. The desolated landscape reminded me of one of those bleak pictures you see taken during the Passchendaele battles in 1917, but with wrecked and abandoned Toyotas and Hondas instead of tanks.

Very, very sobering.

So when I got back, it took a while to get into a hobby frame of mind, but I really wanted to finish those trees- if for no other reason than to clear my painting table! And finish them I did. Here they are.

The bases were textured, with cork chips and small pebbles added for variety. I then "fleshed out" some of the trees with more hobby flocking, and sealed it all with a clear matte lacquer spray.

After that, I took a can of matte black acrylic spray and sprayed some of the interior areas for depth. Then I gave them all a few passes of Armour Yellow spray paint, from one direction only.

After looking at some trees in the sunshine, I realized that the sun and sky can make them appear many shades of green, yellow, and even white. So I decided on an impressionistic approach, and using the side of a fairly broad brush I just "tapped" on successive layers of light green, mustard yellow and finally (and sparingly) bright yellow. I'm very pleased with the way they turned out.

The bases were painted with artists acrylics, raw umber drybrushed with some raw sienna. I picked out the rocks with various shades of grey, and ran a brown ink wash over them for depth. Finally, I just added some static grass and that was it. In a few days I'll seal the flocking with another spray of matte lacquer spray.

So they are all set to go for our Black Powder game this coming weekend. No doubt they will be used by Matt's riflemen as cover from which to shoot up my Frenchies.

"It's a Fair Copse"

2011-04-29T13:17:00.009+09:00

Work on terrain continues, and I textured the bases of the tree stands that I posted last week. Since then I've made some more, along with the first part of what will be a Russian village that I hope will do service with both my 20mm WW2 Soviets and my 28mm Napoleonics.

The village unit consists of a resin cottage from Britannia Miniatures, and one of the wonderful Pegasus Hobbies Russian farm houses. The white patches are glued-down bits of old dishcloths, with the rest of the base textured with a "putty" made of white glue and sand. Once it has all dried out, I will prime and paint it all.

click to enlarge

The buildings are fine for my 20mm miniatures of course, but they should also do for 28mm as well. The Pegasus Hobbies building kits in particular are on the larger end of 20mm, and given unit footprints for Horse-and-Musket games, going down a bit in size for terrain pieces does not look out of place.

The pine trees were easy enough to do, and are ready for painting but the deciduous trees will require some more work, as the flocking drops off the branches at a drop of a hat(chet?). I will just do the messy job of soaking the foliage with watered-down white glue to seal everything together, and adding more flocking to the trees for depth.

Pining away

2011-04-25T08:07:00.006+09:00

Yesterday saw the West Tokyo Wargamers hold its first gaming day since the big quake on 3/11, and it was great to see so many people turn out- even if it did mean space was cramped!

No Napoleonics this time, as Achilleas was celebrating the Easter holiday while Matt was playing host to a visiting friend, so instead I took part (sort of) in a fun British vs German WW2 game.

However, I did get to meet a first-time visitor to the club, Rod, who is interested in doing 28mm Napoleonics and even has his own copy of Black Powder.   So at our next outing it in May it looks like there might be five of us playing Napoleonics!

In the meantime, here is a work-in-progress photo of a quick and simple terrain project I've been working on.

I've long been meaning to put some effort into "tarting up" our table with some better looking terrain pieces. So inspired by an article I was reading in a past issue of Battlegames magazine, I took a hot glue gun and tacked down some old GW trees onto some unwanted CD's (after gluing card over the holes, of course).

I then took some papier-mâché and spread it thinly over the bases. When dry the papier-mâché set rock hard with no warping, and this evening I will be adding some patches of sand to the bases for more texture.

After painting, I'll then glue down some foliage, fallen branches, and flocking around the bases so as to match our table mat.

These are looking pretty good so far, and when complete I have some deciduous trees ready for the same treatment.

One of the discs is/was an old compilation of country music that somehow managed to find its way into my otherwise-country-&-western-free CD cabinet. The only decent use I could find for it, in my honest opinion. Sorry, Garth Brooks, but different strokes 'n all that.

Battle of La Tour Sanglant- the Movie

2011-04-20T18:42:00.006+09:00

Back in February I promised that post with details of our last game of Black Powder- the (fictional) Battle of La Tour Sanglant. I thought I would put together another video gloating over- or rather, I should say, coolly and dispassionately analyzing the events of the day (yeah, right).

I was in the middle of working on it when the earthquake/ tsunami struck on 3/11. Obviously in the days that followed I had neither time nor inclination to work on it.

But time is a great healer, and I've recently been finding myself wanting to get back to some semblance of normality, which naturally includes time for hobby activities. So along with getting in some more painting, a high priority was finishing that video seeing as I had already put a lot of time into it.

Here it is- see how the 18e de ligne- "le Terrible"- earned itself elite status by performing above and beyond the call.

The Bonapartist Propaganda Machine at its well-oiled best! I'm sure Matt and Pete will be disgusted with the triumphant tone- even the editor of le Moniteur may well be blushing in his grave. But hey, winners write history, losers just keep re-writing it until it starts to look the way they want it to.

Eagle-eyed gamers familiar with Black Powder may spot the error we made- I didn't realize it myself until re-reading the rule book after the game. Oh, well.

This month at the club it's WW2 and the Soviets, as Matt and Achilleas can't make it this Sunday. But our next Black Powder game will be in May, and we're all looking forward to it.

Trying times

2011-03-14T15:47:00.006+09:00

The past few days have been very trying as I am sure you all understand, but I just wanted to post to say a sincere "thank you" to all those who have sent emails expressing their concern and best wishes. We really appreciate it.

I lived for a good fifteen years in the region that was struck by both the quake and the tsunami. Nine of them were spent in Sendai and in Ishinomaki, which- along with other communities situated along the coast- have been hit hard.

Many people I know and care about are still unaccounted for, and with upwards of 450,000 people without homes in evacuation centres, it will be a while before I can find out whether they are okay or otherwise.

Ishinomaki as it is now. I lived not far from the hill where this photo was taken.

Things are still chaotic here in Tokyo with train delays, cancellations, and power cuts, and probably will be for a few weeks yet. But in time life will get back to some kind of normal rhythm here, and I may even find myself in a state of mind to start thinking of toy soldiers- but not quite yet.

I did come across this quote in this article online, which is why I am confident that Japan will recover, even if takes a long time and even if it is never quite the same again.

"Some workers showed up on Monday at a factory in Kuji even though it had been destroyed. Asked why he was there, a young worker smoking a cigarette outside the skeletal remains said: "Because it's a work day."

They've been down before, and they'll get up again.

The French Victorious!! Battle of La Tour Sanglant

2011-02-28T15:06:00.014+09:00

At last, good news for the authorities in Paris- French arms emerge victorious! Vive l'empereur!

The "same old style"- that did just fine at Austerlitz and Jena- did just fine on Sunday as well!

This past Sunday at the monthly gathering of the West Tokyo Wargamers saw us playing Game #5 using the Black Powder rules, and it was a most exciting game, the decision being in doubt right up to the last few moves.

Other good news was that Achilleas has been accepted for his Phd program, which means that he will be staying on here in Japan for another three years. Congratulations Achilleas, and we are glad that you will be with us for some good games to come!

On to the field of honour. Achilleas and I were the French as usual, the army being led by General Tallon and his sizeable bureaucratic entourage.   Matt and Peter had the Brunswickers, British and some Russian artillery, all under the command of the Brunswicker General Schwartzotter.

Given physical limitations as a result of my recent -ahem- "indisposition", I was not able to sit down to finish anything new in time for the game. Fortunately though, Achilleas could add a unit of cuirassiers, as well his recently-completed 57th reg. de ligne ("Le Terrible").

For the Allies, Matt could boast his first unit of cavalry, a really attractive regiment of British 14th Light Dragoons. These were some wonderful miniatures out of the Perry stables.

This time there were only two units of unfinished miniatures on the table, so our games are starting to look serious affairs!

Turnout at the club was high, with upwards of twenty people taking part in games as diverse as 15mm ancients, D&D, boardgames and of course our own Napoleonics game. Unfortunately, the club was only able to book one of the smaller rooms at the centre this month, so table space was at a premium. This meant that there would not be a lot of open flanks, so this would have to be another hard-pounding slugfest.

Both sides were pretty evenly matched. Although the French had larger battalions, the Allies had rifle-armed units. The 14th Light Dragoons- while not getting the Marauder rule- got the Ferocious Charge bonus.

It was decided that the French would once again try their luck as attackers. Bien sur. The allies would benefit from the cover of the Tofusky Redoubt. This time however, each side took turns to place a piece of terrain down on the table, and the Allied army- being the defenders- deployed first.

We ended up with a layout and initial setup that looked like this.

click on map to enlarge

Note that the French decided to deploy their strength on the right flank, leaving the left relatively weak but with the cavalry in a position where there was at least some open ground.

Previous games saw French advances grind to a halt due to unsupported units with inadequate reserves being shot up one after another as they approached the enemy line. This time, we were going for an attack in depth along a narrow frontage in a relatively confined space. It was a plan that paid off- just!

The next post will see how the action unfolded. Lots of pictures! Until then, here is a bit of subdued- yet dignified- humility in victory, First Empire style.

Piling it on...

2011-02-12T13:53:00.006+09:00

What with work and the hobby, I have been spending a lot of time at the computer and painting table over the last few months, not to mention spending hours on end sitting in planes and trains over the course of a number of business trips. Mealtimes have been irregular and often I've found myself eating on the run.

The result is that I have developed a severe case of the same ailment that Napoleon so infamously suffered from on the day of Waterloo.

Suffice to say that I have new-found sympathy for the man. If I say it is a real pain in the butt, that would be true in every possible sense of the term.

It's one of those things that can be found amusing only by those who have never suffered from it. Concentration powers tend to go out the window, as does patience and the ability to sit in one place for any length of time. I am just grateful that I don't have to travel anywhere by bicycle, let alone on horseback.

So painting has to be done in very brief shifts, as does working at the computer. Still, I have been able to do a bit here and there in preparation for our next game, and I have also gotten around to putting up a report on our last Black Powder game, which you can read about here.

Not a good day for the French, but the Brunswickers are no doubt making plans for world domination as we speak.

Now where is that cushion? Hopefully this will soon all be behind me, so to speak.

The 1/28e Légère: "Souham's Landsknechts"

2011-01-29T16:33:00.012+09:00

Finally, a completely finished unit! This one was only seven years in the making.

The 1/28e Légère advances towards the foe.

We had another Black Powder game on the 23rd, which saw the 1/28e Légère make its debut as a full six-company battalion.

The weeks prior to the game were a mad rush that saw me having to deal with a number of short-notice projects at work, a nasty flu-like viral infection, and almost all the housework as my wife has been working major overtime almost every night as accounting deadlines need to be met.

On top of that, I was putting in marathon painting sessions that almost had me breaking the paintbrushes in frustration at slower-than-expected progress and stupid, medication-induced mistakes.

But I managed to get a lot done despite everything. I made major inroads on a light cavalry regiment, another artillery piece is well on the way to completion, and I was able to finish and completely base a six pdr. gun and of course the 1/28e Légère.

The voltigeur company rallies against circling Cossacks. The fellow shooting wearing the colpack was a conversion, and the headgear was made of epoxy putty. Of course, just after I did this Front Rank released proper light infantry voltigeurs wearing colpacks! Ah well, at least it's unique.

The battalion in line.

The 1/28e in column, proceeded by voltigeurs and supported by a 6 pdr. gun as Général Bouillon-Cantinat looks on.

I learned a number of lessons after painting these. First, a black undercoat really speeds things up. Secondly, paint the crossbelts first, and block in the colours around them carefully to save time and unnecessary painting.

Next time I'm going to tone down the contrasts a bit, and use a less varied palette for each battalion.

When I started out painting the 1/28e I decided that it would be multicoloured as a result of campaigning and supply shortages- not to mention flagrant disregard for regulations by its proud and eccentric colonel, Col. H-P Debroullier. All well and good, but using fewer colours will not only mean faster painting, it will also be less of a kaleidoscope to the eye. For my next unit of infantry I want to work more on varying tones rather than varying colour.

Thus for good reason, the 1/28e will be given the nickname of "Souham's Landsknechts" by the other, more soberly dressed regiments in the 8e Division!

La Bricole recommissioned!

2011-01-05T10:56:00.022+09:00

As some of you may already know, there has been a change of stewardship over at La Bricole.

La Bricole is a forum devoted to wargaming the Napoleonic wars, and has a small- but dedicated and very friendly- membership.

Over the past few months Iannick Martin, the forum's founder, has been finding himself with more and more demands on his hobby time. By late December having to deal with a new job and various other commitments led him to the conclusion that he would not be able to keep on running the forum given the little time he had available, and that he would probably be forced to shut it down in the near future.

On learning this, I offered to take over the management of the site myself, rather than to see it fade into oblivion.

Iannick readily agreed, and as the old site was a real pain to use in many ways, we decided that this would also be a good opportunity to move the whole forum over to a more user-friendly format.

So here it is! You can find the new forum over at:

http://bricole.46.forumer.com/

The emphasis at La Bricole has been on discussing Napoleonics very much from a wargaming perspective and with a love of eye candy in mind, but of course any contribution or question about the Napoleonic Wars would be welcome. We are a very laid-back bunch, with (so far!) none of the rancour that some Napoleonic discussion has seemed to generate.

Thanks to Iannick for his hard work with the forum over the years! It is much appreciated.

*****

So for anyone who enjoys talking about wargaming in the Napoleonic period, please feel welcome to come over and visit the new site. We would be glad to have you participate, or even just to lurk there from time to time. But of course the old saying still applies; what we get out of a discussion very much depends on what we put into it!

Hope to see you there.

The Battle of El Río de Lágrimas

2010-12-30T14:40:00.062+09:00

Some more pictures from December's game. As I mentioned, a victory for the British and their Russian allies this time. No doubt things would have been different had Gen. Bouillon-Cantinat been in overall command; but on this occasion the Tofusky Redoubt- manned by both Russian and British artillery- proved impregnable, as you can read here.

Rules used were Warlord Games' Black Powder, and as we are still building up our armies not all units are fully painted- especially the cavalry. Purists may want to avert their eyes from the photos, but in our defence we are making excellent progress so that in a few months we will have no more need of work-in-progress miniatures. At this point, we just want to get on with gaming.

The scenario called for the French to seize a strategically significant ford that allowed easy passage across the Lágrimas River. To do this they would have to take possession of the Tofusky Redoubt, which had been constructed by the Allies to cover the approaches to the ford.

The Tofusky Redoubt was a strongly defended fieldwork, manned by a joint Anglo-Russian gun battery. It was further supported by a brigade of British and Brunswick infantry, billeted nearby under the experienced command of the brave- if somewhat befuddled- General Graham Stuart MacDitherer, 6th Lord Ayrehead (Matt).

click on map to enlarge.

The French were under overall command of a long-serving veteran of the Grande Armée, the pleasure-loving GdD Alphonse DeSpicable (Achilleas).

French light cavalry piquets had determined that the far bank of the Lágrimas was defended only by a single battalion of Brunswick infantry, so a small detachment under GdB Bouillon-Cantinat (yours truly) crossed the river further downstream by night, and marched along the river so that by daybreak they would be in a position to overwhelm the Brunswickers. This force consisted of a 6pdr gun, the veteran 28e Legere, and the 7e Chasseurs au Cheval.

After having dealt with the Black Brunswickers, they would then cross the ford and take the redoubt by storm. Meanwhile the main French force would both hold the British at bay and draw the fire of the redoubt while Bouillon-Cantinat made his move. When the far bank was cleared and Bouillon-Cantinat was crossing the ford, they would then join in the assault by attacking the redoubt from the opposite flank.

View of the battlefield. The Casa del Cuspidoro in the foreground with the Lágrimas river flowing just behind it. On the left on the other side of the river can be seen the Tofusky Redoubt, menacing any approach to the Lágrimas ford.

Who put that pen there? The French line from the left. Bouillon-Cantinat's detachment ready to move against the Brunswickers, with the rest of the French force on the other side ready to move in concert with the flanking advance. Or so was the plan...

The 7e Chasseurs au Cheval look painfully naked here, but since the game I've been beavering away steadily on this regiment, and the next time they see combat they will be fully clothed.

The Allied line from the right flank. Brunswickers prepare to defend the ford at all costs. Very nicely painted Perry miniatures from Matt's collection. "Verdammt, unser General ist awfully far avay, is he not, Herr Colonel?"

After scoffing a pre-battle breakfast of grilled pork slices and a few fortifying glasses of fine Bordeaux (or rum/ champagne/ vodka/ schnapps, according to taste, rank and inclination), the action started with the French being given the initiative.

And what happened? The flanking force advanced according to orders; but the main French army under DeSpicable decided to use a brigade order to advance en masse- and he promptly failed his command roll. And I mean failed- double six, command blunder. Result- the whole force retreats off the table, and has to dice to come back.

Cue look of horror amid cries of "Nous sommes trahis!" from French left flank, and Allied gunners drooling in unseemly expectation of a jolly good few turns of target practice ahead.

By the time the French recovered their composure and came back on the board, the Allies had managed to stop laughing themselves silly, and the artillerymen on both sides had begun their devilish work.

One of the first French shots landed amid the Brunswickers, causing them to receive a disorder marker. Then the Allied guns in the redoubt opened up on the French left. The Russian Horse Artillery are quickly gaining a reputation for accuracy and effective fire, and managed to disorder both the French artillery and voltigeurs.

The French artillery replied, and in contrast to the efficiency and skill shown by their Russian counterparts, managed to defy the laws of statistical averages for the remainder of the game by steadfastly rolling a succession of "ones". But what else should one expect of a newly painted unit?

Under fire from the fearsome Russian Horse Artillery, the left flank French 6pdr battery acquires itself an unenviable collection of hit and disorder markers.

On the British side, the 60th Rifles were ordered forward to do some ineffectual skirmishing with the (depressingly tardily) advancing French columns of the main force, while the 78th were ordered to the centre in anticipation of the coming assault.

This required all of Lord Ayrehead's attention, while the Brunswickers on the flank traded shots with French voltigeurs, both sides inflicting disorder and casualties.

Meanwhile, the 7e Chasseurs au Cheval moved steadily ahead.

They would have moved a lot faster had I remembered that French light cavalry get to use the Marauders rule, meaning that they don't need to modify their command rolls for being out of command radius. This was not turning into a banner day for the 1er Empire.

Still, they managed to work their way up the far side of the Casa del Cuspidoro to outflank the Brunswickers. The Germans, being engaged with the voltigeurs to their front and suffering from disorder, were unable to reply. C'était un moment très délicieux.

Meanwhile back to the centre and right of the French battle line, where GdD DeSpicable had ordered forward the French en masse in mixed formation, battalion columns screened by skirmishers. Sound the Pas de Charge!

Here the 9e Legere, closely supported by the 18e de Ligne, ploughs into the 78th Foot.

The 78th yet again failed to write its name in glory across the history books, and it didn't do nearly as much damage as it could have at this range, and given its first-fire bonus. In fact, the next turn at the first break test they all decided to high-tail it back to the rear again, as they did last game. Matt wasn't pleased!

But while all this was taking place, the 88th Foot, blatantly disregarding any threat posed by the French cuirassiers, boldly wheeled towards the French attack and poured a nasty fire into the exposed flank of the 18e de Ligne.

And as luck would have it, this was one really devastating volley- it sent French soldiers down like nine-pins, more than decimating the hapless regiment, which soon broke under the pressure.

Lord Ayrehead knew he could afford to take the risk of exposing the flank of the 88th by wheeling. The French cuirassiers, despite their ferocious appearance, posed less of a threat than they looked. They were in a poor position to deploy effectively, a situation made even worse by poor command rolls.

Note Achilleas' great casualty markers.

Time was running out for the French, and the Allies still had the 45th Foot in reserve. But most importantly, it was becoming clear that the French would soon not have the strength to take the redoubt, for their centre had begun to crumble away.

While the attack of the 9e and 18e was being beaten off, the 45e de Ligne, as the photo below shows, had been slowly advancing directly into the teeth of the crack gunners in the Tofusky Redoubt. During its painstakingly slow advance, with many stops to reform its tattered ranks, it had taken hit after hit from both Russian and British guns.

After too long having had to endure considerable punishment and mounting casualties, the unfortunate soldats of the 45e de Ligne finally vote with their feet; the regiment duly fails one break test too many, and routs.

Clearly its largely unpainted state had resulted in a detrimental effect on unit morale.

This now opens up wide vistas of fire for the elated Allied gunners, who are not slow to take advantage of the situation. They soon direct a hot fire onto the vulnerable flanks of Frenchmen both to the right and left of them. Merde!

On the Allied right flank, all is not well as the Brunswickers get charged in flank by the 7e Chasseurs au Cheval, who have now deployed into line. "Sonnez la charge! Vive l'empereur!"

They survive- barely- but take many hits, are disordered and cannot form square. While the French cavalry reform for another charge, the voltigeurs open up on them again. Not a good day to be wearing the black, but they behave gallantly.

Again, Matt did a great job on these Perry Brunswickers.

At this point Bouillon-Cantinat, standing on the rise at the base of the castle sees that the Brunswickers are neutralized and about to be charged again by the indefatigable 7e Chasseurs. Seeing the French attack in the centre in dire trouble, he decides to risk all ,and to order the veteran 28e Legere- the last French unit at full strength and not suffering from disorder- to advance across the ford and directly assault the redoubt.

Meanwhile the French gunners on the left light up their pipes and rue their generals while continuing to see how many "ones" they can keep rolling up.

But alas for France, time had now run out; GdD DeSpicable remembered that he must take his leave shortly if he was to meet his mistress as arranged for an evening of gastronomic fulfilment and agreeable feminine companionship. What is more, the British 45th Foot was about to see off the remnants of the French attack in the centre, and the Tofusky Redoubt still commanded the crossing with its well-served guns.

So the French call it a day. But who will tell the Emperor of this failure....?

Another fun game, and we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. We are still having to get ourselves fully acquainted with the rules, but a few more games under our belts, and things should start moving a lot faster. As it was, we got six or seven turns in over four hours of gaming, which we consider pretty darned good.

The only truly annoying thing was the discovery that Achilleas had these in his box, but didn't use them in the game!

Sure they were Guard, but as this was the Peninsula, they would have come in handy as converged grenadiers. Certainly they were just too pretty not to have out on the table. Miniatures as good as these should not remain hidden in their carrying cases, for shame!

Another Black Powder game in January, and this time we need to see some Allied cavalry on the table. Some Russian dragoons to go with those horse artillery would be nice.

River of Tears!

2010-12-21T17:54:00.014+09:00

For the French, anyway!

The West Tokyo Wargamers had their monthly games day this past Sunday, and Matt, Achilleas and I had our second game of Napoleonics using Black Powder.

Brunswickers in trouble; disordered and unable to change formation, while out of view at the bottom of the picture are the 7th Chasseurs au Cheval busily forming line for a charge on their flank!

It was a real blast- almost literally, as the Allies (Russians, Brunswickers and British) were aided by the redoubt I built last week, and which was ably crewed by Russian and British artillery. But ultimately it ended in a French defeat, as les crapauds failed to take the redoubt which protected the river crossing.

At least it was certainly no walkover; both sides had their share of heroism- and of craven cowardice!

Suffice for now to say that the 8th Russian Horse Artillery Battery managed to perform wonders again, while my new French 6pdr- painted just in time for the game- put in an overwhelmingly underwhelming performance.

My very-much-unfinished unit of the 7th Chasseurs au Cheval, on the other hand, behaved most gallantly; wiping out the stain of their most shameful behaviour in the last game. They have now earned their place in the front of the queue on my painting table, and will be awarded the privilege, unique among French light cavalry units, of being able to carry their eagles on campaign.

Once I get some more pictures of the game, I'll put up a full report. No apologies for not having everything fully painted, but we are in the early days of Napoleonic gaming here, and the number of painted troops is growing steadily. We find that nothing inspires painting quite so much as does playing a hard-fought and enjoyable game with good company.

*****

I was lucky to be able to get anything painted at all this month, as work has been really eating into my time. But tomorrow marks the beginning of almost three weeks vacation, and I'm itching to take up the brushes and to get painting. My first task will be to finish off the almost-painted miniatures on my desktop, and clear the decks for some new units.

Redoubts for the taking!

2010-12-12T16:21:00.004+09:00

I finally finished that redoubt I was working on.

View of the Tofusky Redoubt. Russian Horse Artillery ready to dish out some Licorne cannister to Johnny Crapaud and his chums.

I'm really pleased with this one. You can see more pictures here, where I've detailed the whole (at times heartbreaking!) story of its construction.

With this project of the way, I can now work on getting some more miniatures done for next Sunday's game. Some French artillery, and more infantry. If we decide to have another game in January, there will be some horseflesh on parade as well.

The Distant Thunder of the Drums...

2010-11-23T22:12:00.018+09:00

I realize I haven't posted here for a good while now; the last couple of club games have been WW2 actions, as you can see here, so my hobby time has been devoted to that project in recent weeks.

However, this December we we have another Napoleonics game using Black Powder coming up, now that Achilleas is available with his growing French horde, so it is time to put on my bicorne again and to sound the pas-de-charge.

Not only that, but after spending the last month on plastic models and khaki drab for my Soviet army, my Nappy painting mojo seems to be back.

"It's only a bit of cannister! What are you waiting for, mes amis? En Avant!!!"

Today was a national holiday here, and I took the opportunity to work on some more sections of my long-neglected French and Russian artillery, which I hope to get finished before I hit the road/ air lanes for a couple of business trips over the next few weeks. The next three weeks are going to be hectic at work, but I've a couple of weeks off on the horizon, so I'm looking forward to some serious "Quality Time" with my paintbrushes.

A photo from our first Black Powder game. As you can see, our collections are still very much works-in-progress. But we are all steadily recruiting and training. Since that photo was taken there have been a number of fully-painted stands ready to take the places of those who, had it not been for the exigencies of the service, would otherwise have failed inspection!

*****

I'm sure by now it is no news to anyone reading this post that Calpe is coming out with a range of French Napoleonic infantry and artillery! As it happens, the news came out just after I received my first order from Peter.

Aside from the excellent service, I have to say I am impressed with the quality of sculpting and with the refreshing lack of flash and heavy mould lines. Some quick work with a needle file, and they were done and ready for priming.

And of course, Peter's new French range will be for the 1813 campaign; none of this hackneyed, done-to-death, 100-Days campaign fixation for a change. So that means it will fit right in with my plans! Safe to say that a battalion or so of these are likely to find their way into my recruiting depot.

*****

Finally, that redoubt is coming along nicely. I have it in mind for December's game scenario, so I need to get it finished within a few weeks.

I've added the duck-boards to the base, and have only the revetments to do now, along with some sandbagging around the tops.

Raided, Looted, and (almost) Burned.

2010-10-30T14:40:00.011+09:00

What a ride these last few weeks have been!

Our club had a great session last Sunday. We had the best turnout ever, and on this occasion we had to book a larger room. Four games on the go at the same time. It was great to see both new and familiar faces enjoying a variety of nicely laid-out games.

The continued growth of our club, and the amount of interest in miniatures gaming evident in the Tokyo area, is really satisfying to see.

Unfortunately, Achilleas and Matt were unable to make it with their French and British, so no Napoleonics this time. But I did have a fun Blitzkrieg Commander II game instead, set in 1945 with my Russkis taking on British (i.e not enough Germans to go around, as there were two BKC II games going on at the same time). I really enjoy that rule set for WW2 games.

I also received two boxes of Warlord Games' new Landwehr. I actually think they are really neat, even if they are not the most accurate out there. They match well in size with my Front Rank figures, were good value with free postage, and will be easy to paint.

That was the good news.

Much less fun was the fact that my wife and I fell victim to identity theft this past week. Some low-life had gotten hold of a whole slew of credit card numbers- ours included- from a very reputable company in the UK.

We found out from the card company after the jerks (a professional job most likely) had gone on what seems to have been a global spending spree. Fortunately the banking system was on the ball; they had caught wind of something fishy going on, and decided to put a tentative stop on the card while they contacted us.

After many phone calls and time off from work (at a busy time, of course!), the good news is that it is all covered by the card insurance, and we won't find ourselves out of pocket.

But you can imagine the hassle and pure waste of time we are having to contend with. We have had to contact other merchants and services we deal with, to let them know what happened and to transfer all other payments to a different card. We keep another card just for emergencies like this, but any new purchases of any kind are ruled out until the matter is officially settled and we get another card number.

Needless to say, je suis très pissed-off.

To be fair, the company in question from whom the information was stolen has been up-front and very communicative about it, sending regular updates to all involved. And certainly we live in an age where electronic transactions are a necessary part of life, especially for me living here in the Far East.   But merchants take note, from now on it is bank drafts or PayPal purchases only.

At least things are calming down now, and I can slowly get back to hobby stuff. We will most likely be able to have another Black Powder Napoleonics game on November 14th, so I will try to get the redoubt finished (coming along nicely now after some surgery and having added the gabions), as well as to finish up some loose odds-'n-ends on my painting table.

Protecting the Armoury

2010-10-16T14:40:00.008+09:00

With the prospect of more Napoleonic games on the horizon, and more gamers at the club, it was clear from our last session that we need more terrain- buildings, woods, rivers, roads- the lot. So I've been working on my allotment of trees as well as some buildings and structures for 28mm games.

I've made good progress with a redoubt I've made from old tofu tubs, and prepared bases for a row of resin buildings I ordered years ago from Hovels. These are great buildings, and will look good once painted and glued on the base with a surrounding fence. But being resin, they are heavy. I've also got the Hovels' carriage house, but that will be for later as it will be quite an undertaking.

In the background is the basic shape of what will be a small(?) armoury, something which seems suitable for opposing forces to fight a battle over.

I knocked it together this morning in about thirty minutes from various pieces of foam packing material- the crumbly white stuff- which I cut into shape and glued together with cocktail sticks and PVA. The whole was covered with packing tape to cover gaps and prevent the foam from crumbling away, and then I brushed it liberally with undiluted PVA to seal it.

I will then face the whole structure with foamcore panels, and add doors, beams, gables, chimneys and the like before the laborious task of roofing it.

Being Styrofoam it is extremely light, so should transport easily to the club despite its size.

The 10 pdr. howitzer in the redoubt protecting it is the next in line in my French for priming and painting. I've just about finished its companion, the 6 pdr. gun, and will post pictures of that once it is base is finished off.

Yes, I know I should be spending more time on painting miniatures! But to me good wargaming is a coming together of good companionship, fun rules, well-painted miniatures, and attractive terrain.

As terrain is notoriously difficult to cart around, and I have only a short distance to travel to the club compared to others having to take the train half way across Tokyo, it makes sense that I work on the buildings as others are already painting up a good number of miniatures as well.

And I do love making terrain, even if I keep on avoiding the annoying problem on how I'm going to store it all.