Author: World2Dave

Leipzig DBN Refight

A bit late in posting about this, but never mind…

Over the first weekend of October I was fortunate enough to take part in a multi-player refight of the Battle of Leipzig 1813. This was put on by Alex Testo, who is one of the original authors of the DBN rules and who runs a very nice hotel in Scarborough. October being closed season, Alex likes to arrange a big game for people to come and play, and to stay in residence over the weekend. I attended the Gettysburg game a couple of years ago and when I heard about this year’s subject battle, I signed up immediately as it’s one I’ve always been fascinated by.

 

In the end there were 10 players (some of whose names I’ve forgotten in the intervening weeks – sorry) who assembled on Friday evening to receive a warm welcome from Alex and his family, an introduction to the custom-built table, the rules and the background to the battle itself. Then off for an excellent fish and chip supper, followed by some social time over a beer or two, during which we divided into two sides/teams to look over the table and forces, and make some plans for the battle.

Some of the armies, laid out by Corps:

I fancied playing on the French side and duly became that dashing fop, Murat. Our leader was Phil, who made a fine Napoleon (or possibly Custer), and our plan was reasonably historical – to hold Blucher in the north and try to bash the Army of Bohemia among the high ground and villages in the south. I had the left flank, from Liebertwolkwitz onwards, to defend against hordes of Austrians, Russians and Cossacks.

We hid the whole army behind the high ground and villages, leaving only 2 artillery batteries in view. The enemy didn’t seem fazed, and deployed in strength pretty much everywhere.

 

 

Needless to say, a 2-day multi-player wargame is about as difficult to accurately recount in detail as a real battle, so I won’t be attempting this!

The gist is that there was hard fighting everywhere, with the allies trying to take Mockern in the north in the face of desperate defending by the French. There were cossack shenanigans all over, trying to get behind the French into the baggage and to occupy objectives (fortunately I dealt with the attempt on my flank).

 

Mockern as the storm approaches:

The big fight was around Liebertwolkwitz, stretching away to both to me on the left, and the Imperial Guard on the right flank. Everyone seemed to have good and bad turns, and the combat swayed back and forth around the villages and ridges. The Guard went in, and a lot of it went down, but not before taking a lot of Prussian and Russian Guard with it.

 

 

The Austrians under Simon tried to swoop on Lindenau to block the French escape route, but they seemed to be walking in treacle and took an age to deliver their assault. He took the gibes well though 🙂

Leipzig and its garrison:

 

I got hold of the Reserve Heavy Cavalry Corps (lots of tough elite Saxons, etc) and managed to crush much of the enemy’s right flank, shoring up my own position at the same time. That was a lot of fun, and a highlight for me!

 

 

 

 

 

At the end there was a very fine line between winning and losing, and it came down to a couple of key combats to see which army would reach its break point first. The French just fell short, and Napoleon would once again have to retreat over the river to live to fight another day.

 

 

All in all it was a brilliant weekend, with very good company and an excellent game that played out so well. The social side was very good too, including some beer and curry on the second evening, and lots of banter throughout the two days. Thanks go to Alex and family for putting on such a great event, and I look forward to another one of these weekends next year hopefully.

SYW 6mm: a Re-start

After a long while, this is a project I am finally returning to – with an actual plan this time.

I have a lot of figures (all H&R), quite a number of which are already painted. But.. everything needs a minimum of a re-base and most need painting or at least a bit of touching up. A big project then, and naturally other things will need to go onto the back burner to accommodate this change of direction.

I’ll be using a heavily revised variant of the Realtime Wargames FPW rules, ie. retaining the core 6″ grid to govern unit positioning and movement, and unit bases to denote combat effectiveness. This will allow me to play some big battles with simple mechanisms, but of course I’m adding in the period flavour with specific rules for the SYW (and WAS).

The armies will be Prussian and Austrian, with a few Reichsarmee or allied auxiliaries for the latter, and to add a bit of colour and variety. After lots of thinking, prevarication and discussion with a fellow gamer, I’ve finally decided on the unit sizes and basing, which frees me up to get started. I’ve had many of the figures for over 20 years, and some for over 30. It’ll be good to get them ready for action again – hopefully there’ll be enough done for a small game or two next year. My initial target is to have enough to refight Mollwitz, or at least a SYW version of it.

Here are some of the first sample units, testing out the basing and the general look. Lots more to come!

The first Austrian Cuirassier brigade, regiments Stampach and Kalkreuth:

 

The first infantry battalions for each side, from the Prinz Moritz and Kaiser regiments respectively:

 

I’ll need some rustic German buildings too, for the villages of Bohemia and Silesia, and have plans to scratchbuild some basic cottages to add to commercially available churches, etc.

A Few Extras Painted

I’m happily lacking any hobby deadlines at the moment, so have been dabbling with whatever takes my fancy (ie. whatever is already prep’d and undercoated).

The latest minor additions to several projects include:

Two units of skirmishers for my 15mm Punic Wars armies. Numidians (Corvus) at the back and blurry Carthaginians (Strategia e Tattica) at the front:

A unit of 6mm Grenzers for my Seven Years War Austrians, which I might finally make a proper start on soon. Heroics and Ros figures.

The first 3 Austrian battalions for my 6mm 1859 army, H&R again. Two of these units need flags, which I’ll be making from pin and foil – so I can scrunch them up and not have to paint perfect double-headed eagles, etc! I’ve tried the Baccus ones and, for me, they suffer from being printed – the symbols are a bit pixelated and they’re faded rather than full of colour.

Who knows what I’ll do next, more soon.

Lion Rampant Game Day

Last weekend saw a dozen gamers gather together from far and wide (Scotland to Essex anyway) to celebrate Goat Major reaching extreme old age and to play some games of Lion Rampant.

The venue was Foundry’s premises at East Stoke Hall, and they generously laid on some superb terrain tables for us to use. Even if you don’t collect their figures it’s a great place to visit, as their ranges are extensive and go on for room after room. The recent addition of a huge display cabinet with thousands of beautifully painted figures is a real treat too. I have to admit that their old fantasy ranges got me interested, with a Frostgrave project to get back to sometime..

We had a great day, with 3 x 4 player games in the morning, using scenarios from the rulebook and card-driven random player activations. It worked very well and the guys on my table (Iain, Andy and Dave) had a lot of fun watching Iain hide (but win..) and Dave/Buff get massacred. The boasts element of the game is interesting and adds some characterisation and storyline to the on-table action, beyond just going for the objectives and killing the enemy. Not having painted my own retinue yet, I was very grateful for the loan of a lovely Wars of the Roses force from Gary. It was a small, tough, force of 4 x 6 point units and was interesting to use. That said, even a small force can be difficult to do anything with if you fail your first activation roll..

GM had worked up an interesting back-story and we were all fighting for either the King or the Usurper, as well as for ourselves. Scores were kept (I scored a net zero in the first game once I’d deducted unfulfilled boasts from the tax points I gathered!) and added to a scoreboard where both individual and team progress was recorded.

Some action from the morning game I played in:

 

 

After lunch we put all the tables together and set up for a big 6 v 6 bash, with players’ positions drawn randomly along their faction’s baseline. We had 3 objectives to fight for overall. There must have been over 500 figures in use, so it was a BIG skirmish game, but actually it played very smoothly and I think it demonstrated the flexibility of the rules. We reverted to IGO-UGO, with each side of the table taking its turn before swapping back to the other side.

Inevitably the game provided some excellent moments and a lot of entertainment, and after a couple of hours we had a result (by which time there were far fewer figures on the table). Scores were counted up (I scored about 8 this time, which at least contributed something to the Usurper’s side which I was on) and individual and team winners were declared.

Somehow Iain, who’s courage and parentage have since been extensively (and quite rightly) questioned on the LAW forum, won the Best General award amid great mirth and mockery. All’s fair in war and wargaming though, so well done Iain. The Usurpers won the overall campaign though, so a new and enlightened era was heralded.

 

Then we packed up and went off to warm ourselves up (it had been a cold day!) with a beer and curry night in Newark. All in all an excellent day with a lot of fun, good company and good gaming.

I like the Lion Rampant rules and the games they generate, and it’s very easy to pick up and get stuck in. I have the Normans in Italy retinue planned, and intend to switch my 15mm Dark Ages collection to this as well in the future.

Beef

Bought a few years ago, based and undercoated over a year ago – I’ve finally painted this very small herd of cattle. They’re 28mm (from Redoubt possibly?) and will serve as generic scenery in some games and specific loot-type objectives in others.

I took the lazy route and went with an easy colour scheme!
Not much more to say really 🙂

Cows (in skirmish order):

 

 

FPW Wurttembergers

I realise that many people (especially those who play solely in the larger figure scales) may not be able to tell the difference between the subject of this post and the previous one, but these are Wurttembergers as opposed to French 🙂

Although I prefer my armies and units to be ‘right’, there’s something nice about 6mm for allowing a bit of ‘fudging’ when it comes to figures, uniforms and flags. A wise man once wrote in a wargames magazine, “at this scale, who cares?” and, while I don’t completely subscribe to that philosophy, it’s something I do fall back on from time to time.

I wanted to add some contingents from other German states to my FPW collection and have decided to create a combined Wurttemberg and Baden division to join the Prussians and Bavarians. These pics are of the first 4 battalions of Wurttembergers, and there’ll be a few more to follow, plus Baden infantry and cavalry, and artillery from both. I’ve done the command bases too as part of this batch.

Of course Heroics & Ros don’t do specific Wurttemberg figures, and I was left with a choice of using figures with kepis (FPW French or ACWs) or… finally using up some packs of Napoleonic Prussian Landwehr I’ve had knocking around for a while. I was originally put off these because the headgear is a bit wrong, as is the equipment and pose – and they’re a bit bigger than the FPW figures. Then I thought, “at this scale, who cares?” and just got stuck in. Similarly with the flags, a shield, a crown and two heraldic beasts became 3 gold blobs and a black blob. I didn’t bother with the blue scroll at all.

All in all, I’ve decided they’ll do. Once they’re on the table they’ll look OK and the games are battle-level affairs so the players’ focus is on command decisions not button counting. That’s my excuse anyway!

More FPW French

Painting output has been a bit slow here lately, with the usual excuses of work and other commitments. However, I have tried to make some progress with my 6mm 19th century collections and have managed to complete a further (and possibly the last, although you never really know do you?) French infantry division.

This one contains some of the more exotic units that I fancied doing. Having already done Zouaves and Algerian Tirailleurs I decided that the Foreign Legion (present in the 1859 Italian campaign) and Marines (present in 1870) would be nice to add too. As my French army will be used in a variety of campaigns I don’t mind the fact that these two troop types weren’t really deployed side by side in either of the major wars.

The division is the 6th one I’ve painted over the years, completing 2 full Corps, and is structured the same as the rest. I use the To the Last Gaiter Button rules from Realtime Wargames, with a few minor modifications to formation structures. The French regiments are represented by 2 battalions instead of the 3 they actually had, to reflect the reduced regimental manpower in the field compared to the Prussians and Austrians. I also omit one of the brigadiers, to re-balance the command and control capabilities in line with the smaller number of wargame units compared to the actual OOB.

All in all, we have the following: 1 Divisional Commander, 1 Brigadier, 4 ‘line’ regiments each of 2 battalions, 1 chasseur battalion, 2 field batteries and 1 mitrailleuse battery. This represents about 9,000 men and 18 guns. This takes the French to about 60,000 in total, which won’t stop them losing on the table, but will help them look more impressive when they do!

All figures are Heroics & Ros as always. All but one of the flags are home-made (and a bit over-sized to look better) with pin and foil as I’d run out of H&R ones. I’ve also started giving some command bases a flag to help them stand out better.

Next up, a composite Wurttemberg and Baden division and 1859 Austrians!

John Ray AMG Vignette

At Partizan in May, where members of the ‘A Military Gentlemen’ forum put on their game, John Ray generously gave each of us a vignette he’d sculpted and had cast specially. This was made up of a superb pair of figures, with an officer being helped into his uniform coat by a servant, and naturally it was going to need painting so that it could get onto the table at some point.

I managed to get mine done towards the end of September, and here it is – presented as an officer of the Medetian Braganza regiment finishing his preparation for battle..

 

 

 

 

 

Many thanks to John for this gift, which I hope I’ve done justice to. Also to Jim Purky, who brought everyone a ‘Spirit of ’76’ vignette from his Fife and Drum range, which I have primed and ready to paint shortly.

 

The Savoy La Marine Regiment

After a fairly long break, a new regiment has joined my 18th century collection. This is the first of the Savoy regiments from the War of the Austrian Succession that will be part of my Fleurian imag-nations army of the same period. The reason for my choice of regiment is hopefully fairly self-evident; the red and green look superb together.

The figures are from the new Crann Tara Savoy range, plus a couple of battalion gunners from Minden Miniatures. The battalion gun is a Minden Prussian 3pdr. I was fortunate to have Dave Jarvis paint the figures, while Mark Allen did the flags, both hugely talented guys. I only did the gun and the basing, which still seemed to take me an age!

I’m reverting to 30-figure battalions for this period, having dabbled with 36s. Lots of reasons; flags in the middle, less to paint (when I actually do some myself), etc, etc.

Some more pics:

 

 

 

 

 

I hope to have another regiment completed over the winter and I’ll be adding a few things myself at the same time, all being well.

Some Progress on the Normans

I’ve now managed to get 3 plastic Norman knights done, representing truly glacial progress..

They’re quite nice to paint, it’s just the very limited time I’ve had to devote to them. So now I’m halfway through the first unit, and at least the leader is done. I am working on the other 3, which will include a standard bearer and 2 figures with their spears held overarm. Then it’s the foot unit, then the other mounted bunch. There’s about 7 weeks until they’re needed, so you never know, I might get them done!

The leader’s shield is a pre-cursor to the eventual Medetian pale blue cross, which I thought would be more interesting as a winged beast in this period. At some point someone married someone, and the original red field became quartered red and black, as displayed by my later Medetian forces. Even when it’s fictional, it’s nice for the history to make sense!