19th Century 28mm – Page 6 – The Medetian Wars

A Very Eventful Skirmish – part 1

Yesterday Simon (Goat Major) hosted me for our second ever game using the Sharp Practice rules. We used one of the scenarios from the Compleat Fondler supplement, which involved the British attempting to rescue an important officer from the clutches of the dastardly French before he could be hustled out of the Peninsular. We took advantage of some of our own back-story from the first game we played last year, where the British commander, Fondler himself, was captured (due to my carelessness and Simon’s initiative). It was therefore Fondler who was to be rescued then, by his own men.

Simon had set up the table (6′ x 4′) as an exact replica of the one called for in the scenario, even going to the trouble of putting in some after-work sessions last week to add a necessary large hill! As you can see, the battlefield looked enticing to play over. Pics are from my phone, but hopefully they’re OK.

The figures were an eclectic mix of our 18th and 19th century forces, some on group bases and some as singles, along with the appropriate Big Men to lead them – and my new rocket battery of course. We rolled for sides, with me getting the ‘British’ and therefore being the one to attack. Simon duly set up a tough-looking defence of the church in which Fondler was being held, with one squad of voltigeurs under Sergeant Petain required to be out on the hills to provide warning of the British approach.

The various arrivals due included my main force of light infantry and the rockets by road at the start (on blinds), my riflemen (represented by Simon’s lovely Grenzers) via the middle road after a few (but randomly timed) turns, and finally the French cavalry which Simon had to hope would come to his rescue in time. The action kicked off with increasing numbers of my infantry peeling off the road to go cross country and push the voltigeurs back so the rockets could deploy unhindered. It was to take a long time to drive them away, which definitely had an impact on my troops’ positions in the closing stages of the battle.

I had some luck with the timing of my rifles’ arrival and they were soon racing to cut off the frustratingly resilient voltigeurs, who were benefiting from the cover offered by the scrub-covered slopes they were retreating across.

The game was beginning to hot up as the rocket battery deployed on the road within sight of the main French position and started taking fire from the enemy’s light gun. As the eccentric Major Brock (slightly mad scientist and inventor of these experimental rockets) ordered the first fuses lit, no-one on either side could prevent themselves from ducking a little in anticipation of the impending mayhem that was expected to follow.

Part 2 to follow..

Arrival of the Big Men

The Sharp Practice rules by the Too Far Lardies focus on the actions and impact of key leaders, referred to as Big Men. These are the officers and NCOs who take command in the heat of action and who are given personalities to add flavour and narrative to the games.

For Saturday’s upcoming game at Goat Major’s we are using a variety of figures to meet the requirements of the scenario. Most are in 18th century attire, but some are from a slightly later period. We’re not bothered, as it’s the game that’s going to be most important. One contingent I am providing is 40 ‘light infantry’ who will be on single bases to allow them to adopt skirmish order. For these I’m using my ‘post-Napoleonic to mid-19th century’ Medetians, in their distinctive Tyrolean hats (Victrix plastic Old Guard Chasseurs with Perry plastic Austrian heads). This meant that I needed a few ‘Big Men’ to lead them, something I had been meaning to get round to..

So, this week I have been busy painting these guys. They are on bigger bases than the rank and file (25mm vs 20mm) to help them stand out. Although I really only needed 4 for Saturday, I’ve managed to do 9 (4 officers and 5 sergeants) so I’ll have a variety to choose from for future games. I have a couple of Jager Big Men and a couple of mounted officers still to do which I’ll get round to sometime.

Here they are, Perry figures bar 2 from Front Rank. There are a couple of conversions; the officer waving the newly-added RSM sword and the one with 2 pistols, both of whom were originally pointing or designed to hold standards. They’ve also had head swaps. Hopefully they’ll make a decent showing in their first outing!

Officers:

Sergeants:

Rock it!

It started innocently enough. Goat Major suggested number 11 from the scenarios book, The Compleat Fondler, for our game of Sharp Practice he’s hosting next Saturday. ‘Sounds good’, I said, spotting, as GM had done, the need for a couple of rocket launchers. I offered to have a go at knocking something together. The Goat generously anticipated a lack of results and said we could always just use a couple of guns to represent them. The gauntlet was laid down then!

I knew I had a box of Victrix British Napoleonic artillery and thought I might use the gun carriages, at least temporarily. Then I spotted the limbers on the sprues and thought they might do even better. At this point I realised that I didn’t have much of a clue about what a period rocket launcher looked like, so I Googled Congreve and looked at some images. A ladder with some upright supports – not very inspiring (or mobile!)

However, the scenario mentioned that these rockets weren’t Congreve’s but were the invention of a competitor mad-scientist, so I decided that I had plenty of artistic licence to play with. I also remembered that I had a Warbases balcony set to plunder for bits, and I was good to go.

Assembling the limbers couldn’t have been easier. The main body, the axle and 2 wheels went together with plastic cement and I was then onto the rocket launcher frames, using the very handy balcony supports in the pack and some cut down railings. The pre-squared-off MDF meant everything was easy to glue together.

I also added a some bits to hold the rockets (which I wanted to be loose, not stuck on) in place – some thin metal modelling tube at the bottom and a couple of bits of card at the top. Next up were the rockets themselves. I was originally going for a very simple (lazy) approach – just pieces of brass rod, but I decided I could do better with a bit of effort. So, the brass rod had cut-down flags poles with pointy heads (from Huzzah! Miniatures) super glued to their tops, and I wrapped and glued some cotton thread round them to look the part – and to leave a length hanging down as the fuse. I made 4 so that my 2 launchers could be fully loaded.

The assembled battery, and showing the removable rockets:

The painting was pretty straight forward; black undercoat followed by Prussian blue main coat, and a lightened shade of the same as a drybrush/highlight. I picked out some metal fittings on the limbers with a metallic wash and then moved onto the rockets. These received brown shafts, black-grey heads (I was tempted to go with red and white but controlled myself) and pale ties and fuses.

So, here’s the finished battery, proudly paraded by Captain Bardolino and moved into position for a test firing (although if I was a member of the crew I’d be giving the rockets a much wider berth!):

I couldn’t resist the firing option, which simply involved some plastic tube as a sabot for one of the rockets, with cotton wool wrapped round it. A fun couple of hours all round, and watch out Major Goat!