Happy New Year!

Well, I have no idea if anyone is actually reading this stuff any more... But I'm gonna keep posting anyway.

2019 has been an interesting year! I finally managed to move out of the family home in June - a full 13 months after my separation from my wife. Got myself a nice little place round the corner. It's not quite feeling 100% like home yet, but I'm almost there. I've managed to sort my mental health out too. Again, I'm not 'cured' but I'm about 400% better than I was in 2018, so I guess that's great progress. That also meant I managed to do some hobby stuff in 2019 as my poor mental state had pretty much curtailed any and all that in 2018 and to be honest for much of the preceding .two years.

I've posted more in December 2019 than in the entire of 2018. I've also done more posts in total in 2019 than in the last two years. I've managed to fully paint 26 Elves and to part-paint or fully paint 42 Orcs and 3 trolls. Quite some going especially since that lot has pretty much been done since October!! More in three months than in the last several years!

I have another 21 Orcs and 24 Elves in the painting queue, intending to complete those by March 2020 ready for my Davale Miniatures Bloody Elves Kickstarter to arrive. When that lot (about another 30 Elves) is done that will give me two good Middle Earth forces, although I do need cavalry for both. Warg riders are being assembled as we speak and I'm mulling over options for Elves.

Mike (Trouble at t' Mill) and I are also planning to pick up our Dux Brit campaign again this year so watch out for that.

I'll leave you with this. Tonight, my son, who is 11, decided he wanted us to do some drawing. He has a cousin (16 years old) who is a demon artist and who really inspired him when they met recently and as I'll do anything to get my lad off tech, I agreed. He sat down to copy Azog from the Hobbit films and Chewbacca from Star Wars while I sat down to draw out my vision of what a First Age Silmarillion Noldor Elf would actually look like. I kinda based it on what I read in The Silmarillion, the Victor Ambrus pictures from the old Tolkien Bestiary by David Day, a bit from the LoTR movies (I do like the Elf armour/clothing in those and The Hobbit films - not at all 'right', but good anyway) and a bit from what I know of Dark Ages armour. I hadn't drawn properly in years, especially not a humanoid figure that wasn't a caricature, but actually, it turned out pretty well. If only I could afford to commission a really great sculptor to do a small range like this...

Anyway, I'll leave you with the drawing and wish you all a very happy, healthy and hobby-filled 2020

Season's Greetings!

Well, hello! Just a quick message to wish all of my readers, both regular and occasional, a very merry Christmas and a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year!

By way of a  small 'gift', here is an update on progress with the Oldhammer/Dragon Rampant Wood Elves I mentioned in my last post.

Here are some armoured 'elite' foot, comprised of late 1980s Citadel Melniboneans. I love these models! The left-handed spearman is a late 1980s Elf champion and the chap on the round base is a conversion of the Citadel Elric of Melnibone 'Dyvim Tvar' (I think that's how you spell it!) model. I always thought it was a horrid model, with a long, pointy fingered left hand and a horridly sculpted head with some odd dragon helm thingy... So anyway, I repositioned the arm, replaced the head (with one from a  spare 1980s Elf cavalry man I got in a big box a few years ago off EBAY) and added a cloak, with greenstuff fur to disguise where that joined the body. I'm quite pleased with him - he looks suitably 'heroic' and can either function as a single-model unit of elite foot or can accompany the 5 Melniboneans to create a unit of elite foot. When playing WFB 4th edition, he'll be a champion in a unit of armoured spearmen. The banner was previously on some other models, but I felt these guys looked more 'elite' so swapped it over! Anyway, you want pictures!! Enjoy!!

The Great Arthurian Repair Project, Colonial Updates and Kings of War...phew!

Just a quick update tonight...


Firstly, after my...ahem... 'slight accident' involving the road and a large box of my beautiful Arthurians a month or so ago, I am pleased to report that all bar 4 of the damaged cavalry are now fixed (barring a wee bit of varnish and Dullcote). This is good, as I want to field them in next week's club Kings of War campaign game!! There are still about 25 infantry in need of a few fixes, but nothing as major as the cavalry - mostly just new spears or bows to paint.

Talking of Kings of War, here's my latest model for the Kingdom of Brythonia, a small kingdom near the Mammoth Steppes...and here's their Warbeast, a faffing great mammoth, courtesy of West Wind miniatures (albeit minus its Dwarf crew!) Apologies for cruddy pics...just snapped 'em quickly with the phone.

Eventually, this will be crewed by this fella (the one with the mahoosive axe!) from the brilliant Barbaric Splendour Barbarians Kickstarter that I have pledged for. I may also add a few old Grenadier barbarians to the crew as well (I intend to do a barbarian war band for Dragon Rampant, you see, so this will get dual use...)

Finally, my good friend Andy MacTaggart and I convened at the club on Monday to do the first play test of the 'Men Who Would Be Kings' game we are taking to Hereward Wargame Show this year. A couple of teaser shots below...as you can see, we have temporarily departed from the NW Frontier in 1897 and have gone back in time 12 years to 1885 in the Sudan! Watch this space for more details as play tests continue!!! 

That's all for now. Back next week for a full Kings of War batrep, all being well!! Toodle pip!!!!

The Great Arthurian Repair Project...and Kings of War

Yes, all the models from last Monday's 'unfortunate incident' now have spears replaced and the job of going over them to 'black out' the chipped parts (and undercoat the new spears) has begun! This is a shame as it has deflected my attention from the unit of Elves I was about to do for my Dragon Rampant Wood Elf force and, more importantly, the start of my big Indian Mutiny project that I am really looking forward to doing.

Still, I need the Arthurian models for a War & Conquest event in September and they are doing double duty as my Kings of War army (although El Cid knights will be called up for duty for tomorrow's campaign game) so I need to bite the bullet and get the done.

Speaking of Kings of War, there'll be more on that shortly. I lost an entire 2000pt army in 4 turns last week in possibly the least enjoyable wargame I have ever had. The fact that this was largely down to being beaten by the rules and army selection worries me, although unfamiliarity with rules mechanisms doesn't help. Still, the chap I played did tell me that, of the 3 games he'd played, I was the only person thus far to destroy even one of his units, so that was a tiny bonus (and he's a lovely chap too, so it wasn't like being gloated over by some tournament crazed buffoon, far from it.)  He played with The Brotherhood, essentially Brettonians... It was rather like the battle of the Somme, as I advanced into the teeth of 60 arrow shots per turn (all armour piercing as well). The archers also count as a phalanx because of the 'stakes' they deploy, so negate knights' charges. Ok...fair enough on first turn of combat, but these guys always count as phalanx, so even if they've been pushed back (and away from their stakes, of course) they STILL negate your knights' 'Thunderous Charge' in subsequent turns...very silly!!! Anyway, he had 2 hordes of these, 2 siege catapults and 2 regiments of kick-ass knights. But the worst thing was the 2 heroes on pegasus that aren't 'individual' heroes  but count as Monstrous cavalry (so they can happily fly into the rear and they then get triple attacks on you!) AND he had taken a horde unit of the same sort of thing as well. I could do nothing but watch as I was systematically taken apart, unit by unit. Even when I did get into combat, my knights were so shot up that the enemy archers routed them in a counter charge (my own charge being weakened by the bloody phalanx rule!) Ignominious defeat...

Still, it was fun fielding the new (partly painted...another thing I can't finish cos of the repair project) giant War Mammoth... It kills things fairly adequately and looks IMMENSE. Pictures when it's done, I promise!!

Anyway, campaign game 2 tomorrow. No doubt I'll be the target of various pre-battle political things so that could end up being interesting!! I suspect that using an historical army in this campaign will prove my undoing as it lacks enough nasty stuff (especially flyers) to enable me to deal with the horrible things in my opponents' armies. I also suspect that the lack of archer models I possess will be a downfall as well, as shooting seems to be a key thing in these rules - possibly far too important given that it's based on typical Fantasy warfare...

Well, that's enough rambling on for a Sunday morning. I plan to sort out the terrain boxes today - bought some new trees and new stone walls at Partizan last week and need to cull the damaged old stock from my collection and repackage it for easy storage...

Hereward Wargame Show, Sunday 1st November at The Cresset in Peterborough, UK

Just a final reminder that Hereward Wargame show is at the Cresset in Peterborough, UK on Sunday 1st November and that Andy MacTaggart and I will be putting on a demo-participation game of The Men Who Would Be Kings. We'll run at least two games on the day and can take 4 players each time for derring-do on the Northwest Frontier. We still hope that author Dan Mersey may be able to join us and we hope that Osprey will send us a few pics of the official cover. What you'll definitely see is over a hundred and twenty Pathan and about 60 Anglo-Indian models (including a mountain gun and Bengal Lancers...oh yes!!) and some cool looking scenery (including the lovely Pathan watchtower that James from Oshiro Model Terrain made for me) in a challenging and fun scenario loosely based on an incident from the relief of Chitral.

We [i]really[/i] hope to see some of you there! If you are a follower of this blog, do make yourself known to us if you pop over to play or to watch... :D

Catching up...

Hi all

Sorry for lack of updates, but I have been extremely busy with all sorts of 'stuff' and what gaming I have done has not made it to the blog, largely because most of it has been showing folk how Dux Brit and Dux Bellorum work, or I've forgotten to take a camera to my gaming sessions, which has happened at least once.

We are currently playtesting our scenarios for the upcoming WAB day 'Carve Out A Kingdom' which recreates the battle fort Italy in the late 11th Century (places still available if interested - Sunday Nov 24th - drop me a line for details) It promises to be a great day!

Painting is slowly progressing. I am currently working on a large batch of various models that will be done with 'dip and highlight'. This includes a dozen LoTR Elves, a dozen LoTR Orcs and a bunch of Colonial Indian infantry and Pathans, plus some WfB High Elves for my son. I aim to basecoat as many models as possible then have one mega dip session, as I have found that the more you open and close a tin of dip, the faster it goes off. So, this time I plan to prep up as many as possible prior to opening the new tin!

The LoTr models will, as previously hinted, be used with a fantasy variant of Dux Brit; the colonials are for Triumph & Tragedy or possibly a variant of Sharp Practice (although I have also bought 'Smooth & Rifled' by the same guys who do Impetus as that looks like it could be fun and easy to play.)

Then there is the mass of WfB High Elves which are currently languishing in the painting pile. They are the knights on barded horses and are proving very difficult to do!! They'll look great once finished, I'm sure of that, but it's hard to be motivated to work on them as progress is son painfully slow, unlike on the 'dip & highlight' models.

I\ll post pics of all of the above once I get them done. Colonial Sikhs likely to be first.

Am playing Dux Brit on Monday - not a campaign game, but I'll try to remember the camera this time!!

Cheers

Andy