One year in review - or two…

The year 2013 is coming to an end, and it seems a good time to pop back on my DestoFante blog for a quick update. Blogging has clearly taken a backseat in my gaming related priorities, already quite stretched by my busy traveling and business schedule, Mrs. DestoFante's busy traveling and business schedule, as well as the legitimate demands of the 4-year old Destofante Jr. That said, 2013 was a good year, in which projects were kept on a good track, and many ideas were sharpened. I am remained committed, as much as a wargamer can, to limit the number of periods in my collection: WAS/SYW, Colonial, WWI, Modern Africa. I have been able to rationalize (in some sort...) my collections, out of the realization that, as a solo player, I really do not need thousands of figures suitable for multi-player games. Also, I feel somewhat more focused about the rules that inspire me. Years of unrestrained rule purchases have fortunately come to an end, and I now gravitate toward two-three favorite sets per period. If you are curious: for WAS/SYW, Might & Arms, Piquet Cartouche, possibly Maurice and Kriegkunst; for colonial, The Sword And The Flame, Piquet Din of Battle, THW Colonial Adventures; for WWI, Piquet Barrage, TFL If The Lord Spares Us, and Greg Novak's Over The Top; for modern Africa, TFL Charlie Don't Surf (a Vietnam adaptation of IABSM) and Ambush Alley. At cost of sounding a little sentimental, I want to take one moment to share the greatest hobby's joys of this year, which happen to be the same joys of the prior's: at the very end, for all our toils in collecting and painting miniatures and terrain, learning rules, devising scenarios, what really matters most is the great bond of friendship and camaraderie forged around the gaming table. This year, I was blessed to meet friends, old and new, at Historicon (for a fantastic siege game arranged by Eric B. and Tim C., a Renaissance clash with Peter Gonsalvo, Gabe and Michelle, and some quality time with Andy, Tom, Jim, Rob, and the team at Rebel Minis). During my business traveling in London, I had the immense pleasure Tim C. in Harpenden for a fun game set in East Africa, and enjoy lunch in the City with Bob C. of "Wargaming Miscellany" fame. In San Francisco during a conference, I only touch base with Freddie A. and Jeff G. - next time, we must ensure we get to the table! Unfortunately, I missed a big gaming extravaganza in Denver with Bob J., Brent O. and Sam M., and I can only hope this will be repeated in 2014! Here's a few pictures with some of these 2013 highlights. At Historicon, Eric B. offered a preview of his latest creation, a witty siege game loosely based on the Piquet mechanisms.

Eric's terrain was gorgeous - and still a work in progress! Of course, my bad rolling resulted in much amusement being had by all, especially when I blew up my own gunpowder magazines!

The game provides a great sense of how sieging operations proceed. It was unnerving to see those trenches getting closer and closer, and little could be done by a couple of brave sortie from my grenadiers. Finally, a breach was opened in the fortress (Warsaw, if I recall correctly the set up of the scenario) and the Russians came in. We called the late game before playing out the storming, but the destiny of the Polish capital was very much decided.

In Harpenden, I played the German in a East Africa scenario where my askaris were called on defending a line of hills from the assault of a full Imperial and British brigade. (Ironically, I play the British in Tanga at Historicon 2012: it seems East Africa is a recurring theme of the games I join.) I successfully held the line until the time to catch the last train from St. Pancras - I'll call it amoral victory, even if things were getting dicey for the Germans after the loss of a gun and some machine guns. Here is a picture of the British lines closing my the hills I was defending.

To all of you, my dear friends, old and new, close and far away: a belated Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Thinking of a DestoFante website

It seems that in recent years blogs have become the standard for wargamers. They are fun - I have one, too, albeit somewhat dormant. Even if I do not write much these days, I check the blog roll on mine almost every day, and I enjoy very much what other people contribute.
So far, so good.
But here's my question: are website a thing of the past? Personally, I have dear memories of the Major-General Tremorden Redding, Bob Cordery's Colonial Wargaming, AK-47 Ztum-Setum, The Great Adventure about Great War Spearhead, just to name a few of my favorite.
The limit (and the strength, in other regards) I see in blogs is their "daily diary" nature. Yes, as a reader (and a writer), it is great to receive a daily pill of wisdom, a splendid picture, a AAR for the ages. But in a blog, all these contributions will end up buried over time; also, a blog makes very hard to arrange the narrative of a campaign, unless labeling is carefully done and the sequence of battles is not too stretched over time. This is particularly true for blogs like mine, which cover many different interests and periods within the hobby, and are not updated with frequency.
All of this to come to another question: am I a fool in contemplating the creation of a website? A site where notes, thoughts, OOB, AAR, reviews may be collected and organized in a more logical order than a blog allows? When I first started DestoFante, I intended to use the blog as a way to generate materials, and have them later organized in a proper site. The blog has become little more of a collection of WIP entries, but I still wouldn't mind to have things organized properly.
Finally: if I create my website, what platform/host should I consider? I know google offers free space on Google Site, but I do not know the quality of the service (although I would be tempted to go that route only because of the hope the technology would resemble Blogger, with which I am rather comfortable now.)
Just sharing some food of thought.

Wagons

I spent the last ten days painting wagons. It seems to me that we never have enough wagons and supply trains on the tabletop, and the reality is: they look good. They are functional (raid on a convoy scenario?), they come handy in almost every period I game, from SYW to napoleonics, to colonial to WWI, and visually they really add a great deal to the game. Yet, it always seems that there are other priorities on my painting table. I have been buying wagons, trains and limbers for a long time, from several different sources (Essex, Minifigs, Hallmark, Museum Miniatures), but they have remained packed away. Over the years, memory of those puchase somewhat faded - I could tell what I own, but I cannot remember clearly what I bought from whom. Finally, a few weeks ago, I brought the lot out and I have finally put my brushes to work. Soon there will be a nice, varied train park at my disposal: a few larger wagons, a few smaller ones, some carts, a nice collection of items to be transported (boxes and barrels), a few canvas wagon tops. Pictures will come, but yesterday night I finished two carts with hay, and even if the pictures aren't of the best quality, I think you will enjoy them.

My 20 questions

I just returned from a two-week break spent in Europe with the family, so my wargaming activities had to take a back seat for a short while. Front and center in my mind is the promised battle report from Historicon, on which I have been procrastinating. But in the meanwhile, my attention was caught by the "20 questions" that have been circulating in other wargaming blogs, and this was too much a temptation to miss. Hence, with no further delay...

1. Favorite Wargaming Period and why?
The Age of Reason, thanks to a lack of ideological fanaticism, nationalism, and racism.
Second favorite wargaming periods being Colonial and Modern African wars, because of the despicable excess of ideological fanaticism, nationalism and racism.

2. Next period, money no object?
Thirty Years War.

3. Favorite 5 Films?
Casablanca, Manhattan, Lawrence of Arabia, Apocalypse Now, Le Dernier Metro,
Favorite five war movies: Lawrence of Arabia and Apocalypse Now (see above) plus A Bridge Too Far, Gallipoli, The Battle of Algiers.

4. Favorite 5 TV shows?
Not being much of a TV viewer, I must go back in the years to pick two: MASH, and the French TV series "Les brigades du Tigre."

5. Favorite book and author?
"For Whom The Bell Tolls." Ernest Hemingway.
Related to wargaming and military history in general, I have a special affection for Pakenham's "The Boer War" and Barker's "The Bastard War."

6. Greatest General? Can't count yourself.
John Marlborough and Erich von Manstein.
Runner-ups: Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, Moshe Dayan, Alexander Suvorov, Frederick the Great.

7. Favorite Wargames rules?
Piquet and its supplements Cartouche, Les Grognards, and Barrage!
The Sword and the Flame.
Runner-ups: Over The Top, Might & Reason, GaPa, Colonial Adventures.

8, Favorite Sports Team?
Milan AC in football, and Baltimore Orioles in baseball.

9. If you had a only use once, time machine, when and where would you go?
Edinburgh 1776 - the year Adam Smith published "The Wealth of Nations."
Alternatively, Wien in the 1920s and Venice in the 1820s.

10. Last meal on Death Row?
Bruschetta, tagliatelle al ragu', polenta e brasato, pesche all'amaretto (amaretto peaches.)

11. Fantasy relationship and why?
Isabelle Adjani.

12. If your life were a movie, who would play you?
Harrison Ford.

13. Favorite comic superhero?
Never been into comics, but the Italian comic strip "Nick Carter" was good.

14. Favorite Military Quote?
"Amateurs study tactics; professionals study logistics."

15. Historical Destination to visit?
One day, I'd love to visit Adowa and Rorke's Drift; in the not-so-distant future, I hope it will be Austerlitz, but in two weeks it might be Rossbach.

16. Biggest Wargaming regret?
Missing a dinner with Sam Mustafa, Bob Jones and a bunch of friends at Historicon 2011.

17. Favorite Fantasy job?
General Manager at the Metropolitan Opera.

18. Favorite Song, Top 5?
May I list five operas instead? Rigoletto, Donna del Lago, Norma, Lucia di Lammermoor, Rosenkavalier, Tancredi.
(I cheated again, those are six.)

19. Favorite Wargaming Moment?
As a teenager, fighting a somewhat fictional invansion of Poland circa 1930 (with Germans facing Polish and French troops), when a rather fortunate artillery blast wiped out the Allied HQ during a visit of the political authorities to the front lines, bringing the 6-month campaign to a sudden end.

20. The miserable Git question, what upsets you?
In wargaming? Igo-Ugo games. Rules that require 2,000 miniatures per side to fight a medium-side battle. Sequences of play running three pages long. Long lists of modifiers.

Cleaning up and updating links, old and new

During my unfortunately long time away from posting, I have continued to take advantage of my blog as a starting point both to visit other blogs, thanks to the Blog List on the side bar, and to enter my favorite wargaming website, also lined up on the side bar under Wargaming Links (a little bit further down the page.)
Over time, though, websites come and go, and today I realized it was time to look for some updates and do some cleaning up. A few links have changed, and I took care of them - most notably, Piquet products are now available at

http://www.piquetwargames.com

Alas, I also have to deal with the sad disappearances of two of my favorite sites: Major General Tremorden Redding has gone for a while, but I cannot help myself to erase it from my list; as for my memory, it is very much unerasable, as it was probably the most inspiring website on colonial wargaming that ever showed up on the Internet. Likewise, AK-47 Ztum-Setum is gone, another truly inspiring website for modern African civil wars (in Peter Pig's AK-47 style, a ruleset that came to define a whole genre of miniature gaming.)
In fact, these website are gone but not entirely lost, as much of their information can still be consulted via the Internet Archive "Wayback Machine."
For this reason, I will add a special section to the side bar, labelled "WayBack Machine", and transfer there the links to those lost websites.

Where is Melik?

As many of you, I have a fascination for Victorian gunboats. I am ashamed to confess that I have yet to deploy one on my gaming table, but I have been anticipating that moment for, quite literally, years. A long time ago I bought a colonial gunboat steamer from the Old Glory Shipyard, which I have been in the process of building for too many moons now; on my shopping list, I also have the paper gunboats from The Virtual Armchair General, which in fact I'd rather build in balsa wood, when their time will come.

This morning, I found myself with a watering mouth by reading some recent posts by Bob Cordery on the Victorian and Edwardian Royal Navy. I took his opportunity to revisit the website of the Melik Society, an indefatigable group that promotes the preservation of the historic gunboat Melik which followed Kitchener to Khartoum in 1898.

I remeber first visiting this site some years back, and falling in love with the mission, and the passion of the organization. I also remember wondering: where is Melik, today?

Well, where is she? The website mentions that Melik now sits on a sand berth at the Blue Nile Sailing Club in Khartoum, and the information sent me on a virtual tour of the Blue Nile river banks in the Sudanese capital. After a thorough exploration of the area by satellite imagery thanks to Google Earth, and some additional verification based on the existing pictures of Melik, like this one found on Flickr, I think I have located the gunboat! The Blue Nile Sailing Club is, rather obviously, on the Blue Nile, on the left bank, immediately before the Al Mk Nemer Bridge downtown Khartoum. In this Google Earth snapshot, I circle the area in red, if you want and locate it yourself.

Zooming in further, and with some help from the additional sources, you can somewhat easily locate the Club, and the profile of Melik, mostly hidden by the surrounding vegetation, as clearly shown in the Flickr picture. Again, I took a snapshot and highlighted with another red circle here.

So, here she is! Our, and Kitchener's, old good friend Melik! I am very grateful for the preservation work of the Melik Society, and who knows, maybe one day, when the political situation will become less tense, there will be an opportunioty to travel to Khartoum and visit the boat in person. For the time being, we'll make it with our traveling dreams, our toy models, Google Earth, and, for those really inclined to paper modeling, with the beautiful model offered by the Paper Shipwright!

Roses for the "Minden Regiments"

It may take a little longer to complete my battle report from Historicon, but here a fascinating news item that has fascinated me. I had an exchange with the British Consulate-General here in Chicago earlier today, and the Public Affairs Officer kindly confirmed me of a "tradition" still alive to this day: every year since 1967, six red roses have been anonymously delivered to the British Consulate on 1 August, anniversary of the Battle of Minden in 1759. A note that comes with the roses lists the six British regiments that fought in the battle and says, "They advanced through rose gardens to the battleground and decorated their tricorne hats and grenadier caps with the emblem of England. These regiments celebrate Minden Day still, and all wear roses in their caps on this anniversary in memory of their ancestors."

The identity of the donor remains a mystery. (It's not me.) For more information, Wikipedia has a good entry on the battle.
Isn't it neat? Roses delivered to the Consulate for forty-five years?

Needless to say, I am now thinking to add the "Minden Six" to my SYW British regiments!

Historicon

I spent last weekend in Fredericksburg VA to attend the mothership of all the miniature wargaming conventions, Historicon. I had missed the meeting one year ago, so I was somewhat eager to join back the fray, and what a great time I had! It was real pleasure to meet old friends, make new ones, playing one game or two, and did some financial damage at the Vendors’ Hall.

In wargamers’ fora there was some apprehension about the new location, south of the Beltway and away from Historicon traditional Pennsylvania’s grounds. Well, the new location worked very well for me. It was an easy flight in and out Washington Dulles Airport, and a relatively easy drive from the airport to Fredericksburg on Friday, and back on Sunday. Some traffic on I-95 on Friday, but I still made the 55 miles or so in about 1h 15min. I stayed at a Best Western about 10min drive from the Fredericksburg Expo, site of the convention. The hotel was simple, clean, functional, and $75 per night. The drive to the Expo was a short trip across a busy mall area (which, incidentally, offers many diverse dining options.) The Expo itself is a large and functional structure, with plenty of space for game tables, and an adequate Dealers’ Hall. Food options on-site were fine – what you would expect in a convention center. Many people loved the opportunity to walk to a Wegmans across the street from the Expo; I didn’t, but apparently the large store had much to offer for food (and drinks…) Some people complained about the noise and din in the large gaming space; it was a mild annoyance, but not a major problem for me. The only complain would be the bathrooms: too few, and not serviced during the day so that by night-time they were in precarious conditions. This is something that can be fixed next year.

Attendance was good, in my opinion – but it is hard to gauge it in a very different space. If you have eight cramped rooms with six games each, you have a very busy convention; if you have 60 games in one large space that can accommodate for 100 of them, you are showing 25% more games, and yet the space may feel somewhat less busy than in the former case. It will be interesting to hear the report on attendance by HMGS-East.

By what I heard, vendors were generally happy about sales and traffic, and I have yet to hear one comment by anyone, dealers or players, who suffered a completely negative experience. Grades on TMP range from A+ to B-, with mine at A/A-. In my opinion, there was a good variety of games, with a little bit for every taste: from the large, organized tournaments for Ancient and FOW (not my cup of tea) to Medieval, Napoleonics, Colonial extravaganzas, and so on up to WWII, post-war and contemporary “Force on Force” games. Both naval and aerial games were also well-represented and easy to locate. Here’s some pictures from random tables that caught my eye.

As for my frolicking. I did some shopping, but I successfully resisted any major splurge. I bought some JR Miniatures buildings, 15mm from the Prussia range, that will look very nice around Saxe-Pape. I bought a few bags of 15mm Blue Moon minis from the Dark Africa range. I brought home Mark Fastoso’s scenario booklet for the Boxer Rebellion – Seymour’s Relief Expedition. I bought trees and palms, and the pontoon bridge by Paper Terrain, plus two other nice bridges that will come handy in the future. That’s pretty much it. To be fully honest, conventions aren’t anymore great shopping attractions if you are mostly in 15mm, as I am. Minifigs was never big at shows, and the American branch of operations is now gone. Essex has a distributor who doesn’t take anything past Marlburians to the convention. QRF wasn’t available (I even forgot who was their Historicon seller in the past.) Old Glory 15 stopped attending a couple of years ago. The only reliable option remains Peter Pig, thanks to the participation of Brookhurst Hobby from California. On net, at least for me, Historicon is less and less about buying figures. As for the games, the one I fully participated and enjoyed was a “Tanga-esque” pick-up battle courtesy of a bunch of good friends, Rob C., Fred A., Tim C., Iain B. Since I have good pictures from that evening, I will write a more complete AAR on that affairs in the coming days. For the time being, here a few shots to whet your appetite!

All in all, Historicon was a great experience as usual, a wonderful opportunity to meet friends, and a fantastic way to rekindle my love affair with the hobby!

Count down to Historicon, and some previews on Saxe-Pape

If all goes well, tomorrow by this time in the morning I will be at Historicon, in Fredericksburg, VA. Having missed the show one year ago, I am really looking forward to reconnect with friends, do some shopping, and hopefully join a few games.
As my usual, I am showing up at the convention without much of a plan. I have no pressing need to purchase miniatures or rules, and one of my favorite hobby bookstore, On Military Matters, is not going to attend this year. Thus, I think I may be aiming to some terrain pieces, or other target of opportunities -- a dangerous spot to be, as there is nothing like a wargamer abandoning himself to impulse shopping!

In the meanwhile, I spent the last couple of days doing some work on my revamped Imagination. I set up a specific blog... shhh, it's still a secret, but you can look at the layout and an introductory post right here at the Chronicles of Saxe-Pape. (By the way: when the time will come for the "official" launch, could anyone suggest how to have Saxe-Pape included in the Emperor vs. Elector blog?)
At the moment, I am doing some background work of the personalities of my Imaginations, comprehensive of family trees and individual attributes. I became a little apprehensive about finding proper names, but as usual, Wikipedia proved to be an invaluable resource. Would you have imagined that somebody make the efforts to provide a comprehensive "List of Hessian consorts"? With a little of research on the history of minor German principalities, and their ruling families, it is really not that difficult to come up with many splendid ideas for an Imagination.
Going forward, my plan is:

1. to review and post the introduction and historical background on Saxe-Pape;
2. to complete the work on personalities and ruling families in Saxe-Pape, and post brief introductions about the leading characters;
3. to finish and post the "official" map of Alte-Saxe;
4. to take pictures, pictures, pictures for the blogs (don't we all love eye-candies?)
5. and, last but not least, to complete the painting of enough miniatures to fight a first battle sometimes before the end of the summer.

With those thoughts, off to Historicon - if computer connection will allow, I wouldn't mind to post from the convention, but do not hold your breath if I fail to return to these columns until Sunday.

Cosmetic change, and Blue Moon Fort Zinderneuf

Maybe I am getting old, maybe my sight is weakening, but as I returned to this blog yesterday, I felt dissatisfied with its look. Light characters over dark background do not make it anymore for me - I find the combination very tiresome on my eyes. Hence, the decision to switch to black and dark grey for the text, and off-white for the background. Any better? It seems so to me, but I will take your recommendations if you feel strongly one way or another.

On wargaming matters. Perfectly timed for release at Historicon, Blue Moon is now offering a French Foreign Legion range which includes an impressive Fort Zinderneuf: Link

We should congratulate Blue Moon for a very active expansion of their 15mm ranges - too many to mention here, but Three Muskeeters and Dark Africa stand out as interesting niches that were missing at this scale. Many of their packages can also be useful to add color and character to other periods (I am thinking of the FIW/AWI civilian sets.) As for myself, I think the Dark Africa range is something I will consider in the near future, to add to my colonial collections. And a Fort Zinderneuf has been in my wishlist for quite some time now, as I have, in a box somewhere, a small collection of FFL and Arabs figures from Stone Mountain. Maybe, as I will take a break from the placid 18th century German countryside, I will finally get into some action deep into a Northern Africa desert... ah, temptation, temptation...

UPDATE - Apparently some of the formatting options in Blogspot have changed during my "sabbatical." I am struggling a bit in spacing paragraphs, breaking the text, and inserting pictures via a link to other websites. I guess I need to spend some time in the Help section...

... aaand, back I am

So much for the need of a reset, uh? My last blog post dates August 31, 2011. It has been a long, long time since I last wrote anything in this blog. In truth, I was on regularly, mosty to peruse my list of links and keep an eye on all the gaming excitement taking place elsewhere. as for myself, full time papa-hood and full time job really suppressed much of my already sparse hobby time; when one hour here and there became available, I ended up spending it on painting figures and enjoying the hobby rather than writing about it! (The good news is, as soon as I get back to my camera, there will be plenty of eye candies to share!) Hopefully my days of being MIA are coming to an end! First of all, all is clear to be back at Historicon! I am planning on arriving around noon on Friday, until Sunday morning. That should make two (TWO!) intense days of shopping and playing, and I look forward to arrange some impromptu dinner on Friday and/or Saturday with friends old and new. I'll make sure that "DestoFante" will appear on my name tag - if you happened to be on this blog, and will be at the show, please stop by and say hi! I really can't wait to be back at Historicon after my 2011 no-show. Second, I really look forward to return to blogging on a regular basis. I miss the discipline and introspection that blogging about my projects provides, but most of all I missed the warmth interaction with the virtual community here. Finally, on the gaming front, I spent most of the last year working, almost exclusively, on "Age of Reason" project. It started small, you may remember -- first in dipping my toe in the Marlburian period, than switching to the WAS/SYW period, but just to complete a couple dozen units of Austrians and Prussians to playtest Sam Mustafa's Might and Reason (the idea was to do Mollwitz, which is a fairly parsimonious battle in terms of troops.) Fast forward two years, and I now have a full cabinet... Prussian and Austrian armies have grown in size, and were joined by... British/Hannoverians, French, Saxons, Bavarians, Palatinate, Hesse-Kassel, and a handful of Reichsarmee battalions... mission creep, anyone? ;-) Next, I am planning on returning to my Imagination (I already have extensive notes, that kept me company during business traveling in the last couple of years), as well as, finally, fighting that original battle of Mollwitz. In fact, I'd like to fight it not once but four times, testing and comparing some of my favorite rulesets, old and new: Piquet/Cartouche, Maurice, Die Fighting, and Might and Reason. These rules that have intrigued me the most in recent years. But, most importantly: I want to make sure it will not be another 11 months before my next post!

In need of a reset

Tomorrow is September 1st, and it makes almost a five-month of long sabbatical from posting. This has been, indeed, a fairly frustrating year, hobby-wise. As I briefly mentioned in the past, for more than six months I were not able to purchase much needed miniatures, because of a long and unfortunate sequence of events including the demise of GFI/Minifigs, the supplier of my much beloved Minifigs 15mm miniatures, and the collapse of the relationship between Essex Miniatures and its U.S. distributor Wargames Inc. To say the least, these situations were very annoying, and left me rather jaded in respect of the professionalism in the hobby, or lack thereof. All I wanted was spending my money on toy soldiers, dude. It was indeed frustrating not being able to succeed in such an apparently elementary task, and to deal with counterparties that were less than straightforward in addressing some basic customer request.

Fortunately, things are improving. A two-year baby boy makes very difficult to find the time to paint of play games, but it doesn't deter dad for continuing the build up of his forces, nor to plan ahead future campaigns and new directions where to direct my hobby interests. At the end of spring, I finally succeeded in getting the much desired figures; thus, I am glad to report that a rather massive order of British, French, Bavarian troops, plus some additional Austrian and Prussian complements, is at Fernando, my miniature painter of choice who did marvels on my previous order. I have already seen some previews of his work on the current batch, and I am very excited about it. A few other units are getting completed by yours truly, slowly but steadily -- hopefully pictures will follow soon. In the making, new plans for scenarios, new plans for my long dormant Imagi-nation campaign, new plans for additional WAS/SYW units. Wargaming is slow, but life is good. I feel I am ready for a much needed reset, and I look forward blogging more frequently.

Experimenting with terrain

I have always had mixed feelings with felt as wargame terrain. Yes, it is cheap, and I cannot quite put my finger on it, but I always perceived it as being... cheap, in fact? Compared with the precious miniatures we deploye, and the often beautiful buildings and structures on our tables, felt never looked quite right to me.
Or maybe it was just a matter of execution. Some friends seem to be very easygoing and not too concerned about the silliness of some of their felt patches on the tabletop. But, after all, it is not the material, but what you make with it, right? So, I decided to experiment a little bit with felt myself, and I am glad to report that I am very pleased by the result.
I started with patches of brownish ochra felt, in order to recreate the effect of a summer field. Here's how it looks like.

Happy with what I see, I push the idea further, working with patches of dark green felt in order to recreate the effect of woods. I need more trees, and some bushes to do justice to the concept, but I was also pleased by the first stab in this direction. I am not a fan yet of the thin stripes of dark green used to underscore bushes along a road, or maybe a little countryside creek running across the ope fields, but overall, I am confident I can improve on that front, too.

Since I was on a roll, I embarked in the most ambitious project: to use thin stripes of green felt, of the very same type as my background terrain, to model the banks of a small river. Here the goal is to show some roughness and three-dimensional effect around the edges of the flowing water, something that I have never been able to accomplish in the past. I need to do better work with some glue here, but I was again very pleased by my first attempt.

This is a very rough first stroke at the whole idea, but I am won over. I think felt will become a recurrent trick out of my terrain bag. I just LOVE the effect on the river banks. I thought the corn fields were nice, and they did not feel cheap at all. And I see some potential is the dark green patches for thick woods and forests.
Overall, a productive evening.

Die Fighting, part II: a preliminary review

As anticipated in my previous post, Die Fighting is the latest set of rules by Bob Jones for the Horse and Musket period 1700-1900. These are tactical rules, in the sense that the basic unit is the battalion, unlike Bob's previous set "Repique: Zouave" which was more of a grand-tactical game based on brigades and divisions. In this respect, Die Fighting takes a more traditional approach to wargaming scale. The game has been out for about ten days, and there is already an excellent online review by Scott Mingus at the Charge! blog.

Scott does indeed an excellent job at reviewing the book and the basic mechanisms of the game. I hope my comments here will not result in much redundancy, but I still want to share a few of my reactions at a first reading. I have not had an opportunity to play the game yet, but several business trips over the last ten days (and the resulting idle time sitting at airports) gave me the chance to read the text a couple of times, and start some work on an order of battle for my future first playtest. So, here's my take on Die Fighting.

• Quality of product: very good. It is a nice softcover booklet of 54 pages, including two sets of cards and one Quick Reference Card. The quality of the printing is very good, the text is well organized and easy to read. I would have liked a few more examples, but examples are indeed included and are helpful to get a better understanding of some subtler points in the rules. Overall, the feel is that of a "simple" game, almost with an "Old School" flair-- but definitely not simplistic!


• Core concept. Units in each opposing army have a basic "type" (guard, elite, regular, irregular, etc.) Based on this "type", each unit contribute a certain number of "resource dice" (six-sided dice) to the army common pool. Actions like movement or combat cost resource dice. When you run out of dice, you've lost. Simple, isn't it? In reality, this whole "game engine" appears to create rather sophisticated trade-offs for the player. You need to spend resource dice to execute your plan, but you must be cognizant that the leadership resources that dice represent are not unlimited. Excess spending of dice and lack of discipline in staying focus on the task at hand may result in costly waste; sudden opportunities can be exploited, but you must keep in mind that resource dice are not infinite, and an action now might come at the cost of an action later.


• Other dice. The rules add two additional sources of dice: leadership dice, depending on the quality of commanders and sub-commanders, and "free" dice, that depend on specific game circumstances as dictated by a Free Dice Table (which has mostly to do with terrain and combat factors.)


• Sequence of play. True to his philosophy of game design, Bob did not write a I-go-You-go game; yet, unlike Piquet, the cycling of activities through the turn can be more or less structured. The game revolves around six very straightforward phases: specialized actions, officer actions, infantry actions, cavalry actions, artillery actions, rally restore and reload actions. The actual order in which they are executed depends by the period that is being played, and/or the players' personal preferences. Players can choose between three basic phase orderings: "Fixed Synchronous, " "Fixed Asynchronous," and "Variable Asynchronous," which, approximately refer to a same fixed sequence for both player, a individually-set fixed sequence (that may differ between players), or a more chaotic variable sequence. Additional options add some randomness that would be particularly suitable to solo playing.


• Movement. It depends on a roll of up two resource dice, plus or minus other dice depending on leadership and terrain factors. If you are familiar of The Sword And The Flame, the mechanism in Die Fighting reminded me of those movement rules, with a few original twists added.


• Combat. In firing and melee, attacker and defender roll their dice, and a variety of consequences (from "no effect' to "retreat," "disorder," "rout," and losses in resource dice) will depend upon the difference between the total score of the dice rolled by the attacker and the dice rolled by the defender. The game does NOT require stand removal as losses accumulate. Disordered or routing units can be rallied during the "Rally, Restore and Reload" Phase.


• Basing. Some recommendations are included in the rules, but as long as the two opposing armies are based in a consistent manner, the rules will work for any basing scheme.


• Period flavor. The rules include specific provisions for the "Linear Warfare" period, with two subsets of tables for the earlier War of Spanish Succession and the later War of Austrian Succession and the Seven Years War; the "Revolutionary Warfare" for the American and French Revolutions; the "Napoleonic Wars"; and the "Wars of Transition" (ACW and FPW). More templates will be freely available online at a later time (see below about "game support.") A Colonial expansion is already in preparation.


• Game support. Die Fighting is fully supported by the Repique website and Bob Jones' Zouave blog; furthermore, Bob is very active in addressing general and specific questions on the game at the Repique Yahoo forum, which, in the files section, includes FAQ and the inevitable Errata.

Of course, despite our bad habits as wargamers, rules are not made to be read, but to be played, and every preliminary review can only offer a limited taste of the game until units are deployed on the battletop, and a battle takes place. That's exactly what I am planning to do, and in the meanwhile I will make note about the actually preparation of the game (preparations of OOB, rating of units, organization of sub-commanders' battle groups, etc. etc.) in order to share in additional posts on Die Fighting. For the time being, let's just hope that "real life" will cooperate letting me having the time to follow-up on my plans, without throwing surprises or unplanned business trips on my schedule.

Die Fighting, part I: Bob Jones' implicit theology

I received in the mail the latest work of Bob Jones, of Piquet fame. It's Die Fighting, a ruleset for the Horse and Musket period 1700-1900. Before I write a review, which will probably take a separate post, and after, as a full disclaimer, I mention that Bob is a good friend, companion in several good meals and sparking chats, I have to say a few words about Bob Jones' implicit "theology." By that I mean the views about wargaming, rules writing, and combat that lie at the heart of a rules writer's work. In the "Die Fighting" Foreword, Pat McGuire offers many interesting remarks about Bob's style, and in the very same spirit I want to add one though or two to the excellent points made by Pat.

There are at least three core ideas that shape Bob Jones rules:

• he writes games where players face several crucial decision-node points. In this respect, Piquet was widely and wildly misunderstood. In Bob's games, you have a chance to act on your own turn, phase or card, but you also need to consider opportunities to act at any other moment, oftentimes directly challenging the actions undertaken by your opponent.


• he writes game that reflect the chaotic nature of the battlefield, where you seldom have a clear picture of the whole situation, where circumstances change suddenly and radically, and where your seldom have control of the events when the battle unfold.


• he writes games where leadership is fundamental, but it is also a scarce resource. Either in the composition of a sequence deck, a' la Piquet, or in the tally of Resource Dice, as in Die Fighting, Bob's rules provide you some latitude for action, but a latitude which is not unlimited. Doing something now usually means that you will not be able to do something later. Maddening, for those of us used to linear, I-go-You-go sequences of play: but a mechanism which is a wonderful engine of excitement and uncertainty in the game!

On this backdrop of gaming "philosophy", on to Die Fighting: any fully successful creation that delivers exactly what it promise to accomplish! In the next post, a preliminary review, following a reading of the rules before my first playtest.

The strength of my cavalry squadrons, and the sad state of the miniatures business

I spend most of my 2010 working on my Seven Year War project: shopping for miniatures in the spring, painting and getting miniatures painted by Fernando in the summer, and basing my armies in the fall. So, it was with a certain disappointment that later in the year I realized I made a mistake.
I built my cavalry squadrons at a strength of twelve miniatures (on six bases of two miniatures each), under the assumption that a six-base squadron will look good next to six-base infantry units (each with four miniatures per base, for a total of twenty-four miniatures per infantry unit.) Wrong! Once I deployed my squadrons on the field, it became apparent that they could look even better if they were sixteen miniatures strong. You can judge by yourself by looking at my Austrian cuirassuers.

A linear formation of eight miniatures wide and two deep looks good, and for larger games I can split it in two, and deploy two squadrons of eight miniatures each. It sounds like a win-win arrangement. And also in plain march line the impact would probably be better than the current six bases strength, although the impact in this case is already pretty good.

So, no big deal, you'd think. Go out, but four more miniatures for squadron, get them painted, and voila’, all my squadrons upgrade in strength. Instead… wrong again! I made the big mistake of ordering my missing miniatures to GFI/Minifigs in November, and I found myself entangled in the sad story of the near collapse of their business. After nearly two months of wait, I ended up cancelling my order – fortunately, I didn’t suffer a financial loss thanks to the reimbursement by the excellent Paypal: nonetheless, what a waste of time! Not good. But then I proceed with my next best alternative, i.e. ordering from the US stockist of Essex Miniatures... and I ended up stuck in the back-log of their inventory restocking, which apparently takes biblical times these days because of security delays at the U.S. Customs! Definitely, not my luckiest streak. Bottom line: I have been waiting thirty-six miniatures to complete nine squadrons since mid-November 2010, and tomorrow is March 1st 2011. Ordering miniatures should not feel like root canal.

I am back

I am back. I went five months without an update on my blog, but believe me, it was not for lack of ideas, projects, or progress on my miniatures and terrain. Rather, it was a complete lack of time; it didn't help, either, that I am now blogging for professional reasons. Quite frankly: if you spend many hours at the office thinking about blogging and writing for a blog, a blog is not exactly what you want to do when you come back home at night.
But anyway: I am back now. The goal is to post here at least once a week. Take it as my New Year Resolution. And if I will not deliver, feel free to come and poke at me in the comments!

In the meanwhile, as a teaser of things to come, two pictures from my SYW project now fully under development. Pandurs (above) and Austrian infantry (below).

And, oh, yes, progress also on the terrain front, as you see!

A completed project?

Is there anything like a complete and completed project in wargaming?!? Am I going to die, next?

Well, yes and no (about the project, not about me dying, of course!)

It seems that my colonial Abyssinia project is extremely close to reach its conclusion. My original target was to have all the necessary units required to play every scenario in Mark Fastoso's Colonial Campaigns book, Ethiopia 1887-1895. And I am now glad to report that the target, by and large, has been achieved. The line-up is nearly completed: all the miniatures are in, painted or very near to be finished. I can count, for the Italians, three units of line infantry, two bersaglieri, five askari, three Eritrean bands, one squadron of mounted askari lancers, plus guns, Maxim guns, and wagons. For the Ethiopians, bands of Galla warriors, Bana warriors, and Danakil lancers (two each), four bands armed with muskets and rifles, four bands of Tigrai irregular, two generic spearmen units, four mounted bands, and guns.

Of course, with hindsight, a few choices could have been different. One day, I might buy a few packs from the Italian shop Aude and get some real "Penne di Falco" askari lancers, instead of my own conversion from Egyptian lancers. And yes, sooner or later, I would add an Ethiopian "barded" cavalry unit from Eureka, a range which did not exist when I embarked in my project. But again, these are minor quibbles, refinements on a project which is now firmly built, and ready to be brought to the next stage -- the tabletop!

As I was going to the final touches to some of the aforementioned unit, I had to good idea to take some picture of the final result. You may have already seen some of these miniatures in early stages of development (here and here), and so you may imagine my satisfaction of bringing the work on them to a closing.

The first two pictures show the Tigrai irregular bands, 15mm Irregular miniatures.




Next, Bana warriors from the excellent 15mm Tin Soldier range, which I plan to deploy as Shoa warriors.


I made sure that at least one miniature could stand out as leader, and here's the detail on the Shoan one.


Tin Soldier also offers Galla warriors, and here's what I was able to came up with.


And here's a more dramatic shot of the charging Galla. Notice again the leader.


Finally, the band(s) of Danakil lancers (Tin Soldier.)
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I also completed the painting job on the Ethiopian leaders. Special attention was paid to create a nice vignette for Negus Neghesti, but I also made sure to paint some good details on the other general offered in the Tin Soldier command pack.




A final note: all my Irregular and Tin Soldier 15mm miniatures are distributed in the U.S. by Silver Eagle Wargame Supplies. Over the years, Jacob has provided top notch customer service and assistance, and it is a distributor whom I enthusiastically endorse and recommend.

WAS & SYW 15mm options for minor armies

A few days back I posted the following question on TMP, but the answers I received were unusually inconclusive... so I am re-posting here, hoping to find some additional insights.

I am tempted to expand my WAS/SYW collection, now being built around Prussian, Austrian, and French forces. In particular, I'd like to add some selected regiments from minor countries; I am looking in particular to Saxony, Bavaria, and the Reichsarmee. Since I am working with 15mm, as a matter of fact it all boils down to the style of the coat.

In the case of the Reichsarmee, the excellent article in the Seven Years war Kronoskaf site helps a lot, stating very clearly which contingent wore a Austrian-like type of coat, and which ones followed the Prussian style.

But what about Bavarians and Saxons? I found reference for the Bavarians pointing both to French and Austrian styles; as for the Saxons, I have been looking to plates for quite some time, and I have not been able to decide which way I should head to.

Unfortunately, available 15mm miniatures cover well only the major players: British, Prussians, Austrians, French, Russians; all the 15mm ranges I know of remain somewhat wanting for the smaller contingents. Which leaves me with the doubt about what would be good "stand-in" for Saxony and Bavaria? Could any expert in the field help?

As always, thanks in advance for sharing your insight!

A momentous decision

About a couple of month ago, I had an epiphany.

I was looking at my Marlburian miniatures, feeling not too happy about the basing, nor about my painting, or lack thereof... I looked at the pile of well-ordered units waiting to be painted on my workbench. I quickly thought of how much time it would take me to add just one or two new units to the current roster. And all the sudden, I had to ask myself the question: what is my hobby? Is it my hobby primarily painting miniatures? Or it is about playing battles with them? Until a couple of years ago, my answer would have been a resolute "Both!" but what about now? I am at the stage of my life in which time has become the scarcest of the resources. Back in the days, I was not bothered by projects that would require one, or two years of painting units before one single die could be rolled on the tabletop. But now? Those one or two years have become three, or four, or who knows how many. Painting in any significant batch of time has become nearly impossible, and you don't make much progress with twenty minutes here, and twenty minutes there.

In that moment, I realized it was time for a decision. Either I make painting my primary hobby, and I postpone for good any hope to fight a battle any time soon, or I focus on the gaming side of the hobby, which may require... somebody else to do my painting.

OK, I said it. Until a few years ago, this was anathema to me. But now my disposable time has evaporated, and it might be time to reassess how I do things. My good friends Peter "Gonsalvo" and Bob Jones, of "Piquet" and now "Zouave" fame, have been recommending the outsourcing of painting for a long time. I think the moment has come for me to follow the lead of these wise men. As of July 2010, the decision is taken: I am back to miniature wargaming. And a large package is about to be shipped to Fernando in Sri Lanka to get the proverbial job done.

I feel I am about to enter a new era of appreciation and enjoyment of my hobby.