Show Report: T'other Partizan, 18th August, 2019

Just got back from The Other Partizan, and thought I'd post a little report. Mostly pics. 

I managed to persuade Teresa, my wife, to go with me. She used to go to all the mini-military events I went to. But stopped doing so some while back. We've had a busy few days, and Teresa more so than me. She soldiered on gamely (boom-boom!) as we went round all the tables, checking out all the games. But then succumbed to exhaustion, and went back to the car for a nap!

These Adler 20mm SS troops were my sole figure purchases.

I was then free to mooch around spending willy-nilly. But in the end I didn't buy that much. Just some new SS troops in 20mm, from Adler (with tiny little collar badge decals!), and some books. I'd have liked to bought a few more books, and probably some WWII vehicle models as well. But there really wasn't a great deal I felt tempted by, in the end. So I wound up feeling a little deflated.

Cool... A wicker man!

I'm assuming the pictures immediately above and below are from Infamy Infamy, a 28mm Romano-British participation game put on by Harrogate Wargaming Club. I do like the 'Wicker Man'. The film of that name is a cult classic, and I love it (the remake... well, let's not go there). This was a great looking game. Excellent figures and great terrain. 

Very nice looking Romans (casualties or reinforcements). Warlord Games?

Fortus Romanus.

A Pacific theatre game. Nice terrain.

Next is the USMC landing and attack on Pelelui, a 1944 Pacific theatre battle, staged here in 20mm by the Like A Stonewall Wargames Group. Teresa liked the verdant tropical terrain. The excellent HBO series The Pacific depicts action from this campaign to great effect. 

An American plane flies over the jungle.

The terrain for Bloody Omaha, a 15mm game by the Peterborough Wargames Club (pictured below) looked terrific. I'm currently reading Stephen E. Ambrose's superb D-Day book, which focuses on Omaha somewhat more than the other beaches. So it was nice to see a game depicting what I'm reading about!

An Omaha beach landing scenario. Again, nice terrain.

A nice encampment in this medieval game.

There were several late medieval or early renaissance games, and once againI don't know exactly which is which amongst the ones I photographed (and I'm only showing a portion of the photos I took here). I've never been drawn to collect figures from these eras, let alone contemplate gaming them. But I do admire the way they look on a table when I see them.

This was rather interesting; an Irish Rebellion battle...

There were a couple of Irish related battles/games. I'm assuming the one pictured above and below was the Bramley Barn 28mm Wilson's Farm, 1798, a beautifully set up demo game. It looked weird to me, at first glance, seeing phalanxes of pike-wielding Irish troops facing the muskets of the British forces. Looked kind of like ECW meets 18th Century. Strange!

Brits have muskets, whilst Irish 'bogtrotters' have pikes!

The next few pics show an Ancients game which might be set in England, or possibly Germany. The smartly uniformed Roman Legions face some superbly done barbarian types, with excellent wagons, druids, and even a flock of shaggy-haired sheep. I wish I knew exactly which game it was, so as to give due credit to whomever's excellent terrain and figures these were. A fantastic looking set-up!

Nice mise en scene type stuff in this Ancients game...

Love the carts and druids and whatnot...

The view from the Roman lines.

54mm ECW, from Mr Miller and Friends.

There were some wargames in the smaller scales, but these were either naval or armour, i.e. not figure based. I don't think I saw a single 6mm or 10mm battle. Of course the larger scales can potentially make for better eye candy. But I do like the larger scope that the smaller scales allow. And in the right hands they can still look very impressive. They are, I reckon, especially suited to large Napoleonic battles, where the big Battalions can be deployed in all their glory. 

There were however more games in 28mm than I'm used to seeing, and some of these with large models, such as the Pirates one. Lots of gurt big ships! Then there were some strange games, with some kinds of kiddie toys, peg soldiers, etc. There were lots of games. And I didn't get pictures of everything. I mainly photographed what appealed most to me.

Camel train in... the Sudan? Or is this the Afghanistan game?

As has already been shown by my inability to accurately caption all my photos, I didn't make a note of the games I was photographing at the time. Guess I should've. So I'm putting the names to the games now as best I can. I oigjnally assumed the pics above and below were from They Don't Like It Up 'Em, a 28mm Sudan game. But then I realised that the planes probably mean it was actually The Boondock Sayntes' 1919 De Haviland Down.

Afghanistani infantry and cavalry.

British aerial supremacy.

The Colonial combat pictured above and below was a very handsomely appointed game. Very enjoyable eye-candy, with great terrain, figures, and other stuff, like the aircraft. Once again, I only wish I could be certain what the game was, to give due credit to a fab looking game. As noted above, after initially locating it in the Sudan, I now think it's the 1919 Afghan game, De Haviland Down. Either way, it's a great game layout.

Lovely desert dwellings, also Colonial HQ, by the looks of it.

Another view of the aerial flypast.

There was only one Napoleonic game, that I noticed. Apparently there were two, but I only recall the one shown in my pics! And I always look out for games from my favourite era. And the one I did spot was set in Spain. Not my favourite theatre. But the figures were abundant, and very nicely turned out. 

French Guard Engineers...

Massed French artillery.

Massed French cavalry and artillery. Looking fab!

Spanish Cavalry, in yellow garb.

A North African beach landing...

There were several North African WW2 games, and I confess, yet again, I don't know which is which. This one had a beach landing by the Allied forces, and Rommel atop a nicely appointed colonial type building. Another one had the Italians fighting an Allied unit that I took to be the Desert Rats. Both sides were using a railway line as a road. Must have been a very bumpy road!

Rommel's rooftop radio-mast HQ.

AWI action from Steve Jones.

Whilst I spotted one very nice looking AWI game, pictured here above and below, I didn't spot any ACW action. After the Napoleonic era and WWII, ACW is my next port of call, interests wise (see later book purchase info!). And most shows I go to I see at least one game from that era.

Looks like the British are fighting themselves!?

Cavalry about to collide...

It's now some time after originally posting this pictorial show report, and I'm still working out which games were which, and slipping in new bits of text accordingly. Several pics follow that are a League of Augsburg Beneath Lily Banners thing called The Three Kings or something similar. You can read more on it here. Not my normal period of interest. But it looked very tempting when so fabulously presented.

A rather splendid battery...

Apparently this is Swedes vs. three other nations (or even Empires?).

Originally I'd posted thus about this game:

One or two of these games I can't even place by referring to the list of games on the Partizan website. That would include the one pictured above and below here. Looks 18th Century. I dimly recall a game referring to a clash of three empires or kingdoms. Was it this one? Maybe this is the League of Augsburg game? That's not actually given on the Partizan webpage (simply listed as  (TBA!).

At least I was on the right track!

This staff group looks dangerously exposed.

Vehicles using a rail bridge as a road... bone-shaking!

The second of the aforementioned WWII North Africa games. Was this one in fact the Forest of Dean Gamers' North Africa 1941, Chain of Command, demo' game? Or hav I muddled the two. North Africa WWII games up?

Brits as well as 'Eye-Ties'...

'Modom, your carriage awaits'.

No idea what this game was. Can anyone enlighten me?

A rather cool looking fort...

Next, another 28mm Sudan game. Now...this must either be They Don't Like It Up 'Em, by RAWgamers, or an untitled game by Iron Brigade. Can anyone clarify?

British troops form square, to meet the revolting natives' attack.

Reinforcements exit the fort.

But wait... danger lurks in the water. And not just the crocodilian variety.

A splendid evocation of a Dutch town.

55 Minutes in Peking. A Victorious Miniatures Boxer Rebellion game.

A Douglas A/B(?)-26 Invader flies over the beach, in Gothenburg Gamers' 28mm Bay of Pigs demo'.

The defenders seek to stop the landings.

I had a small wad of cash to splash, and immediately blew a big chunk of it at David Lanchester's book stall, on Shelby Foote's ACW trilogy. I've wanted this for several years now. The last time I saw any of it, it was just volume two, in a bookshop in Ely, for £39.99. Today I got the whole trilogy for £50. A lot for me to spend in one go on books. But, I very much hope, well worth it. Shelby Foote is great on Ken Burns' ACW series.

A very attractive set! 

Show Report: Partizan, 2019.

I went to this year's Partizan with my pal Paul. As usual books are a primary draw. This year I knew I didn't really want to buy any model kits, as I've already accumulated so many. Nor any (or perhaps many is better?) wargames figures, as I have my fairly vast Napoleonic armies already. They just need painting and basing. Just!? Such a small word, such a large task...

I did think about buying scenery and basing stuff. But I still don't know how I'll be going about all that. So nothing doing there either. Most of the traders are in larger scales than those I'm currently into, and there weren't as many selling WWII 20mm stuff as there sometimes are. But it was in this latter category that I did wind up making a few small purchases.

One thing I ought to note is that I didn't take any means of photographing anything, so I can't, as I normally would, illustrate this with the eye-candy of the better looking games (compare this with my previous visit/report, to Partizan, 2017). As ever, it was fun to wander around marvelling at all the creativity and work people have put into some pretty stunning tables. That said, I wasn't quite as blown away as I have been on some other occasions. Indeed, I'd say - and no offence intended - that this year most of the games were simply at the better end of 'run of the mill'.

WWII German Panzer crew purchases.

I'm a bit old fashioned as well, when it comes to what interests me most, which is WWII (quite well represented, mostly in larger scales), and Napoleonics (less well represented than I'd like). My favourite Napoleonics game, in terms of beautiful figures and well realised scenery, depicted action in my least favourite of Napoleonic theatres, in what appeared to be North Africa, so probably Egypt (I didn't check what the battle was; could've been the 'Holy Land'!?).

Perhaps one of the best looking games was a WWI trench warfare jobbie. That looked amazing. There was a pretty steaming verdant tropical game as well. I'm less keen on the myriad obscurer eras, and even less so the fantasy or sci-fi stuff, including steampunk, which seems to merge those two previously separate genres. I can admire the creativity and imagination involved, but it just doesn't connect to the 'real history' buzz that is possibly the chief dynamo of my interest in all things mini-military.

Starting the clean-up prep at home, inc. removing bases from Orions.

In the end I did buy a few 20mm figures, pictured above, as I need crews for various vehicles. The Caesar German Panzer crews I bought (dark grey) are wearing winter gear, but many of them might well pass in other theatres/climates, once painted. They're made from a nice harder plastic, very much like that used for a set of Preiser figures I acquired some while ago. The Orions (in an unusual brick red!) - which I first saw as expensive resin products - are made from that horrible soft bendy plastic that so many 1/72 figures are available as. Hard to clean up, and tricky to paint.

What I love about the Caesar and Orion figures is the realism of pose and uniform rendering. Many of the standard 'for kids' style plastic toy soldiers I grew up wth, from makers like Airfix and Revell, etc, favoured 'action' poses that are both unrealistic in themselves, and then doubly so in how they are constrained by the moulding processes. These more recent makers seem to take the trouble to create figures in naturalistic poses such as you see in wartime photographs, making them infinitely better and more usable.

Some of Adler's 20mm Jeep crew, from Adler's own publicity images.

Also very well posed and sculpted, I bought my first Adler 20mm WWII figures; German tankers and US Jeep drivers/passengers. I'm looking forward to painting all of these figures and populating some of my vehicles. The Adler German tankers are actually DAK. But I'll be using them for Europe, from Italy and Russia, where their apparel should fit anyway, to the Western Front, where I'll be using a little licence.

Chausseurs a Cheval of the Guard, by Rousselot.

Book wise, I bought a large and very nice hardback called Napoleon's Elite Cavalry, which celebrates the Cavalry of the Imperial Guard, 1804-1815, as depicted in the paintings of Lucien Rousselot, with an accompanying text in English by Edward Ryan. I also got Military Uniforms in Colour, an old Blandford title written and illustrated by Preben Kannik, which is a book I used to get out of my village library as a kid. A real hit of nostalgia!

Ah, the memories this evokes!

Although I'm not currently reading as much as I once was on the subject, I'm still deeply into the Russia 1812 campaign, and hoping to start making inroads into painting my mountains of 6mm and 10mm figures for these campaigns. And in relation to this I still seek out books on the subject. On this occasion I bought With Napoleon In Russia, 1812, by Lt. Vossler, a Würtemberger. (I have so many books on Russia 1812 I'm a little worried I might already have it!)

As mentioned above, usually I'd have my iPhone or iPad on me, and take a bunch of pics. But this time I had neither, as both are suffering with recharging issues. On the one hand I wasn't as impressed with the games this year as in some previous years, but on the other, a show report with no pictures of the many games seems like a failure on my part! Never mind. I enjoyed the show and came home with some fab swag.

Chausseurs a Cheval of the Guard...

the kind of stuff that got me so excited about this era...

I mean, come on... talk about martial splendour epitomised!

Perusing the Rousselot paintings once home in the evening - and I only managed the Chausseurs a Cheval before exhaustion did for me - I realised that this purchase alone made the whole trip worthwhile!