"Lust for Glory" at Colours

 

Here are a few shots of the first test game of the "horse and musket" rules I've been working on, tentatively named "Lust for Glory."

This was the first outing for my new WSS collection, which so far has 16 battalions and 20 squadrons (including dragoons). This turned out to be quite sufficient for an enjoyable four player game- I'll bring more-or-less the same forces to Partizan. My short term plan is to expand the army to 20 Bn/28 Sqn, though, just because I'm enjoying assembling the collection. Also, I need to work on the terrain and snagging. A later phase III will add another 8 Bn and 12 or more Sqns.

Above is Sid who led the Allied army into battle. He liked the cavalry squadron tactics, which are rather  different to the way we handled cavalry in "For King and Parliament."

Finally, here's the battlefield at the end of the game, those are casualties in the foreground. WSS ca. 1710 is a convenient period to test the rules, since there are no pikes or matchlocks.

I'm greatly encouraged by the first outing of the rules and plan to edit in all the notes we made, this week, and start to fill in the various gaps next week, with material clipped from FK&P and TtS! Huge thanks to all who helped or played particularly Ian, Sid and Colin.

The next outing will be at T'other Partizan. If you fancy having a go, please email me, I'll run sessions in the AM and PM and currently have six spaces available.

PS I picked up a restock of gaming mats on Saturday, and have largely restocked the BigRedBatShop, which was looking very bare!

Second Mantinaea at Colours

 

Yesterday we ran Second Mantinaea at Colours. Is was great to see to many friends and meet so many gamers who enjoy To the Strongest! Thanks very much to those who helped (especially Ian, Colin and Andy) and to everyone who played, or stopped by for a chat. It was a really super show and I spent far more than I should have. :-) Hot, though, so very, very hot. A big shout out to chum Andrew who couldn't come because he's had a brush with Covid, hope he's better soon.

While I was away though, Sharp Practice has been pulling ahead of TtS! in the Yarkshire Wargames Rules tournament on Facebook. If you've still not voted, could you give us a plug please? At the time of writing, the gap is around 55 votes, still surprisingly close, and I think we might yet be able to catch them! If not, we can go down, fighting gloriously, like Leonidas at Thermopylae. :-)

Building Roundway Down out of Really Useful Boxes and Masking Tape

For our refight of Roundway Down, I decided wanted to have a hill 12' long, covering the entire battlefield. Here are the stages involved in assembling it, for the big game on Saturday.

First, we arranged 36 spare (!) Really Useful Boxes on a table. I had thought I'd brought way too many, since they filled the car but in fact I only had just enough. The top of the hill, at the back, is two 9L boxes high, around 12".

Above, next we covered the boxes with 6mm MDF boards

Next (again above) we taped the edges of the boards together, to stop them slipping.

Next we covered the boards with rug gripper. This adds structural strength and stops the top cloths slipping during play.

Finally, we laid a black cloth over it, covering the sides, another layer of rug gripper with a terrain cloth over the top of that, and a light random scattering of trees.  Job done, ready for the troops to be set up in the morning!

Below is the real hill at Roundway Down, looking up towards the Parliamentarian position on the crest, as photographed on a recent research trip with Andrew Brentnall, on the anniversary of the battle, showing the slightly-parched July pasture, which is a pretty good match for our cloth.

I hope to see lots of you at Colours tomorrow! We are on the second floor, near the Bring and Buy.

Roundway Down at Colours

I'm in the process of finishing off the extra elements I have planned for our extended Battle of Roundway Down For King and Parliament game at the Colours show in Newbury on Saturday. Above are the new units- Prince Maurice's horse, Captain ffoulkes' firelocks*, some battalion guns and some extra casualty stands. Below is my forming baggage park, now with three teams of horses. 

Many of the minis were painted by chum Shaun McTague or eBay purchases, although Prince Maurice's are built around a core of minis originally painted by chum George Moraitis. I painted the wagons and highlighted/finished everything, Ian flocked all the bases, which I'm in the process of tufting - they will all be finished by the day. I will take some proper photos, later on, when everything is completely finished.

If you fancy playing on Saturday, drop me an email at simonmiller60 at gmail.com and I'll hopefully be able to fit you in. It should be a relatively short game- around 90 minutes, I expect. If not just drop by and marvel at the size of our hill! I hope to see lots of you there.

* There wasn't an actual ECW unit of this name, although there were a number of small units of firelocks on both sides. Captain ffoulkes is a Welsh officer and entirely a figment of my imagination.

Colours Day 2 - Epiphany

I have seen the light!  On day 2, I managed to steal an hour from my game, to go around the show.  I made a beeline for the Bruce Weigle game I'd heard about on WD3.  This was every bit as good as rumoured...

The rolling hills and valleys were the best I've ever seen, and I can well believe he researches the terrain in a light aircraft!

I loved this village.  The minis are the old Heroics and Ros range, but beautifully painted and on very low profile bases.  Very tasteful.

It all looked very realistic.  The build quality was stunning.  I pestered Bruce for details of construction, and he was very forthcoming.  Such a nice chap.  I shall have a go at making some myself, later this year...

I completely failed to take photos of any of the other games, including the highly photogenic Hammers Slammers game, the excellent Marne game with many yards of hanging basket moss, the impressive yet bonkers Leipzig "skirmish" and an Eastern front game.  So... back to my Thapsus game (below) for games 3 and 4. Gaze upon the majesty of my reed banks...

Of the 4 games, Scipio won two and Caesar two, so I'm happy that the scenario is balanced.  I was also very pleased that three out of the four games came in under two hours, and the fourth just over 2, as 2 hours was my target duration (about as long as I reckon anyone can concentrate, at a show!).  

The most pleasing thing was that my To the Strongest "Lite" rules were easily picked up by the players, who were soon able to run without me, which was just as well as there were lots of visitors for me to chat to.  In particular, we had nine or ten children in total play across the four games, and they seemed to love it, each playing for the full two hours. Very well behaved and articulate kids, too, and all phenomenally lucky!  The nine year old with red hair (below) was amazing.

All in all it was a splendid weekend.  I met tons of people.  I have the worst memory in the world for names and faces, so this list won't be complete, but it was great to meet Raglan, nose-stick Matt, Barry Carter, Mark and (I think) Carlo, Henry Hyde, very nice Wargames Holiday chap, CoC Richard, Trevor Halsall, Phil Steele and John Curry, amongst many others...   Hopefully I'll be sending copies of the rules out to those who asked for a set, tomorrow.

Particular hanks to Ian Notter, Nigel and Jean for all their help in lugging 1000 metal miniatures and the terrain up and down all the steps, and helping to run the game.  Also many thanks to the team at Newbury and Reading for running such a well-organised event and giving me such a nice space for the game.

Colours day 1

Had a very enjoyable day- met lots of people and lots of friends.  Unfortunately I was insanely busy and took barely any photos at all, only a couple on the phone.  However I will try to remedy this tomorrow. Below is my Thapsus game.

The second shot of the end of the first game, with Mark, Jean and Nigel.  Caesar lost this battle, but won the second of the day.  Both games lasted 2 hours +/- 5 mins.

Off to sleep; early start tomorrow!

Thapsus is going to Colours on Saturday...

...and I'm looking for some players!  Thapsus is a 1000+ mini participation game, set during the Roman Civil Wars, and I'll be running it twice each day, on Saturday and Sunday.  This means I need up to two dozen players over the weekend, and ideally I'd like to get some players booked in up-front.

The rules used will be my own "To the Strongest!" Lite set, and I'll be able to explain the mechanics and get the game underway inside 15 minutes. I intend to run the game each day at 11:00 and 14:30, with an upper limit of 2 hours of play, which will be enough to decide the battle one way or the other.

So... if you are going to Colours and fancy a game, please drop me a line at simonmiller60 AT gmail.com, and I'll book you in for one of the 4 sessions. I can accommodate up to six players at a time, so please bring your friends!