Ancient Naval Game Using Corvus V2 Rules

I have always wanted to do more naval wargaming, but haven’t had much opportunity.  When the chance came I took it and had a play through solo using cardboard ships so I would be ready for the real thing.

Mark supplied all the models and everything else we needed.  His write-up can be found here: http://stretch76.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/this-was-trial-game-for-society-of.html

My deployment, as the “green force” was to mass in my centre and use my lighter ships to skirmish on the flanks.

Here the Triremes (north) and Trihemiolae (south) are heading off to engage the enemy.

A slightly out of focus shot of the beautifully painted and detailed “green force” flagship.  The Xyston Miniatures 1:600 range of galleys certainly come up well.

My attempt to describe initial action after adding labels using PowerPoint.  There was plenty of action going on as I hope can be seen by this picture.  My massed quinqueremes (5s) did well in shooting up an enemy vessel, but then got split having to avoid the blazing wreck.

Cotton wool has now been used to mark ships on fire.  Hopefully the labels describe the death throes of the “green force”.  All that remains to add is that the Green flagship was sunk and the green Trihemiolae that was coming around sank when it rammed the captured ship.

I think we used all the rules.  The only one that gave us a problem was ramming.  The rule said that a difference of three of more in dice roles meant the rammed ship was sunk.  We settled on this meaning a positive difference of three or more in the ramming ships favour.

The rules did provide a quick game, plenty of decisions and lots of action in what to me at least felt like a naval action.

Clearly it will take more than this one game to stop the boats.

Borodino in 25mm using Napoleon's Battles

These are scans of pictures from a large game fought in the 1990s sometime.  It was a refight of Borodino using Napoleon's battles 1st edition and 25mm figures.  It must have been in the early 90s as I was into 5mm at the time and later swapped into 15mm.

The figures are from David Gray's collection and he hosted the game.  It was either preceded or followed by a refight using 5mm - a game of which I sadly have no photos, although I provided the terrain and some of the figures.

I can't remember the names of all the players or the outcome.  I do remember it was exhausting and that we ate a lot of pizzas.

Anyway, for the historical record, here are the pictures:

Initial deployment from the Russian side.

View from French left.

View from the French side of the initial set up.

Another view from the French left and while not 100% sure, I think this is the wing I commanded as Eugene.

All the figures were metal and I remember the table being weighed down.  The battle is also very cramped as can be seen, especially on the French right.  I can only guess at what is going on in the following pictures.

Update

As luck would have it I did find some photos of the 5mm game and they can be seen here: http://onesidedminiaturewargamingdiscourse.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/borodino-in-5mm-using-napoleons-battles.html

Airfix Figures Converted As Prussian Landwher

This would have to count as one of those "seemed like a good idea at the time" things.  Back in the 1970s I converted a couple of boxes of Airfix AWI Grenadiers to be Prussian Landwher, with the help of Plasticine and nail polish hardener.

Above we have the 3rd and 2nd Elbe Landwher, units codes F11 and F16.  Of course, what happened when I'd finished these?  Airfix released a set of Prussian Landwher ...

The above two pictures are the 1st Silesian Landwher, unit F27.  Nice figures, but not to the same design as the rest of the Airfix Napoleonic range (like the French Grenadier figures that are on the small side).

The last shot is just me taking advantage of the natural light to take a photo without using the flash.  It gives a more natural look, particularly to the Prussian blue (which was probably the Humbrol acrylic).

Airfix Figures Converted As Prussian Infantry

First up we have 24 Prussian Line Infantry converted from Airfix Napoleonic French Line Infantry and painted by Brenton Searle in the early 1980s.  These were gifted to me and I rebased and touched up during October 2002 with an extra two figures added including a standard bearer.  Sadly the rest of his teenage collection of plastic Napoleonics, with one exception that I know of and will feature later) are now lost.

They represent IR Nr 10.  In collection I have given them the code F37.

The other unit featured in this post is a more adventurous conversion I did from the Airfix Napoleonic British Infantry figures, painted as one of the Prussian reserve regiments that were outfitted in Portuguese uniforms donated by the British.  My guess was I did them sometime in the late 1970s.  I wanted to the flexibility to use them as Portuguese and that was what inspired me to make this unit (along with the picture in the Philip Haythornthwaite book Uniforms of Waterloo published by Blandford  - a book which is probably my favorite uniform book).

A total of 36 figures this time, in which I'm guessing were 12 figure units each representing a battalion.  Don't be deceived by the chaps in the British rifle uniforms, there are 8 ring ins from my British Rifle Regiment that I didn't recognize when I took the picture.  If you look closely you can see they don't have the Prussian cockade and have been racially profiled as Celtic with reddish hair, rather than the more Germanic yellow hair.  While a Reserve regiment, they were ultimately number as IR Nr 21.  In my collection they are F07.

The officer figure is from the Airfix Napoleonic French artillery set.  While just allowed to lead some horses in French service, now he is a leader of men for the Prussians.

HAT Napoleonic Cavalry

These are the three sets of HAT cavalry I have: Prussian dragoons and lancers, and French lancers.

Compared to most of my 1/72nd or 20/25mm Napoleonics, these were rather late additions to my collection, but still painted a good ten or twenty years ago (I think I purchased and painted them around the time they came out, so that should date them).  They have never been used in action, although that might change soon (hopefully).

Just for my reference these are units C16, C17 and C14 respectively in what I refer to as my Napoleonic 25mm collection.

Prussian 3 IR 2nd East Prussian

My second unit of Battle Honors 15mm Prussian Line Infantry (BPR02), painted up as Nr. 3 Zweites Ostpreussisches although the distinction at this scale is a bit challenging, but they do have red shoulder straps and my attempt at brick red for collar and cuffs.  This is 16PrLN in Napoleon’s Battles speak and my final unit will be another 16PrLN painted as the 3rd East Prussian (yellow shoulder straps and I will do the flag in reverse).  The two units will allow me to run up to a 28PrLN unit if the scenario calls for it.

I am still amazed at what the camera does to the VJ Prussian Blue as it is much darker to the naked eye, with the unit appearing almost black clad at a distance of a few feet.

Barsoom

Ever since I was a teenager I have been a fan of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ sci-fi tales, particularly the Martian series.  Of course I wanted to game the books and bought some figures by Hinchcliffe. 

In the thirty plus years I have I had them I have completed one plant man and have a red maiden and warrior partially completed.  What stopped me was getting a flesh tone I was happy with.

Today I stumbled across this post: http://hordesofthethings.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/warriors-of-barsoom.html.  So I now know there is a Peter Pig range of figures in 15mm.  I have HOTT and knew it provided Barsoom army lists, but didn’t know of any figure ranges.  A bit more searching found a blog dedicated to Warlords of Mars (http://martianwarlords.blogspot.com.au/2009/05/peter-pig-fantasy-green-and-red-men.html) and also a Yahoo Group Barsoom Gaming (http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/BarsoomGaming/).

The later provided some links to more figures that might mix in with my existing ones and be used for skirmish games (which I would consider seeing if Song of Blades and Heroes might work).  Obviously this is a long term project or two.

The other Barsoom related game I have is the SPI Barsoom role playing adventure game, which I always wanted to do with figures.  http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/3369/john-carter-warlord-of-mars