Latest Acquisitions

Just received from Patrick at 'The Virtual Armchair General' : 4 different game card packs for some of his excellent rule sets. Most of the rules themselves can be ordered on-line, which saves time and avoids the risk of incurring customs and handling charges. Must admit, I'm prone to picking up new rule sets on a whim! TVAG is a great company, very customer-friendly and, amongst other things, their Mahdist Source Books are an absolute must for every colonial gamer 

'Bhoys!' is his game for gang warfare in nineteenth century New York, which has some very interesting ideas even if I never get around to collecting figures and scenery.

'Rough Riders' covers the Spanish-American War - an interesting colonial sideshow and has potential for a mini-campaign in 15mm but I suspect that the Boxer Rebellion will take priority over this one as a 'maybe' project for the future. 

The Event Decks are designed with 'The Sword and the Flame' rules in mind but are eminently adaptable to other games/scenarios. Several different packs are available and these are the ones intended for NWF and FFL in Africa. 

Some of the other packs are quite 'garish' for my tastes but these are more subdued. They come pre-cut on quite thin card, so may not stand up to prolonged rough handling. 

Isandlwana in 28mm: a few photos

While I learn the easiest way to upload photos here, a couple of shots of the Barnsley Christmas game, which featured almost 900 Zulus and 250 Imperial troops on a 12' x 6' table. The game lasted a leisurely 5 hours, ending in a closely fought but historically accurate Zulu victory. We were using a draft version of the new Osprey "Men who would be Kings" rules, due out later this year, which coped admirably with a game almost 8 times larger than they are designed around and despite the fact that only 2 of the 5 participants had ever seen them before!

To Blog or not to Blog....

One year later than originally planned, here's my first tentative efforts at producing a blog mainly focused on my interest in military history and the pushing of little toy soldiers around a table, rolling dice and hopefully having some fun while doing it.

Why blog? I need something to keep me better focused on actually gaming, or doing productive stuff (painting, terrain building etc) rather than just browsing t'internet, drawing inspiration and ideas from fellow gamers, getting all sorts of ideas for new projects without making any progress on the ones that I'm already meant to be working on - and I'm told that the interest and comments of those that follow these things might have a positive influence on that ambition!

I'll probably get a couple of posts up during January, to experiment with how this thing actually works, and to give people something to actually look at before going public to my immediate circle of fellow-gamers and then the wider world.

Me? 50-something historical gamer (though have been known to dabble in the dark side from time to time) who's been a tabletop wargamer for at least 35 years, albeit with some fallow periods in my 20's and 30's when women, small children and real life kept getting in the way. I was a member of the Essex Warriors, an excellent club just outside Chelmsford in Essex for many very enjoyable years but recently moved up to South Yorkshire (hence 'News from...), where I've had an equally warm welcome from the Barnsley Club, despite my strange accent and soft southern ways.

Particular interests right now would include 28mm skirmish games (mainly Napoleonic and 19th Century Colonial) using the excellent 'Sharp Practice' rules from TFL, and 15mm colonial gaming (Sudan a particular favourite) using home-brew adaptations of the same. Just started playing 'Chain of Command' and slowly building up assorted platoons and supports for late WW2, but finding myself dangerously drawn to the different variants available for SCW, VBCW etc.

A brief biographical note on my usual avatar on such sites: the wonderfully bewhiskered Captain Robert Bradstreet of the Newcastle Mounted Rifles, who was killed at Isandlwana. Now I've just got to work out the easiest way of uploading photos to the blog, so I can show off some of the ones taken at our Christmas 2015 club refight of the battle!

The main new project for 2016 is meant to be 15mm ECW, for which I'm amassing figures thanks to the artistry of Mr Kev Louth, aka 'Fat Wally'. I've collected all manner of different rules for the period but will probably end up cannibalising them all to come up with my own take on the period. You can be sure that they will be rather Lardy-inspired!

So, that's one small step. I'll experiment with a few things over the next couple of weeks and then try to be disciplined enough to post at least a monthly update on games played, figures bought and/or painted and anything else that may be of possible interest.