Somewhere in Africa......B'Maso After Action report

     Once again Rich Uncle Pat has graced us with one of his cleverly contrived and beautifully presented games. This outing involved a stolen aid convoy, foreign mercenaries, rebels and an invasion by an aggressive neighbor. So, in other words, an unusually quiet afternoon in these parts. But far and away the most striking thing about the game is that it took place in a shanty-town that covered the entire 6x4 foot table. These little gems had been acquired from tinned-pears via Ebay.UK who produces them in 15mm/20mm/28mm and is also open to commissioned projects. He can also be found on Facebook at Tinned Fruit Buildings. I was completely blown away with the look and the fact that each and every one was a hand-crafted original. Simply Awesome!

 

R.U.P. has more buildings but we needed to have room for a few minis!

 

A view from the other end, just as stunning

 

the mean streets down by the docks

 

hardly a bustling waterfront, but then, civil war is usually bad for commerce

A Return to the Rampant Lion

     Inspired by the fun we were having with Pikeman's Lament Joe and I decided to dig out Lion Rampant and my old 15mm Middle Ages troops and play a game. I have to admit that my first experiences with Lion Rampant left a bad taste in my mouth. As I have played more of Mersey's games I understand his design ideas a bit better and have come to terms with my old apprehensions.

     True to form, instead of playing a game of twenty-four points a side we thought that we would give a sixty point battle a try. We did make two changes; we broke each force into three Battles, these groups diced as separate entities so that one bad die-roll didn't freeze the action all the way across the table, secondly we decided that each base represented two figures (ignoring the number of figures mounted on the base) this changed the look of the game a great deal.

     I chose a force heavy on firepower, crossbows with pavises, a couple of blocks of Foot Sergeants and some Fierce Foot supported by two units of dismounted Knights, my only mounted troops were one unit of Knights and one of Mounted Sergeants. Joe opposed me with three units of Elite Archers, one unit of Foot Sergeants, Two units of Mounted Knights and five of Mounted Sergeants.

the right flank of Joe's army, a threatening mass of cavalry, four units of Mounted Sergeants

 

in the distance the rest of Joe's force; four units of Elite Archers flanked by a unit of Foot Sergeants, on his far left two units of Mounted Knights and another unit of Sergeants 

nearer is my army with (left to right) Mounted Sergeants backed by Mounted Knights then alternating units of crossbow and Foot sergeants backed by Foot Knights on my far right  a unit of foot sergeants and two units of Fierce Foot

Still Further Lamentations

     Once again I had an opportunity to play a quick game and my sole opponent was Joe, we quickly resolved on playing a round of Pikeman's Lament. I had a scenario in mind for a Napoleonic game but the it translated well to the 1690's so I laid it out on the table.

     The situation is that a convoy of siege guns needs to be delivered to the besieging army, it is being escorted by a group of infantry with a nominal cavalry escort. Word of the convoy has been passed to the opposing side. They don't have the forces to lift the siege but there is a handy force of elite cavalry and brave infantry. With steely nerve and a dash of luck they just might be able to intercept the convoy and destroy the guns and disperse the crews.

 

the place of battle, the convoy will arrive from the far end, 

dicing to decide which road they are on

Further Lamentations, a Pikeman's Lament AAR

     This being one of my favorite periods and once again having just Joe as an opponent it seemed a perfect time to give The Pikeman's Lament rules another go 'round. We agreed on standard size companies  but threw an added spin on it by gaming with my (ancient) Minifigs 15mm ECW forces. A little playing around with the look of things we decided that each base of figures would stand in for two figures under the rules; this gave a good looking game and matched the physical space that the larger 28mm figures would have occupied thus saving us from having to scale the moves and ranges. The battle was a heads-up fight to make sure things worked as we hoped they might.

 

we chose standard 24 point companies

Truly Stunning Work

  

     Look at the models then guess the scale then follow this link to be truly amazed!
Then back up a page to his albums and prepare top be awestruck! Talent like his is absolutely humbling. 

New Meets Old, A first test of Pikemen's Lament

     The only person that could make it for the game on the 19th was my rules-junkie buddy Joe. Knowing this I decided that we would give Pikeman's Lament a try. Everybody else in my gaming group has pretty well made up their mind about the pike and shot era (and in a very negative way, I might add).
      These rules are derivative of the Lion Rampant system but have enough differentiation to feel rather specific to the period. In reading the rules one of the scenarios gave me the idea for our game; a redoubt has been constructed in front of the main gate of the fortress and last night the big guns have been moved into position, these guns must be destroyed before they can blow in the the gate and allow the besieging army access to the fortress. To this end a desperate force of volunteers has been assembled and will attack at first light. They must place an unwavering unit on each gun for a full turn to spike the barrels and burn the carriages, anything else is failure.

the Gallopers burst forth from the main gate and headed hell-bent toward the guns

Capricious Imagination Time....

    Actually a couple of people have expressed interest in playing games from the Neulandia Campaign so it looks like we will be running some VSF craziness.

     First up Her Britannic Majesty's Forces will show the bandits on Vectis what proper hospitality looks like (tea and crumpets served a bayonet point, I am guessing)

     Next we have the Mexicanish Empire's initial exploration of their newly granted lands, just so The Housemartin can show off his freshly painted soldiers. (Housemartin please bring your whole force so we can do an "Up close and personal" post on your unique force, you too Joe, and you as well R.U.P.)

     Third will be the  (hopefully) final encounter between the Prussians and the rebellious Malagassian upstarts.

      And, because all of that should take less than three hours I encourage everyone to bring 36 points of their favorite VSF tank/walker/War-car etc for a free-for-all battle as a nightcap. If you don't have enough models I have lots of stuff left over from the D.O.D.O. DampfPanzerLandSchiff Korps so I can help fill in any gaps.

Let The Tedium Begin!!!!!

     Having finished the fun part of the project I am now faced with the essential but hugely tedious task of cladding the surface with card. This process involves covering the model with glue and sticking index card weight paper over the surface. I find that this greatly strengthens the model and helps the foam resist dings and damage in handling. This is neither interesting to see or easy to photograph so I will refer my gentle readers to the posting on my efforts while building Fort Matanzas. It will take some time to complete this step so I will leave you with a photo or two before I return to the workshop.

 

it certainly looks like I'm going to need a bigger table

that is the "small" version of the fort  with the 5" wall sections instead of the 15" versions

 

and storage is going to be an issue too

Of Towers and Gateways

     I had a moment to spend on the Starfort. Operationally unprepared to start cladding the fort in card I opted to build a few of the details that make it scream "Spanish!" Corner tower were a must and the spirit of the Baroque era demanded some sort of fancy gateway. While I was contemplating the off-cuts pile it occurred to me that if I made tiny sections of wall that would connect the bastions to one another it would save a lot of space on the table. There was a handy heap of blue board in 5"x5" squares. These were left over from the build phase and were exactly the  right size for wall segments. So, off I went.

 

first I dug out my old Nemesis, the hot glue gun, and glued the squares into three-high stacks 

(this is exactly wall height)

Of Parapets and Such....

     Having completed the rough shape of the bastions I now needed to add the all-important parapet (that bit of the wall that the soldiers were actually protected by). I cut strips of foam to correct shape and then glued them to the top edge of the bastion, mitering the corners as I went. Below you can see one of the bastions with its parapet installed.

 

cutting, trimming and installing the parapets took longer than building the bastions did 

Further Progress on the 28mm Starfort

    OK, for once I turned down overtime at work and had a whole glorious day with nearly nothing to do with myself. Shunning the magnificent sunshine I descended into the depths of the Anton's Wargames Workshop to address unfinished project pile. Looming (literally) over the rest of my many "in-progress" efforts was the vast blue bulk of the starfort. I grinned and set to work, below you can see the fruits of my efforts.

 

the rough-cut bastions,these are slightly wider than the prototype,

 apparently math DOES matter

A Magnificent Bastion!

     I decided to just push ahead and start cutting foam, instead of the complex geometry stuff. It seems to have worked out so far, what the heck? So I cut three layers of foam to the outline of the bastion and then cut it again at the draft angle of the walls I had finished earlier.  A couple of mistakes and a whole mess of hot glue and I have a bastion. All in less time than the math would have taken.

 

those are 28mm WSS figures from Wargames Factory

 

this is going to be a HUGE model when it is finished

 

the Mantanzas Fort looks tiny sitting inside this thing

 

and in relative terms the Castillo de San Marcos was small, 

Spanish forts in Puerto Rico and Cuba are MUCH larger