ALY MORRISON'S "BUTTERFLY" ADVENTURES IN THE WORLD OF WARGAMES AND TOY SOLDIERS

Thursday, 12 October 2017

Little Britons... Photo shoot.

As I mentioned in my last 'A Gentleman's War' game, I have taken some photo's of all my units.


Here they are in no particular order with some comments and thoughts...







Tirailleurs Algeriens...a lovely colourful unit I chose the white summer trousers to make them even brighter.
At some point I will add another four men to bring this up to a full strength 'A Gentleman's War' unit.











This is French infantry wearing the 1911 Reseda uniform...
This experimental uniform was not very popular with politicians and the public and was eventually rejected for not being French enough...the trousers were originally the same colour as the tunics, I read somewhere that some troops wearing this uniform were mistaken for 'Prussians' and 'abused' by the public...






















I rather like this uniform... these guys also need another four men to bring then up to strength.







French Republican Foot Guards... another lovely colourful unit... again they could do with some reinforcements.







The French 1906 trial uniform... made from beige-blue cloth with a Spanish style kepi.
Again sadly rejected for various political reasons... another unit I need to build up.
















I especially like the Wolseley style helmet...






French line infantry... another six will give me two units...




French Chasseurs a pied... quite a sombre uniform to paint until you add the yellow piping and green epaulettes then they turn into another of my favourite units.




French Hussars... what's not to like?
In 'A Gentleman's War' you only need six men for a cavalry unit, so again a little upgrade will give me two units...




My only Russian Infantry...so far... a six figure skirmish unit.
I will definitely need to do more... the white summer uniform is so attractive.




The Russian Artillery... all of the guns are 4.7" Howitzers regardless of who is manning them.




French Artillery... these chaps are wearing the 1902 Trial Artillery Helmet.








 This proved to be quite successful and was still in use by some units in 1915.




The Royal Scots Greys... one of my favourite cavalry units.
 Of course two more figures would let me do a not very accurate second six man unit...




The Shropshire Rifle Volunteers... a very small unit that needs built up a bit.
Grey uniforms were quite popular with volunteers in the late 19th century so these could be used for a number of different units.




French infantry wearing the 1912 Edouard Detaille uniform.
Interesting details here are the khaki drill canvas equipment and the almost renaissance style helmet.












Sadly the helmet was not popular with the men and the uniform didn't really cut it with the politicians.




Bavarian 6th Chevauleger... green tunics pink facings and white plumes... no other reasons needed.




British Life Guards... So British...So William Britain's... and now So Little Britons...
Would it hurt to add a couple more... probably not.




French Cuirassiers wearing the Reseda uniform....it gives a modern look to an old classic.
Again a couple more men wouldn't go amiss...




The Royal Irish Lancers...a beautiful and classic uniform...and of course in need of one more man.




A small skirmish unit painted up as Black Watch...these could also represent any of a number of volunteer units that chose the highland uniform...and like everything else they could do with one more man...




A small unit of Rifles... once more they represent one of the many volunteer units who chose the 'Rifles' look...
Gosh! I have painted a few little units... mostly this was done to use up castings although again one more would help.




French Artillery... I chose to go for the Reseda uniform with the 1902 Artillery Helmet... A pleasing modern combination I think.




Cossacks!.... I definitely wont more of these...




British Fusiliers... another classic British uniform that is to good to miss...




British Naval Artillery,,, again a bit of a classic...




British Grenadier Guards...probably one of  the most iconic and recognisable uniforms and 'Toy Soldiers' of all time... In my humble opinion.




The Black Watch... another cracking unit...I am not sure why I chose this unit as a lot of my family served in the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders... Ah! well I suppose I will have to paint another unit.




The Manchester Regiment...I like the nice clean contrast you get with white facings.




The 2nd Bombay Native Infantry... this is based on the William Britain's Figures, and shows an unusual error in that companies research... The correct uniform should be a Red Tunic with White facings and Dark Blue trousers... I decided to go the Britain's route because I like the look of it.




The Rifle Regiment... I cant remember what colour I used for the uniforms... but fortunately with twelve men I have more than enough...




Royal Field Artillery...  I like the workman like look of this uniform...




Royal Horse Artillery... well it would be rude not to...




General Rust... named after one of my daughters favourite Discworld characters.




General Malchanceux... his name is inspired by my dice rolling abilities.




The 15th Ukrainian Hussar Regiment of Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna.
Pretty in Pink...
I read somewhere that the Grand Duchess was encouraged to wear a Blue Pelisse when reviewing the regiment in case the Pink was mistaken for bare flesh....
I will be finishing this unit...


Well that's them all...
It has been interesting for me to look at each unit in turn, most of them need a few more figures to bring them up to 'A Gentleman's War' strengths but there is no rush, I have been having great games with them as they are.
Its a perfect butterfly collection, the list of new units I want is endless...


Little Britons are all my own work and are available from ...
http://www.spencersmithminiatures.co.uk/html/little_britons.html


The bases are from Warbases...
https://warbases.co.uk/


I hope you have enjoyed this look at one of my favourite collections.


All the best  Aly



































































































































Saturday, 7 October 2017

The War of Spanish Succession... French Infantry Regiment Sparre-allemand

Hurrah!
Another unit finished... Sparre-allamand.


I chose this unit because I like the colour combination I also wanted to try a different shade of blue...
They are described as having Medium Blue coats and Chamois Yellow cuffs...Hmmmm!
What does Chamois Yellow look like?.......hard to be certain...
I went for a colour that looked the same as my Chamois cloth... Citadel Bestigor Flesh.






This is colour the test ...




Coat and Waistcoat... Citadel... Caledor Sky.
Cuffs... Citadel... Bestigor Flesh.
Belts... Citadel... Balor Brown.
Musket/wooden bits/powder flask ... Citadel ...Mournfang Brown
Ammunition pouches and Officers scabbards ... Citadel ... Skrag Brown
Grenadier, Sergeant and hat braid ... Foundry ... Ochre 4B.


As usual everything was blocked in with flat colours(I had help this time, my chum Wayne did the blocking in for me which sped things up nicely).
Then given a wash of Aly's Brown Liquid... and re-highlighted with the original shade.
https://alystoysoldiers.blogspot.co.uk/2017/08/the-war-of-spanish-succession-prussian.html


Another pleasing unit to add to the collection...











 The miniatures are as always Front Rank...
https://www.frontrank.com/product-category/18th-century/spanish-succession/
The paints are Wargames Foundry and Citadel...
https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/paint
https://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Painting-Modelling
Bases from Warbases...
https://warbases.co.uk/?product_cat=premier-bases-metric
And last but not least Flags from Maverick Models...
http://www.maverick-models.com/flags.htm

All the best.  Aly















Sunday, 1 October 2017

From my side of the table...A Gentleman's War 2

Or Don't trust Dice ,Cards or Sheep...


Last Wednesday we had another game of A Gentleman's War...My friend Chris was over from the States and I had promised him a game of shiny toy soldiers. Our friends Jes and Ben also joined us.


We played a rerun of the game I had with Mharaid... sheep and all...
https://alystoysoldiers.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/from-my-side-of-table-gentlemans-war.html




Ben and I were Army Red...
Jes and Chris were In League With the Devil.... as you will see.


I shall let the pictures tell the story...









Our glorious troops advance down the road... our average die roll was about...3






Army Black's troops move forwards... their average roll was 10
In fact Jes consistently rolled 10 or more....In league with the Devil...










Already the sheep were showing their true colours...




With a cunning use of low dice we moved our cavalry in front of our guns...




Our card luck ran out now... the turn ended before we could move much more than this...




And here we are rushing on to the table... 3 inches at a time... I am getting a sense of deja vu...




The Devil worshippers seem to be doing all right...


It was about this time that Chris started calling out our die rolls before we made them... "you are going to get 4... no wait a minute 3... " with about an 80-85% accuracy rate... and predicting the cards... " Spades,Clubs,Spades,Spades...Hang on a Heart...Clubs,Spades......"
SOUL...
DEVIL...
SOLD TO...




Fortunately Chris cant hit a barn door even if he is sat on it...




Or win a combat... even when he has a charge bonus...




We continued our .... advance... That will be 2" then....





What a beautiful-static-display...




Our Lancers make a surprising advance... supported by their General(Incompetence)




An excellent example of our rapid movement...




And another example of our none Devil worshipping die rolls...



Army Black's cavalry move up rapidly to intercept our lancers...and collect more sheep.




Chris rolls another blinder...




This is where General Hors de Combat decided he could take on the Irish Lancers on his own...Maybe it was Satanic influence maybe just the wine...
Not having encountered this novel tactic we gave him two combat dice... he did not use them well.




The generals Cossacks under Captain Smirnoff charge in to seek revenge...




The dice throwing was truly appalling... Army Black still won...




Our troops moved forwards....I think!




Spade,Club,Spade,Club etc. etc.....




Oh! look ...sheep not heading our way...




Army Black's cavalry eye up our Fusiliers while rather surprisingly some sheep leap the wall in our direction...




A second group of sheep realise that the grass is greener on our side...




A lone Army Red Horse Guard stands in defiance against the enemy...






With the Black sheep once again showing his true colours and the clock striking midnight our Satanic companions announced that they needed to head home and make a sacrifice or something so we conceded the game... they had more sheep.


We started rather late... we stopped off for beer and food... and I think I should have placed the Armies closer to each other or doubled the moves... mind you the way Ben and I were throwing dice I doubt that this would have made any difference.
This was Ben's first shiny toy soldier game , Chris's first none Warhammer/40K game and Jes's first wargame in over 20 years, I was the only one who vaguely knew the rules...
We had a fantastic time.


My neighbour thought that wargamers/geeks would play out games with quiet and intelligent thoughtfulness ...
She was rather surprised to find out that all the noise and laughter came from just four people.


A final point...




If using a card based system... always go for the girlie cards... I distracts you enemies.


While I have been putting my toys back on the shelves I have taken 'studio' shots of each unit...I shall post them when they are all done.


All the best  Aly