Butterfly Moments... Shiny American Civil War.

Greetings...

Okay I am calling it a butterfly moment for now... but I think this one has potential.

One of the reasons that it has potential is the fact that David Andrews has given me a big bag of 20mm figures... so it would be rude not to try.

A while back I ordered some samples from Jacklex Miniatures...

http://www.jacklexminiatures.com/american-civil-war

I have to say that Mark Lodge the current owner is a fine fellow to deal with.

I have always liked Jacklex Miniatures, they have a character all of their own... 

I was however taken by surprise by the genuine old school packaging...

Definitely old school...

I seem to remember Minifigs being packed in the same way many many years ago...

It was quite fun digging the toys out...although I am not sure how I would cope with a really large order.

Jesting aside this certainly reduces the amount of plastic packaging and it is recyclable.

So I painted a few up....

I have to say I am very pleased with them... they certainly tick all the shiny boxes.

I will be taking this one slowly for the moment... It’s not like I don’t have anything else to do...

The next shiny Americans will come out of the box of toys David gave me...

All the best    Aly

Lion Rampant 3rd Century... A new table set up.

 Greetings...

I thought it was about time I tried out my Geek Villain gaming mat...

https://geekvillain.co.uk/products/wargaming-battle-mat-6x4-sicily

So I have set things up for another solo game of Lion Rampant...

I should really try and come up with a cool sounding name for these games... How about...

Lion Rampant - Rome in Crisis.

Anyway here are some pictures...

I think it looks rather good...

I have already said how much I likes the look of this product...and it’s pleasing to see how good it looks on the table.

To get the hills and contours a just set up my normal terrain...

Once the mat was placed over it , the fleece clung nicely to the flocked surface of my boards.

I shall have to invest in roads and rivers at some point.. there are are a few nice ones out there.

Giving in to temptation... yup!

Roman and Palmyrene camel riders and a Nellie...

I think that these are going to be a lot of fun to paint...

They are of course A&A Miniatures

https://www.aandaminiatures.co.uk/

All the best    Aly

Some inspiration...

 Greetings...

Dave Andrews sent me a photo of his Palmyran Camel Cataphracts...

Obviously I will need to have some myself... 

Beautifully painted...as one would expect...

All the best.  Aly

Shiny Napoleonics... Regiment D’ Issembourg.

Greetings...

Just before Xmas a little package of toys dropped through the letterbox...

These were some lovely early Lamming French...

All the way from New Zealand courtesy of my chum Matthew (aka Wellington Man).

These are a lot more delicate that the later Lamming ranges and looking at them I began to think that they would make rather nice Light Infantry.

And then I thought Regiment D’Issembourg... Sky blue uniforms with yellow facings... what’s not to like.

Typically when you start looking for a uniform there seems to be more than one variation to choose from...

I decided to go for this one... 

Okay the coat tails on the miniatures are probably a bit on the long side and I had to alter the gaiters and the cuffs... This wasn’t too painful as I left the tails alone and the detail was fine enough that it just took a bit of light filing and a couple of coats of thick paint to get the result I was looking for.

The Uniform is... Wargames Foundry... Sky Blue 21B

The Belts are... Citadel... Corax White.

The Facings are... Wargames Foundry... Ochre 4B

The Piping is... Citadel... Pallid Wych Flesh.

The Muskets and Packs are... Citadel... Mournfang Brown.

The Greatcoat is... Citadel... Administration Grey.

As usual everything was given a wash of Aly’s Brown Liquid and re-highlighted with the original colours.

The belts were brought up to pure White.

The bases are as always...
https://warbases.co.uk/product-category/bases/round-cornered-bases/

The paints are Wargames Foundry and Citadel...
https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/paint
https://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Painting-Modelling

The Flag is GMB Designs...
https://gmbdesigns.com/product-category/28mm-range/28mm-range-napoleonic-wars/

I must say that I really enjoyed painting these and I am very pleased with the results.

The painting mojo has taken a bit of a dip recently... but it is starting to come back and hopefully things will pick up I the next few weeks.

All the best.  Aly

Shiny Napoleonics... Prussian Freiwillinger Jäger

 Greetings...

It has been a little bit longer than normal between posts... I’ve been a little bit busy with work and life...

Yeh!... Once again I’ve had to make lots of toy soldiers... boo hoo my life is so bad 😂.

I have however now cleared the wargames table and set up my photo booth to taken a few pictures of toy soldiers...

I have added a small unit of Freiwillinger Jäger to the 1st West Prussian Infantry Regiment Nr.6.

It seemed rude not to add these to the Regiment...

They have been painted exactly the same as the previous Battalions except...

Instead of blue for the tunics I have used Wargames  Foundry Forest Green 26B.

I am pleased with these and I am positive that although small in number they will perform magnificently...

That is of course... unless I am using them.

The figures are Minifigs Intermediate range with the bayonets removed and shako covers added by me..

And the bases are as always Warbases...

https://warbases.co.uk/

All the best.   Aly

Lion Rampant 3rd Century... First try

 Greetings...

As I have now painted up enough figures for two small forces, I thought that I would have a little solo game to see how they perform...

It’s been a while since I have played Lion Rampant or any of its variants, so this was a nice opportunity to refresh myself of the rules...

I got the Roman and Sassanid stats from the I live With Cats blog...

http://ilivewithcats.blogspot.com/search/label/romans

So each force was six units strong and I played them pretty much as basic stats...

I used playing cards to decide whose move it was to add a little uncertainty... Red cards for Rome and Black cards for the Sassanids.

When a unit failed an activation roll ... Instead of the turn going to the other side... I turned another card over.

This is the initial set up after the first move... no subtle tactics...
More a case of “let’s get in these and see what happens.”

The Sassanids 

The Romans

The Sassanid light cavalry make a move towards the Roman Temple.
Due to... predictable activation roll fails... this is where they stay for a bit.

Sassanid heavies moving forwards slowly.
It does make a nice picture though.

The Romans start a steady advance.

Sassanid skirmishers in the woods.

The Sassanid Levy Infantry... loiter.

The Roman Noble Horse charge the Sassanid Cataphracts.
And bounce off.

Encouraged by this the Cataphracts decide they want to move forward 

The Roman and Sassanid Light Horse skirmish with little effect.

The Roman Infantry look tough.

The Sassanid Levy... loiter...sigh!

Having gotten the worst of the skirmishing.
The Sassanid Light Horse fall back

My Leader eyes up some Romans as a possible target.

The Sassanid Levy decide to have ago at the Roman Auxilia.
What could possibly go wrong?

A Raven’s eye view of the battlefield.

Having managed to charge the Romans...
The Levy decide they may have bitten of more than they could chew.

Sadly no before picture...
But here is the after.
The Sassanid leader has disappeared in a puff of...
Death!

At this point I decided that this was a good point to call a halt to the action.

I thought that the cards work well for the turn sequence, but by the way my dice were rolling the basic Lion Rampant none activation result felt a bit brutal... next time I will lift the Double One/Double Six rule from Pikeman’s Lament and see how that works... I also think that the Cataphracts could be a bit more aggressive/easier to move.

I also need more Light Horse for the Sassanids.

I really enjoyed this it was nice to see the toys on the table... I already feel like painting more up.

I shall set up a new table and have another game...

All the best.   Aly

 

Butterfly Moments... Henry VIII’s Wars.

 Greetings...

I thought that I would start doing the occasional post about my occasional fluttering...

So... Henry VIII’s Wars...

I was looking around for something that would have a similar size and scale as my Lion Rampant Roman project... its been so much fun and has definitely left me with a desire to play games and add more toys.

Now... I have always had a bit of a problem with Pike and Shot armies... I love the various period histories... I love the flags... I love the clothes... and I love the arms and armour... but when I start to paint the toys... I just grind to a halt and my enthusiasm evaporates.

Maybe it’s the long pointy sticks ( It is a thing... the fear of pointy objects... Aichmophobia) or maybe it’s the flashbacks to when I was in the Sealed Knot.

I had been reading about Henry’s 1544 invasion of France and I quite liked the look of the Assault Groups English Tudor range...

https://theassaultgroup.co.uk/product-category/renaissance/english-tudor/

Then I looked at the Landsknechts and French... I am afraid these are the kind of troops I like to see other people painting... The wars against Scotland looked a bit more doable...

Alas... No one appears to do any accurate mid 16th century Scots...(That I liked anyway).

I went ahead and bought a few samples with the idea that I might be able to modify some of the English to Scots... the miniatures are indeed very nice but the Bill/Pikemen are a bit to over armoured for what the Scottish troops would have worn at the likes of Pinkie Cleugh...

I decided to go ahead and paint up a couple of English and convert and paint a Scot based on the Uniformed Billman...

Here’s an Archer painted up as a man from Thomas Caverden’s contingent...

And here we have an English Billman in Tudor livery and the converted Scots Pikeman...

They have indeed come our rather well and I did enjoy painting them... but here is the rub... Quilted Jacks and possibly chains sewn onto the arms don’t make for a quick and easy project... I am not sure how many of these I could alter before I started looking at Landsknechts with kinder eyes...

I have decided to leave this one for a while (Hopefully The Assault Group will make some Tudor Scots) and flutter off to pastures new... 

I expect there will be more Butterfly Moments as I’ve been fluttering about quite a bit this month...

All the best...Flutter Flutter.   Aly