Sunday, August 3, 2008
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Two New Brigades Ready for Action!
Over the weekend I was able to finish rebasing my British and French units for BAR. Well, apart from the French cavalry. Those are based with some unknown rock-like immovable substance from the UK and short of sawing the horses off at the feet, they are NOT coming off!
I hope to add some pics this weekend:
Brigade of Major General Sir Harald Dawes
I hope to add some pics this weekend:
Brigade of Major General Sir Harald Dawes
- 11th Foot, 36 figures
- 20th Foot, 36 figures
- 37th Foot, 36 figures
- Grenadier Battalion, 36 figures
- Artillery Battery, 2 6pdr, 8 gunners, 1 officer
Brigade of Louis Renault, Comte de Maison-Blanche
- Conde, 1 battalion, 48 figures
- La Sarre, 1 battalion, 48 figures
- Royal Allemand, 1 squadron, 12 figures
- Rougrave, 1 squadron, 12 figures
- Royal Artillery, 2 4pdr, 8 gunners
Saturday, July 26, 2008
The Army of Saxe-Jungbach
Infantry
1st Musketeer Regiment Prinz von Saxe-Gotha
2nd Musketeer Regiment Prinz Maximilian
Each regiment of one field battalion
Each battalion of four musketeer companies of 12 figures (10 privates, 1 NCO, 1 officer), one grenadier company of 13 figures (8 grenadiers, 1 pioneer, 1 drummer, 1 fifer, 1 NCO, 1 officer), and a regimental/battalion staff of 7 figures (2 drummers, 1 fifer, 2 standards, 2 officers)
Total, 68 figures
Total force = 2 battalions, 136 figures
Cavalry
1st Cuirassier Regiment
2nd Dragoon Regiment
3rd Chevauleger Regiment[*] Graf Brühl
4th Hussar Regiment*
Regiment of two field squadrons
Each squadron of 12 figures (8 privates, 1 drummer, 1 trumpeter, 1 standard, 1 officer; chevaulegers have no trumpeters and replace with privates; hussars do not have standards or drummers and replace with privates)
Total, 24 figures
Total force = 8 squadrons, 96 figures
Artillery
1st Artillery Company
Company has 8 figures and 2 6pdr guns
The artillerists are supplemented by infantrymen from the battalions (4 figures)
Total force = 2 guns and 12 figures
[*] Chevauleger and Hussar regiments can each dismount one squadron (12 figures plus horseholders)
1st Musketeer Regiment Prinz von Saxe-Gotha
2nd Musketeer Regiment Prinz Maximilian
Each regiment of one field battalion
Each battalion of four musketeer companies of 12 figures (10 privates, 1 NCO, 1 officer), one grenadier company of 13 figures (8 grenadiers, 1 pioneer, 1 drummer, 1 fifer, 1 NCO, 1 officer), and a regimental/battalion staff of 7 figures (2 drummers, 1 fifer, 2 standards, 2 officers)
Total, 68 figures
Total force = 2 battalions, 136 figures
Cavalry
1st Cuirassier Regiment
2nd Dragoon Regiment
3rd Chevauleger Regiment[*] Graf Brühl
4th Hussar Regiment*
Regiment of two field squadrons
Each squadron of 12 figures (8 privates, 1 drummer, 1 trumpeter, 1 standard, 1 officer; chevaulegers have no trumpeters and replace with privates; hussars do not have standards or drummers and replace with privates)
Total, 24 figures
Total force = 8 squadrons, 96 figures
Artillery
1st Artillery Company
Company has 8 figures and 2 6pdr guns
The artillerists are supplemented by infantrymen from the battalions (4 figures)
Total force = 2 guns and 12 figures
[*] Chevauleger and Hussar regiments can each dismount one squadron (12 figures plus horseholders)
Thursday, July 24, 2008
The Army of Hesse-Fedora
The Army in Review
Infantry
Leib Regiment, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Musketeer Regiment von Blaine, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Musketeer Regiment von Earle, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Musketeer Regiment von Spade, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Each musketeer battalion has 4 companies of 12 figures (10 privates, 1 NCO, 1 officer), plus a staff of 6 figures (1 private, 2 drummers, 2 standards, 1 officer)
Each grenadier company has 12 figures (10 grenadiers, 1 drummer, 1 officer)
Total 66 figures.
Normal-Infanterie-Regiment (Fusilier Regiment Landgrafin Loren), 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Battalion of four musketeer companies of 12 figures (10 privates, 1 NCO, 1 officer), one grenadier company of 12 figures (9 grenadiers, 1 drummer, 1 NCO, 1 officer), and a regimental/battalion staff of 6 figures (2 drummers, 2 standards, 2 officers)
Total, 66 figures
Grenadier companies of the first four regiments are converged into Grenadier Battalion von Dobbs; grenadiers of Landgrafin Fusiliers are not converged.
Total force = 6 battalions, 330 figures.
Heavy Cavalry
Garde du Corps, 1 squadron
Karabinier Regiment von Marlowe, 2 squadrons
Each squadron has 12 figures (9 troopers, 1 trumpeter, 1 standard, 1 officer; 2nd squadron of Karabiniers replaces trumpeter with trooper)
Total force = 36 figures
Dragoons
Dragoon Regiment von Gunn, 2 squadrons
Each squadron has 12 figures (10 troopers, 1 standard, 1 officer)
Total force = 24 figures
Artillery
Artillery Company
The artillery company has 20 figures and 4 guns
The artillery company supports each infantry battalion with a 4pdr battalion gun
Total force = 4 guns and 20 figures
Light Forces
Jägerkorps, 3 companies
Hussar Regiment von Steele, 2 squadrons
Each company has 10 figures (1 officer, 9 jägers), no colors
Each squadron has 12 figures (all troopers), no colors
Total force = 54 figures
Infantry
Leib Regiment, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Musketeer Regiment von Blaine, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Musketeer Regiment von Earle, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Musketeer Regiment von Spade, 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Each musketeer battalion has 4 companies of 12 figures (10 privates, 1 NCO, 1 officer), plus a staff of 6 figures (1 private, 2 drummers, 2 standards, 1 officer)
Each grenadier company has 12 figures (10 grenadiers, 1 drummer, 1 officer)
Total 66 figures.
Normal-Infanterie-Regiment (Fusilier Regiment Landgrafin Loren), 1 bn and 1 grenadier co
Battalion of four musketeer companies of 12 figures (10 privates, 1 NCO, 1 officer), one grenadier company of 12 figures (9 grenadiers, 1 drummer, 1 NCO, 1 officer), and a regimental/battalion staff of 6 figures (2 drummers, 2 standards, 2 officers)
Total, 66 figures
Grenadier companies of the first four regiments are converged into Grenadier Battalion von Dobbs; grenadiers of Landgrafin Fusiliers are not converged.
Total force = 6 battalions, 330 figures.
Heavy Cavalry
Garde du Corps, 1 squadron
Karabinier Regiment von Marlowe, 2 squadrons
Each squadron has 12 figures (9 troopers, 1 trumpeter, 1 standard, 1 officer; 2nd squadron of Karabiniers replaces trumpeter with trooper)
Total force = 36 figures
Dragoons
Dragoon Regiment von Gunn, 2 squadrons
Each squadron has 12 figures (10 troopers, 1 standard, 1 officer)
Total force = 24 figures
Artillery
Artillery Company
The artillery company has 20 figures and 4 guns
The artillery company supports each infantry battalion with a 4pdr battalion gun
Total force = 4 guns and 20 figures
Light Forces
Jägerkorps, 3 companies
Hussar Regiment von Steele, 2 squadrons
Each company has 10 figures (1 officer, 9 jägers), no colors
Each squadron has 12 figures (all troopers), no colors
Total force = 54 figures
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Mittel-Nirgendwo
I plan on doing some housework and tidying up on the blog over the next few days.
I have decided that, among other changes, the links section is getting a makeover.
Originally I planned to link to all of the ImagiNation blogs, but that just isn't working. Besides, Emperor vs. Elector is doing it already! So, except for some personal favorites I will give just the link to E vs. E.
There are a few sites that I feel compelled to keep here, for various reasons. Mostly, though, they are the ones that most fire my own ImagiNation:
Stollen
Pils-Holstein
Hesse-Seewald
Battlegames
and some others
Personally, I am using Google Reader as my main blog source. Since it automatically tells me when there are new posts plus has folders for keeping things organized, I find it very useful. Now, if someone can just tell me how to read blog comments in Reader...
Since I use Reader, I can export my full blog list to anyone interested.
Also, I will be doing Army-specific posts showing each ImagiNation's order of battle with embedded uniform templates from the Not By Appointment plates, and also digipictures of the corresponding miniatures as they are completed. This will be an ongoing work for a few weeks.
In the meantime, here is my working map of the Imperial Circle of Mittel-Nirgendwo, where all of this lace and thunder is taking place.
Cheers!
I have decided that, among other changes, the links section is getting a makeover.
Originally I planned to link to all of the ImagiNation blogs, but that just isn't working. Besides, Emperor vs. Elector is doing it already! So, except for some personal favorites I will give just the link to E vs. E.
There are a few sites that I feel compelled to keep here, for various reasons. Mostly, though, they are the ones that most fire my own ImagiNation:
Stollen
Pils-Holstein
Hesse-Seewald
Battlegames
and some others
Personally, I am using Google Reader as my main blog source. Since it automatically tells me when there are new posts plus has folders for keeping things organized, I find it very useful. Now, if someone can just tell me how to read blog comments in Reader...
Since I use Reader, I can export my full blog list to anyone interested.
Also, I will be doing Army-specific posts showing each ImagiNation's order of battle with embedded uniform templates from the Not By Appointment plates, and also digipictures of the corresponding miniatures as they are completed. This will be an ongoing work for a few weeks.
In the meantime, here is my working map of the Imperial Circle of Mittel-Nirgendwo, where all of this lace and thunder is taking place.
Cheers!
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Awarding Battle Honors (Honours)
So far I've only been able to get in two (2) games of BAR. The first was a solo run through, the second was the game I hosted at ChimaeraCon 2008. Several units had noteworthy performances, and I was writing up some fluff for battle honors when it occurred to me: the Hesse-Fedorans LOST at the second battle.
So, what to do? No army wants to memorialize a defeat that served little purpose. But two units of the Fedoran army distinguished themselves during the battle. (We won't mention one that, ahhhh, did not.)
So, are "honours" just for the unit, or must the army do well in order to recognize the individual?
So, what to do? No army wants to memorialize a defeat that served little purpose. But two units of the Fedoran army distinguished themselves during the battle. (We won't mention one that, ahhhh, did not.)
So, are "honours" just for the unit, or must the army do well in order to recognize the individual?
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Top Five Wargames Articles
We all have favorite pieces of writing that we can enjoy over and over again. Sometimes these are books, sometimes short stories, and sometimes they are magazine articles.
Over my 30-plus year wargames career, I have read plenty of hobby magazines. It all started with board games and Avalon Hill’s The General. Then during college I was first exposed to miniature wargames by a history professor using George Nafziger’s Pas de Charge rules and exquisite 25mm Napoleonic figures, which lead to finding The Courier and Miniature Wargames. I look back at those figures and magazines with a mixture of nostalgia and gratitude for today’s higher quality productions. Not to mention the treasure trove of the Internet!
Narrowing down the field to just miniature gaming, I find plenty of magazines that I acquired over the years: The Courier and Miniature Wargames have been joined on my shelf by (in no particular order) MWAN, Historical Miniature Gamer, Wargames Illustrated, White Dwarf, Battlegames, First Empire, Age of Napoleon, The Journal of the Seven Years War Association, Empire, Eagles, & Lions in various editions, Wargames, Soldiers, & Strategy, Napoleon, and I’m sure there were others. Throw in a subscription to Magweb.com and you can see my opportunities for reading have been legion.
Only a few of these numerous issues have produced articles that draw me back time and again. Don’t get me wrong: there are lots of excellent articles in my collection. But there are just a few that I purposely go back and read again.
What makes these articles so popular with me? There are a number of reasons. They are all well-written. Most of them are from a gamer’s point of view and describe a project about which the writer was passionate. And they conveyed that passion to me.
So here is the list. If you have not read these, I can obviously recommend them. Perhaps you could suggest your favorites in turn?
Number Five
Jack Gill, “Vermin, Scorpions, and Mosquitos: The Rheinbund in the Peninsula,” The Age of Napoleon #17, 1995.
This is a great overview of some of my favorite Napoleonic units, giving a short history and brief orders of battle. Ever since that first Napoleonic miniatures game in 1982 I have had a fondness for the small German states caught up in the inferno of Napoleon’s Empire. Gill’s work is an excellent companion to his outstanding book With Eagles To Glory, which details the German units in the 1809 campaign.
Number Four
Steve Dake, “Napoleonics: Black Hole of Wargaming”, MWAN #94, 1998.
Steve wrote of his introduction to gaming Napoleonics in a very big way. Having bumped into Herr Alte Fritz in his previous incarnation as a purveyor of big Napoleonic gaming (which role he is now reprising!), Steve dove into a project that dwarfs what most people attempt to do. Along the way, he has plenty of interesting lessons and opportunities. Steve amasses the troops, paints them, concocts his own rules, and presents them at a convention. And that’s just the start!
Number Three
Hal Thinglum, “Hal's 25MM Seven Years War Project Continued or ‘Is There No End To This Madness?’", MWAN #87, 1997.
Hal’s Seven Years War Project was legendary to the readers of MWAN. The project just went on and on and on. As far as I know, this was the only time that Hal sat down and described it completely in print. Or rather, as far as it had got at that point! There was a separate article containing the rules he wrote to go with his collection. I find Hal’s almost breathless narration to be both compelling and soothing since it describes my own wargaming collecting so well! “Highly recommended!”
Number Two
N. H. Hyde, “Fictitious Wars”, Miniature Wargames #47, 1987.
Once upon a time, I was a dyed-in-the-wool historical gamer. The idea of fictitious nations left me cold, much less fictitious uniforms! But over the years I have come to see just how much fun a fictitious campaign can be. Henry, who of course is now editor of Battlegames magazine, published this wonderful article long before I was even aware of these concepts except in the realm of fantasy role-playing. I can only hope to reach this level of chronicled detail in my own projects.
Number One
Brian Carroll, “Birth of a Notion, or ‘You want to put how many figures in a battalion?!’”, MWAN #86, 1997.
I really can’t enthuse too much about this article: it is the single influence that I can point to and say, “This got me started on 25mm ‘Big Battalion’ gaming.” Similar in vein to both Steve’s and Hal’s listed above (in fact, Hal writes that this piece encouraged him to write his own article), Brian chronicles the conception, expansion, and exploration of his own “Big Battalions” wargame project. I happened to get this issue of MWAN given to me by a local club member who was cleaning out his stack of magazines. The combination of studying the period, planning and building big battalions, how he put the project together, in fact the whole article just fascinated me. It still does; whenever I want to rekindle the gaming flame, I reread it again.
Over my 30-plus year wargames career, I have read plenty of hobby magazines. It all started with board games and Avalon Hill’s The General. Then during college I was first exposed to miniature wargames by a history professor using George Nafziger’s Pas de Charge rules and exquisite 25mm Napoleonic figures, which lead to finding The Courier and Miniature Wargames. I look back at those figures and magazines with a mixture of nostalgia and gratitude for today’s higher quality productions. Not to mention the treasure trove of the Internet!
Narrowing down the field to just miniature gaming, I find plenty of magazines that I acquired over the years: The Courier and Miniature Wargames have been joined on my shelf by (in no particular order) MWAN, Historical Miniature Gamer, Wargames Illustrated, White Dwarf, Battlegames, First Empire, Age of Napoleon, The Journal of the Seven Years War Association, Empire, Eagles, & Lions in various editions, Wargames, Soldiers, & Strategy, Napoleon, and I’m sure there were others. Throw in a subscription to Magweb.com and you can see my opportunities for reading have been legion.
Only a few of these numerous issues have produced articles that draw me back time and again. Don’t get me wrong: there are lots of excellent articles in my collection. But there are just a few that I purposely go back and read again.
What makes these articles so popular with me? There are a number of reasons. They are all well-written. Most of them are from a gamer’s point of view and describe a project about which the writer was passionate. And they conveyed that passion to me.
So here is the list. If you have not read these, I can obviously recommend them. Perhaps you could suggest your favorites in turn?
Number Five
Jack Gill, “Vermin, Scorpions, and Mosquitos: The Rheinbund in the Peninsula,” The Age of Napoleon #17, 1995.
This is a great overview of some of my favorite Napoleonic units, giving a short history and brief orders of battle. Ever since that first Napoleonic miniatures game in 1982 I have had a fondness for the small German states caught up in the inferno of Napoleon’s Empire. Gill’s work is an excellent companion to his outstanding book With Eagles To Glory, which details the German units in the 1809 campaign.
Number Four
Steve Dake, “Napoleonics: Black Hole of Wargaming”, MWAN #94, 1998.
Steve wrote of his introduction to gaming Napoleonics in a very big way. Having bumped into Herr Alte Fritz in his previous incarnation as a purveyor of big Napoleonic gaming (which role he is now reprising!), Steve dove into a project that dwarfs what most people attempt to do. Along the way, he has plenty of interesting lessons and opportunities. Steve amasses the troops, paints them, concocts his own rules, and presents them at a convention. And that’s just the start!
Number Three
Hal Thinglum, “Hal's 25MM Seven Years War Project Continued or ‘Is There No End To This Madness?’", MWAN #87, 1997.
Hal’s Seven Years War Project was legendary to the readers of MWAN. The project just went on and on and on. As far as I know, this was the only time that Hal sat down and described it completely in print. Or rather, as far as it had got at that point! There was a separate article containing the rules he wrote to go with his collection. I find Hal’s almost breathless narration to be both compelling and soothing since it describes my own wargaming collecting so well! “Highly recommended!”
Number Two
N. H. Hyde, “Fictitious Wars”, Miniature Wargames #47, 1987.
Once upon a time, I was a dyed-in-the-wool historical gamer. The idea of fictitious nations left me cold, much less fictitious uniforms! But over the years I have come to see just how much fun a fictitious campaign can be. Henry, who of course is now editor of Battlegames magazine, published this wonderful article long before I was even aware of these concepts except in the realm of fantasy role-playing. I can only hope to reach this level of chronicled detail in my own projects.
Number One
Brian Carroll, “Birth of a Notion, or ‘You want to put how many figures in a battalion?!’”, MWAN #86, 1997.
I really can’t enthuse too much about this article: it is the single influence that I can point to and say, “This got me started on 25mm ‘Big Battalion’ gaming.” Similar in vein to both Steve’s and Hal’s listed above (in fact, Hal writes that this piece encouraged him to write his own article), Brian chronicles the conception, expansion, and exploration of his own “Big Battalions” wargame project. I happened to get this issue of MWAN given to me by a local club member who was cleaning out his stack of magazines. The combination of studying the period, planning and building big battalions, how he put the project together, in fact the whole article just fascinated me. It still does; whenever I want to rekindle the gaming flame, I reread it again.
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