More of Norman's Soldiers

 A few days ago Norman Paterson sent me some more pictures from his collection(s).  This time we are taken to the Napoleonic wars in Egypt, with 1/32 French infantry under attack from Mameluk cavalry.  They are all beautifully painted.  I think the infantry are Airfix and Armies in Plastic, while the cavalry are by Italeri. Enjoy:

Roman Drive into Nubia - Battle Report

 Continuing operations in southern Egypt a small Roman army heads south along the Nile valley to confront a Nubian led rebel army.  The Romans, consisting of mostly heavy infantry supported by archers and some cavalry meet a lighter force, with chariots and horse archers. Will commands the Rebels and I the Romans. The two forces confront each other on a flat, featureless area of desert:

The Roman heavy infantry are in the centre, with medium infantry and cavalry out on the flanks, with archers as skirmishers in the centre:

The rebels have a similar deployment, with medium infantry dominating the centre and horse archers and chariots out on the flanks:

The battle begins with the Roman archers firing into the Rebel centre, dropping a few infantrymen, but Will pushes his horse archers and chariots out in a flaking move, both right and left.

Roman cavalry move forward to meet the Rebels.  The Roman suffer some casualties as do the Rebels when the Roman cavalry catch the lighter cavalry, who are accompanied by a Rebel general:

A similar action occurs on the other flank, with the Romans taking some hits, but the horse archers are driven off:

The arrival of some spear armed Roman infantry checks the Rebel chariots

On the opposite flank the Roman cavalry retire, pushed back by chariots and light cavalry:

The Roman left is in peril as the cavalry are severely depleted and the medium infantry are forced back

Back on the right, the Rebel light cavalry are destroyed and their chariots run into the Roman heavy infantry that have been slowly advancing.  The chariots are destroyed

Roman infantry advance in the centre too, supported by archers, who continue to pick away at the Rebel infantry.

On the left flank Roman infantry crash into the lighter Rebels causing the Rebels to collapse.

With both Rebel flanks under severe pressure, Will moves his troops in the centre forward in an attempt to split the Roman army, however the tough Roman infantry brush off the assault and now the Rebels are in disarray. Their commander falls They have reached their exhaustion point and begin to run from the field.  The Romans have removed the threat of a rebellion in Nubia and the battle ends.

The game was played using 25mm Minifigs S Range figures.  The rules were from the Command & Colors Ancient game.  The game ran quickly and smoothly and was very enjoyable.  It was quite good having an open battle field with scope for moving troops around easily and offering cavalry and chariiots the chance to run around the flanks.

 

Battle of The Little Big Horn - Battle Report

 Yesterday Will paid a visit during which we managed to play four games.  The first was a table top version of Waddington's board game, The Battle of the Little Big Horn. The game was played using the original figures (see my previous post), which I had painted with a representation of the board set up on the gaming table.  We used hexes, rather than squares.

The troops were set up as close to the original scenario, with Custer's men in the middle amongst some defensive positions, the Indian cavalry beyond the rocks to the right and the Indian foot amongst the trees near the river and their camp.  

Here are some views of the start of the game:

The US cavalry start positions

The last time I played this game was back in the 1960/70s when I received a set for Christmas.  It took Will and I a little while to grasp all of the rules, but soon things ran quite smoothly.  I took on the role of Custer, and Will the Indians.  My plan was to advance towards the top left of the board and retreat off that way, using my firepower to eliminate the Indians in the woods.  If I could get into the trees I would be safe from the mounted braves.

However, the Indians in the wood are counted as in cover and they put up quite a fight.  Although I managed to take down a few, my own men were falling just as fast:

Movement is agonisingly slow, with a steady rate of men falling from the fire out of the trees.  In the meantime the mounted braves are moving closer and forming up for a charge.  When it came it was quite brutal, those US troops not in cover were quickly cut down.  This had the effect of breaking up the US unit into isolated packets:

My efforts to reach the trees were failing as I was losing more men than Will. I decided to pull back and see if I could kill off some of the mounted figures.  I had some success, although casualties continued to mount:

Now rather like the original battle, I was surrounded with men falling fast and the enemy closing in. The remaining troopers closed in around Custer and the flag aa a group of mounted braves charged in to attack Custer himself.

The end came quickly, Custer is cut down and the flag captured:

We both enjoyed the game, which ran at a very fast pace. The rules are simple but effective and the result was an exciting encounter.

We played the game again, swapping sides.  Will decided to attempt to move his forces to the right with the aim of gaining the rocks.  Once again the braves in the trees did quite a bit of damage, and while Custer and his men did slightly better against the mounted men, the eventual result was very similar.  The pinned down troopers were picked off by the advancing Indians on foot.  It is a hard task for the US cavalry to win this game.

Great fun!

Waddington's Battle of The Little Big Horn

 A few months back I spotted on a blog that someone had converted the famous board game into a full size wargame using Britains Deetail plastic figures.  I thought that was an interesting idea and was going to do the same, when I thought it could be done with the figures that come with the game.  The game only has a few figures, if correct, nine for the US and 12 for the Native Indians.  On a large table these numbers do not look very good, so I decided to multiply all force numbers by three.  I managed to obtain figures from my original set, plus some cheap purchases on line.  Unfortunately, I am a few short as some crumbled with the dreaded plastic rot.

The figures are fairly basic and poorly painted, but I thought they could be tarted up with a splash of paint. The figures are around 40mm tall and, given their age, most suffer from considerable paint loss:

The first thing I did was to attach all the figures and horses to bases, which were painted to match my wargaming mat.  The figures were painted using a combination of Speed Paints and normal Acrylics.  It took about four days to paint the lot. Here are the results:

Native Indian cavalry:

Custer's men in a hasty defensive position:

Native foot Indians emerging from the trees:

Not brilliant, but good enough to look OK on the table.  I am working on some tepees and a totem pole, as the board has a camp beyond.

Will is coming up on Sunday and I am hoping to play the full game as per the original rules, with some minor adjustments.

Norman's Soldiers

 I have recently got to know Mr Norman Paterson, who is an avid collector of military figures.  Over the last couple of months he has kindly shared some pictures of his collection, set out as dioramas. 

I thought that the figures looked so good that readers of this blog might enjoy seeing them.  So, with the permission of Norman, set out below are the first pictures of part of his stunning collection.

This set of pictures covers the American Civil War, with some dramatic images of close quarter combat.  The figures are by 'Collectors Showcase' and Norman has entitled the diorama as 'Battle Carnage':

Stunning stuff!

More Les Higgins figures

 During the last week, I managed to finish off two more French line battalions and a Swiss unit. The Swiss are not my work.  They were beautifully painted and donated to me by a friend.  I touched them up, added the colours, varnished and based them:

The Les Higgins Project

 Having played most of my recent Napoleonic battles using the Command and Colors (C&C) rules, I have decided to try something new.  I like C&C a lot and my brother, nephew and I have spent a great deal of time over the years adjusting the rules to suit our needs. However, I wanted to play some games not using a hex based mat.  I think my aim is to try and relive some of the simple games that I played in my youth.  To that end, I have taken a look at the rules by Neil Thomas, which offer up small fast moving games that do not need a great deal of troops.

To fully adopt these rules requires some adjustment to force levels.  I did not want to start rebasing my existing armies, so, over the past few months I have been accumulating 25mm figures by Les Higgins.  Units consist of 16 foot figures, eight light and 12 cavalry. I am going for British and a French armies (as they are the only figures produced by Les Higgins).  Most of the figures have come from a collection sold on eBay, but I have also had some very generous donations from friends.

I started working on the French army, which for a bit of colour will include some German units.  I would like to stick to Les Higgins figures, but some figures seem hard to find, especially French cavalry, although I now have lots of lancers. As an interim I have used some plastic figures to make up numbers.

Here are the first of the French coalition army:

Grenadiers:

French light infantry

Saxon line infantry

Saxon light infantry

French Guard Lancers

There are more French on the way, as well as a number of British units.