Gaming - ACW -Antietam

 Today saw a gathering for the monthly  games day for the North Riding Wargames Crew .  4 of us were playing Altar of Freedom using our 10mm collections - we were doing Antietam which is a big game fir AOF. Having actually visited the battlefield last year it was great to recreate it . Stig and I would be Rebs , Ian and Roy Union .

 

The table is 9x6 . It sees the Union forces attacking and attempting to damage Bobbie Lee’s forces after invading Maryland .  

 

Rebs defend the cornfield area 

Antietam creek - with Burnside attacking the bridge - they just could not get over it .- mind I did have my strongest division defending. It .

The sunken lane - however the Union didn’t get near to it all game 

 

The Union forces could just not co-ordinate their forces or apply sufficient force in an area to kill Reb units . The interior lines and strong command traits and command control points kept the Rebs in control of the game tempo at least until  a Union unit charged through the flank of Jackson’s batteries and severely injured Gen Jackson . However enough of the time clock had passed to stop the Union getting to an anywhere near a victory . Lee would leave the battlefield his army intact .

 

I really like AOF - you play a full battle - but it has you thinking all the time . We checked out current collections and we now have enough to do Gettysburg . That will be along this year 

NWF - Last Stand at Gandamak

 This week is another visit to the North West frontier. I have had the Last Stand at Gandamak set  from Iron Duke in the lead pile since it was released and with a North West Frontier project working through this year I thought it was opportune to get this completed .

The 13th of January 1842 saw a battle near the village of Gandamak on the road from  Kabul to Jalalabad The 44th foot were the last remnants of the 16,000 that tried to retreat from Kabul in the First Afghan war.  . It depicts their last defence of a rocky outcrop just outside the village It is said that bones could still be found at the site of the battles up to the late  1970’s . Lt Thomas Souter wears the regimental colour wrapped around his waist under his Poshteen coat - something that saved his life as when captured they thought he was important enough to ransom. There was one acknowledged survivor of the whole column who made it out to Jalallabad , but several hundred others who were captured and eventually released .Of course it’s another in the line of great colonial disasters depicted in pictures of the time .

 

 

 

The painting by William Barnes Wollen 1898

I made the base up from a range of various sized MDF bases built up on an A5 MDF base raised with a piece of foam board and MDF bases then added , this is covered in filler and tile grout with lots of rocks etc

 

Rocks from my terrain stash, small ballast from cork and sand 

I have been really enjoying my painting this winter - with lots of stuff going on at home it’s been a joy to escape to it . With The end of March approaching that sees the end of the autum/winter plan so it will be time to devise the spring/summer focus. I usually get around 50% of the plan completed and that’s where it is now . My contribution to the AHPC is completed with over 1700 points - almost all of these being actual painting and not theme bonus points . I managed to post something every week so it’s been nicely productive .

There are a few big games in the coming months with D Day doing the rounds and some big ACW too , more on them later 

That’s all,for now! 

7DTTR - Gaming - Invasion Finland

 MartinC wanted a game with his Finns this weekend so we pulled a game together at Pendraken HQ. I decided to set up some winter table stuff to see what it’s starting to look like . The basic scenario was an attempt to capture a small airfield by the Soviets . Martin expected me to rock up with lots of tanks and helicopters - I thought that may be the case so went infantry heavy . In 7 Days infantry are slow to kill , taking multiple hits so he would not have enough firepower to stop me . 

My new winter roads will be along shortly once I pick them up from Bren who made them they will just need some snow/tufts adding in due course .

Finn armour burns from RPG to the flank .

Payback as a T64 explodes 

My armour was getting  hit in return , but the infantry were progressing nicely picking their way through towards to airfield .

 

AA Marksman vehicle incinerated by a mission from the Hind 

The Hinds knocked out the antiaircraft , though were knocked out by some manpads missiles in the end . 

Soviet infantry cleared the Finns from the wood and push into the airfield buildings .

 

Finnish vehicles burn on the airfield as Soviet infantry occupy the airfield buildings . The Finns didn’t have enough infantry or firepower to eject them .

Ardennes ‘44/5 - Let it snow

 A little more creativity for this project . I picked up some second hand unpainted Sherman’s and a Pershing from one if the guys at the local gaming group, so decided to crack on with these . So a rattle can (Tamiya TS28 Olive Drab )  , colour the tracks , then an oil wash and decals just about gets these ready to be “winterised” . 

For the first lot I wanted them heavily done . I used an old white enamel paint to give them a whitewash paint coat , then used some of the AK interactive Snow , and Muddy ground material. 

 

Don’t rivet count too much - one of these is a Brit Sherman - but it looks like a Sherman , so it’s good in my army .

 

I have left the Pershing without the whitewash and snow effect but have used some winter my/snow static grass tufts. 

 

I enjoyed doing these , and for a first attempt I am happy with them . I have found a box of other late war US stuff in the stash - so that will get added to the winter project in due course .