One man and his brushes.

Picking up those brushes again.

Hi and welcome to the occasional mutterings of Dave Doc, a military modeller and some time gamer. Gaming and model making has given me a real education, History & Geography(obvious really), Artistry, Politics, Economics, Logistics, Project Management -you try building miniature armies without the last 3.

I will use the blog to record my creations & the odd occasion I actually do some gaming.

I have always been inspired by the aesthetic side of gaming. Playing on well constructed terrain using excellently painted units is always a joy.

Wednesday, 11 November 2026

Gaming - Trafalgar

The weekend saw a trip to mad friend Gerry over near Scarbados . With a bunch of other guys we were playing through Trafalgar with every ship being represented . We were using the collection of late friend Brendan which had been refurbished recently .

I had Dumanoirs squadrons of French and Spanish ships at the front of the combined fleet (well actually it was the rear , but the fleet had done a u turn )

A little bit of AI augmentation sets the scene

The rules used were the Rod Langton 4th Ed Signal,Close for Action . These are pretty detailed but they played pretty well as Gerry has created new play sheets to streamline things . As ever with naval gaming the simple act of sailing a ship adds to complexity of also fighting it .

The wind was of course definitely with the RN as it was historically . The poorer sailing and command ability of the combined fleet really shine through with them struggling to maintain station and or turn .

The RN heads in to break into the line.

Gerry’s table was left its base green for this - perhaps a large sea mat in due course

HMS Victory. Well and truly hammered with a jury rigged mast and two lots of rigging down

Graham climbs onto the table as his RN ships are that far across! His stern rake on the Santissima Trinidad the huge Spanish 4 decker that took away its rudder caused utter chaos

It was a great weekend with good friends . The RN of course carried the day , but not as convincing as on the day - the guys said they should have done a few different things . The highlight for the combined fleet was the capture of HMS Victory on the last turn . She had been well and truly pummelled and was boarded by a Spanish 74 and captured . She would most likely have been recaptured the following turn , but we had timed out so we took that.

My seriously unlucky ship the Neptuno. Its own first shot had was with an adverse result , a gun blowing up starting a fire .and hull damage. It was then hit by a British broadside that wrecked its rudder . You can see it out if control swinging in front of one of my French ships !