....the story so far....yet another update.....

Bolt Action in Sicily

So, What's New...

 .....yes, another update; that's what these blog things are all about, ain't they? Since I last posted things have been, pleasingly, busy and frothy on my own wargaming front. I've managed to get in two games of Bolt Action; both versus Jamie's Italians; one using a predominantly Inexperienced Soviet force and the other saw my Yanks take a tentative step towards driving the Fascists out of Sicily. Tentative I say, as this game was supposed to be the first in a narrative campaign but we forgot the mission brief for both sides so we're going to have to revisit that particular scenario before I can do a write up of it on here.

 

Soviet and Italians clash in Southern Russia...possibly

   ....as well as that brace of games I spent a fruitful evening at the Village Idiots in East Kilbride with James and Robbie rolling dice and character building our respective retinues for our forthcoming Inquisitor campaign (though we are playing it in 28mm so technically...sort of...it should be called INQ28) but more that in a separate post as, well, it really needs it's own post.

Purchasing Power

.....As ever I have felt the need to flex my financial muscle and indulge in buying lots of stuff; mostly but not exclusively the following.....

Two units of shotte

....with my first game of Pike & Shotte looming over the wargaming horizon and the shameful realisation that I couldn't face building more of Warlord Games plastic P&S figures (I just find them hard to love; sure they fill an enormous gap in trhe wargamng market but they are just so flipping ugly; utilitarian might be kinder but still and all, it takes a lot from me to build and paint them) I bought some cheap, prepainted ones on eBay. They've allowed me to expand on what I have, obviously, and saved me some precious hobby time...result!!

.....equally, INQ28 and my first bash at Games Mastering, is cantering towards the wargames horizon and I felt that some more WH40K universe type scenery was required so a quick trip to the marvellous TT Combat site was in order.

     The second set of MDF terrain is from AQSgames who I found using my Google-fu. This is for games of INQ28 (and possibly Necromunda 95 should I ever get around to playing that!!).

.....and for Lion Rampant? Hail Caesar I indulged in this nice, wee kit when I was shopping on Wayland Games when I went shopping for.....

....because the medieval/Crusades froth is still very strong. A wee while back, whilst off work suffering from Man-Flu I spent a day and a half on the couch watching YouTube and stumbled across the marvellous 7th Son channel and since then the frotho-meter has surpassed previous frotho-meter levels of...erm..frothing. I had always assumed that, like Black Powder, Hail Caesar (and Pike & Shotte for that matter) required a lot of large units of 18-24 figures per unit but no, you can use foot units of 12 figures as your standard sized units and cavalry units of 6 mounted units (though I think units of at least 9 mounted figures looks a wee bit better...just saying). With the amount of units I have for Lion  Rampant I could easily field a decent sized medieval army for Hail Caesar, especially for the 7.5'x5' gaming table that I have.

.....and speaking of medieval cavalry I also indulged in this box set and....

Gripping Beast Islamic spearmen sprue

Victrix Islamic infantry sprue

....a sprue each of Gripping Beast and Victrix Islamic infantry sprues as I can't, or should I say I couldn't, decide which I prefer from watching reviews of both on YouTube so I bought one of each for comparison purposes. I think the Victrix ones are far and away superior sculpts but they appear just a tad tall to my eye and, pardon my pernicketyness, a bit too detailed(?). Anyhoo, the long and short of it is I have bought a box of the Gripping Beast Spearmen and also a load of Little Big Man shield transfers for my Islamic forces.

    There's a whole heap more stuff that I have for LR/HC burrowed away in my plastic mountain that I'll blog aboit later. Right now I need my kip. Am up early to drop the wife off at the airport then Dan is coming down from Up North and we're off to 17th century Poland for a Thirty Years War battle between his Poles and my Swedes. Photos and battle report to follow.

Table set up for Pike & Shotte

likely objective for my Swedes

Toodle pip,

Jim

ps. Had a near brush with some old 3rd edition 40k Space Marine figures and was also tempted to buy a fifth Baneblade whilst visiting Castle Comics in East Kilbride when I went shopping for some paints. Phew!