2024 And All That

 A mixed beginning for me to the year, in November '23 an 'anomaly' was found on my liver while looking at my gallbladder. It was May this year before I finally received an operation to remove a lump on my liver (oh, and also my gallbladder which I did not know about until six months after the op). This and the fact that the builders started to work on the room which used to be the Post Office/shop meant that apart from the odd night I could make the club, my wargaming was minimal for over six months. I also understandably did not want to start anything new.

The op went well and the builders did a superb job, although it did take us several months of calling it downstairs/the shop/the PO/ War Room and a few other things before we settled on The Bunker as the easiest on the tongue. 

With all that time to think about things I came to the decision that there would be no more grand projects and the future would simply be additions to what I already had, if at all. I have some seven forces for WWII, five Dark Ages/Ancient armies, two SYW armies, a very large collection of ACW 15mm and a few skirmish games, trying to get them all on the table at some point is well nigh impossible. For instance I have 122 vehicles for WWII and many have not fired a shot. So my aim for 2025 is to play as many games as I can with as many of the troops as I can.

By July I was back in the saddle and I returned to the club for my weekly fix, the club has expanded with several new members and the range of games played has also expanded, Hail Caesar is the front runner at the moment and I have seen more Dark Age and Ancient armies over the past few months than I have in the last few years. I seemed to lean more towards WWII this year, this was helped by Matt Crump and I starting our second Chain of Command campaign, once again on the Eastern Front, I was lucky that friend Robert Thomson made an effort on his travels to pop in to play another campaign which is ongoing, this time in NW Europe. I also continue to enjoy my trips to Grange to take part in Rob Martin's giant Napoleonic games. Since The Bunker opened I have also managed to host quite a few games here and am grateful to those who have turned up to spend a few hours jousting across the table. I must mention that my own away games at Matt's in Penrith are always a pleasure.

Since eschewing new armies I have managed to add various bits and pieces despite this, I found myself at a loss just before Christmas so opted for some new buildings, I never lose the urge to improve my terrain. I do have to say I missed having something on the tray to do and have decided not to break my own promise above and forego the price of a divorce lawyer and just add units to the Italian Wars next year.

Wanting to get my ACW troops back in action I decided to run a campaign based in the Shenandoah Valley, this is not Jackson's Valley Campaign, just something to keep us all going through the winter months which hopefully will provide some battles with consequences. Just as the curtain comes down on 2024 we have two battles upcoming to kick off 2025.

Despite having to call a halt to my mapping for several months I have still managed to draw for 37 books this year, I do not have the patience to count the maps but 300 would be a decent estimate.

Going forward as I say above, I hope to continue to play more games.

Elephants and Bamboo Bows

 Big news this week, for me anyway, is that I have reached the grand old age of 72, yes I know I don't look it but the inside feels about 82. I received some nice books from my Christmas wish list, I have went all digital this year and put a list on Amazon for people to pick from. So far I think it is working.

My presents, one more to come.

I have been searching and adding some 1/72 planes for the odd strafing run on my tables as a side project and to date had sorted an FW190 for late war and a Stuka for early and mid, I also bought a ready built Spritfire kit from my grandson for my Normandy+ British. I had just about given up getting a Russian aircraft until mate Robert told me he had visited an Antique warehouse in nearby Ingleton and they had kits for a decent price. I set off and sure enough found a treasure trove of 1/72 painted, die-cast models. I reined in my wallet and settled on a Yak-3 for my Russians and spoiled myself with a lovely Henschel 123 for the Jerries, I just couldn't resist it. This biplane was operational in the ground attack role up to and after Barbarossa, it was so good on the Eastern Front the Luftwaffe asked for the factories to be re-opened to make more, but they had already been dismantled.

Yak-3 and Henschal 123.

I am continuing to dust my vehicle collection and am about half way through, you can see the effect better on plain painted vehicles but I am committed to giving them all a coating. Meanwhile I have recieved a few more buildings, two rural barns from Empires at War (unpainted) and two houses from Charlie Foxtrot, most of my collection of buildings are Colin's so these will fit well on the table. All this in expectation of more WWII gaming in 2025. Very happy with the Empires of War, we have some at the club but I now know they are 15mm and 20mm and not 28mm due to the size of the barns, might have a word with the treasurer.

Club had our big Christmas game this week, this year we went full on medieval, the table was fairly open and each player had a mounted knight, these were let loose to win Honour and Money fighting against other knights they came across or challenged, there were also tents, a stable, church and blacksmith's where bonus' or not could be picked up. My quest was pretty unspectacular as I found nothing in the first tent and after several combats I had to retire to heal my many wounds, I was inches from death. Once healed I came back to find a large, buxom wench holding tankards of beer whom I 'rescued' and escorted off the table earning me some sheckles. On my return I failed miserably to move very far and then found myself at the mercy of Fran and Dan's dismounted men-at-arms and subsequently expelled from the game. No photographs I am afraid, too many kids there, sorry.

The rules were vaguely Hail Caesar and worked very well for the mayhem which raged throughout the evening, everyone enjoyed themselves and we were treated to Julian's excellent mince pies as always. That's it for this year at the club, we have had a very succesful year with the introduction of new games and new members while having to annex another classroom to contain our growing numbers. We have a Curry night booked for 3rd January and then a return to business as usual on the 7th.

Yesterday Ian turned up with his Classical Indian army for a try at War and Conquest, I was commanding my Seleucids which have only seen at most half a dozen battles since I raised them. I knew Ian would have a lot of bamboo longbows and a few elephants and maybe chariots so I was a bit worried about my lack of protection in getting across the table and into hand to hand combat. I decided to go a bit heavy on skirmishers as a shield, Elephant Escorts with javelin, elite Cretan and Skythian archers and a normal unit, backed by two pike blocks, some mercenary hoplites and a light infantry unit of Thorakiti, oh, and an elephant. Ian deployed and had a solid centre of archers, supported by spearmen and a lot of elephants, I noticed many more in his boxes, on his flanks were light and heavy chariots.

Seleucid and his army.

The Indian King.

Deployment.

 I dithered a bit at first but knew I couldn't stand around for long, so sent my whole line forward, my Skythians were cut down but their morale held and they duelled with the light chariots for most of the game. On the other flank my light cavalry charged and cleared the heavy chariots here and eventually managed to turn and hit the Indian left flank. I kept targetting the elephants with my skirmishers before they fell to the torrents of bamboo arrows, I had success with one elephant which routed and expired when the mahout killed it as it approached its own troops, this rout also meant a unit of spearmen also ran for a time.

Damn chariots.

A formidable enemy.

Get stuck in boys.

My hoplites took some severe casualties as they advanced but at last managed to strike their tormentors who simply could not stand up to them in close combat, this was the same story as my pikes also managed to close with the Indian infantry albeit the White Shields took heavy casualties from the archers on their march forward. It could have been worse but my sacrificial skirmishers did their job against all the odds until they were killed to a man.

My hardy Escorts.

 

Take that small fry.

The Seleucid advance.

 As his infantry fled Ian threw in his elephants, the hoplites were caught in the flank and destroyed while the White Shields fought off two elephants, one the Indian Kings mount. The Thorakiti also managed to hold and eventually kill their beast. I now threw my own elephant into the flank of the triumphant Nellie which had routed the hoplites, my larger animal won through. With his last offensive now stopped and routed Ian handed over his sword.

The end for the Indians.

 This was a very interesting game and I think I was lucky in that it was Ian's first game, his army has a formidable weapon with the elephants backed up by scores of archers and the skirmishing chariots if used well can be a frustrating challenge to neutralise. Where the army falls down a bit is that the infantry component have less than average morale although bodyguards and mercenaries are available, so if contact is made they have a struggle to compete against hoplites and pikes. I felt outnumbered as the Seleucids are an expensive army and was forced into going forward and into close combat as fast as I could, something I would not normally do unless the circumstances are right. Ian also managed some superb shooting dice which sadly, for him, did not continue over to his melee rolls. It was great to fight a WAC battle again and against such an interesting army, I do hope we can do so again as Ian has several ancient armies at his disposal.

That was the last battle for 2024, I have put everything else including map projects on hold until after new Year, I do have those buildings to paint up but that's it. I will do a rerun of the year as usual later. January already has around four games scheduled for here in The Bunker so I will be off to a flying start.

A nice gift from David Bickley, 2025 Calendar from GHQ.

Konigsberg 6 and stuff

 Mate Jimi asked about Star Wars Legion but got no replies so I offered a game of X-Wing, what a headache that turned out to be. I had to dig out my squad builder and repopulate it with all the ships I actually had so I could print out a list, two lists actually as Jimi was completely new to the game. I put several hours aside to do this only to find out as I tried to put a Rebel and Imperial force together before heading to the club that I had lost all the V2 dials. It would seem I had thrown them out while moving everything I had into The Bunker, typical me. I jury rigged ships for the game minus the Milenium Falcon as I could not find a dial for it nor a stand, what a mess with only ten minutes to go. Then, after a tip from the missus I found all the dials!

So we settled in at the club with Jimi not having a clue and me not much better after several years of the game sitting in boxes. Jimi took the Rebels and I was the evil Empire, of course I was. The good guys had three X-Wing's and an A-Wing while I 'flew' Tie's, two Interceptors and four Fighters, the game was maybe unbalanced as my ships had no shields and the Rebels had better points values and shields. As we wrestled with the game we made the obligatory whoosh and laser fire noises while playing the theme from the movie on our phones, it was a laugh. Experience won out and two of the Rebels hit the stardust while I lost an Interceptor.

I went away with a renewed interest in the game despite being one of the worst star pilots in the galaxy and a quest to find the missing dial for the Falcon (now sorted thanks to eBay). Jimi went away to buy into the game, much of which is still available online. As time passes it will be harder to do but for now a patient search can reveal treasure.

Club was busy again with Midgard and Hail Caesar with three lovely games, Ancients and Dark Ages neither of which are my cup of Rosy but the guys were having a ball, especially Ed who was umpiring a beautiful looking game which I forgot to photograph of course.

Back to Bolt Action V3 this week, Operation Barbarossa at the club, I was the bad, bad guys while Simon was the bad, good guys. I decided to go all realistic this time, the heaviest tank I had was a Pz III along with a Pz II and a 5 cm anti-tank gun, and for a first I brought two halftracks and a tow truck. Simon was mainly Soviet infantry backed by his KV2 monster.

I was a bit late so we just set up a table with three objectives, a hill, house and a bridge. I ran my halftracks forward for the two flank objectives and of course reached them before the Russians, most of my strength was on the flanks especially the right where the bridge was. In the centre I sat a squad supported by the Pz III with an idea to eventually contest the centre objective in the house, but if not I had the other two. The KV-2 missed with its first shot and was very disappointing during the rest of the game as well, it did manage a hit which could have taken out my AT gun but failed to kill the crew. Meanwhile I was shooting up the Russian infantry with my small veteran squads.

The boys make a rush for the bridge.

The monster arrives.

My 'heavy' turns up.

As casualties mounted and initiative dice were lost it was obvious the Soviets could not win, we shook hands and called it done. Obviously I enjoyed the game although I am still not sure if V3 is much better than V2, I think if you are happy with V2 then keep the £35 for something you really need.

Today I was back on the Eastern Front but in the dying weeks as the Konigsberg garrison tried to break out. By now both sides had lost figures, the Soviets slightly less than the Germans but enough to cut down some of their firepower. I had some nice support points and again took the T-34/85, two MMG's and a mortar, I was looking to bring a lot of lead to the party. Matt had recruited a Volksturm squad and a Pz IV along with an MMG for support.

Making use of my new snow mat.

I had a hard time building up my firing line as my command dice were basically useless, Matt managed to hide in the one building on his side of the table and bring on his tank, my one squad started to take hits despite their entrenchments. I managed to get several double turns but still struggled to get troops on the table. Once I did manage it was only one squad and my tank, I was still outgunned. Things seemed to pick up as I shot up the MMG in the upper storey of the house, but again my squads were slowly being shot up while my tank could not hit a barn door. The Pz IV managed several times to hit the T-34 and killed the gunner but never enough to cause serious damage, I eventually had to pull the tank back hoping the replacement gunner could eventually manage to hit something, unlike his dear departed mate.

Useless tank, I think the gunner was dead from the start.

A similarly unimpressive panzer.

Those sandbags will save us Comrades!

I now managed to get all my troops on and although I dealt death out to one squad in particular I was losing the dice battle as my squads were whittled down. I was also unlucky in that when I had to take a morale check they were particularly bad and my morale plunged, Matt on the other hand rolled low scores and only lost one morale point. I was torn between withdrawing my remaining two squads into cover and leaving things to the two MMG's and my tank but being down to four dice and suffering heavy casualties I simply withdrew.

Oh no they didn't!

Soviet thin brown line.

Punished but not enough.

We have not played a back and fro game in Phase B and have just played the different maps, this means the Germans are not able to make the victory points needed to win. Maybe we should have gone on but we have now been playing quite regularly despite health problems for a year so I think we will be happy to play one final game. The campaign is a good one but it needs work, many of the maps are simply far too open to provide any incentive to manouvre and they turn into a firefight and who throws best wins. I would also say that the support points are skewed, the German garrison, cut off from supplies gets more support points than the Russians encircling them with decent lines of communication. The Victory Points table begins at 10, the Germans have to get this down to Zero, a very difficult task with the campaign in its present form. Anyway, we have one more game which will now have to wait until after the hullaballo dies down in January, we both have little faith the Russian defenders can win this, cut to ribbons as they are and with only a few fruit trees to hide behind.

A thought jumped into my head about weathering powders, I have always thougth some of my later German three colour camo looked a bit too bright, even after drybrushing and weathering, so I bit the bullet and ordered up some Light Dust by Ammo. I had looked online and a lot of these pigments need 'anchored' with white spirit or some such, I didn't want that hassle and saw one example where the pigment was simply brushed on, that's for me Tommy I thought. The product arrived and I set too, I was more than pleased and there is enough dust in the bottle to last more than two lifetimes, and if it comes off in play then I just brush on more, the effect was even better on the panzer grey of my early war stuff, they now look like they are rushing along French roads in the summer of '40. Brushing the rest of my collection will take a while so that is my project for December.

With and without dust.

Ditto.

I have just finished Ben MacIntyre's new book on the Iranian Embassy Siege and the emergence of the SAS into the nation's and the world's consciousness. As the siege wears on the tension in the book rises as you know what's coming, what you don't know is the why and how it happened, I certainly learned a lot. Highly recommended. As there is still a bit to go before Christmas I have a void before, I might, get the books and graphic novels I have asked for, so until then I opted for a book on the German invasion of Poland in '39. It is something I know almost nothing about except that Polish cavalry did not charge panzers and rumours that the Poles put up a good fight and the Germans were not as brilliant as they made out, we will see. One thing I have always been curious about is that if we went to war for the Poles why didn't we declare war on the Soviets who also invaded the country?

I think that is it for now, my War and Conquest game was delayed until next Friday, next week at the club is the AGM and the Christmas Game and hopefully the Cumbrian Chef's mince pies. Maybe I will get a game over the Holiday period and maybe I will just sit and chill.

One last parting shot in this mad world, the army has a Climate Change and Sustainability Officer and they are looking at, wait for it, electric vehicles. Considering getting to the other end of the country in one involves an amount of planning second only to D-Day, where do you find them on a battlefield?