Fields of Gold: Tabletop Wheat Fields

    I have seen a number of mentions of using Coir doormats to make wheat fields. but had never come across the type described, and another kind I got proved to be wholly unsuitable. Thus I was very happy to find some of the right kind during a rip to Home Depot last month!

18 x 30'; that should make a fair amount of wheat fields!

And it did! Three 6 x 6",  Two 6 x 9",  Six 6 x 8"

I could base them and put fences, hedges, and or walls around them, but I prefer them like this. That way I can add any enclosure that I want as needed. Must easier to transport that way too. These "Fields" were especially useful in the Klagenfurt game at Historicon last month, and they're on the table now for my Montgomery ECW game. . 

I was trying to work out exactly how I cut up the mat, and just couldn't quite recreate it, but now that I see them this way, I see that it was the other way around - I ruled off five 3" spaced lines the long way down the mat, and then from left to right, cut the two 8 x 9" pieces, then two rows of three 6 x 8" pieces, then finally one row of 6 x 6" pieces - zero waste!

While I was at Home Depot I picked up a new shelf unit - the collection has expanded to the point where my shelf capacity is maxed out!

"Fields of Gold", originally by Sting, but this cover by Eva Cassidy is superlative - beautiful, and full of emotion. It is so sad that her life was cut far too short by cancer, passing only a few months after she recorded this, at the age of 33. 

"Dogs of Gold" - Zoe jumping into the pool. 

Annie at Dock Diving. She really gets into it, and gets a running start off the dock!

British 4th (Queen;'s Own) Dragoons

    This regiment was first raised in 1685, by amalgamating several existing troops, as Princess Anne of Denmark's Dragoons. It saw action by 1689, and participated in the War of the Spanish Succession and the War of the Austrian succession. It was formally titled as the 4th Regiment of Dragoons in 1751, and became the Queen's own, in honor of Queen Charlotte, in 1788.

The 4th  regiment had green facings and white lace. as their distinctions 

I have painted the regiment in it's full dress white pants and green edged white shabraques, and also left the gauntlets off to show the facing color on the cuffs as well.

The use of sabretaches for Dragoons is a British peculiarity; they were black for the rank and file, green trimmed silver for the officers, with a royal badge embroidered on them for full dress. 

I chose to mount this unit on Roan horses, which I think contrasts very nicely with the green facings. 

The front of the jacket had white lace (silver for officers) with a center band of white and green; I have taken the easy way out and went with plain green for the middle stripe. 

Although the helmet strongly resembles that of the French dragoons, the colors are reversed; where the French dragoons had a brass helmet with a brown turban, the British helmet (adopted circa 1812 - 1813) has a black leather helmet with brass decorations and crest. This messed me up on my first attempt painting them!

British cavalry used natural leather for their horse furniture; I made this a pale tan here, once again to complement the white lace. 

The light blue canteens are similar to those used by the British infantry.  The "magic wash (I used a lighter version for these bright uniforms) has nicely picked out some of the details of the sculpts. 

Being Dragoons, the white lace on the front of the jacket extends up the front of the collar as well. 

This regiment didn't participate in the 7 Years War or the American Revolutionary War. It did see extensive combat in the Peninsular War, however, including the battles of Talavera (1809), Usagre (1811), Salamanca (1812), Vittoria (1813), and Tolouse (1814). It did not participate in the 100 Days campaign. 

In 1818, the regiment was converted to Light Dragoons, as the 4th (Queen's Own) regiment. As such, it participated in the Crimean war, fighting the Battle of Alma, and the Charge of the Light Brigade at the battle of Balaclava (both 1854). 

The regiment became the 4th (Queen's Own) Hussars in 1861. A young Winston Churchill was commissioned a cornet in the regiment in 1895. In 1958 it was amalgamated with the 8th King's Royal Irish Hussars to form the Queen's Royal Irish Hussars. 

    The 4th is the first of three units of Old Glory British Dragoons to canter off the painting table this month; its sister regiments will be seen in due time. I did a bit of a photographic experiment with these units. The first 4 pictures were taken using my 20 year old Nikkon Coolpix800 camera, the next 4 were taken with my I pad, which I have hardly used for pictures before, and the last 4 with my i-phone 6 (the i-6 camera is far superior to the crappy one in the i phone 3!). they were all taken at the same time, outdoors, an an overcast morning.  I must say that I am hard pressed to see any great difference between them! 

Oh where, oh where did my little flags go?

One might notice the lack of a flag for this unit, despite the presence of a standard bearer. While few if any of the British cavalry carried their flags in the field by the later part of the Napoleonic Wars, as we have discussed previously, I like the look of the British cavalry flags, and adopt the parade ground appearance wherever possible, so my British cavalry all have flags. Well, darned if I can find the rest of my beautiful GMB British cavalry flags. I have found all manner of other GMB flags that I had forgotten that I even had, but can I find the rest of my cavalry flags?  No, I cannot!  I know that I have them (and if there is any doubt, there are deliberately blurry pictures of all of them in a previous post.  I say, twisted knickers and bloody well annoying, eh what, chaps?! 

A Napoleonic Trio of new book arrivals by James R. Arnold

Having very much enjoyed the two books by James Arnold that I already have (Crisis on the Danube, about the opening phase of the 1809 campaign in Bavaria, and Crisis in the Snows, about the 1807 Eylau campaign), I recently took advantage of a pair of Amazon gift cards that my older daughter gave me at Christmas and Father's Day to acquire three more of Mr. Arnold's books.

This is the revised and expanded 2nd edition; evidently the 1st edition suffered from a lack of maps, which were a strong point of his first book. That is not the case in this 2nd edition.. I got the  paperback version, and have already read it while I was on vacation at the beach earlier this week. It was a thoroughly enjoyable read. Mr. Arnold writes very clear and engaging prose. It includes a good description of the battle of Ebelsberg, and excellent descriptions and analysis of the pivotal battles of  Aspern-Essling and Wagram. All are filled with interesting and illuminating tidbits from both sides, The battles of the Army of Italy at Sacile, The Piave, and Raab are covered in less detail, as is Poniatowskui's battle of Raszyn. Znaim is covered on bruiefly in passing. The book includes detailed Orders of battle, listing the units involved with the number of battalions or squadrons, but no actual strengths. As in the earlier volume, Mr. Arnold gives a succinct but very useful accounts of the diplomatic front as well. His analysis of the battles and Campaign as a whole is another strong point. Recommended, although if you want more detailed OOB's with unit strengths, and coverage of the lesser actions, Gill's 1809 trilogy (plus his earlier "With Eagles to Glory") is a better choice. However that's really comparing apples and oranges big time.  One note of warning: reading this book will make you want to collect Austrian armies and play 1809 wargames, but that's a good thing, right?!

The sequel to Crisis in the Snows, of course! With 2017 coming up, this is a priority for me to read next! I am especially interested in the battles preceding Friedland, which often get short shrift.

The Marengo campaign I am pretty familiar with, but I know little about Hohenlinden, so I am looking forward to this one as well!

His newest book about the Spring 1813 campaign, Decision  at Bautzen, will have to wait for another time (and more funds)! All are available directly from the author at Napoleon Books.

Palms

Remember that lot of Chinese plastic palm trees of different styles that I got a few months back?  Well, they all have a plastic "spike" on the bottom and thus require some kind of basing. After dry brushing the leaves and trunks, I  came up with this:

They are composed of 40mm round masonite bases (purchased in bulk each year from Gale Force 9 at Historicon, and wine corks cut down and glued on top, and then a suitable size hole drilled through both with an electric drill (left side of picture).

I then mixed up several batches of Durham's Rock hard Water Putty and added a generous amount of brown craft paint to color it. The putty was applied to the bases and around the sides of the corks. After drying overnight, I painted both a darker shade of brown, again with latex craft paint. 

I then mixed up a custom batch of Flock from those I had on hand - medium coarse dark brown with some yellow dark green mixed in. White glue, slightly thinned, was then brushed liberally onto the bases and corks, trying to avoid the holes, and dipped into the flock mixture. 

I was going to glue the "stems" into the cork bases, but they fit very snugly, so I left them "loose". That makes it a lot easier to store and transport them!

In all, there are the following, with the colors I used for dryu brushing the truinks and then the leaves:

20 tall trees with frond like leaves - Crartsmart khaki, CC Leaf Green

16 short trees with palmate leaves - CC Light Chocolate, Folkart Bayberry

10 shrubs with large pa;mate leaves - CC Toffee Brown, CC Seminole Green

6 shuns with frond like leaves - CC Cinnamon, Craftsmart Hunter Green

(there are a few more trees than bases; that was all I had!)

I think this gives me a very nice variety of sizes, shapes, and colors of palms!

Post Historicon 2016 Planning

1) Painting:  

A) Job one is completing my British Napoleonic Army. I have 3 units of Dragoons/Dragoon Guards on the table, after that some Foot Artillery batteries and three more Light cavalry  units. Then a single unit of Highlanders, probably Perry (which I will have to order) and a few more command figures, and this army is pretty much DONE. Aside from perhaps the highlanders, I hope to finish these by the end of 2016.

B) Ancients is probably the next priority,. with that huge Macedonian Army, some more Numidians for my Carthaginian army, and some more General figures being the main areas of focus. I can also add some more cavalry and Chariots to my Assyrians if I feel like it. And there is an entire small army of Ancient Syrian types to be allies or enemies to my Egyptians, donated to me by Ken Baggaley, that need refurbishment and basing upgrades, and some that need painting. That should take relatively little time... once I set to it.

C) No lack of other distractions, but at present no pressing need or draw to add to my Late Medieval or Renaissance forces... but that could change!

2) Gaming:

A) Resume the "Lannes" Napoleonic campaign with Barry

B) Play test the in-development ECW rules based on To the Strongest! (This month, probably solo, at least the first time)

Table set up, ready for the scenario Simon included, The Battle of Montgomery, 1644. This will be familiar as the scenario Jon used for his three ECW rules play tests as well!

My Parliamentary Army has been languishing in its storage boxes for far too long.

Likewise my Royalist Army!

c) Whatever else arises... Joe and I need to get together for a game again, and also Jared and company. 

3) Rules:

A) work on a Snappy Nappy Campaign booklet project

B) Develop new rules for my 15mm Renaissance Galleys and play test by the end of this year

4) Convention Games

A) The only convention under consideration for the rest of 2016 is Ellis Conn, held in November in Danielson, CT; that will depend upon my call schedule and energy level. If I run a game there, it will be a "small" game with either Field of Battle, Snappy Nappy, or To the Strongest!

5) Purchasing

Not much planned, but there is this sale from Murawski:  Don't forget our 'buy 5 packs get 2 free' special offer!  This will run until the end of August.

This is quite an important offer as I have some great news!  Paul Hicks has started work on the Polish Imperial Guard Battalion and we've found a new sculptor to work on finishing the Baden range. If this works out we'll also be looking at some other new figures.

Buy Baden!

Historicon 2016: WW1 East Afrika, Russian Civil War with FoB2

       Well, dear friends, I have  a confession to make. Yes, I have done it again; my hands have touched khaki! Tim C. once again made the trip over from the UK, and ran another of his small World War One East Afrika scenarios. These games are an excellent introduction for players new to the Field of Battle rules, and fun for us veteran players, too! Tim ran this game at 10 AM on Friday, and again at Noon on Saturday (twice that day!). From the listing in the PEL:

 The affair at Kisii (British East Africa Sept 12, 1914) 

"The Germans advanced across their northern border into British East Africa, and had set up camp in the small village of Kisii under Kapitan Bock von Wuelflingen. To counter this move, the British sent troops under Captain Thorneycroft. The Germans were completely oblivious to the advancing troops, the first shots hitting them in the middle of a parade!"

And here are the "Germans", all lined up on parade, shouting cadences and glory to the Kaiser! Most of their troops are Askaris of various sorts, and they are definitely not expecting a fight. With there being an open slot, and me not needing to start to set my game up until about 2 PM, I took one of the German commands; the middle one, IIRC. No cavalry though. Is that even civilized,?

The British swoop onto the field, and we Germans have to try to restore command, bring up our off label forces, crew our guns etc.

We Germans make a fair hash of it, failing most of our command rolls, as Captain Torneycroft's men start about the task of throwing this rubbish out of British territory!

Yep, still plenty of black "out of command" markers on the Germans!

The British look pretty smug. "I say. Bostwick, do you think we can wrap up this sordid little affair in time for Tea?"  British players were, left to right, David H, our old friend John M from Colorado (empty chair), and Keith F. 

You guessed it! STILL out of command!  "Rifles, machine guns, ammunition?? Must be some here somewhere!"  German Players were Adam, Steve, and myself. 

Well, at least SOME of our units finally shake themselves into a semblance of combat readiness

... and none too soon, as the Brits are peppering us with long range machine gun fire!

In the center, a British command has established themselves at the edges of a plantation (class 2 terrain). They are pushing their right flank forwards, seeking to seize the small village of Kisii

"Say, good man, what's up with those huts?"  Two units of Ruga-Ruga, temporarily allied to the Germans, rush forth from the village, seeking plunder and easy pickings!

British fire forces a German machine gun back...

and  then, the proverbial worm turns! To my right, the German player takes two shots at David's "British" in the plantation rolling a D4 vs a D6 each time. 4 vs 1 , and 4 vs 1 again! Both units are pushed back 3" out of Command, and lose a unit Integrity each. When a timely MOVE card is turned, my boys move forward to contest the Plantation.

The Ruga-Ruga and our sole unit of European infantry also advance.

Another timely MOVE card and my troops engage the shaken British within the plantation.

Action across the field is fast and furious!

Some Rhodesian police arrive to bolster the British left flank.

The British are being pushed back within the plantation, and are then attacked by a swarm of angry African bees!

My people are a poor people....  Ahem

The Brits try to save face (and Army Morale points) by whupping up on the hapless Ruga-Ruga. 

who prove to be tougher than their stats!

In the end, British morale fails as their losses mount, and they quit the field. A victory for the Kaiser's men. This will not play well with the Horse Guards!

 Reds vs Whites: Retreat to the Crimea! 

From the PEL  "Deniken’s 1919 push on Moscow has failed. With Baron von Wrangel in charge now, the White forces are in full blown retreat towards the Crimea. In this battle, a desperate White rearguard, entrenched along a rail line, attempts to hold off combat ready Red troops who are beginning to shine on the battlefield. 15mm, lots of variety (tachankas, armored cars, White officer battalions), using modified Field of Battle 2 Rules."

 Jared ran this game at 10 AM, Friday and again at 12 Noon on Saturday. Unfortunately, due to my own games I was only able to take few random shots

I see Alex and his son Thomas played in this one. I understand that in the Saturday game, Piquet veterans Ken B and Eric B set new records for dice rolling ineptitude!

Some shots from Tim's Saturday "Kissi" games.

Tim had 2 brothers playing on opposite sides in these games,  as well as Roy Jones (center). 

Jared contributed his pink dice; are you man enough to roll with them?

I understand that the first game ended rather quickly and was surprisingly lopsided, so Tim set it up again!

As he needed players, I took a British command this time, with the other Peter playing on my side (and his brother opposite). I have my hat strategically placed covering may face so as not to be identified as handling Khaki yet again! :-)

 Barry and Tim check the Firing modifiers. How did we Brits do? Well, suffice it to say that our attack didn't Peter out!

    In a message sent to Historicon GM's, event coordinator Bill Rutherford announced that there were more games run at Historicon 2016 than at any previous *Fredericksburg* Historicon, breaking the previous high total set by the first Fredericksburg Historicon (which was in 2012 - good gracious, was this the 5th Historicon in Virginia already?!  Bill also noted that there was less carpet and more noise this year than before, although certainly nothing approaching the severe tinnitus inducing levels of the first show there. Replacement carpet is planned for next year so we should be back up to snuff there for 2017. 

    I certainly want to thank the HMGS officers and all of the Historicon volunteers for a great convention. I've dealt with Bill as a pre-registering GM for quite a few years now, and he has never been anything but accommodating. The GM help desk staff helped resolve a scheduling conflict quickly and effectively, and the greatly improved suply of ice water this year was especially welcome, particularly when the mercury outside hit 102 degrees of Friday. I'll be back again in 2017, although I'd certainly be thrilled if one of the HMGS conventions moved to Somerset, NJ - a huge reduction in drive time for everyone in NY and New England, and as noted previously, very familiar territory for me as well.