Slow boat from China - Battlefield in a Box Terrain

I have had my eye on these additional river sections for several years they were never in stock and when they did appear on e-bay the price was higher than a galloon of 4 star. 

It's been 6 years since I last saw them on the market in any quantity. 

Then suddenly these pop up.... How could I say no...

Straight sections, Ford Crossings, T Junction and Streams, more than enough for what I need.

Add flock and river bank clutter reeds and they are table ready.

 

A great addition to the terrain collection....

Dispatches from the front XXVIII - In house rules & desert purchases.

It's been over a month since the last dispatch and still everything is still middle east focused.... I was hunting around for some extra terrain items for the desert and spotted some nice pieces on Two Shed Fred's eBay page.

As usual great service from Fred.... a set of walls which will add to the village and be useful for multiple periods.

Add to that three Mine Fields, these are great pieces very simple in design with a barb wire fence around each of them, with 6 movable signs, 2 generic, 2 British & 2 German. 

Having had Fred make me some bespoke roads a few years ago, I was wondering what to do with my Battlefield in a Box Roads, the answer was found in a couple of cans of Desert Yellow and Bone Yard and there they are..... Desert Roads..... and an excuse to add a couple of house rules for the desert games around bogging and mid day heat.

To compliment these pieces a small order from Ironclad Miniatures with a selection of fox holes, nothing says desert warfare than a bunch of infantry hiding in fox holes, whilst these are rather high I like the fact that I can drop them over the top of infantry or support teams rather than half figures.

On the subject of House Rules, I played a couple of Pint Size Campaign games with Chain of Command over at the Wyre Forest Club, a good encounter between the French Defenders and the attacking Germans... It's been a few years since I last played CoC, they have some nice mechanisms and feel a little more realistic than Bolt Action however my gaming tastes have changed slightly and I am leaning more towards the 'fun' game but still keeping a degree of realism. 

It got me thinking about adding in certain key elements of Chain of Command into Bolt Action.

I like the Force Morale elements in the Too Fat Lardies game mechanism, this makes you think about when you commit your troops but also not leaving sections too exposed. So adding a Bad Things Happen Table for the loss of a unit in addition to a loss of a dice makes for some jeopardy. 

This is the draft.

Snipers in BA can be pretty lethal and players always go for the LMG in a squad, Force Morale makes Officers more important and their loss could reduce the Force Morale which feels better rather than just taking dice from the bag.

Movement within BA can feel a little rigid with 6" for Advance and 12" for a Run so I have tweaked this with 1D6 for Advance and 3D6 for a Run HOWEVER if you get a double a unit gains a pin. This makes a Run a useful move but you may need to spend a turn reordering the ranks in a future turn.

If a unit fails a pin test and breaks under the house rules now units fall back 6" plus 2D6 and then go Down, but also take a Bad Things Happen Test.

One of my gripes with some rules is how whole units are taken off the table after a few casualties, it takes so long to paint units do I really want them back in the box after a few rounds of fire. So when it comes to Hand to Hand now when units lose they not taken off the table but rout backwards and gain pins equivalent to the difference in casualties.

The initial run through in a small game as French take on the Italians for a desert watering hole played really well.

How to test it with a few more players who are used to BA proper let's see if the tweaks hold up.

Happy gaming...

Pharaoh's gate..... Battlefield in a Box Review.

A slow week, on the painting front, I am still staring at the same 16 Hittites from 2 weeks ago.... I put it down to yet another lockdown and that lack of in person gaming. Keen to ensure I move forward gradually I figured I would give this a bit of make over, an unexpected Christmas gift and one of the latest offering from Battlefield in a Box - Forgotten City Range.

Gamers can be picky about ready made and painted terrain but having spent hours hunched over a table painting miniature warriors who then has the patience to then create the terrain as well? Hence in recent years the rise of straight to table terrain pieces... 

The forgotten city range is loosely based on Egyptian/Babylonian/Assyrian style. The gate has some clean angles which feels largely historical. The walls have a grainy and sand blasted feel to them, which feels in keeping with the period.

The gate is a good size  coming in at 145mm height by 240mm in diameter which feels right for a large scale centre piece and it won't budge once put on the table.

I can see it being used in some forthcoming scenario's for Kings of Bronze or perhaps some of the Atlantis type games should they resurface in the future.

The colouring was not at sandy as on the box cover more grey to my eye, so won't be a perfect mix with my existing terrain and I needed to dry brush the base to fit with my other basing.

I am not sure about the skulls adorning the top of the model and would have perhaps preferred warrior sculpts. Still I suppose it will fit with the Ghost Archipelago games.

On the downside it's weight with two solid resin columns is almost to have for the base, so much so that the base of mine had fractured and cracked across the width of the model, this looks like it is caused by the to columns leaning out and putting stress on the base. It was solved by cementing the roof piece in place to reinforce the base.  I would have perhaps explored hollow columns to reduce the weight?

The edge of the piece is a little fragile and elements could start to chip away over time with numerous game play. 

I disguised the fracture with the occasion tuft, good job that was a style of base I was aiming for.  

An imposing terrain piece you can see with the 25mm Warlord figures on the roof.

Coming in at £25 it's not cheap but will give you a number of gaming choices across a number of periods although you may find yourself rebasing it long term.

How back to the brushes and these flaming Hittites.

Dispatches from the front IV

Some weeks you just can't get your eye in, I sat in front of the paint table and just could not focus on the mini warriors in front of me, is it my age?

But pressing on I had bunch of Warbases that needed finishing for the forthcoming Warlords of Erewhon games, in particular the 3 man command stands. Human forces are on 2p piece based, whilst the undead are on 1p's not ideal but it will give a sense of mass for the forces of darkness.

Lots of dry brushing and flocking and they are ready for the table.

Meanwhile trying to stick to the plan of setting myself a monthly target, next month is Tudor February so I began prepping the Foundry troops for the painting queue. Many of these have been in the paint queue for years, but a number found their way here due to the recent Foundry Christmas sale, once complete I should be able to field 3 new pike blocks for the trained bands an extra unit of Calviers and half a cavalry unit.

Another year older, not necessarily wiser.

The family have come good this year and have been very generous in their gift giving, guided by our good friends at Amazon.

Plenty of reading material for Haiti and the Ancient Middle East project planned for the second part of the year, perfect for the long train ride that I find myself doing on a regular basis for work.

Extra river sections from Battlefield in a box although why are the regular sections so difficult to find these days?

And some extra's for the Far East project my Marines and Japanese have set boxed away for a number of years, I figured I would give Bolt Action a try after having some good experiences with Warlords of Erewhon, I was involved in some very early playtesting many years ago when Rick came to the club.

The extra armour for the US forces will come in handy and the Brits, well. why not.....

The paint queue is filling up quickly for the year ahead. 

Right back to the brushes.

Battlefield in a Box Oil Tanks - The weekend challenge.

Having set myself the challenge last weekend to finish the Russian buildings in time for Sunday's game, I managed to get off to a pretty good start, much of the prep has been done over the evenings this week, with filler and sand covering done, which should give me most of today to get the main block painting done on the buildings, leaving tomorrow free for the detail, washes and flocking.

There were a couple of quick wins to be had very early this morning which is The Battlefield in a Box accessories for Team Yankee in the shape of the Oil Storage Tanks.
They are pretty good straight out of the box, but I wanted mine to blend in with the existing terrain so set about basing them up.

On face value there is very little detail on the them when you unbox them, but by adding them to the base a quick wash here and there and a low wall to highlight the true scale they make for quite an imposing piece on the table top.

They need a little extra flocking and the odd bit of battlefield clutter but should be battlefield ready by sunday night.
Great start to a busy day.

Battlefield in a box rural roads review.

Having recently switched from the TSS terrain blocks to an easier to store Faux Fur Terrain cloth, I have been on the look out for a suitable road and rail system for the various periods I play.

At the recent Lardy day at Wyvern Wargamers a few of the chaps had been using the Battlefield in a box road system and having taken a closer look they seem just what I needed although an out lay of over £70 quid for something other than figures was a little uncomfortable but I have to say I am really impressed.

I picked up the Rural Roads and expansion set, together with the railway line enough to cover a typical 6' x 4' table.

The rear of the boxes showing the content of each.

Whilst designed for 15mm they fit rather well with 28mm figures allowing you to move 2-3 figures along the road if they were of column of march , the road sections come with track markings but these are hardly noticeable once placed on table.

The railway line is slightly narrow but I had not really planned on buying a train for my RJW collection and if required can explain this down to the narrow gauge used in Manchuria

The pre-painting is OK and the colouring seems to match from the 3 separate box sets that I ordered. 

The box sets each come with a pack of Green Grass and Meadow Blend GF9 Static Grass although I will be using my own mix to match my own basing style and this should mask any minor colour variants from the 2 road boxes.

Made of thick durable rubber they appear to stand up to the most heavy handed of player their density  means they sit flat on the terrain cloth unlike some of the MDF road systems available which tend to rise up during game play, they also slightly sticky on the back which helps them stay in position although it does take some of the faux fur with them upon removal.

All in all a very useful addition to the terrain collection and a piece of kit that will cover a majority of periods.