February Club night round up.

Plenty of projects on the go at the moment, but always time for something old and something new.

First up back to an old favourite and AVBCW, one of the joy's of this project is the ability to research your local area and try and replicate it on the table top.... what is now a largely built up area in Worcester was once a country lane and the long established council estate was under construction as a new build. 

In this scenario the BUF under pressure in the city have called for reinforcements from Evesham but find the way locked into the city. But whose side will the St Martin's militia in the new estate side with?

The BUF deploy early having triggered an ambush from the socialist defenders, who have rigged up a trench mortar to fling HE over the hedge rows.

The BUF looking to take a turn to right, more than they already are :-) 

Only for the local militia to decide they did not like the presence of the men in black in their nice new housing estate. The call out their local defence forces to block the road and man the hedge rows.

Knowing time was not on their side the BUF try to rush the main road into the city but find that communist forces have their own armoured car who pin the attackers back.... with burning vehicles and many killed and wounded. the city would not be getting any reinforcements any time soon. 

Leap forward 45 years and another what if.... a game a Team Yankee and a Russian attempt to break though NATO lines as the American recon units beat a hasty retreat on the face of wall to wall Soviet armour.

Pretty pleased with myself I had massed my Abrams all in one place and watched as the Russians chased my recon units as we drew them into range of my main guns.

Ambush !!!! - 60% of the Russian Armour is destroyed in the first round.

Now for the Air Power and on the opposite flank the A10's knock out another bunch of heavy metal.

I may have then got a little cocky and swept down off the hill to turn the Russian flank, forgetting that they to have air power.... and several of my valuable armour went up in flames.... 

I perhaps should have stayed where I was but got a little bit carried away and will most certainly be disciplined by high ups.... If I had not been blown to bits in the final round.

Team Yankee is rather unforgiving.... or is it realistic you perhaps only have to look to the Ukraine to see the life of a tanker is not very long...

Two very different games - Team Yankee was quick, not sure about the ranges and it might be better in 6mm but it was fun and you certainly get a big game done in 2-3 hours....

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.

Back to the Chechen Wars...

I had planned on finishing off the plantation figures for the Haiti project, but last weeks Russian Front outing reminded me that I had several buildings hidden away in the garage waiting for that spark that moves them up the painting queue... The need for a little more terrain for WW2 Russia and the following rules did just the trick.

I have not had a chance to give them a run out yet but the read up seems to hit the right note for what I had in mind.


About the game:

Cornered Wolf is a skirmish game aimed at 15mm, 20mm or 28mm miniatures, and aimed at representing the chaos of urban combat with the simplest possible rules.
Uncertain activation, randomly generated forces, deployment that will throw you immediately into chaos, and quick and deadly rules will have you wargaming Chechnya in no time at all. Perfect for playing with younger family members, or for those of you who would prefer to make tactical decisions rather than look up a rule, Cornered Wolf provides everything you need for infantry, weapon teams, vehicles, multi-level buildings and suppression.
These rules cover the basic infantryman armed with AK-47 or AK-74, RPG, SVD sniper rifle or PKM. Weapon Teams like the AGS-17 automatic grenade launcher, NSV heavy machine gun, ‘fagot’ anti-tank missile and mortars are also covered.
Rules for vehicles cover the BTR-80, BMP-1 / BMP-2, ZSU-23-4 Shilka, 2K22 Tunguska, T-72 / T-80 and MT-LB.
While the basis of this game is kept simple (No markers or tokens needed!), extended rules are provided for players to introduce more detail. Extended rules allow troops to ride along inside (and on top of) vehicles, while extended wounding rules allow carrying wounded and loading them into vehicles. Evacuating wounded could potentially save you some points with regards to completing your mission objective.
A points system is also provided for those who aren’t too keen on randomly generated forces, although we strongly recommend at least trying the random generation as it makes for very interesting and still quite balanced games.

With a game planned for next Sunday, I have set myself the goal of getting this little lot finished in a week.

The Russian rural buildings are from Ironclad and have been languishing in a box for a couple of years, a couple of farm houses and a railway station which I can use for several projects.

The oil tanks are ready made from the Team Yankee modern range but look pretty naff without some basing and some additional dry brushing.

Whilst much of the fighting was centered on Grozny there are plenty of encounters in the mountains and countryside. The pics below are the sort of feel I am after.

Let's see how the next week goes..... No pressure.
Gluing them on the MDF bases is the easy part.