Dispatches from the Front IX

The end of May and as the country slowly creeps out of lock down I look back on another successful month with another major project complete with no more bare metal hanging around for the English or the Forces of Darkness in the Elizabethan Zombie Project.

The new "normal" in terms of working practices has seen an extra couple of hours of hobby time each day which really helps keeping the painting queue moving, whether it's a quick basing session or undercoating its far better than the usual commute. 

Whilst physical gaming has been sparse I have been able to grab a number of Standard Games Cry Havoc and Siege skirmish games over face time. With both of us owning the game we swap pic's of the set up a few hours earlier matching the characters on the map before grabbing a couple of hours gaming time.

The rules have really stood the test of time, I still have an urge to re-create this in miniature but let's see plenty of other projects on the list at the moment.

Whilst Osprey might been offering free downloads when C19 kicked off it does not mean it costs us gamers nothing, reading the pdf on Japanese Infantry it got me thinking using Bolt Action to refight Henderson Airfield, I have a number of 28mm US marines and Japanese Infantry but spotted these from company B on the Great Escape Games website. I needed to add a couple of items from them for the Seven Days to the Rhine Rules and well these would make up the postage.

I found myself flicking through Kickstarter one evening and came across Command and Colors latest offering. I have always fancied gaming the Jacobite Rebellions, but it's not going to happen unless someone really does invent tartan paint.. So this is the next best thing.

Estimated delivery September.... So looking forward to playing this at Christmas based on my usual track record of projects backed.

Meanwhile the boss had the great idea to clear out the loft and I came across my original inspiration for getting into gaming. I remember finding a copy of this in my local library and a poster on the wall for the local historical gaming club, wow that was over 30 years ago.

The Ancient game showed a confrontation between the Sassanid Persians and Romans circa AD363.

Over the years I have only dabbled with ancients but have always thought back to these pics and fancied giving it a proper go...  

So as other projects wind down the Egyptian - Hittite lead pile slowly increases. More on this in the months ahead.

Meanwhile the Diplomacy campaign continues with the Wyvern's with a couple of players down and others tittering on the brink it could all be over in a couple of rounds if truces hold and moves play out. Up until now my Turkish forces and the Austrians have had a mutual agreement but we both know that can't last.

So what of June?

So far the monthly project focus has been very rewarding with 4 projects cleared of all bare metal. As tempted as I am kick off the Ancients I have a number of 'fillers' that need to be brought to life with extras for Russia, Africa, The Far East and Other Egyptian stuff.

Meanwhile some light reading as inspiration for the New Kingdom  - Hittite Project.

Four sons. One throne. A world on the precipice. 

1315 BC: Tensions soar between the great powers of the Late Bronze Age. 

The Hittites stand toe-to-toe with Egypt, Assyria and Ahhiyawa, and war seems inevitable. More, the fierce Kaskan tribes – age-old enemies of the Hittites – amass at the northern borders. 

When Prince Hattu is born, it should be a rare joyous moment for all the Hittite people. But when the Goddess Ishtar comes to King Mursili in a dream, she warns that the boy is no blessing, telling of a dark future where he will stain Mursili’s throne with blood and bring destruction upon the world. Thus, Hattu endures a solitary boyhood in the shadow of his siblings, spurned by his father and shunned by the Hittite people. But when the Kaskans invade, Hattu is drawn into the fray. It is a savage journey in which he strives to show his worth and valour. Yet with his every step, the shadow of Ishtar’s prophecy darkens…

Red Pheonix - The wheels of Industry.

Having completed and upgraded the rural buildings several weeks ago. I needed to complete the warehouses and factories. I had started them several years go but they needed basing up to fit in with the rest of the buildings.

All pieces from the team at Time Cast.

Somewhere in the storage box I have some civilian lorries and vehicles which I will add to the base at another time. I walled off the compound and added some clutter such as crates and barrels.

These will be useful as a complex which will needed to be captured or defended.

Also completed and refreshed are a couple of larger buildings, a small apartment block large house, perhaps a regional command post or factory owner?

All of these come from Time Casts Russian East European Range. I will need to pick up couple of additional items to complete the terrain in the form of some roads and perhaps some more field works.

The storage box still contains around 20 MBT's to paint up, I never got round to them originally when I first started the project as they looked to have been GHQ rip offs, I wondered why they were cheap on e-bay but they are the *last models for this project. I should get to these before the end of the month.

*Well I might be tempted by some air elements.

I have a couple of games lined up for when we are released and also fancied rolling the games into a wider campaign having just picked up a copy of an old classic - Tactics II.

So many ideas so few opponents.....

North & South Korean Reinforcements - Red Phoenix Project

First out of the blocks for April some useful 'fillers' for the North and South Korean Forces for the Red Phoenix Project. When we played the first encounter a few months back, I was short of some key elements, notably air defences and recon units for the South.

Despite the games being in 6mm I don't want to be fielding wall to wall armour I also don't need 5 of everything which is the challenge with GHQ.

The GHQ models are great castings and at 1/285 scale are slightly larger to the eye but can be a touch expensive so I opted for the smaller Heroics and Ros Vulcans in 1/300th scale.

You can buy their models individually at a much reduced rate giving me what I needed at a faction of the cost.

I had a bunch of GHQ's M113's laying unpainted in a box, so filing down the top deck of the M113's allowed me to add the H&R turrets which gave me the correct scale Vulcans to add to me southern defenders.

They look fine to me and the slightly different turret scale is not noticeable.. 

The Fox Armoured Cars are also by H&R, I did'nt have a any in the current force so as smaller nipper models they fit in really well. Perfect for hiding amongst the villages and outhouses.

I also bolstered the North forces with extra recon units.

4 BRDM2's to give them some extra scouting activity. These I found in a box of spares along with a couple of extra tank companies.
I added some red star decals not that they can been seen standing 3 foot away :-)

And to top up the order from H&R a section of BMP1's for a slightly more modern section. Again without others models to compare against they should be fine on the table.

Then last but not least a couple of Sagger teams to bolster the Infantry and defend against the extra Southern Armour that should make it out of the spares box.

Oh I also completed a couple of flocks of sheep which were also languishing in the spares box.

Not a bad effort for a Saturday.

Red Phoenix Project - First outing

The first game of the year and the first out for Red Phoenix, using the rule set Seven Days to the Rhine. Red Phoenix is the 1980's invasion of South Korea by the North, based on the book by Larry Bond.

The book begins with student uprisings, which leads to a South Korean government clamp down and ultimately to US sanctions. Seizing the opportunity, the North invades the south. Plenty of scope for skirmishes and encounters with this backdrop.

Somewhere south of the DMZ the village of Buckchon a scratch force of South Korean's dig in holding a river line awaiting the oncoming vanguard of the North Korean Army.

We selected 500 points in this encounter battle, the T62's of the North Korean Army are cheaper than the M60A1's of the South, which enabled them to bolster their force with a platoon of BTR 60's and BDRM scout cars.

The forces of the North advance on either side of the monastery their armour rushes forwards looking to secure a foot hold before the Southern defenders can react.

Meanwhile the South Korean Infantry scrabble to defend the village, Infantry and Dragon Teams hide amongst the white washed houses as they await the enemy armour. M60's move forwards to bolster the defences.

The North Korean's hackers strike reducing the defenders command dice for the turn.

The card deck within the rules bring a very nice touch, with each card impacting the attackers of defenders in different ways, airstrikes, barrages and counter strikes.

North Korean recon units reach the outskirts of the village de-busing from their APC and taking up positions in the buildings, whilst their counterparts maintain a foothold on the Northern bank. 

A South Korean MBT advances towards the bridge but is destroyed by long range fire from the T62's before it can get into position.

The North Korean Armour skirts the river bank but is struck by off table artillery catching to of the advancing armour in the burst. The remaining armour rushes forwards but is caught in the cross fire by the defenders.

Meanwhile on the left flank the attackers begin to push further into the village but are unable to force the bridge crossing. The defenders cling on until night fall.

 

A great first game with plenty of twist and turns, you find yourself down at eye level grabbing any cover you can, tanks and AT weapons can hit anything on the table, so those little folds in the ground are crucial if you are to get the drop on the enemy.

Looking forward to getting some more games in, in the coming months.  

Red Phoenix Project - 6mm Korean Village

Back in the summer I kicked off the Red Phoenix Project, the fictitious invasion of South Korea in the mid 1980's based on the novel by Larry Bond.

I rebased the infantry and armour to be able to use them with the Seven Days of the Rhine Rules but languishing in the box of shame was a whole bunch of buildings from my first attempt to crack this project a mere 10 years ago. Back then I had painted up perhaps 5 or 6 buildings which left quite a few to get through.

The buildings are a mix of Irregular and Timecast from their Asia and Russian Range. The Irregular buildings are cast in metal which is a rarity these days, they are a little rough around the edges but they do some unusual stuff in their numerous ranges. 

I based each of the buildings on an MDF base and added some textured wall paper to create the occasional tarmac area, I added a number of trees which were lying around to give the buildings more of a rural look.

The Irregular Temple makes a great centre piece and bolting on a couple of extra buildings makes it quite a complex to fight over. A BTR 70 and HQ section are tucked away in the grounds for scale.

A couple of more rural buildings for use on the table.

Wooden buildings are not great when it comes to HE as the above ruins prove.

I tried to mix the buildings into both rural and urban, creating a couple of farm community farms and some buildings based quite close together to create shop fronts or a more urban area.
With over 20 buildings making up the village that should be more than enough for the various force to fight over.

I have a wish list of additional items needed to fill the gaps in this project largely for the South Koreans or US forces and then on the terrain front  perhaps some industrial items, pylons, paddy fields and vehicles to flesh out the table.

Now all I need is some game time to try the rules and new terrain.

Dispatches from the front II

I bloody hate cavalry...… I have been sitting looking at the same cavalry unit for the best part of three weeks, if I can't break the back of them tomorrow they might have to be bounced from the queue for a while.

I am not sure if it's the mass of horse flesh or the fact that I have glued the riders on first, something that I don't normally do in the painting process. Do we all have a touch of OCD when it comes to painting?

Meanwhile we had a crack at Osprey's latest card game, a two player game with a number of missions from D-Day to play through, you use your cards to grab the initiative and use your squads to grab objectives I must admit it was a real blast and felt very realistic, very much a band of brothers feel to it, the early missions contain only rifle squads, but later missions introduce MG's Mortars and snipers.

MG's are great at pinning troops, mortars are flaming nasty and you need to get a move on once the targeting round lands. Stick and move is the name of the game.

Send your scouts out to clear the ground in front of you before you send your rifle sections in to take the ground.

The game tiles have plenty of detail and I am sure I won't be the only one thinking about how I could convert this to a miniatures game. 

Each mission lasts about 45 minutes and makes for a great evenings game. 

I based up the QH Miniatures and have included a couple of comparison shots to the Trent Miniatures, they match up very well in size although the quality of sculpt needs some work when compared to others on the market these days. 

Trent Minatures have a slave pack available which landed this morning along with some casualties which will give me so more line infantry shock markers. 

Whilst finding anything to do other than paint the Haitian horse, I did finally get round to painting up the Warbases Pigeon loft and a couple of the test houses for the Red Phoenix project.

Switching between 28mm and 6mm is not great when you are trying to get you eye in once the cavalry are done I will look to get the rest of the Korean village finished so I can get a couple of Seven Days to the Rhine in.

Seven Days to the Rhine - South Korean Formations..

On to the South Korean's.
So it turns out I had not painted anywhere near enough of these, time to check the spares box or a quick order to GHQ to flesh out the ranks in the coming weeks for some SP Guns, AA vehicles and recon elements.

Once again based and formated for Seven Days to the Rhine.

South Korean Mechanized Regiment

Regimental Headquarters

1 Infantry Regiment
Artillery Battery
Reconnaissance Company
Tank Company

Infantry Battalion

Battalion Headquarters	33 Points	1 Infantry Stand	Jeep
A Company Infantry	73 Points	2 Infantry Stands	M113
B Company Infantry	73 Points	2 Infantry Stands	M113
C Company Infantry	73 Points	2 Infantry Stands	M113
D Company Machine Gun Company	73 Points	2 MG Stands	M113
E Company Support Company	104 Points	2 81mm Mortar & 2 Dragon Stands	M113

Regimental Heavy Weapons Company

Regimental Heavy Weapons Company

104 Points

2 120 mm Mortar & 2 Dragon Stands

M113

Regimental Air Defence Company

Regimental Air Defence Company

46 Points

2 M163 Vulcan

Artillery Battalion

A Company

?? Points

4 110A2 SP 8” Howitzers

Tank Company                                                         

Tank Company

128 Points

4 M60 A1’s

Reconnaissance Company

Recon Company

72 Points

4 Fox Armoured Cars

Armour Battalion

Battalion Headquarters	32 Points	1 M60 A1
A Company	128 Points	4 M60 A1’s
B Company	128 Points	4 M60 A1’s
C Company	128 Points	4 M60 A1’s
D Company Infantry	73 Points	2 Infantry Stands and 1 M113
E Company Infantry	73 Points	2 Infantry Stands and 1 M113
F Company AT Company	80 Points	2 HMMWV + TOW

So with a scratch force of South Koreans and their numerically superior neighbours complete, on to the buildings to give them something to fight over.

I have a batch of Time Cast south asian buildings to base up and some other earlier efforts in need of improvement. But should be able to bring these to the table by August.