The Start of a New Game

I have been painting over the last few months. Right now I am closing in on completion of two new units - The 5th West Indies Regiment and the 15th US Infantry. These two units will complete the core forces of both sides for my upcoming fictitious Niagara Campaign. These units bring the totals to 37 US Infantry stands, 3 Cavalry stands (Regulars, Volunteers and Militia) and 30 British/Canadian Infantry stands, 2 Cavalry stands (Regulars and Militia). Added to these are 9 US gun stands and 11 British/Canadian gun stands and numerous skirmisher stands on both sides. Each side also has the requisite Native American stands.
It has taken a few years to get all of these forces ready to go, but they are almost finished! Now if I can recruit some commanders, we can get started with the campaign! More photos to come in the next couple of weeks.

Last Game of 2007 - WWII SPEARHEAD

Just a quick update on the last game of 2007. I hosted a WWII SPEARHEAD game at the Northern Conspiracy game night on December 28th. The Game is called "Home By Christmas" and it is a slightly modified version of the same scenario from the White Star Rising book. In this game the British Armored force moving up a road must link-up with an American airborne regiment holding a small town. The Germans have a hodge-podge of forces between the two allied forces.
At the game night the Germans decided to defend as far forward as possible to the British deployment. This forced the British to fight towards the Americans from the very start of the game. The Germans initially fighting the British included a motorized SS Infantry Battalion and an SS Panzerjager Battalion. These units fought a British Infantry Brigade of two battalions and an armored battalion to a standstill for about 7 turns. The Americans made quick work of the Luftwaffe training unit surrounding them and ended up attacking the German reserve of one motorized SS Infantry battalion by the end of the game. Even a regular army fusilier battalion reinforced by Stug-III's couldn't prevent the Americans from breaking out and counterattacking the surrounding forces.
While the Germans were very successful at the beginning of the game, I think that the British reserve armored battalion would have tilted the game in favor of the allies if it had played out the total 18 turns. The Americans were so successful in the breakout from the town, that they would have put significant pressure on the Germans trying to hold off the British and basically "turned the Germans" out of their defenses.
We are limited to some extent at game night by time. We completed 8 turns of the 18 turns for this game before we had to pack up. Overall, I believe everyone had a good time in this game. It was much closer than I anticipated with the Germans really making the British fight for every inch of ground along the road. The British didn't conduct a cavalry charge that one would anticipate. They were very patient in their attack using the infantry battalions to push the Germans off of some very dominant terrain.
Overall, a great game that I hope to host again at some point in the future.

Back on Line - CD Test of Battle Game Report

Man! Does time fly! I can't believe it has been so long since my last post. I haven't been doing much gaming. Last weekend I had a chance to play in a Command Decision - Test of Battle game at a friends house. The rules are really interesting and the figures we used were great, however, the scenario needs some work. It was a British vs. Italian Western Desert game. I played on the British side and we got our heads handed to us. The Italians were dug in and the Brits had basically just tanks to attack with. The rules really favor dug in defenses because they are so difficult to spot and return fire on. I think the rules have some promise, however, I think they are a bit involved unless you play them often. I think at this point in my life I want to play a simpler set of rules. that I can be away from and come back to easily. I'll let you know if I play the rules again.

Modern SPEARHEAD Game

Had a great game of Modern SPEARHEAD this afternoon. I was a Russian Tank Regiment commander with reinforcements of an additional BMP armed MRB and the Independent Tank Battalion (ITB). We attacked (well, attempted to attack) a well placed French battle-group of one armor battalion and one mech battalion. The French units were reinforced with an engineer company and a divisional ATGM company. The French tanks were LeClerc's, APC's were AMX-10P. The Russian tanks were T-80U's with the MRB's equipped with BMP-2's. The ITB was equipped with T-72'sBM's. We were pulling out the rules after several months since we last played so we did not use many of the advanced rules and we did not include any aircraft in the game. The bottom line is my good friend Andrew playing the French rolled lights out and had a great battle plan. He halted my entire attack within four turns destroying an entire MRB and tanks equal to at least half of a Tank Battalion. My attack plan stunk and his defense plan couldn't have worked better. I learned that one must play the game just like the Russians planned to attack. Lots and Lots of artillery, close air support, move quickly and get in close before NATO takes out too much stuff. The rules came back to us very quickly and we are going to add some of the advanced rules and aircraft with the next game. We were doing this game to make sure we are ready to start our campaign. I hope we will have the campaign started within the next couple or three weeks.

The 1st Regiment of Foot

This is the senior regiment in the British Army. Also known as the "Royal Scots" the 1st Foot had the blue facings of a royal regiment. This unit has three stands because of the relatively large number of troops in this battalion. Note that the command stand on the far left includes a pioneer or sapper. These men were equipped with an axe and tasked with duties of clearing the route of march through the forest. Also, note that there are several different colors of pants. In the field, and especially in North America at the end of a very long supply line, troops wore whatever they could procure. Finally, note the sergeant on the stand on the right has a musket instead of a pike just like the sergeant in the 100th Foot posted earlier. All of these figures are from the Foundry Napoleonic British Range.

British Rocket Detachments

These two detachments represent Royal Artillery heavy rockets (L) and Royal Marines light rockets (R). All of the figures come from the Old Glory Rockets and Crews pack in their 25mm Napoleonics range. I converted the Marines by removing the heads from the figures provided in the pack and replacing them with Marine heads from the Napoleonic Marines pack. Although not 100% historical, I think the Marines look good. I needed to make the Marine rocket detachment to complete my British Order of Battle for Lundy's Lane. Overall I think that every Napoleonic British force should have a rocket unit to provide a little "color".

The 19th Light Dragoons and Canadian Light Dragoons

The 19th Light Dragoons were the only regular British cavalry regiment to serve in Canada during the War of 1812. The uniform is completely regulation with shako and all lace. I think the expressions on these figures is excellent as they yell and urge their mounts into the charge! Didn't happen much in Canada, but that is something we can overlook. The Canadian Light Dragoons that I have painted are not totally accurate. The historical unit wore a felt round hat with black bearskin crest. I didn't have the ability to correct the hat on these Foundry figures so I used the early Napoleonic light dragoons with Tarleton helmet as presented. I really like the officer figure with his oil cloth covered bicorne. These are the only two cavalry units in my British force at this time. What I really want is some dismounted figures for these units to use as skirmishers. Redoubt makes excellent dismounted hussars, I am hopeful that they will someday do at least two or three dismounted light dragoons.