French IndoChina War

One of our members has began painting up a large number of French and Vietnamese for this period. They are in 10mm, but they look nice. This idea just came about after he saw someone else gaming this period. So, his idea is, to have all the French and their various allies be ran by gamers. The Vietcong will be run by a referee. We have done games like this before, and they are very enjoyable. One site that dabbles in this period is: http://www.hksw.org/index.htm

This is the Hong Kong Society of Wargamers. They have some gaming reports on there that are very interesting.

We have done the French Foreign legion vs the Arabs. This was done in either 20mm or 25mm's. The scale escapes me. Each player was assigned a certain number of troops with various victory conditions. Very enjoyable! We even had a fort for the Legionnaires to defend. We have done scenarios where the Legion had to get from one side of the table to another with supplies they needed to protect, make dashes to an oasis to bring water back to the fort.

I have put on a WW2 micro armor game in this same fashion. I had a German counter attack against an allied invasion. Yes, D-Day was what I fashioned the scenario after with some modifications.

We actually find that games like this result in fewer arguments as everyone is on the same team. Yes, I said arguments, but these are usually in the spirit of the game. No one likes to lose(Grin)

As we progress in this era, I will be sure to post!

As for what I have been doing lately, well nothing. I haven't gamed in a couple weeks now. The Little Wars convention was just completed, though I did not attend, a few of our group did. I haven't painted either as my regular homelife activities have kicked in with the nicer weather.

I am sure I will be gaming this coming week and a report of some sort will be filed. Until then....

What's on my Workbench

Well as the title says, here is what I have been doing. Today, I managed to almost finish up my Rebel dismounts I mentioned in a previous post. I have them mounted and just need to touch up the bases, put some flocking and label them so they can be set up with their mounted units. Shouldn't take too long. As for labeling them, I just print out the unit name from my computer on a small font. Then I cut them to fit the stands and glue them down. My stands are 1"x1" metal stands. That way I can have them stick to the magnetic strips I have in my carrying drawers. Not all my units are on metal stands. So I had small flat pieces of metal on the bottoms, but this doesn't always seem to work. They like to fall off. Sometime down the road, I would like to remount those so they are all alike.

I looked at the figs I purchased from Bartartown. Again mentioned in a previous post. After getting a better look, I realized they were more like 20mm as opposed to 15's. Not a good match for my figs at all. I plan on putting them up for sale soon, hopefully just to get what I paid for them. They are nice figs, just to large. I did get a package of 15's that came with this batch. Those I intend to keep. I have a few more Rebels on tongue depressors waiting for me to begin work on them. I plan on getting those done quickly. I also have some Reb cavalry to get at, but without anymore dismounts at this time, I plan on putting them on the back burner. I will focus more on the infantry I have. Plenty of them to keep me busy for quite sometime.

With the change in daylight savings time, I have the urge to be outside more now. Especially with the weather improving towards spring/summer. Not so much in the basement. My gaming and painting tend to slow down. But as I look at it, it is just a hobby and when the hobby seems to be morphing into work, it no longer is a hobby. I figure this is nature's way of telling me to slow down some.

I have put my painting of the Friekorp also on the back burner. We haven't even discussed them in awhile regarding rules etc. I just recently finished up what I had started. My latest idea I have is based upon some rules I found on the Internet. They are for micro armor and I do have a large collection. They seem simple and fast so I plan on working on them soon. I need to organize them and do some painting and mounting. I would like to mount them on metal bases as well. I have some storage drawers with magnetic strips that I haven't used in awhile. These would be nice for the storage of the micro armor.

Well that is about it for now. As more games and projects come up, I will be posting.

WW2 Germans vs Poles 1939

Last night, our group did a WW2 skirmish type game. It was Poles vs Germans in the fall of 1939. I had only played these set of rules once before, so I had a little adjusting to do. They are called Broadsword. The rules, however, don't have anything for the Poles, so the guy running the game did some modifications.

The background for the scenario was the Poles were attempting a breakout after being encircled. They had to get as many units off the table as they could. The Germans has alot of infantry, a couple IeG 75's as well as a couple mortars and ATG's. Their mission was to prevent the breakout. The Germans also had a relief column to aid the Germans on board, however, wouldn't arrive until turn 4. This column consisted of 2 Pz 35t's, 1 Pz 4 short 75 and 1 Pz 3. They also has 3 trucks with infantry. A Stuka could also be called upon.

The Poles started a good portion onto the table. The had 3 Tanket's and a couple other tanks. Their type escapes me at this point. They had some cavalry, plenty of infantry and a couple artillery guns. Later in the game, a couple of Polish trucks arrived w/atg's attached.

The game started out a little rough when the German IeG's opened up on the mass of humanity approaching them. However, a flaw was noticed after so many Poles were killed. The burst circle was to large. It should have been a 2" diameter blast area as opposed to a 2" radius. This was adjusted and the game continued.

To make a long story short, several problems were observed regarding the rules and this caused some time on our part's to try and decipher them. This slowed the game down alot. Plus we had a late start to begin with. The game did continue with the Germans actually taking a few losses to their artillery guns. The Poles made a huge push on the one side of the table. With the Germans split up defending the entire board, it gave the Poles quite an advantage. The Stuka did make an appearance. It was used for 3 turns before heading back to base. It did some damage to the infantry, but not as much if it was equipped with bombs! Mg's were OK but...

By the time my relief column was on board, it was almost useless. We had to roll to see where we came on. Of course, Murphy's Law played a roll in our game as we ended up coming in at the furthest point of the attack!

The Poles quickly began to make their way to the opposite board edge as described in their briefing. The game was called as the Poles brought up their 2 atg's and had a couple of the larger tanks take up a position to hinder the relief column from assisting.

In the end, I figured it would be a Polish victory just based upon their victory conditions. They would have plenty of time to get their troops off board before we could intercede.

For me, it wasn't a very enjoyable game. Mostly because a few things in the rules seemed to bother me. One thing was that a buttoned up tank could see better than a tank moving, with the commander unbuttoned. The spotting rules for the game seemed to slow it down, plus the Poles weren't rated as good as they should have been. Not to mention that the time spent to decipher the rules was a problem. Not everything was clear cut as it could have been. The charts were'nt as organized as they could have been.

My friend bought the rules based upon a couple games he played at a few conventions. The convention games went so much faster as opposed to the few we played at home. Maybe in time, they could be figured out to make them flow. But until then, I am not a fan of Broadsword.