Wings of Glory

 I played my first game of Wings of Glory, a WWI aircraft combat game.  It's a very intuitive game with simple mechanics but a lot of fun to play.  It's like X-Wing for WWI, but I think it plays cleaner and has a lot more maneuver options.  Each type of plane has a deck of 25 of so cards that have different types of maneuver options.

I really liked the game and its one I think I can get my son interested in playing.

A very fun day

New Campaign at the Club

With our Waterloo campaign coming to a close (and likely defeat for the French, who have me as Grouchy), it's time to start up another Napoleonic Campaign.

I've always wanted to run a campaign, so have volunteered to do so.  This campaign will be focused on a rather silly idea of Napoleon invading the US and will use a set of campaign rules that I've been working on.  Pray for my fellow club members who are now subjected to my whims dreams of rules writing grandeur.

Why the silly scenario?  Well, last summer at Historicon, my hypothetical invasion of Britain game (To Catch a King) proved 4 out of 5 times that Napoleon would have won so naturally he would attempt to re-possess Louisiana as his next move.  Seems logical to me.  Then again, I'm a moron.

In reality, I'm hoping to run the campaign relatively quickly - (within 6 weeks) to refine the rules and see if it's feasible to run a campaign during the course of Historicon's 3 days where the details of the battles are based on how the campaign plays out.

Pictured above is the campaign map, which is based off a period map of the British Gulf campaign during the War of 1812.  This scenario has the french invading from Port-au-Prince (the bottom center box).  Napoleon will have an army of 75,000 men to invade the new world.  Opposing him are two separate forces - The US army under Jackson and the British Exile Force, or BEF, under Wellington.  For game play purposes both sides will be fairly even which implies the US built up its armed forces prior to the campaign.  It's a stretch, but I'm making this thing up anyway.

The campaign will also feature 7 potential minor allies that both sides can try to woo with diplomatic actions.  These allies include:

The Spanish
Jean Lafitte and his Baratarian Pirates
Texicans (cause why not?)
4 different Native American Tribes
- Seminole
- Upper Creek
- Lower Creek
- Choctaw

I'll use the blog to report general progress of the campaign but because there is hidden movement will wait until it's completed before going into detailed moves.

I really do want to get this done is six weeks, which means tight deadlines for turns.  One of the biggest problems with gaming campaigns is they start off with great enthusiasm but players can loose interest if things drag on and/or their position appears hopeless.  Let's see if we can avoid that.

Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge X: Three weeks of Painting

It's been a productive three weeks.  My first submission for the Challenge was these 3 Russian generals from AB Miniatures in 18mm scale.  As I've said many times before AB makes the best 15/18mm Napoleonic miniatures around.  Old Glory's Blue Moon line is a close second and may pip them on value but AB's have stolen my heart. 

 Next up some 28mm WW1 Sailors formed into a Landing Party.  These are for to use with both the upcoming Blood and Valor skirmish game plus a convention game concept I'm working on that may see the light of day at Fall In 2020.

Next up Some Austrians and Russians.  From left to right for the Austrians are 2, 24 figure Austrian infantry Battalions, 10 skirmish stands, 3 batteries and 6 generals.   These are almost all Old Glory figures.  Next we have some Russian command stands and 12 artillery batteries, all from AB Miniatures.  When the Challenge is over I'll do a review of my entire 15mm Napoleonic collection, which now has forces for the French, British, Spanish, Portuguese, Austrians, Russians and US (War of 1812).  Sadly the Prussians are missing - I suspect that will be remedied over the course of 2020.  The club is thinking of doing a Napoleon in Egypt project so there may also be some early French and Ottomans/Mamlukes joining the ranks.

 A space Marine for one of the "X-Marks-the-Spot locales.

 Some 28mm Aztecs, cause I had them on hand

Another X-marks the spot submission in the form of Swedish Dragoons from the wonderful "By Fire and Sword" game system.

Lastly, some War of 1812 miniatures in 15mm from Old Glories Blue Moon line.  A bunch of US commanders and two large calvary groups - US light Dragoons in the front and Mounted KT rifles in the back.  You'll be seeing a lot more of these chaps in a few weeks.  In the lover right are 10 stands of Native Americans.

I would like to leave this post with a plug for Old Glory and their "Army Card" subscription option.  Old Glory make very nice and affordable figures but they also have an option to pay an annual fee of $50.00 and get a 40% discount on the entire line - thats 40% off already reasonable prices.  It's the best deal I know off and one you should take advantage off if you're building out just about any army in 15 - 18mm scale.  Thanks Old Glory!

First Game of the Year: NUTS!

I played in my first game of 2020 last night at the club.  Greg ran some "teaching" games of the WW2 skirmish ruleset NUTS!  It was nasty Russian vs even nastier Germans.  Keith and I were Russian players and we faced of against Dave and Tony

The game is a very tactical depiction of WW2 with some RPG elements thrown in.  Your commander is meant to represent you and each figure can have unique attributes.  We kept it all pretty generic for the first game.

To be honest, I was a little leery of the game as I tried to read the rule book and found it to be very hard to understand.  My concerns were misplaced, I really enjoyed the gameplay and look forward to playing again.

There are all sorts of rules that make getting your commander killed outright pretty hard.  Tony and I managed to blow past all of those protections as the first casualty for each side was our respective commanders.

Can't wait to try the game again.

What's on the Painting Bench?

Lots of US war of 1812 mounted figures - Generals, Dragoons and Mounted Kentucky Rifles.  Oh - and some Native Americans

All of the figures are 15mm from Old Glory's Blue Moon line.

There's a bunch more to do.

AHPC X: Week 3 Update

We are now almost 3 weeks into the X'th version of the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge so I thought I'd put out a short update on my progress.

As the incomprehensible graph shows, I'm very slightly ahead of plan (the bars) but a bit behind past years production (the lines).  As with all past Challenges the composition of what I'm actually painting bears little resemblance to what I thought I would be doing. 

One big thing that has changed is my original goal for this Challenge was to paint up all the figures I need to put on a game at Cold Wars this March.  It was a difficult but tough personal challenge.  Unfortunately some looming work issues may require more of my attention than usual and I was uncomfortable committing to a project where people might sign up to play only to turn around and bail on them because of work.  I still like the game concept and will delay it for Fall In later this year.

I still have a lot of painting to prep for Historicon so there's plenty to do!