SAE Wargame

Blue SAE army deployed, with two units of Zouaves. 

The red SAE army deployed.

The armies close.

The blue artillery loses one man and retreats.

Another blue unit breaks and runs.

The blue army rallies...

...and the red army loses 5 men and one unit retreats.

The red army counterattacks and two blue units retreat.

The second blue Zouaves advance.

The red cavalry moves forward.

The blue army loses four more men,and the artillery is forced to retreat again.

The blue army rallies...

...and three red units retreat.

The red army is in full retreat.

The red general, Higginbottom, comes forward and rallies his troops.

The cavalry kills two Zouaves and forces the other two to retreat.

The cavalry overruns the last of the Zouaves, and eliminates another infantry unit. The blue army is down to 50% and is forced to retreat.

The commander of the red artillery cheers General Higginbottom, the victor of the day.

I decided to use my SAE Guards after being inspired by reading Battle game of the Month. I used a mat that I believe I got from Hotzmats.  This mat worked well with the SAE figures.

More Boat News and an ECW Wargame.

    Besides starting work on more small sailboats, I did manage to get a couple of wargames in. The games made me pull out some old Practical Wargamer magazines.

    This week we had some strong storms move through, with strong winds from the south-east for two days. On Friday the wind died down and the day turned out to be a beautiful fall day. I went down to the pond to look for Odin, hoping that the winds had carried her back towards the beach. Alas, there was no sign of Odin.

    While building the new boats, I looked up Napoleonic gunboats. In one picture, there were Royal Marines sitting in the midsection of the boat. Somewhere I had seen some Peter Laing sitting Marines. I wish I had some of them; they would look good in my boats.

     I used my 2mm blocks to fight a quick battle based on Edgehill. I used The Wargame, by Peter Young as the guide. The board main feature was the ridge line the Royalists set up on. Forces were picked based on 1 stand for every 1000 men, rounded up or down. This gave the Royalists 4 stands of cavalry, 10 of infantry, and the Parliamentarians 3 cavalry and 12 infantry; Dragoons counted as cavalry.

    The Royalist cavalry charged the Parliamentarian cavalry and drove it back. They pursued and the rest of the game were occupied trying to eliminate the remains of the cavalry. The Royalists charged downhill, and at first drove back the Parliamentarian infantry. Eventually the Royalists were driven back up the hill and the Parliamentarians took the ridge and won the battle. From my limited knowledge of the English Civil War, it seemed the game played out much like the actual battle.

  The game turned out to be rather enjoyable, and I am now thinking of using a similar system to fight other historical games. In Practical Wargamer, there was an illustrator by the name of John Parke, who did illustrated battle maps. His maps has me thinking of using them for games based on his battle maps.

Two new "Odin" gunboats being built.

My battle of "Edgehill".  The Parliamentarians (grey) have taken the ridge. A unit of Royalists cavalry is attacking the Parliamentarian right flank belatedly. The Royalists have lost too many units and cannot  recover.  I had no intention of reporting on this game, so only have this one photo of the end of the game.

 

Real World Sailing

      As I mentioned recently, I have been spending time working on model boats. I have been stalled in repairing my RC sailboat, not having the money to buy some necessary parts.  I did come across a small model sailboat that I bought years ago. I test sailed it in the birdbath on a rather blustery day. After testing it, it road at anchor all day in the birdbath. At the end of the day when I retrieved it, I thought of an article in an old model boat magazine; the article was titled "Real World Sailing", where the author built several model sailing ships and sailed them on one of the Great Lakes, with the intention of having it sail across to Canada. His last model was sailing in the right direction; wither it reached Canada is another matter. However, this article encouraged me to try to send a free sailing model across one of the many local ponds in my area.

   I used the original model as a guide to build another sailing ship. The original was based on a Viking ship. I used stuff laying around the house to build my model. I was going to have it crewed by a Peter Laing sailor, as can be seen in the first photograph. If I end more models out, perhaps I'll make a home cast of Peter Laing Viking to man it.

  Today the model sailed. I launched the boat on the eastern end of the pond, the wind seemed to be coming from the west, so I didn't think it would go too far. (By the way, before sending her on her voyage, it was named 'Odin'). At the last second I removed the Peter Laing captain; perhaps next model I won't chicken out!  She started sailing along the shore, then suddenly turned towards the open sea and went some 20 yards out, then started running down the coast. Eventually, the westerly winds caught her and she disappeared behind some bushes, where I could not retrieve her. Hopefully some day  someone will find her.

The 'Odin'

The Odin sets out on it's mission of Exploration.

Odin turns towards the open sea.

Odin looks like she is going to run ashore...

..but once again heads out to sea.

The Odin at her farthest progress (the white dot in the left center of the picture).

The Odin disappeared behind the trees on the right of the picture. While it has nothing to do with wargaming, a Peter Laing figure was involved so.... I also think that this model looks like a 18th century gunboat, and I'm thinking that if I build more I might add a cannon to the bow.

Downsizing

      I have come to the conclusion that I am a packrat and must start clearing away stuff I have collected over the last 30 some odd years.  I have already started going through my model boat magazines, cutting out articles I want and throwing away the rest. I have to start thinking if I will do the same with my wargaming magazines; although I have decided to leave my Practical Wargamer magazines intact.

    I also have decided to get rid of most of my plastic toy soldiers, along with many of my toy soldier molds. I haven't quite decided how to go about disposing of them. I would like to find people who would put them to good use; preferably for postage only.  Right now I'm concentrating on getting rid of books and magazines that I haven't looked at for many years.

Some of the molds I want to go through.

Just some of the plastics that I am going to get rid of.

SAE 30mm Napoleonics

While I haven't done much lately with wargaming, I did come across a nice lot of SAE 30mm Napoleonics. The main reason I bought them was for the British general figure, one figure I hadn't seen before. Perhaps in the future he will lead my SAE Guards into battle.

My new lot of SAE cavalry and general figure.

Perhaps the cavalrymen in bicorns will find themselves promoted to generals.e

Finished Peter Laing Legions

     While on vacation I painted up two of my "Peter Laing Legions".  Originially they had 4 units; one cavalry, two infantry, and one machine gun. One is based on the late 1800's US Army, the other the CIV from the Boer War. I started to add another infantry unit to the CIV and an artillery unit to the US legion. I think in the end they will become 6 units made up of two cavalry and four infantry units, with the machine gun and artillery added based on games.

    Recently I have been taken a break from wargaming and mainly been doing some reading. I also started working on a RC sailboat bought on Ebay. I will not be posting much for a while, although I will continue to follow other wargaming blogs.

The US Army Legion. The figure walking his horse is to be used if the cavalry dismounts to fight as infantry. The US Army during this period wore ammunition bandoliers around the waist, not over the should as the British army did. However, as I rarely fight historical games with these figures, a little "artistic license" was taken.

The CIV Legion. I started painting the third infantry unit, that is on the left of the picture.

Peter Laing Legions

      I recently read a book on the American Revolution. In the book they mentioned the use of Legions in both armies. At the time I was working on my Minifigs AWI armies and started thinking of making a Legion of Minifigs. Of course, I got distracted from my painting and lost interest in that project.

     I also have started rebasing my Peter Laings, switching from washers to plastic square bases. I was working on my Peter Laing Boers. One reason I wanted more Boer figures was so that some could be painted as dismounted Yeomanry. While walking my dog, I started thinking of how to use the new Peter Laings. I also started thinking of legions. As I have been using Neil Thomas' army charts, it dawned on me that his 3, 4, or 6 unit armies would make nice little legions. I decided to make several "legions" of Peter Laings, made up of 3,4,5, or 6 units. I already have a Natal Native Horse "legion" consisting of 2 infantry and 2 cavalry units. I decided to make two more legions, one based on the City Imperial Volunteers from the Boer War, another painted along the lines of the US Army in the late 19th-early 20th century.  Both these legions will have one cavalry, one machine gun, and two infantry units.

Working on Peter Laing Legions.

Close up of the first CIV infantry.

In the background some of the US infantry have started to be painted.

These are the two Natal Native Horse units that I got years ago.

Two units of Natal Native Horse infantry. These four units have been used in several games, fighting as a unit.

Another shot of the CIV infantry.