Well yet another new venture to report on. Last Wednesday night we tried out a Dr Who based skirmish game (see the Dr Who miniatures yahoo group for a full battle report by Matt). The rules are simple and straightforward (http://www.drwhominiatures.co.uk/index.html) with the emphasis firmly on having a fun and enjoyable game.

Our local club (Wargames Association of Reading) had an extra days gaming yesterday so we were able to stage another very enjoyable Dr Who game. This time the Dr. K-9 and UNIT had to evacuate a peace conference being held at a stately mansion before the Daleks could wipe out enough delegates to ruin the chance of the humans signing a global peace treaty. It was nip and tuck all the way with the Daleks finally just failing in their mission - had they killed just one more delegate then their mission would have been a success.

Matt ran the game and came up with the inspired idea of using an old Cluedo board as the floor plan for the stately home. This worked like a treat. We are going to run the game again this week with some fresh victims to see how it plays out. I will endeavour to take a few pics to capture the event for posterity and Matt will write up a battle report for the Yahoo group.

Elsewhere, I made some progress on my Pirate sloop. I added some thin strips of balsa wood to the Black Cat resin boat I got at Salute. I then painted it up using Scorched brown over a black undercoat. Then dry brushing with Foundry Leather (45A,B and C). I have to add some green stuff to tidy up the corners and maybe a few furnishings, coils of rope etc. Just need to name the vessel…..all suggestions welcome

Cheers W.

It’s always nice to get a parcel and today was no exception as the Greek army I won on Ebay a couple of weeks ago turned up. I’ve just finished unpacking it and there were only a couple of models that needed the Hafix treatment. So, just need to work out how many points I can muster. Bill has already put a date in the diary for me to give them a run out against his Romans.

I also popped into hobbycraft today to pick up some balsa wood as  I want to add a timber planking effect to the pirate ship I picked up at Salute last weekend. I was using coffee stirers but they are too thick to bend around the hull.

 Cheers W.

You will have no doubt seen a few plastic figures starting to appear on the market and there were two notable examples at Salute. The Perry twins ACW and the Romans from Warlord. Now having grown up on a steady diet of plastic airfix figures I don’t have any objections per say and can appreciate the economics behind the move away from metal.

ACW has never held any appeal to me as a gaming period so I can’t directly compare the Perry figures to what else is currently on the market for this period. Suffice to say they are in the traditional Perry style which is sligtly thin and awkward for my liking. A friend of mine cynically remarked that this was to save on material costs.

I did however take an instant dislike to the Warlord Romans which looked decidedly poor in my opinion. They were not helped by their exhibit of a whole army that was painted in a day. This was achieved by using the “dipping” method which is fine if your ten years old and are too impatient to hold a paint brush but for me the results are less than impressive.

Downloaded a set of Dr Who rules tonight in preparation for a Dr.Who based game at club on Wednesday and finally got round to undercoating the pirate girls at last.

Cheers W.

Yes Saturday was Salute 08 at Excel, the perfect opportunity to catch up with friends, take in some eye candy and undergo a little retail therapy all under one roof.

The day started bright and early. I picked Matt up from Reading at 6:30 and after a couple of circuits of the town due to me not being quite on the ball, we were soon speeding down the M4. The sat nav decided to take us an interesting route which meant that we arrived at Excel later than we intended but still in plenty ot time to help James set up the Domyoji game. There was a slight delay in the car park as the machine refused to take card payment or notes but fortunately we had the £15 required in coinage.

Overall it was a good show. It didn’t seem as crowded as in previous years, whether this was because there was more space or less stands I’m not sure. There were some good looking participation games, such as the Diamond geezers commando raid and the London by lamplight Victorian game. The demo games weren’t as impressive as in previous years but there was a good range on offer. All of the usual traders I’d expect to see were in attandance and the ones I spoke to seemed to have had a reasonable day in terms of sales. The bring and buy was as busy as ever and always seemed to be three deep when I passed by.

We finished the show off by retiring to a local inn for a couple of jars and the essential post show analysis before retracing our steps back home clutching our goodies and empty wallets.

Breakdown of the days expenditure went something like…..

Car Park - £15, Breakfast £10, Lunch £10, Coffees £5 (shared between Matt and I)

Figure purchases - Painted Sassanids from Curteys £78, painted Pirates from Dave Andrews £40, unpainted pirate girls from Black Scorpion £6.50, unpainted small boat and assorted ships furniture from Black Cat £15 ish, beers £0 courtesy of WSS magazine and Tony - Cheers boys. Petrol - just over 100 miles.

So will be busy over the next few days re-basing the Sassanids and undercoating the pirates. I now have enough for my crew for the WHW event at the end of May so time to get cracking on with them.

Cheers W.

Just a quick update today as I’m tres busy redesigning the front entrance for a hotel.

Anyway, Matt, Richard and I played Superheroes (version 2) last night. Yet again Matt provided the excellent scenery and we used Heroclix figures as the superheroes. We decided just to duke it out rather than play any particular scenario.

I went for a strong guy and a girl with good mental attributes. Matt was kind of similar whilst Richard had a character that could melt your brain at distance and had the ability to see through buildings so didn’t need any line of sight to target you.

My duo both had Hyper movement which meant they could zip all over the board but it wasn’t long before Richard’s Cerebus was taking us down with her mental attacks. In the end both of Matt’s heroes bit the dirt as did one of mine but I managed to get Richard’s heroes to flee the table using a Fear ability, however that was about all I could do so the honours went to Richard with Matt and I swearing revenge in the sequel.

I’m just putting the finishing touches to an article for WSS magazine on model maker James Sharpe from Oshiro Model Terrain. If your going to Salute then James is putting on a WAB demo game - the Battle of Domyoji, 1615. This formed part of the epic siege of Osaka. I’ll be giving him a hand on the day so swing by and say hello if your at the show.

up, up and away……W.

I have been out and about - earlier this week a work committment saw me spending a few hours strolling around the “Home build” exhibition at the NEC in Birmingham. This show is for budding self builders bitten by the Grand Designs bug. Anyway, whilst perusing the latest in eco friendly ground sourced under floor heating gizmos I came across a bloke selling glue. I enquired and he promptly gave me the usual sales pitch which resulted in me parting with a tenner for a 20g bottle of “Hafixs” professional glue.

The glue has a cyanoacrylate resin base so relies on the moisture present to quickly form a strong bond between the surfaces being glued. The glue is in liquid form and should in theory last several years if stored in a cool place. My early experiments seem promising. I tried attaching a few painted spears and the bond took around 30 seconds and looks to be pretty solid. I shall keep you posted on how it performs over the next few weeks but I’m hoping it will be a long term replacement for my collection of dried out superglue bottles !

Cheers W.

I have quite a large collection of figure cases including GW and Figures in comfort (FiC) amongst others. The FiC case is a large soft one and whilst it has a good carry capacity the foam layers are just not stiff enough and have a tendancy to flop around spilling your figures. Whilst these cases are easy to carry it does get a bit laborious putting the figures in and out one by one pre and post battle. More recently I have been transporting my figures in their trays and whilst it requires two hands to carry it speeds up the setting up/paqcking away time considerably. With this in mind I decided to bite the bullet and add magnetic bases to all my figures.

So earlier in the week I got in touch with Richard at Principlesofwar.com and ordered up the necessary magnetic adhesive backed tape and steel paper. A quick bit of maths should tell you that a 5m long 20mm wide roll will base 250 infantry. So far I’m making reasonable progress, most of the Arabs and crusaders are done and with a bit of look the Sassanids and Samurai should be finished by tonight. All in all it will be around 400 infantry and 100 cavalry.

Next task is to work out some default lists for each army. I do like to vary the composition and unit sizes but perhaps it’s time to standardise on a set list for each army and then I can buy all the correct movement trays I need at Salute next weekend.

Cheers W.

..me hearties. More tales from the murky depths as Matt and I ran through a couple more of the scenarios from Legends of the High Seas last night. First up we played the “clash of swords” scenario which was basically a straight fight. I opted to to go for a large crew armed with swords as in our previous encounter the shooting had not been as effective as I’d expected. My tactic this time was to try get into combat as soon as possible and to use weight of numbers to secure a victory. I took a swashbuckler as a hired hand. The tactic sort of worked although I lost the first 5 melees in a row! In the end the toughness of my cutthroats meant that they were able to survive loosing the combats without taking any wounds thereby giving time for the captain and swashbuckler to cut through their opposition.

We followed up with the “Sneak out of town” scenario. Matt strolled this as I only had 3 sentries and he managed to get off table without me getting anywhere near him. So, we replayed and again he nearly managed it. I just managed to spot him before he left the table and blocked his exit with the captain and swashbuckler. I’d put my reinforcements in groups of 2 so I thought I stood a good chance of getting them on table once the alarm was sounded but I rolled the deaded “1″ for the first two attempts to summon the reinforcements.

Still, good fun and more motivation to get the pirate girls painted. Matt had put me to shame by painting at least another 30 figures. I don’t know how he does it. Anyway, super heroes next week.

Land ho - W.

…uummm looks like I’ve aquired a Greek army for my WAB collection. Suprisingly I won an auction on E-Bay for a change. I usually get out bid in the last minute (damn you auction sniper). Anyway, managed to pick up a nice army judging by the pictures. It totals 107 figures broken down as 70 Hoplites, 18 Spartans, 12 Cretans and 7 Peltasts. I’ve already got 8 javelin armed skirmishers so I reckon I just need to pick up a few cavalry now. So the task tonight is to get the Alexander supplement out and work out just how many points I’ve got - not a bad way to spend the evening

cheers Wayne.

Popped over to my good mate and ace modeller James Sharp’s (a.k.a. Oshiro Model terrain) pad yesterday to take a few pictures for a forthcoming article in the Wargames Soldeirs and Strategy magazine. James was working on the 2ft square base boards for the Battle of Domyoji (3rd June 1615) a WAB demonstration game that we will be putting on at Salute in a couple of weeks. The boards will then be recycled and used at the Military History live event at Olympia in May.

James also showed me a WW1 farmhouse he had been working on and a renaisance tower which was stunning, I envy the lucky owner. He also kindly lent me his ECW rulebook. I’m toying with the idea of giving it a go later in the year. James is collecting Royalists so I might do Parlimentarians or heaven forbid - the Scots (only joking Bill).

No progress on the pirate girls

Cheers Wayne.