Friday 22 January 2021

Sugar Islands News

 Wargaming the Sugar Islands Campaign is still available from myself, from Graham at CrannTara and now also from Caliver Books and from On Military Matters in the US. 

You can find details on the their websites, and the post below or by contacting me using the form on the right hand side of the blog. 

https://stuartinschwargames.blogspot.com/2018/11/now-available-wargaming-sugar-islands.html

Thanks to everyone who has already bought a copy and to those who have yet too, now it's even easier.





Saturday 16 January 2021

Some New Goodies

 It's nice to be nice to yourself. If you can't look after you, then you can't do that for others. 

Working from home and using my hobby room as an office is not ideal. It takes my fun place away. So I was chuffed when the doorbell rang and three packages arrived. 

The first was some Gt.War Miniatures Crimean French Chasseurs. I need 9 of these to represent a battalion for my 19thC French. They are lovely sculpts and the command and skirmishing packs give plenty of movement. The uniform hardly changed between the 1850's and 1870 and and so they will serve equally well in The Crimea (or Baltic), Italy or France.



Next up was a book I've fancied for a while. Also scratching my 19th century itch this covers the Hungarian Uprising and specifically the Honved army. It's like a giant Osprey. English and Hungarian text, but little of either and plate after plate of gorgeous uniforms. No background but that's available elsewhere. A nice coffee table book for a wargamer. 

The final package was also a book. Barry Hilton's Every Bullet has a Billet. Now this is an excellent book, well written, well illustrated and with the type of eye candy pics we expect from on of his publications. It's a potted history of the the wars of the late 17thC, the armies (and navies) involved, what they wore, how they fought and how to do it on the tabletop. Even if you know and love this period you will love this book. If you don't it's a perfect primer.I note that Helion, the publisher, has a similar guide on the Great Northern War due in summer. If that's half as good it will be worth getting. 

Batteries recharged!

Last Tuesday I managed to have an online game of Rebels and Patriots using Tabletop Simulator along with the lads from the club. I drew up the map and made the lists and digital guru Ross transferred these to the vitualmtabletop. It was our first go at this online. Other TTS games have crashed or been too fiddly to work properly but this went very well. The scenario was the Lament Ridge game from the book. Surprisingly the Americans won, mainly because the Brits got some terrible movement activations but it was a good game and in my opinion, much better than shuffling counters.




We have another game on Tuesday.


Friday 1 January 2021

Hey Ho, Let's Go!

It's a new dawn and a new day and a new year. So lets start with looking forward not back.


Wa have a lot to look forward to this year, seeing friends, playing games, maybe even winning some battles too. New projects to start, old ones to see on a table again. Conventions, club meets and gatherings. New books, articles and knowledge. New toys to enjoy.

It's going to be good.

I am looking forward to finishing Against Spain, the sequel to the Sugar Islands. I am also working on something covering 16thC battles in Aberdeenshire.

For the tabletop, I am working on some figures to use in scenarios for the Philippines right now. 

After that I have Indian solders for WW1 to complete. Facing them will be either Turks or Germans and Askaris.

Some Jacobites will make an appearance too.

But my big project will be the Franco-Prussian War, in 28mm, on a grand scale, in collaboration will Graham H. 


I can't wait to get started!