Italian Scenery, and going to Salute 52

I'm trying to get back into the swing of my hobby after a bit of a lull and some 'real life' stuff taking up time; we have a tiny bit of progress in the 'Risorgimento'  Italy 1859 project, in the form of some scenery. 

I have no scenery whatsoever in 6mm scale, so started from scratch - need some buildings. A small order from Timecast has recently arrived, with a nice selection of their Mediterranean/Italian buildings. 

These are rather nice, made of resin with just enough detail for my taste and painting abilities,  and will hopefully paint up OK in a simple 'whitewashed walls and red roof tiles' sort of colour scheme.  Enough for a village or small town on the table. I hope.

Given the 1859 setting, a novel but  important feature of the landscsape will be railway lines, and I was pleased to find that I could buy 6mm scale railway tracks from Blotz:

 

I picked these up at the Cavalier show in February. Each pack contains 6 lengths, each 12cm hence a total of 72cm of track - I bought two 'to be sure, to be sure' as St. Patrick might have said, and that should be plenty to be going on with, given that my usual table is about 90cm square.  As you can probably see, they are in pre-cut MDF, the parts break out quite easily and assembly is simple, just slot two thin 'rail' pieces into the track-bed piece and Robert is your mother's brother*. 

So that's a start, now we need some roads, rivers, trees etc. I think some of the narrower roads I already have for 15mm scale might be used - ideally about 30mm wide, to fit the base width of my armies.  Some of this stuff might be fairly easily scratchbuilt at minimal expense ( I also suspect that some more buildings might be fairly easily produced from simple wood blocks or cardboard ), but there is a good hobby shopping opportunity coming up in a few days' time :  Salute 52,  courtesy of South London Warlords,  at the Excel Centre in London. 

                                 

I'm planning to go along, and looking forward to seeing the many games and traders who will be there. Looking at thhe list of games, the ones I am particularly interested to see include :

- Retired Wargamers Reloaded 'Gotterdamerung Berlin 1945' (GA06 on the Floor Plan)  -  which I gather will be nothing if not a large setup! 'Our largest game to date. May 1945 in Berlin and the final days of WW2 in the European Theatre of Operations'   Many readers will have seen their previous displays such as Carentan   and Pegasus Bridge , which have been excellent.  I note from the Salute program that they have a prime position on Saturday, very near the entrance, so should get a lot of attention!   Hoping to see my veteran gaming buddy Tony there, too..

 - Anschluss Publishing 'Defence of Tobruk 1941' ( GD04 )  Always a classy presentation from Anschluss, and interesting to see them tackling the North African theatre.  I bought their rules last year, I think (or was it the year before...? ), but have not tried them out,, as so often happens!

- Continental Wars Society  'Battle of Gurgulat' (GK12), Serb-Bulgarian War of 1885, Ralph Weaver and Co always  put on a good display and can be relied upon to find a battle you won't have heard of! Last year I was so impressed, I joined their society.

- Loughton Strike Force  'Warsaw 44'  (GA11) .  Another group who make lovely display games, I suspect a rubble-strewn urban terrain to compare and contrast with the Berlin game mentioned above. 

- Per Broden and Wyre Forest Wargamers 'The Crossing of Duna 1701' (GL09), 6mm Great Northern War, I assume they might be using 'Twilight of...' rules which Wyre Forest produce.  Their large Poltava game was a highlight at Salute in 2021  

- Wars of the Gelderland Succession 'Vauban's Wars' (GG02) - an 18th Century Imaginations Siege Game.  Having grown up with Charles Grant 'The War Game' this ticks a few boxes, and it will be  interesting to see a siege game, from the period when formal siege warfare was at its peak. 

- Yarkshire Gamer 'Battle of Mentana 1867 - Rome or Death'   Can Garibaldi capture Rome? Given my current project, this is a must, and Ken the Yarkshire Gamer  needs no introduction. On Instagram I have seen that he is using Gringo 40s figures  for this, the Garibaldini units he has painted look splendid.

 That's enough to be going on with, there are loads more games of course, I have noted about 40 I'd like to see, and I admit I have not inlcuded Fantasy or Sci-Fi offerings - there are bound to be some visually spectacular exmaples of those, even if the gaming itself is not my thing! 

Also over 140 traders are listed in the program, so plenty of shopping opportunities, to put it mildly! And hopefully a few familiar faces in the crowd and at the tables? I see that Ray from Postie's Rejects has suggested the usual Bloggers' Meet Up   at 1pm, at the big red dot on the plan below,  and I will certainly try to be there - happy to meet anyone who reads this blog!    

  

So, plenty to look forward to at the weekend, and there's a bit of face-to-face gaming in the offing next week too, so things are looking up.   Now to get busy painting those Italian buildings..  Next post will likely be reporting my day at Salute, and how footsore I feel afterwards!  Until then keep well. everyone. 

* for the benefit of non-British readers, see  Bob's Your Uncle  - I admit I didn't know anything about its origin! 

 

 

 

 

   
 

Italian update..

All roads lead to... well, Italy at least, right now.   This is a brief update on progress with my  'Risorgimento'  project to game the Italian war of 1859 in 6mm scale. Having painted some units of infantry for both Austrian and Piedmontese armies,  I was not very satisfied with a plain 'old-school' green basing system. So I acquired some Baccus 'Basing Medium' and some green scatter material, and had another go at the bases. This has been a bit more successful: 

In the Flocking Tray.. 

 

I used a simplified version of the suggested method from the Baccus website : 

-  apply PVA glue to the whole base and sprinkle over  the basing medium

-  paint the whole textured base with a brown ( I used artists' Burnt Umber ) paint

-  apply PVA in irregular 'splodges' over the base, do not cover the whole base 

- sprinkle over the green scatter material, which will stick to the PVA but not the entire base

 Et voila,  all done.  I am reasonably happy with the result, it has obscured  the 'plinth' effect of the figure strip bases, which was the main aim.  I found that as I progressed through the units, I was gradually  applying less green scatter material and allowing  larger areas of brown to show through, which gave a quite pleasing variation in colours.

The Baccus site suggests dry-brushing a couple of levels of highlights on top of the brown paint before applying the scatter, I was too lazy to do that but may try it next time  ( see Chris 'Nundanket's recent post on Punic Wars elephants, showing his use of the Baccus method, which looks pretty good ). 

Encouraged with this progress, I am making plans to acquire some more troops. I am starting with units organised as specified in Neil Thomas'  Wargaming Nineteenth Century Europe,  whose rules suggest armies of 10 units per side for a basic game - that seems a good starting point.  I now have 4 units of Infantry for each side, and  I already have both Austrian and Piedmontese field artillery packs from Baccus (4 guns each).  Now I need some more infantry and of course, cavalry, as well as some elite infantry units such as Austrian Jagers and Piedmontese Grenadiers and Bersaglieri. 

To find the additional recruits, I am going to try using the interesting MDF 'semi-flat' 6mm figures from Commission Figurines, who have ranges of Napoleonic and ACW troops which I think might be fairly easily employed with 'paint conversion'.and a little creative trimming here and there . As mentioned in a previous post, I happen to already have some of their ACW infantry in slouch hats, which I suspect will do for Bersaglieri and Jagers.  Having browsed their catalogue, I think Napoleonic Infantry in greatcoats may become Piedmontese Line Infantry, French 'Old Guard'  in tall 'busby' stand in for Piedmont Grenadiers,  and ACW cavalry in Kepi for Piedmontese light cavalry, for example. All  good fun!    You may be wondering why do this rather than just ordering from Baccus 'Risorgimento' range which would probably cover all bases - well, it's really just personal preference, I really like the quite stylised look of the MDF figures, so I thought it would be worth a try to use them.  And did I mention that a pack of 96 infantry or 36 cavalry retails for £2.00?

Now, having recruited armies, they are going to need some terrain :  the  Hexon terrain that I have used for all games so far is a little 'green' for Italy, to my mind ( bear in mind it will be used for both and my WW2 'D-Day Dodgers' ),  so I am thinking about adding some of their 'desert transition' hexes into the mix, which will add a bit more brown/sand colour to the terrain and make it a bit less uniform. The other major item required is going to be buildings, I think - what did an  Italian village of 1860 ( or 1944, come to think  of it actually ) look like?  I am starting to think about that. Looking at listings for traders at The Other Partizan this month, I didn't find very much - Baccus have a 6mm scale Spanish farm, which might do,  and  Battlescale/Pendraken some basic rendered houses,  but neither had actually brought any of the items I might have wanted to the show.  I reckon it might be quite easy to make my own buildings, especially for 6mm scale, from odds and ends of wood blocks and/or cardboard. For inspiration, at a recent exhibition at Gainsborough House Gallery in Sudbury I saw a couple of  paintings of 'Italian Landscape'  by Cedric Morris : 

 

Perhaps a little more 'warm South' than the 1860 theatre of  war, but with a bit of creative license they might make good models for my, err,  models(!).  I am also starting to look at the photos in various books about the WW2 Italian campaign ( the Images of War series being very useful here), to get an idea of typical buldings and landscapes.  Having moved into 6mm scale, of course I have to start from scratch with trees, walls, hedges  etc etc too.. lots to think about, at least they should be small, and hopefully cheap! 

 Finally I have some background reading in the form of this :

 

Acquired from Naval and Miltary Press, this is a facsimile of a 19th Century account of the campaign by the splendidly-named Colonel H.C. Wylly,  CB 'late the Sherwood Foresters, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire Regimemt'  in a nice big A4 paperback format. I am going to try to read this with a decent map of Northern Italy to hand at all times.. 

All the above is plenty to be going on with, quite apart from other projects which are in theory still ongoing - must paint some more 7YW French, for example!  I'm sure I'm not alone in having probably got too many projects I'd ideally like to be progressing with. 

So there we are - not massive progress, but I am at least doing some thinking and have some reasonable ideas, I think.   Next step should be expand the armies to at least have Neil Thomas' basic suggested forces - let's see how we get on with the MDF figures, should be interesting.Now it's already Halloween, the clocks have gone back, and where did October go? ( at least I managed 5 blog posts this month - pretty good by my lights!).  On into winter we go,  nothing else to do wih those dark evenings but paint, read and game?  And think of 'Sunny Italy', perhaps?

Until the next time, keep well, everyone.    

  

Now there was a painter... two coats, one afternoon!

Having acquired a copy of Bob Cordery's 'Portable Wargame Compendium', I thought I might try out the '3 by 3 Fast Play' game setup that features heavily in the book. This  would  require a suitable gaming board/table, and I happened to have a cork noticeboard, originally bought for possible boardgame use. Assuming a grid of 6-inch squares with 'reserve' areas at each end, I needed an area of 30 inches by 18 inches, and the corkboard was amply sufficient.   So, taking advantage of a sunny Saturday:

Take a cork pinboard..

prime with diluted PVA glue..

apply green paint ( two coats )..

Mark the grid corners

Ready for battle!

All done in an afternoon, and I think it will be fine! The green paint is artfully the same shade as I use for figure bases  ( from B&Q, it glories in the name 'Ribbit' ), and the grid was marked with a permanant marker pen.  The grid squares will easily take two units as specified in the rules - or even two for each side at a pinch, I hope.  Bob's book has a section with many suggested terrain setups, so I borrowed one of them for the trial layout above - the board easily accomodates six units per side.  I am thinking of maybe painting the other side too, in some sort of sand shade,  for possible Ancients or Western Desert type games.   

Next, I'd better try actually playing a game..

 

p.s. need I explain the title?  ( though I admit I only knew it from Peter Sellars on Parkinson - I didn't realise he'd nicked it.. )   

 

 

 

Al Murrays and Aquisitions..*

Well now, where were we?  Several weeks seem to have gone by, and nothing from The Ragged Soldier - sorry about that.  I'm afraid real life ( work, mainly ) got in the way. As a result, no gaming took place, but I did manage some reading,  and some acquisitions, that will feed into future campaigning. 

Al Murray's 'Watching War Films With My Dad' was a charity shop find ( for £1! ) which turned out to be a great fun read.  It's a sort of memoir - taking us from Al's WW2-obsessed 1970/80s childhood with Airfix kits and Action Man ( shades of Harry Pearson's 'Achtung Schweinhund' )  up to his attempts to present  military history to his own children.  He's a massive enthusiast for military history, he positively fizzes with it, with the result that he jumps  from topic to topic with dizzying speed. Obviously there are  a lot of jokes too,  but  (as listeners to his 'we have ways' podcast will know )  he is very well-read and knowledgable.  I was particularly interested in his views on Arnhem, which I confess I have little knowledge of myself  -  and of course the film 'A Bridge Too Far' gets a fair amount of discussion in the book. Did they really use Leopard tanks? Oh no!  He doesn't seem to have tried wargaming , though - should someone be inviting him to a show?       
 

Having enthused about a year ago over the joys of the local model shop, I'm afraid I didn't get back to Model Junction in Bury St. Edmunds until the other week. But I found them trading OK, and as friendly and helpful as ever.  They have a pretty wide selection of modelling paints ( at least 4 or 5 brands ), and a room full of plastic kits. I've been wanting to add some anti-aircraft capability to my 'D-Day Dodgers' Italian campaign forces, so the Airfix  Bofors AA gun will do nicely, and I couldn't quite resist the Sd Kfz 234 'Puma'  for the Germans. Worthy additions to the 'plastic pile',and it's about time for another go at a WW2 game and a trial of Bob Cordery's 'Portable Wargame'  rules for aerial attacks and AA guns. 

 

Another great book find was courtesy of an antique shop in Lavenham which includes a couple of shelves of history books curated by someone who clearly has a military bent ( so to speak, missis!) - and there was Geoffrey Parker's 'The Military Revolution'. I know I'm about 30 years behind on this one, though I do have his books on The Thirty Years War and The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road - the latter read a memory-wiping long, long time ago.   As a paid-up member of the Pike and Shot Society, I'm really looking forward to reading this and bringing my knowledge of theories of military history bang up-to-date - albeit the 1980s date..

One aspect of The Military Revolution being the Trace Italienne and new fortification techniques culminating in Vauban's  formidable legacy - so it was a very pleasant surprise to coincidentally  receive a splendid gift, from a modest and retiring fellow blogger, of a seriously impressive resin model of a Vauban fort!  It's actually 15mm scale, I am told, but I think it should pass muster in  my Seven Years War campaigning, on the principle of 'under-scale' buildings and scenery. I can see it as a small fortified outpost being fought over  in my central European backwater, or cunningly deployed along the edge of the table to suggest a section of the walls of some larger defended place. Whatever, I am very chuffed indeed with this lovely piece of generosity. No payment was required - I will compensate with a suitable charity donation, perhaps to MSF. 

    

Finally, an update on another generous gift, which I had received from RossMac of 'Battle Game of the Month' fame.  Here is MacFarlane's Scottish regiment of foot, with their associated troop of 'border horse'  Lancers , their  prized regimental cannon, supply wagons and self-propelling food supplies ( i.e. livestock ! ). I've given the foot and the horse new bases to fit my system, and given the horse back their missing lances, but left Ross' 1970s paintwork untouched, it's just fine as it is. The infantry have a preponderance of musketeers and very few pikes, so they may find themselves used as 'commanded musketeers', but there are some splendid axe- and sword-wielding highanders, and even a bagpiper! Also a couple of kilted  musketeers with socket bayonets, who look distinctly 18th century, but I couldn't separate them from their fellows after the long voyage,  so they stayed in the ranks. Their comrades may be bemused by 'Hamish and Dougal, with all  their new-fangled ideas'. 

The bases are just thin card, since the plan is to fit magnetic strip underneath, and use steel paper movement trays, which will add to the thickenss. Maybe I need to texture them a bit, to match Ross' bases for the wagons, gun and livestock. Though I am an adherent to minimally plain basing normally, a bit of texture would be true to their original spirit, I think.  Now they will be needing an excuse to get to grips with the Imperials, or the French, depending which side offers the best pay, of course.. 

That's enough for now, I'm glad to have got back onto the blogging bike, so to speak, and there's lots of gaming posibilities to be thinking  about in the near future.  Meanwhile keep well, and safe, everyone.

 

* title loosely inspired by that good old standby of adventure-story writers - 'Alarums and Excursions', of course !  I'll get my coat..

More Affordable Housing

Just a quick update following my earlier post about model buildings :  I popped in to my local branch of The Works the other day, and they did indeed have some more of their  'Light-Up Wooden House'  table decorations for sale. 

the cute deer has to go, though

 

Slightly different to earlier models, perhaps a bit more fussy, but still  useful looking. And £3 each was a good price, I thought - until I reached the till, and was informed they are currently on offer , two for the price of one!

So, if you like the look of them, hurry on down to your local.. etc 

I will give these the same simple paint job as I did with my earlier examples, and they should be ready for a bit of  'twas the night before Xmas' gaming fun in the near future.

No further forward with gaming recently, alas - time and space, dear boy - but a few ideas being mulled over for future games and posts here.  Until then, keep safe and well, everyone.

  

 

Solving the Housing Shortage

The usual issues of Time and Space have meant that the battle at Rahden remains in hiatus - impatient grumblings may be heard from the troops confined to their storage box.  I hope to return to that very soon, but in the meantime a small diversionary effort  may be in order - let's look at some scenery. There were a couple of approving comments on the buildings of 'Rahden' that featured in the game, so I thought I'd show you them here. 

Keen-eyed readers will have noticed that none of  the previous 'Portable Seven Years War' battles have involved villages or towns - because I had no buildings in the right scale. Or so I thought:  but casting around for scenery for the town in my recent game, I remembered a few likely models acquired from The Works - I think they were sold as Xmas table decorations, at about £3 each. 

 I think they look suitably Central European. 

They needed some colouring, though. Being anything but a skilled painter, and also being in a hurry, I went for an extremely simple scheme - starting with thinned PVA as a sealer, then just a red/brown or grey roof, and white or buff walls, and a grey-brown base. 

Keeping the paint quite thin allowed the etched details of roof tiles, doors and the the clock on one of the houses  to show through, and the  simple overall effect seems in keeping with the generally nostalgic feel of my Seven Years War setup.  They bring to mind Charles Grant's home-made Germanic-looking buildings, as featured in his 'The War Game' and 'Battle - Practical Wargaming',  images imprinted on my mind since childhood. I couldn't really do anything else, could I? 

As you've seen, they were ready in time to play the role of 'Rahden' in the recent game, and looked fine, to my eyes.  I think they may see plenty more action. 

Finally, I should also show their special extra feature - not sure if it will ever be used in a game: 

Night actions, perhaps?  

I don't know if they are still available from The Works, but I think I've seen similar things in other gift/general merchandise type shops ( a shout-out to Roys of Wroxham, for East Anglian readers!), and it's the right season.. I'll take a look in my local branch once they re-open, as I think we are promised for non-essential shops in England next week. A couple more houses could be useful. 

Next time, back to the battle.  Meanwhile keep safe and well, everyone. 

We're Gonna Build A Wall..

Botta Regiment wonder if the Mexicans paid for this?

 

Having set up the premise for the first engagement of my 'Soldier King' boardgame-based campaign, considerations of  Time and Space have been in play, what with work and some chores arising from the renewed 'lockdown' - hence my apologies for a period of silence here. Now turning my mind to the promised battle, I realised I had set a trap for myself by taking note of the 'fortified' nature of the fictional location to be fought over.  Visions of Vauban-style fortifications and elaborate sieges I will leave to the most excellent MS Foy - here at The Ragged Soldier, resources are more limited. I thought about horse and musket period 'Lines' a la Marlborough and Villars 'Ne Plus Ultra', but I'm not certain how to quickly and simply model such an installation  ( must have a go one day, though, having recently read Maurice De Saxe's Reveries on how to attack and defend 'lines' ) .  In the end, I've decided on a much simpler approach - I will just allow the defending Prussians plenty of good stout stone walls to line up behind. 

So, taking a look at available scenery - oops, no walls.  Well, some quite nice model walls ( acquired a few years ago from Total System Scenic ),  but all 15mm scale, which come up roughly to the  knees of the 25mm Seven Years War figures - that's not going to worry the attackers. I want to get the game going pretty soon, therefore there was only one thing for it.  In the immortal words of the 45th POTUS (now, who was that exactly?)  "We're Gonna Build a Wall.."

Score along the lines, fold and glue..

 

Resources were available: good old-fashioned cardboard cereal boxes. I'm glad to say, it proved fairly simple even for a handicraft klutz such as me to come up with a one-piece, scored-folded-and-glued  'box',  100mm long, 15mm high and about 5mm deep, and then glue that to a card base. What's more, when allowing the glue to set, all those elastic bands that the Postman drops on the street, and I pick up because 'they'll come in handy someday' finally did!   The choice of 100mm is a cunning plan - they are therefore exactly the width of my Hexon terrain hexes, if laid along the centre line.  

Waiting on the glue drying - thanks to Royal Mail

 

As to finishing, all  equally improvised. A quick coat of grey acrylic paint, then a very approximate 'stonework' pattern drawn on with a black fineliner pen. It's not exactly Flemish Bond, and I assume that any wall actually built to this pattern would fall down even before it was finished! But it looks like a wall, more or less.   I did try applying a wash of  Army Painter 'Light Tone' to one section, only then realsing that the fineliner pen's ink is not permanent. Debate rages over whether the resulting blurry effect is an improvement or a disaster - for the moment that one is going to be kept at the back, like my school woodwork efforts inevitably were at Parents' Day. 

Based and painted: the one ruined/improved by Light Tone wash is at back right

At this point I'd like to fondly remember a lovely old friend of my parents, now long deceased, whose actual job was to do this sort of thing - gloriously titled 'Cardboard Engineer'. I think he designed advertising materials for shops.  Presumably he was very careful when going out in the rain. George, if you are looking down now and wincing, I'm very sorry. (  I also  remember a line from Alexei Sayle "my girlfriend works as a model - this week she's being an Airfix Stuka Dive-Bomber".  I'll get my coat..).    

So there we are - The Ragged Soldier's beginner-grade scenery.  I still need to think of  something to 'weather' them a bit - maybe dry-brushing rather than a wash? And I need to use permanent ink in future!  The green bases need a second coat, there are some rough corners to be trimmed off, and gaps to be filled with PVA glue and painted over,  and no doubt any sensitive soul  taking a close look will be shocked to their aesthetic core - or just laugh at my pathetic attempts. But from a distance on the gaming table, they will do fine.  I've got some walls, and battle can commence. On time and zero budget - how did your wall go, Donald? 

Next time, to battle - keep well, everyone. And of course, on this Remembrance Sunday: 'Lest We Forget'.