NZ Wars
8 August 2011
Roly over at “Dressing The Lines” has got his first batch of NZ Wars figures done, and I must say they are looking pretty smashing! He’s done a great job of them and also of giving the bases a New Zealand touch with ferns and tussock-like grass! Roly is planning to experiment with using a suitably modified “Sharp Practice” for his games, however this requires a reasonable number of figures (i.e. dozens to 100+), and Roly has the luxury of another gamer at hand doing the same period. I have been rather procrastinating over ordering some of the Empress Miniatures figures as I’ve been undecided about what rules to use – however I’ve pretty much decided on initially trying SDS (“Song of Drums & Shakos” – a variant of “Song of Blades & Heroes“), which will allow interesting games with just 6-30 figures a side… Needless to say Roly’s efforts are a much needed prompt to get organised and order some figures! The photo is a small lower resolution one of some of his figures – Make sure you check out the full set of photos at Roly’s Dressing The Lines blog…
You can read an historical summary of the NZ Wars & key participants at NZ History Online.
Posted in 28mm Figures & Models, NZ Wars | 
Tags: 1840-1860, 1861-1865, 1866-1875, 28mm, British, Māori, New Zealand Wars, New Zealanders, Sharp Practice, Song of Blades & Heroes, Song of Drums & Shakos, Victorian | 
1 Comment »
15 April 2011
Painted examples of the new Empress Miniatures by Bjoern (of the Maori Wars Yahoo! Group & LAF).
Joy, oh Joy! The ether has been alive with chatter of the announcement of this new range for a couple of weeks now – and they really do look like some lovely figures with nice clean casts and great sculpting. I have been wanting to get into Maori Wars in 28mm for sometime – but to be honest there just hasn’t been the figures available to inspire me, only Eureka having anything reasonable – except they are later period (2nd & 3rd Maori Wars) and while their British chaps look quite nice their Maori just don’t get me excited (perhaps they are not animated enough). However now that Empress have released their range everything has changed, as it were, and now there seems little reason not to do some Maori Wars gaming (and hopefully the Empress and Eureka guys will be a close match size wise to allow use of both)?
Posted in 28mm Figures & Models, NZ Wars | Tags: 28mm, British, Colonial, Māori, New Zealand Wars, News, Victorian | 2 Comments »
20 July 2008
Restored Schoolhouse (it seats 4-6 children)!
New Zealand’s main Colonial Growth occurred in a period before and simultaneous to the American Civil War, as a result many major buildings from the 1840-1880 period closely resemble the same style of construction as was common in North America at the time of the American Civil War and before. By the 1870′s there appears to be a reasonably widespread introduction of corrugated iron (and of course in the main towns construction of large multi-story stone and similar buildings) – but this is essentially after the period we are interested in.
Fortunately I am lucky enough to live not far from the Howick Historical Village – this features numerous restored buildings from the Northland-Auckland-Waikato region as well as reconstructions of lesser buildings and both Civilian and Military re-enactors.
Posted in Colonial History, NZ Wars | Tags: British, Buildings, Colonial, Historical, Māori, New Zealand Wars, New Zealanders, Victorian | 2 Comments »
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18 Apr 2012, 2:40 pm UTC Rorkes Drift Arrives! Also, happy to participate in the enormous multi-player you are planning for when they are painted!