Eighties Colonial War Game Armies

Following on from my post a few days ago about some photos I had found of a colonial Anglo-Zulu War game in the mid-1980’s, my friend who provided the armies then still has them! And as it turns out recently he had had them out of their storage containers for the first time in a long while to check their condition and do a bit of a review. He even took photos, so with his generosity, here’s some photos of the full 1/72 plastic colonial wargaming army collection we used for games in the mid-1980’s through to the very early-90’s.

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Anglo-Zulu War Eighties Wargame

Recently I dug out some very old photos – some of my very first records of wargaming and they included these Anglo-Zulu War game photos played with my good friend Wayne in the mid-1980’s (probably 1985 or possibly 1986). We used 1/72 ESCI figures primarily (as their 1879 British & Zulu Figures, along with the Crimean War Russian Infantry & Artillery, had just been released). We started out with the Anglo-Zulu war (including a multi-player campaign at one point) and then expanded to the Sudan and the North-West Frontier. However this is possibly one of our very first games, and is from the Anglo-Zulu war.

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An Interview with Charles Wesencraft

A wargamer and author from that classic era of wargaming who perhaps has not always been recognised as much as the more well known ones (i.e. Donald Featherstone, Charles Grant, Tony Bath, Brigadier Peter Young, Terry Wise and then later George Gush, Stuart Asquith, etc) is Charlie Wesencraft. While many will know him and he probably is better known than Joseph Morschauser and David Nash (see my Wargaming Tomes Collection: Part One post) I for one did not see his books early on in my wargaming career (possibly due to being in New Zealand – although other local gamers here have said they saw them in libraries and such in the 1980’s or very late ’70s). I was interested to recently read an interview with Charlie Wesencraft that reinforces my view that he seems to have contributed more than just his 2 books in the early 1970’s to the classic wargaming era.

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Engle Matrix Games

I’ve recently been introduced to Engle Matrix Games (well perhaps re-introduced as I had read about them briefly in an issue of the SOTCW Journal sometime ago) by Steve Thomas. This came about in a discussion around how to play a Crossfire campaign where the majority of players are in different countries. The idea is to find a system that is rule set agnostic, is ‘story’ driven, and is not constrained by technical details – in many ways in keeping with Crossfire’s own philosophy (although Engle Matrix games are quite suitable for any period and use with any miniatures rule set – heck you don’t even need miniatures or a set of rules to resolve the battles). “Engle Matrix Games are a simple low-tech game engine that allows players to do an amazing number of things” as one gamer has described (in a MS Word Doc). Continue reading “Engle Matrix Games”

Perry Miniatures ACW Buildings

These are some ‘in progress’ pictures of my 28mm Perry Miniatures’  North American Buildings – I’m hoping they will be useful for not just the ACW (American Civil War), but also for the American Old West & Indian Wars, some Colonial theatres, and even early 20th Century pulp periods. Included is a simple conversion of the Perry Store kit, into a small Blacksmith & Stables. The conversion and the kit assembly & painting/basing was done by my fellow gamer, Kieran Mahony (6mm Wargaming). I just need to now flock the bases and add all the micro detail… Continue reading “Perry Miniatures ACW Buildings”

Miniature Addiction!

Roundie, from my local gaming group (the Auckland Wargaming Club), has recently launched his own website & blog of his wargaming & modelling work – he’s one of our area’s most prolific modellers & painters and has built some amazing terrain boards and scratch-built buildings & terrain… He’s also running a local SDS (Song of Drums & Shakos) Napoleonic Skirmish Campaign at the AWC. Continue reading “Miniature Addiction!”

Work Begins On Rorke’s Drift

Well its been much longer than planned and to get things along I have enlisted my mate Kieran (6mm Wargaming) to build my Rorke’s Drift Models and Base Board for me. I have been inspired by the SSWG’s (Southend & Shoeburyness Wargames Group) wonderful demo game from several years ago (you can see a full set of photos here, it was at Salute 2006 in the UK and I believe has been at shows prior to that), and they still reuse it regularly today (see this blog post from 2011). So Kieran has completed assembly of the buildings and we’ve done two mock-ups of the layout…

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Rorke’s Drift Arrives!

My Warlord GamesRorke’s Drift” box set arrived today… It’s an impressive beast- it was part of their pre-order special on the new Anglo-Zulu War range that’s the premier of their new strategic partnership with Empress Miniatures. At the time I resisted the urge to get the full “Horns of the Buffalo – Rorke’s Drift Collectors Set” which is an absolutely huge collection of toys! This set is the first of their collaborations planned with Empress Miniatures – so you get a swag of Warlord Games plastic figures and terrain pieces, some Empress Miniatures speciality metal figs, and a pair of “4Ground” laser-cut plywood building kitsets of the storehouse and hospital. Continue reading “Rorke’s Drift Arrives!”

Najewitz Modellbau Buildings Arrive

Over the past 18 months I’ve regularly looked at the models buildings and wagons (and the Berlin Tram) by Najewitz Modellbau in Germany – they look fantastic in the photos and I’ve always been keen to take the plunge – however the description of the material has always had me a bit wary – the wagons & tram and some of the smaller scale buildings being laser cut Finnpappe which they describe as “…no word for it in English dictionary is a product made of ground wood pulp. To say it is cardboard is the wrong title for it. It´s more similar to MDF, quasi ‘MDF-light’.” However the larger 1/72nd and 28mm buildings are kitsets of a resin material, the type isn’t clearly specified on the website – but I took the plunge recently and ended up ordering a selection of the 1/72nd scale buildings…

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Fantastic 1879 Anglo-Zulu War Photos

The following link was posted by one of the chaps on the Colonial Wars Yahoo!Group and features lots of staged photos using the Britains, Conte, and similar 54mm Plastic Figure “Play Sets” and such like – some of the photos are amazing and it’s a wonderful effort – check out the British & Zulus at the The Play Set Addict’s 2011 Zulu Page. And there’s more great stuff (including Romans & Barbarians, Medieval Knights, ACW, Wild West, WW2) you can get to from The Play Set Addict’s Homepage. Highly recommended (and will bring out a few memories of the kid in most of us too)! Continue reading “Fantastic 1879 Anglo-Zulu War Photos”

An Old Friend Thought Lost

In the last week the Major General Tremorden Rederring’s Colonial-era Wargames Page has been inaccessible across the ether – and the concern that it may have been lost for good! However as events have transpired it is just temporarily down due to technical issues and David Helber (the Major-General himself of Ouargistan) has reported that he hopes to have the site back up and running before the end of April [2011]. Meanwhile if you are looking for something from the site it’s accessible on the Way-Back Machine” archive. Continue reading “An Old Friend Thought Lost”

TSATF Colonial Games at BattleCry 2011

Gerry Webb of Castaway Arts (in Australia) will be at the BattleCry 2011 Convention, here in Auckland on the 19-20 February, with his ranges of Figures and running some The Sword And The Flame participation demonstration games. And I’ll there with Gerry giving him a hand with the games. If you are in Auckland that weekend and interested in Colonials, or just Wargaming in general, pop along for a look at Auckland’s largest regular annual convention (expected to have over 300 gamers participating) at the ASB Stadium in Kohimarama – full details are at the BattleCry website. Continue reading “TSATF Colonial Games at BattleCry 2011”