Author: Wargaming.info

Arrr! A Buxom Beauty: A Pirate Ship in 28mm [Part 2]

Aye!! She's a Buxom Beauty of a Pirate Ship!
Aye!! She’s a Buxom Beauty of a Pirate Ship!

Avast! Get ye grog and hornpipe smartly, lubbers, for a beauty she will be and we must Jolly the Roger! Aye!

Kieran Mahony continues his account of building a Pirate Ship to the plans by Gary Chalk (of Wargames Illustrated Magazine) from Avast! Ye Lubbers: A Pirate Ship in 28mm [Part 1].

Details Around The Deck

I added some balsa strips around the door and also made it look like there are steps between the different deck levels. I extended some of the strips up to the main deck to make a handrail…

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Avast! Ye Lubbers: A Pirate Ship in 28mm [Part 1]

Arrr! A Pirate Ship Ye Say...
Arrr! A Pirate Ship Ye Say…

Avast! Ye Lubbers and Bilge Rats! Be here the means and way to use the contents of ye bung hole to build ye very owne brigantine pirate ship! Arrr!

A while ago one of my main gaming opponents, and Auckland Wargaming Club member, Kieran Mahony built himself a Pirate Ship for use with 28mm Pirate Figures playing GW’s “Legends Of The High Seas” (LOTHS) rules. Kieran originally published this article on his 6mm Wargaming website in 2008, but as that website is not necessarily the best place for an article about 28mm figures and scratch building a 28mm scale Pirate Ship I’ve decided to host Kieran’s article here to hopefully give it a wider audience!

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Siberian Assault: The Troops From The North

Siberian Infantry Arrive! 28mm WW1 Russian Troops.
Siberian Infantry Arrive! 28mm WW1 Russian Troops.

Following on from the World War 1 Russian Artillery my unit of Siberians is now ready for action – although I plan to ultimately rebase these off those dreadful plastic Games Workshop Warhammer bases and onto good quality Litko plywood ones. Although the could actually be nearly any Russian Infantry unit in winter clothing (e.g. Regiments from Moscow wore similar dress just with less ‘woolier’ papaha hats). As with many of my WW1 Russians these were an opportunity buy from another Colonial/WW1 Gamer, and as a result most of the figures were painted to a very good standard. However as with the artillery battery some additional touch up work has been done to these chaps. Siberian Rifles (all Siberian Regiments were designated Rifle Regiments rather than Infantry or Line Regiments) and in cold weather typically wore a great coat called a shinel (which was often a greyish-brown colour).

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World War 1 Russian Artillery

Russian 7.62cm Artillery Battery
Russian 7.62cm Artillery Battery

As things slowly progress with my 28mm World War 1 forces for TSATF the Russian Artillery Battery is now complete and awaiting basing. It consists of 3 (what I believe to be are) 7.62cm Putilov Field Guns. However the long barrels on the Battle Honors models are a bit of a mystery as the standard M1902 model had a relatively short barrel (you can see some good images of the M1902 at the Landships Website). Each model represents 2 actual real guns, so this represents a battery of 6 actual guns (the Russians actually had 8 gun batteries in their Infantry Division Artillery Brigades, but I think 4 models in a typical TSATF game is getting a bit hardcore). Anyway here is an assortment of photos of my artillery battery (along with a General)…

I have not decided whether the General shall be my Russian C-in-C, Infantry Battalion Commander, or (as depicted here) the Artillery Battery Commander…

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FreddyCon: A Seven Years War Convention (October 2011)

Der Kreigskunst is a set of battalion level rules based on the General De Brigade system. Battalions are 4-6 bases of 4 castings on a 40x40mm base. Cavalry are in units of 20 or so castings. Many people have SYW armies in mothballs and this might be a good opportunity to dust them off and give them a run

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MMS Classic Models – Listing by Nation

MMS Cromwell VIII F Model
MMS Cromwell VIII F Model

One of the really great Model Manufacturers around is MMS Classic Models – they produce some really high quality World War 2 vehicles and guns for 20mm scale (I believe they are nominally very accurate 1/76th scale on par with Milicast and Cromwell – but don’t quote me on that). Anyway on their site they list all their packs numerically rather than by Nation or any other logical order – this drives me mad!

So I’ve done my own listing sorted by Nation and then logically within each Nation by type of pack.

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Classic Wargamer’s Journal: Vol. I Issue 1

Classic Wargamer's Journal - Volume I Issue 1Following on from the Pilot Issue (The Classic Wargamer’s Journal: First Impressions) the first regular issue of CWJ is here – and continues on in the vein of the pilot issue. A poignant point by the editor, Phil Olley, is the modern ‘habit’ of talking about playing ‘rules’ (e.g. we say we are off to play Flames of War, not World War II, or do you want to play FoG instead of Ancients), and this embeds a subconscious mindset of playing ‘rules’ rather than ‘periods’ – perhaps a sign of the commercialisation of the hobby?

This issue’s Game Reports & Scenarios include Battles in the Blast Valley: The action at Spurlash Down; Part 2 of the Fireraisers Scenario & Report (from the pilot issue); and Advanced Guard – A Refight of a Charles S. Grant Table-Top Teaser from “Battle for Wargamers” Magazine (from June & July 1978).

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Friend or Foe Figures

Friend or Foe Figures Romanian Mountain Trooper
Friend or Foe Figures Romanian Mountain Trooper

Recently I’ve been looking at the Friend or Foe (FoF) figure range from Shell Hole Scenics. However there is a marked lack of photos to compare the figures. Enquires on the web such as at the 20mm Miniatures Yahoo Group generally just resulted in limited feedback and several enquires back about what the figures looked like! I have picked some up indirectly and got the following photos of them for comparison. As it seems the manufacturer has very limited photos on their website (although Peter at Battlescape the Australian distributor does have some) I thought I’d put these images up for the benefit of anyone interested.

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Banzai – The Japanese are Coming!

Japanese Infantry Attack!
Japanese Infantry Attack!

I thought I’d throw up some preliminary photos of my 20mm Japanese troops – these are the bulk of a Battalion for Crossfire, along with some extra supports and an assortment of guns and tanks to represent most typical Japanese forces throughout the Pacific and Burma campaigns. The figures are mostly Eureka & Warmodelling (Fantassin), with a handful of Sgt. Major’s Miniatures chaps, a few SHQ Officers & NCOs (and a pair of 8cm Mortar Teams), and a couple of Combat Miniatures Officers and a few Scouts/Snipers (plus the Mounted Command Group).

The force represents a Japanese Battalion of 3 Rifle & 1 MG Company, with Regimental Support coming from a pair of 7cm Infantry Guns, and a single 7.5cm Mountain Gun, from the Regimental Gun Companies (visible in the background spray painted in grey primer).

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von Lettow-Vorbeck in East Africa

German Schutztruppe
German Schutztruppe 1905-1918

Another of the World War I ‘side shows’ I’m keen on is the campaigns in East Africa against the German East Africa Colony (today primarily Tanzania). I have had some units for this (and pre-war 1890-1914 Colonial actions) for some time (i.e. about 2 years), albeit waiting for basing to be completed… This theatre has lots of opportunity for variety, both in pre-war Colonial actions against native tribesmen, and the Great War period, where the action spilled over into the areas of modern Kenya, Uganda, Rhodesia, Mozambique, & Zambia. This is an excuse to put up some initial pictures of them (albeit with unfinished basing), and the figures depicted are from the first unit each of European and Askari Schutztruppe, and the unit of Seebatallione Marines.

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Group Fire and Crossfire – How To?

Panzer Mechanics observe the target of their recovery attempt in WCFD 2009
Panzer Mechanics observe the target of their recovery attempt in WCFD 2009

Conducting Group and Cross-Fires in Crossfire can sometimes be a bit of a ‘trap for young players’ for the beginner. As a result I’ve endeavoured to provide a simple little graphic tutorial that hopefully will illustrate the process fairly clearly and help explain some of the benefits…

There are several common mistakes (or perhaps misreading of the rule’s text is a better term) so this basic example will attempt to step through the main points. In our example a German Platoon has somehow managed to enter a small orchard (or olive grove) encountering a single British Squad within. Both the British Squad and the entire German Platoon are fully within the terrain feature – this means they both gain the advantage of Light Cover, and both sides have clear line of sight to each other despite the trees (as there is no intervening terrain feature or obstacle). A German Squad was previously PINNED and the British Squad has just finished phasing fire at the Germans, managing to PIN a second Squad before losing the initiative to the Germans; as Pins are not sufficient to retain the initiative (a Suppression or better being required). We take things up in our example as initiative has just passed to the German Player…

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Troop Scale in Crossfire

British Tommies in Normandy - AB Figures from my collection.
British Tommies in Normandy - AB Figures from my collection.

Something that Is not always generally recognised is that it is intended in CF that all (on table) vehicles and heavy weapons are modelled at a scale of 1:1 – i.e. 1 model of a tank, half-track, or gun is one real tank, half-track, or gun. While this seems logical to some, based on extrapolating the scale of Rifle Squads, HMGs, and Mortars to these, it is not always so to all players, however Arty has also stated this on a couple of occasions when asked… So in the interests of providing a clear guide from the author himself I have asked Arty again to reconfirm that this is what his original intent was, and we have had an ongoing discussion confirm & clarify this. As such the following is the key parts of a post and subsequent discussion on the Crossfire Yahoo Group, and Arty has also read and approved the main content prior to public posting so it can be considered as the closest to an official clarification there is likely to be on the subject.

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